The ‘After Trump’ Era Begins

Expect the media and government to suddenly resent any mention of pushback against a sitting president.

BY:  VICTOR DAVIS HANSON

January 27, 2021

(emphasis added)

The new AT age — “After Trump” — began on either Election Day, Nov. 3, or on Inauguration Day, Jan. 20. But either way, reality as we had known it for four years has been abruptly reinvented.
Pfizer had hinted that a vaccine could be ready in late October. Then, mysteriously, it wasn’t. Then, stranger still, it appeared — a few days after Election Day.
Suddenly, after Joe Biden’s inauguration, Illinois, Michigan, and other blue states eased some of their lockdown restrictions to get their economies back on track despite little change in COVID-19 rates.
During the Trump Age, the president was supposedly responsible for every death from COVID-19. Now, the media reports that career scientists and health administrators in the federal government, especially at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, were largely to blame for past slow testing, and were tardy and lax in apprising the nation of the infectious threat.
The Biden campaign’s widely reported promises of a new, superior COVID-19 plan turned out to be more of the same old, same old from the Trump Age.
Biden did mandate the wearing of masks on all federal property. But he then immediately undermined his own order during the first few hours on the job by going mask-less during a photo op at the Lincoln Memorial.
Stranger still, President Biden announced during his first few hours in office: “There’s nothing we can do to change the trajectory of the pandemic in the next several months.”
For the first time, we now learn that there is “nothing” Biden can do about COVID-19?
Despite millions of vaccine doses being produced when he entered office, Biden went on to warn that many more Americans will die in the next few months — more than 600,000 COVID-19 fatalities in total. The watchdog media just shrugged.
Coincidentally, after weeks of disastrous state incompetence in getting residents vaccinated, Amazon has told the new administration that it will lend its infrastructure and organization to speed up vaccinations. If Amazon could announce that in late January, why not weeks earlier?
Speaking of Amazon, it is opposing mail-in ballots for its own employees voting on whether to unionize a warehouse in Alabama. Amazon says it’s worried about fraud. Yet Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos also owns the Washington Post, which ridiculed those who were concerned about massive mail-in voting in the 2020 election.
Coincidently, with the inauguration of a new president, “nonpartisan” COVID-19 czar Anthony Fauci*, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, now suddenly accuses his former boss, Donald Trump, of ignoring his wise counsel.
But for all of 2020, Fauci had been a master of the “noble lie” — the Platonic idea that government elites should deliberately misinform the supposedly less intelligent people for their own good.
Fauci gave conflicting assessments on mask-wearing, on the percentages needed to achieve herd immunity, and on the impossibility of the virus having originated in a Wuhan laboratory. He claimed that he offered false or unproven narratives to avoid panic, or to encourage Americans to follow his correct policies.
In the new age, expect the media and government to suddenly resent any mention of pushback against a sitting president. Questions about the Biden family’s past multimillion-dollar influence-peddling overseas or Biden’s cognitive ability can no longer be asked.
If the Republicans win the House of Representatives in 2022 and follow the new Democratic model of impeaching a first-term president without a special counsel report, it will be called a national disgrace.
Even worse, we will be told, would be the reckless mention of the 25th Amendment. The very suggestion of removing an elected president due to supposed cognitive challenges will become abhorrent.
For that matter, so too would be the appointment of any special counsel. Why waste two years, $35 million, and dozens of lawyers to harass a sitting president with unfounded charges of Ukrainian or Chinese “collusion”?
In our brave new world, we will hear no more retired military officers weighing in on the “fascism” of the commander in chief.
None will compare the recurring violence of antifa or Black Lives Matter to that of Islamic terrorists. None will compare Biden, who dismissed antifa as a mere “idea,” to Mussolini or the Nazis. Any retired officer who smears the president, we will be reminded, would violate the Uniform Code of Military Justice.
The media, Silicon Valley, Wall Street, Hollywood, top retired military brass, corporate America, universities, and professional sports are all recalibrating the truth for our Year One.
In about a month, they will have it down. And soon, we won’t even be able to tell the old reality from the new.
*At well over $400,000, the highest paid federal employee

Mini-Feature: Can We Fathom the Depths of Reality?

The American Mind Is it possible for a human to fathom the true depths of reality and existence? Yes, in the manner we might explore the ocean, or space—but now I have to go back to tweeting.-Matthew Peterson, founding editor of The American MindCan mere mortals comprehend the whole? Even if granted Methuselah-level longevity? Even under the “best” circumstances, that is, those somehow perfectly optimized for plumbing the ultimate nature of everything down to the very last grain of truth?You can guess from my choosing to ask these questions this way that I don’t suppose there is much of a choice in confronting them and answering in the negative. Yet people will surely try. Why? Out of a sense of duty? An excess of pride? As a gamble against God? As a desperate effort to become one with God? To supplant God? To become one of a race of gods?Or because the whole of what we mere mortals can know and become one with concerning the whole is, in fact, accessible to us already? If so—and here I think yes, it is so—the temptation will always exist to become more specific, more comprehensive, more explicit about it, a temptation even among the “best” at inhabiting this knowledge through the heart.It is a temptation that grows stronger as the digital medium works us all over to become more certain that the explicit recordation of all things is the only sufficiently sacred language.Then again, just this pressure elicits the opposite reaction: one of recognition that being human is different, more, and better than being machine, and that it is our holy language the machines must be made to learn and hold sacred. It is easy to see a sort of intellectual arms race to make explicit all that the bots must be catechized into.But this is to exclude what the explicit can never capture about the whole, which is its most sacred implicitude—the mystery which can never be laid bare, not by any language of man or machine. Without preserving the sacredness of the implicit in the relation of ourselves and our machines with the whole, we will dissolve our bonds with our knowledge by heart of the whole, and then our bonds with the whole itself. Such disenchantment will make of our machines dark new gods, masters not of a whole but a void.-James Poulos, executive editor of The American MindNo one can see my face and live.-David Bahr, managing editor of The American MindShare American MindsetI stress often in this venue that eye has not seen nor ear heard the final truths which God has in store. It is necessarily so. The mind, which is part of creation, cannot by its nature be equipped to grasp or view head-on the reality which lies “outside” creation and “before” it. These clumsy prepositions and figures of speech, in their complete inadequacy to express the real relation of infinity to time, illustrate my point. But when Paul says that we see through a glass darkly, I suspect he is describing the way in which those core truths beyond our sight can be reflected, or analogized, or expressed, in all sorts of philosophical ideas, moral lessons, and most of all direct experiences. To make itself known to us, truth must translate itself into our languages—those of speech, of imagination, of relationship.  Hence in his burning desire to connect with us the Godhead—sacred mystery—has distilled the whole of himself into a human person. This makes it possible for us to know, in our own sphere and at our own level, the whole of a truth which in its essence is beyond us. The kind of “knowing” we must do is expressed in French by connaître rather than by savoir: we must not try and grasp him intellectually like a fact, but to grow intimate with him as with a friend. It is rightly and literally said, then, that when at last we know reality, we will know it face-to-face. -Spencer Klavan, associate editor of The American Mind1

• POLITICS

Here’s The Full List Of Every Lie Joe Biden Has Told As President

By The Federalist Staff

JANUARY 22, 2021

As President Joe Biden assumes the Oval Office, The Federalist will continue its rigorous coverage of the new White House, keeping the administration accountable with substantive fact-checking throughout Biden’s tenure.

Biden Said He ‘Misspoke’ When Claiming US Would Reach Only 100 Million Vaccines in 100 Days

Biden said during a Jan. 25 press conference he “misspoke” when claiming the United States would reach only 100 million coronavirus vaccine shots given out within the administration’s first 100 days, a pace reached by the Trump administration. Biden then emphasized a hope of reaching 150 million instead.

The White House COVID-19 Response Team tweeted two days later, however, that the Biden administration’s goal of 100 million doses in 100 days hasn’t changed.https://platform.twitter.com/embed/index.html?creatorScreenName=FDRLST&dnt=true&embedId=twitter-widget-0&frame=false&hideCard=false&hideThread=false&id=1354482749512548355&lang=en&origin=https%3A%2F%2Fthefederalist.com%2F2021%2F01%2F22%2Fheres-the-full-list-of-every-lie-joe-biden-has-told-as-president%2F&siteScreenName=FDRLST&theme=light&widgetsVersion=ed20a2b%3A1601588405575&width=550px

Biden Trashed Trump’s China Travel Ban as Xenophobic Before Signing His Own

When Trump implemented a travel ban on China in the early days of the coronavirus pandemic, then-candidate Biden railed against the executive action as “xenophobic,” claiming such restrictions do not work.

Less than a year later, Biden has implemented his own travel bans on South Africa, Brazil, Great Britain, and 26 other European countries in the second week of his presidency.https://platform.twitter.com/embed/index.html?creatorScreenName=FDRLST&dnt=true&embedId=twitter-widget-1&frame=false&hideCard=false&hideThread=false&id=1353786063337250816&lang=en&origin=https%3A%2F%2Fthefederalist.com%2F2021%2F01%2F22%2Fheres-the-full-list-of-every-lie-joe-biden-has-told-as-president%2F&siteScreenName=FDRLST&theme=light&widgetsVersion=ed20a2b%3A1601588405575&width=550px

Biden Team: Trump Vaccination Plan ‘Worse Than We Could Have Imagined’

After Biden staffers lied, telling CNN there was “nothing for us to rework” in terms of a vaccination distribution plan, White House press secretary Jen Psaki admitted at the podium during a Jan. 25 briefing that there was a plan — they just won’t give credit. Psaki told reporters the plan from the Trump White House was “much worse than we could have imagined.”https://platform.twitter.com/embed/index.html?creatorScreenName=FDRLST&dnt=true&embedId=twitter-widget-2&frame=false&hideCard=false&hideThread=false&id=1353772850369474560&lang=en&origin=https%3A%2F%2Fthefederalist.com%2F2021%2F01%2F22%2Fheres-the-full-list-of-every-lie-joe-biden-has-told-as-president%2F&siteScreenName=FDRLST&theme=light&widgetsVersion=ed20a2b%3A1601588405575&width=550px

The plan inherited by the Biden White House, however, has already put the new administration on a trajectory to reach its goal of getting 100 million people vaccinated within its first 100 days.

Below is the chart outline for the distribution process under Operation Warp Speed, which produced not one, but two coronavirus vaccines in record time.

Biden Warns Pandemic Will Worsen After Pledging to Shut Down Virus

Biden spent the entire campaign last year running on a platform to shut down the novel coronavirus, only to back away from the signature pledge on day three of his White House tenure with a bold admission.

“There’s nothing we can do to change the trajectory of the pandemic in the next several months,” Biden said on Jan. 22.https://platform.twitter.com/embed/index.html?creatorScreenName=FDRLST&dnt=true&embedId=twitter-widget-3&frame=false&hideCard=false&hideThread=false&id=1352739201016606720&lang=en&origin=https%3A%2F%2Fthefederalist.com%2F2021%2F01%2F22%2Fheres-the-full-list-of-every-lie-joe-biden-has-told-as-president%2F&siteScreenName=FDRLST&theme=light&widgetsVersion=ed20a2b%3A1601588405575&width=550px

Not only did Biden’s official campaign promise acknowledge that “the trajectory of COVID-19 in America is headed in the wrong direction” and that his administration would be the solution, but Biden also pledged numerous times to “immediately put in place a national strategy that will position our country to finally get ahead of this virus and get back our lives.”

Biden Claims Federal Government Never Acted with Urgency to Combat Pandemic

Joe Biden claimed the federal government failed to “act with the urgency” that was necessary to combat the coronavirus pandemic, apparently neglecting to mention the Trump White House’s Operation Warp Speed that produced two viable coronavirus vaccines by the year’s end.

Texas Republican Sen. John Cornyn also pointed out that Congress passed trillions in stimulus, providing funds for pandemic efforts and economic recovery.https://platform.twitter.com/embed/index.html?creatorScreenName=FDRLST&dnt=true&embedId=twitter-widget-4&frame=false&hideCard=false&hideThread=false&id=1352590580321284101&lang=en&origin=https%3A%2F%2Fthefederalist.com%2F2021%2F01%2F22%2Fheres-the-full-list-of-every-lie-joe-biden-has-told-as-president%2F&siteScreenName=FDRLST&theme=light&widgetsVersion=ed20a2b%3A1601588405575&width=550px

Biden Team Tells CNN Trump Offered No Plan for Vaccine Distribution

Sources within the Biden administration told CNN they inherited no vaccine distribution plan from the previous White House.

“There is nothing for us to rework. We are going to have to build everything from scratch,” one source reportedly told CNN’s MJ Lee, except there was, as outlined in Trump’s Operation Warp Speed, included below.https://platform.twitter.com/embed/index.html?creatorScreenName=FDRLST&dnt=true&embedId=twitter-widget-5&frame=false&hideCard=false&hideThread=false&id=1352226560112254977&lang=en&origin=https%3A%2F%2Fthefederalist.com%2F2021%2F01%2F22%2Fheres-the-full-list-of-every-lie-joe-biden-has-told-as-president%2F&siteScreenName=FDRLST&theme=light&widgetsVersion=ed20a2b%3A1601588405575&width=550px

The Biden team’s statements were also contradicted by the National Institutes of Health Director Dr. Anthony Fauci the same afternoon.

“We’re certainly not starting from scratch, because there is activity going on in the distribution,” Fauci told reporters.

Biden White House Claims Elites ‘Celebrating’ Is Exception to Mask Edict

White House spokeswoman Jen Psaki justified Biden’s decision with his family to forgo face masks at the Lincoln Memorial after signing an executive order requiring them on all federal lands.

“He was celebrating a historic day in our country. … We have bigger things to worry about,” said Psaki, whose dismissal of the face mask as an insignificant issue was contradicted by the White House edict passed hours earlier.https://platform.twitter.com/embed/index.html?creatorScreenName=FDRLST&dnt=true&embedId=twitter-widget-6&frame=false&hideCard=false&hideThread=false&id=1352374482753658880&lang=en&origin=https%3A%2F%2Fthefederalist.com%2F2021%2F01%2F22%2Fheres-the-full-list-of-every-lie-joe-biden-has-told-as-president%2F&siteScreenName=FDRLST&theme=light&widgetsVersion=ed20a2b%3A1601588405575&width=550px

Though Biden has received both shots of the Pfizer coronavirus vaccine, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention guidelines stipulate that vaccinated people are to continue wearing face masks, citing a lack of research showing whether those vaccinated can still spread the virus. While Biden likely did not need to wear a face mask, considering he was outside and adequately distanced from others, the absence of a mask flies in the face of Biden’s executive order, in which “celebrating” is not listed as an exception.

Biden Falsely Claims ‘All’ Media Smeared Vaccine Plan as ‘Impossible’

Joe Biden defended his administration’s goal to vaccinate 100 million Americans within his first 100 days in office after a reporter questioned whether the target was too modest.

“When I announced it, you all said it wasn’t possible. C’mon. Gimme a break, man,” Biden snapped.https://platform.twitter.com/embed/index.html?creatorScreenName=FDRLST&dnt=true&embedId=twitter-widget-7&frame=false&hideCard=false&hideThread=false&id=1352349221161197568&lang=en&origin=https%3A%2F%2Fthefederalist.com%2F2021%2F01%2F22%2Fheres-the-full-list-of-every-lie-joe-biden-has-told-as-president%2F&siteScreenName=FDRLST&theme=light&widgetsVersion=ed20a2b%3A1601588405575&width=550px

While few articles at major publications have voiced some skepticism, they remained rare, undermining Biden’s claim that “all” media had been overwhelmingly pessimistic of the Biden administration reaching the 100 million mark by the end of April.

Biden Vows to Be Unity President After Smearing GOP Sens. as Nazis

Biden launched his first term as commander-in-chief by branding himself as the unifier-in-chief while aggressively pursuing a partisan progressive agenda promoting left-wing ideas of “social justice” after smearing two Republican senators as Nazi collaborators.

“To all those who did not support us, let me say this: Hear me out as we move forward. Take a measure of me and my heart,” Biden pleaded with the American people.

Less than two weeks prior, however, the “unity” president smeared Republican Sens. Josh Hawley of Missouri and Ted Cruz of Texas as Nazis.

THE CATHOLIC MONITOR

SEARCH

Flashback: Catholic “Pope Benedict Rebuked Pelosi, Told Her Catholic Legislators Obligated to Protect Life: No Pelosi/Pope photos permitted” 

January 26, 2021

2009 Flashback:

By John-Henry Westen

VATICAN CITY, February 18, 2009 (LifeSiteNews.com) – The Vatican Press Office released a note this morning detailing part of the conversation which Pope Benedict XVI had with Nancy Pelosi, the Speaker of the House of Representatives. Pelosi also released a statement on the meeting, which ignored the one and only crucial issue mentioned in the Vatican note. WHile Pelosi presented the meeting as a fully positive encounter, the Vatican indicated the Pope reminded her of the requirement of Catholic politicians to defend life. Also, contrary to normal protocols for such meetings with dignitaries, no photos of Pelosi with the Pope have been released.

The Vatican note reads: “His Holiness took the opportunity to speak of the requirements of the natural moral law and the Church’s consistent teaching on the dignity of human life from conception to natural death which enjoin all Catholics, and especially legislators, jurists and those responsible for the common good of society, to work in cooperation with all men and women of good will in creating a just system of laws capable of protecting human life at all stages of its development… “

… Pelosi’s positive spin on the meeting is not being swallowed even by left-leaning Papal watchers. Vatican correspondent John Allen, who writes for the National Catholic Reporter, noted that “routine Vatican declarations after diplomatic meetings also generally sum up the range of issues discussed rather than concentrating on a particular point. In that sense, the statement can only be read as a rejection of Pelosi’s statements last summer, and, in general, of her argument that it’s acceptable for Catholics in public life to take a pro-choice position.”

Allen also noted that “by issuing an unusual public statement after the session with Pelosi — which insisted that all Catholics, including legislators, are obliged to work for the defense of human life from conception to natural death — the pope also made clear there will no let-up in the pressure on pro-choice Catholic politicians to change their ways.”

Many pro-life organizations from the US and Canada expressed their serious concerns to the Holy See that Mrs. Pelosi was going to be received by the Holy Father. Some of these organizations sent to different Vatican authorities comprehensive memoranda in which they showed in a detailed and precise way the anti-life statements and the pro-death voting record of Mrs. Pelosi. 

Catholic sources in Rome, who asked to remain anonymous, said they were “very much encouraged by this statement,” saying that it shows that the “Holy Father is ready to stand up with courage to politicians that claim they are Catholics but their voting record denies those hypocritical assertions.”

Francis Notes:

– Doctor of the Church St. Francis de Sales totally confirmed beyond any doubt the possibility of a heretical pope and what must be done by the Church in such a situation:

“[T]he Pope… WHEN he is EXPLICITLY a heretic, he falls ipso facto from his dignity and out of the Church, and the Church MUST either deprive him, or, as some say, declare him deprived, of his Apostolic See.”
(The Catholic Controversy, by St. Francis de Sales, Pages 305-306)

Saint Robert Bellarmine, also, said “the Pope heretic is not deposed ipso facto, but must be declared deposed by the Church.”
[https://archive.org/stream/SilveiraImplicationsOfNewMissaeAndHereticPopes/Silveira%20Implications%20of%20New%20Missae%20and%20Heretic%20Popes_djvu.txt]

– “If Francis is a Heretic, What should Canonically happen to him?”: http://www.thecatholicmonitor.com/2020/12/if-francis-is-heretic-what-should.html

– “Could Francis be a Antipope even though the Majority of Cardinals claim he is Pope?”: http://www.thecatholicmonitor.com/2019/03/could-francis-be-antipope-even-though.html

 –  LifeSiteNews, “Confusion explodes as Pope Francis throws magisterial weight behind communion for adulterers,” December 4, 2017:

The AAS guidelines explicitly allows “sexually active adulterous couples facing ‘complex circumstances’ to ‘access the sacraments of Reconciliation and the Eucharist.'”

–  On February 2018, in Rorate Caeli, Catholic theologian Dr. John Lamont:

“The AAS statement… establishes that Pope Francis in Amoris Laetitia has affirmed propositions that are heretical in the strict sense.”

– On December 2, 2017, Bishop Rene Gracida:

“Francis’ heterodoxy is now official. He has published his letter to the Argentina bishops in Acta Apostlica Series making those letters magisterial documents.”

Pray an Our Father now for the restoration of the Church by the bishops by the grace of God.

Election Notes:  

– Intel Cryptanalyst-Mathematician on Biden Steal: “212Million Registered Voters & 66.2% Voting,140.344 M Voted…Trump got 74 M, that leaves only 66.344 M for Biden” [http://catholicmonitor.blogspot.com/2020/12/intel-cryptanalyst-mathematician-on.html?m=1]

– Will US be Venezuela?: Ex-CIA Official told Epoch Times “Chávez started to Focus on [Smartmatic] Voting Machines to Ensure Victory as early as 2003”: http://catholicmonitor.blogspot.com/2020/12/will-us-be-venezuela-ex-cia-official.html– Tucker Carlson’s Conservatism Inc. Biden Steal Betrayal is explained by “One of the Greatest Columns ever Written” according to Rush: http://catholicmonitor.blogspot.com/2021/01/tucker-carlsons-conservatism-inc-biden.html?m=1

Pray an Our Father now for the grace to know God’s Will and to do it.Pray an Our Father now for America. Pray an Our Father now for the restoration of the Church as well as the Triumph of the Kingdom of the Sacred Heart and the Immaculate Heart of Mary.

Father David R. Belland writes to Abyssum out of his deep felt concern and love for the Church.

He suggests that If Our Lord promised that “the gates of hell shall not prevail against it,” His Bride, He means it.  Yet, what if a man who claims to be a pope becomes a heretic or seemingly teaches heresy?  That question has been pondered down the ages, and to this day no absolute answer has really been provided.  In fact, for all the hypothetical scenarios concerning heresy, the possible solutions proposed by the learned theologians are just that: possible, but not in any way certain.  Michael Davies in his book, I Am with You Always: The Divine Constitution and Indefectibility of the Catholic Church, says the following: 

 Saint Robert was (in De Romano Pontifice Vol. II, chap. 30, p. 720), of course, discussing a theoretical possibility, and believed that a pope could not become an heretic and thus could not be deposed, but he also acknowledged that the more common opinion was that the pope could become an heretic, and he was thus willing to discuss what would need to be done if, per impossible, this should happen: ‘This opinion (that the Pope could not become an heretic) is probable and easily defended. . . . Nonetheless, in view of the fact that this is not certain, and that the common opinion is the opposite one, it is useful to examine the solution to this question, within the hypothesis that the Pope can be an heretic’ [De Romano Pontifice, Vol. II, chap.30, p.418].  The great Jesuit theologian, Francisco de Suarez (1548-1617) was also sure that God’s ‘sweet providence’ would never allow the one who could not teach error to fall into error, and that this was guaranteed by the promise Ego autem rogavi pro te… (Luke 22:32).  But, like Bellarmine, Suarez was willing to consider the possibility of an heretical pope as an hypothesis, particularly in view of the fact, he claimed, that several ‘general councils had admitted the hypothesis in question’ [De legibus, vol. IV, chap. 7, no. 10, p 361].  Saint Alphonsus Ligouri (1696-1787) did not believe that God would ever permit a Roman Pontiff to become a public or an occult (secret) heretic, even as a private person:  ‘We ought rightly to presume as Cardinal Bellarmine declared, that God will never let it happen that a Roman Pontiff, even as a private person, become a public heretic or an occult heretic’ [Dogmatic Works of St. Alphonsus Maria de Ligouri, Vol. VIII, p. 720].”[1] 

 [1] Michael Davies, I Am With You Always: The Divine Constitution and Indefectibility of the Catholic Church, New rev. ed. 1997, The Neumann Press, Long Prairie, Minnesota, 1997, pp. 44 – 4 )

 Certainly, God would not allow his Church to be left in the dust of doubt either with regard to Faith or with regard to Morals. Considering the reality of the situation in the Church today, therefore, one that is absolutely unparalleled, indeed exceptional, can one really look to the past for a solution, which no one has actually demonstrated to be absolutely workable for past crises, or to merely theoretical scenarios envisioned for the future?  Yet, those theoretical problems discussed in the past in no way even remotely approach the unprecedented reality here and now.  

The mind of Father David R. Belland resolutely balks at the idea. He asks: “Does it not seem more likely that the unprecedented reality of today demands an unprecedented concrete solution?  And can you guess what’s coming; yes, you’re right, Benedict is that unprecedented, yet concrete, solution that if looked into can be seen as that unquestionable protection of God.”

Perhaps a better way of stating the QUESTION is this.

A man who occupies the Chair of Peter is called the Pope.

A man who occupies the Chair of Peter seems to be a public heretic or occult heretic, yet it is not reasonable that God would ever permit a Roman Pontiff to become a public or an occult (secret) heretic, even as a private person: 

Ergo, such a man who occupies the Chair of Peter is not the Pope.

Elizabeth Wickham	1:49 PM (5 minutes ago)
to LifeTree, bcc: me

Parishes are suffering financially and spiritually.  So Quebec is locking the doors of parishes permanently.

Betty

On Wed, Jan 27, 2021 at 1:03 PM Randy Engel <rvte61@comcast.net> wrote:

• Jan 26, 2021

Home/News, International/As resources shrink, Quebec Archdiocese reorganizes parishes for outreach

As resources shrink, Quebec Archdiocese reorganizes parishes for outreach

Cardinal Gerald Lacroix of Quebec gestures as he speaks in a video message Jan. 19, 2021. As human and material resources diminish, the cardinal announced the archdiocese will reorganize to focus on reaching out to the population not currently reached by the church’s message. (CNS/screenshot YouTube)

By: Philippe Vaillancourt

Date: January 26, 2021

QUEBEC CITY (CNS) — The Archdiocese of Quebec announced its intention to reorganize its parishes to focus on local missionary activities. This move comes as human and material resources continue to diminish.

At least 75% of the parishes will be affected by this change, in both urban and rural areas.

In a video, Cardinal Gerald Lacroix stressed that the church of Quebec was born out of mission. But, he said, it is now clear that the parish system that had a strong impact on French Canadian society is not sustainable and needs to evolve.

“We can no longer be satisfied with giving good pastoral services to the people who faithfully participate in our assemblies and movements,” said Cardinal Lacroix. “These people now represent a tiny part of the population entrusted to us.”

Quebec Auxiliary Bishop Marc Pelchat added that in recent years, the life of the parishes has relied on teams that have carried out “almost everything” of the daily functioning, often focusing on “expected services.”

“We must now reorient our pastoral teams toward a more intensely missionary activity, turned toward the people and groups that we reach too little,” said Bishop Pelchat.

This call to go beyond the usual frameworks aims at “freeing energies” to better reach out to the population that is currently not reached by the church’s message.

Priests, deacons and laypeople must “envisage working to spread the Gospel message outside our usual frameworks,” with new means, in new territories, Cardinal Lacroix said.

Over the past decade, the number of parishes in the Archdiocese of Quebec decreased from 200 to 38. These 38 parishes were then organized into 29 large “pastoral units.”[WOW!] 

“For a long time now, the resources available have not allowed us to appoint pastors and other pastoral collaborators in sufficient numbers to meet the needs of all the communities,” confirmed Marie Chrétien, diocesan pastoral coordinator. “We now lack the resources to assign a pastoral team to each of these large units.”

From now on, the diocese will constitute expanded pastoral units, which will be articulated around new teams that will collaborate with people involved in the various areas.

The communications director of the Archdiocese of Quebec, Valérie Roberge-Dion, said that, in a first step, 22 of the 29 pastoral units will become 10 missionary units. Human resources will be shared, but no juridical grouping of parishes — a process that ended in 2019 for the Archdiocese of Quebec — is expected initially.

These changes will be made for the pastoral year that begins Aug. 1. In the meantime, the diocese intends to continue consultations to “clarify the roles and responsibilities of each one” and to determine according to which new financial and administrative agreements the parishes will continue to operate.

Cardinal Lacroix said he believes it will be necessary to get used to a “new face of the organization of the church.” He called on employees to welcome these changes and invited them to see how they can collaborate.

He also announced other changes anticipated for the church of Quebec. He raised the possibility that eucharistic celebrations could eventually be centered around “a few central churches.”

“The use of our places of worship and other buildings will have to be reevaluated, for the financial weight of these has increased and considerably restricts our ability to fulfill our essential mission,” he said. “The number of eucharistic celebrations will also have to be reviewed, because priests, far fewer in number than before, cannot limit themselves to multiplying sacramental celebrations while neglecting other forms of presence.”

He said he also expected the diocese will have fewer paid personnel and more volunteers.

– – –

Vaillancourt is editor of Presence info in Montreal.

tonym74	6:30 AM (6 hours ago)
to tonym74@protonmail.com

The Video below goes for 1 Hour but it is essential viewing!!!

Dear Bishops, I Have a Catechism and a Brain: Taking a Vaccine Tested Using Kidney Cells from Living Babies is Gravely Sinful!

Editor’s note: Biologist Pamela Acker discussed with John Henry Weston the use of live babies whose kidney cells were removed (without anesthesia) to test the Wuhan vaccines in the lab. The babies’ cells were not used in the vaccines, but were crucial to testing the vaccine. Hundreds of babies were likely harvested for the lab tests.  Watch the video which reveals the tremendous evil. Are you willing to cooperate? 

The unborn babies used for vaccine development were alive at tissue extr… LifeSiteNews.com Pamela Acker is a biologist and author of a recently released book on vaccinations.

Lise Baur, Les Femmes contributor, is not!

Dear Bishops, I have a Catechism (and a brain) and I am willing to use it!   by Lise Baur

Every faithful Catholic has a valid religious exemption to these immoral “vaccines” even if all the Bishops including the Holy Father accept the jab. I put the word vaccine in quotations because what is referred to as a vaccine is not really and truly a vaccine in the historical use of the word. A vaccine traditionally is something given to prevent that person from infection of a microorganism and if that same individual should have future contact with that microorganism then he could not transmit that microorganism to another. The same happens, by the way, when one catches a virus and then develops natural immunity.
I do not give a care as to what the Catholic Bishops opine about the mRNA injection currently available. That they encourage people to take the injection that has been made with or tested on aborted baby parts is simply evil and they were all taught this long ago in the seminary.

Today, I finally looked at the Catechism of the Catholic Church. The version I used was promulgated by Pope John Paul II and it is an older copy before any of the recent changes* were made. 

Paragraphs 2270 -2273 which fall under the section of the Fifth Commandment, “Thou shalt not kill.” (Exodus 20:13) deals with the grave moral evil of abortion. It is a mortal sin in all cases. There is no room for discussion on that statement. A mortal sin destroys the friendship between God, the Creator and his creature. If friendship is not restored then that soul will suffer a permanent separation from the Beatific Vision (heaven) for all eternity.

Paragraph 2289 deals with the subject of respect for health. It warns that respect for one’s body and attainment of health is not an absolute value. It rejects the “neo-pagan notion that tends to promote the cult of the body, to sacrifice everything for its sake… By its selective preference of the strong over the weak, such a conception can lead to the perversion of human relationships.” This means that we may not put the health of our own bodies above all else which can lead to use of other human beings, such as aborted babies, in a utilitarian manner to preserve our own life.

In paragraph 2296, the catechism explains about organ donation. The last two sentences are particularly important, 

It is not morally acceptable if the donor or his proxy has not given explicit consent. Moreover, it is not morally admissible directly to bring about the disabling mutilation or death of a human being even in order to delay the death of other persons.

Not only is abortion always a grave sin against God and humanity, the use of the body parts gained in that immoral act cannot be used to bring about the delay in the death of other persons. It cannot be clearer. These substances labeled “vaccines” use HEK 293 cell line. HEK stands for Human Embryonic Kidney. The only way to get human embryonic kidney cells (they must be living cells by the way) is to unjustly take them from a living human being in their embryonic stage of development aka abortion in the early part of pregnancy. 

We will all stand individually before the Just Judge for what we have done and what we have failed to do. I will not forfeit my eternal salvation to accept an injection tainted with the grave moral evil of pre-born baby murder even if it means my life ends earlier than expected. If the bishops want to throw away their chance at the Beatific Vision for a few extra moments on earth, let them, but I pray they realize before it is too late the folly of their position and the scandal it brings to those entrusted in their care. 

* FYI: Changes to the perennial teaching of Holy Mother Church are not valid because all the Church’s teachings come directly from our Blessed Lord. The Pope and all the Bishops can only offer enrichment through a deeper understanding of the teachings, they cannot change the teaching to mean something different.

THE CATHOLIC MONITOR

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Papal Scholars: “Bishops to Discern… Discretionary Judgment should be taken against Pope Francis… to either bring him to Repentance and Conversion, or ‘Judge and Convict’ him of Heresy”

January 27, 2021

Yesterday, on the Aka Catholic website, Catholic papal scholars, Robert Siscoe and John Salza, said “that the Church can convict a true Pope for heresy…  may God give the wisdom and courage to our Cardinals and bishops to discern whether the process that would lead to a discretionary judgment should be taken against Pope Francis the First, in order to either bring him to repentance and conversion, or ‘judge and convict’ him of heresy”:

We have demonstrated that [Doctor of the Church] St. Robert Bellarmine explicitly teaches that the Church can convict a true Pope for heresy, without violating the principle “The First See is judged by no one,” because it is a non-coercive judgment of the Church (which the bishops or Cardinals alone can legitimately make). As we demonstrate in the long version of this article, Bellarmine even gives historical examples of such a judgment being exercised with respect to the Pope (Liberius and Marcellinus). When the nature of the two judgments (discretionary/antecedent and coercive/consequent) are properly understood, Bellarmine’s position is easily reconciled with the principle that the First See is judged by no one, as we have demonstrated here and in True or False Pope? And yet the Sedevacantists have denied this teaching for many years, and even accused those who hold it of being heretics.

What this tells us is that Christ works with the Church to depose a Pope. He doesn’t do it secretly, since if that were true the immediate effect would be that the entire Church, which was subject to the Vicar of Christ one moment, would be subject to a false Pope the next; nor would God, “whose works are perfect,” (Deut. 32:4), have been so foolish as to establish His Church as a visible, juridical society, and then arrange things in such a way that the members of the hierarchy would automatically fall from office (be ipso factodeprived) due to the sin of heresy. On the contrary, in His Divine Wisdom, He arranged things so that there is no metaphysical incompatibility between the sin of heresy and acts of jurisdiction, since if there were, not only would it be impossible to know who is and who is not a true Pope or bishop, but the absolutions given by a priest who secretly denied a dogma would be invalid.  Both of these consequences would be contrary to the common good of the Church and to the salvation of souls.

To conclude, may God give the wisdom and courage to our Cardinals and bishops to discern whether the process that would lead to a discretionary judgment should be taken against Pope Francis the First, in order to either bring him to repentance and conversion, or “judge and convict” him of heresy, so that he might be expelled from the Body of Christ and no longer be a clear and present danger to the faithful. We will have more to say about how this process could be implemented in a future article. [https://akacatholic.com/bellarmine-ipso-facto-loss/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=bellarmine-ipso-facto-loss]

Francis Notes:

– Doctor of the Church St. Francis de Sales totally confirmed beyond any doubt the possibility of a heretical pope and what must be done by the Church in such a situation:

“[T]he Pope… WHEN he is EXPLICITLY a heretic, he falls ipso facto from his dignity and out of the Church, and the Church MUST either deprive him, or, as some say, declare him deprived, of his Apostolic See.”
(The Catholic Controversy, by St. Francis de Sales, Pages 305-306)

Saint Robert Bellarmine, also, said “the Pope heretic is not deposed ipso facto, but must be declared deposed by the Church.”
[https://archive.org/stream/SilveiraImplicationsOfNewMissaeAndHereticPopes/Silveira%20Implications%20of%20New%20Missae%20and%20Heretic%20Popes_djvu.txt]

– “If Francis is a Heretic, What should Canonically happen to him?”: http://www.thecatholicmonitor.com/2020/12/if-francis-is-heretic-what-should.html

– “Could Francis be a Antipope even though the Majority of Cardinals claim he is Pope?”: http://www.thecatholicmonitor.com/2019/03/could-francis-be-antipope-even-though.html

 –  LifeSiteNews, “Confusion explodes as Pope Francis throws magisterial weight behind communion for adulterers,” December 4, 2017:

The AAS guidelines explicitly allows “sexually active adulterous couples facing ‘complex circumstances’ to ‘access the sacraments of Reconciliation and the Eucharist.'”

–  On February 2018, in Rorate Caeli, Catholic theologian Dr. John Lamont:

“The AAS statement… establishes that Pope Francis in Amoris Laetitia has affirmed propositions that are heretical in the strict sense.”

– On December 2, 2017, Bishop Rene Gracida:

“Francis’ heterodoxy is now official. He has published his letter to the Argentina bishops in Acta Apostlica Series making those letters magisterial documents.”

Pray an Our Father now for the restoration of the Church by the bishops by the grace of God.

Election Notes:  

– Intel Cryptanalyst-Mathematician on Biden Steal: “212Million Registered Voters & 66.2% Voting,140.344 M Voted…Trump got 74 M, that leaves only 66.344 M for Biden” [http://catholicmonitor.blogspot.com/2020/12/intel-cryptanalyst-mathematician-on.html?m=1]

– Will US be Venezuela?: Ex-CIA Official told Epoch Times “Chávez started to Focus on [Smartmatic] Voting Machines to Ensure Victory as early as 2003”: http://catholicmonitor.blogspot.com/2020/12/will-us-be-venezuela-ex-cia-official.html– Tucker Carlson’s Conservatism Inc. Biden Steal Betrayal is explained by “One of the Greatest Columns ever Written” according to Rush: http://catholicmonitor.blogspot.com/2021/01/tucker-carlsons-conservatism-inc-biden.html?m=1

Pray an Our Father now for the grace to know God’s Will and to do it.SHARE

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Crisis MagazineA Voice for the Faithful Catholic Laity

JANUARY 27, 2021

The Catechism Crisis

AARON SENG

We are currently witnessing the greatest catechetical crisis in the history of the Church.

In 2018, Pope Francis revised the Catechism of the Catholic Church (CCC) to change its teaching on the death penalty—a controversy that continues to be challenged by cardinals, bishops, priests, and theologians around the world.

But that was just the beginning. In addition to warping the very theology of the ordained ministry in his latest motu proprio, Francis is also on record as intending even more “updates” to the CCC that will include changes to its teaching on just warfare, and the inclusion of novel language about “ecological sins.”

Who knows? The Catechism could soon teach that it is sinful to own an air conditioner.

Far more troubling, however, is the Pope’s recent endorsement of homosexual civil unions, which may soon find its way into the CCC as well. For, as the Vatican’s 2020 Directory for Catechesis recently announced: “The [CCC] is therefore not a static expression of doctrine, but a dynamic instrument,” (n. 192) thus making it subject to perpetual revision at the whim of whoever wears the white. 

It seems that the content of the Catechism of the Catholic Church is now entirely up for grabs.

The clearest acknowledgment of this newfound “evolutionary” approach is the fact that the Vatican Directory for Catechesis itself includes a highly revealing footnote within the section on capital punishment. After citing Pope Francis’ unprecedented new teaching on this subject, the footnote reads (emphasis mine): “Cf. also CCC 2267 (new edition August 1, 2018).” 

Imagine that! In a bizarre impersonation of Protestantism, Catholics everywhere will now need to own the most current edition of the CCC, in order to ensure that the changeless teaching of Jesus Christ hasn’t suddenly changed under their very feet: “Oh, you have the 1997 edition of the Catechism? Sorry, we don’t believe that anymore. Check the new edition.”

CATECHISMS SHOULD CLARIFY, NEVER CONFUSE
To use any catechism as a vehicle for constant “development” in this way, tinkering with it whenever it serves popular opinion or the passing fancy of liberal elites, undermines the usefulness of that particular document. It also causes grave scandal and confusion about the abiding constancy of Catholic doctrine as a whole. As Raymond Cardinal Burke, Prefect Emeritus for the Apostolic Signatura, stated so simply: “If the Catechism can be changed by [Francis] in this way, where does that leave the infallible teaching of the Church before? That’s the whole point.” (Marian Catechist Weekend, July 21, 2019).

Indeed, as Saint Paul reminds us, “Jesus Christ is the same yesterday, today, and forever.” (Heb 13:8) The doctrine that Our Lord entrusted to his Apostles does not change from age to age or place to place. This is why, in the latter part of the 19th century, the First Vatican Council thundered against any who would seek to alter Catholic teaching to suit modern sensibilities:

The doctrine of the faith which God has revealed, is put forward not as some philosophical discovery capable of being perfected by human intelligence, but as a divine deposit committed to the spouse of Christ to be faithfully protected and infallibly promulgated. (Dei Filius, Ch. 4)

Even so, because catechisms are not infallible documents in themselves, the Vatican’s new approach of constantly revising the CCC will be highly effective in misleading those who still innocently believe that the CCC is the authoritative lodestar of Catholic orthodoxy—an inerrant compendium of Catholic faith and moral teaching. 

To make matters worse, there are innumerable local and regional catechisms, textbooks, and teaching aids that are modeled on the CCC, using it as their chief point of reference: all of these must be updated as well. For example, the US Bishops’ Catholic Catechism for Adults, having been recently revised to match the CCC’s latest evolution on capital punishment, was rather embarrassingly admitted by Bishop Robert Barron of Los Angeles as employing “eloquent ambiguity” in its teaching—as if the purpose of a catechism was to confuse, rather than to clarify the teaching of Christ and his Church! A true catechism crisis, if ever there was one. 

The doctrinal instability, inherent in the CCC and so many other texts that rely on it, has left men and women both inside and outside the Church wondering: “If these more recent catechisms are unreliable, are there any older catechisms that we should turn to instead?” 

The simplest answer is: “Yes, all of them.”

RESTORING THE PERENNIAL CATECHISM
Even many Catholics are surprised to learn that thousands of different catechisms have been issued by the Church’s teaching office throughout the centuries, and that these display a remarkable continuity of teaching from one to another.

But such continuity ought not surprise us. Christ committed to His Church a single, “defined body of doctrine, applicable to all times and all men,” (Pius X, Lamentabili Sane, n. 59) and we should expect this doctrine to peruse not only decades, but entire centuries of Catholic catechisms. In it, we discover harmonious agreement and unbroken continuity on all matters of faith and morals.

When Catholic bishops spread across the nations and throughout the centuries offer a unified voice to their teaching office in the catechisms officially approved by them, this is an authentic expression of the Universal Ordinary Magisterium. It is an organ of infallibility, and an effective antidote in our own time against the erroneous notion (long since condemned by the Church) that dogma can “evolve.” 

A recollection and renewal of these traditional catechisms—the “perennial catechism,” as it were—can offer a reliable reference point to Catholics today, who are too often confused and scandalized by the ambiguities and errors of many prelates. Written for every level of age and understanding, the catechisms of yesteryear offer a clarifying and stabilizing force in our age of confusion and upheaval; a sure reference point for any Catholic wishing to learn the Faith and hand it on to others.

If I may be so bold, this is precisely the vision behind a project I’m involved in, the nonprofit Tradivox. Tradivox is currently working to research, restore, and republish scores of these priceless catechisms from the last millennium as one cohesive series: the Tradivox Catholic Catechism Index—a project that, in the words of Bishop Joseph Strickland, “promises to be a treasury of truth and tradition that is desperately needed in the world today.”

In a time when even prelates of the highest rank may falter in handing on the immutable truths of Catholic faith and morals, Catholics should seek to follow the “perennial catechism” of bishops and councils from across space and time, and allow them to speak for themselves. He that has ears, let him hear!

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By Aaron Seng

Aaron Seng is the president of Tradivox and general editor of the Catholic Catechism Index (Sophia Institute Press).

Bidenized Catholicism by Judie Brown ShareTweetForwardRead online and share: https://all.org/bidenized-catholicism/Last week’s inauguration and subsequent events have given the public a taste of what it means to betray Christ and His Church. Headlines such as “Biden Is Catholic. He Also Supports Abortion Rights. Here’s What That Could Mean” and “Biden’s Catholic and Supports Abortion Rights. It Puts Him in the Majority of American Catholics” are disturbingly reflective of the posture too many bishops have been taking. Rather than making it clear that Biden is not a Catholic in good standing, some bishops have resorted to catfighting in public about who is the most woke.When the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops’ president, Archbishop Jose Gomez (of Los Angeles), said that he is praying for President Biden, he also went on to say:Abortion is a direct attack on life that also wounds the woman and undermines the family. It is not only a private matter, it raises troubling and fundamental questions of fraternity, solidarity, and inclusion in the human community. It is also a matter of social justice. We cannot ignore the reality that abortion rates are much higher among the poor and minorities, and that the procedure is regularly used to eliminate children who would be born with disabilities.Gomez suggested that working with Biden could be helpful and welcome. Gomez never said that abortion murders a child.Cardinal Blasé Cupich (of Chicago) clashed with Gomez’ statement, tweeting: “Today, the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops issued an ill-considered statement on the day of President Biden’s inauguration. . . . Aside from the fact that there is seemingly no precedent for doing so, the statement, critical of President Biden, came as a surprise to many bishops, who received it just hours before it was released.”-The media was quick to pick up on and focus on this apparent disagreement among prelates. But sadly, both bishops missed the point. Neither called abortion by its proper name, nor did either one explain why support for such a heinous crime immediately disqualifies someone from calling himself a Catholic!Catholic teaching instructs us that every abortion is a grave moral evil. As St. John Paul II enunciated, it is an act of murder: “The moral gravity of procured abortion is apparent in all its truth if we recognize that we are dealing with murder and, in particular, when we consider the specific elements involved.”Today it is clear that bishops who embrace politics and posturing have evaded their duty. They contribute to the twisted thinking that enables publications such as the New Yorker to boldly proclaim that Joe Biden may “save American Catholicism from the far right.”Such poppycock aside, the sad truth is that far too many bishops and media types, not to mention lay Catholics, have treated the teachings of Christ like nothing more than a party platform that depends on surveys and polling data. They do this with impunity even when dealing with the unspeakable act of killing a baby prior to birth.Bidenized Catholicism reeks of evil, and as we know, requires prayer, fasting, and continued vigilance to drive it out.Fr. Paul Scalia recognized this. He wrote about a different inauguration, telling us that, in Sunday’s gospel when Christ began His public ministry, He gave us hope. Scalia says that, when Christ invites us to believe in the Gospel, He is asking us to rise above all this deception and trickery while we repent of our own sins. Further, Scalia writes:Repentance cleanses our souls; faith opens them to God’s grace and truth. Again, this takes on greater significance in our trying times. Against increasing darkness, the light of faith enables us to judge wisely, so that the world’s deceits will not mislead us. That faith also makes us stouthearted, able to stand fast and persevere, because we know the one in Whom we have believed. . . .For us, the first and most fundamental thing to do with the time that is given us is to repent and believe in the Gospel.In the wake of Bidenized Catholicism, let us heed this call to stand fast and persevere.