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Tuesday, March 31, 2020

HAS THE PRETENTIOUS IDOLATRY OF CHURCH MEMBERS, HIGH AND LOW, BEEN BLOWN UP BY THE GOD OF SURPRISES WHO ALSO HAPPENS TO BE THE GREAT “I AM” THE SAME YESTERDAY, TODAY AND TOMORROW?



It is time to explore Catholic teachings found in the Old Testament and New Testament and thus in the Tradition of the Church that we are undergoing a chastisement from God with this Pandemic. And a Cardinal says it is so:

March 31, 2020 (LifeSiteNews) — German cardinal Paul Josef Cordes has joined the growing number of Catholic leaders looking at the coronavirus pandemic as a chastisement. “God’s Word also clearly states that life contrary to God can lead to illness,” wrote the former president of the Pontifical Council Cor Unum.

Read the rest there:

Cardinal: Coronavirus pandemic is a chastisement for the Church


I think we are all still trying to wrap our heads around what has transpired in the Catholic Church in just two or three short weeks. It is so stunning, that one may attribute it to Satan, to Original Sin, to Mother Nature or to God.

The Catholic Church has been stripped of its man-oriented theologies of community, inclusivity, Church as a field hospital, accompaniment, ecological conversion. How odd that the Pope’s metaphor of the Church as a field hospital going out to the peripheries, to accompany those in irregular situations evaporates with a virus that only medical personnel, no matter their religious or lack of religious persuasion is can be present in actual field hospitals and the Church and her ministries locked out!!!!!!!! Is our God of Surprises also a Comedian with a dry, ironic sense of humor?

Pope Francis said this at a homily at the Chapel of His Holiness’ residence, the Vatican Motel 6 (not 666) though on March 26:

“The Pope said, ‘The Lord must not find us, at the end of our lives, and say to us, “You are corrupt. You have left the path I showed you. You have bowed down before idols.’”
What are some of the idols of the past 50 years, new and old:

1. Vatican II, a merely pastoral Council, made dogmatic and the center of Church life these past 50 years, preached and taught more often than Jesus Christ was (this seem to be changing after Pope Benedict assumed the papacy, but has found new life with Pope Francis papacy.

2. Sacrosanctum Concilium’s conservative call for a slight reform of the Mass and sacraments became exaggerated with Pope Paul’s Consilium and the major manufacturing of a new Latin Rite Mass and Sacraments formulas. And this was presented as an infallible reform, coming from God Himself.

3. That liturgical reform would bring about a new springtime for the Church as those reforms concocted by fallible human reformers is the locus of this springtime, and not God Himself who is replaced by reformers’ preferences.

4. Renovating perfectly good sanctuaries and churches to accommodate liturgists’ idea of what they felt the Council wanted and this would bring about a new springtime for the Church and not God’s vertical intervention which has taken place since Jesus founded the Church.

5. Dogmatizing pastoral theology, which Pope Francis’ seems to have placed on steroids. There is no precedence for this in the 2000 year history of the Church. Any pastoral theology, as found in most of Pope Francis teachings and encyclicals is purely opinion, speculative and less in value than the theology of Limbo for unbaptized babies.

6. Making decisions of synods a part the extraordinary magisterium of the Church, when in fact it is a politicization of Catholicism, opening it to the whims of those who are chosen to participate in such synods. Synods like Ecumenical Councils, should be rare and only called in a crisis to address heresy  and offer correction and Anathemas.

7. Investing too much authority in Bishops’ Conferences and their way too many committees and paid personnel as though these are God-given structures, which they aren’t of course.

8. Investing too much authority in local Bishop’s pastoral centers, the plethora of paid personnel there and the dogmatism coming from these pastoral centers and diocesan pastoral councils.

9. Investing too much authority in parish pastoral councils and consulting with the laity, as though God surely is at the heart of this consultation and prayer discernment

10: Elevating personal conscience above the sound and defined Deposit of Faith to include morals

11. Making novelties in the Church and her pastoral theologies a part of what the “God of Surprises”  because the pope or some bishop or priest or lay person says it is so.

12. Treating the papacy, the Sacrament of Holy Orders as though it is the domain of the person initiated into it and not the domain of God and His Church which is the sin of pride in twisting that which belongs to the Church into one’s personal image of what it should be

13. The papal magisterium leading the Church into areas that are not within the competency of the Church’s Magisterium such as climate change, building more humane cities, conversion to ecology, placing non Catholic Christian sects on par with Catholicism, and the same for non Christian religions, secular ideologies, and now pagan entities as a response to the Church to dialogue with the devil in these relationships. Pachamama, is a prime example of idolatry at the Vatican despite comments contrary to the truth from high sources.

14. Bishops and priests abdicating their responsibility before God and the Faithful to be good shepherds leading the laity in the spiritual battle against the flesh, the world and the devil

15. The sex abuse crisis as a part of the reimagining of the promise/vow of obedience and celibate chastity and the corruption that this has caused within bishops and lower clergy.

16. Religious orders, seminaries and other institutions of Church using the collective will of democratic processes accomplished under what is called prayerful discernment, to reimagine the Church, religious orders, etc and call it renewal even when all the evidence points out that what was accomplished by these processes has led to the death of a once strong Catholic Church and strong, thriving religious orders of men and women.


24 comments:

Anonymous said...

I hope you enjoy living in your early 18th century fantasy, since that is all it is.

Fr. Allan J. McDonald said...

Infallible decree?

TJM said...

Anonymous K,

Better than still living in your 1960s fantasy, since that is all it is.

Anonymous said...

"Let's just make everything the way it was in the early 1800's."

If you don't see how utterly preposterous such an idea is, than your fantasy of all you've got.

It is impossible to recreate the past by reintroducing some tiny little part of it. If priests wear birettas and maniples, if Latin is used at Mass, then everything else will just fall into place the way it was.

It's a real as "All mimsy were the borogoves..."

TJM said...

Anonymous K,

Reintroducing tradition has seemed to bring YOUNG people back into the Church. But you old failures want to keep doing what has failed. Einstein had a word for that: insanity

Fr. Allan J. McDonald said...

So you are saying, blind guide, that by recovering the Church’s 2,000 year Tradition of acknowledging God as the center of the Church symbolized in the manner and ethos of our Liturgies is impossible to recover since it is pre-1965? Way to go blind guide. Stick with your resourcement that recovers the early Church.

Anonymous said...

"So you are saying, blind guide, that by recovering the Church’s 2,000 year Tradition of acknowledging God as the center of the Church symbolized in the manner and ethos of our Liturgies is impossible to recover since it is pre-1965?"

No.

First, what you are seeking is not the Church's 2,000 year old Tradition. Our liturgical traditions (note: plural) have varied and will vary over time.

Second, God has remained the center of our worship, whether you recognize or acknowledge that or not.

Third, it is impossible to recover the Church of the early 1800's by restoring, piecemeal, a little bit here and a little bit there.

Fr. Allan J. McDonald said...

So, Lind guide, you prefer getting back to the early Church through liturgical resourcement rather than the reform of the reform Pope Benedict initiated and the recovery of the vertical in our liturgies rather than the emphasis on the horizontal of the past 50 years.

Anonymous said...

"So, Lind guide, you prefer getting back to the early Church through liturgical resourcement rather than the reform of the reform Pope Benedict initiated and the recovery of the vertical in our liturgies rather than the emphasis on the horizontal of the past 50 years."

No. If you read what I am posting instead of making up what you want it to say, you will realize that I am saying we can't bring back the early 1800's Church by reintroducing bits and pieces of the liturgy anymore than we can bring back the 1920's by reintroducing bobbed hair, cloche hats, and feather headbands for women and collar pins, boater hats, and spats for men.

Fr. Allan J. McDonald said...

So what you are saying blind guide, we can’t go back to public Masses. We can’t go back 3 weeks ago. Non pubic on line Mass and private devotions at home is our future. Thanks for making that clear blind guide.

TJM said...

Anonymous K,

Got it. We do not want to do anything to restore the solid practice of Catholicism. We will stay with the ersatz version which says nothing when an alleged catholic, Pelosi, demands we include funding for abortions in the coronavirus relief bill. She would have never have dared that if Catholicism had not gotten so watered down and subservient to the modern culture and afraid to exercise its teaching authority.

John said...

See also this article

John Nolan said...

'If you read what I am posting instead of making up what you want it to say'. This from 'Anonymous' who does this all the time. It's not that he lacks all sense of irony (his stock-in-trade is crude sarcasm); he simply doesn't believe it applies to him.

His usual riposte is to come back with a 'tu quoque', which is not a defence since it admits culpability before attributing the same fault to others.

He's also noted for his inapt analogies. The Church of the 1920s is the same Church as that of the 1800s, or the 1300s, or of any century since she was founded. The comparison with transient fashion and talk of 'bringing back the early 1800s Church' suggests that the writer doesn't believe this.

Now wait for him to come back spluttering that he's been deliberately misread. He might, for our entertainment, indulge in Mockney in the style of 'Gor blimey, guv, you could've knocked me dahn wiv a fevver'.

He's what we call a berk, which is indeed Cockney rhyming slang (Berkshire hunt).

Anonymous said...

"The Church of the 1920s is the same Church as that of the 1800s, or the 1300s, or of any century since she was founded."

You haven't deliberately misread, John. Rather, you have failed in underastanding.

The Church, in essence, is the same since her founding. But you fall into the near-heresy of suggesting that the Church exists as some disembodied "it," something that is wholly separate from time and place.

It does not.

We experience the Church in time and place - until the next life we can do no other. We, right now, with Bishops, the Sacraments, and people, and supernatural faith lived in this natural world, are the Church.

The Church - the whole thing, not some rarified, disembodied "essence" - cannot be reconstituted, as Fr. McDonaad desires, to some former glory by making a few cosmetic changes on the edges.

You're hollerin' into a hole, John.

And you are what we call a jerk. (Nice rhyme, don'tcha think?)

The Egyptian said...

Did not God want to destroy the Israelites for worshiping the golden calf,
pachamama, anyone???
wake up and smell the coffee, time to return to tradition, real tradition not made up 60's/70's happy clappy crap.
The return to the sacredness of the sanctuary, it ain't the place for "participation, it's the place for sacrifice, no more holding hands hugging and dance, it's on your knees hands clasped in prayer.
difficult when so many priests and "liturgical committees have turned it into a "show" to entertain (and doing it badly I might add)
Give me a latin low mass, no music just quiet prayer, no distractions,no SHOW
Yeah I'm in a cranky mood, the leftist both in the church and without are p-----g me off

rcg said...

I did not read the OP as a desire to return a specific point in the past but to recovery successful behavior that was modeled in previous years. If we are seeking progress then we should imitate behavior that resulted in the sort of progress we desire. The current MO of our hierarchy is both retrograde to growth of our Church and possibly to paganism.

The Old Order of Mass had many variations and cultural exceptions. What was not variable was the focus of worship, something that is at least unclear in many modes of the New Mass.

The Old Order of Mass was never ‘outlawed’ although many, including myself, were either misled to this conclusion or outright lied to about it.

I think it is a form of vanity to think that this is scourge of God. His marvelous creation is full of thorns and dangers we ignore at our peril. We run to our favorite gods first in hopes of being saved when the way through this was rejected many years ago. We are caught calling to gods who have no tongues and cannot answer.

TJM said...

John Nolan,

Bravo - you Englishmen really do have a way with words!!!

TJM said...

Anonymous K,

You are like the crooks in Home Alone, you keep coming back for more even though you have been thoroughly beaten.

Bob said...

We are ALWAYS deserving punishment for our transgressions against the Commandments, and this even the reason why we fast, pray, and almsgive during Lent, in partial satisfaction of justice....I try not to second-guess God, as normally that does not work out too well...for me....

John Nolan said...

'Let's just make everything the way it was in the early 1800s'

Who said this? Not Fr McDonald. Nor did he give any indication that he is living in an early 18th century fantasy (that's the early 1700s, by the way) although for a straw man of Anonymous's construction I don't suppose dates are that important.

In his attempt to reply to my comment he has ditched the Mockney in favour of a north American patois, and in doing so he has, for once, hit on an apt metaphor. 'Hollerin' into a hole' is a requirement for anyone wishing to address Anonymous, who has dug a hole for himself and lacks the sense to stop digging.

John Nolan said...

TJM

What little eloquence I can claim probably derives from my Irish heritage (my father's side). When England play Ireland in the Six Nations rugby I don't mind who wins.

I have distant relatives in the US and my paternal grandfather (Peter J Nolan MBE MC) was British Consul in Philadelphia until his retirement in 1957.

Anonymous said...

A 9:20: “We experience the Church in time and place - until the next life we can do no other.”

So, rather than vilifying our blog host yet again, what are YOU doing right NOW to help the Church??

TJM said...

John Nolan,

My heritage is Irish and English.

Thanks for sharing the information on your late grandfather. He was fortunate to have lived in Philadelphia in the 1950s when it was a really nice city, hometown of Princess Grace of Monaco.

TJM said...

Anonymous at 10:16

Anonymous K is likely doing nothing, other than lapping up the Abortion Party's daily talking points