No Space Between Ratzinger and Bergoglio

Part Two

by Thomas A. Droleskey, Ph.D.

We live in a world of "false opposites," which are used by the adversary to distract the masses with false conflicts between various gradations of Judeo-Masonic naturalism in order to keep them spinning their wheels endlessly in the belief that they are "making progress" either to advance or to retard certain evils.

The farce that is American electoral politics and public policy decision-making is awash in false conflicts that fill the coffers of various advocacy groups that thrive on fundraising schemes to "fight" this or that battle of the moment. The ratings of talk show hosts on television and radio depend upon endless conflict between the false opposites of the naturalist "right" and the naturalist "left" as listeners and callers dream great dreams of "restoring America" by returning to the very anti-Incarnational principles that are responsible for our inevitable decline into the abyss.

There are three types of blindness at work in all of this, both of which are inter-related.

First, there is, of course, the blindness wrought by Modernity, itself the product the Protestant Revolution's assault on the Divine plan that God Himself instituted to effect man's return to Him through the Catholic Church. Men and women live their entire lives steeped in the consequences of the Protestant Revolt: the rejection of the Social Reign of Christ the King (institutionalizing the heresy of the separation of Church and State, thereby "liberating" men from a due and docile submission to the Deposit of Faith as it has been entrusted by Our Blessed Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ exclusively to the Catholic Church, which has the authority, exercised judiciously and only after the exhausting of her Indirect Power of teaching and preaching and exhortation, to interpose herself with civil authorities when they propose to do or have i fact done things contrary to the good of souls), semi-Pelagianism (the belief that we are more or less self-redemptive, that we more or less stir up graces within ourselves, that we do not need belief in, access to or cooperation with Sanctifying Grace to be virtuous, that social order does not depend upon men being in a state of Sanctifying Grace), naturalism (the reduction of the affairs of personal and social life to the merely natural level with no thought of Divine Revelation or the necessity of keeping in mind at all times the eternal good of souls), and religious indifferentism (the belief that it does not make any difference what religion, if any, one believes in as long as one is a "good" person). This blindness has been deepened by the rise of Judeo-Masonry, which added an element of overt anti-Incarnationalism into the formation of the Modern civil state, and by the rise of an endless series of naturalistic political philosophies and ideologies that propose to "solve" social problems that have their remote cause in Original Sin and their proximate cause in the overthrow of the Social Reign of Christ the King.

Second, there is the blindness wrought by Americanism's accommodation to the principles of Modernity, as expressed in the Declaration of Independence and in the Constitution of the United States of America. Most, although certainly far from all, of the American bishops of the Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries believed that the First Amendment to that Constitution permitted Catholics the "freedom" to practice their religion openly after over two decades of oppression in those European countries under the domination of Protestants, especially The Netherlands, England and Ireland. As I have noted on many other occasions on this site, these bishops fell into a diabolical trap: the devil, having raised up bloodthirsty Protestants who persecuted Catholics in Europe, raised up "nice" and "tolerant" Protestants in the United States of America in order to lull Catholics to sleep, to convince them that there was no need to convert the nation to the Social Reign of Christ the King, that everything about the founding of the pluralistic and religiously indifferentist United States of America was more or less compatible with the Catholic Faith.

Third, there is the blindness wrought by conciliarism's formal embrace of Americanism, especially by Dignitatis Humanae, December 7, 1965, and by the words and deeds of Karol Wojtyla/John Paul II, Joseph Ratzinger/Benedict XVI and Jorge Mario Bergoglio/Francis, which has confirmed the accommodations of Catholics in the United States of America in their embrace of the false foundations of Judeo-Masonic civil state of Modernity.

Thus it is that Americanism paved the way for the "Second" Vatican Council's embrace of "religious liberty" and for the false "pontiffs" of the counterfeit church of conciliarism, especially Karol Wojtyla/John Paul II and Joseph Ratzinger/Benedict XVI, to endorse the heresy of the "separation of Church and State" in the name of a "healthy secularity." It is not enough, as the false "pontiffs" have said repeatedly, for the Catholic Church to have a "say" in a pluralistic nation, itself the product of the Protestant Revolt and the rise of Judeo-Masonry. She must be recognized as the true religion.

Yes, the Church acknowledges the reality of situations such as those that exist in the United States of America, using the "freedom" of pluralism that exists here to sanctify her children and to exhort them to try to do their best to influence the course of public policy as best they can without compromising the Faith or acknowledging the false principles upon which their political system is based. Fine. The Catholic Church does not accept such a situation as the ideal. She never stops exhorting her children to pray and to plant the seeds for the conversion of their nations to the true Faith. She does not accept false, anti-Incarnational, religiously indifferentist, naturalistic and semi-Pelagian principles as the foundations of either personal or social order.

Pope Pius IX, writing in Quanta Cura, December 8, 1864, put the matter this way:

But, although we have not omitted often to proscribe and reprobate the chief errors of this kind, yet the cause of the Catholic Church, and the salvation of souls entrusted to us by God, and the welfare of human society itself, altogether demand that we again stir up your pastoral solicitude to exterminate other evil opinions, which spring forth from the said errors as from a fountain. Which false and perverse opinions are on that ground the more to be detested, because they chiefly tend to this, that that salutary influence be impeded and (even) removed, which the Catholic Church, according to the institution and command of her Divine Author, should freely exercise even to the end of the world -- not only over private individuals, but over nations, peoples, and their sovereign princes; and (tend also) to take away that mutual fellowship and concord of counsels between Church and State which has ever proved itself propitious and salutary, both for religious and civil interests.

For you well know, venerable brethren, that at this time men are found not a few who, applying to civil society the impious and absurd principle of "naturalism," as they call it, dare to teach that "the best constitution of public society and (also) civil progress altogether require that human society be conducted and governed without regard being had to religion any more than if it did not exist; or, at least, without any distinction being made between the true religion and false ones." And, against the doctrine of Scripture, of the Church, and of the Holy Fathers, they do not hesitate to assert that "that is the best condition of civil society, in which no duty is recognized, as attached to the civil power, of restraining by enacted penalties, offenders against the Catholic religion, except so far as public peace may require." From which totally false idea of social government they do not fear to foster that erroneous opinion, most fatal in its effects on the Catholic Church and the salvation of souls, called by Our Predecessor, Gregory XVI, an "insanity," viz., that "liberty of conscience and worship is each man's personal right, which ought to be legally proclaimed and asserted in every rightly constituted society; and that a right resides in the citizens to an absolute liberty, which should be restrained by no authority whether ecclesiastical or civil, whereby they may be able openly and publicly to manifest and declare any of their ideas whatever, either by word of mouth, by the press, or in any other way." But, while they rashly affirm this, they do not think and consider that they are preaching "liberty of perdition;" and that "if human arguments are always allowed free room for discussion, there will never be wanting men who will dare to resist truth, and to trust in the flowing speech of human wisdom; whereas we know, from the very teaching of our Lord Jesus Christ, how carefully Christian faith and wisdom should avoid this most injurious babbling."

And, since where religion has been removed from civil society, and the doctrine and authority of divine revelation repudiated, the genuine notion itself of justice and human right is darkened and lost, and the place of true justice and legitimate right is supplied by material force, thence it appears why it is that some, utterly neglecting and disregarding the surest principles of sound reason, dare to proclaim that "the people's will, manifested by what is called public opinion or in some other way, constitutes a supreme law, free from all divine and human control; and that in the political order accomplished facts, from the very circumstance that they are accomplished, have the force of right." But who, does not see and clearly perceive that human society, when set loose from the bonds of religion and true justice, can have, in truth, no other end than the purpose of obtaining and amassing wealth, and that (society under such circumstances) follows no other law in its actions, except the unchastened desire of ministering to its own pleasure and interests? (Pope Pius IX, Quanta Cura, December 8, 1864.)

Heedless of these prophetic words, many Catholics, including those who are fully traditional, permit themselves to be drawn into the utter madness of the "left" and the "right" without realizing that we are in the death throes of a world founded upon the overthrow of the Social Reign of Christ the King wrought by the Protestant Revolution and institutionalized by the varied forces of Judeo-Masonry in the centuries thereafter. Thus it is that one phony "battle" after another is fought while the careerists of the "right" do everything they can to ape the statists of the "left" in order to find some "winning" strategy to acquire and retain power.

Readers of this site will understand that the devil has raised up false opposites on the "left" in politics to make those on the "right" seem "good" by way comparison even though both believe in the same naturalistic, anti-Incarnational errors of Modernity and refuse to accept the truth that Catholicism is the one and only foundation of personal and social order.

Yet it is that what Gilbert Keith Chesterton wrote ninety years ago is as true today as it was in 1924:

The whole modern world has divided itself into Conservatives and Progressives. The business of Progressives is to go on making mistakes. The business of the Conservatives is to prevent the mistakes from being corrected. (Gilbert Keith Chesterton, Illustrated London News, April 19, 1924.)

Similarly, the devil has raised up false opposites of "ultra-progressives" in the counterfeit church of conciliarism, to make alleged "conservatives" or "moderates" seem heroic by way of comparison even though both accept the fundamental revolutionary premises of conciliarism (the new ecclesiology, false ecumenism, religious liberty, separation of Church and State, inter-religious "prayer" services, attacks on the nature of dogmatic truth, a liturgy that is abhorrent in the sight of true God, the Most Most Blessed Trinity).

In this regard, of course, as I have noted many times in the past ten months now, Joseph Ratzinger/Benedict XVI is a Girondist or Menshevik (moderate) revolutionary to Jorge Mario Bergoglio's Jacobin or Bolshevik brand of radical revolutionary. The differences between the two are only matters of style an emphasis, something that was noted in part one of this series, which featured the two headed "pope" monster's common heretical views about the "enduring validity" of the Mosaic Covenant, two days ago now.

This installment focuses on the fact that the former universal public face of apostasy and his successor, the ever humble and pious Jorge Mario Bergoglio, who has now taken over an entire floor of the Casa Santa Marta, share heretical positions concerning the salvation of those who do not believe in God or who do not believe in the Sacred Divinity of Our Blessed Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ.

Jorge Mario Bergoglio, masquerading at this time as "Pope Francis," has been quite adamant that "we will meet" unbelievers "there" as long as they "do good:"

“Instead,” the Pope continued, “the Lord has created us in His image and likeness, and has given us this commandment in the depths of our heart: do good and do not do evil”:

"The Lord has redeemed all of us, all of us, with the Blood of Christ: all of us, not just Catholics. Everyone! ‘Father, the atheists?’ Even the atheists. Everyone! And this Blood makes us children of God of the first class! We are created children in the likeness of God and the Blood of Christ has redeemed us all! And we all have a duty to do good. And this commandment for everyone to do good, I think, is a beautiful path towards peace. If we, each doing our own part, if we do good to others, if we meet there, doing good, and we go slowly, gently, little by little, we will make that culture of encounter: we need that so much. We must meet one another doing good. ‘But I don’t believe, Father, I am an atheist!’ But do good: we will meet one another there.”

“Doing good” the Pope explained, is not a matter of faith: “It is a duty, it is an identity card that our Father has given to all of us, because He has made us in His image and likeness. And He does good, always.” (Culture of encounter is the foundation of peace.)

(Vatican Radio) Does God forgive non-believers? Does absolute truth exist? And is God merely a creation of the human mind?

In a lengthy letter to the former editor of the Italian daily ‘La Repubblica’, Eugenio Scalfari, Pope Francis shares reflections on these three questions and urges all non-believers to engage with Christians in an open and sincere conversation.

In the letter published on Wednesday, the Pope laments the impasse that has grown up over the centuries with those who see Christianity as ‘dark and superstitious,’ in opposition to the ‘light of reason’.

Quoting from the recent encyclical ‘Lumen Fidei’, the Pope stresses that, on the contrary, faith must never be intransigent or arrogant, but rather humble and able to grow in relationship with others.

Responding to the three questions posed by the Italian journalist and writer, the Pope says the key issue for non-believers is that of “obeying their consciences” when faced with choices of good or evil. God’s mercy, he stresses, “has no limits” for those who seek him with a sincere and contrite heart.

Reflecting on the question of absolute truth, Pope Francis says he prefers to describe the truth in terms of a dynamic relationship between each Christian and Jesus, who said, ‘I am the way, the truth and the life’. The truth of God’s love, the Pope insists, is not subjective, but it is only experienced and expressed as a journey, a living relationship with each one of us, in our different social and cultural contexts.

Thirdly, Pope Francis considers the question of God as a creation of the human mind, who will thus disappear when human beings cease to exist on earth. In my experience, he says - and in that of so many other Christians past and present – God is not merely an idea but is a “Reality” of infinite goodness and mercy, revealed to us through his son, Jesus of Nazareth.

Reflecting on the originality of the Christian faith in relations to other religions, the Pope stresses the role of Jesus who renders us all sons and daughters of God, therefore also brothers and sisters to each other. Our arduous task, he says, is that of communicating God’s love to all, not in a superior way, but rather through service to all people especially those on the margins of our societies.

Finally the Pope spoke of his deep respect and friendship for people of Jewish faith – especially those with whom he worked so closely in his native Argentina. Reflecting on the terrible experience of the Shoah, he said, we can never be grateful enough to the Jews who maintained their faith in God, thus teaching us too to remain always open to his infinite love. (Antipope's letter to non-believers in Italian paper La Repubblica.)

257. As believers, we also feel close to those who do not consider themselves part of any religious tradition, yet sincerely seek the truth, goodness and beauty which we believe have their highest expression and source in God. We consider them as precious allies in the commitment to defending human dignity, in building peaceful coexistence between peoples and in protecting creation. A special place of encounter is offered by new Areopagi such as the Court of the Gentiles, where “believers and non-believers are able to engage in dialogue about fundamental issues of ethics, art and science, and about the search for transcendence”. [204] This too is a path to peace in our troubled world.

258. Starting from certain social issues of great importance for the future of humanity, I have tried to make explicit once again the inescapable social dimension of the Gospel message and to encourage all Christians to demonstrate it by their words, attitudes and deeds. (Jorge Mario Bergoglio, Evangelii Gaudium, November 26, 2013.)

For antidotes to this assortment of apostasy, please see, respectively: Francis Do-Right,  Francis, The Out-of-Control and Uncontrollable Antipope, part two and  Jorge and Oscar's False Gospel of False Joy, part seven.

Although Bergoglio has grabbed headlines with these statements, they are pure boilerplate conciliarism.

Consider, for example, the following excerpt of a sermon given fifty years ago, way back when in 1964 (can 1964, the year that William A. Shea Municipal Stadium, which was demolished on February 18, 2009, opened, be five decades ago?) by a priest who fancied himself as a theologian and is seen by many in the Motu world as a scion of orthodoxy and a "restorer of tradition:"

...Everything we believe about God, and everything we know about man, prevents us from accepting that beyond the limits of the Church there is no more salvation, that up to the time of Christ all men were subject to the fate of eternal damnation. We are no longer ready and able to think that our neighbor, who is a decent and respectable man and in many ways better than we are, should be eternally damned simply because he is not a Catholic. We are no longer ready, no longer willing, to think that eternal corruption should be inflicted on people in Asia, in Africa, or wherever it may be, merely on account of their not having "Catholic" marked in their passport.

Actually, a great deal of thought had been devoted in theology, both before and after Ignatius, to the question of how people, without even knowing it, in some way belonged to the Church and to Christ and could thus be saved nevertheless. And still today, a great deal of perspicacity is used in such reflections.

Yet if we are honest, we will have to admit that this is not our problem at all. The question we have to face is not that of whether other people can be saved and how. We are convinced that God is able to do this with or without our theories, with or without our perspicacity, and that we do not need to help him do it with our cogitations. The question that really troubles us is not in the least concerned with whether and how God manages to save others.

The question that torments us is, much rather, that of why it is still actually necessary for us to carry out the whole ministry of the Christian faith—why, if there are so many other ways to heaven and to salvation, should it still be demanded of us that we bear, day by day, the whole burden of ecclesiastical dogma and ecclesiastical ethics? And with that, we are once more confronted, though from a different approach, with the same question we raised yesterday in conversation with God and with which we parted: What actually is the Christian reality, the real substance of Christianity that goes beyond mere moralism? What is that special thing in Christianity that not only justifies but compels us to be and live as Christians?

It became clear enough to us, yesterday, that there is no answer to this that will resolve every contradiction into incontrovertible, unambivalent truth with scientific clarity. Assent to the hiddenness of God is an essential part of the movement of the spirit that we call "faith." And one more preliminary consideration is requisite. If we are raising the question of the basis and meaning of our life as Christians, as it emerged for us just now, then this can easily conceal a sidelong glance at what we suppose to be the easier and more comfortable life of other people, who will "also" get to heaven. We are too much like the workers taken on in the first hour whom the Lord talks about in his parable of the workers in the vineyard (Mt 20:1-6). When they realized that the day's wage of one denarius could be much more easily earned, they could no longer see why they had sweated all day. Yet how could they really have been certain that it was so much more comfortable to be out of work than to work? And why was it that they were happy with their wages only on the condition that other people were worse off than they were? But the parable is not there on account of those workers at that time; it is there for our sake. For in our raising questions about the "why" of Christianity, we are doing just what those workers did. We are assuming that spiritual "unemployment"—a life without faith or prayer—is more pleasant than spiritual service. Yet how do we know that?

We are staring at the trials of everyday Christianity and forgetting on that account that faith is not just a burden that weighs us down; it is at the same time a light that brings us counsel, gives us a path to follow, and gives us meaning. We are seeing in the Church only the exterior order that limits our freedom and thereby overlooking the fact that she is our spiritual home, which shields us, keeps us safe in life and in death. We are seeing only our own burden and forgetting that other people also have burdens, even if we know nothing of them. And above all, what a strange attitude that actually is, when we no longer find Christian service worthwhile if the denarius of salvation may be obtained even without it! It seems as if we want to be rewarded, not just with our own salvation, but most especially with other people's damnation—just like the workers hired in the first hour. That is very human, but the Lord's parable is particularly meant to make us quite aware of how profoundly un-Christian it is at the same time. Anyone who looks on the loss of salvation for others as the condition, as it were, on which he serves Christ will in the end only be able to turn away grumbling, because that kind of reward is contrary to the loving-kindness of God. (Catholic Church and Salvation.)

Yes, those words belong to none other than Father Joseph Ratzinger. These words are vintage Ratzinger. Vintage.

Ratzinger the Rationalist, the man whose war on the very nature of dogmatic truth that is nothing other than direct warfare of the very nature of God Himself and of the Sacred Deposit of Faith that He has entrusted exclusively to His true Church, could not accept that an infallible teaching promulgated by Pope Eugene IV at the Council of Florence, February 4, 1442, whose Fathers met under the infallible guidance and protection of the Third Person of the Most Blessed Trinity, God the Holy Ghost, still bound the Catholic Church after the passage of over 522 years:

It [the Holy Roman Church] firmly believes, professes, and teaches that the matter pertaining to the law of the Old Testament, of the Mosaic law, which are divided into ceremonies, sacred rites, sacrifices, and sacraments, because they were established to signify something in the future, although they were suited to the divine worship at that time, after our Lord's coming had been signified by them, ceased, and the sacraments of the New Testament began; and that whoever, even after the passion, placed hope in these matters of the law and submitted himself to them as necessary for salvation, as if faith in Christ could not save without them, sinned mortally. Yet it does not deny that after the passion of Christ up to the promulgation of the Gospel they could have been observed until they were believed to be in no way necessary for salvation; but after the promulgation of the Gospel it asserts that they cannot be observed without the loss of eternal salvation. All, therefore, who after that time observe circumcision and the Sabbath and the other requirements of the law, it declares alien to the Christian faith and not in the least fit to participate in eternal salvation, unless someday they recover from these errors. Therefore, it commands all who glory in the name of Christian, at whatever time, before or after baptism, to cease entirely from circumcision, since, whether or not one places hope in it, it cannot be observed at all without the loss of eternal salvation. Regarding children, indeed, because of danger of death, which can often take place, when no help can be brought to them by another remedy than through the sacrament of baptism, through which they are snatched from the domination of the Devil and adopted among the sons of God, it advises that holy baptism ought not to be deferred for forty or eighty days, or any time according to the observance of certain people, but it should be conferred as soon as it can be done conveniently, but so ,that, when danger of death is imminent, they be baptized in the form of the Church, early without delay, even by a layman or woman, if a priest should be lacking, just as is contained more fully in the decree of the Armenians. . . .

It firmly believes, professes, and proclaims that those not living within the Catholic Church, not only pagans, but also Jews and heretics and schismatics cannot become participants in eternal life, but will depart "into everlasting fire which was prepared for the devil and his angels" [Matt. 25:41], unless before the end of life the same have been added to the flock; and that the unity of the ecclesiastical body is so strong that only to those remaining in it are the sacraments of the Church of benefit for salvation, and do fastings, almsgiving, and other functions of piety and exercises of Christian service produce eternal reward, and that no one, whatever almsgiving he has practiced, even if he has shed blood for the name of Christ, can be saved, unless he has remained in the bosom and unity of the Catholic Church. (Pope Eugene IV, Cantate Domino, Council of Florence, February 4, 1442.)

Ratzinger, who was mentored in large measure by the Hegelian exponent of the "new theology" that was condemned Pope Pius XII in Humani Generis, August 12, 1950, Father Hans Urs von Balthasar, demonstrated very clearly his support for the heresy of universal salvation back in 1964, doing so by means of projecting his own rationalist beliefs about God and His teaching rather than to accept with docility and humility the irreformable teaching stated in Cantate Domino.

Ratzinger's heretical beliefs, stated fifty years ago now, are as one with the heretical beliefs of Jorge Mario Bergoglio, nine years, eight months his junior, who was then teaching philosophy and literature, who, like Ratzinger, believes in the old Modernist heresy that he calls "faith" springs from within a person's being.

This is what Bergoglio published in Lumen Fidei, most of which, of course, had been written by Ratzinger/Benedict:

Because faith is a way, it also has to do with the lives of those men and women who, though not believers, nonetheless desire to believe and continue to seek. To the extent that they are sincerely open to love and set out with whatever light they can find, they are already, even without knowing it, on the path leading to faith. They strive to act as if God existed, at times because they realize how important he is for finding a sure compass for our life in common or because they experience a desire for light amid darkness, but also because in perceiving life’s grandeur and beauty they intuit that the presence of God would make it all the more beautiful. Saint Irenaeus of Lyons tells how Abraham, before hearing God’s voice, had already sought him "in the ardent desire of his heart" and "went throughout the whole world, asking himself where God was to be found", until "God had pity on him who, all alone, had sought him in silence". Anyone who sets off on the path of doing good to others is already drawing near to God, is already sustained by his help, for it is characteristic of the divine light to brighten our eyes whenever we walk towards the fullness of love. (Jorge Mario Bergoglio/Francis, Lumen Fidei, July 5, 2013.)

Saint Irenaeus does not look favorably upon how he is being brought forth as a yet another in the long line of witnesses used by the conciliar revolutionaries to distort their teaching so as to make them, in effect, perjured witnesses in behalf of conciliarism. 

For the truth of the matter is that the passage from Lumen Fidei cited just above, which is in perfect accord with the writings of Father Joseph Ratzinger and his speeches and allocutions of "Pope Benedict XVI," is a perfect example of the immanence used by Modernists that was condemned by Pope Saint Pius X in Pascendi Dominci Gregis, September 8, 1907, all of Bergoglio's protestations to the contrary notwithstanding:

7. But it is not solely by objective arguments that the non-believer may be disposed to faith. There are also those that are subjective, and for this purpose the modernist apologists return to the doctrine of immanence. They endeavor, in fact, to persuade their non-believer that down in the very depths of his nature and his life lie hidden the need and the desire for some religion, and this not a religion of any kind, but the specific religion known as Catholicism, which, they say, is absolutely postulated by the perfect development of life. And here again We have grave reason to complain that there are Catholics who, while rejecting immanence as a doctrine, employ it as a method of apologetics, and who do this so imprudently that they seem to admit, not merely a capacity and a suitability for the supernatural, such as has at all times been emphasized, within due limits, by Catholic apologists, but that there is in human nature a true and rigorous need for the supernatural order. Truth to tell, it is only the moderate Modernists who make this appeal to an exigency for the Catholic religion. As for the others, who might he called integralists, they would show to the non-believer, as hidden in his being, the very germ which Christ Himself had in His consciousness, and which He transmitted to mankind. Such, Venerable Brethren, is a summary description of the apologetic method of the Modernists, in perfect harmony with their doctrines -- methods and doctrines replete with errors, made not for edification but for destruction, not for the making of Catholics but for the seduction of those who are Catholics into heresy; and tending to the utter subversion of all religion. (Pope Saint Pius X, Pascendi Dominci Gregis, September 8, 1907.)

Thus stands condemned one of the principle cornerstones of the conciliar revolutionaries to justify their kind words and messages of "feast day" greetings to non-Catholics as "believers" even though they do not believe that all that Our Blessed Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ taught in the Sacred Deposit of Faith as He has entrusted It to the eternal safekeeping and infallible explication of His Catholic Church and/or reject His Sacred Divinity or even the existence of God altogether.

Thus stands condemned efforts on the part of Karol Wojtyla/John Paul II, advanced at both the "Second" Vatican Council," and during his 9,666 days as the head of the counterfeit church of conciliarism, and of Joseph Ratzinger/Benedict XVI and Jorge Mario Bergoglio/Francis to approach atheists without seeking with urgency their unconditional conversion to the true Faith.

Thus stands condemned the very cornerstone of conciliarism and everything it embodies: the new ecclesiology, false ecumenism, "inter-religious "dialogue" and "prayer services," "religious liberty" and the late Father Karl Rahner's "Anonymous Christian."

Yes, you see, the devil lacks creativity. He is simply repackaging the same old Modernist methodologies in the persons of the supposedly erudite Joseph Alois Ratzinger, and of the "friendly," "ever-humble," "simple" and "devout Jorge Mario Bergoglio/Francis.

It was almost exactly forty-one years to the day after his sermon in 1964 that "Pope" Benedict XVI revisited his heresy in a general audience speech given  on Wednesday, November 30, 2005:

Dear Brothers and Sisters,

1. On this first Wednesday of Advent, a liturgical season of silence, watchfulness and prayer in preparation for Christmas, let us meditate on Psalm 137[136], whose first words in the Latin version became famous:  Super flumina Babylonis. The text evokes the tragedy lived by the Jewish people during the destruction of Jerusalem in about 586 B.C., and their subsequent and consequent exile in Babylon. We have before us a national hymn of sorrow, marked by a curt nostalgia for what has been lost.

This heartfelt invocation to the Lord to free his faithful from slavery in Babylon also expresses clearly the sentiments of hope and expectation of salvation with which we have begun our journey through Advent.

The background to the first part of the Psalm (cf. vv. 1-4) is the land of exile with its rivers and streams, indeed, the same that irrigated the Babylonian plain to which the Jews had been deported. It is, as it were, a symbolic foreshadowing of the extermination camps to which the Jewish people - in the century we have just left behind us - were taken in an abominable operation of death that continues to be an indelible disgrace in the history of humanity.

The second part of the Psalm (cf. vv. 5-6) is instead pervaded by the loving memory of Zion, the city lost but still alive in the exiles' hearts.

2. The hand, tongue, palate, voice and tears are included in the Psalmist's words. The hand is indispensable to the harp-player:  but it is already paralyzed (cf. v. 5) by grief, also because the harps are hung up on the poplars.

The tongue is essential to the singer, but now it is stuck to the palate (cf. v. 6). In vain do the Babylonian captors "ask... for songs..., songs... of joy" (v. 3). "Zion's songs" are "song[s] of the Lord" (vv. 3-4), not folk songs to be performed. Only through a people's liturgy and freedom can they rise to Heaven.

3. God, who is the ultimate judge of history, will also know how to understand and accept, in accordance with his justice, the cry of victims, over and above the tones of bitterness that sometimes colours them.

Let us entrust ourselves to St Augustine for a further meditation on our Psalm. The great Father of the Church introduces a surprising and very timely note:  he knows that there are also people among the inhabitants of Babylon who are committed to peace and to the good of the community, although they do not share the biblical faith; the hope of the Eternal City to which we aspire is unknown to them. Within them they have a spark of desire for the unknown, for the greater, for the transcendent:  for true redemption.

And Augustine says that even among the persecutors, among the non-believers, there are people who possess this spark, with a sort of faith or hope, as far as is possible for them in the circumstances in which they live. With this faith, even in an unknown reality, they are truly on their way towards the true Jerusalem, towards Christ.

And with this openness of hope, Augustine also warns the "Babylonians" - as he calls them -, those who do not know Christ or even God and yet desire the unknown, the eternal, and he warns us too, not to focus merely on the material things of the present but to persevere on the journey to God. It is also only with this greater hope that we will be able to transform this world in the right way. St Augustine says so in these words: 

"If we are citizens of Jerusalem... and must live in this land, in the confusion of this world and in this Babylon where we do not dwell as citizens but are held prisoner, then we should not just sing what the Psalm says but we should also live it:  something that is done with a profound, heartfelt aspiration, a full and religious yearning for the eternal city".

And he adds with regard to the "earthly city called Babylon", that it "has in it people who, prompted by love for it, work to guarantee it peace - temporal peace - nourishing in their hearts no other hope, indeed, by placing in this one all their joy, without any other intention. And we see them making every effort to be useful to earthly society".

"Now, if they strive to do these tasks with a pure conscience, God, having predestined them to be citizens of Jerusalem, will not let them perish within Babylon:  this is on condition, however, that while living in Babylon, they do not thirst for ambition, short-lived magnificence or vexing arrogance.... He sees their enslavement and will show them that other city for which they must truly long and towards which they must direct their every effort" (Esposizioni sui Salmi, 136, 1-2:  Nuova Biblioteca Agostiniana, XXVIII, Rome, 1977, pp. 397, 399).

And let us pray to the Lord that in all of us this desire, this openness to God, will be reawakened, and that even those who do not know Christ may be touched by his love so that we are all together on the pilgrimage to the definitive City, and that the light of this City may appear also in our time and in our world.  (30 November 2005, Psalm 137[136]: 1-6 - If I forget you, Jerusalem.)

The Zenit propaganda agency headlined its news story concerning this general audience talk as follow: Nonbelievers Too Can Be Saved, a headline that caused all manner of "conservatives" within the structures of the counterfeit church of conciliarism to do all kinds of intellectual gymnastics to try to save the "orthodoxy" of Wojtyla/John Paul II's alleged "defender of the faith." Try as they might have done so, however, the spin doctors in 2005 were as delusional then as are those who are spinning mightily for Bergoglio now.

Moreover, Ratzinger, as was his wont, deconstructed and misrepresented the teaching of Saint Augustine, something that Pope Leo XIII made clear when condemning the reliance upon natural virtue and natural goodness by adherents of the heresy of Americanism:

Can it be that those men illustrious for sanctity, whom the Church distinguishes and openly pays homage to, were deficient, came short in the order of nature and its endowments, because they excelled in Christian strength? And although it be allowed at times to wonder at acts worthy of admiration which are the outcome of natural virtue-is there anyone at all endowed simply with an outfit of natural virtue? Is there any one not tried by mental anxiety, and this in no light degree? Yet ever to master such, as also to preserve in its entirety the law of the natural order, requires an assistance from on high. These single notable acts to which we have alluded will frequently upon a closer investigation be found to exhibit the appearance rather than the reality of virtue. Grant that it is virtue, unless we would "run in vain" and be unmindful of that eternal bliss which a good God in his mercy has destined for us, of what avail are natural virtues unless seconded by the gift of divine grace? Hence St. Augustine well says: "Wonderful is the strength, and swift the course, but outside the true path." For as the nature of man, owing to the primal fault, is inclined to evil and dishonor, yet by the help of grace is raised up, is borne along with a new greatness and strength, so, too, virtue, which is not the product of nature alone, but of grace also, is made fruitful unto everlasting life and takes on a more strong and abiding character. (Pope Leo XIII, Testem Benevolentiae Nostrae, January 22, 1899.)

Saint Thomas Aquinas taught us in his Summa Theologica that unbelievers do not merit anything before God for their good works and thus cannot please Him:

Objection 1. It would seem that each act of an unbeliever is a sin. Because a gloss on Romans 14:23, "All that is not of faith is sin," says: "The whole life of unbelievers is a sin." Now the life of unbelievers consists of their actions. Therefore every action of an unbeliever is a sin.

Objection 2. Further, faith directs the intention. Now there can be no good save what comes from a right intention. Therefore, among unbelievers, no action can be good.

Objection 3. Further, when that which precedes is corrupted, that which follows is corrupted also. Now an act of faith precedes the acts of all the virtues. Therefore, since there is no act of faith in unbelievers, they can do no good work, but sin in every action of theirs.

On the contrary, It is said of Cornelius, while yet an unbeliever (Acts 10:4-31), that his alms were acceptable to God. Therefore not every action of an unbeliever is a sin, but some of his actions are good.

I answer that, As stated above (I-II, 85, 2,4) mortal sin takes away sanctifying grace, but does not wholly corrupt the good of nature. Since therefore, unbelief is a mortal sin, unbelievers are without grace indeed, yet some good of nature remains in them. Consequently it is evident that unbelievers cannot do those good works which proceed from grace, viz. meritorious works; yet they can, to a certain extent, do those good works for which the good of nature suffices.

Hence it does not follow that they sin in everything they do; but whenever they do anything out of their unbelief, then they sin. For even as one who has the faith, can commit an actual sin, venial or even mortal, which he does not refer to the end of faith, so too, an unbeliever can do a good deed in a matter which he does not refer to the end of his unbelief.

Reply to Objection 1. The words quoted must be taken to mean either that the life of unbelievers cannot be sinless, since without faith no sin is taken away, or that whatever they do out of unbelief, is a sin. Hence the same authority adds: "Because every one that lives or acts according to his unbelief, sins grievously."

Reply to Objection 2. Faith directs the intention with regard to the supernatural last end: but even the light of natural reason can direct the intention in respect of a connatural good.

Reply to Objection 3. Unbelief does not so wholly destroy natural reason in unbelievers, but that some knowledge of the truth remains in them, whereby they are able to do deeds that are generically good. With regard, however, to Cornelius, it is to be observed that he was not an unbeliever, else his works would not have been acceptable to God, whom none can please without faith. Now he had implicit faith, as the truth of the Gospel was not yet made manifest: hence Peter was sent to him to give him fuller instruction in the faith.  (Saint Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologica, Question 10, Article 4.)

Here is one final example from the false "pontificate" of Ratzinger/Benedict, taken from his address at Assisi III, October 27, 2011, proving yet again that there is no space on matters of substance between himself and his successor as the universal public face of apostasy:

In addition to the two phenomena of religion and anti-religion, a further basic orientation is found in the growing world of agnosticism: people to whom the gift of faith has not been given, but who are nevertheless on the lookout for truth, searching for God. Such people do not simply assert: “There is no God”. They suffer from his absence and yet are inwardly making their way towards him, inasmuch as they seek truth and goodness. They are “pilgrims of truth, pilgrims of peace”. They ask questions of both sides. They take away from militant atheists the false certainty by which these claim to know that there is no God and they invite them to leave polemics aside and to become seekers who do not give up hope in the existence of truth and in the possibility and necessity of living by it. But they also challenge the followers of religions not to consider God as their own property, as if he belonged to them, in such a way that they feel vindicated in using force against others. These people are seeking the truth, they are seeking the true God, whose image is frequently concealed in the religions because of the ways in which they are often practised. Their inability to find God is partly the responsibility of believers with a limited or even falsified image of God. So all their struggling and questioning is in part an appeal to believers to purify their faith, so that God, the true God, becomes accessible. Therefore I have consciously invited delegates of this third group to our meeting in Assisi, which does not simply bring together representatives of religious institutions. Rather it is a case of being together on a journey towards truth, a case of taking a decisive stand for human dignity and a case of common engagement for peace against every form of destructive force. Finally I would like to assure you that the Catholic Church will not let up in her fight against violence, in her commitment for peace in the world. We are animated by the common desire to be “pilgrims of truth, pilgrims of peace”. (Day of reflection, dialogue, and prayer for peace and justice in the world "Pilgrims of Truth, Pilgrims of Peace": Address of the Ratzinger/Benedict, Assisi, 27 October 2011.)

Unbelievers can challenge "the followers of religion." There is nothing lack in the Divine Constitution of Holy Mother Church to instruct us on any point. Those who do not believe or who doubt in the existence of God are objects of prayer for their conversion. They make no contribution to the world other than add to the confusion prophesied by Popes Gregory XVI and Pius IX would be the case when men live in a world of unfettered "freedom of conscience" and "freedom of speech" and "freedom of the press" and "religious freedom:"

This shameful font of indifferentism gives rise to that absurd and erroneous proposition which claims that liberty of conscience must be maintained for everyone. It spreads ruin in sacred and civil affairs, though some repeat over and over again with the greatest impudence that some advantage accrues to religion from it. "But the death of the soul is worse than freedom of error," as Augustine was wont to say. 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.)

The madness represented by Ratzinger/Benedict's speech in 2011 is compounded when one considers the fact that he actually believed that he was "teaching" the "leaders of the world's religions," most of whom actually represent a very tiny sliver of people on the face of this earth as there is no central authority for any of the Eastern "religions" and Protestantism is divided into a welter of warring camps (as is Orthodoxy). Mohammedans have different branches. So do the Talmudists. Ratzinger/Benedict actually believed that his "teaching" will help the "leaders of the world's religions" to be better informed as to how to use their own false religions to prevent violence and thus to build up "peace," which he has defined on numerous occasions to be the "coexistence" of the "world's religions," ignoring the fact that false religions of their nature are violent assaults against the Most Blessed Trinity and the entirety of Divine Revelation, all the while permitting themselves to be "challenged" by unbelievers as they are "pilgrims of truth, pilgrims of peace" just as much as are "believers."

No, those who believe that Joseph Ratzinger is still "Pope Benedict XVI" because they think that he was "forced" to resign the conciliar Petrine Minister are blind to the truth that their "restorer of tradition" is in absolute harmony with his successor, "Pope Francis," on all matters of theological substance. Furthermore, of course, these delusional people have to reckon with the fact that Joseph Ratzinger had nothing to "resign" from as he, a true priest, has never been a bishop or a cardinal, no less a true and legitimate Successor of Saint Peter. He is a Modernist. He is a heretic. So is Jorge Mario Bergoglio

The path to Heaven is to be found by exalting atheists or followers of false religions who "do good."

No, men, whether acting individually or collectively, deceive themselves if they think that they can make the world a "better" place absent a profound devotion to Our Lady's Most Holy Rosary. Our Lady told us in the Cova da Iria near Fatima, Portugal, nearly ninety-seven years ago now that we must pray the Rosary to console the good God and to make reparation for our sins as we pray for the conversion of poor sinners and for the faithful fulfillment of her Fatima Message. This is a work of the Mercy of the Divine Redeemer, Who is giving us every chance to repent and convert. Why do men still persist in their obstinate refusal to take Our Lady's Fatima Message seriously and to organize Rosary processions and rallies to counter the naturalism of the day and to serve as valiant champions of Christ the King?

The devil knows the importance of the Our Lady's Fatima Message, which is Heaven's Peace Plan. He attacks Our Lady of Fatima at every turn, having used the lords of the counterfeit church of conciliarism, including but not limited to Joseph Ratzinger/Benedict XVI, Tarcisio Bertone and Angelo Sodano, to deconstruct, misrepresent and distort the Third Secret of Fatima and to cast doubt as well upon Our Lady's actual, physical apparition in the Cova da Iria (see We Must Accept What Rationalists Reject, Relativizing Our Lady's Rosary and Her Fatima Message and On Full Display: The Modernist Mind).

It cannot be this way with us. We need to petition Our Lady in humility through her Most Holy Rosary to help us to get home to Heaven as we recognize and reject conciliarism for what it is: a diabolically-planned and executed campaign to prepare Catholics and non-Catholics for Antichrist.

Immaculate Heart of Mary, triumph soon!

Viva Cristo Rey!

Our Lady of Fatima, pray for us!

 

Saint Joseph, Patron of Departing Souls, 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.