In fairness to him, he has a self-proclaimed history of mental illness, not to mention a well-documented one of continuing conflict with peers. The problem might not really be Pope Francis, but the state of a Church that enables such a man to become Pope.
When we are baptised we become Catholic. We cannot unbecome a Catholic; we are Catholics till we die, no matter what we get up to. We can only become an Apostate Catholic or lapsed. It is like the priesthood. Once one is ordained they are priests forever. They can leave the clerical state but they are always priests, forever. It is like being the member of a family. You might row with them and never speak to them ever again, but you are forever one of the family, like it or not. Even if we fail in our Easter Duty and never go near a Church we are still one of the family. The only way I think this union can be undone is through excommunication. I don't think there has been an excommunication in the Church in decades now. A pity. A great,great pity.
The great scourge of all of this SG is that the Church herself has to define exactly what would happen if a pope wanders from the faith and she never has. There are different theological opinions on this issue. That is probably one of the reasons why Cardinal Burke is reticent to take the next step. Here is a basic overview: http://www.trueorfalsepope.com/p/how-heretical-pope-loses-his-office.html My understanding of the current situation and the theological line Cardinal Burke is pursuing is that a pope does not lose office unless until they are officially recognized as a pertinacious heretic. This can only be done by those in authority. It seems far less tenable for the laity to be able to make such a judgement. There are many people who think that some or all of the Popes of the last fifty years were heretics and lost office for one reason or another. How could we ever know then who is pope?
Even excommunication does not strip one of their Catholicity. Anyone who is validly baptized is irrevocably a Catholic forever. Excommunication is a legal penalty barring the person from certain Church benefits such as the sacraments. If one gets the excommunication lifted properly the penalties are removed. One would not need to be re-baptized, etc. The simple description: http://www.dummies.com/religion/chr...holicism-excommunication-and-other-penalties/ The detailed description: http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/05678a.htm
Yes we are a Holy Nation, a Royal Priesthood. Once done, never undone. 1 Peter 2:9 But you are a chosen people, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, God's special possession, that you may declare the praises of him who called you out of darkness into his wonderful light.
I was merely responding to gracia's post about PF not being Catholic. Something akin to wishful thinking. Sigh
I don't post this to condemn him, or argue for some kind of split. No. But while he is within and is over the Church his theology is not Catholic. He is our Pope. When someday, hopefully, I can enter the Church, he'll be my Pope. But our Pope is not Catholic, at least not theologically. That much seems clear.
https://mundabor.wordpress.com/2018/05/14/this-is-not-the-time-for-devotional-blogging/ This Is Not The Time For Devotional Blogging May 14, 2018 So, shall we just avoid the controversies surrounding Pope Francis and limit ourselves to praying the rosary and writing about edifying material? If you have followed this blog even only a couple of days, you know my answer. There is an awful lot of material, online and in books, for those who want to deepen their knowledge of traditional Catholicism. This blog, and many others, have plenty of information on the matter for the one who is willing to search. Thank God, the Internet has put this information within the reach of pretty much everyone in the English speaking world. Blogging is, however, a more immediate form of communication than a book; and it therefore allows a faster reaction when things go wrong. A war is raging, and Satan is clearly very influent in the Vatican. I for myself am not going to spend the time I have for blogging in further explanations about the Works of Mercy or the meaning of the word “charity”. Plenty of resources for that; actually even on this blog, but pretty much everywhere. No, this is not the time to retreat to a kind of devotional blogging, or spiritual blogging retreat. This is the time to follow St Michael. The reduction of Catholic blogging to online Catholic fare without reference to the war that is raging is tantamount to giving Francis all the liberty he wants, and to wreck everything he wants, safe in the knowledge that Catholic bloggers will focus on the Joyous Mysteries, or on pious toughts on the day of the Ascension. Let those who think their role is to explain the Catechism to readers do so at the best of their ability. There are many Catholic bloggers out there and everyone can useful in his own way. But without me, and thank you very much. In times of war you need, first of all, warriors. Cooks may be useful, byt they don’t win wars. The Crusaders never stopped thinking whether it would have been better to stop the war and start spiritual exercises instead. They knew it was the time for war, and they acted accordingly. Pray your rosary, my dear reader. And then go on the Internet and blog, comment, retweet, “like”, do all you can to help in the war that is raging. There is a time for peace and a time for war. In the times of Francis, we need to soldier on on the side of St Michael. M
More musings from the Pope......again his reference to being "a bishop". So then, just who are to be considered his "flock" in particular....only Rome? Is the Pope, to his fullness in the mind of Francis, to be one who just offers thoughts and opinions but has no power to wield the Key or expect any truths to be written in stone so to speak and expected to be there for the salvation of souls? Of course the article itself isn't sure in just what context the Pope here was speaking which arrives again at a kind of blurry, existential type of papacy. Pope says he's thought about when it's time to 'take leave' VATICAN CITY (AP) — Pope Francis says he has thought about when it might be time to "take leave" of his flock. Francis made the comment during his morning homily Tuesday; the Vatican didn't release the full text. Francis was reflecting on St. Paul discerning when to leave his flock in the care of others, a decision Francis said all bishops must make. He said: "When I read this, I think about myself, because I'm a bishop and I'll have to take my leave." Francis has said retired Pope Benedict XVI "opened a door" to future popes by resigning. While the 81-year-old pope has said he didn't envisage a long papacy, he hasn't said explicitly if he'd retire. Francis may have also been referring to Chilean bishops implicated in a sex abuse cover-up scandal. https://www.yahoo.com/news/pope-says-hes-thought-time-leave-103212197.html
Back in March I had a dream in which we learned that FLOTUS was one of the individuals posting as “Q.”
Did Archbishop Fulton Sheen prophesy about the condition of (many parts of) our Church today? “[Satan] will set up a counterchurch which will be the ape of the [Catholic] Church … It will have all the notes and characteristics of the Church, but in reverse and emptied of its divine content.” We are living in the days of the Apocalypse, the last days of our era. The two great forces – the Mystical Body of Christ and the Mystical Body of the anti-Christ – are beginning to draw battle lines for the catastrophic contest. The False prophet will have a religion without a cross. A religion without a world to come. A religion to destroy religions. There will be a counterfeit Church. Christ’s Church the Catholic Church will be one; and the false Prophet will create the other. The False Church will be worldly, ecumenical, and global. It will be a loose federation of churches and religions, forming some type of global association. A world parliament of Churches. It will be emptied of all Divine content, it will be the mystical body of the anti-christ. The Mystical Body on earth today will have its Judas Iscariot, and he will be the false prophet. Satan will recruit him from our Bishops. The Antichrist will not be so called; otherwise he would have no followers. He will not wear red tights, nor vomit sulphur, nor carry a trident nor wave an arrowed tail as Mephistopheles in Faust. This masquerade has helped the Devil convince men that he does not exist. When no man recognizes, the more power he exercises. God has defined Himself as “I am Who am,” and the Devil as “I am who am not.” Nowhere in Sacred Scripture do we find warrant for the popular myth of the Devil as a buffoon who is dressed like the first “red.” Rather is he described as an angel fallen from heaven, as “the Prince of this world,” whose business it is to tell us that there is no other world. His logic is simple: if there is no heaven there is no hell; if there is no hell, then there is no sin; if there is no sin, then there is no judge, and if there is no judgment then evil is good and good is evil. But above all these descriptions, Our Lord tells us that he will be so much like Himself that he would deceive even the elect–and certainly no devil ever seen in picture books could deceive even the elect. How will he come in this new age to win followers to his religion? The pre-Communist Russian belief is that he will come disguised as the Great Humanitarian; he will talk peace, prosperity and plenty not as means to lead us to God, but as ends in themselves … The third temptation in which Satan asked Christ to adore him and all the kingdoms of the world would be His, will become the temptation to have a new religion without a Cross, a liturgy without a world to come, a religion to destroy a religion, or a politics which is a religion–one that renders unto Caesar even the things that are God’s. In the midst of all his seeming love for humanity and his glib talk of freedom and equality, he will have one great secret which he will tell to no one: he will not believe in God. Because his religion will be brotherhood without the fatherhood of God, he will deceive even the elect. He will set up a counterchurch which will be the ape of the Church, because he, the Devil, is the ape of God. It will have all the notes and characteristics of the Church, but in reverse and emptied of its divine content. It will be a mystical body of the Antichrist that will in all externals resemble the mystical body of Christ … But the twentieth century will join the counterchurch because it claims to be infallible when its visible head speaks ex cathedra from Moscow on the subject of economics and politics, and as chief shepherd of world communism. Fulton J. Sheen, Communism and the Conscience of the West [Bobbs-Merril Company, Indianapolis, 1948]
