Bishop Joseph Edward Strickland is the fourth bishop of the Diocese of Tyler, in east Texas. He was ordained to the priesthood for the Diocese of Dallas on June 1, 1985, then assigned to Immaculate Conception Parish in Tyler in June of 1985, and served as parochial vicar until June 1989. When the Diocese of Tyler was created in 1987, Fr. Strickland was named the first vocation director in March 1987 by Bishop Charles Herzig. In 1992, he was assigned to study canon law at Catholic University of America. He was consecrated as Bishop of Tyler on November 28, 2012.
Bishop Strickland recently spoke with CWR about the role and authority of the bishop, the challenges of being a “father and servant,” and the need for faithful men in the Church today.
CWR: You speak of and sign yourself two recent two pastoral letters as a “father and servant.” Can you explain how you see these roles in your life as a bishop and priest, and why you think it is important to use these titles?
Bishop Joseph Strickland: Your question reminds me of a writing of Saint Augustine. I can’t quote exactly where he says this, but he speaks about the work of a bishop and says to his flock, “With you, I’m a Christian; for you, I’m a bishop.” And I guess that’s what my attitude is also. Yes, I’m a brother Christian to others, a brother in the Catholic church with brothers and sisters—we’re all brothers and sisters as God’s Children.
But I guess using that title of “father and servant” reminds me that I have the responsibility of a bishop to serve as a spiritual father. And just like natural fathers, that should take on an extra layer of responsibility and of seriousness.
CWR: You write that we must “be wary of any attempts to…push for a faith that speaks of dialogue and brotherhood, while attempting to remove the fatherhood of God.” What does the fatherhood of God imply for the brotherhood of believers?
Bishop Strickland: One of the key things that I think the fatherhood of God refers to is that the truth flows from God: Father, Son, and Spirit. God is the Lord of truth. He’s the creator of all. His son Jesus says in the gospel that all power in heaven and on earth has been granted to Him by the Father in order to foster our relationship with God, our Father. So I think that hierarchical element is essential because while we need to have a brotherhood, need to be in community, need to have dialogue, we also need to look for the answers beyond us.
This looking for answers beyond us is especially relevant for those of us who believe in the Catholic Faith revealed through word and sacrament. The ultimate revelation is Jesus Christ. We’ve always got to look to God for the answers of truth. Certainly, as a community, we can help each other understand or deal with the challenging part of those answers. But I think there’s a danger, which I’ve pointed out elsewhere. Our faith needs to be vertical and horizontal. But I think with the emphasis on dialogue, you can get the idea that it’s just horizontal, we’re just talking to each other and sharing different ideas—and that’s good.
But always, ultimately, we need the vertical, we need that call to look up to God and look for the source of the answers that can help us ultimately, with our dialogue.
CWR: How do you think a proper understanding of episcopal servant-fatherhood can inform the understanding of spousal relation in marriage? In what way do you think strong fatherhood in the home and cathedra inform and support each other?
Bishop Strickland: I think they do. In regards to this, I’m reminded of the complementarity between the husband and the wife in a marriage.
For the husband and wife there is a complementarity. We tend to see everything in terms of “who has the power”. But if we look at a marriage (and, analogously, look at my work as a bishop), we have to recognize that there is more than a power struggle. Ultimately, the husband and wife should be looking to God as the font of truth and the guiding light. Certainly in a Christian marriage they look to Christ: “three to get married” is an image that Archbishop Fulton Sheen used.
Certainly, as humans, we sometimes fail at the balance and sometimes a husband is domineering rather than properly exercising his authority. The reverse can happen also, with the wife being domineering. As humans, we can get out of balance. But I think what God has ordained is a marital complementarity that always humbly bows to God’s authority and to recognizing that a husband exercises that authority in certain ways, as a wife does in certain ways.
I think the same applies to a bishop and the flock of the faithful. A bishop shouldn’t be a tyrant just saying, “You have to do it my way.” There does need to be some conversation and some mutual understanding. But the bishop is an alter Christus looking to Christ, the head of the Church and the faithful, and thus, we are all—as faithful and bishop, flock and shepherd—we are all looking to Christ for leadership.
That is humbling, a call that reminds me, “I’m not the Lord, I’m not in charge.” But neither are the people. We are all looking to our Lord Jesus Christ to be the head of the Church and to guide us. I think, analogously, the same applies to the family. Yes, the husband has a certain responsibility that’s spoken of in very clear terms in some of Saint Paul’s writings, but always with the caveat that he needs to love his wife, and ultimately his family, the way Christ loves His Church. That is a tremendously sacrificial love. I think a bishop is called to love his flock in an analogous way, ready to sacrifice out of love.
CWR: When only a handful of bishops affirm the truth strongly, do you see a temptation for bishops who speak clearly to think “I’m the only hope for the Church? It depends on me.”?
Bishop Strickland: I think in our human weakness we can begin to get an overblown idea of what it means that we are speaking out. As I’ve said, it really is my prayer that my voice and my name will fade into the background because so many bishops are all joining in speaking out. We all need to be one voice. The truth is one. So, really, I think the key is humility: to recognize I’m not Lord and Savior of anyone. I’m one shepherd who needs to shepherd with a healthy humility, recognizing that this truth that I’m trying to share isn’t my truth—it’s truth that God has revealed to us. It is a balancing act that we always have to temper our enthusiasm with the recognition that in humility we’re just pointing the way to the truth that God has revealed to us.
It’s not my truth. I don’t have a corner on it, but I believe it deeply, and because of that belief and because of the responsibility that I feel I’m willing to speak up even when it’s not the popular thing to do, even within the Church.
CWR: It seems that there are widespread misconceptions about obedience in the Church right now, especially the idea that obedience to a human superior always and everywhere trumps Tradition and Church doctrine. Is it not true that there are numerous authorities we must be obedient to, and that to obey one, which contradicts another, is not to be truly obedient?
Bishop Strickland: I certainly agree with that. Again, we go to God as the source of and author of creation. He has made all that is; He is the ultimate authority and we believe He has revealed and given us certain answers. The Church is always taught that through divine revelation (the ultimate revelation, of course, being Jesus Christ), God has revealed to us what we need to know for our salvation—not that He has revealed all the mysteries of the universe. I think it’s accurate to say we couldn’t handle all the mysteries of the universe. It’s beyond us in our human ability to comprehend! But God has revealed what we need to know for our salvation. And so we look to Him for those answers. And within this hierarchy of obedience, we have to be ultimately obedient to God.
The helpful analogy that I’ve heard used is this: if the father of a family says, “Children, you have to beat up your mother and you have to harm her—maybe not kill her, but you have to beat her up.” And this is the order those children get from their father. It’s sort of a bizarre example, maybe, but I think it gets the point across that those children can’t just say, “Well, we know it’s wrong to beat up our mother, but our authority figure—our father—has told us we must beat up our mother. So let’s get out the baseball bats.”
You know, that is not real obedience. You can go to different times in history when, typically in a military setting, and see examples of someone saying they were “just following orders” to do something immoral. You can’t use the fact that someone is ordering you as an excuse to do something which you know is wrong: you have to look beyond their authority. You have to look back to God and determine this action is wrong, and say “I can’t do it.”
All true authority flows from God. And I think that’s why it’s so significant that God’s Son, Jesus Christ, says that all authority has been granted to Him. It’s part of the mystery of the Trinity that God the Father grants the Son the authority in heaven and on earth. Jesus acknowledges that this is a grant from the Father. God hasn’t revealed exactly how that works—and I don’t think we’ll understand in this life. But even if we don’t understand exactly, we do believe the words that Christ says: “All authority in heaven and on earth has been granted to me.” And so authority always traces back to God.
CWR: With this confusion of obedience, I suppose that many men would be hesitant to enter the priesthood, afraid of losing their freedom to fully practice and teach certain aspects of the faith. I heard of one priest who said to a young man, “Don’t join us, we are in such a bad mess. Get married and aid the faith that way, but you don’t want to be caught between a rock and a hard place by becoming a priest in such uncertain times.” How do you see this problem?
Bishop Strickland: We need faithful men, both husbands and fathers of families and spiritual fathers that are ordained priests. We need both. The Church has her brokenness. She always has. There’s always been an element of the broken reality of concupiscence. Just because we’re baptized Catholics, just because we’re ordained priests, doesn’t mean sinfulness still doesn’t affect us. We certainly see that very clearly, sadly, in the world. If you look through the 2000 years of the history of the Church, you always see that. Look at the twelve apostles: one out of twelve was a betrayer. So that’s always been our reality.
My response to that young man would be: discern what God’s call is in your life. Ultimately, you’re likely to run into similar “rock and a hard place” issues both as an ordained priest and as a married man raising children. You are going to face those same questions because the world is telling us you to do wrong, whether that is a superior within the Church or a boss or a government that’s telling a father to do something contrary to what he knows to be the truth that God has revealed.
The solution is not become a priest. We need good faithful priests that are willing to tell a possible superior in the future, “I must do what I know is the truth that God has revealed to us.” That’s what the standard for a priest is because we are “other Christs”.
I’m sure you can understand what a tremendously humbling call it is to stand at an altar, as I have for 38 years, and take bread and wine and stand and use the words of Christ Himself that we believe transform that bread and wine through transubstantiation into the Body and Blood of Christ. How dare I stand and speak for Christ? But that’s the challenge and the authority that we believe a priest has, always looking to the source of that authority.
A good illustration of this is that early on the Church figured out that the Mass is celebrated validly even by a priest who is living an immoral life, committing mortal sin on a regular basis, and not bothering with Confession. This priest has the power given by Christ to take bread and wine and say, “This is My Body, this is My Blood,” but it’s devastating for that priest to do that. Even so, the Mass is validly celebrated in order that the innocent layman person who comes forward to receive Communion in a faithful way, still receives the sacraments. That’s the great irony of that picture: the priest may be in mortal peril because of his lack of fidelity, but that faithful person coming forward is truly receiving the wondrous gift of the Eucharist.
I use this as a reminder that it is not about the priest, but about Christ. And this is a good reminder to get to Confession, because even if I’m not aware of serious sin, I’m still a sinner. I need to regularly humble myself in the sacrament of Confession so that I can be as worthy as possible of what we say at Mass: “Lord, I am not worthy that you should enter under my roof.” The priest needs to say that in a heartfelt manner, as do the faithful.
(Editor’s note: This interview has been lightly edited for length and clarity.)
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A Christocentric bishop…a model for all Catholics. And I mean ALL.
Amen. And a lovely man too.
This interviewer/author is the son of the Peter Kwasniewski I mentioned in an earlier (and revised here below) mapping of the progression of thought of anti-Pope Francis activism. Bishop Strickland is also highlighted as in the stage together with the author’s father. Of latest development and significance is how the thought at their stage can turn into a rhetoric of violence calling for the killing of Pope Francis as in the case of Father Altman. This mapping survey can best help locate where thoughts and acts against Pope Francis can be understood and see where this can ultimately progress and logically lead to. Readers, symphatizers, and followers without using critical thought can also take the same path. Most of the writers here in CWR, the EWTN media empire, and other hard right Catholic media platforms in this stage that can be considered the “loyal opposition” with its use of trigger codewords to describe the positions of the Pope: ambiguity, confusion, dubious (that’s why it elicits the “dubia” of the antagonistic Cardinals). Generally these pundits still consider and respect Francis as the Pope. The second stage goes beyond this after after simply bashing the Pope then moving into outright disrespect and disloyalty. Examples of these are Bishop Strickland, Father Altman, and Peter Kwasniewski who have crossed the line by calling the Pope with more inflammatory trigger codewords: heretic (all three of them) or satanic (Altman) or illegitimate (Kwasniewski) which makes them hidden/unconscious or open “sedevacantists.” The third stage which develops from the second is the form taken by Archbishop Lefevbre, the SSPX and their symphatizers that makes them “schismatics” and outright disobedient to the Pope and the magisterium. In this stage they are no longer in full communion with and are outside the Church making them borderline if not full Protestants.
Thanks for connecting the dots for us, Deacon Dom. It is truly a vast righwing conspiracy. Perhaps if the author of this piece were to publicly denounce his father Soviet-style, he could redeem himself at least a little bit.
“It is truly a vast righwing conspiracy….”
That’s very original.
And maybe we can throw in a public show trial for appearances sake 🤔
“…can turn into a rhetoric of violence…”
“…without using critical thought…”
“…with its use of trigger codewords…”
“…more inflammatory trigger codewords…”
Rigorous. Even rigid.
Samuel Johnson, in A Dictionary of the English Language, published in 1755, wrote that the word gibberish “is probably derived from the chymical cant, and originally implied the jargon of Geber and his tribe.” The theory was that gibberish came from the name of a famous 8th century Muslim alchemist, Jābir ibn Hayyān, whose name was Latinized as Geber. Thus, gibberish was a reference to the incomprehensible technical jargon and allegorical coded language used by Jabir and other alchemists.[8][9][10][11] After 1818, editors of Johnson’s Dictionary rejected that origin theory.[12]
“Bishop Strickland is also highlighted as in the stage together with the author’s father. Of latest development and significance is how the thought at their stage can turn into a rhetoric of violence calling for the killing of Pope Francis…”
******
Whoa! I’ve met Bishop Strickland, he’s a good friend of some members of my family. I’ve attended a lecture given by the father of the author of this article. Those are really unseemly things for a Christian to be intimating about fellow believers. Talk about raising a rhetoric of violence. For shame.
For those advanced in dot-to-dot.
Renowned theologian and professor Journet posits stages of the nihilist illusion (e.g., those who believe Church doctrine evolves…): This “pseudo-Christian society avails itself of the name of God [and the Church] to justify an iniquitous order of things….[D]enouncing the hypocrisy and putting in the place of all the caricatures of God’s real nature and THE INFLEXIBLE DEMANDS OF CHRISTIANITY….” (is the task of the faithful Catholic orthodox believer). “What began as a holy revolt against injustice turns to blasphemy and ends up by the creature putting on trial the Creator from whom he has received everything, including his sense of justice.”
“It is not only social injustices and economic and political disorders which may be held as a grievance against God….[but they] find unbearable the law according to which the formation of one substance presupposes the corruption of another according to which the perfection of sensible creatures must be obtained at the cost of vulnerability and suffering,…[they] may rebel against even the being and the good of which this evil or powerlessness are the reverse side, and [they] may pass from hating created being to hating the uncreated Being from which it has sprung. [They] may feel angry that God could fashion a Universe in which evil has a place, and in which LIMITATIONS ARE EVERYWHERE TO BE FOUND; in short, [they] may be jealous of God for remaining superior to his creatures and for not having made a world equal to himself….”
“Since …romanticism unleashed in it the forces of desire, humanity [of progressive nihilistic persuasion] has let itself be seduced and driven along by IMMODERATE AMBITIONS…it wants…to possess the absolute here on earth. And it lays claim to conquer the absolute by its own strength and refuses, as once the rebellious angels did, to implore it as a gift, wishing rather to snatch it as its plunder.”
Journet concludes: “But it is impossible to annihilate created being or to remove its limitations; it will only be possible to change it into another being, still created, and invite it again to destroy itself.” (~pp. 54-55, The Meaning of Evil, Cluny from PJ Kennedy & Sons, 1963)
Good luck with all that, Sisyphus.
https://thedeaconsbench.com/what-happened-to-the-ambitious-veritatis-splendor-project-in-texas/
Why would a bishop support such a large, expensive project like this without thoroughly doing background checks on the organizers and others involved? Is this a proper approach of a spiritual father?
It would be better to look to spiritual leaders who don’t seem to trust themselves too much. If we do not restore traditional and the sacred with humility and gratitude, we will do it with pride.
The authority of the bishop only properly works within the framework of the College of Bishops of which the bishop is a member. Collegiality as this is called operates rightly only with and under the Pope, the Bishop of Rome, as the successor of Peter. Cum Petro et Sub Petro (With Peter and Under Peter). Bishop Strickland’s episcopal ministry is stained by his recurrent hostile and inappropriate attacks of the Pope to the extent of putting himself above Peter (Supra Petro) by judging Francis a heretic.
Remember Athanasius.
That’s why Bishop Strickland recently got a Vatican visitation (euphemism for investigation). He broke away from and put himself above the College of Bishops by calling the Pope a heretic.
John the Baptist of our time – and we know how that ended for John.
Thank you for this outstanding interview, which provides much food for thought.
From an article titled “For you I am a bishop, with you, I am a Christian”, by Ray Van Neste, July 19, 2010:
Excerpts:
Augustine’s sermon “On the Anniversary of His Ordination” (Sermon 340) provides a beautiful portrait of pastoral ministry. I have included here several excerpts. The importance of the oversight of souls is clear in these comments. Here is a good blend of authority and humility. The people need their pastors and the pastors need their people. Prayer is needed from both. And, pastors are first and foremost members of the church along with everyone else.
[Later (bold style added)]
“Where I’m terrified by what I am for you, I am given comfort by what I am with you. For you I am a bishop, with you, after all, I am a Christian. The first is the name of an office undertaken, the second a name of grace; that one means danger, this one salvation. Finally, as if in the open sea, I am being tossed about by the stormy activity involved in that one; but as I recall by whose blood I have been redeemed, I enter a safe harbor in the tranquil recollection of this one; and thus while toiling away at my own proper office, I take my rest in the marvelous benefit conferred on all of us in common.
Citation:
(In The Works of Saint Augustine: a Translation for the 21st Century. Translation and notes by Edmund Hill. Edited by John E. Rotelle. 292-294. Brooklyn, NY: New City Press, 1990-1997)
A man for all seasons. Bishop Strickland advises in response to the need for both fathers of families, and fathers of the faithful. In moments of crisis Christ desires we not pull back, rather that we stand and fight for justice and truth. The witness of the saints and martyrs calls out to the ordained, as well as men young and older to enter the fray, which is what the priesthood is. Either we succumb to injustice and lies like cowards, or we stand and take the incoming with moral valor.
Bishop Strickland is also on the mark when he confirms that his authority does not come from anyone on this earth, including Pope Francis. His authority to speak the truth comes from God. That understanding is vital for bishops who are Apostolic defenders of the faith. We find bishops, Athanasius Schneider, Cardinals Raymond Burke et al who speak the truth and challenge this pontiff’s policies and have survived. It’s true Francis has sacked faithful bishops with no viable cause, a reprehensible exercise of his authority as supreme pontiff. Although he can’t dismiss a multitude of faithful bishops without precipitating a schism. Repentance expressed in conclusion is an act of humility for Strickland, whether his words and actions are presumptive. It reveals his honesty in witnessing to Christ.
Either sign the oath or death. Such was Henry the Eight’s appeal for loyalty to the throne. His beloved daughter Meg, who begged him to sign was disappointed. Were there similar appeals to the bishop whose defiance made world news, marked him for Vatican interrogation, perhaps worse, persons who sincerely care for him who think it best that ‘he tone it down’? Many of us have given in to reasonable argument when threatened by the powerful. Not Bishop Strickland, who firmly believes his first loyalty is to God.
We’ve reached the watershed moment in the Church, because the lines of spiritual warfare in defense of the faith handed to us by the martyr Apostles, who submitted to death rather than repudiate Christ – have been clearly drawn. If some of us intimidated by authority, unsure about its limits have remained silent, we now have a brave knight.
“Bishop Strickland is also on the mark when he confirms that his authority does not come from anyone on this earth, including Pope Francis. His authority to speak the truth comes from God.”
This kind of reasoning betrays a kind of thinking that is of deeply Protestant and Evangelical anti-papalism that would rather have a pope-less Church for everything should be “direct to God,” or “God alone.” With Strickland as a self-appointed marshal, we are witnessing with this Stricklandian theology that is the construction of a new conception of the role of the pope, or even a new vision of the Church: a pope-less Church of Tradition. In this Church, the Roman Pontiff would no longer possess the “full, supreme and universal power” that he is “always free to exercise” (Lumen Gentium 22). He may still be called “the pope,” but he will be shackled. Tradition and its representatives like Strickland would monitor, judge, and admonish him, since the only popes who can safely wield supreme power are those who are safely in the past.
You fail to distinguish the Chair of authority instituted by Christ to defend the faith, from the person who may occupy it, and conceivably be in error in informal utterances or opinions outside his formal, infallible teaching authority. Your rationale for defending these doctrinal discrepancies is that he’s the Pope. Popes have never been free from error when they speak and act outside of ex cathedra pronouncements, as was Honorius I in his accommodation, by letter, of the patriarch of Constantinople’s Arianism. Honorius was later judged by a Church council to be in error. Willingness to believe that everything a pope utters is true and binding is itself error.
Bishop Strickland is a witness to the truth of Apostolic tradition, what was taught by Christ the Eternal Word, to the Apostles. Revelation that is eternal and which the Roman pontiff is duty bound to defend.
Pope Francis does possess full and supreme universal power. That authority may be abused. It’s not the power to wield authority that’s at stake, rather it’s the truth of Christ’s revelation that we must adhere to for our salvation.
Bishop Strickland is the very embodiment of closeness, compassion and tenderness. If only Pope Francis could see the style of God in him. As a true forwardist, he embodies Synodaling, and is never mired in stuckedness.
We read: “But the bishop is an alter Christus looking to Christ, the head of the Church and the faithful, and thus, we are all—as faithful and bishop, flock and shepherd—we are all looking to Christ for leadership.”
This “looking” thing is what synodality calls “listening” and DISCERNMENT. About, “discernment”, as if waiting for this moment, we have a clarifying meditation by Fr. Thomas Dubay, S.M.: “AUTHENTICITY: A Biblical Theology of Discernment” (Ignatius, 1997). Divided into FOUR PARTS, the book covers (I) concepts and problems, (II) possibility of discernment, (III) signs of the Holy Spirit, and (IV) verification and implications. All readable, deep, and illuminating. Not much here about self-validating synodal summary papers aggregated and synthesized by “experts.”
The SIGNS of the Holy Spirit include: General Principles (God-directed, new love, Cross-asceticism, frugality, uncluttered freedom), Doctrinal Criteria (sound doctrine, at odds with the prevailing spirit of the world [!]), and communal criteria (unity [!], and obedience freely given). And, conversion and the attainment of Truth (some curious problems, the biblical explanation, intellectual conversion [!], moral conversion [!], religious conversion [!], fullness of conversion, and then curious problems revisited).
Richly written, along the way we find such as this:
“[applicable to synodally invoking “the signs of the times”] Two people can examine exactly the same evidence and come up with opposite conclusions [….] It cannot be basically an intellectual matter[therefore at least capable of “dialogue”]. IT MUST BE LARGELY MIXED WITH THE WILL […] The arguments of those who support the popular position have been devastatingly destroyed, and the conclusions drawn from the popular position are now so well known and widely practiced (pre- and extramarital and homosexual relations) that almost no one can be unaware of them. Yet once again there is the vast silence and the tenacious clinging.”
EXHIBIT A: stacked and scripted “synodality”?
And this: “If the Church had no borders [!], she would be a dull, formless society with nothing to say to the world.”
EXHIBIT B: indiscriminate “welcoming” with a free meal ticket, or whatever?
IN THE COMING YEAR—between Synod 2023 and Synod 2024—Dubay’s book should be required reading for ALL. Possibly even welcomed (!) by at least the “willing” synodal swing-vote delegates among the 400 illuminati.
Deacon Dom you are unjust. You string together some people arbitrarily with the unproved unstated assumption that they are related by negative alikes; and you deploy that in the service of some ideas that you won’t name and that could contain various disputations including about how to name them. You also neglect the merits and demerits that move them to react; but which no-one should sideline in any meaningful discourse. What books are you reading? That way of yours is part of a set of problematic things that are misleading Pope Francis. The Pope is looking for new convictions about this and that to define what he supposes is new, worthy and worthwhile; and to try to demonstrate why they are “distinguished” or noble or useful for good.
I would suggest to him however, that the virtues he needs at the present are circumspection and restraint. When there is a true development it is not because it meets the Lerinian titles and the Newman outlines. It is because God shows it to be true. So if the Pope shoots forward (yet once again – as he has been doing) and says hey there everybody here’s a brand spanking Lerinian THIS and a whirling glitzing Newman THAT, but then later God intervenes – well, what will ensue then!
I note that the shooting forward wasn’t there in the first months of the Papacy when he was telling everyone to be calm. The two virtues I mentioned above: the practice will be difficult because he already put so much in motion and he has his heart set on some outcomes that remain hidden from right counsels.
Your approach and reasoning are amateurist. If that’s not bad enough, the fact is many people are amateurs and your amateurist way will mislead them and keep them retarded to boot. I have to suppose you want to do dialogue and parrhesia properly.
Therefore I suggest to you that you must come at them through prayer and prudence patiently embracing broad scopes. And at least be just.
Elias Galy: What I have done in this mapping survey is simply placing in a big picture where a sampling of celebrity personalities of the anti-Francis movement can best be located and understood in this spectrum and progression of thought and activism. This can also serve as a reality check of where your sentiments are as you follow, sympathize, or promote them. Are you: of loyal opposition; a sedevacantist; or a schismatic? In the internet especially in their social media platforms you can always check the veracity of what I cited here for yourself by checking on their present and past writings, talks, tweets, and actions.
Yes Deacon Dom, that is just what I said you did.
You want to repeat what I said back into your own panache instead of hearing what it tells you when I say it. How come your call your jumble up doodling a map?
What direction could I possibly want to follow from such an emblazoned assemblage of your reactions that you say are all connected.
What is irking you is that I called out what you did: you are unjust; and you won’t give on it.
FYI. An update on the map that I did not mention earlier. With the publication of his catechism Credo, Astana, Kazakhstan Auxiliary Bishop Schneider and its endorsement by Scott Hahn, these two celebrity figures and their followers can easily join in the second camp of the hidden or open sedevacantism of Strickland, Altman, and Kwasniewski. Hahn, his biblical and apologetics prowess no longer shining through this time, has lately has been moving in this direction.
Deacon Dom thank you for keeping me abreast and for staying abreast yourself!
I admit! I have an appreciation for Bishop Schneider. Are you carrying a secret temptation to admire him?
They don’t make them like they used to but when they do it’s outright a classic …. we are carried so much closer to God to praise Him.
Did someone ever say when we are drawn to the saints it’s because we see something about God in them. And that God is showing us something He wants for us. I hope there will be an endless process like this in eternity.
Maybe Hahn is just giving way a little to others – what could be wrong in that. Maybe he is very busy with work -this is great. For your information I have disagreed here and there with Hahn -par for the course; but also Hahn has a sustaining quality, very strong. I imagine he does NOT see himself on your map (and I do not mean that in any negative way).
On a more general note there remains an increasing risk of people getting mischaracterized and debate being driven and allowed to become inflated based on the mischaracterizations. Another side to scandal.
If Hahn and others keep some distance from that, it is PRUDENCE. And it is not a map Deacon Dom!
Admire Astana, Kazakhstan Auxiliary Bishop Schneider? Even as you see in him a saint, I see a sedevacantist on the borderline to be a schismatic. Schneider, Strickland, Hahn and ilks recently assembled in a match shouting to the rooftops their conspiratorial sedevacantist rants against Pope Francis. They all forget that the Church as a communion has its center on the Pope and unjustly maligning him cuts them from this communion in sedevacantism or schism. That does not bring them – or their followers like you – closer to but farther away from God.
What a stupid example about beating a woman with a baseball bat. Just shows how out of touch he is. I’d love to see the hard drive on his computer.
This Bishop seems to be both dedicated and humble, a refreshing voice of dissent. We have too many out there who are saying the right things in very nasty and abrasive ways. They have long since gone beyond the issues and have resorted to hatred and calumny. It’s so easy to put a man on a pedestal and treat him as a prophet and saint and ultimately destroying him through vanity and pride. Let’s not do this to this humble servant.j
I had the great joy of attending a parish in his diocese last weekend. It was a piece of heaven… How blessed the souls are, who have him as their shepherd.
Will Bishop Strickland soon be dismissed from his position after the Vatican investigation. He can always join Archbishop Vigano in the camp of mothballed (by Francis) bishops in their relentless campaign to smear the Pope in revenge.