Long Knives Out For Another Good Bishop AND Franciscan Friars Of The Immaculate

We've seen the unceremonious sacking of both Cardinal Burke and Bishop Livieres of Paraguay.  Now it looks as though Bishop Robert Finn is the latest in the progressive cross-hairs.  Eponymous Flower has listed some of his accomplishments in the Diocese of Kansas City - St Joseph.  Here are a few (please read the whole list)

• Promoted Summorum Pontificum and offered the Extraordinary Form of the Mass
• Raised vocations to a 40-year high (Bishop Livieres did that too.  Is increased vocations now considered to be a liability in the Church of Nice?  I suppose so, if the young men are orthodox).
• One that EF missed is that he formally asked the "National Catholic Reporter" to stop calling itself "Catholic", owing to its embrace of heresy and dissidence.  No doubt that set some teeth on edge at one of the "church of nice's" favorite rags.

Finn's administration has not always been stellar. In 2011 he failed to report to the authorities a priest who had pornography on his computer.  But why is Finn being fly-specked while someone like Bishop Robert Lynch of St. Petersburg FL is given a free pass?  Remember that the latter had to spend thousands of dollars to various, uh, "partners" in legal settlements AND he gave the green light to Michael Schiavo as the latter murdered his wife Terri in his diocese.

The Vatican recently sent Ottawa Archbishop Terrence Prendergrast to "investigate" Bishop Finn while the latter was in Rome.  His investigation basically consisted of polling people by asking "do you think Finn is fit to be a leader"?  There's no hint that Prendergrast was the slightest bit interested in the 2011 incident.  So what is that about???

That's the story of the Vatican progressives baring their teeth at Bishop Finn.  Now let's look at their ongoing malicious vendetta against the Franciscan Friars of the Immaculate.  Six of the Friars had sought incardination under other bishops and were awaiting dispensation from their vows to the FFI.  They did not receive those dispensations.  Rather, they received suspensions "a divinis".  That is a sanction reserved for the most grave matters; moreover, it is a sanction that is subject to strict due process under canon law.  Commissioner Fidenzio Volpi observed none of the due process regulations; he delivered the suspensions with no regard to the processes of Canon Law.

None of this is any accident.  Moreover, it is unreasonable to presume that Pope Francis had no knowledge of these matters.  Some, in attempts to give to the Pope the "benefit of the doubt" have to resort to all manners of denial and logical contortions to the point of engaging in intellectual and yes, spiritual, dishonesty.  It's high time that rose-colored glasses were stripped from all faces.  If we're going to lift up our Church and her leaders in prayer, we must be relentlessly honest about the faults of all concerned.  Else our prayers will be so much pious but ineffectual fluffy-puff-stuff.