“Unto us a child is born, to us a son is given; and the government will be upon his shoulder, and his name will be called ‘Prince of Dialogue.’” – The Gospel according to Francis, Bishop of Rome
From now on, it would perhaps make sense for us to refer to Pope Francis, not as the Vicar of Christ, but as the Vicar of Dialogue.
You see, the “Christ” for whom Pope Francis allegedly speaks is not the Christ described by the prophet Isaiah as “the Lord seated on a high and lofty throne, with the train of his garment filling the temple;” no, not by a long shot, his is but a diminished and distorted Christ.
This explains why the statement of Pope Francis to the Third Summit of Christian and Muslim Leaders yesterday concluded, not with a plea to follow Christ, the Prince of Peace, but with the earthbound slogan, “This is the way of peace: dialogue.”
Oh, well… that’s just Francis being Francis, the same who recounted this heartwarming tale on the flight back to Rome from Turkey just a few days earlier:
On interreligious dialogue… I had what was probably the most wonderful conversation about this with the President for Religious Affairs and his team. When the new Turkish Ambassador to the Holy See came to deliver his Letters of Credence, over a month and a half ago, I saw an exceptional man before me, a man of profound piety. The President of that office was of the same school. They said something beautiful: They said:
“Right now it seems like interreligious dialogue has come to an end. We need to take a qualitative leap, so that interreligious dialogue is not merely: ‘What do you think about this?’ ‘We….’ We need to take this qualitative leap, we need to bring about a dialogue between religious figures of different faiths”.
This is a beautiful thing: men and women who meet other men and women and share experiences. We are not just talking about theology but religious experience. And this would be a beautiful step forward, beautiful. I really enjoyed that meeting. It was excellent.
Pope St. Pius X, ora pro nobis!
In his magnificent encyclical Pascendi Dominici Gregis, Pope Pius X seems to have been speaking about the current Bishop of Rome when he wrote:
For the Modernist Believer it is an established and certain fact that the divine reality does really exist in itself and quite independently of the person who believes in it. If you ask on what foundation this assertion of the Believer rests, they answer: In the experience of the individual …
They assert, therefore, the existence of a real experience, and one of a kind that surpasses all rational experience. If this experience is denied by some, like the rationalists, it arises from the fact that such persons are unwilling to put themselves in the moral state which is necessary to produce it. It is this experience which, when a person acquires it, makes him properly and truly a believer. (cf Pascendi 14)
This explains why modernist thinkers, like Pope Francis, consider interreligious dialogue, wherein an exchange of religious experiences takes place, a reasonable substitute for evangelization, and if you don’t “get it,” this is due primarily to your lack of humility – you narcissistic, authoritarian, self-absorbed, promethean neo-pelagian, you!
In truth, it is more accurate to say that the modernist attitude embraced by our current Holy Father effectively extinguishes the flame of evangelization; i.e., it renders proselytism “solemn nonsense.”
You see, whereas the Church, from the time of Pentecost forward, has always carried out a mission ordered on teaching the fullness of truth and baptizing the nations; making believers out of non-believers (those who follow a false religion or no religion at all), for the modernist, there are but precious few non-believers in the world, if indeed there are any. Rather, all of us – Catholic (provided one isn’t too traditional), Muslim, Jew, heathen and heretic – are all true believers, each with a unique experience of the divine!
About this attitude, Pope St. Pius X continued:
How far off we are here from Catholic teaching we have already seen in the decree of the Vatican Council. [Note: The First Vatican Council, that is.]
Here it is well to note at once that, given this doctrine of experience united with the other doctrine of symbolism, every religion, even that of paganism, must be held to be true. What is to prevent such experiences from being met within every religion? In fact that they are to be found is asserted by not a few.
And so it is that Pope Francis, in Evangelii Gaudium, even went so far as to suggest that even pagan rituals find their inspiration in sanctifying grace; the same that Catholics understand to be accessible to man only via the sacrament of baptism:
Non-Christians, by God’s gracious initiative, when they are faithful to their own consciences, can live “justified by the grace of God”, and thus be “associated to the paschal mystery of Jesus Christ”. But due to the sacramental dimension of sanctifying grace, God’s working in them tends to produce signs and rites, sacred expressions which in turn bring others to a communitarian experience of journeying towards God. While these lack the meaning and efficacy of the sacraments instituted by Christ, they can be channels which the Holy Spirit raises up in order to liberate non-Christians from atheistic immanentism or from purely individual religious experiences. (Evangelii Gaudium 254)
Always with the “religious experiences,” this one!
Returning to Pascendi, Pope Pius X, as if staring across the years directly into the eyes of Pope Francis, continued:
And with what right will Modernists deny the truth of an experience affirmed by a follower of Islam? With what right can they claim true experiences for Catholics alone? Indeed Modernists do not deny but actually admit, some confusedly, others in the most open manner, that all religions are true. (ibid.)
With all of this in mind, we might better understand what moved Pope Francis to tell a gathering of Muslim and Christian refuges earlier this year:
Sharing our experience in carrying that cross [the hardships associated with refugeeism], to expel the illness within our hearts, which embitters our life: it is important that you do this in your meetings. Those that are Christian, with the Bible, and those that are Muslim, with the Qur’an. The faith that your parents instilled in you will always help you move on.
You see, the reason the current Bishop of Rome is so often pleased to behave as if the false religions of the world are every bit the pathway to God as the Holy Roman Catholic Church is simple, he is infected with modernism.
He is, after all, the Vicar of Dialogue.
It is my belief that Bergoglio took the name Francis–supposedly in honor of St. Francis of Assisi–because he also intends to “rebuild the Church”. However, this “Francis” does not intend to rebuild the church according to the Holy Will of Her Divine Founder. His goal is to rebuild the Catholic Church according to his own demented mind. It is time for Bergoglio to be declared a formal heretic and be sent packing back to Argentina—by the most humble form of transportation available. This papacy is a disgrace!!!
Louie,
This really hits home as a cause of division within the Church and even in many families–between those who believe the Church has changed, and those who know it can’t -regarding dogma and the mandate of Christ versus the “new ecumenism”.
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Pius X said he read daily from the teachings of Cardinal Pie (1815–1880)–a French bishop of Poitiers known for his defense of the papacy and the social reign of Christ the King, active at Vatican I.
— The Cardinal preached man’s duty to return to God, with sermons that violently attacked the French Revolution, as a conception of society based on human – and not divine – sovereignty, –what he called the main error, and capital crime of his century, satanic in essence. He wrote:
–The time has not come for Jesus Christ to reign? Well, then the time has not come for governments to last. ( meeting with Emperor Napoleon III)
— When Christianity is no longer the soul of public life, of public power, of public institutions, then Jesus Christ deals with this country in the manner He is there dealt with. He continues to give his grace and his blessings to the individuals who serve him, but He abandons the institutions, the powers which do not serve Him; and they become like shifting sand in the desert, they fall away like the autumn leaves which are gone with the wind. ( Works, vol. II, pp. 259–60)
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In 1911, Pope Pius X made a prophecy regarding France, (containing advice the whole world needs):
“A day will come, and we hope it will not be far, when France, like Saul on the road to Damascus, will be surrounded by a heavenly light and will hear a voice repeating to her, “My daughter, why do you persecute me?” And to her response, “Who art thou, Lord?” the voice will reply, “I am Jesus, whom you persecute. It is hard for you to kick against the goad, because, in your obstinacy, you destroy yourself.”
— And she, trembling and astonished, will say, “Lord, what wouldst thou have me do?”
–And He will say, “Rise up, wash the filth that has disfigured you, awaken in your heart those dormant affections and the pact of our alliance and go, eldest daughter of the Church, predestined nation, vessel of election, GO, AS IN THE PAST, AND CARRY MY NAME BEFORE ALL PEOPlES AND BEFORE THE KINGS OF THE EARTH.”
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Both Pie and Pius X preached : Return to the pious practices of he past, the mandate of Christ to teach all nations–centered on Christ, not man.
— Pope Francis “back-burners” that mandate, saying “No,no,no, we don’t proselytize” –living out the teachings of VII- read through the modernist lense.
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But Is God is making use of this self-proclaimed child of VII and his wild abandon, to awaken the dormant hierarchy? : In addition to the pre-Synod collaborative book, and interviews given by Cardinal Burke mentioning a “ship without a rudder” and a seasick faithful, –Eponymous Flower now reports that Cardinal Muller gave a speech -published in the Vatican newspaper Tuesday, saying:
” “Every separation of theory and practice of the faith would be the manifestation of a subtle Christological HERESY in principle. …there can be no truth without life and no life without truth.
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No more walking on egg-shells. The head of the CDF just called it heresy.
Excellent article.
If a clergyman does not believe that his religion is reasonable enough to be presented to an unbeliever as objective truth, then he cannot believe it is reasonable enough to be presented to anyone as objective truth. This would include the people who fill his collection plates. At this point, the clergyman is obliged to hang up his dog-collar. Any claim to religious authority in these circumstances is nothing less than grotesque hucksterism.
Off topic, but comforting words from Ann Barnhaart’s blog….
Here is a beautiful quote from St. Aelred of Rievaulx:
“Brothers, however cast down we may be by harassment or heartache, the consolations of Scripture will lift us up again. . . . I tell you, brothers, no misfortune can touch us, no situation so galling or distressing can arise that does not, as soon as Holy Writ seizes hold of us, either fade into nothingness or become bearable. This is the field where Isaac walked in the evening meditating, and where Rebecca came hurrying towards him and soothed with her gentle charm the grief that had befallen him. How often, good Jesus, does day incline to evening, how often does the daylight of some slight consolation fade before the black night of an intolerable grief? Everything turns to ashes in my mouth; wherever I look, I see a load of cares. If someone speaks to me, I barely hear; if someone knocks, I scarcely notice; my heart is turned to stone, my tongue sticks fast, my tear-ducts are dry. What then? Into the field I go to meditate. I reread the holy book; I note down my thoughts; and suddenly Rebecca comes running towards me and with her light, which is your grace, good Jesus, dispels the gloom, puts melancholy to flight, disintegrates my hardness. Soon sighs give way to tears, accompanied in their turn by heavenly joy. Unhappy are those who, when oppressed in spirit, do not walk into this field and find that joy.”
Indignus famulus
” “Every separation of theory and practice of the faith would be the manifestation of a subtle Christological HERESY in principle. …there can be no truth without life and no life without truth.
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CraigW:
Would you say the SSPX is wrong here ? A theoretical possibility ( baptism of desire and being saved in invincible ignorance) is considered a defacto exception to the dogma EENS.The SSPX USA is following the Letter of the Holy Office 1949.
http://archives.sspx.org/miscellaneous/feeneyism/three_baptisms.htm http://archives.sspx.org/miscellaneous/feeneyism/three_errors_of_feeneyites.htm
Craig in theory has accepted that there are no exceptions to the traditional teaching on salvation and there are no Church documents before 1949 which say that these cases are known to us or are explicit exceptions to Tradition.No Church document! So in ‘practice’ why does he not say that the SSPX has made a factual error in the two links above ?
Cardinal Muller calls this heresy.
I ask Lynda, can you quote any pope or saint before 1949 who said that these cases are visible to us and so are exceptions to the traditional interpretation of the dogma ?
No answer. Why does she not say that she does not know of any case and there is no such case before ?
Instead she will in’ practise’ support the SSPX error.
Cardinal Muller calls this the separation ….
Why does Quo Vadis Petre not admit that the doctrine of the baptism of desire refers to a hypothetical case ? Is this too difficult?
Would he then have to say that the SSPX made an error ? And of course he does not want to ? Another case of separation of… by Catholics who do not use their real name to proclaim the faith.
Dear Lionel,
Please don’t expect us to speak on behalf of other posters.
If we understand you correctly, you accept the Church’s dogmatic teaching-that there is no salvation outside the Church, just as we do.
The Church’s teaching on Baptism of desire, therefore, cannot contradict this dogma, which it doesn’t.
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So, if anyone has been saved by BOD, (and as far as we know their identity/ies have not been revealed to man), then since the original sin, there could have been zero, one, or billions saved that way–and we have no way of knowing the number.
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Therefore, for the Pope or anyone else to assume large numbers or even entire religious sects have already been saved or will be saved by BOD, seems presumptuous and recklessly foolish to us, especially when applied to the urgency of preaching the Gospel in order to help bring about conversion before death. Since we cannot read minds, hearts or souls, the success of that preaching is as close as we can come to gauging the success or failure of our ability to carry out Our Lord’s mandate to go teach, and Baptize the nations. That urgency should therefore remain as it always was in the past, or if anything, be increased now, because the time allotted by God for the world as we know it, grows shorter, not longer, according to Sacred Scripture. And since the new ecumenism seems to seek only fraternal cooperation, rather than necessary conversion, it seems positively diabolical to us.
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If that lack of concern is based on presumed BOD, then we can readily understand your high degree of concern that this matter be clarified and any misunderstandings be rectified, in order to reinstate the sense of urgency needed- to proselytize as the missionaries did for centuries–and end this “silence” from the Church.
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But we have no idea why you are HERE asking US to explain to you or account for, the positions of other posters, who may easily have far greater knowledge about the issues involved than we do, and/or other information at their disposal which causes them to question your statements and withhold their full agreement.
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The controversy you’ve raised concerning the SSPX and the “letter of 1949, is one example of an area with which we are not at all familiar. We know semantics are very important, but don’t know what the writers or readers of that letter took the word “exception” to mean or to what they applied it. If, on the one hand, by using the word “exception” they only meant that BOD is an “unusual” way of being saved, i.e. not the ordinary, visible way, then that means something entirely different than the idea that the way it is accomplished by God, is an “exception” to the Dogma of no salvation outside the Church, i.e. that they are in fact, NOT saved THROUGH His Church, but by some imaginary Divine intervention outside of it. (That itself seems silly to us-maybe due to more of our theological ignorance?) Sorry, don’t think we can help here.
Au contraire, not at all “off topic.” Anyone who really reads Louie’s posts understands exactly what it means to be in the midst of distressing situations, and in need of Divine consolations, as all the Faithful are. 🙂 🙂
Dear Indignus Familus,
You are welcome to speak on behalf of yourself and not other posters. So could you answer the following for yourself.
Would you say the SSPX is wrong here ? A theoretical possibility ( baptism of desire and being saved in invincible ignorance) is considered a defacto exception to the dogma EENS.The SSPX (USA) is following the Letter of the Holy Office 1949.
http://archives.sspx.org/miscellaneous/feeneyism/three_baptisms.htm http://archives.sspx.org/miscellaneous/feeneyism/three_errors_of_feeneyites.htm
1.
Craig in theory has accepted that there are no exceptions to the traditional teaching on salvation and there are no Church documents before 1949 which say that these cases are known to us or are explicit exceptions to Tradition.No Church document! So in ‘practice’ why does he ( and you ) not say that the SSPX has made a factual error in the two links above ?
Cardinal Muller calls this heresy.
2.
Indignus Familus, I ask Lynda,( and you) can you quote any pope or saint before 1949 who said that these cases are visible to us and so are exceptions to the traditional interpretation of the dogma ?
No answer. Why does she ( and you) not say that she does not know of any case and there is no such case before ?
3.
Why does Quo Vadis Petre ( and you) not admit that the doctrine of the baptism of desire refers to a hypothetical case ?
Dear Lionel,
Please don’t expect us to speak on behalf of other posters.
If we understand you correctly, you accept the Church’s dogmatic teaching-that there is no salvation outside the Church, just as we do.
Lionel:
‘Just as we do’ ?
For you the baptism of desire and being saved in invincible ignorance refer to invisible cases. So they are not defacto exceptions in 2014 for all needing the baptism of water and Catholic faith for salvation ?
So in these two links the SSPX was incorrect to assume that there were known exceptions to the dogma ?
http://archives.sspx.org/miscellaneous/feeneyism/three_baptisms.htm http://archives.sspx.org/miscellaneous/feeneyism/three_errors_of_feeneyites.htm
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The Church’s teaching on Baptism of desire, therefore, cannot contradict this dogma, which it doesn’t.
Lionel:
So invisible for us baptism of desire does not contradict the dogma?
While visible for us baptism of desire would contradict the dogma?
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So, if anyone has been saved by BOD, (and as far as we know their identity/ies have not been revealed to man), then since the original sin, there could have been zero, one, or billions saved that way–and we have no way of knowing the number.
Lionel:
So the baptism of desire ( followed by the baptism of water is a possibility if God wants it) is not an exception to the dogma ?
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Therefore, for the Pope or anyone else to assume large numbers or even entire religious sects have already been saved or will be saved by BOD, seems presumptuous and recklessly foolish to us, especially when applied to the urgency of preaching the Gospel in order to help bring about conversion before death. Since we cannot read minds, hearts or souls, the success of that preaching is as close as we can come to gauging the success or failure of our ability to carry out Our Lord’s mandate to go teach, and Baptize the nations. That urgency should therefore remain as it always was in the past, or if anything, be increased now, because the time allotted by God for the world as we know it, grows shorter, not longer, according to Sacred Scripture.
Lionel:
So every one in 2014 needs Catholic Faith and the baptism of water for salvation ( to go to Heaven and avoid Hell) and there is no exception ?
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And since the new ecumenism seems to seek only fraternal cooperation, rather than necessary conversion, it seems positively diabolical to us.
Lionel:Since all Protestants, Orthodox Christians, Pentecostals etc need Catholic Faith for salvation (AG 7, Cantate Dominion, Council of Florence etc) and we do no know of a single exception in 2014?
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If that lack of concern is based on presumed BOD, then we can readily understand your high degree of concern that this matter be clarified and any misunderstandings be rectified, in order to reinstate the sense of urgency needed- to proselytize as the missionaries did for centuries–and end this “silence” from the Church.
Lionel:
So we proclaim the Gospel since all non Catholics are on the way to Hell in 2014 ?
__________________________________
But we have no idea why you are HERE asking US to explain to you or account for, the positions of other posters, who may easily have far greater knowledge about the issues involved than we do, and/or other information at their disposal which causes them to question your statements and withhold their full agreement.
Lionel: Since we have to proclaim the Gospel knowing that all in 2014 are on the way to Hell without ‘faith and baptism’ and there are no known exceptions.
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The controversy you’ve raised concerning the SSPX and the “letter of 1949, is one example of an area with which we are not at all familiar.
Lionel:
You are now familiar that the baptism of desire is an acceptable doctrine but it is not known and visible in personal cases.
You are also familiar that the baptism of desire is a hypothetical case.
We agree that a hypothetical case cannot be a known exception to the dogma in 2014.
This is all commonsense. It is common knowledge.
So we cannot create a theology and call it Feeneyism or what ever and say:-
1.The baptism of desire is an acceptable doctrine but it is known and visible in personal cases.
2.The baptism of desire is not a hypothetical case but it is defacto, objectively known and visible to us in personal cases.
3. A hypothetical case can be a known exception to the dogma in 2014.
This would all be contrary to reason and we cannot create a theology based on this irrationality?
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We know semantics are very important, but don’t know what the writers or readers of that letter took the word “exception” to mean or to what they applied it.
Lionel:
In the two links I have cited from the SSPX (USA) website the SSPX priests are criticizing Fr.Leonard Feeney, another traditionalist priest, for not assuming that the baptism of desire and being saved with the baptism of blood or in invincible ignorance – are known to us in the present times ( not hypothetical).
They also criticizeg him for not assuming that visible for us baptism of desire is an exception to the dogma.
Neither are they criticizing the Letter of the Holy Office 1949 for this irrationality.
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If, on the one hand, by using the word “exception” they only meant that BOD is an “unusual” way of being saved, i.e. not the ordinary, visible way, then that means something entirely different than the idea that the way it is accomplished by God, is an “exception” to the Dogma of no salvation outside the Church, i.e. that they are in fact, NOT saved THROUGH His Church, but by some imaginary Divine intervention outside of it. (That itself seems silly to us-maybe due to more of our theological ignorance?) Sorry, don’t think we can help here.
Lionel:
The dogma says all need to enter the Church. For an adult one can only enter the Church with ‘faith and baptism’.So how can there be an exception ?
How can there be an ‘extra ordinary way’?
How can someone go to Heaven without the baptism of water ?
This is a de fide teaching of the Church.
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Anyway the bottom line is that we agree that there are no defacto, visible to us, exceptions to the dogma ?
Dear Lionel,
You ask if we would “say that the SSPX is wrong here,” yet you gave no response to what we wrote above regarding that very controversy,– pointing out to you some of the reasons we do not feel informed enough about the SSPX’s understanding and interpretations of the main terms involved, or their other reasons for their positions on this issue, to make such a declaration. We have stated what we do understand and agree with, regarding what you have said.
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Regarding the SSPX, what we do know, is that when we have read their postions in the past on other issues which seem more “black-and -white to us than this one, they appear to be completely in line with all the Church teachings of the past. That doesn’t make them perfect, but it gives them credibility.
-On more complex issues, which involve theological concepts which at times seem “over our heads”, we take St. Paul’s advise to Christians not to delve into things which are “too sublime” for us. We’ve discovered via the internet, that Saintly and learned men of the Church in the past have disagreed completely on some important issues which were not yet resolved; and in some cases the same statements made by one Saint are frequently quoted by opposing sides in an argument, as proof of their claims to rightness. So we generally try to speak out only about things we feel we can grasp thoroughlly, rather than repeating what others think while we are in doubt.
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-So our questions to you are these:
1. Why is it, that you persist in demanding others state their agreement -with certainty- about your conclusions regarding the opinions of third parties which are unclear?
2. Why are you not satisfied with our agreement with the things you have stated which seem true to us, -which we have already done?
3. Would in not be more in keeping with the virture of Charity for you to comply with Louie’s directives that such discussions as these- which are of necessity quite lengthy and therefore sideline his topic; be carried out in a Forum started by you, in which you invite others to read your challenges voluntarily, or on your own blog to which you provide a link and the same invitation?
-That seems to us, the best thing to do, considering the repetition we’ve seen here, and the number of posters who have requested similar things. Don’t you agree?
God Bless you.
Dear Lionel,
In case you missed our last response above, under #2, please visit it.
We see here, you at least addressed our point about the SSPX and their understanding which we cited above; but it seems to us you quote responses from us and proceed to ask questions that don’t prove you are right and the other party is wrong without requiring us to research extensively what THEY are saying, and with no one to speak on their behalf to answer any further questions your links may leave unanswered. As we said above, we don’t feel such a one-sided discussion should be continually forced on people here.
May God bless you with the wisdom to determine what to do about that.
🙂 🙂
A tremendous new incentive to convert the whole world into the Catholic Church could be that would bring to an end the debate on Baptism of Desire !!!
Ever mindful, the proper understanding of BOD doesn’t negate us Catholics to convert the whole world.