2012 Elections: Family and Economy

Would he have punished his mother with himself?

“values voters see big government and deficit spending as the result of policies that arise “when the natural family is looked down upon” and thereby foster dependency”.

This very intelligent reflection comes from a speech of Mr Tony Perkins, president of Family Research Council, about the electoral voters of Us-American Evangelicals.

Evangelical voters, he says, tend to link the economic and the social issues that will – hopefully, for the seconds – dominate the 2012 campaign, and the line above is an example.

As an Italian, I can resonate with the phrase chosen by Mr Perkins, as in those societies where the welfare state is rather weak – in Italy it is very weak if you consider it as “welfare state proper”, that is: entitlement – the family is very strong and conversely, you can afford to have an almost non-existent welfare state and survive as a politician only because the family is so strong.

I do not use the word “natural family” because in Italy the absurdities and perversions of the US have not yet gained a foot in the social and legal framework of the country. Long may it last.

I do agree with the statement, particularly after having lived in Germany and the UK and having seen the result of the mentality prevailing in those countries.

Still, I wonder what resonance it would find among the US Catholic voters, as this would seem to be a more specifically Evangelicals-related phenomenon.

Mundabor

Vanderbilt University: Sodo-Nazis At Work Again

I sometimes have the impression that the taking of drugs in certain parts of the United States is not only largely tolerated, but compulsory.

As this video says, this “takes political correctness to new highs”. What has happened this time that is that a militant sodomite has been refused admittance in a Christian prayer group because, the group requiring the members to be Christians – with all that this entails, including the opinion about sodomy, bible studies, meetings – he is “discriminated” and therefore the group must change its rules or be shut down.

What is more shocking – and another important indication of the widespread abuse of illegal substances – is that the local Catholic prayer group adjusted its admission criteria to comply with the needs of the sodomites.

Then we complain that we have homosexual pedophile priests.

The university officials did not want to go in front of the cameras, but said that they were working with the religious group to “bring them into compliance with Vanderbilt’s non-discrimination policy”, and at this point the smell of marijuana is clearly perceptible from London, UK.

These liberals and perverts are worse than the Nazis.

I think the following song might give them some motive of reflection. Or not, as the case may be.

Mundabor

Mexicos Supreme Court Rejects Legalisation of Abortion

Gotta love the signature

A strange country, Mexico; at least seen from the other side of the pond.

On the one hand, Christian values seem to be deteriorating rather rapidly, with sodo-marriages now allowed in parts of the countries (strong federal structures, apparently, with wide-reaching powers for the individual states).

On the other hand, the 2007 decision of the Constitutional Court to allow abortions for the first 12 weeks after conception has caused a real pro-life run, with 18 of their 31 states approving state constitutional measures meant at keeping abortion away from their own territory. A bit the equivalent of Proposition 8 regarding sodomy, but without the sodomite judge.

The widespread move to keep abortion away from the relevant state has prompted one of the judges of the constitutional court to try to impose the overruling of the single states, that is: the decision that it is unconstitutional for a state to put measures in place meant at banning abortion from its own territory.

This attempt has now been thwarted.

Whilst it would appear that abortion is still legal in 13 of the 31 states, one can only salute a decision that allows vast parts of Mexico to continue to give themselves, at least in this respect, Christian rules.

Mundabor

Planned Parenthood Engulfed In Scandal, Under Investigation For Cover-Up Of Child Abuse And Assisting Child Sex Traffickers

Planned Holocaust

“The Committee has questions about the policies in place and actions undertaken by PPFA and its affiliates relating to its use of federal funding and its compliance with federal restrictions on the funding of abortion,” said Rep. Cliff Stearns (R-Fla.), chairman of the Subcommittee on Oversight and Investigations, in a Sept. 15 letter to Planned Parenthood president Cecile Richards.

The letter requested details on the amount of money received by Planned Parenthood under different federal funding programs, as well as documentation of policies and procedures to ensure that federal money received by Planned Parenthood “is not being used to impermissibly subsidize abortion.”

The House committee also asked for information about the organization’s policies in place to prevent improper billing and overbilling.

Furthermore, it requested documentation of Planned Parenthood’s policies and procedures to ensure that criminal conduct, including sex trafficking and sexual abuse, are reported to the proper authorities.

Planned Parenthood’s business practices were placed in the spotlight after the pro-life group Live Action released undercover videos that showed several Planned Parenthood workers and managers appearing to assist child sex traffickers and cover up cases of sexual abuse of minors.

Oh well, it appears something has the suspicion that Planned Parenthood not only doesn’t care for the killing of children, but once they’re born they don’t care much for them, either.

A vulgar smear, say the liberals. All made up by those baddies, the Republicans, to destroy such a humanitarian institution; a killing wonder, a well-oiled genocidal machine that the likes of Hitler and Goebbels would be proud to call their own!

We shall see how this ends. I register with satisfaction that Catholic institutions are not the only ones to get this kind of attention. I trust that justice will, in the end, prevail.

In the meantime, I invite everyone to forward the news to as many people as they can, and please take note of the blog post title to add some spice (utterly truthful, by the way).
You see, if the liberals do not lose any occasion to link the Catholic Church and the accusations against her priests, I can’t see why we shouldn’t care that people be informed that Planned Parenthood is in the middle of a rather big scandal – and under an investigation of the US House of Representative – because accused of assisting child sex traffickers and covering up cases of sexual abuses of minors.

The last accusation must ring, to the ears of liberal champagne-drinkers, strangely familiar…

Mundabor

The Voter, The Cardinal and The Pig

Looking for the wrong target.

I never liked Berlusconi. What I think of him, you don’t want to read here. But after following his political career for almost twenty years one thing has become clear to me: that this corrupted, corrupting, thieving, liar, bastard pig is an exceptional salesman and is, like all exceptional salesmen, obsessed with the satisfaction of his clients.

This is, in the end, what has kept the nano pelato (“bald dwarf”) in power all these years: even most of his voters have realised that he is a pig and a (former, at least) thief. But they also know that the man is well aware of who keeps him in power, and does his best not to disappoint them.

Italy has not only no homo-“marriage”, but not even “civil partnerships”. In a world where even Spain, Mexico and Portugal  do not know better, this is an achievement. Italy is a country where crucifixes are still in every classroom and every court room, after the government had the gut to fight for them. Italy is still a country with a decent anti-euthanasia legislation, also because of the very controversial battle of this government. Make no mistake, dear reader: these achievement are largely not due to the Italian clergy, rather to a diffuse conservatism that knows that it is better to have a pig in power who serves your ideals, than a clean man who doesn’t.

It has worked, in a way (in Italy, almost everything “works in a way”), until now, where after months of rumbling the Vatican has started the steamroller and it is now clearly moving it in the direction of Berlusconi. Which in Italy is a serious problem, as proved by the fact that after a couple of days the dwarf still hasn’t picked up the gauntlet and declared total war. Never happened before, I assure you.

Let me say it once again: Berlusconi is a thieving bastard. But I hope Cardinal Bagnasco knows what he is doing, and I am not so certain he’s making the right calculations.

Let us examine the situation with a bit of coolness: the man is a pig, but he is largely at pain to keep his piggish behaviour outside of the public sphere. What comes out, comes out largely because of phone tapping,  directly intruding into the life of a man for whom breathing and bragging are one and the same, or private indiscretions. Berlusconi doesn’t do scandal for the notoriety, or the desire to be considered a stud. Pig as he is, he is smarter than that.

But he should publicly repent, one might say. How hypocritical, and how Anglo-Saxon. In Italy the contrite politician going in front of the cameras and reciting the little tale of repentance for the use of the simple has no chance. If you aren’t really repentant, you had better shut up, is the thinking. Fine with me.

He could resign, they say. Fine too. But if we do not want to help the lefties to come to power – and make no mistake, with them in power the next battle against homo-“marriage” is on us, as sure as the “amen” in the church – there is no need for the Vatican to kick on a man already lying on the ground. If he is weak enough and the centre-right thinks it can do without him, he’ll be disposed of anyway. If the Vatican is decisive in his political demise, then the Vatican is involuntarily helping the leftists. Not good.

I have no doubt whatsoever that the centre-left can throw in the ring not one, but many candidates much cleaner than Berlusconi was the day he made first communion. But you see, I do not care in the least. My Christian values come before my desire for clean politicians, and that’s that. Millions, in Italy, think like me. This is the only reason why the man is still in power: he delivers. This is also the reason why no one on the centre-right side could bury him: no one is sure they would. 

Now it can certainly be that you can have a strong centre-right coalition without the bald dwarf. I’d be the first to greet the event. But I do not want the Vatican helping anti-Christian values to spread, just because they aren’t very satisfied with the private virtues of one man.

And come on, this is Italy. People have a big mouth, and language is very, very imaginative. The more so, when people speak with friends and do not know that they are tapped. Even more so, when a pathological megalomaniac mythomaniac sex-obsessed old pig is speaking. Everyone knows it, even Cardinal Bagnasco.

Thief, corrupt, egocentric, megalomaniac, sex-obsessed idiot that he is, I still prefer him to Cameron every day, because with Berlusconi Christian values will be defended in the public arena, irrespective of what he does with them in his private life, or how gross is his bragging among friends. The man is an exceptional salesman. He’ll protect what is sacred to his clientele. He is very good at that.

Try that with Cameron, who kicks in the eggs middle-class England to please 0.5% of the population and try to court the Labour moderates.

Mundabor

Test Your Patience: Bishop Vienneau

I have written only hours ago about the message of Pope Benedict to the German bishops, that they are better at being organised than at believing in God. Some mild – for my standards – reflections about the inadequate shepherds these past decades have given us followed.

In a spectacular confirmation of Pope Benedict’s words – and very probably, of the fact that the Holy Father’s talk is rather better than his walk – I read today about this story, brilliantly explained by the “Reluctant Sinner”.

Seriously, go there and try to stay calm. I couldn’t, and frankly I do not feel that I could write about this with the necessary serenity.

Before you click away, you may want to click on the link on the right, that will lead you to the small page dedicated to the daily offering to the Immaculate Heart of Mary. It wasn’t enough for me, but it might be for you.

I am making an effort, as you see, not to say what I think.

The worst of all that is that I must admit that it isn’t probable that there will be consequences. This is the world we live in.

Bishop Vienneau is, by the way, an appointment of the late John Paul the Not So Great.

Mundabor

Austrian Heresy: Meowing Gets Louder

Add Austrian accent

I have written in the past about the Austrian heresy, a shame for the entire Catholicism that has gained a pretty high place in my list of links (basically, after the Blessed Virgin alone).

We write today the 25 September and whilst there has been no substantial change in the matter – the internet site with the call to disobedience is still there, but the Archbishop doesn’t care about such minutiae like more than 300 of his priests and deacons openly calling to heresy – the Archbishop’s language is, as expected, slowly becoming more aggressive. If you have followed my previous blog posts in the matter, you know that the Archbishop is forced to quench the revolt in order to keep his job, but wants to do so by giving as many Austrian as possible the idea that he would be on their side, if he only could.

We have now some small movement in the matter as after the anticipated “discussion” with the heretics, the Cardinal has given several interviews to Austrian radio and television, basically announcing an escalation if the revolt continues.

Let us see how Reuters reports his words:

“If in our diocese here I would step out of line with the community of the Catholic Church then I would lead our diocese into a schism. I am not ready for this and I think no Austrian bishop is ready for this,”

This is, as expected, 100% Schonborn. He imagines a possibility (“If I were to”) that clearly implies a possibility of him doing so. The Cardinal doesn’t say “this is absurd and therefore I won’t do it; the proposers are heretics and they must give a full abiura or be defrocked”, which he should have done months ago. He says instead : “If I do it this will lead us to a conflict with Rome”. This is fully in line with the previous declaration of the Cardinal, where not once have I seen him on record saying that their requests are simply doctrinally wrong. His problems have always been: a) unity with Rome, and b) obedience. By doing so he clearly shows that he “gotta do what he gotta do”, but doesn’t say that the heretics are wrong in the matter. If this is a shepherd, I am a giraffe.

Still, slowly but surely the Cardinal must start to initiate some kind of escalation; then his ignoring the revolt (which continues to grow, albeit more slowly now) can be fatal for his own position.

The problem is well-known and I have dealt with it in my previous posts. Schonborn must quench the revolt, but at the same time he wants to give the vast number of church tax paying Austrian Catholics supporting the heretics the impression that he would so much like to be on their side. He doesn’t care two straws for the confusion that he engenders among the faithful, for the danger of contagion to Germany and Switzerland, or for the reputation of the Austrian Church. What he wants is to save the money coming from the dissident, by at the same time saving his own job.

Read all the story in this light and you will have a very clear picture of what is happening. Yes, one day he will quench the revolt. He will simply have to. But not one day too soon, and not without having done all he can to show the Austrian wannabe Catholics that he is obliged by his office to follow those dinosaurs down there in Rome.

The direction of things seems to be that the heretics will continue to be heretic, but will claim not to be such; they will lose face whilst claiming not to, and the Cardinal will keep his job whilst claiming to have been “sensitive” to the “instances” of the heretics. Dialogue, discussion, and bla bla.

On their Internet-site a newsletter (number 10) has appeared making clear that whilst the title “Call to disobedience” will remain notwithstanding the criticism they have received, they consider their disobedience (let us remember here: doctrinal disobedience, this is no SSPX!) in the sense of ….. being obedient to the Church. Jeez, these people should become Anglicans!

I also notice that the number of new priests and deacons adhering to the initiative starts to stagnate as the day of reckoning slowly approaches. Basically, more and more of these wannabe modernists (more than seldom with Freundin or even Freund, one would think)  start to understand that they are nothing more than the Cardinal’s useful idiots, helping him to show to the Austrian dissenters how sensitive to their plight he is whilst sacrificing the rebels on the altar of his job. They had it coming, one must say, but this doesn’t make the Cardinal’s behaviour any more acceptable.

The Cardinal needs our prayers. He needs to be removed, too.  This scandal has gone far too far, for far too long already.

Mundabor

German Church Better at Organising than Believing in God, Says Pope

Weak appointments, weak Church

The CNA reports Pope Benedict’s observations about the German Church with the following words:

Using Catholicism in Germany as an example, the Pope said that while the German Church was “superbly organized” it was perhaps lacking in a “corresponding spiritual strength, the strength of faith in a living God.”

Having lived in Germany more than some years, I can only confirm the analysis. Whilst no one can deny that the German Church is very well organised – besides the German penchant for organisation, this is an extremely wealthy Church – during my German years I could never escape the impression that for all German Christian organisations (the Only Church as well as the Protestant ecclesial communities) God is an embarrassment that can be safely mentioned only in the most innocuous of circumstances, that is: in conjunction with “feel-good” issues like world peace, or social justice.

This is why the Holy Father’s words are important: the Pope is telling his bishops that an important reason why the Germans are getting more and more distant from a healthy approach to life – the critic of the Western secularism is here clearly aimed at the specific situation he is dealing with –  is that “the faith in a living God” is lacking in strenght in his own shepherds.

I see the same happening here in the UK of course, though I find here in the UK examples of spotless orthodoxy that would be probably more difficult to find in Germany. But the message is clear: if the shepherds don’t have a strong faith, how will they be able to give a strong faith to their sheep? As always, the fish stinks from the head down.

When we ask ourselves, though, who has appointed the present German hierarchy, two names come to mind: Pope John Paul II and Pope Benedict XVI. My suggestion to the Holy Father would be – if I were ever be asked to give one – that if he wants that the German Church has a strong faith it might help to appoint bishops who have it, rather than failed social workers obsessed with popularity, and with the Kirchensteuer.

Another interesting observation of the Holy Father concerns the difference that people coming from other countries see in the individual attitude of Westerners: the obsessive self-centredness.

Even coming from Italy – a partly secularised country, but where traditional values still have a stronger hold than here in the North – I was rather shocked at seeing how here in the UK and in the USA the pursuing of one’s every  whim has become a religion in itself. A married couple informing their friends that they are going to split will be inundated with messages of “support” and wishes of “happiness”, reinforcing the idea that the pursuit of the individual happiness of the two be more important than the godly institution they have just decided to bomb. Not so in Italy, where la famiglia, exactly as la Patria – and, alas, often even more so – has rights on the individual that go above his own pursuit of an anyway largely illusory personal happiness.

This in Italy, a partially secularised country. I can imagine the shock of people coming from African countries, where not many think twice about walking for hours every week to go to Mass, and the Christian commandments are different from their Western counterparts “be nice”, “don’t judge” and “provided no one is harmed, it isn’t a sin”.

I heard with my ears a Catholic priest say that he didn’t know the Ten Commandments by heart, and wasn’t interested in learning them.

I don’t think you’ll find many of those outside of the West.

Mundabor

Homos: The Hate Speech Card Is Played Again

By the grace of God, I have lived a very sheltered, bourgeois middle-class existence deprived of contacts with “alternative lifestyles”, and cannot say to you that the reaction of a sodomite to what he perceives – or wants to perceive – as an insult is something with which I am very familiar on a daily basis.

Still, the very small number of unrepentant homos I have been forced – by way of belonging to the same community of foreigners – to come in contact with did tend to have a whining, bitching, passive-aggressive attitude that persuaded me very rapidly that the possibly worst nightmare on this planet is a relationship between two faggots.

You see, some women may be passive-aggressive, and some of them may be bitching; but all of them will be, to some extent, feminine. The same Providence that made each sex in its own way also provided us with ways to make our shortcoming accepted by the other sex. Not so of course in the case of the whining homo: in this case, you’ll have all the bitchiness without any of the femininity, and all of the aggressiveness without any of the (authentic) manliness. A tragic parody of creation, and a cautionary tale for us heterosexual, who are shown in a rather scary way what happens when the Devil is allowed to install himself firmly into one’s consciousness and system of – aha – “values”. Coprophagy is another example, but at least the followers of the latter “lifestyle” haven’t asked to be “married” to their feces yet.

And so it happens that people claiming to be persecuted are, without questions, the finest Nazis around, and would gladly shut us up just for having a system of values that – incredibile dictu – rejects perversion.

We had a prime example today, with the well-known blog of a Catholic priest publishing an email from one of these pathetic, bitching little perverts.

This idiot doesn’t know the first thing about freedom of expression – which still exists even in England, where “Hug-a-fag” Cameron hasn’t managed to wipe it out completely yet – and so he doesn’t hesitate in defining his Catholic view on sexual perversion, expressed by the priest in question with extreme kindness and sensitivity, a criminal offence; the same happened, of course, with the supportive comments of the blog’s readership: hate speech all of them.

Faggot.

A letter to the bishop has been now announced. I very much doubt that it will have any consequence whatsoever, but by the actual standards of UK bishops you can never know whether, perhaps not today on this occasion, but another day on another occasion, the one or other trendy bishop won’t profit of some bitching sod to silence the blog of some brave Catholic priest.

This makes, in my eyes, the more important that the blogging laity, who besides having no vocation doesn’t have the problem of being told by a bishop what to do with their blog, says things as they are and contributes to the end of this unbearable stench of political correctness that allows every idiot with broken sphincter to think that he can bully decent Christians.

In honour of our whining little fag I have preceded this blog post with a fine piece of comedy from Eddie Murphy, a brilliant comedian who was forced to apologise by the gay mafia for his trenchant and perceptive  humour in order to be able to continue to work, and whose brilliant comic spirit – and truthful spirit of observation – should receive more notoriety now that the homo SA think they can get aggressive. Please forward the video to friends and acquaintances if you can.

We know how the SA ended, by the way.

Mundabor

 

The New Undeserving Poor

 

... but hey, no obligation to mass attendance.....

 

 

One really doesn’t know how to start when such things happen.

A drug addict is arrested and given the choice: one year of jail or the participation to a rehab program from a Catholic charity. It doesn’t cost a dime, but you must apply and know what it is about. The lady writes a letter stating that she is aware of the religious nature of the course, and that she wants to change her life through God and spiritual growth.

She is accepted, which incidentally means that she avoids jail.

Not good enough, apparently. Her helper – no, let me rephrase it: those who help her to live drug-free, at the expense of their donors and of the taxpayer, and to stay out of jail – are oppressive fanatics who let her do unbelievable things like….. praying. She is so upset that she goes away crying not one, but – would you believe it – three times. The lady says she is discriminated, and victimised.
She loses, as even the ninth US Circuit of appeals finds that this is too much even for a liberal mind.

Than there is the man who is periodic guest in a Catholic shelter. He is a Mormon and they encourage him – not force, sadly; encourage – to go to Mass. They also tell him that Mormonism is a “sect”, which must surely rank just before water boarding in Guantanamo’s interrogation methods list. He thinks he has a right to live under other people’s roof without having to abide to the rules of the people under whose roofs he lives. One starts to understand why he is in need of a roof. By the way, the shelter receives no government funding.

One of the clearest sign of a corrupted society is when help is not received with gratitude, but with the arrogance of the one who thinks that everything is due to him, and he must have everything according to his wishes.

Mundabor

Too Much Assisi In Erfurt.

The Primacy of Peter made image. No, wait....

Personally, I am not enthusiastic about what I have been reading concerning Pope Benedict’s travel to Germany.

There is in this visit, it seems to me, too much accent on wrong ecumenism, and too little on right Catholicism.

Was it necessary to visit a former monastery now dedicated to a heretic, I wonder. And if it is really necessary to visit such a monastery, should not be the duty of a Catholic – even more so, of a Pope – to make clear to every non-Catholic that there is no salvation outside of the Church, and to explain to them that whilst one can be brought inside the Church in ways we cannot entirely fathom – how many have been saved by last-minute conversion, or perfect contrition before death, we will never know – the willed separation from the Only Church can easily lead to damnation? Isn’t the fight against error something that should be, in the mind of every sincere Christian – even more so, of a Pope –  the paramount consideration, and come before every talk of “ecumenical dialogue”, every diplomatic consideration, every show of desire for a “unity” talked about as if it was a value in itself?

And what is the sense – I mean, the religious one; I fully understand the political motive – of traveling to a Protestant site and telling a congregation of assorted Lutherans that we should focus on what unites us? Has heresy been reduced to an aside, something you look at as if it were only a nasty stain on a beautiful painting, an annoying detail, something that should not be allowed to distract you from the main image? Isn’t it, in fact, exactly the contrary: that it is the very fact that we are all Christians that makes heresy so painful and such a wound in the body of Christianity, nay, in the body of Christ?

Isn’t it so, that the photos that will now be transmitted around the world – the Pope on the observer’s right; the head of the German heretics on the left; no obvious distinction in rank or dignity – create a powerful visual image of Catholicism and Heresy being two variants of the same Faith, with equal legitimacy? Isn’t it so, that the massive talk of ecumenical dialogue of the last days generates the impression that the “talks” between Catholics and Protestants be akin to the talks between, say, Israelis and Palestinians, that is: talks were two merely human political positions are opposed, instead of Divine Truth being opposed to Lie? Where does this lie comes from: from the father of lies, or from good-willed men of God happening to have a slight disagreement with Christ’s Church? Can you create a heretical movement and call yourself – or be treated by Catholics as if you were – a man of God? Luther made the work of the devil, full stop.

The photo you see above appeared in the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung, with the caption: “The Pope takes place on the right, Nikolaus Schneider on the left”.  The implied message is, dear reader, exactly the one you are thinking about.

With the usual acumen, Pope Benedict found the way of telling it rather straight about the matter of ecumenism and the wrong hopes it can engender.  He is quoted by the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung as saying:

“Ein selbstgemachter Glaube ist wertlos. Der Glaube ist nicht etwas, was wir ausdenken und aushandeln.“

I would translate as follows:

” A self-made Faith is valueless. Faith isn’t something that we make up and negotiate”

Beautiful, strong words, nicht wahr? What a pity, that he himself should weaken the very concept he has so beautifully expressed by traveling to Erfurt and giving millions of Germans the impression that Luther’s heresy has a dignity or legitimation in itself in the eyes of Catholicism. What a pity, that what can’t be negotiated in Catholicism be swept under the carpet, when the Pope himself says that Catholics and Lutherans should focus on the “great things they have in common”.

Last time I looked, having great things in common with Catholics wasn’t enough to avoid hell. Every pedophile has great things in common with normal people: would you tell him that he should not lose sight of all the great things he has in common with normal people, or would you rather suggest him that he, for the good of his soul, focuses on – cough – the big problem he has?

The comparison of a Protestant with a pedophile may seem strong, but if we look at the matter lucidly we must acknowledge that unless Truth has changed whilst we were in the bathroom, heresy is as big a threat to salvation now as it has always been. How many Protestant sanctuaries this or that Pope decides to visit will, I am afraid, not change an iota in the seriousness of the danger, but it will certainly play a role in how many people are exposed to that danger.

It seems to me that this visit has been – at least up to now – worse than a lost opportunity, rather a positive damage to Catholicism. I have lived in Germany many years and am painfully aware of the confusion reigning among common Catholics as to what is right, and of the unexpressed but palpable desire of wanting to consider Protestantism just another ice cream flavour, or the preference for a different shade of blue.

If you ask me, if this visit will have one effect it will be to reinforce this confusion.

Mundabor

The Daily Offering to the Immaculate Heart of Mary

O Jesus, through the Immaculate Heart  of Mary,
I offer you my prayers, works, joys, and suffering of this day in union with the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass throughout the world.
I offer them for all the intentions of Your Sacred Heart: the salvation of souls, reparation for sins, the reunion of all Christians;
I offer them for the intentions of our Bishops and of all Apostles of Prayer and in particular for those recommended by our Holy Father this month.

DOMA: Dolan’s Ultimatum to Obama

Already shopping for a bunker: Adolf Hussein Obama.

I have been, in the past, rather critical of what I perceive as the light foot of Archbishop Dolan, particularly in matters concerning sodomites. It seems to me that if the Church is to conduct a well-fought battle on the matter, the battle should be led from her  Numero Uno rather than from other – and be they so prestigious and beloved – archbishops like Chaput.

I must say that the criticism most certainly does not apply to the letter the Archbishop has written to the President. The tones are so strong  that I do not recall having heard such a strong rebuke of a President of the United States not only from archbishop Dolan, but from any American bishop in recent times.

It seems to me that this is a very strong warning; nay, an ultimatum. If Obama doesn’t backpedal on his anti-marriage (anti-Christian, anti-decency) policy, what awaits him is nothing less than an all-out confrontation.

Let me examine the most important parts of the letter, a letter I consider even more meaningful because its core message is, after the usual introductory blabla, brutally short and straight to the point.

First, there is the invitation to stop the attack on DOMA.

Mr. President, I respectfully urge you to push the reset button on your Administration‟s approach to DOMA.

Note here the very strong words: push the reset button. What is asked here is not this or that different approach, or this or that consideration for Catholic sensitivities. No, what is demanded here is nothing less than the total abandonment of the White House’s scheming against DOMA. Already this phrase shows a will to open confrontation that, if I were the president, would let me stop and reflect about where this is all going to lead if I continue my actual policy.

Still, it can be that  Obama decides not to take the hint. Therefore, archbishop Dolan puts a much heavier foot on the gas pedal (all emphases mine):

Our federal government should not be presuming ill intent or moral blindness on the part of the overwhelming majority of its citizens, millions of whom have gone to the polls to directly support DOMAs in their states and have thereby endorsed marriage as the union of man and woman. Nor should a policy disagreement over the meaning of marriage be treated by federal officials as a federal offense—but this will happen if the Justice Department‟s latest constitutional theory prevails in court.

Two messages are strongly voiced here: a) you can’t treat the overwhelming majority of your country like evil racists, and b) you can’t think of being such a liberal Nazi as to just treat disagreements with your agenda as criminal offences.

Still, it can be that Obama decides not to get the message, even if it is at this point shouted in a manner rather impossible to be overheard. Then, in what is the first direct threat of confrontation to a president of the United States that I can remember from a prelate of the Church, comes what I can only define an open warning and, well, rather clear ultimatum:

The Administration‟s failure to change course on this matter will, as the attached analysis indicates, precipitate a national conflict between Church and State of enormous proportions and to the detriment of both institutions.

National conflict is strong enough, but enormous proportions is already past every diplomatic concern. I can’t imagine any stronger wording for such a message. In fact, I doubt that I myself would have, if put in the position of the writer of this letter – Kudos to him, and a Hail Mary is not out-of-place – suggested to the archbishop the use of such blatantly undiplomatic words.Oh well, perhaps I would have, but then again I wouldn’t be requested to draft such a letter in the first place. The “detriment to both institutions” means, possibly, that no threat of taking the tax exempt status away will stop the Church.

If you follow the link and read the entire letter (very short), you’ll get the idea of what is happening here.

Nor is this the initiative of Dolan alone, rather the letter makes it very clear that the front here is compact, and the tanks ready to roll.

One might opine – as I would – that stronger words in the past would have avoided the necessity of today’s words – or the creation of today’s situation – in the first place, but the past is the past and I can only salute what seems to me a completely new approach to the relationship between political power and Catholic hierarchy in the United States.

With the elections already looming, this is excellent news, and the controversy will be a very interesting one to watch.

Expect the liberal Nazis now starting to demand that the tax privileges of the Church be cancelled. Let them cry. The only way to approach this confrontation is by going head on against the liberals. Let us see who will dare to push the tax agenda then. It seems to me that a decision has been taken already here, and there will be no turning. Alea iacta est. Can’t imagine, otherwise, the reason for such tones.

The giant has started to wake up.

Mundabor

“God forgives so many things for a work of mercy!”

Everyone has twenty-two seconds.

Dio Perdona tante cose per un’opera di Misericordia

“God forgives (so) many things for a work of mercy!”. With these words, the simple but pure peasant girl Lucia addresses her mighty kidnapper, a man so powerful that the Spanish power is a joke to him, and so corrupt as to be willing to have a girl kidnapped and consigned to her raper for a matter of prestige and reputation among his peers. A man, though, not mighty enough to escape the patient, silent work of the Holy Ghost, and whom the sight of such helpless, desperate purity will move to the point of causing the explosion of a looming crisis; a crisis that will see him, after a terrible and liberating night, see the dawn of a new life.

Millions of Italians know these words, who have become – like so many expressions from this wonderful novel – part of the everyday language in Italy. They are particularly fortunate because – like many other expression of the Promessi Sposi, written by a man very fit in Catholic doctrine – they give to the reader beautiful snippets of Catholic wisdom, a wisdom that will, hopefully, came back to them in moments of crisis even after they have – like most of those who know these words – stopped attending Church.

Like millions of other Italians, the one or other phrase from this immortal novel comes back to me from time to time, and makes me think. It seems to me that one of the greatest strenghts of Catholicism is in its attention to the little things, in the quiet knowledge that God doesn’t abandon those who don’t forget him in the little things, and helps them to stay – or to return to – the straight and narrow even when they stray in the bigger ones. The attitude of your typical Italian Catholic of one-two generations ago – before the “everyone’s a saint” era that has, to an extent, polluted Italy as well as the rest of Catholicism – was exactly this idea that when one does his part, and even not such a big one, the Provvidenza – a concept Manzoni comes back to again and again – takes care that the sheep finds his way, in due time, to the fold.

This is in my eyes the reason why the Countries that are more traditionally Catholic are also the ones with, I am sorry to have to say so, the happiest people. Not for us the life-quenching rigidity of old Presbyterians, the tortured morality of old Puritans, the virtue that kills joy. A stream of quiet optimism runs through the veins of Catholics, the idea that salvation doesn’t come without doing anything to deserve it, but that deserving it is well within the reach of sinners like you and I.

God forgives so many things for a work of mercy.

This is the reason why I do not stop boring you with my insistence on the Rosary, as I am fully persuaded that – besides Mass attendance – no other weapon in the Catholic armoury is so powerful in its effects, or so easy in its use.

As, though, God forgives so many things for a work of mercy, I have thought to flank my link to the Rosary with a smaller, less demanding link to a short prayer also linked to by Father Z, the Daily Offering to the Immaculate Heart of Mary. This short prayer will take you, literally, twenty-two seconds, but exactly because of its non-demanding nature can become a habit everytime you visit this site.

In case you understand or enjoy Italian – how silly of me: the two are one and the same….. 😉 – below is the scene I was talking about, the beautiful and extremely accurate – with the text used as script; basically, it is the excerpt of an audiobook with images – 1967, Sandro Bolchi rendition of I Promessi Sposi , featuring a beautiful and very moving Paola Pitagora as Lucia and the – as usual – stellar Salvo Randone as the Innominato.
The scene begins at 7:10.

APPEAL: Archbishop Nienstedt on the Threat to Religious Freedom

Please forward.

I read this article on Father Z’s blog, and his invitation to echo it. I am all to glad to help.

Whilst this is more specifically American, the issues at hand are relevant for everyone of us.

If you are American , please consider following the link leading you to a letter template for your member of Congress. In the comment box you will find suggestions now collected about wording and sites to collect electronic petitions if you don’t want to write. I doubt that writing to Sebelius will lead to any result but hey, it’s your adrenaline…..

The deadline is the end of September.

If you have a blog, you may want to echo this.

Mundabor

The Seven Arrows Of The Sodomite

From the (protestant) blog Wisdom for Life, an interesting contribution about the strategy used by sodomites to try to get acceptance for their perversion.

I copy and paste the seven points in their entirety,

1. Using the language of civil rights: For several decades we’ve heard increased association of gay rights with battles for racial and gender equality. A desire for homosexual sex (we’re told) is an inborn condition, not a choice. Although a false comparison, the aim is to view gays and lesbians as we would people of different race. If successful, those who oppose gay marriage will be viewed as racists.

2. Using accusations of hate and irrational fear: The goal has been to convince the public that opponents of gay marriage are bigoted hate-mongers with irrational phobias. They are homophobic and full of venomous prejudice — not just people who choose to see things differently. They are portrayed as irrational religious fanatics who destroy civility. Supporters of traditional marriage are presented as dangerous people who cling to bigoted ancient laws of a by-gone era.

3. Exposing heterosexual hypocrisy: Attention is drawn to marriage as a failing institution among heterosexuals. This is partly done to make Christians appear to be hypocritical for opposing gay marriage when they have their own marriage crisis. It’s simply an effort to silence opposition to gay marriage. It also assumes that gay marriage will improve the marriage scene.

4. Using the language of justice: In a twisted way, radicals gay activists portray opponents of gay marriage as perpetrators of injustice. They are accused of inequity for denying loving people the opportunities to have the same rights and freedoms others enjoy. The laws that protect all citizens are sufficient but gay activists demand special laws for their lifestyle choices.

5. Using the language of religion: Connecting gay rights to religious freedom and claiming God’s approval of gay relationships is another tactic. They scold us for failing to understand that religion is about love and tolerance. Although every major faith for most of history denounced homosexual behavior, they suggest that it’s the view of a fringe group of fundamentalists. They even deceptively portray Jesus as favoring gay marriage based on a supposed argument from silence (see: Matthew 19:3-9).

6. Playing the victim card: Every crime or death that can be connected in any measure to opposition to homosexuality is used to demand special laws to protect them from violence. They want us to believe that all opposition to gay marriage incites hate and violence, even causing suicides. This has played on the gullibility of Christians and silenced too many of them.

7. Using judicial coercion: Since State after State has approved constitutional amendments protecting traditional marriage, radicals gay activists bully Americans into acceptance of gay marriage by judicial force. In Massachusetts four justices unilaterally imposed their acceptance of gay marriage on the entire state (even though surveys indicated that the majority of residents did not favor gay marriage).

Whilst no one of these points is new or original (in the end, the author is describing commonly used strategies), the concise but complete list makes of this a very interesting reading, to which not much is to add.

I only allow myself here to point out to a couple of concepts I have expressed several times in the past:

1. Words have a meaning. Perverts and evil people will always try to pervert the meaning of a word to push their agenda. No they are not “gay”. Gay, my foot. They are very sad, frustrated, suicidal faggots. I could go on.

2. It is illusory – not to say: of dubious virility – to think that confrontations of these kind should be run like a bunch of well-behaved convent school girls oh so mindful that no one gets “emotionally hurt”. The battle must be fought as such battles were always fought before journalism got to be dominated by women and sodomites: with ferocious satire, and burying the enemy under a mountain of ridicule.

Which is, in this case, not really difficult.

Mundabor

The SSPX, the Mamma and the Cake

No poison in the fudge, says the Vatican.

One of the things I love about (us) Italians is the imaginative, colourful language. A beautiful example comes from Don Alfredo Morselli’s brilliant blog post of Messa in Latino, examining the possible content of the Preambolo Dottrinale.

The blog article is very long and I will not even attempt to translate it, but there is a concept (the key message) there that is very interesting.

According to this article (I am very aligned with this hypothesis, as it can be read around the blog in several places) what the Vatican is asking from the SSPX is nothing else than the renunciation of the “poisoned cake theory”, allegedly an image invented by Bishop Williamson. Williamson’s idea is that Vatican II is like a poisoned cake: once you know that there is poison inside the cake, you throw away the entire cake instead of discussing which parts of it aren’t poisoned.

The answer of the author (and very probably: of the majority of the SSPX) is as follows:

..la Mamma (la Santa Madre Chiesa) non fa torte [avvelenate], ma, in virtù delle promesse del Salvatore, può fare solo torte buone (altrimenti prevarrebbero le porte dell’inferno). Certamente però, come a ogni buona mamma, qualche torta o qualche sua parte non riesce sempre al meglio.

My translation:

“The mamma (the Holy Mother Church) bakes no poisoned cakes; on the contrary, in virtue of the Saviour’s promises, she can only bake good cakes (otherwise the gates of Hell would prevail). Certainly, though, as it happens to every good mother, some cake or some part of the cake does not always result in a perfect success”.

I have the impression that truly nothing more than this is required of the SSPX, and I frankly wonder how less than this could be required.

I also notice that:

1) the press release of the 14th was a joint one. I wonder how can it be seriously feared that at least Fellay and his strictest collaborators have worked to the presentation of a dish which they themselves have no intention of eating. If Fellay & Co. hadn’t considered the Preambolo worthy of approval, the tones would have been rather different ones or, more probably, no joint press release would have taken place.

2) Bishop Williamson started to become rather nervous already in June, before the news of the Preambolo Dottrinale but after the news of the invitation for the 14th September. Once again, with the benefit of hindsight we can clearly see that Williamson understood that the Vatican proposal would have cut in the middle between his position and those of the more moderate elements within the SSPX.

We will see how this evolves. Frankly, though, I can’t understand how one can avoid being optimistic in the presence of so many encouraging signals.

Mundabor

Cameron Backs Sodomite “Unions”

Mundabor's personal gift to the PM

If you ever had any doubt that David Cameron is the enemy of every Christian in this country, every doubt must have been dissolved after the chap revealed of being strongly in favour of so-called “gay marriages” and to want to start consultations to introduce it next March.

Cameron’s behaviour – certainly not approved by many among his own people, but very probably accepted as part of the effeminate cowardice now become prevalent within the once glorious Tory party – is fully in line with the Cameronian idea that bed-and-breakfast owners who do not want faggots to sleep more uxorio under their roof are intolerant, and with his blatant mockery of Christian values under the usual veil of being “compassionate”.

I will not say what I think of the man, because you know already and I would avoid becoming too explicit.

What I will follow with interest in the next months will be the reactions within: a) his own party (David Davies? Liam Fox?), the Catholic Church and, in case Christians are still among them, the Anglicans.

Let me say that I do not have much hope, as the first group have reduced themselves to street workers ready to do everything if it helps them to stay in power – learning from their boss, no doubt, who has been developing political whoredom to a fine art for many years -, the seconds are led by a clear – if not explicit for reasons of job security – heretic and supporter of sodomy, and the thirds have largely forgotten what Christianity is in the first place.

Still, you never know when the pendulum starts to swing the other way: in the United States the signals are increasing that the decision of the State of New York has been the event that will now start a massive offensive in favour of basic Christian decency (no: decency tout court) and it can’t be excluded that here in the UK this latest push towards institutionalised sodomy will cause the opposition to get organised and to become vocal.

I have said many times – and repeat now – that pieces of legislation like this deprive a country of his democratic legitimation -. Democracy is certainly not a bad idea in itself – Pope Pius XII was a great supporter – but when a democracy betrays Christian values, this democracy loses its right to exist. When the next British Franco comes out – and make no mistake, unless things change radically it is only a matter of time before he does – Christians will certainly not be on the side of such a democracy and those on the side of such a democracy will certainly not be Christians.

It is very naive to think that democracies are destroyed because some small clique of evil people manages to overcome the will of the peaceful, democracy-loving majority. On the contrary, democracies make themselves vulnerable and worthy of getting rid of because they fail to get the support of the masses on the secular plane, and/or want to defy God on the heavenly one.

The Italian democracy succumbed to Fascism because most people were perfectly all right with ditching the first and getting the second. The German democracy was defeated with utterly democratic measures, showing its failing of democratic legitimation in the most democratic of ways. The Spanish democracy died when it was clearly on the way to being substituted by an anti-Christian repressive apparatus. One sees analogies, for sure.

Cameron is working against Christianity, and he is working against the British democracy. He may think that whatever brings to him an electoral advantage in the foreseeable future works for him, but he will change his mind the day he dies at the latest, and his initiative will, in time, further alienate vast strata of the British population from a government system not seen anymore as being in tune with their own values.

In the meantime, you would expect that the Catholic bishops would rise up in arms and start telling Cameron very clearly to shut up and repent, nicht wahr?

Catholic bishops, yes; but no, not our bunch of heretics. They’ll meow a bit, if they really must, but that will be all.

The battle will be fought – and won – primarily in the United Stated. Old, weak, de-Christianised Europe will, as always ,follow.

Mundabor

The End Of The Cult Of Vatican II

Jean Baptiste Greuze, "The Drunken Cobbler"

“The truth is that this particular Council defined no dogma at all, and deliberately chose to remain on a modest level, as a merely pastoral council; and yet many treat it as though it had made itself into a sort of ‘superdogma’ which takes away the importance of all the rest.”

These words, pronounced by the then Cardinal Ratzinger in 1988, are the starting point of an interesting blog post on Rorate Caeli, centred on the end of the myth of the Religion of V II.

Whilst I disagree with the author’s point that “from now on, one may be of the Church without holding on to the controversial points of Vatican II ” (this has clearly always been the case, with the exception of liberal nutcases and outright heretics), it can’t be put into question that the climate which tended to define the Church as shaped in the image of V II (rather than in the image of the authentic Magisterium she is there to transmit and defend) is becoming less and less perceptible; this process of awakening is now taking momentum,

And voices rise up in Italy denouncing the spirit of the Council, which has not let fresh air in, but rather a freezing gust. These voices are those of a Monsignor Gherardini and of the author of his preface, Bishop Oliveri. Those of a Roberto de Mattei or of a Bishop Schneider. All take up their pens and do not hesitate to openly demand that the taboo of the Council be finally shattered.

Let us give some little contribution to the shattering, then.

I often use the image of the hangover, as it seems to me that Vatican II was a drunken orgy of cult of the youth (still present in today’s clergy, if a french bishop can still today say something as unbelievably stupid as “that he felt forced to bow to this movement [SSPX], because the youth was present in it”) and obsession with being loved and making everyone feel comfortable. Not even fifty years later, a great headache has taken the place of the drunken euphoria and, slowly but surely, clarity is coming back.

It will be some time before sobriety is fully recovered; but when that happens, all V II-generated interpretative “innovations” will be annihilated.

When you read the V II documents from a doctrinal point of view (not talking of the pastoral aspects here), you can only find statements of two kinds:

1) those who are undoubtedly in line with what the Church has always believed.
2) those who seem to introduce novelties in the way the Church lives and interprets what she has always believed.

Number 2 is a logical fallacy, and was the effect of pastoral drunkenness. A drunk person may think that he is reasoning lucidly, but he isn’t. He may think that his reasoning is even brilliant, but what he says is either obvious and as such no novelty, or believed to be some genial novelty but, in fact, stupid.

When the drunken man has come back to reality, he will see with a newly regained clarity that a sober man cannot reinvent or redefine reality, or truth. Truth was exactly as true when he was drunk as it is now that he is sober. His drunkenness can, in fact, never modify an iota of truth. It just can’t, because this is not the way truth works. At that point, the sober man will recognise that his talking of the evening before was a mixture of things that were logical in themselves – as they have always been, and always will be – and drunken blabber fruit of a skewed perception of reality.

Vatican II can never change, nor could it ever change, nor will it ever be able to change, Truth. Not an iota of it. This is as true today as it was in 1968 or in 1972, because truth is unchangeable, not negotiable and not subject to modifications due to one’s state of sobriety or otherwise.

Therefore – and I think that at the SSPX this will easily be accepted by most – a criticism of Vatican II can never be a criticism of the immutable truths Vatican II reflected, exactly in the same way as a drunken man who says that two and two is four is no less right because he is drunk.

The Golden Calf of V II is being destroyed under everyone’s eyes, and in such a way that no one will be able to pretend he didn’t notice it. It will take time, but it will happen.

Say goodbye to the Cult of V II.

Mundabor

Today is the day: Friday Abstinence is with us again!

Very tasty.... tomorrow, that is...

For all of us living in the UK< today is a rather historical day, as for the first time in ages the obligation to make penance on Friday by abstaining from meat is reintroduced.

The importance of this goes, if you ask me, beyond the mere fact, and extends to the clear signal (eve here in the UK) to recover traditional Catholic practice. The recovery of the practice will, in time, give a great contribution to the recovery of the values.

We have seen it happening the other way round decades ago, when the immense patrimony of Catholic devotions and usages was suddenly discarded as old, not in keeping with the time and, in a world, unpleasant for a Church desperately – and disgracefully – seeking for popularity.

Today, here in the UK – and, no doubt, in many other Countries in the years to come – a public, if not explicit, admission of the mistake of following the trend of the times takes place.

Every Catholic should rejoice at the possibility he is given to feel more catholic in his daily life, and to be able to make use of small but constant reminders of the religious dimension his life is called – wretched sinners as we all are – to have.

I’ll have a Potato and Leak soup accompanied by a small salad with some feta cheese, and a mozzarella with some little bread. Meatless Friday doesn’t mean joyless eating, it means that once a week you remember He Who died for you, and give him a little tribute of gratitude. In these little things lies, if you ask me, one of the great strengths of Catholicism; the Hail Mary, the Rosary, the sign of the cross when walking past a church, the small prayer when walking past someone with a disability, and many other little gestures keep us anchored in our real dimension in the middle of the hustle and bustle of our daily life.

Say hello to your soup; the meat will be able to wait until tomorrow and, for sure, no one will die of meat abstinence in the meantime.

Mundabor

Crystal Cathedral: God Uninterested In Answering The Phone

No proddie miracle: Crystal Cathedral.

It would appear that the Great Protestant Miracle is not going to happen, and that the Holy Ghost has rather blatantly refused to make the necessary overtime.

As you will remember, the Proddie church had tried to start a massive donor/tv viewer mobilisation, thinking that people as far as Europe and Asia would have massively forked out to allow an impressive, but rather strange-looking building in the Orange County to remain in the hand of the congregation. Let us see how it worked: hmmm, I like to see the building in the opening title of the “hour of impotence”, therefore I will now send a couple of hundreds, or thousand, of dollars to Orange County to continue to see the building every week for a couple of seconds in the outside, and from the inside during the transmission. Yep, makes sense…. 😉

This absolute failure to raise an amount of money remotely sufficient to persuade the judges to hold the sale proceedings (which they duly refused to do) is also a clear warning of the trap of Protestant “you can get whatever you wish”- thinking, something at times resembling Donizetti’s Dulcamara selling his love potion more than sound Christianity. And it is highly indicative – and if you ask me, not without a message from the Holy Ghost Himself – that the prophets of “possibility thinking” be confronted with the impossibility of doing what they so vividly desire, and that the “Hour of Power” have transformed itself in long months of impotence.

Let this be a cautionary tale, and let us remember that we can’t take the Cross away from Christianity, nor can we transform it into a sort of Pollyanna amusement park.

Mundabor

Pro-Homo Weprin Destroyed In Race To Replace Weiner

This is really, really good news.

The allegedly oh so liberal, sex-and-the-wiener New York has soundly defeated the democratic candidate, the soi-disant orthodox Jew, but liberal pro-homo candidate Weprin and sent a daily communicant, Catholic Republican to replace Anthony Weiner.

If you liked this, you’ll love the 2012 elections.

Weprin was literally steamrolled, losing with a 8% difference in a district formerly considered solidly under Democratic influence.

No, it is not that the voters in New York have suddenly become right-wing Catholic Republicans. It is rather that the anger at the treason of the democratic and republican prostitutes who have sold themselves for the sake of electoral campaign money was strong enough to overcome partisan disagreements, and persuaded an awful lot of voters to side with Christian values in the midst of a Sodom offensive.

Please note that this vote humiliates a Democratic candidate in a rather safe democratic district. What will happen to the republican rats, I do not even want to think…

This result will now echo all over the United States and send a very clear message to what happens to the Jezebels of liberal politics.

I have said already often in the past that the Christian giants only needs to be properly awaken to destroy every secular/liberal/sodomite enemy on his way. No better proof than today’s.

I know it sounds trite, but it never sounded so true: if we could make it there, we’re gonna make it anywhere!

Mundabor

“Messa In Latino” on the Vatican-SSPX Talks

After the end of my pressing engagements 😉 , I notice that the usually very well informed Messa in Latino informs us of the following:

1) The SSPX has been given ample time to answer. This is very good as it prevents the SSPX internal debate occurring in the middle of the predictably torrid weeks leading to and – hopefully not – perhaps following the Assisi-III initiative.

2) It would seem that a personal prelature in Opus Dei-style is being considered instead of an Ordinariate; but Messa in Latino points out that it would have to be an organisation sui generis to avoid the SSPX pastoral activities being controlled by the local bishops, a solution which not only will never be accepted, but is very probably not desired by the Vatican, either.

I cannot avoid a certain sense of euphoria, I admit. It’s not the evening whiskey, either. It seems to me very clear that the Vatican would not have released such an invitation, and handed such a document, without an agreement with the top echelons of the SSPX having been reached beforehand.

Of course, it will now be the SSPX’s job to persuade their ranks; but again, if I am right and they have already deemed the document acceptable this is a clear sign that they already know that they will have a clear majority of the SSPX with them, and no one seriously doubts that a minority of professional grumpy men would have never been satisfied anyway.

Better days ahead.

Mundabor

Vatican – SSPX Talks: Huge Step Forward, Full Communion Now In Sight

This is the communique released today. Emphases mine.

On September 14, 2011, at the office of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, a meeting was held between His Eminence, Cardinal William Levada, Prefect of this Congregation and President of the Pontifical Commission Ecclesia Dei, His Excellency, Archbishop Luis Ladaria, S.J., Secretary of this Congregation, and Monsignor Guido Pozzo, Secretary of the Pontifical Commission Ecclesia Dei, and His Excellency, Bishop Bernard Fellay, Superior General of the Priestly Fraternity of Saint Pius X, and Fathers Niklaus Pfluger et Alain-Marc Nély, General Assistants of the Fraternity

Following the petition addressed on December 15, 2008, by the Superior General of the Priestly Fraternity of Saint Pius X to His Holiness, Pope Benedict XVI, the Holy Father had taken the decision of lifting the excommunication of the four bishops consecrated by Archbishop Marcel Lefebvre and to open at the same time doctrinal conversations with the Fraternity, aiming to overcome the difficulties and the problems of a doctrinal nature, and to achieve a healing of the existing fracture.

Obedient to the will of the Holy Father, a mixed study commission, composed of experts of the Priestly Fraternity of Saint Pius X and of experts of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, assembled eight times for meetings that took place in Rome between the month of October 2009 and the month of April 2011. These conversations, whose objective was that of presenting and examining the major doctrinal difficulties on controversial themes, achieved their goal, which was that of clarifying the respective positions and their motivations.

Given the concerns and requests presented by the Priestly Fraternity of Saint Pius X regarding the integrity of the Catholic faith considering the hermeneutic of rupture of the Second Vatican Council in respect of Tradition – hermeneutic mentioned by Pope Benedict XVI in his Address to the Roman Curia of December 22, 2005 -, the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith takes as a fundamental basis for a full reconciliation with the Apostolic See the acceptance of the Doctrinal Preamble which was delivered in the course of the meeting of September 14, 2011. This preamble enunciates some of the doctrinal principles and criteria of interpretation of Catholic doctrine necessary for ensuring fidelity to the Magisterium of the Church and to the sentire cum Ecclesia, while leaving open to legitimate discussion the study and theological explanation of particular expressions and formulations present in the texts of the Second Vatican Council and of the Magisterium that followed it.

In the course of the same meeting, some elements were proposed regarding a canonical solution for the Priestly Fraternity of Saint Pius X, which would follow the eventual and hoped-for reconciliation.

Early days (or hours) and I have pressing engagements now (Champions League, mainly 😉 ).

It seems to me that the acceptance of the preamble is the only thing required, and that this preamble – whose content is for the moment not published – does not demand that the SSPX accepts any interpretation of the V II document deemed in contrast with Catholic orthodoxy. Actually, the SSPX seems even authorised to question the entire way the Magisterium has been (erroneously, of course) presented in the following decades (the “Spirit of V II” and all the annexed bollocks).

Without having read the preamble – which might be a cold shower, though I’d say this is rather improbable – I’d say that this is huge; but this is, in fact, even bigger 😉

Again: early days, and we’ll have to see how the situation develops. But come on, I can’t imagine the SPPX having being informed and having given informal approval to the document beforehand.

This is huge, huger, hugest!! However it may end up, the text already signals a great understanding for the SSPX position, and the fact that they are in line with the “hermeneutic of continuity”, whilst the trendies are not.

Better days ahead. Now we only have to pray.

God bless Pope Benedict.

Mundabor

Spot The Error

The Right Stuff

“He who is able to bow before the Eucharist, who receives the Lord’s body cannot fail to be attentive, in the ordinary course of the days, to situations unworthy of man, and is able to bend down personally to attend to need, is able to break his bread with the hungry, share water with the thirsty, clothe the naked, visit the sick and imprisoned,” ….

Pope Benedict XVI

Yep, you saw it right.

Pope Benedict didn’t say “bow”.

He said “kneel”

Mundabor

Rowan Williams Is On His Way

If I were Anglican, this would be worth a really good bottle.

It would appear that Rowan Williams has decided to take himself out of the embarrassing situation he had put himself in by doing what the likes of him – people unable to decide, incapable of taking a stance and constitutionally inept at leading – generally end up doing: hook it.

In future he will bore university students, we are told, and whilst I can’t envy them, I would suggest that in their tribulations they reflect that through their sacrifice a great embarrassment for Christianity has been taken away from a position of I do not say importance, but public relevance.

Like his predecessors, Rowan Williams has ceaselessly worked at making himself and his mickey-mouse church utterly and completely irrelevant. His intervention in favour of Sharia-law will be remembered as the Jimmy-Carter-moment of British Anglicanism, the point of deepest tragedy and humiliation; but one must say that during his tenure, RW has consistently worked at never deciding anything, never daring to displease anyone, and waffling around nonsense of such incomprehensible stupidity that not even his Anglican fans had the nerve to declare that he was saying anything astonishingly intelligent, but oh so difficult to grasp anymore.

Under his tenure, the Anglican Communion has all but officially imploded and within his own shop, the ambiguity about sodomites wanting to be clergymen and bishops has reached levels considered ridiculous even by Anglicans. He has failed in everything, hasn’t given a line of conduct or a guidance, hasn’t said what he stands for, hasn’t given any indication of how he wanted the so-called church of England to be. Oh, but he has  talked a lot, and written  – perhaps – even more. No doubt, he’ll be mightily pleased with himself. Now the ship is half-sunk and he takes the lifeboat, leaving others to cope with the mess he never wanted to address. Well done, skipper…

I would almost wish the Anglicans – the few serious, committed believers still out there – that his successor will be a man of strong Christian convictions, that is: something RW never allowed himself to be, because it would have been offensive to non-Christians. Almost, I say. In fact, the best thing that can happen to them is that some trendy sodomite – or friend of sodomy –  is called to succeed the Muppet Man, so that the few honest Anglicans remained may be exposed to the tragedy of heresy and secularist infiltration in one go, rather than in installments. It might do them some good after all.

Good riddance, Mister Rowan Williams: we will miss the comedy factor.

His farewell speech is at the beginning of this post. Loads of clarity and entertainment factor, as always.

Mundabor

Fr Pavone Under Fire.

Please, not again!

I had read several times about Fr Pavone and if you use the search function of this blog, you might find an entry or two about him. I liked his pro-life commitment and the way he engages to do that which too many clergymen do not want to do.

It would now appear that his Bishop has suspended him and has ordered him to come back to Amarillo, alleging that Fr Pavone has disobeyed him by not allowing the accounts of his 10-million-bucks-a-year charity to be audited.

One would say that this is (then) Father Corapi all over again (poor chap, by the way; what has happened to him? I see dark clouds there, but I digress…), but in this case the circumstances appear rather different because Fr Pavone obeys to the bishop (coming back to Amarillo as ordered) even when he is not obliged to (as he has already appealed, and the appeal allows him to wait for the decision; I am not an expert in canon law but I’d say that we have seen this in the case of bishop Nourrichard).

The matter here is rather disconcerting for a different reason: the bishop says that Fr Pavone doesn’t want to have his books audited; Fr Pavone says that the books are audited but the bishops doesn’t want to acknowledge that they are. As the matter of auditing of financial statements is heavily regulated all over the West and not much of a grey zone seems possible, I am sure that we will rather soon know who is talking without thinking here. If Fr Pavone picked his cousin to audit the financial statements because he happens to be an accountancy student, the books are not audited and I think he’s in trouble; if he had the accounts regularly audited I think the Bishop will have some explaining to do.

The other matter rather reminiscent of the Corapi affair is the bishop’s accusation about “persistent questions remained unanswered” regarding how the money is used (hence the great need for auditing, of course). Once again, either the books have been properly audited, or they haven’t. If they have, it should have been for the auditors to express concerns, if such areas of concerns had been established. If they haven’t, the problem is there irrespective of Pavone having being wasteful or not.

It is sad to see that once again, a famous priest makes headlines for the wrong reasons. On the other hand, if a scandal is really on the making (and be that one of careless administration) the Latin saying oportet ut scandala eveniant has once again deserved its excellent reputation.

As in Corapi’s case, Fr Pavone should be presumed innocent until found guilty.

I truly hope we won’t see him soon photographed in a motorcycle jacket, though.

Mundabor

Brave Italian Priests, and the Pitfalls of Biritualism

Good wine, and good priests: Piedmont.

This has already made some waves, but I get to write some comment only now.

In Italy, three brave priests have decided that once the Church has put at their disposal the possibility to celebrate the better Mass, it makes no sense to celebrate the lesser one. Mind: none of them says that the Novus Ordo has no sacramental validity. What they say, is that you don’t do things by half, and that they most certainly won’t do it. The three priests have set up a common internet site, called Radicati nella Fede (“Rooted in the Faith”). Truly, these people don’t do “gradualism”.

Rorate Caeli publishes an interesting interview of one of the three, in an English translation. The interview is very interesting to read because it shows people who, whilst not being “extremists” in any normally accepted ways of the word, are hard as granite in their desire to be the best priests they can.

The following concepts of Father Alberto Secci particularly caught my attention; firstly, that he had found at school a more militant Catholic spirit than he subsequently found in the seminary; secondly, that he wore the cassock and gave communion on the tongue even in those pre-Benedict times; thirdly, that he seems to stress the fact that he gave traditional catechism to the children, thus clearly distancing himself from the watered down catechism he must have seen taught around him.

The interview becomes really interesting, though, when Don Secci gets to speak about why he celebrates the Tridentine Mass and no other:

I shall be brief. I find the obligation of biritualism absurd. If one has found that which is authentic, which is best, that which expresses the Catholic Faith more completely, without dangerous ambiguities, why would there be the need to celebrate something much less so? With biritualism, in actual fact, one rite dies and the other stays. With biritualism, the priest gets weary, with the sadness of a sort of schizophrenia, and the people are not edified, instructed, consoled in the beauty of God. I shall avoid discussing the theological liturgical aspects – an interview is not the place for that. I will say only that whoever stays with biritualism sooner or later abandons the Old Rite and manufactures reasons to stay in the world of the reform, lived perhaps in a conservative way, but with an interior sadness, like one who has betrayed the love of God since his youth. I have to add that it was very helpful for me to read “The Anglican Liturgical Reform” by Michael Davies – a fundamental text which is very clear: the ambiguity of the rite leads to heresy in fact. Is it not this that has happened?

Heck, this man is lucid. He has a legitimate instrument that is better than another legitimate instrument, and therefore he uses it. He recognises that the ambiguity of the rite leads to heresy, and acts accordingly. He has the gut to say loud and clear that this is what the Novus Ordo has given us: heresy.

Now, one might legitimately say that the “radical” choice of only celebrating the Tridentine is against that spirit of gradualism and progressive change that generally serves the Church rather well. I think that the argument has, in abstract, its legitimacy. But in practice, in a country like Italy, where every village has its church and the next church is just a short walk or bicycle or car or bus ride away, it doesn’t seem very valid: Piedmont has world-class infrastructure, we are not talking Burkina Faso or even Calabria here. The choice between the rites is given at every practical level anyway and as long as there are parishioners (the vast majority of them, in today’s Italy) who must live without having the Tridentine round the corner, I find it more than acceptable that there should be rare parishioners who must live without having the Novus Ordo round the corner.

I think what explains the motivations of Father Secci (and his colleagues) best are the following words about the present situation:

A great many think they are Catholics, but they aren’t anymore. It’s terrible.

Once again, the lucidity of thought and clarity of expression of this man is admirable (though more accustomed for an Italian, as by us the culture is to say things rather more directly than in the UK). You clearly see this man wanting to obey Christ as best as he can.

Which leads us to the last issue: obedience. I do not know (and the interview doesn’t throw light on the matter) whether the priests are in direct violation of canon law, or whether they are just giving it an unusual interpretation, not very popular among some faithful, certainly unusual and not pleasing the bishop much. If the three are in direct violation of Canon Law, I think this (not the gradualism argument) is the most valid argument against the “radical” choice made by them.

I still can’t escape the impression that these three are wonderful priests, though; and at the cost of appearing – as I sometimes am – rather too sanguine, I also have the impression that these priests are the spear head of a thinking that will soon – possibly as soon as the next papacy, very probably with the one after that – spread all over the Church as the limits and shortcomings of the Novus Ordo become more and more apparent and the generation which created it dies.

As always, whoever looks at the past of the Church, also looks at Her future.

Mundabor

Left-footer’s “How Nice To Be Nice”

How nice to be nice!
To tolerate vice,
And give honour to every perversion.
To love without boundaries,
Ideological quandaries,
And have Faith, but one’s own private version.

Left-footer, 2011

Colombiana and the Rosary

Powerful even in the hand of a Colombian gangster: the Rosary.

Strange feelings on seeing the film “Colombiana”, now on cinemas in the United Kingdom.

You see a lot of Catholic symbols; crosses, rosaries, even a mantilla. There is even a catholic Mass, but I stupidly forgot whether the celebrating priest was ad orientem (the fact is, it is so normal to me that if it was I have probably failed to register it as unusual).

Unfortunately, these crosses and rosaries, and even mantillas are worn by what are undoubtedly the wrong people; particularly the rosary, with which a gangster ostentatiously plays at the beginning of the movie. Perhaps the ideology behind that is that “baddies wear crosses and have rosaries”, but this would be rather stupid as no one can say the baddies are the only one to wear them; perhaps the intention was to show the diffuse reliance on Christian values within the Colombian society; or perhaps it is just – and I say this only as a passing thought – that the slow recovery of Catholic customs in the Catholic world (you only need to go to the shop of the Westminster Cathedral to find a dozen of different rosaries on sale; on Ebay the choice is endless; I do think some things are changing here) is slowly being registered outside of it and the rich world of Catholic symbolism starts to catch the imagination of the world again. This would seem, by the way, reinforced from the post I wrote just a couple of days ago about the 10 hour documentary about the Church.

It can, of course, always be that the crosses and rosary have been shown to mock the Catholic faith, seen as the religion of choice of bloody, evil people. But this would not be a very clever strategy for a secularist or an atheist, as the Cross and the rosary are very powerful instruments, and the idea that they wouldn’t impress the one or other cinema goer in a sense opposite to the one intended a very naive one.

Be it as it may, I am surely not the only one noticing the heavy reference to Catholicism in the movie, and the rather strange context in which they are made. But if you put crosses and rosaries on the big screen, this can’t be bad.

Mundabor