News that I missed, courtesy of The Babylon Bee:
TYLER, TX — Pope Francis has officially sacked Bishop Joseph Strickland of Tyler, Texas for being “way too Catholic.”
“Despite repeated warnings, Bishop Strickland refused to stop being so Catholic,” said Pope Francis. “He adamantly held firm to Catholic doctrine, and there is simply no room for that in today’s Catholic Church.”
According to sources, Bishop Strickland initially drew the Vatican’s ire due to multiple episodes of him publicly professing the Catholic faith. “Bishop Strickland had the incredible audacity to actually teach the Catechism of the Catholic Church,” said Cardinal Robert McElroy. “Like, even the really unpopular parts about gender and marriage. That stuff is so – how did the Pope say it – ‘backwards and out-of-touch’! Anyhow, Pope Francis wanted to make sure all the Catholics out there holding fast to the Church’s teachings as they battle an increasingly hostile culture know how truly alone they are.”
Even after multiple admonitions from the Vatican, Bishop Strickland chose to affirm the magisterial teaching of the Catholic Church instead of giving in to the dominant cultural ideology. In an effort to make the charges against Strickland as ironic as possible, the Vatican accused Bishop Strickland of choosing cultural ideology over the teaching of the Catholic Church. “The irony really is delicious, isn’t it?” said a smiling Pope Francis. “It’s like when I banned celebrating the Latin Mass, purportedly for the sake of church unity – when the Latin Mass is of course a way to unify Catholics across generations and cultures. Also, those Latin Mass parishes were actually growing – had to nip that in the bud.”
Go here to read the rest. Heckuva job Conclave of 2013, heckuva job.
Bishop Strickland was very diplomatic and circumspect in the interview. And yes, I shall pray for Pope Francis, that God Almighty deposes him and his lavender-laced mafia, and anathematizes all of them and all their works of iniquity and depravity.
Both the Bee and Rorate truly nailed this one. And yes, LQC, Bishop Strickland is everything Francis is not.
I’m remembering that not-very-cogent article by Fr. Robert Johansen twenty years ago seeking to explain why bishops who’d made a mess of disciplinary matters could not be willy nilly removed from their sees (the policy of the Congregation for Bishops being you only removed bishops if they were caught with a dead girl or a live boy, amended later to include bishops who were guilty of vehicular manslaughter and hit-and-run).
Our situation with Francis reminds me of a very minor scene in Fiddler on the Roof.
One of the villagers asks the rabbi if there is a prayer for the tsar. After a moment or two of thought, he replies:
May God bless and keep the tsar – far away from us!
I recently went through the conditions for a plenary indulgence for a deceased family member and one of the conditions gave me pause…” pray for the intentions of the Supreme Pontiff” I’m wasn’t sure that I wanted to do that, but prayed for his intentions that were consistent with God’s will…