John Paul II — The Face of Love

e3mil.com ^ | 8/6/02 | James Bemis

[nickcarraway]

One picture told it all: At Toronto's airport, the world's eye caught little ten-year-old Georgia Rae Giddings as she emotionally burst into tears after Pope John Paul II embraced her. For the next hour, she recalled the moment repeatedly before crowds of journalists. "When I stood in front of the Pope, I just got dizzier and dizzier," she said.

"Out of Step" with the Contemporary World

She's not the only one. Many of the million or so attending the World Youth Day celebrations reported the same phenomenon.

Most people would be astonished to hear that the Holy Father might be the most beloved person in the world among young people. After all, we're always told the Catholic Church's message is irrelevant, outmoded and - worst of all - square. Cynics charge it has nothing meaningful to say to today's fun-loving, hedonistic youth.

According to the press, polls repeatedly show the Pope's relentless opposition to contraception, abortion, homosexuality, pornography, pre-marital sex, easy divorce and other fruits of the sexual revolution is anathema to the modern and fashionable. (It goes without saying that no one knows the mind of the modern and fashionable like the media.) The Holy Father, they conclude, is out of step with the contemporary world.

A Rebuke to the Modern Age

Okay, then how do you explain nearly a million kids at the Pope's World Youth Day? And where else would the gathering of that many youngsters be termed a "disappointing" turnout?

Perhaps it's because young people's love for the Holy Father is a direct rebuke to the modern age, and thus to its primary megaphone, the modern journalist. No institution has been a more powerful force for secularism, materialism or sexual freedom than the media.

Most reporters today are alienated from religion, looking at faith as little more than an ancient superstition. They don't understand it, so they don't cover it - unless a "religious" story involving scandal or human weakness pops up. That they comprehend.

In listening to World Youth Day participants speak, their deep affection for the Holy Father is clear. The same words keep popping up over and over to describe him - "radiance," "hero" "world's role model," "leader of youth," "our rock," "following in St. Peter's footsteps," and "the person closest to Jesus."

Thus, reasons for the Pope's youthful legions are quite simple: When young people see the weary, lined, rugged, leathern visage of the Holy Father, they see the face of love. Not love the way Hollywood loves them - as walking wallets, rear ends in movie theaters, pairs of ears to listen to the latest CDs - but real affection, from someone who sees them rightfully as precious individuals with eternal souls. And when the Vicar of Christ's deep, aged, honeyed voice is intoned, it seems they're hearing the very Words of God.

An Inexhaustible Treasure of Grace

This, then, is the Papal appeal to the young: faith, as the steadfast leader of the Church, the eternal Bride of Christ; hope, offering refuge for the restless heart; and love, from a elderly man walking in persona Christi. Of these, as St. Paul says, the greatest is love.

This is what Georgia Rae Giddings reacted to. After telling the Pope she loved him, he tenderly stroked her head and whispered gently that he loved her too, the perfect personification of Cardinal Newman's great motto of "Heart Speaketh to Heart." It's hard to imagine any other world leader reacting this way to the presence of an unexpected young stranger - so fearless, so compassionate, so Christlike.

No wonder kids love him.

Catholicism may be known as the Old Faith, it's the Young Faith too, with a remarkable, time-tested ability to outlive every fad that mocks it as passe. Each Catholic generation discovers anew the richness and power of their ancient religion, finding within it an inexhaustible treasure of grace and beauty, boundless as the sea. Once that discovery is made, as a million young pilgrims recently learned, no worldly interest can ever again quite satisfy.

[sitetest]

Dear ultima ratio,

Of course Vatican II taught things. It taught a whole bunch of things! It required no exercise of the extraordinary Magisterium, but the entire Council is part of the infallible ordinary Magisterium of the Church.

What is given to the Church at an Ecumenical Council is infallible, authoritative, and binding on the conscience of every Catholic, whether doctrinal development occurs or not. There is no such thing as a Council which is "advisory" that one is not bound to obey. Read the Papal Brief that I posted, given by Pope Paul VI, to conclude the Council. Here are some pertinent parts:

"At last all which regards the holy Ecumenical Council has, with the help of God, been accomplished and all the consititutions, decrees, declarations, and votes have been approved by the deliberation of the Synod and promulgated by us."

"We decide moreover that all that has been established synodally is to be religiously observed by all the faithful..."

"We have approved and established these things, decreeing that the present letters are and remain stable and valid, and are to have legal effectiveness, so that they may be disseminated and obtain full and complete effect, and so that they may be fully convalidated by those whom they concern or may concern now and in the future; and so that, as it be judged and described, all efforts contrary to these things by whoever or whatever authority, knowingly or in ignorance, be invalid and worthless from now on."

Anyway, Bud McDuell has already answered that a Council can teach error. Do you believe that a Council can teach error?

sitetest

[ultima ratio]

Your view is that the all-knowing and all-wise "Supreme Pontiff" was right and the lowly, ignorant, and disobedient Archbishop was wrong?

Then how come the facts bear out the Archbishop? And how come his order is flourishing? And how come everything the Pope touches--except maybe his rock concerts--is collapsing?

By their fruits you will know them.

[sitetest]

Dear ultima ratio,

"Your view is that the all-knowing and all-wise 'Supreme Pontiff' was right and the lowly, ignorant, and disobedient Archbishop was wrong?"

LOL. Are you sure you're really a Catholic?? It isn't a matter of all-knowing or all-wise, it's a question of binding authority. The pope's got it, the archbishop didn't.

As to whether or not the late archbishop's order is flourishing, I recently read that his order's vocations are down about 20% over the past 10 years. I know that the orthodox "Novus Ordo" seminaries in the US are bursting at the seams. Our own orthodox seminary in our archdiocese is full.

Thanks for asking. ;-)

sitetest sitetest

[ultima ratio]

Good I'm glad it's infallible. Maybe now they'll bring back the old Mass and Latin which the Council said should always be preserved. And Gregorian chant while they're at it. Funny how you guys find infallibility only where you want to. What else was infallible? And what are we to make of the explicit statement by the Council that nothing was to be taken de fide? This is getting confusing.

[sitetest]

Dear drstevej,

"Help me understand why the RCC tolerates the hiring a witch/Wiccan/pagan at one of it's universities to help teach religion."

The lady in question is not teaching religion, but rather the psychology of religion.

Your question is still a fair one, even corrected, but accuracy in these things avoids misundertandings.

sitetest

[sitetest]

Dear ultima ratio,

Please quote from the documents of the Second Vatican Ecumenical Council that nothing was to be taken de fide.

Please balance whatever quote you come up with and misconstrue against the final word of the Supreme Pontiff issued in closing the Council, that all the decrees of the Council are to be religiously observed, and that any who gainsay the Council, there are efforts are "invalid and worthless."

sitetest

[Gophack]

Using the Vatican I documents:

...all the faithful of Christ must believe "that the Apostolic See and the Roman Pontiff hold primacy over the whole world, and that the Pontiff of Rome himself is the successor of the blessed Peter, the chief of the apostles, and is the true vicar of Christ and head of the whole Church and faith, and teacher of all Christians; and that to him was handed down in blessed Peter, by our Lord Jesus Christ, full power to feed, rule, and guide the universal Church, just as is also contained in the records of the ecumenical Councils and in the sacred canons.

... the faithful of whatever rite and dignity, both as separate individuals and all together, are bound by a duty of hierarchical submission and true obedience, not only in things pertaining to faith and morals, but also in those which pertain to the discipline and government of the Church spread over the whole world, so that the Church of Christ, protected not only by the Roman Pontiff, but by the unity of communion as well as of the profession of the same faith is one flock under the one highest shepherd. This is the doctrine of Catholic truth from which no one can deviate and keep his faith and salvation... [Dogmatic Constitution on the Church, Vatican Council I, 1870]

I hope this is clear. I will admit that I am not as well versed as many of my Catholic brothers and sisters on doctrine and history, but I try and find the answers and remain faithful to the Church. Because when all else fails, and it seems that we're in despair because of a scandal such as the one we are facing today, the most important thing is to have faith in Jesus Christ that He will not let the the gates of Hell prevail against His church.

[drstevej]

***The lady in question is not teaching religion, but rather the psychology of religion.***

Read her vitae. She is a wiccan and I'd not have one of my kids explaining the psychology of religion to her. If she were a calculus professor your argument might be more substantive.

She should be given a broom and told to take off.

[sitetest]

Dear drstevej,

Did you read my post, Steve?

I specifically stated that your question was still a valid one, even allowing for the correction. I made no argument whatsoever that it was appropriate for her to be teaching what she is teaching.

Thus, my argument isn't substantive at all, since I didn't actually put one forward.

;-)

sitetest

[ultima ratio]

More propaganda. It's bursting at the seams, ever since the scandals broke. Hordes of guys recently left their N.O. seminaries in India, lots of others. There are about 500 priests now, and one million plus faithful. This is only about a quarter of the Traditional Movement in toto. They increase roughly by 10% annually--at about the same rate as the Novus Ordo decreases. And yes, I'm Catholic. What I'm not is a Vatican-two-er. You Novus Ordo people believe the Church began in 1963. Mine began in the days of Christ and the apostles. No problem at all attracting the young, by the way. Lots of young families--who don't practice birth control. 12 new schools were built this year in this country alone. One other thing: the people we attract are devout--not cafeteria Catholics. We practice the old faith, not the watered-down Protestant variety.

[ultima ratio]

Read and ponder: "For the Holy Spirit was not promised to the Successors of Peter that by His revelation they might disclose new doctrine, but that by His help they might GUARD the revelation transmitted through the apostles and the deposit of Faith." (Denzinger, 1800, citing Vatican Council I, can. 3.)

In this case, it was the good Archbishop who was concerned about guarding the Catholic tradition and its deposit of faith.

That's the big difference between traditionalists and conservatives. You ignore Vatican I as well as Trent; you exalt Vatican II and the popes who support it.

[ultima ratio]

Announcement made by the Secretary General of the Council, regarding the Vatican II documents and affirmed by the Council fathers: "Taking into account the conciliar practice and the pastoral purpose of the present council, the sacred synod defined as binding on the Church only those matters of faith and morals which it has expressly put forth as such."
(Vatican Council II, 1988 Revised Edition, "The Explanatory Note", p. 423.)
It put none forth, thank goodness.

[ultima ratio]

"Are we Protestants heretics or errant brethren?" LOL. Right now I'd say more like the voice of sanity. We've been arguing infallibility--which has got to be right up there with how many angels are dancing on the head of a pin.

[sitetest]

Dear ultima ratio,

I can't speak about the rest of the world, but the website www.sspx.org, which is the website for the organization in the United States, tells me that within the United States, the organization has:

- 43 priests
- 5 deacons
- 6 brothers
- 60 seminarians
- 98 chapels

What is interesting is that there are only 43 priests for 98 chapels. That sort of ratio in a diocese of the real Catholic Church is usually considered a sign of a lack of vocations.

In any case, the SSPX, at least in the United States, is a very, very, very tiny organization compared to the Catholic Church in the United States, even though the SSPX has 65,000,000 nominal Catholics from which to poach for members.

sitetest