Fr. Thomas Rosica claims that Cardinal Bergoglio banned the Tridentine Mass in Buenos Aires

From Fr. Thomas Rosica's speech, "An inside Look into the Papal Transition" recently broadcast on Salt and Light TV[the following, beginning at 29:35]:  

The final ideological temptation, that the Pope has been speaking about; he refers to it as the Pelagian solution. The Pelagians, this group at the time of St. Augustine, believed that sanctity was the result of human effort without any assistance from God or the Spirit. This is the temptation of conservative Catholicism to a form of restorationism. "We gotta get back to what things were; the Council was wrong, this shouldn't have happened. We're gonna take you back to the real thing'"!

They seek a purely disciplinary solution to all of the Church's problems; through the restoration of outdated forms and manners, the usage of English [Latin?] language, incomprehensible to most of us who speak English. On a cultural level, it is no longer meaningful. We can see why Francis rejected the  grandiose Papal apparel. One of the things I felt very badly about (and I loved Pope Benedict), is the way that they dressed him up in these past years, and put vestments and things on him. And looking at some of the pictures; saying: this is not Pope Benedict. This is not this great theologian. And how many of us - hopefully not a lot of us here - loved Pope Benedict for the wrong reasons. And there's nothing worse than loving someone for the wrong reasons. 

I asked some of my friends who are very upset with the simplicity of Pope Francis; I said: what were you upset about; what are you upset about? "We loved Benedict! We loved the clothes, we loved the fanon". We loved all these exotic things from museum cupboards"! But I said: did you remember Pope Benedict's homily on Christmas Midnight Mass, do you remember what he said on Holy Thursday, do you remember what he said at the Stations of the Cross at the colosseum? "No! I liked the clothing". 

As Archbishop of Buenos Aires, Jorge Maria Bergoglio was never a fan of the Tridentine Mass, and he only allowed it when it was mandated by Pope Benedict for the entire Church. There is nothing wrong with the Tridentine Mass; it was a very beautiful attempt of Pope Benedict to make peace in the Church. But for adherents of that Mass who wish to use it as a weapon of division, as a denial of the Council, as a mean spirited force; no liturgy in the name of Jesus Christ is meant to do that. Whether one celebrates the New Rite, the Extraordinary Form, the Rite of Paul VI, or whatever, it is ultimately about Jesus Christ and his life giving action in that celebration. 

UPDATE: Vox Cantoris has published a commentary on Fr. Rosica's speech, "Rosicanism". 

My own commentary may be read here. 

Canonist Ed Peters on the dangers of idle chatter about the Church changing Her doctrine on divorce

Rumours are being spread that Pope Francis is going to "change" doctrine on marriage and divorce. Others are spreading rumours that it will be contraception. Some of this noise is even coming from those who have masqueraded for years as "Catholics"; usually strident self-promoting laypersons (as they no doubt would wish to be termed). 

Ed Peters has a sober article on the foolishness of trying to speculate over things that have no pastoral component. Doctrine cannot change. The Pope can no more change doctrine on these issues, then declare that a square is a circle. People who muse on such things do not understand the concept of the universal Ordinary Magisterium. 

What EWTN does not want you to see

I have been concerned for some time as to the direction/s EWTN is going. That organization certainly has a lot of good programming, and is strongly pro-life. However, there is more and more, not only neo-con material appearing, but, so it seems, an internal struggle pertaining to doctrine. 

Rorate Caeli posts an interesting article that is self explanatory. The author's opinion, Patrick Archbold  - and that all it is, an opinion - was deemed unacceptable by EWTN. It was removed.

Fr. Paul Nicholson: "stay Catholics dear friends, stay victorious"

Fr. Paul Nicholson reminds us of the importance to remain united to Christ through the See of Peter during troubling times. 

Fr. Paul Nicholson on the Duty of Correcting wayward Catholics according to St. Peter Damian

There is much talk about who and how a superior should be corrected. Given that we are in a crisis of unprecedented proportion, a careful viewing and studying of Fr. Paul Nicholson's exposition of St. Peter Damian's thesis on correcting the wayward - especially the clergy - is necessary.  

The Hands of the Handmaid..... by Susan Fox

THE HANDS OF THE HANDMAID:

God rocking in the cradle

(The chief charism of the Legion of Mary is evangelization, and her members regard themselves as the mystical presence of Our Lady in the world. This was written during Peregrinatio Pro Christo, an adventure for Christ, in which legionaries traveled from all over the United States to do door-to-door evangelization for a full week in Anacortes, Wash.)

By Susan Fox

My Lady's hands are sewing

beauty in embroidered light,

quickly moving to the rhythm

that the cricket chirps tonight.

A life is slowly mended,

   a heart now turns to Christ;

another reaches as a child

for that Great Love so mild

that made us out of nothing,

good and perfect in His sight...

The full poem may be read here. 

Pray for peace in the Ukraine

The genius of Wagner: Parsifal and Tannhauser

The Royal Opera's director, Antonio Pappano, presents a remarkable talk on Wagner's final opera, Parsifal. Parsifal was also Wagner's "religious" work, and deserves - as with all his music - serious listening. 

The following is a performance in Rome of  Wagner before Pope Benedict XVI.

The seductive lure of Fifties Catholicism

Though the Church in the 1950s certainly had Her good points; conversions, especially with missionary growth in third world countries, far greater evil was already outweighing the good. The Providential blessing of the Second Vatican Council, if there was one, was to detonate the fraud of fifties Catholicism. Firstly, we need some definitions. When I use this term I refer to the socio-economic-religio mindset of the vast majority of Catholics in western Europe and North America. Fifties Catholicism was the result of well over 100 years of moral and spiritual degeneration that turned Catholicism from being counter-cultural to a mushy, feel-good religion that outside of Mass barely distinguished the Catholic from his or her nominal protestant neighbour. 

Early signs were the ignoring of Gregory XVI's Mirari vos, and the American bishops desperate equivocations vis-a-vis Pius IX's Syllabus and Quanta cura. The bishops were more interested in being good Americans then good Catholics. The end result of Americanism was the establishment rejoicing in the election of Kennedy to the Presidency. Worldwide, a few decades earlier, Pius XI's Quas Primas on Christ the King received a similar treatment to Mirari vos: silence, obfuscation, rejection...

Open decadence exploded after the Council to reveal the true spiritual state of the Church in these affluent countries. It was Fifties Catholics who wrecked the Church after Vatican II; it was Fifties Catholics who were caught asleep when neo-Modernists seized control of most of the organs of control in the Church. Fifties Catholics were, as religious sentimentalists, unable and unwilling to react. Though not doctrinal modernists, they were - and in their modern reincarnation, still are - social modernists. 

Pius XI was well aware of this disease in 1922, when he wrote his inaugural encyclical, Ubi arcano. These sentimentalists recited (note, they did not pray) Rosaries, novenas, went to Mass every Sunday; perhaps were in the choir, the Sodality etc,; but the Church, the parish had been reduced to a feel good social club. Gone was the missionary, counter-cultural spirit, gone was the fight for conversions, gone was opposition to secularism in all its hideousness. 

Do you wish to know the name of a priest who was a real missionary, a real fighter, a real counter-culturalist? St. Maximilian Kolbe. Yet it was this radically militant priest, who was able, in that hellhole of Auschwitz, to achieve the impossible: ubi caritas et amor, Deus ibi est... and thus save the souls of the doomed men. Radical Catholicism has that divine ability to spread true love where hatred exists! Yet this same man would no doubt be suspended from the priesthood if he were alive today. Doubt it? Read his writings! You know he would be suspended! A sign of grave spiritual illness in the Church.

Sadly, there are those who wish to return to some form of fifties Catholicism, thinking that a return to the mere externals of worship prevalent at that time will bring a revitalization. Not a chance. It did not work back then, and it will not work today. The culture has changed; and it is always changing. We can no more go back to 1955, then Catholics during the Council of Trent could return to the Church of Aquinas. It is a question of radical evangelization at the moment in time, and moving this into the future. It is a question of doctrine, and living that doctrine, not time travel.

An even greater danger is that this neo-fifties Catholicism is a delusional re-creation of a pseudo-fifties. What some wish to reconstruct is actually even worse than what existed in the fifties, for it is a caricature. One certainly can understand why some seek the all elusive (so they think) doctrinal solidity of the 1950s, but a review of the facts does not support this. 

One example of this externalist fantasy is the use - more the abuse - of the Mantilla. The wearing of it is symbolic not so much always of piety, but an attempt to import a foreign cultural expression from Spain amongst peoples predominantly of northern European extraction to the degree that it has become a totemistic affectation. Polish, English, Irish etc. women did not wear the lace headdress of wealthy Spanish women. Affluent northern European  women wore hats. Poor women wore scarves (usually with delightful folk designs and colours). Nothing is odder than chapels populated with women dressed as neo-Mennonites or flower children - with little pre-pubescent girls in ankle-length dresses  and mantillas. Ridiculous sentimentalism and dangerous Manicheanism. This North American phenomena, driven by influences drawn from puritanism, will not rebuild the Church. To try to go back in time is foolish, to try to go back into a fantasy world, even more so. The Church is not going to be saved with ensuring little boys attend supper resplendent in dinner jackets (not to mention crew cuts), nor blocking out the sun with an umbrella of mantillas. The Church is not localized culture, however quaint or charming; it is the Body of Christ. It is a question of reality, not fantasy. 

But it goes even deeper. The fixation on accidental cultural externals is indicative of a desire to be "safe", to "feel good" to have a sense of "belonging". My apologies to those of you who may be shocked. True religion is not about safety, feeling good, belonging. It is about risk, abandonment, the Cross, suffering. It is about evangelization; not mirror gazing. A sack of a dress, a mantilla, coming out of Mass on Sunday and feeling good is not true religion.  The  Catholic Church is not a social club for self affirmation, for the indulgence of a nice, warm, mushy inner feeling. The Church is not a quasi-political association!

The Church preaches Jesus Christ and Him Crucified. Nothing more. Her preaching is the Cross; living the Cross. One does not get to Heaven on Feather beds! as St. Thomas More would say. One gets to Heaven on the Cross. Fifities Catholicism was a Catholicism of a cross-less Christ. Blasphemy! 

Fifties Catholicism will not bring back the Cross; it will only bring back a more horrendous replay of the disaster of the immediate conciliar and post-conciliar years.

How the Great Powers conspired against the Holy See in 1915 with the shameful Secret Treaty of London

Not enough Catholics are aware of the bitter Freemasonic opposition to the diplomatic efforts of the Holy See. In 1915, on April 26th, the anti-Catholic Italian government was induced to join the Great Powers in a secret treaty, signed in London.

Clause 15:

France, Great Britain, and Russia undertake to support Italy, in so far as she does not permit the representatives of the Holy See to take diplomatic action with regard to the conclusion of the peace and the regulation of questions connected with the war.

Clause 16: 

The present Treaty is to be kept secret...

Signed: Grey (Great Britain); Cambon (France); Imperiali (Italy); and Beckendorff (Russia).

Hence, Pope Benedict XV, the Pope of Peace, was excluded. Likewise his August 1st, 1917 Five Point Plan was haughtily cast aside. The Masonic President of the United States, Woodrow Wilson, dismissed the Holy Father's efforts in this manner: "To deal with such a power [Germany], by way of peace, upon the plan proposed by His Holiness, would, as far as we can see, involve a recuperation of its strength and a renewal of its policy, and would make it necessary to create a permanent hostile combination of nations against the German people who are its instruments" (c.f. Benedict XV, Pope of Peace, H.E. Rope).

The immediate result of all this was the disastrous Peace of Versailles, and the naturalistic League of Nations. Lloyd George and Clemenceau worked hard after the Great War to ensure Bavaria was not attached to Austria; as well as working might and main to ensure that any reborn Poland was as weak as possible. The longer term result of all this was Germany recuperating her strength, and the birth of a racialist State which would eventually lead to gas chambers.... all because the Holy Father was cast aside. God is not mocked.

Let the present rulers of the United Nations be warned that the mocking, the casting aside of Christ's Vicar has serious consequences. It should also awaken us to the reality that the great "democratic" powers, shall I say, are not favourably disposed towards Christ and His Church. 

It also is interesting to note that quite a number of internet resources on the Treaty exclude Clause 15. A slightly different version of Clause 15 may be read here, which does not carry a different import than my version. 

The poetry of Susan Fox: The homeless heart is made for God

There are many ways of evangelizing. One method is through the use of art. The Catholic Church, the great cultural benefactor of Society, has always encouraged beautiful art: be it visually, the spoken word, or music. Pope Benedict XVI has written about the value of beauty, of art , of music as a great gift of God. 

Susan Fox, a dear friend of Witness is one such Catholic artist whom I would encourage you to read her poetry. Here is just the opening two stanzas of one of her latest poems. Please visit her blog to read it in its entirety and other poems as well. 

Willard’s Heart: Made for God

                                    by Susan Fox

He worked in the adult book store –

the one they call, “The Rat” –a cigarette  

in his mouth and a new-grown mustache;

a man and a little class.

He came to us

                               like the cat on the Fourth of July - 

-thrust into the Center by loud noise, 

shivering and afraid. But he chose to stay. 

People avoided Willard, but he never abandoned anyone....

The bishops, the media, and the sexual revolution - the result being the near destruction of the Church?

"The family, like the Church, ought to be a place where the Gospel is transmitted and from which the Gospel radiates"

Pope Paul VI

Most of us are tragically aware - or should be - that the vast majority of "Catholics" dissent on serious matters pertaining to Christian morality. The reasons are various, but the end result is abandonment of the Faith. Along with ignorance, spiritual laziness, material heresy and lack of catechesis, families' minds are being warped and twisted  "above all from the mass media" (Pope John Paul II, Familiaris consortio). Parents are thus the nexus point of this spiritual combat.

The ministry of evangelization carried out by Christian parents is original and irreplaceable. It assumes the characteristics typical of family life itself, which should be interwoven with love, simplicity, practicality and daily witness.

But this presupposes parents themselves catechized, solidly evangelized; living the Faith. As the Pope wrote "it assumes", amongst other things "daily witness". And, as we know, this is not the case. Modern "Catholicism" is just another feel-good social club; mushy, silly and devoid of the Cross. A caricature, a blasphemy. 

What we are witnessing - unless there is some near miraculous reversal - is a near total collapse of the Catholic Church in Europe and the English-speaking world. 

We are looking at a massive paradigm shift; the Catholic Church in these lands returning to a small - probably very small - local church - yet intense, evangelical. This tiny, future, local church will be viciously persecuted. Churchmen - naturally - are in denial. Things are good; the local church (yes, she has a few troubles) is solid and making progress. Nonsense! Rubbish!! Lies!! The local church is imploding: look around. 

The local churches in Europe and North America (and not only) have been betrayed by cowardly and ravenous churchmen; wolves in sheep's clothing who have abandoned the flock and handed them over to satan to be sifted like wheat. What can we say of our young people who have been so easily, so swiftly, sucked into the pan-sexualist whirlpool of sybaritic immorality? I have predicted before, and I repeat here again: in 30 years we are looking at an implosion of unprecedented magnitude. Look for a collapse somewhere in the 80 % plus range. 

And yet, was it not 33 years ago that Pope John Paul II warned the Church and bishops in particular about the dangers facing the family; and, by extension the Church and the whole of human society? He was certainly not the first Pope to ring the alarm bell. Pius XI rang a huge bell with Casti connubii. Catholics failed to listen to the Pope, but instead more and more to their protestant and lapsed neighbours. They spent far too much time succumbing to secular influences, and indulged in 50s Catholicism which ultimately led to the near collective dive off the cliff following the Council into the sea of secularism. They have been drowning since.

To return to John Paul's warnings and admonitions: 

Not infrequently ideas and solutions which are very appealing but which obscure in varying degrees the truth and the dignity of the human person, are offered to the men and women of today, in their sincere and deep search for a response to the important daily problems that affect their married and family life. These views are often supported by the powerful and pervasive organization of the means of social communication, which subtly endanger freedom and the capacity for objective judgment.

He was ignored. He was betrayed. More accurately: Christ was ignored, Christ was betrayed. And the result of betraying our Blessed Lord is the wrath of His Father. Following the betrayal of our Lord with the rejection of Humanae Vitae, is it any wonder that local churches in rebellion began to collapse? For a few years it was not so much evident: a cut off branch still might have a few green leaves. But, give it time, and it withers, dies. So it is with the various  de facto schismatic in spirit local churches: they have been cut off from Grace by the Father for the betrayal of His Son by vile, evil churchmen. 

To return to the Pope again: 

In the context of a culture which seriously distorts or entirely misinterprets the true meaning of human sexuality, because it separates it from its essential reference to the person, the Church more urgently feels how irreplaceable is her mission of presenting sexuality as a value and task of the whole person, created male and female in the image of God.

Are you seeing any urgency in your diocese?

The person principally responsible in the diocese for the pastoral care of the family is the Bishop. As father and pastor, he must exercise particular solicitude in this clearly priority sector of pastoral care. He must devote to it personal interest, care, time, personnel and resources, but above all personal support for the families...

Is your bishop actively supporting families and teaching the truth about human sexuality in the face of false "teaching" given daily by the media?

...Priests and deacons, when they have received timely and serious preparation for this apostolate, must unceasingly act towards families as fathers, brothers, pastors and teachers, assisting them with the means of grace and enlightening them with the light of truth.

And your priests and deacons?  

Cardinal-elect Vincent Nichols on welfare reform in Britain

Fr Paul Nicholson on the pernicious evil of pornography

Fr. Paul Nicholson is one priest who is a true evangelist. God bless him. May Our Lady protect him in his ministry.

Fr Nicholson provides us with a very sober assessment of the ubiquitous invasion of pornography into the lives of young people. This is something that virtually no priest or bishop seems to want to address. And yet, it is a soul destroyer, a life destroyer, and a family destroyer. 

No surprise, but "Catholics" have taken to pornography, like a flea to a dog. As I mentioned in an earlier post, the crisis of sexual morality (driven more recently by its easy access via the internet, and new technologies e.g. Instagram) is so serious that it has been  dealt with by two popes in detail. Both Pope John Paul II and Pope Benedict XVI called for a concerted Pastoral Plan to deal with grave misunderstandings about human sexuality. The Popes were ignored with the inevitable result of the vast majority of Catholics dissenting from Church teaching. Now we know why: churchmen, virtually to a man have failed. The situation is so grave with Faith, religious indifferentism and ethics eating away at the body of the Church, that Pope Benedict calls it a "profound crisis" of Faith. 

One frightening reality is that a significant minority of regular, Sunday going Catholics (predominantly males, but not exclusively) are habitual pornography consumers. Apparently, "sexting" is incredibly popular amongst youngsters. How can this be? Was the lure of the modern world so strong that priests, parents and schools were no match? Or, have there also been grave failings amongst pastors, parents and schools? The sense of decency, morality, sin has been totally numbed. 

Pornography insinuates itself via the promotion of the sexually bizarre; as well as abnormal sexual practices. It parasites on art, as the lie does on truth.  Hence, it tries to masquerade as normal. A local Toronto example (BRAZEN: Sexual Stigma Overcome) of the penetration of deviancy and pornography into society was a "group art exhibition" about  which, according to the information provided, called for exhibits stressing "safe sex, queerness and kinkiness". Abstinence is a "a scar left on the psyche". A "positive" review of the event may be read here. 

Do events such as the above contain lapsed Christians? How many Catholics  are there who have turned their back on Christ and His Church? How is this all possible? Fr. Nicholson encourages us to see the vast possibilities of evangelization; to bring back those who have fallen away, to reach out to those who have never know Christ, His beauty, and His Church. The importance of teaching our young people to live chastely is central to being faithful to Our Lord, and thereby living a truly human existence. We must begin to think what are we doing to promote chaste living amongst our youth; our young Catholic people? Many dioceses are becoming more and more concerned with "devout" church going families, succumbing in various degrees to unchaste and impure living. The Archdiocese of New York has even developed a program to assist confessors when dealing with pornography; so prevalent has it become. 

We usually do not just sit on our thoughts; an impure mind, soon leads to an impure lifestyle. The numbing of the conscience to the reality of sin opens full wide the door to sexual libertinism and moral degeneration. This is further exacerbated with a society that has, or is establishing gender ideology as a new religious dogma; replete with intolerance towards those who adhere to Christian morality. 

A final thought: what has your bishop done to implement the Popes call for a Pastoral Plan on sexual ethics?

Visit Pope Benedict at the Apostolic Palace

Yesterday, was the first anniversary of the resignation of our beloved Pope Benedict XVI. The following video is a beautiful and intimate portrait that delves into the daily world of the Pope; watch a beautiful morning Mass, see the Holy Father prepare and address the faithful from his study window; witness ladies lovingly prepare the Holy Father's meals, join the Holy Father at the dining room table, walk and pray with the Holy Father during his private moments.... 

Lumen Fidei and the rejection of gender-ideology

A further passage of note, from Pope Francis' encyclical, Lumen Fidei (already forgotten and/or ignored) may enlighten us to the Catholic response to gender ideology, of which a main component is the promotion of the idea that sexual differentiation is not a unique sign of God's goodness (hence, homosexualism outside the Church; homoheresy within the Church as a "theological" position taken in varying degrees by members of the clergy). 

"The first setting in which faith enlightens the human city is the family. I think first and foremost of the stable union of man and woman in marriage. This union is born of their love, as a sign and presence of God’s own love, and of the acknowledgment and acceptance of the goodness of sexual differentiation, whereby spouses can become one flesh (cf. Gen 2:24) and are enabled to give birth to a new life, a manifestation of the Creator’s goodness, wisdom and loving plan. Grounded in this love, a man and a woman can promise each other mutual love in a gesture which engages their entire lives and mirrors many features of faith. Promising love for ever is possible when we perceive a plan bigger than our own ideas and undertakings, a plan which sustains us and enables us to surrender our future entirely to the one we love. Faith also helps us to grasp in all its depth and richness the begetting of children, as a sign of the love of the Creator who entrusts us with the mystery of a new person"

Pope Francis

Roberto de Mattei: The Unspoken history of Vatican II

An interesting video (in English with Polish translation), with serious reflections on the Second Vatican Council by Prof. Roberto de Mattei should be carefully studied by Catholics. Your understanding of the Council will be deeply enriched by this address.

The address was given in Krakow, Poland before the Club "Polonia Christiana". de Mattei is clear, he is speaking as an historian, not a theologian. The opening address by John XXIII is of critical importance to de Mattei: the relationship between the Church and the modern world. It was to be non-doctrinal, but a new pastoral approach. The Church's language was changing, because Her judgment on the world was changing. The shift to the papacy of Paul VI was no longer optimism, but a pessimism, founded on Maritainian "integral humanism" (c.f. Paul's closing address). 

More importantly than even the documents is the paradigm of the Council which can be summed up in Paul VI's "boundless sympathy for the world". The pastoral element was raised to a higher level than the dogmatic; the accidental pastoral element became the priority. The change in language from the past is to carry out a transformation that is deeper than seen. The manner of presentation, reveals a way of being and thinking. 

For example, says de Mattei, the thinking that hell is empty (something the Council did not do) is not only reckless, but probably an heretical proposition. Omitting/limiting hell - as the Council did - in reference to hell, is not erroneous, but is an omission that paves the way for a more serious error in that hell is something that is not spoken of, or does not exist. Kung, Rahner etc., reduced hell to a mythological description, while considering its reality as empty. This negation, or resizing of hell, was implicit in the papal opening address. 

A more momentous example of omission is that of communism. Until the Council the Magisterium was clear and spoke with condemnation. The sessions of the Council would have been a perfect place to commence a trial against communism, as Nuremburg exposed culturally, morally Nazism. The progressive minority demanded a dialogical opening to the world. A petition to condemn on Oct 9th, 1965, by over 454 fathers from 86 countries, was suppressed; causing an enormous scandal. Cardinal Oddi wrote that it was a "disconcerting fact" that the Council did not speak about communism. Gaudium et Spes tried to render a new description between the Church and the world. Yet, it lacked any condemnation of communism.

de Mattei believes that the heritage left by the Council is the loss of the "militant spirit"; the rediscovery of this is an urgent priority of the Church of our time. The defenders of tradition in the Assembly, need to be recognized as prophets; we need defenders of tradition, patrons of tradition. St. Teresa of Avila wrote words that should comfort us: "let nothing trouble you, let nothing frighten you, everything passes. God never changes". These words, says de Mattei should be a manifesto. Tradition is not only the rule of the Church, but the foundation of society. 

Bishop Richard Williamson: The modern world - "its god is liberty"

Pius XII's encyclical "Unity of Human Society" is a rebuke to the delusions of the post-conciliar Popes fantasies regarding the UN

Pius XII wrote the following just after the outbreak of war in 1939. His words should be studied with the UN attack on the Church in mind. Contrast the great pope's realistic assessment of the international situation with Pope Paul's dream of 1965. It is time that the leading churchmen return to such sound doctrine, avoiding niceties and foolish compromises. One does not compromise truth with a lie.

 ...We limit Ourselves to some fundamental observations.

28. The present age, Venerable Brethren, by adding new errors to the doctrinal aberrations of the past, has pushed these to extremes which lead inevitably to a drift towards chaos. Before all else, it is certain that the radical and ultimate cause of the evils which We deplore in modern society is the denial and rejection of a universal norm of morality as well for individual and social life as for international relations; We mean the disregard, so common nowadays, and the forgetfulness of the natural law itself, which has its foundation in God, Almighty Creator and Father of all, supreme and absolute Lawgiver, all-wise and just Judge of human actions. When God is hated, every basis of morality is undermined; the voice of conscience is stilled or at any rate grows very faint, that voice which teaches even to the illiterate and to uncivilized tribes what is good and what is bad, what lawful, what forbidden, and makes men feel themselves responsible for their actions to a Supreme Judge.

29. The denial of the fundamentals of morality had its origin, in Europe, in the abandonment of that Christian teaching of which the Chair of Peter is the depository and exponent. That teaching had once given spiritual cohesion to a Europe which, educated, ennobled and civilized by the Cross, had reached such a degree of civil progress as to become the teacher of other peoples, of other continents. But, cut off from the infallible teaching authority of the Church, not a few separated brethren have gone so far as to overthrow the central dogma of Christianity, the Divinity of the Savior, and have hastened thereby the progress of spiritual decay.

30. The Holy Gospel narrates that when Jesus was crucified "there was darkness over the whole earth" (Matthew xxvii. 45); a terrifying symbol of what happened and what still happens spiritually wherever incredulity, blind and proud of itself, has succeeded in excluding Christ from modern life, especially from public life, and has undermined faith in God as well as faith in Christ. The consequence is that the moral values by which in other times public and private conduct was gauged have fallen into disuse; and the much vaunted civilization of society, which has made ever more rapid progress, withdrawing man, the family and the State from the beneficent and regenerating effects of the idea of God and the teaching of the Church, has caused to reappear, in regions in which for many centuries shone the splendors of Christian civilization, in a manner ever clearer, ever more distinct, ever more distressing, the signs of a corrupt and corrupting paganism: "There was darkness when they crucified Jesus" (Roman Breviary, Good Friday, Response Five).

31. Many perhaps, while abandoning the teaching of Christ, were not fully conscious of being led astray by a mirage of glittering phrases, which proclaimed such estrangement as an escape from the slavery in which they were before held; nor did they then foresee the bitter consequences of bartering the truth that sets free, for error which enslaves. They did not realize that, in renouncing the infinitely wise and paternal laws of God, and the unifying and elevating doctrines of Christ's love, they were resigning themselves to the whim of a poor, fickle human wisdom; they spoke of progress, when they were going back; of being raised, when they groveled; of arriving at man's estate, when they stooped to servility. They did not perceive the inability of all human effort to replace the law of Christ by anything equal to it; "they became vain in their thoughts" (Romans i. 21).

32. With the weakening of faith in God and in Jesus Christ, and the darkening in men's minds of the light of moral principles, there disappeared the indispensable foundation of the stability and quiet of that internal and external, private and public order, which alone can support and safeguard the prosperity of States.

The Catholic Church's decades long delusion about the UN is shattered

It may well do us good to recall the address given by Pope Paul VI on October 4th, 1965 before the United Nations. This foolish, delusional approach to the world body, has fed the Catholic belief that somehow the Church can positively influence this body. I think that as of February 5th, hopefully, most Catholics will realize that the UN, in its official positions, is an open enemy of Christ and His Church. May the scales fall from our eyes. It waits to be seen if leading churchmen continue with the delusion, or, awaken. 

Our message is meant to be, first of all, a moral and solemn ratification of this lofty institution. This message comes from Our historical experience. It is as an "expert in humanity" that We bring to this Organization the suffrage of Our recent Predecessors, that of the entire Catholic Episcopate, and Our own, convinced as We are that this Organization represents the obligatory path of modern civilization and of world peace...

...The peoples of the earth turn to the United Nations as the last hope of concord and peace. We presume to present here, together with Our own, their tribute to honour and of hope... 


...This is the finest aspect of the United Nations; it is its most truly human aspect; it is the ideal that mankind dreams of on its pilgrimage through time; it is the world's greatest hope; it is, We presume to say, the reflection of the loving and transcendent design of God for the progress of the human family on earth a reflection in which We see the heavenly message of the Gospel. Here indeed We seem to hear the echo of the voice of Our Predecessors, and particularly of Pope John XXIII, whose message of "Pacem in Terris" received so honourable and significant a response among you. You proclaim here the fundamental rights and duties of man, his dignity, his freedom and above all his religious freedom. We feel that you thus interpret the highest sphere of human wisdom and, We would almost say, its sacred character. For you deal here above all with human life, and human life is sacred; no one may dare make an attempt upon it. Respect for life, even with regard to the great problem of the birth rate, must find here in your Assembly its highest affirmation and its most rational defence. Your task is to ensure that there is enough bread on the tables of mankind, and not to encourage an artificial control of births, which would be irrational, in order to diminish the number of guests at the banquet of life. It is not enough, however, to feed the hungry; it is necessary also to assure to each man a life that befits his dignity. This, too, you strive to achieve. Is this not the fulfillment before Our very eyes, and through your efforts, of that prophetic utterances applicable to your Institution: "They shall beat their swords into ploughshares and their spears into pruninghooks" (Is. 2:4). Are you not using the prodigious energies of the earth and the magnificent inventions of science, no longer as instruments of death, but as tools of life for the new era of humanity? ... All this is magnificent and merits everyone's praise and support, including Our own. We, too, would set an example, even though the smallness of Our means may hinder an awareness of its practical implication: We intend to give Our charitable institutions a new development in order to combat the hunger of the world and to meet its principle needs. It is thus, and in no other way, that peace can be built. One more word, Gentlemen, one last word: this edifice which you are constructing does not rest upon merely material and earthly foundations, for if so, it would be a house built upon sand; it rests above all on our own consciences. The hour has indeed struck for "conversion," for personal transformation, for interior renewal. We must get used to thinking of man in a new way; and of men's life in common in a new way; in a new way, too, of the paths of history and the destiny of the world, in accordance with the words of Saint Paul, to "put on the new man, which has been created according to God in justice and holiness of truth" (Eph. 4:23).

Tragic, absolutely tragic. No conversion, no new man.... 

Liturgical celebration on the 5th anniversary of enthronement of Patriarch Kirill

An extraordinary liturgical celebration was held in Moscow on February 1st. Please see the link for further photos. It would be well advised for the Catholic Church to take note of maintaining, and returning to traditional liturgical practice. 

Significantly, following the Divine Liturgy the presidential envoy addressed the Patriarch as follows. It may well be this potential for growth between the Russian State and the Church that is a major factor in the virulent campaign against the very mild Russian law against homosexual propaganda for minors. Secularism, is now the established official dogma in western Europe and most of the English speaking world. The Catholic Church should take note accordingly, and choose Her allies likewise. 

Mr. A. Beglov, presidential envoy for the Central Federal Region, conveyed to Patriarch Kirill congratulations from President Vladimir Putin.

Speaking in response, Patriarch Kirill said, “I value the opportunity for conducting a benevolent, calm and realistic dialogue with the authorities. Thanks to this dialogue, the spiritual and moral mission of the Church is realized today in concrete joint projects in education, pastoral work with those who need support, be it children, the disabled, the sick, inmates of penitentiaries or the military. The state and the Church maintain a certain internal autonomy from each other, which the legal language calls separation of the Church from the state. At the same time, our people and the Church are not separated from each other”.

Vladimir Putin provides clarity on homosexual propaganda: Russia will protect her children

Will the Sochi Olympics 2014 Opening Ceremony expose the West for its decadence?

When the 2010 Vancouver Winter Games were coming to a close, we were advised by the Russian authorities that they intended to present to the world the best of Russian culture. In a few hours we will see the results:  will it be Tchaikovsky, Scriabin, the Bolshoi  etc., or filthy, disgusting commercialized metronomic cacophony? In all honesty one must admit that the Canadian ceremonies were not manifestations of a cultured mind.

As to the 2012 London ceremonies, the closing events were an absolute betrayal of a nation; powerful commercial and occult forces at that event proceeded to impose on the British nation a foreign, implicitly anti-Christian programme of manifest decadence. (If memory serves me correctly, the first overtly occultic ceremony was the French winter games, set in the 90s).

Art (visual, dance, the written word etc.) and music do not grow in  a vacuum. Music, arguably, the highest product of man's mind is a near spiritual experience, properly understood. Art and music are a great gift of God. To pervert same is a great sin.

I present two examples of art for your reflection. One Russian (albeit using a Polish dance form); the other - based on youtube hits - an apparently very popular "western" pastime, the "Kizomba", masquerading as a "dance". Its lustful vulgarity, the licentious hoots from the onlookers (and matching combox banter) - reflect the profound degree of degeneration that is present across the so-called "west". Watch, reflect, compare.... and weep. How far we have fallen without the Gospels. 

Further recommended viewing:

Pope Benedict XVI against the United Nations

Pope Benedict XVI's Apostolic Journey to Scotland and England provide us with much spiritual and intellectual sustenance against the moral bankruptcy of the United Nations - as exemplified in its bizarre document on the "rights" of the Child, released on the 5th of February. Do not forget that the UN, via the WHO and UNESCO, is closely linked with the most "evil organization on earth" (Fr. Paul Marx OSB), Planned Parenthood. One can hardly take seriously someone who claims to oppose child abuse; yet promotes such evils onto children as: a false conception of the family, a perverted definition of marriage, sexual perversion, sexual libertinism, and "reproductive health" which renders infecund the marriage act, and/or delivers the fruit of conception to be destroyed.Have I forgotten anything?

UN report on sexual abuse by clergy is being used as a cover to attack the Church

The United Nations is not an organization that considers truth important. The organization, in its fundamental documents places truth outside consideration, and enshrines "liberty" as the great human "right". The UN simply does not understand that true liberty is based on truth. Without truth, liberty quickly turns to license. So much for the background of the organization that has just humiliated the Catholic Church before the entire world. 

Back in the 1990s the Catholic Church signed off on the very questionable "rights of the child". In doing so, the Roman authorities thought they could sup with the devil, yet leave before "dessert" was served. Sadly this is not the case. 

The most recent UN report on child sexual abuse is disconcerting. The Roman authorities are caught out by a secular authority in hiding and covering up for numerous clergy who are abusers. Fair enough. Readers of this blog are by now well aware of (e.g.) the ongoing efforts by Scottish churchmen to coverup decades of abuse and homosexual activity by clergy. 

At the same time we should realize that there is a natural human tendency to cover up scandal; especially if it is our own backyard, and will cost us something personally. And this natural tendency at the parish level perpetuates itself at the diocesan level; and so on. This does not excuse coverup; it only suggests how human weakness feeds the mentality of coverup. The UN itself, rife with scandal, corruption, criminal activity (c.f. UN troops committing rape in Africa) etc. too indulges in manifest coverup. 

A serious issue stemming from the UN report, is its own paedophilia, in promoting certain illicit and intrinsically immoral sexual practices for children; insisting the Catholic Church take up the promotion of abortion, birth control, homosexual activity and so on. As I mentioned, the UN has no conception of truth; this report being used to openly attack the Church's right to proclaim the Gospel. 

"abusers.... transferred from parish to parish..."

UN requests the Catholic Church to promote homosexuality

UN requests the Catholic Church to promote birth control and abortion

UN requests the Catholic Church to change education to promote
philosophies on sexuality incompatible with the Gospels

Fr. Patrick Lawson: Removed and persecuted for speaking up against sex abuse

Fr. Patrick Lawson

The recent decision to affirm the canonical removal Fr. Patrick Lawson underscores the culture of denial, coverup, and gross hypocrisy of powerful churchmen in the Scottish hierarchy. Just consider that Fr. Paul Milarvie - caught in a drunken homosexual incident - continues in the Archdiocese of Glasgow as a member of the diocesan curia. A priest indulging in homosexuality is treated with white gloves, promoted, pandered to. A priest exposing sex abuse and corruption is persecuted and removed from ministry. 

Montfort wrote of Fr. Lawson on a number of occasions in previous posts; here and here. Significantly he wrote: 

Fr. Patrick Lawson, a loyal Catholic priest, is presently being persecuted for daring to speak out against and expose the evil that has penetrated deep into the Church in Scotland. I speak of the iniquity of sexual perversion and abuse. Vile and satanic actions committed by men who claim to be priests against others - be they seminarians, youthful vulnerable men, or boys. 

In the case of the evil Patrick Moore, Fr. Lawson had no option but to approach the secular media because the local Church -literally - was hell bent on continuing the coverup. For his courage to speak out, he is being persecuted by Bishop John Cunningham, whose behaviour towards Fr. Lawson is more akin to that of a thug, then a father towards a son. Cunningham is now in the process of instigating canonical procedures against Fr. Lawson.  This is not the first time the Scottish hierarchy has tried to hide behind canon law to continue their coverup and lies. Canonical proceedings against Fr. Matthew Despard were shelved - temporarily - due only to fear on the part of the bishops that the said action would result in massive media exposure of their corruption. We must ensure that Fr. Lawson's case is known and spread far and wide. 

Fr. Paul Milarvie - Member of Archdiocesan Curia
Archdiocese of Glasgow
|Screenshot, Feb 2nd, 2014

From the Herald: 

There have been many years of silence for Patrick Lawson. To understand his story, it is necessary to go right back to 1996. Then a seminarian, he was posted to St Quivox, Prestwick, under the supervision of parish priest Father Paul Moore. One night, he woke to find Moore fondling him under the bedclothes.

He rebuffed Moore, but the parish priest continued to make advances. He also noticed Moore's secrecy about a locked cupboard. "I found a box of keys, and tried each one until it opened. At the bottom, were videos. I don't know what was on them. On the shelves were photographs, some with names on. Provocative photographs: young boys in different poses, some with hats on, naked at the beach. I felt really sick."

Lawson also discovered Moore had abused altar boys and reported this to his bishop, Maurice Taylor.

Taylor and Moore already knew one another. They went on holiday together, visiting a Vatican diplomat from Galloway, Father Peter Magee. Lawson says he found letters between Magee and Moore in the locked cupboard. Magee would later become the head of the Scottish Tribunal, the person responsible for issuing legal advice to the Scottish bishops.

For 17 years, Lawson campaigned for appropriate action to be taken over Moore's abuse. He gave names and numbers of victims to Taylor asking him to help them. Nothing happened. He asked that Moore be laicised - ejected from the priesthood. Nothing happened. Instead, Taylor told parishioners that Moore was going on a well-earned sabbatical. In fact, he was sent abroad for psychological counselling.

ON his return, he was given a presentation and a retirement home - an irony that has not gone unnoticed in Galston. Lawson has had to move back in with his elderly mother and has no house and no income except a small monthly pension the church pays while proceedings in Rome continue. They even deduct his removal costs from the pension each month.

When Taylor retired, Lawson approached his successor, John Cunningham. He also appealed to Cardinal O'Brien, just before news broke of O'Brien's sexual advances to his own priests, and appealed to Archbishop Philip Tartaglia. All refused to help. He felt constantly like an outsider. "Rooms would often go silent when I walked in," he recalls.

Fast forward to 2012. By now, Lawson was looking after three parishes and six towns, but became ill with bladder cancer. He arranged his own cover, receiving no help or visits from the diocese. Doctors advised him to cut his workload and he arranged cover for the parish he did not live in, St Paul's in Hurlford. It was already a divided community with a history of tension predating Father Lawson's arrival. People there were unhappy that they did not have a resident priest. But things escalated when the Vicar General, Willie McFadden, went to St Paul's without telling Lawson, and advised parishioners to put complaints in writing. A parishioner issued pro formas. Twenty-three complaints were received, at least one from someone outwith the parish.

When news of this ­orchestrated campaign leaked, Lawson's ­supporters swung into action. Over 200 letters of support were written. Bishop Cunningham ignored them. Now suffering from stress as well as cancer, Lawson submitted evidence from doctors advising that he could continue with work but only on a reduced basis. The bishop then used the very letters that had been written in support of him as evidence that he was too ill to work.

Although the bishop refuses to say publicly what this case is about, the official grounds for removal on church documents are threefold. Firstly, Father Lawson's ill-health. Secondly, the "loss of his good name" because of the complaints. And thirdly, the "grave harm" this division has done to the ecclesiastical community. But what was it really about? "We knew it was really about his stance over Paul Moore," says parish secretary Manuela Simonini.

The decision from Rome, a seven-page document, just rubber-stamps everything submitted by the bishop, saying the 23 complaints are from "upright and serious-minded parishioners". The 200 supporters, presumably, are not upright and serious. "

...If Rome believed that simply upholding the bishop's authority was likely to dampen down scandal and enforce discipline, the calculation may misfire. The authoritarian way the church has dealt with challenge, while simultaneously preaching "forgiveness" for those who have seriously abused their power, has created a standoff.

On one side is a growing number of priests and lay people who want change; on the other is an old-guard hierarchy, afloat in a turbulent sea of scandals, clinging to the old certainties of secrecy, obedience and control like lifebuoys.

Father Gerry Magee, another Galloway diocese priest, contacted Lawson immediately when he heard of Rome's decision. The bishop had assured priests Lawson had been informed, but he knew nothing.

Despite the letters being dated January 7, he did not receive his until January 30 - the day after his fellow priests were told. A mix-up in Rome, the bishop claimed. A disgrace, says Magee. Magee felt sick when he heard the decision, and contacted Bishop Cunningham immediately.

"What I ask, in God's name is going on here?" he wrote. "All that I am certain of is that all those responsible for this disgrace will be held accountable by God."

Please pray for Fr. Lawson, please pray for Scotland.