Today in the Traditional Latin Mass calendar, we celebrated the Feast of Christ the King. In his sermon today, the priest stated that Our Lord is King of all creation, and that all people and nations have the duty to acknowledge Him as such. Furthermore, Father stated that the world will never know peace until Christ is acknowledged as King. This was first stated by Pope Pius XI when he established the Feast of Christ the King.
Father made the point of denouncing not only the errors of the pachamama debacle and the travesty of giving to the leader of a heretical sect a chair in the Vatican Basilica, along with allowing Muslims to worship their demon-idol in the Vatican library. He also reminded us that similar travesties had been committed by John Paul II when he held a "prayer service" with heretics and pagans within the Fatima shrine and at Assisi. Father didn't mention it, but what also came to my mind is when John Paul II degraded his papacy by kissing a koran.
On a happier note, Cardinal Burke celebrated a Traditional Latin Mass in St. Peter's Basilica yesterday. During that Mass, Cardinal Troshani recited the Prayer to St Michael. It was the long form, reserved to priests for the purposes of exorcism. Given all the demonic things that have happened there in the past several years, an exorcism was sorely needed. The video appears below.
Last week, Raymond Arroyo interviewed Cardinal Raymond Burke on the importance of the Traditional Latin Mass and why attempts to suppress it are gravely misguided and most likely engineered by demons themselves. LifeSiteNews summarized some highlights of that conversation. The entire exchange can be viewed in the clip below.
He commented, too, on the number of young people who are coming to the Traditional Latin Mass in great numbers. They are coming because they see the emphasis on Jesus Christ, and Him alone. They see it in the solemnity and the transcendence embodied in the liturgical form and language used. By the way, that draws many of us older types, too.
Later on, as you'll read in the article, His Eminence stated that the contact with God in the most sacred liturgy gives us the strength to overcome evil and do good in our lives. When I read those words, I thought of the Latin maxim "lex orandi, lex credendi, lex vivendi".
Now I will go out on a limb here and state some personal theories. Despite the best efforts of progressive bishops and even popes who seem hell-bent on deconstructing authentic Catholic faith, the Latin Mass continues to grow and attract Catholics. Might it be the ever-increasing grace, brought down by authentic worship, that has enabled people, particularly in those areas that have relative freedoms of speech, assembly and worship, to score victories against de facto tyrants in their civil leadership? Witness the election of Donald Trump in 2024. Witness those areas of the world that are standing up to the plague of illegal immigrants crashing through their borders. Was this mass border-crashing, largely by young Muslim men, a planned invasion designed to implement the Cloward-Piven strategy?
Why else would the progressive bishops, in the pockets of their liberal sugar-daddies, be waxing tyranical against the Tradtional Latin Mass? They understand its spiritual significance.
So if the liberal de facto apostates understand its significance, why do so many otherwise decent Catholics refuse to acknowledge the truth? I suppose some could be unaware of the Latin Mass, but these days, with information available at a few clicks of a mouse, I find that increasingly difficult to accept. Perhaps if they do, then they might realize that they can no longer sit on the fence and remain noncommittal about these matters.
I will now link to a piece written a while ago, just when Traditionis Custodes and all its spiritual poison was foisted on the Catholics in the pew. The author is quite correct when he states that not only are we permitted to resist the attempts to destroy the Mass of the Ages, but we have a solemn duty to do so. Not being a moral theologian, I cannot say whether or not such duty binds on pain of sin, but I wouldn't be a bit surprised to learn that it does.
Follow also the plight of faithful Catholics in the Diocese of Charlotte. Not only is the local bishop attacking the Latin Mass like a ravenous wolf, but he is also attacking piety during the Novus Ordo Masses. Altar rails and kneelers are being removed. In Catholic high schools, students will be compelled to "share" during Mass. I sure hope home-schooling increases there. These bishops hate the faith and any semblance of adherence to it. Are we awake yet?
Saint John Eudes once stated that evil clergy are a manifestation of God's punishments upon His people. I don't have time to enumerate the ways in which we, as a Church, more than merited such chastisement, save only to say that multiple infidelities occurred way before Vatican II occurred.
Francis' less-than-illustrious papacy has drawn to a close, but this is no time to breathe a sigh of relief. Recall that he stacked the College of Cardinals with like-minded individuals. It will take a miracle for a faithful and capable Catholic pontiff to be elected. God can, if He is willing, work such a miracle.
Are you praying for such a miracle? The salvation of millions, perhaps some in your own families, depend on it. At the very least, be offering your daily Rosaries for this intention.
His Eminence Cardinal Burke composed the following prayer. True, the novena period is past, but this still is an excellent prayer that one can use.
A few days ago, Archbishop Vigano laid bare the case against Francis in no uncertain terms. Recently, we've also heard from Cardinals Burke and Sarah, along with Bishop Schneider regarding the affronts posed by Francis to the Faith. The bulk of their recent comments are directed at Fiducia Supplicans, the document penned by Cardinal Kissy-Face Fernandez and signed by Francis. That document gives the go-ahead for "gay unions". Given the fact that that to counsel for sin and to approve it are ways of cooperating with sin, the production and the promulgation of Fiducia Supplicans has been inherently sinful on its face.
On June 14, Cardinal Sarah came to Catholic University of America in Washington DC to address some students there. In his remarks, he held out, as an example to follow, his fellow African bishops who refuse to implement Fiducia Supplicans. owing to its "grave error". At about the same time, in an interview, Cardinal Burke stated, "we affront the Lord, we show profound lack of respect for Our Lord in love for Him if in some way we try to ask blessing for something that’s sinful."
Bishop Schneider's stance is none too nuanced. He called Fiducia Supplicans "a mockery of the natural and revealed law of God." And so it is. Then he said something very wise, laying bare a part of the insidious strategy of the goons in the Vatican. He said, "but perhaps creating a state of permanent debate, generalized uncertainty, and doctrinal and practical anarchy, was precisely its aim." Francis seems to excel at this, to undermine the certainty that has always been a hallmark of God's truth as revealed through Holy Mother Church.
Cardinal Raymond Burke authored a nine-month novena to Our Lady of Guadalupe, asking her intercession upon our very troubled and sin-sick world. It commenced today and is to be prayed everyday until December 12, the feast of Our Lady of Guadalupe. I reproduce it below. Copy it, share it, and get all your friends to join you in prayer.
Taylor Marshall, in the podcast below, examines various aspects of yet another abysmal plane interview given by Pope Francis on his return from eastern Europe. As an aside, I'll highlight some new terms: "cootie-jab". Marshall coined this and it just might bypass the obnoxious and ubiquitous "fact-checkers" of Facebook. The second one is from someone commenting on the video on the you tube page. He asked, "since Pope Francis supports the jab, can he be called Poke Francis"? Hmmm...
With these two reactions, I seek not only to give the reactions to highly-respected orthodox clerics in the Church, but to highlight also their understandings of just how insidious this motu proprio really is. They both bring to bear their expertise on theology and canon law. First, I link to a treatise written by Cardinal Burke.
Note that in his first point, Cardinal Burke asks why the document wasn't written first in Latin. He then points out how an Italian word could be mistranslated into English. Whether or not he intended it, His Eminence illustrated Latin's value as a dead language.
Throughout his analysis, His Eminence comments on the alleged evils described in the motu, stating that in all his years of dealing with attendees of traditional Latin Masses, that he never saw the ills that the pope stated were such a threat. I'll leave the rest for your reading.
Taylor Marshall then deals with the statement that Archbishop Vigano made regarding the pope's obvious antipathy for the Latin Mass. The archbishop recommended to our reading an article by Massimo Viglione, entitled "The Hatred For The Mass Of All Time And The Question Of Obedience". The archbishop wrote the forward to that article. To be honest, I haven't yet had time to digest the article myself, but I trust the archbishop enough to believe that when he recommends it to our reading, then we should take him at his word. I also post Marshalls' commentary below.
Today is Holy Thursday, when Our Lord celebrated the first Sacrifice of the Mass and ordained the apostles as the Church's first priests and bishops. Yet today we see both the priesthood and the Mass coming under vicious attack. Most egregiously, that attack is not arising from forces outside the Church, but from within - from corrupt prelates and even the pope.
Father Clay Hunt of San Antonio is one such attacked priest. When he expressed his desire that all his flock receive the Sacraments, his bishop, who has many times displayed his progressive stripes, initiated canonical action against him. Read about it in this Church Militant link and watch the interview embedded therein.
LifeSiteNews informs us of prohibitions enacted by the Archdiocese of Boston, limiting lay ministry at the altar to vaccinated persons. While it may be a blessing in disguise to be rid of lay lectors and "extraordinary ministers of Holy Communion", that places unconscionable burdens and yes, conflicts of conscience on altar boys. It is utterly immoral, considering that this archdiocese is in fact mandating that their flock make sinful use of the bodies of aborted babies.
I wrote a few weeks ago on the banning of private Masses from the side chapels in St Peter's Basilica in the Vatican. Both Archbishop Vigano and Cardinal Burke rightly decry this state of affairs.
There will be more of these. As I become aware of them, I will publicize them. Only if these priests and bishops feel the rebuke where it hurts, that is, their bank accounts, our pleas will fall on deaf ears. That means when we stop our donations, we must tell them precisely why. Please pass this along to your other networks.
Watch this video. The pope is announcing some sort of meeting commencing May 14, 2020. Let's cut through the bovine manure. He states that the purpose of this gabfest is to coordinate brainwashing education efforts to build some sort of "village" - that is, a new-world order utopia completely devoid of God and any thought of eternity. Obviously he is borrowing ideas from Hillary Clinton and her book. He is asking religious and political leaders to sign a "global pact for a new humanism". That was his one mention of the word "religious". I listened carefully. This Vicar of Christ didn't utter the name of Jesus Christ or even God once during this entire screed.
Related to this attempt to undermine the Faith is his call for us to "obey the United Nations". The Gloria article outlines nicely how antithetical to Jesus's teachings this is. See the video below and go to the 27:27 mark for the exact quote from the pope's Sept 10th plane conference.
On Friday I posted the call to prayer and fasting that was issued by Cardinal Burke and Bishop Schneider. They also issued a document listing several areas in which the direction of the synod would lead the Church to massive theological departures from Sacred Tradition, maybe departures so severe that they would lead to schism. I believe the pope realizes that too. That is why I believe he went into preemptive damage control - to shift blame on us who would simply be pointing out the havoc that he is wreaking.
The pope himself seems unafraid of schism. That is what he claims, and I believe that he is being quite frank. Archbishop Vigano gave an interview last month in which he stated that next month's synod could be the culmination of a centuries-old plan by Freemasons to desconstruct the Church and to bring on a "new church".
Zenit has published the transcript of the Sept 10th interview. Here it is.
Recall Matt's words that the possible schism. If the Amazon sin-nod doesn't do that, this May 14, 2020 gabfest just might well do it.
Just to reiterate the progressives' desire for a "new church", let me call from your long-suppressed nightmares the farce from 10 years ago from Call to Action..
A declaration warning against six "theological errors and heresies" contained in the Instrumentum Laboris for the Amazon Synod that will happen next month in Rome, and
A call for prayer and fasting during the forty days prior to the sin-nod. They will start September 17. The two prelates recommend a daily Rosary and fasting, preferably on Wednesdays or Fridays. The intention is that the errors and heresies noted in their warning will never come out of the sin-nod.
If these errors are issued from the sin-nod, the way will be paved for even more violations of the Faith. Some of these are happening now.
For those in the Washington DC area, I use as an example Holy Trinity Parish, just south of Georgetown University. It is run by Jesuits and has been a dissident hotbed for some time now.
This parish is celebrating its 225th anniversary. What better way for a Catholic parish to celebrate and give thanks to God for its existence by fawning all over sexual perverts and their enablers? As you see in this bulletin, gay-enabling Father James Martin is scheduled to give an address at 10am, Saturday Oct 5 to peddle his latest heretical tome. Read the entire bulletin to see more groveling to the gay juggernaut.
From the parish's youtube channel, we see this pathetic fellow wax lyrical regarding his descent towards perdition being accelerated by Holy Trinity.
On the parish's page dedicated to this anniversary, we read: "could Bishop John Carroll and Rev. Francis Neale, S.J. know what Holy Trinity would become 225 years ago?" The answer is no - not in their most horrid nightmares.
As we join in this prayer effort, let us also pray for all the Joe Figinis of this world who, when they asked for fish, were given serpents. Pray that they may come to repentance and salvation despite their parishes.
It is no coincidence whatsoever that the "sex abuse sin-nod" has convened on the feast day of St. Peter Damian, a prelate and Doctor of the Church who fought vigorously against the sins of sodomy that infested the clergy of his day. We beg his intercession for this "summit" is most likely intended as a farce to induce the faithful to believe that they will address the root causes of sex abuse by clergy when in reality they are only interested in mollifying us and providing cover for perverted clergy - some of whom might well be participating in that sin-nod.
Not all bishops are partaking of the kool-aid. Two days ago, Cardinals Brandmuller and Burke, the two remaining dubia Cardinals, issued an open letter to the summit attendees. In that letter, the two cardinals challenged the attendees to break the silence regarding homosexuality. They stated that ,"The plague of the homosexual agenda has been spread within the Church, promoted by organized networks and protected by a climate of complicity and a conspiracy of silence." Yesterday Brandmuller released a statement reemphasizing the role of homosexuality as a major plague in the Church. Meanwhile, Archbishop Vigano today issued his own statement to the attendees urging them to convert. So here we have Cardinals Burke and Brandmuller, with Archbishop Vigano, speaking truth to corrupt power. Perhaps that is why they were not invited to attend.
Let's look at these "organized networks" to which Cardinals Burke and Brandmuller alluded. They are real and they are powerful. In his report on this sin-nod today, Michael Voris details how this network, most likely established by Bella Dodd (before she converted to Catholicism) and probably launched the horrific rampage known as McCarrick's career. One of these networks is known as "St Gallen's mafia" and most likely played a role in strong-arming the resignation of Pope Benedict XVI and then shoving Cardinal Jorge Bergoglio into the papacy. These networks insinuated many clandestine perverts and Communists into the clergy.
The sin-nod is silent on this because now the Vatican is most likely in league with these networks and doesn't want the light shone on their plans and deeds. Just take a look at these "21 reflection points" that the pope wants the sin-nod attendees to consider. Do you see the word "homosexual" mentioned once therein? I don't! I don't even see the word "sin" in this mish-mosh, much less repentance and Confession. And what's with all this jibber-jabber about "protocols" and "norms"? All that's needed is to reaffirm the Church's immutable teachings on morality and faith. It's not at all complicated, but these charlatans want the matter to appear like it is so that they might avoid accountability.
As I look at that picture of St. Peter Damian and ponder his question, I have to think that for today's perverted cabal in the Church, we know the answer. They deliberately seek to undermine the Church. In so doing, they goad many souls to hell, including their own, if they die unrepentant. Therein lies some hope, for if Bella Dodd could convert, so can they. But for some of them, McCarrick especially, the sands of time are running out. Pray that they are converted and pray that the damage they did can be reversed.
Last week Cardinal Burke gave a talk in Slovakia. I needn't rehash what Gloria TV said, so I'll just urge you to watch it on their site. I trust he'll be speaking on similar themes at the Rome Life Forum.
As said in the previous post, Cardinal Burke gave an address at a conference in Rome last week. The conference was called, "Catholic Church: Where Are You Going?" He broached the consequences of any needed disobedience to Pope Francis. He is speaking primarily of the direction that Amoralis Lamentia explicitly states in its infamous chapter 8 footnote regarding the administration of Holy Communion to adulterers.
The question of excommunication was raised. The Cardinal said we must be ready to suffer such consequences with Christian patience.
My question is, if such an attempt at excommunication was made, would that excommunication be valid? Perhaps that "consequence" would not even exist in fact. Excommunication just can't be done willy-nilly, at the drop of a hat. Specific conditions must be met for a valid excommunication, along with specific protocol to be followed.
The Catholic New Advent Encyclopedia has a treatise on excommunication. One sections says, and I quote, "Catholics on the contrary, cannot be excommunicated unless for some personal, grievously offensive act. Here, therefore, it is necessary to state with precision the conditions under which this penalty is incurred." Right there we see that excommunication can only occur as a consequence of a "grievously offensive act". What would be these acts that would cause excommunication? They'd have to be objectively sinful, correct? Ruffling the feathers of a church leader and/or pricking his conscience would not constitute an "offensive act"!
Moving on down that article, we read, "An excommunication is said to be null when it is invalid because of some intrinsic or essential defect, e.g. when the inflicting it has no jurisdiction, when the motive of the excommunication is manifestly incorrect and inconsistent, or when the excommunication is essentially defective in form." Therefore, I ask that if an attempt at excommunication is made in the absence of a mortal sin, does that "excommunication" have any consequence?
I for one think not. In the face of these considerations, I cannot see how one so "excommunicated" could, in good conscience, submit to that. In so doing, he/she would be cooperating with the sin of an abuse of ecclesial authority. He/she would actually be validating an act of abuse and dishonesty.
The cardinal is right to broach these matters. Given the trajectory of this papacy, especially the manners in which traditional orders and faithful prelates have been thrown under the bus (including Cardinal Burke himself), draconian attempts at excommunication are clearly within the realm of real possibilities. I can see where some might think the proper response to that kind of abuse might be to acquiesce to it and comply with the "excommunication". I do not believe it is inherently virtuous to roll over and play dead like that. Evil must be resisted. If no excommunication really exists in fact, we cannot pretend that it does. Such lies must be disobeyed, just like the lie of admissibility of adulterers to Holy Communion.
Since Vatican II, Mass attendance has been on the decline. In fact, Catholic life in general has deteriorated, as those who claim a Catholic ancestry believe and live as, well, heathen. Their level of immorality is identical to the culture of death at large as they divorce, fornicate and abort their babies at the same rates.
There was a respite in the downturn, albeit brief. It was right after the 9/11 attacks. All of the sudden, people remembered that God existed. For a few weeks, the churches were quite crowded. However, by and large, our bishops didn't know how to respond - or maybe they didn't want to see real repentance and conversions for then they'd actually have to be attentive to their duties. I remember reading in the Catholic Standard about this return to churches when it was still in play. Cardinal McCarrick waxed absolutely giddy and silly about the full churches. Why? Well, because that meant the local church would have to buy more real estate and build more buildings. That was his focus. Meanwhile the church hierarchy was doing absolutely zilch about meeting the spiritual needs of those who were darkening church doors after being away for so long. I was quite exasperated at McCarrick's inane prattling, wondering why he didn't propose increased times for confession and remedial catechism for the returnees. Not encountering real Catholicism, the returnees soon stopped returning.
So having blown what was literally a God-given field for true evangelism, the hierarchy returned to its tried-and-failed tactics. They completely ignored the traditional means of evangelism, for those means would have entailed both fidelity to Sacred Tradition and incurring the displeasure of the world at large. If anything, we witnessed even greater banality from the hierarchy as they tried so desperately to earn the approval of the world, particularly young people. We witnessed priests and religious break-dancing, rap-singing, etc - all to imitate worldly fashions to trick young people into "liking us". There have been a few who have come to the Church, but by and large the world regards these pathetic farces with derision. Who can blame them?
There is hope, though. A growing number of Catholics who are concerned with the Church's problems are assessing honestly the Church's failures with the "new evangelism". They understand that the world will only respect Catholics (not necessarily like, but respect) who are in fact praying, believing and acting like Catholics in accordance with Tradition.
I recommend to your reading an article by Eric Sammons called "The Old Evangelization: Five Steps To Renew A Parish". In a nutshell, he hits the nail on the head. When Catholics pray and worship as Catholics in accord with Tradition stemming from the One True Faith, the world will take notice. Conversions will happen - but more importantly, God will be worshiped as He ordered.
What Eric said about the primacy of proper worship echoes the words of both Cardinal Sarah and Cardinal Burke. Only through authentic, proper worship will we and the world be receptive to the grace needed for evangelism and conversion.
Here is a blog piece written by Msgr Charles Pope called "Recovering The Gospel From The Notion Of Merely Happy Or Good News". In this piece he points out that both Jesus and John the Baptist preached the entire truth. They didn't cater to any "snowflake" wishes for "happy positive warm fuzzies". They preached the need for repentance from sin as being crucial to the process of conversion. Recall that in the Gospel of Mark, the first recorded word of Jesus is "repent". Jesus and the early preachers proclaimed the joy of the Gospel, but they also proclaimed the consequences of refusal of the Gospel and preference for sin. Some priests would do well to recall that when they are tempted to adopt some silly fad as a means of "evangelism".
Let's stop the cutesy gimmicks and return to the Traditions of Our Church. Converts will come then, as they did earlier.
As we all know, the pope has not responded to the dubia issued by Cardinals Burke, Branduller, Caffara, and the now-deceased Meisner. The dubia were five very simple questions, requiring a mere "yes" or "no".
Cardinal Burke, in a recent interview, has stated that in light of the pope's unresponsiveness, a formal correction on some areas of the pope's teachings (particularly as found in Amoris Laetitia) is now necessary. The pope will then be obliged to respond. As Burke points out, the Church is being divided over various interpretation of Amoris Laetitia. Recent comments from the Vatican favor interpretations that fly in the face of Church Tradition, i.e., the Teachings of Jesus Christ.
LifeSiteNews has summarized twelve points about this situation. The text of the interview (at least the pertinent section) is here. Meanwhile, Cardinal Brandmuller (another dubia cardinal) published an article about a tradition of popes reciting a declaration of faith upon their ascents to the char of Peter; it's high time that tradition was reinstated.
Let us pray that these Cardinals can proceed with all due haste, and more importantly, that the pope will respond to this correction in such a way that will preserve fidelity to the Church's timeless teachings on marriage, family, sexuality, and the sacraments.
On July 22 in Louisville KY, Cardinal Burke spoke at a forum called "The Church Teaches". That day he said two key things. First he stated a point that was similar to one uttered by Bishop Schneider. He warned against "idolatry of the papacy", an error that leads people to ascribe papal infallibility to every utterance that comes from a sitting pontiff. In reality, the pope only speaks infallibly under very special circumstances. Of course other teachings of the pope bear weight when they conform with Church Tradition. One corollary error that attends this papal idolatry is a belief that the pope, never erring, can never be contradicted nor questioned even by faithful Catholics.
Burke also said during that same conference that "confusion and error" coming from shepherds at the highest level in the Church (i.e. the pope) "realistically seems to be apocalyptic". Our Lady of Akita stated something very similar when she said that shepherds would be opposing one another. She uttered the same concerns under her title Our Lady of Good Success.
As an example of confusion flowing forth from a bishop, I link now to an article in Crud, regarding Bishop Antonio Carlos Cruz Santos, a bishop of Brazil. I won't go through the entire tome. but during a recent homily, he said that "homosexuality is a gift from God". We know that the homosexual orientation is inherently disordered. If one acts upon that inclination, he/she mortally sins and also leads his/her accomplice in mortal sin. In that homily Cruz both blasphemed God by saying that God gifted to mankind the occasion of mortal sin. He also scandalized the congregation by his approval of mortal sin, possibly deceiving them into thinking that they could mortally sin without eternal consequences.
The Remnant has commentary on what Cardinal Burke said in a recent teleconference. They point out that what Cardinal Burke flies in the face of some nonsense uttered in various Church documents. Yes, it's nonsense to claim that Muslims worship the God that we worship. Even Muslims will agree on that point, although they hold erroneously that their false idol "allah" is a deity. We thank the One True God that Cardinal Burke had the guts to go against the politically correct nonsense - no, heresy - that claims that "allah" is just another word for God.
On Tuesday Cardinal Paul Josef Cordes (of Germany) confirmed the statement of Father Amorth (Vatican exorcist) that Pope John Paul II did not consecrate Russia to Mary's Immaculate Heart in 1984. Apparently he wanted to do so, but allowed himself to be persuaded by Vatican diplomats not to mention Russia for fear of causing political conflicts.
We all know that he consecrated "the world" to Mary's Immaculate Heart. While that consecration was undoubtedly beneficial in and of itself, it was not done in the manner that Our Lady specified to the Fatima seers in 1917. The LifeSiteNews posts reminds us that the Fatima apparitions are not part and parcel of the Deposit of Faith and one may be a true Catholic and not believe them. That is true enough. However, one either believes that the Blessed Mother spoke at that time, or they don't. If they do believe that she spoke, then why the reticence about taking her at her word? Why demure in complete obedience? Why place the pleadings of Vatican officials over the requests of the Mother of God?
Today at the Rome Life Forum, Cardinal Burke called for the consecration of Russia to Mary's Immaculate Heart per her exact specifications. He too stated that the consecration in 1984 was not in accord with Our Lady of Fatima's specifications. His exact quote is: "Certainly, Pope Saint John Paul II consecrated the world, including Russia, to the Immaculate Heart of Mary on March 25, 1984. But, today, once again, we hear the call of Our Lady of Fatima to consecrate Russia to her Immaculate Heart, in accord with her explicit instruction."
There are those good Catholics who insist on pretending that the Fatima requirements were satisfied in 1984. They probably are loathe to believe that Pope St John Paul II might have faltered in being completely obedient to Our Lady of Fatima. They fail to consider that while he was still on this earth, he was subject to his own sin-weakened human nature, as are we all. However some others who don't have any intention to honor God have their own reasons. One individual on Facebook believes that these faux-katholycs fear a large-scale return to Faith and Tradition if Russia is properly consecrated. I think he's onto something, especially in light of the bad-mouthing that Cardinal Burke received from Cardinal Maradiaga (head of the pope's "gang of nine" because of his dissidence).
Cardinal Burke went on to list six requests of Our Lady of Fatima. Five of them we should be doing regularly ourselves. The sixth one has to do with the consecration of Russia. Let us join the cardinal in acknowledging that the consecration to Russia has been inexcusably delayed and pray and call for its immediate fulfillment.
Last week while commenting on how Pope Francis has jumped aboard the "climate change" bandwagon, I proposed (last paragraph of the post) how the Church could put its ostensible "green" convictions into practice. To be honest, that suggestion was rather rhetorical as I knew the hierarchy would not go for it. Why not? Don't they have an eye for being green? Well, yes they do, but not that green. They salivate over the other kind of green - as in long green. Let's face it; those missalettes and magnificat magazines are big business. Might some of that filter to church officials? Money talks!
And the chattering of the long green seems to be heard throughout the wheelings and dealings of the Knights of Malta these days. Lepanto Institute and Church Militant have articles detailing the skulduggery around the ouster of Fra Festing and the de facto ouster of Cardinal Burke. The Lepanto article in particular reveals the influence of donations in both the two ousters and perhaps with the distribution of contraceptives in which Maltesar has participated. I won't rehash what they wrote. But I will point out that all the machinations have the pawprints of the Vatican Secretary of State all over them.
One more thing I'll mention that the two articles don't. The name Albrecht Von Boeselager is mentioned throughout - the chancellor who Festing discharged but who was reinstated at the obvious promptings of the Vatican. When all that was going on, Albrecht's brother Georg Von Boeselager was appointed to the board of directors of the Vatican Bank. Not a coincidence!
LifeSite News reports that Cardinal Agostino Vallini, Vicar General of the Diocese of Rome, has released guidelines based on Amoralis Lamentia that lure adulterers into greater mortal sin by receiving Holy Communion while carrying on in that state. Cardinal Villini is merely the Vicar General of that diocese. The Chief Shepherd of that diocese is none other than Pope Francis himself.
These directives fly in the face of the Teachings of the Church. They most certainly contradict Humanae Vitae, Familiaris Consortio and others. Supposedly this is to be allowed for limited cases and only when the adulterers are consulting with a confessor. But think about this for a minute. If these adulterers are conferring with a confessor, is not that confessor explaining to them the gravity of both adultery and receiving Holy Communion while in that state? Therefore the adulterers should know that their sins are grave. The confessor is supplying them with knowledge of the Church's teaching. If they continue their sin, they are thus doing so in full knowledge of the sin and in deliberate disobedience to the Church. Therefore we see: 1) grave matter, 2) full knowledge 3) deliberate consent. The educated Catholic will know that these three conditions determine mortal sin. It only takes one mortal sin for a soul to be damned to hell if he/she doesn't rectify the matter within the Sacrament of Confession. If adulterers receive Holy Communion while in a state of mortal sin, they commit yet another mortal sin, that of sacrilege against Holy Communion. No Amoralis-Lamentia-based double-talk will erase that reality.
Now in order for a valid Confession to occur, the penitent must have the firm purpose of amending their sinful ways. That means they must actually quit the sin, not merely give lip service to it. If they approach the Confessional while having no intention of correcting their fault, they commit a sacrilege against the Sacrament of Confession.
Again, this is the Diocese of Rome. Does anyone really believe that this guideline, which is in reality an outright temptation to mortal sin, would ever have been promulgated without the permission - if not instigation - of its bishop Pope Francis? We see more seduction to mortal sin coming from Cardinal Francesco Coccopalmerio, president of the Pontifical Council for Legislative Texts. This is the Vatican office charged with interpreting Church law. He stated that adulterers who "want to change their situation but cannot" can receive Holy Communion. He gave an example of a woman shacking up with a man and his children. He states that she may be unable to leave lest she neglect her duties to the children. But what "duties" are discharged by flaunting adultery before the children's eyes? See this post from Toronto Catholic Witness for some analysis of Coccopalmerio's heresy.
These developments seem to be the attempts to silence those clergy who hold fast to Christ's words to us through Tradition. I suspect we'll see more such persecutions and more blatant moral heresies. Pray that either the dubia are answered or that the four cardinals take their next steps with all alacrity.
