Chicago, Ill., Mar 4, 2020 / 02:45 pm (CNA).- Gazing at the Chicago skyline from his upper-floor hotel room, Brian Carroll is excited to be visiting the Windy City.
“I figured while the sun is shining, I might as well get out and see something,” the 70-year-old Californian told CNA, with the enthusiasm of a seasoned traveler eager to explore.
This is Brian Carroll’s first trip to Chicago, he said, other than changing planes at O’Hare. But he’s not here for tourism.
Carroll has the clear diction and the good nature of a teacher, which should come as no surprise— Carroll spent his 43-year career teaching in one capacity or another, before retiring last year.
Now, he’s running to become President of the United States.
Carroll, an evangelical Christian, is the presidential nominee of the American Solidarity Party, a small-but-growing political party based largely on Catholic social teaching.
Carroll has come to Chicago to meet, for the very first time, his running mate, Amar Patel— a high school teacher from the city’s suburbs.
He’ll also take part in a March 4 debate for third-party presidential candidates.
“There’s no way I can look ahead and see what God is doing. I feel very strongly that God told me to run, but he didn’t tell me what was going to happen,” Carroll told CNA.
Birth of a party
Though the American Solidarity Party is not explicitly religious, its platform rests on the principles of Catholic social teaching: solidarity, subsidiarity, and distributism.
The party began in 2011 as the Christian Democracy Party USA, and Mike Maturen, a Catholic, ran for president on the party ticket in the 2016 election.
Abortion is a key issue for members of the ASP. The party platform calls for an end to legal protection for abortion, and it supports social services for mothers in need. But the party says that pro-life convictions must also include opposition to euthanasia, assisted suicide, embryonic stem cell research and the death penalty.
The party’s beliefs on the definition of marriage and religious liberty could be considered conservative, while its views on the environment, health care and immigration could be considered liberal.
Distributism, the favored economic theory for the party platform, is a model championed by notable Catholics such as G.K. Chesterton and Hillair Belloc.
The party describes distributism as “an economic system which focuses on creating a society of wide-spread ownership…rather than having the effect of degrading the human person as a cog in the machine.”
“The core of distributism is to bring the economic engine closer to home,” then-presidential candidate Mike Maturen explained to CNA in 2016.
“Rather than having a huge portion of our economy wrapped up in the hands and control of a few major corporations, we believe that it is the small business – the mom and pop shops – that drive the economy best. We would propose to rewrite regulations to favor the small businesses and family farms, rather than the major corporations that also just so happen to be the major donors to our government officials. Regulations, taxes, etc all need to be re-thought and revamped.”
Carroll had never heard the word “distributism” until he joined the ASP, but as soon as he read the description, it clicked for him.
“It shares with scripture the importance of watching out for our brothers, and not letting any class of people become exploitative of others,” Carroll explained.
Amar Patel, the ASP’s 2020 vice presidential candidate, is also chair of the party. Patel said the ASP is working to break the narrative that if you’re pro-life, you have to be a Republican, and if you want to love for the poor, you have to be a Democrat.
Patel became involved in the pro-life movement after converting to Catholicism in 1993. His opposition to abortion was— and still is— a guiding principle for his politics, and for years, he said he would vote for whichever candidate he considered pro-life, which would almost invariably be the Republican candidate.
Over time, as Patel grew in faith, and became involved with the Knights of Columbus, he says he started to become disillusioned with Republican policies and attitudes.
For example, he says, the United States was constantly at war during the George W. Bush years, and looking at the Catholic Church’s just war theory, the wars in the Middle East, waged primarily in retaliation for the September 11th attacks, did not seem to Patel to be just.
Through a Facebook page called Catholic Geeks, and through conversations with fellow Catholics, Patel started to realize that he loved plumbing the depths of Catholic social teaching.
“One of the rules of the group was that everything you posted had to be from the Catechism, or encyclicals, or the Church Fathers, and just reading some of the things that people found about the richness of our faith, it made me [think]: neither party is addressing this,” Patel told CNA.
“Neither one comes close. They both just touch tips of icebergs…but the totality of the faith I felt was missing. And I felt like that should be an integral part of my life in the public square.”
“The long game for Christians in the public square is a big loss if more people don’t get out there and proclaim the Gospel message,” he said.
Faith journey
For presidential hopeful Carroll, getting out of his native California and exploring new places is nothing new. He’s lived abroad for more than a decade, altogether, most of that time spent in Colombia.
Carroll grew up in Los Angeles, and moved to California’s Central Valley in the late 1970s. His family was very active in the Methodist Church during his formative years.
His family’s commitment to education made an impression on Carroll. His aunt was the international president of Laubach Literacy, a program that began in the 1930s to address adult illiteracy. Carroll’s brother got involved in teaching English to immigrants.
Carroll’s family also left him with a sense of the struggles migrants and refugees face. For a time during his childhood, his parents used their spare bedroom to sponsor two Vietnamese refugees from Saigon.
“From a very young age we were involved in refugee resettlement, meeting the needs of immigrants, both to learn English and other training, so that was my upbringing,” he told CNA.
He remembers that the Gospel has long had a hold on his mind, and his imagation. When he was 10 or 12, a preacher mentioned a quote from the biography of Dietrich Bonhoeffer, a German Protestant pastor.
“If you were put on trial for being a Christian, would there be enough evidence to convict you?” Carroll recalls hearing.
“And I thought: ‘Boy, if that’s the question, that would be a horrible thing to live your life as a Christian without leaving enough evidence to be convicted for it,’”
At a certain point, Carroll says, he became disillusioned with the “social gospel,” that some members of his church seemed to hold.
“We were doing lots of good things, but it just seemed to me like they were treating the Bible as a convenient mythology to hold the social organizations together,” Carroll mused.
He said he failed to gain a sense that, in his church, there was a “sufficient belief that the Bible was true.”
“And I thought: I don’t really want to base my life on a mythology. I want something that’s firm and secure.”
He said he spent some time looking for truth in other faiths. He says he read the Koran, as well as Buddhist and Taoist literature. None spoke to him.
One thing he did learn with time, though— don’t judge a religion by the way people are living it.
“Judge a religion by what the original founder said,” he concluded.
Carroll resolved to try living by the words of Christ, and to lead his family that way.
As early as 1980, Carroll and his wife became concerned that, despite some legislative efforts to the contrary, federal money was funding abortions. They wanted no part of that. So, they decided to reduce their income— by drastically increasing their tithing— to the point where they weren’t paying any income tax. At one point, they were donating as much as 30% of their income to Christian causes.
“Then God said: I don’t want your money, I want you,” Carroll recalled.
Carroll and his family got involved with Wycliffe Bible Translators, a nondenominational mission that translates the bible into indigenous languages. He and his wife went to Colombia to teach, staying for 5 years, returned to the US for two years, then went back for another four.
Wycliffe had to leave Colombia in 1995 because of the country’s civil war. At that point, the Carrolls returned to California.
Trying to decide what was next, Carroll earned a Master’s degree in fine arts and creative writing, worked at a Pentecostal school for a while, and eventually settled into another teaching job, where he taught for 11 years before retiring.
At that same time, Carroll was involved in building a new congregation in the Evangelical Free Church. That community split four years ago, over doctrinal and leadership issues, Carroll says.
A group of 30 people, including Carroll, organized a house church. With little overhead, they mainly fund and support missionaries.
A new political home
Though Carroll had voted Republican ever since 1980, primarily because of his pro-life convictions, he told CNA he eventually began to feel that the Republican party was just “leading us on”— that the candidates needed votes to pass their economic agendas, but “could not afford to give us what we really wanted.”
He says the first crack from him came in the George W. Bush era, when Republicans had control of the House and Senate. Bush was asked in 1999 if he would push for a federal personhood amendment to outlaw abortion, and the president said no. Carroll says that shook him.
Then, in 2010, California Republicans ran a pro-choice candidate, Meg Whitman, for governor.
When Donald Trump burst on the scene as a presidential candidate, Carroll says it seemed that Trump “had a habit of sucking in everyone around him and corrupting them.”
“And I don’t want to see the pro-life movement sucked into that,” Carroll said.
“I don’t want it to be Trump’s pro-life movement; I want it to be Christ’s pro-life movement.”
Like Carroll, Patel cited the rise of Donald Trump as a tipping point, which caused him to question his party allegiances.
In 2016, Carroll resigned from his church and changed his voted registration at the same time, briefly joining the Democratic party. He liked Bernie Sanders’ idea of “getting money out of politics,” so he supported him while searching for a third party.
It only took a few weeks to find the American Solidarity Party.
Caroll helped to organize the solidarity party in California, and in 2018 decided to run for Congress against Devin Nunes, a Republican who has held his seat since 2003.
He did not have much time or money to devote to the campaign, as he was still teaching full-time. Still, he garnered 1.3% of the vote— more than the Libertarian candidate in the race.
After his run for office, Carroll realized that he had gained more campaign experience than nearly anyone else in the American Solidarity Party, and that the party would likely ask him to run for president.
“I saw that coming, and had a year to pray about it,” Carroll said.
Every time he came up with a reason not to run, God seemed to provide an answer, usually through preaching that Carroll heard on the radio.
“Lord, you didn’t bring me out into the desert for me to die here,” Carroll remembers telling himself.
Faith and politics
The reasons Carroll joined the American Solidarity Party are not immediately obvious to his fellow evangelical Christians, he told CNA.
He says many of his fellow elders in the church he left behind “probably thought I was a heretic.”
For example, everybody else on the elder board felt that capital punishment was what the Bible demanded, but Carroll started to doubt that. After reading up on the subject, when capital punishment came up on the ballot in California, he decided to vote against it.
He says he has Christian friends on both the left and the right who tell him, often, why his positions are wrong.
But, he says joining the party has given him a chance to get to know many more Catholics than he had ever encountered in his life.
Recent polling conducted by EWTN News and RealClear Opinion suggests that some 52% of US Catholics are open to voting for a third party.
Some of those Catholics have made their way to the American Solidarity Party.
“99% of my Catholic friends are members of the party,” he said.
Carroll estimates that at least 80% of members of the party are Catholic, with some Orthodox Christians as well.
“It has very much changed the flavor of my Facebook friends list,” he chuckled.
Paths to victory
Neither Carroll nor Patel is sanguine about their chances of actually winning the presidency.
Though the ASP hopes to get on the ballot in Colorado, in many states ASP members are working hard just to earn the chance to be counted as write-in candidates.
In some states, such as Oregon, even achieving write-in status has been an uphill battle.
The ASP is “in the process of building a party,” Carroll explained.
He said California, New York, Ohio and Texas are increasing in activity in the party— though turnout remains small compared to major parties.
“If we get 5 people to a meeting, that’s a major rally,” he admitted, and the ASP is “not yet to the point where we’re going to be satirized in the Onion or the Babylon Bee.”
Still, the party has gained at least one high-profile member in the past few months: Charles Camosy, a leading pro-life Democrat, announcing in early February his departure from the Democratic Party in favor of the ASP.
“Who knows what’s coming this year,” Carroll said.
Both men said their presidential run is about raising the party’s national profile and getting people talking about the issues that are important to the ASP.
Even if they don’t win offices, Carroll said, their party can affect policy by influencing the national conversation or drawing attention to specific issues.
Carroll pointed to Ross Perot, who ran for president as an independent in the 1990s, while pushing for a balanced federal budget. Though Perot did not come close to winning, the major parties discussed a balanced budget for years after that, Carroll contended.
In Carroll’s mind, if enough pro-life Democrats switch to the ASP, then the Democratic Party may consider softening its position on abortion.
Also, he said, if enough Republicans who “don’t like to see kids in cages at the border,” or who support a more universalized healthcare system, switch to ASP, the Republican Party might also begin to rethink their positions.
“My personal goal is for everyone, whether they love us, they hate us, or are completely indifferent and think we’re a joke, at least will have heard of us by November 3, and that the people who want to vote their conscience have at least that opportunity,” Patel said.
He said he suspects that many Christians and Catholics end up voting for a candidate who they believe will defend one specific aspect of Christian morality, rather than looking for “ideal candidates who will actually defend the Christian message in total.”
“They can actually put in ‘Brian Carroll’ if they want a write-in vote that is significant, is meaningful, and counts specifically FOR something, as opposed to against something, which I think a lot of people are ending up doing.”
Patel said he hears a lot about “wasted votes” when it comes to third parties. But in states where a Republican or Democratic victory is all but assured, such as California, even if millions of voters switched to a third party, it would be unlikely to change the outcome, he said.
If that happened, however, the “entire face of American politics would have changed,” because people would be talking about the third-party candidate who garnered millions of votes.
“If you’re strongly pro-life and you vote for Trump in a state he’s going to lose, THAT’S a throwaway vote, because not everyone who votes for Trump is pro-life,” Patel argued.
“But if you change your pro-life vote to Brian Carroll, that will be a specifically pro-life vote that will be counted as such,” he added.
[…]
Having matriculation from the Mr McCarrick school of pink collegiate, His Eminence, McE is the last one to speak about creating an atmosphere of polarization…
Nothing says “PLEASE UNDERSTAND WE ARE NOT TO BE TAKEN SERIOUSLY” any better than having a panel discussion on “civil discourse” involving His Eminence Cardinal McElroy, a man who asserts that he is a Christian Shepherd, and denounces all Christians who accept the teaching of Jesus and his apostles as tantamount to being “deplorables,” simply motivated by what McElroy declares to be nothing other than “animus.”
So if anyone fails to conform to the sexual revolution ideology held by His Eminence Cardinal McElroy and His Holiness Pontiff Francis, and dares instead choose to obey the Son of God, it is because such people are motivated not by devotion to Our Lord and The Truth and the well-being and salvation of others, including their own family and friends, but are simply “haters” (to quote their mutual spokesman Rev. Martin) and “backwardists” and “children” and “stupid” (to conjure just a few labels employed by the Pontiff Francis).
As to taking sides in matters where some “new-office-holding-members” of the CHURCH DIVERGE from “the mind of Christ,” a quote from one of the Pontiff’s earlier predecessors comes to mind:
“Whether it is right for us to obey men rather than obey God, you be the judge.”
Interesting “weather” we’re having, isn’t it?
It’s REMARKABLE that the very men who spent the last 10 years showing their contempt for those who would remain “united” in Christ, and reject the alternative on offered to “unite around them instead,” are now looking to the near future, and are suddenly concerned about “unity.”
What could possibly motivate such a course change? Are they looking ahead and worried they’ll be out-voted on something coming up soon?
It’s a pity that, not only do the above men fail to appreciate the divine word, but they even fail to voted appreciation for mere irony.
But Eminence McElroy does have the consolation that some of his audience reading Harvard Magazine this month will esteem him for “distancing himself” from Christ.
More dialogue? How about just stop persecuting us for wanting the Traditional Latin Mass, and leave us the hell alone? Would that work for you guys?
Tim, amen brother!
Very gutsy (or not?) to place Bishop Barron and Cardinal McElroy at the same table–actually two parallel and different universes, like the collision between matter and antimatter. And what do we get from this encounter? The ideological harmony of “dialogue”!
Good so far as it goes, but the missing ingredient, even more than mutual respect, is fidelity.
Barron is too bland and McElroy is too much of a company man. For both to suggest that what divides the Church today is only “ideological differences” seems an ideological attempt at some sort of middle ground.
So, yes to “civility,” and “dialogue” and “love” . . . but as the realist Fr. Werenfried van Straaten said, in reference to the mid-20th-century Vatican, and of such a dance step during the geopolitical Cold War: “No peace without justice, and (!) no justice without truth.”
Was it the clericalist balm of “fraternal collegiality” that enabled the spreading and unchecked Sexual Abuse Scandal?
More dialogue? How could there be more dialogue when, in fact, at least 70% of those who claim a Catholic identity don’t believe in Catholicism?
What about more catechesis? Accurate catechesis by faithful accurate catechists. If an exchange is required during that process well and good. What are we to “dialogue” about otherwise? Premarital intimacy? Divorce? Same-sex attraction? Abortion? Beyond accurate catechesis those issues are proper to the Sacrament of Reconciliation, to spiritual direction, or simply an exchange and counsel between a parishioner and their parish priest.
What actually requires dialogue? The reality of the Incarnation? The Divinity of Christ? The nature of the Most Holy Trinity? The Immaculate Conception? The Assumption? I’m unfamiliar with too many individuals, ordained or otherwise, who can plumet these Mysteries beyond what we have from the perennial Magisterium and the reflections of the saints.
Or shall we dialogue regarding the proper role of the papacy, the episcopate and the clergy class in their role to be evangelists, upholding the perennial Magisterium? Or are they to be the primary agents of the deconstruction of Roman Catholicism as they appear to regard themselves? At least the ones not hiding under their desks.
Why not just do your jobs — ecclesiastics and academic “theologians” — and otherwise be still? No one requires your sophomoric speculations. Just be and model utter fidelity to our Lord and Master Jesus Christ. We don’t require too much beyond utter fidelity, total conviction and genuine piety.
Very good, James. The only element missing is virtue—authentic virtue. Most dialogue would benefit by guardrails (also provided by the Magisterium) based on good and evil, virtue and vice, and how to imitate Christ. If Christian life were still the pursuit of holiness instead of the quest for affirmation and self-expression, the dialogue would open a world of beauty to the confused masses.
Accurate comprehensive catechesis inherently addresses the abandonment of vices and the acquisition of the virtues. The content of catechesis not directly bearing upon moral behavior in light of the Decalogue and the Beatitudes is provided to support the individual — the child, the adolescent, the adult — in conversion — in adopting a Roman Catholic perspective on human existence and its purpose. Catechesis is evangelization, it is the call to conversion and provides the rationale for such a life stance.
Both Bishop Barron and Cardinal McElroy, though distant on some mutual issues, have much in common insofar as intelligence and repartee. Fireworks are unexpected. Endless discussion on options is. Synodality in its ordinary table talk form is always the choice to end conflict and achieve unity when the players, at least these two know well east is east and west is west and the twain shall never meet. Not until the majority of the Church agrees on one baptism and one holy Catholic doctrine.
For that to occur at this stage of mutual polarity on the key issues, disordered sexuality, marriage and family, sin and repentance, personal sanctification v secularization there will be no peace since reconciliation is too incompatible. It cannot be done incrementally. There must be complete conversion. We’ve become two distinct churches within the Church united by name only. A reunification cannot be achieved by civil discussion as one bishop suggests. A strong willed pontiff firmly dedicated to Christ might succeed.
I wonder if Catholicism will fracture like Judaism, with Orthodox, Conservative and reform versions? Yes, we are polarized, but cracking the whip and issuance of ultimatums will not work. When you employ ultimatums, people might take you up on them. And not in the way you want. Do you really want for half the laity to walk?
Will, I think half the laity in the West have mentally walked away already. But that’s much more a First World issue. Elsewhere,the Church is growing and flourishing. And more orthodox.
If half of the laity are progressives, then yes, they should walk and not let the church door hit them on the way out. Then the church could get back to the business of being the church.
So we can all hold hands and sing Kumbaya.
Although I respect Bp Barron, I must demur when he says that theological differences in previous eras were carried on in a civil manner.
Let us consider the “dialogue” between Polycarp and Marcion: Marcion asked the bishop of Smyrna, “Do you recognize me?” Polycarp answered, “I recognize you as the first-born of Satan.”
Or, what is one to think of St Nicholas whacking Arius?
In eras when Christians took doctrine seriously, everybody didn’t always play nicely in the same sandbox.
Yo, Fr. Stravinskas, why so negative? Here, have a smiley button for your lapel!
And, more about Arius…Yes, the ecumenical Council of Nicaea (A.D. 325) was about faithfully evaluating and then excluding (!) his contradictory ambiguity and doctrinal reductionism, not about syndodal inclusivity and forwardism…
A clarifying moment for the 1700th anniversary of Nicaea in 2025 and, likewise today, discerning truly the ambiguity of ecclesial and moral reductionism. But, who are we to judge? Or dialogue, or monologue, or whatever?
Don’t forget St. Jerome, especially to Pelagius!
Dear Fr. Stravinskas,
I agree with Bishop Barron’s desire for greater civility in theological discourse. You are correct, though, that there are many examples in Church history of uncivil theological exchanges.
The example of St. Nicholas whacking Arius at the Council of Nicaea is probably a legend as this article explains: https://aleteia.org/2021/12/06/did-st-nicholas-punch-arius-at-the-council-of-nicea/
Professor Christian D. Washburn, however, described a memorable example of uncivil discourse from the Council of Trent in his article, “Transformative Power of Grace and Condign Merit at the Council of Trent,” published in The Thomist 79 (2015), 183–184. Here’s the incident:
“From July 15th to the 23rd [1546], the council fathers discussed the issues dealing with the second and third stages of justification in eight general congregations. As they did, the theological battle among the council fathers over justification and merit became increasingly antagonistic, as illustrated in the infamous behavior of two bishops. Already in late June, Dionisio de Zanettini, known by his nickname Grechetto, the Franciscan Bishop of Chironissa, had accused the entire Augustinian Order of being infected by the teachings of Luther. Then during a speech to the general congregation of July 17th, 1546, Tommaso Sanfelice, the Bishop of La Cava, reasserted the theory of double justification and explicitly denied the value of merit. This only confirmed some of Zanettini’s suspicions about the extent of the infection. As the council fathers were preparing to leave, Zanettini insulted Sanfelice to another bishop, muttering under his breath that ‘he is either a knave or a fool.’ This sentiment was encouraged by the Bishop of Bertinoro, who added that he had often told Sanfelice that he ‘does not understand these things at all.’ Sanfelice overheard these remarks and reproached his insulter by asking, ‘What are you saying?’ Zanettini repeated his words: ‘Yes, you are either a knave or a fool.’ Sanfelice grabbed Zanettini’s beard, shaking him so violently that he was left with a handful of hair. Zanettini, unruffled by the violence done to his person, shouted, ‘I have said that the Bishop of La Cava is either a knave or a fool, and I shall prove it!’ Sanfelice had struck a bishop, a crime punishable by excommunication, and was immediately imprisoned in a local monastery.”
A colorful account of dialogue during Trent. And I think I get your surprising meaning…
Surely we are to notice how, instead of overly-demonstrative dialogue in centuries past, the equivalent today–instead of beard-pulling and imprisonment and possible excommunication–is banishment from the Vatican. As with Cardinal Burke. Or maybe Cardinal Muller when he was still Prefect for the CDF, and who was told to fire three of his best priests for no stated reason except that “I’m the Pope, I don’t need a reason.” Some dialogue! Some civility! “Backwardists” begone! As the adage goes: “Shut up, he explained!”
As you say, “there are many examples in Church history.” Thank your for this tutorial!
Well…considering some of those involved have been at the heart of spreading division and and even depend on it. How many times has McElroy demonized groups of the faithful? And America mag. routinely does the same. And the Jesuits? And Purvis is becoming a Catholic Al Sharpton, fomenting the narrative there is “systemic racism”, including in the church. (With no data to back it up with.) She basically has carved a niche for herself as self-appointed activist in this regard and it depends on furthering such narratives no matter what. It also includes now frequently inferring people who disagree with her are racist, etc. That’s not divisive right? Good luck with that! How about discussing the basics such as heterodox vs. orthodox, the most basic source of division.
I used to enjoy listening to Gloria Purvis on EWTN radio. I don’t know what happened but whatever the reason it’s a shame. She shared some really important things about her faith.
Everything isn’t about racism and “race ” isn’t even real science. But people really can treat each other differently according to our ancestry. If my ethnic make up was more apparent I don’t think I would have been hired for a single one of the jobs I’ve held. And I wouldn’t have had an opportunity to hear the sort of really distressing comments about “race” that people say when they think it’s safe to do that.
“Race” is bogus but racism is not. However it’s becoming generational. Young people care less and less about that. Thankfully.
On the contrary, I believe people of my generation care very little about race. We expect life to be a meritocracy. But the “woke” young people of today are obsessed with race and any other difference or identity they can twist into a rationalization for their failure to cope and succeed.
I see many young people today marrying folks of other ancestries and having families. No one seems to pay much mind to it except the elderly. And I live in the Deep South. Things change.
I hear what you say about Wokeness but that’s not as much a concern here and it’s seen as a separate issue I think.
I remember once while at the University I brought my composition to my teacher. My concern was a technique. She said “Anna, when you really have something to say, you will find the way how to say it – even if crudely it will be convincing”. My composition was empty and this is why it was unconvincing. I learnt that lesson and I believe it is universal. Rephrasing it, one does not need to proclaim “we need a dialogue in the Church”. It is as stupid as my composition because it has real substance. If one is desperate to discuss the matter he does, in whatever way.
I do not recall that iconoclasts (people who destroyed the holy imaged out of wrong theology) wanted to have a dialogue with those who defended the imaged. The first camp removed the icons and burnt them, the second hid them, often ricking own lives. Both caps believed they did the right thing. It took the Ecumenical Council to settle the matter via proclaiming that it is right and proper to depict Our Lord and that such images must be venerated.
From here follows that there is no such a thing as a vague “dialogue” and even worse “mutuality with synodality” (or synodality with mutuality, whatever you prefer) but the disagreements are examined in the light of truth (revelation). For example, there is no need for the opposite camps to engage in “a dialogue” about a possibility of ordination of women because we have an answer, in the revelation. There is nothing to discuss here! It is all about determining who is right and who is wrong via applying the objective measure, of the Person of Jesus Christ and the revelation.
But this is precisely what most people do not wish to do, i.e. to surrender own view to the examination against the revealed Truth. To surrender to the truth means losing all that this world esteems so highly – own “nicety” and own significance. The revealed Truth makes everyone very small and this is unbearable.
This is why when I hear the words like “we must engage in a dialogue” I feel like throwing up. For Christ’s sake, engage if you want, stop talking about that engagement.
They are now disturbed by the problem of division in the Church that they themselves created by tinkering with the perennial Teaching of the Church as well as its Tradition? These are the ones eho ought to be looking in a mirror: Bergoglio, McElroy, the USCCB, the Jesuits, America magazine, etc. Hypocrites all.
Bingo!
In my simple terms, the cultural divide is over the definitions of evil and sin, what is Right and what is wrong hence the Church must define the definition of Kingdom Building to either conform the world to God or conform their god to the World.
The TLM was and is the “loving” dialogue. Maybe some of those attending were ideologically harsh, but so what? The obvious problem for the other side of the “dialogue” is that the TLM was quietly, and one might say lovingly, taking over. The relative youth of the participants with their large families and children have been such a stark contrast with the septuagenarian-and-up attendees at the “ordinary form” masses that the handwriting was on the wall for anyone with eyes to see. Suppression was their last, withered gasp, a death rattle, and it won’t last.
What a nice, lukewarm panel. They are inadmissible. Revelation 3:16
At least the Pope still has a bit of the old bouncer: http://popefrancisbookofinsults.blogspot.com/
A fish rots from the head…
What a boring thing to cover with a story, more bishops talking dialog. If they are talking political divisions, politics has no business being discussed, past reinforcing teachings of past 2000yrs and telling people to vote for the candidate they see as aligning closest with those teachings. And reminding them no party can be trusted to not turn on a dime for votes and power.
As for dialog with those within the Church who disagree with the same 2000yrs of constant teaching, they can dialog all they want from outside the Church until they can accept those teachings and be readmitted. Dangerous species are best studied and possibly tamed outside the home. To bring them inside has predictable results which we see in the Church today.
Dialogue. Smh.There can be no dialogue in re: chastity, sin, damnation. These things are clear and have been clear since the beginning.
The fault lies in all of us, but it is up to the bishops to teach the fullness of the faith.
They haven’t done it, not for decades.
Also, lex orandi, baby. What happened to the lex orandi? Vatican 2.
“Suppression was their last, withered gasp, a death rattle, and it won’t last.”
It all depends on the next conclave. Could be interesting!
We’ve spent 50 years in “dialogue,” which is why we are in the mess we are in: the failure to teach clearly because that’s “rigid,” so let’s fudge everything. A Francis-McElroy specialty in “discourse,” but not in practice, where it’s VERY CLEAR where they are.
Being nice is not enough to achieve unity. Being charitable is not enough to achieve unity. We can be (and hopefully are) charitable even to enemies with whom we never reconcile.
Unity comes from One Lord, One Faith, and One Baptism.
If you reject One Lord by allowing syncretism and Pachamamas and admitting other religions as equivalent means of pursuing God, you won’t have unity.
If you reject One Faith through heresy (a.k.a. cafeteria Catholicism), intercommunion, and ambiguous teaching on faith and morals, you won’t have unity.
If you soften the need for One Baptism by speaking and acting as though the unbaptized are as likely to be saved as those baptized Catholics seemingly in a state of grace, you won’t have unity.
If you have that framework, then all the liturgy wars and disagreements can be worked through rationally and charitably and with a lot of liberty in diversity. If we don’t agree on that framework, there is no means but force and tyranny.
Only Bishop Barron has the ears of the Gen Z Catholics and non-Catholic Christian youths, the rest of this motley crew of ex-hippies can sing “Kumbahyah” all they want but in 20 years it will be as if they never existed. The rallying song of my Gen Z kids and their peers is, “And They’ll Know We Are Christians by Our Love”.
One of the great quips, made about “dialogue,” came from Joseph Ratzinger, in an aside to a friend when Rev. Rahner was holding court at another interminable meeting or conference:
“More monologue about dialogue.”
Newsmax tickertape reports Bergoglio says: “US Catholic conservatives “have a suicidal attitude.”
Dialogue?
With who?
The process of constant discussion on doctrine, praying for spiritual discernment, questioning perennial doctrine, never reaching a just revelation based resolution is in effect the Protestantization of the Catholic Church. Since the Roman pontiff supports this process, Synodality, bishops and cardinals are obliged to speak the truth of the faith for sake of the faithful, and press His Holiness on what’s occurred and continues to deteriorate the faith. That the Roman pontiff has with the office of the Chair the commission to defend and uphold the faith.
The choice of words needs a little correction.
When they say “polarization,” they should say “alienation.” When something is polarized, like a magnet, there is still a basis for unity and fruitful interaction.
When they say politics, they should say defined doctrine, or sacred teachings. Politicians may compromise on debatable policies. Apostles give the truth in it’s fullness.
When they say ideology, they should say the Catholic Faith.
When they insist upon civility and dialogue, I think of the example of Jesus cleansing the Temple, or the prophet Elijah meeting with the 400 prophets of Baal.
Bishop McElroy is a divisive presence in the Church because of his philosophies that are polar opposites of Church teaching.Ms Purvis show on EWTN was taken off air because of her stances on BLM.Bshp Barron is controversial in his teachings as well.They are part of the problem.
Bergoglio has striven hard to polarise the Church for political gain and to advance his Synodal Superlodge project for NWO, unhindered by Catholics.
How?
1) Bergoglio initiated the German Synodal Disaster with his C9 left-hand man Cardinal Rainbow Marx. Bergoglio is entirely responisible for millions of Germans fleeing the Rainbow Synodal Madness.
2) Bergoglio iniated a purge on Freedom to Worship for Catholics attending TLM first in China and then shortly after, the China-Deal went world-wide with Traditionis Custodes.
Bishop Daniel Flores got it wrong – he “emphasized the need to remember what Christ would do” he should have emphasized, what did Jesus teach us to do in the Gospels? Jesus is the Teacher, we are the students, it is up to us to get it right.