Posted on 05/24/2018 3:00:53 PM PDT by Mrs. Don-o
Archbishop Charles Chaput
222 North 17th Street
Philadelphia, PA 19103
Dear Archbishop Chaput,
I just read your First Things essay "What Happens in Germany",which was forwarded to me by Fr. Thomas Weinandy. It certainly justified his recommendation: very clear, very much on-target, very important. Thank you for writing this.
I have been on my parish RCIA teaching team for over 15 years, and I sincerely strive to adhere with religious submission of will and intellect to everything Christ authoritatively teaches through His Church. This is how I raised my sons, how I teach my students, and how I live my life.
I am too old and too stubborn to change. I have bet my life on this.
During my first decade as a RCIA teacher, I always encouraged my students to subscribe to Catholic periodicals and keep up with Church-related news. But no more. This has changed. In recent years, I find I have to warn them away from Church news in order to shield them from the slow-motion demolition of Catholic doctrine, which is not being done, as it were, "in a corner", and which hits us in bold headlines on every media platform.
Our spiritual leaders (even at the top) give us doctrinal interpretations which no canonized saint and no previous pope would ever have accepted. Can ultimate realities --- Death, Judgment, Heaven, and Hell --- really be redefined? Can doctrine really be decentralized? Can there be one way to understand and to "do" Marriage, Penance, and Eucharist in Chicago, another in Philadelphia? (What happened to "One, Holy, Catholic and Apostolic Church"?) All the nuts and bolts, joints and welds of the structure of the Church are visibly loosening.
We are sick unto death of the bafflegab. We are desperate for Spiritual Fathers who will speak up clearly and pay up personally.
I don't despair. God's got this. But we absolutely need you and your still-Catholic fellow Bishops to keep admonishing those who are in error, and confirming us in the Holy Faith. Speak up. You've got our attention. We're listening. God's listening. And as St. Thomas More said, "Not a bad public, that."
I ask you, please, for your blessing.
Sincerely in Our Lord,
[Signed]
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You are fighting the good fight. May God bless you. This is heroic.
Thanks, Mrs D.
Glad to see someone at least try to let the powers that be know the jig is up. Do you think they need some actual specifics or do they already know what has to be addressed?
Bravissimo! Thank you!
Bergolio appointed 14 new cardinals.
11 of them are under the age of 80.
(Making them eligible to vote for the next pope.)
47% of the college electors have now been appointed by Bergoglio.
59 cardinals in Total.
Again, Bergoglio passed over traditional dioceses in Europe and America, in favor of Iraq, Pakistan, Japan, Peru, Madagascar.
Per Raymond Arroyo- EWTN
Good job. Thanks for doing this.
Thank you for your several actions for Christs Church, particularly this letter and your motivating all of us to join His mission in earth.
Thank you.
It's way too late to hope or pretend that things are normal, or will be normal any time soon. "All times are dangerous times" --- St. Teresa of Avila . That's all I can say for now.
It’s a fine letter, but the decision whether or not to send it depends on what kind of bishop you have. I have just finished 14 years of RCIA teaching myself. I have my pastor’s support (obviously) and that of my own conscience. As far as possible, I try to stay off the radar of my bishop and his chancery bureaucrats.
Pope Francis......
...is the Pope.
I will say no more than to add: the Holy Spirit will protect him from teaching error.
This is my Faith. I know it is yours too. As it is every Catholic.
My parting thought (as well as the above): I feel the Holy Spirit uses men in ways we dont expect. To keep our Faith alive.
I certainly believe that no Pope will be able to teach error in such a way that he is formally demanding the adherence of faith from the whole Church for these errors.
I do think the reason Pope Francis is so devious and equivocating, and downright double-tongued --- relying on devious spokesweasels, "confidential" personal conversations that get leaked, ambiguous footnotes and the like --- is that he would *like* to proclaim outright heresy but finds that he cannot.
Sort of like the mercenary Balaam in the OT, who wanted to prophesy curses against Israel, but couldn't: only blessings would come out of his mouth.
You are such a sweetie.
Hey Don-o. You know you got a keeper, right?
I have found that local priests have not been at all sympathetic or interested in hearing any criticism about papal "bafflegab" and gobbledygook, or his doctrinal tampering, (and have actually been downright hostile and insulting in response to any such criticism - even saying such criticism was sinful), and I think it is also pretty clear that most bishops are not interested in hearing those kinds of criticisms either. Sadly, Archbishop Chaput is part of a very small minority of faithful bishops I'm afraid.
Thanks again for your courage and strength. God bless you.
Well done!
This is the Faith, our faith.
Pope Francis may have ill intentions, or he may simply be someone who believes that now is a good time for the Church to be provocative (in every sense of the word). I tend to believe the latter is true, not simply for charitable reasons but also because I believe thats the kind of man he is. I believe his motto is make a mess of things or something to that effect.
My heart (the heart spoken of in the Bible, not just my feelings) tells me that the Holy Spirit is using His Holiness despite any ill intentions on his part (or perhaps because of them) to do precisely that: to provoke us all into a deeper and more authentic faith because He knows the times are coming when we will need a faith much stronger than something that merely asks us to to go to Mass on Sunday and say the Roasary every day.
The Devil wants us focusing on hot button issues instead of Him, Jesus, who should not be the most important thing in our lives He should be the only thing. Period. The strength of our faith does not lie in traditionalism defeating liberalism or right over left. If it did, then our faith is exactly no different than any other proposed social system in the world from consumerism to communism and everything in between. If all we have for our faith are better arguments (or what we think are better) than the other side, then we have nothing.
We need Jesus as much as the rest of the world we are no different than those who havent met Him already. We have only met Him before others thats it.
If we focus on left vs right we are lost already. Im not saying we shouldnt be vigilant but that the strength to be vigilant comes from Him not how conservative or liberal we are. And so how do we meet Jesus where is our relationship with Him most alive most real? I submit in the drama of life, when we allow ourselves our hearts (Biblical hearts not just our emotions) to experience the wound we have without Him. And then approaching, nay begging him in this brokenness to come. Maranatha! That should be our daily prayer.
This is the only way the Church is going to survive. Not because of or despite Francis, not by defeating all the social ills with finely crafted arguments, but by experiencing Christ fully in our life and then sharing Him with others. From that true evangelism, all the rest (abortion, euthanasia, gay marriage, you name it) will flow will be automatically solved. Solved not by us but by Him, by an encounter with Him. It sounds too easy thats why we reject it and try to solve things on our own. But its not the Christian way to do things on our own. We cant ever do anything on our own.
Im not saying its wrong or a bad thing or a waste of time to write to ones bishop with concerns or to engage in apologetics or theological study. Im just saying we need to realize even all those good things wont solve the problem, because our problem as is the worlds problem is a lack of Jesus as the only thing, only person, in our life. The Devil wants us to forget that all we need is Jesus. We cant let that happen; thats really whats threatening the Church and the world today.
Concern over doctrinal issues does not detract from "knowing Jesus," though. Doctrine protects us from false 'Jesuses' being presented to us with dubious credentials.
For just one example, when Pope Francis ("allegedly") told Juan Carlos Cruz that being gay is no problem, because God made him that way and loves him that way.
I certainly don't believe that God wills anybody to be burdened with an objective disorder such that a male yearns to copulate with other males. Unless that's refuted loud and clear, people will get a warped idea of God's desire, which is not affirm our disorders, but to free us from them.
The fanatical devotion of non-Fundamentalist Protestant chrstians to evolution is absolutely stupefying.
But just keep ignoring it. The notion that the Middle Ages can be restored but that "this time" it will accept evolution is a pipe dream.
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