LETTERS FROM THE VATICAN by Dr. Robert J.Monahan September 28, 2018 |
| Day #34Today is the 34th day since the publication of Archbishop Carlo Maria Vigano‘s Testimony. (The full text is here; it was made public on the evening of August 25.)Yesterday Vigano issued a new statement (link), dated September 29 (tomorrow), the Feast of St. Michael the Archangel. Some readers have written saying they are confused by that dating. It isconfusing; Vigano dated his letter tomorrow, but it appeared before it was dated, published yesterday on several websites. Vigano’s main point is that Canadian Cardinal Marc Ouellet, now the head of the Congregation for Bishops in Rome, can confirm (Vigano claims) that Pope Benedict issued sanctions in about 2009 or 2010 against then-Cardinal McCarrick. Vigano asks Ouellet to come forward and confirm the truth of this assertion, which was a central element in Vigano’s Testimony.Meanwhile, everyone is still waiting for an official response from the Vatican. The response was promised on September 10, 18 days ago (link). So it is evidently taking some time to get the response together. And there are all sorts of speculations on the internet about what it will contain, some saying the response will attack Vigano’s integrity, without addressing his charges, others saying no attack will be made on Vigano, but that his charges will be addressed, others saying the response will take some intermediary position between these two extremes. But up until now, no response.So what is now happening seems to be a sort of “pause” in the “crisis.” How did this crisis reach this pitch of intensity?The crisis was sparked by three events this summer: (1) the release on June 20 of the news that McCarrick had been “credibly accused” of molesting a minor during Christmastime in 1971, in St. Patrick’s Cathedral in New York, 47 years ago, when McCarrick, now 88, was about 41, and the alleged victim, now 62, was 16 and 17 (link, linkand link); the charges were evidently made in late 2017 (“several months ago,” the archdiocese said); it has not been fully explained why the charges were made after 46 or 47 years, or how the charges were evaluated, or why the judgment was made public on June 20 by the New York archdiocese; after the judgment was made public, McCarrick at first said he had no recollection of the event, then resigned as a cardinal, then the Pope, dramatically, removed him from the College of Cardinal; (2) the release on August 14 of the Pennsylvania grand jury report on clerical sexual abuse in Pennsylvania (link);(3) the release on the night of August 25 of Vigano’s testimony, in which he alleged that he had told Pope Francis about McCarrick’s serial sexual molestation of seminarians on June 23, 2013, but that Francis had not done anything to sanction McCarrick for five years, until this summer.This summary necessarily condenses the history of this past summer. A fuller account would detail how the single June 20 charge that led to McCarrick’s downfall was accompanied during late June and all of Julyby other reports, including that he had molested seminarians over many years. And the August 14 grand jury report was given massive coverageon the main television channels and media outlets in the US. So the abuse scandal was covered day after day, week after week, creating an ever-greater sense of outrage. Thus, when Vigano released his Testimony, tracing the lack of oversight all the way to the very top of the hierarchy, many Catholics were fully prepared to say, “Ok, to put an end to these scandals, let’s hope the process will be reversed, and from the top down, there will be a cleansing, so that children will be protected, and the scandals ended, and the honor of the Church restored.”So this has been a more than three-month period in which the psychological pressure on American Catholics — and especially on the clergy and hierarchy — has been ratcheted up almost daily.And now there has been a moment of pause.But nothing has been resolved.And there is a sense that a whole series of inter-connected issues must be addressed:(1) the issue of clerical abuse, first of all;(2) the issue of the coverup of such abuse, even more scandalous than the abuse itself;(3) the larger issue of Pope Francis and his government of the Church — first regarding action on the sexual abuse crisis, and its coverup, but also regarding his action, or lack of action, on many other matters — for, especially since Vigano’s August 25 Testimony, the issue of Francis and his government of the Church has taken center stage;(4) the still larger issue of the general apostasy from the faith in our generation, first, perhaps (since Dr. Alfred Kinsey (link) in the 1940s, the invention of The Pill in the 1950s and the Sexual Revolution of the 1960s) on matters of sexual morality, but then also on central dogmatic teachings of the faith itself, from the divinity of Christ, to His Real Presence in the Eucharist, to the existence of the soul, or of such destinations for the soul as heaven, or hell, to the very existence of God, and even to the judgment that any action or thought at all is “good” or “evil,” as the “dictatorship of relativism” warned about by Benedict has spread its influence and strengthened its authority, and our culture increasingly accepts the teaching that no action can be judged right, or wrong.==== |
ABYSSUS ABYSSUM INVOCAT / DEEP CALLS TO DEEP 
I apologize for a slight mix up. The Akita video in the link below is the one I have watched and which impressed/touched me so deeply.
They are both videos on Akita but I have only watched the very first part of the one posted in the link above. After checking the link to be sure it worked I realized it was not the video I had watched.
I can’t be certain about the quality of the first one but this is the one that I watched and it includes the address for the Contemplative Eucharistic order of the Japanese sisters.
Feel free to edit anything Bishop Gracida (as if you need my permission)!
I posted a link to the Akita apparitions and prophecies in response to this second letter by 🎚️🎚️Vigano on Lifesite news.
I searched it out after reading the letter, as I had never heard the entire story or seen the video on the site set up for The Japanese sisters. Here is the link for anyone who has not seen it; (I now believe the entire Fatima secret has been revealed in spite of all the resistance and foot dragging (for whatever reasons).
My heart breaks For Archbishop Vigano. We need to pray for him. What courage! What are we to think of Francis! I’m confused ,Pope Benedict XVI was such a Man Of God.
I still look to Pope Benedict XVI as the Pope! I will pray for Francis. GOD must be keeping Pope Benedict XVI alive, I believe he is the Pope in Saint Catherine Emmerich’s vision!
Dear Bishop, Another deviation from Catholic teaching is the label of death on someone with a beating heart and circulation. Were the leaders of the Church so distracted that cutting out the beating heart from such person could not be recognized as killing ? Paul A. Byrne, M.D.
http://www.lifeguardianfoundation.org
>