On the heels of the “People’s Pope” video that I posted on Thursday, I had to laugh yesterday when I saw a copy of Catholic Review, the newspaper of the Archdiocese of Baltimore (yea, the same newspaper that ran that sacrilegious image of a Crucifix held aloft in LGBT flavored hands).
Oh, yes… he’s a people person alright; provided you’re not one of those people. You know, the kind who happen to think and feel and live like a Catholic.
The pope’s recent press conference has any number of commentators talking about the interior makeup of Jorge Bergoglio the man, and one can only imagine that it won’t be very long now before the Defenders of all things Francesco burst onto the scene to admonish us to cease focusing on the man’s personality.
After all, one can just hear them saying, that isn’t really pertinent to the faith; surely we’ve had good popes whose personal disposition would have invited similar criticism.
Now, they might just have a point save for just one inconvenient fact; Francis is reaping precisely what he himself has sown.
From day one, this pontificate has had precious little to do with the Office of Peter and the duties that go with it; rather, it has been all about Jorge; what Jorge will wear, where Jorge will live, and how Jorge will get there.
It is he who unceremoniously thrust his personality, opinions and preferences on the Petrine Office, remaking the papacy in his own image and likeness to such extent that he’s probably graced the covers of more pop culture magazines in the last year than Brittany Spears and Lady Gaga combined.
And let’s not forget the near endless stream of Humbleganda that began flowing out of Rome like so much waste from a sewage pipe even before the new “Bishop of Rome” had time to descend from the balcony at St. Peters.
From there, photo-ops just coincidentally began to present themselves before the ever-ready cameras of a media hungry to keep the illusion going, like that unforgettably candid image of the pope kneeling at the confessional; yes, the same whose knees simply will not bend in genuflection before Christ the King present on the altar at Holy Mass.
Let’s be honest: The general thrust of this pontificate has never truly been ordered toward protecting and passing on the Faith that comes to us from the Apostles; it has been leveraged instead as a mechanism for revealing the thoroughly Jesuitized mind of Jorge Bergoglio. (Forgive me, St. Ignatius, for I trust you know what I mean.)
Even the much ballyhooed display of collegiality-in-action, the Extraordinary Synod of Bishops 2014, was really just another opportunity to broadcast, and then to place a counterfeit stamp of Catholic approval upon, Jorge’s personal desires.
Indeed, even the most noteworthy papal instrument to date attributable solely to Pope Francis, that wretched 53,000 word tome, Evangelii Gaudium, is really nothing more than Jorge’s personal diary wherein every stray thought that ever entered his modernist mind is recorded for precisely what purpose God only knows.
No, the attention being paid to the personal character of the current Bishop of Rome isn’t unwarranted in the least; rather, it is precisely what happens when the man chosen (be it by collusion or otherwise) to ascend to the Chair of St. Peter makes the Office all about himself.
Good take on all this, Louie. There’s a story about Father Sera (hope I’ve got that right) – that he wrote to his superiors asking what the current pope’s name was so he could add it to the appropriate prayer in Holy Mass. O the bliss of ignorance. O the bliss of A Holy Father submerging his personality beneath the duties of His Office. O the bliss of priests so far removed from the world that they have no need to ‘follow’ the latest Pop Pope.
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Poor Francis seems like a giddy teenager who’s been elected Class President, and has a platform so he can speak from his deeply emotional teen life.
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Just before I read this post I came across this article in America magazine. Written by a Jesuit. The thoughts expressed about ‘theology’ as it exists inside and outside the Church describe Poor Francis’ thoughts to a T. Bishop Fellay asked “Is Francis a Modernist?” He was hesitant to come right out and say it but we all know that formal heresy informs ALL Church thinking (with, sadly, very few exceptions). Part of this heresy focuses on man’s humanity to the exclusion of all else. We can see Poor Francis embodies (a pun!) this thought – he’s human all right!
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http://americamagazine.org/issue/theologys-new-turn
I always cringe when I see anything prefaced with “People’s.” I think People’s Princess, People’s Democratic Republic of (take your pick) etc. Never anything good.
Whatsoever is dedicated to The People with man at its crown and center is not of God.
Let’s face it: the way he has described the Immaculata, who the fake Francis had the audacity to claim She felt “deceived” at the Foot of the Cross and that God “lied” to Her, is straight out of the serpent’s mouth. Couple it with all the other “solemn nonsense” Bergoglio engages in, especially his false humility and what do we have? The false prophet right before our eyes. There is no way of getting around this Truth anymore.
Any Pope who does not fall on his knees, begging for forgiveness after the disgrace of the Mega-Masses is not worth even my 2 cents!!
Dear Louie,
We have high regard for the quality of your writing, so it’s hard to make use of superlatives from one post to the next. But it seems they get “better and better” the more justifiably ticked-off you become. 🙂 🙂
We selfishly ask that you to keep’em coming, while we pray God keeps vigilant watch over your blood pressure.
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This one led to our reflecting on His awareness of our sufferings, while He allows us to be subjected to evildoers and fools, which in turn tests our Faith in His promises. In Proverbs 29, His words seems to apply as much to our current Pontiff and many high-ranking Churchmen, as they do to most secular-world leaders- including those come to power by sheer force and terror:
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-“When just men increase, the people shall rejoice: when the wicked shall bear rule, the people shall mourn.”
-“A prince that gladly heareth lying words, hath all his servants wicked.”
-“A fool uttereth all his mind: a wise man deferreth, and keepeth it till afterwards.”
-“Bloodthirsty men hate the upright” ..”When the wicked are multiplied, crimes shall be multiplied: but the just shall see their downfall.”
-“The man that with a stiff neck despiseth him that reproveth him, shall suddenly be destroyed: and health shall not follow him.”
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Those help while we continue to battle while foolish ideas are breeding like rabbits, and Kasperian wickedness goes on being misrepresented as products of prayerful meditation and signs of the mercy of God.
And we find ourselves taking great comfort in verse 18, which simply states:
“He that keepeth the law is blessed.”
Amen, IF. I too find great comfort in the Bible. Praying the Psalms is a wonderful way to calm oneself – if nothing else these men will get their just reward – they will be cut down like grass on the rooftops as it withers at the end of the day.
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We want to save them!! That’s the frustrating part. We do want to save them by our exhortations, our pleas, our sacrifices, our prayers for their conversion!
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To paraphrase an old expression “you can lead a pope to reason, but you can’t make him think.
Dear Barbara,
Amen. Radical Catholic posted a bit of satire which goes nicely with comments about “the fool uttering his mind.”
http://theradicalcatholic.blogspot.com/2015/01/rome-mistral-air-has-announced-that-it.html
[Spoiler alert]
Our favorite lines:
“Mistral Air – will be equipping all machines chartered by the Vatican with a new “No In-Flight Interview” signal.
–“… The cost of the refitting- covered by a donor who wished to remain anonymous.
–” In the unfortunate event of an interview occuring despite the new restriction- rosaries would automatically drop from the overhead area.”
Our thanks to Rad Cat… we all need a chuckle about now… 🙂 🙂
If the Church continues on this trajectory it may not belong before the Society is the only refuge for the true Catholic. Me & my family spent six years in an ICK parish; while there is a good helping of authentic Catholicism there and among the FSSP, it’s clear this pontiff wants all traces of the true faith snuffed-out. They already are not allowed to speak about the root causes of the crisis (and indeed many of their good priests sadly do not really understand it themselves); I fear it will not be long before they are somehow directly suppressed. Almost certainly not as drastically and suddenly as was the FFI (which the neo-Catholics have no issue with, of course), but in some way, little by little, probably.
FSSP parishes have to keep their mouths firmly shut and not complain or even exhort bishops. I know this from personal experience. We fly below the radar.
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At least Bishop Fellay is free to speak to his own people in a clear way. I’ll be in Rome in April. I will NOT attend the Wednesday bean-fest with Poor Francis but will spend more time inside St. Peter’s at the foot of the tomb of Pius X.
I like your plan, Barbara.
Another thing: My wife & I have been to St. Peter’s twice but at neither time did we take advantage of the tour of St. Peter’s (actual) tomb. That’s kind of a bummer, because it’s not likely we’ll make it back – don’t make the same mistake if you can still get on the list! God bless.
And great numbers of apparently well-meaning Catholics, who were rational before Francis, now fooled by this Pope, who says and does wicked things continually, while they whistle and look away. Only the devil could be behind such mass delusion.
Bible Quiz:
Who said this….
“Sin is crouching at the door, eager to control you. But you must subdue it and be its master.”
He was provincial superior of the Jesuits in Argentina from 1973 to 79 — the Me Decade.
Pope Francis spoke Friday to the Roman Rota, about the qualities the Church needs in a good marriage-tribunal judges– calling for them to
— “practice righteousness that is not legalistic or abstract, but adapted to the demands of reality” and able to “go deep in the situation of the parties involved.”
[In Italian:”Doti che gli permettono – ha aggiunto – di “praticare una giustizia non legalistica o astratta, ma adatta alle esigenze della realtà concreta” e in grado di “entrare in profondità nella situazione delle parti in causa”.]
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Eponymous flower has more information about further cautions from the Pope: “Law must not degenerate into “splitting hairs” and in determining nullity the judges must consider the “lack or absence of values” in the revelant pairs, at the time of the “marriage” http://eponymousflower.blogspot.com/
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We see no mention of what the Church said 10 years ago in “Dignitatis Connubi” -as the Vatican responded to reports that American annulments had gone from 338 in 1968, to 63,933 in 1991, warning Bishops “that rules will be insufficient to achieve their stated purpose unless diocesan judges know the sacred canons thoroughly.” and calling on every judge- ” before he accepts a cause and whenever he perceives the hope of a good outcome, to employ pastoral means to convince the spouses, if this can be done, to convalidate the marriage and reestablish conjugal life” (can. 1676).
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While we’re not against careful proceedings in these matters,we are concerned that this is a push to side-step the roadblocks put in place by Faithful Prelates at the October Synod. If adulterer aren’t to be welcomed to Communion on the grounds that the Holy Spirit doesn’t mind mortal sin; then we’ll just have to put them on the “fast track” to annulments of their marriages, so they can validate all they’ve been. If a Pope who kisses books that say there is no Trinity is now a Saint, why not?
Last time I was there we did pray at St. Peter’s tomb. Unfortunately one has to pass by John Paul II’s resting place. That felt very sad and empty. The whole structure is built upon and around the tombs of such holy men! It truly is a treasure of Catholicism but hard to visit now.