Pagan Idolatry In US Catholic Church - What Will YOU Do???

At St Denis Church in Diamond Bar CA, an immense sacrilege happened during the evening Mass for the Feast of Our Lady of Guadalupe, obviously with the authorization of the parish priest.  After the homily and before the offertory, a troupe of pagan dancers performed a dance that can only be called sacrilegious idolatry.  The parish of St Denis seemed to think nothing amiss about this, having posted the video below to their Facebook page.  They seemed to have trouble with their sound system, and perhaps that is just as well.  The pagans actually started off that Mass at the 13:00 mark with an introductory ritual.

If you know anything of Our Lady of Guadalupe, you'll know that she aided greatly in the conversion of the Aztecs and other native American tribes, delivering them from the very same pagan practices that were celebrated at this Mass.  Somehow the phrase "the dog returns to its vomit" seems most appropriate here.  There is a more complete analysis of this debacle at Complicit Clergy.  Meanwhile, the Traditional Latin Mass is banished to the hinterlands while idolatry is celebrated during Mass.

I am equally appalled by the behavior of the congregation.  In the video, you see them applauding that dance of idolatry.  Some of them look like they are old enough to know better than that.  Can their own faith in Our Lord be so compromised that they actually approve of this idolatry during Holy Mass?  Or could it be that they are simply going along to get along, because they are cowards too afraid to stand up for Jesus in His Church?

Now the question is "what will we do when this happens in our parishes?"  Not "if", but "when".  I remind you that this isn't happening in some third-world backwater.  That happened a few days ago in the United States.  Will we laypeople have the conviction and courage needed to drive the filth out of our churches (as Jesus cleansed the temple), should someone dare place it there?  Or will we just sit on our hands, stew about it and then complain on social media afterwards?  As Bishop Strickland said a few weeks ago, what will it take for us to act?

ADW Catholics, Are You Ready To Take Action?

What To Do As Opposed To Suffering In Silence

The latest issue of Our Parish Times offered a predictably milquetoast response to perhaps the most significant Church scandal in recent history, if not in fact the entire history of the Church.  The issue in question is this August 2018 edition and the article is at the bottom right-hand corner of the front page: A Breach In Trust by Patricia McGann.

You'll have to follow the article to page 8.  There you'll see the problematic sentences in the last paragraph.  We're supposed to:

• "Do our best to live according to God's laws"  Fair enough, in and of itself.  But that is not all that is required.  What is not said is just as important as what is said.
• "Seek comfort and courage by praying together and in the silence of our hearts"  Oops!  Problems here in the underlined parts!  Forget this "seeking comfort" crap!  It's time to put on the big-boy and big-girl pants here and stop this incessant focus on emotions, particularly the weepy variety!  And again, let's forget the "silence" nonsense!  Let us listen to St. Catherine of Siena on the matter: "We've had enough of exhortations to be silent!  Cry out with a thousand tongues!  I see that the world is rotten because of silence!"
• "We won't waste our time judging or condemning Cardinal McCarrick or those who were complicit with their silence, because that's God's job and we trust He'll take care of it".  Did McGann write this before McCarrick resigned from the College of Cardinals?  Maybe so.  Anyway, while we don't judge or condemn McCarrick, Wuerl, et al as persons, we most certainly do condemn the rapes of young men and their cover-ups.  It is our job to root out this mess and shine the light on it relentlessly.  By the way - beware of the phrase "God will take care of it".  Often enough, that is simply a sanctimonious cop-out phrase used by people who just don't want to take up their responsibilities as Church Militant, for reasons of laziness and/or cowardice.

All that said, I'm happy to provide some evidence that some Catholics are indeed waking up and confronting the evil where it is to be found.  These are examples to be emulated.  Within the past two weeks, Cardinal Maradiaga, one of Pope Francis' "gang of nine" visited the Diocese of El Paso, Texas.  From Ann Barnhardt, we get a pictorial report of the greeting they provided to him.  Look at the pictures!  It'll do your heart good!

Below I post a video taken by the blogger behind Mahound's Paradise, a Chicago-based Catholic blog.  He cornered Auxiliary Bishop Bartosic and tried to interview him regarding the tyrannical behavior of his boss, Cardinal Cupich.  My!  Some people really do squirm under scrutiny, don't they?

These are the types of actions that we must all be prepared to emulate if we are to purge the various progressive diseases from our Church.  Prayer and reparation are useless if we aren't willing to undertake practical action.

Faithful Catholics Form The John Paul II Academy For Human Life And The Family

Recall what I said in the last paragraph of Thursday's post - that I had to exercise my pro-life apostolate outside the context and confines of the parish and archdiocesan structure in order to elude progressive attempts to muzzle and hogtie my efforts.  I am not alone in coming to this realization.

At the Humanae Vitae Conference sponsored by the Voice for the Family last week, several faithful scholars announced the formation of the John Paul II Academy for Human Life and the Family - JAHLF for short.  Its first president is Dr. Josef Seifert.  It will serve the same goals as the original Pontifical Council for Life and will remain independent of official Church organizations.  Many of its founding members were members of the original Academy who were given the heave-ho by Pope Francis.  In addition to Seifert, other such members include Judie Brown of American Life League, Professor Roberto de Mattei, Mercedes Wilson of Family of the Americas and others.  I commend these Catholics and look forward to their output.

The late Archbishop (now Venerable) Fulton Sheen once said that it would be up to the laity to save the Church.  More and more I am seeing the truth of his prediction.  It will be up to us to intercede and to actively resist the rot that infests the structures of Our Church.

Laity! It's Way Past Time To Resist!

Today the Vortex published an interview with His Excellency Bishop Rene Gracida, Bishop Emeritus of Corpus Christi.  The main theme of this interview is the need for the laity (meaning most of us) to rise up to save our Church.  As an historical example, he mentions the ancient Christians shouting down Arius as he uttered heresy from the pulpit (stating Jesus isn't divine).

What caught my ear immediately at the 5:28 mark was the bishop's declaration that it is "out and out heresy" to state that God's essential attribute is mercy, stating that this heresy was on a par with that of Arius.  Bishop Gracida outright condemns the Kasperite's claim, stating that God's main attribute is love.  His explanation was brilliant; while the Three Persons love on another, they don't have mercy on each other for mercy implies sinfulness of the recipient.

With that in mind, we must bear in mind Pope Francis' excessive focus on mercy to the expense of God's other characteristics (such as justice).  In fact, he wrote a book called "The Name of God is Mercy".  Consider all that is entailed in that whopper of a title.  To name someone or something is to exercise an authority over them; that's apparent throughout Scripture.  Adam names the animals.  A parent names a child.  So now Pope Francis names God??  Really???  I've written copiously about how the Pope seems to think that the Church has been deficient with true mercy; please read here for a review for I don't want to rehash all that in this post.

Getting back to the interview, the bishop says we need to stop "suffering in silence" (at 10:20).  We need to object - loudly.  Of course we'll create an uproar.  So what?  The late Mother Angelica stated that "if you're not a thorn in somebody's side, you aren't doing Christianity right".  I'll post the video beneath the jump break but I have more to say below that.

Laudato Si - READ IT!

Ladies and gentlemen, I'm reading on too many sites - from faithful Catholics - who, being understandably disgusted with Laudato Sii, are suggesting that others NOT read the encyclical.  One site owner went so far as to state that because he endured the reading of Laudato Sii and published his commentary, others need not "waste their time" in reading it for themselves.

BIG MISTAKE!!!

Ladies and gentlemen, the problems within our Church can be blamed (in part) on faithful Catholics who have not been diligent in doing their research and are content to let others do "the heavy lifting" and thinking for them.  They are culpable of grave negligence and the suggestion to eschew the encyclical only affirm others in being lax and non-vigilant.

Look, I know the encyclical is full of progressivism and humanism.  I know it can be exasperating to read such pig-slop.  I know there can be temptations to anger and frustrations.  SO WHAT??  Read it anyway!  Each and everyone of us (that means YOU, dear reader!) has a solemn responsibility to understand what is happening within our Church and our civilization.  We cannot slough our personal responsibiity onto others.  If you do, just what do you expect to give as an answer when you face Our Lord at the moment of your death?

Here's the link.  Please start reading it NOW!

Rose-Colored Glasses Often Lead To Complicity In Sin

Yesterday was Thanksgiving.  Being busy with Mass, food prep and the dinner I was unable to post some thoughts.  For what it's worth, I'll do so now.

With some regularity I'll receive some very irate comments to my posts urging - even demanding - that I "cease negativity and be grateful for the a) pope's cuteness, b) happy-clappy crap, c) you name it".  For the record I'll state that I am very grateful for what Jesus did 2000+ years ago, and that He founded His Church to mediate His graces and to save souls, including mine.  But thanksgiving is more than just happy, "positive" thoughts about real blessings received.  It also involved dogged, relentless efforts to preserve these blessings AND to recover those that we squandered by apathy and even disdain.  Those efforts require speaking the truth, sometimes in direct and blunt terms.  It is for these reasons that I - and other bloggers - speak out against evils emanating from within the Church and even those originating from the Holy Father (when not speaking infallibly).

I now have a word of warning to those who insist on looking at the hierarchy - and particularly the pope - through rose-colored glasses.  While in the past you have lambasted others and me for "being negative", I could not help but notice your abysmal silence when that debacle that I call the SinNod was going down last month.  Why, oh why, was that?  I could hypothesize a number of reasons, but in reality those reasons are quite irrelevant.  Rather I beg you to consider that you are silent in the face of numerous gaffes and even de facto heresies that have spewed from the Vatican and even the Holy Father's mouth.  Time and time again you ignore the glaring evidence before your eyes.  Not only that, you chastise those of us who have the clarity to understand that there is an elephant in the living room - all to perpetuate your own denial of the truth that all is not peaches and cream at the Vatican.

Church teaching has always taught that there are nine ways that one can share in the guilt of a particular sin without being the primary one to commit that sin.  I refer to this, this and this (paragraph 1868).

For ease of reference, I'll list the nine below.

1. Counsel: Giving advice or direction to the evil-doer;

2. Command: Ordering or inducing another to commit sin;

3. Consent: approving of the sin, before or after its act;

4. Provocation: Inciting or urging one to commit sin;

5. Praise or flattery: Inciting or urging one to commit sin by praise;

6. Concealment: helping one to commit sin by offering to conceal the crime;

7. Partnership: Sharing the fruits of another’s sin;

8. Silence: Not speaking out when we should, or not acting to prevent sin when obliged;

9. Defending evil: Attempting to justify the evil actions of others.

Many detractors, I believe, are acting in accord with numbers 8 and 9.  This goes for some bloggers and other social media wielders who do not speak out when the Pope utters rank heresy (as I believe he did here).  To those bloggers, I believe our platforms and audiences present to us an obligation to speak out.  If that is not your persuasion, I'd welcome comments as to why you would not believe that to be the case.

Be advised that I will not risk being an accessory to the corrosion of Holy Mother Church by my silence.  I'd encourage others to do the same so that the Church can be about her true mission to save souls.

I'll present this link to show how many sainted Catholics - many of them popes - regarded silence in the face of evil with utter disdain.  I'll close with this from St Catherine of Siena: "We've had enough of exhortations to be silent! Cry out with a hundred thousand tongues. I see that the world is rotten because of silence!"

Holy Thursday Rubrics Violated At My Parish

This past Sunday I wrote what I intended to do if my parish's Holy Thursday service was marred by the washing of women's feet.  All the while of course I was praying that our parish wouldn't surrender to the temptation (I mean that word in every sense) to political correctness and false sense of "inclusion" to violate the rubrics for Holy Thursday.  Alas, I was disappointed although not the least bit surprised.  As I announced earlier, I knelt and prayed a Rosary in reparation for the violations occurring on the altar steps before our eyes.  Not my eyes, though, for I refused to give that debacle my visual attention.  Two women were up there.  One I don't know, but the other is one who (I thought) would have known better than that.  I suspect poor catechesis had a significant role to play here.

My blogging colleague Connecticut Catholic Corner has done excellent work with this, compiling many sources including this from Fifth Column.  She even posted a letter from the Vatican that confirms that Holy Thursday feet-washing is reserved for men only.  I will post it below.  I will also post an "oldie-but-goodie" from the Vortex on this matter.

Julie's post asks a good question: "Is Pope Francis a Bad Example to Catholics?"  It's a fair question.  Unfortunately with respect to Holy Thursday rubrics, the answer is an unequivocal "YES!"  I think I just saw a good portion of my parish (St John Neumann in Gaithersburg) get blind-sided, snookered and hog-tied big-time by his poor example.

Bishops' Failures Means Laity MUST Step Up To The Plate

Here's the link that Voris mentions.. http://www.churchmilitant.tv/premsignup.php

Marching Orders For The Laity

Michael Voris of the Vortex spells it out nicely.  Towards the end of the clip, he gives some practical pointers as to how to make your voice heard.  This blog, and many others, exists in part to help you do just that, to inform you of things going on, and to let you know of networking opportunities.

Click here if you can't see embedded video.

The Time of the Laity Has Arrived!

Actually, it's been here for quite a while.



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