Proper reasoning is more than “natural.” It ultimately involves divine wisdom. This is not a matter of ecclesial chauvinism, but an affirmation that the Church affirms not only the simpler and more practical uses of the intellect, but is the custodian of the truths given to us by divine revelation.

Where is the Fides – and the Ratio?

Bevil Bramwell, OMI

THE CATHOLIC THING

SUNDAY, SEPTEMBER 8, 2019

Later this week, we will be celebrating the anniversary (14 September) of the issuing of Fides et ratio (“Faith and Reason”) by St. John Paul II. That encyclical is a concise but comprehensive explanation of the close interrelationship between authentic faith and authentic reason. It’s a good moment to look back and see how this contribution to the Church by a modern saint has been used since it first appeared.

At the time, it seemed odd (to unbelievers and even some believers) that the Roman Catholic Church was the institution in the modern world teaching about and advocating for reason, properly conceived.

It was, to be sure, not the universities. In a way, this was not surprising because, with a few exceptions – very few – most universities today are determined to use, at most, agnostic and rationalist methods of reasoning in all departments. At worst, universities no longer have much of a commitment to reason’s ability to reach the truth at all. The whole modern complex of accreditation and peer review is trapped in this reductive framework.

This is essentially true of almost all “Catholic” universities as well. Their academic departments – including Scripture and theology – still struggle along in agnostic, rationalist forms of reasoning.

What Fides et ratio did, and did spledidly, was remind people, including Catholics, that Catholicism knows the true context of things because proper reasoning is more than “natural.” It ultimately involves divine wisdom. This is not a matter of ecclesial chauvinism, but an affirmation that the Church affirms not only the simpler and more practical uses of the intellect, but is the custodian of the truths given to us by divine revelation.

The Church “brings to mankind light kindled from the Gospel and puts at its disposal those saving resources which the Church herself, under the guidance of the Holy Spirit, receives from her Founder.” That notion appears in the Second Vatican Council’s Pastoral Constitution Gaudium et Spes, but few are the enthusiasts of the Council who have take it to heart.

The question thus arises: why academics would be at a Catholic university if they do not believe that Catholicism has something superlative – and necessary – to offer in the academic realm. That dead-end approach seems to result from embracing the imagined romance of “diversity” or from a false sense of what constitutes professional work.

Fides et ratio. showed people what proper faith and what proper reason are. And yet there was not much of an effort to make sure that they are applied even in the Catholic Church. The attitude was “ho-hum another text from John Paul II,” or “we don’t have a clue what it means,” or most often, “we like the status quo because Catholicism isn’t the whole truth.”

Wishy-washy adherence to Catholicism has a certain comfort to it for many people. Being wishy-washy is easy and it is politically correct. It doesn’t rock the boat with our colleagues in non-Catholic institutions. As long as everyone thinks equally badly there’s no conflict.

Fides et ratio also showed up the inadequacies of many of our bishops. They are supposed to ensure that teaching is going on and that it is of the best quality possible. But they themselves would have first to understand what the encyclical says, and that is already asking a lot. Requiring bishops to have doctorates is not a solution. It certainly does not work in Germany. People can have doctorates in wrong-headed thinking too.

The real problem for the episcopate is that bishops often do not recognize the full scope of their obligations to the truth. After the nadir in catechetics right after Vatican II, the Church, under John Paul II, made a surprising recovery and developed a solid Catechism. (1992)

Unfortunately, this did not translate into a revision of the Church’s work in the remaining realms of knowledge. Bishops who have Catholic universities in their dioceses should really hang their heads.

Even Fides et ratio did not wake them up. It was mostly business as usual, leave the universities unchallenged and assert – by omission – that Catholic thinking really does not measure up to the glorious fruits of the Enlightenment.

If Catholicism is not true enough for you to implement, then whatever your position, please resign. Get another job, one that does not involve truth.

The bishops are not the only ones, however, who should be embarrassed. Diocesan clergy and religious all received the same encyclical. The deep problem is that reasoning poorly, for example, ignoring the data of faith, impairs you from operating as a fully human person.

In John Paul II’s words: with faith and reason in concert, “men and women have at their disposal an array of resources for generating greater knowledge of truth so that their lives may be ever more human.”

Ignoring Fides et ratio has meant that most people in the Church have not been pushed to develop their full humanity. Preaching does not strive to present the best combinations of faith and reason. Instead preaching keeps on getting pre-occupied with homespun thoughts or simplistic nostrums from psychology or sociology.

Congregations were not helped to contribute more to the mission of the Church, which “makes the believing community a partner in humanity’s shared struggle to arrive at truth.” (JP II) Did we do more of that after Fides came on the scene?

It’s time to re-read that astounding document and embrace the power of the truth it proclaims.

Happy birthday Fides et ratio and God bless St. John Paul II!

© 2019 The Catholic Thing.

Bevil Bramwell, OMI

Bevil Bramwell, OMI

Fr. Bevil Bramwell, OMI, PhD is the former Undergraduate Dean at Catholic Distance University. His books are: Laity: Beautiful, Good and TrueThe World of the SacramentsCatholics Read the Scriptures: Commentary on Benedict XVI’s Verbum Domini, and, most recently, John Paul II’s Ex Corde Ecclesiae: The Gift of Catholic Universities to the World.

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THE LEGISLATIVE SESSION OF THE TEXAS LEGISLATURE IS OVER, BUT ANTI-LIFE FORCES DO NOT REST.

kassiblog.com

“Brain Death” & the Texas Advance Directives Act

Posted: 07 Sep 2019 08:47 PM PDT

Read about this Orthodox Monk’s incredible story and commitment to life and opposition to euthanasia.
(*For those without Facebook, I post the full story below.)
️☦
The legislative session is over, but anti-life forces do not rest. Right now patients all across Texas are at risk of having their lives prematurely ended against their – or their surrogates’ – will. I’ve long-written and talked about the Texas Advance Directives Act (“TADA”) and how it unconstitutionally works against patients. Nearly this entire blog has been dedicated to this law, its effects, and efforts to amend or repeal it. But what you may not know is that even TADA does not have to be invoked if the hospital declares a patient “brain dead.” It can withdraw care from a patient without even going through that nominal farcical procedure devoid of due process rights. 
Recent case in point: Taylor Campos. Fortunately, her father called Texas Right to Life and Taylor’s life was saved from euthanasia. Read about it for yourself.


What they are able to do with a quick declaration of brain death – which does not require tests – is actually worse than TADA. Read the statute yourself – it is easy and quick. It has two sections. The first section includes subsection (b) which allows the doctor to walk in and “announce” death. The second section makes sure he is immune from liability for doing so and all those who act according to his pronouncement are immune as well. 

So, if the person is receiving life-sustaining care, under subsection (b), the doctor just has to go in and “announce[ his] opinion” that they are dead. Note, that “[d]eath must be pronounced before” life-sustaining care is removed.
Then there is the second subsection, protecting a doctor from liability for this “announcement.” 

Note that the statute does not require certain tests or any level of “reasonable probability” in making this “announcement” or “pronouncement.” The “ordinary standards of medical practice” simply means “whatever they usually do.” It’s that simple. It’s like that in medical malpractice law. A doctor’s potential negligence is measured against the “accepted standards of medical  care” used in that situation. If everyone else is doing it, that’s pretty good cover for a doctor, even if it’s not actually the best medicine. In essence, this “announced opinion” is based on what we’d call in the law, the ipse dixit of the “expert.” This means, “he himself said it” and is defined as “something asserted but not proved.” In civil law cases where expert testimony is required, that is not good enough. You have to have a reliable foundation for an opinion by an expert qualified in the field in which he is offering an opinion where there are not great “analytical gaps” between the facts and the opinions. This high standard of evidentiary reliability among expert opinions applies in all cases – including, ironically – medical malpractice cases. But here, that same standard does not apply despite the fact that we are dealing with decisions concerning life and actual death of people. Interesting, no?
Understand, too, that the term “brain death” is very controversial among doctors and even among Catholic philosophers. There is no definitive test for it or criteria that makes it absolutely certain. In fact, the definition of brain death is not established. It depends on who you ask and where you are at the time. It’s often a medical or legal fiction used to serve other purposes. (Among those purposes is organ donation. At some point, we are going to have to confront that inconvenient truth and all the moral and ethical considerations it raises. Many will be surprised. Many are studiously avoiding addressing this. They don’t even want it brought up.) 
There are tests that call such an “announcement” into question and may make a hospital back off, such as blood flow tests to see if blood is flowing to the brain, but those are problematic for a variety of reasons. They are not necessarily definitive either. Often a hospital will want to do an “apnea” test to determine brain death which can (and often) does more damage to the ill person. It requires withdrawing a ventilator for 10 minutes and seeing if they breathe on their own. If they can’t, that is considered “proof” they are brain dead. But if they need the ventilator, they can’t breathe entirely on their own, can they? But that does not mean that their brains have ceased to function either. Other areas of the brain may be functioning fine and they may yet breathe again on their own or with less support given more time to heal and recover. However, being without any or sufficient oxygen for 10 minutes can certainly cause further brain damage. These tests have also been shown to have the greatest possibility for inaccuracies as well.
That said, Texas Right to Life has been successful in a number of cases in challenging brain death declarations where tests did contradict the “announcement” / “pronouncement” of brain death by a doctor. Thanks be to God! 
It cannot be emphasized enough that we continue to learn more and more about how brain death is simply not as it has been and is presented. Science actually knows very little about the brain. Much has been based on assumptions that continue to be disproven. People recover from injuries that were said just a few years ago to be impossible to recover from. Follow the Terri Schiavo Life & Hope Network; Bobby Schindler covers these stories and the latest medical research all the time. Follow Wesley Smith who covers the ethical side of this and the ever-expanding euthanasia side of the Culture of Death. 
I have a growing library of books written by people who were in “comas” and “brain dead” or in “persistent vegetative states” who recovered eventually. It is stunning what they have to say. (At some point, I may start writing book reviews as I work through all of these.) Less than a month ago, yet another person “woke up” who was never supposed to. Read the stats in this article and where things are (note the attitudes of some of the health care providers as well; what a shame). Then ask yourself if doctors should be making diagnoses that kill people prematurely, even preemptively, especially when that “diagnosis” comes down to “because I said so.”
Nevertheless, in Texas, all it takes is for the doctor to “announce” / “pronounce” the person “brain dead” and a death certificate can be issued with what is apparently intended to be complete immunity for the doctor and those acting under this “he’s dead because I said so” determination. Further, once that declaration has been made, the person is considered “dead” and they do not fall within TADA anymore. Do you see how insidious this is? How the cards are stacked against the patient? They always were even with TADA, but now even the one-sided due process-less “protocol” or “procedure” under TADA is not even required. There is no “hearing” with the “bioethics committee” and no 10 days. 
However, if the brain death declaration can be challenged successfully, if the hospital will do the requested tests (I’ve seen nothing that requires them to do them), the very real risk is then that the hospital will invoke TADA to try to withdraw care that way and receive the immunity found under that statute. Remember, when Texas Health & Safety Code Section 166.046 is invoked – and used per the statute (which has no substantive or procedural due process rights for the patient or surrogate) – doctors and hospitals have total immunity from lawsuits under Section 166.044. 

Some lawyers have interpreted this to include immunity from lawsuits for medical malpractice that may have occurred prior to the invocation of TADA. To my knowledge, this has yet to be challenged. I hope it is one day. Soon. (But medical malpractice lawsuits, in general, are exceedingly difficult to bring in Texas anyway given the “tort reform” that was put into place which further eroded rights from patients and took away an important means of holding negligent (and sometimes grossly negligent) doctors accountable. It is not true that lawyers sue over everything. We can’t. Lawsuits are expensive (a med mal can easily get to six figures to prosecute) and we foot the bills for many of them until and unless a favorable settlement or judgment is reached, if any. Someday, as an attorney who works on medical malpractice lawsuits and products liability cases on behalf of plaintiffs, I may write a post explaining how lawsuits work and how tort reform – far from helping you – actually hurt you both in financial terms and in terms of your overall safety.)
One can also imagine a scenario in which a quick declaration of brain death and then acting to stop the life-sustaining care of that person could cover up many a mistake or even the investigation to see what might have gone wrong, whether there was negligence or not. People, even doctors, can panic and act in fear. Without further testing or ability to examine the person, it would be very hard to prove a case unless someone actually wrote down what happened in a medical record or was willing to testify. (If you think the blue wall of silence among police can be impenetrable; try finding someone in a hospital that will testify about the negligence of a doctor even where it can be objectively proven). In my world, when evidence is destroyed to cover things up – be it a defective part or some other such thing – it’s called spoliation and you can get into big trouble for it. Here, there are procedures in place to protect one who might spoliate (yes, that’s how it’s spelled) the most important evidence of all – the very patient himself! 
This is not to make any specific comment on Taylor’s case, which to my knowledge did not involve invoking TADA, but was the declaration of brain death (presumably to avoid even that) which was successfully challenged. Then she was transferred to another facility for further care. I have not read her medical records and know very little more about it than what I post here. 
It is to say, however, that doctors and hospitals can be very quick to invoke either brain death or TADA and that always makes me wonder why. Remember, these are not always cases of people who are terminal or even unconscious or “suffering” (mercy killing is prohibited under TADA, by the way, see Section 166.050). Neither Carolyn Jones nor Chris Dunn were unconscious, but hospitals invoked TADA to withdraw their life-sustaining care to hasten their deaths in both cases. In both cases, Texas Right to Life and their allies worked to stop it and give these people more time. In other cases, TRTL and their allies work to stop the effects of TADA or a brain death declaration to give patients more time for their bodies to heal, for their true situations to be assessed, and, in many cases, for them to be moved to safety. 
Pro-TADA forces say this stuff rarely happens in Texas. That is untrue. At the time that Taylor’s case was ongoing, I know of at least three others that were happening at the same time. And, today, I read about another that was going on about this time as well. Joe is a 12-year old who was declared “brain dead.” That decision was challenged and found to be incorrect. His family, as others have, moved him out of state – to New Jersey for Heaven’s sake – to be safe from Texas’ law. 
To say I am ashamed of Texas and all those who claim the mantle of “pro-life” and support this is to put it mildly. What they advocate and support should be criminal, is immoral, unethical, and nothing less than a full embrace of the Culture of Death. Those that did not have the courage and strength to amend this law this past session have this on their consciences. They will be judged for what they did and did not do. I’m looking at you, Republicans. 
There is only one organization that is fighting against this law, against the political and other forces supporting the Culture of Death – and – just as importantly, if not more so, is helping families get out of harm’s way as best they can – and that is Texas Right to Life. They are the lone organization fighting this in Texas. They take some hits and abuse, as you might imagine, from the forces that make sure this law stays in place and more are victimized by it. But TRTL has many supporters and allies, including many who travel from out of state to help out like Bobby Schindler and Wesley Smith. Their biggest allies, however, may be the families they’ve helped; the families who found out the hard way what Texas law can do to you. But know that those other organizations claiming to be pro-life and support this law as well as the entities that push this law down your throat (and are in an unholy alliance with these faux life groups) do nothing to help out. Of course, they don’t. If you give one penny to them, you’re promoting a Culture of Death. Know that. 
If you oppose TADA and want to help families victimized by it, you should be a regular donor to TRTL. You should also consider going to their Houston Celebration of Life, on September 28, or the one that will be held up here in Dallas on October 26. They are excellent events that are inspirational, fun, informative, and an opportunity to meet some really good people who work very hard in ways seen and unseen in this urgent, necessary, but exhausting and difficult battle. 
I’ll be at the one here in Dallas and I hope to see you as well. More on all that later.
Thanks for reading! 



* For those who do not have Facebook, I copy and paste the story about the Orthodox Monk, here:

Orthodox Parables and StoriesMarch 8 · A monk from the monastery in Chania, Crete: ” agree with everything except euthanasia. My strength is weakened by sicknes.”: Sophronios, who suffers from Terminal Motor Neurone disease, has recently given a sensational interview to Crete TV with the help of a keystroke system.Q: They say that pain completes existence. Do you experience this and how?
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A: Pain is a big school and teaches self-knowledge that leads to brotherhood and ultimately to godhood. Pain humiliates you with humiliation, our heart softens and opens to God and our fellow man. I communicate with people all over the world suffering from physical or mental illnesses.With the help of God, with my experience in bed of pain, I understand them, even a little to say a comforting word, a word of our Christ. Today, there is so much loneliness in the world and riot and fear. We Christians who have the gift of God to know Christ must share with our fellowman the joy, the peace and the love that is Christ. Is not this the goal of our existence, to save all?
.
Q: What would you say to someone who wants to make euthanasia?
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Q: Life is a gift of God to all of us. I understand this better than ever now that I’m in bed. No one came to life with his will. So how can you put an end to your life, since it really does not belong to you? This, in my opinion, is the problem of our time, it cultivates in the modern man an egocentric way of life, cut off from the community, from the family, the neighborhood, the homeland, etc. so we think we are independent, self-propelled in this world.I think it is the wrong view of life that leads the man of our time from “self-confinement” to suicide. I understand that he does not want the patient to become a burden on others or does not want his loved ones to see him suffer. It’s very humiliating – I know it very well. But the humble has the Kingdom of God, not the selfish.
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Q: Do you think that if you had no faith, would you have the same attitude towards pain?
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A: Without Christ I would be nothing. There is another pain that is more painful than the pain we are talking about. And this is the pain that the soul feels when it is lacking in the presence of God, which enlivens everything and gives meaning to this human pain. The absence of God from man’s life today is the most painful pain.
.
Q: In the bed of pain come moments that make you question God and your faith?
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A: On the contrary, it joins me with God and I feel Love and His presence more intense. But it does not mean that the moments of human weakness do not come. The Christian needs faith, bravery, and courage. God never abandons us.
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Q: How can pain be blessed? What can “life” mean when you are stuck in the bed of pain?
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A: Pain and difficulties are sometimes unbearable for humans. In these moments I feel the presence and consolation of God more intense. I think in both these questions the answer can be given by Him who I also receive in my difficult moments when I look at the crucified Christ. He first turned His own pain into blessing. And His own life on the Cross was glorified and remained in history as the King of Glory. It is the standard and at the same time the rest of every pain.
.
Q: What are the difficulties of your illness?
.
A: I have ALS / MND – Stephen Hawking’s disease. It has no cure. I am paralyzed, I only can move my eyelids and lips. I do not swallow, I’m eating through a feeding tube. I do not breathe on my own, except with the support of a ventilator. I can tell you details, but it suffices to say that I can not do anything without the help of someone taking care of me.

As a layman I was very independent to a degree very selfish. Now that I can not do anything without someone else, I understand why Christ taught us to be united in one body. We need each other to be in a society with our fellow humans.
.
Q: How many years have you been in bed and how does communication work?
.
A: I have been permanently bedridden for 6 years. I communicate with a computer system that allows me to write with my eyes. Thank God ! You see what the good God is doing!
.
Q: What do you think you have gained as the most positive of your illness?
.
A: Without a doubt, the most positive is my union with God, that I feel His love filling my heart.
.
Q: How is your relationship with your brothers in the Gouverneto monastery now with your illness?
.
A: I am very blessed in the Gouverneto monastery. It is a holy place under the abode of the Virgin Mary. With the intense presence of St. John the Hermit and the place of martyrs, it has a great deal of grace. In the Divine Economy I have a very blessed abbot, Elder Iromeo, a man of God, full of love. The brotherhood is very beloved with humble fathers who make their struggle.

They take care of me with sacrificial love. An example of the love that exists here: At the time I was a novice my illness was occurred. I was diagnosed with ALS, an incurable disease. When I learned what it all involved, I told my elder that I do not want to be a burden on the brotherhood and I will not stay. But the elder and all the brothers said that they want me as I am. This is the love of Christ.
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Q: What would you like to say to the viewers who are watching you now, sick or not?
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A: Life without Christ is not life. With Christ at the center of your life you have love, peace and life has another meaning. As St. Porphyrios said: “Christ is everything”.Source ekklisianonline.gr


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IS STEVE SKOJIC A DOUBLE AGENT WHO KEEPS CATHOLICS CONFUSED BY HIS DEFENSE OF FRANCIS THE MERCIFUL

THE CATHOLIC MONITOR

Thursday, September 05, 2019

Infallibility: Is 1P5 Skojec a “Double Agent” who keeps Catholics “Confused… a Whining Bunch of Scandalmong[ers] rather than United in any Useful Purpose”?

– Vatican I expert Fr. Chad Ripperger, PhD, in his book “Magister Authority” shows that almost all Francis apologists be they liberal, conservative or traditionalist are “proximate to heresy”:
“[T]reating ALL papal statements as if they are infallible… is proximate to heresy because it rejects the precise formulation of the conditions of infallibility as laid out in Vatican I… by essentially saying the pope is infallible regardless of conditions…”
“… Worse still, those who were to follow a pope who was in error in a non-infallible teaching which is taught contrary to something that is infallible is not, therefore, excused.”
(Magisterial Authority, Pages 5-14)
– 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)

At times, I have found that the comments in the Catholic Monitor comment section are better than my post. This was true of the last post in which Jack wrote a deeply insightful comment that mirrored Fr. Rippinger’s above explanation of Vatican I and Pope Innocent III’s “in the matter of the faith I [and all popes and antipopes] could be judged by the Church” and he covered many other matters.

However, prior to getting to it, I want to thank all the loyal Catholic Monitor readers and commenters for their prayers especially Praypraypray and Therese who are prayer warriors and the vast majority of CM commenters for their wisdom.

Also, I want to say, unlike Jack, I am not inclined to think that One Peter Five publisher Steve Skojec is a “double agent,” but it appears to me that he does keep Catholics “confused… a whining bunch of scandalmong[ers] rather than united in any useful purpose.” 

Here is the great comment by Jack:

“People who imagine that Vatican I’s definition of papal infallibility is circular, tautological, or otherwise redundant imagine that the dogma goes like this: “Solemn papal definitions are infallible, because the pope has the power of infallibility.” Which is like saying, ‘it’s right because the pope says it’s right.'”

“This would be to set up the pope as a kind of god, since only God is truly self-justifying like this, right simply because He is right, because He is Truth itself by His very essence.”

“I think in the wake of liberalism and its undermining of all authority, Catholics rallied to the pope and after Vatican I made this kind of mistake, at least implicitly, that the pope is right because he is right. But this is just another human error, setting up a man in God’s place, undermining authority in an even more subtle way.”

“The pope is not right because he says he’s right, and he’s not infallible simply because he has the power of infallibility (although he is and he does). Vatican I is very clear. The pope is infallible BECAUSE Christ gave the keys to Peter and his Successors, and HE guaranteed by HIS divine power that the pope would never err in his solemn teaching capacity. This is perhaps a subtle distinction, but it makes a profound difference. It means that our faith is not centred on the person of the pope, but centred on Christ just has it has always been.”

“So when we come across a pope who appears to be erring in doctrine, the first thing we should ask is whether he is really erring or not. And if he is erring, the next thing to ask is whether his papacy is legitimate or whether he’s an antipope. But for people with a worldly mindset who are too willing to accept the world’s opinions and maintain their public image, and who’s faith is more centred on the person of the pope than on the person of Christ, they would rather deny Vatican I and become heretics than accuse a possible antipope (despite there having been many, many antipopes in history) and fall temporarily out of favour.”

“To be honest at this point I would not be surprised if Skojec is a kind of double agent and 1p5 a false-opposition operation designed to keep potential critics of the regime confused and pigeonholed. Keep traditionalists as a whining bunch of scandalmongerers rather than united in any useful purpose.”
[http://catholicmonitor.blogspot.com/2019/09/is-skojecs-infallible-opinion-that.html?m=1]

Lastly, here is my simple post that hopefully helped inspire Jack in his exceptional comment:

It appears that One Peter Five publisher Steve Skojec’s infallible opinion that the Francis papacy cannot be invalid under any circumstances is leading him towards heresy.

Yesterday on Twitter, Skojec said to @JoshuaPotryus and @MikeJon:

“The problem is that infallibility appears to be tautological at best and borders on superstition at worst.”

A example of a tautology is former Vice President Dan Quayle’s:

“If we do not succeed, we run the risk of failure.”

A possible Skojec tautology might go:

“If Francis is not a valid pope, we run the risk of Francis being a antipope” which may lead to this possible Skojec tautology:

“I believe Vatican I’s papal infallibly teaching “appears… [to border] on superstition,” so I accept as true that that infallible dogma “appears… [to border]” on being a unfounded belief.”

It appears that Skojec’s logic goes something like the following:

“Francis’s papal validity is a 100% infallible belief and if anyone doubts it they are a schismatic therefore Vatican I’s infallible teaching on papal infallibly “appears to be a tautological at best and borders on superstition at worst.”

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

Fred Martinez at 8:35 PMShare

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I HAVE A FRIEND WHO SUFFERS FROM Tourette’s syndrome WHICH CAUSES HIM TO EXPERIENCE UNCONTROLLABLE JERKING OF HIS HEAD. AUSTIN RUSE HAS DISCOVERED THAT THERE IS A SYNDROME WHICH CAUSES OTHERWISE HEALTHY PEOPLE ON THE LEFT TO UNCONTROLLABLY CONDEMN CONSERVATIVES WITH EXPLETIVES LIKE ANTI-SEMITE

SEPTEMBER 6, 2019

Everyone I don’t like is an anti-Semite: and other lessons from the Catholic Left

AUSTIN RUSE

CRISIS MAGAZINE

Many months ago, I criticized certain lefty Catholic ladies for their ongoingattacks on faithful Catholic institutions like Franciscan University of Steubenville and Christendom College. In more recent days, I criticized a former rock historian who has been transmogrified into a Grand Inquisitor of faithful Catholics.

The almost uniform response from these quarters is that I am an anti-Semite.

One of those chaps said I was “dog-whistling” to other anti-Semites. The fellow actually wrote that I was “spending inordinate amounts of time dwelling on the Jewishness of such women… and their imagined ties to Sinister Jewish Jew of Jewishness, George Soros.” First of all, does it strike you as odd that a person would actually write such a phrase as “Jewish Jew of Jewishness” for any reason? Stranger still is the fact that I have never once mentioned the “Jewishness” of such women, for the simple fact that I never knew of their “Jewishness” until they later started calling me an anti-Semite. My (quite measured) criticism of these women was directed at their actions as Catholic writers and nothing more.

In short, I’ve been called an anti-Semite because I criticized these lady-bloggers when, really, I should have known full well that their great-great-grandpappies may have worn a kippah. The charge of anti-Semitism is kind of a blanket counter-attack—or, more accurately, an invisibility cloak à la Harry Potter. These ladies are automatically exempt from all scrutiny and critique because somewhere in their past, near or far, someonebelonged to the Jewish faith. 

To be utterly clear, my criticism of these lady-bloggers is based on their actions as Catholics and has nothing to do with the Jewish faith of their ancestors. To repeat, I had no idea any of these ladies were of Jewish descent. What’s more, I don’t do “dog whistles.” As anyone even remotely familiar with my work figures out pretty quickly, I’m direct. I don’t pussyfoot around.

In my expert opinion, these lady-bloggers suffer from a condition I call “political Tourette’s.”

Now, Tourette’s syndrome is a condition of the nervous system that causes a person to unwillingly and uncontrollably make certain sounds or shout certain words—often cusses or vulgarities. Tourette’s isn’t a funny condition. It’s a heartbreaking trial for the afflicted and those who love them.

Political Tourette’s, on the other hand, affects the political and religious Left, who find themselves losing political or ecclesiological arguments. Their response is to shout out certain vile epithets: racist, homophobe, anti-Semite, xenophobe, white supremacist, white nationalist, and so on ad nauseum. We shouldn’t sympathize with those afflicted with this particular condition. Political Tourette’s is a choice. More precisely, it’s a weapon—one that they use to distract from their total lack of substantial arguments.

Political Tourette’s is very much in the air these days. Last week, an unhinged columnist at the Amazon Post charged J.D. Vance with being a white nationalist because he said that “our people” are not having enough babies. This brain-dead hack was certain “our people” referred to whites, when it’s clear from the speech he was referring to Americans. What’s more, J.D. is married to a woman with brown skin, with whom he has a mixed-race child.

Those with Political Tourette’s, however, are a pretty savvy lot. They argue that slavers had an impulsive drive to couple with female slaves. So, it would follow that J.D. marrying an Indian woman doesn’t absolve him of his white supremacy. More than likely, it confirms him in it. Thomas Jefferson, call your office.

One of the other great rhetorical jujitsu flips I have seen lately is when they say, “the only people who object to being called racist are racist.” Do you see how brilliant that is? If you marry someone with brown skin, this proves you are a racist. If you complain about the charge, this further proves the charge. As my Mom says, “You can’t win for losing.”

Political Tourette’s is easy and it’s lazy. It absolves you from having to make real arguments. And that’s the thing. These lady-bloggers don’t really believe what they say. They don’t honestly think I hate Jews. It’s just a club they use to beat their critics—i.e., me. Their charge is also profoundly and knowingly dishonest, a bold-faced slander.

Finally, I love my Jewish brothers and sisters. I’ve known and been close to observant Jews from grade school through college and well into my professional life. In the current day, I am proud to stand with Jewish friends like the intellectual David Goldman and political entrepreneur Yoram Hazony.

However, as I said to a roomful of Muslim diplomats several years ago, and say now to all those of the Jewish faith, God wants all men to become Catholic. And I believe when they—as observant Jews—wake up in Heaven, they will happily find they are members of the Church Triumphant.

Lastly, as the lady-bloggers like to say, anti-Semitism is real. I covered violence against Jews in Europe for Breitbart. In many sophisticated European capitals, Jews may not wear kippahs in public for fear of deadly violence. On the streets of New York, Jews are routinely hassled and even beaten; anti-Semitic thugs regularly vandalize Jewish houses of worship.

Yes, anti-Semitism is real. But it doesn’t include lady-bloggers having their feelings hurt over justified criticism. They cheapen what is a real—and growing—problem.

Unlike the actual disease, Political Tourette’s is a choice. Those who practice it are foolish, and it’s time for them to stop.

[Photo credit: Getty Images News]

Tagged as anti-SemitismChristendom CollegeFranciscan University104

Austin Ruse

By Austin Ruse

Austin Ruse is a Crisis contributing editor and president of the Center for Family & Human Rights (C-FAM). He is the author of Fake Science: Exposing the Left’s Skewed Statistics, Fuzzy Facts, and Dodgy Data, published by Regnery; and Little Suffering Souls: Children Whose Short Lives Point Us to Christ, published by Tan Books. The views expressed here are solely his own.

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BILL GATES, UNHAPPY WITH THE PROGRESS OF DEPOPULATING AFRICA WHICH HIS FOUNDATION HAS BEEN PROMOTING FOR YEARS THROUGH BIRTH CONTROL AND OTHER SCIENTIFIC MEANS, NOW SETS HIS SIGHTS ON DEPOPULATING PLANET EARTH.

Project SCoPEx: Bill Gates pursuing a plan to carry out planetary GENOCIDE under the guise of halting “climate change”

Friday, September 06, 2019 by: Mike Adams
Tags: badclimatebadpollutionbadsciencebill gatesCollapsedepopulationdisastereugenicsphotosynthesispopulation controlSCoPEcsunlight

https://www.naturalnews.com/2019-09-06-project-scopex-bill-gates-has-a-plan-to-carry-out-planetary-genocide.html

Image: Project SCoPEx: Bill Gates pursuing a plan to carry out planetary GENOCIDE under the guise of halting “climate change”

(Natural News) SCoPEx is an acronym for “Stratospheric Controlled Perturbation Experiment,” and it’s the name of a new Bill Gates-funded global genocide experimentdesigned to eliminate most living humans by collapsing the biosphere. The dangerous SCoPEx plan, which is being masterminded by mad scientists at Harvard, falls right in line with the genocidal dreams of communist Democrat presidential candidate Bernie Sanders, who recently announced his endorsement for expanding mass abortions across Third World nations in order to achieve accelerated depopulation of brown and black people.

Both SCoPEx and Bernie Sander’s eugenics population control scheme are being packaged under the label of halting “climate change,” a false, manufactured crisis invented by globalists to spread mass hysteria and convince the people of the world to surrender all remaining liberties.

“This is not the crackpot plan of a garden-shed inventor,” writes the UK Daily Mail. “The project is being funded by billionaire and Microsoft founder Bill Gates and pioneered by scientists at Harvard University.”

Recreating massive volcanic eruptions that caused a global collapse of food crops

The SCoPEx project seeks to replicate the effects of an apocalyptic volcano disaster such as the 1815 eruption of Mount Tambora, which ejected so much particulate matter into the atmosphere that it produced what was called, “the year without a summer.” Food crops failed across the planet, leading to mass starvation and disease. This is what Bill Gates and today’s mad scientists are working to replicate through artificial means. And yes, it’s all about unleashing mass starvation, genocide and depopulation on a global scale.

The mechanism by which this is achieved is rather straightforward. By ejecting millions of tons of particulate matter (i.e. pollution) into the stratosphere, a measurable amount of sunlight is blocked and prevented from reaching the surface of the Earth, where plants grow. All plants need sunlight and carbon dioxide for photosynthesis, so reducing sunlight — even a little — would devastate plant-based food webs, food crops and ecosystems across the planet. Because marine ecosystems also depend on the photosynthesis that takes place in phytoplankton, the pillar of marine food webs, much of ocean life as we know it today would also collapse, leading to a cascading ecological nightmare that would destroy global food supplies and lead to the mass starvation of humans, land animals and sea creatures.

We aren’t the only ones concerned about the implications of planetary-scale geoengineering and deliberate mass pollution of the skies. Even the UK Daily Mail admitsthe project generates, “fears that it could trigger a disastrous series of chain reactions, creating climate havoc in the form of serious droughts and hurricanes, and bring death to millions of people around the world.” The UK Daily Mail continues:

One fear is that spreading dust into the stratosphere may damage the ozone layer that protects us from hazardous ultraviolet radiation which can damage human DNA and cause cancers. Climatologists are also concerned that such tinkering could unintentionally disrupt the circulation of ocean currents that regulate our weather. This itself could unleash a global outbreak of extreme climatic events that might devastate farmland, wipe out entire species and foster disease epidemics… This dream ‘fix’ seems to have plenty of potential to become a global nightmare.

Note that this is all being deliberately rolled out in the name of “climate change,” which has become the cry of genocidal maniacs like Bill Gates, Elizabeth Warren and Bernie Sanders… people who now openly talk about global-scale eugenics and depopulation as “the only way to save the planet.” Warren even claims that humanity only has 11 years remaining on planet Earth before a climate apocalypse destroys everything. So they use this fabricated fear to justify mass murder, essentially telling the world that billions of humans are going to have to die in order to prevent the planet from collapsing. Yet the real collapse is being engineered by these same people who actively seek to carry out planet-scale genocide.

If successful, they will kill 1000 times more people than the Holocaust. We’re talking about roughly six billion humans being annihilated by globalists, all in the name of “saving the planet.” It’s difficult to out-Hitler Hitler, but Bill Gates may yet go down in history as the man who spearheaded a global pollution program that murdered six billion humans. (All in the name of caring about the environment, of course.)

No longer a theory; these programs are funded and being rolled out right now

It’s no longer a conspiracy theory that the world’s political and science leaders want to mass murder humanity: It’s now admitted and right out in the open. The experiments are already funded and under way at this very moment. All voices of reason who are sounding the alarm on this issue are censored, silenced, de-platformed and ridiculed. Yet the experiments are under way right now to systematically pollute the atmosphere. Now, thanks to the lunacy of the climate change cult, the goal is to pollute the planet and block the sun, then collapse global food webs and starve out billions of people.

This is beyond geoengineering. It’s actually terraforming, as I have explained in previous articles.

Watch my exclusive video explaining all this, and share everywhere you can.

https://www.brighteon.com/dffce8b7-cc83-47a9-a19c-1bd7d829702d

I will be discussing this global eugenics agenda in great detail in an upcoming live event in Branson, Missouri. The event is produced by GenSix.com which also sells live streaming access to watch all the speakers, spanning three days. My talk focuses on the terraforming agenda and the globalist plan to eliminate most human beings from planet Earth, preparing Earth for what I call a “post-human era.”

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I HAVE SIGNED THE PETITION AND I URGE YOU TO DO LIKEWISE

PETITION UPDATE (9/5/19)

Dear Bishop Emeritus Rene Henry,

Support for the Pardo Family’s stand against the illegal removal of their child, Drake, by Texas Child Protective Services (CPS), is growing at a massive rate!

Since we first launched this petition – only eight days ago, nearly 11,200 people have signed in SUPPORT!

As you know, this is a CRITICAL moment for parental rights in the U.S.

And, on August 30th, a large group of bipartisan Texas legislators signed an amicus brief to the Texas Supreme Court, supporting the Pardo Family.

As we said in our first email: If this can happen in a relatively ‘conservative’ and ‘pro-life’ state, imagine what will happen across the nation if this is allowed to continue.

That’s why, right now, we need to make an even BIGGER PUSH to demand that Texas recognize the rights of parents, and reform Texas CPS.

That’s also why we are encouraging people to sign this petition, NO MATTER WHERE YOU ARE FROM.

Now, have you had a chance to read, sign and share this hugely important petition?

If you haven’t yet opened this petition, could we ask you to make the extra effort to read it, and then consider SIGNING it yourself, and SHARING it with your like-minded family, friends, and colleagues?

CLICK HERE to READ and SIGN this petition.

CLICK HERE to SHARE this petition with your Facebook friends.

If you don’t use Facebook, but would still like to share, you can easily cut and paste the following link into the body of an email which you send to your like-minded family, friends, and colleagues, encouraging them to read and sign the petition.

https://lifepetitions.com/petition/demand-tx-legislature-stop-child-protection-services-from-illegally-taking-children

STAND FOR PARENTAL RIGHTS, TODAY!

Thank you for considering this urgent request to read and sign this petition, and share it with your family and peers.

Yours faithfully,

Scott Schittl and the whole team at LifeSiteNewsHere’s the original email we sent about the petition on August 28th:Dear Friend,

Texas Child Protection Services (CPS) has recently come under severe scrutiny for taking children from good families – many of them CHRISTIAN and HOMESCHOOLING – without justification.

In some instances, CPS has even admitted they did not follow proper procedure, but the children still remain separated from their families!

This is an explicit violation of parental rights and it needs to STOP!

That’s why this petition demands that the Texas State Legislature support legal reforms which would increase accountability and add structure to the requirements for removing children from their parents.SIGN THE PETITIONIf this can happen in a relatively ‘conservative’ and ‘pro-life’ state, imagine what will happen across the nation if this is allowed to continue.

NO MATTER WHERE YOU ARE FROM, please feel free to SIGN this petition!

We need to ask Texas to become a role model, for the rest of the nation, in respecting parents’ rights!

CLICK HERE to learn about the two families pictured above – the Tutt’s and the Pardo’s – and how their lives have been torn apart by the Texas CPS.

While we wish, in no way, to put children at risk, we must also point out that, because of the current lack of state supervision over the CPS, the agency is, in many cases, abusing its authority by removing children from good and loving families — many of them homeschooling Christians.

PLEASE CLICK ON THE LINK TO LEARN MORE. THEN, SIGN THIS URGENT PETITION, TODAY!

Fortunately, there is hope. In fact, this issue was recently raised by the Texas State Legislature.

Although House Bill 3331 failed to pass the house last session, it outlined changes to CPS that would increase accountability and add structure to the requirements for removing children from their parents.

Specifically, the bill seeks to increase the ‘standard of evidence’ required before the court can approve removing a child from their home.

In sum, this bill would finally give the state the power to properly oversee the work of the CPS, and it would respect parents’ rights.

Now, please SIGN and SHARE this urgent petition, demanding that the Texas Legislature support House Bill 3331 in the next legislative session.

In order to send the message loud and clear, this petition will be CC’ed to Texas Governor Greg Abbott, and Texas Attorney General, Ken Paxton.

Yours faithfully,

Scott Schittl and the whole team at LifeSite

PS – This petition demands that the Texas Legislature now support legal reform (House Bill 3331) to increase accountability and add structure to the requirements for removing children from their parents.

PPS – Please CLICK HERE to find out more about the petition. Then, please SIGN and SHARE with your like-minded friends, family, and colleagues.
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I AM NOT ATHANASIUS, I AM NOT WORTHY OF BEING COMPARED TO HIM. IF I MUST BE COMPARED WITH SOMEONE I WOULD CHOOSE THE PROPHET JEREMIAH, LIKE JEREMIAH I AM A VOICE CRYING IN THE WILDERNESS. MY CRY IS THAT THE PROBLEM OF FRANCIS THE MERCIFUL NEEDS TO BE SOLVED AT THE ROOT, AT THE LEVEL OF THE INVALID PAPAL ELECTION OF 2013

More1 of 6

Bishop Athanasius Gracida Against Francis

Richard Stokes 2:51 PM

Alone it is Bishop Gracida against Francis in the Greatest Church Crisis in History & the Historic Gracida Open Letter

http://catholicmonitor.blogspot.com/2019/09/alone-it-is-bishop-gracida-against.html


Tuesday, September 03, 2019

Alone it is Bishop Gracida against Francis in the Greatest Church Crisis in History & the Historic Gracida Open Letter 

We are in the greatest crisis in the history of the Church because Francis and his pro-gay bishops network who make the immoral Borgia popes and their inner circles look like choir boys are creating gay heretical cardinals in a attempt to make a permanent gay heretical church.

As a priest recently said even if we can get the Church or state to remove all the bad men, Francis is only going to replace them with worse men.

Of course, we must continue to work for the removal of Francis’s immoral pro-gay bishops network, but the only way we are going to begin a real restoration of the Church is to remove Francis as well as all his controllers and collaborators.

There is only one bishop in the Church actively working toward the removal of Francis.

He is Bishop Rene Henry Gracida.

Whether he acknowledges it or not, Bishop Gracida is our St. Athanasius.

Athanasius virtually alone, except for the faithful laity, lead the resistance against the Arian heresy in the fourth century even when the Pope excommunicated him.

They said it was Athanasius against the world. Now, it is Gracida against the world.

The Bishop became like Athanasius when he explicitly said Amoris Laetitia is in error and to resist sacrilege Communions.

On December 2, 2017, Bishop Gracida became the only bishop to resist the Amoris Letitia sacrilege on his official website declaring Francis is teaching error:

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

We have a humble yet heroic man to lead us in the resistance against heterodoxy and those who have created the greatest crisis in the history of the Church.

Bishop Gracida was a courageous WWII airman, monk, friend of Pope John Paul II and the “Savior of EWTN” as Raymond Arroyo called him in his book (see post below) who at 96 looks like he is in his 70’s, is mentally sharper than most men 40 years younger than him and looks by a large margin younger than Pope Benedict XVI or Francis.
[https://www.catholicworldreport.com/2016/01/11/airman-monk-priest-bishop-an-interview-with-bp-rene-henry-gracida/]

We have leading us in Gracida a real life hero who makes every other living bishop in the whole world look like a midget by comparison.

We have a 96 year old retired bishop with the heart of a lion leading us: Rene the Lionhearted.

I’ll say it again:

They said it was Athanasius against the world. Now, it is Gracida against the world.

I know he will not be happy that I said this. He told me by email that it would be prideful to think of himself as a Athanasius.

But for better or worst that appears to be the role God has given him in this crisis.

Since most of the clergy apparently have abandoned us, what can we the faithful laity do to assist Bishop Gracida against the world?

First pray for him.Then please read, pray and share the following open letter with cardinals, bishops, clergy, canon lawyers and the laity so clarity and the action that is within God’s will can result from the letter.

The laity need to force people like Cardinal Raymond Burke and others to answer the theologically sound, clear and precise arguments put forward and either clearly and precisely counter them or put into action the needed canonical procedures to remove Francis if he was “never validly elected” the pope or else remove him from the Petrine office for heterodoxy.

If Burke and others do not act they are putting their immortal souls in danger because they are denying the Petrine office of Pope John Paul II who made binding law for the 2013 conclave in Universi Dominici Gregis.

The open letter of Bishop Gracida is a analysis of Pope John Paul Il’s Universi Dominici Gregis which appears to establish the “legal conclusion that Monsignor Bergoglio was never validly elected Roman Pontiff”  and calls the Cardinals to “Address… [the] probable invalidity”:AN OPEN LETTER TO THE CARDINALS OF THE HOLY ROMAN CATHOLIC CHURCH AND OTHER CATHOLIC CHRISTIAN FAITHFUL IN COMMUNION WITH THE APOSTOLIC SEE


AN OPEN LETTER TO THE CARDINALS OF THE HOLY ROMAN CATHOLIC CHURCH AND OT…Visit the post for more.


AN OPEN LETTER TO THE CARDINALS OF THE HOLY ROMAN CATHOLIC CHURCH AND OTHER CATHOLIC CHRISTIAN FAITHFUL IN COMMUNION WITH THE APOSTOLIC SEEPosted on July 30, 2018  by abyssum

AN OPEN LETTERTO THE CARDINALS OF THE HOLY ROMAN CATHOLIC CHURCHAND OTHER CATHOLIC CHRISTIAN FAITHFULIN COMMUNION WITH THE APOSTOLIC SEERecently many educated Catholic observers, including bishops and priests, have decried the confusion in doctrinal statements about faith or morals made from the Apostolic See at Rome and by the putative Bishop of Rome, Pope Francis. Some devout, faithful and thoughtful Catholics have even suggested that he be set aside as a heretic, a dangerous purveyor of error, as recently mentioned in a number of reports.
Claiming heresy on the part of a man who is a supposed Pope, charging material error in statements about faith or morals by a putative Roman Pontiff, suggests and presents an intervening prior question about his authenticity in that August office of Successor of Peter as Chief of The Apostles, i.e., was this man the subject of a valid election by an authentic Conclave of The Holy Roman Church?  This is so because each Successor of Saint Peter enjoys the Gift of Infallibility. 
So, before one even begins to talk about excommunicating such a prelate, one must logically examine whether this person exhibits the uniformly good and safe fruit of Infallibility.  If he seems repeatedly to engage in material error, that first raises the question of the validity of his election because one expects an authentically-elected Roman Pontiff miraculously and uniformly to be entirely incapable of stating error in matters of faith or morals.  So to what do we look to discern the invalidity of such an election?  
His Holiness, Pope John Paul II, within His massive legacy to the Church and to the World, left us with the answer to this question.  The Catholic faithful must look back for an answer to a point from where we have come—to what occurred in and around the Sistine Chapel in March 2013 and how the fruits of those events have generated such widespread concern among those people of magisterial orthodoxy about confusing and, or, erroneous doctrinal statements which emanate from The Holy See.  
His Apostolic Constitution (Universi Dominici Gregis) which governed the supposed Conclave in March 2013 contains quite clear and specific language about the invalidating effect of departures from its norms.  For example, Paragraph 76 states:  “Should the election take place in a way other than that prescribed in the present Constitution, or should the conditions laid down here not be observed, the election is for this very reason null and void, without any need for a declaration on the matter; consequently, it confers no right on the one elected.”  
From this, many believe that there is probable cause to believe that Monsignor Jorge Mario Bergoglio was never validly elected as the Bishop of Rome and Successor of Saint Peter—he never rightly took over the office of Supreme Pontiff of the Holy Roman Catholic Church and therefore he does not enjoy the charism of Infallibility.  If this is true, then the situation is dire because supposed papal acts may not be valid or such acts are clearly invalid, including supposed appointments to the college of electors itself.
Only valid cardinals can rectify our critical situation through privately (secretly) recognizing the reality of an ongoing interregnum and preparing for an opportunity to put the process aright by obedience to the legislation of His Holiness, Pope John Paul II, in that Apostolic Constitution, Universi Dominici Gregis.  While thousands of the Catholic faithful do understand that only the cardinals who participated in the events of March 2013 within the Sistine Chapel have all the information necessary to evaluate the issue of election validity, there was public evidence sufficient for astute lay faithful to surmise with moral certainty that the March 2013 action by the College was an invalid conclave, an utter nullity.
What makes this understanding of Universi Dominici Gregis particularly cogent and plausible is the clear Promulgation Clause at the end of this Apostolic Constitution and its usage of the word “scienter” (“knowingly”).  The Papal Constitution Universi Dominici Gregis thus concludes definitively with these words:  “.   .   .   knowingly or unknowingly, in any way contrary to this Constitution.”  (“.   .   .   scienter vel inscienter contra hanc Constitutionem fuerint excogitata.”)  [Note that His Holiness, Pope Paul VI, had a somewhat similar promulgation clause at the end of his corresponding, now abrogated, Apostolic Constitution, Romano Pontifici Eligendo, but his does not use “scienter”, but rather uses “sciens” instead.  This similar term of sciens in the earlier abrogated Constitution has an entirely different legal significance than scienter.]
This word, “scienter”, is a legal term of art in Roman law, and in canon law, and in Anglo-American common law, and in each system, scienter has substantially the same significance, i.e., “guilty knowledge” or willfully knowing, criminal intent.  Thus, it clearly appears that Pope John Paul II anticipated the possibility of criminal activity in the nature of a sacrilege against a process which He intended to be purely pious, private, sacramental, secret and deeply spiritual, if not miraculous, in its nature. This contextual reality reinforced in the Promulgation Clause, combined with:  (1) the tenor of the whole document; (2) some other provisions of the document, e.g., Paragraph 76; (3) general provisions of canon law relating to interpretation, e.g., Canons 10 & 17; and, (4) the obvious manifest intention of the Legislator, His Holiness, Pope John Paul II, tends to establish beyond a reasonable doubt the legal conclusion that Monsignor Bergoglio was never validly elected Roman Pontiff.
 This is so because:
1.  Communication of any kind with the outside world, e.g., communication did occur between the inside of the Sistine Chapel and anyone outside, including a television audience, before, during or even immediately after the Conclave;
2.   Any political commitment to “a candidate” and any “course of action” planned for The Church or a future pontificate, such as the extensive decade-long “pastoral” plans conceived by the Sankt Gallen hierarchs; and,
3.  Any departure from the required procedures of the conclave voting process as prescribed and known by a cardinal to have occurred:each was made an invalidating act, and if scienter (guilty knowledge) was present, also even a crime on the part of any cardinal or other actor, but, whether criminal or not, any such act or conduct violating the norms operated absolutely, definitively and entirely against the validity of all of the supposed Conclave proceedings.
Quite apart from the apparent notorious violations of the prohibition on a cardinal promising his vote, e.g., commitments given and obtained by cardinals associated with the so-called “Sankt Gallen Mafia,” other acts destructive of conclave validity occurred.  Keeping in mind that Pope John Paul II specifically focused Universi Dominici Gregis on “the seclusion and resulting concentration which an act so vital to the whole Church requires of the electors” such that “the electors can more easily dispose themselves to accept the interior movements of the Holy Spirit,” even certain openly public media broadcasting breached this seclusion by electronic broadcasts outlawed by Universi Dominici Gregis.  
These prohibitions include direct declarative statements outlawing any use of television before, during or after a conclave in any area associated with the proceedings, e.g.:  “I further confirm, by my apostolic authority, the duty of maintaining the strictest secrecy with regard to everything that directly or indirectly concerns the election process itself.”
Viewed in light of this introductory preambulary language of Universi Dominici Gregis and in light of the legislative text itself, even the EWTN camera situated far inside the Sistine Chapel was an immediately obvious non-compliant  act which became an open and notorious invalidating violation by the time when this audio-visual equipment was used to broadcast to the world the preaching after the “Extra Omnes”.  While these blatant public violations of Chapter IV of Universi Dominici Gregis actuate the invalidity and nullity of the proceedings themselves, nonetheless in His great wisdom, the Legislator did not disqualify automatically those cardinals who failed to recognize these particular offenses against sacred secrecy, or even those who, with scienter, having recognized the offenses and having had some power or voice in these matters, failed or refused to act or to object against them:  “Should any infraction whatsoever of this norm occur and be discovered, those responsible should know that they will be subject to grave penalties according to the judgment of the future Pope.”  [Universi Dominici Gregis, ¶55]   
No Pope apparently having been produced in March 2013, those otherwise valid cardinals who failed with scienter to act on violations of Chapter IV, on that account alone would nonetheless remain voting members of the College unless and until a new real Pope is elected and adjudges them.  Thus, those otherwise valid cardinals who may have been compromised by violations of secrecy can still participate validly in the “clean-up of the mess” while addressing any such secrecy violations with an eventual new Pontiff.  In contrast, the automatic excommunication of those who politicized the sacred conclave process, by obtaining illegally, commitments from cardinals to vote for a particular man, or to follow a certain course of action (even long before the vacancy of the Chair of Peter as Vicar of Christ), is established not only by the word, “scienter,” in the final enacting clause, but by a specific exception, in this case, to the general statement of invalidity which therefore reinforces the clarity of intention by Legislator that those who apply the law must interpret the general rule as truly binding. 
 Derived directly from Roman law, canonical jurisprudence provides this principle for construing or interpreting legislation such as this Constitution, Universi Dominici Gregis.  Expressed in Latin, this canon of interpretation is:   “Exceptio probat regulam in casibus non exceptis.”  (The exception proves the rule in cases not excepted.)  In this case, an exception from invalidity for acts of simony reinforces the binding force of the general principle of nullity in cases of other violations.
Therefore, by exclusion from nullity and invalidity legislated in the case of simony:   “If — God forbid — in the election of the Roman Pontiff the crime of simony were to be perpetrated, I decree and declare that all those guilty thereof shall incur excommunication latae sententiae.  At the same time I remove the nullity or invalidity of the same simoniacal provision, in order that — as was already established by my Predecessors — the validity of the election of the Roman Pontiff may not for this reason be challenged.”  His Holiness made an exception for simony.  Exceptio probat regulam in casibus non exceptis
 The clear exception from nullity and invalidity for simony proves the general rule that other violations of the sacred process certainly do and did result in the nullity and invalidity of the entire conclave.
While it is not necessary to look outside Universi Dominici Gregis in order to construe or to interpret its plain meaning, the first source to which one would look is the immediately prior constitution which Universi Dominici Gregis abrogated or replaced.  Pope John Paul II replaced entirely what Pope Paul VI had legislated in the immediately previous Constitution on conclaves, Romano Pontfici Eligendo, but in so doing, Pope John Paul II used Romano Pontfici Eligendo as the format or pattern for His new constitution on conclaves.  Making obvious changes, nonetheless, Pope John Paul II utilized the content and structure of his predecessor’s constitution to organize and outline Universi Dominici Gregis.  Therefore, while it is not legally necessary to look outside Universi Dominici Gregis, the primary reference to an extraneous source of construction would entail an examination of Romano Pontfici Eligendo, and that exercise (bolsterd by the use of the key word “scienter” in the Promulgation Clause) would reinforce the broad principle of invalidity. 

Comparing what Pope John Paul II wrote in His Constitution on conclaves with the Constitution which His replaced, you can see that, with the exception of simony, invalidity became universal. In the corresponding paragraph of what Pope Paul VI wrote, he specifically confined the provision declaring conclave invalidity to three (3) circumstances described in previous paragraphs within His constitution, Romano Pontfici Eligendo.  No such limitation exists in Universi Dominici Gregis.  See the comparison both in English and Latin below:
Romano Pontfici Eligendo, 77. Should the election be conducted in a manner different from the three procedures described above (cf. no. 63 ff.) or without the conditions laid down for each of the same, it is for this very reason null and void (cf. no. 62), without the need for any declaration, and gives no right to him who has been thus elected. [Romano Pontfici Eligendo, 77:  “Quodsi electio aliter celebrata fuerit, quam uno e tribus modis, qui supra sunt dicti (cfr. nn. 63 sqq.), aut non servatis condicionibus pro unoquoque illorum praescriptis, electio eo ipso est nulla et invalida (cfr. n. 62) absque ulla declaratione, et ita electo nullum ius tribuit .”] as compared with:Universi Dominici Gregis, 76:  “Should the election take place in a way other than that prescribed in the present Constitution, or should the conditions laid down here not be observed, the election is for this very reason null and void, without any need for a declaration on the matter; consequently, it confers no right on the one elected.”  [Universi Dominici Gregis, 76:  “Quodsi electio aliter celebrata fuerit, quam haec Constitutio statuit, aut non servatis condicionibus pariter hic praescriptis, electio eo ipso est nulla et invalida absque ulla declaratione, ideoque electo nullum ius tribuit.”]        
Of course, this is not the only feature of the Constitution or aspect of the matter which tends to establish the breadth of invalidity.  Faithful must hope and pray that only those cardinals whose status as a valid member of the College remains intact will ascertain the identity of each other and move with the utmost charity and discretion in order to effectuate The Divine Will in these matters. The valid cardinals, then, must act according to that clear, manifest, obvious and unambiguous mind and intention of His Holiness, Pope John Paul II, so evident in Universi Dominici Gregis, a law which finally established binding and self-actuating conditions of validity on the College for any papal conclave, a reality now made so apparent by the bad fruit of doctrinal confusion and plain error.

        It would seem then that praying and working in a discreet and prudent manner to encourage only those true cardinals inclined to accept a reality of conclave invalidity, would be a most charitable and logical course of action in the light of Universi Dominici Gregis, and out of our high personal regard for the clear and obvious intention of its Legislator, His Holiness, Pope John Paul II.  Even a relatively small number of valid cardinals could act decisively and work to restore a functioning Apostolic See through the declaration of an interregnum government.  The need is clear for the College to convene a General Congregation in order to declare, to administer, and soon to end the Interregnum which has persisted since March 2013.
Finally, it is important to understand that the sheer number of putative counterfeit cardinals will eventually, sooner or later, result in a situation in which The Church will have no normal means validly ever again to elect a Vicar of Christ.  After that time, it will become even more difficult, if not humanly impossible, for the College of Cardinals to rectify the current disastrous situation and conduct a proper and valid Conclave such that The Church may once again both have the benefit of a real Supreme Pontiff, and enjoy the great gift of a truly infallible Vicar of Christ.  It seems that some good cardinals know that the conclave was invalid, but really cannot envision what to do about it; we must pray, if it is the Will of God, that they see declaring the invalidity and administering an Interregnum through a new valid conclave is what they must do. Without such action or without a great miracle, The Church is in a perilous situation. 
 Once the last validly appointed cardinal reaches age 80, or before that age, dies, the process for electing a real Pope ends with no apparent legal means to replace it. Absent a miracle then, The Church would no longer have an infallible Successor of Peter and Vicar of Christ.  Roman Catholics would be no different than Orthodox Christians.
In this regard, all of the true cardinals may wish to consider what Holy Mother Church teaches in the Catechism of the Catholic Church, ¶675, ¶676 and ¶677 about “The Church’s Ultimate Trial”.  But, the fact that “The Church .   .   .  will follow her Lord in his death and Resurrection” does not justify inaction by the good cardinals, even if there are only a minimal number sufficient to carry out Chapter II of Universi Dominici Gregis and operate the Interregnum.This Apostolic Constitution, Universi Dominici Gregis, which was clearly applicable to the acts and conduct of the College of Cardinals in March 2013, is manifestly and obviously among those “invalidating” laws “which expressly establish that an act is null or that a person is effected” as stated in Canon 10 of the 1983 Code of Canon Law.  And, there is nothing remotely “doubtful or obscure” (Canon 17) about this Apostolic Constitution as clearly promulgated by Pope John Paul II.  The tenor of the whole document expressly establishes that the issue of invalidity was always at stake. 
 This Apostolic Constitution conclusively establishes, through its Promulgation Clause [which makes “anything done (i.e., any act or conduct) by any person  .   .   .   in any way contrary to this Constitution,”]  the invalidity of the entire supposed Conclave, rendering it “completely null and void”.So, what happens if a group of Cardinals who undoubtedly did not knowingly and wilfully initiate or intentionally participate in any acts of disobedience against Universi Dominici Gregis were to meet, confer and declare that, pursuant to Universi Dominici Gregis, Monsignor Bergoglio is most certainly not a valid Roman Pontiff.  Like any action on this matter, including the initial finding of invalidity, that would be left to the valid members of the college of cardinals. 
 They could declare the Chair of Peter vacant and proceed to a new and proper conclave.  They could meet with His Holiness, Benedict XVI, and discern whether His resignation and retirement was made under duress, or based on some mistake or fraud, or otherwise not done in a legally effective manner, which could invalidate that resignation.  Given the demeanor of His Holiness, Benedict XVI, and the tenor of His few public statements since his departure from the Chair of Peter, this recognition of validity in Benedict XVI seems unlikely.
In fact, even before a righteous group of good and authentic cardinals might decide on the validity of the March 2013 supposed conclave, they must face what may be an even more complicated discernment and decide which men are most likely not valid cardinals.  If a man was made a cardinal by the supposed Pope who is, in fact, not a Pope (but merely Monsignor Bergoglio), no such man is in reality a true member of the College of Cardinals.  In addition, those men appointed by Pope John Paul II or by Pope Benedict XVI as cardinals, but who openly violated Universi Dominici Gregis by illegal acts or conduct causing the invalidation of the last attempted conclave, would no longer have voting rights in the College of Cardinals either.  (Thus, the actual valid members in the College of Cardinals may be quite smaller in number than those on the current official Vatican list of supposed cardinals.)
In any event, the entire problem is above the level of anyone else in Holy Mother Church who is below the rank of Cardinal.  So, we must pray that The Divine Will of The Most Holy Trinity, through the intercession of Our Lady as Mediatrix of All Graces and Saint Michael, Prince of Mercy, very soon rectifies the confusion in Holy Mother Church through action by those valid Cardinals who still comprise an authentic College of Electors.  Only certainly valid Cardinals can address the open and notorious evidence which points to the probable invalidity of the last supposed conclave and only those cardinals can definitively answer the questions posed here.  May only the good Cardinals unite and if they recognize an ongoing Interregnum, albeit dormant, may they end this Interregnum by activating perfectly a functioning Interregnum government of The Holy See and a renewed process for a true Conclave, one which is purely pious, private, sacramental, secret and deeply spiritual.  If we do not have a real Pontiff, then may the good Cardinals, doing their appointed work “in view of the sacredness of the act of election”  “accept the interior movements of the Holy Spirit” and provide Holy Mother Church with a real Vicar of Christ as the Successor of Saint Peter.         May these thoughts comport with the synderetic considerations of those who read them and may their presentation here please both Our Immaculate Virgin Mother, Mary, Queen of the Apostles, and The Most Holy Trinity, Father, Son and Holy Spirit.N. de PlumeUn ami des Papes
Pray an Our Father now for the restoration of the Church.

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WITH THE APPOINTMENT OF TEN NEW CARDINALS FRANCIS THE MERCIFUL THINKS THAT HE IS CONTROLLING THE FUTURE CHARACTER OF THE CHURCH, BUT SURPRISE, IN SPITE OF APPEARANCES, GOD IS IN CONTROL. THANK GOD !!!!!

Cardinal control: Is the Church’s future at stake?

By Dr. Jeff Mirus (bio – articles – email) | Sep 03, 2019

CATHOLIC CULTURE

Not being God, my interpretation of what God Himself is accomplishing through the current pontificate may at the very best illuminate a tiny portion of the Divine plan, and could well be utterly worthless. Nonetheless, I am moved to this exercise by a desire to offer consolation in the wake of today’s perceptive commentary by Phil Lawler, “The new cardinals: Pope Francis bids for ‘irreversible change’”.

Providence at work in my lifetime

In broad outlines, my perception of Divine Providence—which always concerns the Body of Christ—is based on a simple faith that, since Catholic renewal is the most important goal of our time (or of any time), Our Lord is far more aware of its need than I. If this is true—as in fact it must necessarily be true—then I am bound to interpret history by asking what God is doing to purify and renew His Church. The answer certainly includes many things that I cannot or do not see, and at least some things that no man or woman living on this earth sees. But here are a few things that I do see:

First:
God has recently raised up a series of saints to effect a renewal of the Church, which was already very much needed (once again) by the dawn of the twentieth century. He raised up Pope Saint John XXIII to recognize how much the Church reflected the serious deficiencies of the established post-war European order and to put the concept of renewal back in the Catholic institutional lexicon. He raised up Pope Saint Paul VI to gain incomparable graces for the Church by suffering a prolonged experience of helplessness as his every effort at renewal was derailed by Western secularism among Catholics themselves—especially the leadership groups of bishops, clergy, religious, and academics. He raised up Pope Saint John Paul II to recover the lost vision of the Second Vatican Council and inspire a new generation to a deeper commitment of Faith. It will surprise nobody if Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI is eventually canonized as a confirmation of the renewal of Catholic theology over which he presided for nearly thirty-five years.

Second:
At the same time, in my lifetime God’s Providence has permitted the long decline of Christianity in the West to reach a level so catastrophic as to make it obvious to the meanest intelligence that the Church can no longer embody the values of the dominant culture and still remain Catholic in any way whatsoever. This, in addition to a period of widespread betrayal by priests, religious and Catholic academics, has made it obvious to huge numbers of highly-committed lay persons that they must themselves engage directly in both renewal and public witness.

Third:
The result of the Providential gifts of sanctity already enumerated, and of the human response to them, was an immense strengthening of the episcopate and the priesthood in a great many of the local churches, sufficient at long last for Catholics to begin to believe and teach and preach that Christ calls His faithful to a radical rejection of the values of this world. But important as this change was over a period of fifty years, the local churches at every level (bishops, priests and laity) remained excessively dependent on sound guidance from Rome, almost as if they could not take up either the episcopal fullness or even the ordinary baptismal powers to teach, rule and sanctify without detailed guidance from the Vatican.

Fourth:
But with the resignation of Benedict XVI and the election of Jorge Bergoglio as Pope Francis in 2013, it rapidly became very clear that sound direction from Rome could not be expected. This meant that the bishops in particular had to learn in practice what the Second Vatican Council and Pope Saint John Paul II had tried to teach them in theory, namely that they are established as vicars of Christ in their own dioceses—and nothing can excuse them from their responsibility to foster, lead and guide the authentic mission of Christ in their own flocks. Some bishops and episcopal conferences have responded badly thus far to this challenge, but others have already begun to form strong local churches. What many of us would call the scourge of Pope Francis has hastened these developments, as increasing numbers of Catholics in influential positions have learned that they cannot lead by following anyone but Christ.

Fifth:
Finally, throughout this whole Providential sequence, the secular rottenness which has been gradually increasing its hold on the Church over the past hundred years or so—in political matters, in concern for institutional power largely based on a secular model, in an excessive ecclesiastical stratification, in its labyrinthine ties to power and wealth, in the poisoning of nearly all of its academic wells, in the facile cultural assumptions of its leaders, and ultimately in their gravest sins—has been permitted to emerge in its full horror in the abuse crisis, which has finally produced a reaction which furthers the difficult but serious cleansing of Catholic institutions, from bottom to top.

Where we are now

The Church’s Augean stables can never be cleansed completely (for the Church is necessarily populated by sinful members), and even the constant goal of improvement—which we call renewal—can be effected in any given period only partially and painfully. But I am convinced that the pontificate of Pope Francis has been Providentially permitted to demonstrate the depths to which the center of ecclesiastical power has fallen, and to impress upon all the local churches the need to take far more responsibility for the advance of the Gospel in their own regions.

Thus a renewal initially understood and promoted by a very few can be embraced as the logical consequence of the baptism of all Catholics. The Church, especially in the West, may initially shrink as a result of this increasing awareness of what it means to accept the outrageous claims of Jesus Christ, but it is precisely the function of Divine Providence to purge away spiritual dross, releasing energy and strength in those who, through such purification, learn at last what it means to be happy.

No fear of human plans

Therefore, I have no fear of the “stacking” of the College of Cardinals by Pope Francis, which Phil Lawler recorded for all of us today, not only accurately but insightfully and altogether appropriately. Forewarned is forearmed. But read the headline again: “The new cardinals: Pope Francis bids for ‘irreversible change’”. Phil covers the news not only with incomparable dedication and skill but with an unparalleled Catholic intelligence. Trust me on this: If the sky were falling, that would have been his headline.

Instead, everything, including the College of Cardinals, is a tool of Providence, and grace remains at work even in the least likely situations and groups. Moreover, I will give three very human reasons for not worrying overmuch about the various political machinations used even by bishops and popes to secure their own legacies. The truth of these reasons is substantiated by the election of Jorge Bergoglio himself.

First, the cardinals do not know themselves very well. Bergoglio himself was most likely elected because he established a reputation for wanting the authentic Vatican renewal which Benedict had not the strength to achieve. Yet he proved to be anything but what most of those who voted for him expected.

Second, popes do not know most of the cardinals very well (or even the men they choose to make new cardinals); nor can they accurately predict what any cardinal will be like, once the mask of even a legitimate subservience is removed, when an elected successor embarks on his own program.

Third, God knows—as surely as we do not—what immediate and pressing concerns will surround the next conclave, and how these concerns will influence the election. In addition, it is quite possible for a man who will become both a holy and an effective pope to be elected for reasons astonishingly irrelevant to either his holiness or his effectiveness. Apart from Divine inspiration, nobody predicts the future accurately, not even with all the information available in this world.

Many popes have attempted to control the election of their successors. The only successful one we know about was Peter, when (as we believe) he hand-picked Linus—and only those in heaven know whether Peter was himself satisfied with the result. It is fitting, then, to end where we began, with Divine Providence. In a commentary designed to interpret it, I can only hope my reading has some points in its favor. But then I am hoping from my own point of view, am I not? So again, Divine Providence. Ultimately, I am content with it. I hope you are too. Nothing is more calculated to eliminate worry about all those horrible outcomes—all those many futures—which remain infinitely beyond our abilities to foresee.

Jeffrey Mirus holds a Ph.D. in intellectual history from Princeton University. A co-founder of Christendom College, he also pioneered Catholic Internet services. He is the founder of Trinity Communications and CatholicCulture.org. See full bio.

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YOU WANT TO TALK ABOUT HARD TIMES? TALK ABOUT ST. ISAAC JOGUES AND COMPANIONS AND HIS LOVE OF GOD AND HIS FELLOW MEN

Dauntless Faith of Saint Isaac Jogues

ETHICA POLITIKA

By Ralph Capone

August 29, 2019In 1958, Father Joseph Ratzinger (future Pope Benedict XVI) wrote an essay entitled “The New Pagans and the Church” in which he called  Christian Europe the birthplace of a new paganism. “She is no longer, as she once was, a Church composed of pagans who have become Christians, but a Church of pagans, who still call themselves Christians.” He noted that in the very beginning the Church was founded upon the “spiritual decision of the individual person to believe…”. Individual acts of “faith in the grace of God which was revealed in Christ” distinguished Christians from non-Christians.  

Sixty-one years later this observation is proven prescient. While many Catholics during this time have left the Church, some remain as cultural Catholics who have neither thought about nor made a personal commitment of faith. In the encyclical, Redemptoris Missio (1990), St Pope John Paul II wrote about a re-evangelization to “groups of the baptized (who) have lost a living sense of the faith, or even no longer consider themselves members of the Church, and (who) live a life far removed from Christ and his Gospel” (RM 33). 

Get our free bookThe Essential Ethika PolitikaWhere has Evangelization Gone?

Over the past 50 – 60 years, modernism, secularism, materialism and narcissism in the world and more sadly in the Church have combined to diminish to near extinction the supernatural gift of faith. For many, faith has become a “burden and not a grace.” This has afflicted both laity and clergy alike. Is there a way forward into true discipleship that re-kindles individual faith to achieve a ‘new’ evangelization? 

In the Apostle’s Creed, following the avowal of the “the holy Catholic Church” is the statement of belief in “the communion of saints.” The saints intercede for us to the Father for the grace to proceed as “companions and fellow disciples” of Christ. (CCC 957). They also instruct us by their stories marked by a profound and humble faith wholly dependent on God. Lumen Gentium (1964), the Second Vatican Council’s Dogmatic Constitution of the Church, instructs the faithful to look to the saints who by their close unity with Christ “establish the whole Church more firmly in holiness, lend nobility to the worship which the Church offers to God here on earth and in many ways contribute to its greater edification….(and) by their brotherly interest our weakness is greatly strengthened.”(LG 49) (author’s italics) By many examples of courageous faith they may inspire in us a deeper belief and commitment to the revealed truth of the gospel. One outstanding example is Saint Isaac Jogues, one of the heroic North American Martyrs, whose prayer in the divine office states that “(b)y the help of their prayers may the Christian faith continue to grow throughout the world.” 

The Life of Saint Isaac Jogues

He was born on January 10, 1607, the third son of Francois de Saint-Mesmin Jogues and Laurent Jogues and baptized the same day in Orleans, the city of Saint Joan of Arc, in north central France. (editor’s note: all subsequent quotes come from this book). Isaac was educated from the age of ten by the Fathers of the Society of Jesus. The Jesuit college stressed piety and virtue as part of the curriculum and he responded by diligence, quiet assertiveness and perseverance. He frequented the sacraments, especially confession and the Eucharist and he was especially devoted to the Blessed Virgin. At age seventeen he decided he wanted to become a priest of the Society of Jesus. Isaac envisioned a future in God’s service, saving souls, and initially imagined going to India, China or the Levant (Syria and the Eastern Mediterranean.) He implored the master of novices to send him to Constantinople whereupon, after a short pause, Father Louis Lalemant, responded “Brother Isaac, you will not die anywhere but in Canada.” Isaac Jogues was ordained a priest in 1636 and soon after, at age 29,  he was granted his fervent desire to serve God as a missioner in New France, Canada. He was going to provide some of the greatly needed assistance to the missions of the Fathers, including another saint-martyr, Jean de Brebeuf. A generation earlier, under Henry IV, exploration and settlement had begun in the Americas, New France, Canada. Since that time it had become a fertile mission field, attracting several religious orders including the Jesuits. 

For the next 10 years, until his death in 1646 at age 39, Isaac Jogues, sustained by grace, labored to spread the Gospel to the native Indians of North America. In teaching others about Christ, he endured all difficulties, disease, afflictions, torments, and personal discomfort, ultimately suffering the death of a martyr. In a correspondence to his younger brother Samuel he wrote that “(i)n spite of the fire of persecution, the zeal of the missioners did not relax…(despite) the hate and ill-will of the (village) inhabitants, there were always some who were desirous of following our instructions. I have regenerated (baptized) about one hundred of these in the waters of baptism, among whom were twenty-two little children who are raised up in the Blood of the Lamb.” Enkindled by the love of the Holy Spirit, tirelessly he performed the corporal and spiritual works of mercy; the former limited by his own materially impoverished state. The spiritual works, urged on by his immense faith and love, were inexhaustible. Another letter he wrote to his mother stated “(t)he life of a man, could it be better employed than in this noble work? What am I saying? All the labors of a million persons, would they not be well compensated for by the conversion of one single soul gained for Jesus Christ?” (author’s italics)

In August, 1642, he and his French companions, including another future saint, Rene Goupil, along with a group of Hurons who had accepted the faith were captured by the Iroquois. He was beaten with clubs, stripped of his blackrobe and had finger nails pulled out. In a further fit of fury, some captors chewed and crushed the bones of both forefingers, amputating their ends. Over the next two weeks, each with festering wounds, he and his battered companions were paraded in many villages and subjected to further humiliations and intense physical tortures. At night, they were tied on the ground, spread-eagle, and exposed to further assaults including having hot coals thrown on them.  His unwavering concern remained with his fellow Christian prisoners. He sought opportunities often at his own risk to minister to each and to offer encouragement amidst their great fear and suffering. He prayed together with them and heard their confessions, giving absolution.  He urged them to persevere knowing that “they would exchange these momentary sorrows for a joy that is eternal.” It was his love for Christ, impelled by a profound faith, that kept his eye “single” and his “whole body full of light”. (Matt 6:22) 

After an escape he returned to France as ordered by his superiors to recover his physical health. He arrived on the Normandy coast on Christmas morning, 1643. Immediately, though travel-worn from the hard passage, he sought a priest in the village to hear his confession and then attended Mass for the first time since his captivity. Much to his discomfort, due to his great humility, he was treated in France as a living saint and hero of the order. His only objective was to obtain permission to resume his missionary work in New France and to complete his destiny. Father Jaques Buteux, his confessor in Canada and spiritual director, wrote posthumously of him that “(h)is modesty kept secret from me the principle thing, that which adorns all else: I mean his interior virtues, his charity, his patience, his conformity to the will of God through which he suffered…” Further, Buteux continued, “(n)ot only had he no ill-feelings toward them (Iroquois), but rather intense longings of charity to bring about their salvation, to pray for them…” In answer to his prayers and pleadings he was granted permission to return to Canada only several months later, setting off to return there in April, 1644. His biographer wrote that he was “homesick” for New France and that he deeply desired “to be with the little children whom he might instruct, whom he might baptize if they were dying.” 

A Heart Beating for Martyrdom

Shortly upon his return he would die a martyr’s death. One month before this he wrote to a fellow Jesuit in France “…my heart tells me: ‘Ibo et non redibo – I shall go, but I shall not return'”.  Further, he said that “(m)y confidence is placed in God Who does not need our help for accomplishing His designs. Our single endeavor should be to give ourselves to the work and to be faithful to Him, and not to spoil His work by our shortcomings.” His letter ended with this – “Farewell, my dear Father, and beg God that He may join me with Himself, never to be separated from Him.” On October 18, 1646, when, in the process of trying to engage his tormenters to mediate peace, he was felled by tomahawk blows to the head. He went to his death proclaiming the kingdom, a martyr by God’s grace and love.

Saint Isaac Jogues and the entire communion of saints still intercedes for us and shows the way to Christ through strong faith and zeal for personal holiness.  By their lives often amidst trials and great sufferings, and by their indomitable faith, they persevered to announce the good news and to build up God’s kingdom. These holy men and women, the Church triumphant, provide for us clear examples of living the Gospel even amidst our personal sorrows and challenges in these faithless times. Today more than ever while the Church’s mission is muted and marginalized and “out of season” she needs other fearless ‘saints in the making’ to become beacons of light in this fallen world. May these holy ones who compose this formidable cloud of witnesses become for us that inspiration. May they fill us with that same desire, as Jogues told his fellow prisoners, to “exchange these momentary sorrows for a joy that is eternal.” These saints are, like Isaac Jogues, a ‘pearl of inestimable price’ who once by their lives and now by their heavenly intercessions, point a way for a genuine renewal of faith and discipleship. May they encourage and inspire us to evangelize tirelessly and never cease winning souls for God. May we praise God in gratitude for His saints.  

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THE GREATEST MORAL FAILING OF THE HIERARCHY OF THE Roman Catholic Church SINCE THE CLOSE OF THE SECOND VATICAN COUNCIL IS THE LACK OF COURAGE ON THE PART OF CATHOLICS OF ALL STRIPES, CARDINALS, BISHOPS, PRIESTS AND LAITY.

MARCH 13, 2019

A Catholic Call to Courage

JEREMY A. KEE

CRISIS MAGAZINE

As he stood before the rain-soaked crowd estimated to be as great as 20,000, Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn—with that truly Russian sense of solemn sincerity and conviction—suggested to the 1978 graduating class of Harvard University that what the West lacked above all else—and in his view the West lacked quite a good bit—was courage. Said Solzhenitsyn:

A decline in courage may be the most striking feature that an outside observer notices in the West today… Such a decline in courage is particularly noticeable among the ruling and intellectual elites, causing an impression of a loss of courage by the entire society. There are many courageous individuals, but they have no determining influence on public life… Political and intellectual functionaries exhibit this depression, passivity, and perplexity in their actions and in their statements, and even more so in their self-serving rationales as to how realistic, reasonable, and intellectually and even morally justified it is to base state policies on weakness and cowardice… Must one point out that from ancient times a decline in courage has been considered the first symptom of the end?

One does not often hear mention of courage or its absence in modern discourse. In fact, one would be most hard-pressed to hear mention of any virtue at all, lest it be mentioned derogatorily. When Solzhenitsyn said that the West lacked courage, perhaps not even he could have seen coming a time such as ours—a time in which virtue has been buried alive and replaced in the public square with a set of ideas parading as values though lacking any value, which represent exactly what our former virtues stood emphatically against. If a decline in courage led to the world of the 1990s and early 2000s, what sort of world will result from its being summarily executed?

Our Russian prophet was lambasted, predictably, by the media (who also received no uncertain measure of scorn for his address) and other cultural elites. How dare this ungrateful exile from the East, taken in by the West—God’s country—say such disparaging things about his one true safe haven? The reaction to his observations, which were actually encouragements for those willing to look past their own ersatz offense, did hurt his reputation, it is true, while at the same time proving his very point. Men of the West lacked the courage to stand up to evil, even the evil within themselves. Solzhenitsyn famously wrote that evil cuts through each human heart. We all have that choice to make—either that we will submit to good or succumb to evil. It may be the nebulous “others” who are responsible for the downward trend of society, but to those “others” we are also “other.” All share blame, and it is in no small part due to our lack, our divorce, and our infidelity against courage, honor, other virtues, and, ultimately, truth itself. 

Our Infidelity Against Truth
Western civilization is unquestionably founded upon and has been unmistakably influenced by the Christian worldview. No serious argument exists to refute this claim. As time has soldiered on, however, and as so-called “progressive” ideals have seeped into the popular imagination, our adherence to the truth has weakened and in many ways dissolved entirely. We have forsaken the straight and narrow for the wide and easy, as the former has often led to persecution, alienation, and being forsaken ourselves. Perhaps we can fight the good fight from within, as many have undoubtedly thought to themselves. This is nothing but the Devil speaking through us.

So we come to our modern fragile day. Everything, it seems, teeters on the precipice of ruin. Never has it been easier to gain access to the full body of the Magisterium; the Truth stands at the ready at our very fingertips. Conversely, never have the faithless had such an expansive and visible platform from which to spew their deceitful poison. The “Dark Ages” are so called due to the superstition that it was a worthless period. The Roman Empire had fallen, and the Enlightenment had not yet begun. It was a period of social and cultural darkness. When one looks at the great works done by the Church during this time—a deeply humane work, one laughs at the label of a “dark” age. Were it not for the Church, there would have been no Enlightenment, as it was the Church that worked tirelessly to preserve the wisdom of the ancient world. Dark, indeed.

To the contrary, one could call our own time the new Dark Age, or perhaps even the first true Dark Age, without being called a cynic. What could be darker than the conscious turning away from God and the assumption of the mantle of lies peddled by the countless heretics and snake oil salesmen of our day? If God is the Light, then wandering away from him can only lead to darkness.

When Solzhenitsyn diagnosed the root of our social troubles as a spiritual weakness, he said it was because we lacked courage. Why? Because it takes courage in the truest sense to be men and women of faith in a godless society. C.S. Lewis once wrote that courage is not a virtue unto itself but rather every virtue at its testing point. In other words, any virtue will eventually be put to the test, and only with courage will that virtue be found true in the life of he or she who hopes to live accordingly. Virtue requires courage, and we lack courage, so it should come as no surprise that our society is so susceptible to vice. Lest we forget, no less than Christ our Lord tells us that the world will hate us, it will persecute us, and it will demand our very lives. Those who stand firm in the faith—in Lewisian language, those whose virtue is tested and found true—will see eternity. Faith, then, requires courage.

One might expect that the Church, as the Body of Christ on Earth and the storehouse of all eternal truth, be a bastion of courage. How could it not be one? Yet, we know that even among the Body of Christ, layperson and leader alike, courage is lacking. It can be most discouraging to see this. During a homily following the legislative massacre that was the Irish abortion referendum, my own priest, a good and decent man, spoke powerfully and forcefully against such wanton pursuits of death. Fire poured from his mouth, and, judging by the body language of those in the chapel (not a small crowd particularly for a 7:30 am service), more than a few were badly burned. Perhaps those squirming uncomfortably in the pews were doing so because they vehemently disagreed with Father. Or perhaps they were uncomfortable because they were hearing the truth that they knew and felt deep within themselves and were thus confronted with that most terrible of possibilities—they might just be wrong about something very, very bad.

But if they are wrong, what is to be done? To adhere to what is right might mean social discomfort. Friends may be lost. Status may be lowered. Surely God will forgive them for doing nothing. Surely God will understand that the potential consequences were just too high. It is a difficult thing to stand up for what is true amidst such pervasive hostility. Jesus probably did not intend all that stuff he said to be taken so literally that you and I are actually expected to risk our social or professional lives just to say what is right, or did he? Perhaps we should ask the Apostles, the countless saints who have died as martyrs, or even our Lord. Faith requires courage. It always has and it always will.

We are told to be perfect as Christ is perfect, but how? I have no answer to this question, but it is spelled out very clearly that this is our charge nevertheless. We are called to be saints—not in the casual manner of a really nice or helpful person but, rather, in the manner of existing in eternity before the Ancient of Days. Saints in the manner of those called upon for help by those who remain in the Vale of Tears.

We are called to be saints.

You, who have sinned so profoundly in your life up to this point, are called to be a saint. And you can be one. So many of us say, “No way. There is simply no way I could ever become a saint. They’re so much better than me!” If you believe this, then you are a coward. Why adhere to a religion that calls all its members to sainthood if you do not believe yourself capable of it yourself? Why waste your time and energy going to Mass if you do not believe that you will receive the full gift of the Holy Spirit, or that God expects as much of you as he expected of Jerome, Augustine, or Aquinas? Here is the truth: it is not that one does not believe but rather than one chooses not to. Wide and easy is the way that leads to hell, and God is not a God of cheap grace. Faith requires courage.

We are called to be saints, so let us be saints, for this is precisely what the world, our country, our communities, and our homes need. Let us call out sin when and where we see it, with love, yes, but with courage as well. Let us stop calling it “fake news” and start calling it by its other name—lies. Let us stand up for life—all life—the unborn, the refugee, the poor, the sick, and the elderly. Let us test our courage. If we fail, let us fail spectacularly and try again. Faith is not a dichotomy of pass or fail; we are given a lifetime of opportunities. Finding a place to begin is like finding the right spot of the pool into which to jump: every spot is good. Let us jump in. Let us stop wasting our time and instead be men and women of courage. Let us be saints.

Editor’s note: Pictured above is a fresco of Peter walking on water toward Jesus in the Herz Jesus church, Berlin, painted by Friedrich Stummel and Karl Wenzel near the end of the nineteenth century.

Tagged as Alexander SolzhenitsynCourageSainthoodVirtue214

Jeremy A. Kee

By Jeremy A. Kee

Jeremy A. Kee writes from Dallas, Texas, where he also serves as a manuscripts editor for a local university. He is, as well, the founder and editor of Further-In.com. His writings have appeared at The Imaginative Conservative, Real Clear Politics, and The Daily Caller, among others.

Posted in Uncategorized | Comments Off on THE GREATEST MORAL FAILING OF THE HIERARCHY OF THE Roman Catholic Church SINCE THE CLOSE OF THE SECOND VATICAN COUNCIL IS THE LACK OF COURAGE ON THE PART OF CATHOLICS OF ALL STRIPES, CARDINALS, BISHOPS, PRIESTS AND LAITY.