The USCCB has a new leader, Archbishop Joseph Kurtz, and that apparently means a somewhat new approach to the Obama Administration’s overreach known as the HHS mandate.
In a January 6th editorial published by Religion News Service, Archbishop Kurtz made the case for a Catholic exemption in a 700 word essay that, unlike his New Year’s Eve letter to President Obama, doesn’t mention “our first freedom” even once. Praise God!
A step in the right direction, you say?
No, not even close; it’s really just another dance move on the part of a bishops’ conference that has long since committed itself to sidestepping the Church’s mission, and you’ll never guess who provided the inspiration for this latest episcopal pirouette…
According to the Archbishop:
Pope Francis inspires Catholics and non-Catholics alike with his focus on the gospel call to serve “the least of these.”
And-a-one, and-a-two, and-a-on-your-toes, ladies!
Our faith calls us to put first the needs of our brothers and sisters who suffer in poverty, and Catholics are justly proud of our network of schools, hospitals and social service ministries that work every day to help the poor and vulnerable.
Correction: Our faith calls us to put first our duty toward Almighty God and His Divine Law. Remember Him?
If you’re looking for evidence of a “Francis Effect,” here you go. Remember, this isn’t your great granddaddy’s Church, this is the Bergoglian Church, an institution whose most urgent problems are youth unemployment and the loneliness of the elderly.
You can read the rest of the editorial on the RNS site, but the gist of the archbishop’s appeal for an exemption is summed up as follows:
The mandate went into effect on Jan. 1; ministries now are faced with the choice of violating our deeply held beliefs or paying crippling fines … If these ministries don’t comply, the financial penalties may mean that some may have to close their doors. As that happens, the poor and those who serve them will be hurt the most.
So, you see, the problem with the HHS mandate isn’t that it violates the Divine Law to which every human being is beholden, thereby jeopardizing the salvation of souls; no, the real issue is that it just might stand in the way of the Church’s ability to meet the temporal needs of the poor.
Now, don’t get me wrong, corporal works of mercy are important, but according to the priorities on display here, wherein spiritual works of mercy don’t even merit a passing mention, the plea of Archbishop Kurtz can essentially be reduced to:
“Thumb your nose at Christ the King, ignore the Divine Law, and undermine the eternal salvation of an entire nation, Mr. President, but whatever you do, please give us the freedom to see to it that the poor go to Hell fat and happy!”
In fairness, the atrophic testicularitis that has turned the overwhelming majority of Catholic bishops into a bouquet of shrinking violets far too timid to even hint at objective moral truths in the face of godless civil authorities didn’t just arrive on the scene with Archbishop Kurtz and his brother bishop from the Diocese of Rome.
That said, the latter has done a magnificent job of creating an ideal environment for it to spread like H1N1 in a Piper Cub, and the former appears all-too-happy to play the pilot.
In November of 2012, shortly after the Second Coming of Obama was confirmed on Election Day, I wrote:
As difficult as it may be to accept, the anti-Christian oppressor and purveyor of evil extraordinaire, Barrack Hussein Obama, is precisely what the American people and the Church that has failed to properly form them deserves. Yes, deserves. And in that day when the degradation to which this president intends to enslave us becomes more than we can bear, the Lord will not answer our cries because justice demands otherwise. This, my friends, is the price that an entire nation has to pay for the failure of the Catholic Church in our day to faithfully perform its divinely-assigned duty.
I stand by that assessment today and urge Archbishop Kurtz and the USCCB to abandon all efforts to calculate any response to the Administration beyond, “We must obey God rather than man.”
Amen, Louie. How the church prays so goes the world. We did not get this way over-night. Everything comes from the top down, not the bottom. If there is an excellent principal of a school, the school will be tops. If the pope is holy, the church is holy, the laity are holy and the world will become holy and convert. When the angelic doctor, St Thomas Aquinas was thrown out, the devil stepped in and has never left. His stronghold continues and there WILL be a remnant!
And now for something completely different, …pray for the Friars.
http://pray4thefriars.wordpress.com/
Please support the Franciscan Friars of the Immaculate in their hour of need. If we don’t help the FFI during this Great Persecution by the modernists, we should not expect anyone to help us when the Volpi come for us.
The Poles have a famous saying that goes something along the lines of ” For their freedom and ours”.
Every little rosary helps.
PS And remember, God really likes those that are said in Latin, are rote prayers and the rosaries are counted. 😉
It’s a different religion. It’s there for all to see and hear.
Unfortunately, you are correct, Louie.
But there is a simple way to express what you have eloquently written. It is this: we have gone from the Church Militant to the church wimp.
The answer why is easy and obvious.
The Church hierarchy has disobeyed the Command of their Queen, first in disregarding Her Fatima request and second, by disregarding Her request as Our Lady of America (and watch out for those who have hijacked this devotion using calumny against the very nun who held the visionary Sister Millie in her arms when she died in 2000).
That is the reason we have a man like Obama in the White House and in the face of the Church. And that is why we have American Catholics like Kerry, Pelosi, etc.
We have told Our Lady of America there is no room for Her at the inn, which, in reality, keeps Her Son out of our society as well and He is none too happy with us either. He has given us, through the democratic-minded American cardinals, what we deserve as the church wimp: the wimpiest pope-wanna-be in the history of the world. It’s going to get worse — and soon (just look at what the Church of England is doing to the Baptism rite for an upcoming hint at what we will see in our wimpy church in the near future).
Obama is said to admire Francis. Perhaps the Archbishop could have used this quote to defend the Church’s rights:
“On this point,” Pope Francis said, “there is no shadow of a doubt. A battle exists, a battle in which the eternal salvation of us all is at stake”. There are no alternatives, he said, even if at times we hear about “pastoral proposals” that seem more accommodating. “No! Either you are with Jesus or you are against him”.
Pope Francis, Morning Meditation, Domus Sanctae Marthae, 0ctober 11, 2013
Then again, the President could reply along the lines of his Italian counterpart one month later:
“We have been struck by the absence of all dogmatism, the distancing from positions ‘not touched by a margin of uncertainty,’ the call to leave ‘room for doubt’ characteristic of the ‘great leaders of the people of God,'” Napolitano said, quoting the Pope’s words from an interview with a Jesuit confrere published in September.
Reported in The Catholic Herald, November 14, 2013
Excellent commentary re Pope Francis’ 10 most erroneous and damaging statements on: http://www.defeatmodernism.com
The Francis effect is in full swing. God help us!
“The mandate went into effect on Jan. 1; ministries now are faced with the choice of violating our deeply held beliefs or paying crippling fines … If these ministries don’t comply, the financial penalties may mean that some may have to close their doors. As that happens, the poor and those who serve them will be hurt the most.”
________________________________
This is a clear example of pragmatism on the part of the USCCB. By shifting the emphasis from our 1st Amendment Rights (rights which are no longer plainly evident to the current administration and society, at large) to that of helping the poor (an emphasis shared by the current administration, their supporters, and all people of good will), the bishops hope to gain more traction in their fight to preserve the freedom of conscience of their Catholic institutions.
This is to be expected since clear preaching on the evil of contraception and the rights of the state to worship God according to the morals he has divinely-established have not been heard from Catholic episcopal leaders since around 1964. When this clear expository preaching of episcopal leadership is lacking, pragmatism is all you have left.
Nevertheless, this new form of pragmatism has the added disadvantage of subtly altering the hierarchy of morals enunciated by Pope John Paul II. No longer is abortion the “first” moral concern of the Church. Rather, helping the poor is first in the new hierarchy of morals enunciated by Pope Francis and gradually being reflected in the episcopal conferences of the world (at least the one’s who retain some tangible communion with Rome).
“Napolitano, 88, praised the Pope’s “conception of the church and the faith,” which he said had impressed all Italians, “believers and nonbelievers.”
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“We have been struck by the absence of all dogmatism, the distancing from positions ‘not touched by a margin of uncertainty,’ the call to leave ‘room for doubt’ characteristic of the ‘great leaders of the people of God,’” Napolitano said, quoting the Pope’s words from an interview with a Jesuit confrere published in September.”
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## In context, that quotation is still ambiguous. There is a duty to be immovably certain about dogmas – they are not negotiable. There is room for doubt when there is room for a variety of views – as when the best way to achieve an end in not certain, or when a theological idea needs to be hammered out.
For instance, the Assumption is a fact – whether Our Lady died or not, is not clear, so there ample room for discussion. Discussion is not a bad thing – far from it; but it is out of place when there is no doubt whether something is true or not. So, the immorality of murder is beyond doubt – whether a specific act counts as murder, OTOH, is not always clear; which is why there is a science of moral theology.
IMHO, some at least of what the Pope has said can be taken in an innocent and orthodox sense, and the assumption – which to some extent can be tested – should be that he intends that sense, rather than a bad one. I think this is merciful to the Pope, and allows one to avoid assuming the worst; there is a danger of criticising the Pope out of sheer habit, and I for one really don’t want to get stuck in that frame of mind.
I just wish that he didn’t say & do things that need to be explained, because with so much need for explanation it can look horribly as though stuff is being explained away – a very different thing. I think that finding reasons to support an idea that one finds problematic is a good experiment. That probably sounds terribly “wimpy” – but there is a saying “Let the other side be heard”; the Pope’s not here to explain his words, so, it’s worth trying to see his words & acts from his POV, if one can. In fairness to the Pope, ISTM he deserves at least that. There is always the possibility that an unwelcome idea or emphasis is one that needs to be heeded.
None of that is a reason for denying any dogmas or other Traditional teaching – it just seems a good idea to ask oneself whether he is always as wrong as he can seem to be. And he is the Pope – Catholics should pray for the Pope, and avoid opposing the Pope when there is no sufficient reason to. Not only he is the Pope, but Divine Providence has chosen him to be Pope – there are lots of reasons that entitle him to be prayed for. Who knows, if we pray for the Pope, we might get the sort of Pope that a Pope ought to be. If we Traditional Catholics prayed more, we might be more united – one of our great weaknesses is the number of splits among us. Charity can help us to overcome those.
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“Our faith calls us to put first the needs of our brothers and sisters who suffer in poverty, and Catholics are justly proud of our network of schools, hospitals and social service ministries that work every day to help the poor and vulnerable.
Correction: Our faith calls us to put first our duty toward Almighty God and His Divine Law. Remember Him?”
## This inversion of priorities is a really dangerous development 🙁 Contrary to the saying that “Some people are so Heavenly-minded that they are no earthly good”, Christians *need* to be Heavenly-minded, if they are to be any earthly good at all. It is possible – but not at all clear, sad to say – that “first” means, not before even God & our duties to Him (which is the most obvious interpretation of the words), but, first, among earthly priorities. I hope that was what Abp. Kurtz meant, but the context does not make clear that he did, to put it no more strongly 🙁 Preaching the Kingdom of God is not much use, if the God Whose Kingdom is being preached is treated as less important than His Kingdom.
@steve:
“It’s going to get worse — and soon (just look at what the Church of England is doing to the Baptism rite for an upcoming hint at what we will see in our wimpy church in the near future).”
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## That sounds bad 🙁 – have you a link ? Thanks 🙂
“The Faith has become a fluid concept, charity a kind of universal solidarity, and hope is, above all, hope for a better world.”……Archbp. Lefebvre
Jimmy:
http://wdtprs.com/blog/2014/01/church-of-england-to-dump-sin-and-devil-from-baptism-rite/
@S.Armaticus: I saw that site today. Indeed a worthy call to prayer for the Friars. I just wanted to mention that I happened to be reading the site’s “About” page and find that the author apparently believes that the persecution is coming entirely from Fr. Volpi and that good Pope Francis is entirely unaware of the situation. He prays that someone will make the Pope aware of these draconian measures that Fr. Volpi is carrying out, and will intervene. Head in the sand just a tad?
thanks for the link Catholic militant:
this one: http://defeatmodernism.com/defeatmodernism/martinsspx
‘there is a large body of highly placed clergy beginning with Cardinals and down to monsinger any exercise of petrine authority obsoleces and falls into destitute…the pope no longer exercises Papal authority…’
Elisabeth,
Not quite “head in sand”.
I think everyone “suspects” (ok, they know) that Francis is behind this, but to accuse Francis directly without proof (in the absence of his admission) is “bad form”. So the way the game is played is to suggest that Francis knows nothing about this. The perpetrators in turn, are actually bad people doing things behind the popes back, and if only Francis knew, he would surely put a stop to it.
Remember, in Roman circles, “form” is everything and “substance” is a treated as an industrial byproduct.
Mundabor has a great piece about the “importance of what is not said” here:
http://mundabor.wordpress.com/2014/01/07/what-socci-does-not-say/ He is a good reference since being Italian, he does a good job in explaining the Roman mindset.
the mundabor take is brilliant. just when you think confusion is the only road…a voice of commonsense rising above Frankenstein’s Monster Apologetics Inc.
the manipulation is unbelievable. But then those who have no fear of God, are just the nicest people, because they have nothing to fear, but fear itself.
And the ‘Smileys’ dance……’the dance of ‘love’ in the spirit of the church of ‘men’……. And-a-one, and-a-two, and-a-on-your-toes, ladies!
……UNLESS…… they miss the step and trip, falling flat on their ‘smiley faces’ bruised and ashamed……and turn their blind and bloody eyes to ‘Heaven’.
…..for those who will get up, shake off like an old tired dog, but proud…….. while still smiling they will continue their dance………as they will dance themselves straight into ‘perdition.’…….. And-a-one, and-a-two, and-a-on-your-toes, SATAN!
I’m a newbie know next to nothing. my mother was catholic but she decided all that was unnecessary. I’ve decided it is, yet my local NO doesn’t seem to concur. after confirmation the catechist sent a note, ‘you got your wish’…was this Congrats or a ‘poor soul? what is wrong with the Church?
Saluto, you seem to know more than a lot of ‘not-so-newbies’. There really is a 2000 year old Church that we can follow.
Mundabor’s take (S. Armaticus’ link) is abrasive but hilarious, along the lines of the above mentioned ‘atrophic testicularitis’. (I particularly liked that one. I’m a nurse and that looks like a real diagnosis, Louis!) Loved it…
Elizabeth, Mary K:
Here is Mundabor’s take on “if only the pope would know” storyline. And it is hilarious!
http://mundabor.wordpress.com/2014/01/08/caesar-biggus-dickus-and-the-fratres-immaculatae/#comment-11127
Enjoy.