A Slap In The Face
The Pontiff Emeritus has broken his silence, and his words are both revealing and ominous. Revealing, because they are clearly targeted (though the recipient of the criticism is, obviously, not mentioned) at the entire obscene edifice of FrancisMercy. Ominous, because I am very much afraid the good man has decided to speak now, only days before the announced publication of the Apostolic Excrementation (© Mundabor 2016), because he has got word of something obscene therein contained. I might be wrong, of course; let’s hope so.
Anyhow, let us come to the content of the interview itself. It has brought me back to a time when the Pope was – albeit of the V II sort – still Catholic. How the times have changed…
First salvo: loss of the fear of hell destroys the Faith.
The missionaries of the 16th century were convinced that the unbaptized person is lost forever. After the [Second Vatican] Council, this conviction was definitely abandoned. The result was a two-sided, deep crisis. Without this attentiveness to the salvation, the Faith loses its foundation.
There is no way whatsoever, not even in a desperate effort of Pollyann-ing, that this can be interpreted otherwise than an indictment of the MercyCrap (© Mundabor 2016) the Evil Clown has been spouting around for a very long time now. let us quote:
This is very V II, of course (he does not say he is convinced, too, unless other conditions occurred). Still, the message is clear enough: MercyCrap © destroys the very foundations of Catholicism.
Second salvo: loss of extra ecclesiam nulla salus destroys proselytism.
[Benedict] also speaks of a “profound evolution of Dogma” with respect to the Dogma that there is no salvation outside the Church. This purported change of dogma has led, in the pope’s eyes, to a loss of the missionary zeal in the Church – “any motivation for a future missionary commitment was removed.”
One is reminded of the one who said that proselytism is “solemn nonsense”. Who might that have been? Oh well..
Again, there is no way you can possibly misunderstand it. Benedict goes squarely against what Francis preaches day in and day out. Seriously, there is nowhere to hide.
Benedict is, obviously, the Emeritus. Therefore, he does not speak in any official role as the Pope. However, he speaks with the authority of one who once was the Pope in charge. It is the most authoritative voice choosing to be heard in such a clear manner on matter that go at the very heart of Catholicism.
I lament the imprecision of the language, that might be due to the translation: dogmas don’t evolve, and for a religious to even imply (he later says “purported”) that any dogma may be “evolved” is not good at all. However, the well-formed catholic will understand what the man means without any difficulties.
Similarly, Catholic convictions can never be “definitively abandoned”. Rather, some bad Catholics can abandon them. Again, the impression might be engendered that Catholic convictions may change. They don’t. What can change is the quality of the believer, never the quality of the belief. Again, it might have been the translation, or a certain lack of attention.
Be it as it may, these are welcome words as the Holy Week is about to begin, and Francis is about to embark in another orgy of “Muslims saved by holding to their Korans”.
But honestly, I fear that something worse might be in the making.
M
P.s. before I get 30 messages about this: I know, Benedict is still part of the problem. But I am sure everyone will see the difference with the Evil Clown. In any way, this blog post is not about Benedict’s pontificate.
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Posted on March 16, 2016, in Catholicism, Conservative Catholicism, Traditional Catholicism. Bookmark the permalink. 11 Comments.
Mundabor's Blog 
It was nine o’clock in the morning when they crucified him.
Mk 15:25
I agree that Pope Emeritus Benedict does not retain an “official” capacity, humanly speaking; the sort of bureaucratic capacity that means something to, say, Pope Francis.
He does obviously retain the capacity that truly matters, as a living sharer of St. Peter’s Seat. God sees this very clearly to the detriment of shadowy ambition in “high” places.
I have always thought it extremely strange Pope Benedict would choose this path. It made no sense on multiple levels. I have strongly suspected he has a major role to play on the world scene in our Lord’s Church before all is said and done. If so, I very much think it is tied into the Fatima prophecy, which he undoubtedly knows intimately.
These are but rumblings, perhaps, of great things to come.
The impetus for his speaking now may not just be the Apostolic Excrementation, but also what Chris F. wrote about today: http://fatimaperspectives.com/fo/perspective839.asp . Quoting Cardinal McCarrick regarding the underground Chinese Catholics:
“If you have a Church that considers martyrs, that sets them off against the others, this in itself contains the pebbles of a rocky road to disunity. Sure I appreciated [Cardinal Zen’s] concerns and sufferings… You have to be proud of the Church that suffers, but also worried that a Church that suffers allows that suffering to be a barrier to the common union to which the Lord has called us.”
AARRRGH!!
So let me get this straight. The “missionaries of the 16th” century believed in extra ecclesiam nulla salus, but VII “definitely abandoned” this dogmatic teaching? Well, if Benedict is right, the Council has taught heresy. Surely, in this case, its texts and prescriptions should be immediately disregarded both by individual Catholics and by the magisterium. Is it even possible, according to Church teaching, for a valid ecumenical council to teach actual heresy?
Benedict is a VII Catholic. He wants to believe Catholicism and still retain the texts of the Council. But the two really are incompatible so that even an intelligent, analytical man like Joseph Ratzinger has to take refuge in ambiguity and equivocation, leading to illogical contradictions – something he would never have tolerated in his students.
Catholicism – Vatican II – Logic: Choose two.
The difference to the Evil Clown is that the latter only chose one, rejecting both Catholicism and logic.
He certainly means in the praxis. He does not mean that the Church abandons dogmatic teaching.
M
I see Benedict’s words as matter for an “examination of conscience” for the Church.
Those who are conscious of growing old, if Christian, will know they are close to facing the Judgment and their eternal reward. But if they believe none of this – and Christ is neither Redeemer nor Judge for them, they will ignore Benedict’s warning.
The Word became flesh at the Incarnation, and God entrusted Himself to men’s hands, initially to the Blessed Virgin Mary and St Joseph, then in adulthood without parental protection. We see in Passiontide what men did to their Messiah, our God.
We see in the lamentable state of the Church in the “developed” world, and in the suffering of Christians throughout the world because of that destruction of the Church’s life over the last sixty years, what members of the Church have done to Christ’s Body on earth.
And the judgment draws visibly nearer to both Europe and North America, every day.
Ooooh the gloves are off now. Slap in the face is exactly that that was, couched even as it was in the gentle language of Romanita. I don’t think he meant to say the dogma was changed. He meant to say Vatican II is an ocean of ambiguities, is not a “mega” council as he once said, and we clearly need a Vatican III to clean up the whole mess that is letting ill formed Catholics like PF run around relatively unchecked.
Way too little and way too late.
Had these words been said while he was Pope with puissance and authority, the response would have been consequentially cataclysmic; now, they are aught but the personal opinions and words of a retired cleric sans authority/power.
Oh, I remember several intervention with similar words. The response wasn’t cataclysmic at all. The man wasn’t a good enforced even in his best days.
However, the words of a Pontiff Emeritus still carry some weight; particularly when, as in this case, they clearly point out to the shortcomings of the man in charge.
M
Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI is primarily responsible for this massive loss of faith in the post-Vatican II era. He has no credibility to now “break his silence” and be concerned.
I doubt fifty years of decay can be blamed on the Pope who, alone in fifty years, tried to at least fight against it. Of course, Benedict’s thinking is also faulty. But to blame principally him is vastly exaggerated.
M