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Good News - in fact great news: The dissident push to embracing adultery as a good and precious vocation of family life in the Church and sacrilegious Communion was officially squashed. Michael Voris states, and I agree, the shove to the push back seems to have had an effect. As it always does. The victory won't last long. Though the disturbing paragraphs were voted out of the Relatio, the Pope ordered the Relatio to be published as if the vote and removal never took place. Supposedly: as for the rejected paragraphs, they will still be sent out (!) as part...

Pope Francis' address to the Synod Fathers at the conclusion of the Extraordinary Synod on the Family: Dear Eminences, Beatitudes, Excellencies, Brothers and Sisters, With a heart full of appreciation and gratitude I want to thank, along with you, the Lord who has accompanied and guided us in the past days, with the light of the Holy Spirit. From the heart I thank Cardinal Lorenzo Baldisseri, Secretary General of the Synod, Bishop Fabio Fabene, under-secretary, and with them I thank the Relators, Cardinal Peter Erdo, who has worked so much in these days of family mourning, and the Special Secretary...

Bishops Reject Shift in Tone for Gay, Divorced Catholics Bishops Reject Language Highlighting ‘Precious Support’ Committed Gay Couples Lend Each Other DEBORAH BALL Oct. 18, 2014 ROME—Catholic bishops voted Saturday to water down a report earlier this week that advocated a significant shift in the church’s approach to gays and divorced Catholics, reflecting a deep split within the church’s leadership. In a vote Saturday evening, an assembly of nearly 200 bishops, who have been discussing issues concerning the family at a special meeting known as a synod, took their final vote on a working document released Monday. That document, released...

[This is part of Catholic Analysis' special series on Pope Alexander VI. This part, the fifth, explains Alexander's connections with the Italians. Read the fourth part.] Once his installment was settled, the pope set about making many changes. Alexander was a reformer. He despised the corruption prevalent in some ranks of clergy, and so he proclaimed, "We are well aware that morals have notably fallen back. No longer can we tolerate the way in which the former salutary measures instituted by our predecessors to keep sensuality and avarice within bounds have been violated so that we fall headlong into corruption....

Another day, another Synod post. Yes, it’ll be over soon. For a while. Then it will fire back up in full fury before next year’s Synod.Today the bishops are working on the final Relatio. They will use electronic voting during their session. What could go wrong?Meanwhile, let me throw a few items at you, in no particular order, for your consideration. Some differing perspectives. Listen for the premises.From Corriere della Sera, my translation: An imprudent move. This is what the publication of the report following the first week of the Synod was considered: the one that had the openings toward...

Featured Term (selected at random:LUMEN GENTIUM Dogmatic Constitution on the Church, of the Second Vatican Council. Its purpose is declared to be twofold: to explain the Church's nature as "a sign and instrument of communion with God and of unity among all men," and to clarify the Church's universal mission as the sacrament of human salvation. A unique feature of the constitution is the Explanatory Note, added to the conciliar document by order of Pope Paul VI, clarifying the meaning of episcopal collegiality, that the community of bishops have no authority without dependence on and communion with the Bishop of...

Hell’s Bible’s editorial on the SynodPosted on 18 October 2014 by Fr. John Zuhlsdorf At Hell’s Bible we find an editorial:Pope Francis Walks the TalkVatican Signals on Gays and Remarriage Are a Hopeful BeginningA half-century after the historic changes of the Second Vatican Council, Pope Francis is showing his intent to drive a comparably ambitious agenda for the Roman Catholic Church in the 21st century.The current synod of bishops in Rome, called by Francis to encourage reform and modernization, [ahhh... that's why he called it!] set a ringing tone of compassion this week with an opening call for a more...

This has been the most incredible week in my over 30 years of dealing with Catholic Church controversies and negligences on the life and family issues. Finally, many bishops are seeing the deceitful manipulations within the Church towards evil agendas and are heroically, fiercely, and very publicly acting to defend the Church from the wolves within. We are witnessing real men coming forward to lead. These are what we have always expected and hoped bishops would be, but have so infrequently seen in recent decades. For many of us, we have waited a long, long time for this. I pray...

Prayer to the Holy Family for the Synod  Jesus, Mary and Joseph, in you we contemplate the splendor of true love, to you we turn with trust.  Holy Family of Nazareth, grant that our families too may be places of communion and prayer, authentic schools of the Gospel and small domestic Churches.  Holy Family of Nazareth, may families never again experience violence, rejection and division: may all who have been hurt or scandalized find ready comfort and healing.  Holy Family of Nazareth, may the approaching (ongoing) Synod of Bishops make us once more mindful of the sacredness and inviolability...

"It is profoundly sad and scandalous that such remarks were made by a Cardinal of the Church."Late yesterday, Cardinal Raymond L. Burke, the Prefect of the Supreme Tribunal of the Apostolic Signatura, responded to questions sent as a follow-up to his October 14th interview with Catholic World Report. He confirmed that he is leaving his positiion as Prefect, remarked on the reactions against the Relatio released this past Monday, reflected on the importance of the texts issued by the ten small groups, and commented on the recent controversy over an interview given by Cardinal Walter Kasper of Germany. CWR: Not...

Late in life, St. Augustine issued his Retractationes, which may be translated, I believe, as either “retractions” or “re-treatments” of things he had written earlier. I’m going to do one of the latter. Yesterday, I reported that the Synod bishops voted – against the clear attempt by Cardinal Baldisseri, the leader of the Synod, to suppress the reports of the ten small language groups – that they should be published. That was not accurate. So let me “re-treat” the situation. With fuller information today, it seems to have gone like this: Baldisseri seems to have decided, on the spur of...

"The general feeling is one of huge relief," says an influential professor at a Pontifical University. "On Thursday, at around noon, John Paul II operated a miracle at the Synod." That was the hour when the uprising began against the man carefully chosen by Francis, his own first Cardinal, Lorenzo Baldisseri - dearly prized by Bergoglio for the inestimable services rendered before and during the 2013 Conclave - picked over a year before the Synod to orchestrate both assemblies, in 2014 and 2015, so that they could reach the results willed by the Pope without any dissension. It was a...

I wish to offer some reflections on the Synod, given as “bullet points” in no particular priority order. I would also encourage readers to refer to my May/June editorial, in which I anticipated some of the problems that I thought might emerge and which, unfortunately, have emerged. • The shroud of secrecy surrounding the presentations by the bishops and various lay presenters was most regrettable and most unnecessary. Never before in the modern history of synods have the media and the Catholic faithful been shut off from the conversations occurring in the Synod Hall. It is passing strange that this...

VATICAN CITY — Inaccurate media reports about Church teaching on homosexuality published after the Extraordinary Synod of Bishops on the Family’s midterm relatio was released are an attempt to pressure the Church to change its perennial teaching, a cardinal who is also a synod father has said. Cardinal Robert Sarah, president of the Pontifical Council Cor Unum, emphasized to CNA Oct. 16 that “what has been published by the media about homosexual unions is an attempt to push the Church [to change] her doctrine.” “The Church has never judged homosexual persons, but homosexual behavior and homosexual unions are grave deviations...

A half-century after the historic changes of the Second Vatican Council, Pope Francis is showing his intent to drive a comparably ambitious agenda for the Roman Catholic Church in the 21st century. The current synod of bishops in Rome, called by Francis to encourage reform and modernization, set a ringing tone of compassion this week with an opening call for a more welcoming attitude toward gay people, unmarried couples, divorced Catholics who remarry, and children in these unions. The bishops’ report on their first week of private discussions did not immediately change church doctrine. But it signaled the pope’s determination...

October 18, 2014Feast of Saint Luke, Evangelist    Reading 1 2 Tm 4:10-17b Beloved:Demas, enamored of the present world,deserted me and went to Thessalonica,Crescens to Galatia, and Titus to Dalmatia.Luke is the only one with me.Get Mark and bring him with you,for he is helpful to me in the ministry.I have sent Tychicus to Ephesus.When you come, bring the cloak I left with Carpus in Troas,the papyrus rolls, and especially the parchments. Alexander the coppersmith did me a great deal of harm;the Lord will repay him according to his deeds.You too be on guard against him,for he has strongly...

Just a quick question. As we all know now, Cardinal Kasper gave an interview which Ed Pentin of the Register and Zenit reported on in which he denigrated the African bishops. When the outrage ensued, he denied ever giving the interview and said he'd never said any of those things. Pentin, however, taped the interview. But here's my question. If he hadn't, Pentin's career would've been harmed. Possibly irreparably. Would Cardinal Kasper have admitted to the interview or simply watched another man's life be possibly destroyed? There's no answer. But perhaps we have our answer in that Cdl. Kasper is...

Oct 17 20147 Comments By Church Militant TV News Headlines BREAKING: Pope Harming the Church Cardinal Burke: Pope is harming the Church by not making his position clear. To read the entire interview with Cardinal Raymond Burke, click here! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZLS3cOxfkJw

While Pope Francis has been silent about many of the controversial matters being debated at the Synod, both in the lead-up to the Synod and in the Synod Hall, veteran Vatican watchers say he has been obliquely making his views known through other avenues, including through some of his close advisors, as well his homilies at his private morning masses. When it comes to advisors, none have sparked more speculation than Cardinal Walter Kasper, with debate swirling for months about whether Pope Francis himself personally supports Cardinal Kasper’s controversial proposal to allow divorced and remarried Catholics to receive communion in...

I must say, I am impressed… Father Z publishes the translation of the story published by Marco Tosatti on La “Stampa”. The extent of the events yesterday cannot be underestimated. It is obvious that a deep malcontent was already there. It is also obvious Francis, Kasper and Baldisseri thought they could keep treating the bishops like the pussycats they have been in the last nineteen months (and for a long time before then). What has happened afterwards could, one day, be remembered as the turning of the tide. Notice the dynamic. As rather often in life, it needs for only...