Father Reto Nay On St. Peter and St. Paul

Though one day late, if you follow the link you’ll see Father Reto Nay’s interesting take on St. Peter and St. Paul.

It is beautiful to know that in the middle of heretic Mitteleuropa some strong priest acts to defend and spread proper Catholicism.

Mundabor

http://gloria.tv/?media=305939&connection=highdefinition

Venerable Fulton Sheen

Last hurdle before Beatification is taken: Venerable Fulton Sheen.

Why ++ Di Noia’s Appointment Won’t Change Anything

Forget ++ Di Noia. This is the one calling the shots.

Once again, we have a small change in the Vatican and once again, the Internet is alive with speculations as to what this might mean for the SSPX-Vatican negotiations.

I am always amused at this exercise by which a huge elephant is in the room, and so many commentators stubbornly refuse to see it.

Now, Father Schmidberger may have his diplomatic reasons to say that the appointment of Archbishop Di Noia to the position of main negotiator with the SSPX might be a positive sign, and he is right in sending a signal to the Holy Father that when the Vatican abandons unrealistic demands, the door of the SSPX is always open. It is, also, perfectly fine he does not say who is, in the end, the responsible for the “ping-pong ball treatment” reserved to the Society. Once again, and even after having been abused and lied to, the SSPX shows real charity and a sincere desire for – proper – reconciliation.

What in my eyes is not realistic is to think that this or that appointment of this or that person may really change anything in the fundamental question: either the Pope (not Levada; not Di Noia; not Gaenswein; The Pope)  accepts that the SSPX will not change its position on Vatican II, or there will be no agreement. Not now, not in two years’ time, and not if the Pope lives to be 120.

Please note unless I am mistaken the incardination of Ecclesia Dei under the CDF has not been changed; therefore, Di Noia’s immediate superior is still Cardinal Levada. Please also note Cardinal Levada was supposed to retire… today, and as far as I can see he is still there. Ditto Gaenswein.

Therefore, at the moment I do not see any change in the position of the Pope (not Levada’s; not Di Noia’s; not Gaenswein’s; the Pope’s) that in order to reach an agreement the SSPX must swallow Vatican II whole. We know this is the position of the Pope because we know the Pope isn’t doddering, and we know he can write, use the phone, send emails and surf on the internet. Therefore, if he were minded to  consent to regolarise the SSPX’s position (leaving the doctrinal discussions to a later stage), and would – incredibly, as they are his own people, and still at their places – not entirely trust Gaenswein, or Levada, or Di Noia, or whomever else, he could simply grab the phone and be done with it in just a few minutes. Something like that:

“Gut morning, may I speak to Bishop Fellay, please? Yes, zis is ze Pope. Thanks, I’ll vait….

Hallo, Bishop Fellay? Thanks, excellency, hope you too. Zis is just to tell you I am faxing over ze doctrinal declaration. Yes, it’s all fine. How’s ze veather by the vay? Here is very varm… You’re velcome, excellency. It vas a pleasure”.

Five minutes, top; including the waiting, and the fax transmission.

Where there’s a will, there’s a way. Particularly if you are the most powerful man on Earth.

In this case, I begin to think there is simply no will. What is wanted here is either an unrealistic conversion of the SSPX to V II bollocks, or a rather shameless attempt to split them in the middle – as already attempted with the FSSP; I forget who was one of the main architects of the operation at the time… – dangling in front of them the bait of the reconciliation, and hoping that some back and forth and some broken promises will move them to cave in in the end.

Someone at the Vatican is being too clever by half. Not good.

Mundabor

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Extremely interesting blog post from the “American Papist”, Thomas Peters. In his blog post, Peters point out to a clearly visible, but often not sufficiently considered reality: that the overwhelmingly liberal mass media greatly increase the feeling of inevitability of homo marriage by stubbornly ignoring their many defeats, and giving enormous space and “historic significance” to their very rare victories.

Stop for a moment and reflect what the liberal media (that is: the vast majority of the mass tv channels in the US and Europe, and the majority of mass newspapers) would have said if in the US there had been thirty popular consultation about the so-called homo marriages and the perverts had won all of them. And now please think that the reality is that they have lost them, all of them. It’s 31-0 for Christian values, and counting!

If this kind of results had been achieved by the…

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The Business Of Medjugorje

Medjugorje in pictures.

 

Very interesting blog post on Crisis Magazine about the biggest Catholic scam of our times, Medjugorje. I allowed myself to take the photo from there too, as it is so apposite.

As always, it is rather entertaining to see the long list (this blog post has an extremely long one) of blunders, contradictions, and outright  absurdities  linked to this cult for the gullible and the outright stupid.

What is perhaps more interesting – and something I had not known – is that some of the seers endorse “apparitions” which are considered “not approved” by the other seers and by the official Medjugorje site.

The thing is too funny to let it pass: the Medjugorje site is saying “only our slated apparitions are authentic; the slated apparitions of one of us, whose apparitions are authentic when they happen by us, are not approved when they happen by other people”.

One wonders: does the Blessed Virgin dare to disobey to the seers by appearing to one of them without the approval of the others? Or has one of the “seers”, Marija Pavlovic Lunetti, a split personality by which she is a real seer when her apparitions are “approved”, and a con woman when they aren’t? What do the other seers think of said Marija Pavlovic Lunetti?

But most of all: how can people be so thick to believe all this? How can any person say “I will be at your place in the days between 1 and 5 July, during which the Blessed Virgin will appear to me five times?” What is this?  This is not even good as a joke! This would offend the intelligence of a six-years-old child! But no, the Medjugorje businesses (both “original” and “unapproved”; but run or supported in part by the same people) goes on undisturbed.

In the meantime the Vatican does – as pretty much always – nothing. We are told a decision on Medjugorje should fall within the year, but by the leonine qualities the Pontiff has been showing in the last years I rather think he’ll prefer to, as they say, chicken out. Cardinal Schoenborn supports the apparition and he is a pal of the Pontiff, so don’t expect the Spanish Inquisition.

We shall see.   What is sure is that – to use a happy Italian saying – the mother of the idiot is always pregnant.

Enjoy the link.

Mundabor

 

 

 

SSPX, Vatican, Integrity

Fornicator, but orthodox: Pope Alexander VI.

What would you think of a, say, Prime Minister who first indicates a draft of  agreement is fine, and then eats his words and decides on second thought it is better to back pedal?

What would you think of  a Prime Minister who surrounds himself with people of such falseness as to – in case; this is the milder hypothesis for the Prime Minister – lie to negotiation counterparts concerning the PM’s agreement with the draft document?

If the Prime Minister were surrounded by people without scruples, duplicitous and scheming, would you not consider the Prime Minister responsible for the people he selects to be near him?

If the Prime Minister surrounds himself with people of evidently manipulative character – Alastair Campbell comes to mind –  would you not think that said Mr Campbell is there because he is exactly the kind of person the Prime Minister wants in that position?

When Blair decided to wage war in Iraq, how many of those critical with this decision blamed Gordon Brown for it? How many of those in favour praised the same Brown for it?

When a man promises to a woman to marry her, and then eats his word because he didn’t like the reaction  of some relatives of his – perhaps important, no doubt; but none of them the bridegroom –  what do decent people think of such a man? Do they think that bad “wolves” made him change his mind? Or do they think that a man is only as good as his word, and a man who does not keep his word is not a decent man? 

Here the matter is very simple:

a) The Holy Father ate his word; or

b) The Holy Father surrounds himself – willingly, mind; and full knowing what he does – with people who do not hesitate to lie and to spend his own name and personal integrity to reach some objective of theirs: for example, in order to achieve a general mobilisation  of the German clergy so as to scare the – in himself not truly difficult to scare – Pope.

Unless of course you persuade me that Pope Benedict can work with the likes of Bertone, Levada & Co. for decades without knowing them, in which – absurd – case you are telling me that he should not have been made parish priest, let alone Pope.

The falseness and duplicity of what has happened in the Vatican in the last weeks is beyond contempt, because here something much worse was done than simply saying “no” to the SSPX. In this case, the SSPX was simply used – either by the Holy Father, or by the likes of Gaenswein under the supervision and responsibility of the Holy Father – to proceed to the mobilisation of the V II crowd. The saddened words of Bishop Fellay about the SSPX being used like a ping-pong ball seem to me to clearly refer to this.

Let me tell you this once again, because I get slightly nervous when I read that suddenly Cardinal Levada should be the culprit and the Pontiff, who obviously lives on Mars, should be whither than snow: Levada is not the Pope. Benedict XVI is the Pope. The Pope is in charge. He is answerable for what he does and for what his people do. If Gaenswein has lied, he is responsible for having Gaenswein in his role. If Levada was duplicitous, he is responsible for having Levada in his role. If “wolves” are roaming around, he is responsible for everyone of them, because they are there on his decision and under his responsibility.

Make no mistake, this blunder is 100% Pope Benedict’s responsibility, and casts a huge shadow on his personal integrity in the worst of cases, and on his leadership and ability to work as a Pope in the best one.

In case, then, you should think a Pope would, oh, never ever do such things, think again: the leak is still very fresh of how Pope Benedict authorised the scandalous neo-catechumenal liturgy and simply let Cardinal Burke in the dark. Just like that. This is not only poor leadership, this justifies doubts about one’s personal integrity, and it might be useful to open one’s eyes and see reality as it is instead of chasing imaginary “wolves” accurately selected by the Pontiff across several decades to do exactly…. the contrary of what he wants.

Then the “Levada did it ” argument is preposterous, because by wanting to discharge him it simply indicts the Pontiff in the most brutal of ways. If you surround yourself with wolves all your life, can you say you are better than them? Did the Pontiff think these dogs would have no fleas? For an entire lifetime? Please.

Once again: Cardinal Levada is not in charge. The Pope is. Levada can only propose, but he cannot decide. If the Pope has come to the point that his Cardinals do whatever they please without his having the force to react, he should resign at once for the good of the Church and of his own soul. But we all know that this is simply not the case; and that frail as he is, he is certainly not an old man in his dotage.

The problem I see with the Pontiff is, very bluntly stated, one of lack of integrity. He lacks integrity if he lies (let’s hope not; but let us not be Pollyanna here); if not, he lacks integrity because he chooses collaborators who evidently lack integrity; and he certainly  lacks integrity if he does not have the basic decency of sticking to his own word, as can be expected by every man who think his word has value.

“Let your yea be yea and your nay, nay” seem words unheard of in nowadays’ Vatican, from the Pope down. Instead, playing with the SSPX  in this shameful way – in order to divide them, or to provoke a reaction from the other side – seems to be perfectly legitimate. For shame.

Then we are told the Pope is “saddened” that there are leaks, and plots, and subterranean schemes. Of course there are, if this is the mentality he promotes and selects! Of curse there are, if this is the forma mentis he wants in the people surrounding him! The Pontiff  made this bed in its entirety, but now he is saddened he has to lie in it! This is about the same as Obama complaining his team is made of money-squandering, incompetent, atheist nincompoops; with the difference that Obama has far less liberty in choosing his people than the Pope.

We all have seen in the past how the one or other Pope disgraced his Office and the Church. In recent times, Pope John Paul II – who managed to tamper with the Crusades, be scolded live by “rock stars” and “nuns”, and kiss the Koran – comes to mind; but the old Pope was, at least on some of these occasions, probably not really there with his head anymore, and one wonders to what extent he can be blamed.

I don’t think the same can be said of the present Pontiff. Whatever has happened here, it has happened during many weeks of careful plotting. Whatever deception was staged here, it was made in cold blood and with utter disregard for the feelings of thousands of devoted Catholics, and with the arrogance of those who think to them everything is allowed.

Let us pray for the Pope, recruiter of wolves; that he may see the error of his ways and make a better use of the time left to him.

Mundabor