Clamorous errors in the Latin of the Renunciation

Nov20by The Editor

https://fromrome.wordpress.com/2019/11/20/clamorous-errors-in-the-latin-of-the-renunciation/

By Br. Alexis Bugnolo

Thus read the headlines in the newspapers within days of the publication of the official Latin text of the Act of Renunciation made by Pope Benedict XVI on Feb. 11, 2013: Clamorous Errors in the Latin text of the Renunciation. (here and  on point, here). These articles only spoke of the errors of commissum not commisso and vitae instead of vita.

And in this case, the headlines were not misrepresenting the reality. For I have discerned at least 40 errors!

Yet, the propaganda machine immediately went to work and anyone who on social media in 2013 began talking about errors was immediately and viciously attacked as judging the pope! — The real purpose was that the Lavender Mafia was very worried about anyone questioning the validity. I remember my professor in Canon Law diverting the lectures he made in February and March to teach things about certain canons in an erroneous way so as to stifle any consideration of the invalidity. But he did it with such subtlety that only after all these years do I recognize what he did. — The other voices shouting down criticism of the Latin are all part of the circles of those conservative Cardinals who just impaled their reputations by demanding unquestioning obedience to Bergoglio after his acts of idolatrous worship and reverence. This is when the controlled opposition of Trad Inc. was born. It was their first act of loyalty to the regime. And it indicates they were positioned to respond and were told what to do.

So for the sake of a more exact historical truth, I will discuss here these errors and give an English translation of what Pope Benedict XVI’s Latin said (in a Later post, since there are too many errors to be discussed). I do this to correct any misunderstanding given by my previous English translation of the Act of Renunciation, in the article I entitled, “A Literal English translation of Benedict XVI’s Discourse on Feb. 11, 2013“, where by “literal” I mean faithful to the sense, not to the grammar of the Latin employed.

I base my comments on the Latin text on my own knowledge of the Latin tongue garnered in 14 years of translating of some nine thousand Letter sized pages of medieval Latin ecclesiastic texts into English. I will be the first one to say that I do not think I am an expert in the matter, but I do think it would be no exaggeration to say that there are only a handful of men alive today in the Church who have translated more Latin than myself. I also wrote a popular Ecclesiastical Latin Textbook and Video series, which I produced for Mansfield Community TV, in Massachusetts, USA, and which The Franciscan Archive distributed for some years after the publication of Summorum pontificum.

And thus, conceding I can always learn from others, I will also draw from two German Scholars who publicly critiqued the Latin text: the professor of Philology, Wilfried Stroh (see here) and those of Attorney Arthur Lambauer, a Vienese lawyer, whose comments are recorded in part here.

I can also give personal witness to the fact that the Latinists who have worked in the Vatican during the pontificates of John Paul II and Benedict XVI are away of all of these errors and have only been reticent for personal reasons, from what I gather from having had the occasion to dine with one at an Agritourismo, at Bagnoregio, Italy, in the summer of 2016.

First, the Latin Text in Black, with RED indicating the errors of expression (numbering each), after which I will comment on each error section by section, because there are so many. The official Latin text can be found at the Vatican Website (here).

Fratres carissimi

Non solum propter tres canonizationes (1) ad hoc Consistorium (2)vos convocavi (3), sed etiam ut vobis (4) decisionem (5) magni momenti pro Ecclesiae vita (6) communicem. Conscientia mea iterum atque iterum coram Deo explorata (7) ad cognitionem certam perveni (8) vires meas ingravescente aetate non iam aptas esse (9) ad munus Petrinum aeque (10) administrandum.

1. To say propter tres canonizationes is to mean for the sake of or on account of, three acts of canonizing. This grammatical structure in Latin means, not that the Pope has called the Cardinals together to conduct or announce the canonization of three groups or individuals, but that somehow the Cardinals have been convoked to honor the acts of canonizing or because the acts themselves cannot be completed without them. But the act of canonization is a papal act which does not require the Cardinals. Therefore, the correct Latin should be in trium canonizationum annuntiationem, that is, to announce my decision to decree three acts of canonization, as the Latin construction beginning with the preposition in is used to express purpose.
2. To say ad hoc Consistorium may very well be the custom of the Papal court — to this I cannot comment — however, in Latin, since consistorium is an act of standing together, not a place to which the Cardinals are convoked, but a solemn way of gathering together, the correct grammatical structure should be in hoc consistorio.
3. A pope when he acts, speaks in the first person plural, that is, with the royal “We”. The man who is the pope, inasmuch as he is the man and not the poper, speaks with the first person singular, “I”.  Therefore, the correct form of the verb here should be convocavimus.
4. The Latin verb communicem takes the preposition cum not the dative of reference, and thus vobis should read instead vobiscum. Since the renunciation is by the person, not the pope, the verb can be left as  it is, but I think since this is still that part of the text said by the Roman Pontiff it should be in the first person plural: communicemus.
5. I agree here with Dr. Stroh, that the word should be consilium not decisionem, because this latter Latin word means a “act of cutting off”, or at best an “act of making a decision”, which clearly is not apropos to the thing at hand, because the Pope has not included them in the decision making process, only declaring a decision which he has already made. And consilium is the proper word for such a thing as that, when done by a superior with authority.
6. This is the most absurd error of them all. The person who wrote this does not even understand that in Latin you use the dative of reference not a phrase beginning with a preposition as in modern languages. This should read Ecclesiae vitae, for as it stands it says on behalf of the life of the Church or for the sake of the life of the Church; unless of course he is making a reference to a grave threat to the life of the Church for which this act is intended to defend that life. This may be, but as nearly all modern computer programs which do translations into Latin get this wrong in just this way I presume its ignorance, not a hint.
7. This is entirely the wrong word. Because this word in Latin refers to the exploration of a place or region or the investigation into a thing which physical dimensions or size, or is the military term for spying or watching something to gain information. It is never used with spiritual things, for certainly your conscience is not a world unto itself, it is a faculty of knowing. The correct term should be one which means exposedor settled, on account of the reference to being before or in the presence of God.
8. This verb does not have the sense of arrived, in matters which deal with knowledge. It rather means to attain, which would make sense if you were spying on the enemy, but to say you have attained certain knowledge by examining your conscience is absurd, because the conscience only recognizes moral truths, it is not the fount of knowledge or certitude.
9. Here there is a clause in indirect discourse following cognitionem certam. The correct form should be introduced with quod and be in the nominative, not accusative, because the object of the certain knowledge is a fact known, not a knowing that. And thus, on account of the error in n. 9, the verb here should be sunt, the whole phrase reading vires mihi ingravescente aetate non iam aptae sunt. I think the emphatic dative of possession mihi should be used rather than the possesive adjective meae, because the strength spoke of is intimate to his physical being, not just some exterior possession.
10. Doctor Stroh rightly points out that this is the wrong adverb. The correct one should be recte or apte or as I suggest constanter (rightly, aptly, or consistently).

Bene conscius sum (1) hoc munus secundum suam (2) essentiam spiritualem non solum agendo (3) et loquendo exsequi (4) debere(5), sed non minus patiendo et orando. Attamen in mundo nostri temporis (6) rapidis mutationibus subiecto (7) et (8) quaestionibus magni (9) pro vita fidei (10) perturbato ad navem Sancti Petri gubernandam et ad annuntiandum Evangelium (11) etiam vigor quidam corporis et animae (12) necessarius est, …

1. Here anyone who has ever read Latin knows that one says cognosco not conscius sum when referring to present personal knowledge of a thing. The adjective conscius is used to introduce phrases or states of being, not knowing.
2. Here there is simply the error of someone who thinks in Italian, because the possessive adjective for the third person, in Latin, is NEVER used for a thing in a sentence, only for the subject of a verb. The correct Latin, therefore should be eiusthough it could be omitted entirely since the phrase secundum essentiam spiritualem is a standard of measure and its object is implicitly understood. Dr Stroh rightly points out that naturam should be used instead of essentiam. I agree, because St Bonaventure says nature refers to the being of a thing as a principle of action.
3. Here whoever wrote the text is ignorant that in Latin agere refers to all actions, physical or spiritual, and thus is an improper pair with loquendo which is also an act. It is difficult to understand to what the writer is referring, since nearly everything a pope does is by speaking. It is not as if he cleans toilets or does manual labor. Perhaps, the better word would be scribendo, that is writing.
4. The Latin verb here is badly chosen, because exsequi refers to a work done, but the subject is not a work but a munus or charge, which is a thing. The proper Latin would be geri that is, conducted in the sense of the modern fulfilled or executed.
5. This is the wrong verb to express what is intended. It is proper or necessary that the duties of the office be fulfilled. But it is not a debt, which is what debere means. The correct Latin should be oportere that is, that it is proper or necessary so as to reach the goal intended.
6. Whoever wrote this has no experience reading Latin. The idea that seems to be the intent of the expression is in our our contemporary world, but Latin would say that as in saeculo nostro, because saeculum is the Latin term for the world in the sense of time, this generation, or culture, not mundum, which refers to the cosmos as a physical reality or place.
7. And on account of error n. 6, this phrase must be rewritten entirely, as velocium orcelerium mutationum using the genitive of description not dative of reference, and hence there is no need for subiecto. The Latin rapidus is used for hurried or swift changes, which is simply not historically accurate.
8. And thus, likewise, on account of the dropping of subiecto this conjunction can be entirely omitted.
9. Here the magni lacks momenti or should read magnis to agree with the prior noun.
10. Here there is the same error as before, and thus the Latin should read fidei vitae or fidei.
11. Here you have the error of a First year Latin student who forgets that object go before verbs in Latin, not afterwards: the reading should be Evangelium annuntiandum.
12. Here the wrong word is chosen, because clearly the soul does not grow old or weak by age, but the spirit does. And thus the correct Latin should be animi. Dr. Stroh agrees with me.
    

qui ultimis (1) mensibus in me modo tali minuitur (2), ut incapacitatem meam ad ministerium mihi commissum beneadministrandum (3) agnoscere debeam (4). Quapropter bene conscius (5) ponderis huius actus plena libertate (6) declaro (7) me ministerio (8) Episcopi Romae, Successoris Sancti Petri, mihi per manus Cardinalium (9) die 19 aprilis MMV commisso (10) renuntiare ita ut a die 28 februarii MMXIII, hora 20, sedes Romae (11), sedes Sancti Petri vacet et (12) Conclave ad eligendum novum Summum Pontificem ab his quibus competit convocandum esse.

1. In Latin you signify recent things by saying praecedentibus not ultimis. Dr. Stroh suggests: his praeteritis since the emphasis is on recent in the past.
2. Here the tense is wrong, since the reference is to what has happened in recent months, and is still happening, the correct tense is the imperfect minuebatur and take mihi as a dative of reference not in me.
3. It is nonsensical to say that you are administering a ministry, the better word should be gerere, as before.  But the entire phrase is incorrectly formed, since incapacitatem takes a gerundive construction with or without in (dative of reference), so the whole should read (in) ministerio mihi commisso bene gerendo.
4. Seeing that the text is being read as if a decision is already made, to say that you ought to acknowledge is contextually out of place, according to time. Also, as clause subordinate to an imperfect, it must be in the perfect subjunctive. The phrase should read something like iustum fuerit, “it was just that”.
5. Attorney Lambauer holds that this construction with conscius takes the reflexive pronoune mihi.
6. Now come the errors which touch upon the nullity, invalidity and irregularity of the act. Because the renunciation has to be made freely. That it is declared freely is good too, but presumed. So this phrase should be with the verb renuntiare, and both should NOT be in indirect discourse, because to announce or declare that you are renouncing, is not to renounce anything, but to announce something, and that is not the act specified in Canon 332 §2 which requires a renunication as the essential act, not a declaration.
7. This verb if left should introduce a phrase which prepares the listeners about intent or such like, not the act of the renuntiation.
8. This is the wrong object of the Act of renunciation, which according to Canon 332 §2 should be muneri. Dr Stroh, writing it seems in February 2013, notes that this error makes the renunciation invalid. I agree!
9. The Petrine Munus and Ministerium are not entrusted to the elected pope, but received by him in the Petrine Succession immediatley as he says, “Yes, I accept my election”. This is basic papal theology 101. If you get that wrong, it can sanely be questioned whether you were compos mentis at the time of the act. Unless of course the entire phrase ministerio … per manus Cardinalium … commisso is meant to rebuke the Cardinals for allowing him a ministry but not conceding him any real authority. Though such an intent would be both sarcastic and effect the invalidity of the resignation. So this should read in succesione petrina or something similar
10. This should be a me accepto or a me recepto, that is, “accepted by me” or “received by me”.
11. This is the one phrase which is correct, but which no one but an expert in the Secretariate of State would know, because, as an eminent Vatican Latinist told me, it is the customary way of indicating the Roman time zone in Latin. Dr. Stroh and Attorney Lambauer, writing from Germany, did not know this.
12. Here the indirect discourse should end, or rather, the expression of the first person, I, should end, because the calling of a conclave is a papal act, the man who is pope, who just renounced, has NO authority to call one. So here the Latin should resume with the Papal WE, et declaramus.

Fratres carissimi, ex toto corde gratias ago vobis (1) pro omni amore et labore (2), quo mecum pondus ministerii mei portastis et veniam peto pro omnibus defectibus meis (3). Nunc autem Sanctam Dei Ecclesiam curae Summi eius Pastoris, Domini nostri Iesu Christi confidimus (4) sanctamque eius Matrem Mariam imploramus, ut patribus Cardinalibus in eligendo novo Summo Pontifice materna sua bonitate assistat. Quod ad me attinet etiam in futuro (5) vita orationi dedicata Sanctae Ecclesiae Dei toto ex corde servire velim. (6)

Ex Aedibus Vaticanis, die 10 mensis februarii MMXIII

1. Again, the error of the First Year Latin student. The phrase should read gratias vobis ago.
2. If you are grateful for their service and collaboration, you do not say amore et labore, which refer to physical work and physical affection; you say, rather, omnibus amicitiabus operibusque to show that the friendship and works were multiple and united one with the other. Four errors here.
3. Again, the First Year Latin student’s error of getting the word order wrong. It should read: pro omnibus defectibus meis veniam peto and the phrase should be introduced by de vobis or de omnibus. Two errors here.
4. Dr. Stroh rightly points out that this is the wrong verb, the correct Latin is committimus.
5. Dr. Stroh again reminds that the correct Latin temporal expression is in futurum.
6. In Latin there is no conditional. The subjunctive is uses to expres wishes, but not with the verb to wish! You say rather serviam not servire velim.

CONCLUSION

I think it would be no exaggeration to say, that if anyone saw even some of these errors and did not ask the Holy Father that they be corrected before the act was published, he sinned mortally against his duty of loyalty to the Roman Pontiff. I also think that the number of these errors is qualified forensic evidence that IF Benedict wrote this text and read it freely, that he was either not in a proper state of mind or did not act with mature deliberation.

VIEWPOINTS 

Virginia Goes Blue: Pro-China Communists Claim Credit

Did a China-based American communist help flip Virginia?Trevor LoudonCONTRIBUTOR5Comments November 14, 2019 Updated: November 18, 2019Share

https://www.theepochtimes.com/virginia-goes-blue-pro-china-communists-claim-credit_3140463.html

News Analysis

It’s official. The once deep-red Commonwealth of Virginia is now a blue state. As a result of the Nov. 5 election, Democrats now hold all three of the statewide constitutional offices, both U.S. Senate seats, the majority of its Congress members, and both chambers of the State House.ADVERTISING

Laura Ingraham of Fox News says it’s because of “changing demographics.” That’s only partially true. Virginia went blue because a handful of well-organized pro-Chinese communistsmade it happen.

The group in question, New Virginia Majority (NVM), has exploited Virginia’s changing population and “liberal bleed out” from the Washington area to flip not just Northern Virginia but also districts across the state. Based in Alexandria and Richmond, NVM has sent hundreds of paid workers and volunteers out across the commonwealth to register and send to the polls hundreds of thousands of new voters—all under the nose of the Virginia Republican Party.

The Democrats have flipped two state Senate seats, and now hold a 10-vote advantage in the Assembly. NVM endorsed and supported 23 Virginia candidates this cycle and won with 15 of them, including two state Senate races and nine Assembly victories.

The 15 who were endorsed by NVM and won are:

• Ghazala Hashmi, Virginia Senate District 10
• John Bell, Virginia Senate District 13
• Wendy Gooditis, House District 10
• Kelly Convirs-Fowler, House District 21
• Elizabeth Guzman, House District 31
• Dan Helmer, House District 40
• Kathy Tran, House District 42
• Hala Ayala, House District 51
• Schuyler VanValkenburg, House District 72
• Rodney Willett, House District 73
• Shelly Simonds, House District 94
• Steve Descano, Fairfax County Commonwealth’s Attorney
• Parisi Deghani-Tafti, Arlington County and Fall’s Church Commonwealth’s Attorney
• Buta Biberaj, Loudoun County Commonwealth’s Attorney
• Phyllis Randall, Chair Loudoun County Board of Supervisors

None of this electoral success was down to luck or changing demographics alone.

NVM Co-Chair Tram Nguyen has already published an op-ed in The New York Times saying, “Democrats could learn a lot from what happened in Virginia.” The message? “Democrats, do what we did in Virginia—everywhere.” By going after the minority vote with mass voter registration drives, you can flip almost any state.

According to Nguyen:

“The national Democratic Party spent millions in Virginia this year, but the state wasn’t always such a priority. From its position in the South to its prominent role in America’s legacy of oppression, Virginia was long considered reliably conservative—unbreakable. As recently as six years ago, Republicans controlled the office of the governor and the General Assembly.

“Local organizations like mine understood the political potential of Virginia when we got started 12 years ago. We are winning because we recognize the power of an electorate that includes and reflects the diversity of our state. We don’t talk to voters only when campaign season rolls around. We try to reach voters of all colors, women, low-income workers and young people where they are, which has made it possible for us to develop a robust base of support along Virginia’s so-called Urban Crescent, from Northern Virginia to Hampton Roads. Long before Election Day, we registered more than 300,000 voters, knocked on more than 2.5 million doors, and organized within communities of color to help win significant policy changes like Medicaid expansion, which covered nearly 400,000 people.”

Nguyen (who was part of Democratic Gov. Ralph Northam’s transition team) also went on to explain the importance of the ex-convict vote.

“Virginia’s state constitution bars anyone with a felony conviction from voting until their rights have been restored by the governor. For more than nine years, we organized formerly incarcerated women and men to help them demand that their full civil rights be restored. The former governor, Terry McAuliffe, restored the voting rights of more than 173,000 Virginians during his term, more than any other governor in Virginia’s history. In 2016, of the nearly 20,000 men and women who registered to vote for the first time as a result of the restoration of their rights, a whopping 79 percent voted. They were a key voting bloc in Virginia, the only Southern state that Hillary Clinton won.”

NVM worked closely with McAuliffe to win ex-felon voting rights. The organization actually gave the governor an award at its annual dinner for his sterling work.

And the path to success lies in organizing and energizing minority voters who already lean left, but normally vote at very low rates:

“Changes in the shape of the electorate and rising enthusiasm among voters can only go so far, without campaign architecture that channels those changes into tangible political outcomes. …

“Engaging meaningfully with voters of color means talking to tens of thousands of voters to make sure they have the information they need to cast their ballots even after receiving racist Republican campaign communications. … We didn’t need to persuade voters to embrace our worldview—they were already there on the issues. They just needed to be convinced that their vote mattered. To give one example of how this works in practical terms, in precincts in the Virginia suburbs of Washington, turnout this year increased by 24 percent over 2017. …

“States don’t become battlegrounds overnight. Democrats and national progressive organizations have the resources to take their case to the people and win, but they have to start early and organize relentlessly. When they lose, they have to stay in place and keep fighting for every political inch they can get. No place is unwinnable forever.”

All this would be serious enough if NVM members were merely well-meaning “liberal Democrats,” which unfortunately isn’t the case.

NVM is a front for Liberation Road, known until April this year as Freedom Road Socialist Organization (FRSO), the United States’ most influential Maoist organization.

Maoist Groups

NVM is led by longtime FRSO/Liberation Road cadre Jon Liss of Alexandria. Several FRSO cadres have served in NVM over the years, as have many activists from two NVM satellite groups, LeftRoots and the Virginia Student Power Network.

FRSO/Liberation Road comes out of the militantly pro-ChinaAmerican Maoist student movement of the 1970s. While it’s more discreet about its Chinese loyalties these days, several of its leading supporters maintain close ties to the People’s Republic.

Fred Engst is a longtime FRSO supporter. Born to U.S. communist parents and raised in China, Engst was educated in the United States, where he became immersed in Maoist politics. He returned to China in 2007 and is now teaching at the University of International Business and Economics in Beijing.

Alex Tom, a leader of LeftRoots and the pro-Beijing San Francisco-based Chinese Progressive Association, in 2012 formed the China Education and Exposure Program to “build a deeper analysis of China for US progressives and leftists and to build relationships with the grassroots movement in China,” according to his 2013 LeftForum speaker’s bio.

John Marienthal, a San Jose-based FRSO member, has been a leader of the pro-Beijing U.S.–China Peoples Friendship Association for more than 40 years and has taught in several Chinese educational establishments since the 1980s.

Steve McClure is a former Washington resident who, in the 1970s, was active in the pro-Mao Revolutionary Student Brigade. He has close ties to FRSO and NVM. Since 2010, he has worked with the Geography Department of Wuhan University in China, and he is a research associate with the State Key Laboratory of Engineering Information in Surveying, Mapping, and Remote Sensing at the university.

McClure has used his skills in Geographic Information Systems (GIS) to supply highly targeted voter identification information to NVM.

As far back as 2005, McClure was using GIS technology to identify low-income voters for Liss’s Tenant Workers Support Committee. McClure “plotted lower-income, high-rental housing areas to get a picture of where there was affordable housing in Northern Virginia,” according to the Mason Gazette. This information probably proved very useful when Liss established NVM two years later.

According to an Aug. 25, 2011, post on McClure’s blog:

“I have been recently working with New Virginia Majority to make a series of maps to inform planning for precinct walks in Virginia State house districts. … The core data are lists of individual households by pan-ethnic census categories. … The results are subjective but do suggest … the ways that actual communities conform or diverge from the discrete territorial units which define an electoral terrain in a democracy.”

All this wasn’t theoretical. It was designed to help NVM flip districts across the state by micro-targeting potential Democratic voters in low-income and minority communities. In another post, he wrote:

“In the general elections of 2008, Virginia voted Democratic for the first time since 1964 with Obama carrying the state. Demographic shifts and increased voter participation rather than a shift in political allegiances account for this outcome. …

“Focusing on Prince William County, Virginia, I applied spatial interpolation techniques in a GIS to translate the 2008 election returns from the geography of precincts to year 2000 zoning classification areas for further quantitative analysis. The goal was to produce actionable intelligence for working class organizations building popular power at the base. …

“The results are presented as maps and diagrams which might illuminate challenges and opportunities for organizations engaging with electoral efforts.”

McClure is still actively engaged in giving advice to his U.S. comrades on winning elections for the Democrats.

An article co-written by McClure and Bob Wing, “The Importance of the Fight for the South—and Why It Can and Must Be Won,” appeared on the Liberation Road-linked website Organizing Upgrade on Sept. 4, 2017. It states:

“The far right, racism, militarism, inequality, and poverty are all centered in the South. The majority of African Americans, the main protagonist of progressive politics in this country, live in the South. And the South has more electoral votes, battleground state votes, population, and congresspersons than any other region.

“The South is changing rapidly, giving rise to more progressive demographic groups—especially Black and Latino migrations, LGBTQs and urbanites—and a growing Democratic vote. These trends can only be maximized if the importance of the South is understood as a strategic necessity and the chance to win state by state, is acknowledged and acted upon.

“Hard as the fight is and will be, downplaying the Southern struggle is a losing political strategy and forfeits the moral high ground on the biggest issues facing the country.”

McClure and Wing (another “former” Maoist associated with FRSO) argue that to destroy the Republican Party in the South, black communities must be targeted and mobilized to vote:

 “(1) A critical mass of Southern states can and must be won if we are to block or defeat the right in presidential elections. Three of the five or so critical battleground states are in the South: Florida, Virginia and North Carolina. Southern blue and battleground states plus Washington D.C. hold 38 percent of the electoral votes needed to win.

“(2) Winning an anti-rightwing congressional majority depends on winning in the South, as the South has a bigger congressional delegation than any other region and Southern congresspersons also hold key leadership posts within the Republican Party’s congressional hierarchies.

“(3) There are tremendous opportunities to build progressive political power and governance at the local level in the South as 105 counties have a Black majority. …

“While some might dismiss the South, focusing strategically on the Northeast and Pacific Coast as central to a progressive program and the Midwest as the main political battleground, the South’s dynamic growth, historical legacy of Black struggle and powerful political weight make it a critical battlefield.

“The nuance is that the South cannot be won as a bloc, but only state by state and county by county. In fact, winning the South in large part means understanding that it is not a monolithic entity and winning it piece by piece: i.e. politically deconstructing the South.”

President Donald Trump’s victory in 2016 shocked the left and, according to McClure and Wing, has made their goal of flipping the South even more urgent:

“This essay was prepared in March 2015, prior to the 2016 election season that eventually resulted in Donald Trump’s victory. However, the far rightwing’s capture of the presidency makes this essay’s main arguments even more important. …

“The South is the key center of the far right and the Republican Party; neither can be defeated without battling for the South.”

Liberation Road has a large presence in Georgia, Tennessee, North Carolina (Durham for All), and Florida (the New Florida Majority). Now that Virginia is safely in the Democrat column, look to see an upsurge of Maoist electoral activity in North Carolina and Florida to turn those states blue in 2020; Tennessee and Georgia will be next. Then, Texas.

Chinese ‘Collusion’?

Trump has been tougher on Beijing than has any other president in living memory. It’s no secret that China doesn’t like Trump and would love to see him defeated in 2020.

Rather than risk war, or suffer huge economic setbacks, wouldn’t it be much cheaper and easier to use China’s American assets, such as Liberation Road, to ensure Trump’s defeat by “democratic” means?

It’s inconceivable that the Chinese government didn’t know what McClure was up to. After all, they presumably pay his salary or living costs while he is in China.

It’s clear that Liberation Road is tied to China. It’s also clear that their front-group NVM is heavily involved in U.S. electoral politics and played a decisive role in turning Virginia blue. It’s also obvious that Liberation Road’s goal is to destroy President Trump and the Republican Party to pave the way for a socialist America.

Is there Chinese “collusion” here? Do we need investigations and executive action against these subversive groups before they’re able to fully realize their goals? With less than a year until the 2020 election, there’s not much time left to do so.

Trevor Loudon is an author, filmmaker, and public speaker from New Zealand. For more than 30 years, he has researched radical left, Marxist, and terrorist movements and their covert influence on mainstream politics.

Views expressed in this article are the opinions of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of The Epoch Times.

These Days of Testing

Helen Freeh

THE CATHOLIC THING

WEDNESDAY, NOVEMBER 20, 2019

Note: There’s an old Latin saying, ecclesia semper reformanda (“a Church always in need of reform”) that should never be far from our minds. But at certain times the truth of that maxim is closer to the surface than at others. Today Helen Freeh looks at our current crisis – and the responsibility we all have for the fact that it exists, and for doing something about it: A great challenge that presents great opportunities. At The Catholic Thing, we’ve been involved in these labors for several years and intend to stay at them for as long as it takes to bring about better days. We literally cannot do so without your help. If you want us to do some great things together for the Church and the world, please do your part. Click the button. Follow the instructions. Be part of the Catholic thing. – Robert Royal

Fr. Thomas Weinandy recently wrote a sobering article on this site in which he concluded: “I believe it will be the laity who bring about the needed purification. . . . More specifically, I believe it will depend mostly on faithful and courageous Catholic women.” Cardinal Robert Sarah in his new book, The Day Is Now Far Spent, also speculates that “women have a special role to play” in helping priests dedicate themselves “radically to God.” Perhaps, as Pope Francis has declared, this is the “Age of the Laity.” But I have my doubts.

If we laity are the ones to fix this mess, then just how can we do it, having no institutional power in Church politics?  Are we simply to use the power of the purse to force wayward bishops “back in line”?

That is no true solution to this problem, although recent financial reports suggest that Peter’s Pence may be suffering in its annual revenues, which no doubt will get the attention of Rome.

The two laymen’s forcible removal of the wooden fertility statues from the church of Santa Maria in Traspontina ought to be a serious wake-up call to the Vatican bureaucracy regarding the steps some laity are willing to take in response to a sense of outrage and powerlessness.  The removal of the statues temporarily resolved a problem, but clearly cannot resolve The Problem.

The burden of a rebirth for the Church seems unfairly to have been put on the shoulders of the laity, especially given that most lay Catholics have been poorly catechized in Catholic schools and parishes – see the recent Pew study, which found that almost 70 percent of Catholics do not believe in the Real Presence.

Yet the laity also seem too quick to point fingers at weak and silent bishops and fault them for every problem the Church experiences. We blame our priests and bishops for their sins and weaknesses, but how many Catholic laity fail in living their own daily lives in accord with Christ and His Church’s moral teachings?

How can we sheep ask so much of our shepherds when we are not willing to be living examples of Christ to the world ourselves?  How can our shepherds ask anything of the sheep that they are not willing to model first for us?

A mutual acceptance of the burden of rebuilding the Church needs to be made by each and every member of the Body of Christ, whatever their vocation. It is not a duty only for laypersons, nor for religious alone.

Perhaps we are moving into a time of great destruction in which the institutional Church as we have known it for over a millennium will crumble, as happened after the fall of Rome and the conquest by Germanic tribes.

Yet even if waves of destruction sweep over us, we will hold on to the flame of faith not merely through the hierarchical structure of the Church, but through domestic catechism and underground networks, like the ones that the Catholic faithful in Elizabethan England created despite official persecution.

Blessed Fulton Sheen declared in 1974 that we were entering the fourth fall and rise of the Church in which our great test will be to resist the “spirit of the world.” Yet he was undaunted: “these are marvelous days in which to be alive. I thank God that I can live in these days, because these are days of testing.”

All the faithful must thank God that we have been chosen for these times to preserve and convey to new generations the essential nature of our faith, which is joy, but the joy that comes through rejecting our own will and accepting God’s will and plan for our lives.  Virtus tentamine gaudet!  Strength rejoices in the challenge.

That is what we face today. While we may find ourselves echoing Frodo’s complaint in Tolkien’s Lord of the Rings, “I wish it need not have happened in my time,” we must heed Gandalf’s response: “So do all who see such times.  But that is not for them to decide. All we have to decide is what to do with the time that is given us.”

So what are we laity to do? We cannot – however appealing the idea – throw out weak and wayward shepherds, but we do have the real power of prayer and personal holiness.  St. John Henry Newman’s motto cor ad cor loquitur, “heart speaks to heart,” must be one each of us laymen and women takes as our own.

We must teach the joy of the faith first and foremost in the secret recesses of our families, because, as Mother Teresa famously said, peace begins in the home.  We must live this peace and its fruit, joy, at home, and from the sanctuary of our home, emerge as witnesses of joy to all those we meet in our daily lives.

I have three young children, the oldest of whom will receive her First Holy Communion in the Spring.  My husband and I will prepare her and our sons, as well as we possibly can, for the tribulations they will face in our world, by teaching them the joy of the faith.

I may not feel great joy in being a Catholic right now, but I know the truth the Catholic Church safeguards – and in that truth lies the joy.  What is this joy but the truth that we are sons and daughters of the triune God; that we are the people He loved so much that He sent his only Son to suffer and die that we might have eternal life with Him in heaven.

*Image: The Virgin among the Virgins by Gerard David, 1509 [Musée des Beaux-Arts, Rouen, France]

© 2019 The Catholic Thing. All rights reserved. For reprint rights, write to: info@frinstitute.orgThe Catholic Thing is a forum for intelligent Catholic commentary. Opinions expressed by writers are solely their own.

Helen Freeh

Dr. Helen Freeh, a new contributor, received her B.A. and M. A. from the University of Dallas, and her Ph.D. from Baylor University. She has taught at Hillsdale College, where she met her husband, John. She is now in temporary early retirement, raising and homeschooling their children in Lincoln, Nebraska.

Catholic Monitor

http://catholicmonitor.blogspot.com/2019/11/is-remnant-wrong-in-saying-francis-is.html?m=1

Sunday, November 17, 2019

Is the Remnant Wrong in saying Francis is same as Benedict & John Paul II?

The Remnant newspaper recently appears to be saying that Francis is the same as Pope John Paul II and Pope Benedict XVI which I will attempt to show is inaccurate. However, the newspaper is right in saying that the Vatican II’s ambiguities which were a forerunner of Amoris Laetitia’s ambiguity lead to false ecumenism within the Church and outside.

Strangely, the non-traditionalist conservative Matthew Schmitz put it best:

“[T]he post-Vatican II settlement [of]… Upholding Catholic teaching on paper but not in reality as led to widespread corruption… a culture of lies… that allowed men like McCarrick to flourish.”

It allowed the Church of John Paul II and Benedict XVI to keep heretics and homosexual predators in the hierarchy such as McCarrick and others like him to flourish and to promote neo-sacrilegious media productions such as the Assisi fiasco and the kissing of the Koran.

This was wrong and God will judge them for their failures to be good fathers (popes) in allowing evil men into God’s Church to abuse and to lead many to indifferentism and away from salvation which is only in Jesus through His Church.

Both sincerely in my opinion because of false philosophical personal ideas while not totally abandoning Thomism tried to do the practically almost impossible task of being loyal to the infallible teachings of the Church while holding on to neo-modernist Personalist versions of Kantian and Hegelian philosophy as well as the ambiguities of Vatican II.

Benedict if you read his later writings finally rejected Kantianism, but apparently couldn’t completely give up Hegelianism.

However, he realized in a vague way that the ambiguity of Vatican II was destroying the Church so he brought back the Traditional Latin Mass and attempted to fight against sex abuse, the Vatican gay lobby and reform the finances to the Church.

Unfortunately, in my opinion, these efforts united the financially corrupt old guard of Cardinal Angelo Sodano and the Vatican gay lobby which brought about Vatileaks and other pressures against Benedict that eventually lead to the Benedict resignation and the papacy of Jorge Bergoglio whose pontifical validity has been questioned by many even in the hierarchy from the beginning to this day.

As Bishop René Gracida has said there was never universal acceptance of Bergoglio by the Church.

But even more importantly, there are reasonable doubts about the validity of Benedict’s resignation and Bergoglio’s lawful election to the papacy which were never present with the other papacies which Bishop Gracida declares must be investigated and interpreted by the cardinals as John Paul’s conclave constitution explicitly states.

This is one reason that Francis is not the same as Benedict and John Paul.

The other reason that The Remnant is wrong about apparently recently saying Francis is the same as Benedict and John Paul can be put simply in analogy:

John Paul and Benedict were sincere doctors with medicine that was getting the patient sicker.

Benedict realized the medicine was bad and slowly started giving good medicine.

But in my opinion, Francis is a doctor who is trying to kill the patient by slow poisoning.

In my opinion, it is obvious that Francis doesn’t have even a remnant of Thomism. Nor does he apparently care about being loyal to the infallible Church teachings. He appears to be a nihilistic postmodernist like his favorite theologian Michel de Certeau. 

Francis’s only grasp of reality or meaning appears to be leftist and Peronist ideology as well as his close friend the kissing bishop’s Bernard Haring Hegelian situation ethics all dressed in religious language.

While Benedict and John Paul upheld Church teachings on paper while not always in reality, Francis with Amoris Laetitia, the Argentine letter, the death penalty Catechism change and the latest indifferentism papal statement isn’t even upholding the infallible teachings on paper.

George Gilder wrote a book called “Sexual Suicide” which helped me return to the Church because it showed that the Catholic teachings on sexuality were true and those outside those teachings were committing slow suicide.

Francis in my opinion is trying to kill the Church by slow suicide.

He will not succeed because Jesus promised the gates of Hell will not prevail.

Those who don’t oppose him in my opinion are his accomplices unless they are in invincible ignorance.

In my opinion, it appears that if Francis doesn’t convert he may be heading down a path of destruction along with all his accomplices if they don’t convert if they aren’t in invincible ignorance.

I feel sorry for them.

We must pray for him and his accomplices, but most of all we must pray for all those abused and lead away from salvation by their promotion of heresy.

Pray an Our Father now for the restoration of the Church.Fred Martinez at 3:53 PM

Catholic Monitor

Sunday, November 17, 2019

Why are Remnant Writers Hilary White & Siscoe Afraid of an Cardinal Investigation of Francis’s Validity? 

http://catholicmonitor.blogspot.com/2019/11/why-are-remnant-writers-hilary-white.html?m=1

On November 14, Remnant writer Hilary White twitted: 

Hilary White@hilarityjane  Replying to  @billhowardesq  @BVMConsolatrix and  3 others

“The validity of a papal election rests on more than one thing, the most important of which is his acceptance by the Church in the person of the bishops. Even C. Burke, an elector and canon lawyer, has said nothing about UDG affecting validity. Its the reason the question… … is unanswerable. Only a pope can determine if a person has violated UDG and only a pope can violate UDG. If these are the same person, what have we got? Only a pope can say that a previous pope had been an antipope. So, maybe the answer to your question will simply have to wait.”[https://mobile.twitter.com/hilarityjane/status/1195066222188077057]White is wrong on her claim that Cardinal Raymond Burke said nothing on the conclave constitution:Patrick Coffin on his YouTube show asked Cardinal Burke: “I was wondering rather if those [Universi Dominici Gregis conclave constitution] rules [of the 2013 conclave that elected Francis] were violated and rather or not the whole election of Francis may be invalid. Is there any foundation for that speculation?” Cardinal Burke answered: “The only grounds that could be used for calling into question the validity of the election would be were the election organized by a campaign beforehand which is strictly forbidden and that would be difficult to demonstrate…” “… If these persons [the St. Gallen Mafia of liberal cardinals] engaged in a active campaign first to undermined Pope Benedict XVI and at the same time to engineer the election of someone [Francis] then that could be a argument. I don’t think I have the facts, and there have to be facts, to prove that. That’s all I have to say about that.” (Patrick Coffin show, “141: Dubia Cardinal Goes on the Record – Raymond Cardinal Burke (Free Version),” Premiered 13 hours ago, 19:55 to 21:46)Next, White is wrong in saying “Only a pope can determine if a person has violated UDG and only a pope can violate UDG”:White is ignoring paragraph 5 of Universi Dominici Gregis which says: “Should doubts arise concerning the prescriptions contained in this Constitution, or concerning the manner of putting them into effect. I [Pope John Paul II] Decree that all power of issuing a judgment of this in this regard to the College of Cardinals, to which I grant the faculty of interpreting doubtful or controverted points.” (Universi Dominici Gregis, paragraph 5) Later in the paragraph it says “except the act of the election,” which can be interpreted in a number of ways. The point is, as Bishop Rene Gracida says and Universi Dominici Gregis said, only the cardinals can interpret its meaning, not a future pope, not White or anyone else.Again, White is wrong in saying “The validity of a papal election rests” most importantly on “his acceptance by the Church in the person of the bishops” and, moreover, “Only a pope can say that a previous pope had been an antipope”:The case of Antipope Anacletus II proves that it is possible for a majority of cardinals to claim a man is pope while he, in reality, is a antipope. In 1130, a majority of cardinals voted for Cardinal Peter Pierleone to be pope. He called himself Anacletus II. He was proclaimed pope and ruled Rome for eight years by vote and consent of a absolute majority of the cardinals despite the fact he was a antipope. In 1130, just prior to the election of antipope Anacletus, a small minority of cardinals elected the real pope: Pope Innocent II. How is this possible? St. Bernard who wasn’t a pope said “the ‘sanior pars’ (the wiser portion)… declared in favor of Innocent II. By this he probably meant a majority of the cardinal-bishops.”(St. Bernard of Clairvaux by Leon Christiani, Page 72)  How is this possible when the absolute majority of cardinals voted for Anacletus?Historian Warren Carroll explains: “[C]anon law does not bind a Pope arranging for his successor… [Papal Chancellor] Haimeric proposed that… a commission of eight cardinals should be selected to choose the next Pope… strong evidence [shows] that the Pope [Honorius] endorsed what Haimeric was doing, including the establishment of the electoral commission [of eight cardinals].”(The Glory of Christendom, Pages 36-37) The majority or “sanior pars,” five cardinals out of eight of “the electoral commission,” elected Pope Innocent II as St. Bernard said and as evidence shows was the will of the previous pope in what we can call a constitution for the election of his successor.In the same way, is it possible that Francis was not elected pope even though he received a absolute majority of cardinals votes and is now as in the case of Anacletus proclaimed pope by the same absolute majority? As with the case of Anacletus, it is possible Francis is a antipope if his election contradicted or violated the constitution promulgated by Pope John Paul II for electing his successor.The renown Catholic historian Carroll explicitly says that what matters in a valid papal election is not how many cardinals claim a person is the pope. What is essential for determining if someone is pope or antipope is the “election procedures… [as] governed by the prescription of the last Pope”: “Papal election procedures are governed by the prescription of the last Pope who provided for them (that is, any Pope can change them, but they remain in effect until they are changed by a duly elected Pope).”  “During the first thousand years of the history of the Papacy the electors were the clergy of Rome (priests and deacons); during the second thousand years we have had the College of Cardinals.” “But each Pope, having unlimited sovereign power as head of the Church, can prescribe any method for the election of his successor(s) that he chooses. These methods must then be followed in the next election after the death of the Pope who prescribed it, and thereafter until they are changed. A Papal claimant not following these methods is also an Antipope.” “Since Antipopes by definition base their claims on defiance of proper Church authority, all have been harmful to the Church, though a few have later reformed after giving up their claims.”  [http://www.ewtn.com/library/homelibr/antipope.txt] Finally, Remnant writer White got her idea that “The validity of a papal election rests” most importantly on “his acceptance by the Church in the person of the bishops” from Remnant writer Robert Siscoe who claims that it is a infallible dogma that a man is infallibly a pope if there is “peaceful and universal acceptance” by the Church.The problem apparently is Siscoe, who is White’s mentor in the “universal acceptance” claim, is possibly either a poor scholar or possibly a bit disingenuous in his leaving out the second part of a quote by a Doctor of the Church. He says “peaceful and universal acceptance of a Pope who was not legitimately elected… nevertheless becomes a true Pope… [by] universal acceptance… curing any defects that may have existed in the election… Here is what [Doctor of the Church] St. Alphonsus taught”: ‘It is of no importance that in the past centuries some Pontiff was illegitimately elected or took possession of the Pontificate by fraud; it is enough that he was accepted afterward by the whole Church as Pope, since by such acceptance he would become the true Pontiff.'” (TrueorFalsePope.com, “Peaceful and Universal Acceptance of a  Pope,” 2-28-19 & 3-20-19) [read this whole article here] The problem with Siscoe’s quote is he leaves out the very next sentence: “‘But if for a certain time, he was not accepted universally and truly by the Church, during that time then, the pontifical see would be vacant, as it is vacant at the death of a Pope.’ ‘Verita Della Fede’, vol. VIII, p. 720.'” (CathInfo.com, “Contra Cekadam by Fr. Francois Chazal,” December 2, 2017) Did Siscoe leave it out because he is a poor scholar or for some other reason or because it said “for a certain time”? What does “for a certain time” mean? Is that “certain time” immediately at the conclave or is it a few years after the conclave? Does this possibly mean that since Francis “afterwards… for a certain time… was not accepted universally… then, the pontifical see would be vacant”? Francis is not “accepted universally.” I am honored to know a successor of the Apostles, Bishop Rene Gracida, who questions the validity of Francis and is calling for the cardinals to investigate if he was “lawfully elected.” Moreover, Siscoe can’t have it both ways in his quotes when they apparently contradict each other. In the above same article he quotes John of St. Thomas saying: “[T]his man in particular lawfully elected and accepted by the Church, is the supreme pontiff.” (TrueorFalsePope.com, “Peaceful and Universal Acceptance of a  Pope,” 2-28-19 & 3-20-19) But getting back to Siscoe’s selective quote of St. Alphonsus, a good place to go to find out what the Doctor of the Church really meant is to go to a scholar who quotes him in full. This is Arnaldo Xavier de Silveira who Siscoe respects as shown by his website: “‘Arnaldo Xavier de Silveira’s Endorsement of ‘True or False Pope?'”  Note: Having recently learned of the passing of the great Brazilian scholar, Arnaldo Xavier da Silveira, we are publishing a portion of his endorsement of True or False Pope?, which will appear in the upcoming second edition. (1-8-2019)” [http://www.trueorfalsepope.com/?m=1] There is good reason to respect de Silveira’s scholarship has he himself explained: “In the 1970 Brazilian edition of my study of the heretical Pope, in the French edition of 1975 and in the Italian in 2016, I stated that on the grounds of the intrinsic theological reasons underpinning the Fifth Opinion I considered it not merely probable but certain. I chose not to insist on the qualification ‘theologically certain’ for an extrinsic reason, namely, that certain authors of weight do not adopt it.43 This was also the opinion of the then Bishop of Campos, Bishop Antonio de Castro Mayer, as expressed in a letter of 25th January 1974, when he sent my work to Paul VI, asking him to point out any possible errors (which never took place), expressly stating that he referred to the study ‘written by lawyer Arnaldo Vidigal Xavier da Silveira, with the contents of which I associate myself .’” [https://www.scribd.com/document/374434852/Arnaldo-Vidigal-Xavier-Da-Silveira-Replies-to-Fr-Gleize-on-Heretical-Pope] Here is what  de Silveira say in his book “Implications Of New Missae And Heretic Popes”: “On this same sanatio in raclice by virtue of the acceptance of the Pope by the whole Church,  Saint Alphonse of Liguori writes, in less heated but perhaps even more incisive terms:  “It is of no importance that in past centuries some Pontiff was illegitimately elected or took possession  of the Pontificate by fraud; it is enough that he was accepted afterwards by the whole Church as Pope,  since by such acceptance he would have become the true Pontiff. But if during a certain time he had not  been truly and universally accepted by the Church, during that time the Pontifical See would have been  vacant, as it is vacant on the death of a Pontiff’ (2).  “4. The Election of a Person who Cannot Be Pope  “The designation, as Pope, of a person who cannot occupy the charge, would constitute a special  case of dubious election. For it is a common opinion (3) that the election of a woman, of a child, of a  demented person and of someone who were not a member of the Church (a person not baptized, a  heretic, an apostate, a schismatic) would be invalid by divine law.  “Among these causes of invalidity it seems to us that it would be necessary to distinguish those  which would admit of a “sanatio in radice” from those which would not. A woman could not become  Pope under any hypothesis. But the same thing would not apply with a demented person, who could be  cured; with a child, who could grow; with a non-baptized person, who could be converted.  “This being laid down, we ask: in the hypotheses of invalidity which admits of sanatio in radice ,  would the eventual acceptation by the whole Church of the invalidly elected Pope remedy the vices of  the election?  “A complete answer to this question would require a detailed analysis of each of the cases of  invalidity. And this would exceed the objectives which we have set for ourselves.  “Such being the case, we shall only consider the hypothesis which is most relevant to the  perspective in which we place ourselves: The election of a heretic to the Papacy. What would happen if  a notorious heretic were elected and assumed the Pontificate without anyone having contested his  election?  (1) Billot , Tract de Eccl. Christi, tom. I, pp. 612-613.  (2) Saint Alphonse de Liquori , Verita della Fede, in “Opera…”, vol. VIII. P. 720, n. 9.  (3) See: Ferreres , Inst. Canonicae, tom. I, p. 132; Coronata , Inst, luris Canonici, vol. I, p. 360; Schmalzqrueber ,  lus Eccl. Univ., tom. I, pars II, p. 376, n. 99; Caietan , De Auctoriatate…, cap. XXVI, n. 382, pp. 167-168.  187  “At first sight, the answer to this question is, in theory , very simple: since God cannot permit that  the whole Church err about who is her chief, the Pope peacefully accepted by the whole Church is the  true Pope (1). It would be the duty of the theologians, on the basis of this clear theoretical principle, to  resolve the concrete question which would then be put: either proving that in reality the Pope had not  been a formal and notorious heretic at the moment of election; or showing that afterwards he had been  converted; or verifying that the acceptation by the Church had not been pacific and universal; or  presenting any other plausible explanation.  “A more attentive examination of the question would reveal, nevertheless, that even on purely  theoretical grounds, an important difficulty arises, which would consist in determining precisely what is the concept of pacific and universal acceptation by the Church. For such acceptation to have been  pacific and universal would it be enough that no Cardinal had contested the election?Would it be  enough that in a Council, for example, almost the totality of the Bishops had signed the acts, recognizing  in this way, at least implicitly, that the Pope be the true one?Would it be enough that no voice, or  practically no voice had publicly given the cry of alert?Or, on the contrary, would a certain very  generalized though not always well defined distrust be sufficient to destroy the apparently pacific and  universal character of the acceptance of the Pope?And if this distrust became a suspicion in numerous  spirits, a positive doubt in many, a certainty in some, would the aforementioned pacific and universal acceptance subsist?And if such distrusts, suspicions, doubts and certainties cropped out with some  frequency in conversations or private papers, or now and again in published writings, could one still  classify as pacific and universal the acceptance of a Pope who was already a heretic on the occasion of  his election by the Sacred College?” [https://archive.org/stream/ SilveiraImplicationsOfNewMissa eAndHereticPopes/Silveira% 20Implications%20of%20New% 20Missae%20and%20Heretic% 20Popes_djvu.txt] It is obvious that the renowned theologian de Silveira does not think that St. Alphonsus taught what Siscoe claims he taught that “peaceful and universal acceptance of a Pope who was not legitimately elected… nevertheless becomes a true Pope… [by] universal acceptance… curing any defects that may have existed in the election.” Does Siscoe think that “peaceful and universal acceptance of a Pope who was not legitimately elected… nevertheless becomes a true Pope… [by] universal acceptance… curing any defects that may have existed in the election” includes “curing” such “defects” as:  – “a special case of dubious [unlawful] election. For it is a common opinion (3) that the election of a woman, of a child, of a demented person and of someone who were not a member of the Church (a person not baptized, a heretic, an apostate, a schismatic) would be invalid by divine law.” Francis is not “accepted universally” as Bishop Gracida has said. But, even more important, it is obvious that besides “acceptance” a valid pope needs to be “lawfully elected.” Lastly, I ask Siscoe and White to specifically answer if Francis was not “lawfully elected” then does a “peaceful and universal acceptance” overturn a unlawful election? More importantly, why are Siscoe and White apparently so afraid of an investigation by cardinals since they continually ignore or avoid addressing the subject by the “universal acceptance” mantra? I ask both to please give a specific answer to why they are apparently so afraid of an investigation.Pray an Our Father now for the restoration of the Church and for Catholics to not just bemoan heresy, but put pressure on the cardinals to act as well as for the grace for a cardinal to stand up and investigate and to be the St. Bernard of our time.

Fred Martinez at 4:55 PM

Pope Benedict’s forced Abdication

Nov18by The Editor

HOW IT WENT DOWN

by Br. Alexis Bugnolo

As the long time readers of my blog, From Rome, know, I have extensively covered the Renunciation of Pope Benedict in articles analyzing it’s canonical value (here), who perpetrated the seizure of power from him (here), how it lead to his de facto imprisonment (here) and how, nevertheless, He has triumphed over all his enemies by it (here). Moreover, I have covered the signs he has given after the fact that he never signed validly (here, here and here). And in many other articles.

Now I want to focus on how the Renunciation happened, that is who was behind it and how it went down, to show that in some respects it might have been a forced and in others, a free act, and how and why Benedict may have sound reasons to be continually hesitant to admit what he really did and why.

History is Context

Fred Martinez, of Catholic Monitor Blog, is doing some excellent work at cutting through the propaganda of the controlled Catholic media. In his post of Monday, October 29, 2018, entitled, “Is Francis our first gay Pope?” he laid out in great detail all the evidence that the core agenda of Bergoglio is to achieve the agenda of the LGBTQ movement.

Two days and one year later, Raffaela, who blogs at, Il Blog di Raffaela. Riflessione e Commenti fra gli amici di Benedetto XVI, published a very excellent historical chronical of Pope Benedict’s war against pedophilia in the Church, in a blog post entitled, “Le decisioni e l’esempio del Papa Benedetto XVI nel combattere la piaga della pedofilia nella Chiesa. Cronologia“ (English translation: The decisions and example of Pope Benedict XVI in fighting against the plage of pedophilia in the Church. A Chronology).

These two excellent contributions to Church history by lay bloggers are the necessary context to understand the forced abdication of Pope Benedict, or rather, to discern what I believe are the general and specific indications that in some way the Renunciation was demanded of Pope Benedict and in some way it was a free act.

Rules of Power

The first forensic criterion to employ is the common principle, often quoted here in Italy, of Cui prodest? This Latin maxim means, literally, Who is profiting from it? And the soundness of this principle in forensic investigations is based on the principle of moral theology, that no one does anything purposeful without a reason, and thus no one commits a crime unless something is to be gained by it.

So, Rafaella shows us that Benedict was a strong opponent of pedophilia in the clergy and was willing to remove Cardinals, Archbishops, Bishops, priests and even place Commissioners on large and powerful groups, to punish this abominable vice.

But after his abdication (I use this term to refer to a forced renunciation), there comes into power Jorge Mario Bergoglio, the Mafia of St Gallen and the Lavender Mafia, who are pushing the gay agenda, openly and flagrantly.

The common sense inference, then, is that one of these three groups or all of them insisted on the removal of Pope Benedict.

This is less a conjecture than a simple application of the rules of power struggles. The Papacy since the time of the Italian Risorgimento, has lost all real temporal power. It can be invaded at any time, and the powers of the nations can at any time take away its status as an independent diplomatic entity. The result of this loss of temporal power, means in truth, that the Papacy is left with a small enclave which is populated only by the Roman Curia and ruled by the Cardinals.

Now while the Cardinals each do not have as much power as the Pope, all of them together, with all their political and financial connections round the world, do in fact have more power than the pope.  Therefore, it would not be surprising if in the century following the suppression of the Papal States, that the College of Cardinals would come to dominate the power structure of the Vatican and that the Pope might become simply the public pawn of an all male club of ecclesiastics.

Now if these political inferences are correct, it would be expected that if a Pope started to impose discipline upon the subjects of each faction of Cardinals, by booting out of the priesthood or suspending some of their best friends and supporters, who were pedophiles, that eventually a zealous pope might in fact undercut all the power structures which put him in and maintain him in power.

What was happening in the year prior to the Renunciation?

With these speculations as a preface, let’s consider just some of the groups that Benedict XVI penalized in the year prior to Feb. 11, 2013, and watch how the timeline supports the inferences of risk, which I just outlined.

1. On Feb. 2, 2012, Mons. Scicluna (who now leads Bergoglio’s pro gay clerical investigation team) marks out Pope Benedict as the person responsible for punishing pervert priests.  This may sound like praise, but it also might be painting a bull’s eye upon the target to be removed.
2. From Feb. 6 to 9, 2012, there is a Conference in Rome for Bishops and heads of religious orders on the need to remove perverts. Members of the Conference again finger Pope Benedict as being the prime mover of it.
3. Feb. 16, 2012 onwards: The Legionaires of Christ, their Movement and their woman’s branch come under strictures and strong measures against sexual perversion and the evil role of their founder.
4. Spring, 2013: Church of Ireland rocked by allegations.
5. May, 2012: Members of the Legionaires of Christ are reduced to lay state, new strictures upon the institute imposed by Papal order. New investigations.
6. Spring and Summer, 2012: Pope Benedict begins to demand resignations of bishops.
7. July 2, 2012: Pope Benedict appoints Archbishop Muller to the CDF. Shortly after this, he begins considering a renunciation. Before the end of summer, he mentions it to Cardinal Bertone, the then Secretary of State, who was effectively the real monarch at the Vatican and who was blocking Benedict on many things. (Why mention this to your chief opponent?)
8. October 2012: Don Oko publishes the book, Pope Benedict against the Homo-Heresy.
9. October 11, 2012: The investigation into the Legionaries is put on pause, allegedly because the Cardinal assigned needs to rest.
10. January 30, 2013: the Acts of the Conference from a year ago are published an presented to Pope Benedict.
11. February 1, 2013: Archbishop Gomez of Los Angelos announces that Cardinal Mahoney is banned from all public activities as a Bishop on account of his gross mishandling of cases of pedophilia in that Archdiocese. At the same time he names 126 priests of the Diocese as involved in such crimes. (Sicluna and Mahoney share the same episcopal lineage)
12. Feb. 5, 2013: New promoter of Justice at the CDF, Fr. Oliver, mentions Sicluna in a statement wherein he fingers Benedict as the key man in the Vatican for punishing pervert priests.
13. Feb 7, 2013 — From Rome Blog has it from a source at Rome, that on this day, Mr. Gotti, who had been dismissed from IOR the previous summer, without the knowledge or consent of Pope Benedict, had an hour long meeting at the Vatican with Cardinal Bertone, the then Secretary of State, in which the Cardinal affirmed Benedict’s decision to reinstate him fully and back him in his investigation of the Vatican Bank.
14. Feb. 11, 2013 — On a single sheet of paper, to the surprise of nearly everyone, who is left speechless, except Cardinal Sodano, Pope Benedict reads out a statement of renunciation.

In short, in one year Pope Benedict had shown himself willing to take down the most powerful priestly institute in the conservative flank of the Church AND to take down one of the most powerful Cardinals in the liberal flank of the Church.

An Examination and Discussion

The decision to tell Mr. Gotti that he would be reinstated on Feb. 7, and the decision to renounce on Feb. 11 simply do not add up. You cannot have any real hope that you will reinstate someone if you are planning ahead to resign in 4 days. That makes no sense. Also, it makes no sense that Benedict was planning to resign since the summer (as Bertone claims in 2016), and never find the 14 errors in the Latin text you are planning to read out-loud in the Consistory of February.

We do know that the Archdiocese of Los Angelus is ground zero of a  Jewish Gay Mafia with strong ties to the financial industry, and that the Archdiocese has strong ties with this Mafia. We know that on Jan. 5, 2013, the ATMs at the Vatican were shut down by Deutch Bank, a move many have speculated was a signal to Benedict that the financial powers wanted him out.

Conclusions

I believe, therefore, that the demand for Pope’s resignation was most probably made after February 7, 2013 and before the consistory of Feb. 11, 2013. — If Giuseepe Auricchio, the seer of Avola, Italy, can be believed, he foresaw that Benedict would receive a demand he could not agree to. — If you examine the text of the renunciation, you will find a Latin rife with errors, of the kind which would result if a non expert wrote it and had only 4 days or less to find errors in it. So it is very possible that Benedict was given a text, and that He modified it to make it appear to be a valid resignation, but in fact rather to make it to be an invalid resignation. And that, not knowing who was behind those demanding his resignation, has never admitted what he really did, so as to protect himself and the Church from this Mafia.

I have not proven a crime, however, I have only outlined a chronology that needs to be further investigated, a chronology which leads me to use as an operative hypothesis, that Benedict DID NOT write the original text of the Renunciation, only changed perhaps the word munus to ministerium.

In my next report, I will discuss the errors in the Latin text and what they show about who may have written it.

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Meet Giovanna Chirri, mother of the notion that Benedict resigned the papacy

Nov18by The Editor

https://fromrome.wordpress.com/2019/11/18/meet-giovanna-chirri-mother-of-the-notion-that-benedict-resigned-the-papacy/

This is our English translation of the article published by ChiesaRomana.info yesterday.

How did it happen that the entire world
thinks that Pope Benedict XVI
renounced the papacy?

by Br. Alexis Bugnolo

Behind every great man, there is a woman;
and behind every great act of a man, the insistence of a woman.

Today, nearly the entire world believes that Pope Benedict XVI renounced the papacy on Feb. 11, 2013.

And perhaps, dear readers, you think so too.

But the truth of what really happened that day has been obscured by the psychological presumption induced by the announcement made moments after the renunciation, by Mrs. Chirri. I am not kidding you!

Did you know that? The entire world thinks that way because of a single tweet, from a pool reporter for ANSA, known as Mrs. Giovanna Chirri. and here is that tweet:

In English, that reads:

B16 has resigned. He leaves the pontificate as of February 28.

This tweet is in fact the first announcement of the renunciation. It caused Giovanna Chirri to become immediately the most famous journalist in the world, for that moment. For the sake of posterity she subsequently gave several interviews so that we all might understand better the series of events which took place on that day.  Here is her testimony, given to the magazine, Familiga Cristiana, on the third anniversary of the Renunciation (Italian original here), the English translation of which is our own:

Though the Consistory should have concluded at that moment, the Pope remained seated, and began to read, again in Latin, from a white sheet which he held in his hand.  He said two things first of all: that he had not convoked the Cardinals solely to hear his approval of two decrees for the canonization of saints, but that he had to say something “important for the life of the Church”, and that he was growing old: his precise words were ingravescente aetate.  At these words I felt as if a hand was placed upon my throat and a ball was being inflated in my head: because Ingravescentem aetatem is the document whereby Pope Paul VI took from the Cardinals the right to elect a pope, after they obtained their eightieth year of age: they were words which signified retirement.  Benedict XVI continued to speak in a Latin, which fortunately was much more comprehensible than that of Cardinal Amato; he spoke for some time, saying that he no longer had the strength to govern the Barque of Peter in a world which is increasingly face paced.  He explained that in conscience he had decided to leave, that the Cardinals will have to hold a Conclave to elect a successor and that he was establishing the beginning of the sede vacante at 8 pm on February 28.

I heard what he said but as one who had not heard; I was breathless and my legs trembled as I sat. I could not hold my left hand steady, even when I tried with my right hand.  I began to make telephone calls seeking help and confirmations.  At the Vatican, where obviously, everyone had something else on their mind, no one picked up the phone.  I was prey to a sensation of terror which I had never experienced in my life.  At this point, Pope Ratzinger had finished speaking. Some of the faces of those present grew pale; Monsignor Guido Pozzo, sitting next to him, seem to have turned to stone; different Cardinals had fixed stares and the muscles of their faces were frozen.  In an unreal silence, the Dean of the College of Cardinals, Angelo Sodano, said in Italian: “This news strikes us as a bolt of lighting out of the blue”.

As you continue to read her testimony in Italian, you see immediately that after three years, she has understood in part the error she made that day, for she no longer speaks of a renunciation of the papacy, but expressly now speaks only of a renunciation of ministry.

Hence, if on February 11, 2013, Mrs. Chirri announced to the world one thing, and three years after in 2016, she explains that Benedict had renounced something else, perhaps we can shake off our presumption that what she said first was correct? One thinks so.

Compare what she said in 2014 on the first anniversary of the renunciation, when she was interviewed by Antonio Sanfrancesco, likewise of Famiglia Cristiana, in an article entitled, La Giornalista che diede la notizia, Non rispiravo, ero terrorizato (qui). A title – which in English, means: The Giornalist who broke the story, I could not breath, I was terrorized – which does not give the reader any confidence that she had a clear mind at the moment of her tweet.

This history and the alteration of the narrative is important for all of us because, according to the norm of Canon Law, there is no canon which regards a renunciation of ministry!  This is because in the Code of Canon Law of 1983, ministry is never associated with power or office, but only with action or the execution of a duty.  Moreover, in canon 1331 §2 °4, ministry is not even listed among those things which an excommunicated person is forbidden to acquire.  Hence, in the Code, an excommunicate can exercise a ministry.

Obviously, if the thing, according to its genus, which Pope Benedict renounced on Feb. 11, 2013 is something which someone not in communion with the Church or with the pope, can exercise, how can it be possible that in renouncing it Pope Benedict separated himself from the papal office? That does not make sense. It’s not even rational to contemplate.

Hence, it appears that in changing her story, Mrs. Chirri no longer agrees with what she wrote on that day:

Indeed, let us read that tweet with precision: it contains the words, dimesso, lascia and pontificato, which in English are resigned, leave and pontifcate.  But no where in the Latin text of the renunciation does Pope Benedict use any Latin words which mean these things!

Hence, if we are to speak properly and with precision, her tweet is not a report of news, but an interpretation of the event, an interpretation which arises out of the state of her mind in that moment in which she rushed to get the scoop on the news before any other journalist.

Now, at last, perhaps the time has come for the Church to recognize that none of us is obligated to understand that act of renunciation according to the state of mind of Mrs. Chirri, the Mother of the Papal Resignation. I call her, “the Mother of the Papal Resignation”, because in the understanding of the world, it was she who gave everyone to understand the act as an act of renunciation of the papacy, not merely of the ministry, an understanding and interpretation which all who study Canon Law are forcing themselves to find in the Code of Canon Law, but fail to do so, because it ain’t there.

ORIGINAL CREDITS: Testo di Famiglia Cristiana citato dall’articolo citato qui sopra. L’immagine in evidenza, della Sig.ra Chirri trovato sulla pagina di Famiglia Cristiana nel articolo di 11 Febbraio 2014, citato qui sopra, ma senza attribuzione di proprietà intellettuale. Si presume fair use per tutti due. Il tweet di Chirri è replicata dal suo conto su Twitter che è ancora in rete.

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SUNDAY REPORTFrancisChurch Strains at the Gnat and Swallows the Camel While Uncle Ted’s nephews still exercise power, the pope frets over “ecological” sins. 

byGEORGE NEUMAYRNovember 17, 2019, 12:04 AM Cardinal Joseph Bernardin in 1992 (YouTube screenshot) 

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Earlier this year, James Grein, the primary victim of Theodore McCarrick, reported that he had also been abused by Joseph Bernardin, the late cardinal of Chicago. Grein said the abuse took place in Wisconsin at Lake Geneva. As Grein was swimming, McCarrick pulled down his swimsuit and Bernardin groped him. The accusation received zero coverage in the mainstream media, which continues to treat the politically liberal Bernardin as a canonized figure. But officials at the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB) are familiar with the charge, and they can’t dismiss Grein as a crackpot (after all, it was Grein’s testimony against McCarrick that the Vatican used to laicize him).

In light of all of this, one might have thought that the USCCB would rename its “Cardinal Bernardin Leadership Award,” which honors outstanding youth. But it didn’t. It gave the award out again this year — to a young “immigrant mother” who advocates for amnesty.

As the USCCB was giving out an award named after a credibly accused molester, it received the news that one of its members, Bishop Nicholas DiMarzio of Brooklyn, has been accused of abusing an altar boy in the 1970s while DiMarzio served as a priest in New Jersey. On December 1, New Jersey will give victims of abuse two years to file lawsuits without regard to the statute of limitations. DiMarzio is one of Uncle Ted’s nephews. He served under Theodore McCarrick as an auxiliary bishop in Newark from 1993–99, and was co-consecrated by McCarrick and McCarrick’s corrupt pal, John Mortimer Smith, the late bishop of Trenton.

Even setting aside the recent accusation against him, DiMarzio, given his compromising associations, had no business serving as an investigator of sex abuse claims in Buffalo, an assignment to which he had recently been dispatched by Pope Francis. The tone-deafness of both the USCCB and the Vatican is astounding. To put it in the words of Jesus Christ, they strain at the gnat and swallow the camel. As Uncle Ted’s nephews remain in power — Cardinal Kevin Farrell, his corrupt former roommate, will preside over the next conclave as camerlengo — the Pope and the USCBB rail against “ecological sins,” call for “virtual zero access to guns,” and urge pastors to deliver more “homilies on racism.”

The pope threatened this week to add “ecological sins” to the catechism. “We have to introduce, we are thinking about, in the catechism of the Catholic Church, the sin against ecology, the sin against our common home,” he said.

In his encyclical Laudato Si, he listed as offenses against ecology the West’s reliance on air conditioning and fossil fuels. The pope would like to see you use the bus more, bring home your groceries in cloth bags, and sweat it out during the summer. In 2016, he proposed that green activism be added to the corporal works of mercy. He advised Catholics to confess their sins against “our common home,” if they, for example, don’t separate “refuse,” cook “only what can be reasonably consumed,” and turn off “unnecessary lights.”

The “pope of the poor” somehow hasn’t recognized that the poor are living longer and healthier lives precisely because of these “ecological sins.” Throwing out bad food and keeping air conditioning on helps keep the poor alive.

What doesn’t keep people alive is abortion — a topic Francis’s lobby within the USCCB worked hard to try and deemphasize in Baltimore. Bishop Robert McElroy of San Diego, whom Francis is likely to promote, argued that abortion is not the “preeminent” issue facing the world.

The ghost of Cardinal Bernardin — who was the first to push the idea that abortion is “just one of many” life issues — haunted the conference in more ways than one. His so-called “seamless garment” still hides the heresies of many bishops. Almost a third of the bishops supported the seamless garment-style motion that McElroy represented. Archbishop Charles Chaput of Philadelphia, who is retiring and may see his seat filled by McElroy (he is on the short list for Philadelphia), took issue with McElroy’s comment, for which he received applause. Had Pope Francis been in the room, he wouldn’t have applauded. He clearly agrees with McElroy; recall his complaint about a Church “preoccupied” with hot-button moral issues and his emphasis on issues “equally sacred” to abortion.

This is a pontificate that obsesses over trivialities while ignoring the worst catechetical and abuse crises in the history of the Church — an era of payouts to victims and awards named after the perpetrators.

George Neumayr FOLLOW THEIR STORIES:VIEW MOREGeorge Neumayr, a contributing editor to The American Spectator, is co-author of No Higher Power: Obama’s War on Religious Freedom. SPECIAL REPORTThe United States Conference of Catholic BlowhardsbyGEORGE NEUMAYRSUNDAY REPORTThe Warped Catechism of Jorge BergogliobyGEORGE NEUMAYRSUNDAY REPORTThe Post-Christian Pope and the Pacha IdolsbyGEORGE NEUMAYRSUNDAY REPORTFrom the Pact of the Catacombs to the Amazon SynodbyGEORGE NEUMAYRSUNDAY REPORTThe Rhine Flows Into the AmazonbyGEORGE NEUMAYRSUNDAY REPORTThe Strange Gods of Pope FrancisbyGEORGE NEUMAYR Sponsored by Revcontent

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Catholic Monitor

Monday, October 29, 2018

Is Francis our First Gay Pope? 

Francis strolls hand in hand with the anti-gangster and gay rights advocate Fr. Luigi Ciotti.

– Updated November 16, 2019

Yesterday, the pro-gay CBS headline was:

“Pope Francis compare homophobic politicians to Hitler”

Is Francis our first gay pope?

It is beyond a doubt true that no pope or antipope in history has had a gayer agenda than this man.

Put it this way, it appears probable that someone with Francis’s gay agenda would have felt more at home in the idol worshipping pagan cities of Sodom and Gomorrah than in the tent of Abraham.

Remember how a extremist Black feminist said Bill Clinton was the first black president in an 1998 New Yorker article. The radical Black feminist Toni Morrison in the piece said Clinton is “our first black president. Blacker than any actual person who could ever be elected in our children’s lifetime.”

Remember how extremist feminists said Barack Obama would be our first woman president. More womanly than any actual person who could ever be elected in our children’s lifetime. Feminist Bonnie Erbe said Obama was a “woman”:

“ Still, her [Clinton] female supporters who are watching Obama’s movement coalesce, solidify, and take over should console themselves that there will be a woman Democrat in the White Houseeither way if the Democrats win the general election. The nominee will either be a woman [Hillary] with double-X chromosomes or one [Obama] with XY chromosomes who votes more like a woman than most with XX.” [https://www.usnews.com/opinion/blogs/erbe/2008/02/13/if-hillary-loses-do-women-lose]

Feminist Kathleen Dolan said: 

“Obama… [is] being more feminine than she [Hillary] can be.”[http://archive.boston.com/bostonglobe/editorial_opinion/oped/articles/2008/02/21/obama_uses_female_style_to_win/

What they were saying was that Bill Clinton had a radical Black agenda and Obama had a radical feminist agenda.

Now we have Francis who is our first gay pope. Gayer than any actual person who could ever be elected in our children’s lifetime.

The Francis like Clinton and Obama has a agenda. 

Francis has a radical gay agenda and his inner circle is largely composed of the gay lobby and those who covered-up for them. 

The Deus Ex Machina blog in a post titled “This Might Sound Crazy, But this Question Needs to be Asked” said that Francis’s inner circle is a “WHO’S WHO of the homo-mafia”:

“It appears as if it’s a WHO’S WHO of the homo-mafia in the upper echelons of the post-conciliar church.”

I mean, it’s like Francis has a LIST of names of the worst HOMOHERETICS in the post-conciliar church and is promoting them, with their entire entourages to the highest levels of the government of the Vatican.”

Moreover, the blog had a video to illustrate the point:

“[T]his here caught the ever gazeful eye of this humble blogger, not to mention his news feed filters:”

[https://sarmaticusblog.wordpress.com/]

The Catholic Argentinian website the Wanderer on October 23, 2014 posted “Unmasking Bergoglio” where it said “Bergoglio [Francis] always had the ‘gay agenda'” and bestowed “constant protection that he lavished on many homosexual priests”:

“Bergoglio always had the “gay agenda” among his plans… It is a question of asking the Buenoairean clergy about the constant protection that he lavished on many homosexual priests.”

“… Cardinal Bergoglio as Primate… of the Argentine Episcopal Conference… “[had a] “star”… of the Argentine Episcopate. The great theologian… of the poor [Archbishop Juan Carlos Maccarone].”

“Until… in March 2005 a video appeared in which the archbishop appeared having sexual games with a young man… Pope Benedict XVI… immediately removed [him from his]… position [as bishop].”

“The reaction of Bergoglio”

“By a letter that Maccarone himself directed in [to] his bother bishops, it can be easily deduced that the entire Argentine episcopal gang knew of his weakness… And, in spite of that, they promoted him to the episcopal office.”

“… Bergoglio… issued a statement in which he expressed his ‘gratitude’ to the former bishop [Maccarone].”

“… The spokesman of the arzobipado porteno went out to say… the [sex] video corresponded to “the private life of Bishop Maccarone.”

Jimmy Burns in his book “Francis, Pope of Good Promise” after referencing that “Maccarone resigned” because of the “videotape showing the bishop having ‘intimate relations'” wrote:

“Bergoglio’s own spokesman, rather than focus on Maccarone’s political links with Kirchner, jumped to the bishop’s defense claiming he had been set up.”

“… Fortunato Millimaci, a Buenos Aires sociologist [said]… ‘This means that the idea of the Catholic Church as a moral reference of a Catholic nation is very strongly in doubt… It shows that a double standard exists within the Church [of Bergoglio] itself.'” (Pages 231-232)

Francis’s inner circle since leaving Argentina is largely composed of the gay lobby and those who covered-up for them:

BusinessStandard, September 19, 2017:

Francis’s Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith perfect Archbishop Ferrer will go to trail for “complicity in alleged cover-up” of paedophile priest.

The Telegraph, July 19, 2013:

“Pope’s [Francis’s] ‘eyes and ears’ in Vatican bank [allegedly] ‘had string of homosexual affairs’… [Battista] Ricca is a trusted confidante of the Pope”

LifeSiteNews, March 7,2018:

Francis’s closest advisor in the C9 papal inner circle Cardinal Oscar Rodriguez Maradiaga left in charge of his Honduras archdiocese his close confidant Bishop Juan Pineda “accused of ‘abusing seminarians, having a string of male lovers.'”

National Catholic Reporter, April 29, 2014:

Francis’s close advisor in C9 papal inner circle Cardinal “Errazuriz [and his]… successor… [Cardinal] Ezzati” “Chilean cardinals close to pope stained by abuse cover-ups” of priest sex abuser of Juan Carlos Cruz.

The Remnant, September 12, 2017:

Francis’s confidant Cardinal Francesco Coccopalmerio’s Secretary has homosexual orgy in Vatican:

“Secretary to the powerful Cardinal Francesco ‘Positive Realities of Homosexuals’… [Coccopalmerio’s Secretary] Capozzi was arrested for hosting a raucous drug fueled homosexual orgy.”

New York Times, April 30, 2018:

“Cardinal George Pell, the [Francis] Vatican’s third-highest-ranking official, will stand trail… of sex abuse.”

BBC, August 29, 2010 & LifeSiteNews, September 16, 2017:

Francis collaborator invited by Pope to be number two representative in family synod “Belgian Cardinal Danneels condoned sex-abuse silence.”

The Week, January 3, 2017:

“Pope Francis and his cardinal allies… known to interfere…  on abuse cases… Consider case of [serial sex-abuser] Fr. Mauro Inzoli… Francis returned him to the priestly state.”

Vebuumdei.blogspot, June 23, 2014 & Catholic Monitor, April 18, 2017:

Francis strolled hand in hand down the street with gay activist Fr. Luigi Ciotti at a anti-gangster event.

Chiesa, December 16, 2016:

Vatican expert Sandro Magister said Francis has a “number of homosexual priests in the inner circle of his closest collaborators and confidants.”

Now we are going to look at the evidence that Francis has a gay agenda. Just because Francis’s inner circle is almost completely composed of gays and those who cover-up for them doesn’t necessarily mean he has a gay agenda.

On September 1, 2017, Crux reported that Francis said:

“Let’s call unions between the same sex ‘civil unions.'”
(Crux, “‘I consulted a psychoanalyst,’ Pope Francis reveals in new book,” September 1, 2017)

The gay/lesbian dissenting New Ways Ministry said:

“Pope Francis has never, as pontiff, stated his endorsement of civil unions so flatly. (He did support civil unions as a compromise to his opposition towards marriage equality… As pontiff, he did make a ambiguous statement about civil unions…).” 
(New Way Ministry Bondings 2.0 Blog, “Pope Francis Allows for Civil Unions for Lesbian and Gay Couples,” September 2, 2017)

The gay movement New Way Ministry endorsed Francis’s apparent endorsement of the civil unions of cohabiting homosexual couples.

On June 3, 2003 the then Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, head of the Congregation for the Faith, said such an endorsement was against Catholic teaching:

“Those who would move from tolerance to the legitimatization of specific rights for cohabiting homosexual persons need to be reminded that the approval or legalization of evil is something far different from the toleration of evil… The Church teaches that respect for homosexual persons cannot lead in any way to approval of homosexual behavior or to legal recognition of homosexual unions.”
(Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, “Considerations Regarding Proposals to give Legal Recognition to Unions between Homosexual Persons,” June 3, 2003)

On June 18, The Telegraph reported that Pope Francis has a commission drafting doctrine for “excommunicating” the Italian Mafia which again has the endorsement of the gay movement.

Francis appears to be following the lead of gay advocate Fr. Luigi Ciotti and the gay/feminist “antimafia” movement in Italy.

This movement is spearheaded by “Rosario Crocetta, Sicily’s openly gay governor and antimafia activist… That normative order effaces queer, gay and feminist antimafia protests. That ‘taste’ for justice and civility’ spoken of by don Luigi Coitti” according to author Robin Pinkering-lazzi.
(“The Italian Antimafia, New Media, the Culture of Legality,” 2017, books.google.com)

It appears that Francis may be following the lead of the Italian gay movement against the Mafia and the gay mafia within the Catholic Church against moral doctrine.

Author and gay mafia expert Fr. Dariusz Oko according to ChurchMilitant.com affirmed that homosexual clerics “control…many diocese.” Oko said:

“There is…a problem with homosexual bishops…There is a gay mafia…They create informal unions, and they infiltrate the Church.” (ChurchMilitant.com, April 18, 2017)

Has the gay mafia infiltrated the diocese of Rome and do they control Francis?

Vatican expert Sandro Magister said Francis has a “number of homosexual priests in the inner circle of his closest collaborators and confidants.” (Chiesa.espressolineit.com, December 16, 2016)

Monsignor Battista Ricca, for example, was appointed by Francis as head of the Vatican Bank. The Monsignor is “well known for homosexual conduct.” (Lifesitenews.com, July 14, 2015)

The appointment of the gay priest to run the Vatican Bank was “a totally personal one made by Francis” according to Asia News.

Francis, after a long day of papal work, goes home to the homosexual Ricca who is the head of Francis’s personal “residence at the Casa Santa Marta hotel.” (Asianews.it.com, 06/26/2013)

On March 21, 2014, in his desire to accompany someone who is a “strong promoter of homosexuality” and gay rights who “participates in a ‘gay parade'” as well as is promoted and better known as fighting the Italian Mafia, Francis decided to pay homage to Fr. Luigi Ciotti. (The Vatican promoted the Ciotti visit as a anti-ganster event.)

Ciotti is a advocate or “a strong promoter of homosexuality…of ‘gay marriage’ and the adoption of children by homosexuals.” (Vebuumdei.blogspot.com, June 23, 2014)

Two very telling photos of Pope Francis and Ciotti can be viewed if one googles: Fr. Luigi Ciotti.

Francis is actually holding hands with the priest, who is a gay rights advocate, as they stroll.

Just because the Francis’s home is run by a priest “well known for homosexual conduct” and he holds hands as he strolls with a gay rights advocate and he appears to endorse gay civil unions doesn’t necessarily mean he is controlled by a gay mafia agenda.

Unfortunatedly, another of Francis’s appointments after Ricca begins to show a pattern of homosexual activist influence on papal policy.

The Francis’s appointment of Archbishop Vincenzo Paglia to head the Pontifical Council for Life showed the direction of papal policy.

Archbishop Paglia’s coat of arms features the gay activist symbol of the rainbow and he commissioned a gay artist to paint a massive “homoerotic” pornographic mural at his former cathedral.

Lifesitenews.com reported the mural depicts:

“Jesus carrying nets to heaven filled with naked and semi-nude homosexuals, transexuals, prostitutes, and drug dealers, jumbled together in erotic interactions.” (Lifesitenews, March 3, 2017)

In the painting is the homosexual image of a shirtless Paglia affectionately embracing a naked man. (Lifesitenews, March 16, 2017)

If Paglia was painted affectionately embracing a naked woman that would be a heterosexual image. There is no dought it is a homosexual image of the Archbishop.

This is not the end of Francis’s appointee to head the Pontifical Council for Life exploits in the homoerotic.

Psychologist Gerard van den Aardweg and sex abuse expert Rick Fitzgerald M.D., in an article titled “Is the pontificate of Francis in the clutches of the gay lobby?” wrote that Paglia produced  a sex education program that “contained homoerotic and heterosexual pornography which was like that employed by adult predators of youth.” (Lifesitenews, March 6, 2017)

The Paglia pornographic sex ed program called Meeting Point was released with the “apparent approval” of Francis on World Youth Day accordingly to the article.

The two sex abuse experts said the “homoerotic and heterosexual” porn predator like program “should be withdrawn as soon as possible by the Vatican and its website closed.”

It is beginning to appear that Pope Francis just might be under the influence of his “homosexual…inner circle of…collaborators and confidants” who could be pushing the gay activist agenda.

Fr. Zuhlsdord at his website on April 16, 2016 posted:

“Pope Francis made it clear to everyone that he was backing the Kasper Proposal and Pope Francis knows how to use his absolute power!”

Fr. Z in the same article showed why Francis used his “absolute power” to attempt to bring about the ultimate purpose of the Kasper Proposal:

The “Trojan Horse Archbishop Bruno Forte stealthily snuck into the Synod’s Interim Report… of the 2014 Synod…was the moment when many of us knew that ‘homosexuality’ was the bigger issue with the Kasperites…This is still the Kasperite strategy.”

Lifesitenews.com summarized what Forte and Kasper were using Francis’s “absolute power” to control the procedures of the Synod for:

-“‘Earthquake’: Vatican Synod mid-term report suggests emphasizing’ positive aspects of cohabitation, homosexuality…’Accept and value’ homosexuality.”

-The “Voice of the Family coalition charging that it amounts to the ‘betrayal’ of the Catholic faith.” (Lifesitenews.com, October 13, 2014)

Remember what Fr. Z said of the Kasper Proposal. It is ultimately the strategy to achieve the gay agenda:

Homosexuality is “the bigger issue…This is still the Kasper strategy.”

Is this Francis’s strategy?

Is Amoris laetitia the strategy to achieve the Kasper Proposal which is ultimately the means to impose the gay agenda?

Francis strolled hand in hand with the gay rights advocate Fr. Luigi Ciotti.

Is Francis hand in hand, that is closely working together, with the Kasperites who would betray the Catholic faith?

Is Francis hand in hand with those who call for the acceptance and imposing of the gay agenda “pastorally” by sex ed and other abuses on the little ones in the Church without supposedly changing doctrine?

If he is truly hand in hand with those who would cause one of these little ones to fall into sin then he needs to listen to Jesus’s words:

“If you cause one of these little ones who believe in me to sin, it would be better for you to have a great millstone fastened around your neck and be drowned in the depths of the sea.” (Matthew 18:6)

The sex abuse experts Fitzgerald and van den Aardweg, who wrote “Is the pontificate of Francis in the clutches of the gay lobby?,” in the article said:

“Public concern about the policies placing Catholic youth at risk of abuse has been further intensified by Pope Francis’ restoring to priestly ministry an Italian priest Fr. Mauro Inzoli, who was laicized by Pope Benedict XVI for homosexually abusing adolescent males. After his priestly facilities were restored, he again repeated his homosexual abuse of youth, was arrested and imprisoned.”

“In the United States, a member of the hierarchy who deliberately places youth at risk of abuse by a known sexual predator is expected to resign.”

Alessandro Bianchi/Reuters at RT News on June 5, 2016 wrote the headline:

“Pope Francis vows to remove pedophile cover-up bishops with new church law” (https://www.rt.com/news/34565-pope-bishop-priest-abuse/)

Will Francis be true to his vow?

Will he remove the Bishop of Rome for pedophile cover-up?

International child advocate attorney Elizabeth Yore asked Francis:

“Dear Pope Francis, who is responsible for ignoring the pleas of victims of the sexual abuse by Fr. Nicola Corradi of deaf and mute children? Who restored priestly facilities and released back into the community a formerly laicized sexual predator, Fr.Inzoli? Who raised the stature of Cardinal Danneels caught on tape covering up abuse by appointing him to the Synod on the Family and having him on the balcony at the papal election?” (Lifesitenews, January 25, 2017, “Six cases where the sexual abuse scandal touches Pope Francis”)
Jesus said to St. Faustina:
“When you say this prayer with a contrite heart and with faith… I will give the grace of conversion.”
This is the prayer:
“O Blood and Water, which gushed forth from the heart of Jesus as a fount of Mercy for us, I trust You.” (Divine Mercy Diary 186,187)

Say this prayer for the conversion of Francis every day.

If Francis through his free will refuses the grace to convert, then may the grace go to Cardinal Burke and the other dubia Cardinals so they will issue the correction to him which would be the first step to him being “deprived” of the “Apostlic See.”

In no way do I mean this request for prayer to dishonor the Office of St. Peter.

I honor the Office of Peter.

St. Paul honored St. Peter, but when he clearly witnessed Peter manifesting error and confusion on the infallible teachings of the Church by his actions & words, he “rebuked” or corrected him for the good of the first Pope and the Church.

As in the time of Paul, it is now very clear that Francis is manifesting error and confusion on the infallible teachings of the Church by his actions & words.

In this website, I have tried to present the evidence in a straight forward manner without polemics although sometimes I implicitly used humor.

I may have used and I have quoted others who used a tone that could be considered harsh, but not, I believe, different from the tone Paul used on Peter.

Please read the posts in this website for clear evidence of Francis’s errors.

Please remember what a great priest in our present troubled time said:

We get the leaders we deserve. What have we done to preserve the Catholic faith? Have we prayed and practiced our Catholic life? Or do we just talk about it? In that case we get what we deserve.

Please pray and practice your Catholic faith for your sake, for your family and friends sake and for the Church.

Pray especially for Francis and Cardinal Burke & the dubia Cardinals.

The most reliable Vatican expert in the world Edward Pentin reported on why it is of the upmost importance to pray for the Pope:

“Whatever the exact truth behind the lurid and disturbing story, it has further exposed such gravely sinful behavior taking place in the Vatican that one senior member of the curia says has ‘never been worse.’” 
“According to reports in the mainstream media, Vatican police broke up a drug-fueled homosexual debauched party in an apartment of the Holy Office, but how true is it?”

“The news first broke in a June 28 article in Il Fatto Quotidiano…”

“The article’s author, Francesco Antonio Grana, says Pope Francis, whose Santa Marta residence is just 500 yards from the Holy Office, was aware of the raid and knew of the monsignor’s capture…”

“In the meantime, a reliable senior member of the curia has told the Register that he has heard from “multiple sources” that the story is true, including from another senior curial figure.”

“He said the extent of homosexual practice in the Vatican has ‘never been worse…’” 

“The precise details of the reported events in the CDF therefore remain open to question, but the substance of the story appears to be true. If so, many would find such behavior taking place in the Holy Office not only unconscionable but also highly sacrilegious…”

“In light of the latest scandal and the current situation, one former official urged readers to recall the warnings of the Lord on homosexual acts, especially between priests, as explained by St. Catherine of Siena in her Dialogues written as if dictated by God Himself.”

“The medieval mystic, co-patron of Rome and Doctor of the Church, relayed the words at a time when a number of clergy had fallen into grave sin.”

“Such priests, the Lord told St. Catherine, not only fail from resisting their fallen nature, ‘but do even worse as they commit the cursed sin against nature [homosexual acts].’”

“’Like the blind and stupid having dimmed the light of the understanding, they do not recognize the disease and misery in which they find themselves,’ the Lord continued, adding that it not only causes God ‘nausea, but displeases even the demons themselves, whom these miserable creatures have chosen as their lords.’”

“He added that ‘this sin against nature is so abominable that, for it alone, five cities were submersed, by virtue of the judgement of My Divine Justice, which could no longer bear them.’ The Lord told St. Catherine that even the demons are ‘repulsed upon seeing such an enormous sin being committed.’”

“As a remedy, St. Catherine recounted the Lord saying:

‘Never cease offering me the incense of fragrant prayers for the salvation of souls, for I want to be merciful to the world. With your prayers and sweat and tears, I will wash the face of my bride, Holy Church. I showed her to you earlier as a maiden whose face was all dirtied as if she were a leper. The clergy and the whole of Christianity are to blame for this because of their sins, though they receive their nourishment at the breast of this bride.’”  

(Click for complete July 8th, 2017 National Catholic Register article by Edward Pentin: http://m.ncregister.com/blog/edward-pentin/the-drug-fueled-homosexual-scandal-allegations-at-the-holy-office#.WWELJXNlAwi)

Jesus have mercy on the Church.

Mary and Joseph pray for the Church.

Francis strolls hand in hand with the anti-ganster and gay rights advocate Fr. Luigi Ciotti.

Pray an Our Father now for the restoration of the Church.

Posted by Fred Martinez at 8:40 PM Email ThisBlogThis!Share to TwitterShare to FacebookShare to Pinterest

Saturday, November 16, 2019

Br. Bugnolo: Those with “Teaching[s] on what happens to Heretics” like Skojec including “Cardinals and Bishop” may be in “Heresy”

One Peter Five publisher Steve Skojec apparently claims a manifest heretical pope can not as Doctor of the Church St. Francis de Sales says be “deprived” of “the Apostlic See” by the Church. Skojec appears to claim Francis’s heretical papacy can’t be judged by the Church in this present time in history.

Canon law expert Br. Alexis Bugnolo recently stated that those with teachings like Skojec “on what happens to heretics” without mentioning his name including “Cardinals and Bishop” may be in “heresy”:

“We are left with repeated examples that defy explanation. Those Cardinals and Bishop who have the reputations for being the most conservative, who often speak in the defense of many truths, openly reject catholic teaching on what happens to heretics. To do such a thing is itself a heresy, because it is asserting that entire dogmatic and canonical tradition of the Church on heresy is not true.”

“Heretics will never out heretics. I just hope that this principle is not verified in the case of the men of whom we speak, and that they are only cowards, not heretics.” 
[http://catholicmonitor.blogspot.com/2019/11/why-is-schneider-apologist-of-franciss.html]

Br. Bugnolo stated that in the comment section of the Catholic Monitor to this article:

Why is Schneider a Apologist of Francis’s “Apostasy” by Defending the Manifest Heretical Papacy of Francis against a Pope, Two Doctors of the Church and “all the ancient Fathers”?
Bishop Athanasius Schneider, in his recent interview with Michael Matt on Remnant Video called “Defend & Resist,” said about the Francis Vatican Pachamama idolatry:

“[T]he apostasy… even Pope Francis, unfortunately, defends.”

 Doctor of the Church St. Robert Bellarmine said:

“The manifest heretical pope ceases per se to be pope… This is the opinion of all the ancient Fathers.”

Bishop Schneider who admits that Francis “defends” the “apostasy” or heresy of idolatry, unfortunately, claims a manifest heretical pope can not as Doctor of the Church St. Francis de Sales says be “deprived” of “the Apostlic See” by the Church. Schneider by claiming Francis’s heretical papacy can’t be judged by the Church is implicitly defending the Francis “apostasy” or heresy of idolatry.

Is Schneider’s opinion true or false?

Here is the answer from a POPE to Schneider’s opinion and all the Francis apologists who claim that a heretical pope can’t be judged by the Church:

 Pope Innocent III (1198-1216) in “Si Papa”:

“‘Let no mortal being have the audacity to reprimand a Pope on account of faults, for he whose duty it is to judge all men cannot be judged by anybody, unless he should be called to the task of having deviated from the faith. (Si Papa)'”

“Pope Innocent III: ‘For me the faith is so necessary that, whereas for other sins my only judge is God, for the slightest sin in the matter of the faith I could be judged by the Church.’ (propter solum peccatum quod in fide commititur possem ab Ecclesia judican)”
(The Remnant, “Answering a Sedevacantist Critic,” March 18, 2015)

Moreover, the important theologian Dominique Bouix in, Tractatus de papa, ubi et de concilio oecumenico, vol. II , pars IIIa, cap. iii, p. 653ff, responded to Schneider’s opinion:

It is objected 1°. — This opinion stands contrary to the more common and ancient opinion of the doctors of the school.It is responded: That is true. But in questions not yet defined and permitted to the free disputation of the schools, it can happen that a more recent and less common opinion is true and ought at length to be recognized as such.
It is objected 2°. — Moreover, it stands contrary to the authority of Innocent III, whose words these are in the third sermon for the anniversary of his consecration: Faith is so necessary to me, that, while I have God for my judge in other sins, I am able to be judged by the Church on account of the sin which is committed against faith (see Sylvius, In IIamIIæ S. Thomæ, tom. III, q. xxxix, art. 3, concl. 2).
It is responded: Indeed, in that text Innocent III supposes that the Roman Pontiff can, as a private person, fall into heresy. But Innocent III spoke thus, following the opinion which was more accepted in his time; nor did he pronounce it as the Pontiff defining the faith; whence it can be said that in this, he erred. But this error of his is not heresy, because this proposition, the Pope cannot become a heretic even privately, even if it be true, is yet not an evident or defined ARTICLE OF FAITH. Therefore the cited dictum of Innocent III indeed favors the opinion which holds that the Pope can become a heretic privately; yet it does not have peremptory force.
It is objected 3°. — The canon Si papa (from the acta of Boniface of Mainz, in Gratian, dist. XL, c. vi) affirms that the Pope is exempt from the jurisdiction of his inferiors, with this exception: Unless he be discovered to have deviated from the faith. And in a similar document of the fifth council under Pope Symmachus it is read: Unless he should deviate from the right faith. Therefore, even in remote antiquity the doctrine held sway undoubted, that the Pope could become a heretic[https://lumenscholasticum.wordpress.com/2019/05/05/bouix-on-the-pope-heretic/]
It is objected 3°. — The canon Si papa (from the acta of Boniface of Mainz, in Gratian, dist. XL, c. vi) affirms that the Pope is exempt from the jurisdiction of his inferiors, with this exception: Unless he be discovered to have deviated from the faith. And in a similar document of the fifth council under Pope Symmachus it is read: Unless he should deviate from the right faith. Therefore, even in remote antiquity the doctrine held sway undoubted, that the Pope could become a heretic.[https://lumenscholasticum.wordpress.com/2019/05/05/bouix-on-the-pope-heretic/]

Finally, one of the greatest modern theologian Fr. Ioachim Ioachim whom “Msgr. Clifford Fenton in a March 1953 article of the American Ecclesiastical Review [said] ‘holds very much the same position in the theological world of the mid-twentieth century that Cardinal Billot occupied in that of fifty years ago'” appears to disagree with Schneider’s opinion. In Salaverri’s De Ecclesia Christi, it says:

1056. The doctrine of the Church. The first part is implicitly defined in the Council of Florence’s decree for the Jacobites: D 714. But concerning heretics and apostates, we deduce our teaching also from the formula of faith “Clemens Trinitas”, from can. 23 of the Second Lateran Council, and from the Bull Ineffabilis Deus of Pius IX: D 18 367 1641.

The second part, in which we hold that those excommunicated by perfect excommunication, which the Supreme Pontiff can determine, are separated from the body of the Church, is taught as Catholic doctrine by Pius XII in the encyclical Mystici corporis: AAS 35 (1943) 202ff.
1057. This whole thesis of ours is clearly taught by Pius XII and the Catechism of the Council of Trent.[16]

Pius XII writes: “But in truth, only those are to be numbered amongst the members of the Church who have received the laver of regeneration and profess the true faith, who have not miserably separated themselves from the community of the Church or through most grave crimes been separated by the legitimate authority…For this reason, those who are divided from one another in faith or government are unable to live in the one Body of this sort and in its divine Spirit…Nor should it be thought that the Body of the Church, because it is insigned with the name of Christ, consists, even in this time of terrestrial pilgrimage, only of members outstanding in sanctity, or that it is constituted only of the company of those who are predestined by God to sempiternal felicity…Indeed not every crime, even if a grave wickedness, is of such kind that of its very nature it separates man from the Body of the Church—as do schism, heresy, or apostasy.”

In the Catechism of the Council of Trent we read:

“Only three sorts of men are excluded from the Church: firstly, infidels, then heretics and schismatics, and finally excommunicates: pagans indeed, because they have never been in the Church, nor ever known it, nor been made partakers of any Sacrament in the society of the Christian people; heretics and schismatics, because they have revolted from the Church, for they no more pertain to the Church, than do deserters to the army from which they have defected: yet it must not be denied that they are in the power of the Church, as ones who may be called to judgment by her, punished, and condemned by anathema. Finally also excommunicates, because by the judgment of the Church have they been excluded from her, and do not belong to her communion until they come to their senses. But concerning other men, though they be wicked and criminal, it is not to be doubted that they yet persevere in the Church.”

1058. Dogmatic value. The first part, concerning heretics, apostates, and schismatics, is implicitly defined, particularly in the Council of Florence: D 714. The second part, on excommunicates by perfect excommunication, is Catholic doctrine, especially from the words of the encyclical of Pius XII, Mystici corporis Christi, recently cited by us above.

1059. The first part is proved. Heretics, apostates, and schismatics are not members of the Church… 
          
… For the minor. That formal and manifest heretics, apostates, and schismatics formally and manifestly have severed the essential social bond of the Church’s faith or government, is clear from the notions themselves. Thus they are not of the Church, which is the congregation of the faithful, because schismatics are not congregated and heretics are not faithful.
1060. The same doctrine is confirmed by the authority of testimonies of the holy Fathers.

a) On heretics. Tertullian: “If they are heretics, they cannot be Christians” (R 298). St. Hilary: “I am a Catholic; I do not wish to be a heretic. I am a Christian, not an Arian.” St. Jerome: “Heretics pass judgment upon themselves, receding from the Church of their own will.” St. Augustine: “Sever yourselves from the members of the Church, sever yourselves from its Body. But what still might I say, in order that they might segregate themselves from the Church, since they have already done this? For they are heretics; they are already without.” The controversy on the rebaptizing of heretics, which was agitated thence from the middle of the third century, supposed as recognized by all that heretics are outside of the Church.[17]

b) On schismatics. Cyprian: “But what pertains to the person of Novatian…you know that we in the first place ought not to be inquisitive of what he taught, since he taught from without. Whosoever he is and of whatever condition, he is not a Christian who is not in the Church of Christ…he who neither held fast to fraternal charity nor ecclesiastical unity, has lost even that which he was previously.” St. Jerome: “Between heresy and schism, we think there to be this difference, that heresy imports perverse dogma; schism, on account of episcopal dissension, separates from the Church…moreover, no schism does not fabricate for itself a heresy, so that it might seem to have receded from the Church rightly.” St. Augustine: “Heretics and schismatics call their congregations churches. But heretics, thinking falsely about God, violate the faith itself; but schismatics burst free of fraternal charity through hostile divisions, although they believe those things which we believe. For this reason, heretics do not belong to the Catholic Church, because she loves God, nor schismatics, because she loves the neighbor” (R 1562). St. Fulgentius: “Most firmly hold and doubt not at all, that every one baptized outside of the Catholic Church is unable to become a partaker of eternal life, if before the end of this life he has not returned and been incorporated to the Catholic Church. Most steadily and in no way doubt, that not only all pagans, but also all Jews and all heretics and schismatics, who finish this present life outside of the Catholic Church, are to enter into the eternal fire” (R 2274-5). Pelagius I: “Pollute not a mind ever Catholic by any communion of schismatics. It is clear that the Body of Christ is one, the Church is one…our Savior taught: a vine separated from the grapevine cannot be good for anything, but fire for burning…Do not think that they either are or can be called the Church. And indeed since, as we have said, the Church is one…it is clear that there is no other but that which is founded in the apostolic root.”[18]
[https://lumenscholasticum.wordpress.com/2016/12/05/fr-salaverri-on-whether-heretics-apostates-schismatics-and-excommunicates-are-members-of-the-church/]

Why is Schneider a apologist of Francis’s “apostasy” by defending the manifest heretical papacy of Francis against a pope, two Doctors of the Church and “all the ancient Fathers”?

Pray an Our Father now for the restoration of the Church.Fred Martinez at 4:02 PMShare