Today marks the second anniversary of the elevation of Jorge Bergoglio to the Chair of St. Peter, and what have we learned since?
I suppose I could go about offering a review of the things that stand out most from these last 24 months, but instead I’ll get straight to the bottom line.
If nothing else, we’ve discovered that Pope Francis is very passionate about his faith.
Far from the unpredictable free-spirit that so many once imagined him to be, all indications are that his firmly held beliefs animate and account for nearly everything he says and does; including his most “off-the-cuff” remarks and “spontaneous” gestures.
Ordinarily, a Holy Father such as this would bode rather well for the Church and her faithful, but in the case of Pope Francis, I’m afraid that’s not so.
Why not?
For the simple reason that the faith about which Pope Francis is so very passionate, and the beliefs that animate his actions, are not Catholic; they are humanistic and earthbound, focused almost exclusively on man and his temporal condition.
As for the faith that comes to us from the Apostles, Pope Francis has consistently made it clear that he despises that faith. He sees it as an obstacle to be surmounted and its adherents as objects of ridicule to be defeated.
Oh, sure, certain portions of the one true faith as expressed in the sacred deposit of Christian doctrine are discernable in the pope’s words and deeds, but overall, one is hard pressed to deny that the drumbeat that this pope follows is not a Catholic one.
Let’s be honest, if his Apostolic Exhortation, Evangelii Gaudium, were written by a Catholic theologian, a moderately diligent censor librorum would withhold the nihil obstat; i.e., it doesn’t even qualify for an imprimatur.
Objectively speaking, if one were to review the sum total of Pope Francis’ public proclamations, much of it would be unrecognizable as having come from a Catholic layman much less a pope, with considerable portions of it objectionable even to the heretics.
This is the reality of our situation, and it would be bitter enough if Pope Francis were content to simply live out his days in peace while keeping his personal faith to himself.
Unfortunately, however, he is not.
In fact, Pope Francis is among the most remarkably aggressive Roman Pontiffs the Church has had in the course of my lifetime, save for Paul VI who had the audacity to shove the Novus Ordo down the throats of Latin Rite Catholics the world over, only to be beatified by, who else, Pope Francis.
This brings me to the most important thing we’ve learned since Francis took office; we must pray and fast for this pope – not just pray, but fast, and every good Catholic knows why.
Prayer for the pope is always the duty of Catholics, but in the present case, our prayer, if we are to pray according to the Church’s actual needs, is unique to our day.
Specifically, we must pray for the conversion of Pope Francis; that he will embrace, protect and propagate the Holy Catholic Faith that he currently despises.
As of this moment, two years into his dreadful pontificate, there is no indication that he intends to do so apart from Divine intervention.
http://www.catholicherald.co.uk/news/2015/03/13/pope-francis-on-st-peters-balcony-i-did-not-know-what-to-say/
According to this article, Francis does not expect his papacy to last very long. He may be referring to a possible resignation because he makes it clear that he misses walking into a pizzeria and having a slice. (He’s SO papal!!)
In any event, his papacy will be judged according to where you stand. If you hate Catholicism, he will be hailed a success. If you truly love the Catholic Church, you will look back in horror. As Vicar of Christ, there is no greater job description worthy of holiness, dignity, power and honor. Bergoglio doesn’t have a clue!
From the Catholic Encyclopedia:
“Of course, the election of a heretic, schismatic, or female would be null and void.”
Dies eius fiant pauci…
“the faith about which Pope Francis is so very passionate, and the beliefs that animate his actions, are not Catholic; they are humanistic and earthbound, focused almost exclusively on man and his temporal condition.” The New Order has redefined for itsef the ‘papacy’ as an idea to be exploited by error. I wouldn’t dare accuse the Holy Ghost inspiring the New Order Confraternity of the White Cassock.
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Bergoglio is the poster child writ large for those errors forcefully and Magiseterially condemend by His Holiness Pope Pius IX in Quanta Cura and the Syllabus of Errors and echoed or already sounded in the teachings of every True Pope. So which Pope is a ‘Pope’ – they can’t both be. One is a fake, an interloper, a tool of antichrist; and one a shepherd, authentic, a servent of Christ. We may pray for Bergoglio’s conversion – what a shock that would be to his soul – but with God all things are possible. However, he is part of a brotherhood errors with an aim counter to Christ’s. Unless VII is condemned and the Novus Ordo anathematized by an authentic Apostolic Bishop of Rome (not one who has been ‘ordained’ via Novus Ordo Rites), this ‘mess making’ will continue.
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Remember the parable about the ‘Goodman’ who sowed a field of wheat? Then an enemy came and sowed cockle/tares/weeds amidst the wheat. The Goodman – the Master who sowed the wheat – gave instruction to his servants to leave the weeds for fear that an early harvest would harm the wheat and to give the ‘tares’ time to repent and convert. In St John Chrysostom’s sermons on this parable the weeds are heresies and the enemy sower is satan and his wicked servants. St John calls this sowing of heresy, ‘the devil’s craft.’ A Pope is the Goodman who sows the wheat and cares for it with Truth. The ‘devil’s craft’ is not the craft of a Pope. Any man, however magisterially he is dressed, who sows the weeds is a servant of the devil and is not Christ’s Vicar. He needs conversion, not collaborators.
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http://www.fisheaters.com/parables5.html
We keep asking God for hopeful reminders that He is far more powerful than any number of modernists who have power in the Church, including the current pontiff. Things like the latest Rorate Caeli news item [surprisingly from U.S.A Today (p.6)] could be part of His answer to our prayer. It says (in part):
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“Fifty years after the traditional Latin Mass was abandoned by the Roman Catholic Church, it is making a comeback.” “In 2007, Pope Benedict XVI formally allowed the majestic Latin Mass to be more accessible to congregations. Since then, participation has mushroomed.
–“Interested Catholics now realize it’s not some peculiar thing tucked away in an embarrassed corner,” said Joseph Shaw, (Latin Mass Society-UK). “Once they’re in the door, the Mass speaks for itself.”
–“There is a movement among young Catholics to know, discover and preserve their Catholic heritage, and the traditional Latin Mass fits in with that,” said Joseph Kramer, a Rome-based priest and longtime advocate of the Latin Mass. “I think they are drawn to the liturgical richness of the past.”
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..”The International Una Voce Federation, lay groups associated with the Latin Mass, said member organizations are growing in all parts of the world.”
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..”Antonia Martinez, 33, a Catholic school administrator who attended a recent service in Rome said: “This Mass has a more reverent tone that seems more appropriate for worshiping God.” “In my church in Miami, people come wearing short pants and checking their cellular phones during the service.”
http://rorate-caeli.blogspot.com/2015/03/usa-today-article-on-traditional-latin.html#more
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Especially on anniversaries like today, it’s good to see signs that God has plans (slowly growing) which no would-be subverters of His Church will be able to overcome–in the end. 🙂 🙂
Truth is courting us day and night.
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Pope Pius XII: “If a true Pope could be a heretic and still remain Pope, then the Church would have no need of a Pope — then he would not differ in essence from the leaders of the Anglican sect, or of the Eastern Orthodox churches, or of the Protestant faith communities. He would just become a ceremonial head whose tasks might include that of guiding, directing, and inspecting, but who ultimately holds no genuine authority, in virtue of his office, to teach the Faith and whose teaching demands assent for the mere fact that he, the Pope, is the one who is teaching.” Encyclical Humani Generis.
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It gets to the point where if a Catholic can sincerely say, ‘heretical pope’, he can sincerly say a ‘satanic True Church’. Even the most morally appalling Popes miraculously upheld, in their Office, the True Faith:
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“There is not a heretic or a schismatic who has not endeavored to legitimate his own conduct dogmatically: Photius tried to justify his pride, Luther his sensual passions, Calvin his cold cruelty. Neither Sergius III nor John XII nor Benedict IX nor Alexander VI, supreme pontiffs, definers of the faith, certain of being heard and obeyed by the whole Church, uttered, from the height of their apostolic pulpit, A SINGLE WORD that could be an approval of their disorders…At times John XII even became the defender of the threatened social order, of offended canon law, and of the religious life exposed to danger. Rev. Fernand Mourret, A History of the Catholic Church.
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If we had been properly catechised their would not be such an interior earthquake when a Catholic is confronted with the facts that people use the name of Christ and even the name of His Church to lie and mislead. There is always only one recourse – Christ and His True Church. There are True teachings and false teachings, True disciplines and false discplines, True Rites and false Rites. We will always, if we heed True Shepherds and watch and pray, be shown the Way.
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The lie of the falsehoods promulgated by the traitors (Judas Iscariot was a ‘bishop’) brings us back to the Teaching of Christ – He is the Truth, and the father-of-lies attacks, seduces, obfuscates, destroys, theives and lies lies lies. If we don’t face the lies we cannot hope to stay unmixed from the tares/weeds the heretics have planted with the Novus Ordo Rites and the Vatican II thirty-pieces of silver. A genetically modified wheat-field is not what Christ has in mind – we must be wheat or weeds.
Dear Louie,
A lighter Lenten note:
I think maybe I should be offering up more prayer and fasting for you. You are aleady pretty skinny (sorry) and will be in serious trouble if you take on more fasting whereas the object of your starvation grows fatter by the minute.
At what point does he notice that all the trads are emaciated and ready to die off and solve his problem? If he discovers why this is, might he not be encouraged to spew forth ever more heresies in the hopes of bringing about a quick end to his plan to eliminate his enemies?
heheh. that does sound like a modernist tactic. But since God sees all and knows what both our left and right hand our doing, no prayer or fasting is ever in vain.
All our days are few. Despite the new age doctrine of our temporal importance – even if one wears white!
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Generally speaking, we live in times where the local village ‘news’ is actually the ‘news of every village’. We live in a time where scandal is presented from 360 degrees, especially if it attacks the Faith. We live in a time where someone called a ‘pope’ exploits that 360 degrees, especially if it attacks the Faith.
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Ask, Seek, and Knock! Instructs Our Lord. The Church and Her teachings and worship are our lodestone. How has so much gone so wrong so quickly?
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The Heresiologists of the Church were/are like blood-hounds seeking out every falsehood, exposing it, explaining it and soundly refuting it. Is this happening in any capacity anymore, except where the SSPX permits its priests or the ‘Resistance exists’ or amongst Sedevacantist priests (or Cardinal Burke and his quite clerical supporters)? In the VII sect there is, as we know, no such thing as heresy – unless it is ‘Traditionalism.
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Would that the days of confusion and ‘officiated’ doubt be made few. Generally speaking, if anyone is interested, why is a Novus Ordo Priest so susceptible to falsehood and sacrilege? Is it merely ‘the beat of the age’ or something more? There are many Novus Ordo priests – though fewer and fewer as the years pass – who were ordained by Roman Catholic Bishops of the ‘old’ Rite and, one hopes, they are less susceptible to the ‘beat of the age’.
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There are those of Apostolic Succession of the True Faith who question Montini’s Rites of Ordination. This rigour is totally Catholic. Let someone in ‘authority’ explain why the Rites are not in doubt. The ‘resistence’ have railed against the changes in the Mass and doctrine…but Rites of Ordination…(and how fundamental to everything Church is ordination)? If there is not error then I, for one, and maybe only one, need an explaination – old heresiologist style – of why Montini was permitted to change something Pope Pius XII said could not be changed. Why is Montini’s Rite of Ordination ‘good’ but Montini’s mass not? Montini oversaw the ‘smoke of satan entering the Church’. It confounds me as to why the new rite of ordination of the ‘smoke of satan’s’ overseer’ is ignored.
Dear Salvemur,
The True Church will always remain at the center, but “the outer courts ” will be given over to the pagans/gentiles -according to the prophecy of St. John in the Apocalypse. We’ve seen that happening for well over 50 years now, while modernists have assumed positions of power and continually attempt to alter the Faith by twisting the meaning of words and lately, by claiming that changes in praxis are not equivalent to attempting to change the dogmas/doctrines.
–We feel it’s perfectly legitimate for us to sort out the differences between the solid teachings of the past, and the false ones we hear so often these days; denounce them as best we can with the help of all that have gone before us and those, like Cardinal Burke and Bishop Athanasius Schneider, etc.. and still consider Francis the Pope–unless or until he is officially declared otherwise by the proper authorities. We know you disagree with this position, having read your postings about it. But that’s where we stand on it.
Dear Justathought,
FUNNY! 🙂 🙂
We pledge to continue to fast- but will be on the lookout out for anorexia symptoms.
–And if anyone does start getting too thin, they can always make food substitutions at mealtimes–eating something they dislike (like broccoli for some) rather than further reducing their overall intake to the point where they harm their health.
Dear Salvemur and all, So far as I can see, the episcopate and even the Holy See has been marked for decades by a studied avoidance of truth – the objective, universal and infinite truths of the Faih and morals, and how they apply in respect of the fact of manifold and intensifying evils imposing upon every area of our lives. That is the big diabolical marker, denial of truth. The Great Deception. Diabolical disorientation.
Dear Mr Verrechio, could you, please, post a short piece on the miscarriage of justice that is Fr MacRae’s case, and ask people to pray especially hard for the rest of Lent for the end of his unjust incarceration and that the truth will finally be declared, by both the state, and the diocese? His federal habeas corpus application is at long last being heard on 17th (St Patrick’s Day).
Dear Lynda,
Thank you for this information of Father MacRae.
Reading the accounts, it seems obvious that reasonable doubt was ignored, given the facts that his diocese had just paid out multiple millions in out of court settlements, and there were bound to be those who would want to take advantage of such financial gains, at the expense of a priest’s reputation.
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This particular accuser, having a long rap sheet including a history of theft, drug use and violence, which speak to basic dishonesty and aggressive hostility, testified that he had been molested on five occasions while counseling with the priest. When asked why he would return a second to fifth time, after being forcibly molested the first time, he said he had no memory of it upon returning for the next session, and had “out of body experiences” that also had blocked his recollection. Others have testified that he privately admitted on more than one occasion, that he had never been molested, but had sued for the money.
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If ever there was reason to doubt testimony, this is definitely questionable.
The priest was offered a 3 year sentence if he would admit guilt He refused because he claimed he was innocent. He has now been jailed for 19 years, and called “unjustly incarcerated” by Cardinal Avery Dulles, and others who have taken up his cause.
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http://www.wsj.com/articles/SB10001424127887324482504578453363318730182#articleTabs%3Dvideo
and
http://thesestonewalls.com/gordon-macrae/new-in-the-wall-street-journal-the-father-gordon-macrae-case/
and
http://www.themediareport.com/2013/05/21/rev-gordon-macrae-case-facts/also
Hello, Lynda. It’s good to read your comments, along with Indignus and most others on Louie’s site, (and offer Ave’s for you de Maria and your children) glad for the ‘firey devotion’ (Revelation 3:16) to Christ and His Bride.
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There is a diabolical orientation – but I would call it a ‘re-orientation’ rather than disorientation – at least where those with responsibility over others lies. We know it started when an angel fell from heaven and took a third of them with him. It reasserted itself when Adam and Eve decided that a proscribed ‘fruit’ – just one little jot/iota in the whole grand garden – given a modernist spin, had more wieght than the Voice of God. It raised its head umpteen times in the ‘adultery’ (courting false religions, false teachings, false gods) of Israel who too often hated upon their God-given and authentic Prophets (Credo et Spiritum Sanctum…Qui locutus est per Prophetas) and then murdered these Prophets; but, blessedly, a remnant of prophetic Israel kept Faithful – the fruit of which is the Immaculate Conception, the Virgin Birth and the Incarnation…
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As for diabolical reorientation – it even found place at the Table of Our Lord where He gave us the Eucharist.
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I don’t see, however, the Church or Her Popes as diabolically disoreinted (was Judas Iscariot ‘church’? interesting question) or reoriented. I see paraders and pretenders proudly promoting reorientation; but the indefectible Church cannot be a part of this. The Rock is the Goodman and the Wheatfield (RE: parable of the wheat and tares). There may be tares sown in it after dark by enemies but they are not Church and not its authority doing the sowing. There is a big leap from saying, ‘the enemy has sown cockle amidst the wheat’, to the saying, (pahtooey) ‘the Lord sowed cockle amidst the wheat.’
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Diareor-ientation is what satan does. If things are coming to a big clash (which the signs suggest – I guess we can dismiss the prophecies of the past couple of centuries on the eclipse of the Church, the church of darkness, the ‘mysitical body of the antichrist’, the counterfeit church) – if things are rallying for a bigger clash, at least we here all know which side we are on. I hope and pray those for whom we are bound to pray will have the mercy of God upon them, and choose wisely – me included!
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God’s mercy upon us.
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If we meet Bergoglio, would our sense of rightness and Truth permit us to ask him to ‘bless’ us? And if so, what would the ‘blessing’ mean?