Posted on 01/06/2005 12:04:16 PM PST by latae sententiae
ping
I am sure he would. The sinple parish priest who became pope.
The owner's servants came to him and said, Sir, didn't you sow good seed in your field? Where then did the weeds come from?
An enemy did this, he replied.
The servants asked him, Do you want us to go and pull them up?
He answered, "No, because while you are pulling the weeds, you may root up the wheat with them."
Did He nail that one or what?
It's hard to know where to begin and end my comments here, there are so many points that one could address.
Nothing of the sort happened with the Modernists whose primary characteristic is to try to stay within the Church at all cost:
That we make no delay in this matter is rendered necessary especially by the fact that the partisans of error are to be sought not only among the Church's open enemies; they lie hid, a thing to be deeply deplored and feared, in her very bosom and heart, and are the more mischievous, the less conspicuous they appear.10 [W]e allude...to many who belong to the Catholic laity, nay, and this is far more lamentable, to the ranks of the priesthood itself,...and lost to all sense of modesty, vaunt themselves as reformers of the Church.
The Priests will have to answer to God in a special way, but we in the laity just fled. I say we, including myself, because I fled eventhough it had nothing to do with the rot of modernism setting in. And many more people fled as well, one for this reason, one for that. And as a consequence we were instrumental in not stemming modernism's insidious ascendency.
Moreover they lay the axe not to the branches and shoots, but to the very root, that is, to the faith and its deepest fires. And having struck at this root of immortality, they proceed to disseminate poison through the whole tree, so that there is no part of Catholic Truth from which they hold their hand, none that they do not strive to corrupt.
Even when you cannot name this, it is palpable in the lack of reverence that abounds in many a Liturgy, and the inability of so many Priests to preach forcefully, beautifully and with ardor about what it means to be a Catholic.
Human reason, without any reference whatsoever to God, is the sole arbiter of truth and falsehood, and of good and evil; it is law to itself, and suffices, by its natural forces, to secure the welfare of men and nations. (Condemned Propostion No. 3) Upon reading this definition of Rationalism, we cannot but notice the radical opposition between Rationalism and the Catholic Faith. One of the infallible signs betraying the Modernist character of an author or some writing, is precisely that adulterous union between Catholicism and Rationalism:
For they double the part of the rationalist and Catholic, and this so craftily that they easily lead the unwary into error.15
Hence, in their books you find some things that might well be expressed by a Catholic, but in the next page you will find other things which might have been dictated by a rationalist.16
This adulterous union between Catholic thought and rationalist thought is the direct result of the Modernist's will to stay within the Church in order to change the Faith from inside. To speak clearly against the Faith would immediately render them visible and mark them in everyone's eyes with the infamous seal of heresy and apostasy! That is why they never speak clearly.
The definition given for rationalism could easily be interchanged with the definition of humanism. Pope John Paul II seems taken with humanism. That has made me feel uneasy about him.
I believe JPII takes his role as the Vicar of Christ very seriously. He is a lover of people. You can see that in his face. For both theological and political reasons, I think it is mainly Christ's immeasurable love of man that captured the Pope's mind and heart. He, as Christ's Vicar, wants to extend that same immeasurable love to all, both Catholic and non-Catholic alike. I think it is the reason the Pope himself is so loved. And it certainly is an admirable thing.
The problem is though, that humanism by it's very existence and name either totally rejects Christ, or seeks to modify and marginalize his influence as the Son of God.
So, while our dabbling with humanism will certainly leave its mark on the Catholic Church. Humanism will bear no such reciprocal Catholic stamp.
The other side of the coin in that the return of a Modernist to the totality of the Faith is always doubtful. How can one be certain of the sincerity of such a conversion when dissimulation and hypocrisy are at the root of the system? Didn't all these fashionable Modernist theologians of the last 50 years repeatedly swear the Anti-Modernist Oath: Chenu, Rahner, Congar, Küng, Drewerman and Boff, to mention a few? With that apparent submission to the authorities, Modernists frequently lead as well an externally exemplary life:
To this must be added the fact, which indeed is well calculated to deceive souls, that they lead a life of the greatest activity, of assiduous and ardent application to every branch of learning, and that they posses, as a rule, a reputation for the strictest morality.24 Here, too, they could not remain in the Church without apparently keeping the discipline of the Church and its way of life. The apostate or the one who seeks laicization will bring himself to the attention of the Catholic faithful.
This whole passage made me think immediately of Walter Kasper. His book, Jesus The Christ, seems to me to be one big, navel-gazing excursion into perpetual vacillation, so that you come away from the book not really feeling confident in calling him a heretic, but feeling quite confident in coming to the conclusion that he doesn't seem to know what he really believes. And he was Professor of Dogmatic Theology when he wrote the book.
It's dispiriting and unsettling to have to admit that their largely running the earthly show, and probably will continue to do so for quite a while yet.
Thanks for posting a great article.
"We are now standing in the face of the greatest historical confrontation humanity has gone through. I do not think the wide circle of the American society or the wide circles of the christian community realize this fully. We are now facing the final confrontation between the Church and the Anti-Church, of the Gospel versus the anti-Gospel. This confrontation lies within the plans of divine providence; it is a trial which the whole Church, and the Polish Church in particular, must take up.
It is a trial not only of our nation and the Church, but in a sense it is a test of 2000 years of culture and Christian civilization with all its consequences for human dignity, individual rights and the rights of nations."
Thank you so much, you picked great pictures.
Bump and thank you.
I wonder what happened to him after 1976 - and I'm not being sarcastic. While JPII occasionally issues a plaintive statement regretting the course of things, mostly in Europe, he has never really come out fighting very agressively.
We (my family and I) were very happy when he was elected, because he seemed to be heading in the right direction, following the course of JPI.
Perhaps it was the assassination attempt, but he never really carried through on things that many of us thought he was going to do. Aside from his inability/unwillingness to govern, he hasn't even been that forthright in confronting the horribly anti-Catholic European governments, or at any rate, not until very recently.
Thanks for posting this!
It is considered nearly dishonorable to be on the right in Italy now, and no doubt was much the same in '58 both in Italy and Poland. JPII socialist tendencies are probably what spurred his affection for humanism.
Several weeks ago PAX TV aired a special on Fatima. One of the people who was given a pretty good size role in the special was a Rabbi, and I'm sorry but I can't remember his name. The Rabbi, outshone all of the other speakers in the special, with the possible exception of Gerry Matatics (sp?).
Anyway, he posited that much of what Pope John Paul did was in direct reaction to what he believed Traditionalists sought. And I found his argument to be persuasive.
IMO, JPII views Traditionalists as a non-progressive force, and as part of that left/right battle, carried over from the political strife in Poland to the Theological strife in Catholicism.
In Pope John Paul's statement where he addresses the Faithful who are attached to the Latin Mass, and in which he proclaims that a generous attempt to meet that request be honored, there is a sense in the Grant of giving the Faithful something they're attached to simply because they're attached to it. I never got the sense from his words that it was something to be preserved because it was part of our Faith for so many, many years.
I feel like I know this Pope better than any other Pope because he's made himself known. And I like that. Growing up, the Pope seemed a distant figure to me, I felt nearly nothing for them. I was always comparing them to St. Peter who I felt I did know, and who I felt might possible deign to know me, as his imperfections were known to all.
Pope JPII can sound so pious and in tune with the crisis going on in our Church, but at the same time you must shake your head and wonder why he's never done anything about it. Many of his statements and stated desires for the Church would make a man like Pope St. Pius X cringe. In fact, the Cardinal who founded this great pope's namesake society was excommunicated by JPII. The stated cause for his excommunication was 'disobedience', while the actual cause was his bold attempt at propagating the classical, traditional Catholic faith.
Lefebvre never got the red hat.
It was an Archbishop, not a Cardinal.
Good analysis of JPII, I think. ALL Europeans are much more Socialist and government-oriented than Americans, and they do tend to view everything in political terms.
It is also true that Traditionalists are usually seen as being opposed to Socialism, an attitude that is incomprehensible to the sort of soft-leftism that is pervasive in the European Church. This may well be something that influences JPII's dealings with the Traditionalist movement. As you said, he doesn't really treat the indult as something that relates to the Faith, but as more of a political concession.
Very interesting analysis, and it would certainly explain many puzzling things. (BTW, I think Socialism is becoming much more agressive and overtly anti-Catholic in Europe right now - look at Spain, for example - so it will be interesting to see if there is any change in this attitude if this trend continues).
"A Secret Society? To conclude his analysis of Modernist tactics with practical advice, Pope Pius X called for the unmasking of Modernism. Faced with such hypocritical and deceitful error, only one thing needs to be done: BRING IT OUT TO THE LIGHT OF DAY SO THAT ALL CAN SEE ITS EVIL.
We must now break silence, in order to EXPOSE BEFORE THE WHOLE CHURCH IN THEIR TRUE COLORS THOSE MEN WHO HAVE ASSUMED THIS EVIL DISGUISE.32 It is very interesting to compare this order of the Holy Pontiff with that of his predecessor Pope Leo XIII in the encyclical Humanum Genus in condemnation of Freemasonry:
We wish it to be your rule first of all to TEAR AWAY THE MASK from Freemasonry, and to LET IT BE SEEN AS IT REALLY IS."
IMHO God heard the prayers and intents of these Holy Pontiffs and acted so that Modernism could be exposed in all its stinking infidelity.
He did this by causing John XXIII to call a "pastoral" Council of the Church and to invite the modernists to run it and attend as "experts". Their m.o. was exactly as St. Pius X described: they admixed novelty and rationalism in one paragraph followed by Catholicism in the next.
Perhaps the post-conciliar Popes have just been unwitting instruments in the continuation of this process over the last 40 years. Their inability or failure to use their authority in the fight against modernism has allowed the unmasking to continue.
Dread to think what might come next.
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