Perhaps Pope Francis can read this, courtesy of Rorate Caeli, if he can take time out from his climate change encyclical or dealing with the two greatest problems confronting the world in his opinion: lonely geezers and youth unemployment:
This quotation from Hilaire Belloc comes to mind:
The Barbarian hopes — and that is the mark of him, that he can have his cake and eat it too. He will consume what civilization has slowly produced after generations of selection and effort, but he will not be at pains to replace such goods, nor indeed has he a comprehension of the virtue that has brought them into being. Discipline seems to him irrational, on which account he is ever marvelling that civilization, should have offended him with priests and soldiers…. In a word, the Barbarian is discoverable everywhere in this, that he cannot make: that he can befog and destroy but that he cannot sustain; and of every Barbarian in the decline or peril of every civilization exactly that has been true.
We sit by and watch the barbarian. We tolerate him in the long stretches of peace, we are not afraid. We are tickled by his irreverence; his comic inversion of our old certitudes and our fixed creed refreshes us; we laugh. But as we laugh we are watched by large and awful faces from beyond, and on these faces there are no smiles.
What are we to do of it? Pope Francis told us that violence never conquers violence.
Father of seven: Armed forces like St. Michael the Archangel and the military are not violating the law. Armed forces are defending the innocent and persons unable to defend themselves. Calling the Allied forces who liberated the victims of concentration camps violent is pure lie. The Fifth Horseman of the Apocalypse: Unbridled Ignorance.
“Violence is never conquered by violence..” (Pope Francis address, July 20th, 2014)
Again, we need courageous and intelligent leadership, and instead we get progressive-minted sloganeering. When we need a Pope St Pius V, we get instead a Clement VII (notwithstanding the one right thing the latter did in his pontificate, I.e., standing up to Henry VIII and Cranmer).
“Pope Francis told us that violence never conquers violence.”
I would love to see Pope Francis explain that to the Carthaginians, the Vandals, the Kassites, ad infinitum.
“Perhaps Pope Francis can read this, courtesy of Rorate Caeli, if he can take time out from his climate change encyclical or dealing with the two greatest problems confronting the world in his opinion: lonely geezers and youth unemployment.” Apparently you do not take the Holy Father very seriously. You talk about him the way people talk about poiticians they disagree with. God takes the Holy Father seriously. If the Holy Father is making mistakes can there be anything more inappropriate than snide comments about them?
It was the Pope who said the greatest problems in the world are lonely seniors and youth unemployment.
https://www.lifesitenews.com/news/pope-francis-the-most-serious-evils-are-youth-unemployment-and-the-loneline
The only appropriate way for any loyal Catholic to take such rubbish is to pray that the Pope was making a very bad joke.
One recalls Prosper’s account of the meeting between Atilla the Hun and Pope Leo the Great.
“Now Attila, having once more collected his forces which had been scattered in Gaul [at the battle of Chalons], took his way through Pannonia into Italy. . . To the emperor and the senate and Roman people none of all the proposed plans to oppose the enemy seemed so practicable as to send legates to the most savage king and beg for peace. Our most blessed Pope Leo -trusting in the help of God, who never fails the righteous in their trials – undertook the task, accompanied by Avienus, a man of consular rank, and the prefect Trygetius. And the outcome was what his faith had foreseen; for when the king had received the embassy, he was so impressed by the presence of the high priest that he ordered his army to give up warfare and, after he had promised peace, he departed beyond the Danube.”
There is a fine depiction by Raphael
http://tinyurl.com/nnxyzmv
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I suspect it was the infinitum part that the Pope had in mind.
“I suspect it was the infinitum part that the Pope had in mind.”
We haven’t had any problems from Carthaginians lately.
“he was so impressed by the presence of the high priest”
Pope Leo was no doubt impressive, as were the famine in Italy and a plague that was starting to spread. Attila retreated to the Danube and planned to ravage the Eastern Empire, but his death intervened.
And what, in the grand scheme of things, did destroying Carthage do for the Romans that kept either the Visigoths or the Vandals from sacking Rome?
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Is the point. Or half a point, or whatever it’s worth.
“And what, in the grand scheme of things, did destroying Carthage do for the Romans that kept either the Visigoths or the Vandals from sacking Rome?”
Since those sackings took place over 500 years after Rome destroyed Carthage, I would consider that a pretty effective operation.
Off topic other than in the sense that the Church is being led primarily by pacifists (and that is the nicest expression I can think of), I highly recommend Anne Hendershott’s article today on Crisis on the nauseating cowardice that is taking place here in New Jersey with regard to a teacher at a Catholic high school, Patricia Jannuzzi, who dared to express opinions that offended Susan Sarandon and her nephew. Seriously.
“Since those sackings took place over 500 years after Rome destroyed Carthage, I would consider that a pretty effective operation.”
Bingo. Among other things the destruction of Cathage, or rather its defeat in the Second Punic War, allowed the creation of the Roman Empire and the Pax Romana that enabled the rapid spread of Christianity.
The military defeat of the Western Roman Empire meant the coming of a Dark Age for three centuries in the West, just as the military successes of the Eastern Empire ensured that the light of learning would be kept bright in Constantinople. Military victory and defeat usually have had major consequences throughout History, and to deny that is to sacrifice truth on the altar of fashionable pacifism.
It should be remembered that at the time Rome destroyed Carthage, the Carthaginians were no longer a strategic rival to the Romans, having yet to really recover from their catastrophic defeat in the Second Punic War. Also, that the military defeat of the Roman Empire was only possible because of the frequent resort to violence by the Romans themselves as their preferred means of resolving political disputes –particularly over who was entitled to rule the empire.
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And anyways it seems to me that you two are thinking concretely about something that’s better thought of abstractly. At least in this instance. That is, violence itself will never be conquered by violence.
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Unless of course you really, really want to think of Pope Francis as someone who mouth’s platitudinous tripe along the lines of “an eye for an eye leaves the whole world blind.” Violence, like the Poor will be with us always.
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So for myself at least, I’m choosing to read this particular comment of Francis’s as a philosophical or perhaps metaphysical statement of reality. Maybe resisting the temptation to read Francis like a politician talking in bromides might a better way of putting it. Since Francis often seems like, well, a politician talking in bromides.
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If it was murder, it was an inside job. Western civilzation committed suicide. Same same the Church and the US. They are being wrecked by execrable elites and dysfunctional government/hierarchy.
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Pacem Mac, The Irish saved civilization . . .
“It should be remembered that at the time Rome destroyed Carthage, the Carthaginians were no longer a strategic rival to the Romans, having yet to really recover from their catastrophic defeat in the Second Punic War.”
Right. Massive violence in the Second Punic War destroyed them as a mortal threat to Rome. Massive violence in the Third Punic War made sure that Carthage would no longer exist.
“Also, that the military defeat of the Roman Empire was only possible because of the frequent resort to violence by the Romans themselves as their preferred means of resolving political disputes –particularly over who was entitled to rule the empire.”
The Romans no longer wanted to dirty their hands with fighting and hired barbarian mercenaries to do their fighting for them. That is usually, although not always, a sign that a civilization is sprinting to the tar pits. (Of course the Romans, meaning the inhabitants of Rome, had stopped staffing the legions during the first century AD, with the composition of the legions steadily coming from ever further frontier areas and finally leaping the frontiers into barbarian areas.)
“Unless of course you really, really want to think of Pope Francis as someone who mouth’s platitudinous tripe along the lines of “an eye for an eye leaves the whole world blind.””
All signs point to the Pope largely thinking in fashionable cliches on most issues beyond abortion and contraception.
“So for myself at least, I’m choosing to read this particular comment of Francis’s as a philosophical or perhaps metaphysical statement of reality.”
His statement is untrue no matter how it is looked at.
“The only way for a loyal Catholic … ” Be snide to me all you want. I don’t care. Shoot if you must this old gray head but don’t aim at you pope.
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Think of the West as having been gaslighted.
“The only way for a loyal Catholic … ” Be snide to me all you want. I don’t care. Shoot if you must this old gray head but don’t aim at you pope.”
You aren’t Barbara Frietchie Roger, and the Pope isn’t the flag or any other symbol but rather a living human being quite able to say silly things. As long as he gives vent to that proclivity, PopeWatch is going to point it out when he does, just as PopeWatch points it out when he says something wise.
Donald R McClarey wrote, “Pope Leo was no doubt impressive…”
Also diplomatic, rather than confrontational: “The senate and the people of Rome, once conquerors of the world, now indeed vanquished, come before thee as suppliants. We pray for mercy and deliverance. O Attila, thou king of kings, thou couldst have no greater glory than to see suppliant at thy feet this people before whom once all peoples and kings lay suppliant. Thou hast subdued, O Attila, the whole circle of the lands which it was granted to the Romans, victors over all peoples, to conquer. Now we pray that thou, who hast conquered others, shouldst conquer thyself. The people have felt thy scourge; now as suppliants they would feel thy mercy.”
One might also compare the approach of St Vedast and St Germanus to Clovis and his Franks.
Nothing in history changes. I’m reading a book on St. Hyacinth to my 7th grader (homeschooled). In the 1200s the Tartars attacked & destroyed everything in Eastern Europe. Interestingly enough, in the book, there’s no mention of the pope. Only of St. Hyacinth and how, through God, his miracles saved his band of brothers and converted thousands. Somehow, it’s easy for the human mind to be “okay” with terrorism and barbarism in the 1200s (and every age before ours) and pretend it doesn’t still exist today.
I imagine you know you argue like a liberal on this topic, never addressing my point. You speak disrespectfully about the Holy Father. The unstated argument in support of your disrespect is that he errs, and therefore forfeits your respect. St Catherine criticized popes who erred, in her view, but never with disrespect. Do you really think the pope deserves less respect than the American flag?
Mr. Conley, be careful about how you characterize S Catherine of Siena’s “respectfulness” for the Pope. We now have about 385 letters of hers: recently translated into English (2008) by Sr. Suzanne Noffke, OP, at Arizona State U’s Center for Medeival and Renaissance Studies (4 volumes). (Would that Fordham, USF, or my alma mater, St. Louis University had such an institute: shall we practice holding our breath and turning blue?).
Here is just one sample of S Catherine’s much ballyhooed “respect for the pontiff” at that time, the Avignon pope Gregory XI, frustrated with his refusal to leave Avignon:
“Since [Christ] has given you authority and you have accepted it, you ought to be using the power and strength that is yours. If you don’t intend to use it, it would be better and more to God’s honor and the good of your soul to resign….If I were in your place, I would be afraid of incurring divine judgment.” [ Later in her letter]… “Cursed be you, for time and power were entrusted to you and you did not use them!”
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I don’t think Popewatch has cursed the present pontiff, but he (PF) is certainly cursed by his many foolish self-convicting declamations.
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There is another excerpt, but you will have to rely on my memory which is precious. Infuriated with Gregory XI’s prevarications and deliberately slow transit to Rome, she reputedly said, “Do not tell me that you are near now [to Rome], I can smell you coming a mile away.” (verbatim, letter 234, but this is not an exact quote, but catches the “fragrance” of her respect for the pope.
“You speak disrespectfully about the Holy Father.”
No. It’s simply that Don doesn’t share your unblinking adulation for the current Bishop of Rome. That does not constitute “disrespect.”
At least not unless a cult of personality is in full effect.
I find it curious how our Church leaders never, ever, say war, and natural disasters are the result of our sins. What happened to this idea our thought and teachings? Our Lady of Fatima said it directly, that war and suffering was a direct result of our sinful lives. Why is there never a call for repentance to avoid, or stop war? Why no call to stop being adulterers, or fornicators, or liars, or drunkards, etc… if we want to end wars, and natural disasters? The only sins our Pope and bishops see, are polluters, and capitalism. Why not sins of the flesh too, as Our Lady said at Fatima, “More sinners go to Hell, due to sins of the flesh, than any other sin!!! Yet now we must accept immorality of the flesh? Something is very wrong.
Mr Price you got me on the facts. I should study all the letters and see what the saint’s dominant tone is. I was going by very respectful excerpts that I had read individually over the years. At least I am not being opposed by arguments on the topic I raised. Thank you for providing these facts.
But I would like to know what her general tone with popes was. How was she usually? If a pope actually told her he was moving to Rome, and then didn’t, I can see her believing that she was entitled to believe what he said. But I don’t understand the sense of entitlement of people who think the Holy Father is not up to their standards and therefore must only be discussed with biting distain. The way liberals always talked about every pope from 1968 to Francis, excepting only JPI. Can you tell me if St Catherine was always full of distain for all the Avignon popes all the time?
Sorry, Mr Price, I just saw your second comment. The author does in fact speak of the Holy Father with disrespect. He does not deny it. How much snide do you think he’d have to put in these posts to rise to the level of disrespect? You have corrected a factual error of mine. I have now corrected one of yours.
I apologize again, Mr Price. The “not” should be removed from the penultimate sentence of the first paragraph of the comment before last.
The author of this blog has been vet generous in allowing me to comment. Unfortunately I have erred yet again and will try to fix it here. My comments should have been directed to Mr Orice and Mr Phoenix, not Mr Orice twice.
No, Don didn’t admit to disrespect. He said the Pope has said silly things (“rubbish”), which–in addition to being true–is not inconsistent with overall respect. My father has said some silly things, but I love and respect him nonetheless.
The belief that the Pope is some kind of divine oracle who demands kadaverghorsham whenever he speaks does neither the occupant nor his office any favors.
Missy, I love Polish heroes. St. Hyacinth Would you be so kind as to provide the title of the book?
Typical of Polish history…they lost some battles against the Mongols, but won the last one.
No Pope is worthy of papolatry. Not Pius XII, not John Paul II, not Francis. When a Pontiff speaks as much and abut as many things as the current Roman Pontiff, those words are going to be examined.
“I imagine you know you argue like a liberal on this topic, never addressing my point.”
Actually I did address your point but I do appreciate the unusual insult. It made me smile.
“You speak disrespectfully about the Holy Father.”
No I write truthfully about the Pope, something all Catholics should always do:
“Peter has no need of our lies or flattery. Those who blindly and indiscriminately defend every decision of the Supreme Pontiff are the very ones who do most to undermine the authority of the Holy See—they destroy instead of strengthening its foundations” – Melchior Cano O.P., Bishop and Theologian of the Council of Trent.
“St Catherine criticized popes who erred, in her view, but never with disrespect.”
Saint Catherine is a very great saint and I am not. She referred to the Pope as Christ on Earth, which I rather think that everyone else who knew Gregory XI probably thought was taking things a bit far. My intent is never to be disrespectful to the Pope, but rather to point out problem areas in his Papacy. Ignoring such problem areas does the Pope no good.
“Do you really think the pope deserves less respect than the American flag?”
The Pope is not a symbol or an icon, but rather Christ’s Vicar on Earth. He should always be respected by Catholics for his office, if not for any better reasons, but that respect should never be blind to policies he may be attempting to implement which are mistaken.
Penguins Fan, it is called St. Hyacinth of Poland: The Story of the Apostle of the North, by Mary Fabyan Windeatt. You can get it here for $3. https://tanbooks.benedictpress.com/index.php/page/shop:flypage/product_id/376/keywords/hyacin/
Missy and Penquins Fan, Thank you for the info and link on St. Hyacinth. I have seen his statue at Lourdes but didn’t know his history. I am familiar with the author and will purchase two copies. Cynthia (Greek goddess of the moon) is a first name in my family. The young girls when starting Catholic school were relieved, when told that they did have a Christian name -the feminine of Hyacinth.
Agreed Taad It would be great for church leaders to give a call to repentence and prayer.
The pope does not act up
to your expectations so snideness is appropriate? It seemed to me that you couldn’t believe this but you do. Your snipe, supercilious, condescending comments wouldn’t ordinarily be respectful, but because he doesn’t do want you want it’s all the respect he deserves? Again, I began this thinking you couldn’t actually believe this but you sincerely do. Really there’s nothing more to say.
CAM wrote, “Cynthia (Greek goddess of the moon) is a first name in my family.”
I knew a lady called Cynthia, who had two daughters. The elder was called Cynthia and the younger Selina, which is the Latin form of the same name.
“The pope does not act up to your expectations so snideness is appropriate?”
A Pope saying silly, factually incorrect things, and, according to some sources, spouting heresy, is far more serious than not living up to my standards.
“Your snipe, supercilious, condescending comments wouldn’t ordinarily be respectful, but because he doesn’t do want you want it’s all the respect he deserves?”
No, a Pope deserves to be corrected when he is in the wrong by loyal Catholics, something I gather you would never do.
“Really there’s nothing more to say.”
The first accurate thing you have had to say Roger. You obviously do not care for the tone of my posts regarding the Pope. Then you not reading them is the obvious solution to your problem.
There’s a certain irony in Roger complaining that Don “argues like a liberal” while posting some half-dozen comments that never address the substance of Don’s post, instead focusing on the “tone.” That is a rather common tactic of heterodox Catholics who would prefer to ignore harsh truths
Roger Conley is not defending or demanding respect for the Pope. Roger Conley is verbally assaulting Mr. McClarey. What I am thinking, I dare not write. “Hypocrite” shall suffice.
MPS, thank you. Will pass it on to the two Cynthias. Then there’s Hyacinth Bucket (Boo-kay) as an example.