When Hate Goes Wrong

Mundabor’s present to Mr Geller

Every now and then, hatred backfires.

This time, it happened to a chap called Eric Geller, a cybersecurity journalist at Politico.

Mr Geller writes about cybersecurity, not about religion. As a Politico journalist, he had to be well aware of their policy about tweets. You would think that, this having to do with his job, he pays attention to it.

Well, er, no.

The corpse of Pope Benedict was not yet cold when this guy, blinded by hatred and virtue-signalling leftist zeal, wrote an extremely vile, libellous tweet about him. The tweet profile has (actually: had) his name and Politico affiliation all right.

Politico is not a conservative outlet, at all, and I suspect that virtue-signalling Mr Geller thought he could violate company policy with impunity because hey, shooting at a Pope is an activity nobody will question. Sadly for him, Politico’s standards are, for now, still higher than that.

It is, of course, not the first time these things happen. However, it seems to me that they normally happen to people who either are not educated enough to understand what they are doing (say: the rapper sending out the libellous tweet or YouTube video), or are so immersed in their world of political hate (because they work in it) that they don’t reflect that they are crossing a red line. This was was, however, a journalist for cybersecurity. You would think he can let Benedict rest in peace. Alas, he couldn’t.

This tells us the hate that pervades the mind of your average leftist in 2023. It’s not the writing of the tweet in itself that is shocking (a lot of people have such poison in their minds). It is the fact that, in this case, the hatred was such, that all inhibitions linked with doing something that you know could cost you the job failed to materialise!

Nor is this guy the fearless “freedom of speech activist”. Not at all. He deleted the tweet and admitted it was wrong. This clearly indicates that what was his undoing was, in fact, the boundless desire to look good showing his venom.

The end of the story: Mr Geller is now “freelancer”, meaning he is unemployed; nobody will remember, tomorrow, what his slander even was about; he got rid of a certainly very remunerative job, and Benedict does not care about the stuff that venomous cybersecurity journalists write of him.

A last consideration I would like to make before leaving you: what hides behind the man’s hatred? It is merely cheap vanity and desire to look good with your atheist friends? Or is Mr Geller – just thinking – a member of another, shall we say, tribe? Or is he, perhaps – just perhaps – afflicted by a horrible perversion that, once upon a time, was not even mentioned in polite society? Why would, otherwise, a cybersecurity journalists who knows his company has a Twitter/social media policy behave that way?

One has to pose himself the question, because the hatred that is on show here is quite remarkable. It’s either totally blinding vanity, or the devil at work in a more sinister way.

Enjoy your free time, Mr Geller.

Hopefully you’ll stay away from Twitter.

The Punishment.

Yeah, let’s drink….

The Bishops you have appointed eagerly embrace the heresies of the day. The Cardinals you have appointed shut up when confronted with open, manifest heresy.

Your successor does exactly the same of what you wanted to do, but he has all the energy you never had. You thought he would listen to you, but he certainly doesn’t. In fact, he is at pain to always make clear how different he is from you.

The wave of conversions and vocations that your actions have spurned is gone. Your greatest “achievement”, which you never had the guts to properly enforce, is openly fought against, and you have to see with your own eyes as the attempt at total demolition become public.

Perhaps you thought, in some more honest hour, about how much you could have done, had you decided to die at your place. Perhaps you thought, when your conscience assailed you during sleepless nights, that an 85 years old should not be worried about what he can do for his health as much as what he can do for Christ.

Perhaps you bitterly regretted your step. Perhaps you begged God for forgiveness, for fleeing for fear of the wolfes. Perhaps you understood that those long years watching the demolition of even that little that you did right were a punishment, the amply deserved punishment for the sin of cowardice, for abandoning the post in the hour of the enemy’s assault. Perhaps your tears were bitter, and your sorrow sincere.

But then, why did you praise to the skies the work of your successor? Why did you give not only one, but at least two interviews in which you openly approved of the work of your successor; a circumstance the more humiliating, as your successor never made a mystery of what he thought of your work?

I understand that an open criticism of your successor would have caused a major uproar; but many other ways were open to you – from books to theological articles to interviews – to reiterate the true teaching without openly, undiplomatically pointing the finger to the one who betrayed them.

You did not do any of this. You swam with the flow.

Again.

It is easy to say “Jesus, I love you” on the deathbed.

It is far more difficult to show this love in deed, when it hurts.

May you be, one day, in the company of the angels. May the Lord have given you the strength to sincerely repent of both your desertion and your complicity with the work of your successor. May we all, one day, rejoice together in the company of Christ.

But if the 10 years-long punishment hasn’t opened your eyes, I frankly don’t know what would, and what would allow you to die a very eloquent, highly intelligent, very prayerful deserter.

The Funeral: Two Takeaways

“They overcooked my Porterhouse Steak again….”

I had the opportunity to watch a short fraction of the funeral of the Pontiff Emeritus. Two things, of this event, struck me the most.

The First: Francis’ girth.

It seems to me that the man keeps getting larger. The camera footage from the side, as he theatrically held his head near the coffin of a man he certainly never liked, and very probably never esteemed, showed a man shockingly different from his 2013 version. It was also fairly clear that that stick/crutch he held is now indispensable if he wants to move on his own, and that the sciatica-induces limp is now quite pronounced. I can’t say he looks healthy. Of course, fasting would, as widely reported, be of great help in treating his fatness-induced issues of sciatica and general mobility. But it looks like oh so spiritual Francis prefers to feast instead.

2022 Francis compared to 2013 Francis: double the fat, same heresy content.

What shall I say: “soon, soon!” ?

The second: the sermon.

I have not listened to the homily/sermon, but reports indicates that Benedict was, as a whole, ignored, apart from some obligatory, very short references. I would call this a last slap in the face of the German Shepherd from his successor, the Argentinian Bouncer.

You would expect a sermon to focus on the dearly departed, extolling his theological stature, gentle mind, towering intellect, shepherd’s zeal etc. If the sermon is, however, completely about other issues, you can safely interpret this as Francis’ desire to show you, on the last worldwide televised occasion, how high (or low) his consideration for Benedict is. This is, I am afraid, classic FrancisBoor, and will go down in history together with the empty seat at the concert and the mocking of those praying the rosary for him.

So, not much news from this funeral.

Here’s hoping I will, soon, be able to write about another one; one which, hopefully, will lead to an improvement from the dismal situation we have today.

Abdication: Instructions For Use

“A Capuchin cassock will do admirably, Father Benedict…”

If Francis wants to do something good for the Church, once in his lifetime, he could do worse than to issue detailed instructions as to what happens when a Pope resigns. Of course, I understand that the Pope who wants to resign could change the rules anyway; but I think that such an established procedure would bring clarity to the event.

Naturally, best is that a Pope does not abdicate. However, in cases of diseases like Alzheimer’s it would, I think, still be preferable that the pope abdicates, rather than having the Church run by the most aggressive. bullying homo mafias among the several likely infesting the Vatican. There is, after all, a reason why a Pope has always been allowed to abdicate.

If Francis were to ask me how this should be done, I would suggest the following:

A. The Pope who resigns should join a monastery of his choice, with the proviso that the choice can be changed at any time by his successor(s).

B. The Pope who resigns should renounce every title, every pomp, and every privilege. He should live a life of poverty in some isolated monastery. He should be forbidden from giving interviews. If he writes books or memoirs, these should not be published during his lifetime. His successor would be able to, at any time, order him to become a proper, cloistered monk.

Fra’ Benedetto. Boy, it sounds nice.

C. Upon his death, the abdicated Pope should receive the rank and the protocol ceremonies of a Cardinal.

In my opinion, such rules would, as far as reasonable, engender the following:

1. Prevent the birth of pathetic excuses, like “he did not made the right gestures/ he had a bad stomach / he did not pronounce the words correctly, so his abdication isn’t valid”. Of course, those who want to reject reality will always reject reality, but an established procedure and the unequivocal demotion would make it far more difficult to deceive oneself in this respect.
2. Put an end to the clearly confusing and damaging show of two men in white, merely because the former guy really wants to keep, in a modified form, his accustomed title. Not anymore. If you want to go, you’re gone. You don’t get to keep the white habit after skirting the responsibilities that come with it.
3. Give the deceased former Pope a farewell that, whilst reflecting the old rank in a reasonable way, leaves no doubt as to who is Pope (hint: the new guy).

It really should be a no-brainer: a Pope who abdicates would, methinks, do so because he is not fit for the office anymore, and wants to spend the rest of the time allotted to him in prayer. A formal procedure and set of rules minimises the disruption and creates an established pattern of having only one guy in white. If a Pope changes the procedure because, say, he wants to be Pontiff Emeritus, his successor will be well able to change it again, and have the guy lock himself in a cloister with the title of “Father XY”.

We will see whether Francis deals with the issue or prefers to just ignore it once the pesky, very near presence of Benedict has gone.

The End Of The “Pope Menu”

The death of Pope Benedict puts an end to the strange – and, if you ask me, vanity-driven – situation of a real Pope – the one in office – being, er, the Pope, whilst an ex-Pope – the one not in office – clings to the prestige of the position, in no small measure because he was terrified of being called what everybody will call him anyway: a Celestino (a common way, among well-educated Italians, to indicate a person in power who cowers and betrays the duties of his office).

Amazingly, there were people until this morning who, whilst calling themselves Catholic, thought that they could decide who is Pope. They took the Vatican Menu and found there two plates: the Pope and the Emeritus, both coming in white. So they decided that the Emeritus would be Pope, and the Pope would be, I don’t know, the wrong guy.

Then they wrote messages everywhere, saying: “if you watch the 40 hours video marathon I have linked to here, it will show very clearly that two and two is five, pigs fly, Francis is an usurper, and Benedict is the real, as in “the guy in charge”-Pope.

The very guy who was supposed to be in charge always said that Francis, not him, was in charge, and even praised his work (may the Lord forgive him for this). Therefore, this was hard case of wishful thinking or, rather, wishful not thinking. It was a strange situation. It reminds me of the Decembrist revolt, with a bunch of dreamers (the moderate dreamers; there were much worse people among them) who wanted Konstantin as Tsar, when Konstantin himself wanted Nicholas to be the Tsar. I don’t know what the Decembrists were thinking: perhaps that Konstantin was kept prisoner in some obscure cell, and forced to renounce under duress?

Anyway, all this theatre is at an end now.

There is only one Pope around. He is a thoroughly horrible person. We hope that he dies soon and somewhat resembling normality comes back. We also reflect on what horrible punishments the Church and the faithful have called on themselves, by indulging in the subversive or outright revolutionary fantasies of both the V II years and the even worse years that followed it.

I seriously hope that nobody will come out now with some outlandish new theory, like that Benedict has not died, but is hidden in a dark cell somewhere in the Tierra del Fuego together with Jim Morrison, or that he is Pope from heaven, or from purgatory, or from wherever he is now.

Sad as this death is, at least there is one problem less now.

Of course, this is not the end of wishful non thinking, because wishful non thinking seems to be a necessity for some. They will enlarge the ranks of the Sedevacantists, those quite funny people who believe that the Church has been kidding with two billions Catholics for 60 years now.

You know what? Reality can harsh to look at in the face. But it is still preferable to creating an artificial one we have dreamed about because we don’t want to suffer.

Let us suffer instead, and pray more, and do more penance.

We were never told the Earthly Jerusalem would always be immaculate.

Pray For Benedict, The Tragic Pope Who Fled For Fear Of The Wolves.

The earthly journey of Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI is now coming to an end. The latest I have heard is that he can still assist to mass, but if his condition is called “serious” we all know how this is, most likely, going to end in the next few days.

The legacy that the man will leave is, if you allow me to be so blunt, a total failure (in execution, but most likely not in intention) with the addition of Summorum Pontificum; a measure, the last one, in which Benedict also managed to fail as he was spectacularly AWOL when the most difficult part (the enforcement) came.

The report on the homosexuality in the Church, which he himself commissioned, and on which he, once again, refused to act, is the other, tragic, pole of his Papacy. I consider the latter the most grave failing of his Pontificate, even worse than his very weak defence of Summorum Pontificum. But there are other issues about which I prefer to speak now, when he is still alive.

Benedict was, if you ask me, the controlled opposition to the dominant V II HomoChurch. Having flirted with heresy himself in his youth (as always in his life, as a moderate heretic, a position of sub-zero risk in the Church of those years), he progressively recovered – in a journey that went on for decades and completed, if it really completed, only when he was Pope – a more orthodox understanding of his place in the great scheme of things. But he never was the guy who would do anything forceful.

Those Cardinals who made him Pope (yes, my dear readers: it’s the Cardinals, not the Holy Ghost, who elect the Pope) evidently knew very well that the man depicted in the secular press as a (ahem) German Pastor eager to defend the Church was, in reality, an already old, already frail man, with less desire for battles than he had ever had in his life, and with an extraordinary propensity for being manipulated, ignored, or openly disobeyed without any consequence. They knew very well that the guy was, again, controlled opposition, giving a facade of austerity and seriousness whilst the Homo Party went on undisturbed. The result was the extraordinary admission of being afraid of fleeing for fear of the wolves. Something which, as it is abundantly clear now, the man actually did.

And a man of the power apparatus Benedict, as expected, was. His appointments of bishops and cardinals were atrocious. The German Shepherd was the obedient lapdog of the dominant groups within the Vatican. The problems we have now are also caused by almost eight years of such appointments.

The weakness of character (which should have advised him to simply ask the Cardinals to pick someone else) was his greatest weakness. Vanity was the second.

It was, if you ask me, vanity – however he might have called it – that led a Pope fleeing from the wolves, and likely obsessed by his fear of being remembered as such, to stress that he was not actually fleeing by – and this is not casual – clinging to the title and the pomp. How much better for him would have been to request to be sent, with the title his successor would deem fit, in some monastery in the extremely beautiful corner of the planet where he was born, and to live there a life in prayer. But no: the failure of his Pontificate, the actual absence of the balls required to simply do his job, had to be hidden behind a veil of gravitas, keeping the title (in a way common, in Italy, to Professors, and which Benedict knew perfectly well) as he was relinquishing the job. A Professor who retires is called Emeritus to allow him to get the honour of the position when he does not have the job anymore. Benedict invented for himself a way of doing exactly the same himself. The issues that this engendered are well-known and, whilst they are totally unfounded, it cannot be said that Benedict made things easier.

Now, let me come to the main event: the fleeing.

If you look at my blog posts of those times, you will see that I had given the man the benefit of the doubt, thinking – very rationally, if you ask me, and avoiding the sin of detraction – that he had decided to resign because he knew that he did not have the physical strength to keep doing the job, something also influenced by the sad spectacle offered by the last years of John Paul II. I stay behind everything that I have written at the time, and consider it, to this day, the most logical reading of the events.

I changed my mind about it – and persuaded myself that the man was, actually, fleeing all the time, and a water carrier of the “progressive guys” all his life – when I saw the unconditional approval Benedict gave to the obviously heretical pontificate of Francis. This, my friends, is not the behaviour of a man who is strong in spirit, but decides to leave the office so that others may continue his work with the necessary energy. This is the behaviour of a yes-man who will do whatever it takes, even with approaching judgment, in order to be seen as an obedient wheel of the apparatus. This is the guy who will never, ever rock the boat.

Ratzinger was never a leader. In typical German fashion, he was born a follower. The job offered to him in 2005 was the possibly most unsuited to his character and inclinations. He could not have changed his character, but he could, and should, have recognised that he was absolutely not cut for the job. Whatever excuse he gave to himself (“the will of the Lord” and such like), let me tell you that, is you ask me, vanity, again, was in play.

A career as a theologian based on heresy-light. Then a pontificate as a fake hard guy. Then a post-pontificate (in itself a problem) marked by complicity with evil.

This is the legacy of Joseph Ratzinger; the man who always managed to do it safely, comfortably wrong.

He is, now, very near to that terrible moment, the moment that awaits all of us. I will pray with all my heart that he may die at peace with the Lord, as I wish for myself and, my dear readers, for all of you.

Keyboard Cardinals

One day, it has been said, the Church could consider the election of Francis invalid.

Beautiful, say I. Let us hope and pray that such a moment comes, no matter how far in the future, so that it is easier to excise all the poison of this guy from the body of the Church.

However, if such a day comes, it will be the day that the Church has made a decision. The Church; not a grumpy old man in the pew, or a blogger at his desk.

Nor can anybody say that, if the Church, one day, decides that Francis’ election was void, these grumpy old men and Keyboard Cardinals will be “proven right”.

They won’t. They would be just as wrong on that day as they are wrong now, because it is not for them to say “I told you so”. In fact, it is not for them to tell, full stop.

We are not at liberty to decide who is Pope, or whether the Pope is legitimate or not. That basic humility is required of a Catholic. We aren’t a Protestant mini-outfit where everybody decides which rules he adheres to, and three people can get together and create another mini-outfit with the rules they like.

If the Pope is a disgrace – this one is a huge disgrace; his successor, very likely, too – then it is our duty to say so, stick to what the Church has always taught, and deny obedience to such a disgraceful Pope in everything in which he goes against what the Church teaches.

We are no pope-makers. It is extremely arrogant, and very possibly gravely sinful, to think that we can decide who is Pope and who isn’t. The Church says that Francis is Pope. Even Benedict says that Francis is Pope. Not one single Cardinal denies to Francis the fact of life that he is the Pope.

The sun goes up in the East. Francis is Pope. Live with it.

We don’t decide who is Pope. We can – and should – pray for the return of worthy Popes in an authentically Catholic Church. We need to also understand that the horrible disfiguration of the Church we are living now is – as everything else – God-willed, and most likely a punishment for the sins of both the clergy and the laity. The solution is, then, not more arrogance but more humility.

Pray more. Do penance. Hope for a better day, but realise it might never come in your lifetime. Hope you will die believing in the Catholic teaching. Be faithful to the end, knowing that sixty-five generations of Catholics are on your side.

We are no Pope-makers.

It’s as simple as that.

Pope Celestino Ratzinger, Explained

He was never a strong beer: Pontiff Emeritus Benedict.

As Benedicts approaches the grave, and after I received a comment on the other blog post from the reader Aqua, I would like to say two words on how I see the position in which Benedict has put himself with his abdication and his strange choice of title.

Benedict is a very well educated man. He is, also, very grounded in the Italian cultural environment. He knows that in Italy – other than in other Countries – to be a Celestino is another way of saying to be a coward. It really is a language usage well spread among the educated, who know their Dante.

Benedict knows his Dante, and he knows his Italians. He did not want to be a Celestino (though, let us be frank, he actually is). Being quite a cerebral guy, and wanting to abdicate without looking like a coward, he decided to keep the title Emeritus, using another language usage that every Italian knows from, say, university professors.

A Professor Emeritus does not have the job anymore. He is retired. But he has not run away. He is simply too old to keep doing his job, but he keeps the dignity of the office, which he does not want to be seen as simply discarding.

In Benedict’s very intellectual world, this makes him a guy who – like the Professor – does not cowardly retreats, but decides to simply pass the baton to a healthier, stronger Pontiff; who is then, clearly, the Pontiff, exactly in the same way as the Professor Emeritus does not have the job anymore, it’s the new guy who has it.

Why does Benedict does all this? Why does he just not abdicate, takes a title he already had (Bishop, Cardinal, Priest!), and asks a monastery of his choice to host him for the rest of his life? At the root of it all, I think the answer is: vanity, and concern for his legacy and reputation.

However, a guy like Benedict would have some excuses for his vanity. He likely reasoned that, upon becoming a Pope, he was not a cardinal anymore. He had the title of bishop, but without a diocese. He could have been Father Benedict, but again I think he was just too vain for that. Plus, all these titles, and the correspondent attire – purple, or black – would have reminded him every day that he has abandoned his post, for fear of the wolfs.

This is not what a Benedict does. A Benedict makes excuses for his lack of courage – like he did in his eight years as Pope: not going decisively against the homo lobby, allowing Summorum Pontificum to be largely neglected, and appointing horrible bishops all the way for the sake of a quiet life – and finds ways to justify his dereliction of duty. Hence the white tunic, the Emeritus title, and all the mess that ensued.

It must be said that, if the new Pope had been Pius XIII, nobody would be talking of Benedict now, unless to remember what improvement the conclave brought.

I have often made the comparison – known to everybody in Italy because of Manzoni – between crock vases and iron vases. Benedict is a crock vase all right. But he is a very intelligent, learned, cerebral crock vase, who will find one thousand excuses not to be the iron vase that is, actually, written in blood letters in the job description of a Pope.

Ultimately, Benedict failed in this as he failed in so many other things as a Pope.

He should know by now that he will forever remembered, in Italy and elsewhere, as a Celestino.

“Anonimi Della Croce”: The Letter Is Published

*Not* smoking…

I visited the “Anonimi della Croce” site in order to see whether the famous letter showing that Benedict resigned because of external pressures was published. 

Actually, it was, and on Good Friday already. The post is here. I will translate the important part below. 

However, be informed from the start that there are a couple of big caveats:

1. The letter is also anonymous. This means that the one who wrote the letter is not known. The letter could be, simply put, a fake. 
2. Benedict is the recipient, not the author, of the letter. Not to put too fine a point on it, I could write to any of my readers a letter stating “I know how hard it is to live with the terrible burden of having committed adultery”. This would not prove that you have committed adultery. I could then extract this letter from my sleeve at any time. Again, it would prove nothing.     

The important part of the letter is this: 

Il Suo pensiero di dimissione dal Suo stato deriva sicuramente da un grave conflitto interiore, dovuto ai motivi e alle pressioni che mi ha elencato. So per certo che in altre condizioni, Sua Santità non avrebbe mai pensato minimamente ad avanzare un gesto simile. Ma di certo, questo momento per la Chiesa di Cristo è da considerarsi terribile. E Lei Santità ne è il Capo. E solo Lei sa di cosa oggi la Chiesa ha bisogno.

My translation: 

Your thoughts about abandoning your state certainly derives from a grave interior conflict, due to the motives and the pressures you have listed. I know for certain that in a different situation, Your Holiness would never have thought of making such a gesture. However, it is certain that the actual situation of Christ’s Church must be considered terrible. And you, Holiness, are Her head. And only you know what the Church needs today.

There is a (paper) bomb hidden in these words: “the pressures you have listed”. The Italian “pressioni” leaves little doubt that this is not a generic indication of “pressing needs”, but rather directly refers to the pressure exerted on someone to move him to do something. There might also be several of those, and there are certainly a minimum of two, as allegedly Benedict “lists” a series of “motives and pressures”. 

So, the famous letter was published. 

However, in my opinion the letter does not prove much. 

Firstly, the writer might have misunderstood Benedict.

Secondly, any priest worth his salt would never say to a Pope revealing to him that he is being blackmailed into resigning “only you know what the Church needs today”. He would actually say, no matter what the extent of the pressure is: “it would be gravely sinful, irrespective of the state of the Church, to yield to blackmail”.

Thirdly, Benedict has very officially stated that he has resigned out of his own free will and without external pressure, and I still trust the old man more than an anonymous letter.

Fourthly, if Benedict had mentioned “pressures” in the sense of “blackmail” it is likely that his “pen friend” would have used the word “ricatti”. You exert pressure on someone to make him do something, but this is clearly short of blackmailing. The teacher exerts pressure on his student, making clear to him that he either applies himself more or will sit the year. Ivanka Trump exerts pressure on her father to make him bomb a Syrian airport. The act of exerting pressure is strong, but not necessarily immoral and generally not criminal. The act of blackmail is fundamentally different, and is described with a different word. This letter is also confidential. Therefore, the writer would not hesitate to write “ricatti” (the plural of “blackmail”) if he thought this is what is in play.  

What this most probably looks like is that several people were telling Benedict that the Church needs a strong man, and he – as he himself stated publicly – does not want to end up like JP II. And the man, weak and meek (in the bad sense) as he has been his entire life, has felt the burden of being put “under pressure” to resign. Which makes his decision, in this hypothesis, entirely his anyway; because he was the Pope, not a child of three.    

If we were to know the author and circumstances of the letter, and the author ‘s relationship with Benedict, we could make a better assessment. But as it is, this seems hardly a smoking gun.

More a chocolate one. 

M  

     

AbdicationGate?

 

“[…]tra un mese Anonimidellacroce sarà in grado di pubblicare il contenuto della lettera fatidica che Benedetto ricevette prima di decidere di dimettersi”.

“In a month, AnonymousoftheCross will be able to publish the content of the fateful letter Benedict received before deciding to resign”

The bomb was published here.  More to come in a month (means: after Easter? Or literally during Holy Week?). The motives of Benedict’s abdication were allegedly a) very serious and b) nothing to do with his health. 

Yours truly reads, and reflect as follows: 

1. I have always thought Benedict a decent man. Therefore, I have always believed his words, that his resignation was due to his feeling he was not strong enough to keep being an effective Pope. I think we owe the man, as every man we believe decent, to believe what he says until the contrary is proven.  
2. I will wait to see whether something really gets published, and really confirms Benedict decided to resign because of external pressure. If it turns out Benedict is a liar (and, inevitably, a coward of stellar proportions), this is the reality we will have to live with. My estimation of the man took a decided turn south when he gave the gushing FrancisInterviews anyway. However, I greatly hesitate in believing that he could be such a horrible person. 
3. If it turns out Benedict was put under pressure to resign, do not think for a moment this justifies the old man, no matter what caused the abdication. There is no universe in which the resignation of a Pope because of external pressure cannot be an act of immense cowardice. It is inconceivable that, say, Pius XII would have resigned if Stalin had said to him: “either you abdicate or I start a nuclear war”. A Pope must never be strong-armed, full stop. Nor does the Church recognise the idea of a Pope resigning because he embraces some “lesser evil” to avoid a bigger one. The idea that Benedict might have resigned to protect himself I do not even want to entertain.  
4.  If it turns out Benedict was put under pressure, I will leave it to expert theologians to decide what happens next. However, it seems difficult to me to deny that the decision of Benedict was, in any way, voluntary. It is, also, what the man explicitly stated. If a Pope abdicates because he is a coward my first take is that he has still abdicated, and he is still a coward. To my knowledge, there is no provision that says that if the Pope is a coward, the next Pope can’t be validly elected. If this were the case, we would have the rather problematic possibility that the last, say, 203 Popes were invalidly elected and we never knew it.We live in the Age Of The Kitten. An age in which people like Cardinal Burke are considered courageous. We must cope with the fact that our clergy are a bunch of girls, Popes possibly included. But this does not mean that the entire institution of the Papacy is put into question.  
5. It can still be that nothing comes out of this. “Fra’ Cristoforo” clearly wasn’t there, and he might not have seen the letter he mentions. Even the best can be deceived. 
6. Don’t be distressed. Bad Popes are a constant fixture of the Church. Many Popes in the past have been put under pressure to condemn and destroy good people or institutions (Joan of Arc and the Knight Templars come to mind). The Church has survived. 

In what horribly entertaining times it was given us to live…! 

M

1.  

 

The Cupich Of The West: San Diego Gets Another Joke Of A Bishop

In case you should think that when all it's said and done Francis' Pontificate will leave behind only a huge amount of senseless waffle, you can change your mind now.

Francis is aggressively promoting his agenda through episcopal appointments. After Chicago, San Diego is now getting an excuse of a bishop, promoted to a successor of the Apostles because he wants to undermine them.

Robert McElroy is a social justice warrior; his main care is “income inequality”, not the salvation of souls; after his theology studies he got his doctorate in political science. Whether this speaks of a strong faith I leave it to you to decide. And he is obviously not a friend of the Traditional Latin Mass.

It angers me, it angers me no end that when we get a generally conservative Pope he will mostly make bad appointments to appease the progressives, and when we get the progressive Pope he proceeds to promote the worst people without any qualm.

Conservative prelates must stop being sissies. There is no value in helping the enemies of Christ. If a climate of loud opposition to Francis is created by Cardinals, priests and bishops, the appointment of bad bishops will be at least more difficult, because Francis sniffs the air like an Irish Setter for every whiff of massive opposition.

I did not expect a Pope like Benedict to promote Catholic hardliners, because he never was one himself. But the appointment of solidly Catholic bishops, without exceptions, should have been expected from a Pope who knows where the Truth lies.

May God forgive Benedict for his lack of decisiveness and bite. Eight years down the drain. What a chance, and what a waste. Who knows when the next chance will arise.

M

 

Where Benedict Failed

 

 

 

Not everyone is born to be a leader. Some are born to be generals, some are born to be soldiers, some are born to be thinkers, some are born to be, well, idiots.

Pope Benedict never had the stuff of the doer. He had even less the stuff of the leader. A man inclined to reflection and theoretical elaboration, he never showed that kind of energy that leads men to be relentlessly driven toward a goal, and completely focused on the practical task at hand. He also never had that kind of charisma, the quiet but solid authority that leads poets to say “oh captain! my captain!” to him. Benedict never was much of a captain, and Whitman would not have been terribly impressed.

His activity as Pontiff clearly shows the poor practical record. A man of words rather than actions, Benedict never had the will or energy to give his papacy the required bite. He gave us Summorum Pontificum, and then watched as it was ignored in the Third World and actively boycotted in much of the West. His episcopal appointments show a high degree of naïveté, weakness, or simply lack of interest in the extremely delicate task of appointing the men who run the Church. But he was happy with writing books, even as he was appointing almost half the Cardinals that would give us Bergoglio as his successor.

The lack of authority reached disquieting proportions when the world discovered that even his butler thought that Benedict had to be, in some way, protected from the people around him. No, this is not the stuff of a leader, and the request that the faithful pray for him, that he may not flee before the wolves, showed in time to be a tad more concrete than the somewhat coquettish remark of an old man faced with a great responsibility. Benedict was simply not born a wolf fighter.

The apex of both this naïveté and this lack of leadership was shown in the most dramatic way – though it became apparent only later – on the 11 February 2013. A weak and undecisive man, not endowed with the stuff of leaders in his strongest days, Benedict possibly felt overwhelmed by the 300 pages report about homosexuality within the Church; a report which very obviously sent him the message that it was now time to wear the armor, and go to war. This is when Benedict’s mistakes catch up with him, and they will now plague his existence for the rest of his days.

Benedict felt – rightly, I think – that he was not up to the task. It is difficult to wage war against the homo Mafia when not even your butler has any esteem in your qualities as leader. One cannot, as the Germans say, jump over his shadow, and  very few are the men who experience a dramatic change in character and attitude at 83. His decision to resign is, in my eyes, fully understandable in a man who saw a task in front of him for which he had neither the attitude nor the energy, and for which he felt – or so it seems to me – that the Church he loves needed a far more suitable man than himself.

But the bigger mistake was not that. If Benedict had done his job properly in the appointment of Cardinals and Bishops he could have resigned with the knowledge – as opposed to the naive illusion – that his successor would have had the orthodoxy for the good fight, and the cojones to fight it. Then it would all have made sense. But nothing went as he was certainly planning.

Benedict’s biggest mistake was to think that he had prepared a Conclave fit for electing someone who would continue his work; and that he could therefore retire in good conscience, after almost eight years at the helm, because now simply too weak and too old to be a good helmsman.

Benedict’s failure of judgment in his appointments unluckily combined in a huge failure of judgment concerning his Cardinals and, as a result, his successor. Never a lion, the man was evidently also rather easily duped. Not a good quality in a Pope, however many books he can write.

I do not believe for a second that he was forced to resign, as lack of leadership quality does not a coward make. I truly believe that the man believes in God, and would die rather than cave in to the Church’s enemies. I find the idea that he would simply allow to be bullied aside extremely insulting to the man.

But that this gentle soul was not fit to look at men in the proper light, and was ultimately unable to understand where he was steering the Church, this seems blatantly obvious to me.

Soon it will be two years from that fateful day, the day that plunged the Church from the frying pan of rampant neo-Modernism and sexual perversion into the fire of open, shameless heresy and celebration  of the very perversion this papacy was supposed to fight against.

The gentle, undecisive, naive man is still alive. He is far too loyal to say it, but he must now feel that his survival is his punishment. I doubt he thought, when he resigned, that he had another two years to live. But the man must be stunned, and horrified, at thinking what his pontificate has resulted to in the end: an attempt at hostile takeover from Satan himself.

Pray for Benedict; a kind, gentle man of thought and prayer who did not have the stuff of which effective Popes are made.

M

 

Edited with BlogPad Pro

Quisque Faber Fortunae Suae

Increasingly more a tragic figure: Pope Benedict.

There has been some discussion about the behaviour of some Cardinals who might have conspired to deceive Pope Benedict into believing that, in case of abdication, a successor able to continue on his line would have been picked. Rorate has some reflection, but they are not the only ones.

It is, in my eyes, inconceivable that Benedict would choose to abdicate whilst still able to function, but without a funded hope that the Cardinals would pick a, say, Benedict XVII. No, of course he thought that his abdication would further, not thwart, his work. To think otherwise is to imagine a man so selfishly absorbed in his own desires that he does not care of what happens to the Church after him, provided he can write his books. This is, in my eyes, almost as absurd – and almost as offensive – as to think that Benedict could have been cowed into the abdication by any threat whatsoever.

Still, I would like to make a couple of consideration.

1. If Benedict was more or less assured that things were “fine” and decided to abdicate on the strength of this confidential knowledge, in what is this different from the “canvassing” so lamented when Cardinal Murphy O'Connor would be the one guilty of it? I am not talking of “pacts” or “agreements” here, but of several people observing with Benedict how sound, dependable, through and through papabile – say – Cardinal Scola is. Is, then, a Pope abdicating on the strength of such “canvassing” not guilty of the same behaviour? Mind, I do not think such “canvassing” is there in the first place. I merely say that if you condemn Murphy O'Connor, it's difficult to see how, in this scenario, you should not condemn Ratzinger.

2. If the scenario is true, then Benedict would prove a further disappointment. It would mean that he could be gulled into a false sense of security not only in the weeks or months preceding his abdication, but actually since his ascendancy to the Throne; because in order to commit a mistake of that magnitude Benedict must have been a bad judge of the character of many Cardinals for many years. He must, in other words, have been blind to the character of many trusted people in his entourage, and of many of the very Cardinals he has himself appointed.

I am not in the mind of the Pope Emeritus. I will never know whether he – without any suggestions from outside – simple made the decision that the time was right and the Cardinals sound enough; or whether he was perhaps thinking of waiting another Consistory or two – to be used wisely – before proceeding to his historical step, and was then reassured from the noises and hunches he heard around him that no, everything was fine and he could abdicate assured of a happy ending.

In both cases, Benedict must feel a horrible burden on his soul, because it must be clear to him that it was his “middle of the road” (or so he thought) appointments that made Bergoglio's election possible in the first place.

JPII's Conclave didn't pick Bergoglio. It picked Ratzinger. Cardinal Ratzinger was there, and was therefore very aware of the role played by the Bergoglio candidature. If he had appointed better Cardinals, he would now not be forced to witness the demolition of his work, and the utter shame in which Bergoglio is dragging the very institution of the Papacy. It must be very sad, for a Pope, to outlive his own mistakes, and have them stare at him in the face every day.

Pope Benedict was the tragic, if involuntary enabler of all that has happened since that dratted evening of the 13 March 2013. Without him, ithis mess would simply not have been possible. Bergoglio's election was made possible by his multiple mistakes in the appointment of Cardinals; mistakes which, frankly, are in tune with his very mediocre episcopal appointments.

Pope Benedict has made his own bed. Whether he was “helped” in so doing does not change the fundamental drama of the man, because there isn't a big difference between being simply gullible all the time and being, in addition, double gullible in the last months of his pontificate. Which leads us to another point that I think very important.

—-

Pope Ratzinger's tragedy is the Church's tragedy. It is the fruit of the illusion that there be, somewhere, a viable “V II road” able to serve the Church well. There isn't. A Cardinal is either solidly and unashamedly Catholic, or he is a walking booby trap. A Conclave is either full of people who really believe in God and are afraid of gravely displeasing him, or there is no way of knowing what they could be able to do. Pope Benedict knew them personally, and therefore had to know what Conclave he would leave better than every Vaticanist, or gossiper, much less blogger. Half of the Cardinals were hand-picked by him, well knowing what their future task would be.

Quisque Faber Fortunae Suae. Pope Ratzinger has, entirely with his own hands, fabricated a nightmare retirement, as he must look in astonishment at what Humble Wolf is doing to his sheep. The longer the retirement, the longer the suffering, because it is not probable at all that he will outlive Francis and, God willing, see sanity restored.

Pope Benedict has, with his historic decision, also put himself in the position of the one who must repeat to himself, every day, “what have I done?!”

Not pretty. Not pretty at all.

But the bed he made.

M

 

 

After “Mad Monday”: A New, Forward-Looking Hermeneutic For The Second Vatican Council.

 

The always attentive reader Rhizotomos directs my attention to a blog called Public Vigil; from what I can see a soundly conservative blog, well worth the reading but exempt from, say, Sedevacantist error. 

The author of the blog is kind enough to mention my little effort, and has some less than very kind, but rather intelligent, words for Pope Ratzinger and his cohort. 

I will profit of these intelligent considerations to spend a couple of words on Cardinal/Pope Ratzinger, and Vatican II in general. By the by, the blog author also spends some words on the “not fooling anyone” matter; his are perfectly understandable objections, but see here and here for my thinking in the matter. 

I have, in the past, compared Ratzinger to Gorbachev: a last attempt, made in good faith, to take the best out of something that is intrinsically wrong. I do not doubt in the least Cardinal/Pope Ratzinger’s good faith, but I think he applied it to the wrong cause. 

Gorbachev tried to save Communism injecting in it elements of sanity, but ultimately failed because Communism is, however you tweak it, insane. Similarly, Ratzinger represents the last attempt to date to extract some “good” from something that is, when we look at it properly, entirely and irredeemably bad. 

Whatever Cardinal Ratzinger and Pope Benedict XVI later proposed to make V II “work” would work much better if V II were to be ditched altogether. The “hermeneutic of continuity” is nothing else than the attempt to beautify the Council with elements of timeless Truth; not only in the liturgy, but in the approach to Church governance, evangelisation, etc. This Truth was there before the Council. What has the council improved? Zippo. What has it damaged? Everything.  

Pope Benedict’s strategy was, just like Gorbachev’s, self-defeating. If the bad of the present needs the good of the past to make it presentable, it is obvious that the exercise as a whole is not presentable. Once again: whatever was good in what Ratzinger proposed was there before V II, and there is no need of V II at all to introduce it.  Actually, everything “good” that he proposed could have been done “better” by entirely ditching V II: liturgically, doctrinally, pastorally, and so on. 

To make the usual, Mundaborian sexist comparison (we need more sexism around; good, old-fashioned sexism; there are two sexes, after all…) it is as if the good girl (the Church pre V II) had been substituted by a slut (the Church post V II), and Ratzinger had come to tell us that it is much better if the slut dresses modestly and adopts some ways of speaking, acting, talking, moving, and thinking from the good girl. Give me the good girl back, then, thank you very much. You are not going to fool me by asking the slut to wear the plisse’ rock and the ponytail.

V II has, as often stated in this blog, a construction defect. It is wrong in the very way it was conceived, in the very mentality it represented, and in the very attitude it spread the world over. The Council is Church Sluttishness in the most authentic sense of the word. The “treason of the true Council” is a legend, and a very naive one at that: the “Council Fathers” went back to their dioceses and accompanied the demolition of so much sound Catholicism every step of the way. Do not try to persuade me this is not what was wanted all along. Once again, this is like a premarital pregnancy: it did not “just happen”. 

Summa summarum: V II is a slut. It is a slut in the way it walks, in the way it talks and, obviously, in the way it lives. Ratzinger tried to cloth sluttishness with modesty, and everyone praised how nice and chaste the ponytail looked; but look: a ponytail isn’t changing the mentality that is still there; and boy, how the mentality was still there! 

The author of the blog also makes another very important consideration which, translated, means: as long as the slut is around, problems won’t be far. Or: even if we were to get a Benedict XVII after Pope Dope, the next nutcase is just a matter of time. Why? Because, to remain by the figure of speech, behaving badly is what sluts do. 

When we say ( and everyone says) that Francis is “V II on steroids” we mean just this: that the disease was already there; with Francis, it has merely degenerated to a serious fever. 

Who has ordained Bergoglio? JP II. “Faggot” Forte? JP II, (apparently, then Cardinal Ratzinger celebrated the Mass!).

Schoenborn? Kasper? Maradiaga? Tagle? 

It’s always one of the two: either JP II or Ratzinger. The latter failed in his appointments of bishops and cardinals so parlously, that it is because of him that we are now where we are.

There is nothing good in V II, or Communism. Merely degrees of bad. What is good and sound in Communism, or in Church practice (or in the clothes and demeanour of the slut) can always be found in the original, much better form elsewhere. The Traditional Latin Mass is better than every form of Novus Ordo no matter how reverent; the sound principles of Catholic teaching will always work much better when the novelties of V II are expunged from it; pastoral work will always be more effective when sin and its punishment are mentioned, and so on. 

There is nothing good in V II. Nothing to be saved. No improvement whatsoever. V II must be destroyed like it’s Carthago in 146 BC.

The “Hermenutic of burning to the ground and spreading salt over the ruins” is the only one that will solve the problem once and for all.

Don’t try to impress me with a plisse’ rock and a ponytail.

I know what is behind. 

Mundabor  

  

 

  

 

Non E’ Francesco? Of Pop Songs, Puns, And Popes.

There is a Sixties’ pop song in Italy, “Non e’ Francesca”, which every Italian knows and could sing. Including, probably, newborn babies, already dead people, and people with advanced Alzheimer’s Disease. The song is cruelly beautiful and its enduring popularity, now arrived at the fourth generation, is utterly deserved.

“You are mistaken”, says the singing voice (the late, but not forgotten, Lucio Battisti), “she whom you have seen is not Francesca”; and he does not want to believe that the wife he believes so true is, in fact, undoubtedly betraying him.

Why do I tell you this? Because I love my country, and the best of even its pop culture, and the wonderful sense of humanity we carry with us, shortcomings and all; and Lucio Battisti, and this particular song, is as much a part of Italy as the Colosseum, or the balcony of Palazzo Venezia.

But there is also another reason: this very song is the obvious “insider joke” (for Italians) of Antonio Socci’s book, of imminent publication, and pre-selling already very well on Amazon: “Non e’ Francesco”. His own newspaper has very recently made the surprise announcement.

In it, Socci apparently states that you are mistaken: he whom you think the Pope is not Francesco, but Benedetto.

I have already written about the Rapunzel-like fantasies of the proponents of such outlandish theories, and I will not repeat them here.

I only ask this: when Pope Benedict dies who is, pray, supposed to be the Pope? Francis is no Pope – they say – and his election invalid. If Francis should die or resign, the election of his successor would also be invalid, because effected through a number of Cardinals appointed by a non-Pope. Nor could any other rule, bar the Second Coming, offer an unquestioned, valid way of election, as every alternative method would cause division and controversy on an absolutely atrocious scale. Mind, here, that for Socci five votes instead of four in the same day suffice to invalid an election (how he can be sure of the five is another matter), so it follows that every other rule would be a far bigger deviation, and totally arbitrary, and I can’t see how a validly elected Pope can come out of it.

So: is not the consequence of Socci’s thinking a Sedevacantism in instalments? How would the proposer of the theory recover from it?

And as we are there: are we really sure the number of votes in past conclaves was always the prescribed one? Not one more, not one less? What is, therefore, if a Pope was elected in such a procedurally vitiated way? Shall he be a valid Pope merely because there was no Emeritus around? What about his own appointments? Was the successor validly elected? How so, particularly in case of a long pontificate of the “Francesco” of the day?

And let us think further: Francis dies or resigns. What then? Is Benedict Pope? How so? Will he say “I have caved in to blackmail, therefore I should be reinstated”? Seriously? Shall he be re-elected? By whom? By Cardinals appointed by non-Pope Francis?

Or, Francis dies, and Benedict says “stop dreaming, Jungs!” (He has, by the way, he has! Socci was listening to Battisti, so he missed that…). What then, skipper? Unless the Cardinals elect Benedict again and he says “I accept, but I was always Pope anyway” and proceeds to appoint as Cardinals the new ones (or deprive them of their red hat) I can’t see how this will work.

Socci has, no doubt, an answer to all this. We will have to wait for the book. I merely doubt it will be a credible one. But we shall see.

Up to then, and if you ask me, and remaining by the song pun, Socci should listen to the song again and again and repeat to himself its first three words: “ti stai sbagliando”.

You are mistaken.

M

Two Popes In Contrast

The (excellent, from what I can understand) Argentinian blog “Wanderer Revisited” has this interesting picture collage about two Popes.

I am not good at Spanish, in the sense that it is only accessible to me in the way it would be to a casual Italian reader. But one certainly does not need great language skills to understand the message of this:

 

More and more people are opening their eyes. More will follow as October approaches.

Let us be vigilant, and let us fight against the huge tide of satanic deception coming our way.

Mundabor

Sedevacantism In Waiting.

I know it seems absurd, but apparently there are people around who think they aren't Sedevacantists because they think Benedict is the Pope. What they are, is Sedevacantists In Waiting.

Let us leave aside the absurdity of saying that Benedict is Pope when he himself says it is absurd to think so. Let us imagine Benedict has been, say, hypnotised to say so. Or they have threatened to kill his cat. Or something like that.

If Benedict is Pope and Francis isn't, the latter's appointment are invalid. Not only those of the bishops, but those of the Cardinals, too. Therefore, the next conclave will take place with a number of invalidly appointed Cardinals, and I am unable to see how from such a conclave a legitimate Pope might be elected.

Then, at some point Benedict will die, and the Benedictsedists will have to recognise that the Sea is vacant. Then, at some point, Francis will die or resign too, and the now Benedictsedevacantist will have to recognise that his successor is a bogus Pope elected by bogus Cardinals in an invalid conclave. Then at some point – actually rather fast now – all the Cardinals appointed by JP II and Benedict XVI would be above eighty and as such, according to the rule of those same Popes, would lose the right to elect a Pope. Therefore, there would be no Cardinals who can elect a Pope, no mechanism to elect new ones, and no authority that could give validity to whatever new method to elect a Pope.

We would, therefore, be in a situation of utter impasse, for which no solution can be found within Church rules that would allow to get out of it.

Mind, Popes were not always elected by Cardinals. But they were always elected in recognisable harmony with the will of their predecessors. Who could, now, say with any authority what this will is, and therefore which rules shall apply? Shall those Bishops elect the Pope, who have accepted to serve under illegitimate Popes? Who will decide Francis' bishops are to be excluded? How many pre-Francis bishops will remain in a decade or two? Shall we make a poll among pre-Francis priests, instead? Those who have deemed Francis and his successor Popes, you mean? How long until they are gone, too? Shall we elect the new Pope in a worldwide election, then? Paper poll? Internet? Who will organise it? Shall women be allowed to vote? How about those baptised by Francis' non-priests?

No, this is all absurd. So absurd in fact, that one wonders how the Benedictsedists can utter such outlandish ideas without looking three inches beyond their own nose.

Benedict has resigned. He is not the reigning Pope anymore. Volens nolens, Francis is Pope. An atrocious one, I'll give you that; but the Pope elected from largely atrocious Cardinals, selected among largely atrocious Bishops, selected among largely atrocious clergy, produced from largely atrocious seminars, ruined from a largely atrocious Council.

You can turn it and twist it as much as you like, but in the end Francis is the undeniable product of the visible Church. His legitimacy is universally recognised through all the layers of that organisation we and all our ancestors have called “the Church”. There is no way we can call a fantasy parallel reality into existence, that would declare the real reality a scam and bogus organisation. There is no way any of us can decide, whilst in a sober state, that a fake Church now commands the loyalty of all those seen the world over as Catholic Bishops, Priests, Cardinals, Popes, Deacons, and Seminarians; an entire planet showing the Cross on top of fake churches, with no Blessed Sacrament in the tabernacle, and no valid Masses being celebrated. All this, in favour of a fantasy Church whose last Pope, Benedict, died saying he has validly resigned, and Francis is Pope.

Stop dreaming. Start thinking.

Benedictsedism is sedevacantism in waiting, and in the present situation it is just as absurd as the mainstream Sedevacantism.

Mundabor

 

Pontiff Emeritus Quashes Speculations

Only one of these two is Pope. Even if he is the wrong one.

The Pontiff Emeritus has officially reacted to Andrea Tornielli's recent questions about the supposed background of his resignation, and has invited to stop absurd speculations.

If you ask me, he was very right in saying a word or three, because such speculations damage the institutions of the Papacy, and we should not damage the Papacy merely because we have an atrocious Pope.

It goes without saying that the conspiracy ultras will not be satisfied with this. If one thinks the Pope was horribly blackmailed into resigning, he will believe his latest statements have the same cause as the resignation. This is the beauty, so to speak, of all conspiracy theories, whose followers are by definition able to persuade themselves of absolutely everything they wish without reality having to provide any concrete evidence of what they believe. It's all secret, you know.

Still, I rather hope reasonable and sensible people will now definitely stop every conjecture on the matter. Not to do so means to insult Benedict to the point of considering him not only cowardly enough to give in to blackmail, but outright servile in that he keeps marching towards his grave with such a weight on his conscience.

The Church does not believe in lesser evils. If a Pope is threatened with a huge scandal unless he resigns, he has the duty not to resign whatever evil may come out of the scandal. This, assuming that the unearthing of a scandal is the evil, rather than the scandalous facts themselves. A Pope can simply not accept to be strong-armed into resigning his office. Popes haven't resigned faced with Napoleon and the possible devastation of Catholicism all over Napoleonic Europe. Just imagine if a Pope should resign to avoid some sex or abuse or financial scandal.

Please let us stop this, and let us be real.

Benedict freely decided to resign. Whether we like it or not.

Mundabor

 

Don’t Be A Catholic Shaman

With ugly regularity one reads of pious Catholics all too ready to give to simple facts a meaning that goes beyond the event, and that they take as unmistakable “God's special sign”; generally, these people do not resist the temptation to give voice to their own superstition, as if their strange theories were obvious for the world to see.

Let us take a couple of examples.

The day Pope Benedict resigned, a blizzard fell on St. Peter's dome. Countless Catholics were ready to read in it a sign of the wrath of heaven. They were ready to do it, of course, because they didn't agree with Pope Benedict's decision in the first place. If I don't like the decision, the reasoning goes, it follows that God must be displeased with it. If God is displeased with it, then let us look at something that corroborates my conviction.

If Pope Benedict had excommunicated Hans Kueng on the same day instead of resigning, I wonder whether the very same lightning would have been interpreted as a sign of God's wrath for the decision.

In those days, some went to even worse extremes: every natural phenomenon of some kind – there is always a storm somewhere, and the next earthquake can't be far away, either – was taken as a witness of what they were already persuaded of. It reminded me of Redskin shamans explaining to the uninitiated the wrath of Manitu.

I even read of someone having bad dreams, which left no doubt in her mind something very wrong had just happened. Hey, she had bad dreams. What else do you need to be persuaded.

But then during the 2013 conclave some bird took place on the chimney of the Sistine Chapel, and the shamans were all in a flutter for the contrary reason adduced for the lightning. Ah, a bird stopped to rest over a chimney. What a miracle.

Or think of this: when an extremely strong earthquake and sea quake took the extremely Catholic Messina in, I think, 1908 and killed around 100,000 people, no one deduced from an earthquake and sea quake in a most Catholic city of a most Catholic Country with a most Catholic pope (St. Pius X, no less) that God must be angry at that particular papacy…

This “shaman” mentality extends to very trivial events; like predatory birds attacking the doves just freed by Bishop Francis The Peaceful Killer Of Clueless Birds. Ominous, they said. A sign of the times. Strangely, they never saw a sign of the times on the many occasions in which the doves went away peacefully (to be killed by some other bird shortly thereafter, surely…). Still, if one is prone to such coffee reading he is perfectly free to conclude that God protects the peaceful dove as it flies peacefully away from St. Peter's squares, showing God's support for the humble Pope Of Peace, Francis The Peaceful Protector Of Doves.

Look: birds attack birds. It happens all the time. It's part of the rich fabric of Creation.

The mentality that this implies is a very strange one indeed: God talks to us through events that can be deciphered only by those who already know what God wants to say. Funny world.

The simple truth of the matter is that natural disasters, diseases, and the like all happen because the Garden of Even is no more, and we must live in a world full of imperfections and troubles, and in which the disgraces and diseases are, as a whole, the fruit of our disobedience. Still, cancer will strike the good as well as the bad, earthquakes will destroy the most heathen or the most Catholic of cities, doves will be attacked or not attacked by predatory birds, and the lightning rods of the highest buildings of the surroundings will continue to attract lightnings more than the lightning rods of the surrounding buildings until the end of time.

I invite my readers to have a more reasonable approach to natural events; not only because it is the reasonable thing to do, but equally importantly because if one starts to take random facts as evidence that God is on his side he will rapidly blind itself to the falseness of the most outlandish theories, and will start to believe in whatever he pleases, certain of the reassurance of the next lightning, or earthquake, or comet, or storm, or anything else that may serve the purpose, anywhere on the entire planet.

If my Internet connection is not working, is God telling me I must stop blogging? If I opened my blog and the statistics reader says “666”, am I in the thrall of Satan? Pope Francis has a cold: surely, God is warning him! I got a cold: surely, God wants me to stay home today and blog like there's no tomorrow!

Do not give any heed to Catholic shamans. If you do, belief in daily apparitions of the Blessed Virgin, followed by a fax to the adoring crowds, cannot be far away.

Mundabor

 

Rumours About Benedict’s Vision Officially Invented

Unfortunately, the sign on the front door of Zenit wasn't really noticed.

“Invented from alpha to omega” is how Archbishop Gaenswein described the rumours about the Pontiff Emeritus' alleged “mystical visions” (many of them).

I have already dedicated a blog post to this, and warned from falling into the trap of those fake Catholics trying to create a new Magisterium, made “infallible” by the Holy Ghost's alleged endorsement of Pope Francis.

Well, now it's official. From the mouth of the de facto speaker of the Pontiff Emeritus himself.

This reminds me of the idiot who left a message in my combox accusing me of being so evil that I do not read the signs of the Holy Ghost, and blasphemous in stating that God is immutable (never read Aquinas, of course).

From the rumours they are ready to believe you will recognise them.

I expect abject apologies from Zenit, who first spread the rumour. I personally would also be interested in knowing the source of this revelation, because the suspicion the sodomite mafia had a finger in this is more than legitimate.

I somewhat doubt either will happen.

Mundabor

 

On Pope Benedict, Again.

They had just been informed they run the Vatican, and dispose of Popes as they wish…

A certain view of Pope Benedict’s resignation goes along the lines of the Pontiff Emeritus having resigned as a consequence of “pressures”, or even having been “forced” to resign. In this second case, his successor would not be the legitimate… bishop of Rome.

I do not think these theories have any solid fundament in reality. Allow me to explain why.

A) Pressure

A Pope, like every powerful man, is under pressure all the time. Unavoidably, he – and they – will be surrounded by people having different ideas about the course he should take on this or that matter; some of them will be in good faith, and other won’t. It’s all par for the course.

What is not par for the course is a Pope that suddenly begins to do stupid things just because he is put under “pressure” to do so. Pope Ratzinger had a decade-long experience of positions of power; nothing, absolutely nothing of the office life of a powerful man could have been unknown to him. Powerful people know how it works. If they didn’t, they wouldn’t be powerful.

The idea of a Ratzinger just deciding that the time has arrived to think with other people’s head, and do what he thinks wrong because others say so, is just untenable and, I add, disrespectful of the former Pontiff, seen as a Romulus Augustulus rather than a true Prince of the Church.

Be it as it may, it might in all cases never be denied that a man who chooses to bend to exterior pressure is himself responsible for his behaviour. Ubi honor, Ibi onus. There is no way Pope Ratzinger might have taken such a decision without bearing all its responsibility. So we are at square one.

B) Threat

Even more absurd is the second hypothesis: that the Pope was “forced”. How do you “force” a Pope to do something he does not want to do? Is our esteem for Benedict so low that we consider him able to bend to, say, the threat of physical violence, or blackmail? What fear of death may a man of 83 have, a Pope to boot? And who on earth would be in a position to threaten or blackmail him without being immediately arrested? Again, this theory is, when reflected upon, even more offensive for the Pontiff Emeritus, who is then seen as having fears for his life, open to blackmail, and outright cowardly. It makes the same sense as to imagine that extraterrestrials would have visited the Pope and said to him either he resigns or they will invade and destroy the Earth in order to devote it to the cultivation of their favourite mushrooms.

No, it doesn’t make sense. What also does not make sense are these equilibrist’s exercises by which every time the Pontiff does something we do not approve of, the reason for it must be looked elsewhere: typically, the culprits are chosen among the “wolves”, as if a Pope could not send all of them to Uganda at three hours’ notice, and as if there were only one of them who is allowed to exert influence on him for even thirty second without his consent.

In addition, this second theory hides a terrible menace to Catholicism: ad libitum Sedevacantism.

If every time we have a bad Pope we start to theorise that the former Pope might have been “forced” to resign (or have been poisoned, or the like) and therefore the current Pope not validly elected, or the result of murderous scheming, we will create an army of Sunday Sedevacantists who think they can decide, by every Pontificate, whether it is a legitimate one or the Sea is vacant. This in itself is a worse danger than every Papal resignation, and can cause immense damage by weakening the dignity and authority of the Papacy.

If I think that I can freely decide whether the Pope is Pope (say, because I have become persuaded the last Pope was illicitly disposed of), it is fair to say I am the last one who can call himself Catholic.

My suggestion is that we leave the conspiracy fantasies where they belong: to the old cranks, the Sunday Novelists and the Vodka Vaticanists – of whom there will never be any scarcity – and start to respect the Papacy, the Popes and common sense.

Benedict “forced” to resign? Seriously, the “extraterrestrial” theory makes more sense.

We live in terrible times for a Catholic; a time in which not only the… Bishop of Rome is very bad (this has often happened in the past, as I will never tire to point out), but the news of how bad he is goes around the world in minutes. We are, therefore, subject to challenges our ancestors did not have. One of the results of this disgraceful Papacy will be to undermine the prestige of the office, and the devil will try to use this to persuade the faithful that the Church is not the Church, or the Pope is not the Pope, or both.

We, who are good and well instructed Caholics, react to such a temptation. We stay faithful to the Only Church as we bemoan Her miserable state, and we stay faithful to the… Bishop of Rome and to the Papacy he does not even want to mention, because as good Catholics we side with the Papacy even when the Pope is an utter disgrace.

Beware the temptation of escaping the drama that is unfolding under our eyes by fleeing to a fantasy world made of non-popes, of “poping wolves”, or of outlandish theories of Vatican Fiction. The reality is bad enough. It is a Cross we are called to carry. Let’s carry it denouncing every falsehood and scandal, but staying faithful to the institutions of the Church and the Papacy.

Mundabor

Bollocks By Hearsay.

The first attempt to give Francis the title of “Officially Endorsed By The Holy Ghost” had miserably failed…

 

 

 

Don’t believe the rumours. Believe the facts.

The fact is that the Pontiff Emeritus has said that he did not have the strength, both spiritual and physical, to continue his job as Pope. That’s what he said.

Now there are third-hand, unnamed rumours according to which Benedict would have had a mystical experience (actually many months long; heavy stuff, then…) at the end of which he felt inspired to live a life totally dedicated to prayer.

This already strange news – from, let us say it again, an unnamed source – is made even stranger by the other follow-up rumour, that Benedict would have recognised even more, after “witnessing the charisma” of Francis, that his stepping down was “the will of God”.

Please.

God’s will doesn’t change like the one of a sixteen year old girl, so it remains to be explained how Benedict would justify saying “my successor does all the contrary of what I do, but he has “charisma”, so it must be the will of God that he is now the Pope”. It does not make sense from a purely logical point of view, but it makes even less sense if you think Popes are elected at God’s bidding (they aren’t: the Pope is elected by those chaps in red called the Cardinals. Don’t blame God for the Cardinals’ mistakes, irreligious attitude, cowardice, corruption or outright criminal attitude).

If God positively decides who becomes Pope, than this must be a very strange God, positively imposing several dozens of appallingly secular or outright criminal people to His own flock. He would also be as fickle as the above mentioned girl, having decided in 2005 for Ratzinger against Bergoglio and now saying “on second thoughts, Joseph, that in 2005 might have been, like, kinda mistake. I’d rather have the other chap. Would you mind to step down? Please?”.

If you ask me, this is uncontrolled bollocks spread by those who want to give Francis the quality seal “officially endorsed by the Holy Ghost”.

Don’t believe the rumours.

When, and only when, Benedict says publicly that Francis is the man hand picked by the Holy Ghost to be Pope, call a doctor and don’t believe a word anymore of what he says; then in that case it would be clear the good man has clearly gone the sad way of John Paul II; gone, in fact, to the point of insulting the Holy Ghost and the Papacy at the same time. A Koran-kissing Pope, Mk II.

Heavens, can it really be that we live in such stupid times that basic Truth can be undermined by this kind of third-rate bollocks by hearsay? Can it truly be that there are people not only simple enough to think God wanted (as opposed to “allowed”) that the likes of Benedict IX and Leo X, of Liberius and John XXII, and of many others, become Pope, but even that in doing so God would not be able to let even eight years pass without radically, erm, changing His mind?

Such a hypothetical God wouldn’t be believable in a kindergarten, but it must be obviously just the ticket of the V II “revolution” crowd. If the narrative of the “hand picked by the Holy Ghost” were to swallowed by the faithful, we would have a new infallible magisterium, but endowed with a, erm, more recent and “fresher” infallibility than the original one! “Hey, Francis was the man picked by the Holy Ghost with his own hands! How can every blasphemy, heresy or stupid novelty he says not be the new will of God?”.

God is immutable. God never changes His mind, or His rules. If He did, He wouldn’t be God, because the very idea of mutation, of change, of transition is in contradiction with the idea of total, omnipotent perfection that must perforce be an essential element of God. If it is God, it does not change His mind. Whatever changes his mind, can never be God.

If anyone says or implies God “changes his mind” tell him to wash his mouth, and that he deserves to be slapped.

Don’t believe the bollocks by hearsay.

Mundabor

 

 

The Press Is Not Spinning Francis. He Is.

Look, World! No Mozzetta!

If you had any doubt about the devastating effect of Bishop Francis' senseless self-promotion at the expense of sound Catholicism and elementary truths, this one is only one of the very many articles now on the net concerning the news.

Note the usual two issues: “Francis good, Benedict bad” and “it's a beginning, but by far not enough”. You can read these narratives everywhere.

Now, someone might say “the leftist press spins the Bishop”, but I must strongly disagree.

When Francis himself does not miss any occasion to point out how different he is from his predecessor, can we really blame the press for jumping on it? Francis' and Benedict's attitude towards not only homosexuals, but even sodomites are so distant the two seem to belong to different religions. It is just plain blind to make every possible and impossible effort to try to reconcile the two. The entire planet has picked up the difference, because the difference is there.

How can any sane person expect that a Pontiff waffles the usual “who am I to judge?” Mantra without the world press picking it up? And do you really think Bishop Francis is so thick he thinks he can throw such a bomb without the explosion being heard everywhere? Come on…

Francis knew the conflagration would be huge. This is exactly why he threw the bomb. Or can anyone seriously believe this man is now systematically “misunderstood” in a way which makes him very popular with the world, and lets him appear like the good man “trying to change the Church as much as he can”?

People who don't want to be misunderstood do not insist with “off-the-cuff” comments regularly causing a pandemonium. They express themselves in public with carefully worded statements, that do not leave any space for “misunderstandings”. But this is a revolutionary… Bishop of Rome. He is interested in spreading as much confusion as he can, whilst making himself popular in the process. He says that openly, by the way, and the famous reference to the “noise” is nothing else than a further confirmation of the climate of permanent revolution he wants to create at the grassroots: in the dioceses, in the religious orders, in the universities, in the seminaries, everywhere.

I just wonder: how can a man go on doing exactly the same for four and a half months, without people believing that he does it on purpose?

Seriously? Seriously?

Does all this, then, achieve some results? Of course it does.

1. Francis is the mascot of the world.

2. The world appreciate Francis' effort, but is not satisfied. “Baby steps”, says the linked article. Tsk, tsk. Not good enough. Much more to do towards the “gays” (a term, tellingly, now used by Francis himself: first time for a Pope). Francis is good, but still not like the world; but everyone understands it's not really his fault, so he does just fine.

Maximum damage for the Church and maximum confusion for the faithful, but maximum personal advantage for the humble Bishop.

A coincidence?

Thought not…

Mundabor

 

R.I.P. “Reading Francis Through Benedict”

One must appreciate the effort made by some to offer what at the beginning appeared a reasonable key of interpretation of the new successor of Peter.

The Church is inherently conservative, and Popes tend to be even more conservative. It was, therefore, absolutely understandable one would consider the novelties of the Bishop of Rome – which, one must admit, the man did not lose a second in showing – as the quirks of an old man, possibly meant to make him popular and possibly meant to make the Church, as a whole, fashionable; quirks that would, it was reasonable to assume, not alter anything substantial in the way the Church understands Herself, with merely the addition of poverty rhetoric, and a generous dollop of Peace 'n Justice.

Soon, though, it became clear this interpretation was more and more difficult to defend: when the refusal to wear the Mozzetta or the red shoes was followed by a serious liturgical abuse on Maundy Thursday, it was clear we are in front of a man who considers himself above Canon Law; a man unable to understand that even if he is the Bishop of Rome and can therefore change some of the rules, he is nevertheless bound by an elementary sense of propriety – and by the necessity to give a good example – to be the first one who abides by them as long as they are there. The oh so humble Bishop was already resembling an Oriental satrap.

With the weeks, it became worse. It was clear to everyone the current Bishop of Rome was insistently and ostentatiously distancing himself from his predecessor. The examples are too many to be all recollected here: from the choice of transport to the refusal to spend the summer in Castel Gandolfo, from the obsessive search for wheelchairs in front of the cameras to the dismal habit of uncontrolled off-the-cuff observations the world absolutely had to be informed about, this man showed more and more clearly he wants to be seen as entirely different from Benedict, totally focused on himself, and completely detached from everything his predecessors have done. Jorge was at this point already madly in love with Francis, and the entire planet had to be informed of the fact. This alone is as Un-Benedictine as can be, and every hope Francis might still be like Benedict – when he did not lose a single occasion to show how different he is – was already appearing the preserve of pathological optimists.

The last weeks have, though, put very thick nails on the coffin of the “reading Francis through Benedict” narrative. The unspeakably arrogant refusal to even suspend such a disgraceful individual as Monsignor Ricca was followed by an even more arrogant, and even more astonishing, downplaying of sodomitical activity as some sin of the youth – as if the man had been chasing skirt in his early Twenties and before his vocation rather than being an inveterate sodomite uncaring for scandal probably until exposed, and certainly well in his Forties and whilst being a Monsignor – and by the mocking dismissal of the existence of the “gay lobby” of whose existence he himself had informed the planet.

At this point, any reading of Francis through I do not say Benedict, but even Paul VI is utterly untenable. On the contrary, this is a man so different from Benedict in absolutely everything – including intellectual and, as is now abundantly evident, moral stature – that every reading of the one through the others is as absurd as the attempt to give a Catholic interpretation of Mein Kampf.

Francis is, sees himself, and wants to be seen as in head on collision with Benedict. He lives in a completely different dimension, in which not even the concept of the most basic decency could be said to be shared with Benedict's worldview. This is the reality on the ground, and has been from the habemus Papam. We have been slow to get the message, because the message is so shocking that it takes a while to even persuade the faithful of it. But this is where we are, and the Bishop of Rome's invitation to “make noise” – when seen in conjunction with his blatant liturgical abuses before and after his accession to the throne – clearly show this man is positively encouraging a revolutionary movement from the grassroots, and countless liturgical and otherwise abuses meant to make the Church more “modern” and “relevant”; that is, meant to sell Her to the world; lock, stock, and barrel.

Of course, Francis will always be, at times, in agreement with Benedict. It's not that he is denying the Trinity, or the necessity of the Sacraments. If Benedict say that two and two is four, Francis will necessarily agree. But this is also where the similarities end, because truly, Bishop Francis could not have troubled himself more to stress how different he is from Pope Benedict; and, I must add, from all the Popes before the latter.

Seriously: if Francis can be read through Benedict, Hitler can be read through St. Thomas Aquinas.

It just doesn't work.

Mundabor

 

Rio: More Poison For The Patient

Short-term effect: Pope Benedict in the UK, 2010.

And so the gay-friendly – at least when they are his own buddies – Bishop of Rome is now in Rio, a place known all over the world for its spiritual atmosphere and culture of contemplation and asceticism. Apparently, the mission objective is supposed to be – besides the usual “youth” rhetoric – to revitalise Brazilian Catholicism.

Sandro Magister informs us not more than around two thirds of Brazilians are Catholics nowadays, with Proddies of a newer sort – those who believe in God, I am told – making massive inroads particularly in the big cities; in fact, the same source tells us in Rio the percentage of Catholics is merely 46%, thus making of them a minority compared to the population as a whole.

I have written in the past, but repeat today, that these short-term media exercises all have a short life. You'll hear a lot of people saying they are so “energised”, “inspired” or the like; but when you look at the long-term collective effect, you'll see it tends towards zero.

Pope Benedict XVI visited the UK in 2010 amongst crowds far, far exceeding the most optimistic expectations. Three years later, we have the so-called same sax marriage, and few of those who call themselves Catholic care a.. fag. Nor have his travels in Germany or the US or elsewhere left a permanent mark; nor did, in fact, his predecessor, with his huge theatrical streak, the earth-kissing and the like.

There is no reason whatever to believe the Bishop of Rome will have more success; actually, seeing the type one would be scared at the new Catholics he were to allegedly covert; but be not afraid: it won't happen.

These are media stunts; mere straw fires; the populace flocks to see the Pontiff largely because it's an “event”, something worth one's time in an age constantly looking for some form of excitement. I have actually even heard people saying a Papal visit is a “cultural” event. One doesn't need any sort of value investment to participate to such an event, nor will he take away anything durable from it.

Of course, here and there someone will be deeply impressed. Someone is always doing something. But it is very reasonable to assume serious work on the ground is far more important, and leads to far more serious conversions, than this kind of media circus.

On the contrary: the media circus tries to cure the disease administering more poison to the patience: more superficiality, more easy slogans, more entitlement mentality, more sneaking socialism: that is, more of what has caused the loss of faithful in the first place.

The real evangelisation is made with serious priests on the ground; reverent masses; proper Catholic instruction; open defence of Catholic values on the public square, and the courage to talk about the whole faith – including the unpleasant parts – rather than always hammering on the easy parts (the obsessive mantra of “joy” is the one that always amuses me most; it's like a motivational course for the kindergarten.

We are going to get an awful lot of this in the next days, including all the talk about how “energised” Brazil is. But it is just another straw fire.

Mundabor

 

SSPX: Please Let Us Not Kid Ourselves

The discussions as seen by the Pontiff Emeritus.

 

If you scour this blog for the posts of June of last here, you will find the news about the impending agreement, when it seemed that the reconciliation had been achieved and only the right moment to make a public announcement  was being waited for. Then, the initial reaction of surprise at the news that the widely anticipated reconciliation might not take place. When it became clear that the obvious informal agreement had been changed at the last minute (or misrepresented by people very near to the Pope) your humble correspondent, who doesn’t like to switch his brains off whenever a Pope is in play, dared to write that someone at the Vatican had lied, or had been duplicitorus, or had eaten his words.

When it subsequently became clear that the deal wasn’t going to happen, yours truly pointed out once again to the obvious: the Vatican had changed the cards on the table at the last minute, obviously after green informal green light for an agreement that seemed a done deal.

How the situation had probably evolved originally, I examined here.

Still, after the porcelain was broken I wrote this blog post, with the following observation:

it seems clear to me they are well aware the Holy Father himself has either eaten his word because scared of the results of the agreement, or he has wilfully lied to them when he first indicated his agreement with the SSPX’s version of the preambolo. Their answer to this is rather laconic: “We do not make names here, but if you want to talk to us be serious and stop playing  clever guys”.

As an aside, I also made some proposal to improve the “dialogue”; proposals which, as I understand, were not followed.

Bishop Fellay, though, gave Mueller a lesson or two in Catholicism anyway, among other things pointing out that in the past Mueller would have ended in the sight of the same Holy Office he now leads. I heartily agree, by the way.

Who the real responsible of the entire mess was (make no mistake: Pope Benedict) I wrote here.

In the same tone, I pointed out how the appointment of Archbishop’s DiNoia to formally lead the “dialogue” would lead no nothing, if there is no intention to ever reconcile with Traditionalism.

The news making the round in the last hours are, therefore, interesting in themselves, but not entirely new to the readers of this forum: an agreement was certainly signaled to Bishop Fellay as done, prompting the formal offer of the SSPX which was then only waiting for the formal acceptance. At that point, someone ate his word, and if memory serves Bishop Fellay received confirmation in the following months that the one who ate his word was the Pontiff himself.

At the cost of being unpopular, I repeat once again that it is inconceivable that the sudden change in the Vatican attitude was not approved by the Pontiff, who therefore is the one bearing the responsibility for it.

Still, Pope Benedict is too intelligent to think that after two or three years of discussions, the SSPX would have suddenly abandoned the fight that is the very reason of its existence. Rather more probable is that the Pontiff Emeritus thought he could divide the SSPX dangling in front of the moderate elements the carrot of a reconciliation, retracting it at the last moment to see what effect it has. As I have already written i the past, this was too clever by half. 

Where we are now, is that in the Vatican there is no interest in even pretending to be interested to a reconciliation. They prefer to reconcile with the Lutherans, and waffle about the “success” of the Reform. 

Please let us not kid ourselves: Benedict never wanted an agreement. What is wanted, is either lead the SSPX to accept V II (a scenario improbable to the point of absurdity), or try to divide them in the process. Look at whom he appointed as head of the former Holy Office, and this will show you everything there is to know.

If Pope Francis ignores the SSPX I will still consider the attitude more honest than the disingenuous, frankly unethical ping-pong and carrot dangling we have lived in the past years.

Mundabor

 

 

 

 

 

Popes In Contrast.

Rorate has these beautiful quotes from Pope Benedict. I have kept the emphases in their entirety. 

Please note Pope Benedict made all these comments far before the astonishing regress in Western civilisation achieved since March 2013 in several countries.

Pope Benedict wasn’t a lion, but at least he had the lucidity to understand he had to speak, and the intellectual depth to speak in an effective way.

The contrast is, as they say in Italy, impietoso; that is: merciless.

Mundabor.

—————————————————————————————————————————————————————————

None of us, in fact, belongs exclusively to himself or herself: one and all are therefore called to take on in their inmost depths their own public responsibility.

Marriage as an institution is thus not an undue interference of society or of authority. The external imposition of form on the most private reality of life is instead an intrinsic requirement of the covenant of conjugal love and of the depths of the human person.

Today, the various forms of the erosion of marriage, such as free unions and “trial marriage”, and even pseudo-marriages between people of the same sex, are instead an expression of anarchic freedom that are wrongly made to pass as true human liberation. This pseudo-freedom is based on a trivialization of the body, which inevitably entails the trivialization of the person. Its premise is that the human being can do to himself or herself whatever he or she likes: thus, the body becomes a secondary thing that can be manipulated, from the human point of view, and used as one likes. Licentiousness, which passes for the discovery of the body and its value, is actually a dualism that makes the body despicable, placing it, so to speak, outside the person’s authentic being and dignity.

Benedict XVI
Address at the Diocesan Convention in Rome at the Lateran Basilica
June 6, 2005

When new forms of legislation are created which relativize marriage, the renouncement of the definitive bond obtains, as it were, also a juridical seal.In this case, deciding for those who are already finding it far from easy becomes even more difficult. Then there is in addition, for the other type of couple, the relativization of the difference between the sexes.

The union of a man and a woman is being put on a par with the pairing of two people of the same sex, and tacitly confirms those fallacious theories that remove from the human person all the importance of masculinity and femininity, as though it were a question of the purely biological factor.

Such theories hold that man – that is, his intellect and his desire – would decide autonomously what he is or what he is not. In this, corporeity is scorned, with the consequence that the human being, in seeking to be emancipated from his body – from the “biological sphere” – ends by destroying himself.

If we tell ourselves that the Church ought not to interfere in such matters, we cannot but answer: are we not concerned with the human being? Do not believers, by virtue of the great culture of their faith, have the right to make a pronouncement on all this? Is it not their – our – duty to raise our voices to defend the human being, that creature who, precisely in the inseparable unity of body and spirit, is the image of God?

Benedict XVI
Christmas Address to the Roman Curia
December 22, 2006

[Human] love is the privileged path that God chose to reveal himself to man and in this love he calls human beings to communion in the Trinitarian life.

This approach enables us also to overcome a private conception of love that is so widespread today. Authentic love is transformed into a light that guides the whole of life towards its fullness, generating a society in which human beings can live. The communion of life and love which is marriage thus emerges as an authentic good for society.

Today, the need to avoid confusing marriage with other types of unions based on weak love is especially urgent. It is only the rock of total, irrevocable love between a man and a woman that can serve as the foundation on which to build a society that will become a home for all mankind.

Benedict XVI
Address to Members of the Pontifical John Paul II Institute
May 11, 2006

…there are mounting threats to the natural composition of the family based on the marriage of a man and a woman, and attempts to relativize it by giving it the same status as other radically different forms of union. All this offends and helps to destabilize the family by concealing its specific nature and its unique social role.

Benedict XVI
Address to the Diplomatic Corps
January 8, 2007

…no law made by man can override the norm written by the Creator without society becoming dramatically wounded in what constitutes its basic foundation. To forget this would mean to weaken the family, penalizing the children and rendering the future of society precarious.

Benedict XVI
Address to Participants of Congress on Natural Moral Law
February 12, 2007

Worship pleasing to God can never be a purely private matter, without consequences for our relationships with others: it demands a public witness to our faith. Evidently, this is true for all the baptized, yet it is especially incumbent upon those who, by virtue of their social or political position, must make decisions regarding fundamental values, such as respect for human life, its defence from conception to natural death, the family built upon marriage between a man and a woman, the freedom to educate one’s children and the promotion of the common good in all its forms. These values are not negotiable. Consequently, Catholic politicians and legislators, conscious of their grave responsibility before society, must feel particularly bound, on the basis of a properly formed conscience, to introduce and support laws inspired by values grounded in human nature. There is an objective connection here with the Eucharist (cf. 1 Cor 11:27-29).

Benedict XVI
Sacramentum Caritatis

[Reposted; original post: 2008]

Philistines And Renaissance Princes

For the entire afternoon, Francis did not leave his room at [Domus] Sanctae Marthae and simply told his associates: “I am not a Renaissance Prince who listens to music instead of working.”

One must truly wonder at the kind of people walking along the corridors of the Vatican.

The statement above was – Rorate reports – initially fed to a relevant Internet site, and only after more than little surprise was expressed at the alleged Pontiff’s words it was taken away and substituted for a more neutral comment about the Pope’s general lifestyle and preferences, and the fact he was so busy.

Concerning the words himself, either the Pope is their author, or he is not. If he is, we are clearly in front of a philistine of the most worrying sort, and one taking a very cheap shot at Pope Benedict to boot. If he hasn’t, he should stop having people near him putting words in his mouth that he has not said. To send out an official denial that he has said the words would also be useful.

Others will comment about the empty chair, and the general duties of a Head of State who is also the Successor of Peter. I would, in this blog post, limit myself to remark that in all probability, those who sent out the statement, directly attributed to him, about the “Renaissance Prince” – which, between you and I, sounds so much like Pope Bergoglio it’s even scary – thought they would make him a service, and increase his popularity.

Not very smart, I know; but thinking of it, if it worked with the bus-riding Pope, the home-cooking Pope, the black-shoes-wearing Pope, the Mozzetta-hating Pope, the bishop-of-Rome Pope and the newsagent-telephoning Pope one can see how some people might think it will work with the oh-so-hard-working, down-to-earth, Beethoven-shunning, “no time for luxuries”, “one-of-us” Pope.

In a way, it makes sense. Most people’s concept of musical achievement stops at the likes of Lady Gaga, and if one is so thick that he thinks riding the bus makes for a better Pope he might well think a Pope who fails to show up at a Beethoven concert is very much in tune with “the people”.

Alas, this time it has backfired. Apparently, to shun the Mozzetta is good, but to shun Beethoven is bad; to disparage pomp is good, but to disparage a classical music concert is bad; the Pope is praised when he breaks liturgical rules, but he is criticised when he breaks rules of etiquette.

Now, if you are one of the simpler kind you may well believe that the Pope did have urgent work to do, like the all-busy CEO of a troubled multinational company running from one emergency to the next; but I truly hope few of my readers think like this. What I think most of them will believe is that the Pontiff just doesn’t have much in common with Beethoven, considers beauty a kind of luxury, doesn’t really care much for rules and when he has no fancy to show up at a concert he just avoids it; not out of wilful discourtesy, mind, but of a semi-socialist, philistine mentality according to which a classical music concert is a pastime for the bourgeoisie, and his attendance to it more or less inappropriate whilst the favelas suffer poverty.

Remember, this is a man staging Pinocchio masses. Beauty must be a rather foreign concept to him. He doesn’t see beauty, he sees luxury and pomp.

My impression is that the time of the easy popularity is rapidly going to an end. Three months ago, most mainstream bloggers would have fawned about the Pope, the new buddy of the poor, shunning the luxury of a Beethoven concert because he is so far away from all these unnecessary frills, and so hard working for peace ‘n justice; now that people start to think clearly, all the limits of this quest for popular gestures – certainly fed by a lack of cultural depth – start to show up, and it hurts.

If you ask me, this Pope must still learn his job, in the sense that he seems not to have grasped – another sign of mediocre intelligence, or humble arrogance – what the job entails. On the contrary, he seems to think that he can behave as he pleases, rules aren’t so important, people fuss too much about immaterial things, and provided he is concerned for the poor he will be fine.

I am afraid he will learn the lesson the hard way.

Mundabor.

Ars Orandi, The Popes, And The Pious Life.

Stellar blog post from David Werling on Ars Orandi about Pretty Pictures and Pious Pelagians.

Besides examining the attitude of the last two Popes concerning the new trendy word, Pelagian – a word used very appropriately by Pope Benedict, whilst Pope Francis gives the idea of simply repeating words he has heard or read somewhere -, this excellent article touches an extremely valid point: the V II “spontaneous”, vague, fluffy, tofu spirituality (yes, the one lived and promoted by Pope Francis) puts upside down the very concept of living and practicing the Catholic Faith.

There are other themes that lead one to a rather worrying reflection (like the separation between the love for the “pretty pictures” from the love from the Truth they represent and should inflame one for; or the brutal, but so true statement of the one who would never allow the Pontiff to teach religion to his children; a very sad fact whose reality is in front of our eyes every day).

Still, what impressed me most is this convincing portrayal of modern Catholicism, in which devout Catholics are considered wrong for being thorough, for taking Catholicism seriously, and for counting their rosaries.

I will not say more, because I could not make justice to the author. You can do much worse than invest the time to follow the link.

Enjoy.

Mundabor

Beati Simplicissimi

Not very shy also in the writing of encyclical letters: Pope Pius XII, Pastor Angelicus.

 

I had to smile when I read on Rorate that Pope Francis is asking the Pontiff Emeritus to … complete the encyclical letter on Faith. I could almost hear the Pontiff says to the Emeritus, in tears, “aiutami, Benedetto!” after comparing the existing text with his own additions…

Don’t take me seriously, of course. It is normal for encyclical letters to be either written or co-written with expert theologians (when they are expert, or rather orthodox), and even a smart Pope like Pius XI asked his very own Cardinal Pacelli to write Mit Brennender Sorge. Nothing wrong or unusual per se. 

Still, I had to smile…

Also interesting is the other news the Pope is working at an encyclical letter on (you guessed it) poverty, hopefully and allegedly intended in the proper way. Beati pauperes is clearly being hinted as a possible name for this effort.

We shall see, but I don’t think I’ll need to read any period of this twice, or will emerge from the reading tremendously enriched.

No great risk of controversy, either. Expect rather grilled tofu on soya sauce. I do not doubt the, ahem, simplest Catholics will be delighted, and the tofu blogosphere will be utterly, utterly delighted.

We shall see, and read. I do not doubt which of the two encyclicals will make the better reading.

Mundabor