Israel prepares for famine

Israel is stocking up now on wheat in preparation for the coming famine. See here.

A ration of wheat will cost a day's pay...

"When he broke open the third seal, I heard the third living creature cry out, "Come forward." I looked, and there was a black horse, and its rider held a scale in his hand. I heard what seemed to be a voice in the midst of the four living creatures. It said, "A ration of wheat costs a day's pay,  and three rations of barley cost a day's pay. But do not damage the olive oil or the wine." (Revelation 6: 5,6).

Our Lady told Mother Anne of Jesus (at Quito, Ecuador) that, "..the Church will go through a dark night for lack of a Prelate and Father to watch over it with love, gentleness, strength and prudence, and numbers of priests will lose the spirit of God, thus placing their souls in great danger...Satan will take control of this earth through the fault of faithless men who, like a black cloud, will darken the clear sky of the republic consecrated to the Most Sacred Heart of my divine Son.  This republic, having allowed entry to all the vices, will have to undergo all sorts of chastisements: plagues, famine, war, apostasy, and the loss of souls without number.."

Don Bosco warned in a prophecy:

"Now Heaven's voice is addressed to the Shepherd of shepherds. You are now in conference with your advisors. The enemy of the good does not stand idle one moment. He studies and practices all his arts against you. He will sow discord among your consultors; he will raise up enemies amongst my children. The powers of the world will belch forth fire, and they would that the words be suffocated in the throats of the custodians of my law. That will not happen, they will do no harm but to themselves. You must hurry. If you cannot untie the knots, cut them. If you find yourself hard pressed, do not give up but continue until the head of the hydra of error is cut off. This stroke will make the world and Hell beneath it tremble, but the world will be safe and all the good will rejoice. Keep your consultors always with you, even if only two. Wherever you go, continue and bring to an end the work entrusted to you. The days fly by, your years will reach the destined number; but the great Queen will ever be your help, as in times past, so in the future She will always be the exceeding great fortress of the Church.

"Ah, but you, Italy, land of blessings! Who has steeped you in desolation! Blame not your enemies, but rather your friends. Can you not hear your children asking for the bread of faith and finding only those who smash it to pieces? What shall I do? I shall strike the shepherds, I shall disperse the flock, until those sitting on the throne of Moses search for good pastures and the flock listens attentively and is fed.

"Of the flock and over the shepherds My hand will weigh heavy. Famine, pestilence, and war will be such that mothers will have to cry on account of the blood of their sons and of their martyrs dead in a hostile country.

"And to you, Rome, what will happen! Ungrateful Rome, effeminate Rome, proud Rome! You have reached such a height that you search no further. You admire nothing else in your Sovereign except luxury, forgetting that you and your glory stands upon Golgotha. Now he is old, defenseless, and despoiled; and yet at his word, the word of one who was in bondage, the whole world trembles.

"Rome! To you I will come four times.

"The first time, I shall strike your lands and the inhabitants thereof.

"The second time, I shall bring the massacre and the slaughter even to your very walls. And will you not yet open your eyes?

"I shall come a third time and I shall beat down to the ground your defenses and the defenders, and at the command of the Father, the reign of terror, of dreadful fear, and of desolation shall enter into your city.

"But My wise men have now fled and My law is even now trampled underfoot. Therefore I will make a fourth visit. Woe to you if My law shall still be considered as empty words. There will be deceit and falsehood among both the learned and the ignorant. Your blood and that of your children will wash away your stains upon God's law. War, pestilence and famine are the rods to scourge men's pride and wickedness. O wealthy men, where is your glory now, your estates, your palaces? They are the rubble on the highways and byways.

"And your priests, why have you not run to "cry between the vestibule and the Altar," begging God to end these scourges? Why have you not, with the shield of faith, gone upon the housetops, into the homes, along the highways and byways, into every accessible corner to carry the seed of My word? Know you that this is the terrible two-edged sword that cuts down My enemies and breaks the Anger of God and of men?"

In our own time, the germ ideas of a one-world religion are already being sowed. And this false humanitarian religion will burst into poisonous flower when enough hearts have grown cold and have abandoned the true religion. As Jane Le Royer explained in prophecy: "When the time of the Antichrist is near, a false religion will appear which will be opposed to the unity of God and His Church. This will cause the greatest schism the world has ever known."

Cardinal Christoph Schonborn: Women deacons are an open question

The apostasy grows.

"Cardinal Christoph Schönborn has said that in his view, whether the Church could ordain women as deacons remains an 'open question.'

The Archbishop of Vienna was speaking Sept. 29 to 1700 delegates from parish councils and other bodies in St. Stephen's Cathedral. Reflecting that he recently had ordained 14 men to the permanent diaconate, he added, according to local news agency Kathpress, 'perhaps one day also female deacons.'"

In this he aligns himself with the destructive program of Modernists, warned of by St. Pius X in Pascendi: "There is no part of Catholic truth which they leave untouched, none they do not strive to corrupt.” 

Modernists who want to ordain women to the diaconate are not only engaging in heresy but will foment schism in the Church.  There is absolutely no basis whatsoever for considering this. 

Gerhard Ludwig Muller, Professor of Dogmatic Theology in Munich, explains in his scholarly work entitled "Priesthood and Diaconate" (Ignatius Press) that the consecration of deaconesses in the early Church was not an ordination of women to the diaconate.  He writes:

"The institutionalization of charitable services performed by widows in the Christian community, of the assistance rendered by women during baptismal ceremonies, and of liturgical functions in a convent of consecrated virgins is apparent from the beginning of the third century in the ecclesiastical  neologism: diaconissa/diacona.  For Koine Greek, unlike Latin, could not construct the female form of 'servant' by a change of ending, but could only indicate it with the feminine article (cf. Rom 16:1). Aside from that, we also encounter the title diaconissa (and, similarly, presbyterissa and episcopissa) as a designation for the wives of deacons - for example, in papal instructions or conciliar canons that admonish higher clerics to practice celibacy, in the sense of continence.

Although there are records of the liturgical installation of deaconesses dating back to the fourth century, one must not overlook the fact that the selfsame authors who testify to this practice also make clear that the consecration of deaconesses was not the ordination of women to the diaconal ministry; on the contrary, it was a question of a different ecclesiastical office.

To the early Church it was clear that, without prejudice to the various degrees of bishop, presbyter, and deacon, which assumed a definitive form in the transition to the postapostolic age, these ministries owe their existence to the historical initiative of the apostles and to the special presence of the Holy Spirit in the foundational phase of the Church; whereas the latter, so-called nonsacramental consecrations were introduced by ecclesiastical authorities and thus are not matters of divine law but only of Church law." (pp. 48-49).

The Catechism of the Catholic Church teaches clearly that: "Deacons share in Christ's mission and grace in a special way. The sacrament of Holy Orders marks them with an imprint ('character') which cannot be removed and which configures them to Christ, who made himself the 'deacon' or servant of all. Among other tasks, it is the task of deacons to assist the bishop and priests in the celebration of the divine mysteries, above all the Eucharist, in the distribution of Holy Communion, in assisting at and blessing marriages, in the proclamation of the Gospel and preaching, in presiding over funerals, and in dedicating themselves to the various ministries of charity." (CCC, 1570).

And again: "Since the Second Vatican Council the Latin Church has restored the diaconate 'as a proper and permanent rank of the hierarchy,' while the Churches of the East had always maintained it. This permanent diaconate, which can be conferred on married men, constitutes an important enrichment for the Church's mission. Indeed it is appropriate and useful that men who carry out a truly diaconal ministry in the Church, whether in its liturgical and pastoral life or whether in its social and charitable works, should 'be strengthened by the imposition of hands which has come down from the apostles. They would be more closely bound to the altar and their ministry would be made more fruitful through the sacramental grace of the diaconate.'" (CCC, 1571).

Women cannot receive Holy Orders. Period.  End of story.  The Sacrament of Holy Orders is conferred in the degrees of Bishop, Presbyter, and Deacon (See Lumen Gentium Nos. 18-29). Tradition in its entirety has always firmly held that all degrees of ordination are essentially rooted in one sacrament, as being a repraesentatio Christi capitis [a representation of Christ the Head].

The darkness spreads.

Francis the Divider..

Francis continues to divide the Catholic Church as this article makes clear. From the article:

"Father Thomas Weinandy, a former chief of staff for the U.S. bishops’ committee on doctrine, has accused Francis of causing 'theological anarchy.' Another group of bishops has warned Francis risks spreading 'a plague of divorce.' Last fall, more than 200 scholars and priests signed a letter accusing Francis of spreading heresy. 'This was not something I did lightly,' Father John Rice, a parish priest in Shaftesbury in the U.K. said, claiming the pope’s liberal push has caused 'much division and disagreement, and sadness and confusion in the church.'"

It should come as no surprise that dissent within the Church leads to polarization and undermines truth which is the principle of the Church’s communion. In its Instruction on the Ecclesial Vocation of the Theologian, No. 40, the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith said that, “The Church ‘is like a sacrament, a sign and instrument, that is, of communion with God and of unity among all men’ (LG, 1). Consequently, to pursue concord and communion is to enhance the force of her witness and credibility. To succumb to the temptation of dissent, on the other hand, is to allow the ‘leaven of infidelity to the Holy Spirit’ to start to work.”



Some will still object: "But even if people dissent from Church teaching, that's not our concern. Leave them to God. We shouldn't say anything for the sake of peace. They will come to the truth in God's time." 

What of this? Is this an authentic peace? Well, no. In the words of Pope John XXIII, who was an extremely good-natured and peacable Pontiff, a lover of peace, an authentic peace, "is not completely untroubled and serene; it is active, not calm and motionless. In short, this is a peace that is ever at war. It wars with every sort of error, including that which falsely wears the face of truth; it struggles against the enticements of vice, against those enemies of the soul, of whatever description, who can weaken, blemish, or destroy our innocence or Catholic faith." (Ad Petri cathedram, AAS, 51 (1959) 517, PE, 263.93).

Faithful Catholics must now oppose a heretic who is committed to destroying our Catholic faith. A deceiver whose word is worthless.


Related reading here.

The church of heresy, schism and scandal is going to make itself voluntarily the slave of the beast and the dragon which have conquered it

No serious Catholic can ignore the heterodoxy of Francis.  See here.

Church Militant is confirming that Pope Francis has officially approved the interpretation of Amoris Laetitia that opens Holy Communion to the divorced and civilly remarried in some instances, directly contradicting Canon 915 of the Code of Canon Law, arguably making this interpretation binding on the consciences of the faithful.

In a Papal Rescript granted on June 5, 2017 ex Audientia Sanctissimi to the Cardinal Secretary of State Pietro Parolin, and just now released by the Vatican in the Acta Apostolicae Sedis, the Holy Father has raised to the level of “authentic Magisterium” both the private letter he wrote on September 5, 2016 to Bp. Sergio Alfredo Fenoy, the Delegate of the Buenos Aires Pastoral Region of the Bishops’ Conference of Argentina, and the Criterios Basicos para la aplicación del capitulo VIII de Amoris laetitia (“Basic Criteria for the Application of Chapter VIII of Amoris Laetitia“), issued on the same day by the bishops of the Buenos Aires Pastoral Region.

Some are arguing that Pope Francis is using a “back door” in order to raise to the level of official teaching what his defenders had been describing as merely new “pastoral” discipline.Tweet

The directives of the Buenos Aires bishops caused controversy last year because it interpreted the pope’s apostolic exhortation to allow Holy Communion in certain cases to those in invalid unions who deliberately engage in sexual relations. In the Pope’s September 5 letter to the bishops, he praised their interpretation.

“The document is very good and completely explains the meaning of Chapter VIII of Amoris Laetitia,” he said, adding, “There are no other interpretations.”

According to experts whom Church Militant has consulted, the importance of the official decision of the Pope to elevate the referenced documents to the level of “authentic Magisterium” and order their publication in the Acta Apostolicae Sedis (the official register of the Holy See, a compendium of decrees, encyclicals, appointments and other official acts of the Holy See) cannot be underestimated. The issuance of the decision through Rescript form puts to rest any more discussion regarding the official and precise interpretation to be given by the episcopal hierarchy and faithful to Amoris Laetitia.

Church Militant’s unofficial English translation of the Rescript published in Latin states:

The Supreme Pontiff decrees that the two Documents that precede [this Rescript] are to be made known by publication on the Vatican website and in the Acta Apostolicae Sedis, as authentic Magisterium. From the Vatican Palace, on the 5th day of June in the year 2017. (emphasis added)

Pietro Cardinal Parolin
Secretary of State

The terms of art, “authentic Magisterium,” are especially referenced in canon 752 of the Code of Canon Law:

While the assent of faith is not required, a religious submission of intellect and will is to be given to any doctrine which either the Supreme Pontiff or the College of Bishops, exercising their authentic magisterium, declare upon a matter of faith or morals, even though they do not intend to proclaim that doctrine by definitive act. Christ’s faithful are therefore to ensure that they avoid whatever does not accord with that doctrine. (Code of Canon Law Annotated, 2nd ed. Midwest Theological Forum: Woodridge, 2004, p. 586) (emphasis added)

The use by the Supreme Pontiff of the terms “authentic Magisterium” has been qualified as “very troubling” by one expert whom Church Militant consulted regarding this breaking development, because such usage is primarily employed in strictly categorizing doctrines pertaining to faith or morals, not merely ecclesiastical discipline. Consequently, some are arguing that Pope Francis is using a “back door” in order to raise to the level of official teaching what his defenders had been describing as merely new “pastoral” discipline meant to “accompany” divorced and civilly remarried faithful in their “discernment” as to whether they can receive Holy Communion despite living more uxorio (as husband and wife).

_____________________________

It was Frere Francois de Marie des Anges, in his important work entitled "Fatima: Tragedy and Triumph," who warned that:

"The Apocalypse teaches us that the "false prophet" will act exteriorly as exercising authority in the name of God and in His service, whereas he will be in reality in the service of the Beast.  Our Father Superior comments:

The church of heresy, schism and scandal is going to make itself voluntarily the slave of the beast and the dragon which have conquered it

In order to bend souls and not only bodies under his domination and obtain their adoration, the political power instigated a religious power completely to his service, and thus the lamb is going to become the vehicle of error. , the spiritual animator of the empire of Satan.  He will use fire from Heaven, which is the Word of God, anathema, to disarm its enemies and conquer Christians.  Then the lamb will condemn what is holy and consecrate what is of the evil one.  Here we are at the most extreme point of the triumph of impiety, at the hour of the most complete victory of the mystery of iniquity....'" (Fatima: Tragedy and Triumph, p. 285).

Emma-Kate Symons: Advice from the Demon...stamp out the remnant!

From The Washington Post:


"Pope Francis needs to take tougher action against the United States’ most influential Catholic in Rome, Cardinal Raymond “Breitbart” Burke. The renegade cleric is not only undermining Francis’s reformist, compassionate papacy, and gospel teaching as it applies to refugees and Muslims, but the rebel prince of the church is also using his position within the walls of the Vatican to legitimize extremist forces that want to bring down Western liberal democracy, Stephen K. Bannon-style. Simply put, the Vatican is facing a political war between the modernizing Pope Francis and a conservative wing that wants to reassert white Christian dominance..."

In his Encyclical Letter Humanum Genus (on Freemasonry), Pope Leo XIII warned that: "Wickedly, also, but at the same time quite consistently, do those act who do away with the expectation of the joys of heaven, and bring down all happiness to the level of mortality, and, as it were, sink it in the earth. Of what We have said the following fact, astonishing not so much in itself as in its open expression, may serve as a confirmation. For, since generally no one is accustomed to obey crafty and clever men so submissively as those whose soul is weakened and broken down by the domination of the passions, there have been in the sect of the Freemasons some who have plainly determined and proposed that, artfully and of set purpose, the multitude should be satiated with a boundless license of vice, as, when this had been done, it would easily come under their power and authority for any acts of daring.


What refers to domestic life in the teaching of the naturalists is almost all contained in the following declarations: that marriage belongs to the genus of commercial contracts, which can rightly be revoked by the will of those who made them, and that the civil rulers of the State have power over the matrimonial bond; that in the education of youth nothing is to be taught in the matter of religion as of certain and fixed opinion; and each one must be left at liberty to follow, when he comes of age, whatever he may prefer. To these things the Freemasons fully assent; and not only assent, but have long endeavoured to make them into a law and institution. For in many countries, and those nominally Catholic, it is enacted that no marriages shall be considered lawful except those contracted by the civil rite; in other places the law permits divorce; and in others every effort is used to make it lawful as soon as may be. Thus, the time is quickly coming when marriages will be turned into another kind of contract-that is into changeable and uncertain unions which fancy may join together, and which the same when changed may disunite....With the greatest unanimity the sect of the Freemasons also endeavours to take to itself the education of youth. They think that they can easily mold to their opinions that soft and pliant age, and bend it whither they will; and that nothing can be more fitted than this to enable them to bring up the youth of the State after their own plan. Therefore, in the education and instruction of children they allow no share, either of teaching or of discipline, to the ministers of the Church; and in many places they have procured that the education of youth shall be exclusively in the hands of laymen, and that nothing which treats of the most important and most holy duties of men to God shall be introduced into the instructions on morals.

What, therefore, sect of the Freemasons is, and what course it pursues, appears sufficiently from the summary We have briefly given. Their chief dogmas are so greatly and manifestly at variance with reason that nothing can be more perverse. To wish to destroy the religion and the Church which God Himself has established, and whose perpetuity He insures by His protection, and to bring back after a lapse of eighteen centuries the manners and customs of the pagans, is signal folly and audacious impiety. Neither is it less horrible nor more tolerable that they should repudiate the benefits which Jesus Christ so mercifully obtained, not only for individuals, but also for the family and for civil society, benefits which, even according to the judgment and testimony of enemies of Christianity, are very great. In this insane and wicked endeavor we may almost see the implacable hatred and spirit of revenge with which Satan himself is inflamed against Jesus Christ.


So also the studious endeavour of the Freemasons to destroy the chief foundations of justice and honesty, and to co-operate with those who would wish, as if they were mere animals, to do what they please, tends only to the ignominious and disgraceful ruin of the human race. The evil, too, is increased by the dangers which threaten both domestic and civil society. As We have elsewhere shown, in marriage, according to the belief of almost every nation, there is something sacred and religious; and the law of God has determined that marriages shall not be dissolved. If they are deprived of their sacred character, and made dissoluble, trouble and confusion in the family will be the result, the wife being deprived of her dignity and the children left without protection as to their interests and well being.

To have in public matters no care for religion, and in the arrangement and administration of civil affairs to have no more regard for God than if He did not exist, is a rashness unknown to the very pagans; for in their heart and soul the notion of a divinity and the need of public religion were so firmly fixed that they would have thought it easier to have city without foundation than a city without God. Human society, indeed for which by nature we are formed, has been constituted by God the Author of nature; and from Him, as from their principle and source, flow in all their strength and permanence the countless benefits with which society abounds. As we are each of us admonished by the very voice of nature to worship God in piety and holiness, as the Giver unto us of life and of all that is good therein, so also and for the same reason, nations and States are bound to worship Him; and therefore it is clear that those who would absolve society from all religious duty act not only unjustly but also with ignorance and folly."

Most people today have become so desensitized that they are incapable of seeing just how far this masonic agenda has advanced. The movement to eradicate Christianity is accelerating. Masonry, if it is to prepare the way for the Man of Sin, must concentrate its attacks on the one institution which stands in its way: the Holy Roman Catholic Church. After more than two thousand years of Christian history, the charge levelled against Christians by the pagan historian Tacitus is being revived: The Christians are the enemies of the human race. (Annals, XV, 44).

The new humanitarian religion of Antichrist must institute its own cult, ministers and temples which will be filled with its own faithful who have replaced the hope for Heaven with the idols of humanity, fertility, maternity and virility as surely as the Greco-Romans worshiped the statues of Venus and Apollo. Already we are witnessing an increasing hatred for the Crucifix. As Romano Guardini warned so long ago: "One day the Antichrist will come: a human being who introduces an order of things in which rebellion against God will attain its ultimate power. He will be filled with enlightenment and strength. The ultimate aim of all aims will be to prove that existence witout Christ is possible - nay rather, that Christ is the enemy of existence, which can be fully realized only when all Christian values have been destroyed. His arguments will be so impressive, supported by means of such tremendous power - violent and diplomatic, material and intellectual - that to reject them will result in almost insurmountable scandal, and everyone whose eyes are not opened by grace will be lost. Then it will be clear what the Christian essence really is: that which stems not from the world, but from the heart of God; victory of grace over the world; redemption of the world, for her true essence is not to be found in herself, but in God, from whom she has received it. When God becomes all in all, the world will finally burst into flower."

Our Lady warned us on November 15, 1990 that, "The great trial has arrived for your Church.  Thse errors which have brought people to the loss of the true faith have continued to spread.  Many pastors have been neither attentive nor vigilant and have allowed many rapacious wolves, clothed as lambs, to insinuate themselves into the flock in order to bring disorder and destruction.  How great is your responsibility, O pastors of the holy Church of God!  You continue along the path of division from the Pope and of the rejection of his Magisterium; indeed, in a hidden way, there is in preparation a true schism which could soon become open and proclaimed.  And then, there will remain only a small faithful remnant, over which I will keep watch in the garden of my Immaculate Heart." (To Father Gobbi).

The schism Our Lady spoke of is indeed beginning to emerge.  A new humanitarian religion and a new Future Church are being constructed.  The new religion will be devoid of the supernatural.  It will be man-centered.  Men will decide for themselves what is moral and immoral.  They will build this new Church in their own image and likeness.  Those who still adhere to Christ and His teaching will be declared enemies of progress and the new Moloch State.

Only a confused soul, infested with demons, would describe Francis and his distorted teaching as "compassionate" while castigating Cardinal Burke and labelling him a "Fascist."

Emma-Kate Symons is in the grip of the Devil.

Pray for her!

Francis: Open to the possibility of "Women deaconesses."

Catholic Family News is reporting:


"After crippling moral theology, opening the door to Eucharistic sacrilege and undermining Catholic doctrine on Matrimony by means of the latest Synods and Amoris Laetitia, Francis now turns his sights to the possibility "woman deaconesses."

It's almost as if he lies awake at night thinking, "What can I disrupt next?"

In this he aligns himself with the destructive program of Modernists, warned of by St. Pius X in Pascendi: "There is no part of Catholic truth which they leave untouched, none they do not strive to corrupt.”

Francis has also learned, by means of Amoris Laetitia, that he can mangle Catholic doctrine and practice with virtually no resistance from the hierarchy, except for some 'careful' responses from a tiny handful of conservatives. He has good cause to believe there will be no organized opposition from prelates."

If Francis intends to ordain women to the diaconate, he is not only engaging in heresy but will foment schism in the Church.  There is absolutely no basis whatsoever for considering this.  Gerhard Ludwig Muller, Professor of Dogmatic Theology in Munich, explains in his scholarly work entitled "Priesthood and Diaconate" (Ignatius Press) that the consecration of deaconesses in the early Church was not an ordination of women to the diaconate.  He writes:

"The institutionalization of charitable services performed by widows in the Christian community, of the assistance rendered by women during baptismal ceremonies, and of liturgical functions in a convent of consecrated virgins is apparent from the beginning of the third century in the ecclesiastical  neologism: diaconissa/diacona.  For Koine Greek, unlike Latin, could not construct the female form of 'servant' by a change of ending, but could only indicate it with the feminine article (cf. Rom 16:1). Aside from that, we also encounter the title diaconissa (and, similarly, presbyterissa and episcopissa) as a designation for the wives of deacons - for example, in papal instructions or conciliar canons that admonish higher clerics to practice celibacy, in the sense of continence.

Although there are records of the liturgical installation of deaconesses dating back to the fourth century, one must not overlook the fact that the selfsame authors who testify to this practice also make clear that the consecration of deaconesses was not the ordination of women to the diaconal ministry; on the contrary, it was a question of a different ecclesiastical office.
To the early Church it was clear that, without prejudice to the various degrees of bishop, presbyter, and deacon, which assumed a definitive form in the transition to the postapostolic age, these ministries owe their existence to the historical initiative of the apostles and to the special presence of the Holy Spirit in the foundational phase of the Church; whereas the latter, so-called nonsacramental consecrations were introduced by ecclesiastical authorities and thus are not matters of divine law but only of Church law." (pp. 48-49).

The Catechism of the Catholic Church teaches clearly that: "Deacons share in Christ's mission and grace in a special way. The sacrament of Holy Orders marks them with an imprint ('character') which cannot be removed and which configures them to Christ, who made himself the 'deacon' or servant of all. Among other tasks, it is the task of deacons to assist the bishop and priests in the celebration of the divine mysteries, above all the Eucharist, in the distribution of Holy Communion, in assisting at and blessing marriages, in the proclamation of the Gospel and preaching, in presiding over funerals, and in dedicating themselves to the various ministries of charity." (CCC, 1570).

And again: "Since the Second Vatican Council the Latin Church has restored the diaconate 'as a proper and permanent rank of the hierarchy,' while the Churches of the East had always maintained it. This permanent diaconate, which can be conferred on married men, constitutes an important enrichment for the Church's mission. Indeed it is appropriate and useful that men who carry out a truly diaconal ministry in the Church, whether in its liturgical and pastoral life or whether in its social and charitable works, should 'be strengthened by the imposition of hands which has come down from the apostles. They would be more closely bound to the altar and their ministry would be made more fruitful through the sacramental grace of the diaconate.'" (CCC, 1571).

Women cannot receive Holy Orders.  Period.  End of story.  The Sacrament of Holy Orders is conferred in the degrees of Bishop, Presbyter, and Deacon (See Lumen Gentium Nos. 18-29). Tradition in its entirety has always firmly held that all degrees of ordination are essentially rooted in one sacrament, as being a repraesentatio Christi capitis [a representation of Christ the Head].

Related reading here.

"When the time of the Antichrist is near..."

Father Linus Clovis makes the point that,“Obedience is owed to the pope, but the pope owes obedience to the word and the apostolic tradition. We have to obey the pope, but the pope himself must obey the written word. He must obey the tradition. He must respond to the inspiration of the Holy Spirit. Obedience is owed to the pope, but it is the duty of the pope to give the character of possibility to this obedience. The pope has to facilitate our obeying him, by himself being obedient to the Word of God. Pope Felix III told us, ‘an error that is not resisted is approved. A truth that is not defended is suppressed.’ So we have an obligation to resist error, and we must do everything that we can to promote the truth.”  Father Clovis made this remark in response to the crisis in the Church and the role of Pope Francis in this crisis.  See here.

"The apostasy of the city of Rome from the vicar of Christ and its destruction by Antichrist may be thoughts very new to many Catholics, that I think it well to recite the text of theologians of greatest repute. First Malvenda, who writes expressly on the subject, states as the opinion of Ribera, Gaspar Melus, Biegas, Suarrez, Bellarmine and Bosius that Rome shall apostatize from the Faith, drive away the Vicar of Christ and return to its ancient paganism. ...Then the Church shall be scattered, driven into the wilderness, and shall be for a time, as it was in the beginning, invisible; hidden in catacombs, in dens, in mountains, in lurking places; for a time it shall be swept, as it were from the face of the earth. Such is the universal testimony of the Fathers of the early Church.”- Henry Edward Cardinal Manning, The Present Crisis of the Holy See, 1861, London: Burns and Lambert, pp. 88-90)

Cardinal Manning delivered a series of lectures in 1861 under the title “The Present Crises of the Holy See Tested by Prophecy” in which Manning he foresaw a future crises in the Roman Catholic Church initiated by a false ecumenism and progressivist theology that many orthodox Catholics have loathed following the Second Vatican Council. Manning believed that this progressivist current would undermine the authority of the Church and ultimately result in a departure from the true faith by the nations together with the displacement of the true pope by a false prophet, thus ushering in the Antichrist and global apostasy. Manning also believed secret societies like the Freemasons were part of this conspiracy. “The secret societies have long ago undermined and honeycombed the Christian society of Europe, and are at this moment struggling onward towards Rome, the center of all Christian order in the world,”he wrote. But when he looked at the prophecy in Revelation 18 concerning the end-time destruction of Mystery Babylon, Manning saw it was the hand of God in judgment of worldwide apostasy emanating from Rome:
"We read in the Book Apocalypse, of the city of Rome, that she said in the pride of her heart, “I sit as a queen, and am no widow, and sorrow I shall not see. Therefore shall her plagues come in one day: death, and mourning, and famine; and she shall be burned with fire, because God is strong who shall judge her.” Some of the greatest writers of the Church tell us that…the great City of Seven Hills…the city of Rome will probably become apostate…and that Rome will again be punished, for he will depart from it; and the judgment of God will fall…"

Manning explained how many of Catholicism’s greatest theologians agreed with this point of view:

"The apostasy of the city of Rome…and its destruction by Antichrist may be thoughts so new to many Catholics, that I think it well to recite the text of theologians, of greatest repute. First, Malvenda, who writes expressly on the subject, states as the opinion of Ribera, Gaspar Melus, Viegas, Suarez, Bellarmine, and Bosius, that Rome shall apostatize from the faith, drive away the Vicar of Christ, and return to its ancient paganism. Malvenda’s words are:
'But Rome itself in the last times of the world will return to its ancient idolatry, power, and imperial greatness. It will cast out its Pontiff, altogether apostatize from the Christian faith, terribly persecute the Church, shed the blood of martyrs more cruelly than ever, and will recover its former state of abundant wealth, or even greater than it had under its first rulers.'
Lessius says: 'In the time of Antichrist, Rome shall be destroyed, as we see openly from the thirteenth chapter of the Apocalypse;' and again: 'The woman whom thou sawest is the great city, which hath kingdom over the kings of the earth, in which is signified Rome in its impiety, such as it was in the time of St. John, and shall be again at the end of the world.'
 And Bellarmine: 'In the time of Antichrist, Rome shall be desolated and burnt, as we learn from the sixteenth verse of the seventeenth chapter of the Apocalypse.' On which words the Jesuit Erbermann comments as follows: 'We all confess with Bellarmine that the Roman people, a little before the end of the world, will return to paganism, and drive out the Roman Pontiff.'

 Viegas, on the eighteenth chapter of the Apocalypse says: 'Rome, in the last age of the world, after it has apostatized from the faith, will attain great power and splendor of wealth, and its sway will be widely spread throughout the world, and flourish greatly. Living in luxury and the abundance of all things, it will worship idols, and be steeped in all kinds of superstition, and will pay honor to false gods. And because of the vast effusion of the blood of martyrs which was shed under the emperors, God will most severely and justly avenge them, and it shall be utterly destroyed, and burned by a most terrible and afflicting conflagration.'"


 It was Saint John Bosco who prophesied, "And to you, Rome, what will happen! Ungrateful Rome, effeminate Rome, proud Rome! You have reached such a height that you search no further. You admire nothing else in your Sovereign except luxury, forgetting that you and your glory stands upon Golgotha. Now he is old, defenseless, and despoiled; and yet at his word, the word of one who was in bondage, the whole world trembles.

Rome! To you I will come four times.

The first time, I shall strike your lands and the inhabitants thereof.

The second time, I shall bring the massacre and the slaughter even to your very walls. And will you not yet open your eyes?

I shall come a third time and I shall beat down to the ground your defenses and the defenders, and at the command of the Father, the reign of terror, of dreadful fear, and of desolation shall enter into your city.

But My wise men have now fled and My law is even now trampled underfoot. Therefore I will make a fourth visit. Woe to you if My law shall still be considered as empty words. There will be deceit and falsehood among both the learned and the ignorant. Your blood and that of your children will wash away your stains upon God's law. War, pestilence and famine are the rods to scourge men's pride and wickedness. O wealthy men, where is your glory now, your estates, your palaces? They are the rubble on the highways and byways.

And your priests, why have you not run to 'cry between the vestibule and the Altar,' begging God to end these scourges? Why have you not, with the shield of faith, gone upon the housetops, into the homes, along the highways and byways, into every accessible corner to carry the seed of My word? Know you that this is the terrible two-edged sword that cuts down My enemies and breaks the Anger of God and of men?"
In our own time, the germ ideas of a one-world religion are already being sowed. And this false humanitarian religion will burst into poisonous flower when enough hearts have grown cold and have abandoned the true religion. As Jane Le Royer explained in prophecy: "When the time of the Antichrist is near, a false religion will appear which will be opposed to the unity of God and His Church. This will cause the greatest schism the world has ever known."

Can you not see the emerging signs? How do we find the Church today? The Mystical Body of the Crucified One - the Holy Catholic Church - is climbing Calvary, carrying a heavy cross. She is experiencing the hour of abandonment and betrayal. Her body is being tormented by the scourges of sin which strike at it and by numerous sacrileges which open up deep wounds in it. A Catholic priest in East Longmeadow, Massachusetts openly calls her "evil" just as the Pharisees suggested Our Lord was evil and demon possessed (Matthew 11:18; 12: 24). And his parishioners applaud.

Indeed, Our Lady told Father Gobbi,"The hour of Calvary has arrived for the Church, called to offer herself in holocaust and to be immolated on the cross of her bloody martyrdom. The hour of Calvary has arrived for this poor humanity, which is already beginning to live the painful hours of its chastisement..' (Rome, May 1, 1994).

But too many are proud. Their eyes blinded by sin and egoism. Like the Pharisees before them, they are incapable of reading the signs of the times because their spiritual eyes are closed. They cannot hear the Spirit because their ears are closed. They cannot feel the promptings of the Eucharistic Heart of Jesus because their hearts are closed. Such people cannot endure sound teaching but have itching ears and will continue to accumulate teachers who suit their own likings, teachers who will cater to their lusts by providing them with myths (2 Timothy 4: 3, 4).

And still so many of our shepherds remain silent like mute dogs. They have not begged God to end these scourges. They have not wept between the vestibule and the altar. They have not taken up the shield of faith to protect their flocks. Their judgment will be all the more severe, for God expects more from His ministers (Luke 12: 48).

Francis Effect.

Signs.....

Pope Benedict XVI has decided to resign.  See here.  On September 18, 1988, Our Lady revealed to Fr. Stefano Gobbi that, "there will come to completion that fullness of time beginning with La Salette all the way to my most recent and present apparitions; the purification will come to its culmination; there will come to completion the time of the great tribulation, foretold in Holy Scripture, before the Second Coming of Christ; the mystery of iniquity, prepared for by the ever-increasing spread of apostasy, will become manifest; all the secrets which I have revealed to some of my children will come to pass and all the events which have been foretold will take place."


The Papal Preacher has already noted that Antichrist may already be among us:

http://www.zenit.org/english/visualizza.phtml?sid=103757

And there are growing signs of open confrontation between the forces of Antichrist both outside and within the Church (ecclesiastical masonry) and the Catholic Church united with Rome - with the Holy Father and the Magisterium:

http://dtf-jayg.blogspot.com/2007/02/friend-of-court.html.

Sean Cardinal O'Malley has expressed his concerns over the increasing persecution of Christians in Canada:


http://www.lifesite.net/ldn/2007/mar/07030606.html.

And yet, many Catholics (and other Christians) are either blind as to what is occurring or refuse to see. On December 31, 1983, Our Lady told Fr. Gobbi that: "The signs the Lord sends are neither understood nor accepted; the dangers pointed out by 'my Pope' who courageously and anxiously is predicting the storm awaiting you, are not believed. The messages which I give, through simple and little souls chosen by me in every part of the world, are not taken into consideration. The appearances which I am still making, often in faraway and dangerous places, are ignored. And yet you are only inches from your ruin. When all will be shouting for peace, a new World War could suddenly fall upon you, spreading death and destruction everywhere."

Many reject the messages of Our Lady because they consider themselves "too sophisticated." Such souls have succumbed to the myth of "modern man," of "scientific man." For these individuals, Antichrist is a myth, a fairy-tale. They purposely ignore the fact that the rise of Antichrist is foretold in Sacred Scripture and was believed by all the Fathers of the Church.

It was Saint Augustine who said, "Daniel prophesies of the Last Judgment in such a way as to indicate that Antichrist shall first come, and to carry on his description to the eternal reign of the saints....But he who reads this passage, even half asleep, cannot fail to see that the kingdom of Antichrist shall fiercely, though for a short time, assail the Church before the last judgment of God shall introduce the eternal reign of saints. For it is patent from the context that the time, times, and half a time, means a year, and two years, and half a year, that is to say, three years and a half."

As the persecution intensifies, it is important to remember that while Satan is the Prince of this world and hates and seeks to destroy all that is of God, and will unleash a persecution through Antichrist which will be total, his time is short. Even now he awaits the heel which will crush his head. Even now he trembles in fear as the triumph of the Immaculata draws near. For Our Lady of Fatima has said it: "In the end, my Immaculate Heart will triumph."

Related reading here.

Times of diabolical disorientation...

300 Viennese priests are challenging the Church and sowing the seeds of rebellion.  CNS is reporting that "Michael Pruller, spokesman for Cardinal Christoph Schonborn of Vienna, said the cardinal plans to meet in late August or September with the Viennese priests who are among the leaders of the 'Initiative of Parish Priests,' which launched a 'Call to Disobedience' in June.

The initiative, which says it has just more than 300 members, suggested saying a public prayer at every Mass for church reform; giving Communion to everyone who approaches the altar in good faith, including divorced Catholics who have remarried without an annulment; allowing women to preach at Mass; and supporting the ordination of women and married men.

In a telephone interview from Vienna July 11, Pruller said that as far as he knew, the Austrian bishops have not discussed a common response to the priests.

'No bishop has threatened disciplinary actions, but at the end of the day if a priest leads his parish away from what the church teaches, action would have to be taken,' Pruller said.

The 'Call to Disobedience' said the priests felt forced to follow their consciences for the good of the church in Austria because the bishops have refused to act.

Cardinal Schonborn issued a statement June 22 and said he waited three days to respond because he did not want to react 'out of the anger and sorrow' the priests’ initiative caused him.

'The open call to disobedience shocked me,' he said.

The cardinal said none of the priests was ordained by force and all of them vowed obedience as they strive to do God’s will." (See here).

How quickly many of those who vowed obedience are succumbing to the Father of Lies.  On September 15, 1993, at Tokyo Japan, on the Feast of Our Lady of Sorrows, the Mother of God told Fr. Stefano Gobbi:


"Today I see you gathered here in this cenacle of prayer and brotherhood, beloved Sons of my Marian Movement of Priests of Japan, and I am consoled by you in my great sorrow.

A cause of my great sorrow is all of these poor children of mine who are still living immersed in the darkness of paganism and who are unaware of the truth of the Gospel. In this great country, almost all are still far from faith in Jesus Christ, who has come into the world to be your only Savior, your only Redeemer.

I am the Mother of all these pagans as well, a Mother who is concerned and anxious for their salvation. I nurture seeds of life and goodness in their hearts. I help them to observe that law which the Lord has engraved in the depths of each man. I stir up in their minds a desire for the truth, and thus lead them gently to the encounter with my Son Jesus. Their full and total adhesion to the Gospel will be an extraordinary work of my Immaculate Heart.

A cause of my great sorrow is my Church which, in every part of the world, is passing through the painful and bloody Gethsemane of its great tribulation. You have seen, my little son, how even here in Japan, the Church is being threatened with the loss of faith, and with the increasingly vast and subtle spread of errors. It is wounded in its unity by the contestation and opposition directed against the Pope and his universal Magisterium. Its holiness is being obscured by the spread of sins and sacrileges.

Thus it is becoming paralyzed and its drive to evangelize has become greatly weakened.

A cause of my great sorrow is the hardness of your hearts and your incapacity to accept what your heavenly Mother is asking of you. How many times have I spoken to you and you have not listened! I have given extraordinary signs of my motherly intervention and you have not believed. How many have closed the door of their own hearts and have not wanted to receive me as a Mother in their lives!

In this very country I have given you an extraordinary sign, causing copious tears to fall more than a hundred times from the eyes of one of my statues, in which I am represented as the Sorrowful Mother beneath the Cross of my Son Jesus. And I have also given you three messages to warn you of the great dangers into which you are running.

I now announce to you that the time of the great trial has come, because during these years all that I have foretold to you will come to pass. The apostasy and the great schism in the Church is on the point of taking place and the great chastisement, about which I foretold you in this place, is now at the very doors. Fire will come down from heaven and a great part of humanity will be destroyed. Those who will survive will envy the dead, because everywhere there will be desolation, death and ruin.

And so, once again I have wanted you here, my little son. For you must tell all that the hour of the chastisement has come and that, in order to be protected and saved, they must all enter right away into the safe refuge of my Immaculate Heart.

Return to your homes, my beloved children, and bring to all this message of mine, as a final call from your heavenly Mother, who is calling you all and gathering you under her mantle, that you may be consoled and defended by her, during the painful trial of these last times of yours."

Our Lady said eighteen years ago that the Apostasy and the great schism in the Church were "on the point of taking place."  And where do we find ourselves today?  Is there anyone now who honestly doubts that the Church is in crisis?  That the forces of darkness have multiplied everywhere?

But we have Our Lord's assurance that the gates of Hell will not prevail against His Church.  When everything seems lost, it is then that Our Lady will have her greatest triumph as she crushes Satan's head, the seat of his intellect.

The battlefield is primarily in the mind right now.  The Evil One is confusing so many souls who have given up on prayer or who put stock in their own intelligence rather than trusting in the Lord God and His infallible Church.

Pray every day.  Confess your sins.  Live a sacramental life.  Avoid those who will not stand with the Holy Father.  Do not lose hope.  St. Padre Pio told us to pray and not to worry.

"I saw how baleful would be the consequences of this false church..."

"Among the strangest things that I saw, were long processions of bishops. Their thoughts and utterances were made known to me through images issuing from their mouths. Their faults towards religion were shown by external deformities ... I saw what I believe to be nearly all the bishops of the world, but only a small number were perfectly sound. I also saw the Holy Father - God-fearing and prayerful. Nothing left to be desired in his appearance, but he was weakened by old age and by much suffering. His head was lolling from side to side, and it dropped onto his chest as if he was falling asleep ...Then I saw that everything pertaining to Protestantism was gradually gaining the upperhand, and the Catholic religion fell into complete decadence. Most priests were lured by the glittering but false knowledge of young school-teachers, and they all contributed to the work of destruction. In those days, Faith will fall very low, and it will be preserved in some places only, in a few cottages and in a few families which God has protected from disasters and wars....

As we came nearer, however, the fire abated and we saw the blackened building. We went through a number of magnificent rooms, and we finally reached the Pope. He was sitting in the dark and slept in a large arm chair. He was very ill and weak; he could no longer walk. The ecclesiastics in the inner circle looked insincere and lacking in zeal; I did not like them. I told the Pope of the bishops who are to be appointed soon. I told him also that he must not leave Rome. If he did so, it would be chaos. He thought that the evil was inevitable and he should leave in order to save many things beside himself. He was very much inclined to leave Rome, and he was insistently urged to do so....


I also saw the various regions of the earth. My Guide (Jesus) named Europe and pointing to a small and sandy region, He uttered these words: 'Here is Prussia (East Germany), the enemy.' Then He showed me another place, to the north, and He said: 'This is Moskva, the land of Moscow, bringing many evils'...


I saw also the relationship between two popes ... I saw how baleful would be the consequences of this false church. I saw it increase in size; heretics of every kind came into the city of Rome. The local clergy grew lukewarm, and I saw a great darkness...

I had another vision of the great tribulation. It seems to me that a concession was demanded from the clergy which could not be granted. I saw many older priests, especially one, who wept bitterly. A few younger ones were also weeping. But others, and the lukewarm among them, readily did what was demanded. It was as if people were splitting into two camps.

I saw that many pastors allowed themselves to be taken up with ideas that were dangerous to the Church. They were building a great, strange, and extravagant Church. Everyone was to be admitted in it in order to be united and have equal rights: Evangelicals, Catholics, sects of every description. Such was to be the new Church ... But God had other designs...

I saw again the strange big church that was being built there in Rome. There was nothing holy in it. I saw this just as I saw a movement led by Ecclesiastics to which contributed angels, saints, and other Christians. But there in the strange big church all the work was being done mechanically according to set rules and formulae. Everything was being done according to human reason ...I saw all sorts of people, things, doctrines, and opinions. There was something proud, presumptuous, and violent about it, and they seemed very successful. I did not see a single Angel nor a single saint helping in the work. But far away in the background, I saw the seat of the cruel people armed with spears, and I saw a laughing figure which said: 'Do build it as solid as you can; we will pull it to the ground'...

I saw again the new and odd-looking church which they were trying to build. There was nothing holy about it ... People were kneading bread in the crypt below ... but it would not rise, nor did they receive the body of our Lord, but only bread. Those who were in error, through no fault of their own, and who piously and ardently longed for the Body of Jesus were spiritually consoled, but not by their communion. Then my Guide (Jesus) said: 'This is Babel'...

I saw deplorable things: they were gambling, drinking, and talking in church; they were also courting women. All sorts of abominations were perpetrated there. Priests allowed everything and said Mass with much irreverence. I saw that few of them were still godly... All these things caused me much distress....

Then I saw an apparition of the Mother of God, and she said that the tribulation would be very great. She added that people must pray fervently with outstretched arms, be it only long enough to say three Our Fathers. This was the way her Son prayed for them on the Cross. They must rise at twelve at night, and pray in this manner; and they must keep coming to the Church. They must pray above all for the Church of Darkness to leave Rome... These were all good and devout people, and they did not know where help and guidance should be sought. There were no traitors and enemies among them, yet they were afraid of one another...

I saw more martyrs, not now but in the future ... I saw the secret sect relentlessly undermining the great Church. Near them I saw a horrible beast coming up from the sea. All over the world, good and devout people, especially the clergy, were harassed, oppressed, and put into prison... Whole Catholic communities were being oppressed, harassed, confined, and deprived of their freedom. I saw many churches closed down, great miseries everywhere, wars and bloodshed. A wild and ignorant mob took violent action. But it did not last long... " (Venerable Anne Catherine Emmerich, The Life and Revelations of Anne Catherine Emmerich).

More than ever faithful Catholics need to pray for the Holy Father and for those Bishops, priests and religious who remain faithful to the Magisterium. There is in preparation a schism the likes of which few can imagine. Ecclesiastical masonry seeks to build a counterfeit church within the true Church, one which is based on a humanitarian religion which will serve the Antichrist. Our Lady told Fr. Gobbi of the Marian Movement of Priests, "When there will have entered into her the man of iniquity, who will bring to fulfillment the abomination of desolation which will reach its climax in the horrible sacrilege, as the great apostasy will have spread everywhere, then my Immaculate Heart will gather together the little faithful remnant which, in suffering, in prayer and in hope, will await the return of my Son Jesus in glory." (May 13, 1994).