"..each of the faithful always has the right to receive Holy Communion on the tongue..."

Unlike Bishop Rozanski, here's a Bishop who understands that Catholics have a right at all times to receive Holy Communion on the tongue.  See here.

Redemptionis Sacramentum, No. 92:


"Although each of the faithful always has the right to receive Holy Communion on the tongue, at his choice, if any communicant should wish to receive the Sacrament in the hand, in areas where the Bishops’ Conference with the recognitio of the Apostolic See has given permission, the sacred host is to be administered to him or her. However, special care should be taken to ensure that the host is consumed by the communicant in the presence of the minister, so that no one goes away carrying the Eucharistic species in his hand. If there is a risk of profanation, then Holy Communion should not be given in the hand to the faithful.

Holy Communion on the tongue is the norm.  Communion in the hand is only allowed by indult, which is a sort of grudging permission.

I challenge Bishop Rozanski, or any Bishop or priest who believes Communion on the tongue may be prohibited, to cite a Church document that justifies this belief.

I await a response.

In the meantime.  See here.

Update: NOAA says President Trump was right about Hurricane Dorian...

As noted here:

"The parent agency of the National Weather Service said late Friday that President Trump was correct when he claimed earlier this week that Hurricane Dorian had threatened the state of Alabama."

Even though the lying "mainstream media" insisted that President Trump is a delusional narcissist who cannot admit when he is wrong, this Blog showed otherwise.  

The truth cannot be suppressed.  Watch Fredo's meltdown here.

Pope Francis has forgotten that conscience has a right to respect and obedience in the measure in which the person himself respects it and gives it the care which its dignity deserves

Even now the Man of Sin readies to reveal himself.  Various signs are emerging.  There is a growing diabolical disorientation.  Life Site reports:

"The most controversial moment of Pope Francis’ new apostolic exhortation – Amoris Laetitia (The Joy of Love) – might be confined to a humble footnote, but the implication is clear: the pope has opened the door to Cardinal Walter Kasper’s proposal that in some circumstances divorced and remarried Catholics could be readmitted to the sacraments, including the Eucharist.

In so doing the pope appears to have taken up a position contrary to that of his predecessors, most notably Pope Saint John Paul II, who had flatly rejected the idea of admitting the divorced and remarried to Communion in his apostolic exhortation Familiaris Consortio. Pope Benedict XVI, during his time as prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, had also addressed the controversy, coming down definitively against liberalizing the Church’s practice.

 

It isn’t until Chapter 8 of Pope Francis’ historically lengthy apostolic exhortation that he deals directly with the question that has embroiled the Church in debate for the past two years - ever since Cardinal Kasper, at Pope Francis’ personal invitation, outlined his controversial proposal in a keynote address to a consistory of Cardinals at the Vatican.

 

The text of the final document (or relatio) of last year’s Synod on the Family had caused concern among some synod fathers by referencing the idea of the “internal forum” in relation to the debate over the divorced and remarried. This idea has been used by some theologians to argue that a penitent who persists in an objectively sinful state could discern, in private discussion with his confessor, that his subjective culpability is limited, and he could therefore return to the sacraments.

 

In the exhortation released today, Pope Francis has adopted and expanded that reasoning.

Though the entire thrust of Chapter 8 is making the case for a deeper “integration” of those in “irregular unions” into the life of the Church, in the main body of the text the pope leaves the meaning of the phrase more or less ambiguous. However, he provides a clear answer at the end of a footnote to paragraph 305, where he states that this “integration” can, “in certain cases,” involve admittance to the sacraments, including the Eucharist. He does not explicitly elucidate what those "certain cases" might be, though broad principles for discernment are given elsewhere in the text. 

In paragraph 305, the pope warns that “a pastor cannot feel that it is enough simply to apply moral laws to those living in ‘irregular’ situations, as if they were stones to throw at people’s lives.” Quoting a well-known section of his own speech at the conclusion of the Synod on the Family last October, Francis says that such a pastor would be “sitting on the chair of Moses and judging at times with superiority and superficiality difficult cases and wounded families.”

He adds:

Because of forms of conditioning and mitigating factors, it is possible that in an objective situation of sin – which may not be subjectively culpable, or fully such – a person can be living in God’s grace, can love and can also grow in the life of grace and charity, while receiving the Church’s help to this end.

 

At the end of that sentence, he includes a footnote (351), which clarifies: “In certain cases, this can include the help of the sacraments,” and then refers to both Confession and the Eucharist. He writes: “I would also point out that the Eucharist ‘is not a prize for the perfect, but a powerful medicine and nourishment for the weak.’”

 

Speaking of the problem of integrating people in irregular unions, the pope says it would be impossible to establish “general rules,” such as through canon law. Rather, he encourages individuals to discern their individual circumstances in the “internal forum” - i.e. in private consultation with their priest - and following guidelines established by the bishop.

 

He writes: “What is possible is simply a renewed encouragement to undertake a responsible personal and pastoral discernment of particular cases, one which would recognize that, since ‘the degree of responsibility is not equal in all cases’, the consequences or ef­fects of a rule need not necessarily always be the same.”

 

This applies even to “sacramental discipline,” he writes in a footnote to that text, because “discernment can recognize that in a particular situation no grave fault exists.”

 

Quoting the Synod on the Family’s final text, he says the discernment “can never prescind from the Gospel demands of truth and charity, as proposed by the Church.” Still quoting the Synod text, he says the discernment must involve several conditions: “humility, discretion and love for the Church and her teaching, in a sincere search for God’s will and a desire to make a more per­fect response to it.”

 

He then writes: “These attitudes are essen­tial for avoiding the grave danger of misunder­standings, such as the notion that any priest can quickly grant ‘exceptions’, or that some people can obtain sacramental privileges in exchange for favours.”

 

The pope bases his argument on a radical interpretation of the role of conscience - which he suggests could, in some cases, actually reveal to a person that God may in fact be “asking” them to continue in a situation that does not achieve the “objective ideal” of the Gospel.

 

The pope writes that “individual conscience needs to be incorporated into the Church’s praxis in certain situations which do not objectively embody our understanding of marriage.” He continues:

Naturally, every effort should be made to encourage the development of an enlightened conscience, formed and guided by the responsible and serious discernment of one’s pastor, and to encourage an ever greater trust in God’s grace. Yet conscience can do more than recognize that a given situation does not correspond objectively to the overall demands of the Gospel. It can also recognize with sincerity and honesty what for now is the most generous response which can be given to God, and come to see with a certain moral security that it is what God himself is asking amid the concrete complexity of one’s limits, while yet not fully the objective ideal.*

 

Perhaps the most surprising aspect of the exhortation’s treatment of irregular unions is the pope’s apparent dismissal of the idea that couples in such unions who find themselves unable to separate for legitimate reason should be required or even encouraged to live together as “brother and sister” - i.e. to forego engaging in sexual relations.

 

Pope John Paul II had, in Familiaris Consortio, proposed sexual continence as the only moral solution for couples who, repenting of their irregular union, find that “for serious reasons” - such as the need to raise their children - they “cannot satisfy the obligation to separate.” In such cases, wrote John Paul II, the couple must "take on themselves the duty to live in complete continence, that is, by abstinence from the acts proper to married couples."

 

Pope Francis, however, while citing this sentence of Familiaris Consortio to show that the Church does acknowledge cases where separation may be impossible, leaves out the latter half of the sentence, which references the obligation to continence. In a footnote, Pope Francis then casts into doubt the wisdom of living in continence for such couples, suggesting that doing so could harm the couple’s relationship and children.  

 

“In such situations, many people, knowing and accepting the possibility of living ‘as brothers and sisters’ which the Church offers them, point out that if certain expressions of intimacy are lacking, ‘it often happens that faithfulness is endangered and the good of the children suffers.’” This footnote in turn cites the Second Vatican Council’s document, Gaudium et Spes - in particular a section that acknowledges the strain married couples face during periods of abstinence in the practice of natural family planning. However, Pope Francis’ usage of the quote applies it to those in irregular unions.

Pope Francis acknowledges that the pastoral approach he has outlined may be viewed by some as causing confusion, but suggests that this is a risk he is willing to take. "I understand those who prefer a more rigorous pastoral care which leaves no room for confusion," he writes. "But I sincerely believe that Jesus wants a Church attentive to the goodness which the Holy Spirit sows in the midst of human weakness, a Mother who, while clearly expressing her objective teaching, 'always does what good she can, even if in the process, her shoes get soiled by the mud of the street'.”

 

The pope’s decision today follows decades of pressure on the issue from progressives in the aftermath of Vatican II. In particular, it was a major point of discussion at the Synod on the Family that Pope John Paul II convened in 1980. It was in his exhortation following that Synod, Familiaris Consortio, that he firmly shut the door on the question, citing Scripture and the Church’s doctrine. His short paragraph on the issue still offers the most cogent and concise explanation for why the proposal is impossible. He wrote:

However, the Church reaffirms her practice, which is based upon Sacred Scripture, of not admitting to Eucharistic Communion divorced persons who have remarried. They are unable to be admitted thereto from the fact that their state and condition of life objectively contradict that union of love between Christ and the Church which is signified and effected by the Eucharist. Besides this, there is another special pastoral reason: if these people were admitted to the Eucharist, the faithful would be led into error and confusion regarding the Church's teaching about the indissolubility of marriage."

See here.


*  There is a famous hymn written by Martin Luther which begins, "A mighty fortress is our God, a bulwark never failing.." For all too many people today (including sadly, many Catholics and Francis himself) the conscience has become a "mighty fortress" built so as to shelter one from the exacting demands of truth. In the words of Joseph Cardinal Ratzinger, "In the Psalms we meet from time to time the prayer that God should free man from his hidden sins. The Psalmist sees as his greatest danger the fact that he no longer recognizes them as sins and thus falls into them in apparently good conscience. Not being able to have a guilty conscience is a sickness...And thus one cannot aprove the maxim that everyone may always do what his conscience allows him to do: In that case the person without a conscience would be permitted to do anything. In truth it is his fault that his conscience is so broken that he no longer sees what he as a man should see. In other words, included in the concept of conscience is an obligation, namely, the obligation to care for it, to form it and educate it. Conscience has a right to respect and obedience in the measure in which the person himself respects it and gives it the care which its dignity deserves. The right of conscience is the obligation of the formation of conscience. Just as we try to develop our use of language and we try to rule our use of rules, so must we also seek the true measure of conscience so that finally the inner word of conscience can arrive at its validity.

For us this means that the Church's magisterium bears the responsibility for correct formation. It makes an appeal, one can say, to the inner vibrations its word causes in the process of the maturing of conscience. It is thus an oversimplification to put a statement of the magisterium in opposition to conscience. In such a case I must ask myself much more. What is it in me that contradicts this word of the magisterium? Is it perhaps only my comfort? My obstinacy? Or is it an estrangement through some way of life that allows me something which the magisterium forbids and that appears to me to be better motivated or more suitable simply because society considers it reasonable? It is only in the context of this kind of struggle that the conscience can be trained, and the magisterium has the right to expect that the conscience will be open to it in a manner befitting the seriousness of the matter. If I believe that the Church has its origins in the Lord, then the teaching office in the Church has a right to expect that it, as it authentically develops, will be accepted as a priority factor in the formation of conscience." (Joseph Cardinal Ratzinger, Keynote Address of the Fourth Bishops' Workshop of the National Catholic Bioethics Center, on "Moral Theology Today: Certitudes and Doubts," February 1984).

In the same address, Cardinal Ratzinger explains that, "Conscience is understood by many as a sort of deification of subjectivity, a rock of bronze on which even the magisterium is shattered....Conscience appears finally as subjectivity raised to the ultimate standard."

A broken conscience, an ill-formed conscience, becomes a mighty fortress which shuts the truth out. Have we built an interior castle, as did St. Teresa of Avila, which remains open to the demands of truth and the promptings of the Holy Spirit? Or has our conscience become a mighty fortress built to prevent our encounter with truth? 

Francis is preparing the way for the Beast.  Where the Holy Spirit brings clarity and peace, the False Prophet brings confusion, disorientation and discord.

Make no mistake about it, Francis is proposing (and imposing) a radical interpretation of the role of conscience which directly contradicts the perennial Magisterial teaching of Holy Mother Church.


Soon, the Man of Sin will reveal himself openly.  As we approach the 100th anniversary of Our Lady of Fatima's apparitions (where the Queen of Heaven gave us the weapons for fighting against the Devil and his followers), the False Prophet - in a cruel and sick parody of the Baptist - prepares the way for the Man-god.

Pray.  Prepare the catacombs.  The New Church foretold by Venerable Emmerich, behold, is upon us.  Sin and evil will increasingly be justified and openly celebrated.
Suggested reading: Catechism of the Catholic Church Nos. 1783-1785.

 

 

Photo courtesy of TradCatKnight

 

 

Related reading here.

Pope Francis, the examen, and Bonny and Clyde

In his book entitled, "Rise, Let Us Be On Our Way," Pope John Paul II writes that: "By his manner of life, a bishop demonstrates that the Christ as "Model" lives on and still speaks to us today. One could say that a diocese reflects the manner of life of its bishop. His virtues - chastity, a spirit of poverty and prayer, simplicity, sensitivity of conscience - will, as it were, be written into the hearts of his priests. They, in their turn, will convey these values to the faithful entrusted to their care, and in this way young people can be led to make a generous response to Christ's call." (p. 129).

And on page 66 of the same book, the Holy Father explains that, "It is very important for a bishop to have a rapport with his people and to know how to relate to them well...Interest in others begins with the bishop's prayer life: his conversations with Christ, who entrusts 'His own' to him. Prayer prepares him for encounter with others."

And so, a Bishop should be a man of deep prayer. And that prayer should motivate him to be a good "paterfamilias" to the faithful who have been entrusted to him by the Lord Jesus. As the Holy Father explains, every individual diocese is a reflection of its Bishop's manner of life. If a diocese is in near constant turmoil, what would this indicate about the Bishop's "manner of life"? If children are sexually abused while a Bishop merely shuffles the abuser from one assignment to another, would this not indicate that something about the Bishop's "manner of life" is gravely wrong? If a diocese is plagued with dissidents and other malcontents who lay siege to various parishes while insisting that the Church's teaching must change or that the very structure of the Church must change, what would this indicate about its Bishop's "manner of life"?

To be sure, not everything negative which transpires in a diocese may be laid at its Bishop's doorstep. However, as the Holy Father makes abundantly clear, "The responsibilities that weigh on a bishop's shoulders are many." (p. 93). He cites St. Augustine's long sermon "On the Shepherds" writing that, "With reference to the Book of the Prophet Ezekiel, the bishop of Hippo strongly rebukes evil shepherds, who are concerned not for the sheep but only for themselves. 'Let us see how the word of God, that flatters no one, addresses the shepherds who are feeding themselves, not the sheep. You take the milk, you clothe yourselves with the wool, you slaughter the fatlings; but you do not feed my sheep. The weak you have not strengthened, the sick you have not healed, the crippled you have not bound up, the strayed you have not brought back, the lost you have not sought; any strong one you have killed; and My sheep are scattered because there is no shepherd.'" (pp. 63,64).

Indeed, the responsibility of a Bishop is a grave one. This is why the great Saint Augustine (Bishop and Doctor of the Church) said that his vocation as a Christian instilled him with "great hope" but that his vocation as Bishop instilled him with "great fear." It was Jesus, after all, who said that: "Much will be required of the person entrusted with much, and still more will be demanded of the person entrusted with more" (Luke 12: 48).

Could this be why the normally gentle Saint John Chrysostom has been quoted as having said that the road to Hell is paved with the skulls of Bishops?

Troubling words coming from a gentle saint who was known not only for his great eloquence (his last name translated as "golden-mouthed") but for his pacific spirit.

In a previous post, I noted how Bishop Johan Bonny is calling on the Church to recognize same-sex "marriage." Can it honestly be said that Bishop Bonny is presenting himself as a model of Christ to the faithful entrusted to his care?

The Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, in its document entitled Considerations Regarding Proposals to Give Legal Recognition to Unions Between Homosexual Persons, warns that even where homosexual unions have been legalized, "clear and emphatic opposition is a duty." (No. 5). This important document stresses that, "any kind of formal cooperation in the enactment or application of such gravely unjust laws" and even any "material cooperation on the level of their application" must be avoided. "In this area," states the document, "everyone can exercise the right to conscientious objection."

Considerations makes it abundantly clear that, "The Church teaches that respect for homosexual persons cannot lead in any way to approval of homosexual behavior or to considerations of homosexual unions." (No. 11). In other words, there can be no doubt that all Catholics have a moral duty to oppose the homosexual agenda.

Why hasn't Pope Francis thundered against Bishop Bonny and his insanity?  The Pontiff wants us to examine our conscience.  See here.

I call upon Christ's Vicar to set the example for the rest of us and to examine his own conscience, asking himself: "What, if anything, is my responsibility with regard to insisting upon the RIGHT OF THE FAITHFUL TO RECEIVE CATHOLIC DOCTRINE IN ITS PURITY AND INTEGRITY? (Veritatis Splendor, No. 113).

An orangutan cannot examine his conscience.  A Bishop, like any member of the Church, is called to the examen, both general and particular.  An orangutan cannot understand why homosexual acts are gravely sinful.  A Bishop is called to defend God's Revelation which condemns such acts as an abomination.

A Bishop is called to be something more than an orangutan.  Is that too much to ask from our hierarchy?

President Barack Obama elevates homosexual sex to the level of a "right" and a "fundamental freedom"

Ben Johnson over at LifeSiteNews is reporting that:

"President Barack Obama has elevated the right to have sex with a member of the same sex to the level of universal 'fundamental freedoms' in a new presidential statement criticizing Uganda. But critics say his promotion of homosexuality in a continent that overwhelmingly opposes that behavior amounts to a form of liberal 'cultural imperialism.'

Obama wrote on Sunday that he opposed a proposed bill in Uganda that would criminalize same-sex 'marriages' and impose life imprisonment for repeated homosexual acts, among other provisions, because 'as a country and a people, the United States has consistently stood for the protection of fundamental freedoms and universal human rights.'

Obama said the bill represents 'a serious setback for all those around the world who share a commitment to freedom, justice, and equal rights.'

He added that he had 'conveyed' the message that 'enacting this legislation will complicate our valued relationship with Uganda.'" Read full article here.

President Obama's notion of what constitutes "freedom" is gravely distorted.  Pope Leo XIII, in Libertas Humana, explains that: "Liberty, then, as We have said, belongs only to those who have the gift of reason or intelligence. Considered as to its nature, it is the faculty of choosing means fitted for the end proposed, for he is master of his actions who can choose one thing out of many. Now, since everything chosen as a means is viewed as good or useful, and since good, as such, is the proper object of our desire, it follows that freedom of choice is a property of the will, or, rather, is identical with the will in so far as it has in its action the faculty of choice. But the will cannot proceed to act until it is enlightened by the knowledge possessed by the intellect. In other words, the good wished by the will is necessarily good in so far as it is known by the intellect; and this the more, because in all voluntary acts choice is subsequent to a judgment upon the truth of the good presented, declaring to which good preference should be given. No sensible man can doubt that judgment is an act of reason, not of the will. The end, or object, both of the rational will and of its liberty is that good only which is in conformity with reason.

Since, however, both these faculties are imperfect, it is possible, as is often seen, that the reason should propose something which is not really good, but which has the appearance of good, and that the will should choose accordingly. For, as the possibility of error, and actual error, are defects of the mind and attest its imperfection, so the pursuit of what has a false appearance of good, though a proof of our freedom, just as a disease is a proof of our vitality, implies defect in human liberty. The will also, simply because of its dependence on the reason, no sooner desires anything contrary thereto than it abuses its freedom of choice and corrupts its very essence. Thus it is that the infinitely perfect God, although supremely free, because of the supremacy of His intellect and of His essential goodness, nevertheless cannot choose evil; neither can the angels and saints, who enjoy the beatific vision. St. Augustine and others urged most admirably against the Pelagians that, if the possibility of deflection from good belonged to the essence or perfection of liberty, then God, Jesus Christ, and the angels and saints, who have not this power, would have no liberty at all, or would have less liberty than man has in his state of pilgrimage and imperfection. This subject is often discussed by the Angelic Doctor in his demonstration that the possibility of sinning is not freedom, but slavery. It will suffice to quote his subtle commentary on the words of our Lord:    'Whosoever committeth sin is the slave of sin.'  'Everything,' he says, 'is that which belongs to it a naturally. When, therefore, it acts through a power outside itself, it does not act of itself, but through another, that is, as a slave. But man is by nature rational. When, therefore, he acts according to reason, he acts of himself and according to his free will; and this is liberty. Whereas, when he sins, he acts in opposition to reason, is moved by another, and is the victim of foreign misapprehensions. Therefore, `Whosoever committeth sin is the slave of sin.' Even the heathen philosophers clearly recognized this truth, especially they who held that the wise man alone is free; and by the term 'wise man' was meant, as is well known, the man trained to live in accordance with his nature, that is, in justice and virtue.

 

Such, then, being the condition of human liberty, it necessarily stands in need of light and strength to direct its actions to good and to restrain them from evil." (Nos. 5-7).

As human beings, we possess only contingent rights. Those which have been given to us by God. There can never be a "right" to choose that which is evil. And homosexual acts are evil.
When moral liberty is detached from Natural and Divine Law, it degenerates into license. Pope Leo XIII reminds us in his Encyclical Letter Libertas Humana that, "Liberty, the highest of natural endowments, being the portion only of intellectual or rational natures, confers on man this dignity - that he is 'in the hand of his counsel' and has power over his actions. But the manner in which such dignity is exercised is of the greatest moment, inasmuch as on the use that is made of liberty the highest good and the greatest evil alike depend. Man, indeed, is free to obey his reason, to seek moral good, and to strive unswervingly after his last end. Yet he is free also to turn aside to all other things; and, in pursuing the empty semblance of good, to disturb rightful order and to fall headlong into the destruction which he has voluntarily chosen...

Therefore, the nature of human liberty, however it be considered, whether in individuals or in society, whether in those who command or in those who obey, supposes the necessity of obedience to some supreme and eternal law, which is no other than the authority of God, commanding good and forbidding evil. And, so far from this most just authority of God over men diminishing, or even destroying their liberty, it protects and perfects it, for the real perfection of all creatures is found in the prosecution and attainment of their respective ends, but the supreme end to which human liberty must aspire is God."

President Obama is serving the Devil.  There is no sin in speaking the truth.  And this truth must be acknowledged by Christians who have not apostacized.

No disorderly tendency can have a right to citizenship in a person's thoughts

In its document entitled Letter to the Bishops of the Catholic Church on the Pastoral Care of Homosexual Persons, which was published on October 1, 1986, the Sacred Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith recalled the distinction between homosexual tendencies and homosexual practices: "Although the particular inclination of the homosexual person is not a sin, it is a more or less strong tendency ordered toward an intrinsic moral evil; and thus the inclination itself must be seen as an objective disorder."

Many interpret the Church's teaching as meaning that a homosexual person only sins if he or she actually engages in homosexual acts.  I have received comments at this Blog suggesting that only homosexual acts are sinful.  But this is not the Church's teaching.  Although the homosexual inclination itself is not a sin, still, the homosexual person sins if he or she makes a concession to this tendency in his or her mind.

It is Catholic doctrine that any disorderly tendency, and most especially toward a vice which is contrary to nature, cannot have a right to citizenship in a person's thoughts.  Recall the teaching of Our Lord Jesus in Matthew 5: 27, 28: "You have heard that it was said, 'You shall not commit adultery.'  But I say to you that every one who looks at a woman lustfully has already committed adultery with her in his heart."

This is why in the Confiteor [Latin: I confess], which is part of the Penitential Rite, one asks for forgiveness for thoughts, words and deeds.

We know as well that homosexual persons also sin when their external behavior expresses a homosexual tendency.  Which is why we read in Isaiah 3:9 that, 'Their very look bears witness against them; their sin like Sodom they vaunt, They hide it not.  Woe to them!  they deal out evil to themselves."  And in Deuteronomy 22:5 we read, "A woman shall not wear an article proper to a man, nor shall a man put on a woman's dress; for anyone who does such things is an abomination to the Lord, your God."

As I said in a previous post, the Cult of Softness continues to spread.

Is it time for Margaret Russell, editor of the "Catholic" Free Press, to resign?

Vatican II, in its Decree on the Media of Social Communication (Inter Mirifica), has this to say:

"The principle moral responsibility for the proper use of the media of social communication falls on newsmen, writers, actors, designers, producers, displayers, distributors, operators and sellers, as well as critic and all others who play any part in the production and transmission of mass presentations. It is quite evident what gravely important responsibilities they have in the present day when they are in a position to lead the human race to good or to evil by informing or arousing mankind.


Thus, they must adjust their economic, political or artistic and technical aspects so as never to oppose the common good. For the purpose of better achieving this goal, they are to be commended when they join professional associations, which-even under a code, if necessary, of sound moral practice-oblige their members to show respect for morality in the duties and tasks of their craft.

They ought always to be mindful, however, that a great many of their readers and audiences are young people, who need a press and entertainment that offer them decent amusement and cultural uplift. In addition, they should see to it that communications or presentations concerning religious matters are entrusted to worthy and experienced hands and are carried out with fitting reverence.

The public authority, in these matters, is bound by special responsibilities in view of the common good, to which these media are ordered. The same authority has, in virtue of its office, the duty of protecting and safeguarding true and just freedom of information, a freedom that is totally necessary for the welfare of contemporary society, especially when it is a question of freedom of the press. It ought also to encourage spiritual values, culture and the fine arts and guarantee the rights of those who wish to use the media. Moreover, public authority has the duty of helping those projects which, though they are certainly most beneficial for young people, cannot otherwise be undertaken.

Lastly, the same public authority, which legitimately concerns itself with the health of the citizenry, is obliged, through the promulgation and careful enforcement of laws, to exercise a fitting and careful watch lest grave damage befall public morals and the welfare of society through the base use of these media. Such vigilance in no wise restricts the freedom of individuals or groups, especially where there is a lack of adequate precaution on the part of those who are professionally engaged in using these media." (Nos 11-12).

And in No. 14, we read, ".....To instill a fully Christian spirit into readers, a truly Catholic press should be set up and encouraged. Such a press-whether immediately fostered and directed by ecclesiastical authorities or by Catholic laymen-should be edited with the clear purpose of forming, supporting and advancing public opinion in accord with natural law and Catholic teaching and precepts. It should disseminate and properly explain news concerning the life of the Church. Moreover, the faithful ought to be advised of the necessity both to spread and read the Catholic press to formulate Christian judgments for themselves on all events."

A Catholic press should be edited "with the clear purpose of forming, supporting and advancing public opinion in accord with natural law and Catholic teaching and precepts."  And this so that the Church's children may be "salt and light" to give "savor to the earth and brighten the world." (No. 24).  To this end, the same paragraph insists that "those who have charge of the media" must "strive to turn them solely to the good of society whose fate depends more and more on their proper use."

But time and again, The Catholic Free Press, official newspaper of the Diocese of Worcester, Massachusetts, has failed to live up to the demands of Inter Mirifica.  The newspaper has often given a place to dissent from Catholic teaching and precepts while promoting even those who advance New Age occultism.  See here and here and here and here for a few examples.

This is most unfortunate.  And an ongoing source of scandal to the faithful who possess a right to receive Catholic doctrine in its purity and integrity (Veritatis Splendor, No. 113).  The Catholic Free Press has done violence toward the faithful, assaulting that very right time and again with dissent from revealed truth and ideologies which are hardly consistent with Catholic teaching and precepts.  In the words of one Catholic layman, left as a comment at this Blog, "Dear Paul, I have written three letters over the past two years to complain to Bishop McManus about the 'Catholic-Free' Press giving print space to dissenting Catholics. I am glad to have discovered your blog. I am also glad I am not the only one who has noticed this trend. My courageous and faithful pastor has dumped the CFP from our parish.

I urge all faithfull men of the diocese to boycott CFP and dump into the trash this newspaper until Margaret Russell resigns and an independent editorial board can be set up so that anti-Catholic dissent cannot be surreptitiously published." - Michael F. Poulin.

I have received numerous other comments echoing this concern.

Perhaps it is time for  Margaret Russell to resign.  If she finds it too difficult to live up to the guidelines established by the Church and outlined in Inter Mirifica for the establishment and maintenance of a sound Catholic press, perhaps it is time for someone more qualified to fulfill the role of editor.

Constructing a New World Order Police State

The Fourth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution states that, "The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized."  But there are forces in this country which are striving to undermine these constitutional protections.

This past Thursday the Indiana Supreme Court ruled that citizens have no right to resist unlawful police entry into their homes.  Justice Steven David, writing for the court, said if a police officer wants to enter a home for any reason or no reason at all, a homeowner cannot do anything to block the officer's entry.  See here.

William Parker, in an article entitled "Your fourth amendment rights under attack by Obama, DOJ," writes:


There is no talk of 'the slippery slope' anymore, which so many people used as an argument against many policies enacted by the Bush administration. Yet, now more than ever, it seems the slippery slope has given way to the sheer drop from the cliffs of sanity. There are intentional actions already in progress to simply take from us the rights we have apparently taken for granted. The Dept. of Justice apparently believes that U.S. citizens do not enjoy a "reasonable expectation of privacy" with respect to cell phone use, and have been attempting to acquire the ability to simply demand user information from the cell phone companies without going through standard procedures to obtain a warrant for specific information on specific individuals for use in specific prosecutions. They are assaulting the fourth amendment in yet another case, asserting that "email over 181 days old should not be protected from warrantless search and seizure."

Where is the outrage? These are not things that are occurring as a consequence of, or as a by-product of, some other action being taken for some otherwise lofty purpose. The government means to take these freedoms, piece by piece, with the hopes that nobody will care until it's too late."  Full article here.

In his Encyclical Letter Centesimus Annus, Pope John Paul II warned us that, "....totalitarianism arises out of a denial of truth in the objective sense. If there is no transcendent truth, in obedience to which man achieves his full identity, then there is no sure principle for guaranteeing just relations between people. Their self-interest as a class, group or nation would inevitably set them in opposition to one another. If one does not acknowledge transcendent truth, then the force of power takes over, and each person tends to make full use of the means at his disposal in order to impose his own interests or his own opinion, with no regard for the rights of others. People are then respected only to the extent that they can be exploited for selfish ends. Thus, the root of modern totalitarianism is to be found in the denial of the transcendent dignity of the human person who, as the visible image of the invisible God, is therefore by his very nature the subject of rights which no one may violate — no individual, group, class, nation or State. Not even the majority of a social body may violate these rights, by going against the minority, by isolating, oppressing, or exploiting it, or by attempting to annihilate it.." (No. 44).

Two years ago I argued that the United States was in twilight.  It would appear that the darkness is now falling swiftly.  And where is all of this leading?

Another chilling development noted here.

Mr. Gerard Villemure of Goffstown, New Hampshire gets it right

Area Catholics are reacting to House Majority leader D.J. Bettencourt's highly inappropriate description of Bishop John McCormack as a "pedophile pimp."  In an article published in The Union Leader, Goffstown resident Gerard Villemure responded in a most beautiful way.  Mr. Villemure was quoted as having said, "...we know the Bishop has problems, but we have to be respectful of our priests and bishop..It was uncalled for.  It's too bad.  It hurts the Church...We are all human."

There is a man who is not far from the Kingdom of Heaven.  How easy it is to forget  the words of St. Augustine: interficere errorem, diligere errantem: kill the error, love the one who errs.  Put another way, hate the sin, love the sinner.  Judging by many of the horrific comments which accompany the Union Leader article, it would appear that far too many people have forgotten this maxim.

We expect much from our priests.  And much more from a Bishop of the House of God.  In a book entitled "God and the World: A Conversation with Peter Seewald," then Cardinal Ratzinger and now Pope Benedict XVI is asked a question by German journalist Seewald:

"If they [priests] have been called by Christ himself, why are there bad priests?  Why are there even bad bishops?  In the case of some of those he has chosen the Lord obviously seems to have made a mistake."

Cardinal Ratzinger's response:

"It certainly can happen that people slip through, as it were, without really having received a call.  But there are also 'failed callings,' that is, callings that are not truly lived out.  The strange thing is...God entrusts himself to such fragile vessels.  That he has taken such a horrible risk with the Church.  He has put himself into hands that betray him time and again.  And he has left us the opportunity of falling and of being corrupted, so that he still has to support the Church himself again and again through these very tools that have proved unsuitable.  It is a consolation, on the one hand, that the Lord is stronger than the sins of men, but, on the other hand, a great challenge for all those who have turned toward this calling and who believe they have received it to let it truly mature in fellowship with Christ." (p. 431).

This whole unfortunate affair could prove to be a teaching moment for the Church and the wider community.  For we all have to learn how to be more merciful: "They said to him, 'Teacher, this woman was caught in the very act of committing adultery.  Now in the law, Moses commanded us to stone such women.  So what do you say?'...Jesus bent down and began to write on the ground with his finger.  But when they continued asking him, he straightened up and said to them, 'Let the one among you who is without sin be the first to throw a stone at her." (John 8: 7).

We all know what happened.  Each and every person who had been holding up a stone to hurl at the woman who had been caught in adultery dropped their stone and left the woman alone with Jesus.  Doesn't Bishop McCormack deserve the same? 

It would be so easy to just distance ourselves from Bishop McCormack.  But such an approach would be wrong.  As Dr. Germain Grisez has said, "When the Church suffers from the shameful misdeeds of a leading member, no one should distance himself or herself from the shame by joining the company of scorners; rather, everyone should accept some share in the shame and work to heal the wound."