Spite has ever played a major role in this pontificate. Conservatives, the United States and Traditional Catholics are all high on the lengthy enemies list of the current pope. Heckuva job Conclave of 2013, heckuva job.
PopeWatch: Spite
- Donald R. McClarey
Donald R. McClarey
Cradle Catholic. Active in the pro-life movement since 1973. Father of three, one in Heaven, and happily married for 43 years. Small town lawyer and amateur historian. Former president of the board of directors of the local crisis pregnancy center for a decade.
Beeeeeeeeeeeep…. this is a test of the national broadcast system, this is only a test.
That’s all I see.
A test.
Who will jump ship? Who will ride out the storm?
Interestingly the pope himself puts us to the test and whether he realizes it or not is unimportant. What is important is that we stay the course regardless of the storm. We stay in the ship.
A while ago NCR was commenting on Archbishop Fulton Sheen’s writings in relationship to the storms that the church goes through periodically;
*Sheen warned “what we are going to have in the Church is a minority report: a minority report of sisters, a minority report of priests, a minority report of laity — not the minority that is aggressive and troublemaking, but the minority that like Caleb and Joshua, trusts in God. So we are tested just as the Jews were tested.”
He went on: “Not far after our time, and perhaps in the time of some, then will come the battles and the testing. Our Lord said, Satan would sift you as wheat. And we are being sifted as wheat. So we can all thank God that we live in these days. Really, it’s beautiful. Now we can say, ‘aye’ or ‘nay,’ and we can bear up under assault, criticism and ridicule, because this is the lot of the Christian in the days of the spirit of the world.”*
Whether it’s Pope Francis or President Biden or Genghis Khan it doesn’t matter. What matters is trusting in Jesus and the ship that he founded even if the ship is mostly destroyed, we hang on to the remnant.
Genghis Khan reincarnated?
Oy vey! 🥸
Pope Francis should beware the lesson of the priest Eli.
Today’s OT reading for Morning Prayer is the call of the boy Samuel by the Lord in 1st Samuel chapter 3:
https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=1+Samuel+3&version=NRSVCE
Where did the Lord speak to Samuel? Before the Ark of the Old Covenant in the temple as Samuel was lying down (verse 3). Where will the Lord speak to us? Lying down before Jesus our new Temple where the Ark of the New Covenant, the Blessed Virgin Mary, is.
What was God’s message to Samuel? Judgment on the house of Eli because he failed to punish his immoral and corrupt priestly sons. What will be God’s message regarding the current immoral and corrupt clergy of the Church? The same judgment. God is Holy and He will NOT have either His Body the Church or His Ark defiled.
For those of you familiar with Cicero’s first oration against Cataline, there is a line in it that reminds me of good Papa Francesco:
“Notat et designat oculis ad caedem unum quemque nostrum” (“With his eyes, he marks and selects each one of us for destruction”).
I mean, have you ever seen how he looks around the crowd when he’s “presiding” at Mass?
Fr. J:
“Quo usque tandem abutere, Francisce, patientia nostra?”
(How much longer, Francis, will you abuse our patience?)
Philip:
Ghengis Khan didn’t persecute Christians, and in his court were Nestorians, who had communities scattered all across Central Asia. A better example would be one of the Iconoclast emperors, like Leo the Isaurian.
Heretics lose their office. I know Francis has control and has been accepted as pope. But he has shirked the duties of office for 11 years. If his goal was further destruction of the church, he is on that path.
Quo usque tandem abutere, Catilina, patientia nostra? quam diu etiam furor iste tuus nos eludet? quem ad finem sese effrenata iactabit audacia? Nihilne te nocturnum praesidium Palati, nihil urbis vigiliae, nihil timor populi, nihil concursus bonorum omnium, nihil hic munitissimus habendi senatus locus, nihil horum ora voltusque moverunt? Patere tua consilia non sentis, constrictam iam horum omnium scientia teneri coniurationem tuam non vides? Quid proxima, quid superiore nocte egeris, ubi fueris, quos convocaveris, quid consilii ceperis, quem nostrum ignorare arbitraris? [2] O tempora, o mores! Senatus haec intellegit. Consul videt; hic tamen vivit. Vivit? immo vero etiam in senatum venit, fit publici consilii particeps, notat et designat oculis ad caedem unum quemque nostrum. Nos autem fortes viri satis facere rei publicae videmur, si istius furorem ac tela vitemus. Ad mortem te, Catilina, duci iussu consulis iam pridem oportebat, in te conferri pestem, quam tu in nos [omnes iam diu] machinaris.
Oratio in Catalinam I, Marcus Tullius Cicero.
T.B.
Good point.
Thank you. Maybe we could use a Kahn to straighten out the FBI. Or the lavender Mafia while were at it.
[…] Francis:PopeWatch: Spite – Donald R. McClarey, J.D., at The American […]