Two ADW Priests Channeling Their Inner Andrew Greeleys

Two priests in the Archdiocese of Washington have collaborated on a theological dissertation.. No, wait, scrub that!  It's a murder mystery novel.  Knowing who the authors are, I suspect the book would be good for a paperweight and that's about it.  Who are these two priests?

Long-time readers of this blog will be familiar with the name of Father Peter Daly, pastor of St John Vianny in Prince Frederick, MD.  He is on record as disregarding the Church's teachings regarding homosexuality. Why he retains his position might constitute its own mystery novel.

The second author is Father John Myslinski.  During the autumn of 2002, he was pastor of St. Mary's Church in Rockville Maryland.  When the first 9-11 anniversary was approaching, he announced plans to commemorate it with a Mass.  He had retained two Catholic pro-abortion politicians to speak from the pulpit.  I do not recall if they were to speak during Mass or afterwards; either way was bad enough.  One of them was Connie Morella.  She was the US Congressperson for that district and she was Catholic; neither of them are currently true.  A number of us committed to a street protest at the church if that appearance wasn't cancelled.  We advised both the parish and the DC chancery of the same.  Wiser heads must have prevailed for Morella's appearance was indeed cancelled.

On the Amazon link at the top, you can take a peek at the forward.  That gives an idea of the flavor and progressive bias of the book.  It is a flavor that warrants a one-word response - BLECH!!!  One might hope it doesn't channel Greeley's stuff entirely; the latter was know to contain pornography.  So now in this "year of mercy" they are letting loose with screed that decries the "increasingly dysfunctional papacy of Benedict XVI" (some of the first words of the forward).  But of course the timing is just a coincidence, right?  Might we also assume that this kitty-litter is being released with the knowledge, if not approval, of Cardinal Wuerl?

What other goodies await us during this "year of mercy"?

Petition To Pope Francis - Please Uphold Traditional Faith Or Resign

On December 8, 2015,  a group of faithful Catholics associated with The Remnant newspaper put forth a petition to Pope Francis.  In effect, it asks him to either start to assume the real duties of the Vicar of Christ or resign his office.  As evidence to corroborate the necessity for such a change, the petition lists some of the most egregious offenses against the One True Faith that had been perpetrated by the pope at the time of the petition.  It is a long list, and we have witnessed these atrocities being committed.

To those of my readers who insist that the pope is "being misrepresented, etc", I adjure you to immediately remove the happy-clappy rose-colored glasses.  Your attempts at self-deception simply cannot withstand the evidence, and such attempts may be inherently sinful.  It's time to grow up and face reality as it presents itself, not as we might wish it to be.  I too am pained to see this, but face it we must.  Else, how on earth can we pray for our Church in an intelligent fashion?

As I said, the petition was promulgated last December.  It predates the horrific heresy that the pope uttered during his most recent flight between Mexico and Rome regarding the allowance of contraception to prevent zika-infected children from coming into being.  That heresy only adds to the necessity of asking the pope to change course: either by upholding Church Tradition or resigning.

For close to 30 years I have been involved in pro-life activism as well as pursuing a faithful Catholic life.  To be frank, we must admit that the culture of death is advancing.  We will never have a snowball's chance in hell of reversing that trend unless and until the slime and corruption is removed from the One True Church.  We must be resolute in our efforts to do so, even if that corruption is to be found with the reigning pontiff.

Thanks to Thinking Catholic Blog, I have just become aware of this petition.  Already it has gone to Rome but we can still add our names to this.  I myself have done so.  I link to it now for your prayer and consideration.

Will We Be Like Hans And Sophie Scholl Or Will We Cower In Our Own Narrow Worlds?

Sophie Scholl was a member of the White Rose, a student group advocating resistance to the Nazis during World War 2.  She, along with her brother and other White Rose members, was beheaded on Feb 22, 1943.  She was 21 years old.

In her statement, Sophie embellished upon what Edmond Burke famously said about 200 years prior to Sophie's death: "All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing."

Do the statements of Burke and Scholl describe you?  Be advised that if you are focused only on your own isolated world and you don't put any effort into fighting the atheistic culture of death, then that culture will come crashing into your world with devastating effect.  In that case you will bear much of the blame.  Look around you, please and wake up.

Lent is an appropriate time to change that.  An excellent way to do so would be to participate in 40 Days for Life.  Click on the link for a location near you.

Francis Effect And Seattle Metropolitan See - Out With Faithful Catholics, In With Baby Killers

The two incidents on which I'll speak below would seem unrelated to each other on the surface but for two things:

1. They both occurred within the metropolitan see of Seattle (Washington) AND
2. They closely resemble two recent actions by Pope Francis.

Because this is a very long post, I'm placing a jump break here.  So...

Denial Runs Strong In Surprising Places

As I mentioned yesterday, too many good Catholics are in denial regarding the reality that we currently have a pope who poses a danger to souls every time he opens his mouth.  Am I saying that the pope intends this damage?  I of course cannot say one way or the other, although common sense indicates the affirmative.  I will say, however, that regardless of his motives, he indeed is causing real damage.

Therefore it troubles me greatly when prominent Catholic pro-life leaders advocate the continuance of denial.  When they do so, they unwittingly act as to dissuade their readers from discerning the input that feeds their souls.  Thus these deniers contribute to the spiritual damage already being wrought by the pope's harmful words.

A sad "case in point" is found in an article by Judie Brown, co-founder and president of American Life League.  ALL has always been in the forefront of the Catholic pro-life movement as they have correctly pointed out the spiritual destruction caused by contraception.  The article is to be found in RenewAmerica entitled "The Pope Francis Effect".  While I respect Mrs. Brown highly, I have no choice but to refute this.

Let's bring in the first two sentences:  "Over the last week, considering all the events that Pope Francis participated in during his six-day visit to Mexico and the many lives he touched with his words, his actions, and his very presence, it seems so sad that only one or two sentences from one interview captured our attention. It is as though nothing else happened that week."  The effects of his trip to Mexico are debatable at best, but I won't broach that for now.  Suffice it to say that any (debatable) benefit from his trip was far outweighed by the heresy against morals in his "one or two sentences".  No amount of benefit will mitigate the immense harm and scandal caused by his stated approval of contraceptives.  For example, consider the morning of April 15, 1865.  Can you just imagine someone asking Mary Todd Lincoln, "Aside from that, Mrs. Lincoln, how did you like the play?"  Well the notion that we should dismiss the outright heresy because of the "lives he touched" is similarly preposterous.  Let us consider that his heresy is "touching lives", too.

Proceeding down, she says "the pope was speaking off the cuff".  So what?  It was still the pope who was speaking.  "What he said or didn't say really isn't the problem."  Yes it is, when Humanae Vitae, Casti Connubi and Evangelium Vitae are undermined in the eyes of the world by the Vicar of Christ, the "problem" cannot be overestimated.  Perhaps I'm wrong, but I suspect that if it weren't Pope Francis on that plane and instead we had Cardinal Dolan, Cardinal Wuerl or some other progressive shepherd on that plane uttering those exact same words, Mrs. Brown's take on the matter would be decidedly different - and rightly so.

She said that "it is troubling to realize that all the good (?) Pope Francis did during his visit to Mexico was so easily overshadowed by one or two silly comments made to reporters".  I'm glad she acknowledged that, at best, the comments were "silly", but actually they constituted heresy.  Refer to what I wrote of Mrs. Lincoln's experience at Ford Theater.  She might have watched a lovely performance, but when the shots were fired, what constituted the real impact of that evening in her life?

Toward the end she says, "it makes me so sad that we are always so prone to jump on something negative rather than embracing the positive.  No, the positive will never take top billing on the nightly news."  A few things..

• It seems that Mrs. Brown, at least in this case, has fallen for the "positive versus negative" codswallop.  I've said this many times and now will say so again.  The "positive versus negative" paradigm has nothing to do with objective truth or falsehood of a given statement or situation; rather it is a paradigm that focuses on the emotional impact that said statement or situation has on its beholders.  Obviously whether a situation is "positive" or "negative" depends on whom you ask and their particular disposition - not the objective merits of the same.
• As far as "top billing on the nightly news", the problem is that the news is abuzz about the whole mess, and viewing what we would consider a "negative" as a "positive".  To wit:
• ABC News
• Inquisitr
• Los Angeles Times
• Wall Street Journal
• NBC News
• The above news sites are on the first page after I googled "pope Francis contraceptives".  Can we all now see the scandal caused by the pope's utterance of heresy?  Please - let's not blame the media for this.  They didn't "bait" him into a trap.  He's a grown-up who is responsible for what he says, just like the rest of us.

My friend at Tenth Crusade, in writing about these matters, states that "we are going to get louder".  Many of the other writes I cited yesterday said the same thing.  I say "amen".

Shedding The Shackles Of Denial - Faithful Catholics Finding Their Voices

As we all know by now, the pope let loose with a statement regarding contraception that can only be classified as heresy.  This happened on one of his now-infamous plane interviews this past Thursday.  There are still Catholics who insist that the pope caused no harm.  Here are their arguments and my refutations in "bullet form".

• "less than 25% of Catholics really know what the Church teaches or even cares, what the Pope says or doesn’t say isn’t going to matter one bit" This is an actual quote from a recent exchange regarding the contraception heresy matter.  Now is this supposed to be comforting to be told that no one cares what the vicar of Christ says?  What really does that say about the crap coming from the pope's mouth?  And by the way, I hold that the world isn't entirely oblivious to papal sayings when those words tickle their ears with justifications for their mortal sins.  In that case the world is all too quick to glom onto the errors; therein lies the scandal.
• "It's becoming obvious that he doesn't fully grasp his international role, where a casual comment is elevated in importance."  While that would be nice to believe, we must realize that if he doesn't understand the gravity of the papal office then he's an absolute moron.  I might concede that point if we were talking about some 20-year old kid whose Catholic education was thoroughly dumbed down by the "spirit of Vatican II" but NOT in the case of someone who was educated before Vatican II AND who went through seminary and rose to become a cardinal.  No, Pope Francis has been "around the block" a few too many times for us to really believe that he doesn't appreciate the weight of his office.
• Then we have the folks on Facebook who sniff "if you criticize the pope I'm going to unfriend you, so there!"  Well, they can go ahead and do that if they can't handle the facts as they present themselves.

But many are waking up and smelling the coffee - and saying so publicly.  I salute them.  In an article that she wrote a few days ago, Jenn Giroux said that "this week was the straw that broke this faithful Catholic's silence".  World Net Daily's columnist Barbara Simpson weighed in, as did the blogger Non Veni Pacem who writes why he/she will no longer consider his/her anger against the pope's misdeeds as matter for confession.  LifeSiteNews has quotes from other Catholics and pro-life leaders who are rightly appalled at the pope's utterance of heresy.

Now many of you are aware that Michael Voris has, in the past, taken to task some of us who've voiced our criticisms of the pope's bloopers.  I've had to contradict him in response.  However, it seems that the heresy uttered by the pope is so blatant that he cannot ignore it.  In today's Vortex he all but says the pope committed heresy.  By the way - I did download this so it won't disappear as did the video from the synod.  I'm going to expound on the video beforehand, again in bullet format.

• At the 2:24 mark, Voris directly refutes the notion that "the Holy Spirit selects the pope".
• At 3:09, he begins a litany of popes who were true reprobates.  I'm surprised he neglected to mention Alexander VI.
• At 5:20 he states the obvious truth that "men in the office of the pope can be wrong".
• At 5:49 he asks "Why should reporters even be allowed to pop questions at the pope?  Any pope?  Always a bad idea."  The short obvious answer to the first question is because this pope says so - and even invites the questions.  We agree that it's a bad idea.  Most of the previous popes did as well, and that is why they gave few (if any) interviews.  So perhaps that first question should be phrased "Why does this pope invite these interviews on a regular basis?"
• At 6:04 Voris says that what the pope says about climate change, etc has no magisterial weight.  That is something that most educated Catholics understand.  However, progressive clergy, bishops' conferences, etc actively promulgate the hoax that everything coming from the mouth of Pope Francis is of Divine inspiration.  Therein lies the reason why many faithful Catholic bloggers MUST take issue with this pope's ever-increasing errors and now heresies.  Perhaps now Voris can admit that we play a vital role.
• At 6:30 Voris says "Jorge Bergolio can easily misspeak, especially if he's conflating his thoughts with what amounts to a hypothetical theological discussion point about nuns in the congo which no one can find any actual evidence of .."  True enough, but when he speaks while wearing those papal robes, he is not just some ordinary guy on the plane running his mouth.  Were that the case, the reporters wouldn't be one bit interested in what he has to say.
• At 7:16 we hear "we must suffer as He did, even if that suffering comes at the hands of His shepherds."  But we do not suffer in silence, lest others be led astray.
• He continues, "It is absurd to think that the men who are popes are perfect in their understanding, thoughts and so forth."  Most of us aren't asking for perfection from our pontiffs.  But is it too much to expect that our popes not constantly insult the devotions of faithful Catholics, not embrace progressivism and not utter heresies against basic Catholic morality?
• At 7:35 he correctly says that "it has become..a cult of the pope, driven by media, which turns it into a feeding frenzy from every side.."  Every side?  I can see it from the progressive side.  However, many of us must call out the errors for the express purpose of disarming the "cult" aspect of the matter and to keep objective truth in front of the world's eyes.  Those who incessantly try to excuse the pope's errors, minimize them, or stifle our attempts to refute errors are just as responsible for the "cult" problem as are the media.
• The "danger of the media driven papacy" can be controlled and even diffused.  The primary responsibility for that lies with the pope himself, with his Vatican staff.  That brings us back to a question asked here and elsewhere: "Why does the pope see fit to grant these impromptu interviews?"
• At 8:31 he brings up the example of Pope Benedict's interview, when the condom remark was taken out of context.  Yes, Pope Benedict made a mistake when granting that interview.  Now here's the really important point.  Pope Benedict XVI never repeated that "papal interview: error!  "Popes make mistakes!"  Yes, but if they keep making the same mistakes repeatedly, with devastating consequences, it's quite fair for us to ask why.
• "Private thoughts that are wrong.." cease to be private when they are spoken before reporters who will literally broadcast these thoughts to millions.  I do congratulate Voris for acknowledging those remarks of the pope as being "wrong".
• "For the first 1900 years we were spared.  From here on out, we're on notice".  True enough; for the first 1900 years the errors could not be widely promulgated.  Now they can be, and thus faithful Catholics must contradict those errors as they occur.

Kudos to Michael Voris for acknowledging that the pope's remarks on this latest plane interview were decidedly off the mark.  But let us not trivialize the damage potential that they do have.

From The #Rosicagate Department - Father Rosica Interviews Bernie Sanders

Highly-placed Father Thomas Rosica is once again making news for all the wrong reasons.  Vox Cantoris reveals that Rosica, on his Salt and Light network, interviewed Bernie Sanders, Democratic candidate for the US presidency.

In his post, Vox mentioned that Sanders dabbled in porn writing.  I googled that and sure enough, he did precisely that in the 1970s.  I wonder if that topic was broached in the Rosica interview?  Has anyone seen or heard of this as Sanders conducts his campaign?  Probably not and I take a dim view of that omission.

Ladies and gentlemen, our governmental system is that of a constitutional republic bound by rule of law.  That said, the moral character of our elected officials really matters.  We elect human beings, with their own sets of principles and convictions.  It behooves us to know whom we are electing to high office.  If Sanders' porn dalliance matters little to the voters, that says more about the voters than it does Sanders.

Getting back to Rosica himself, do you think he'll be interviewing the other US candidates?  Me neither!

#no$2crs - Not In The Rice Bowl Nor In The Second Collection

About eight days ago I posted a suggestion for faithful Catholics regarding the Operation Rice Bowl campaign conducted by the Catholic Relief Service during Lent.  It is one of their biggest fundraisers; regrettably CRS has seen fit to divert millions of these dollars to organizations that distribute contraceptives and abortifacients.  In some cases, CRS personnel have been caught committing the mortal sins themselves.  I hope many of you are implementing that suggestion.

Today the USCCB announced that the second collection to be taken during the weekend of March 5-6, Laetare Sunday, will be for CRS.  That will be the case in most parishes.  For the Archdiocese of Washington, the CRS collection will occur during the weekend of May 14-15.  Please check your local calendars to ascertain when that collection will be held in your parishes.

In my post regarding the CRS, I suggested putting in that "rice bowl" a flyer created by Lepanto Institute.  That same flyer would do nicely for use in your CRS envelope in lieu of money.

Baltimore's Bishop Madden Said What??!!?!

Three months ago, I wrote of St. Matthew's Church in Baltimore Maryland.  It is a Catholic parish that has been taken over by gay activists, with the cooperation of its pastor, Father Joseph Muth.  More troubling is the apparent approval of Auxiliary Bishop Denis Madden and the willful silence of Archbishop William Lori.  The Baltimore chancery has been contacted about this matter numerous times; none of us who did so received the courtesy of a reply.

Defend Life is a Catholic pro-life organization that is based in Baltimore.  They publish a bi-monthly newsletter.  The Jan-Feb issue came out a few days ago and has an expose on the moral rot that has infested St. Matthew's.  It also details the depths of depravity to which Bishop Madden seems to have sunk in his support of the gay infestation at that church.  The article is here and you can read the first few lines to get an impression as to how low the bishop has allowed himself to fall.

The bishop is reported to have congratulated two women for engaging in acts that will most likely condemn them to hell for all eternity.  The author of the article made plain throughout the article that they attempted to contact the chancery for clarification on this matter.  As before, the chancery has not given the author any reply.  I agree that "silence implies consent".  At any rate, the bishop did exactly the opposite of what a real successor of the apostles would do, e.g., explain to the women that they are endangering their souls, that they should break off the sinful relationship and get to confession immediately.  If these women die unrepentant, Bishop Madden will have these souls to his charge.

I am again urging that we all contact the Baltimore chancery and politely but firmly demand that they take corrective measures lest the goings-on at this parish facilitate eternal damnation for hundreds of poor souls.

Spirits Of 1930 Lambeth Conference And Eugenics In Yesterday's Papal Interview

Many people think that Roman Catholics (and maybe a smattering of evangelical denominations) are retrograde neanderthals when it comes to allowance for contraception.  Well, let's face it.  Our Lord entrusted to the One True Church His infallible teachings.  One of those teachings is that sexual activity is to be conducted by one biologically-born man and one biologically-born woman united in faithful matrimony and open to the generation of children.  Any deviance from that constitutes grave matter for mortal sin.

Until 1930, all protestant denominations adhered to that Christian teaching.  But during that year, the Lambeth Conference (of the Anglican denomination) occurred.  They passed a resolution allowing for limited usage of contraceptives.  Thus the fissure opened, allowing floodgates of immorality and leading to the plagues of baby-murder, all manners of perversion and all their attendant evils.

Please refer to my post from yesterday.  Today, Vatican spokesman Father Federico Lombardi (who was on that plane) confirmed that yes indeed, the pope was saying that contraception usage could be allowed "in cases of emergency".  Here is Lombardi's exact quotes via LifeSiteNews (again, Lombardi was there).  As you read these quotes, recall that Casti Connubii calls contraception "intrinsically vicious".  (Aside - I'd suggest reading this encyclical, along with Huamae Vitae and Evangelium Vitae, all available on the Vatican website)

"The contraceptive or condom, in particular cases of emergency or gravity, could be the object of discernment in a serious case of conscience. This is what the Pope said."  And  “the possibility of taking recourse to contraception or condoms in cases of emergency or special situations. He is not saying that this possibility is accepted without discernment, indeed, he said clearly that it can be considered in cases of special urgency."

The pope's spokesman made very plain that the pope's intentions were right in line with the 1930 Lambeth Conference.  However, this time the demonic disorientation is not coming from a heretical sect but from a successor of Peter.  Already I'm hearing of misguided people justifying contraceptive sex because "the pope says it's ok".  Such scenarios will only multiply, owing to the horrid scandal that the pope is now posing for deluded people.

But let's examine another troubling aspect to this debacle.  The pope uttered his dissidence from Church teaching when asked about pregnant women exposed to the zika virus.  It is in that context that he said "avoiding pregnancy is not an absolute evil".  So what would he propose to be a more overwhelming evil in that context, if not the birth of babies with microcephaly?  So this "serious case of conscience" could be ordered to preventing the existence of sick babies.  This is eugenics, ladies and gentlemen!  I link now to a post in which I put the Maafa 21 video.  Watch that and see how the eugenics movement has been spreading its vile poison with advocates such as Margaret Sanger.  Do we now see that bile oozing from the Vatican?  The short answer is "yes".

Not only must we pray, but we must call out error so that others aren't led astray.