Free Republic

Leaked FBI Document: More than meets the eyeThe big Catholic news story of late concerns a leaked internal FBI document targeting traditional Catholics.The document, which originated in the FBI’s Richmond field office and is dated 23 January 2023, provides a list of “the nine RTC (radical-traditionalist Catholic) hate groups operating in the United States in 2021 as defined by the Southern Poverty Law Center” (SPLC). The list is as follows:Catholic Apologetics InternationalCatholic Family News/Catholic Family Ministries, Inc.Christ or ChaosCulture Wars/Fidelity PressFatima Crusader, The/International Fatima Rosary CrusadeIn the Spirit of Chartres CommitteeRemnant, The/The Remnant PressSlaves of the Immaculate Heart of MaryTradition...

Even Abortion Freedom Has Become a Matter of Contention. Two Bishops in a DuelIt could very well come as a stunner that a bishop would see the need to speak out in defense of a doctrine that at first glance is beyond dispute, within the Church: the inviolability of every new human life from its conception. The bishop is Domenico Sorrentino (in the photo), age 74, head of the dioceses of Assisi, Nocera Umbra, Gualdo Tadino, and Foligno, former secretary of the Vatican’s congregation for divine worship. He has done so with a two-page article in the historic Catholic magazine...

[Catholic Caucus] Cardinal McElroy Accidentally Tells the Truth about “St. John Paul II Catholics”n his recent article in America — “Cardinal McElroy on ‘radical inclusion’ for L.G.B.T. people, women and others in the Catholic Church” — Cardinal Robert McElroy framed the challenges facing the Church today in terms of getting “the people of God” to take new paths in the coming decades:“What paths is the church being called to take in the coming decades? While the synodal process already underway has just begun to reveal some of these paths, the dialogues that have taken place identify a series of challenges...

[Catholic Caucus] A New Catholic Faith for Children to AbandonAbove: a blessing service as part of a day of action in defiance to the Vatican’s ruling on same-sex unions in the Youth Church in Wurzburg, Germany, on Monday, May 10th.I am picturing a small French-speaking Saskatchewan village in the 1930s. It is perhaps disingenuous to shrug one’s shoulders and simply declare that times are tough. When dust bowls replace food and water, and roots and berries are standard fare on a large family’s table, suffering abounds. Living in the shadow of death is a reality. No government bailouts will reach...

[Catholic Caucus] "The Death of Benedict XVI: The Failure of the Hermeneutic of Continuity"Much has been said about Benedict XVI in recent weeks. The major newspapers, not very complacent, have recalled that he was called "panzercardinal" when he was the Pope's guarantor of dogma. The more conservative media hailed him as the architect of liturgical pacification, the one who had the merit of publishing the Motu Proprio Summorum Pontificum. Perhaps we forget that with his death, a real page in the history of the Church is being turned, since with him the last great actor of Vatican II has disappeared....

[Catholic Caucus] Paul VI: Refounder of CatholicismReligion Department Academics of a certain sort love to scandalize undergraduates by telling them that Jesus is a marginal figure in Church history; the real founder of the religion, they whisper, was Paul. In fact, they persist, the religion should really be called Paulianity.From the standpoint of Roman Catholicism, there is some truth to the claim.The Mass as Roman Catholics celebrate it today received its form under Paul. Paul changed the formula of consecration during the Mass, as well as the rites of baptism, marriage, confession, extreme unction (anointing of the sick), and burial....

“Continuous ‘Aggiornamento’”: Synod Seeks to Preserve “Precious Legacy” of Vatican IIThis article first appeared in the December 2022 Edition of Catholic Family News (click HERE to subscribe; current subscribers can access the E-Edition by following the instructions posted HERE).After months of “listening to the People of God” and reviewing reports prepared by dioceses and episcopal conferences around the globe, the General Secretariat for the Synod of Bishops in Rome has produced a “Working Document for the Continental Stage” (DCS), the next phase of the three-year Synod on Synodality (Oct. 2021—Oct. 2024).[1]The 49-page text, released on Oct. 27, 2022 via a...

Mythbusting: “African Catholicism is a Vatican II Success Story”Bishop Gregory Ochiagha, of Orlu Diocese in Nigeria, offering pontifical Mass in the old riteA recent episode of “Word on Fire” responds to Ross Douthat’s two NYT pieces on Vatican II and its failure with two arguments:Argument #1: To blame the collapse of Catholicism in the West on Vatican II is a “post hoc propter hoc” fallacy.Argument #2: The growth of the Church in Africa since Vatican II is entirely thanks to The Council.It hardly requires pointing out that the second argument commits the same fallacy.Nevertheless, this oft-repeated claim about Africa really...

The “Hermeneutic” of Correction and Rejection: Taking Vatican II Away from the Heretics“A certain number of important theological questions about which no agreement could be reached were left open by choosing formulations that could be interpreted differently by particular groups and theological tendencies at the Council.” (Karl Rahner and Herbert Vorgrimler, as quoted in Fr. Matthias Gaudron’s The Catechism of the Crisis in the Church) Those who have sought to destroy the Church for the past several decades have routinely used Vatican II and its “Spirit” to justify their anti-Catholic initiatives. All Traditional Catholics oppose these attacks on the Church,...

The Council and the Eclipse of God by Don Pietro Leone: CHAPTER 11 (part 1) : The Effects of Council Teaching After having terminated his analysis of the Council and its causes, Don Pietro returns to the quotation at the beginning of the book: "How does the city sit solitary that was full of people...?" attempting to understand the present state of the Church and the world in the light of his findings. He first surveys the heterodoxy and the chastisement of the Church and the World subsequent to the Council, and then the role that the devil has...

Viganò Homily on the Feast of the Chair of Saint Peter in RomeCATHEDRA VERITATISDeus, qui beato Petro Apostolo tuo, collatis clavibus regni cælestis, ligandi atque solvendi pontificium tradidisti: concede; ut, intercessionis ejus auxilio, a peccatorum nostrorum nexibus liberemur.Praised Be Jesus ChristToday the Church in Rome celebrates the feast of the Chair of Saint Peter, with which the authority that Our Lord conferred on the Prince of the Apostles finds in the Chair its symbol and ecclesial expression. We find traces of this celebration since the third century, but it was in 1588, at the time of the Lutheran heresy, that...

To Deny One Dogma Is to Separate Yourself from Christ Can a Catholic Deny Just One Dogma and Remain a Catholic?In the past we considered that dogmas do not evolve, as well as the truth that Catholics must believe more than only infallible dogmatic proclamations. A similar question arises when someone asks what the consequence is for denying just one of the Church’s dogmas. What would happen to someone who absolutely refuses to believe that God created the world out of nothing; that the souls of the blessed in Heaven possess the Beatific Vision; that the Holy Eucharist is the...

[Catholic Caucus] ‘Catholics Got Talent?’: Competition Invites Musicians to Promote Zeal for the EucharistWASHINGTON — Catholic poets, composers, and songwriters are invited to participate in a competition in which the winning piece could be performed before 80,000 people at the 2024 National Eucharistic Congress. The United States Conference of Catholic Bishops’ Secretariat for Evangelization and Catechesis is sponsoring a Eucharistic Revival musical competition in an effort to renew zeal for the Eucharist.The musical competition is one facet of the multiyear National Eucharistic Revival launched on June 19, 2022 — the solemnity of the Most Holy Body and Blood of Christ,...

The One Thread By Which the Council Hangs: a Response to Cavadini, Healy, and WeinandyAbove: photos of (left) Requiem Mass for Pope Benedict XVI at the Monastère Saint-Benoît, provided by the monastery, and (right) Mass in Mexico, by marianaarias of CathoPic.“Don’t touch that! If you do, everything will collapse!” The warning is clear enough. Any sensible person would rapidly desist, lest their one seemingly minor act bring everything crashing down, undoing the work of many days, weeks, years or even decades.I am not sure whether these were the exact words used by a number of bishops at the beginning of...

The differences between traditional baptism and the new rite matter: here’s whyAll of the new sacramental rites bear the mark of ecumenism, but one of the most striking is certainly the new rite of baptism.(LifeSiteNews) — Since Benedict XVI’s Summorum Pontificum, released in 2007, many more Catholics and clergy have had the opportunity to discover the Traditional Latin Mass. Those who discover this rite are led, sooner or later, to compare it to the Novus Ordo Missae of Paul VI. The recent restrictions placed on the old rite by Pope Francis have perhaps intensified these comparisons. Any such comparative study...

Pope to appoint women as lectors, catechists at Vatican for second timeThe event is possible due to Pope Francis' 2021 motu proprio, which has been described as ‘a tectonic shift both in theology and in praxis.’Pope Francis receives the cruets from two women during MassVATICAN CITY (LifeSiteNews) — Pope Francis will confer the ministries of lector and catechist to women for the second time, in a Mass to be held at the Vatican this Sunday. In a press release sent out by the Dicastery for Evangelization, the Holy See Press Office announced that the conferral of the two ministries would...

Mosque: Novus Ordo Church Falls ApartThe Margaret Mary Church in Ottawa, Canada, will soon be operating as a mosque, reports Cbc.ca (7 January).The new owner is the Islamic Supreme Council of Canada, which owns 32 mosques across the country, including two former Christian churches.The sale will be completed in March. The church has not been used for three years.

[Catholic Caucus] Brazil, Pray the Rosary“Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it.” ~George SantayanaBrazilians are convulsing over the fraudulent election of Luis Inacio Lula da Silva “Lula”, the radical Communist convicted felon, who narrowly defeated the moderate, President Jair Bolsonaro. Cries of election fraud dominate the massive street protests.This isn’t the first time when Brazil faced the scourge of a tyrannical Communist takeover. In 1966, Brazilians faced a similar Marxist government that posed a radical political and social transformation of South America’s largest country. With nowhere to turn, the largely Catholic country turned to the Blessed...

Why is God, Our Loving Father, Permitting the Worsening Crisis in the Church and World?In his message to end 2022, Archbishop Carlo Maria Viganò invoked the image of God as a loving Father:“The Lord is our Father, and as Father He punishes us so that we understand our faults, repent of them, and change our lives. Deus, qui culpa offenderis, pœnitentia placaris, says a prayer of Lent: O God, who is offended by guilt and appeased by penance. Wherever there is guilt, wherever the Majesty of God is infinitely offended, there is the need of a punishment. Flagella tuæ iracundiæ,...

Cursed Cultus or Worthy Worship: The Choice That Faces UsEditor’s Note: The following is a transcript of prepared remarks delivered by Dr. Peter Kwasniewski at the official launch of Bishop Athanasius Schneider’s book, The Catholic Mass: Steps to Restoring the Centrality of God in the Liturgy (Sophia Institute Press, 2021), hosted by the publisher in Arlington, VA (Oct. 18, 2022). It is truly a great honor and joy to be here this evening, in the company of His Excellency Bishop Athanasius Schneider, my long-time friend Diane Montagna, my newer friend Charlie McKinney, and all the distinguished guests and faithful Catholics...