Attempts To Silence Us In The Church And Civic Life

When truth is spoken, those who revel in falsehood and fantasy lash out at those who speak it.  They fear both the searing of their consciences and for some the threat to their exploitation of the good faith of those who might be inclined to listen and obey them.  I believe that is why a plethora of these progressive wonks are trying to cajole and even coerce us into silence.

Let's examine the attempt being made by Bishop Barron.  He recently suggested that the US bishops introduce a mandatum for those "who claim to teach the Catholic faith online".  He laments "those trading in hateful divisive speech".  One wonders how he defines "divisive", for truth is divisive.  One either heeds it, or they don't.  There really is no "meeting of the minds" here.  If the bishops were really serious about cleaning up the teaching of the Faith, they have their work cut out for them at so-called Catholic institutes of higher learning like Georgetown University or Marquette University or Notre Dame.  Then of course there's Bishop Barron's heretical "hope" that no one is in hell.  Would that cause him to be denied this "mandatum"?  Of course not!

Then we have the chief of the Italian Bishops' Conference, Cardinal Bassetti, telling Catholics who question the pope's ever-increasing indiscretions to consider leaving the Catholic Church.  In other wods, he is advocating schism.  Similarly, the pope himself had similar gripes.  He coined a new term: "deepfake news".  Of course, if he had been inspired with that phrase by watching CNN or reading the Washington Post I might understand, but the context makes clear his thinking.

The close timing of these two statements by Barron and Bassetti are, I suspect, no coincidence.  They understand that they no longer have total control of the public arena of ideas.  They also know that not only will we spread the word, we will NOT spread our money; recall Saturday's post.  Both of these facts threaten their progressive schemes for the Church.

We are seeing similar backlashes against the truth in the secular arena as well.  In Virginia, the now-Democrat-controlled house is considering HB 1627.  This bill would essentially criminalize any criticism of the governor and other elected officials.  Please note that it is the progressives, mostly Democrats, who are devoid of any sense of obedience to God.  Thus, perceiving themselves to be de facto gods, behave as authoritarian, jack-booted thugs and tyrants.

As we assume the mantle of Church Militant, evil will push back.  We must double down on our prayers, particularly Mass and Rosary.  We must also stand for the Faith.