Flamboyant Corruption – “Now the Vatican is once again paralysed by scandals, but this time round, correspondents working for secular and Catholic outlets are trying to protect Francis, who faces more serious questions about his personal conduct than any pope in living memory.” The scandals haunting Pope Francis: Scheming cardinals are sharpening their knives (Unherd)
Signs of Grace – “When should Catholics get confirmed? We can look to history for an interesting take on the question.” Restoring the Order of the Sacraments (Catholic Answers)
Behind the Scenes – “Maier’s love for the Church comes through in this book and is why others who love the Church will want to read it.” A Review of True Confessions: Voices of Faith from a Life in the Church, by Francis X. Maier (The Public Discourse)
Selling Bibles in China – “A court in China’s Inner Mongolia province sentenced a Protestant Christian to five years imprisonment for alleged illegal sales of Bibles on behalf of a house Church not affiliated with a state-run body, says a report.” Chinese Christian jailed for distributing Bibles ‘illegally’ (Union of Catholic Asian News)
Revelation, Faith, and Tradition – “Is tradition an organically and homogeneously developing process or is the living tradition practically identical with the voice of the Church, the living consciousness of the present-day Church?” Early Ratzinger on Revelation, Faith, and Tradition (Homiletic and Pastoral Review)
Women Leaving Church – “What does it mean that many more young women than young men are leaving American churches?” The Gender Gap in Religion (The American Conservative)
Religious and Public Schools – “Is it any wonder Americans no longer share a hope for the future and a sense of the common good?” Study: Religious School Kids Are Way More Tolerant And Informed Than Public Schoolers (The Federalist)
Scripture and Creation – “The Center for Integral Ecology recently hosted an evening colloquium entitled “Embracing Creation: A Celebration of the Legacy of Pope Benedict XVI” on the campus of Benedictine College” Like Aristotle, Like Augustine, Like Aquinas: 10 Quotes Celebrating Benedict XVI (Benedictine College – Media & Culture)
AI Not Going Away – “Sorenson said he’ll be working to revise the AI experiment this week — likely dropping the priest character altogether — but that he believes AI can have a place in teaching the Catholic faith.” ‘I just have to take my lumps’ (The Pillar)
Campus Controversy – “Yes, Notre Dame is dead; but only insofar as her image is herself. That is, she has been killed in the eyes of the large swaths of American Catholics who have populated her quads since her founding in 1842.” A Requiem for Notre Dame (The Irish Rover)
Just War Theory – “[P]erhaps the most consequential part of Dignitas Infinita was its section dedicated to Just War Theory, which at first glance may not seem substantially new, but upon careful review appears to take aim at the doctrine of Just War in concerning ways.” Dignitas Infinita Betrays Catholic Just War Doctrine (Providence)
Feminism Failed – “We were taught to prioritise our careers over marriage – and now we are paying for it … “Feminism has left middle-aged women like me single, childless and depressed (The Telegraph)
Diverse and Inclusive – “A chorus line of publications, including the New York Times, Washington Post, Time, and Salon, registered alarm: House Republicans had elected a white Christian nationalist to a post just two chairs removed from the presidency.” The Myth of White Christian Nationalism (First Things)
An Odd Distance – “On Divine Mercy Sunday in 2014 (April 27th), Pope Francis canonized two of his predecessors, John XXIII and John Paul II. Ten years later, has the Holy Father turned to John Paul in his time of need?” Dignitas Infinita: John Paul Returns (The Catholic Thing)
Dynamic Commerce in China – “Crucially absent from Chinese thought was an appreciation of economic competition’s role in driving growth. That had to await China’s nineteenth-century clash with Western powers wanting easier entry into the Chinese economy.” Market Liberalism, Chinese-Style (Law & Liberty)
Eras Tour – “Women deserve better stories than Taylor Swift’s songs. Our daughters deserve better role models than the singer. It’s time to grow up.” Taylor Swift Does Not Belong in Your Christian Era (Crisis Magazine)
Ready, Synod, Prophecy – “Pope Francis said the most important aspect of the ongoing synod is its process of synodality and not the topics discussed during the synod.” Pope asks lay Catholics to prepare for synod’s ‘prophetic’ stage (USCCB)
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Pope asks lay Catholics to prepare for synod’s ‘prophetic’ stage
See entry for Boiling a Frog, How to.
Rich,
Where can I read this?
Never mind! I found it. This too from we know who: “At the origin of wars are often missed or rejected embraces, which are followed by prejudice, misunderstanding, suspicion, to the point of seeing the other as an enemy,” he said. “All this is unfortunately before our eyes these days in too many parts of the world.”
Francis’ prescription for peace: A papal year dedicated to Embrace. Tucho can kick it off by writing an updated version of The Wholey Book. Tucho’s selfie, embracing a globe, could be pictured on the cover. Francis provides the Imprimatur. No problem with the Index of Forbidden since it does not exist.
Who knew that the 1960s hippies were right all along about ushering in a permanent path to world peace? The problem remains though. After all the hugging who’s going to do the work? And when human resentment starts to rise again ten seconds after the last hug, how will resentments be adjudicated? And how will resentments about unjust adjudications be adjudicated? And how will the human propensity that conceives of evil in the world as a social management problem to be managed out of existence by the designated elites deal with their failures to recreate a human nature that cannot be reformed by wishful thinking. And how will the human propensity to identify evil as exclusive to those presumed to be of a different sort of human being then one’s self and others like one’s self be rectified so evil can then be dealt with truthfully? So many questions that hippies who never grow up never ask.
@ Scripture and Creation
“God created the world in order to enter into a history of love with mankind.” Ratzinger, The Divine Project, 53″. A question of whether God intently created Man with the inevitability of his fall from grace so as to demonstrate the greatness of his merciful love. Rather, as omniscient, was it with knowledge of his fall rather than intentionally creating him with the inevitability of falling from grace?
Some among the greats were of the opinion that God purposely created Man with that tragic flaw that he might exhibit the greatness of his love. That would appear to ascribe a flaw in God’s infinite good. Although, who can rationally describe the intricacies of that infinite good? Did he not, for example, harden Pharaoh’s heart when dealing with Moses so as to fulfill his strategy to save Mankind through the liberation of Israel? Did he not inspire Moses to contend with him to relent when he intended to destroy the Jews for worship of the golden calf? Was Moses divine like charity in refusing God’s offer to make of him a greater nation, that God might spare the Jews a parody of God’s own revelation in Christ?
There’s much to support the thesis that God engineered creation to suit his intentions, whereas there’s also reason to hold that God’s infinite goodness is manifest in his prescient knowledge of all things. That the creation was with the intent of perfect good both in nature and Man, that he created all with that good intent despite knowledge that we would freely reject him against his will and intent in the Garden of Eden, and that he would restore that potential good in us in the Garden of Gethsemane.
I had hoped CWR would suggest The Catholic Thing’s Fr. D’Souza’s article on Dignitas Infinita and JPII. It shocked to learn the miracle requirement was waived for John XXIII.
I remember well the day chosen for JPII’s and John XXIII’s canonization. It was a weekday and I attended Mass to honor JPII. I didn’t know that the same day was to honor John XXIII’s declared canonization also, but I learned soon. At the NO Mass, in the sanctuary, two massively framed portrait-photos shocked me into bewildered anxiety. How were these two popes in any way similar except for each having been pope? The Catholic Thing article reinforces my notion of their dissimilarity.
Further, I did not understand the final few sentences of Fr. D’Souza’s article. Is he suggesting Tucho and Francis could seek JPII’s assistance in parting the waters of the Red Sea? Is he suggesting Tucho and Francis ask the Lord to bridge the chasm between Lazarus and the rich man? Haven’t Tucho, Francis, and their teaching already almost fully crossed the Rubicon?
Is Fr. D’Souza warning us to be forearmed in how Tucho and Francis may play St. JPII to perversion? What gives?
The canonization of Pope Paul VI was equally problematic, and maybe even more so. He was canonized on the basis of only one miracle instead of the customary two. But was that even a miracle? A woman who was told she may have a child with a problem prayed to Pope Paul VI, so she reports, and she delivered a healthy baby. That has happened hundreds of times. It is hardly grounds for a declaration of a miracle. The conclusive medical evidence is just not there. So why the canonization? Pope Francis was about to issue Traditiones Custodes, a Moto Proprio that makes claims that are false. He was bucking against St.ope Pius V who issued Quo Primum; St. Pope John Paul II who promoted the Latin Mass; and Pope Benedict who issued Sumorrum Pontificum. I believe Francis felt he needed saint support, and so he canonized Pope Paul VI who signed off, reluctantly, on the Novus Ordo. Francis then claimed the Novus Ordo is the Mass of Vatican II. It is not. It goes against nearly every directive the Council Fathers issued in Sacrosanctum Concilium. His Traditiones Custodes has divided the Church as much as anything ever written.
And the notion that Paul VI enjoyed a “local cult” doesn’t even pass the straight face test.
Although a weak man, he did suffer enormously for standing firm on Humanae Vitae. He knew full well he was a man hated by millions. Not an easy way to live. And there were those who admired him for this.
Edward,
I absolutely agree. Also, although belatedly, Paul VI did question Bugnini’s NO…[OTOH, that is not a miracle, is it?]
Error correction: The Mass of canonization was DIVINE MERCY SUNDAY. Canonizing both men on the feast JPII promulgated effectively decreased the just honor which God and JPII deserve. It effectively grants mercy to John XXIII.
Error correction: The Mass of canonization was DIVINE MERCY SUNDAY. Canonizing both men on the feast JPII promulgated effectively decreased the honor which God and JPII rightly deserve. At the same time, mercy was granted to John XXIII. In essence, JPII acted as a corrective or a counterballast to any debatable directions in which John XXIII led the church.
Re: Flamboyant Corruption
The facts assembled here are far beyond scandalous. They are utterly unthinkable.
I challenge you perennial popesplainers here at CWR to read this litany of hideous atrocities and pretzel them into some kind of reasonable justification.
Bergoglio is a monster. He does not serve the Holy Spirit, but is an incarnation of the unholy ratfaced one.
I don’t think it is helpful to characterize the pope as a monster in order to critique his teachings, which a believe are grounded in a modernist understanding of reality and not the correct biblical understanding, which all other modern popes grounded their teachings. He is not responsible for the fact that a good deal of modernist teachings have entered the Church since the so-called 18th century French Enlightenment. Many in the Church do not take seriously the doctrine of original sin, despite the evidence of its consequences all around us.
Did you read the article, Russell?
Anyone who would commit the offenses listed there is, by definition, a “monster.”
I don’t couch my language based on what is or is not “helpful.” That’s what politicians, including bishops, usually do.
I, by contrast, do my best to adhere to the truth in simple, direct, easily understood terms.
And I repeat:
Bergoglio is a monster.
Stick to your guns, brineyman. Any bishop (of Rome, in this case) who gives succor in his diocese to a priest who sexually abused religious sisters is a monster himself.
I don’t take a back seat to anyone in believing Francis is the worst pope in history in large part because he condemns that for which his knowledge is juvenile at best, the Catholic religion. That he rose to the top might be the greatest scandal in the history of the Church. But none of us knows the level of malice in his intentions. There might be a lot in a man so contemptuous of the past and willing to believe that truth changes. The post VII theological culture in moral theology was dominated by a consequentialist “rethinking” of proscriptions against evil that sought benign interpretations, a practice that became so widespread anyone who failed to search for guilt free living was seen as cruel and unpastoral. Even God came to be disassociated as the source of morality itself. The process was so pervasive, it was possible to become this stupid and remain in the clergy in good standing. Ignorance is the main problem of Francis and other foolish prelates. We will not win converts to the, “we have a bad Pope and how do we proceed as a Church for now cause” if we call a sad and grotesquely foolhardy man a monster. In war, we must be strategic.
I agree here also. But I totally relate to Briney’s frustration, rebellious zeal, and tongue.
I doubt we can put a lack of converts onto Briney’s words. Frankly, I believe we can put that squarely onto a different man.
On the Flamboyant Corruption:
This is the “Magisterium-of-the-Pontiff-Francis-McCarrick-cult.”
It’s the wake of destruction left by the pederast-apostates of “the-spirit-that-rules-the-spirit-of-vadigun-2.”
It was necessary therefore to orchestrate the idolatry of Pachamama in 2019, to “groom” the church into submitting to the sanctification of the pederasts’ “preferential-option-for-sodomy-and-sex-liberation-LBGTQ,” because, as we all understand, both “pro” and “con” alike, the “movement “ cannot dismantle Commandment #6, until it first shows its contempt for Commandment #1.
It’s just the process…
“Feminism has left middle-aged women like me single, childless and depressed ”
********
And I think it’s left many men in a similar state. Unlike women though, men don’t have a fertility clock ticking in the same way & they still can have hopes of a family later in life.
@ An Odd Distance
Fr de Souza deftly presents the well visited chasm between His Holiness and John Paul II as if it were news, the art of the writer. Nevertheless he identifies the anomaly of his purchasing a vague quote by John Paul on infinity and human dignity to bolster the spiraling Dignitatis Infinita.
What de Souza omits is Francis’ rigid antiJohnPaulism initially evident in the corruption of the Pontifical John Paul II Institute on Marriage and the Family. John Paul’s Veritatis splendor the enlightening Christ centered gift to the Church the opposite, even inimical to His Holiness’ Cardinal Fernández’ effort Amoris Laetitia, Fernández providing the thesis His Holiness the spin.
Distance in this is yes, odd, and certainly purposeful. The difference between the two John Paul and Francis is like day and night. Night has fallen [as alluded to by Cardinal Sarah in The Day is Now Far Spent] many groping in its darkness. Although the darkness cannot extinguish the Light that is Christ.
Re #12 – Feminism failed
Yes, it has failed all of us by its promotion of contraception/abortion and its disparagement of marriage and motherhood.
@ Flamboyant Corruption
A must-read on why the numbers of new Francis-cardinals will likely not produced a Francis II in the next conclave. The two-thirds threshold no longer reachable.
But, also, nothing here about the possibility (?) of a unilateral motu proprio altering the rules of election as in case of a deadlock, added to the unprecedented sixty motu proprios already logged by this pontificate.
@ Just War Theory
Dignitas Infinita is found to erode just-war doctrine. Part of the explanation, I propose, is that release of the document was stalled in order to cobble some abbreviated and breezy stuff onto its original focus. Airbrush pronouncements on warfare and immigration at the expense of articulate prudential judgment—which used to be central to Catholic Social Teaching.
The same history blurs the Second Vatican Council’s decree on relations with non-Christian religions. Early drafts focused on the continuity between Judaism (the Old Testament) and Christianity (the New Testament), but then came the undigested apples-and-oranges complexities posed by Islam and Buddhism (and Pachamama!).
How to better engage the world (aggiornamento) in a way fully consistent with Revelation (ressourcement)—and without amateur ambiguity? And, without burying the groundwork developed by Popes John Paul II and Benedict XVI?
But now, if everything is brought to the table all at once, then surely synodal proceduralism will figure things out and cap the pyramid! Oops, the “inverted pyramid.”