FROM POLITICAL CHAOS TO RELIGIOUS COOL!!!!

 

As a rebellious teenager in the late 1960’s and when I could drive myself to Mass, I wore jeans to Mass and when I got home my dad complained that I wore jeans to Mass. Of course my sarcastic reply was to say to him that he should be glad that I went to Mass on my own! To have a soon to be proclaimed saint, Blessed Carlos Acutis, wearing jeans in a statue of him in church, well, I am overjoyed and vindicated after all these years! BTW, I wonder if Nike payed for the statue as I think he’s wearing their shoes???? How funny is that! A saint sponsored by NIKE!

FATHER THOMAS REESE, SJ, MAYBE YOU DON’T KNOW GOD’S PLAN FOR THE CHURCH BUT I CERTAINLY DO AND IT IS NO SECRET! IT’S OUT IN THE OPEN!

I print the last paragraph below in red of Fr. Thomas Reese come-to-Jesus piece about Pope Francis and the uproar His Holiness has created by saying “NO!” to any aspect of women being ordained to any of the three aspects or degrees of Holy Orders. Then His Holiness, in contradiction to his cliche about “Who am I to judge?” used a derogatory term to describe those who identity as homosexual. And then speaking to young priests of Rome, he told them not to act like women who gossip or talk too much. YIKES on that one, seeing that His Holiness might be a “woman” in this regard too!

I think it might be a truism that the things we complain the most about are the things we are most guilty of. But who am I to judge?

But back to Father Thomas Reese, SJ. He doesn’t know what God’s plan is for the Church. 

He is foolish, not dumb, and like me, he too can find out what God’s plan is for the Church. It is doctrinal and moral perfection, begun in this life, and completed by God Almighty when we enter the fullness of heaven made completely perfect forever by God to live with Him in heavenly bliss and eternal worship. 

In other words, God’s plan for the Church is fidelity, fidelity, fidelity to God Almighty discovered in natural law and made specific in Scripture, Tradition and the Moral laws of God found in the 10 Commandments and explained by the catechism  of the Catholic Church—IT IS OUT IN THE OPEN!

Here is Fr. Reese’s concluding paragraphs to his NCR article:

But the old progressives are tired and dying off. The young simply don't care, having given up on the church as a boring, homophobic and patriarchal institution not worth their time. The church may become more conservative simply because everyone else gives up on it.

This leaves the pope in an unenviable position. Moving too quickly could blow up the church, as it did with many other denominations. Moving too slowly means losing the young. This is especially critical among women, which is why issues like birth control and women priests and deacons are so important.

In Europe, men left the church in the 19th century because of the hierarchy's political stances, but women stayed. At the end of the 20th century, we began losing women.

Despite its male hierarchy, the church cannot exist without women who do the heavy lifting of passing the faith on to the next generation, either as mothers or teachers.

How the church will survive in the 21st century is a mystery. I am sure God has a plan; I just don't know what it is.

Father James Reese, SJ, nails it though. Wild progressive Catholics my age and older, which includes Fr. Reese and Fr. James Martin, and also Pope Francis, are tired and  dying off. The young don’t care about the Church because a life of infidelity to God they have found not within the Church but outside the Church. They have made a free-will decision to leave the Church and follow their mortal sins to its logical conclusion-eternity in hell. By God’s grace, then can repent and return and strive for perfect fidelity to the will of God which is out in the open for all to discover and available for all of us to embrace. 

Those who want the Church to conform to their will, including many women in the Church, want women’s ordination, birth control, infanticide through abortion and murdering already born children. They want the ideology of the LTBGQF++ CLUB to usurp God’s plan for males and females and an anthropology that overthrows God’s plan for Holy Orders and the Sacrament of Holy Matrimony. The Church cannot be unfaithful to God—that is a mortal sin worthy of eternal punishment in hell. God does not accommodate mortal sin or redeem mortal sin. He redeems sinners who are mortal sinners. The Catholic Church cannot, by the will and grace of God, proclaim infidelity to Scripture, Tradition and Divine Moral Law as the new norm to be Catholic. Those who seek the overturning of God’s truth and fidelity to it are neo-Gnostics! 

Jesus did not change His teaching on “eating and drinking the Flesh and Blood” of Himself even when His followers complained about the language, the thought of it and departed Him. JESUS DID NOT CHANGE DIVINE TRUTH OR FIDELITY TO IT TO KEEP SINNERS FROM LEAVING HIM! 

But the road iS wide to hell and the way to heaven is narrow. And only fidelity to Jesus Christ is the way for Jesus is the Way, the Truth and the Life.

In the meantime, those of us who struggle with fidelity to God and suffer sins due to concupicence and the temptations of the world, the flesh and the devil, and have a confident hope that by God’s Divine Mercy in His only begotten Son, Jesus, repentance is possible, by God’s grace alone, and forgiveness and reconciliation available until our final breath. 

And those of us who die in a state of grace, but not yet perfect in fidelity to our Lord will be purified by the fires of purgatory as gold purified by fire and then we will be welcomed by Jesus into the halls of heaven!

THAT IS GOD’S PLAN FOR THE CHURCH!

I HAVE TO SHED CROCODILE TEARS FOR THE POOR RAD-UNTRADS WHO ARE NOW EXPERIENCING WHAT THE POOR RAD-TRADS HAVE BEEN EXPERIENCING UNTIL THE LAST TWO WEEKS OR SO….

Poor rad-untrad Jesuitical Father Thomas Reese. He is now forced to acknowledge that Pope Francis may not be the hope-for pope of the 1970’s type of dying rad-untrads! Ouch. 

I think too, poor LGBTQF+++++ Jesuitical Father James Martin is feeling the same pain, but maybe in a more flamboyant way as Fr. Reese expresses in his grieving piece at the National Catholic Reporter that I post below. 

Oh my, rad-untrads, my age and older, know that time is running out for them and there might not be a living cardinal their age who can do as the next pope what Pope Francis, their greatest disappointment, isn’t going to do for them now.

Crocodile tears anyone???????????

Pope Francis disappoints progressives. He will do so again, by Jesuitical Father Thomas Reese

THIS IS HOW TO REFORM WHAT NEEDS TO BE REFORMED WITHOUT USING INSULTING LANGUAGE

Let me reiterate, what Pope Francis said to Italian bishops behind closed doors, needed to be said, but without being crass or insulting. 

If Italian seminaries and priesthood needs to be cleaned up, and evidently Pope Francis knows something that I don’t, then it was right and just that he speak to the very bishops who have enabled a situation that now needs a desperate reform. 

Bishops are the ones who accept candidates for the seminary and priesthood. If they select morally, emotionally and mentally compromised/corrupt men, it isn’t the men’s fault but the bishops. The pope knows this.

But this is how the pope should have said it without insulting those who, through not fault of their own, were accepted into the seminary and ordained priests by the bishops Pope Francis was lecturing:

A document issued in 2005 under Pope Benedict XVI, Francis’ predecessor, excluded from the priesthood most gay men, with few exceptions, banning in strong and specific language candidates “who are actively homosexual, have deep-seated homosexual tendencies, or support the so-called ‘gay culture.’”

The document allowed ordination only for candidates who experienced “transitory” homosexual tendencies that were “clearly overcome” at least three years before ordination as a deacon, the last step before priesthood.

THE ART OF THE INSULT—NOT A GOOD TATIC FOR THE PAPACY OR ANY GIVEN POPE-BUT THE CHURCH WILL SURVIVE…

THE LOSS OF MAJESTY!

Way back in the early 1980’s my then bishop, now deceased, Bishop Lessard spoke at one of our clergy conferences. In a nice way, I thought back then, he lamented the loss of “majesty” of how some priests were living out their priesthood. Like so much majesty stripped from the “new” Mass, as we called it back then, so too had the priesthood and religious life stripped itself of majesty all in the name of relevancy and making our lives more accessible to the poor laity who needed our ordinary way of doing things, not a majestic way, at least perceived by clergy and religious in the late 60’s into the 70’s. 

It seems that our 1970’s loving pope has now brought the papacy back to those grand ole days of leaving the trappings of majesty, not just in dress but in behavior, to be more pedestrian in order to make the papacy more relevant to a world that loves false egalitarianism. 

I have written this before, many years ago, about the Italian side of Pope Francis. When he was first elected pope, I loved listening to his Italian because he speaks it as rank and file Italians speak it. It is pedestrian and Italians use a lot of tongue-in-cheek humor to make their points, but the humor can be harsh when one stops laughing at how something is said. Thus Pope Francis is what we more sophisticated Italians call a “vulgar” Italian, especially how he communicates in the Italian language. 

I’m sorry that we have a pope and hierarchy that love to debase themselves in a public way. It is a loss of priestly majesty, but that’s where we are and all of us, even traditionalists, can fall into the trap of acting like everyone else in language and behavior, even sinful public behavior.

I am sorry too, that what Pope Francis said about seminarians and priests in seminaries and churches  in Italy was stated in a crass, vulgar way by the pope.  What Pope Francis said, while true, I presume, I don’t know at all as I haven’t seen any statistic on how many LGBTQF++++ ideologues there are in Italian seminaries and priesthood, who embrace a life of unchasteness as they feel they are above God’s laws when it comes to the Catholic Church’s teaching on what constitutes breaking the 6th Commandment and sinning against God in a sexual way.

Evidently Pope Francis knows and is alarmed by it and wants to clean things up in Italian seminaries. But as usual, trying to do something good, while using crass language that doesn’t promote moral and doctrinal clarity but debases it, he steps on a good message of ridding seminaries those seminarians and priests who want the LGBTQF+++ ideology shoved down the throat of the institutional Church and with no protection whatsoever!

By the way, may I recommend that the LGBTQF+++ ideologues redeem the word fag as they have redeemed the word queer? I’ve added the F to their never ending list of letters for them. 

By the way, too, when I was a young teenager in the south, Augusta, Ga, the word fag, as the word queer, had multiple meanings, some not derogatory. Fag in the south could also refer to a cigarette! Now you know. 

IS THIS TRUE FOR POPE FRANCIS AND THE BARQUE OF SAINT PETER?

 

PANICKING DAMAGE CONTROL

 The Body of Christ deserves a more nuanced and truthful statement from the Vatican Press office. I am not sure what this is. It sounds childish, but who am I to judge?

A BOMBSHELL YIKES! POPE FRANCIS USES A DEROGATORY TERM FOR HOMOSEXUALS AND THE POPE TELLS ITALIAN BISHOPS NOT TO ALLOW HOMOSEXUALS WHO HAVE EMBRACED THE HOMOSEXUAL AGENDA INTO THE PRIESTHOOD

Pope Francis of “Who am I to judge” fame, will now be remembered as walking that back and boy did His Holiness do it!

I suspect Pope Francis is receiving a lot of blow-back from his perceived LGBTQ+++ friendliness and enablement. 

But I think the fiasco of a LGBTQ+++blasphemous, sacrilegious and really unbelievable funeral at St. Patrick’s may have shown the pope what his enablement of this ideology is doing in dioceses in the world and how the LGBTQ+++political lobby is so powerful in the Church led like people like Fr. James Martin that Jesuitical priest that Pope Francis has also enabled. Who knows and Who am I to judge?

You better believe that what I report next is a game-changer and the wrath of the LGBTQ++ community will be loud and bitter. It will be interesting how the pope and the Vatican walk this back. I suspect they will ignore it, but indeed it is a game changer! 

This was reported by Rorate Caeli just now and I thought it was a joke, but you can read it HERE.

Then I went to see if it was reported anywhere else, and sure enough, the Jesuitical America Magazine has a full article HERE (They offer free readings but then a paywall). 

America reports that “Il Corriere della Sera, La Repubblica and Dagospia report that Francis, whose native language is Spanish, not Italian, and who often uses colloquial language in conversation, surprised bishops by using the Italian word “frociaggine,” which is a derogatory term for “queerness” in Italian. It is not clear if he was aware of the word’s offensive nature. The main Italian dailies quoted him as saying that “there is too much frociaggine in seminaries.” 

Rorate Caeile translates the Italian into proper English Slang, which is what caused me to doubt the veracity of their reporting, which it turns out, to be true. We do know that this “street” Pope likes to use colorful language at times that would make old ladies blush:

“Pope Uses the “F word”: Tells Italian Bishops Not to Admit Gay Seminarians, because “there’s already too much faggotry” in the Church”

And another news outlet reports this:

Pope Used Gay Slur In Meeting With Italian Bishops: Media

Barron's

https://www.barrons.com › news › pope-used-gay-slur-i...

39 minutes ago — Pope Used Gay Slur In Meeting With Italian Bishops: Media ... Pope Francis used an offensive gay slang word during a meeting with Italian bishops, ...

RIGIDITY IS RESPONSIBLE FOR LITURGICAL CHAOS EVERYWHERE! FLEXIBILITY WILL SOLVE THE CHAOS, DIVISION AND VIOLENCE!

Press the title below for The Pillar’s take on the on-going scandal of liturgical chaos and violence in the Syro-Malarbar Eastern Rite Church of India. 

As far as I am concerned, we should not focus on who is responsible for the Syro-Malabar liturgy impasse, but what is responsible. And it is:

RIGIDITY!

Yes, you read that correctly, from the pope to the patriarch to the Syro-Malabar Synod, liturgists, clergy and laity, there is rigidity! And it isn’t just there.

Why not just say that “ad orientem” is the norm but facing the people for their Liturgy is an option to be determined by the bishop and pastor of a particular parish. If there is more than one Sunday Liturgy, one should be facing the people. 

This rigidity can be applied to the Latin Rite resting with the pope and His Holiness’ underlings. The liturgical norm for the Modern Latin Rite Mass is facing the people, but one of those multiple Sunday Masses in a parish should be ad orientem. 

The norm in the Latin Rite is the Modern Mass, but the Ancient Latin Mass is allowed especially in parishes with multiple Masses.

Flexibility in these sorts of things creates liturgical harmony, not chaos, division and liturgical violence! 

From the Pillar: 

 ANALYSIS

Who’s responsible for ending the Syro-Malabar liturgy impasse?

If no one is obviously in charge, is it any wonder the dispute is dragging on for years?

WOW! PRAYTELL, A SHADOW OF ITS FORMER SELF, UNWITTINGLY EXPLAINS HOW LITURGICAL RENEWAL WENT OFF THE RAILS IN THE 1980’S AND 90’S BUT NOT AS THEY THINK

 

There is a long article at Praytell about how the 1980’s and 90’s saw liturgical renewal collapse. For the author, who is a nun, it was all those mean conservatives, mostly laity, who rejected the brilliant leadership of this nun and others like her, who wrote the article.

And that my friends was and is the problem: liturgical experts who think so highly of themselves and their newly acquired power to manipulate the liturgy of the Church as THEY think best, becoming liturgical Nazis to enforce THEIR vision for liturgical renewal, creativity and inculturation, a top-down approach that rank and file clergy and laity rejected, especially laity and sometimes in an indignant and righteously angry way. 

The nun who writes this article sees the collapse from her superior perspective alone and in her old age longs for the good old days when she had power over the liturgy and over the laity. Gone with the Wind is that!

As an aside, she is right that most liturgical commissions of dioceses are a thing of the past precisely because they were power hungry liturgists foisting their power on the poor laity. I think bishops should have an advisory council for the liturgy, but orthodox ones that promote reading the black and doing the red but with style and energy. 

Amen Corner: Is Liturgy Simply “a Given” in a Synodal Church?

Pray Tell is pleased to reprint, with permission, the Amen Corner from Worship 98 (July 2024). To subscribe to the journal Worship, visit the link here.

IT’S TIME FOR THE SAN FRANCISCO CATHEDRAL’S SANCTUARY TO UNDERGO A RENOVATION AND I HAVE THE WAY TO DO IT…

In another post, I praised the San Francisco Solemn Sung Mass for the Eucharistic Revival pilgrimage. I even praised the ultra-1970’s-modern San Francisco Cathedral, which I do like, except…

The San Francisco Cathedral’s sanctuary is a time capsule of 1970’s thinking, which is itself a going backwards to how basilicas in Europe, which once were pagan temples, were converted into Catholic houses of worship after Constantine allowed the Church to flourish and trappings of the royal courts were incorporated into the liturgies of both the west and east as a sign of the Kingdom of Heaven.

As you look at the San Francisco Cathedral, the bishop’s throne is on the highest level, eclipsing the altar and everything else on the floor-plan of this edifice. 

Ancient basilicas had this sanctuary floor plan, the bishop’s throne at the highest level and the altar lower. It did not take too long for the Church of the East and West to see the folly of this and that local bishops should not be elevated over Christ as represented by the altar. Thus the altar was placed where the throne was and the throne placed on a lower level and to the left of the altar when viewing it from the nave. 

Then in the 1970’s the Church went backwards prior to almost every Council of the Church and recovered putting the throne of the bishop, but also now, of the local priest, at the highest level of the building and behind the altar. How tragic was that especially as the Church was at the precipice of seeing just how unworthy so many Catholic clergy and laity were. 

I hope that Archbishop Cordilione rips out that 1970’s throne, for it is ugly and ostentatious, places the altar, maybe a lovely new one, where the throne is and moves the throne to the lower level and to the side. That would be a great iconoclasm of 1970’s backwards thinking to the 3rd century. 

A STRANGE THING HAPPEN AS POPE FRANCIS ENTERS THE FINAL PHASE OF HIS PAPACY--HE'S WALKING BACK A FEW THINGS AND DOING SO WILL INFLAME RADICAL PROGRESSIVES AS HAVE HIS RADICAL PROGRESSIVE THOUGHTS ON THIS, THAT AND THE OTHER HAVE INFLAMED RADICAL CONSERVATIVES--BOTH GROUPS SUICIDAL, BTW!

 Ed Condon of the Pillar has his own take on the "damage control" that Pope Francis seems to be undertaking at the moment. 

Have progressive voices in the Church finally warned Pope Francis that if he keeps up His Holiness' opinion of what "doctrinal development" means, apart from making moral, doctrinal and dogmatic teachings more comprehensible rather than changing them outright, that a major schism will be unleashed in the Church. I think too, that the African continent to include Egypt has given the Holy Father a couple of ultimatums recently as it concerns FS.

Perhaps too, Pope Francis is having second thoughts on his version of Synodality which only less than 1% of Catholics have any desire to pursue and could care less about it and hope it dies a quick death. 

At any rate, here is Ed Condon's take on it. It it very good, I think:

Tide watch

Two things happened this week which I think merit consideration together.

The first was Pope Francis’ response when asked about the possibility of sacramental ordination for women as deacons on the infotainment show 60 Minutes.

“I’m curious, for a little girl growing up Catholic today,” Norah O’Donnell asked with the kind of oleaginous pomposity only American TV types can manage with a straight face, “will she ever have the opportunity to be a deacon and participate as a clergy member in the Church?” 

“No,” said the pope. 

This was broadcast just as several national reports for the global synodal were calling for exactly that — as we have previously reported — and it triggered an immediate, if somewhat predictable, backlash from the usual suspects.

The second thing that happened was that DDF prefect Cardinal Victor Manuel Fernández met with Pope Tawadros II, the head of the Coptic Orthodox Church and offered a kind of apology-by-way-of-explanation over the fallout of Fiducia supplicans, the DDF’s pre-Christmas declaration on the blessing of gay people who present themselves as a couple.

In March, the Coptic Orthodox issued a statement in response to Fiducia supplicans, saying they had “decided to suspend theological dialogue with the Catholic Church, re-evaluate the results achieved by this dialogue from its beginning 20 years ago, and establish new standards and mechanisms for the dialogue to proceed in future.”

It was a major setback to what had previously been one of the biggest ecumenical advances of the Francis era.

According to Vatican News, Fernández affirmed to Tawadros that “these blessings are not given to the union between individuals” and do not impart “‘sanctifying grace’ but those aids of the Holy Spirit that Catholics call ‘actual graces,’ which push the sinner towards conversion and maturation.”

Cardinal Fernández looking to mend fences and repeating, as he has done several times now in the months since Fiducia was issued, that such blessings are for individuals not couples qua couples, is all so much to be expected.

What I thought was especially notable, though, was to see him, via the official Vatican media portal, using the language of sinners and conversion when speaking about gay Catholics. 

Whatever the rival agendas in regards the Church’s approach to same-sex relationships in the current synodal process, this is exactly the vocabulary many expected would be the first thing to change when it concluded, including a redrafting of the language of the Catechism of the Catholic Church on this point.

What we have seen in the last week is Pope Francis and his top doctrinal deputy express what many would consider (in the worst possible to way) to be deeply conservative views on the hottest topics going in the synodal process, and they did so with no discernable wink or nod to those on the other side of the issue — at least that I could see.

If I am sure these events are significant, I am unsure what to make of them.

Is it a calculated, thinly coded rebuke by Francis of the Cardinal Hollerich school of synodality, who seem to have taken it as read that the synod is, indeed, a doctrinal free-for-all and decided to start saying so out loud?

Is the pope laying down some clear markers on what is absolutely not going to pass papal muster in any post synodal document in a bid to focus minds ahead of October?

Maybe there’s increased concern that radical progressive calls for reform have been given so much space and air time that more conservative leaders (like in Africa, say) will simply refuse to buy in to the process and boycott proceedings.

Or have Francis and Fernández come to some new understanding or concern that some of the more radical proposals going around, with some loud voices behind them, pose an actual threat to Church unity and doctrinal coherence?

I genuinely do not know. Maybe it is some combination of all these, maybe it is something else entirely. 

But this I do know: Francis knows the rhetorical volume of a flat “no.” And Vatican News doesn’t get the editorial green light for saying Fernández called people “sinners” on a whim.

A tide is shifting here. I am just not sure in what direction it’s being pulled. Yet.

SAN FRANCISCO’S REFORM IN CONTINUITY MASS FOR THE NATIONAL EUCHARISTIC REVIVAL…

Actually, I would call this the reform of the manner in which the Modern Mass is celebrated. And it is a Mass that actually follows the rubrics of the Modern Mass with solemn options and with a look that is in continuity with the majesty and royal court-like qualities of the Traditional Latin Mass in its most solemn pontifical form, in other words, a foretaste of the Kingdom of Heaven and its Majesty!

As an aside, as I have stated before, I do like modern architecture for churches when it is done well. I have been to San Francisco’s cathedral a few times and I find its “new’ cathedral to be stunning with many devotional areas in its spacious floor plan. 

I also love the ultra modern new Oakland Cathedral, a hop, skip and a jump from San Francisco. 

I will add, though, that when the altar/sanctuary is set up in the traditional way, with the “Benedictine Altar Arrangement” it makes all the difference in the world in a modern structure. 

Finally, the only way to an actual reform of the Modern Mass and Eucharistic Renewal, isn’t through catechesis alone, but celebrating the Modern Mass as it is intended to be celebrated, reading the black and doing the red and with solemnity, devotion and traditional piety. Every bishop should make sure his parishes attempt what Archbishop Cordileone models for us. That is the way to a Eucharistic Revival!

PROGRESSIVE CATHOLICS REVIVING THEIR ANTIPATHY FOR POPE BENEDICT XVI BY SHOWING. POPE FRANCIS THE SAME HATEFUL ANTIPATHY

Is the love fest for Pope Francis by progressive Catholics radicalized by the modern liturgy over? In a word, YES! The Modern Liturgy created this mess and now the the hate is coming home to roost once again, not seen since Pope Benedict. 

This is from the Jesuitical America Magazine. They, too, must be apoplectic like the radicalized Modern Mass crowd:

In a press release this morning, the Women’s Ordination Conference, which advocates for women to be ordained to the priesthood, called the pope’s comment “a betrayal of the synodal project of ‘journeying together,’” noting that “the church is currently in the midst of a global consultation process, and calls for women’s equitable inclusion in all aspects of church life have been heard on every continent.”
Others took issue with Pope Francis’ formulation of the historical question of women deacons, when he said, “Women have always had, I would say, the function of deaconesses without being deacons, right?”
Phyllis Zagano, one of the world’s foremost experts on the female Diaconate in the Catholic Church and a member of the first Vatican study commission on the topic under Francis, said in a written statement to America, “Surely Pope Francis did not intend to shut down several decades of study and ignore the import of Spirit-led discernment, which he has been so keen to emphasize as the modus operandi of the Catholic Church.”
“It is unfortunate that the pope seems to deny the well-known tradition of ordained women deacons in Christianity, especially given the fact that a [Greek] Orthodox woman was ordained deaconess on May 2 in Zimbabwe,” Dr. Zagano added. “The question of restoring women to the ordained diaconate is before the Synod on Synodality, and one can only hope the process within Catholicism, and the Orthodox return to [t]radition, will be respected.

BOMBSHELL: AND THE BOMBSHELL IS THIS, POPE FRANCIS CLEARLY STATES THAT WOMEN CANNOT BE ORDAINED DEACONS AS IN THE SACRAMENT OF HOLY ORDERS! THE CLARITY OF HIS OFF-THE-CUFF STATEMENT IS THE BOMBSHELL

This is in the National Catholic Reporter’s on-line publication. The 1970’s dinasourers there must be apoplectic to say the least. And Hollerich? He must be dumbfounded as are the post-Catholic synodal leaders:

Pope Francis voices firm opposition to women deacons in CBS interview

Money-byte:

"I understand you have said no women as priests, but you are studying the idea of women as deacons," O'Donnell asked Francis. "Is that something you're open to?”

"If it is deacons with Holy Orders, no," replied the pope, referencing the sacrament by which deacons, priests and bishops are ordained to their respective ministries.

"But women have always had, I would say, the function of deaconesses without being deacons, right?," Francis continued. "Women are of great service as women, not as ministers, as ministers in this regard, within the Holy Orders."

READ THE REST AT THE NCR OF ALL PLACES HERE!

AND NOW FOR SOME GOOD NEWS

 Young people, and I mean young, packed the Chartres Cathedral to conclude their pilgrimage. This Mass was celebrated by Cardinal Mueller on Pentecost Sunday. Some believe that the good Cardinal could be elected pope by a miracle of God. 

Chartres has a ridiculously small or cube like altar clearly out of place in this magnificent cathedral. But even the cube looks good with the TLM altar arrangement, also known as the Benedictine Altar Arrangement. 

And even banners look nice and are blessed being allowed to participate in a TLM in this magnificent cathedral. Kudos to the banners! Even they are elevated by a TLM!

Here are a few photos which show the original altar designed for the TLM in the background:

PERHAPS THE PROBLEM POPE FRANCIS HAS CREATED FOR HIMSELF ISN’T JUST THEOLOGICAL BUT DESCRIBING EVERYONE WHO HAS A DIFFERENT OPINION FROM HIM AS BEING “RIGID, SUICIDAL AND MAD (IN THE MENTAL SENSE)!

 There the Holy Father goes again…

I have often wondered if Pope Francis has been or is under psychoanalysis or missed his vocation in life by not becoming a pop-psychologist or psychiatrist. 

Herein lies his Achilles heal that has caused so much division and/or polarization in the Church, using psychology against people he criticizes rather than sound theological, doctrinal and dogmatic teachings. 

We already know that he has diagnosed in the psychological way those who prefer the TLM to the Modern Mass or those who love both well celebrated. 

In his recent 60 Minutes interview, he described clergy and laity who love dogma and then boxed themselves in and he called that suicidal. That is a psychological diagnosis rather than a theological one. 

Then he said that leaving migrants where they are coming from is “madness” in the mental sense of the word. 

He also couches his statements in political terms and the politics of countries where he is not an expert, especially when it comes to illegal immigration. But this pope disdains canon and civil law and mocks as “doctors of the law” those who say a sane Church and a sane society have laws that need to be upheld, with dispensations here and there.

All of this, though, contributes to the ambiguity of this pope, the confusion he creates and the areas he dabbles in which are not a part of being a “pontiff” which means bridge builder. 

You should be able to watch the 60 Minutes interview here.

BILL MAHER, A LAPSED CATHOLIC, POINTS OUT THE DUPLICITY OF THE LEFT AS IT CONCERNS HARRISON BUTKER

 Bill Maher, a lapsed Catholic, calls out the narrow minded, misguided media and others living in the 1960’s still, and defends Harrison Butker with a sense of humor, but defend him he does. This is somewhat fair and balanced and funny. The left have become a caricature of themselves unfortunately. 

Pray for Bill Maher, deep down he is still Catholic because of Christ’s sacramental and indelible imprint on his soul, that he returns to being a sane Catholic once again. I can’t bleep or strike the more colloquial street word for the rectum’s exit, forgive me but be forewarned.

I know the proper name for the rectum’s exit because having my very first colonoscopy, I was wide awake, watching the procedure on the monitor and speaking with my gastroenterologist. I saw the problem area and asked him, is that the problem by the entrance? He said, “we prefer to call it the exit!”

Unlike Maher who did listen to what Butker said, most did not listen to what he actually said. He said some of you (women) will choose a career but others of you (and yes he knows his traditional audience) will choose to be a wife, mother and homemaker. He did not exclude other options nor did he demand that all women be homemakers. Where did the godless, anti-Catholic, anti-tradition left get the idea he blasted women working outside the home? He did call out the diabolical pro-abortion, anti-Christian, anti-religion aspects of our society that influence people more than the Gospel. I’m glad Butker takes Vatican II seriously in terms of his role in the Church as a layman and using his celebrity for good rather than evil.

WATCH THE BILL MAHER VIDEO HERE AT BRIETBART

FROM BRIETBART:

On Friday’s broadcast of HBO’s “Real Time,” host Bill Maher defended Kansas City Chiefs kicker Harrison Butker and argued that many people do feel pressured that “there’s only one way to be a good person, and that’s to get an advanced degree from one of those asshole factories like Harvard.”

Maher stated, “He said, ‘Some of you’ — talking to the women, ‘Some of you may go on to lead successful careers in the world.’ Okay, that seems fairly modern. ‘But I would venture to guess that the majority of you are most excited about your marriage and the children you will bring into this world.’ I don’t see what the big crime is, I really don’t. And I think this is part of the problem people have with the left is that lots of people in this country are like this. He’s saying, some of you may go on to lead successful careers, but a lot of you are excited about this other way that people — everybody used to be, and now can’t that just be a choice too? I feel like they feel very put upon, like, there’s only one way to be a good person, and that’s to get an advanced degree from one of those asshole factories like Harvard.”

MAYBE THERE IS A BETTER WAY TO LEAD PEOPLE TO CONVERSION?

 

You can read ABC’s news report on how Harrison Butker committed mortal sins against pride and women by pressing their title:

Kansas City Chiefs player faces backlash for graduation speech criticizing working women, calling Pride a 'deadly sin'

Many in and outside of the Church have applauded the words of Harrison Butker at Benedictine College, where he received a robust standing ovation for his speech, but the world, the flesh and the devil as expressed by the heterodox and the politically liberal are outraged at the orthodox Catholic teaching expressed by Mr. Butker. The NFL has distanced itself from Butker and I would not be surprised if pressure is placed upon the Kansas City Chiefs to fire him. 

Heterodox Catholics are outraged at Butker’s  remarks. 

He must be on the right path? Is he a prophet who will be persecuted for plainly saying what the Church actually teaches and encourages? You betcha! 

There has always been anti Catholicism in the USA, but it came from Protestants sects. Today it is a political animus coupled with leftist ideologies and a virulent authoritarianism. It will lead to orthodox Catholics being persecuted like we were under communism.

Old Testament prophets as well as Jesus never pandered to the world, the flesh and the devil. They always paid the price and most prophets fought the call of God to be a prophet because they knew what was in store for them from the world, the flesh and the devil. 

I suspect Buckner knows too. 

The truth inflames the world, the flesh and the devil. It has always been so and Jesus experienced it to the fullness. Mr. Buckner is experiencing it now. Kind of reminds me of “The Prisoner” movie I posted in another thread. 

VINCENTIAN CHICAGO PASTOR WHO PRESIDED AT A QUASI “MARITAL BLESSING” OF TWO LESBIANS OFFERS A MEA CULPA, MEA CULPA, MEA MAXIMA CULPA—WAS IT FORCED? YOU BETCHA!

 Jesuitical Father James Martin, SJ must be livid!

From the Deacon’s Bench:

CHICAGO PASTOR OFFERS APOLOGY FOR THE WAY HE CONDUCTED SAME-SEX BLESSING

You may remember this story from a couple weeks ago: A priest in Chicago last month blessed a same-sex couple,

Read More

THE PRISONER MOVIE FROM 1955–WELL WORTH THE WATCH!

The Prisoner Trailer: 

A Cardinal is arrested for treason against a communist state. As a Prince of the Catholic Church, he’s a popular hero of this people for his resistance against the Nazis during World War II, and now his resistance after his country again fell to another totalitarian conqueror. In prison, his interrogator is determined to get a confession of guilt from the strong-willed man, and thus destroy his power over his people. The verbal and psychological battles are gripping and powerful, not even the increasing pressures put upon the Cardinal can force him to weaken, no even solitary confinement, continuous blazing light in his cell, sleeplessness, efforts to persuade him he is going mad. and yet, in the deepening conflict the superbly indomitable prisoner creates a tremendous pity on his tormentor. 

WATCH THE ENTIRE 1955 MOVIE, THE PRISONER, HERE.

WHAT A HEAD SCRATCHER—POPE FRANCIS SPEECH TO THE SYRO-MALABAR CATHOLICS ON RESPECTING LITURGICAL TRADITIONS, LIKE AD ORIENTEM, AND NOT ALLOWING THE WEST TO DICTATE LITURGICAL TRADITION IN CONTRADICTION TO THEIR OWN PAST!!!! YOU CAN’T MAKE THIS UP!

Pope Francis gave an excellent elocution to the Eastern Rite, Syro-Malabar Church about the Latin Rite Church trying to colonize the Eastern Rite liturgy! By way of Pope Francis’ logic, we can say that Pope Paul VI’s Conslium, which fabricated the newly reformed Mass of the Latin Rite, not only tried to colonize the Eastern Rite with its innovations, like Mass facing the nave, but also the Latin Rite Liturgy by colonizing it with modernist views of the Church and her liturgy!

My astute comments embedded within the text of the pope in “red”. 

Your Beatitude,
Your Excellencies,
Dear brothers and sisters,

I am pleased to welcome you, your brother bishops and those who have accompanied you on your first trip to Rome after your election. It was good to have this election! I also fraternally greet the representatives of the Syro-Malabar community in Rome.

The faithful of your beloved Church are known, not only in India, but throughout the whole world, for the “vigour” of their faith and piety. Your faith is of an ancient origin, as it is rooted in the witness to the point of martyrdom of Saint Thomas, the Apostle of India. You are all custodians and heirs of his apostolic preaching. You have had many challenges over the course of your long and difficult history, which has also seen some members of the faith commit unfortunate acts against you because of their insensitivity to the particular nature of your flourishing Church. Yet, you have remained faithful to the Successor of Peter. 

And so it gives me great joy to welcome all of you and to confirm you in the glorious legacy that you have received and which you carry forward. You are obedient, and where obedience is present, there is the Church. Where there is disobedience, there is schism. You are obedient; this is one of your glorious attributes: obedience. I know this is not without suffering, but continue to press forward. (Obedience to the authentic teachings of the popes uncontested by other bishops, is a hallmark of Catholics, clergy and laity!)

Your history is unique and precious, and it is a special heritage for all God’s holy people. And I take this opportunity to stress that Eastern traditions are indispensable treasures in the life of the Church. This is especially important to recall in a time like ours, which severs the roots connecting us to the past and measures everything based on what is useful and immediate. (If the pope would only say this to those who embraced Pope Benedict’s Summorum Pontificum and with gusto, rather than calling them backward looking and demanding that Latin Rite Catholics walk in lockstep with only what is useful and immediate by jettisoning the Latin Rite’s rich liturgical heritage!) This unfortunately can also include religious attitudes. The Christian East allows us to draw from ancient and ever new sources of spirituality; these become fresh springs that bring vitality to the Church. It is, therefore, good for me, as Bishop of Rome, to encourage you, the Syro-Malabar Catholic faithful, wherever you are, to cultivate the sense of belonging you have to your Church sui iuris, so that your great liturgical, theological, spiritual and cultural heritage may shine ever more brightly. (Again, if only Pope Francis could be humble enough to say this very same thing to those who were obedient to Pope Benedict’s Summorum Pontificum and what Pope Benedict told the entire Latin Rite Church about our liturgical heritage!)

 I also told His Beatitude to ask for jurisdiction with regard to all your migrants in so many parts of the Middle East. I said that they have to ask for jurisdiction in writing, but I have given it today and they can already exercise it. This has to be put in writing, but again, as of today, you can exercise it. I wish to help you, not supersede you, because the nature of your Church sui iuris empowers you not only to examine carefully the situations and challenges that you face, but also to take appropriate steps to address them, with responsibility and evangelical courage, remaining faithful to the guidance of the Major Archbishop and the Synod. This is what the Church wants, for apart from Peter, apart from the Major Archbishop, there is no Church.

To this end, I have recently sent letters and a video message to the faithful, warning them of the dangerous temptation to focus on one detail, (i.e. celebrating their Liturgy in a novel way by facing the congregation rather than obedience to the now expected posture of ad orientem for the Liturgy of the Eucharist) and an unwillingness to let it go, even to the detriment of the good of the Church. It stems from a self-referentiality, which leads to listening to no other way of thinking but one’s own. In Spanish we call this self-referentiality “yo, me, mi, con migo, para mi”: “I, me, with me, for me, everything for me”. It is here that the devil, the divider, who truly exists, creeps in and thwarts the most heartfelt desire that the Lord expressed before dying for us: that we, his disciples, be “one” (Jn 17:21), without division and without breaking communion. For this reason, guarding unity is not a pious exhortation but a duty, and it is especially so when it concerns priests who have promised obedience and from whom the faithful expect the example of charity and meekness. (Pope Francis wants obedience to ad orientem since it is not only the Latin Rite’s rich liturgical heritage, but that too of the Eastern Rite, thus uniting both rites in celebrating the Divine Liturgy in the same direction!!!!)

Your Beatitude, let us work with determination to protect communion and pray tirelessly that our brothers and sisters, tempted by a worldliness that leads to rigidity and division, may realize that they are part of a larger family that loves them and waits for them. Like the Father in the parable of the prodigal son, let us leave the doors open and our hearts open so that, once they have repented, they will not find it difficult to re-enter (cf. Evangelii gaudium, 46): we are waiting for them. Let us meet and discuss without fear, this is fine, but above all, let us pray, so that the light of the Spirit, which reconciles differences and brings tensions back into unity, may resolve disputes. There is one certainty: pride, recriminations and envy do not come from the Lord and never lead to concord and peace. Showing a grave lack of respect for the Blessed Sacrament – the Sacrament of charity and unity – by arguing about the details of how to celebrate the Eucharist, the pinnacle of his presence among us, is incompatible with the Christian faith. The guiding criterion, the truly spiritual one that derives from the Holy Spirit, is communion: this requires us to do a self-examination of our dedication to unity and our faithful, humble, respectful and obedient care for the gifts we have received. (Yes, the liturgical progressives in the Syro Malabar rite, have caused violence and chaos and sacrilege as well as vandalism due to their rigid opposition to ad orientem for the Liturgy of the Eucharist and closed mindedness to their own liturgical past much like what the progressive left has done in the Latin Rite, but aided and abetted by Rome and modernist liturgists!)

I would like to say to everyone, in moments of difficulty and crisis, do not be overcome by discouragement or a sense of helplessness in the face of problems. Brothers and sisters, let us not extinguish hope, grow weary of patience, or close ourselves off to prejudices that fuel animosities. Rather, let us think about the vast horizon of the mission that the Lord has entrusted to us, the mission to be a sign of his loving presence in the world, and not a scandal to those who do not believe! When making decisions, let us think of the poor and the estranged, those on the peripheries, in India and the diaspora, and those in an existential crisis. Let us also be mindful of those who are suffering and waiting for signs of hope and consolation. I know that the lives of Christians in many places are difficult, but the difference is that we Christians respond to evil with good and we work tirelessly with all believers for the good of humanity. (Pope Francis could say this to those suffering due to their fidelity to Summorum Ponticum and renewal in continuity which is derided and mocked by the progressive liberals of the Latin Rite Church.)

I would like to thank you for your Church’s commitment in the areas of family formation and catechesis, and I support your pastoral work aimed at youth and vocations. I am close to you in prayer and carry you in my heart every day. Please also take my encouragement to your brothers and sisters.

Together we look to Jesus, crucified and risen, who loves us and makes us one, who wants us united as one family around one altar. Like the Apostle Thomas, let us look at his wounds. They are still visible today on the bodies of the hungry, thirsty and discarded, those in prisons, hospitals and on the streets. As we touch these brothers and sisters with tenderness, we welcome the living God in our midst. Like St. Thomas, we look at the wounds of Jesus, which had stunned the disciples and could have thrown them into a hopeless guilt, and see that it is from those wounds the Lord made channels of forgiveness and mercy. A big heart, always a big heart! What amazement must have seized the Apostle Thomas as he contemplated them and saw his doubts and fears vanish before the greatness of God! It is an amazement that generates hope, an amazement that prompted him to go out, to cross new borders and to become your father in faith. Let us cultivate this amazement of faith, which enables us to overcome every obstacle!

And you, dear faithful of the Syro-Malabar community in Rome, descendants of the Apostle Thomas in the city of Peter and Paul, have a special role to play. From this Church, which presides over the universal communion of charity (cfr. Saint Ignatius of Antioch, Letter to the Romans), you are called to pray and cooperate in a special way for unity within your Church, not only in Kerala but also throughout India and the whole world. Kerala is a treasure-trove of vocations! Let us pray that it will continue to be so.

Your Beatitude, thank you for this fraternal visit; I am pleased by it. Dear brothers and sisters, from the bottom of my heart I bless you and entrust you to the Virgin Mary, Saint Thomas the Apostle and your saints and martyrs; and I ask you, please do not forget to pray for me. Thank you, thank you very much!

Francis,

Bishop of Rome

Patriarch of the West

IS POPE BENEDICT XVI STILL ALIVE AND LIVING IN EXILE IN BRAZIL? I REPORT; YOU DECIDE!

 This is a photo from Vatican News’ website this Monday morning showing a man being carried out of the flood waters in Brazil. Who do you think that is? Please pray for those suffering from natural disasters throughout the world.

BOMBSHELL! YANKEES SEND NORTHERN LIGHTS INTO GEORGIA AND SOUTH CAROLINA!!!

 Instead of Aunt Pittypat Hamilton of Gone with the Wind exclaiming “Yankees in Georgia! How did they ever get in?" This morning she is exclaiming “Northern Lights in Georgia! How did they ever get in?”

The Aurora Borealis made it to Richmond Hill and the Hilton Head area!