Fret Not About Denying The Faith, Fret Not, Says Benedict XVI
by Thomas A. Droleskey
Remember, the false "pontiff," Joseph Ratzinger/Benedict XVI, frets not about the eternal welfare of non-Catholics, going so far as to praise as "Christians" a few Protestant "theologians" who deny the Sacred Divinity of Our Blessed Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ. (See appendix below.)
Joseph Ratzinger/Benedict frets not as he denies the very nature of dogmatic truth--and thus of God Himself--as the means of justifying what is a new religion whose praise for non-Catholic religions and their nonexistent ability to create a "better world" is the antithesis of these papal injunctions to the contrary:
Everyone should avoid familiarity or friendship with anyone suspected of
belonging to masonry or to affiliated groups. Know them by their fruits
and avoid them. Every familiarity should be avoided, not only with
those impious libertines who openly promote the character of the sect, but
also with those who hide under the mask of universal tolerance, respect
for all religions, and the craving to reconcile the maxims of the
Gospel with those of the revolution. These men seek to reconcile Christ
and Belial, the Church of God and the state without God. (Pope Leo XIII, Custodi di Quella Fede, December 8, 1892.)
This being said, what must be thought of the promiscuity in which young
Catholics will be caught up with heterodox and unbelieving folk in a
work of this nature? Is it not a thousand-fold more dangerous for them
than a neutral association? What are we to think of this appeal
to all the heterodox, and to all the unbelievers, to prove the
excellence of their convictions in the social sphere in a sort of
apologetic contest? Has not this contest lasted for nineteen centuries
in conditions less dangerous for the faith of Catholics? And was it not
all to the credit of the Catholic Church? What are we to think of this
respect for all errors, and of this strange invitation made by a
Catholic to all the dissidents to strengthen their convictions through
study so that they may have more and more abundant sources of fresh
forces? What are we to think of an association in which all
religions and even Free-Thought may express themselves openly and in
complete freedom? For the Sillonists who, in public lectures and
elsewhere, proudly proclaim their personal faith, certainly do not
intend to silence others nor do they intend to prevent a Protestant from
asserting his Protestantism, and the skeptic from affirming his
skepticism. Finally, what are we to think of a Catholic who, on entering
his study group, leaves his Catholicism outside the door so as not to
alarm his comrades who, “dreaming of disinterested social action, are
not inclined to make it serve the triumph of interests, coteries and
even convictions whatever they may be”? Such is the profession of faith
of the New Democratic Committee for Social Action which has taken over
the main objective of the previous organization and which, they say,
“breaking the double meaning which surround the Greater Sillon both in
reactionary and anti-clerical circles”, is now open to all men “who
respect moral and religious forces and who are convinced that no genuine
social emancipation is possible without the leaven of generous
idealism.” (Pope Saint Pius X, Notre Charge Apostolique, August 15, 1910.)
Ratzinger/Benedict doesn't even fret about a bevy of supposed Catholics in public life who support one grave social evil after another while maintaining their "good standing" in the structures of his counterfeit ape of the Catholic Church.
One of these, of course, is the Secretary of the United States Department of Health and Human Services, Kathleen Sebelius, a notorious pro-abort who was a close political ally of one the late George Tiller "The Killer," who operated the only late-term surgical baby-killing center in the State of Kansas prior to his murder on May 31, 2009, and was an important donor to her successful gubernatorial campaigns for the office of Governor of the State of Kansas:
Wichita, Kansas, May 29, 2008 (LifeSiteNews.com) - In early April, 2007,
late-term abortionist George R. Tiller and his entire abortion clinic
staff was honored by Gov. Kathleen Sebelius at a lavish secret party
held at Cedar Crest, the Governor’s mansion. In response to photographs
published by Operation Rescue this week, Gov. Sebelius’ office has
released what Operation Rescue is calling a “laughable” defense, saying
that the Tiller party depicted in the photographs was a prize in a
charity auction in which Sebelius had no control over who would attend.
OR
obtained the set of 27 photographs from a confidential source that told
OR the party was held exclusively in Tiller’s honor. Tiller and his
staff were the only guests invited to the gala event that featured,
according to the source, a menu of steak and lobster.
“According
to our source, who attended the event at Cedar Crest, the party was ‘by
special invitation only.’ It was obvious to this person that Tiller was
on a very friendly basis with Sebelius and took the time to personally
introduce each member of his abortion clinic staff to the governor,”
said Operation Rescue President Troy Newman. “Our source was very
specific that the event’s purpose was to ‘honor’ Tiller and his staff.
The pictures, especially the ones that include the political t-shirts
produced by Tiller, back up our source’s claims.”
“It is laughable
for Sebelius to now say she has no control over who she parties with.
The Women’s Political Caucus is a radical leftist feminist organization
that is providing the smoke and mirrors to cover for the Tiller party,”
said Newman. “We don’t buy it.”
Receipts obtained by Operation Rescue from the Governor’s office show that taxpayers paid for the April 9, 2007, event.
OR
alleges that "Tiller is a major contributor to pro-abortion candidates
in Kansas, giving hundreds of thousands of dollars through a
complicated series of political action committees and non-profit
organizations".
“Sebelius’ office arrogantly believes that they
can keep her strong ties to Tiller a secret, but their efforts to keep
the truth from the public have only exposed their corruption,” said
Newman. “Sebelius would not be governor today if not for Tiller’s
financial support. She owes him her career. Every agency in Kansas that
could hold Tiller accountable for illegal late-term abortions, from the
Board of Healing Arts to the Kansas Supreme Court to the Attorney
General, are all laced with Sebelius appointees. It is little wonder
that they all have done nothing but stall and obstruct efforts to
prosecute him.”
OR suggests this event is an indication of a broader relationship that the Governor shares with the abortion industry.
Just
over a month after the Tiller soiree, Gov. Sebelius celebrated her
birthday on May 15, 2007, at a party thrown by Planned Parenthood of
Kansas and Mid-Missouri, while they were still under investigation by
the Attorney General’s office and the Johnson County District Attorney.
The party featured Planned Parenthood CEP Peter Brownlie leading a conga
line in celebration. Planned Parenthood was later cleared by Sebelius’
handpicked Attorney General Paul Morrison but charged by District
Attorney Phill Kline with 107 criminal charges related to illegal
abortions and manufacturing records. ( Sebelius Issues “Laughable” Defense of Secret Party at Governor's Mansion .)
Here are some records, found on the Operation Rescue website, that indicate the extent to which Sebelius fed at the late baby-killer's money trough, sopping up all of the blood money that she could:
09-25-2001 JEANNE TILLER $ 2,000
09-25-2000 WOMENS HEALTH CARE SERVICES $2,000
09-25-2000 GEORGE TILLER $2,000
9-25-2000 GEORGE TILLER MD $2,000
09-10-1998 GEORGE TILLER $ 200
12-14-1998 JEANNE TILLER $ 250
06-18-1998 PRO CHOICE ACTION LEAGUE $1,000
05-01-1997 GEORGE TILLER $ 500
11-21-1994 GEORGE R TILLER $ 500
11-14-1994 GEORGE R TILLER PA $2,000
09-02-1994 GEORGE R TILLER $2,000
06-10-1994 GEORGE R TILLER $ 500
04-15-1994 GEORGE R TILLER $ 500
In Addition, Tiller has contributed generously to Sebelius’ PAC, the Bluestem Fund:
09-01-2000 GEORGE R. TILLER MD $5,000
09-07-2000 GEORGE R. TILLER MD PA $5,000
12-28-2001 WOMENS HEALTH CARE SERVICES $8,000
03-18-2002 WOMENS HEALTH CARE SERVICES $5,000 ( Sebelius Unfit For HHS Post – Facts About Her Connections To The Abortion Industry.)
Sure, sure, sure.
The conciliar "archbishop" of the Archdiocese of Kansas City in Kansas,
Joseph Naumann warned the arrogant Sebelius when she was Governor of Kansas that she should refrain
from receiving from receiving what purports to be Holy Communion in the Protestant and Masonic Novus Ordo service, which is in and of itself an abomination that offends God and
is harmful to souls, serving as the pathway for all of
conciliarism's multiple defections from the Faith. Leaving aside the
fact that Kathleen Sebelius has excommunicated herself from the Catholic
Faith by her support of baby-killing by both chemical and surgical means, "Archbishop" Naumann's efforts to discipline her are
undermined by the fact he that accepts conciliarism's "reconciliation" with
the modern world as represented by what Pope Pius VII termed the heresy
of religious liberty and by a concept of "healthy secularity" that
makes a mockery of the Catholic Church's consistent condemnation of the
thesis in support of the separation of Church and State. Naumann's position is further undermined by the fact that Joseph Ratzinger/Benedict XVI does not believe that pro-abortion Catholics in public life should be excommunicated.
Ratzinger/Benedict is incapable of speaking in in plain words about the state of the immortal souls of those such as Sebelius who support the extermination of innocent human life in the womb. He is simply constitutionally incapable of speaking about this crime as did Pope Pius XI in Casti Connubii, December 30, 1930:
Those who hold the reins of government should not forget that it is the
duty of public authority by appropriate laws and sanctions to defend the
lives of the innocent, and this all the more so since those whose lives
are endangered and assailed cannot defend themselves. Among whom we
must mention in the first place infants hidden in the mother's womb. And
if the public magistrates not only do not defend them, but by their
laws and ordinances betray them to death at the hands of doctors or of
others, let them remember that God is the Judge and Avenger of innocent
blood which cried from earth to Heaven. (Pope Pius XI, Casti Connubii, December 30, 1930.)
Ratzinger/Benedict is incapable of even thinking in these terms.
So is the President of Georgetown University, Dr. John Di Gioia, who has made headlines for himself this year by defending the "right" of one of his university's law school's students, Sandra Fluke, to testify before a rump Congressional committee about the necessity of having her chemical abortifacients called "birth control pills" funded by the taxpayers of the United States of America. Here is part of a statement he issued at the time to attack radio talk show host Rush Limbaugh for criticizing Fluke by means of an ill-considered word:
There is a legitimate question of public policy before our nation
today. In the effort to address the problem of the nearly fifty million
Americans who lack health insurance, our lawmakers enacted legislation
that seeks to increase access to health care. In recent weeks, a
question regarding the breadth of services that will be covered has
focused significant public attention on the issue of contraceptive
coverage. Many, including the United States Conference of Catholic
Bishops, have offered important perspectives on this issue.
In recent days, a law student of Georgetown, Sandra Fluke, offered
her testimony regarding the proposed regulations by the Department of
Health and Human Services before a group of members of Congress. She
was respectful, sincere, and spoke with conviction. She provided a
model of civil discourse. This expression of conscience was in the
tradition of the deepest values we share as a people. One need not agree
with her substantive position to support her right to respectful free
expression. And yet, some of those who disagreed with her position –
including Rush Limbaugh and commentators throughout the blogosphere and
in various other media channels – responded with behavior that can only
be described as misogynistic, vitriolic, and a misrepresentation of the
position of our student.
In our vibrant and diverse society, there always are important
differences that need to be debated, with strong and legitimate beliefs
held on all sides of challenging issues. The greatest contribution of
the American project is the recognition that together, we can rely on
civil discourse to engage the tensions that characterize these difficult
issues, and work towards resolutions that balance deeply held and
different perspectives. We have learned through painful experience that
we must respect one another and we acknowledge that the best way to
confront our differences is through constructive public debate. At
times, the exercise of one person’s freedom may conflict with
another’s. As Americans, we accept that the only answer to our
differences is further engagement.
In an earlier time, St. Augustine captured the sense of what is
required in civil discourse: "Let us, on both sides, lay aside all
arrogance. Let us not, on either side, claim that we have already
discovered the truth. Let us seek it together as something which is
known to neither of us. For then only may we seek it, lovingly and
tranquilly, if there be no bold presumption that it is already
discovered and possessed."
If we, instead, allow coarseness, anger – even hatred – to stand for
civil discourse in America, we violate the sacred trust that has been
handed down through the generations beginning with our Founders. The
values that hold us together as a people require nothing less than
eternal vigilance. This is our moment to stand for the values of
civility in our engagement with one another. Sincerely, John J. DeGioia, President, Georgetown University. (A Message to the Georgetown Community on Civility and Public Discourse.)
Let me reprise a few questions that I posed to Dr. Di Gioia in article over two months ago now.
1) Is the nationalization of health-care represented
by the "Affordable Care Act of 2010" a violation of the Natural Law
principle of subsidiarity, to say nothing of the precepts of the
Constitution of the United States of America?
2) What is "legitimate" about "debating" that which no one has the right to use, contraception?
3) Leaving aside, of course, their bogus
arguments about "religious liberty" and the inconvenient little fact
that most of them have never preached against contraception from the
pulpit or have cared all that much as "Catholic" hospitals have
distributed "morning after pills" and as supposedly "Catholic"
educational institutions and their very own priests/presbyters have
informed Catholics that they can use contraceptives as a matter of "good
conscience," why do you dismiss the objections of some of the conciliar
"bishops" to the insurance mandate for contraception as simply being
their "perspective," thereby implying that other being have
"perspectives" that need to be "heard" in support of such coverage,
4) How is not Miss Fluke's "expression of
conscience" before a rump committee, convened solely for the purposes of
public agitation and fund-raising, an indication that her conscience is
misinformed and that by speaking as she has only confuses souls by the
use of emotionally-laded arguments that are meant to deflect from the
simple reality that you, as a supposed Catholic, are supposed to
recognize and respect: that the use of contraceptives is a violation of
Sovereignty of God over the sanctity and fecundity of marriage?
5) Although one can disagree with the specific
adjective used by Rush Limbaugh to describe Miss Fluke, how did she not
place herself in a position of public criticism and ridicule by
demanding that the taxpayers of the United States of America fund her
wanton behavior by the commission of "consequence-free" sins against the
binding, immutable precepts of the Sixth and Ninth Commandments?
6) "Constructive debate"? Please explain how matters
pertaining to the Sixth and Ninth Commandments are subject to any kind
of debate, "constructive" or otherwise?
7) You have quoted Saint Augustine on the search for
truth. Is the truth about Miss Fluke's personal behavior and her use of
contraceptives not immoral, objectively speaking, leaving all subjective
judgment to God, Who alone knows the subjective state and thus
the culpability of individuals souls, in se not known? What is there to
"search" for on this matter?
8) Are you familiar at all with Saint Augustine's
injunction that ""But the death of the soul is worse than freedom of
error?" Do you believe that Saint Augustine was wrong?
9) Was Pope Gregory XVI wrong when, after quoting
Saint Augustine, explained the social consequences of the spread of
error in the name of "liberty of conscience"? If so, please explain how
any of this is incorrect?
When all restraints are removed by which men are kept on the
narrow path of truth, their nature, which is already inclined to evil,
propels them to ruin. Then truly "the bottomless pit" is open from which
John saw smoke ascending which obscured the sun, and out of which
locusts flew forth to devastate the earth. Thence comes transformation
of minds, corruption of youths, contempt of sacred things and holy laws
-- in other words, a pestilence more deadly to the state than any other.
Experience shows, even from earliest times, that cities renowned for
wealth, dominion, and glory perished as a result of this single evil,
namely immoderate freedom of opinion, license of free speech, and desire
for novelty. (Pope Gregory XVI, Mirari Vos, August 15, 1832.)
10) Was it not the case years ago that one who
expressed public support for the misuse of the generative powers that
God has given man for the continuation of the species would have been
dismissed from Georgetown University as an undesirable student who
lacked the moral character to be admitted to the bar?
11) How is Miss Fluke to be admired in any way given
the fact that she offends God, wounds her own immortal soul and thus
wounds the Church Militant and society itself by her behavior?
12) Are not the the following words of Silvio
Cardinal Antoniano proof that your belief that there we need a
"constructive debate" on this mater nothing other than an exercise in
self-serving pandering to feminist groups and to your fellow theological
"dissenters" in what you think is the Catholic Church?
The more closely the temporal power of a nation aligns itself with the
spiritual, and the more it fosters and promotes the latter, by so much
the more it contributes to the conservation of the commonwealth. For it
is the aim of the ecclesiastical authority by the use of spiritual
means, to form good Christians in accordance with its own particular end
and object; and in doing this it helps at the same time to form good
citizens, and prepares them to meet their obligations as members of a
civil society. This follows of necessity because in the City of
God, the Holy Roman Catholic Church, a good citizen and an upright man
are absolutely one and the same thing. How grave therefore is the error
of those who separate things so closely united, and who think that they
can produce good citizens by ways and methods other than those which
make for the formation of good Christians. For, let human prudence say
what it likes and reason as it pleases, it is impossible to produce true
temporal peace and tranquillity by things repugnant or opposed to the
peace and happiness of eternity. (quoted in Pope Pius XI, Divini Illius Magistri, December 31, 1929.)
Undaunted by his efforts to defend Sandra Fluke and undisciplined by the Archdiocese of Washington, District of Columbia, John Di Gioia has once again taken to defending his decision to invite none other than Kathleen Sebelius herself to give an address at an awards ceremony held at the university's public policy institute on Friday, May 18, 2012:
In recent days on the Georgetown University campus and in the larger American Catholic community, concerns have been expressed by some who object to an invitation to Secretary Kathleen Sebelius to participate in a Public Policy Institute awards ceremony during the University’s commencement weekend.
Last fall, public policy students expressed preferences for potential speakers who could participate in the program. Given her role in crafting the landmark legislation that will make health care more accessible to 34 million Americans who are currently uninsured, Secretary Sebelius was identified by students as a leading policy maker in our country who could contribute to this event. Secretary Sebelius has a long and distinguished record of public service, including two terms as governor of Kansas before beginning her service in April, 2009, as Secretary of the Department of Health and Human Services. She is also the spouse and the mother of Georgetown graduates.
In early January, an invitation was extended to Secretary Sebelius and she accepted. In the weeks that followed, elements of the legislation, specifically terms covering contraception, dominated our public discourse and impacted our Georgetown community very directly.
In different contexts over the past three months, including a March 14 “Statement on Religious Freedom and HHS Mandate,” the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops expressed strong opposition to the position put forward by the Obama Administration. Some have interpreted the invitation of Secretary Sebelius as a challenge to the USCCB. It was not. The invitation to Secretary Sebelius occurred prior to the January 20th announcement by the Obama Administration of the modified healthcare regulations.
The Secretary’s presence on our campus should not be viewed as an endorsement of her views. As a Catholic and Jesuit University, Georgetown disassociates itself from any positions that are in conflict with traditional church teachings.
We are a university, committed to the free exchange of ideas. We are a community that draws inspiration from a religious tradition that provides us with an intellectual, moral, and spiritual foundation. By engaging these values we become the University we are meant to be. (Statement of Dr. John Di Gioia.)
Free exchange of ideas, Dr. Di Gioia? Free exchange of ideas? "Freedom" only goes so far in the counterfeit church of conciliarism.
Would you invite, say, Bishop Richard Williamson of the Society of Saint Pius X to give an address on the nature and extent of the crimes committed by the agents of Adolf Hitler's Third Reich?
Would you invite, say, a Catholic who rejects the legitimacy of Joseph Ratzinger as "Pope" Benedict XVI to speak on the pretender to the papal throne's multiple defections from the Catholic Faith?
Free exchanges of ideas, Dr. Di Gioia? "Freedom" is not exactly limitless in the counterfeit church of conciliarism.
Yes, the Archdiocese of Washington did permit an unsigned editorial to be run in its newspaper, My Catholic Standard, against Di Gioia's decision to invite Sebelius to give an address at the Georgetown University Public Policy Institute in which the woman who authored the Health and Human Services mandate for all employers to provide health insurance coverage for their employers was criticized for having "violated" the very thing that gave rise to the entire structure of errors of the Modern civil state that has been embraced and celebrated by the conciliar church: "religious liberty." (See Ominous Offenders Offending Ominously, Memo To David Axelrod And Other Social Engineers, John Carroll's Caesar, Victims of Compromise, Taking A Figure Of Antichrist At His Worthless Words, Prisoners Of Their Own Apostasy, Timothy Dolan, Meet Timothy Dolan (And Friends), Just More Conciliar Incongruities, Candidate For Man Of The Year?, From John Carroll To James Gibbons To Timothy Dolan.)
Other than this editorial, which was reviewed by Donald "Cardinal" Wuerl, the conciliar "archbishop" of Washington, District of Columbia, who permits the likes of United States Representative Nancy Patricia D'Alesandro Pelosi (D-California), the House Minority Leader, and Joseph Robinette Biden, Jr., the Vice President of the United States of America, and countless other pro-abort, pro-perversity office-holders to receive what purports to be Holy Communion in the conciliar liturgical service that is invalid and thus devoid of sacramental efficacy, what is going to be done to John Di Gioia or to Kathleen Sebelius by conciliar officials, including "Pope" Benedict XVI?
Nothing.
That's what.
Nothing.
Fret about denying the Faith or supporting grave evils in public office? Fret not, saith the false "pontiff."
Indeed, as noted in Apostates Reprimanding Apostates, the conciliar church's Doctrinal Assessment of the Leadership Conference of Women Religious will never produce any reform of religious life in the older, more established communities of religious women that have gone even beyond the approved apostasies of conciliarism to embrace almost any kind of pantheism imaginable as they celebrate the feminism of Eve with ready abandon. No reform will be produced as that which is erroneous at its foundation, the conciliar church, can never control or turn back tidal waves started by its own having let loose the floodgates to every error imaginable as being tolerated, at least on a level of pastoral praxis, by its local and universal authorities.
As expected, of course, who has undermined the "weight" of the slap on the wrist represented by the Doctrinal Assessment of the Leadership Conference of Women Religious?
You got it.
Joseph Ratzinger/Benedict XVI:
In our conversations, many of you
have spoken of your concern to build ever stronger relationships of friendship,
cooperation and trust with your priests. At the present time, too, I urge
you to remain particularly close to the men and women in your local Churches who
are committed to following Christ ever more perfectly by generously embracing
the evangelical counsels. I wish to reaffirm my deep gratitude for the example of fidelity and
self-sacrifice given by many consecrated women in your country, and to join them
in praying that this moment of discernment will bear abundant spiritual fruit
for the revitalization and strengthening of their communities in fidelity to
Christ and the Church, as well as to their founding charisms. The urgent
need in our own time for credible and attractive witnesses to the redemptive and
transformative power of the Gospel makes it essential to recapture a sense of the
sublime dignity and beauty of the consecrated life, to pray for religious
vocations and to promote them actively, while strengthening existing channels
for communication and cooperation, especially through the work of the Vicar or
Delegate for Religious in each Diocese. (To the Bishops of the United States of America, Regions XIV-XV and the
Eastern Rite, on their ad Limina visit, May 18, 2012.)
How far have the women religious in the United States of America gone off even the conciliar reservation? See Mrs. Randy Engel's Sisters in rebellion - non serviam, part one, Sisters in rebellion - non serviam, part two, and Sisters in rebellion - non serviam, part three.
Apostates who give esteem to the symbols of false religions and who embrace one condemned proposition after another reforming fellow apostates? Impossible.
Fret not, member communities of the Leadership Conference of Women Religious. Fret not.
The only groups that do have to fret a bit are those traditionally-minded communities within the structures of the counterfeit church of conciliarism or who are seeking full, active, and conscious participation in its structures. Communities such as the Society of Saint Pius X are just going to have to toe the conciliar line on such the conciliar line about adherents of the Talmud or face banishment from the merriments of apostasy in the conciliar church. (See Admit Bearer Only After Denying The Catholic Faith.)
Other than such groups, however, almost everyone in the conciliar church has carte blanche to do, say or believe whatever they want, which makes a mockery of Pope Leo XIII's plain reiteration of Catholic teaching as to what constitutes the Divine Constitution of Holy Mother Church:
Agreement and union of minds is the
necessary foundation of this perfect concord amongst men, from which
concurrence of wills and similarity of action are the natural results. Wherefore, in His divine wisdom, He ordained in His Church Unity of
Faith; a virtue which is the first of those bonds which unite man to
God, and whence we receive the name of the faithful - "one Lord, one
faith, one baptism" (Eph. iv., 5). That is, as there is one Lord and one
baptism, so should all Christians, without exception, have but one
faith. And so the Apostle St. Paul not merely begs, but entreats and
implores Christians to be all of the same mind, and to avoid difference
of opinions: "I beseech you, brethren, by the name of our Lord Jesus
Christ, that you all speak the same thing, and that there be no schisms
amongst you, and that you be perfect in the same mind and in the same
judgment" (I Cor. i., 10). Such passages certainly need no interpreter;
they speak clearly enough for themselves. Besides, all who profess
Christianity allow that there can be but one faith. It is of the
greatest importance and indeed of absolute necessity, as to which many
are deceived, that the nature and character of this unity should be
recognized. And, as We have already stated, this is not to be
ascertained by conjecture, but by the certain knowledge of what was
done; that is by seeking for and ascertaining what kind of unity in
faith has been commanded by Jesus Christ. . . .
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).
The need of this
divinely instituted means for the preservation of unity, about which we
speak is urged by St. Paul in his epistle to the Ephesians. In this he
first admonishes them to preserve with every care concord of minds:
"Solicitous to keep the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace" (Eph.
iv., 3, et seq.). And as souls cannot be perfectly united in charity
unless minds agree in faith, he wishes all to hold the same faith: "One
Lord, one faith," and this so perfectly one as to prevent all danger of
error: "that henceforth we be no more children, tossed to and fro, and
carried about with every wind of doctrine by the wickedness of men, by
cunning craftiness, by which they lie in wait to deceive" (Eph. iv.,
14): and this he teaches is to be observed, not for a time only - "but
until we all meet in the unity of faith...unto the measure of the age of
the fullness of Christ" (13). But, in what has Christ placed the
primary principle, and the means of preserving this unity? In that - "He
gave some Apostles - and other some pastors and doctors, for the
perfecting of the saints, for the work of the ministry, for the edifying
of the body of Christ" (11-12). (Pope Leo XIII, Satis Cognitum, June 29, 1896.)
Anyone who defects from the Catholic Faith ought to be considered as a non-Catholic with whom we can never be in communion no matter how many times he protests that this is not the case.
As we await the miracle of the Triumph of the Immaculate Heart of Mary that will usher in a period of peace and restore Holy Mother Church, we must cleave to the Catholic Church, not to the counterfeit church of conciliarism, as we attempt to plant the seeds for the triumph of the Immaculate Heart of Mary as we seek to live more and more penitentially, making reparation to the Most Sacred Heart of Jesus through the Sorrowful and Immaculate Heart of Mary for our own many sins and for those of the whole word., praying as many Rosaries each day as our state-in-life permits. No matter the problems in the Catholic catacombs, and they are problems aplenty, one can never
Isn't it time to pray a Rosary now?
Immaculate Heart of Mary, triumph soon.
Viva Cristo Rey! Vivat Christus Rex!
Our Lady of Fatima, pray for us.
Saint Joseph, pray for us.
Saints Peter and Paul, pray for us.
Saint John the Baptist, pray for us.
Saint John the Evangelist, pray for us.
Saint Michael the Archangel, pray for us.
Saint Gabriel the Archangel, pray for us.
Saint Raphael the Archangel, pray for us.
Saints Joachim and Anne, pray for us.
Saints Caspar, Melchior and Balthasar, pray for us.
See also: A Litany of Saints
Appendix
Up to the very end of his conference, Card. Ratzinger
resolutely continues on this road of agnosticism and now logically
comes to the most disastrous of conclusions. He writes:
In conclusion, as we contemplate our present-day
religious situation, of which I have tried to throw some light on some
of its elements, we may well marvel at the fact that, after all, people
still continue believing in a Christian manner, not only according to
Hick's, Knitter's as well as others' substitute ways or forms, but also
according to that full and joyous Faith found in the New Testament of
the Church of all time.
So, there it is: For Card. Ratzinger, "Hick,
Knitter, and others" who deny the divinity of our Lord Jesus Christ, His
Church, His sacraments, and, in short, all of Christianity, continue "despite everything" "believing in a Christian manner," even though they do so using "substitute forms of belief"!
Here, the Cardinal Prefect of the Congregation for the Faith leaves us
wondering indeed, just what it is he means by "believing in a Christian
manner."
Moreover, once the "preambula fidei" have been
eliminated, that "full and joyous Faith of the Church of all time" which
seems [for Card. Ratzinger] to be no different from modern-day
apostasies other than by its style and total character, is utterly
lacking in any rational credibility in comparison with and in relation
to what he refers to as "substitute ways or forms" of faith. "How is it," Card. Ratzinger wonders, "in fact, that the Faith [the one of all time] still has a chance of success?" Answer:
I would say that it is because it finds a
correspondence in man's nature…..There is, in man, an insatiable desire
for the infinite. None of the answers we have sought is sufficient [but
must we take his own word for it, or must we go through the exercise of
experiencing all religions?]. God alone [but Whom, according to Card.
Ratzinger, human reason cannot prove to be truly God], Who made Himself
finite in order to shatter the bonds of our own finitude and bring us to the dimension of His
infinity [...and not to redeem us from the slavery of sin?] is able to
meet all the needs of our human existence.
According to this, it
is therefore not objective motives based on history and reason, and thus
the truth of Christianity, but only a subjective appreciation which
brings us to "see" that it [Christianity] is able to satisfy the
profound needs of human nature and which would explain the "success"
[modernists would say the "vitality"] of the "faith" ["of all time" or
in its "substitute forms," it is of but little importance]. Such,
however, is not at all Catholic doctrine: this is simply modernist
apologetics (cf. Pope St. Pius X, Pascendi), based on their affirmed
impossibility of grasping metaphysical knowledge (or agnosticism or
skepticism), which Card. Ratzinger seemed to want to shun in the first
part of his address.
Now we are in a position to better
understand why Card. Ratzinger has such a wide-open concept of
"theology" and of "faith" that he includes everything: theology as well
as heresies, faith and apostasy. On that road of denial of the
human reason's ability of attaining metaphysical knowledge, a road which
he continues to follow, he lacks the "means of discerning the
difference between faith and non-faith" (R. Amerio, op. cit., p.340)
and, consequently, theology from pseudo-theology, truth from heresy:
All theologies are nullified, because all are regarded as equivalent;
the heart or kernel of religion is located in feelings or experiences,
as the Modernists held at the beginning of this century (Amerio, op.
cit., p.542).
We
cannot see how this position of Card. Ratzinger can escape that solemn
condemnation proclaimed at Vatican I: "If anyone says...that men must be
brought to the Faith solely by their own personal interior
experience...let him be anathema" (DB 1812). (Cardinal Ratzinger. This article, by the way, appeared in a publication of the Society of Saint Pius X, Si, Si, No, No in January of 1998.)
