Wien: Providence At Work

The SSPX has been given the Minoritenkirche in Vienna. This a beautiful, very old, prestigious church in the heart of the City. The SSPX had, up to now, no presence in Vienna.

It really is like a breath of fresh air. Exactly in the place whence the stench of Cardinal Schoenborn’s homosexualist propaganda spreads all over the Catholic world, a beautiful, authentically Catholic voice will be raised.

The church is big, but it is an easy prediction that it will be constantly packed; reaction to Schoenborn, curiosity, and love for Latin will draw to it not only the true believers but , in time, those whom Providence will gently, but irresistibly, attract towards the beauty of proper Catholicism, the same way it has happened to many others in the past; among whom, unworthily, yours truly.

If you ask me, it should be a constant endeavour of every sincere Catholic to see Providence at work in all events of this disgraceful age, bad and good ones.

The antics of our clown prelates do have a providential function, as they help the Elect to, by the simple reaction to them, get in touch with proper Catholicism, deepen and more firmly love it like the prisoner longs for freedom. Still, I think that the Lord in His Mercy also helps us in a more uplifting way, showing us by many signs the irrepressible vitality of His Church, properly intended.

If you ask me, we – and I with you – need to train ourselves in the detection of God’s providential plan in all the seeming defeats, outrages and other bad news engendered by the bunch of scoundrels currently disfiguring the Church; to whom, all of them, no matter how evil, we should wish repentance and salvation, actually praying for it for them so that, through their repentance and conversion, God’s glory may be more evidently revealed and shown to all; but knowing at all times that, if that is not the case, they will still be the expression of God’s glory, only in a much more fearful way.

This news made my day. We will know more in the next days.

The battle is already won.

The Resistance Is Everywhere

Francis’ true intentions behind the footnote in the previously mentioned letter is clear. The poison in the pie, giving the Eucharist to faithful in mortal sin due to adultery, is part of a grand plan to attempt to permanently alter the Faith itself. Catholics who believe in the teachings stand in the way. For the longest time now many of us who were Catholic, or who were better Catholics, because of the pope now have to learn to be Catholic despite the pope.

Read these words, which are (sadly) not mine, and understand the lucidity with which many, writing on their blogs, realise what is going on and, without leaving Catholicism or taking refuge in absurd fantasies, react to the situation by simply taking refuge in… our wonderful Catholic faith.

People will either know the Faith better because they’ve had to debunk so many erroneous sounding utterances or will fall victim to his deceit and receive Communion uselessly and sacrilegiously like so many Bidens or disgruntled baptized Catholic proabortion/sodomy leftists who show up at special church events to run everything, demanding they’re reading the Scriptures at funerals and marching up self-righteously to demand Communion at weddings and funerals as though they’re just as Catholic as Mother Teresa.

More from the same author. A harsh, but truthful, examination of the current situation in the Church; a situation which sees Catholics treated as bad human beings, and the promoters of holocausts receiving all possible honours from those very people that should be their shepherds.

[Francis] seems to lack humility, changing the Lord’s Prayer as he does, kneeling to kiss the feet of African leaders or wash Muslim feet on Holy Thursday while refusing to do so each time he says holy Mass for God Himself truly present in the Eucharist. It seems that everything is ridiculously venerated except the Faith and the Lord Himself, a hallmark of the modernist heresy.

This is another pearl. Yes, everything is venerated nowadays, from retarded youth to animals and plants; most of all, the veneration of sinfulness – particularly of, in the end, the most sinful of all sinners, sexual perverts – has reached now a lever where the opposition to perversion is not only merely formal, but the Vatican hierarchy will do everything they can to let you know that they are just going through the motions (the recent events in Italy are quite illuminating).

Who is, you will ask, this lucid, but very harsh blogger? Who is this guy who accuses Francis of encouraging, promoting heresies at every step, whilst – obviously – recognising him as the Pope?

Well, let me reveal him to you: he is a blogger priest.

There is, in this worthy man, no desire to escape reality. Things are what they are. We cope with reality, acknowledge the issues, and tackle them with the weapons the Church has given us; weapons which will always be sufficient to deal with any issue under the sun.

The situation in which we find ourselves is certainly unprecedented, but the arising of unprecedented situations is not new at all. It was a first when Marcellinus denied God. It was a first when Honorius prohibited the traditional Creed and had it substituted for a PC one. It was a first when Honorius took side with the heretics. It was a first when John XXII threatened to proclaim an absurd, obviously heretical “dogma”, and it was still a first when, having renounced to the proclamation of the dogma, still claimed for himself the right to believe in his heresy and was left in place.

It is no use to recur to subtle distinguos and state that Honorius, perhaps, wasn’t really as bad; that Marcellinus did, in fact, never proclaimed any heresies; or that John XXII was, I don’t know, badly instructed. It does not count. All those situations were a new, never before seen challenge to the Church. How did the faithful react? By being, well, faithful; sometimes with greater energy, speed and resolve (Marcellinus), sometimes with a long-drawn battle that went on for decades (Liberius), and sometimes biding their time after the cowardly reaction and acquiescence of the Bishops, which ended only after the death of the pope (Honorius, but also Formosus, who seems to have done unspeakable stuff himself, the details of which remain obscure).

Providence has, as it always will have, the answer already. The Resistance is here to stay, and – by God’s grace – it will not be an Argentinian boor with no clue of anything, not even of his own stupidity, or any of his equally unworthy successors, that crushes the Church.

The reprobates will, one day, go to hell. The elect will, one day, end up in Heaven. Francis will not change the count, not even by one.

Francis is pope. And he is an unprecedented disgrace. We know this because it’s happening. We are called to react to this by knowing the faith better.

More Catholicism. More penance. More fasting. More faith in the Lord.

Face reality with faith, and leave the fantasies in the realm of the fiction.

The Resistance is everywhere. Providence is at work.

Our side has already won.

The Altar Of Oneself

One of the things that most drive me mad these days is the superficial, feel-good fluffy nonsense I see all around me. It is not only the stupidity in itself that grates me. It is, rather, the loss of religious feeling that it exposes.

Where I grew up, people were inserted in a system of values that was not decided by them. Faithful or atheist, leftist or right-wing, old or young, they all knew that …. they don’t make the rules; that they are not the arbiters of right and wrong; that it would be absurd to demand that they are “affirmed” in anything just because they have decided that this is the way they want it. Even Commies had a system of rules that they had to accept.

This is not the case anymore. Nowadays, it seems that everything is right because I say so. From purple metallic hair, to tattooes, to being 350 pounds heavy at 29, nobody can be criticised. The loss of religious feeling put an end to a socially accepted standard of norms.

People who don’t believe in God have no polar star in their lives. They also have no accepted, morally solid standard of goodness anymore. Therefore, everyone becomes his own little god,  and demands that everybody else worships at the altar of himself.

These new microreligions are childish, emotional and, more often than not, outright damaging. 300 pounds at 29 means a change of lifestyle or a likely early grave. A body covered with tattooes leaves marks that will be, one day, either regretted or even uglier to look at than in years past. Purple metallic hair out someone as immature and childishly rebellious, or childishly insecure, if not worse.

“Always be yourself”, stood on a coffee mug proudly exposed in a window shop.

Yourself is the new deity. Worship it at all times.

Obvioysly, “yourself” could be, and it actually is in most cases (yours truly included) a deeply flawed individual who should, like yours truly, actually think about how to become a better self, rather than bask in the feeling of his own unique snowflake greatness.

In past times, people thought “always strive to get better; always strive to get nearer to God; always strive to deny your flaws and to scalpel yourself into a person nearer to salvation”. Even when they weren’t religious, they would always understand the need to try to get nearer to that particular “religion” they had embraced. A coffee cup with “always be yourself” would have sounded, in those times, not only unbearably cheesy and superficial but, most of all, deeply wrong in the message it is obviously sending.

I miss that common  sense, that grounded feeling of being among responsible adults. It seems to me, increasingly more often, that I live among overweight, superficial, middle-aged children going through life with zero awareness of what is really important, but with a great, great opinion of themselves, at least officially.

I know that not everybody is like that. Still, there are enough of them to feed an entire business of cheesy mugs, cheesy pillows, and cheesy mottos put on the wall where a crucifix used to be.

So, irrespective of how sinful, superficial, godless, pink-haired, drug-addled, or donut-addled you are, remember that you are a unique snowflake, wonderful just as it is.

The only thing you have to do, is to always be yourself.

Pope Francis The Failure

Rorate Caeli has an interesting article (translated) from Antonio Socci.

The Leitmotiv of the article is very simple: Francis has failed, and he is now criticised even by his allies of yesteryear, increasingly more isolated and, in general, going down like a Japanese aircraft during the Great Marianas Turkey Shoot. The description of the multi-faceted chaos over which Francis is now reigning is truthful, extensive, and rather entertaining.

Socci, who writes for a newspaper and must pretend he has some esteem for Francis, says that the man might be in good faith. He must, also, pretend that behind all the chaos there is some strategy of sort, that the idea of becoming the next UN would, in Francis’ hopes, “invigorate” the Church.

If you ask me, Socci knows perfectly well (but he cannot write it) what the real situation is: Francis has, since the beginning, been operating with an arrogance, a godlessness, and incompetence and, very evidently, a degree of imbecility that could only produce the results it has produced. It is, in the end, absurd to think, as Socci in his excessive charity seem to invite you to do, that the total mess he describes could have been caused by a man guiding the Church in a planned, at least half-intelligent way. No, the massive deterioration of the support he used to enjoy among the godless, the leftists, the Pollyannas and the perverts, after losing a long time ago the support of the true Catholics, can only be explained with the inability, typical of the idiot, to look beyond the tip of his nose and to understand that the “inclusive” church that excludes Christ will, in the end, become hostage of bigger and bigger demands, until not even he can comply with them. But then again, it is typical of an idiot to think that he can impress people forever with wheelchair stunts, hollow sounding tweets, and popular heresies.

The “Bergoglio effect”, remember it? Where is it now? The “Bergoglio effect” has been, in reality, the one that this little blog, and many other blogs beside, have been forecasting for years: the total loss of face of a Pontificate based on a mixture of nothing, easy slogans, nothing, three dollops of socialism, nothing, heresy, more nothing, sabotage of the Sacraments, constant downplaying of and insult to traditional Catholic values, even more nothing and, last but not least, constant attacks against Catholics. All this, mixed with more, daily doses of nothing in the form of pro-climate-scam tweets and the like, the childishness of which now embarrasses even his most ardent fangirls.

This Pontificate is going down like the above mentioned aircraft, and it will crash with a huge bang the day this unprecedented example of godlessness, incompetence, arrogance and stupidity finally meets his maker.

Let me say it once again: I really can’t wait.

Demonic Influences

So, is the Pope under demonic influences?

I think I will say a word or two about this. However, please consider that I am not an exorcist, and my thoughts are the fruit of common sense and the sensus catholicus in the middle of which I had the misfortune, but also the grace, of growing.

We are, all, at all times, under siege (and may it be a soft siege) of demonic influences. Sin tempts us from every side. Our fallen nature, whilst helped by the many graces God constantly pours on us, is still susceptible to attack. “Be sober, be vigilant; because your adversary the devil, as a roaring lion, walketh about, seeking whom he may devour”.

The devil walketh about, as a roaring lion, seeking to devour… me. I had better keeping this in mind, if I want to achieve salvation.

The common knowledge, and parlance, reflects this at all times. The image of the demon on one side and the angel on the other when a person is in front of a difficult, but right, choice is omnipresent. Even as children, we used to end our squabbles with the well-known nursery rhyme, “e mannaggia al diavoletto che ci ha fatto litigare; pace, pace, pace!” “Darn the demon (“little devil”) who made us bicker: peace, peace, peace!”. The little devil profited of our weakness and made us bicker. But we understood what’s happening, and chose to make peace instead. The temptation is always around us, the demons will try to use any way they can to gain entry in our soul.

It seems to me another of those proto-Protestant absurdities (for some reasons, I have noticed that a number of converted Protestants go from the refusal of the papacy to the exaggeration of both its role and the moral qualities of the current occupier of that role) that the Pope would, because of some sort of vaccine, be exempt from this kind of temptation and, happily protected by his white habit, be protected from demonic attack. Of course he isn’t. None of us is, why would he? If anything, it is reasonable to assume that, even in normal times, a Pope would be under a graver, more sustained attack than most others.

These, however, are not normal times. They are, in fact, so abnormal, that the earthly institution of the Church is now soiled and, even, disfigured like, very likely, never before in Her twice millenarian history, in which She was soiled and disfigured many times already. These are times in which we see countless Bishops and Cardinals under the same demonic attack, every day acting in a way that clearly shows us that the devil has made inroads inside them; not, mind, in the sense that they are now willing Satanists; but in the way that they, in the many way in which they betray their function and the Catholic Church, clearly bring water to the devil’s mill.

The Pope is, of course, not exempt from this. Paul VI was, in recent times, the first clear example of a Pope with something demonic about his actions. A Pope clearly able to see all the ways in which the Church is being attacked, and (with one big exception) unwilling to act about it clearly shows all the signs of being, all too often, influenced by the demon on one side of the shoulder rather than the angel on the other. The oh so saintly John Paul II gave us the abominations in Assisi, not once but twice. The one who asked us to pray that he may not flee for fear of the wolves likely did, as it becomes increasingly more evident, just that.

As to Francis, you know already what I am about to say: a man clearly without a shred of Catholic faith, and without any wish to even learn it, he is the most unworthy occupier of the See that we can, at least up to now, imagine. He is, so to speak, the turbocharged consequences of many demons whispering stupid things to the ear of many stupid, or utterly corrupt, or outright evil Cardinals. In a word, Francis is what happens when God wants to – as St Francis of Lerins said – “punish” us with a Pope.

Yes, of course a Pope can be under demonic influences; not, hopefully, of the “satanist” kind; however, socialism, communism, environmentalism, “inclusion”, and all sorts of pretend worldly do-goodism actually taking people away from God ***are, all of them, of Satan***, and Francis is very big on all of them.

I cannot see how anyone can deny this without denying the very reality around him.

Schismatic Patriarch More Catholic Than The Pope

OK, I know… I know…

These days, even my cat is more Catholic than the Pope; but I just couldn’t resist.

It turns out that our schismatic brothers and sisters still have, at least, a solid grasp on reality, which cannot be said for the Evil Clown so unworthily occupying the chair of Peter.

The Bulgarian Patriarch has just stated to his Government that two and two is four; or, if you prefer, that reality is what it is, and it is literal madness to pretend that there can be a parallel universe just because we think it “nice” (if we are dumb) that it be so.

Being born with a penis makes one a male. Being born with a vagina makes one a female. Two and two is four.

The Patriarch, however, does not limit himself to stating the obvious. He delves into that stuff, totally unknown to Pope Thunberg, called religion. He says, in fact, that all this “gender” stuff is of the devil. Mind, this is no breathtaking news, either, particularly if said by a prelate, however schismatic. But I miss, in now eight year of extremely disgraceful pontificate, even this from Francis.

We all know why. It’s not that Francis likes trannies and gender “confusion”, and I think that this could be the only issue in which he agrees with the real Catholics out there. It is there, evidently not believing in God, the man is unable to think in term of “devil”. He might mention him, of course, but if he does, it is normally to bash us. The idea that there is a devil out there, who wants to confuse people about their won sex in order to get a bigger harvest, is clearly a stranger to him.

This is going to get interesting in the years to come, because I do not doubt that the Western part of the European Union (including Italy) will, in the next years, push hard for more gender confusion. When this happens, they will meet a strong resistance from a block of Countries which, taken together, are quite relevant in the great scheme of European Union things. When insanity is claimed to be a human right, it won’t be long before the sane react.

It would be nice to think that, when the time comes, the reigning Pontiff will throw his diminished prestige and waning authority on the side of sanity. But in order to do this we need, at the very least, Francis gone.

Pray for the end of this Pontificate.

We need a Pope who, at least, believes in God, the devil, and the four last things.

Victoria’s Trannies, Victoria’s Dykes, and Victoria’s Fatties.

Rumoured as the new Victoria’s Turd

Victoria’s Secrets is the last Company to give way to the – already tired – wave of wokery and third-rate feminism (this, assuming that there can be a first and second rate of feminism; which is debatable) and embark on a “courageous” journey towards financial hurt.

Instead of beautiful women representing – at least for the world – the canons of beauty, femininity and sweetness, they will, in future, give space to atrocious parodies of dykes like that Rapinoe person (“woman” is a compliment she has not deserved), to some representative of exploded fatties like every American corner has by the dozen, and – it is rumoured – even to trannies, in order to really, really push out any only half maddened woman who might still have wanted to give them some money.

I am not a woman, and it is difficult for me to fathom what goes on in the mind of any of them (for example, they seem to actually find men attractive; something, I assure you, inconceivable and inexplicable to most men…). However, one thing is very easy to understand: that, as long as the sun shines, women will want examples of other women who represent the best of what they find in themselves: femininity, sweetness, grace and, of course, beauty. Yes, beauty, then the young girl, even the very little girl of four or five, who does not understand how important beauty is in a woman must be, even at that young age, very, very thick.

Not as thick, though, as the people at the helm of Victoria’s Secrets; a company who had become the very epitome of female beauty and has now decided to sacrifice a marketing campaign (and embodiment of female aspiration) gone on for decades for some sort of virtue signaling which will not fail to have a disastrous effect on their (no pun intended) bottom line.

You may criticise the scantiness of Victoria’s Secrets bikini-clad models. What you must see, though, is that the campaign touched a very obvious nerve in the female psyche, exactly because it went at the very root of what every woman, whatever her feminist claims, desires to be: beautiful, feminine, sweet, desired by worthy men.

Fatties, trannies and dykes are neither beautiful, nor feminine, nor – sorry to bust your bubble – desired by the men the other women want. I concede that a fatty might be, in a way, sweet and feminine, but let us be honest with ourselves: this is not the kind of femininity any woman aspires to. I never saw a beautiful, slender woman wish she were a fattie. I never saw two beauties look at some hippo crossing the street and murmur to each other, with a mixture of admiration and envy, “she is so beautiful”. I never saw the high school beauty look at the local fattie and sigh a resigned “every man must be in love with her!” It’s just not the way it works.

In short, even the “model fatties” (or turd of other kind: see the “model” at the top) on the billboard will only smash their own ugliness in the face of the ugly potential clients of the brand, whilst the model dykes and the model trannies will positively repel them. This, ladies and gentlemen, is not how you sell lingerie, or bikinis. Actually, this is a good way to let your clients run away in disgust, then – if these idiots really keep their word, which I dare them to do! – there will not be many women willing to willingly associate their idea of themselves with the ideas of trannies, dykes, and fatties.

Not understanding much of women – which is, in fact, reassuring in a person of my sex – I think I can still easily understand this: Victoria’s Secret sold to their, in the vast majority, not stunningly attractive clients exactly that: the aura, the momentary illusion, the stardust of exceptional beauty, femininity and grace. If that goes away, and the stardust is substituted for a turd, it’s an easy bet that this turd will not be found as an inspiration by many; then if this were the case, it would mean that absolutely everyone, from the beginning of time to now, and most certainly from the beginning of advertisement to now, got absolutely everything, and I mean ab.so.lu.te.ly e.ve.ry.thing, wrong.

I must say that, meanwhile, I enjoy this kind of woke antics. Besides being funny in that mockingly terrifying way in which the cannon woman and the bearded woman were funny, it has something to see these woke companies crush and burn. Nickelodeon is almost extinct. CNN is well on the way of the dodo. Coca Cola managed to seriously harm themselves before partially waking up. Countless other companies have seen the consequences of woke thinking, and my funniest example is always the shop that practised a surcharge of 18% or 19% to men, to be donated to wymyn’s charities, and thought that they would thrive. Alas, they went bust, and I wonder if they ever understood why.

If they follow up on their promise and keep spreading dykes, trannies and fatties around, the jokes on Victoria’s Secrets will be many, and brutal.

They will deserve every one of them and, if this blog post has not contributed to it, be assured it has not been for lack of trying.

Victoria’s Turds are coming to a billboard near you.

Start making popcorn now.

Please Pray For Father Tim Finigan

The sad news reached me today that Father Finigan had a stroke.

Many of you will not know, or will barely remember, The Hermeneutic of Continuity, a blog much followed in years past. Father Finigan was his writer, and a very good one he was. He was, also, always good to this little effort. I liked his blog as a blog, and him as a priest.

At some point, Father started to write less and less, and the suspicion was not far that he was… ordered to, as his blog was clearly outside of the usual Vatican II narrative, albeit not as militant – understandably so, seen the position of the author – as others.

Gradually, I stopped visiting the blog, whose posts were becoming less and less frequent. I always thought that something was going on there, “under obedience”, that could not be said openly.

I always kept holding a high opinion of the blog’s sincere, faithful, worthy author.

It is sad to hear of a stroke, it is worse to hear that he can write “fairly” fluently, and “has considerable difficulty reading”. Bad stuff.

Whether you know him or not, whether you used to read his blog or not, I ask all my readers, in charity, to say a Hail Mary for the good Father.

The Resignation That Wasn’t.

God knows I think that both Francis and many of his – particularly progressive – Cardinals have no shame. But even I wasn’t prepared for the resignation debacle that we witnessed in Germany.

First, a cultural note. Germans aren’t Argentinians. If you pull a stunt like a resignation when you think you will remain in office, they will think (much) worse of you. “What we say, we must also do” is a liked quote over there.

Cardinal Marx resigned as a “gesture”, and remained in office. This will stay with him forever and he will, forever, be seen as a trombone, at least in Germany and by the people with some morality left, whatever their religious persuasion or lack of it. Something has gone wrong here, because this is not how you do it in Germany. In fact, I have seen third party video commentaries about Marx’s resignation, giving it as a fait accompli. This is how your typical German journalist (and citizen) thinks. You resign when you know your resignation will be accepted, then this is not a pro forma resignation. If this is not the case, you don’t resign.

So, I am thinking what might have happened here, and I have come up with some hypotheses. None of these is flattering for Marx, Francis, or the Vatican at large.

First: Marx wants to move to Rome. There are a couple of appetising Congregations available, and he tries to force Francis’ hand. He stages a grand resignation that makes him appear, after his “courageous” act, oh so suitable to lead from the front, in Rome. In this scenario, Francis ruins the party, as it appears Marx will be forced to stay in the shadow of the Theatinerkirche (and what a beautiful shadow it is!).

Second: Marx wants to go NGO, in order to hobnob with the really powerful of this earth. He will resigns and undergo self-martyrdom, then ask Francis for whatever authorisation and dispensation he needs to jet around the world. Again, if this was the plan, Francis wasn’t in agreement. The guy might have put him a bit in the shadow.

Third: Francis might have had plans for Marx in Rome, but he was peeved that Marx wanted to force his hands. So he decided to make him stay in Munich for as long as he pleases.

Fourth: Francis, who is – emphatically – not a German, does not care about stuff like, you know, doing what you say. Therefore, he suggests to Marx that he makes the grand gesture, in order to strengthen the progressives in the ongoing German Schism Saga. Perhaps Francis leads Marx to believe that he is exactly what is needed in Rome in order to move him to resign. Then he screws the guy, with a stunt that looks very stupid in Germany if Marx does not go, but is probably quite the event in places like South America, or wherever people without integrity live.

I still have the impression that something went wrong here, as this is so cheap it’s even below Francis’ standards.

Still, they have no shame, so you don’t know what they invent if they are bored.

Marx looks, as it stands now, very stupid as if he knew that Francis “needs him at his place” and would make him stay, with whatever excuse, he should not have resigned in the first place.

Francis looks like, well, Francis.

We all look like we can’t wait for these people to go away.

Mud Black: How Feminism Engenders Sluttishness

A very interesting article, fairly conservative for my standards, was published here (hat tip to Father Z).

The golden words (also cited by Father Z) in the article (which is long and very instructive, in an alarming way) are:

No one wants to wife a sex expert.

I have written about this several times, and have tried to imprint in the minds of my younger readers (particularly female readers; but also male readers, if they are tragically blue-pilled) the following concepts:

First: every sexual partner of a woman diminishes her value in the eyes of the following partner

Second: the ideal number of sexual partners for a woman is either zero (if unmarried) or one (if married).

Feminists don’t get that, because they are, fundamentally, childish and stupid besides being great, great sluts (more about this later). Feminists are like cats who want to bark because dogs do it. What they don’t understand is that a barking cat is an impossibility, and a cat pitifully attempting to bark (which cats don’t do, being smarter; but feminists do, being dumb) becomes a ridiculous object of pity.

At the root of the issue is this simple fact: that men can sleep with a variety of women and (sinful as it is) feel great, whilst women cannot sleep with a variety of men without feeling cheap, used and, in a word, sluts. That’s the human nature, boys ‘n girls. You can protest as much as you want, you won’t change the basic facts.

Feminism rejects basic facts. The desire to bark (because dogs do it) and the desire to have multiple sexual partners without feeling slutty (because men do it) pushes them towards a promiscuity that they see (because, remember: they are stupid) as a reaction to an oppressive, patriarchal society, and as a prejudice that can be fought against, and conquered, by creating the Age of the Slut.

Once sluttishness has been deprived of its stigma, they reason, Prince Charming will gladly marry Mud Black, happy in the certainty that she is the woke, better version of the Snow White of his ancestors. Alas for them, it does not work in that way, because sex roles and sex differences are in-built and divinely ordained, not the product of a social structure artificially created by religion and “male oppression”.

So, Feminist becomes a big, big slut, and desperately tries to overcome her feelings of sluttishness (which are, clearly, human nature being what it is, still there…) by being more of a slut and condemning slut-shaming.

Here, my friends, lies, if you ask me, the crux of the matter; an issue, in fact, which the author of the linked article has just been unable to see.

Simply put: Feminist slut will introduce her daughter to Xtreme Sluttishness is order to avoid that her daughter realises what a miserable slut she is. She will just not run the risk of her daughter telling her, one day, “dear mum, I want to be the woman of one man and be happy in my monogamous marriage; both because I feel that I was born for it and because I see what a wretch of a woman and a sad, pathetic human being you, yourself, have become”. This is, for every feminist, the horror scenario, the total destruction and demolition of her entire life; made worse by that nagging, unconfessed feeling that, in fact, such a daughter would be right.

This, I think, and no other, is the reason for the early sexualisation of the feminists’ daughters. It’s nothing to do with abortion, because a feminist thinks nothing of an abortion. It’s to do with the total and complete annihilation of her reputation in the eyes of the person they – in their own selfish way -love most.

Therefore, daughter will have to become a big, big slut, the sooner the better. The rising “cock count” (yes, girls: this is how men think; as well they should!) of the younger slut will then bind mother and daughter with a chain of lived feminism and shared filth (for whose feelings of guilt “Patriarchy” and, who knows, “White Supremacy” will be easily blamed) that will last a lifetime.

It’s not abortion. It’s the terror of growing a sane daughter.

One who knows that no one wants to wife a sex expert.

“Let them be blotted out of the book of the living, and not be written with the righteous”: Some Reflections On The Imprecatory Psalms

Like the quotation in the title? No?

The one in the picture here above? Neither?

Ouch!

What about this:

Pour out thy wrath upon the heathen that have not known thee, and upon the kingdoms that have not called upon thy name.

What do you say? Unchristian? You know this is called, and rightly so, “the word of God”, right?

Or perhaps you think these are single statements taken out of context? How about this:

Do unto them as unto the Midianites; as to Sisera, as to Jabin, at the brook of Kison: 10 Which perished at Endor: they became as dung for the earth. 11 Make their nobles like Oreb, and like Zeeb: yea, all their princes as Zebah, and as Zalmunna: 12 Who said, Let us take to ourselves the houses of God in possession. 13 O my God, make them like a wheel; as the stubble before the wind. 14 As the fire burneth a wood, and as the flame setteth the mountains on fire; 15 So persecute them with thy tempest, and make them afraid with thy storm. 16 Fill their faces with shame; that they may seek thy name, O LORD. 17 Let them be confounded and troubled for ever; yea, let them be put to shame, and perish: 18 That men may know that thou, whose name alone is JEHOVAH, art the most high over all the earth.

You have already understood that I could go on for very long, but I think I have made my point. Any search for Imprecatory Psalms will give you a wealth of quite robustly written, testosterone-laden but, crucially, Divinely ordained and Divinely inspired quotes to impress your friends at a party, if we will ever have parties again.

As you might have noticed, this little effort delights in distributing little Catholic red pills around, and in shocking and scandalising his new readers before it makes them, hopefully, think smartly about Catholicism for the first time in a long while. Therefore, I would like to spend some words on these beautiful, if nowadays studiously avoided, Imprecatory Psalms.

Preliminary consideration: do not think that this is all Old Testament “stuff”, and Jesus started “to do things differently”. The New Testament is the completion of the Old one, it is not in contrast to it. The truth remains the truth, and does not change with the Incarnation. The Old testament is as much the word of God today as it ever was, but now it is inserted in a completed, perfected frame of reference. If you have any doubt, have a thorough read of a Gospel of your choice and looks for the many times Our Lord expresses Himself on several occasions with such brutality, that every milquetoast PC guy of our times would not hesitate in calling him all sorts of vile names, obviously in the name of “lurv”, or “peace”. I have written often about this, so feel free to scour this blog for the fruits of my efforts.

Once made clear that this stuff is not “outdated”, let us reflect on why what we know must be right is, in fact, right. This will require, alas, the ingestion of a number of red pills that I have just here with me, and that I will proceed to give to you now.

You are welcome.

1. The Imprecatory Psalms were seen as totally normally, and logical, in manlier times. But we now live in the Age Of The Concerned Man, and this man will look for a shallow “goodness” in all the wrong places. Yes, it’s the lack of testosterone. All that soy milk, and no red meat at all. Terrible. If you suffer from the soy milk affliction, I suggest the introduction in your diet of copious quantities of red meat, fairly rare – actually, dripping blood – for a while. Just for the experience, you know.
2. The Imprecatory Psalm caused no scandal in times in which people got angry at those who offend God. Why? because they loved Christ. In modern times, people love themselves first, second, third and 237th, though they call this “tolerance”, “inclusion” and many other fashionable but hollow sounding names. However, they don’t love Christ. Imagine asking your garden variety parish priest around, say, 1931, whether the Imprecatory Psalms have a place in the Bible. Note: those priests didn’t drink soy milk, either.
3. As we aren’t Proddies, we read Scripture within the frame of Catholic doctrine. It is obvious that the punishment called upon the wicked is not the fruit of an unguarded moment, or even of a Friday night escapade. It is, rather, the fruit of hardened, insisted, ideological enmity with God. It is, so to speak, what you know is going to happen to Reprobates who are quite bad even as Reprobates go. We pray for our enemies. I pray even for darned Francis. The Imprecatory Psalms describe, evoke and call for what happens when that fails.
4. The Imprecatory Psalms are not personal. David is not calling for God’s vengeance upon his dishonest plumber, the mailman who keeps opening and reading his subscriptions, or the guy who stole his smartphone. His (and God’s) anger is (and shall, at the appointed time, be) directed at God’s enemies. Hostility against God makes the good man’s blood boil. See above: red meat. Also see above: love of Christ.
5. With their very existence, the Imprecatory Psalms alert us to a simple facts: at times those who seem “rude” or “violent” or “hateful” are, actually, on the side of Christ. Those, on the contrary, who preach their fake gospel of lurv, inclusion and – most popular nowadays – “niceness”, are those who make the work of the devil. This is very interesting, because niceness has now – in parallel with the disappearance of the real article – become a veritable religion, with his very own priests. You have, I am sure, met many of them.

There. Five Red Pills to swallow with some water and digest calmly.

I think they will be very useful.

There is far too much soy milk around.

Ignorant, Arrogant, Heretic, And Stupid: Pope Francis And Transubstantiation

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Pope Francis, without a doubt the most ridiculous piece of work ever to unworthily sit on the throne of Peter, has, once again, piddled outside of the pissoir. We are now informed that “Jesus becomes bread”.

I would like to examine the man behind this utter piece of theological crap from several angles.

First: this man is deeply, profoundly ignorant of everything that has to do with Catholicism. A child of six might buy the “Jesus becomes bread” heresy (“impanation”, I learned today; it’s amazing how many stupid people have preceded us; however, they weren’t Popes); a child of ten would understand that something is deeply wrong with the concept, and a confirmed boy of fifteen would think, probably rightly, that Francis smoked too many illegal substances during his wasted life.

Second: the arrogance. This is a guy who, being Pope, does really not care a straw if he says something deeply heretic concerning the Transubstantiation. It is obvious that he does not allow anybody to correct him, or to check him when he wants to say something that sounds cool to him. Too proud to ask for review of his theological stunts, but also – and very obviously – too arrogant to care anyway.

Third, the heresy: Francis has stated something officially sanctioned as heretical. That’s it. It’s on record. It’s official. Even if the heresy was unintentional (I am persuaded it was due to ignorance, arrogance and stupidity, not the will to spread the heresy of “impanation”), when a Pope expresses himself, unintentionally, in a heretical way (something that would, in a sane world, not ever happen in the first place) he should at least immediately have an unequivocal statement issued, possibly apologising and begging Christ for forgiveness for his appalling mistake, as a Pope. But no. The guy does not believe in “doctrinal rigidity”, you see.

Last: the stupidity. I have said many times, and repeat today, that this man is deeply, profoundly stupid. Even not believing in God, as he certainly doesn’t, and hating the Church, as he certainly does, a man with a better intellect would simply avoid making an ass of himself all the time. Francis isn’t like that. He doesn’t care for what he says, he is too arrogant to ask for help in not looking dumb, and is too stupid to realise he does.

I always have this image of Francis: that it is as if the cranky old man every rural village in Italy has (the godless, arrogant, stupid, ever complaining dumbass giving everyone a piece of his mind and treated with mild, half-amused contempt by the villagers) would suddenly become Pope. Upon becoming Pope, that guy would think, talk and act just like Francis, as countless examples of his boorish stupidity have shown to us.

In Francis case, he has gone, in some mysterious way, through many years of theological studies. At this point, I’d say he has clearly spent them playing cards with some buddy of his, or smoking pot, or doing who knows what else, certainly not caring to learn the first thing about Catholicism.

This guy joined the Jesuits to scrounge an existence. If you still haven’t got it, I wonder how you can go through life without being taken advantage of by everybody, starting with your dog.

One Short Thought

Francis has stated the planet only has ten years to avoid catastrophe.

In my mind, the real catastrophe would be ten more years of Francis.

Of Scroungers, Christ, and Exclusion.

The Evil Clown has given us another example of the completely Catholicism-free way he sees the Church. It seems that for this guy, the Church is a sort of meeting place, where everybody feels good just because nobody is left out.

Like so much that this man spouts, this is claptrap that will likely sound good to non-Christians (like Atheists, or Father Martina), but in the end means absolutely nothing.

So, let’s say we all gather in the same Francisspace. We “celebrate around Christ”. We don’t leave out anyone.

Soon, the issue will arise: what if some celebrate Christ by believing the Creed, and some think they can “celebrate Christ” but don’t? Will we keep “celebrating Christ” with those who, say, reject Christ’s Divinity? Would this not, to any Christian, be an offence to Christ?

It obviously goes on from there to every aspect of life. Shakinna is a transsexual, pansexual Fruitarian betrothed to her female dog, Arafatta. She thinks that Christianity is pure evil, and Christ was very cruel in eating carcasses of dead animals. She also thinks that he was homophobic, transphobic, and pansexualphobic. Still, she demands admission because she thinks that everybody should be included everywhere, in the spirit of Pandyka, the Great Dyke In The Sky, and Francis’ words about not letting anybody out (she obviously likes Francis, as men go) impressed her. What do you have in common with her? Why would you want her to breath the same air you do? Isn’t telling her to to stay the heck out, at least for as long as she keeps her opinions, the Christian things to do?

You see: words like inclusion are very easily said, and never fail to impress those who don’t believe in anything. But it isn’t so easy.

If you love Christ, you will have to exclude. If you don’t want to exclude, you don’t love Christ.

Francis clearly doesn’t love Christ. I actually thinks he does not even believe in Him, or he would be utterly terrified of what happens to him after his death (hopefully, today). I don’t think he is a Satanist, either, though there is nothing, absolutely nothing that would shock me in this human being. The way I see it, he is most of all an ungrateful, atheist scrounger who resents the hand (the Church) from which he got a comfortable, respected, well cared-for existence whilst not believing in anything he was taught about Her. Now, come to the top, he can’t resist grating all those pesky Catholics, whom he hated all his life, just out of spite and evil spirit.

Still, my dear readers, and as tragic as the event is, this guy is, actually, the Pope, whatever fantasies you may want to sooth your pain with.

What we learn from the events of this tragic Century is not that we should, now, all become mini-Popemakers. It is that this state of things must move us to reflect on the cause of the mess, and the cause can be described with one word and one word only: Aggiornamento, the harmless-sounding Trojan Horse of all heresies.

Francis is the vomit meant to make Catholics understand that the poison of Vatican II is not good for them. The more they keep not understanding, the more they will have to vomit and the worse the impulse to vomit will become. At some point, by God’s Grace, things will start to change.

The escape into parallel realities is not the answer. The answer is the lucid examination of what is happening, and the reasoned, sensible, logical conclusion as to why it is happening.

Jesuits Without Jesus

Well, the reading of this article was not as depressing as I had thought. It appears, as we write the Year of the Lord 2021, some Jesuits are still Catholic.

They are still ostracised by their organisation, of course, and one wonders what they had to stomach during their formation. Still, and encouragingly so, if the rumour is confirmed not all the new recruits are obvious fairies like that Jemima Martin guy. In fact, the article mentions not one, but several orthodox Jesuits in one go.

Shall we say: unexpected.

But no worries: the place is still a cesspool. Substituting “for God and His Christ” with “men and women for others” only points out to the obvious: the loss of faith means the religious becomes a social worker. At the same time, the faithless “social worker” environment becomes an excellent destination for the Jemima Martin of this world, who get to scrounge an existence at the expense of faithful both dead and alive whilst indulging in their favourite social work: sodomy.

You might ask me how to deal with this. My answer is very simple: abolish the order. Then, set on the calendar the year 2121, or perhaps 2171, to examine whether the order might be started again. But seriously, there is no rush, as the stink spread by these people will take a while to disperse.

Of course, the abolition should be accompanied by a veru close examination of the activity of these people, ending with the fast defrocking of the Jemimas and the slow defrocking of those who are found to have all or some of his afflictions after more careful examination. For example, a guy like this one was clearly born not to turn lives, but to flip burgers.

Let us not forget, by the way, that the toxic Jesuit environment gave us the most toxic Pope, ev-ah. This alone would merit them abolition.

Still: 25 new Jesuits this year in the US and Canada.

Who knows, the majority might be straight?

Catholic Writing: Some Modest Suggestions

So you want to write about Catholicism, because you love Christ and His Church and want to give your little contribution in these disturbing times. Congratulations. More power to you. High five, and all that.

I would like, here, to give some little, very personal suggestions about how to make it work. There are people still reading this blog after eleven years, so perhaps I know one thing or two. So there we are:

1. Get a day job

Unless you are a priest, or a bishop, I am not sure that living out of your faith is really a good idea. It can work for some, it will not work for most. The fact is: conflicts of interests will be everywhere. Say, Traditionalism goes out of fashion and you have a family to feed. What do you do, start chanting Kumbaya? I would suggest that a day job giving you the authentic independence to write what you want is the best thing to do. Mind, you might make it work the other way, too. But I think you are making your life difficult.

2. Write anonymously

Be smart, young boy (or girl). History goes in cycles, and we might be on a trajectory that leads to persecution. I love history, and have been around the block a couple of times. I think I can spot historical cycles better than many. The danger of being in a persecution cycle was clearly there when I started blogging, and it has certainly increased in the last years. It is already manifesting in several, more or less subtle ways. I am not sure that real, all-out, brick-hard persecution is coming at some point, but the danger is a clear and present one. A good Catholic tries to exercise the virtue of prudence and does not invite persecution. You have decided to follow points 1 and 3 (below), so this one is not an issue anyway.

3. Get your ego out of your blog

Your friends don’t need to know that you are blogging. You don’t need to advertise yourself as a Catholic blogger or writer. In heaven, everybody knows who you are anyway. You don’t need to see your name in print. Your job is to help others, not aggrandize yourself. Point 3 is very important. I lost count of the times I saw this part blatantly ignored. If you follow point 2, point 3 will be so much easier. On your death bed, I think you will be happy of having followed both point 2 and point 3.

4. Get your issues out of your blog

Believe me, young boy (or girl). People really, really don’t care about your back ache, or the flu you had, or the moods of your cat. They don’t relate to your “daily journey”, and don’t want to read tedious accounts about how the quarrel with your dog, Hannibal, made of you a better dog-owner and, by reflection, a better Catholic, teaching you how we can learn from the wisdom God has given to dogs. The same goes, cela va sans dire, for your finances. People click your blog for inspiration, not to hear you whine. Ask for prayers, and let your readers pay you with them. These are the only finances your blog should be worried about.

5. Have a strong and well-formed faith, or avoid wasting your time.

Catholic blogging is for people who, bluntly stated, know what they write and have no doubts. If you have doubts, have the decency of not writing. No doctors prescribed you to write a blog, and everybody has his own calling. If you have doubts, Catholic writing is not your calling. Sorry to burst your bubble, pal, but you are making tiramisu’ with mascarpone gone bad here, so don’t ask other people to eat your dessert. Writing about your doubts is even much, much worse than having them, as it violates points number 3 and number 4, besides helping the devil. This is, to keep the metaphor, making tiramisu’ with dung instead of cocoa, eating it in public, and ask people to give a thought about eating it, too. How some people lack the basic decency of understanding that what counts is the Church, not their damned, ego-driven doubts, is beyond me. Again, every time I read this stuff I think this is the devil at work, leveraging on the writer’s ego. Believe me, points 2 and 3 are very, very smart.

6. Stop caring about your clicks

You follow 2 and 3, so you don’t care about fame or clicks. You have the freedom to write what you want, when you want it, and only when you think there is something that you should say. You don’t need to write a gazillion times about Francis having said something stupid, or worse, for the gazillionth time. Your readers know it. Write for the Blessed Virgin. She is the only reader you need to care about.

7. Keep your blog clean

You are not a newspaper. You are not a discussion forum. You don’t need to answer to everyone. You don’t need to give a voice to anyone. You don’t run a democracy. Cull mercilessly all the pests, the trolls, the doubters, the witches, the professionally offended, and the PC crowd. Your space is not for them. They have no right to be in it. Kick them out and live a relaxed life. Again, you follow points 1,2,3 and 6 already, so this one is quite natural.

—-

There, I think it’s enough. I can’t imagine how a blogger who follows these points can write a blog that is not useful to his readers or well received in heaven. As we are all sinners (God knows I am!), we can all need some deposits in our eternity checking account (or, shall we say, “checking out account”).

So, there it is. If you liked this, it costs you a Hail Mary. If you start a blog because of this, I want the entire Rosary.

Marx Goes, Catholics Rejoice.

Cardinal Marx has happily decided to free the Catholic world of his very un-Catholic presence. I, for myself, will welcome the event, then it seems to me to be an event worthy of celebration that a bad man goes away, irrespective of how bad his successor will be. For this reason, please be informed that a very expensive bottle will be bought when Francis either follows Marx’s example (please, God!) or departs from this vale of tears (please, God!).

We can speculate about the real motives for this decision, aside from the outlandish explanation he has given. One thing that comes to mind is that he had skeletons in the closet and was made to go against the promise of the skeletons remaining there. Another, perhaps more likely, is that the man realised that in the actual climate in Germany he could not escape – the job still being what it is – becoming the bad guy of the people for whom he cares most, and decided that it wasn’t fun anymore. The third is that he wants to do something else that is not compatible with being a Cardinal – say, being involved in more directly political initiatives – and decided to stage a wannabe noble exit. Who knows what the real motives are.

But wait: was the exit, actually, noble? Well, no. Not in the least. It was, in fast, another wordly act of virtue signalling staged by an obviously very worldly man. A man who, if he had been a Catholic, would have considered his duty to stay at the helm until the last, and die in it if needs be, rather than taking on himself the sins of others, by the way in a veiled accusation of cowardice and attachment to power to all, and I mean all, his German colleagues.

In fact, I will go out on a limb and suggest that his example is now followed by all of them. Let all German Bishops resign, in a collective act of purification.

We would not lose many Catholics, and we would get rid of an awful lot of really awful people. Seems a fair deal to me.

Marx is gone.

Today at least, the Church is a better place.

Wrestling With God And Looking For Answers

I must apologise to my readers. I must, also, make a very important outing.

I “do” obedience.

Obedience means a couple of things of which I should be, reading around, almost ashamed as backward and bigoted, certainly very low-key. It’s good that I don’t have to write about Catholicism to put some pasta on my table. Boy, I would be in trouble.

Let us, for example, take this “wrestling with God” stuff. I don’t know, it must be Protestant?

In my culture (Catholic Country, you know) this kind of thinking is just not there. God being Infinitely Just and you being Infinitely Small, wrestling with Him makes you, inter alia, Infinitely Dumb.

But then again you see where it comes from. The very idea that one would be entitled to do such a thing for whatever reason that grates his oh so developed sensitivity smells of devil like Francis smells of arrogance and vulgarity. It’s just too obvious to overlook.

We must be, first of all, obedient and submissive. There is nothing cool in questioning this obedience and submission. It does not make you a cool guy. It makes you a cretin.

Then there is the other trope that always riles me up, the “searching for answers” routine. I mean, not the natural reaction of the guy who, upon being told he has incurable cancer, reacts with a “why me, Lord” of understandable, but hopefully temporary, disorientation. No, I mean the searching for answers that, actually, says “why you, Lord”. The questioning of God’s wisdom. The questioning, again, of one’s own duty to obedience.

Forgive me, again, for my naivete. I realise I will never be among the cool guys. But in my simple mindedness, I do think that the Church has already given us all the answers we need, and has given us beautiful Mysteries for the ones we don’t.

My job in this life is not to wrestle, but to serve; and not to question, but to obey.

All the rest, my friends, is of the devil, and the devil will do irreparable damage if we allow him to. The devil will, as I see written around with great waste of pixels, leverage one’s ego and try to slowly turn a soul, which at this point fancies itself so good and deep, against God.

I know that I already have, through the wisdom Holy Mother Church has given us, all the answers I am ready to have, and will have when I die the ones I am, now, not in a position to receive. I also know that I want to die in full obedience to God, and pray that He may give me the grace to never even begin to question His work.

In this, my friends, it’s not only an important ingredient of the cake called Salvation; but great peace, too.

The kind of contentment the devil will never be able to give.

Tradidi Quod Et Accepi: Some Simple Reflections On Bad Clergymen And Evil Times.

One of the advantages of not writing professionally is that I do not have endless hours to write about how this or that member of the  clergy displeased me. Granted, I have been displeased less than others; still…

I see the matter as very simple. The Church is the Bride of Christ, given to us by the Latter to help us in our way towards, hopefully, salvation. If a priest or a bishop, or twenty o them, tried to abuse me in various ways, I love to think that I would not react very kindly to their behaviour; still, I hope that, even after clergyman number twenty tries to abuse me, I would not doubt the sanctity and the truth of the Church.

You see: you can call me a dreamer, or a romantic; but to me, the Church is represented by those thousands of canonised saints – pre- Francis, obviously – and by the countless souls now in heaven or purgatory,  not by Francis and the many evil religious currently walking around.

People should never allow anyone to lessen their faith in the Church, because the Church has not been given to us by people.

So, where does this leave me when not even the Our Father is safe from clerical attack?  Where it always left everyone who, before me, was confronted with heresy.

Tradidi quod et accepi.

There is, in our little mission, not much more than working on the salvation of ourselves and our beloved one, and defending the truth that we have received.

This truth is as solid as granite. The Traditional Latin Mass is, likely, more solid than Granite. I do not doubt the TLM because the officiating priest is bad. I can and will doubt the bad priest, not the Church inside which it operates.

I am a simple man, mind, and I do not mind a bit of quite banal, but consequential, analysis of what is happening: the Church is getting mad, and this is the challenge of my lifetime. Others had other challenges, from war to pestilence,  but I have this one.

It has not been given to me to live in a time of sanity. I have to live, and die, in a time in which people think that a man can be a woman, and dogmas are bad for the Church.

I still prefer this to pestilence, though, so I count my blessings and soldier on, no matter what priests, bishops or Popes do.

One day, if all goes well, I will be admitted to join the saints.

That day, all this madness will be utterly irrelevant.

Ab Illo Benedicaris: Defending Francis From The Professionally Outraged.

No, my dear readers. I am not drunk, or drugged, or in any way impaired in my ability to reason. I assure you I feel, actually, quite fine.

The reason I have, today, the extremely unpleasant duty of defending the Evil Clown is the criticism directed towards him after a joke he made.

My take on the joke is as follows:

1. I am pretty sure that, in provate, Popes have always made jokes about salvation. It would be sad it they didn’t, but in fact I am pretty sure that every Pope with a sense of humour would joke (operative word is here: joke) about hell. You see, my dear readers: Catholics aren’t Protestants! They are quite relaxed about such things. If you have a problem with that, it’s you who are protestantised, and you need to a) relax more than a bit, and b) stop signaling virtue.
2. One might say that Francis was talking to a microphone. Therefore, this wasn’t a private joke among friends. However, as a journalist you can not be OK (as pretty much everybody of these virtue signaling people is) with the “off the cuff” papal remarks, and then complain that you didn’t like a joke.

As always, some people have a complete lack of sense of humour, coupled by the desire to show how good they are. Heavens, Pius X (if memory serves) had himself photographed relaxing in the garden, smoking a pipe (which is not a sin, by the way), and apparently quite satisfied with the moment. In those times, in which the Pope had no public appearance that wasn’t official and solemn, I have no doubt this bunch would have, if they had lived then, expressed the same complaint.

And what to say of that Pope (again, I think it was Pius IX, but don’t quote me on that) who “blessed” the visiting delegation of Anglicans with the words “Ab illo benedicaris in cuius honore cremaberis”, “May you be blessed by Him in whose honor you shall be burned”? I found it a wonderful joke, the more refined because the learned Anglicans appeared not to get it. But yes, a joke, a joke nevertheless.

Francis not only has problems, but – tragically – he is the problem.  I think, in him, we have a much bigger issue than a joke about drinking Brazilians.

This professional offence taking needs to stop. Even when Francis is its target.