The visible destruction of the Catholic Church

The Danger of Equating Vatican II and the Liturgical Reform

Interesting article from New Liturgical Movement:

by Peter Kwasniewski

Pope John Paul II pointed out: “For many people, the message of the Second Vatican Council was perceived principally through the liturgical reform” (Vicesimus Quintus Annus, 12).

 
That’s just the problem in a nutshell, isn’t it? If the liturgical reform itself was bungled—and, in the wake of the scathing critiques of Gamber, Ratzinger, Nichols, Lang, Mosebach, Robinson, Reid, et alia, it is no longer intellectually honest to think that it was not, in some very important respects—and, what is worse, if its implementation was still further compromised by the prevailing secularism of the environment into which it was launched, one must ask: What version, or rather, what caricature, of Vatican II did those many people perceive whose idea of the Council came, perhaps exclusively, from the liturgical revolution?

 
They took in little or nothing of the authentic doctrine of the Council—the salubrious doctrine that, according to John XXIII’s intention and the very words of Vatican II itself, fully accorded with the teaching of former ecumenical councils, especially those of Trent and Vatican I. Instead of bread, the faithful were given a stone. Instead of substantive content, the faithful were given a hermeneutic, a manner of viewing the Church, her teaching, her tradition, her liturgy—and it was decisively one of rupture and discontinuity. To be Catholic in those heady days meant to be different, to be other, to be up-to-date; it certainly did not mean to be stably the same, consistent with one’s past, reliant on tradition. The Church was no longer the Mystical Body and Immaculate Bride of Christ; the Church was reform, reform without an end in sight, without even much of a plan, reform for the sake of reform. As the famous Protestant theologian Karl Barth asked in the wake of the Council: “When will the Church know that it is sufficiently updated?” I think that’s what you call a rhetorical question.

 
Tragically, generations of clergy have been trained in the same hermeneutic of rupture and discontinuity, including most of the world’s bishops. That is why the unexpected resurgence of traditional forms of faith and worship among young people, mounting at times to passionate commitment, is a source of bewilderment, consternation, and even anger to them. Due to their training and mental habits, such clergy equate today’s liturgy and its multitudinous aberrations with Vatican II, and hence equate a love of or preference for the traditional liturgy and the culture surrounding it with a rejection of Vatican II. This might be true for some people, but it isn't true across the board, and it need not be true at all.

 
It does not seem to matter that the traditional liturgy and the integral Catholic life it sustains is, in fact, profoundly in harmony with the best and greatest teachings of the Council—one need only think of Lumen Gentium, Dei Verbum, and even Sacrosanctum Concilium. It does not matter that Pope Benedict XVI, the greatest theologian to sit on the Chair of Peter for centuries, saw continuity between his own liturgical doctrine and praxis and that of the Council to which he made significant contributions. No, it does not matter, because it doesn’t look that way to Catholics ignorant of the Council’s documents, ignorant of the liturgical patrimony of the Church, and poorly formed by almost fifty years of liturgical abuse.

 
What is necessary today is to show, patiently, persistently, and accurately, with the humility and confidence born of careful study, that the fathers of Vatican II did not desire or ask for the liturgical reform that came out of Bugnini’s Consilium, that the Novus Ordo Missae is not in full accord with Sacrosanctum Concilium (see here or here), and that the teaching of the sixteen official documents of Vatican II supports rather than dismantles traditional Catholic theology and piety. The least we can do, in any case, is not to allow ourselves to be tossed to and fro, carried about by every wind of secondhand half-truths or tendentious readings that emphasize rupture, whether modernist or traditionalist in source.

 
It is true that there are problems, difficulties, and ambiguities in the conciliar documents. It is true that not every formulation is immune to legitimate criticism—even Ratzinger complained that parts of Gaudium et Spes were “downright Pelagian.” And it is beyond doubt that there were bishops and periti at the Council who sought to infuse modernism into the documents and, to some extent, succeeded in influencing the formulations. But it is still more certain that the final documents, reviewed so many times and passed through the crucible of papal and conciliar scrutiny, are, with few exceptions, sound in content and form; and it is most certain that they are free from error in faith and morals, being the formal acts of an ecumenical council and solemnly promulgated by the Pope. We must never, as it were, abandon the Council to the modernists; this would only play into the devil’s hands.

 
In any case, it is not simply this most recent Council that gives us our map and marching orders; it is the entirety of Catholic Tradition and the totality of the Magisterium for the past 2,000 years, of which this Council is but a part, and within which it is rightly understood. We know that in principle, no reading of Vatican II can possibly be right that results in formal contradiction between past and present. We are guided by all of the Church’s teaching, not just the most recent. Indeed, we are blessed to belong to a body that, while it develops over time, cannot essentially change. The partisans of perpetual change can have their bizarre liturgies and politically correct catechisms, but they will no longer—or not for much longer—be Catholics.

Pasquale Cati, Council of Trent

 

Benedict XVI “defrocked” 384 clerics in 2 years

From Fr. Z:
According to AP, and this was also clarified by the papal spokesman Fr. Lombardi, Pope Benedict XVI “defrocked” almost 400 priests for the crime of sexual abuse of children – in a little more than 2 years.
 
We are talking here about the formal dismissal of clerics from the clerical state, sometimes quickly, through inaccurately, called “defrocking”.

Nearly 400 from 2011-2012!

John Allen (now leaving NSR) says:

Based on information provided in the published volume “Activity of the Holy See,” according to Scicluna, there were 135 priests in 2011 who voluntarily requested dismissal from the clerical state and 125 for whom laicization was imposed as a penalty.
For 2012, the numbers were 67 voluntary dismissals and 57 cases in which laicization was imposed.
In total, that comes to 384 clergy over the two year period who were removed from the priesthood in cases related to the sexual abuse of minors.

What we will now wait to see in the MSM and in the liberal catholic press is the praise of Benedict XVI for his aggressive and exemplary work to protect children.

Sodomy and 'Welcoming' Catholics

A Call for Unity

Ecce quam bonum et quam iucundum...

The division of the Traditional Catholic world was a master stroke by the enemies of the 1962 Missal and of the Roman Catechism. They have managed to sow discord between friends and to establish fratricidal hatred among priests who used to march together hand in hand. The first group began to treat their brothers as radicals, the second called the others sellouts. The former were convinced that those who remained under Abp. Lefebvre would soon fall in total schism, and the latter thought with certitude that their former brothers would abandon both Mass and Catechism.

What can we say more than a quarter-century later? That, on both sides, these judgments were, in great measure, overreactions.

On its own side, for all its known problems, the Society of Saint Pius X did not become schismatic or a parallel "church". It has always kept contacts with Rome and has made what it considered necessary in order to regularize its situation with the successive popes, even if, for reasons that its superiors considers prudential (and with which we ourselves may prudentially disagree), regularization has not been achieved for the moment. On the other side, the Ecclesia Dei communities never abandoned the Traditional Mass, nor traditional Catechesis.

 
It must be said in all honesty: on the side of the SSPX, recognition of the Pope remains, and the desire for its work to be recognized is still sought, according to different measures that vary from person to person. On the side of the Ecclesia Dei communities, there remains a disapproval of the new Mass (regardless of the fact that it is considered both valid and legitimate) and of the alteration of traditional doctrine, both of which are also expressed differently from person to person. The exceptions within these groups confirm the rule in both communities.

A problem has been that, throughout the years, some religious authorities, while the situation remained by itself already quite confusing, proclaimed fatwas, dogmatizing attitudes that would require a certain pliancy and lots of understanding. We heard, for instance: "Visiting the SSPXers? Don't even think about it, or you'll be excommunicated!" Or still: "Go to a Mass with those sellouts? You'll lose your faith there!"

In the documentary on the life of Abp. Lefebvre which was recently released in America, a famous professor and journalist, Jean Madiran, who had distanced himself from the SSPX in 1988, made nonetheless this brave declaration regarding the Lefebvre consecrations: "It is hard for me to say today that he was mistaken." Since he passed away in 2013, it is, at least in a small way, his testament. That the most famous French layman of the Traditionalist struggle is willing to affirm this soon before dying should make us ponder. Many faithful in the young generation refuse this mutual demonization whose only motivation seems to be the fear of having some sheep escape to the neighboring pasture.

Now, is this text an appeal to mix everything up? Absolutely not. May each one continue to advance in one's own post. The scenario that has come up in the past few decades, even more so after the motu proprio Summorum Pontificum of Benedict XVI, is the worst thing that the Progressives could have imagined considering the very dire circumstances of the 1969-1988 period: a Society of Saint Pius X that remains somewhat strong, and that keeps presenting to Rome its doctrinal misgivings; and Ecclesia Dei communities that spreaded out throughout the world, slowly but surely, and with great determination, making clear to the bishops every single day what the Church has always willed and stood for, especially in liturgical matters. Are not both in a way the heirs of Marcel Lefebvre, who unfailingly asked for the "experience of Tradition" to be allowed?

Now then, what is to be done in the future? The forceful proclamation of the faith! And to work cum et sub Petro without complaining! May the fans of the Ecclesia Dei and Summorum Pontificum communities not be afraid of the first response. And may those of the Society of Saint Pius X not shy away from the second. In times of troubled waters and unknown obstacles, the unity of all likeminded traditional Catholics is essential, with mutual tolerance and acceptance.

The Smoke of Satan in the Church

a letter by Mario Palmaro

What follows is a little unusual, but as it is a central topic in the life of the Church and of our work, we offer it to you knowing well that it requires a considerable effort by those who want understand things thoroughly. Mario Palmaro, a well- known writer to the readers of La Nuova Bussola Quotidiano, wrote me a very long letter to express publically his indignation about the direction the Church is taking, above all regarding the homosexual aggression which is of interest to the whole world. My reply follows this letter, and with it, I do not want to close the discussion, but open it to other input. Palmaro with his friend and colleague, Alessandro Gnocchi, were at the centre of polemics in the past months because of a series of articles in Il Foglio, when they harshly criticized Pope Francis. The Pope himself, then called Palmaro, after discovering that he had a grave illness. Hence, I would like to take the opportunity to ask all our readers to pray for him.

Riccardo Cascioli, 

Director of La Nuova Bussola Quotidana

[Catholic online daily]

January 8, 2014 Dear Director,

I read your editorial of January 3 [2014] – “Renzi - if this is progress!” , and I can only agree with your analysis on the new Secretary of the [Socialist] Democratic Party - his cunning self-confidence, his transformism, the inevitable contradiction between saying he is Catholic and his promotion of things that conflict not only with the Catechism, but with the natural law. I would like to add my appreciation for all that you have been doing for some time now with the Bussola in the face of the homosexual assault, and don’t want to reproach you in any way.

However, I feel the need to write to you and your readers. In all honesty: is our problem really Matteo Renzi? Did we really expect that one who becomes Secretary of the Democratic Party, would then set about defending the natural family, the unborn, combating artificial insemination, abortion, and opposing euthanasia? Forgive me, are you actually familiar with the PD electorate which include Catholics on pastoral committees, nuns and parish priests? In your opinion, what does that electorate want from Renzi? It is obvious: “homosexual marriage” and “lesbian-democratic” adoptions. Have you ever listened to the average worker who votes for the left? In your opinion, do they want the defense of natural marriage or do they want council houses for our brother-homosexuals so horribly discriminated against? Let’s stop believing that the problem is Niki Vendola* or the ugly, bad, communist extremists and that it is important to be moderate; the points of reference for the average man are Fabio Fazio* and Luciana Littizzetto*, the Coop, Gino Strada*, Enzo Bianchi* and Eugenio Scalfari*. Renzi puts all these ingredients into his blender, mixes them with doses of homoeopathy from Don Ciotti* and Don Gallo*, and the result is the perfect brew which holds the “little democratic parish” and the Arcigay together. To expect something different from him would be stupid.

The scandal, forgive me, is another. Compared to Renzi - the Secretary of the PD who winks at the homosexuals, the scandal is in listening to the exponents of the New Centre Right who are saying: “Civil unions are not a priority for the government”. Do you get it? It is not that the NCD jumps up like a spring and declares: we shall never vote for these unions – ever! No: he says that they are not a priority. Someone meets Hitler who is talking about wanting to construct gas chambers. Does he reply like this: “Look, Adolf, this is not a priority.” We will do that, we will do that too, all in good time”?

I watched government minister, Hon. Lupi – a Catholic, who explained the situation on a Rai News program. With a very embarrassed face and the terrified eyes of one who is thinking (but I could be mistaken) : “Damn it! Now I have to talk about the non-negotiable principles and homosexuals, and I’ll end up like Pietro Barilla. I’ll have to leave my strategic and important ministry, where I can do so much good for my country and my movement. And then Lupi takes refuge in that well-known theme called ”priorities”, like all of the other lion-hearts in Angiolino and Roccella’s party: no, civil unions are not a priority.

Obviously there’s worse: on the same News programme, there was Scelta Civica (Civic Choice) saying: we have to defend the rights of homosexual people. Scelta Civica, I believe, is that same party created in a rage by Todi 1* and Todi 2*, which the Italian bishops had erected as a new bulwark for the non-negotiable values under the ‘very Catholic’ leadership of Mario Monti. Then we have the worst of the worst. In the same News, there was a ‘lady’ belonging to Forza Italia who triumphantly announced that they would have put their proposals for homosexual rights together with those of Renzi. I heard a distant roll of drums against civil unions from Salvini’s Lega and even more feebly from the Fratelli d’ Italia. The end.

No, dear Director, my problem is not Matteo Renzi.

My problem is the Catholic Church. The problem is that on the subject of the worldwide outbreak of the homosexual lobby, the Church has fallen silent. We have silence from the Pope to the humblest priest in the peripheries. And if the Pope speaks, the day after Padre Lombardi has to rectify, specify, clarify and differentiate. Please abstain from dusting off letters and declarations made by Cardinal Jorge Mario Bergoglio ten years ago. If I find out today that my son takes drugs, what should I say to him: “go and re-read the joint declaration made by me and your mother six years ago when we told you not to take drugs”? Or would I face him and try to shake him immediately as best I can?

Dear Director, where are the Episcopal Conference and the bishops in this battle? A deafening silence has fallen upon them. Actually, no: Monsignor Domenico Mogavero, Bishop of Mazara del Vallo, ex-under-secretary to the CEI and canonist – no less – spoke – oh, and how he spoke:

“The law cannot ignore hundreds and thousands of people cohabitating. It is right that cohabitating couples be recognized also in Italy without putting them on equal terms with families.” For Mogavero, “The State can and must protect the pact that two cohabitants have made between themselves. In contrast to Christian mercy and universal rights – note well - two cohabitants don’t exist for the law. Today, if one of the two is taken to hospital, the other is even denied in the lending care or receiving medical information, as if they were an outsider.” The Bishop concludes: “I think it is legitimate to recognize rights such as the reversibility of pensions or the transfer of rent in virtue of the person’s importance. It is unsustainable – Mogavero underlines – that the cohabiter is a Mr. Nobody for the law.” And as regards the Church, for which Pope Francis has invited reflection on this theme, in view of the extraordinary Synod on the Family, “without equating them to married couples, there are no obstacles to common-law unions.” Amen.

Do you get it, dear Director? Shortly they’ll take my son of seven and at school they’ll make him play with condoms and his genitals, and what does the Church talks about with me? About boatloads which sink near Lampedusa, about Jesus who was a refugee, about an obscure Jesuit of the 17th century just beatified!

No, my problem is not Matteo Renzi.

Dear Director, where is the Archbishop of Milan, Angelo Scola in this battle?

Shortly they will stop us from saying and writing that homosexuality is against nature, and Scola talks to me about half-castes and of the need to understand and value the Roma culture. And again, it was the Archbishop of Milan some weeks ago who invited the Archbishop of Vienna, Schönborn, to our Cathedral: as the Church is disappearing in Austria, they asked him to come and explain to the priests of our diocese how to obtain such results - what their secret was. Just like this: a coach has brought his team to fall down on the league, and so we’ll give him the teaching post at Coverciano! [The central training ground and technical headquarters of the Italian National Football Team.]

And would you look at the coincidence, among other things: Schönborn – who wears the habit of St. Dominic and Thomas Aquinas – came to explain to the Ambrosian priests that he had personally intervened in protecting the nomination of two homosexuals for a parish council. Schönborn says he met them and: “I saw two pure young men, even if their cohabitation is not what the order of creation has foreseen.” There you have it, dear Director, this is purity according to a prince of the Church at the dawn of the year 2014.

And my problem should be Matteo Renzi and the PD?

They are going to take my seven-year-old son and brainwash him into thinking that homosexuality is normal and in the meantime, my Archbishop invites a bishop to the Cathedral to teach me that two homosexuals living together are examples of purity?

And so to finish. The Matteo Renzi who promotes civil unions is a physiological byproduct of a Pope who, in his travels is interviewed by journalists on the plane and declares: “Who am I to judge” etc, etc. Obviously, I know too that these two are not of the same nature, that the Pope is against these things and certainly suffers regarding them, and that he is motivated by good intentions. However, facts are facts. Confronted with that little sentence – epochal from the mouth of a Pope “Who am I to judge”–,  loads of corrective and reparatory articles can be written, which tireless troops of “normalists” have been doing now for months, in order to say, don’t worry all is well – everything is just fine.

But we both know well, and anyone else who knows the mechanisms of communications does as well, that, that “Who am I to judge” is a tombstone on any political and legal battle regarding the recognition of homosexual rights. If we were in rugby, I would tell you that that little sentence gained in a few seconds more meters in favour of the homosexual lobby, than decades of work by the world’s homosexual movement. I’ll tell you too, that bishops like Mogavero, in the shade of that little sentence “who am I to judge” can build castles of dissolution without impunity, and the only thing left for us to do is to keep our mouths shut.

Let’s be clear: to impute that the Pope or the Church are to blame because all the countries in the world are normalizing homosexuality would be foolish: this rising tide is unrestrainable, it cannot be stopped. The reason is simple: London, and Paris, New York and Rome, Brussels and Berlin have become a gigantic Sodom and Gomorrah. The point is however, whether we want to admit this, dispute and denounce it, or whether we want to play smart and hide behind the “Who am I to judge”. The point is also, whether this worldwide Sodom and Gomorrah, merit the language of mercy and comprehension. 

 Well, then, I wonder, why don’t we also reserve the same mercy for the traffickers of chemical weapons, the slave-traders and financial embezzlers? Aren’t they also poor sinners? Right? Or do I have to ask Schönborn to meet them for lunch and evaluate their purity?

Dear Director, the situation by now is very clear: any Catholic politician, intellectual or journalist even if he wants to fight on the homosexualist front, will find himself spiked in the back by the mysticism of mercy and forgiveness. We are all completely de-legitimized, and any bishop, priest, theologian, director of a diocesan weekly or politician of the Catholic-democratic-type can shut us up with that “Who am I to judge”. We would be riddled with shots like a farm pheasant in a hunting chase by types like Mogavero.

Dear Director, our problem is not Matteo Renzi.

Our problem, my problem, is that the other day the Holy Father said the Gospel “is not proclaimed with doctrinal beatings, but with sweetness.” Also here, I would please ask “normalists” and timewasters to abstain. Even I know that effectively the Gospel is announced like that – apart from the fact that John the Baptist had rather brusque methods himself, and the Lord defines him “as the greatest among those born of woman”.

But you know very well that with that little sentence, we have both been spiked like codfish.

We have both been fighting against legalized abortion, divorce, in vitro fertilization, euthanasia, homosexual unions and cunning politicians like Matteo Renzi, who are promoting and spreading all that stuff. But there you have it, we are both irremediable doctrinal bashers, people without charity, ethicists, “theologians”, as some journalist from Communion and Liberation calls us. Furthermore, phenomenon like La Bussola and Il Timone are anachronistic examples of this lack of charity, of this unpresentable moral rigour. Plus, the daily, titanic efforts of the “normalists” will not be enough to subtract these titles of de-legitimization from official Catholicism, as all the balancing exercises in trying to keep your feet in two different shoes, always end up, sooner or later, with a tragic flight into the void.

I also think that the problem – forgive the personal aspect – is not dirty, ugly and bad Gnocchi and Palmaro, because of what they wrote in Il Foglio.

I would re-write the same thing again, ten, a hundred, thousand times more, since unfortunately, everything is coming to pass in the worst way, much worse than what we could have ever predicted.

This is why, dear Director, our problem and the problem of Catholics and ordinary people is not Matteo Renzi.

The problem is our Mother Church, who has decided to abandon us in the jungle of Vietnam: the helicopters have taken off and we have been left where we’ll let ourselves, one at a time, be spiked by the “Vietcong relativists.” I am not protesting for myself, and you know the reasons why. And besides, I prefer a thousand times, to stay down here waiting for the Vietcong, rather than ever get into one of those helicopters, in which perhaps there is the promise of a little seat in some clerical conference of the type “Scienza e Vita,” under the illusion that one is a part, in some way, of the official power, together with all the other ecclesial movements. Or with the crazy idea - written in black and white - that, Gnocchi and Palmaro were perhaps right, but they shouldn’t have said it, because certain truths should not be uttered, rather they should be somewhat denied publically in order to confound the enemy.

No, I am not protesting for myself.

However, I still have the problem of that seven-year-old son of mine and three older ones too. I don’t want to and can’t give them the response of the boatloads sinking near Lampedusa, the homosexual example of purity from Cardinal Schönborn, the half-castes and the praise of the Roma culture by Cardinal Scola, the disdain for doctrinal thrashings according to Pope Francis and the eulogizing of civil unions by Mogavero. To these children I cannot tell the fairy-tale called “Matteo Renzi.” Anyway, regarding Renzi, ten minutes done well by Crozza* will fix him.

Dear director, dear Riccardo, why would I ever write these things to you? Because last night I couldn't sleep. And because I’d like to understand – and ask the readership of Bussola a question: What more has to happen in the Church for Catholics to stand up, once and for all, and shout their indignation from the rooftops? Attention: I am addressing individual Catholics, not associations, secret meetings, movements, sects which for years have been managing the brains of the faithful for the benefit of third parties, dictating the line the followers have to take. These groups seem to me to be placed under the care of those minus habens [of lesser intelligence] and headed from afar by more or less charismatic individuals, who are more or less trustworthy. No, no: here I am making an appeal to individual consciences, to their hearts, their faith and their virility. Before it is too late.

I owe this to you my dear Riccardo. I owe this to all those who know me and still have esteem for me and for what I represent. Pardon me for having taken advantage of your patience and also that of your readers.

Mario Palmaro

__________________

Translation, slightly adapted to conform to informal style used by Mario Palmaro – Francesca Romana. Source: Bussola Quotidiana

Translator’s notes:

*Niki Vendola, LGBT activist, left-wing politician

*Fabio Fazio, TV presenter for left-wing RAI 3

*Luciana Littizzetto, comedian, anti-Catholic, does TV spots for COOP

*Gino Strada, war surgeon, Founder of Italian NGO Emergency

*Enzo Bianchi, Prior of Monastic Community of Bose (Biella), but not a priest, and progressive Catholic writer

*Eugenio Scalfari, editor of left-wing daily – La Repubblica.

*Todi 1 and Todi 2 – two Forums held in the Todi, Umbria for associations and people of Catholic inspiration in the work place in October 2012

*Crozza, comedian of scathing satire

*Don Ciotti, Catholic priest, writer, social activist, particularly against drugs and the Mafia

*Don Gallo, Catholic priest, now deceased famed for communist ideals and social activism  

Business as usual in the Roman Curia

Fr. Michael Brown and the ways of the Curia whose shenanigans compelled Pope Ratzinger to leave:

OK I may have misunderstood but I thought the situation was as follows. The conclave gathered after the unfortunate resignation of pope Benedict XVI. He was the greatest Supreme Pontiff since his namesake Benedict XIV but was overwhelmed by the corruption he saw in the Church and so decided to throw his hat in. The conclave are of the opinion that one of the Great Problems is the Roman Curia. It is full of self-obsessed Promethean Neo-Pelagians only concerned with how they can make further progress up the greasy pole and is a scandal. So step forward Cardinal Bergoglio who has what it takes to do the job and is elected on the understanding that he will reform the Curia.

So what happens? To overcome the great evil of clergy careerism it is decreed that the title of Monsignor will be abolished for all below the age of 65 to prevent clergy working to procure a handful of purple buttons. Hurrah, they say this man means business. But wait: this applies to the whole Catholic world except the Roman Curia where it will be business as usual and priests over the age of 35 who have completed five years service will automatically become Monsignors. Well that shows the Curia they`d better change their ways.

Looking forward to the next reforms!

So God made a liberal......

Was Mary Tempted to Doubt God?

From The Remnant:
Written by  Father Celatus

Pope Francis vs. Pope John Paul II Reality television is a genre of television programing that documents unscripted situations and actual occurrences, often highlighting conflict and drama. Typical reality programs involve survival situations, family feuds, repo companies, pawn stores and much more. The most popular reality program in the history of cable television is Duck Dynasty, which is watched weekly by millions of Americans and has brought in hundreds of millions in sales of merchandize. Duck Dynasty follows the everyday lives of a southern family that made a fortune in hand-made duck calls. Their company is called Duck Commander.
Even if you do not watch reality shows you may have heard of the squawk raised against the family patriarch who founded the Duck Commander company for his recent remarks regarding homosexuality:
"Start with homosexual behavior and just morph out from there. Bestiality, sleeping around with this woman and that woman and that woman and those men…Don’t be deceived. Neither the adulterers, the idolaters, the male prostitutes, the homosexual offenders, the greedy, the drunkards, the slanderers, the swindlers—they won’t inherit the kingdom of God. Don’t deceive yourself. It’s not right."
Contrast what the Duck Dynasty patriarch had to say on this subject with that of the Bishop of Rome:

"If someone is gay and he searches for the Lord and has good will, who am I to judge...A person once asked me if I approved of homosexuality. I replied with another question: "Tell me: when God looks at a gay person, does he endorse the existence of this person with love, or reject and condemn this person?" We must always consider the person…We cannot insist only on issues related to abortion, gay marriage and the use of contraceptive methods. This is not possible."

For strong statements against homosexuality, the patriarch was bounced from his reality program [and subsequently reinstated by A&E after massive protest]. For soft comments regarding homosexuality, on the other hand, the Pope was named “Person of the Year.” There is something terribly wrong in the Church when a Duck Commander begins to sound more Catholic than the Pope.

But papal ambiguity is no longer limited to comments upon moral matters; we are now subjected to such statements related to faith. Incredibly, even for this papacy, Pope Francis said the following of Our Lady in a recent sermon:

"The Gospel does not tell us anything: if she spoke a word or not… She was silent, but in her heart, how many things told the Lord! ‘You, that day, this and the other that we read, you had told me that he would be great, you had told me that you would have given him the throne of David, his forefather, that he would have reigned forever and now I see him there!’ Our Lady was human! And perhaps she even had the desire to say: ‘Lies! I was deceived!’ John Paul II would say this, speaking about Our Lady in that moment. But she, with her silence, hid the mystery that she did not understand and with this silence allowed for this mystery to grow and blossom in hope." (December 20, 2013)

Is the Bishop of Rome kidding us? Whether intended or not, this statement is scandalous. The idea that the Blessed Mother might possibly have desired to accuse God of a lie—making God a liar—is so utterly contrary to Sacred Scripture, Sacred Tradition, Marian piety and Catholic theology that not even a bible believing Duck Commander would make this assertion. Even Neo-Catholics may struggle to spin this whopper!

Even apart from the egregious error regarding Mary, there is another error by Pope Francis, regarding Pope John Paul II, whom he alleges—falsely—to have said the same thing about the Mother of God:
"And now, standing at the foot of the Cross, Mary is the witness of the complete negation of these words. On that wood of the Cross her Son hangs in agony as one condemned…How great, how heroic then is the obedience of faith shown by Mary in the face of God's "unsearchable judgments"! How completely she "abandons herself to God" without reserve, offering the full assent of the intellect and the will" to him whose "ways are inscrutable" And how powerful too is the action of grace in her soul, how all-pervading is the influence of the Holy Spirit and of his light and power! Through this faith Mary is perfectly united with Christ in his self- emptying. At the foot of the Cross Mary shares through faith in the shocking mystery of this self-emptying." (Redemptoris Mater, 18)

In fact, it is readily apparent that Pope John Paul wrote just the opposite of Pope Francis, namely, that Mary had a heroic obedience of faith, not the deep-down doubt suggested by Pope Francis. If Francis were correct—and he is not—then there would be little merit won beneath the Cross by the doubting Mother. Instead of the Pieta, imagine Mater Dubita with fists clenched, screaming interiorly “Lies!”

But that is unimaginable, as is this papal meditation on this mystery. Speaking of which, let’s hope and pray that there are not more modernist mysteries to be added to the rosary. They may be called the Doubting Mysteries and include: Zechariah doubts the Archangel, Joseph doubts Mary, John the Baptist doubts Jesus, Mary doubts God, Jesus doubts the Father and Thomas doubts the Apostles.

One really wonders how the Pope could get this wrong. In effect, he has confused the New Eve with the Fallen Eve. Mary is the model of faith and obedience. Never mind that Mary was personally familiar with the prophecy of Simeon, that a sword of sorrow would pierce her heart; never mind that Mary was certainly aware of the prophetic words of her own Son, who repeatedly foretold that the Son of Man would be crucified and then rise from the dead.

If anyone thinks that I am being too hard on Pope Francis, remember that in this case, whether intended or not, the Bishop of Rome has messed with our Mother. The Pope concluded his sermon saying, “May the Lord give all of us the grace to love the silence.” Based on what we have heard, many of us would love a little more papal silence. When it comes to the matter of mystery, there is one mystery that defines this papacy: the mystery of Pope Francis and what he really means.

Remnant Editor’s Note: The following few quotations provide the traditional understanding on the mystery of Mary’s role in the Incarnation and crucifixion of her Son—an understanding which we hope and even presume Bishop of Rome Francis intended to reiterate, if in vain, in his confusing sermon of December 20, 2013. Credit to Rorate Caeli for compiling these quotes:

Venerable Fulton Sheen:“From the moment she heard Simeon’s words, she would never again lift the Child’s hands without seeing a shadow of nails on them; every sunset would be a blood-red image of His Passion.”

St. Ambrose: “His mother stood before the Cross, and, while the men fled, she remained undaunted... She did not fear the torturers... His mother offered herself to His persecutors."

St. Bernard: "But perhaps someone will say, 'Did she not know ahead of time that her Son was going to die?' Yes, undoubtedly."

St Bonaventure: "When she saw the love of the Eternal Father towards men to be so great that, in order to save them, He willed the death of His Son; and, on the other hand, seeing the love of the Son in wishing to die for us: in order to conform herself who was always and in all things united to the will of God to the excessive love of both the Father and the Son towards the human race, she also with her entire will offered, and consented to, the death of her Son, in order that we might be saved."

Fr. Reginald Garrigou-Lagrange: "She is at the foot of the Cross on Calvary, though all the Apostles, St John only excepted, have fled; she stands erect there, firm in her faith that her Son is the Son of God, that He is the Lamb of God Who is even then taking away the sins of the world, that though apparently defeated, He is Victor over Satan and sin, and that in three days He will conquer death by His resurrection. Mary's act of faith on Calvary was the greatest ever elicited on earth, for the hour was unspeakably dark and its object was the most difficult of all – that Jesus had won the greatest of victories by making the most complete of immolations. Her faith was aided then by the gifts of the Holy Ghost. By the gift of Understanding she read far into the revealed mysteries, far into their inner meaning, their harmony, their appropriateness, their consequences. She was particularly favoured in her understanding of the mysteries in which she herself had a part to play, such as the virginal conception of Christ, His Incarnation, and the whole economy of the Redemption. ... It was increased also by the fact that Mary was confirmed in grace and preserved free from every shortcoming – lack of confidence as well as presumption.”

Blessed Simon of Cassia: "While grieving, she rejoiced, that a sacrifice was offered for the Redemption of all, by which He Who was angry was appeased."

Pope Benedict XV: "She offered her Son so generously in sacrifice to satisfy the justice of God, that it may be said with reason that she cooperated in the salvation of the human race along with Christ."

Arnold of Bonneval: "Love for his Mother moved Christ. At that moment, Christ and Mary had but one single will, and both were equally offering a single holocaust to God: she with the blood of her heart; He with the blood of His body."

Alain de Lille: "The disciples' faith failed, but the firmness of the Virgin's faith was not diminished.''

Reason #7566 for Summorum Pontificum

Now, I know only too well how easy it is to make light of the Novus Ordo, and all that surrounds neo-Catholicism…but hey, at least this old priest believes in the Benedictine arrangement on his table-altar.  At least give him that much?