Does This Man Give Any Thought to His Particular Judgment?
by Thomas A. Droleskey
A provision version of this article was written on Wednesday evening, November 28, 2012, the Feast of Saint Catherine Laboure, into the first three hours of yesterday morning, Thursday, November 29, 2012, the Vigil of Saint Andrew and the Commemoration of Saint Saturninus, before sickness and the need for sleep overcame me and after I had concluded that it would be better to wait until I had read the text of Joseph Ratzinger/Benedict XVI's Jesus of Nazareth: The Infancy Narratives to make sure that the press reports upon which the provisional text of this article had been based had not been taken out of context. If anything, those press reports and the few excerpts released by the Occupy Vatican Movement do not even begin to give one any real idea of the quintessentially Modernist nature of this new book.
My mouth was agape when I opened the book after walking out of a Barnes and Noble Book Store late yesterday afternoon (I was surprised the find the following two nights ago at Barnes and Noble online: Meeting the Mets: A Quirky History of a Quirky Team) and found a a section of text in which the conciliar "pope" quoted his fellow Modernist, Jean "Cardinal" Danielou (I preferred Desilu to Danielou, thank you very much), who had served with him as a "peritus" (expert) during the "Second" Vatican Council, concerning the "historicity" of Three Kings having worshiped the Infant Jesus as follows:
At the end of this lengthy chapter, the question arises: how are to understand all this? Are we dealing with history that actually took place, or is it merely a theological meditation, presented under the guise of stories? In this regard, Jean Danielou rightly observes: "The adoration of the Magi, unlike the story of the annunciation [to Mary], does not touch upon any essential element of our faith. No foundation would be shaken if it were simply an invention of Matthew's based an on a theological idea" (from Danielou's The Infancy Narratives, p. 95.). Danielou himself, though, comes to the conclusion that we are dealing here with real historical events, whose theological significance was worked out by the Jewish-Christian community and by Matthew.
To put it simply I share this view. (Joseph Ratzinger/Benedict XVI, Jesus of Nazareth: The Infancy Narratives. Translated by Philip J. Whitmore and published by Image, an imprint of Crown Publishing Group, a division of Random House, 2012, p. 118.)
The man who is believed to be the true and legitimate Successor of Saint Peter by most Catholics alive today, Joseph Ratzinger/Benedict XVI, "shares" the view of Jean "Cardinal" Danielou, who, by the way, died while visiting a Parisian woman engaged in "professional" work in a house of ill-repute (on a mission, Paul The Sick's Vatican contended at the time in 1974, to provide "bail" money for one of the woman's "associates"), that "no foundation would be shaken if" the visit of the Three Kings to adore Our Blessed Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ "were simply an invention of" Saint Matthew's "based on a theological idea." Even though Ratzinger/Benedict stated shortly after this passage that Saint Matthew was "recording real history, theologically thought and theologically interpreted," which it itself is a mother lode of Modernism, the mere belief of the Epiphany of Our Lord to the Three Kings is not "fundamental" to the Catholic Faith is to make a mockery of Divine Revelation and is thus to blaspheme the very Third Person of the Most Blessed Trinity, God the Holy Ghost, under Whose inspiration ever word of Sacred Scripture was written. I will return to the contention that the Epiphany is not "fundamental" to our Holy Faith at the end of this commentary.
For the moment, however, what this passage near the end of Jesus of Nazareth: The Infancy Narratives demonstrates is that Joseph Ratzinger's view of Divine Revelation is thoroughly Modernist, believing that the Gospels were a collaborative effort on the part of the "Jewish-Christian" "community to look at what Ratzinger/Benedict calls in his book "real history, theologically thought through and interpreted" that "helps us to understand the mystery of Jesus more deeply" (cf. Joseph Ratzinger/Benedict XVI, Jesus of Nazareth: The Infancy Narratives, p. 119.)
"Thought through and interpreted"? This is the exact Modernist methodology that was excoriated very succinctly by my late seminary professor of Hermeneutics, Father William Heidt, O.S.B.:
"It is vital for the modernists and modernist Scripture scholars to
place the dating of the Gospels as late as possible. That way, you see,
the Modernists can claim that it was not the eyewitnesses of Our Lord's
Passion and Death who wrote the Gospels but the "Christian community of
believers at some later point who were merely reflecting on what Our
Lord might have said and done.
Ratzinger/Benedict is always looking for "sources" to "prove" the "historicity" of Sacred Scripture, which is, of course, the approach of Modernist agnosticism that was dissected and demolished by Pope Saint Pius X in Pascendi Dominici Gregis, September 8, 1907. Modernists such as Ratzinger/Benedict believe that there is a "necessity" to "reinterpret" and thus make "more relevant" to "our times," to make Our Lord "come alive" for "modern men." And thus you have this false "pontiff's" raison d'etre for writing everything he does, including this new book that places settled matters of Catholic tradition into question as he seeks "resolve" "problems" that exist only the minds of Modernist "exegetes" such as himself and his associates, including the Protestants he quotes at length in each of this new completed three volume series that misrepresents, distorts and deconstructs Divine Revelation yet again. He goes so far in his speculations and conclusions as to be a scandal even to some of the penultimate theological relativists, Protestants.
Scandalizing Even Some Evangelical and Fundamentalist Protestants With His Modernism While Many Catholics Get Confirmed In Falsehoods
Yes, yes, yes. Granted. Stipulated. Every Protestant is by nature a deconstructionist in that he rejects the Catholic Church as the sole repository of the Sacred Deposit of Faith and thus the sole and infallible explicator of all that is contained therein.
It is nevertheless true, though, that some evangelical and fundamentalist Protestants recoil with more horror than do many Catholics when a putative "pope" uses ambiguity when writing about the fact of the Resurrection of Our Blessed Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ and as He places doubt upon the fact that Saint Peter actually preached the discourse on the first Pentecost Sunday as recorded in the Acts of the Apostles. Joseph Ratzinger/Benedict XVI did precisely this in Volume 2 of Jesus of Nazareth: Holy Week: From the Entrance into Jerusalem to the Resurrection (see Coloring Everything He Says and Does, part one and Coloring Everything He Says and Does, part two).
Even though he should be busy at work actually governing what he thinks is the Catholic Church, especially by protecting the Sacred Deposit of Faith that he undermines consistently by his words and actions and by disciplining clerical predators and their "episcopal" enablers and Catholics in public life who support baby-killing and perversity, Ratzinger/Benedict did find time to complete that three volume series of books that contain his Modernist speculations about the life of Our Blessed Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ, doing little but to place into question, if not deny entirely in some instances, defined dogma and the always reliable teaching of Holy Mother Church's Fathers and Doctors. Ratzinger/Benedict has simply followed the "novelty" introduced by his predecessor, Karol Wojtyla/John Pau II, in writing books as a "private theologian" that do not reflect any "official" teaching on his part in his capacity as the putative Successor of Saint Peter.
The general public, including most Catholics, will never read Ratzinger/Benedict's newest work, Jesus of Nazareth: The Infancy Narratives, the work that completes his trilogy deconstructing the life and teaching of Our Blessed Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ. Many of them will, however, read the press reports about the book and conclude that no part of Catholic teaching is free from reexamination, something that gives them even more license than before to choose live as they want as they have every reasonable expectation that the "logic" of such instability and unpredictability of teaching will result one day in what they think is the Catholic Church's "official reconciliation" with divorce and remarriage absent even a conciliar decree of nullity, contraception and maybe even surgical baby-killing in some instances. All they have to do so is "wait things out," they believe, and the "Church will catch up to the world."
Far From A"Minor" Issue
Ratzinger/Benedict's book has drawn a great deal of press attention, much of it focusing on his statement that we do not know whether animals were present at the Nativity of Our Blessed Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ in Bethlehem because none were mentioned as being there in the Gospel according to Saint Luke. Although some might consider this to be but a "minor" point, it is actually quite significant as it is an exercise in Protestant rationalism that was practiced by the likes of the alleged Scripture scholar by the name of Father Raymond Brown, who said that it was impossible to prove the Virgin Birth of Our Lord as no such "proof" exists in the Infancy Narratives. In other words, the "exegete" must limit himself to the text without being concerned about how it has been explained by Holy Mother Church's Fathers and Doctors. Brown accepted the authority of Church teaching, saying only that the Scriptures do not "prove" that teaching.
Casting doubt on the reliability of Sacred Scripture, which was, after all, written under the inspiration of the very Third Person of the Most Blessed Trinity, God the Holy Ghost, Modernists have sought to use what is called the "historical-critical method (understanding the text in light of the historical circumstances in which it was written, which is really the same thing as Ratzinger/Benedict's "hermeneutic of continuity" and Wojtyla/John Paul II's "living tradition" that has been discussed ad infinitum, ad nauseam on this site)
to "discover" the "true" meaning of various passages of Sacred Writ, meaning, of course, that those old "fogies" (the Fathers and the Doctors and the fathers of the Church's twenty general councils) simply lacked the intellectual tools or had lived before the advent of modern archeological research and the "deeper" understanding brought about by various linguistic studies and the "insights" of various heretics and schismatics.
Joseph Ratzinger/Benedict XVI's entire priestly life has been dedicated to the rewriting of Catholic doctrine and history. This is what Modernists are compelled to do. Who says so? Well, let's try Pope Saint Pius X in Pascendi Dominici Gregis, September 8, 1907:
Then the philosopher must come in again to enjoin upon the historian the
obligation of following in all his studies the precepts and laws of evolution.
It is next for the historian to scrutinize his documents once more, to examine
carefully the circumstances and conditions affecting the Church during the
different periods, the conserving force she has put forth, the needs both
internal and external that have stimulated her to progress, the obstacles she
has had to encounter, in a word, everything that helps to determine the manner
in which the laws of evolution have been fulfilled in her. This done, he
finishes his work by drawing up a history of the development in its broad lines.
The critic follows and fits in the rest of the documents. He sets himself to
write. The history is finished. Now We ask here: Who is the author of this
history? The historian? The critic? Assuredly neither of these but the
philosopher. From beginning to end everything in it is a priori, and an
apriorism that reeks of heresy. These men are certainly to be pitied, of whom
the Apostle might well say: "They became vain in their thoughts...professing
themselves to be wise, they became fools.''18 At the same time, they excite
resentment when they accuse the Church of arranging and confusing the texts
after her own fashion, and for the needs of her cause. In this they are accusing
the Church of something for which their own conscience plainly reproaches them.
34. The result of this dismembering of the records, and this partition of
them throughout the centuries is naturally that the Scriptures can no longer be
attributed to the authors whose names they bear. The Modernists have no
hesitation in affirming generally that these books, and especially the
Pentateuch and the first three Gospels, have been gradually formed from a
primitive brief narration, by additions, by interpolations of theological or
allegorical interpretations, or parts introduced only for the purpose of joining
different passages together. This means, to put it briefly and clearly, that in
the Sacred Books we must admit a vital evolution, springing from and
corresponding with the evolution of faith. The traces of this evolution, they
tell us, are so visible in the books that one might almost write a history of
it. Indeed, this history they actually do write, and with such an easy assurance
that one might believe them to have seen with their own eyes the writers at work
through the ages amplifying the Sacred Books. To aid them in this they call to
their assistance that branch of criticism which they call textual, and labor to
show that such a fact or such a phrase is not in its right place, adducing other
arguments of the same kind. They seem, in fact, to have constructed for
themselves certain types of narration and discourses, upon which they base their
assured verdict as to whether a thing is or is not out of place. Let him who can
judge how far they are qualified in this way to make such distinctions. To hear
them descant of their works on the Sacred Books, in which they have been able to
discover so much that is defective, one would imagine that before them nobody
ever even turned over the pages of Scripture. The truth is that a whole
multitude of Doctors, far superior to them in genius, in erudition, in sanctity,
have sifted the Sacred Books in every way, and so far from finding in them
anything blameworthy have thanked God more and more heartily the more deeply
they have gone into them, for His divine bounty in having vouchsafed to speak
thus to men. Unfortunately. these great Doctors did not enjoy the same aids to
study that are possessed by the Modernists for they did not have for their rule
and guide a philosophy borrowed from the negation of God, and a criterion which
consists of themselves. (Pope Saint Pius X, Pascendi Dominci Gregis, September 8, 1907.)
This is a precise, exact dissection of the method used by Joseph Ratzinger/Benedict XVI in part three of Jesus of Nazareth: Holy Week: The Infancy Narratives. The false "pontiff" feels free to wipe out almost the entirety of the Catholic past with a mere wave of "papal" hand as he makes advertence yet again to what he thinks is a "bullet proof" shield by saying anyone is free to criticize his theological ruminations in his "unofficial" works. What this "unofficial" work demonstrates, however, is the grip that Modernism and its offspring, the "New Theology," have on his mind. The man believes that he is free to reinterpret Sacred Scripture in the manner of a Protestant. He believes that he is free to ignore or to misrepresent the solemn teachings of the Fathers and the Doctors of Holy Mother Church. He believes that everything about the Faith is open to re-examination and re-interpretation. He is one of mind with the Orthodox and Protestants in seeking a "purer" understanding of Sacred Scripture than was accorded us through the "rigidity" of the Scholasticism of Saint Thomas Aquinas.
Thus it is that the false "pontiff" wrote in Jesus of Nazareth: The Infancy Narratives that the belief of the presence of barn animals at the Nativity of the Christ Child was merely a desire on the part of some Christian iconographers to symbolically express the fulfillment of a prophecy of Isaias on the part Christian iconographers as no account of their presence has been provided for us by Saint Luke in his Gospel. Here is the full text of the passage that has attracted so much press attention.
Mary wrapped the child in swaddling clothes. Without yielding to sentimentality, we may imagine with what great love Mary approached her hour and prepared for the birth of her child. Iconographic tradition has theologically interpreted the manger and the swaddling cloths in terms of the theology of the Fathers. The child stiffly wrapped in bandages is seen as prefiguring the hour of his death: from the outset, he is the sacrificial victim, as we shall see more closely when we examine the reference to the first-born. The manger, then, was seen as a kind of altar.
Augustine drew the meaning of the manger using an idea that at first seems almost shocking, but on closer examination contains a profound truth. The manger is the place where animals find their food. But now, lying in the manger, is he who called himself the true bread come down from heaven, the true nourishment that we need in order to be fully ourselves. This is the good that give us true life, eternal life. Thus the manger becomes a reference to the table of God, to which we are invited to receive the bread of God. From the poverty of Jesus' birth emerges the miracle in which man's redemption is mysteriously accomplished.
The manger, as we have seen, indicates animals, who come to it for their food. In the Gospel there is no reference to animals at this point. But prayerful reflection, reading Old and New Testaments in light of one another, filled this lacuna at a very early stage by pointing to Is.1: 3. "The ox knows its owner, and the ass it master's crib; but Israel does not know, my people do not understand."
Peter Stuhlmacher points out that the Greek version of Hab. 3:2 [Habucuc] may well have contributed here: "In the midst of two living creatures you will be recognized . . . when the time has come, you will appear" (cf. Die Geburt des Immanuel, p. 52.) The two living creatures would appear to refer the two cherubs on the mercy-seat of the Ark of the Covenant (cf. Ex 25:18-20), who both reveal and conceal the mysterious presence of God. So the manger has in some sense become the Ark of the Covenant, in which God is mysteriously hidden among men, and before which time has come for "ox and ass"--humanity made up of Jews and Gentiles--to acknowledge God.
Through this remarkable condition of Is. 1:3, Hab. 3:2, Ex. 25:18-20 and the manger, the two animals now appear as an image of a hitherto blind humanity which now, before the child, before God's humble self-manifestation in the stable, has learned to recognize him, and in the lowliness of his birth receives the revelation that now teaches all people to see. Christian iconography adopted this motif at an early stage. No representation of a crib is complete without the ox an the ass. (Joseph Ratzinger/Benedict XVI, Jesus of Nazareth: The Infancy Narratives, pp. 68-69.)
What is remarkable about all of this is that Ratzinger/Benedict presents as a possibly "shocking" idea what has been taught by the Fathers and the Doctors and numerous Catholic priest-scholars who have written books about the life of Our Blessed Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ concerning the symbolic significance of the manger and of the swaddling cloths and of animals whose presence is not mentioned in Chapter Two of the Gospel according to Saint Luke. These are not "new" thoughts. Similarly, his discussion that the monk Dionysius Exiguus (Dennis the Small) made a mistake when calculating the year of Our Lord's Nativity is nothing new at all. My word, this contention was made long ago now. To the master of "originality," however, Ratzinger/Benedict is compelled to demonstrate that he has been able to "synthesize" what only a few feeble minds before him have grasped.
Yawn.
Perhaps most egregiously of all in this passage is Ratzinger/Benedict's contention that we receive Our Blessed Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ in Holy Communion in order to be "fully ourselves." Fully ourselves? This is the principal effect of the worthy reception of Holy Communion?
Ratzinger/Benedict is relentless in dropping his little bits of poison into sentences that are commingled with elements of Catholic truth.
Sure, Ratzinger/Benedict referred to Saint Augustine (he seems unwilling to refer to the canonized as saints, perhaps so as not to offend the sense of "scholarship" acceptable to his Protestant peers and collaborators). He also relied upon a Lutheran theologian, Peter Stuhlmacher, to provide "insights" about the not very shocking connection between the pertinent passages in the Books of Isaias and Habacuc. Holy Mother Church is in need of no "insights" from Protestants to "understand" any part of Divine Revelation, whether contained in Sacred Tradition or Sacred Scripture.
Even though the false "pope" says that every "crib scene" should include an "ox and ass," he clearly does not believe that such animals, to say nothing of the presence of the very donkey who carried Our Lady and the Unborn Baby Jesus from Nazareth to Bethlehem, were present at Our Lord's Nativity. To be so dismissive of the belief, held from time immemorial, that the Newborn Babe, Christ the King, was warmed by the breath of the barn animals that were fed from the very feeding trough that was the manger into which He was placed is to undermine the wonderful imagery of the dumb beasts who, no matter their admittedly symbolic representation, did indeed worship to their Creator at His Holy Nativity in Bethlehem, the City of David, the City of the House of Bread wherein was born for us the true Bread of Life come down from Heaven to save us on the wood of the Holy Cross and to be our very supersubstantial food unto eternity. (Ratzinger exerts a good deal of effort in his book to demonstrate that the "sources" prove that Our Lord was born in Bethlehem, something that no believing Catholic scholar contests. This is not one of the burning questions that keep believing Catholics from sleeping at night.)
Not everything about the Catholic Faith is written down. To dismiss traditions that have been handed down because there is no Scriptural "proof" for them is to undermine the Faith of Catholics and to scandalize even Protestants in many instances. And to disparage the presence of barn animals in a cave where they would be living is make to light of the actual, physical fulfillment prophecy of Isaias, referred to by Ratzinger/Benedict in his new book, that the donkey would indeed worship his Creator at the crib:
[3] The ox knoweth his owner, and the ass his master's crib: but Israel hath not known me, and my people hath not understood. [4] Woe to the sinful nation, a people laden with iniquity, a wicked seed,
ungracious children: they have forsaken the Lord, they have blasphemed
the Holy One of Israel, they are gone away backwards. [5] For what shall I strike you any more, you that increase transgression? the whole head is sick, and the whole heart is sad. (Isaias 1: 3-5.)
A rationalist such as Ratzinger/Benedict cannot believe in the actual, physical fulfillments of Old Testament prophecies unless the "sources" can "prove" that they took place.
Although some rationalists even in fully traditional Catholic circles disparage the reliability of Mary of Agreda's Mystical City of God because it is part of private revelation and thus not binding upon Catholics to believe, I, for one, think that Our Lady, gave the following account to her chosen soul in order to provide us with a ready antitdote to Ratzinger/Benedict's rationalism that leads him to discount the miraculous, including what he believes is the "undocumented" presence of the barn animals at Our Lord's Nativity in Bethlehem:
When Saint Joseph
had begun to adore the Child, the most prudent Mother asked leave of her Son to arise (for until then She had remained on her knees) and, while saint Joseph handed Her the wrappings and swaddling-clothes, which She had brought, She clothed Him with incomparable reverence, devotion and tenderness. Having thus swathed and clothed Him, his Mother, with heavenly wisdom, laid Him in the crib, as related by Saint Luke (Luke 2, 7). For this purpose She had arranged some straw and hay upon a stone in order to prepare for the God-Man his first resting-place upon earth next to that which He had found in her arms. According to divine ordainment an ox from the neighboring fields ran up in great haste and, entering the cave, joined the beast of burden brought by the Queen. The blessed Mother commanded them, with what show of reverence was possible to them to acknowledge and adore their Creator. The humble animals obeyed their Mistress and prostrated themselves before the Child, warming Him with their breath and rendering Him the service refused by men. And thus the God made man was placed between two animals, wrapped in swaddling-clothes and wonderfully fulfilling the prophecy, that "the ox knoweth his owner, and the ass his master's crib; but Israel hath not known me, and my people hath not understood." (Venerable Mary of Agreda, The Mystical City of God, Book II: The Incarnation, page 408.)
486. My daughter, if men would keep their heart disengaged and if they would rightly and worthily consider this great sacrament of the kindness of the Most High towards men, it would be a powerful means of conducting them in the pathway of life and subjecting them to the love of their Creator and Redeemer. For as men are capable of reasoning, if they would only make use of their freedom to treat this sacrament with the reverence due to its greatness, who would be so hardened as not to be moved to tenderness at the sight of their God become man, humiliated in poverty, despised, unknown, entering the world in a cave, lying in a manger surrounded by brute animals, protected only by a poverty-stricken Mother, and cast off by the foolish arrogance of the world? Who will dare to love the vanity and pride, which was openly abhorred and condemned by the Creator of heaven and earth in his conduct? No one can
despise the humility, poverty and indigence, which the
Lord loved and chose for Himself as the very means of teaching the way of eternal life. Few there are, who stop
to consider this truth and example: and on account of
this vile ingratitude only the few will reap the fruit of these great sacraments.
487. But if the condescension of my most holy Son was so great as to bestow so liberally upon thee his light and knowledge concerning these vast blessings, ponder well how much thou art bound to co-operate with this light. In order that thou mayest correspond to this obligation, I remind and exhort thee to forget all that is of earth and lose it out of thy sight; that thou seek nothing, or engage thyself with nothing except what can help thee to withdraw and detach thee from the world and its inhabitants; so that, with a heart freed from all terrestrial affection, thou dispose thyself to celebrate in it the mysteries of the poverty, humility and divine love of the incarnate God. Learn from my example the reverence, fear and respect, with which thou must treat Him, remembering how I acted, when I held Him in my arms; follow my example, whenever thou receivest Him in thy heart in the venerable sacrament of the holy Eucharist, wherein is contained the same God-Man, who was born of my womb. In this holy Sacrament thou receivest Him and possessest Him just as really, and He remains in thee just as actually, as I possessed Him and conversed with Him, although in another manner.
488. I desire that thou go even to extremes in this holy reverence and fear; and I wish that thou take notice and be convinced, that in entering into thy heart in the holy Sacrament, thy God exhorts thee in the same words, which thou hast recorded as spoken to me : become like unto Me. His coming down from heaven onto the earth, his being born in humility and poverty, his living and dying in it, giving such rare example of the contempt of the world and its deceits; the knowledge, which thou hast received concerning his conduct and which thou hast penetrated so deeply by divine intelligence: all these things should be for thee like living voices, which thou must heed and inscribe into the interior of thy heart. These privileges have all been granted to thee in order that thou discreetly use the common blessings to their fullest extent, and in order that thou mayest understand, how thankful thou must be to my most holy Son and Lord, and how thou shouldst strive to make as great a return for his goodness, as if He had come from heaven to redeem thee alone and as if He had instituted all his wonders and doctrines in the holy Church for none else than thee (Gal. 7, 20). (Venerable Mary of Agreda, The Mystical City of God, Book II: The Incarnation, pp. 408-410.
I don't know about you. However, I am with this account, not with Ratzinger/Benedict's rationalism.
Our Blessed Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ condescended to be born in anonymity and humility in the midst of the very presence of the barn animals, whose stench was quite noticeable, as He was placed in the wood of their feeding trough to be warmed by their very breaths, a foreshadowing of the coldness He would feel atop the stench of the dung heap known as Golgotha as our sins affixed Him to the wood of the Holy Cross on Good Friday.
The false "pontiff" believes that there should be an "ox and an ass" included in Nativity scenes (what about the donkey?) because of symbolism, not because they were there. He cannot "know" that they were there and thus believes only in the symbolism. As my dear wife Sharon note when reading this article after I had printed up for her, "Ratzinger only has to bring the ox to his Nativity scene." Remember, Sharon was born of the Feast of Saint Jerome, who used rather blunt language to denounce those who dared to promote heresies and errors (see Putting Love of God Above All Else.)
Yet it is that Alessandro Speciale, a correspondent for the Religion News Service, observed:
"The pope is a traditional man and he doesn't want people at all to change their traditions." (Fake, Phony, Fraud Claimant to Papacy's book on Jesus challenges Christmas tradition.)
If the "pope" is so "traditional," why, Signore Speciale, did he even comment on Saint Luke's not referring to the barn animals in Chapter Two of his Gospel? Why bring this up? Why not enrich the Faith of Catholics and non-Catholics alike by drawing from the richness of what has been handed down to us about the Nativity of Our Blessed Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ over the centuries?
Furthermore, Signore Specialize, what part of Catholic tradition involves esteeming the symbols of false religions, giving "joint blessings" with the non-ordained clergy of false religions, encouraging Catholics to engage in inter-religious "prayer" and calling false places of worship as "sacred"? This Alessandro Speciale is comedian, not an astute observer of the Modernist mind of a man who has dedicated to "tearing down the bastions" of the Catholic Faith in order to do what some say he does in the current volume, to provide "new and unexpected" "insights" into the Infancy Narratives. In other words, Ratzinger/Benedict is a Gnostic to whom has been given "secret" information" that makes him capable of writing with "originality," something that was denied to the true popes of the Catholic Church.
Little by little, you see, Ratzinger/Benedict tampers with even the slightest details of what has been handed down to us over the course of nearly two millennia now.
The Genealogy of Our Blessed Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ Undermined By Ambiguity, If Not Denied By Implication By Omission
Another aspect of Jesus of Nazareth: The Infancy Narratives revolves around the false "pope's" discussion of the genealogy of Our Blessed Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ from the line King David:
Both the genealogy and the history that it recounts are largely structured around the figure of David, the king to whom the promise of an eternal kingdom had been given: "Your throne shall be established for ever" (2 Sam. 7:16). The genealogy that Matthew puts before us is steeped in this promise. It is constructed in three sets of fourteen generations, at first rising from Abraham to David, then descending from Solomon to the Babylonian captivity, and then risen again to Jesus, to whom the promise comes to fulfillment. The king who is to last for ever now appears--looking quite different, though, from what the Davidic model might have led one to expect.
The threefold division becomes even clearer if we bear in mind that the Hebrew letters of the name "David" add up to fourteen" even in terms of symbolism, then, the path from Abraham to Jesus bears the clear imprint of the David, his name and his promise. On this basis one could say that the genealogy, with its three sets of fourteen generations, is true a Gospel of Christ the King: the whole of history looks toward him whose throne is to endure forever.
Matthew's genealogy traces the male line, but in the course of it, prior to Mary who appears at the end, four women are mentioned by name: Tamar, Ruth, and the wife of Uriah. Why do these women appear in the genealogy? By what criterion are they chosen?
It has been said that all four women were sinners. So their inclusion here would serve to indicate that Jesus took upon himself their sins--and with them the sins of the world--and this his mission was the justification of sinners. But this cannot have been the determining factor for the selection, not the least because it does not in fact to all four women. More important, none of these women were Jewish. So through them the world of the Gentiles enters the genealogy of Jesus--his mission to Jews and Gentiles is made manifest.
Yet most important of all is the fact that the genealogy ends with a woman: Mary, who truly marks a new beginning and relativizes the entire genealogy. Throughout the generations, we find the formula: "Abraham was the father of Isaac . . ."
But at the end, there is something quite different. In Jesus' case there is no reference to fatherhood, instead we read: "Jacob the father of Joseph the husband of Mary, of whom Jesus was born, who is called Christ" (Mt 1:16).
In the account of Jesus' birth that follows immediately afterward, Matthew tells us that Joseph was not Jesus' father and that he wanted to dismiss Mary on account of her supposed adultery. But this is what is said to him: "That which is conceived in Mary is of the Holy Spirit" (Mt 1:20). So the final sentence turns the whole genealogy around. Mary is a new beginning. Her child does not originate from any man, but is a new creation, conceived through the Holy Spirit.
The genealogy is still important: Joseph is the legal father of Jesus. Through him, Jesus belongs by law, "legally," to the house of David. And yet he comes from elsewhere, "from above"-from God himself. The mystery of his provenance, his dual origin, confronts us quite concretely: his origin can be named and yet it is a mystery. Only God is truly his "father."
The human genealogy has a certain significance in terms of world history. And yet in the end it is Mary, the lowly virgin from Nazareth, in whom a new beginning takes place, in whom human existence starts afresh. (Joseph Ratzinger/Benedict XVI, Jesus of Nazareth: The Infancy Narratives, pp. 5-7.)
As there is no clarifying text anywhere in Ratzinger/Benedict's new book to state that Our Lady is of the House of David herself, then there can be no doubt that this bit of ambiguity contains, at the very least, an implied denial of the Catholic Faith concerning the fact that Our Lord, having taken His very Flesh from His Most Blessed Mother is actually, physically descended from the line of David.
Our Lady is the House of David. To even imply, no less assert as what could be construed by readers to be a positive fact, that Our Blessed Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ is not of the human, corporeal lineage of King David is to blaspheme God by making Him into a liar. It is to reinvent the totality of Catholic teaching in order to fit his own warped Modernism, and it is to disparage the royal lineage of the Queen of Heaven and Earth herself whose Fatima Message Ratzinger/Benedict has worked so hard to deconstruct, distort and misrepresent, whose Holy Rosary he rarely promotes and whose actual, physical apparitions in such places as Lourdes and Fatima he has denied (see We Must Accept What Rationalists Reject).
Although the hour is late yet again on Friday, November 30, 2012, the Feast of Saint Andrew, and I do not have the time to provide more sources now (I will do so sometime in the coming week as the documentation on this point has been provided us by our Church Fathers), here are just three sources to demonstrate that Joseph Ratzinger/Benedict XVI has yet again demonstrated his total disregard and contempt for citing the authentic patrimony of the Catholic Church in work filled with the typical ambiguities and "subtleties" of the Modernist mind.
Consider first the commentary of Bishop Richard Challoner in the Douay-Rheims Bible about Verse Sixteen of Chapter One of the Gospel according to Saint Matthew:
[16] The husband of Mary: The Evangelist gives us rather
the pedigree of St. Joseph, than that of the blessed Virgin, to conform
to the custom of the Hebrews, who in their genealogies took no notice of
women; but as they were near akin, the pedigree of the one sheweth that
of the other. (Bishop Challoner Commentary, Douay-Rheims Bible, Matthew 1: 16.)
Consider second the commentary provided by Bishop George Haydock, who accepts the authority of the Challoner Commentary, based it was on the teaching of the Father, about the meaning of verse sixteen, in his Haydock's Catholic Bible Commentary on Verse Six of Chapter One of the Gospel according to Saint Matthew:
Ver. 6. Extract from St. Chrysostom's first Homil.
upon the first chapter of St. Matthew: "How, you say, does it appear
that Christ
descended from David? For if he be born not
of man, but of a virgin, concerning whose genealogy nothing is said, how
shall
we know that he is of the family of David? We
have here two difficulties to explain. Why is the genealogy of the
Virgin passed
over in silence, and why is Joseph's
mentioned, as Christ did not descend from him?...How shall we know that
the Virgin is
descended from David? Hear the words of the
Almighty addressed to the archangel Gabriel: 'Go to a virgin espoused to
a man,
whose name is Joseph, of the house and family
of David.' What could you wish plainer that this, when you hear that
the Virgin
is of the family of David? Hence it also
appears that Joseph was of the same house, for there was a law which
commanded them
not to marry any one but of the same
tribe....But whether these words, of the house and family of David,
be applied
to the Virgin or to Joseph, the argument is
equally strong. For if he was of the family of David, he did not take a
wife but
out of the same tribe, from which he had
descended. Perhaps you will say he transgressed this law. But the
evangelist has
prevented such a suspicion, by testifying
beforehand that Joseph was a just man. Beware how you attach crime to
him, whose
virtue is thus publicly acknowledged....It
was not the custom among the Hebrews to keep the genealogies of women.
The evangelist
conformed to this custom, that he might not
at the very beginning of the gospel offend by transgressing ancient
rites, and
introducing novelty." (Haydock's Catholic Bible Commentary on Matthew 1: 6; please scroll down to the commentary on the left side of your computer screen to arrive at Bishop Haydock's commentary on Verse Six.)
That last sentence is a slam against the Modernist daring to wear the robes of a true pope, a usurper and imposter residing in the Apostolic Palace. It is Ratzinger/Benedict who is introducing a "novelty" by, at the very least, implying, that Our Blessed Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ is only legally part of the House of David, not physically descended from it.
Given the lateness of the hour and my poor state of health as those ribs continue to heal, here is the final source refuting Ratzinger/Benedict's thoroughly heretical contention in Jesus of Nazareth: The Infancy Narratives concering the human lineage of Our Blessed Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. This final source is the commentary of Blessed Archbishop Bishop Jacobus de Voragine, O.P., on the Nativity of Our Lady that he provided in his The Golden Legend:
The nativity of the blessed and glorious Virgin Mary, of the lineage of
Judah and of the royal kindred of David took her original beginning.
Matthew and Luke describe not the generation of Mary but of Joseph,
which was far from the conception of Christ. But the custom of writing
was of such ordinance that the generation of women is not showed but of
the men. And verily the blessed Virgin descended of the lineage of
David, and it is certain that Jesu Christ was born of this only Virgin. It is certain that he came of the lineage of David and of Nathan, for
David had two sons, Nathan and Solomon among all his other sons. And as
John Damascene witnesseth that of Nathan descended Levy, and Levy
engendered Melchion and Panthar, Panthar engendered Barpanthar,
Barpanthar engendered Joachim, Joachim engendered the Virgin Mary, which
was of the lineage of Solomon. For Nathan had a wife, of whom he
engendered Jacob, and when Nathan was dead Melchion, which was son of
Levy and brother of Panthar, wedded the wife of Nathan, mother of Jacob,
and on her he engendered Eli, and so Jacob and Eli were brethren of one
mother but not of one father. For Jacob was of the line of Solomon and
Eli of the line of Nathan, and then Eli of the line of Nathan died
without children, and Jacob his brother, which was of the line of
Solomon, took a wife and engendered and raised the seed of his brother
and engendered Joseph. (The Nativity of Our Lady.)
Yes, Ratzinger/Benedict is correct when stating that Our Blessed Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ had no human father. He is wrong to imply, however, He is not physically descended from the House of David through His Most Blessed Mother. He is. While Our Lady is the New Eve, the new Mother of the Living, she was descended of the House of David and married within her tribe to the just and quite man of that Royal House, Saint Joseph. To ignore this fact is to place into question its very veracity and its very relevance to Our Lord's being the very fulfillment of the Sacred Scriptures:
[1] And there shall come forth a rod out of the root of Jesse, and a flower shall rise up out of his root. [2] And the spirit of the Lord shall rest upon him: the spirit of wisdom,
and of understanding, the spirit of counsel, and of fortitude, the
spirit of knowledge, and of godliness. [3] And he shall be filled with the spirit of the fear of the Lord. He
shall not judge according to the sight of the eyes, nor reprove
according to the hearing of the ears. [4] But he shall judge the poor with justice, and shall reprove with equity
for the meek of the earth: land he shall strike the earth with the rod
of his mouth, and with the breath of his lips he shall slay the wicked. [5] And justice shall be the girdle of his loins: and faith the girdle of his reins.
[6] The wolf shall dwell with the lamb: and the leopard shall lie down with
the kid: the calf and the lion, and the sheep shall abide together, and
a little child shall lead them. [7] The calf and the bear shall feed: their young ones shall rest together: and the lion shall eat straw like the ox. [8] And the sucking child shall play on the hole of the asp: and the weaned
child shall thrust his hand into the den of the basilisk. [9] They shall not hurt, nor shall they kill in all my holy mountain, for
the earth is filled with the knowledge of the Lord, as the covering
waters of the sea. [10] In that day the root of Jesse, who standeth for an ensign of the
people, him the Gentiles shall beseech, and his sepulchre shall be
glorious. (Isaias 11: 1-10.)
Holy Mother Church prays the following Antiphon in Vespers on December 19, six days before Christmas:
O Radix Jesse, qui stas in signum populorum,super quem continebunt reges os suum,quem Gentes deprecabuntur:veni ad liberandum nos, jam noli tardare.
O Root of Jesse, standing as a sign among the peoples;
before you kings will shut their mouths,
to you the nations will make their prayer:
Come and deliver us, and delay no longer.
How does this not apply to the actual physical descent of Our Lord from the Root of Jesse, that is, the Royal House of David? How can Ratzinger/Benedict make reference to the Root of Jesse near the end of the book (page 117) without mentioning that Our Lady comes from the House of David?
Ratzinger/Benedict has, though, played right into the hands of Protestants who claim that the genealogy of Our Lord provided in the Gospel according to Saint Matthew is a "problem" because the only way that Our Lord could be of the House of David, Protestants believe, is if Saint Joseph was His biological Father. Ratzinger/Benedict, it appears, believes, that he has "solved" this "problem" by his assertion that it is Our Lord's "legal," not biological, relationship to His foster-father that matters. He has chosen not to make reference to Catholic Biblical commentaries or to the clear teaching of the Church Fathers as Protestants accept the authority of neither.
"Peace to Men of God Will"
Ratzinger/Benedict recycled his by now familiar rejection of Saint Jerome's translation of the line "peace to men of good will" in the Gospel according to Saint Luke in his Latin Vulgate edition, pronounced as authoritative and without error by the Council of Trent (Fourth Session, 1546) and by three recent popes (Pope Leo XIII, Providentissimus Deus, November 18, 1893, Pope Benedict XV, Paraclitus Spiritus, September 15, 1920, and Pope Pius XII, Divino Afflante Spiritu, September 30, 1943):
The familiar Latin text was until recently rendered thus: "Glory be to God on high and on earth peace to men of good will." This translation has been been rejected by modern exegetes--not without reason--as one-sided and moralizing. "God's glory" is not something to be brought about by men ("Glory be to God"). The "glory" of God is real, God is glorious, and this is truly a reason for joy: there is truth, there is goodness, there is beauty. It is there--in God--indestructibly. (Joseph Ratzinger/Benedict XVI, Jesus of Nazareth: The Infancy Narratives, p. 74.)
Whose "familiar Latin text" was this? Saint Jerome's. So much for the Council of Trent. So much for Pope Leo XIII. So much for Pope Benedict XV. So much for Pope Pius XII. Another wave of the "papal" hand does away with firm assurances of the reliability of Saint Jerome's Vulgate Bible.
Whose "translation" does Ratzinger/Benedict prefer? The conference of conciliar "bishops" in the Federal Republic of Germany (see Joseph Ratzinger/Benedict XVI, Jesus of Nazareth: The Infancy Narratives, pp. 74-75 for an extended discussion of the "theology" behind this translation).
Whatever happened to Saint Ignatius of Loyola's "For the greater honor and glory of God" (Ad majorem Dei gloriam)?
Yes, mere creatures do render unto God the glory that is His due.
As I have written an commentary about Ratzinger/Benedict's "insights" on this matter that he provided at the Midnight offering of the Protestant and Masonic Novus Ordo liturgical service in the Basilica of Saint Peter on December 25, 2010, there is need at this point only to refer you to that commentary, To Men of Good Will, something that saves me a bit of work now, although I am sure that others will comment more extensively on the "theology" behind Ratzinger/Benedict's rejection of "Glory to God in the highest and on earth peace to men of good will" that plays an important part in "new theology" that is at the root of the "Second" Vatican Council and the "magisterium" of the conciliar "pontiffs."
What About the Epiphany?
As mentioned at the beginning of what has become an extensive commentary, Ratzinger/Benedict accepts the "historicity" of the Epiphany and the journey of the Three Kings, something that occupies almost the entirety of Chapter IV of Jesus of Nazareth: The Infancy Narratives, he agrees with the late bail bondsman, Jean "Cardinal" Danielou, that it nothing "fundamental" would be taken away from the Faith if the worship offered by the three earthly kings to Christ the King had not actually occurred.
Why does Ratzinger/Benedict believe this?
The answer is simple.
He knows that the Catholic Church has taught from time immemorial that the homage paid by the Three Kings to Christ the King was performed to teach us that He the King of men and nations now in this life before the end of time, not merely at the end of time. The Epiphany proves the Social Kingship of Our Lord Jesus Christ that Joseph Ratzinger/Benedict XVI rejects. The false "pope" accepts only the eschatological Kingship of Our Lord at the end of time, which is why one must keep this in mind when seeing any and all references, including in Jesus of Nazareth: The Infancy Narratives, to Christ the King. For a recent discussion of this, please see Today and Every Day, Viva Cristo Rey!
The Social Reign of Christ the King is fundamental to the Catholic Faith. Ratzinger/Benedict rejects this, thereby making a mockery of the Catholic teaching that Christ the King is the very theme of the Epiphany. That is why Ratzinger/Benedict does not consider the historicity of the "Magi account" to be "fundamental" to the Faith, although he accepts it, explaining it, of course, by the "lights" of his Modernist methodology, aided by a number Protestant "Scripture Scholars" who are in essence of one mind with him on "modern" Biblical exegesis.
Forgotten Miracles
Although Joseph Ratzinger/Benedict XVI discusses in Jesus of Nazareth: The Infancy Narratives the state of the world at the time of the census that had been decreed by Caesar Augustus, he does not anywhere relate the miracles that occurred just before, during and after Our Lord's Nativity. Again, of course, he is a rationalist. His duty, as he has told us, has been to perform Scriptural exegesis in order to better "understand" Our Lord as though we have ever lacked any understanding about Him. Even to imply that we can "understand" Him better through the exegesis of Protestants is deny the Divine Constitution of Holy Mother Church.
Thus it is that Ratzinger/Benedict must take no account of the miracles that occurred when Our Lord was born for us in utter poverty and anonymity in Bethlehem. One does not need to wonder why he did not make any reference at all to Archbishop Jacobus de Voragine's account of one of these miracles in The Golden Legend as rationalists do not believe in that which they cannot "prove":
When the world had endured five thousand and nine hundred years, after Eusebius the holy saint, Octavian the Emperor commanded that all the world should be described, so that he might know how many cities, how many towns, and how many persons he had in all the universal world. Then was so great peace in the earth that all the world was obedient to him. And therefore our Lord would be born in that time, that it should be known that he brought peace from heaven. And this Emperor commanded that every man should go into the towns, cities or villages from whence they were of, and should bring with him a penny in acknowledgment that he was subject to the Empire of Rome. And by so many pence as should be found received, should be known the number of the persons. Joseph which then was of the lineage of David, and dwelled in Nazareth, went into the city of Bethlehem, and led with him the Virgin Mary his wife. And when they were come thither, because the hostelries were all taken up, they were constrained to be without in a common place where all people went. And there was a stable for an ass that he brought with him, and for an ox. In that night our Blessed Lady and Mother of God was delivered of our Blessed Saviour upon the hay that lay in the rack. At which nativity our Lord shewed many marvels. For because that the world was in so great peace, the Romans had done made a temple which was named the Temple of Peace, in which they counselled with Apollo to know how long it should stand and endure. Apollo answered to them that, it should stand as long till a maid had brought forth and borne a child. And therefore they did do write on the portal of the Temple: Lo! this is the temple of peace that ever shall endure. For they supposed well that a maid might never bear Bethlehem, there may ye find him wrapt in clouts. And anon, as the angel had said this, a areas multitude of angels appeared with him, and began to sing. Honour, glory and health be to God on high, and in the earth peace to men of goodwill. Then said the shepherds, let us go to Bethlehem and see this thing. And when they came they found like as the angel had said. And it happed this night that all the sodomites that did sin against nature were dead and extinct; for God hated so much this sin, that he might not suffer that nature human, which he had taken, were delivered to so great shame. Whereof S. Austin saith that, it lacked but little that God would not become man for that sin. In this time Octavian made to cut and enlarge the ways and quitted the Romans of all the debts that they owed to him. This feast of Nativity of our Lord is one of the greatest feasts of all the year, and for to tell all the miracles that our Lord hath showed, it should contain a whole book; but at this time I shall leave and pass over save one thing that I have heard once preached of a worshipful doctor, that what person being in clean life desire on this day a boon of God, as far as it is rightful and good for him, our Lord at the reverence of this blessed high feast of his Nativity will grant it to him. Then let us always make us in clean life at this feast that we may so please him, that after this short life we may come unto his bliss. Amen. (Jacobus de Voragine, O.P., The Golden Legend, Volume I.)
Yes, Ratzinger/Benedict, who is constantly telling us how "religion" can be a a force against "irreligion" and how the "religions" can work together to build a world of "peace," does not realize that he, who has attacked the very nature of God by denying the nature of dogmatic truth, is one of the greatest destroyers of peace on earth as he has enabled sodomites in his false church at every turn and failed to discipline those who have enabled them, which would men, of course, that he would have to discipline himself. Ah, there can be no reference to the miracle mentioned by Archbishop Jacobus de Voragine, O.P., by a man who cannot believe anything he cannot prove rationally, a man who is oblivious to the horror of personal sin, starting with how he defames the honor, majesty and glory that are due to the Most Blessed Trinity.
Catholics Reject "Originality"
Catholics are never impressed with "originality." They are informed by Tradition. Such is the difference between conciliarism's love of "novelty" and "originality" and Catholicism's unshakable defense of God's immutable truths, which Holy Mother Church always brings forth with security and stability and without a shadow of change or alteration.
Joseph Ratzinger/Benedict XVI stands condemned by these words of Pope Saint Pius X in Praestina Scripturae, November 18, 1907:
After mature examination and the most diligent
deliberations the Pontifical Biblical Commission has happily given
certain decisions of a very useful kind for the proper promotion and
direction on safe lines of Biblical studies. But we observe that
some persons, unduly prone to opinions and methods tainted by
pernicious novelties and excessively devoted to the principle of false
liberty, which is really immoderate license and in sacred studies proves
itself to be a most insidious and a fruitful source of the worst evils
against the purity of the faith, have not received and do not receive
these decisions with the proper obedience.
Wherefore we find it necessary to declare and to
expressly prescribe, and by this our act we do declare and decree that
all are bound in conscience to submit to the decisions of the Biblical
Commission relating to doctrine, which have been given in the past and
which shall be given in the future, in the same way as to the decrees of
the Roman congregations approved by the Pontiff; nor can all those
escape the note of disobedience or temerity, and consequently of grave
sin, who in speech or writing contradict such decisions, and this
besides the scandal they give and the other reasons for which they may
be responsible before God for other temerities and errors which
generally go with such contradictions.
Moreover, in order to
check the daily increasing audacity of many modernists who are
endeavoring by all kinds of sophistry and devices to detract from the
force and efficacy not only of the decree "Lamentabili sane exitu" (the
so-called Syllabus), issued by our order by the Holy Roman and Universal
Inquisition on July 3 of the present year, but also of our encyclical
letters "Pascendi dominici gregis" given on September 8 of this same
year, we do by our apostolic authority repeat and confirm both
that decree of the Supreme Sacred Congregation and those encyclical
letters of ours, adding the penalty of excommunication against
their contradictors, and this we declare and decree that should anybody,
which may God forbid, be so rash as to defend any one of the
propositions, opinions or teachings condemned in these documents he
falls, ipso facto, under the censure contained under the chapter
"Docentes" of the constitution "Apostolicae Sedis," which is the first
among the excommunications latae sententiae, simply reserved to the
Roman Pontiff. This excommunication is to be understood as salvis
poenis, which may be incurred by those who have violated in any way the
said documents, as propagators and defenders of heresies, when their
propositions, opinions and teachings are heretical, as has happened more
than once in the case of the adversaries of both these documents,
especially when they advocate the errors of the modernists that is, the
synthesis of all heresies. (Pope Saint Pius X,
Praestantia Scripturae, November 18, 1907.)
This is what Ratzinger/Benedict thinks of such proclamations by true popes:
The text [of the document Instruction on the Theologian's Ecclesial Vocation]
also presents the various types of bonds that rise from the different
degrees of magisterial teaching. It affirms - perhaps for the first time
with this clarity - that there are decisions of the magisterium
that cannot be the last word on the matter as such, but are, in a
substantial fixation of the problem, above all an expression of pastoral
prudence, a kind of provisional disposition. The nucleus remains valid,
but the particulars, which the circumstances of the times influenced,
may need further correction.
In this regard, one may think of the declarations of Popes in the
last century [19th century] about religious liberty, as well as the
anti-Modernist decisions at the beginning of this century, above all,
the decisions of the Biblical Commission of the time [on evolutionism].
As a cry of alarm in the face of hasty and superficial adaptations, they
will remain fully justified. A personage such as Johann Baptist Metz
said, for example, that the Church's anti-Modernist decisions render the
great service of preserving her from falling into the liberal-bourgeois
world. But in the details of the determinations they contain,
they became obsolete after having fulfilled their pastoral mission at
their proper time. (Joseph Ratzinger, "Instruction on the
Theologian's Ecclesial Vocation," published with the title "Rinnovato
dialogo fra Magistero e Teologia," in L'Osservatore Romano, June 27,
1990, p. 6; Card. Ratzinger: The teachings of the Popes against Modernism are obsolete.)
Some will contend that the "pope's "private beliefs" do no matter. They do. They do very much as it is not what a man proclaims that casts himself outside the pale of Holy Mother Church. It is what he believes that does no so. Ratzinger/Benedict has done us the great favor once again of showing us that he does not believe what is taught by the Catholic Church, therefore proving to us yet again that he is not a member therein and thus cannot be a true and legitimate Successor of Saint Peter:
The Church, founded on these principles and mindful
of her office, has done nothing with greater zeal and endeavour than she
has displayed in guarding the integrity of the faith. Hence she
regarded as rebels and expelled from the ranks of her children all who
held beliefs on any point of doctrine different from her own. The Arians, the Montanists, the Novatians, the Quartodecimans, the Eutychians, did not certainly reject all Catholic doctrine: they abandoned only a certain portion of it.
Still who does not know that they were declared heretics and banished
from the bosom of the Church? In like manner were condemned all authors
of heretical tenets who followed them in subsequent ages. "There
can be nothing more dangerous than those heretics who admit nearly the
whole cycle of doctrine, and yet by one word, as with a drop of poison,
infect the real and simple faith taught by our Lord and handed down by
Apostolic tradition" (Auctor Tract. de Fide Orthodoxa contra Arianos).
The practice of
the Church has always been the same, as is shown by the unanimous
teaching of the Fathers, who were wont to hold as outside Catholic
communion, and alien to the Church, whoever would recede in the least
degree from any point of doctrine proposed by her authoritative
Magisterium. Epiphanius, Augustine, Theodore :, drew up a long
list of the heresies of their times. St. Augustine notes that other
heresies may spring up, to a single one of which, should any one give
his assent, he is by the very fact cut off from Catholic unity. "No
one who merely disbelieves in all (these heresies) can for that reason
regard himself as a Catholic or call himself one. For there may be or
may arise some other heresies, which are not set out in this work of
ours, and, if any one holds to one single one of these he is not a
Catholic" (S. Augustinus, De Haeresibus, n. 88). (Pope Leo XIII, Satis Cognitum, June 29, 1896.)
The Chair is Still Empty.
One does have to wonder whether this man, Joseph Ratzinger/Benedict XVI, gives any thought to his Particular Judgment. One must be totally bereft of even the most superficial familiarity with the reality of that terrible moment as described by Saint Alphonsus de Ligouri's Preparation for Death to believe that he can face God in a good state while speaking, writing and acting as Ratzinger/Benedict has done and continues to do.
This is, of course, a chastisement for our sins, for our own infidelities, for our own lukewarmness, for our own lack of steadfastness in prayer, especially to the Mother of God. We need to pray many Rosaries of reparation now that these additional offenses have been given to God by the false "pontiff." whose "unofficial" words deceive Catholics and non-Catholics alike just as much as his "official" words and deed, We need, therefore, to make much reparation for these sins as we seek always to make reparation for our own sins as we entrust to the Most Sacred Heart of Jesus through the Sorrowful and Immaculate Heart of Mary the needs of the present moment, especially as we approach the beginning of Advent tomorrow night with the praying of First Vespers.
We must, of course, continue to remember that this is the time that God has appointed from all eternity for us to be alive. He has work for us to do. Let us do this work with courage and valor as we never count the cost of being humiliated for the sake of defending the integrity of Faith, as we never cease our prayers for the conversion of all people, including Joseph Ratzinger/Benedict XVI and his fellow conciliarists, to the true Church, outside of which there is no salvation and without which there can be no true social order.
Viva Cristo Rey! Vivat Christus Rex!
Immaculate Heart of Mary, triumph soon!
