The Vatican Has Fallen

In our love of orthodoxy and truth it is tempting to make a decisive separation between the "good guys" and the "bad guys". Today at the nursing home, we held a meeting that included the Head of the Activity Dept (who hires chaplains), Fr. F (who celebrates bi-weekly Holy Masses for the residents), myself, and Mike Casey, who is in deacon formation. The purpose was to ensure that Catholic residents have access to the Anointing of the Sick. Fr. F is a very generous priest who gives of his time and effort at Iroquois NH and other facilities. He is gentle, warm, and loving toward the residents.

However, when the Head of the Activity Dept lamented about the lack of priests in the Diocese (it is dire), Father made a case for the loosening of celibacy and the need for married priests, mentioning the frustration Pope Francis must feel at being stymied. It was not the time to confront him, since the focus was on meeting the spiritual needs of the residents, of which he has thus far been most generous. But he did share an inaccurate analysis on the history of celibacy, so I will have to present to him and the others a more honest appraisal.

So here we are, a gentle, effective minister in end-of-life situations whose orthodoxy leaves something to be desired!

Lord have Mercy!

 

Latin American bishops to ask Pope for married priests in wake of new Amazon exhortation
Close collaborators of the Pope made it clear that Francis' post-synodal exhortation Querida Amazonia did not close the door to the married priesthood.
Wed Mar 4, 2020 - 6:14 pm EST

https://www.lifesitenews.com/blogs/...ried-priests-in-wake-ofnew-amazon-exhortation

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It's all good. The Pope's intentions for March:


Those rigid underground Chinese Catholics had better not be proselytising. They have to be good citizens. I suppose that means no minors at Mass so no Sacraments before age 18.

 

Thanks Dolours, I will pray for his intentions. I have always thought of proselytism as an attack against another persons beliefs with the intention of conversion. Like the Jehovah's witnesses slyly try to do when they come to your door and you tell them you are a Catholic and they want to show you where you are in the wrong.
When I was young I had some friends who made it their mission to do this with as many people as they could. What they actually accomplished was isolating themselves from everyone because nobody wanted to be around them.
I have never known any Catholic to do this so I am not sure why he would continue to bring it up but maybe in China it is an issue.

 

I pray every day for Cardinal Zen and Bishop Guo and all Chinese Catholics faithful to the true Church. They are living martyrs.

 

Yes. I'm wondering whether it would be ok to tweak the Pope's intentions in my prayers.

 

I do.

 

Cardinal Raymond Burke: ‘I Find Querida Amazonia Troubling’
While he expressed gratitude that the document itself did not call into question clerical celibacy or recommend ordaining women deacons, he identifies a number of aspects that are problematic.

Edward Pentin

https://www.ncregister.com/daily-news/cardinal-burke-discusses-querida-amazonia

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Synod of Bishops to take up theme of synodality in 2022
Pope Francis has chosen “For a synodal Church: communion, participation, and mission” as the theme for the next Ordinary General Assembly of the Synod of Bishops.

By Christopher Wells

In a formal declaration released on Saturday morning, Cardinal Lorenzo Baldisseri, the Secretary General of the Synod of Bishops, announced that Pope Francis will convene the XVI Ordinary General Assembly of the Synod of Bishops in October 2022, with the theme, “For a synodal Church: communion, participation and mission”.

Synodality: the path of the Church in the third millenium
The topic of synodality has been an important feature in Pope Francis’ pontificate. In October 2015, on the occasion of the 50th anniversary of the establishment of the Synod of Bishops by St Paul VI, Pope Francis said, “From the beginning of my ministry as Bishop of Rome, I sought to enhance the Synod, which is one of the most precious legacies of the Second Vatican Council… it is precisely this path of synodality which God expects of the Church in the third millennium”.

More recently, speaking to the International Theological Commission in 2018, the Holy Father said the theme of synodality “is very close to my heart: synodality is a style, it is walking together, and it is what the Lord expects of the Church in the third millennium”.

To foster unity and assist the Pope
The Synod of Bishops was established by Pope St Paul VI toward the end of the Second Vatican Council. According to the Code of Canon Law, the synod is “a group of bishops who have been chosen from different regions of the world and meet together at fixed times to foster closer unity between the Roman Pontiff and bishops, to assist the Roman Pontiff with their counsel in the preservation and growth of faith and morals and in the observance and strengthening of ecclesiastical discipline, and to consider questions pertaining to the activity of the Church in the world”.

Normally, the Synod of Bishops meets for Ordinary General Assemblies every 3-4 years, with other meetings (Extraordinary General Assemblies or Special Assemblies) taking place at the discretion of the Pope.

An Extraordinary General Assembly of the Synod of Bishops was convoked by Pope Francis in 2014 on “The Pastoral Challenges of the Family in the Context of Evangelization”; one year later, the Ordinary General Assembly considered the topic of “The Vocation and Mission of the Family in the Church and in the Contemporary World”. In 2018, the Ordinary General Assembly focused on “Young People, Faith, and Vocational Discernment”.

Most recently, in October of 2019, Pope Francis called a Special Assembly of the Synod of Bishops for the Pan-Amazon region, “to identify new paths for the evangelization of God’s people in that region”.

https://www.vaticannews.va/en/pope/...s-to-take-up-theme-of-synodality-in-2022.html

I think that this synod will open the way for the bishops to have the power to carry out the reforms that Francis intends, it seems to me an attack against the unity of the Church

 

I agree, Luan. Not good . But as we are witnessing now, a lot can happen in two years. So who knows?

 

I frankly have my doubts as to whether Pope Emeritus will be alive in 2022 to stop any attack on Church doctrine as he did this year in defending the mandatory nature of celibacy in the Church, I think that without him liberals will have more strength to act in the Church. in 2022 the synod of the German Church is concluded, which seems to want to claim its own doctrinal authority, so if the Pope's synod grants doctrinal authority to the bishops, they will initiate a break with the Church

 

This is a likely scenario unless we have Divine Intervention. The fact that we have this burgeoning plague teaches me that we as humans have no control over some things. God is not mocked. He will have the last answer. His Church will prevail against the gates of Hell. We know this, but we do not know the timetable.

 

Francis vs. the Deep Church

Does the Vatican have a General Directorate for Personnel? This is, perhaps, the most boring question ever posed by a writer in Crisis Magazine. And yet, as we fumble for an answer, we also come a little closer to understanding one of the most confounding papacies in 2,000 years of Christian history.

Last Friday, the Vatican’s daily news bulletin announced the creation of this new “Directorate,” which would be nestled under the Secretariat of State. It was to be charged with “internal ecclesiastical governance,” and was called “a step of great importance in the path of reform initiated by Pope Francis.”

The next day, Rome took it all back. “It’s a proposal advanced to the Holy Father by Cardinal Reinhard Marx, President of the Council for the Economy, and Cardinal Óscar Rodríguez Maradiaga, President of the Council of Cardinals, to institute such a structure,” the Vatican explained. Apparently, the proposal had not (yet) secured the Holy Father’s approval.

But even that’s speculating. In truth, we really have no idea what’s going on. Is someone in the Secretariat of State now openly taking orders from Cardinals Marx and Maradiaga? Both progressive prelates were burned by Pope Francis’s crackdown on the German bishops’ “synodal journey” and his lack of support for married priests in Querida Amazonia. At present, the Holy Father is laid low with a bad cold. Are these diehards fomenting some sort of revolt in his absence, aided by ecclesiastical bureaucrats within the Eternal City?

Now here’s the larger point: Pope Francis’s critics generally fall into one of two categories. The more strident tend to view him as a master manipulator—a Modernist agent working to undermine the traditions and dogma of Holy Mother Church. The milder ones see him as well-intentioned but naïve, ill-suited to the power games that prevail in Rome’s upper echelons.

When I was an Anglican working for (conservative) political magazines, I fell in the former camp. But since converting and joining the religion beat, I’ve slowly drifted into the latter camp. And this little incident—please, let’s not call it Directorategate—perfectly illustrates why.

Francis is a man of profound contradictions. He abhorred liberation theology as a young Jesuit provincial, back when the Society of Jesus in Argentina was first overrun with Marxists. And yet, as pope, he notoriously accepted the gift of a crucifix wrought of a hammer and sickle from Bolivian president Evo Morales.

He made his first splash as Supreme Pontiff by saying, “Who am I to judge?” when asked a question about the hypothetical confession of a gay man. And yet, as Archbishop Carlo Maria Viganò recalled in his testimony, Francis once told him that bishops “must not be left-wing”—”and when I say left-wing,” he clarified, “I mean homosexual.”


MORE:
https://www.crisismagazine.com/2020/francis-vs-the-deep-church

 

Half way through reading that opinion piece, it struck me that I have the perfect bridge for sale to the author.

 

Or a puppet.

 

I was very glad to hear what Pope Francis said during his homily that re-opened the churches for the people of Rome at least to be able to go and pray. That there are no processions or other ceremonies like prayer vigils that one could keep an adequate social distancing from one another surprises me both in Rome as well as here in places in the US but all we can do it seems is offer it to God as a penance and pray for this to glorify Him. Pope Francis especially now needs all our prayers.

 

This is as good an explanation as any. It's almost as if he had dueling personalities.