Heresy Suit Against Pro-Abortion Politicians Making Progress (Vanity)

Marc Balestrieri, the Catholic canon lawyer who has brought canonical lawsuits against John Kerry, Mario Cuomo, and half a dozen other Catholic pro-abortion politician on charges of heresy, reports that, after a long and complicated effort, the suits are making headway in Rome. One of them may be quite near an official judgment.

The FAQ page for the lawsuit is probably the best source for current information.

Balestrieri is struggling to press these lawsuits despite having been fired from his former job as a canon lawyer employed by the Archdiocese of Los Angeles. He needs prayers.

This is a good opportunity to perform a Spiritual Work of Mercy. Or rather, several Works at once: instruct the ignorant, correct the sinner, counsel the doubtful, comfort the afflicted.

I am honestly concerned. above all, for the salvation of the souls of these wayward politicians who are both so misled and so misleading. Seen in gthis light, the canonical lawsuit is an important effort at clarification and thus not "vindictive" or "political" at all, but a crucially necessary charitable act. A loving act.

Even if you pray only one Hail Mary on your Rosary for this effort, I have it on good authority that Jesus is a genius in getting the maximum out of mustard seeds and widows' mites.

"He is also one who understands paradox. In this case, the paradox may be that a smaller church is in fact a bigger and better church."

"Paradox" is one who's been coerced into the Hitler Youth and captured as a POW to become the Pope of the Roman Catholic Church. "Paradox" is having a reformed playboy swear off alcohol who listens to a non-Protestant anti-secret society Catholic Pontiff and lead conservative Americans away from the vices of the Culture of Death.

But the "secret" "paradox" is as local and powerful as the individual's soul for its opportunity to Forgive, Reconcile, and do Penance. It's because as "powerful" as temporal or religious leader may be, the only power we can truly be concerned with is what personal power we have in our lives for redemption of our soul.

Jesus exercised this Spiritual Weapon during His persecution for His persecutors, and for the Glory of His Divine Example. Miraculously, it isn't a copyright owned by just Christians since anyone of any walk of life has the Power to forgive their transgressors. A devotion to Jesus makes the use of this Spiritual Power easier.

Matthew 6
14
If you forgive others their transgressions, your heavenly Father will forgive you.
15
But if you do not forgive others, neither will your Father forgive your transgressions.

Luke 23:34
34
[Then Jesus said, "Father, forgive them, they know not what they do."] They divided his garments by casting lots.

(It's no small coincidence that today we honor St Martin who gave freely of himself and his garment to who needed clothing. And forsaking a woven garment, cut it in two with his sword so that a beggar might not go naked.)

The suffering of one persecuted for Christ's Love is such that it was reflected forward from Christ to St Steven, as he begged God's Mercy for those murdering the Church's first martyr.

Acts 7:60

60
Then he fell to his knees and cried out in a loud voice, "Lord, do not hold this sin against them"; and when he said this, he fell asleep.

We are at the dawn of a new Advent Season. Our mission now can be what the Angel with the flaming sword shouted upon being in contact with the splendor that Our Lady of Fatima: "Penance, Penance, Penance!"

Penance can be won not for only our souls, but for others in the grip of evil and also for the suffering souls in purgatory.

Hypothetically (and please correct me if I'm wrong), if the uneducated soul could forgive with the desire for peace, then such a personal act of human spiritual courage may merit the soul a Spiritual Reconciliation and a Purgatorial passport to Redemption in spite of not knowing the Sacramental Life. Thus, from this pilgrimage such a soul, though imprisoned by original and its own personal sins (if any), can venture to discover Jesus in a cosmic sense. What would an All Just and All Merciful God provide to a soul as thus mentioned? And not just souls of the far removed and remote areas of the world, but also those yet to be born or even microscopic in size. If Saints can intercede on our behalf, then our Penance can win favor for such suffering souls.

You wrote: "I guess I don't understand how a "Canon lawyer" is different than the Torah lawyers" whom Jesus accused of putting heavy burdens on people and of being hypocrites."

There's nothing here, though, that says that Jesus accused ALL Torah lawyers or ALL (future) canon lawyers, or even all future civil and criminal lawyers of being overbearing hypocrites.

Amazingly, one doesn't have to be a lawyer at all, to be a hypocrite. I have a dash of it in me, myself, and I am far, far, thank God very far from Curia, Chancery, or Court. I can oppress and be hypocritical right here in my own home! May Christ have mercy on my soul.

But it is possible to be an honest lawyer (Turibius of Mongrovejo was one of my favorites) and even an honest chancellor (Thomas More). And I think this Marc Balestrieri fellow is one of the most honest and least hypocritical of all the canon lawyers out there.

He's not putting burdens on the weak and vulnerable lambs. He's going after the wolves. God bless him, God bless him, a lawyer, a man, and a mensch.

Here's a pretty good entry on my man Turibius.

http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/14781a.htm

You'll notice he was a lawyer with the Inquisition. (Yes, there is even such a thing as a good Inquisitor!) He went to South America and convened Tribunals in which the local clergy were accused by laypeople of extorting money, living with concubines, public drunkenness, and various other forms of corruption.

Turibius dealt with them strictly, but not brutally. He was about meticulously careful investigation, exposure, and repentance. He went after the powerful and confronted them to their faces. He was often in danger of assassination. Yet he was fearless. He had a tremendous love of Jesus and of the Indians and the poor.

Why don't we know THIS history?! It is glorious. Heroic manhood always moves me, right down to the heart.

Your writing today on this thread is just...wow.

"What you don't seem to be aware of, is that there are parishes in the USA where little homeschooled Catholic children have been denied First Communion because they did not attend a parish CCD class which their parents judged inadequate for their religious formation."

One of our Orthodox bretheren pinged me in on a thread last week. He was involved in a discussion where it was apparent that a western Catholic parish was allowing a lay teacher to decide when the children were "ready" for first communion.

I was polite and restrained in my response to a western Catholic who thought that this was just a fine practice, but my personal emotion was one of horror. Eucharist is a Christian birthright, not some sort of earned social privilege to be delivered or withheld based on social ranking, educational status or some nebulous assessment of spiritual "readiness".

I'm very thankful that the tradition in the eastern churches is for Baptism, Chrismation and first Eucharist to be performed at the same time, shortly after birth.

"Our hierarchy would undoubtedly lose money, membership, and "respectability" if they forthrightly did their duty to call murder murder and heresy heresy. I can imagine nothing better for the soul of the Church than to lose money, membership, and respectability, for the sake of Christ and His Truth."

It's all in how we define our church. Unfortunately, too many of our bretheren define "the church" as the physical institution and all it's trappings. The pretty church buildings, the cathedrals, the schools, the pension plan, etc. Not as the community in Christ.

An observation along these lines is that there seems to me to be a direct relationship between the physical poverty of the parish and the spirituality of the parish in question. It's not a 1:1 scientific relationship, but a rule of thumb: parishes that are materially poor tend to be spiritually rich.

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