The Cult of Softness

 As this article explains:

"In the past few hours, Agenzia Fides has published the document “Statistics of the Catholic Church 2025.” Once again, the numbers reveal a bleak picture: vocations continue to decline. Yet there is an unspoken truth that no statistic dares to confront: the problem does not lie with young people, but with the places where vocations should be born and grow.

An archbishop who has dedicated decades to vocational accompaniment, visiting seminaries, listening to formatorsand priests around the world, confirms this. These days — he tells us — he is engaged in a series of visits to various seminaries in Rome and across Europe. His analysis is clear and unsettling: “The crisis of vocations does not arise from the absence of young people willing to give themselves, but from the toxic atmosphere dominating the very places where vocation should mature.”

Seminaries — at least in many cases — are no longer places of discernment, but of selection. And today’s selection is not oriented toward freedom and maturity, but toward docility and dependence. They welcome fragile, confused, often psychologically unstable young men, as if the institution needed patients rather than disciples. It even seems that the search is for “those who need to be healed,” in order to later “save” and control them.

The Cult of Fragility

In recent years, seminaries have stopped attracting balanced, creative, intellectually alive individuals. Not because such people no longer exist, but because — in a system that fears freedom — maturity becomes a defect. Many rectors and formators end up accepting only those with obvious troubles, those needing constant guidance, those willing to be “molded” according to uniform standards. The implicit idea is that a more fragile person will also be more faithful, more obedient, less likely to question authority. It is a pedagogical illusion that borders on ecclesial pathology: no longer forming the man, but manufacturing the dependent. Even aesthetics plays into this perverse game: preference is given to candidates who are unassuming, poorly groomed, under the belief that they will “cause fewer problems,” “draw less attention,” as though a lack of outward appeal guarantees a “safer” path, free of risk.



Behind this mentality lies an ancient fear and a subtle distortion: the fear that, should a priest one day fall, his fall would be all the more scandalous if he once inspired sympathy, charisma, or esteem. Conversely, if a young man is handsome, articulate, intelligent, socially adept, and perhaps has a following on social media, suspicion arises immediately: he will be too liked. Should he enter the seminary, his path will be strewn with obstacles — from unwanted attention to jealousy, envy, and accusations of “special friendships.”



Behind all this lies a criterion that is anything but Gospel-oriented yet deeply human: power prefers what it can control and distrusts what shines with its own light.

The Flight of the Free

The prelate observes: “Let us ask why so many priests who cause real problems in our communities — those who spread gossip, division, and tension — also display an external and personal disorder. They are overweight, troubled, and suffer from their own condition. Yet no one dares say anything, though they represent the true drama of dioceses now on the verge of collapse. The atmosphere has become unbearable: not only do young men refuse to enter seminaries, but even those inside seek to transfer, while bishops no longer know how to govern such realities.



Often, these are the very same men who show inappropriate attention to seminarians or confreres and, once rejected, react with slander and innuendo, attributing to others what in fact describes their own behavior. Paradoxically, these are often the ones who love to cover themselves in vestments, hiding behind form the emptiness of substance.” For this reason, many truly called young men — emotionally mature, with healthy friendships, passions, and interests — choose not to enter the seminary or leave once inside. Those with critical thought, cultural tastes, artistic or athletic pursuits, or healthy relationships outside the Church environment, find the seminary not a place of growth but a cage full of serpents.



Where one would expect a journey of freedom, one finds a climate of suspicion: spontaneity is read as disobedience, freedom as rebellion, maturity as danger. Many priests now advise young men who express a vocation to stay away from seminaries, warning that they would “come out worse than when they entered.”



Thus, the numerical data on vocations is deceptive: it is not that vocations are lacking, but that trust is lacking — in the places meant to nurture them and in the people the hierarchy appoints as “guardians” rather than formators.

Related reading

here.

Goodbye, Good Men here

Only real men can adequately fulfill the role of priest and pastor..

As I've said so many times at this Blog over the years, see here for example, the Cult of Softness and associated effeminacy have permeated the Catholic Church since Vatican II.

Several years ago, in a piece entitled "Priestly Identity: Crisis and Renewal," Annamarie Adkins interviewed Father David Toups, Associate Director of the Secretariat of Clergy, Consecrated Life and Vocations of the U.S. episcopal conference.  Annamarie Adkins wrote, 'A general crisis of authentic masculinity in society has also affected the priesthood as only 'real men' can adequately fulfill the role of priest and pastor, says Father David Toups. Father Toups, the associate director of the Secretariat of Clergy, Consecrated Life and Vocations of the U.S. episcopal conference, is the author of 'Reclaiming Our Priestly Character.'

In this interview with...Father Toups, he comments on the identity and character of the priesthood, and the various challenges it faces today.

Q: Your book focuses on recovering what you call the 'doctrine of the priestly character.' Can you describe this 'doctrine' in a nutshell?

Father Toups: The 'doctrine of the priestly character' is about the permanent relationship the priest enters into with Christ the High Priest on the day of his ordination. The priest is always a priest; he is not a simple functionary who performs ritual actions, but rather he is configured to Christ in the depths of his being by what is called an ontological change.

Christ is working through him at the altar, 'This is my Body,' and in the confessional, 'I absolve you of your sins,' but also in his daily actions outside the sanctuary.

The character that the priest receives is a comfort to the faithful inasmuch as they realize that their faith is not based in the personality of the priest, but rather the Person of Christ working through the priest. On the other hand, the priest is called, like all of the faithful, to a life of holiness. The character received at ordination is actually a dynamism for priestly holiness. The more he can assimilate his life to Christ and submit to the gift he received at ordination, the more he will be a credible witness to the faithful and edify the Body of Christ.

Q: Is it your view that the nature of the priesthood is unknown or misunderstood by many priests? Is mandatory 'continuing priestly education' the answer?

Father Toups: Studies show that there has been confusion regarding the exact nature of the priesthood among priests themselves depending on the timing of their seminary training.

Immediately following the Second Vatican Council, there was confusion among priests and laity alike about the difference between the priesthood of the faithful and the ministerial priesthood.

Vatican II’s intention was not to suppress one in order to highlight the other, but rather to recognize the universal call to holiness and the dignity of both.

The ministerial priesthood is a specific vocation within the Church in which a man is called by Christ in the apostolic line to offer the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass. Priests are different by virtue of ordination, as confirmed by the council itself in paragraph 10 of 'Lumen Gentium,' which emphasized that the baptized and the ordained share in the one and the same priesthood of Christ, but in a way that differs 'in essence and not only in degree.'

This difference certainly does not mean better or even holier -- that would be a major error -- but it does mean that there is a distinction.

Cardinal Avery Dulles points out that, if anything, the priesthood of the faithful is more exalted because the ministerial priesthood is ordered to its service. Hence, a recovery from the confusion lies in the need to understand the balance a priest is to find; he is both a servant and one who has been set aside by Christ and the Church to stand 'in persona Christi' -- not as a personal honor, but as 'one who has come to serve and not be served.'

The priest need not be embarrassed about this high calling, but should boldly live it out in the midst of the world. Pope John Paul the Great regularly reminded priests: 'Do not be afraid to be who you are!'

This brings us to the second part of your question, namely, is mandatory 'continuing priestly education' the answer?

In the book, I use the term 'formation,' not education -- though learning is an important, component part.

Ongoing formation is essential for every Christian vocation. In the midst of full liturgical schedules, parish councils, leaking roofs and hospital visits, the priest must continually open his heart and mind to Christ in prayer and study, annual retreats and seminars, as well as times of recreation and vacation, if he is to thrive as an individual and as a man of faith.

Ongoing formation is about deepening one’s interiority and fostering a relationship with Jesus Christ. It is about an ongoing conversion that reminds the priest who he is as a minister of the Gospel and whose he is as a son of God."

________________________________________

If we are to have an authentic reform within the Church, and a new Springtime of evangelization, we will need more mature priests who fashion themselves after masculine saints like John of Avila.

Weak, tepid priests will not inspire the faithful to become the Church Militant and to fight against the Devil and his angels while being salt and light during a time of diabolical disorientation.

We need men who are filled with missionary zeal and who are determined to challenge the culture while bringing souls back to Holy Mother Church.

Effeminate priests and Deacons, sissy clerics, are not up to the task at hand.

Priest administering Holy Communion to Marines,
Invasion of Okinawa

Woman protecting priest from a few raindrops

The Francis legacy in Argentina

From The American Spectator:

"My principal purpose in visiting Buenos Aires is to learn about its not-so-favorite son, Jorge Bergoglio, who still hasn’t visited Argentina since becoming Pope Francis. During my first few days here, I asked every Catholic I met to explain that anomaly. I got some blunt and brutal answers.

'We all know he is a son of a bitch,' said a former prosecutor to me. 'We are ashamed of him. He represents our worst qualities.'

His friend chipped in that Catholics consider Francis 'to be a fake, a make-believe pope,' not to mention, he added, an uncultured, ill-mannered flake.

The former prosecutor oozed contempt for Francis: 'He knows nothing — not morals, not theology, not history. Nothing. Only power interests him.'

The description of Pope Francis as a power-mad ideologue is very widespread, I am finding. I spoke at length with Antonio Caponnetto, who is the Argentine author of several books on Pope Francis. 'At seminary, his classmates called him ‘Machiavelli,’ ' he noted."

The Francis effect here.

Sociopathic?  See here.

The feminization of the Church continues...

Cardinal Raymond Leo Burke says,  "I think there has been a great confusion with regard to the specific vocation of men in marriage and of men in general in the Church during the past 50 years or so. It’s due to a number of factors, but the radical feminism which has assaulted the Church and society since the 1960s has left men very marginalized.

Unfortunately, the radical feminist movement strongly influenced the Church, leading the Church to constantly address women’s issues at the expense of addressing critical issues important to men; the importance of the father, whether in the union of marriage or not; the importance of a father to children; the importance of fatherhood for priests; the critical impact of a manly character; the emphasis on the particular gifts that God gives to men for the good of the whole society.

The goodness and importance of men became very obscured, and for all practical purposes, were not emphasized at all. This is despite the fact that it was a long tradition in the Church, especially through the devotion of St. Joseph, to stress the manly character of the man who sacrifices his life for the sake of the home, who prepares with chivalry to defend his wife and his children and who works to provide the livelihood for the family. So much of this tradition of heralding the heroic nature of manhood has been lost in the Church today.

All of those virtuous characteristics of the male sex are very important for a child to observe as they grow up and mature. The healthy relationship with the father helps the child to prepare to move from the intimate love of the mother, building a discipline so that the child can avoid excessive self‑love. This ensures that the child is able to identify himself or herself properly as a person in relationship with others; this is critical for both boys and girls.

A child’s relationship with their father is key to a child’s self‑identification, which takes places when we are growing up. We need that very close and affirming relationship with the mother, but at the same time, it is the relationship with the father, which is of its nature more distant but not less loving, which disciplines our lives. It teaches a child to lead a selfless life, ready to embrace whatever sacrifices are necessary to be true to God and to one another.

I recall in the mid-1970’s, young men telling me that they were, in a certain way, frightened by marriage because of the radicalizing and self-focused attitudes of women that were emerging at that time. These young men were concerned that entering a marriage would simply not work because of a constant and insistent demanding of rights for women. These divisions between women and men have gotten worse since then.

Everyone understands that women have and can be abused by men. Men who abuse women are not true men, but false men who have violated their own manly character by being abusive to women.

The crisis between man and woman has been made much worse by a complete collapse of catechesis in the Church. Young men grew up without proper instruction with regard to their faith and to the knowledge of their vocation. Young men were not being taught that they are made in the image of God – Father, Son and Holy Spirit. These young men were not taught to know all those virtues that are necessary in order to be a man and to fulfill the particular gifts of being male.

Making things worse, there was a very fluffy, superficial kind of catechetical approach to the question of human sexuality and the nature of the marital relationship.

At the same time, in society, there came an explosion of pornography, which is particularly corrosive for men because it terribly distorts the whole reality of human sexuality. It leads men and women to view their human sexuality apart from a relationship between a man and woman in marriage.

In truth, the gift of sexual attraction is directed toward marriage, and any kind of sexual union belongs properly only within marriage. But the whole world of pornography corrupts young people into believing that their sexual capacity is for their own entertainment and pleasure, and becomes a consuming lust, which is one of the seven capital sins.

The gift of human sexuality is turned into a means of self‑gratification often at the expense of another person, whether in heterosexual relations or in homosexual relations. A man who has not been formed with a proper identity as a man and as a father figure will ultimately become very unhappy. These poorly formed men become addicted to pornography, sexual promiscuity, alcohol, drugs, and the whole gamut of addictions..."

But the feminization of the Church continues unabated.  See here.

Related reading here.

Father Naranjo on Good Friday: Passive Aggressive behavior in service to the Cult of Softness

As this article notes:

"In the seventh century, the Church in Rome adopted the practice of Adoration of the Cross from the Church in Jerusalem, where a fragment of wood believed to be the Lord's cross had been venerated every year on Good Friday since the fourth century. According to tradition, a part of the Holy Cross was discovered by the mother of the emperor Constantine, St. Helen, on a pilgrimage to Jerusalem in 326. A fifth century account describes this service in Jerusalem. A coffer of gold-plated silver containing the wood of the cross was brought forward. The bishop placed the relic on the a table in the chapel of the Crucifixion and the faithful approached it, touching brow and eyes and lips to the wood as the priest said (as every priest has done ever since): 'Behold, the Wood of the Cross'...In kneeling before the crucifix and kissing it we are paying the highest honor to our Lord's cross as the instrument of our salvation. Because the Cross is inseparable from His sacrifice, in reverencing His Cross we, in effect, adore Christ. Thus we affirm: 'We adore Thee, O Christ, and we bless Thee because by Thy Holy Cross Thou has Redeemed the World.'"

I was hoping to reverence the Holy Cross today while commemorating Good Friday at Saint Mary's Church in Orange, Massachusetts.  The priest, Father Peter Naranjo, brought the Cross to the first pew on the right side of the Church, allowing several people to venerate it with a kiss.  He then proceeded to the left side of the Church where he presented the Cross for veneration to those in the first pew, bypassing me.

I'm not surprised at Father Naranjo's hatred.

As this article explains:

"Though the New Evangelization has been a major effort in the Catholic Church for over forty years, it has failed to stem the disastrous losses of the faithful in the U.S. The New Evangelization is faltering: since 2000, 14 million Catholics have left the faith, parish religious education participation of children has dropped by 24%, Catholic school attendance has dropped by 19%, baptisms of infants has dropped by 28%, baptism of adults has dropped by 31% and sacramental Catholic marriages have dropped by 41%. Something is desperately wrong with the Church’s approach to the New Evangelization.

The New Emangelization Project has documented that a key driver of the collapse of Catholicism in the U. S. is a serious and growing Catholic “man-crisis”. One third of baptized Catholic men have left the faith and the majority of those who remain “Catholic” neither know nor practice the faith and are not committed to pass the faith along to their children. Recent research shows that large numbers of young Catholic men are leaving the faith to become “Nones”, men who have no religious affiliation. The growing losses of young Catholic men will have a devastating impact on the U.S. Catholic Church in the coming decades, as older Catholic men pass away and young men fail to remain and marry in the Church, accelerating the devastating losses that have already occurred.

While there are massive cultural forces outside of the Church (e.g. secularism, pluralism, anti-Christian bias, radical feminism, pornography, media saturation, etc.) and missteps within the Church (e.g. failure to make men a priority, sex abuse scandals, homosexuality in the priesthood, etc.) that have contributed to the Catholic “man-crisis”, the New Emangelization Project has conducted dozens of interviews with top Catholic men’s evangelists[4] that suggest that a core reason for the “man-crisis” is that bishops and priests have not yet made the evangelization and catechesis of men a clear priority. Men are being ignored by the Church."

Addicted to homosexuality and effeminism, the Cult of Softness has a deep and abiding hatred of real men and anything even remotely resembling masculinity.  I've addressed this truth often at this Blog.  Which is no doubt why Naranjo is filled with hatred toward me.

From Facebook.

The Cult of Softness and the "Francis effect"

We need priests and Bishops who fear God more than they do men.  Cowards will not lead us out of the valley of death.  Neither will homosexual or effeminate clerics who cannot relate to men.

Only shepherds who have the spiritual strength, the Cardinal Gift of Fortitude, to brave the risk of worldly criticism, will be able to lead the Catholic Church out of the valley of the Culture of Death and back on the road to the Civilization of Love which Pope John Paul II spoke of so often.

Why have so many priests succumbed to fear?  Why is it that their preaching no longer points out sin?  Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange provides us with an answer:

"The reason for this is not difficult to find.  A sermon is the result of the combined effort of all the priest's powers; it reveals his entire person; it is his struggle against the vices of the surrounding world."  In other words, if the preaching is unsound, it is because the priest's spiritual life is unsound.  Fr. Lagrange continues, "Everything in the priest cooperates in his preaching - study, reflection, his powers to compose and revise, the activity of his intellect, his imagination, his memory, his feelings, his voice.  Therefore, when he preaches, the priest stands exposed for all to study; some will be attracted, others will not.  Some will accept what he says, others will simply criticize.  So if the priest approaches his task from the human angle, he will say to himself: 'I cannot afford to lose my reputation; people of weight in the parish who take offense easily must be spared their feelings and not provoked; I must proceed warily so as not to incur criticism.'  In that way Christian eloquence is invaded by a profane eloquence in which the preacher looks after his own interests, not the glory of God or the saving of souls." (The Priest In Union With Christ, p. 156).

The Cult of Softness (see here) continues to produce only rot within the Church.

The New York Times has confirmed what devout Catholics already know, that the "Francis effect" is a myth:

"...are Catholics actually coming back? In the United States, at least, it hasn’t happened. New survey findings from Georgetown’s Center for Applied Research in the Apostolate suggest that there has been no Francis effect — at least, no positive one.

In 2008, 23 percent of American Catholics attended Mass each week. Eight years later, weekly Mass attendance has held steady or marginally declined, at 22 percent.

Of course, the United States is only one part of a global church. But the researchers at Georgetown found that certain types of religious observance are weaker now among young Catholics than they were under Benedict. 

In 2008, 50 percent of millennials reported receiving ashes on Ash Wednesday, and 46 percent said they made some sacrifice beyond abstaining from meat on Fridays. This year, only 41 percent reported receiving ashes and only 36 percent said they made an extra sacrifice, according to CARA. 

In spite of Francis’ personal popularity, young people seem to be drifting away from the faith."

Young people are naturally idealistic. They want to be challenged.  They need to be challenged with the hard demands of the Gospel, with the truth.

But Francis offers only a non-dogmatic, Cotton-Candy Catholicism.  A sacharrin "gospel" which appeals to worldly types but which is short on substance.  And while more and more youth are abandoning the Church, rather than placing an emphasis on doctrinal truths, Francis offers unsound teaching and meets with people like Simon Cazal, a homosexual activist who claims to be married to another man while demanding that the Church founded by Christ Jesus change its teaching on homosexuality to accommodate the New Sodom.  See here.

The Cult of Softness has failed.  But Francis cannot steel himself to admit this.  He has succumbed to an alien ideology.  He has decided to genuflect before the spirit of Sodom while this demonic spirit continues to wreak havoc within an already devastated vineyard.  See here.

Father Peter Naranjo, Saint Mary's Church in Orange, Massachusetts on Twitter:

Bill Clinton to a veteran: Shut up

Speaking to a crowd in Bluffton, South Carolina, former President Bill Clinton told a veteran to "shut up" because he didn't want to hear what he had to day.  See here.

While many are enjoying the best of everything this country has to offer, many are not.  Twenty-five percent of homeless men in this country are veterans.  Apparently we are content with this situation because it is only getting worse.  My father served in Korea and during the Vietnam conflict. He was career military.  But when he needed a hearing aid, he was denied one.  We treat veterans in this country much like disposable razors: we discard them after use.

It was Henry James who said, "I think patriotism is like charity - it begins at home."  But we have forgotten this.  We spend countless millions helping illegal aliens in this country but we still neglect to treat veterans with dignity.

Even in the Church, those of us who served in the military are often treated as second-class citizens. As Wintery Knight says, "All of the outward facing disciplines within Christianity, such as apologetics, theology, ethics, etc. are de-emphasized, censored or resisted in feminized churches. There is no place for rationality, moral judgments and boundaries, debates and disagreement, confrontations and persuasion, or other manly Christian practices."

I've personally encountered such resistance toward apologetics and spiritualities which are decidely masculine (such as the Ignatian model). I'm convinced that the effeminization which has take place within the Catholic Church in this country is one reason I am not welcome at my own parish and have been, like so many other healthy young men who are not homosexual or crippled by effeminacy, relegated to the trash bin.

I have been ostracized in my parish because I refuse to accept sodomy and the agenda to "queer the Church" or effeminize her.

A. Lawrence Vaincourt, in a poem, offers something for Bill Clinton and others who disrespect veterans to reflect upon.  It is entitled Just a Common Soldier - A Soldier Died Today:


He was getting old and paunchy and his hair was falling fast,
And he sat around the Legion, telling stories of the past.

Of a war that he had fought in and the deeds that he had done,
In his exploits with his buddies; they were heroes, every one.

And tho’ sometimes, to his neighbors, his tales became a joke,
All his Legion buddies listened, for they knew whereof he spoke.

But we’ll hear his tales no longer for old Bill has passed away,
And the world’s a little poorer, for a soldier died today.

He will not be mourned by many, just his children and his wife,
For he lived an ordinary and quite uneventful life.

Held a job and raised a family, quietly going his own way,
And the world won’t note his passing, though a soldier died today.

When politicians leave this earth, their bodies lie in state,
While thousands note their passing and proclaim that they were great.

Papers tell their whole life stories, from the time that they were young,
But the passing of a soldier goes unnoticed and unsung.

Is the greatest contribution to the welfare of our land
A guy who breaks his promises and cons his fellow man?

Or the ordinary fellow who, in times of war and strife,
Goes off to serve his Country and offers up his life?

A politician’s stipend and the style in which he lives
Are sometimes disproportionate to the service that he gives.

While the ordinary soldier, who offered up his all,
Is paid off with a medal and perhaps, a pension small.

It’s so easy to forget them for it was so long ago,
That the old Bills of our Country went to battle, but we know

It was not the politicians, with their compromise and ploys,
Who won for us the freedom that our Country now enjoys.

Should you find yourself in danger, with your enemies at hand,
Would you want a politician with his ever-shifting stand?

Or would you prefer a soldier, who has sworn to defend
His home, his kin and Country and would fight until the end?

He was just a common soldier and his ranks are growing thin,
But his presence should remind us we may need his like again.

For when countries are in conflict, then we find the soldier’s part
Is to clean up all the troubles that the politicians start.

If we cannot do him honor while he’s here to hear the praise,
Then at least let’s give him homage at the ending of his days.

Perhaps just a simple headline in a paper that would say,
Our Country is in mourning, for a soldier died today.

It's not a loyal marine corps veteran who needs to "shut up."  Rather, it is Bill Clinton, a failed President who spent his career enriching himself while cheating on his wife.

Mr. Clinton hasn't earned the right to tell an honorable veteran to shut up.

It's time to get rid of effeminacy in the Church...

I am viewed as "strange" or as somehow "fringe" by liberal counterfeit Catholic wreckovators within my local Church

because I promote and defend the perennial teaching of the Church regarding the "Last Things," or what theologians refer to as "eschatology."

Our "modern world" hates to be reminded of death, judgement, heaven, hell, purgatory and the end of the world.  And anyone today who speaks or writes about these things must be demonized and cast as a freak because the "New Church" Catholics are uncomfortable with these realities.

Pope John XXIII would not have understood this spiritual sickness.  He used as a motto for his whole life the following, entitled "Four Future Things":

Death, than which nothing is more certain;

Judgement, than which nothing is more strict;

Hell, than which nothing is more dreadfull ;

Paradise, than which nothing is more delightful.

(Journal of a Soul, Appendix 6).


Because I preach the hard truths men need to hear, I am sometimes accused of having "little mercy."  And I am not entirely surprised.  So many Catholics have been fed on chaff rather than wheat for so long that authentic Catholic teaching seems to them as something evil or hard-hearted.  Years of consuming a diet of false compassion has wrought much havoc in the souls of certain people who are content with remaining mental and moral midgets.

Father Albert, a Dominican priest, writes, "If Pope Leo XIII in his encyclical on the Holy Rosary could speak (over a century ago) of the forgetfulness of man concerning future goods, what would he say today!  The future goods and the future evils that await all of us after death are buried in total oblivion!  The present life seems to be the BE-ALL and END-ALL of all things.  Even in the Church, since Vatican II, all one hears about from the pulpit is social justice. To speak of Heaven, Hell, Purgatory, Death and Judgement is considered strangely bizarre.  Meditation on the Glorious mysteries of the Holy Rosary brings us back to reality!" (Dedicated Decades, Winter 2013, pp. 32, 33).

But then, most clerics (be they priest or deacon) no longer pray the Holy Rosary. They prefer worldly things to the Holy Rosary.  Once prayer is abandoned, doctrine follows.

Today the Catholic Church is infested with many effeminate priests and deacons who are spiritually unable to offer the faithful the sound doctrine, the hard truths which they need to hear. And parishes are emptying.

The priest who not only does not encourage the involvement of masculine men but actively discourages the same is contributing to the demise of his parish.  Strong masculine men set an example for the entire parish.  When masculine men are encouraged and not relegated to the fringe, whole families will return to Church.

The Cult of Softness must go. Effeminate clerics who discourage masculine men must go.

Some years ago, I informed my parish priest that he shouldn't be promoting CCHD.  See here.  And although the priest in question thanked me in an email for informing him that CCHD was giving monies to groups which promote sodomy, abortion and contraception, I became persona non grata.  Even though I volunteered to serve the parish in some capacity, I never heard from the parish.  After all, we can't have a masculine male involved in the parish who might actually provide others with a good example of fidelity and courage.

Where is the effeminacy coming from?  From the vice of luxuria.  See here.

It's time to fashion a whip and drive the disease of effeminacy from the Church. One priest, in a comment left at this Blog, wrote:

I was the pastor of a large suburban parish of 2100 families for almost a decade. The effeminization of the parish was disastrous.

I immediately ended the feel-good, feminine expressions in the liturgy, ended the awful practices in the school masses which neutered boys and drove them away from the Church.

I preached constantly about the need to accept Jesus as Lord and Savior, to serve him in battle, and invited men back to Church. The results were amazing. Men came back and stayed. Boys in 7th and 8th grades were invited to become Masters of Ceremony at mass, and were given cassocks and surplices to wear at mass. They loved it! They rose to the occasion. A visiting priest told me that he had never seen so many "normal men" at mass.

We junked liturgical dance, wispy, wimpy hymns, and hand-holding and all the rest of the emasculating practices. We promoted Confession endlessly, and saw a gradual return to the sacrament by many young men seeking to live a life of purity - and these are mostly men in their 20s.

We promoted Marian devotion by men and women, and saw a huge response.

I was asked to take on another assignment and had to leave the parish, but I left a solid young priest who will continue the good work The parish has grown in numbers and participation and collections.

The Lord has given us all the spiritual tools we need to draw people into the life of Christ: the sacraments, the Word of God, preaching and teaching the Truth, and the good work and example of good holy priests who are healthy and real men, as well as deacons who believe the Word and preach it and live it. The results are fantastic!

God is good.

Amen....let's get to work!

In the New Church, masculinity is anathema

As this article explains:

"Though the New Evangelization has been a major effort in the Catholic Church for over forty years, it has failed to stem the disastrous losses of the faithful in the U.S. The New Evangelization is faltering: since 2000, 14 million Catholics have left the faith, parish religious education participation of children has dropped by 24%, Catholic school attendance has dropped by 19%, baptisms of infants has dropped by 28%, baptism of adults has dropped by 31% and sacramental Catholic marriages have dropped by 41%.[1] Something is desperately wrong with the Church’s approach to the New Evangelization.

The New Emangelization Project has documented that a key driver of the collapse of Catholicism in the U. S. is a serious and growing Catholic “man-crisis”.[2] One third of baptized Catholic men have left the faith and the majority of those who remain “Catholic” neither know nor practice the faith and are not committed to pass the faith along to their children. Recent research shows that large numbers of young Catholic men are leaving the faith to become “Nones”, men who have no religious affiliation.[3] The growing losses of young Catholic men will have a devastating impact on the U.S. Catholic Church in the coming decades, as older Catholic men pass away and young men fail to remain and marry in the Church, accelerating the devastating losses that have already occurred.

While there are massive cultural forces outside of the Church (e.g. secularism, pluralism, anti-Christian bias, radical feminism, pornography, media saturation, etc.) and missteps within the Church (e.g. failure to make men a priority, sex abuse scandals, homosexuality in the priesthood, etc.) that have contributed to the Catholic “man-crisis”, the New Emangelization Project has conducted dozens of interviews with top Catholic men’s evangelists[4] that suggest that a core reason for the “man-crisis” is that bishops and priests have not yet made the evangelization and catechesis of men a clear priority. Men are being ignored by the Church."

Addicted to homosexuality and effeminism, the Cult of Softness has a deep and abiding hatred of real men and anything even remotely resembling masculinity.  I've addressed this truth often at this Blog-  see here for example.

In the New Church, which will accept the Man of Sin, the Cult of Softness will be the New dogma.  Already there is preparation on so very many levels.

The Latin Vulgate (see the Douay-Rheims Bible) indicates that the effeminate will not inherit the Kingdom of God (1 Corinthians 6:10). But the New American Bible, which is used by the USCCB, omits the word effeminate:


1 Corinthians 6:9-10 (Latin Vulgate):

Verse 9: "Know you not that the unjust shall not possess the kingdom of God? Do not err: Neither fornicators nor idolaters nor adulterers:

an nescitis quia iniqui regnum Dei non possidebunt nolite errare neque fornicarii neque idolis servientes neque adulteri

Verse 10: Nor the effeminate nor liers with mankind nor thieves nor covetous nor drunkards nor railers nor extortioners shall possess the kingdom of God.

neque molles neque masculorum concubitores neque fures neque avari neque ebriosi neque maledici neque rapaces regnum Dei possidebunt."


1Corinthians 6: 9-10 (New American Bible) posted online by the USCCB:

Verse 9: "Do you not know that the unjust will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived; neither fornicators nor idolaters nor adulterers nor boy prostitutes nor sodomites

Verse 10: nor thieves nor the greedy nor drunkards nor slanderers nor robbers will inherit the kingdom of God."

Why do you think this is so?  The Latin Vulgate, which we have obtained from the great St. Jerome, is the most precise translation of the Sacred Scriptures available.  There are many other problems with recent translations of the Scriptures.  But my focus here is on this passage.  Why has the word "effeminate" been dropped from 1 Corinthians 6?

Dr. Leon Podles writes, "Walter Ong, having been formed in a masculine, Jesuit, clerical milieu does not seem to be aware of how feminized Christianity had become even before the 1960s, but he saw a rapid shift in the Catholic Church in the 1960s toward even greater feminization...The contrasts of Christianity, grace and sin, life and death, have been toned down with a considerable loss of emotional power.  Without this power, the popular appeal of the liturgy has declined (even with a more accessible language) and church attendance has plummeted...Even the change from Latin to the vernacular was also a symptom of feminization, according to Ong.  Latin had been a means of maintaining a Latin culture in the Roman Catholic clergy.  A language restricted to men is common; it is a sign of masculine separation from the feminine world.  After it became a learned language, Latin was learned almost exclusively by men.  The system of education that used Latin and centered around Latin literature was centered around contest and disputation and was confined almost entirely to men.  The disappearance of Latin was part of the demasculinization of the clergy.." (The Church Impotent: The Feminization of Christianity, pp. 133-135).

So crippled by radical feminism and effeminate clergy, the Church often finds herself incapable of either giving or receiving fraternal correction.  The Cotton-Candy "Church of Nice" (not the Church founded by Christ Jesus to deliver hard truths and thereby save souls), is the Church of "Who am I to judge?", the Church of empty, bland New Age homilies-  Chicken Soup for the Chicken Catholic. Because I had the audacity to stand up to several women at a parish in Baldwinville, Massachusetts who were disrespecting Our Eucharistic Lord by talking loudly and laughing before the tabernacle as people attempted to prepare for Holy Mass, I was told by the priest that I am a "large man" who is scary and that I would be "ostracized." See here.

This is a favorite tactic of liberals to silence authentic men who are not sissified and who actually possess backbone.

The Cult of Softness permeates the entire Church.  It is passive aggressive and desires total control of everything it comes into contact with.

But it cannot fight head on or on solid ground. That is its weakness.  And it is there we must take the fight.

The Cult of Softness and its fruit: The Church in decline

Crux News reports: "...the total number of Catholics in the United States dropped by 3 million since 2007, now comprising about 20 percent – or one-fifth – of the total population.

And perhaps more troubling for the church, for every one Catholic convert, more than six Catholics leave the church. Taken a step further, Catholicism loses more members than it gains at a higher rate than any other denomination, with nearly 13 percent of all Americans describing themselves as 'former Catholics.'"

This should come as no surprise.  Years of witnessing corruption of various kinds (material and moral), not to mention a lack of leadership and charity, have turned young people-  and people of all ages-  off of the Church.

In many parishes, orthodox Catholics are subjected to hatred and violence.  For example, when I called for reverence in the liturgy and advanced the teaching of Pope Benedict XVI that applause has no place within the liturgy, I was threatened with violence by "leaders" at Our Lady Immaculate Parish in Athol and banned from the parish's Facebook page.  See here.

We've had enough of a preaching which leaves Zebulun and Naphtali in the shadow of death.  We've had enough of a Cotton-Candy Catholicism which offers Chicken-Soup Homilies and asinine theatrics rather than the solid meat of sound preaching and liturgical reverence.  Sadly, so many of our priests haven't caught on to this.  And so they continue to spoon-feed us the unsatisfying pablum.

The time for lying is over.  I have been saying this for years.  Back in 2009, Archbishop Charles Chaput noted that, "40 years of American Catholic complacency and poor formation are bearing exactly the fruit we should have expected...We can't talk about following St. Paul and converting our culture until we sober up and get honest about what we've allowed ourselves to become.  We need to stop lying to each other..."

The lying must stop.  For this to happen, we need priests and Bishops who fear God more than they do men.  Cowards will not lead us out of the valley of death.  Neither will homosexuality or effeminate clerics who cannot relate to men.  Only shepherds who have the spiritual strength, the Cardinal Gift of Fortitude, to brave the risk of worldly criticism, will be able to lead the American Catholic Church out of the valley of the Culture of Death and back on the road to the Civilization of Love which Pope John Paul II spoke of so often.

Why have so many priests succumbed to fear?  Why is it that their preaching no longer points out sin?  Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange provides us with an answer:

"The reason for this is not difficult to find.  A sermon is the result of the combined effort of all the priest's powers; it reveals his entire person; it is his struggle against the vices of the surrounding world."  In other words, if the preaching is unsound, it is because the priest's spiritual life is unsound.  Fr. Lagrange continues, "Everything in the priest cooperates in his preaching - study, reflection, his powers to compose and revise, the activity of his intellect, his imagination, his memory, his feelings, his voice.  Therefore, when he preaches, the priest stands exposed for all to study; some will be attracted, others will not.  Some will accept what he says, others will simply criticize.  So if the priest approaches his task from the human angle, he will say to himself: 'I cannot afford to lose my reputation; people of weight in the parish who take offense easily must be spared their feelings and not provoked; I must proceed warily so as not to incur criticism.'  In that way Christian eloquence is invaded by a profane eloquence in which the preacher looks after his own interests, not the glory of God or the saving of souls." (The Priest In Union With Christ, p. 156).

Forty years of lying has wrought so much damage to the American Catholic Church.  Archbishop Chaput is right, we are merely reaping the fruit of what we've planted.  St. Paul tells us that, "...the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, generosity, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control.." (Galatians 5: 22).  But what fruit have we witnessed in the American Catholic Church?  The Church has been infected with dry-rot as so many Catholics have succumbed to the works of the flesh.

We need heroic shepherds.  Men who, like Blessed Miguel Pro, S.J., are willing to give their very lives for the Catholic Church and her teaching.

Sissy clerics aren't getting the job done.  And this Lavender Mafia will never acknowledge this.  The Cult of Softness will not-  IT CANNOT - examine itself.  It is too fat, too lazy, too corrupt, too proud.  It has become a haunt of demons where every manner of filth and immorality is welcome and faith and purity are treated with animus.

Large segments of the Church in America are simply lost.

Wild Bill on the Cult of Softness...

On April 6, 1941, Bishop Fulton John Sheen gave a sermon on his radio show "The Catholic Hour" in which he reminded listeners that, "The basic spirit of the modern world for the last century has been a determination to escape the Cross." He told his audience as well that, "There is no such thing as living without a cross. We are free only to choose between crosses." And then he asked them: "Will it be the Cross of Christ which redeems us from our sins, or will it be the double cross, the swastika, the hammer and sickle, the fasces"?

Bishop Sheen believed, as I do, that America is at a crossroads. In his own words, "We in America are now faced with the threat of that double cross...Our choice is not: Will we or will we not have more discipline, more respect for law, more order, more sacrifice; but, where will we get it? Will we get it from without, or from within, Will it be inspired by Sparta or Calvary? By Valhalla or Gethsemane? By militarism or religion? By the double cross or the Cross? By Caesar or by God? That is the choice facing America today. The hour of false freedom is past. No longer can we have education without discipline, family life without sacrifice, individual existence without moral responsibility, economics and politics without subservience to the common good. We are now only free to say whence it shall come. We will have a sword. Shall it be only the sword that thrusts outward to cut off the ears of our enemies, or the sword that pierces inward to cut out our own selfish pride"?

Thus far, America has chosen the double cross. Fleeing from the Cross of Christ and the supernatural kingdom established by the Son of God; one of sacrifice and sanctity, America has chosen to pursue a terrestrial kingdom of pleasure and power founded upon a distorted idea of what constitutes liberty or freedom. But this city of man, which has certainly achieved astounding advancements in various spheres while increasing the affluence of some, has also contributed to a climate where men are regarded as mere machines whose only value is to be found in what they produce or consume. This in turn destroys the individual’s sense of personal dignity and responsibility.

Americans, in their tragic desire to flee from the Cross of Christ, have rushed to embrace this distorted notion of "freedom" and have forgotten that, as created beings, they only possess contingent rights. That is to say, rights which are accorded by Almighty God. Consequently, in their zeal to promote the fallacious idea that the basis of public morality should be whatever the majority of citizens are prepared to accept, they have also forgotten that man does not possess, and never will possess, the right to perform or engage in any act which is displeasing to God.

And where has this flight from the Cross of Christ led us up to this point? Was Bishop Sheen being an alarmist? In the words of Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn, taken from his Commencement Address at Harvard University entitled "A World Split Apart": "Destructive and irresponsible freedom has been granted boundless space. Society appears to have little defense against the abyss of human decadence, such as, for example, the misuse of liberty for moral violence against young people, motion pictures full of pornography, crime and horror. This is considered to be part of freedom, and theoretically counterbalanced by the young peoples’ right not to look or not to accept. Life organized legalistically has thus shown its inability to defend itself against the corrosion of evil."

Getting back to Bishop Sheen. What did he mean when he said that, "Our choice is not: Will we or will we not have more discipline, more respect for law, more order, more sacrifice; but, where will we get it"? I believe Pope Benedict XVI was providing us with a hint toward an answer when he spoke of the "dictatorship of relativism." Americans who have gleefully embraced the tenets of liberalism have not learned the lesson the concentration camp and the gulag. These unfortunate souls refuse to acknowledge that atheistic ideology (and make no mistake, the current idea of "freedom" which has taken root in America is itself rooted in atheistic ideology) always, and without exception, gives birth to sheer violence. This is the lesson of atheistic humanism. A lesson which the majority of Americans would rather not think about.

Who would deny that Bishop Sheen’s warning, issued some 64 years ago, was highly prophetic? America, and the West in general, is at a crossroads. We have before us two crosses: The Cross of Christ and the double cross (which may also be referred to today as the "dictatorship of relativism"). Which will we choose in the end? Will we continue on our present course or change direction and finally come to embrace the Cross of Christ? Will we embrace Christ and His kingdom of sacrifice and sanctity or continue to rush headlong into the idolatry of unbridled hedonism while declaring ourselves, albeit tacitly, to be God?

If we continue to choose the latter, then we should remember the words of Fr. Vincent Miceli, S.J., "When man becomes God, history testifies that then millions of men become imprisoned slaves, terrified automatons and murdered corpses. Society, in the words of Gabriel Marcel, becomes a ‘termite colony.’" (The Gods of Atheism, p. 463).

Father Brian O'Toole and the lack of the passion of anger

In a past post, I noted how it is possible to "be angry and sin not" (Ephesians 4: 26), something which Father Brian O'Toole, "pastor" of the failing Sacred Heart Parish in Gardner, apparently does not understand. And he is not alone.

Writing for Touchstone Magazine, Dr. Leon J. Podles explains that, "..many Christians have a false understanding of the nature and role of anger. It is seen as something negative, something that a Christian should not feel.

In the sexual abuse cases in the Catholic Church, those who dealt with the bishops have consistently remarked that the bishops never expressed outrage or righteous anger, even at the most horrendous cases of abuse and sacrilege. Bishops seem to think that anger at sin is un-Christian. Gilbert Kilman, a child psychiatrist, commented, 'What amazes me is the lack of outrage the church feels when its good work is being harmed. So, if there is anything the church needs to know, it needs to know how to be outraged.'

Mark Serrano confronted Bishop Frank Rodimer, asking why he had let his priest-friend Peter Osinski sleep with boys at Rodimer’s beach house while Rodimer was in the next bedroom: 'Where is your moral indignation?' Rodimer’s answer was, 'Then I don’t get it. What do you want?' What Serrano wanted Rodimer to do was to behave like a man with a heart, a heart that is outraged by evil. But Rodimer couldn’t; his inability to feel outrage was a quality that had helped make him a bishop. He would never get into fights, never rock the boat, never 'divide' but only 'unify.' Rodimer could not understand why he should feel deep anger at evil, at the violation of the innocent, at the oppression of the weak.

Emotional Deformation

The emotions that are now suppressed are hatred and anger. Christians think that they ought not to feel these emotions, that it is un-Christian to feel them. They secretly suspect that Jesus was being un-Christian in his attitude to the scribes and Pharisees when he was angry at them, that he was un-Christian when he drove the moneychangers out of the temple or declared that millstones (not vacations in treatment centers) were the way to treat child abusers.

Conrad Baars noticed this emotional deformation in the clergy in the mid-twentieth century. He recognized that there had been distortions in 'traditional' Catholic spirituality. It had become too focused upon individual acts rather than on growth in virtue; it had emphasized sheer naked strength of will. In forgetting that growth in virtue was the goal of the Christian’s moral life, it forgot that the emotions, all emotions, including anger and hate, are part of human nature and must be integrated into a virtuous life.

Baars had been imprisoned by the Nazis. He knew iniquity firsthand and that there was something wrong with those who did not hate it:

A little reflection will make it clear that there is a big difference between the person who knows solely that something is evil and ought to be opposed, and the one who in addition also feels hate for that evil, is angry that it is corrupting or harming his fellow-men, and feels aroused to combat it courageously and vigorously.

Just Wrath

Wrath is a necessary and positive part of human nature: 'Wrath is the strength to attack the repugnant; the power of anger is actually the power of resistance in the soul,' wrote Josef Pieper. The lack of wrath against injustice, he continued, is a deficiency: 'One who does good with passion is more praiseworthy than one who is ‘not entirely’ afire for the good, even to the forces of the sensual realm.'

Aquinas, too, says that 'lack of the passion of anger is also a vice' because a man who truly and forcefully rejects evil will be angry at it. The lack of anger makes the movement of the will against evil 'lacking or weak.' He quotes John Chrysostom: 'He who is not angry, whereas he has cause to be, sins. For unreasonable patience is the hotbed of many vices, it fosters negligence, and incites not only the wicked but the good to do wrong'..." (Full article here).

The spiritually mature Christian understands that not all anger is unjust. That there is such a thing as just or righteous anger. Such a Christian strives to control anger through prayer and by considering the example of Christ. Let's all pray for those in leadership positions in the Church. That they may come to a mature faith which is able to discern between just and unjust anger.

One shepherd [and he is that in every sense of the word] who possesses such a mature faith is The Most Rev. Fabian Bruskewitz, Bishop of Lincoln, Nebraska. His Excellency has been quoted as having said, "No words that are printable, or even conceivable, are adequate to express my outrage, fury, and depression upon learning that anyone, much less a priest, would sexually molest any children. Such a thing is an unspeakable abomination. Upon hearing such things, I must confess that I am tempted to look for my shotgun and baseball bat, much sooner that I am tempted to give any consideration to a possible 'sickness' in a perpetrator. Molestation victims and their families are certainly entitled to anger. Sometimes their excessive anger and demands, while often becoming unacceptable and unreasonable, are still understandable to me."

How much more just anger should a shepherd demonstrate against those who would spiritually molest faithful Catholics.

At his homily delivered at the 10:30 AM Mass at Sacred Heart Parish today, Father Brian O'Toole said that Jesus "lost it," and drove out the money changers who "weren't really doing anything wrong." This even though Our Lord rebuked them for making His Father's House a "Den of Thieves."

Father O'Toole, as with many of his effeminate contemporaries who have succumbed to the Cult of Softness, doesn't understand this Gospel passage because he lacks the passion of anger.

And that is a vice.

Pope Francis: Men shouldn't be so macho and should listen more to women

As noted here, Pope Francis, who once boasted of having been a bouncer,"has called for more women in the International Theological Commission, even after tripling the number of women on the team this past September. 'In the ever more diverse makeup of the Commission,' he said, 'I want to see a higher presence of women.'

The Pope also said recently that it is chiefly women who pass on the faith, and urged men to listen to women more and not be so 'macho.' He said that men often don’t allow enough room for women while 'women are capable of seeing things with a different angle from us, with a different eye.'

Got that?  You men who are discerning a vocation to the priesthood must come to view masculinity as a sort of disease which leads to men ignoring women and ultimately excluding them.  Men must be ashamed of their masculinity and learn to identify more with women.
We don't listen enough to women?  I think the problem, at least in the West, is that we cater too much to women.  One could certainly argue that women in Islamic nations are suppressed and relegated to the status of furniture.  But not in the West.  Throughout the Church in the United States, women outnumber men in virtually every Church ministry. Everyone knows this. The absence of laymen participating in Church ministries to any appreciable degree is the result of the effeminization of the Church, the Cult of Softness.

Several years ago, in a piece entitled "Priestly Identity: Crisis and Renewal," Annamarie Adkins interviewed Father David Toups, Associate Director of the Secretariat of Clergy, Consecrated Life and Vocations of the U.S. episcopal conference.  Annamarie Adkins wrote, "A general crisis of authentic masculinity in society has also affected the priesthood as only 'real men' can adequately fulfill the role of priest and pastor, says Father David Toups. Father Toups, the associate director of the Secretariat of Clergy, Consecrated Life and Vocations of the U.S. episcopal conference, is the author of 'Reclaiming Our Priestly Character.'

It was Jacques Maritain who said, “Christianity must inform or, rather, transpenetrate the world; not that this is its principal aim (although it is an indispensable secondary end), and not in order that the world become right now the kingdom of God, but in order that grace may be more and more effective in it, and in order that man may better live there his temporal life.”

If grace is to be more and more effective in the world, if a new Christendom is to arise from the ashes of our morally-bankrupt, sin-sick society which subjects mankind to constant and ever-growing threats of degradation and destruction, then saints will have to arise in the midst of our broken world. These saints will be, according to St. Louis de Montfort in his classic treatise True Devotion to Mary, “..like thunder-clouds flying through the air at the slightest breath of the Holy Spirit. Attached to nothing, surprised at nothing, troubled at nothing, they will shower down the rain of God’s word and of eternal life. They will thunder against sin, they will storm against the world, they will strike down the devil and his followers and for life and for death, they will pierce through and through with the two-edged sword of God’s word all those against whom they are sent by almighty God.” (True Devotion, 57).

Such disciples will not be “part-time Catholics” or “Chicken-Catholics,” devoting only one hour a week to their Creator and Redeemer while retreating in fear from any and all conflict during the spiritual battles ahead. St. Montfort insists that, “..we know they will be true disciples of Jesus Christ, imitating his poverty, his humility, his contempt of the world and his love. They will point out the narrow way to God in pure truth according to the holy Gospel, and not according to the maxims of the world. Their hearts will not be troubled, nor will they show favor to anyone; they will not spare or heed or fear any man, however powerful he may be. They will have the two-edged sword of the Word of God in their mouths and the blood-stained standard of the Cross on their shoulders. They will carry the crucifix in their right hand and the rosary in their left, and the holy names of Jesus and Mary on their heart. The simplicity and self-sacrifice of Jesus will be reflected in their whole behavior.” (True Devotion, 59).

George Weigel, weighing in on the supreme crisis which faces the Catholic Church in the United States in the wake of President Obama’s re-election, asserts (correctly) that: “..the opportunity embedded in this crisis..is nothing less than to be the Church of the New Evangelization, full-throttle. Shallow, tribal, institutional-maintenance Catholicism is utterly incapable of meeting the challenges that will now come at the Catholic Church from the most aggressively secular administration in American history. Only a robustly, unapologetically evangelical Catholicism, winsomely proposing and nobly living the truths about the human condition the Church teaches, will see us through the next four years. Radically converted Christian disciples, not one-hour-a-week Catholics whipsawed by an ever more toxic culture, are what this hour of crisis..demands.” (The crisis of a second Obama administration).

Sadly, the militant evangelical Catholicism described by George Weigel is not encouraged - or even tolerated - in some corners of the Catholic Church here in the United States. In some dioceses, the Cult of Softness has all but crippled an authentic, militant evangelization and replaced it with a sacharrin-spirituality which sugar-coats sin while leaving Zebulun and Naphtali in the shadow of death.  As part of the Ecclesia Militans, I am persona non grata in my own diocese - the Diocese of Worcester, Massachusetts.  New Age advocates, dissidents who rail against the Magisterium and those who engage in radical homosexual agitprop are welcome.  But an orthodox Catholic who vigorously promotes and defends the teaching of the Magisterium is deemed "rigid" and "too pre-Vatican II." And, because of my military background, I am held in contempt.

This is our moment as Catholics: We can choose to take a courageous stand for the Faith of our Fathers, witnessing to Gospel truths with the whole of our lives and even unto death; or we can fall back into the shadows and thereby cooperate in the spiritual destruction of a once-great nation.

Along with the Church’s other martyrs, St. Thomas More was confronted with the same choice. While remaining a loyal servant of the King, he chose to be God’s servant first. Will we?

The Church needs men if there is to be a militant evangelization.  Real men who are ready to join the battle.  Not sissies who identify more with women than men, frustrated and psychologically cramped characters who have gender identity issues or latent homosexual tendencies.

I wrote my Bishop expressing interest in discerning a vocation to the priesthood.  I never did get a response.

But then, I am probably considered "too macho."

Recommended meditation: 1 Corinthians 6: 9-10:

"Know you not that the unjust shall not possess the kingdom of God? Do not err: neither fornicators, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, Nor the effeminate, nor liers with mankind, nor thieves, nor covetous, nor drunkards, nor railers, nor extortioners, shall possess the kingdom of God."

The Church is being queered

The Telegraph reports:

Ground-breaking new research into the sexual lives of Irish Catholic priests has revealed many of them are or have been sexually active, that the bishops are aware of the situation, and that there is a gay scene within the church.

'Thirty-Three Good Men: Celibacy, Obedience and Identity' publishes new analysis of priests' views from a series of interviews conducted by Dr John Weafer, a former seminarian who is now married with children.
The book, which has just been published by Columba Books, reveals that one parish priest interviewed confidentially by Weafer is in a long term gay relationship.

Speaking to the Irish Independent, the author said 'Fr C' was "very happy with his life as a priest and a person".
Another priest interviewed, 'Fr L' was ordained in the 1990s. It was only when he was ordained that he finally ended up 'sleeping' with another priest.
"Although we both vowed it would never happen again, it did and I was really very confused," he said.
When he ended up in bed "fumbling around" with another priest, he decided to try the gay scene.

Fr L then "discovered a strong clerical gay scene in Ireland", although it was not easy to access because of the clerics' need for secrecy.

He believes that there are "quite a lot of gay guys in the priesthood" and on one occasion when he went into a gay bar in Dublin, he recognised at least nine priests in the bar.

Dr Weafer said he did not think that the Irish hierarchy would be shocked by the revelations in the book as the interviews showed that the "hierarchy are aware" of what is going on.
"As long as priests don't go public and don't flaunt those actions that don't correspond with being a celibate priest" they turn a blind eye, he claimed.

This will shock many as the official church's attitude on homosexuality deems it as intrinsically disordered.
According to Dr Weafer: "If a priest was to say in the morning 'I am gay', he would be fired. Priests have learned to keep their heads down".

The researcher, who was the first lay director of the Irish Bishops' Council for Research and Development in Maynooth, said that while most of the priests he interviewed lived celibate lives, and some are enthusiastic about their priesthood, others have become disillusioned.

The new research shows that the majority of Irish priests are unhappy with mandatory celibacy.
Those most enthusiastic about the retention of celibacy are younger, more conservative priests, the research shows.

Many of the priests were highly critical of the fact that sexuality was a taboo when they were training to be priests in the seminary.

The majority of 33 priests interviewed by Dr Weafer for the book were heterosexual.

One former priest had married and joined the Church of Ireland while Fr L has since decided to leave the priesthood, as he found the double standards too much. Another gay priest Fr G had opted to remain in the priesthood and was not sexually active.

 And this really shouldn't surprise us. Those who abandon Divine Revelation and the Natural Law will no longer seek God and His precepts and Commandments but will instead pursue their own lusts and fantasies.

Such people will create and adore their own gods which are almost always a mythical projection of their own vices. They attribute a religious dimension to these vices to "baptize" them, to justify them in their own darkened minds.

It was Saint Cyprian of Carthage, writing against the Greco-Roman pagan world and its vices, who said: "That Jupiter of theirs is not more supreme in dominion than in vice, inflamed with earthly love in the midst of his own thunders...now breaking forth by the help of birds to violate the purity of boys. And now put the question: Can he who looks upon such things be healthy-minded or modest? Men imitate the gods whom they adore, and to such miserable beings their crimes become their religion." (Letters 1:8).

In a series of letters written from 1969-1970, Sister Lucia [of the Fatima apparition] wrote: "It is indeed sad that so many people let themselves be dominated by the diabolical wave that is sweeping the world, and that they are blinded to the point of being incapable of seeing error! Their principal fault is they have abandoned prayer; in this way they have become estranged from God, and without God everything fails. The devil is very cunning and looks for our weak points in order to attack us. If we are not diligent and careful to obtain strength from God, we shall fall, for our age is very wicked and we are weak. Only the strength of God can keep us on our feet."

There is a retreat from truth. Those of us who refuse to abandon our Christian faith must be demonized. We must be placed in a ghetto. Isolated. Portrayed as "backward" and "archaic." And eventually placed in internment camps or simply eliminated altogether should we refuse to accept the New Order.

A Church which is being increasingly effeminized...

 

Watering down the Word of God to please appease the Cult of Softness.

 

The Latin Vulgate (see the Douay-Rheims Bible) indicates that the effeminate will not inherit the Kingdom of God (1 Corinthians 6:10). But the New American Bible, which is used by the USCCB, omits the word effeminate:


1 Corinthians 6:9-10 (Latin Vulgate):

Verse 9: "Know you not that the unjust shall not possess the kingdom of God? Do not err: Neither fornicators nor idolaters nor adulterers:

an nescitis quia iniqui regnum Dei non possidebunt nolite errare neque fornicarii neque idolis servientes neque adulteri

Verse 10: Nor the effeminate nor liers with mankind nor thieves nor covetous nor drunkards nor railers nor extortioners shall possess the kingdom of God.

neque molles neque masculorum concubitores neque fures neque avari neque ebriosi neque maledici neque rapaces regnum Dei possidebunt."


1Corinthians 6: 9-10 (New American Bible) posted online by the USCCB:

Verse 9: "Do you not know that the unjust will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived; neither fornicators nor idolaters nor adulterers nor boy prostitutes nor sodomites

Verse 10: nor thieves nor the greedy nor drunkards nor slanderers nor robbers will inherit the kingdom of God."

Why do you think this is so?  The Latin Vulgate, which we have obtained from the great St. Jerome, is the most precise translation of the Sacred Scriptures available.  There are many other problems with recent translations of the Scriptures.  But my focus here is on this passage.  Why has the word "effeminate" been dropped from 1 Corinthians 6?

Dr. Leon Podles writes, "Walter Ong, having been formed in a masculine, Jesuit, clerical milieu does not seem to be aware of how feminized Christianity had become even before the 1960s, but he saw a rapid shift in the Catholic Church in the 1960s toward even greater feminization...The contrasts of Christianity, grace and sin, life and death, have been toned down with a considerable loss of emotional power.  Without this power, the popular appeal of the liturgy has declined (even with a more accessible language) and church attendance has plummeted...Even the change from Latin to the vernacular was also a symptom of feminization, according to Ong.  Latin had been a means of maintaining a Latin culture in the Roman Catholic clergy.  A language restricted to men is common; it is a sign of masculine separation from the feminine world.  After it became a learned language, Latin was learned almost exclusively by men.  The system of education that used Latin and centered around Latin literature was centered around contest and disputation and was confined almost entirely to men.  The disappearance of Latin was part of the demasculinization of the clergy.." (The Church Impotent: The Feminization of Christianity, pp. 133-135).

The Cult of Softness has made such inroads that it has crippled the inner life of the Church.  Liturgy has been feminized  And now, the Sacred Scriptures (the very Word of God) must be rewritten so as not to offend more "civilized" and "refined" tastes; so as not to offend "modern man."  The Christian faith must be replaced by a self-worship which cloaks itself in language which purports to be Christian but which nevertheless remains a language which has been watered down to make it more acceptable to modernity.

Dr. Podles cites a study by Lewis M. Terman and Catherine Cox Miles, which included a Masculinity-Femininity test, writing, "Terman and Miles gathered data from three groups: Catholic seminarians, Protestant seminarians, and Protestant ministers.  As one might expect, men attracted to the religious life differed strikingly in their masculinity from the general male population: 'The Catholic student priests score at a point far less masculine than any other male group of their age; in their early twenties they are more feminine than the general male population at middle life.  The Protestant theological students in their middle twenties are, however, more feminine than they and exceed in femininity the sixty-year-old man of equal education.  The adult ministerial group is barely more masculine than the Protestant theological students and less so than the student priests.  They exceed in femininity the college men of the seventh decade.'  Terman and Miles concluded that 'some dominant factors must be present in all three groups to make them, without regard to age, conspicuously and almost equally lacking in mental masculinity.'  Interestingly enough, the similarities between the Protestant and Catholic groups and the Catholic group's slightly higher scores ruled out celibacy as a major factor in a lack of masculinity..." (P. 9).

Effeminacy (and here we are not necessarily speaking of homosexuality), has become the forgotten vice in seminary formation.  This as many masculine men continue to be excluded from pursuing priestly vocations and masculinity itself is banished to the margins of the Church.

In my own Diocese (Worcester, Mass), I have encountered a positive hostility toward masculinity on many occasions.  Just recently, the "pastor" of Saint Vincent de Paul Parish took exception to my calmly and politely requesting that a group of women refrain from engaging in loud and disruptive conversation before the tabernacle just prior to Holy Mass.  This priest left a comment at this Blog (see here) suggesting that I am somehow "frightening" because I am "a large man."

How many of you have seen the Gregory Peck/Richard Basehart film adaptation of Herman Melville's classic novel Moby Dick?  Remember the fiery sermon delivered by the minister who was portrayed powerfully by Orson Welles?  The priests I grew up with (I was a military "Brat"), were of the same sort.  They were men who knew the Sacred Scriptures.  Men who inspired a sort of military-like zeal with regard to evangelization and the spiritual life.

In a previous post, I wrote that, "A testosterone-free Church is not appealing to men.  Effeminate priests and ministers do not inspire healthy young men to consider a vocation within the Church.."  An article which may be found here, is saying essentially the same thing.  The writer asserts (and I couldn't agree more) that, "All of the outward facing disciplines within Christianity, such as apologetics, theology, ethics, etc. are de-emphasized, censored or resisted in feminized churches. There is no place for rationality, moral judgments and boundaries, debates and disagreement, confrontations and persuasion, or other manly Christian practices."

Small wonder that the Worcester Diocese has been plagued by homosexual and effeminate priests and a culture of softness and theological dissent!

Because I am a veteran and refuse to buy into the Cult of Softness and the homosexual agenda, I am unwelcome in my Diocese.  Anyone who speaks the hard truths (like Robert Spencer) is unwelcome here.  In our effeminized diocese, there is no room for manly Christian practices!

Related reading here.

 

"..a culture that produces weak and vacillating men will produce weak and vacillating priests.."

Some years ago, Brad Miner, in an interview with Zenit, said that: "The notion of the gentleman has been out of fashion for some time, especially because of its connection to boorish, Victorian-era stoicism..."

When asked, "What is a 'complete gentleman?", Miner responded, "First, he is an inheritor of the medieval tradition of knightly prowess, and the Victorian ideal of gentlemanly decorum. As a means for recovering a sense of the complete gentleman, I propose three archetypes: the warrior, the lover and the monk...I say that he is a warrior, because he knows there are things worth fighting for and is willing and able to fight; that he's a lover, because he treasures the woman in his life, gives her what she wants and allows her to free him from the tyranny of his own ego; and that he is a monk in that he values learning and silence.

I think the great, lost virtue in our time is restraint: the recognition that there is a difference between the public and the private. The complete gentleman practices what I call the art of "sprezzatura," which means that he is who he is and does what he does without drawing too much attention to himself in the process.

And when asked, "One commentator has described today's adolescent boys and young men as 'wimps and barbarians.' What has given rise to this phenomenon?"  Miner answered, "I suppose the 'barbarians' are the boys animated by the macho violence of hip-hop culture and the 'wimps' are the kids politicized by the various 'isms' of the New Age...There are many causes of this degradation, but it all comes down to a simple fact: Young people tend to lack a sense of calling or mission. This is partly what Michael Barone is getting at in his recent book 'Hard America, Soft America.' We have teen-agers who seem unable to cope with the rigors of competition and then 30-year-olds who are capable of running the world.

We live in a nation that has achieved an unprecedented level of luxury and in an age in which technology encourages passivity. Young people ought to be physically fit, if possible, morally responsible and intellectually active. If education does nothing but raise doubts, and culture mostly encourages predation, then the 'smart' kids will be weak and 'tough' kids will be cruel.

The antidote to this is balance and restraint. We need scholarship, devotion and self-control."

And then, referring to Cardinal Newman's famous passage describing the Victorian-era gentleman, he added, "Without question, he considered saintliness preferable to gentlemanliness, but his point of reference was an ideal of the gentleman that had long ago lost its connection to chivalry. I believe the complete gentleman recovers that connection, especially chivalry's martial quality.

Newman was reacting to the portraits of the gentleman as drawn by writers such as Lord Chesterfield, Samuel Smiles and Charles Kingsley. Having summarized their views, Newman says they are fine — as far as they go. Trouble is, they don't go far enough. It's as though the man they describe is what he is by virtue of his clothes; that gentlemanliness is merely something you wear. The biblical phrase 'whited sepulchers' comes to mind.

A real man, we might say, was in Newman's view someone who 'discerns the end in every beginning,' which means he lives more fundamentally, less superficially.

He is patient and forbearing on philosophical principles — not on the basis of social expediency; he 'submits to pain, because it is inevitable, to bereavement, because it is irreparable, and to death, because it is his destiny.' This is a flesh-and-blood man with, perhaps, emphasis on the blood..."

And when Zenit asked him, "How can men exhibit the manly virtues, but at the same time exhibit the appropriate sensitivities? In other words, what is authentic manhood"? Miner replied: "At the risk of seeming to duck the question, I have to say that each man must answer in his own way. Authenticity is inseparable from individuality. I have no 'Seven Steps to Manliness.'  But I will say this: We do well to reconsider the ancient qualities of the knight, which are loyalty, generosity, courtesy, honor, courage and restraint. It's fair to say that men in the Middle Ages mostly fell short of the ideal, as probably we will today. But for heaven's sake, let's at least aspire to a higher standard.

If I could give one rather reckless bit of advice to American men, it's this: Learn restraint, learn to fight, remember that you will die, and meditate devoutly on the fact that death is preferable to dishonor....a culture that produces weak and vacillating men will produce weak and vacillating priests."

Increasingly, the Church is being feminized and effeminized. This is a great tragedy because, as Dr. Leon Podles explains, "Since men continue to want to be masculine, they will continue (unless there are major changes in the Church) to put a greater or lesser distance between themselves and the Church....Feminism and homosexual propaganda dominate the liberal churches, and both drive men even further away. Apart from some groups of evangelical Protestants, whose commitment to Scripture has made them aware of the lack of men and led them to use tactics which have had at least initial effectiveness, all other varieties of Western Christianity are totally bent on expanding the role of women in the Church and choose to ignore the absence of the male laity....Catholic and mainline Protestant churches that cultivate a gay atmosphere...will keep heterosexual men away. Fear of effeminacy is one of the strongest motivations in men who will sometimes die rather than appear effeminate....Christianity has within it the resources that allow it to appeal to men, to show that not only will Christianity not undermine their masculinity, but it will also fulfill and perfect it."

But the Church continues capitulate to the Cult of Softness. And we wonder why vocations are drying up. I cannot even apply for the priesthood in Worcester. But the Diocese has ordained men who acted out homosexually or who committed acts of satanic pedophilia.

Rather than trying to cater to the homosexual elements within the Church, our Holy Father should be working to restore sound Catholic doctrine and pastoral practice.

Do we have to be a Church which caters to disorderly tendencies and a criminal subculture?

The crisis faced by the Catholic Church today is, as in every age, a crisis of saints.  As long as the Church continues to promote a distorted feminism and toleration of homosexuality as an ersatz "orthodoxy," the crisis will only deepen.  Events such as the "Catholic Men's Conference" might lead some men into the Church or to deepen their commitment to her in the short term, but if they do not encounter a spirituality which permits them to be both men and Christian at the same time, they will either remain marginalized Catholics or will leave the Church altogether