To comment please open your gmail account or use my email address FB Messenger or Twitter.
 |
| New World Church: hidden in plain sight |
Perhaps the most beautiful aspect of the Palm Sunday liturgy at St Anthony's SSPX Whanganui was the priest who distributed the palms (to be kissed while kneeling), chanted the antiphons, led the long procession, chanted St Matthew's Passion and celebrated Sung High Mass - and then only five minutes later was celebrating the next Mass.
Or maybe it was the angel-faced, very small Asian boy who joined us in the pew queue, kneeling, hands clasped, until he disappeared, maybe with a Mum or Dad who had to go.
It made one wish it were one's own little boy years ago, one's own children who were drinking at the well which Pope Francis is determined to seal up - not just the well of the Traditional Latin Mass but the Catholic Church herself, by whipping a lay-loaded Synod out from under the bishops' feet.
On his own authority - which is not infallibility, far from it - the pope says lay men and women will vote at the Synod of Bishops on an equal footing with bishops.
Unqualified (that is, unordained by God) men and women, be they ever so expert or ecumenical or inclusive, were not appointed by Jesus Christ to govern His Body the Church. If Francis gets away with this the Rock Masses won't be far away.
The Bolshevik (1918, aka Red Army Soldier taking Bread from a Child) by Ilya Repin
This painting (above) symbolises the attempt by Francis not just to take the magisterium away from Christ's bishops but to take away the Bread of Scripture and Eucharist, first from faithful Catholics by denying them the Mass of Ages and ultimately also from Novus Ordo Massgoers by transforming their Catholic Church into a New World Church. The synful Synod is the Trojan horse which tries - unsuccessfully - to conceal this intention of the hierarchy and the "global elite".
"Oh what a tangled web we weave/when first we practise to deceive"
Then again, one wonders whether Pope Francis has dreamed this one up simply to inflate the numbers attending the synod. One can imagine many more of the sort of Catholic who flew in from all over New Zealand to attend the National Synod at St Catherine's Wellington last year being very keen on the idea of flying to Rome for more of the same, only worse. It's widely thought that the idea of dragging the whole bunfight out for another year was to boost drooping morale and apathy among the laity and at an educated guess, also the clergy.
Hamilton diocese in New Zealand lamented that "the principal theme that occurred to the committee was that of apathy," which was "marked by the lack of participation." https://www.churchmilitant.com/news/article/pope-drags-out-synod-as-laity-spurn-gabfest
Another cunning ploy by Francis was to handpick the ghastly Fr Timothy Radcliffe to lead the retreat for all bishops attending the October 2023 synod gathering. A prominent Dominican theologian who facilitated the Church of England's validation of homosexual relationships, Radcliffe has called sodomy "Christ's gift". https://www.churchmilitant.com/news/article/synod-preacher-aided-anglican-homoheresy
 |
| Fr Timothy Radcliffe: "sodomy is Eucharistic" |
Pope Francis recently spoke about the Synod on Synodality with Argentine journalist Elisabetta Piqué of La Nacion. He talked specifically about his 2018 Apostolic Constitution Episcopalis Communio [EC], which established new canonical norms for the Synod of Bishops:
Ten years ago a serious reflection was undertaken, and a document was written, I signed it, with theologians with me, it was a community thing. This marked out a stage: “we have arrived so far, now something more is missing.” And we did not explicate what was missing, but little by little it became evident, and it was to explain synodality. For example, it was already something accepted by all that women could not vote. Then at the Synod for the Amazon it was asked, “Why can’t women vote? Are they second class Christians?”
Catholics aren't Anglicans. Yet. Francis needs a bit more time. Women can't vote because they're not bishops.
So, we were dealing with even more serious problems for making things more perfect.
Piqué then asked: “So now will one woman or all women vote?” Pope Francis responded: “Everyone who is a participant in the synod is going to vote. He or she who is a guest or an observer is not going to vote. Whoever participates in the synod has the right to a vote. Be it a man or a woman. All, all. This word ‘all’ is key for me.”
Pope Francis shows once more that he has fallen victim to the fashionable cult of papolotry. "All" might be key for him, but it is not key for the Church.
So now lay men and women will be voting members of the Synod of Bishops, on an equal footing with the bishops. With this revamping, the Synod of Bishops has ceased to exist, and a new de facto entity has come into existence, the Synod of Bishops and Laity.
This new arrangement represents a revolution in the Church. The laity can now exercise an important function previously restricted to bishops (and by law to a few selected priests). No theological or canonical justification was offered, simply the assertion that previous rules treated women unjustly as second-class Christians. Is it an injustice that the Synod of Bishops be composed of bishops who vote on their final document?
Just as an aside, the Holy See’s official logo for the Synod of Bishops was altered last year to simply use the word Synod. The official logo for the Synod on Synodality simply reads Synod 2021- 2024? Is this the reason that the homepage of the Synod on Synodality website nowhere uses the correct title of Synod of Bishops, except for the copyright notice in Latin (2023 Synodus Episcoporum)? Is this the reason that the home page of the Holy See website does not have a link for the Synod of Bishops, but rather for the Synod? The correct title, however, is used in the website section you are sent to when you click on Synod. Is this an oversight?
EC states: “The Synod of Bishops, which is ‘in some manner the image’ of an Ecumenical Council and reflects its ‘spirit and method,’ is composed of Bishops. Nevertheless, as also happened at the Council, certain others who are not Bishops may be summoned to the Synod Assembly; their role is determined in each case by the Roman Pontiff.
By "certain others" Francis refers to Uncle Tom Cobbley and all the Protestants who were "summoned" to Vatican II, resulting in such awful anomalies as "For Thine is the Kingdom" etc, which is nowhere to be found in Scripture. How do Novus Ordo Massgoers not choke on it?
In this connection, special consideration must be given to the contribution that can be offered by members of Institutes of Consecrated Life and Societies of Apostolic Life.” Religious and laity who are not in holy orders can be summoned, but they cannot exercise the same role as bishops. This has been the consistent practice until now.
Canon 346 §1 is clear on who make up the membership of this ecclesial institution: “A synod of bishops assembled in an ordinary general session consists of members of whom the greater part are bishops elected for each session by the conferences of bishops according to the method determined by the special law of the synod; others are designated by virtue of the same law; others are appointed directly by the Roman Pontiff; to these are added some members of clerical religious institutes elected according to the norm of the same special law.” [Note: “others” means “other bishops”] The only non-bishops who can become members of the synod are clerics who are members of religious orders. Until now.
Lay men and women and religious have up to now been present at synods under various titles: “Besides the members, certain invited guests without voting rights may attend the Synod Assembly. These include Experts (Periti), who help with the redaction of documents; Auditors (Auditores), who have particular competence regarding the issues under discussion. Fraternal Delegates from Churches and Ecclesial Communities not yet in full communion with the Catholic Church. To these may be added further special guests (Invitati Speciales), chosen because of their acknowledged authority.”
Pope Francis’ announcement that “all” who are named “participants” in the upcoming Synod on Synodality will have the vote, including lay men and women, alters the nature of the Synod of Bishops. It ceases to be an exercise of episcopal collegiality and solidarity with the bishop of Rome as described in canon 342: “The synod of bishops is a group of bishops who have been chosen from different regions of the world and meet together at fixed times to foster closer unity between the Roman Pontiff and bishops, to assist the Roman Pontiff with their counsel in the preservation and growth of faith and morals and in the observance and strengthening of ecclesiastical discipline, and to consider questions pertaining to the activity of the Church in the world.”
In short, the Synod of Bishops had been a meeting in which selected shepherds of the Church gather together with the chief shepherd to discuss and explore what best needs to be done to fulfill their divinely given mission to sanctify, teach, and govern Christ’s flock.
Now, we have a totally different assembly in which lay people who are not sacramentally conformed by holy orders to Christ the High Priest will be treated in law as equal to bishops. This is plain wrong. A Christian is not second class because he’s not a bishop, or is not allowed to exercise a sacred function reserved by its nature to bishops, or to some invited priests who share with bishops in the priesthood of Jesus Christ.
Just as a man isn't a second-class human because he's not a woman.
This innovation must be resisted by the Church’s bishops. It conflicts with the dogmatic teaching of the Church on the nature of the sacrament of Holy Orders, in particular the nature of the episcopate. Another ‘Revolution’ in the Church - The Catholic Thing
 |
| The Ointment of the Magdalene (James Tissot) |
No comments:
Post a Comment