Catholic Champion Blog

Save Saint Thomas, Save the Church

2012-01-27T13:24:00.001-05:00

Save Saint Thomas, Save the Church

By Matthew Bellisario 2012

Pope John XXII in 1323, only 49 years after Aquinas’ earthly passing, proclaimed St. Thomas a Saint. He wrote, "We believe that Brother Thomas is glorious in heaven, because his life was holy, and his doctrine alone is a miracle." This Saturday , Jan 28th (in the new calendar, March 7th in the old. I celebrate them both!) is the feast day of the greatest theologian the Church has ever produced, Saint Thomas Aquinas. In 1567 Pope Pius V declared him a Doctor of the Church. He was however given an even higher title by the Church, that of the Angelic Doctor, or The Universal Doctor. These are titles that have yet to be given to anyone other than him. It is no secret that Saint Thomas’ works have been used by the Church to help explain and defend the truth of Christ to the world. In fact, his work was referred to in great depth during the great ecumenical council of Trent, and his line of thinking was used to formally further explain and define dogmatic truths of the faith which included the Eucharist, the Mass, the Sacraments and the unity of the Church. He was a sure safeguard against the errors of Protestantism, and men such a Luther despised him because his knack for getting at the truth of things, which often made a folly of Luther’s bloated ego and the heretical theological positions he held. The Church in fact survived the Protestant Revolt and came away all the stronger because of the Church’s use of St. Thomas’ thought. The method of St. Thomas became time tested as the Church made its way through history, refuting the errors of the world effectively. Looking to modern times, six popes in a row, from Pius IX to Pius XII all hailed him and his thought as an indispensable asset to aiding the human intellect in understanding the Catholic faith.

It was August of 1879 when Pope Leo XIII launched his monumental encyclical ‘Aeternis Patris’, which was directly aimed at combating modernism in the Church. The document sought to ensure that all of the clergy in the Church be firmly rooted in the mind of St. Thomas. "Let, then, teachers carefully chosen by you do their best to instill the doctrine of Thomas Aquinas into the minds of their hearers; and let them clearly point out its solidity and excellence above all other teaching. Let this doctrine be the light of all places of learning, which you may have already opened, or may hereafter open. Let it be used for the refutation of errors that are gaining ground." Pope Leo XIII clearly understood that the very foundations of the Church were being shaken by new philosophical systems which were not rooted in objective truth. He warned of the grave situation that the Church found itself in, “...both by reason of the gravity of the subject and the condition of the time, we are again compelled to speak to you on the mode of taking up the study of philosophy which shall respond most fitly to the excellence of faith, and at the same time be consonant with the dignity of human science.”

Pope Pius X then followed suit with an even more extreme response to the modernist crisis. He wrote five hard hitting documents all attacking the danger of modernism, as well as proposing St. Thomas as the antidote. The first was ‘Acerbo Nimis’ (April 14, 1905) which stressed the importance of proper catechetical formation. In the document Pope Pius X referred to the Council of Trent to illustrate his point. Next on July 3rd of 1907 he launched ‘Lamentabili Sane’, which was also referred to as a Syllabus of Errors. In it he listed 65 of the most noxious errors plaguing the Church. He followed that in September of the same year with the groundbreaking Encyclical ‘Pascendi Domenici Gregis.’ In this document Pope Pius X did is best to clarify the gravity of the situation, and also proposed a clear course of action to stop the modernist incursion. “In the first place, with regard to studies, We will and ordain that scholastic philosophy be made the basis of the sacred sciences...And let it be clearly understood above all things that the scholastic philosophy We prescribe is that which the Angelic Doctor has bequeathed to us, and We, therefore, declare that all the ordinances of Our Predecessor on this subject continue fully in force, and, as far as may be necessary, We do decree anew, and confirm, and ordain that they be by all strictly observed. In seminaries where they may have been neglected let the Bishops impose them and require their observance, and let this apply also to the Superiors of religious institutions. Further let Professors remember that they cannot set St. Thomas aside, especially in metaphysical questions, without grave detriment.” We see here that it is very clear that the actual survival of the Church’s effectiveness in proclaiming the Gospel is rooted in the perennial wisdom of Thomism.

On September 1st of 1910 Pope Pius followed through on his end of the deal when he made all clergy throughout the Church subject to his newly crafted ‘Oath Against Modernism.’ In the document, he not only made the clergy swear to adhere to all of the formal teachings of the Church, but he also bound them to his two documents, ‘Lamentabili Sane’ as well as ‘Pascendi’ which obviously included the clergy’s command to put the teaching of the Angelic Doctor at the heart of their study. Part of the Oath included, “Furthermore, with due reverence, I submit and adhere with my whole heart to the condemnations, declarations, and all the prescripts contained in the encyclical Pascendi and in the decree Lamentabili...” The line in the sand had been drawn and this lethal defense of Saint Thomas would deal a hard hitting blow to the new arch-heresy of modernism. Under Pius X’s watch modernism was for the most part kept firmly in check. Keeping with the leitmotif of his papacy, the Saint ended his Papacy with yet another parting dose of Aquinas is his Motu Proprio, ‘Doctoris Angelici.’ In it he wrote these sobering words of wisdom, "The chief doctrines of St. Thomas' philosophy cannot be regarded as mere opinions—which anyone might discuss pro and con, but rather as a foundation on which all science of both natural and divine things rests. If they are taken away, or perverted in any way, then this necessarily follows: that the students of sacred studies will not perceive even the meaning of those words whereby the divinely revealed dogmas are uttered by the teaching of the Church." Unfortunately Pope Pius X’s warning would come true many years later after the very commands he gave during his entire papacy were later ignored by many in the Church.

Pope Benedict XV followed Saint Pius X and also hailed St. Thomas and his work as indispensable to the Church for all ages. “...the eminent commendations of Thomas Aquinas by the Holy See no longer permit a Catholic to doubt that he was divinely raised up that the Church might have a master whose doctrine should be followed in a special way at all times.” Likewise his successor on June 29th, 1923, Pope Pius XI rolled out his Encyclical ‘Studiorum Ducem’ which again held St. Thomas in the highest esteem. The document opened with, “In a recent apostolic letter confirming the statutes of Canon Law, We declared that the guide to be followed in the higher studies by young men training for the priesthood was Thomas Aquinas. The approaching anniversary of the day when he was duly enrolled, six hundred years ago, in the calendar of the Saints, offers Us an admirable opportunity of inculcating this more and more firmly in the minds of Our students and explaining to them what advantage they may most usefully derive from the teaching of so illustrious a Doctor.” The document again explained why the Church’s effectiveness in the world remained largely on the clergy’s adherence to the teaching methodology of St. Thomas Aquinas. “...a combination of doctrine and piety, of erudition and virtue, of truth and charity, is to be found in an eminent degree in the angelic Doctor and it is not without reason that he has been given the sun for a device; for he both brings the light of learning into the minds of men and fires their hearts and wills with the virtues.”

Not only was Aquinas to be the illuminating light for the clergy, but for the entire Church. Pope Pius XI continued, “We propose to comment briefly in this Letter on the sanctity and doctrine of Thomas Aquinas and to show what profitable instruction may be derived therefrom by priests, by seminarians especially, and, not least, by all Christian people.” The document made it clear that there was no substitute for Aquinas, “in the first place, who has provided a better explanation than he of the nature and character of philosophy, its various divisions and the relative importance of each?...His teaching with regard to the power or value of the human mind is irrefragable...Such a doctrine goes to the root of the errors and opinions of those modern philosophers...The metaphysical philosophy of St. Thomas, although exposed to this day to the bitter onslaughts of prejudiced critics, yet still retains, like gold which no acid can dissolve, its full force and splendor unimpaired...There can be no doubt that Aquinas raised Theology to the highest eminence...Thomas is therefore considered the Prince of teachers...For in the first place he established apologetics on a sound and genuine basis by defining exactly the difference between the province of reason and the province of faith and carefully distinguishing the natural and the supernatural orders...The other branch of Theology, which is concerned with the interpretation of dogmas, also found in St. Thomas by far the richest of all commentators.” In these brief yet telling soundbites I have quoted from the document, we begin to see a common opinion among all of these popes; there was to be no substitute for the Angelic Doctor, period.

After just over 17 years, Pope Pius XI’s papacy came to an end, and his successor, Pope Pius XII, likewise spared no expense in promoting St. Thomas Aquinas as the remedy for the modernist assault on the Church. Not only did he publish documents to combat the new wave of modernist theologians, he also shut many of them down. For example, under his papacy In 1954 the Master General of the Dominican Order in Rome, Emanuel Suarez, was sent to Paris by the command of the Holy See. Three Jesuit Provincials from Paris, Lyons and Toulouse were removed from office including the four new theologians, Boisselet, Feret, Chenu and Congar, who were expelled from Paris, France. Likewise in 1954, Pope Pius XII condemned what the German theologian Karl Rahner had written in his 1949 article titled “The many Masses and the one Sacrifice.” Pope Pius XII did his best to keep many of these "new" theologians away from the faithful by trying to stop the publication of their modernist heresies. These actions were preceded by his well oriented Encyclical, ‘Humanis Genris.’ The document, although similar to those penned by his predecessors, also took aim at modernist philosophy, and hence also the theological ideas of individual theologians such as the wily French Jesuit, Henri de Lubac. De Lubac, was also an avid defender of the condemned ideas of Pierre Telhard de Chardin, who also promoted a deficient philosophical line of thinking which stood truth on its head. As a result, de Lubac held to an improper view of nature and grace, which was rooted in his modernist philosophical method of thought.

It is worth quoting paragraph 32 of the encyclical ‘Humanis Generis’ at full length to appreciate the condemnation of his line of thought. “How deplorable it is then that this philosophy, received and honored by the Church, is scorned by some, who shamelessly call it outmoded in form and rationalistic, as they say, in its method of thought. They say that this philosophy upholds the erroneous notion that there can be a metaphysic that is absolutely true; whereas in fact, they say, reality, especially transcendent reality, cannot better be expressed than by disparate teachings, which mutually complete each other, although they are in a way mutually opposed. Our traditional philosophy, then, with its clear exposition and solution of questions, its accurate definition of terms, its clear-cut distinctions, can be, they concede, useful as a preparation for scholastic theology, a preparation quite in accord with medieval mentality; but this philosophy hardly offers a method of philosophizing suited to the needs of our modern culture. They allege, finally, that our perennial philosophy is only a philosophy of immutable essences, while the contemporary mind must look to the existence of things and to life, which is ever in flux. While scorning our philosophy, they extol other philosophies of all kinds, ancient and modern, oriental and occidental, by which they seem to imply that any kind of philosophy or theory, with a few additions and corrections if need be, can be reconciled with Catholic dogma. No Catholic can doubt how false this is, especially where there is question of those fictitious theories they call immanentism, or idealism or materialism, whether historic or dialectic, or even existentialism, whether atheistic or simply the type that denies the validity of the reason in the field of metaphysics.”

Pope Pius XII like his predecessors had held firm to the merits of Saint Thomas Aquinas. Never has there been more praise from the Church for any theologian as there has been for Saint Thomas. Even as great as Saint Augustine was, by God’s grace, Saint Thomas enhanced and surpassed the wisdom of St. Augustine. Pope Leo XIII wrote in his encyclical ‘Aeternis Patris’ “Among the Scholastic Doctors, the chief and master of all towers Thomas Aquinas, who, as Cajetan observes, because “he most venerated the ancient doctors of the Church, in a certain way seems to have inherited the intellect of all...The doctrines of those illustrious men, like the scattered members of a body, Thomas collected together and cemented, distributed in wonderful order, and so increased with important additions that he is rightly and deservedly esteemed the special bulwark and glory of the Catholic faith.” We must realize that the Church has never relied on anyone in the Church to the extent that it has on Saint Thomas. Entire ecumenical councils have used his thought to further define and guide the Church’s doctrine. The Church has used his methods to further develop moral theology and give answer to critical moral questions. So we honor the happy feast of Saint Thomas Aquinas. On March 7th, I will again honor the Feast of St. Thomas. Perhaps he should just be given two feast days! We can do no harm in honoring this great Saint every chance we get. We should invest our energies into reading and studying the work and methods of this unique and splendid Saint. His work has had the ability to recognize and convey the truths of the Catholic faith like no one else’s ever has. We should likewise imitate him in his holiness, and in the way he integrated study and prayer, not viewing them as separate works, but one flowing from the other. Many today have adopted the errors of modernism in the Church. The reason this has happened is that many have long ignored the great Angelic Doctor. It is plain to see according to the successors of St. Peter, from whom I have extensively quoted here, there is to be no substitute for Saint Thomas Aquinas and the principles of reality that he so beautifully brought to light. There has been no more important time in history to awaken those in the Church to the life, thought and work of Saint Thomas Aquinas. There has been a motto going around the internet, “Save the liturgy, save the Church.” I think it is more appropriate to say, “Save Saint Thomas, save the Church.” Happy Feast of Saint Thomas!

Faith and Facts I: Changing Luther’s Doctrine of Sola Fide.

2012-01-26T21:28:00.004-05:00

Faith and Facts I: Changing Luther’s Doctrine of Sola Fide.

I am reading an interesting book I purchased on the internet. The title is ‘Catholic Moral Teaching and Its Antagonists’ by Joseph Mausbach, D.D. It was printed in 1914 and presents and defends Catholic moral teaching against many Protestant arguments. I found some information that the book presented on Lutheranism, and how the view of justification, and the doctrine of sola fide, or faith alone, has changed over the years. Most of the “average Joe” Lutheran church goers probably have no idea how the Lutheran sect has changed its teaching over on this doctrine. Most probably do not even understand what Luther taught concerning the heretical doctrine. As a whole, Lutheranism does not present what their founder Martin Luther taught concerning “faith alone.” For example, Luther’s famous “faith alone” doctrine has been shifted back towards the Catholic view, which is not really “faith alone,” but faith working and charity. This is one of the reasons why their have been recent attempts to try and reconcile the modern Lutheran doctrine and Catholic doctrine on the matter, although what they are now trying to reconcile is not really the Catholic doctrine of faith and works, and the classic Lutheran doctrine of faith alone. There is no way possible to reconcile the two, the error must be either condemned or simply changed. These changes however are presented not as changes, but that what has been taught before was only misunderstood.

The books offers a nice explanation of what was going on back in the early 1900s concerning this issue. Lutheran’s had began to shift away from Luther’s radical heresy of sola fide, because they realized that it could not stand up to Biblical scrutiny. Yet, as they changed it, they still insisted that it was “Lutheran.” This has continued on to this day. Below is a quote from the text on pages 25 and 27 of this book, which gives a good explanation of what happened in this new redefining of what the Lutherans now wanted to be accepted as their new doctrine of Sola Fide. Of course, this does not apply to all “Lutherans” since there are many different sects of them. You still have the occasional "trad-Lutherans" who attempt to adhere to the radical, confused and ultimately contradicting doctrine that Luther himself presented. Otherwise, it seems that many “Lutherans” have just decided to reformulate what they wanted Luther to have taught, rather than what he really taught.

There have always been Protestant theologians who boasted of preserving their inheritance from Luther with scrupulous fidelity. They have watched with distrust every attempt to attach more importance to the necessity of a moral life. Ever since the time of the Majoristic controversy "the aversion to any interpretation or expression which brought obedience on the part of man, or his good works, into relation with eternal life grew year by year stronger and more general among German Protestants,” and theological works with a strongly marked moral tendency incurred at once the suspicion of heresy.

Apart from the veneration of Luther's person by Protestants, there is something else which makes it difficult for them to assign the true historical meaning to his definitive teaching, and this is the fact that, in the course of time, Protestant preachers and theologians have stripped Luther's doctrine of justification of its contradiction and, as we have seen in the case of Tschackert, have changed sola fides into "faith and charity."

This is the so-called silent reformation which Krogh-Tonning describes as a "reaction in the heart of Protestantism in favour of Catholicism." It is at the same time a very decided "condemnation of the essential point in Luther's teaching." In consequence of this gradual transformation, as this Norwegian convert points out, the relation of faith to good works is now a doctrine upon which Catholics and Protestants are practically agreed. Protestant theology has abandoned those of Luther's tenets that are unchristian and subversive of morality, and so it now teaches a form of Lutheranism that is not historical, for "it has given up the principles antagonistic to the Church, and by means of a silent reformation has again taken up the moral point, endeavouring all the while to assert its Lutheran origin, even in matters that are irreconcilable with the thoughts and the teaching of the Reformation."...

Hamack admits that many Protestants still refuse to agree to the proposition that faith only is valuable which reveals itself in love of God and of one's neighbour, and that their refusal to agree to it becomes more obstinate when they engage in religious controversy with Catholics. This is due not to any interior, ethical, or even biblical difficulty involved in the proposition, but to a consciousness that it contradicts Luther's doctrine of justification, which they are unwilling to surrender. Moreover, if the antithesis "faith alone," and "faith and love" is defined as Hamack defines it, the former receives a meaning which forbids us to say that Luther asserted the correct doctrine in the sharpest terms. A Catholic is certainly not led to consider the delicate question whether value is to be attached to faith or love, because he abides by the principle of faith and love, — faith as the root, love as the blossom and fruit of justification. On the other hand, with the principle "faith alone," the question is already settled in a most fatal and incorrect manner. That faith is absolutely inseparable from love is true of that view of faith mentioned by St Paid in Galatians v. 6, which scholasticism describes as "faith inspired by love," and which Luther also occasionally has depicted very nicely. But elsewhere he emphatically combats this fides caritate formata of the scholastics and denies that love bears any relation to justification; he represents justifying faith as compatible with sin even so emphatically, that it is impossible to say that his conception of faith necessarily includes charity.

‘Catholic Moral Teaching and Its Antagonists’ by Joseph Mausbach, D.D.

Here we can see what the new Lutheran teaching is concerning "faith alone."

Pray Tell Watch: Fr Anthony Ruff On Luther

2012-01-24T23:08:00.001-05:00

I recently posted about Fr. Anthony Ruff's recent critique of some of what was written by Fr. Barron concerning a video put out by an evangelical. I think it is relevant to look at the rest of his response, which concerns the arch-heretic Martin Luther. This is really amazing stuff. First, below is what Fr. Barron wrote,

"What the young man in the video is presenting is a simplistic and radical form of evangelicalism whose intellectual roots are in the thought of Martin Luther. Luther famously held that justification (or salvation) takes place through grace alone accepted in faith, and not from good works of any kind...

To rely on liturgy or sacraments or moral effort for salvation, Luther thought, amounted to a pathetic “works righteousness,” which he sharply contrasted to the “alien righteousness” that comes, not from us, but from Christ. This basic theological perspective led Luther (at least in some texts) to demonize many elements of ecclesial life as distractions from the grace offered through Jesus, and this is why we find, even to this day in many evangelical Protestant churches, a muting of the liturgical, the sacramental, the institutional, etc."

Next we have Fr. Ruff's response.

"Also unfortunate is Barron’s caricature of Luther. Pro Ecclesia and recent Luther studies, anyone? The New Finnish School, anyone? Barron rightly critiques the video for driving a wedge between Christ and the Church. What a shame that in doing so, Barron drives a wedge between Luther and the Catholic Church. So much for ecumenism."

First of all, how can Fr. Barron drive any larger wedge between Luther and the Catholic Church than that which Luther himself drove? How is what was presented a caricature? What about the "New Finish School?" Anyone? Anyone care? How about being honest? Look at historical documents and read what the arch-heretic Luther actually wrote and taught, and then ask yourself who drove the "wedge". Luther in many respects was in complete opposition to the Catholic faith. Putting your fingers in your ears, closing your eyes and then pretending that it never happened is not going to improve Catholic-Lutheran relations. The only way to improve that relation is to clearly demonstrate where Luther erred, and why Lutherans today should reject his errors and return to the one true Christian faith. Ecumenism does not come at the expense of truth.

How about this for a wedge? Anyone? Anyone?

Below is an excerpt from Luther's reply to Pope Leo X and his Bull of excommunication. Luther was so out his mind that he couldn't even decide who he thought wrote the Bull. He sounds like a raving lunatic. But even despite that fact, he made it clear that whoever it was, whether it be Pope Leo, Eck, or anyone else, that they were surely the "anti-Christ." We all know who approved of the Bull don't we? Pope Leo X. There was no wedge there! How dare Fr. Barron recount Luther's teaching and drive a huge wedge between Luther and the Catholic Church!

But whoever wrote this bull, he is Antichrist. I protest before God, our Lord Jesus, his sacred angels, and the whole world that with my whole heart I dissent from the damnation of this bull, that I curse and execrate it as sacrilege and blasphemy of Christ, God's Son and our Lord. This be my recantation, Oh bull, thou daughter of bulls...Of the cross of Christ, that all men should resist them. You then, Leo X, you cardinals and the rest of you at Rome, I tell you to your faces: "If this bull has come out in your name, then I will use the power which has been given me in baptism whereby I became a son of God and co-heir with Christ, established upon the rock against which the gates of hell cannot prevail. I call upon you to renounce your diabolical blasphemy and audacious impiety, and, if you will not, we shall all hold your seat as possessed and oppressed by Satan, the damned seat of Antichrist; in the name of Jesus Christ, whom you persecute.

Move along people..nothing to see here...no wedge here folks....Luther calling the Pope the anti-Christ, along with the rest of his rants drove no real wedge...no wedge here folks......nothing to see.....move along....

Where is the New Theology Leading Us?

2012-01-24T22:00:00.001-05:00

If there is one article worth putting on your read list this week, this would be it. It is titled, 'Where is the New Theology Leading Us?' It was originally written by the great theologian and opponent of modernism, Fr. Reginald Garrigou-Lagrange, O.P. in 1946. The article clearly demonstrates why it is so important to follow the principles of perennial philosophy, which ultimately effects how one views dogmatic and moral theology. If you are wondering why we have all of the turmoil in the Church today, it is because many of the bishops and clergy have adopted modernist principles in some shape or form, which has been long condemned by the Church. If you read many of the theologians who are hailed today as being such great theologians, such as Hans Urs van Balthasar, Henri de Lubac and Karl Rahner among others, you will observe how readily they bought into much of the modernist line of thinking. I wrote a review on Hans Urs von Balthasar's work, 'Razing the Bastions' recently, and it is plain to see that he bought into many of the philosophical ideas which were explicitly rejected by the Church.

Excerpt from Lagrange's article:

"The truth is no longer the conformity of judgment to intuitive reality and its immutable laws, but the conformity of judgment to the exigencies of action, and of human life which continues to evolve. The philosophy of being or ontology is substituted by the philosophy of action which defines truth as no longer a function of being but of action."

Thus is modernism reprised: “Truth is no more immutable than man himself, inasmuch as it is evolved with him, in him and through him. As well, Pius X said of the modernists, “they pervert the eternal concept of truth.”

Mark Wahlberg: One of the Few Decent Men In Hollywood

2012-01-22T23:08:00.003-05:00

There are not many men in Hollywood today that people can look up to. It seems that Mark Wahlberg has his head on straight. It is great to see a fellow Catholic in his particular state in life trying to live his faith in today's culture.

Pray Tell Watch: Father Anthony Ruff- Did Jesus Found The Church?

2012-01-22T02:15:00.002-05:00

Pray Tell Watch: Father Anthony Ruff- Did Jesus Found A Church?

    I keep an eye on the foolishness that is espoused over at the ‘Pray Tell’ blog. Recently I ran across a post in which Fr. Anthony Ruff challenges the notion that Jesus founded the Church. Father Anthony Ruff recently stated the following in critiquing what Fr. Longnecker and Fr. Barron had to say about the recent video that came out last week by a dimwitted evangelical, which ridiculed religion, while claiming to promote the love of Jesus. Fr. Barron made the following comment, “What [Jesus] affected was a transfiguration of the best of that classical Israelite religion—Temple, law, priesthood, sacrifice, covenant, etc.—into the institutions, sacraments, practices and structures of his Mystical Body, the Church.” Father Ruff responded “I find Fr. Longecker’s defense of organized religion, though perhaps a bit overstated, more persuasive than Fr. Barron’s. Both point out the communal nature of following Jesus, but Longecker does so without Barron’s triumphalistic, preconciliar-sounding claims about how Jesus founded the Church.” Pre-conciliar sounding? Triumphalism? To disagree with the fact that Jesus founded a Church is heresy, period.

    It is clear here in this statement that we have a priest, who is part of the Benedictine order at St. John’s Abbey, espousing heresy in a public forum. That is right, I am claiming that the words he wrote here are blatantly heretical. Any allusion to the fact that Jesus did not found the Church is against the Catholic faith. Yet, according to Fr. Ruff, Fr. Barron was wrong to claim that Jesus ever founded a Church. The claim that Jesus founded the Catholic Church is defined by Fr. Ruff as being old triumphalism, and apparently such claims are to be condemned as “preconciliar-sounding” nonsense. This is not the first time Fr. Ruff has made wild-eyed claims regarding the Church. If we look back to August 25th of 2010 we read, “I’ve become increasingly interested in the issue of what Jesus’s radical message really was (to the extent that we can ever get at least a bit closer to it), and in what ways the tradition of the Church both conveys and betrays his message.” (http://www.praytellblog.com/index.php/2010/08/25/summer-what-weve-been-reading-wednesday/) We also remember his comments in one the com-boxes on the Pray Tell blog awhile back concerning the Church's apostolic succession, "But “sacramental priesthood in the apostolic succession, as understood by the Catholic (and Orthodox) churches” is quite a bit more complicated, historically problematic, ambiguous, and open to further doctrinal development than you seem to have any inkling of." So we see that Fr. Ruff is no stranger to questioning or ridiculing the Church's teaching concerning the Church.

    Let us now see what Christ Himself taught about the Church. Let us also investigate the words of those who followed Him throughout the centuries and handed on the faith throughout the world, concerning the foundation of the Church. Finally we will look at what the Popes and the Church Magisterium has consistently and officially taught about Jesus founding the Church. This material will include what has been claimed not only from the pre-Vatican II sources and documents, but also what came from the Second Vatican Council, as well as what came after it. We will find plainly that this renegade priest is misleading people on a public forum, and as usual, no one in the hierarchy will do anything about it. You wanna know why? Its because most of them also buy into this same modernist heretical nonsense that Fr. Ruff buys into. So Fr. Ruff can espouse anything he likes in a public forum, where thousands, or perhaps millions of men and women can be mislead by his writings, without any opposition whatsoever.

The facts concerning this teaching.

1. Jesus said He founded the Church; "You are Rock and on this rock I will build my Church." (Matthew 16: 18) So here we have Jesus Himself telling his followers that He was going to found a Church. The only problem here is that Fr. Ruff has often claimed that he does not believe that the words in the Bible are the actual words that He spoke. Fr. Ruff once wrote, “Saint Benedict Press prints the words of Our Lord are in red! Just like the Protestant fundamentalists. Just what you need if you think everything attributed to Jesus in the canonical Gospels was said by him...” (http://www.praytellblog.com/index.php/2011/04/08/what%E2%80%99s-up-with-the-nabre/) So, if you don’t believe the Scriptures are inspired, and that Jesus’ words were passed on to us through the Church and her Scriptures, then what other evidence is going to compel you? Probably not much of anything, but I will continue anyways.

2. The immediate followers of Jesus said He founded the Church; “Therefore as the church is subject to Christ, so also let the wives be to their husbands in all things. Husbands, love your wives, as Christ also loved the church, and delivered himself up for it:...” (Ephesians 5:24-25) Here we see Saint Paul telling us that Christ delivered Himself up for the Church, and that the Church is subject to Him. Of course Fr. Ruff probably doesn’t believe that St. Paul said this either.

3. The early Church Fathers said Jesus founded the Church; “Peter upon which rock the Lord promised that he would build his church.” (Saint Basil the Great) “For from the coming down of the Incarnate Word among us, all the churches in every part of the world have possessed that greatest church alone as their base and foundation, seeing that, according to the promise of Christ Our Savior, the gates of hell do never prevail against it, that it possesses the Keys of right confession and faith in Him, that it opens the true and only religion to such as approach with piety, and shuts up and locks every heretical mouth that speaks injustice against the Most High.” ( Saint Maximus the Confessor) Unfortunately those in the Church hierarchy have grown soft as roasted marshmallows since the days of the great St. Maximus, and they will not shut the heretical mouths of those who espouse heresy today.

4. The Popes have said that those who claimed that Jesus did not found the Church are heretics. The following statement was proclaimed to be heresy according to Pius X. “It was far from the mind of Christ to found a Church as a society which would continue on earth for a long course of centuries.” (Lamentabili Sane, 1907)

5. The Magisterium before Vatican II said Jesus founded the Church; “We teach and declare that according to the gospel evidence, a primacy of jurisdiction over the whole church of God was immediately and directly promised to the blessed apostle Peter and conferred on him by Christ the lord...if anyone says that blessed Peter the apostle was not appointed by Christ the lord as prince of all the apostles and visible head of the whole church militant; or that it was a primacy of honour only and not one of true and proper jurisdiction that he directly and immediately received from our lord Jesus Christ himself: let him be anathema.” (Decrees of the First Vatican Council) So here we have the Magisterium proclaiming that anyone who would deny that Christ immediately founded the Church, with Peter as its head, to be anathema.

6. The documents of Vatican II said Jesus founded the Church; “Christ the Lord founded one Church and one Church only.” (Unitatis Redintegratio) “Christ, the one Mediator, established and continually sustains here on earth His holy Church, the community of faith, hope and charity, as an entity with visible delineation through which He communicated truth and grace to all.” (Lumen Gentium) So here we have two Vatican II documents telling us the same thing, that Jesus founded the Church. So I think we should ask Fr. Ruff how he deems this teaching to be “pre-conciliar-sounding". Explain that one to us please.

7. The Church documents of today tell us that Jesus founded the Church, and that Catholics are required by faith to assent to this teaching; “The Catholic faithful are required to profess that there is an historical continuity — rooted in the apostolic succession — between the Church founded by Christ and the Catholic Church: “This is the single Church of Christ... which our Saviour, after his resurrection, entrusted to Peter's pastoral care (cf. Jn 21:17), commissioning him and the other Apostles to extend and rule her (cf. Mt 28:18ff.), erected for all ages as ‘the pillar and mainstay of the truth' (1 Tim 3:15).” (Domius Iesus, CDF) I guess Fr. Ruff does not have to comply with this requirement? It seems that he does not, otherwise his superiors and the bishop of which his abbey resides under, would be publicly apologizing to everyone for these statements. In addition, they would then need to jerk this mountebank off the internet to do penance on an island far, far away from any computer connected to the internet.

So I have proven here that Fr. Ruff’s claim that Jesus founding a Church, as being nothing more than old triumphalism, and pre-conciliar in nature, to be a false heretical claim. Oh sure, if he is ever pressed on this issue he will find a way to slither out from what he said. All modernists are good at the word games. I however would put his feet to the fire and make him answer a simple question. "Do you believe that Jesus Christ founded His one and only Church, the Catholic Church, on Peter and His successors? Was this foundation a historical one, and do you believe what the Church in her documents, and in and her Sacred Scriptures attest to regarding this teaching? Yes or No?" It is a fact, when this teaching is denied or in any way questioned, it should be recognized as being heretical in nature, and it should be halted. It does not matter in what manner the teaching is questioned, for any speech that could cause one to doubt this teaching should never be tolerated. This teaching is a core tenet of the Catholic faith which must be believed in order for one to be of the Catholic faith. Will we see Fr. Ruff put under interdict for this heretical statement made in the public sphere? Don’t hold your breath. If we had real men like Saint Maximus the Confessor in the Church today, we would see the likes of this heretical speech shut down. For now we will have to relish in the words that the great Saint left behind for us, and pray that some day this heretical speech will not be tolerated in open forums by the very men who swore to protect the flock from the wolves who seek to devour them. Instead we have these men leading the sheep right into the wolves den, where they then stand with delight, wringing their hands with broad smiles on their faces as they watch the wolves devour them.

“The extremities of the earth, and all in every part of it who purely and rightly confess the Lord look directly towards the most holy Roman Church and its confession and faith, as it were to a sun of unfailing light, awaiting from it the bright radiance of the sacred dogmas of our Fathers according to what the six inspired and holy councils have purely and piously decreed, declaring most expressly the symbol of faith. For from the coming down of the incarnate Word amongst us, all the Churches in every part of the world have held that greatest Church alone as their base and foundation, seeing that according to the promise of Christ our Saviour, the gates of hell do never prevail against it, that it has the keys of a right confession and faith in Him, that it opens the true and only religion to such as approach with piety, and shuts up and locks every heretical mouth that speaks injustice against the Most High.” (Saint Maximus the Confessor)

The Intelletual Life: Read This Book!

2012-01-13T07:53:00.003-05:00

There are some books that have the ability to change the way you look at things, and this is one of them. Written originally back in 1921, 'The Intellectual Life' by A.G. Sertillanges O.P. is a manual for those interested in the intellectual life of study. But is is much more than that, it is a manual on how to live. The book is based upon a Thomistic framework, explaining first what the intellectual life is and why one would engage in such work. The author makes it clear that there can be no real intellectual work without virtue, being regularly engaged in prayer, and of course being in the state of grace. Discipline of the body is also expressed. One who cannot control their appetite for example makes a poor intellectual. It is extremely important to have a regular schedule in life, having the same time each day to pray, to exercise, to study, and of course fulfill your regular obligations of work and family, etc. The author even touches upon getting proper sleep, not too much, yet not too little, and even gives advice on how to make your sleep productive.

The second half of the book explains how to actually engage in study. He talks about always using the methods of Saint Thomas to form one's intellectual foundation, starting first learning the basic principles of philosophy and logic. The book teaches you how to read and how to properly research the subjects you want to study. He teaches you how to take notes and how to write well. How you spend your time with others and how you engage with them is also talked about. In short, the author teaches you not really how to study or how to write as a separate work, but he teaches you what it actually means to be an intellectual in the true sense of the word. It is not something that you do, but something that you become. He teaches you how to integrate your daily work, your family life, your spiritual life and your study so that you can always be active in living "the intellectual life." If there is one book you should read before you read any others, this is it. It has changed the way I think about life, and it is rare that a book has this effect. It has made me think about what is important in life. I am now on a mission to remove any obstacles that will keep me from achieving a well ordered life towards God, and towards my studies.

The author also has another great book available titled, 'Thomas Aquinas, Scholar, Poet, Mystic, Saint'. It is an introductory book on Saint Thomas which gives a basic sketch of his life, his thought, his spirituality and his work. It is only 140 pages, but it is a great book to read along with 'The Intellectual Life.' I find it always rewarding to go back and read introductory works on Saint Thomas. There is always something to be learned from them. If you implement what these two books teach, then I believe that you will be made a better person in doing so.

Contradictions? You Decide...

2012-01-09T22:03:00.001-05:00

Proposal #1

Pope Pius X wrote: "The chief doctrines of St. Thomas' philosophy cannot be regarded as mere opinions—which anyone might discuss pro and con, but rather as a foundation on which all science of both natural and divine things rests. If they are taken away, or perverted in any way, then this necessarily follows: that the students of sacred studies will not perceive even the meaning of those words whereby the divinely revealed dogmas are uttered by the teaching of the Church."

Doctoris Angelici
Pope Pius X
29 June 1914

Pope Leo XIII wrote, "Let, then, teachers carefully chosen by you do their best to instill the doctrine of Thomas Aquinas into the minds of their hearers; and let them clearly point out its solidity and excellence above all other teaching. Let this doctrine be the light of all places of learning, which you may have already opened, or may hereafter open. Let it be used for the refutation of errors that are gaining ground."

Aeterni Patris
Pope Leo XIII
4 August 1879

Pope Pius XII wrote, "In theology some want to reduce to a minimum the meaning of dogmas; andto free dogma itself from terminology long established in the Church and fromphilosophical concepts held by Catholic teachers, to bring about a return in theexplanation of Catholic doctrine to the way of speaking used in Holy Scriptureand by the Fathers of the Church. They cherish the hope that when dogma isstripped of the elements which they hold to be extrinsic to divine revelation,it will compare advantageously with the dogmatic opinions of those who areseparated from the unity of the Church and that in this way they will graduallyarrive at a mutual assimilation of Catholic dogma with the tenets of thedissidents.

Moreover, they assert that when Catholic doctrine has been reduced tothis condition, a way will be found to satisfy modern needs, that will permit ofdogma being expressed also by the concepts of modern philosophy, whether ofimmanentism or idealism or existentialism or any other system. Some moreaudacious affirm that his can and must be done, because they hold that themysteries of faith are never expressed by truly adequate concepts but only byapproximate and ever changeable notions, in which the truth is to some extentexpressed, but is necessarily distorted. Wherefore they do not consider itabsurd, but altogether necessary, that theology should substitute new conceptsin place of the old ones in keeping with the various philosophies which in thecourse of time it uses as its instruments, so that it should give humanexpression to divine truths in various ways which are even somewhat opposed, butstill equivalent, as they say. They add that the history of dogmas consists inthe reporting of the various forms in which revealed truth has been clothed,forms that have succeeded one another in accordance with the different teachingsand opinions that have arisen over the course of the centuries. It is evident from what We have already said, that such tentatives notonly lead to what they call dogmatic relativism, but that they actually containit.

The contempt of doctrine commonly taught and of the terms in which it isexpressed strongly favor it. Everyone is aware that the terminology employed inthe schools and even that used by the Teaching Authority of the Church itself iscapable of being perfected and polished; and we know also that the Church itselfhas not always used the same terms in the same way. It is also manifest that theChurch cannot be bound to every system of philosophy that has existed for ashort space of time. Nevertheless, the things that have been composed throughcommon effort by Catholic teachers over the course of the centuries to bringabout some understanding of dogma are certainly not based on any such weakfoundation. These things are based on principles and notions deduced from a trueknowledge of created things. In the process of deducing, this knowledge, like astar, gave enlightenment to the human mind through the Church. Hence it is notastonishing that some of these notions have not only been used by theOecumenical Councils, but even sanctioned by them, so that it is wrong to departfrom them.

Hence to neglect, or to reject,or to devalue so many and such greatresources which have been conceived, expressed and perfected so often by theage-old work of men endowed with no common talent and holiness, working underthe vigilant supervision of the holy magisterium and with the light andleadership of the Holy Ghost in order to state the truths of the faith ever moreaccurately, to do this so that these things may be replaced by conjecturalnotions and by some formless and unstable tenets of a new philosophy, tenetswhich, like the flowers of the field, are in existence today and die tomorrow;this is supreme imprudence and something that would make dogma itself a reedshaken by the wind. The contempt for terms and notions habitually used byscholastic theologians leads of itself to the weakening of what they callspeculative theology, a discipline which these men consider devoid of truecertitude because it is based on theological reasoning.

Humani Generis

Pope Pius XII

12 August 1950

Proposal #2

The then Father Ratzinger wrote, "I want to emphasize again that I decidedly agree with Küng when he makes a clear distinction between Roman theology (taught in the schools of Rome) and the Catholic Faith. To free itself from the constraining fetters of Roman Scholastic Theology represents a duty upon which, in my humble opinion, the possibility of the survival of Catholicism seems to depend."

Zum Problem Unfehlbarkeit -
"The Problem of Infallibility"

a series of essays edited by Karl Rahner.

Fr. Joseph Ratzinger, 1971

The then Cardinal Ratzinger wrote, "In a certain sense, the theology of the first half of the [20th] century was more balanced, but also more closed within itself. Much of that theology lived inside the box of Neo-Scholasticism. It had greater certainty and logical lucidity than today's theology, but it was far removed from the real world. The adventure that began in the Council took theology out of that box and exposed it to the fresh air of today's life."
"Consequently this exposed it to the risk of new unbalances, since it was subject to divergent tendencies without the protection of a system. This caused theology to look for new balances in the context of an open and lively dialogue with today's reality.

"This step seems to me not only justified, but also necessary, because theology should serve faith and evangelization, and, for this reason, must face reality as it is today .... Therefore, it was a just and necessary step, although also a risky one .... But risk is part of a necessary adventure."

Interview from 1994 from
the Portuguese edition of 30 Giorni-
Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger
(30 Dias, April 1994, p. 62)

The then Cardinal Ratzinger wrote, "As a result of this struggle [between faith and reason], a new philosophical category – the concept of “person” – was fashioned, a concept that has become for us the fundamental concept of the analogy between God and man, the very center of philosophical thought….The meaning of an already existing category, that of “relation”, was fundamentally changed. In the Aristotelian table of categories, relation belongs to the group of accidents that point to substance and are dependent on it; in God, therefore, there are no accidents. Through the Christian doctrine of the Trinity, relation moves out of the substance-accident framework. Now God himself is described as a Trinitarian set of relations, as relation subsistens. When we say that man is the image of God, it means that he is a being designed for relationship; it means that, in and through all his relationships, he seeks that relation which is the ground of his existence. In this context, covenant would be the response to man’s imaging of God; it would show us who we are and who God is. And for God, since he is entirely relationship, covenant would not be something external in history, apart from his being, but the manifestation of his self, the “radiance of his countenance.” (P. 76-77).

'Many Religions – One Covenant'

Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger

1999

A Warning to Those Who Oppose Saint Thomas and Scholasticism

2012-01-07T18:31:00.002-05:00

I think these two paragraphs are a good rule of thumb to use when seeking out your Catholic reading material. Long live the happy memory of Pope Saint Pius X! We should hope that all today would hear and obey his words.

45. In the first place, with regard to studies, We will and ordain that scholastic philosophy be made the basis of the sacred sciences. It goes without saying that if anything is met with among the scholastic doctors which may be regarded as an excess of subtlety, or which is altogether destitute of probability, We have no desire whatever to propose it for the imitation of present generations (Leo XIII. Enc. Aeterni Patris). And let it be clearly understood above all things that the scholastic philosophy We prescribe is that which the Angelic Doctor has bequeathed to us, and We, therefore, declare that all the ordinances of Our Predecessor on this subject continue fully in force, and, as far as may be necessary, We do decree anew, and confirm, and ordain that they be by all strictly observed. In seminaries where they may have been neglected let the Bishops impose them and require their observance, and let this apply also to the Superiors of religious institutions. Further let Professors remember that they cannot set St. Thomas aside, especially in metaphysical questions, without grave detriment.

46. On this philosophical foundation the theological edifice is to be solidly raised. Promote the study of theology, Venerable Brethren, by all means in your power, so that your clerics on leaving the seminaries may admire and love it, and always find their delight in it. For in the vast and varied abundance of studies opening before the mind desirous of truth, everybody knows how the old maxim describes theology as so far in front of all others that every science and art should serve it and be to it as handmaidens (Leo XIII., Lett. ap. In Magna, Dec. 10, 1889). We will add that We deem worthy of praise those who with full respect for tradition, the Holy Fathers, and the ecclesiastical magisterium, undertake, with well-balanced judgment and guided by Catholic principles (which is not always the case), seek to illustrate positive theology by throwing the light of true history upon it. Certainly more attention must be paid to positive theology than in the past, but this must be done without detriment to scholastic theology, and those are to be disapproved as of Modernist tendencies who exalt positive theology in such a way as to seem to despise the scholastic.

PASCENDI DOMINICI GREGIS

ENCYCLICAL OF POPE PIUS X
ON THE DOCTRINES
OF THE MODERNISTS

A Critique on Hans Urs von Balthasar’s Work ‘Razing the Bastions’

2012-01-05T20:52:00.002-05:00

A Critique on Hans Urs von Balthasar’s Work ‘Razing the Bastions’
(The ‘Anti-Humani Generis)
By Matthew J Bellisario 2012

A Critique on Hans Urs von Balthasar’s Work ‘Razing the Bastions’
(The ‘Anti-Humani Generis)
By Matthew J Bellisario 2012

Introduction

    Hans Urs von Balthasar is routinely hailed as being one of the most prolific and brilliant theologians of the modern Church. He is often lauded by popular priests today. For example, Fr. Joesph Fessio promotes his work and has published many of his works at Ignatius Press, Fr. Robert Barron routinely quotes him at his ‘Word on Fire’ website, often times using von Balthasar’s opinion over that of even Saint Thomas Aquinas. Even our current Pope as well as John Paul II often cite his work. It would seem then based on popular opinion that this theologian is the golden boy of theologians, no? Well, based on my reading and study of this particular work ‘Raising the Bastions’, as compared to what past Popes have taught us, I tend to disagree.

    I am going to look at this work in particular and give you a few reasons why I do not care for his theological opinions. I have attempted to reference the page numbers that I quoted from so that you the reader can easily cross reference my claims if you have the book. I urge you to read it for yourself as well. Again, as I often state here, this is my opinion, nothing more. Feel free to agree or disagree with me, it is of little difference to me. I am offering you my observations of topics that may interest readers, if that interests you then great, if not that is fine as well. I took the time to study the 100 plus page work that was republished by Ignatius Press in 1993. Originally the work was penned in 1953 in German. It is often referred to as a prototype for the new mentality of the modern Church. The modern publication contains an introduction by Cardinal Christoph Schonborn, who is also not on the top of my list of reputable theologians, nor can he be trusted in his liturgical theology. Just watch this video to see what kind of liturgical buffoonery he has been responsible for in the past.

    In his introduction Schonborn praises the work as being one calling for the Church to interpret the “signs of the age” “from the bed of historical sleep for the deed of today.” These quotes were taken directly from the work itself. Schonborn kind of summarizes Balthasar’s anti-middles ages attitude which pervades the work. He writes, “Certainly the medieval congruence of the world with the inner room of the Church is shattered. The Church stands as one body among many others.” The Cardinal then, like the author of the work, speaks of the Church’s alleged failures of the past including the Baroque period, as well as the attempted restoration during the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. In short, it seems that the Cardinal shares the views of the author which, makes the bold claim that the Catholic Church in the past has been a huge failure, and that it must essentially change and adapt to the modern age, or die. Although there may be some truth in the claim that the Church must be mindful of the age it finds itself in, the battle lines must be drawn as to how the Church should preach and communicate the life saving Gospel of Jesus Christ to the world. Anything short of proclaiming and defending this truth boldly is no solution at all. Unfortunately, as we will see, I believe the bastions that have been razed recently concerning the Church, are part of the reason why the Church is no longer relevant to the world today. In other words, these bastions that Balthasar tells us needed to be shattered, were in large part necessary to proclaiming the Gospel effectively.

Departure

    Balthasar starts his book with a chapter titled, ‘Departure.” Here he proposes a “restoration” of the Church, which is in his eyes caught in a crisis. Remember, this is 1953 when he is writing this, so keep this in mind. The author talks about a unity of humanity on the planet, and he further implicates the past actions of the Church as being insufficient in relation to the true unity of humanity. In fact, he tells his readers that the Church must accept the world and its expansions and new horizons, “The Church cannot avoid joining humanity in ascertaining this cosmic situation and task, and in accepting it.” He then scolds the Church, “Perhaps she continued too long after the Reformation to hand on the old intellectual framework of the middle ages...” This arrogant distaste for anything “middle ages” riddles this entire work. The author then lauds nineteenth century discoveries in the world, “and above all the immense wealth of Asia’s modes of thought”, and calls for those those in the Church to abandon their own tradition in favor of these newly discovered ones. (pages 18 and 19)

    He then turns to tradition, and the way in which the clergy and the laity understand, or fail to understand it. Although the work largely praises the involvement of laity in the Church, he throws them all under the bus when it comes to understanding “tradition.” He writes, “...since the theological determination of what may have been entrusted to the Church as revelation, outside of Scripture, is complicated, disputed and difficult to grasp (especially for laypeople), the laity will always be inclined to equate or confuse the theological principle of tradition with a more general Catholic preference for handing on what already exists. This confusion affects all the forms- spiritual and worldly, liturgical, political and social- that have been carried along in the great river of history as its detritus...” He continues on to declare everything from late antiquity, Greek Philosophy, classical and medieval education as part of this detritus. (In case you are wondering what detritus is, it is usually understood to be dead organic material, or waste) He makes the claim that these ideas that were given in these times only belong in the past and “can no longer make any straightforward claim of belonging to the future.” This kind of thinking is why so many in the Church today have discarded anything beautiful the Church has passed on from these past times in history. It also why they have rejected the realist tradition of Aquinas. They arrogantly regard all of this to be mere waste floating down the river of time.

    The next move the author makes is to exploit the Church as being a failure in keeping Christianity united. As if the Church ever loses its unity when heretics break off from it? This idea is absurd, yet he claims, “Christianity has dissolved in the course of the centuries like a crumbling rock into ever more churches...” Von Balthasar views the Church during the period of Constantine and the French Revolution as being closed off, and then proposes that since that time, it has been almost irrelevant and in need for a renewal. He defines two forms of renewal, one being “violent” from the outside, and the other being “intellectual” coming from within. The second is the first choice for the author, claiming the need for transcendence from within. He will pick this idea back up later.

    The call to holiness is the next line of infantry that the author brings forth to set up his justification for this massive internal shift. Of course no one can argue against the need for holiness in the Church. But, he almost implies that no one before this modern age was capable of this holiness. In fact, he accuses a tradition closed in upon itself as the primary reason for a lack of holiness. This is a clever trojan horse that the author uses to further castigate that what has been handed on to us from those pesky middle ages. I find his further claim that the Church must accept “new messengers of God”, as being absurd. As if we now must accept him as one of the new prophets of the modern age. He quite clearly makes the implication that if you are not on board with his new ideas, than you are akin to those who opposed the apostles! (pages 24 and 25) In fact he writes, “Through its opposition we see that tradition is continually in danger of becoming “Old Testament” and pharisaic...” I find his insistence that those who are not on board with his proposed renewal to be void of holiness to be vain and arrogant. He spends the next few pages ranting on holiness and how a true holiness only falls within what he perceives to be a renewal, and a large rejection of that which had been preserved and handed on from the middle ages. He depicts what was presented in that age as only a mere sketch of the true faith, and not a fully executed painting of it, which is not to be completed until we all get on board with his modern proposal.

    Next on his target list is dogmatic theology, and its stagnation in the Church. I also found this to be extremely appalling, and again crudely arrogant. He basically tells the reader that the Trinitarian theology and Christology of the Church that had been passed on until his time, to be dry and void of any progress whatsoever! “...what a dryness there is in the doctrine about Christ, which likewise has made scarcely any progress since Chalcedon, where an abstract formula has to answer for the central mystery.” This is arrogance on an unprecedented level. He continues, “A theological interpretation of the whole Gospel in the terms of Christology has never been made, however.” He then blames a lack of understanding Scripture and the Church Fathers as a primary reason for this “dry” theological understanding. Yet, he fails to see the great Saint Thomas Aquinas, coming 800 years before him, as being well versed in Scripture or the Fathers. I would venture to say that Saint Thomas would have had more profound thoughts over a 5 minute cup of coffee in the morning than Balthasar had in his entire life. Yet, we should believe the self proclaimed “New Theologian” that Christology has never been understood properly? He then also blames the closed in middle ages as having an underdeveloped ecclesiology, one which he says could not possess the solidarity needed to bond with the Jews, heretics, schismatics, etc. (pages 30 and 31) What kind bond would that be?

    Balthasar then continues his assault upon the ancient Church, and its irrelevance for us today. Next he tries a clever maneuver to disarm anyone who would possibly be attached to these “useless” traditions.. He does so by making a reasonable claim, “...every formula that is discovered must be transparent to the event both of then and of today; it is to be made use of to the extend that it permits what was then to become reality today, and left unused to the extent that it impedes this. In the many complicated systems of thought, perhaps only one thing remains vital today: namely, that in them we can discover what other ages knew about encountering the mystery of God. Where this can no longer be discerned, the systems quite deserve to be utterly forgotten.” What systems he is referring to here is never really identified. This sets up a clever rule however to discard whatever the author sees fit to dispose of, under a noble banner indeed. Anything he deems to be non-vital he can dispose of under this clever rule. But what von Balthasar does tip his hand to is a need for truths to be updated, and thought of in new ways. This is precisely what Pope Pius IX, Pius X, and Pius XII warned about, which was an insistence on having to update the truth, or be creative with truth. Yet the author states, “A truth that is merely handed on, without being thought anew from its very foundations, has lost its vital power.” He then again makes another noble, yet unproven theory on is part. He tells the reader that everything must be renewed in Christ. Again, this in itself is a reasonable claim. Who would not want to be renewed in Christ? Yet what he is proposing is that his ideas are the ones we should accept as being rooted in Christ, and therefore if you reject his new ideology, then you obviously reject the renewal in Christ. This obviously begs the question. (Pages 33 and 34)

    He continues, “...in thoughts and points of view, themes and ideas, where people are content to understand tradition as the handing-on of ready made results. Boredom manifests itself at once, and the neatest systematics fail to convince, remains of little consequence.” So we can see here that perennial wisdom, which is rooted in the natural law, and the unmovable proclamation of Divine Revelation, are in his view, boring and outdated. The system which concerns reality and the natural law would then be a mere boring handing on of truth for him. He even says that a mere handing on of truth becomes esoteric or foreign to the world. We can see his position now developing here as he tries to convince the reader that no longer will it suffice to just proclaim the truth of the Gospel plainly. It must now be updated and creatively conformed to the changing world. What a burden it must be for such an enlightened mind such as his, to be bound to this boredom. Yet I hear Pope Pius XII’s words echo, “Hence to neglect, or to reject,or to devalue so many and such great resources which have been conceived, expressed and perfected so often by the age-old work of men endowed with no common talent and holiness, working under the vigilant supervision of the holy magisterium and with the light and leadership of the Holy Ghost in order to state the truths of the faith ever more accurately, to do this so that these things may be replaced by conjectural notions and by some formless and unstable tenets of a new philosophy, tenets which, like the flowers of the field, are in existence today and die tomorrow; this is supreme imprudence...” (Humani Genris, para 17)

    Von Balthasar then moves to his ecclesiological view, and what he thinks the Church should now resemble. He balks at the medieval view of the Church as having been closed in and rooted in a Constantinian-Carolingian spirit, which must be overhauled by the laity. He writes, “There is no doubt that the hour of the laity is sounding in the Church.” But he never really tells us exactly what that role is explicitly. He makes references to the laity in spreading the Gospel, but never explains this new view of the hierarchy of which he speaks until the third chapter, where he invents a Marian analogy based on the philosophy of Hegel. Even then it is cryptic in nature. He then moves on to drop a liturgical bomb which essentially mocks the beautiful churches that were built in the earlier ages of the Church. He states, “The church buildings of that time (such a heavy burden for our acts of worship today, since it is impossible or very difficult to realize the liturgy in them as a community celebration) at best allowed only the lay elite into the most sacred precincts, while the people had to remain at the back.” Here we can see where much of the liturgical damage that was done after the council came from. No longer is worship primarily a vertical experience of worshipping God, it is now primarily a horizontal community experience. We also can see where the idea of letting anyone into the sanctuary of the Church came from. Balthasar essentially tears down the bastions between the sacred sanctuary and that of the rest of the Church. Balthasar sees this distinction of the Holy of Holies, where the sanctuary remains the center of focus since Our Lord is sacrificed on the altar, as being an obstacle to be torn down. Little more is said about the liturgy in this work, but his opinions are clearly observed in this brief comment on church architecture, where he views the churches of old as being such a “heavy burden.” This of course is an opinion which I personally find revolting, as well as being quite arrogant and insulting to those Catholics who built these most beautiful structures to worship Our Lord. (Pages 38 and 39)

    The first chapter closes with the continued assault on the middle ages, as well a call to overhaul the hierarchy with the laity. Von Balthasar looks again at the present Church as being in a unique situation compared to that of the past ages. Again, he is partly correct, but again makes huge conclusions he never backs up. For example, he writes, “The intellectual situation of the Church has perhaps never been so open, so full of promise and pregnant with the future at any time since the first three centuries.” So in his mind the Church has been at a standstill since Constantine. I find this to be a preposterous claim, one again made with no substantial backing. In fact, in my opinion, the intellectual situation has been at an all time low since the likes of him and his new theologians corrupted the Church. Another broad claim is made that the world has been maturing since the middle ages. He does not tell us exactly what that maturing is, but it becomes clear as I progressed through the book that his Hegelian ideas had to be partly responsible for his ideas. Sure we could say the we have matured technologically, but that has little or no bearing on our maturity regarding theology, morality, philosophy or how the human mind perceives truth. It could easily be argued that we have significantly declined in morality since the middle ages, for example. He closes out the chapter with a parting shot at anything historical that he thinks should be disposed of. “What must at all costs be shattered is the historical consciousness of Christians, a conscious which has become senile because the pulse that beats in it is a pulse of insufficient faith.” So again the arrogant author implicates that is you are not on board with his new ideology, that you are also at odds with true “faith”. In short, anything he considers to be a non-essential must be discarded.

Descent

    The next chapter titled ‘Descent’ opens with a proposed new definition for what “truth” really is. Balthasar proposes that truth cannot stand like a stone, but must present itself anew, being influenced by the world, and it must adapt itself to the altered relationships in the world. “Or should one say that the truth, even the truth that endures, ought not at all to be compared to rigid stone, but itself possesses a fullness of interior life that can present itself ever anew without denying the past? The truth of the Church is always the same, but the onward march of the world’s hour puts it into a new light, into altered relationships that allow something new, something altered, to become visible in the truth itself. The tension and drama of its existence in the world and of its relationship to the world around it increase with each century.” The author elaborates further by describing two great changes which have caused this tension in this relationship. The first being what he calls the Western division of the Church, and the second being an altered awareness of the non-Christian world. He complains that the Church of the past was closed in upon itself and was weak because of this. Then he moves on to explain how all of that had to change, and did so by the hands of the Reformation. Apparently, this great schism amply demonstrated the Church’s failure to obey the commandments of Christ. In fact he tells his readers that this division was ample evidence to the Jews Muslims and pagans that the civitas Dei, or “the City of God”, had failed. “For it could not be denied that the division of the Western Church was evident proof for the former outsiders-Jews, Muslims and pagans-of decisive defeat, the fatal weakening of the alleged civitas Dei: and this was not merely in the superficial sense that it would be easy to strike a foe who is busy attacking himself, but in the deeper sense that Christianity denied its own obedience of faith t the commandment of Christ, abandoning this obedience.” So, we can clearly see what Balthasar’s view of the Church really was. He viewed it as a complete failure, and in fact blamed the entire Church of that time as being guilty of not having any faith in Christ whatsoever. He cannot see that it was disobedient individuals who caused the Protestant revolt, and that the Church herself had never failed in communicating the truth. He plainly confuses those who were actually obedient to the Church and remained with her, to those who left her and were disobedient. Then he follows this nonsense with an even more bold claim. “Through the division of faith, Christianity had refuted itself...The Catholic Church, until then the crown on a pyramid of orders and kingdoms all oriented toward herself, thus saw herself being doubly deposed: the collapse of the outer walls had brought her into a horizontal (and no longer a hierarchical) solidarity with the whole of humanity; the collapse within herself had rendered her, to all appearances, one church among other churches.” Again this type of view fails to see the Church in her proper perspective. Seeing her no longer as a united Church containing everything needed for the world and its salvation would be a gross error. Yes, political and social climates would change and it would affect the Church. But I fail to see these changes as deposing and stripping it of its hierarchal nature.

    The next point of attack will be the Counter-Reformation. Not only did the Church fail in unity, according to our dear author, but it also failed in its medieval order during the Counter-Reformation period. The solution he proposes, remains in the “intellectual domain.” What the author writes next should be a dead giveaway to the modernist agenda that he is pushing in this work. He proposes that truth cannot be proposed as being absolute. “The way ahead must lie in the intellectual domain: a path defined negatively by two solutions neither of which can be followed. The first is the solution of an absolutism of the truth, which does not understand the new situation of solidarity, but wishes to deal with the people of our time on the same level of consciousness that characterized medieval absolutism.” We see here the author’s true colors. For him the culture and society changes, and therefore we cannot present the truth as absolute any longer. This is modernism at its core. Balthasar wants to redefine truth as being beyond the absolute. Yes, Balthasar does also reject in this writing what he calls the relativism of the Enlightenment. Instead however, he gets creative and wants to create a new third way, one which, “now understands all forms of religion as meaningful, justified and complementary to one another on various levels of relationship to a total truth.” (Pages 51 and 52) This proposal is preposterous. First of all, no religion outside of the one true Catholic faith can ever be viewed as being “justified” in the Catholic Church’s eyes. He fails to understand that the total truth is only found in the Catholic faith. Balthasar denies one of the core principles of truth, which is the law of non-contradiction. This should come as no surprise since he rejects anything coming even close to realism.

    He has abandoned the sure norm of Thomism, or perennial philosophy, in favor of something that is not even comprehensible to the human mind. Should he have recalled to mind Pope Pius XII’s words concerning theology and philosophy? “But reason can perform these functions safely and well only when properly trained, that is, when imbued with that sound philosophy which has long been, as it were, a patrimony handed down by earlier Christian ages, and which moreover possesses an authority of an even higher order, since the Teaching Authority of the Church, in the light of divine revelation itself, has weighed its fundamental tenets, which have been elaborated and defined little by little by men of great genius. For this philosophy, acknowledged and accepted by the Church, safeguards the genuine validity of human knowledge, the unshakable metaphysical principles of sufficient reason, causality, and finality, and finally the mind's ability to attain certain and unchangeable truth.” (Humani Generis par 29) It appears that he rejected this idea wholesale. In fact, in order to get his readers to buy into his ridiculous scheme, he must write a disclaimer just after he pitches his harebrained proposal, “One must not be surprised that this new Catholic attitude is difficult to understand for the unbelieving world (and often too for the Christian who has not yet adapted to it); and that indeed contains a mysterious audacity and an apparent paradox, in keeping with the lateness of the hour; and that ultimately it cannot be explained in a perfectly rational manner at all,...” This truly tells the tale. Balthasar has invented a new explanation of truth, one that cannot be explained in any rational manner at all. It must be something to be so brilliant, so enlightened, that you can claim to have invented a new type of truth, one that cannot be understood in any rational manner. (To understand further what is going on here, read Pope Pius XII’s encyclical Humani Genris-para 13-17) This game of his is looking more and more like a game of Three-card monte.

    In the following pages Bathasar continues his assault on the poor medieval Church, one that according to him had its bowels ripped out by the Reformation. Thats, correct, the Church essentially had its guts torn out by the Reformers. And we see further how these types of modernists justify not converting those outside the Catholic faith. “Something of the innermost bowels of the Church had been torn out of the Church by the Reformers, something of her heart continued to beat outside her heart, in a transposition for which we have no metaphor.” Well we have a metaphor for such a foolish statement, “Chaos is a friend of mine.” He continues on to say that Luther had stolen something from the Church, and the lunacy goes on. (pages 55-57)

    Next he ties this idea in with his view of the bastions as having been toppled by the Reformation. Under the claim that the medieval Christians were naive, and that the bastions had now fallen, we apparently have no choice but to embrace a new age, one where for the first time, we see humanity united, and not just a Church united. Now that these “barriers” have been pulled down, something was truly awakened in the Church. No longer would we be tied down by St. Augustine’s view of Romans for example, in which we trembled at God’s sovereignty in predestination. The medievals were too naive to see past that. (pages 59 and 60) Balthasar then makes another bold claim in telling his readers that what he proposes in this new truth and new consciousness, had been there from the beginning, but had now remained hidden for a long time. Sounds familiar doesn’t it? Only he has the key to unlock what was truly present at the beginning, and everyone who disagrees with him is now rejecting Christ and His apostles you see. “This deepening of the Christian consciousness in the modern era can be demonstrably traced to the earliest Christian sources; this deepening penetrates through to authentic matters that become evident in the Gospel only now...” Again, we must be like the emperor with his new clothes. Can’t you see that gorgeous new robe you have on? You don’t need to see it, just believe it. Don’t ask Balthasar to explain all of this, because he can’t as he has already admitted. You will just have to take his word for all of it.

    The Church is further depicted by our pitiful author as almost bleeding out and in need of renewal. He claims that the Church has lost its integrity. He uses a most peculiar analogy of Christ having the power go out from him (Luke 6:19) to compare to the loss of power in the Church. Then he makes it seem as if we need to go out into the world to try and find ad embrace this lost power, which now resides all over the place in all religions and peoples, etc. (pages 64-68) A new age has dawned, one that can never look backward. In his eyes there is now a new form of truth, one that will now forever replace the old. “The blossom that has opened in the Church will not close again. If we look back to the middle ages, we will see it still closed. Some things were possible then that are no longer possible now.” Poor Dante now is his next target. He is only one of the most brilliant Catholic poets to grace the Church, but this is of little consequence for our brilliant theologian. He refers to Dante’s description of passing through hell in his Divine Comedy, and those of his age who contemplated the tortures of hell, or telling life stories of tragedy and triumph, as not being acceptable to any Christian today! In fact this is what he says, “What a Christian of that era could justify, cannot be accepted today; otherwise, he would reveal himself to be an utter un-Christian.” This is quite alarming to read, but yet again it is quite telling of this radical’s twisted, modernist philosophical and theological approach to the Catholic faith. This type of rhetoric in my opinion should not be taken lightly. This man has demonstrated in this work, that what passed for the Catholic faith in Dante’s time could never pass for the same faith now. It is clear, Balthasar wanted to invent a new truth, a new Catholic faith, one that would never be recognized by any of the Saints of old. The chapter ends with a fitting command, to further disarm anyone who would attempt to see through this charade, “Let us therefore not cling tightly to structures of thought, but let us plunge into the primal demands of the Gospel...” (page 70) As if those who held to a sound structure of thought such as Thomism are incapable of plunging into the Gospel? I think a lot of Saints of the Church would be to differ with him, no?

Endurance

    “The new position of the Church vis-a-vis the world augers an ever deeper and more serious incarnation.” This is how the third chapter begins to now tie in Jesus’ incarnation with this new type of Church, which up until now had never been able to reproduce or engage it. Here we can see how faulty the Christology of Balthasar was. “But when she enters into the world and becomes for the world one religion among others, one community among others, one doctrine and truth among others- just as Christ became one man among others, outwardly indistinguishable from them- her truth comes into a communism with all the forms of worldly truth: with the experiential truth of all branches of knowledge, and with the wisdom-systems of the world which attempt conclusive statements about the being of the world and its truth.” This again points to why most of the bishops and clergy, who have bought into this mentality, act the way they do when it comes to false ecumenism. It is good to be one among others.

    One does not have to read too much further to see how he comes up with all of this nonsense. “This exclusively modern experience- that the different realms of truth demand a change of one’s intellectual standpoint (an experience given clear expression by Hegel’s dialectics, Bergson’s and Dilthey’s intellectual philosophy of life and of understanding, and Husserl’s phenomenology)- reinforces in an exceptional manner the necessity of truth in intellectual matters.” If you are not familiar with the philosophy of Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel, then you may not notice his pattern of thinking being displayed through Balthasar’s entire work. Hegel, a follower of Kant, was insistent upon a historically changing type of thought which was elevated higher and higher as man’s function and experience progressed through time. So we see why Balthasar had this warped view of truth having to change as time progresses. In my mind this must surely be one reason for his new line of thinking concerning truth and the Church. We can see now why the Popes like Pius IX, Pius X and Pius XII warned the Church not to adopt non-realist philosophies or thought rooted in historicism. “There is also a certain historicism, which attributing value only to the events of man's life, overthrows the foundation of all truth and absolute law, both on the level of philosophical speculations and especially to Christian dogmas.” (Humanis Generis- Pope Pius XII) Again, everything that Pope Pius XII warned about is being proposed here in Balthasar’s work. The remaining pages of the chapter deal with the maturation process of the Christian, and how he must now relate the world on a different level. He insists that anyone who remains locked into this old way of thinking is not breathing in the greater space of God and of Christ. (page 76 and 77) “As he matures in his specialty he will become convinced of this.” Another giveaway as to his embracement of modernity lies in the fact that he sees no division now between the “City of God” and the “City of Man”. Instead, he insists on a new solidarity between the two. (page 84)

Contact

    This mangled work ends with a small chapter titled “Contact.” He opens it up with the following line, again an insistence that the Church has now essentially changed in her thinking. “If all this is true, then sentire cum Ecclesia, “thinking with the Church”, has likewise changed.” Now the Church has been liberated from its “splendid isolation.” He proposes that the laity should assume more responsibility, which as we have seen in many parishes today, that they control and run them. On pages 95 through 98 Balthasar comes up with an elaborate Marian scheme based on the philosophy of Hegel, some of which makes sense and some of which seems to get fuzzy at times. The idea he expresses is that obedience is found in Mary, which sounds good, but then he comes to a conclusion that it has “perhaps then passed beyond hierarchal obedience into a zone or a Joachimite epoch of ecclesial maturity and self awareness.” In brief, the short final chapter proposes a new type of hierarchy. One that makes it seem as if he is all in favor of it, while at the same time completely overhauling it, all by using the Blessed Mother of God as a vehicle to do so. All of this arrives at an erroneous conclusion, which is the Church now coming into new contact with the world. “She, the “closed garden”, the “sealed up spring”, the veiled bride of the thousand monasteries, has been opened up by force and almost ravaged, now that the feet of the nameless multitudes tamp heavily through her soul.” After reading and studying this work, it is hard to see how this theologian became such a household name for so many prominent Catholics. Maybe he changed his mind on this entire proposal later in his life? Perhaps, but I have to find any retractions where he proclaims this work a huge mistake. He ends the book, “Tumbling walls can bury much that seemed alive as long as they protected it; but the contact with the space that then comes into being is something greater.” What that greater being is one can only guess.

    In summary, I think it is important to recognize how this kind of thinking has pervaded much of the Church today. We wonder why the liturgy is celebrated so poorly across the world in so many Catholic churches. We wonder why iconoclasm has wreaked havoc upon church architecture. We wonder why so many embrace false ecumenism, and why so many seem to think that it matters little wether one embraces Christ and the one truth faith today. We wonder why the natural law is disregarded and why the realist philosophical system of Thomism has been discarded. In my opinion, those who wrote books like this, and those who promoted them and their ideas, are largely responsible for all of these atrocities. Why has everyone ignored the warning given by Pope Pius IX,Pius X and Pope Pius XII? Why did they not listen when Pope Pius XII wrote, “If one considers all this well, he will easily see why the Church demands that future priests be instructed in philosophy "according to the method, doctrine, and principles of the Angelic Doctor," since, as we well know from the experience of centuries, the method of Aquinas is singularly preeminent both of teaching students and for bringing truth to light; his doctrine is in harmony with Divine Revelation, and is most effective both for safeguarding the foundation of the faith and for reaping, safely and usefully, the fruits of sound progress. How deplorable it is then that this philosophy, received and honored by the Church, is scorned by some, who shamelessly call it outmoded in form and rationalistic, as they say, in its method of thought. They say that this philosophy upholds the erroneous notion that there can be a metaphysic that is absolutely true; whereas in fact, they say, reality, especially transcendent reality, cannot better be expressed than by disparate teachings, which mutually complete each other, although they are in a way mutually opposed. Our traditional philosophy, then, with its clear exposition and solution of questions, its accurate definition of terms, its clear-cut distinctions, can be, they concede, useful as a preparation for scholastic theology, a preparation quite in accord with medieval mentality; but this philosophy hardly offers a method of philosophizing suited to the needs of our modern culture. They allege, finally, that our perennial philosophy is only a philosophy of immutable essences, while the contemporary mind must look to the existence of things and to life, which is ever in flux. While scorning our philosophy, they extol other philosophies of all kinds, ancient and modern, oriental and occidental, by which they seem to imply that any kind of philosophy or theory, with a few additions and corrections if need be, can be reconciled with Catholic dogma. No Catholic can doubt how false this is...” (Pope Pius XII, Humani Generis, para 31 and 32.) It is my opinion that this book titled ‘Razing the Bastions’ by Hans Urs von Balthasar, can be retitled as the "anti-Humani Generis." For it embraces all the faulty ideas that Humani Generis condemned.

Recommended reading

Pope Pius IX- Syllabus of Errors
Pope Pius X - Lamentabili Sane
Pope Pius X - Pascendi Dominici Gregis
Pope Pius X - The Oath Against Modernism
Pope Pius XII- Humani Generis

Hans Urs von Balthasar 'Razing the Bastions' Church Architecture

2012-01-03T20:11:00.000-05:00

I just finished reading Hans Urs von Balthasar's work called 'Razing the Bastions' now published by Ignatius Press. I finished it one sitting today, since it is only a 100 pages long. I found many problematic statements and ideas in the book which I want to elaborate on, either in an upcoming written article, or in a future Podcast. For now I wanted to share with you one quote which I found to be a summary of his clouded thinking, which is expressed abundantly throughout the book. It concerns the liturgy and church architecture. As they say, ideas and thoughts have consequences, and bad ideas and thoughts have bad consequences. When you embrace bad philosophy and the muddled thinking of the likes of Hegel, which von Balthasar freely expresses on page 73 of the work, it is no wonder that he could not stand the beautiful architecture that the Church for so long had built to worship and honor God.

After reading the book there is no certainly no doubt that von Balthasar had a brazen distaste for anything medieval. At least that is what is conveyed in this particular work. In one of his rants, which laments the middle ages, he balks heavily at the church buildings of the time as not being conducive to a communal celebration. Many today make the mistake of separating today's liturgical disaster with the theology and philosophy that sustains and gives life to it. Balthasar's insistence on the absorption of the Church into the world, also forces him to lose his focus on man's ultimate end, which is God. We can see that he loses man as merely part of a worldly communal celebration, rather than part of a heavenly and saintly family looking vertical to the worship of God. We have seen this type of thinking with all of the "New Theologians." Community, or horizontal worship trumps the vertical worship of God. Although little is said in the book on liturgy, it is plain that his corrupt line of theological thinking concerning the Church and the world, had also corrupted how he viewed man's relation to the worship of God.

"The church buildings of that time (such a heavy burden for our acts of worship today, since it is impossible or very difficult to realize the liturgy in them as a community celebration) at best allowed only the lay elite into the most sacred precincts, while the people had to remain in the back." Hans Urs von Balthasar 'Razing the Bastions' Ignatius Press (Pages 38 and 39.)

Merry Christmas From Christ The King, Sarasota 2011

2011-12-25T05:11:00.000-05:00

Merry Christmas to all from Christ the King, Sarasota, FL! Words do not begin to describe the beauty of tonight's candle lit midnight Mass, so I thought I would share a few pictures I took instead.

Checking out Fr. James Fryar's antique missal before Mass.

The altar before Mass.

Fr. Fryar carries in the infant Jesus.

Fr. Fryar kissing the altar.

Breaking out the incense.

Reading the Epistle.

Incensing the Gospel.

The Consecration.

We at Christ the King are truly blessed to have something that few have today in the world. Indeed a Merry Christmas!

Commentary on the Psalms: St. Bellarmine

2011-12-18T18:19:00.004-05:00

I just bought myself a Christmas gift! Well, that is the excuse I am using for the purchase of my new Bellarmine commentary on the Psalms book. There is a wealth of spiritual guidance offered in this 380 plus page coffee table sized book. Each Psalm is expounded upon by one our great Saints of the Church in extensive commentary, perfect for sitting home at the desk for spiritual contemplation. This along with St. Augustine's commentary should be sufficient for years or perhaps even a lifetime of examining the Psalms. If you are still looking for Christmas gifts, this will make a nice one.

Podcast: A Legitimate Crusade To End The Death Penalty?

2011-12-15T20:34:00.000-05:00

I have compiled much of what I have written and referenced concerning the death penalty in a new Podcast episode. It is titled, 'A Legitimate Crusade To End The Death Penalty?' It clocks in at over an hour and I have tried to present my position refuting the current crusade that the US Catholic bishops are making to abolish capital punishment. You can stream the podcast here or download it on iTunes from the CatholicChampion podcast channel. Just click the update option on your iTunes for the podcast and it will be downloaded to your computer. Comments are welcome here so don't be shy.

James White, a 100 Denominations or 100,000 What’s the Difference?

2011-12-13T00:28:00.002-05:00

James White, a 100 Denominations or 100,000 What’s the Difference?

Matthew J. Bellisario. 2011

I saw the arch-heretic “Reformed” Protestant James White complaining about Catholic apologists using the 33,000 denomination number again for the number of Protestant sects in existence since the “Reformation.” I wrote an article a couple of years ago addressing this issue and I came to the conclusion that there were well over 100 plus Protestant denominations with significant doctrinal beliefs, which came about as a result of their personal interpretation of the Sacred Scriptures. I believe that by Catholics using this inflated number of 33,000, they are only causing problems for future conversions, because this number is not truly accurate. We can see why this is the case when we look at James White’s latest video where he cries like a baby over Michael Voris using a number of 40,000 Protestant denominations. Can anyone wine and complain so much as this droning, blathering windbag? How one can stand to listen to his rant on this video is beyond me. However, I am sorry to say, I would never use such an inflated number, because quite frankly, it is not accurate. What this does is give White and those wining Protestant apologists like him an easy smokescreen. White loves to gloat about the unjustified inflated number that these Catholic apologists use today in their apologetic works to demonstrate the failure of Sola Scriptura. Yet, I find it ironic that White never addresses the justified number of 100 plus (Going by a wide variety of names) Protestant sects that I can prove do exist. It is a fact these 100 plus Protestant sects all disagree with each other on a huge number of significant doctrinal beliefs. These include, how they are saved, if they can lose their salvation, if they are strictly predestined for heaven or hell, how they understand the sacrament of Baptism, how they interpret and understand the Last Supper, and the list goes on and on. How does James White deal with this enormous failure of the heresy of Sola Scriptura, which has produced well over 100 Protestant sects? You guessed it, he does not address the issue. He would rather focus on the inflated number that these apologists keep using.

The fact is, whether or not there are 100, or 100,000 Protestant sects makes no real difference in the end. Did Our Lord come to make 100 churches all teaching different core doctrines? No, He established one Church, not 100, not 33,000, not 40,000, not 100,000. So all James White does in his latest video is throw huge smokescreen over his man made doctrine by attacking the gross exaggeration that unfortunately all too many Catholic apologists use today. He does this rather than addressing the real insurmountable problem the “Reformers” have, which is that Sola Scriptura has been a cause of doctrinal division, not doctrinal unity. Did the early Church believe in Sola Scriptura? No. Did any of the early Church Fathers teach it? No. Oh sure you will see the Protestant pop-apologists like White take the Fathers out of context when the Fathers speak highly of Sacred Scripture, but the Fathers never taught the heretical doctrine that James White and his pop-apologist buddies teach today, which is that Scripture alone is the sole rule of the Christian faith. Jesus didn’t teach it, the apostles didn’t teach it, the Church Fathers didn’t teach it, and the Sacred Scriptures never teach it. So even while White is justified in refuting the gross exaggeration (Not wining incessantly about it) of how many Protestant denominations many Catholics claim there are, it really doesn’t help his overall argument concerning Sola Scriptura. White never really addresses the division this man made doctrine has fostered over the past 500 plus years. I would love for once to see James White actually deal with the problem of this huge Protestant division that has been caused largely, but not solely by Sola Scriptura, rather than use the exaggerations of these Catholic apologists to hide behind like a coward. 100 or 100,000 denominations, does it really matter? I agree that this exaggeration is not justified and I call upon Catholic apologists like Michael Voris to quit using these inflated numbers so that White and those like him will have less to hide behind. In the end, division is division, and division is not of the Holy Spirit, and Sola Scriptura is not of the Holy Spirit. Jesus said, "That they all may be one, as thou, Father, in me, and I in thee; that they also may be one in us; that the world may believe that thou hast sent me." Who sent you Dr. White? Not Jesus, not the apostles and not Sacred Scripture. Deal with the fact that your man made doctrine is part of the cause of over 100 different Protestant sects, all claiming that they are the true Church and the true interpreters of Sacred Scripture. Deal with that rather than crying like a 5 year old for minutes on end about something that in principle doesn’t fix the pickle you are in.

A Traditional Catholic Understanding of Punishment

2011-12-09T02:40:00.001-05:00

You have heard me say before that many in the Church hierarchy today are attempting to redefine moral theology to suit their modernist agendas. An assault is being waged against the natural law today within the Church, and the subject of legitimate punishment legislated by the state is often maligned and intentionally misconstrued by many in the Church today. Below is an excerpt from a Thomistic moral theology book published in 1895 by Rev. Charles Coppens, S.J., and the work is titled 'A Brief Textbook of Moral Philosophy'. Notice here how the Church had clearly defined punishment, and the primary and secondary reasons for it. Next observe how the Church understood capital punishment in regard to human dignity. It is clear that many of the bishops today do not have a clear understanding of the topic at hand or we would not see the misguided opposition to the death penalty that we see today by the bishops. Take a look below to familiarize yourself with how the Church up until recent times viewed punishment and the death penalty.

From 'A Brief Textbook of Moral Philosophy'

247. Let us consider how and why such punishment is necessary in order that civil society may attain its end.

1. That end is the maintenance of social order. To secure this, it is necessary that advantage and pleasure be consequent on the observance of order. But the criminal disturbs the order of things by seeking to make advantage and pleasure consequent upon disorder. Accordingly, justice requires, for the restoration of right order which he has disturbed, that he shall lose advantages or feel pain. For this purpose, then, various kinds and degrees of punishment are needed to match the various kinds of evil doings and the various grades of guilt. Hence, one purpose of legal punishment is expiation.

2. The end of civil society is likewise to guard rights from violation; but this cannot be done unless offenders be punished in a manner to deter others from following their evil example; the penalty should, for this purpose, be proportioned to the crime.

3. The criminal himself needs correction, i. e., by the bitter medicine of pain he is to be induced to give up his vicious practices, and kept from disturbing the social order in the future.

248. Thus a threefold reason exists for the infliction of legal punishment; it is expiatory, deterrent, and medicinal. In domestic society, punishment is primarily medicinal for the correction of the offender, yet at times it may be deterrent for others. In civil society, punishment is chiefly expiatory and deterrent, and it need not be medicinal.

249. Thesis IX. Civil society has the right to inflict the death penalty for enormous crimes.

Explanation. We know from Revelation that God has bestowed this right upon civil authority; we maintain here that it belongs to civil society by the principles of natural reason.

Proof. The means employed by civil society must be sufficient to attain its end. Now, in many cases, nothing less than capital punishment is sufficient to attain that end. For, (a) There are criminals so depraved and so indifferent to other forms of punishment that the death penalty alone can deter them from committing enormous crimes. (b) Some crimes, such as deliberate murder, treason, or parricide, disturb social order to such an extent that capital punishment alone approaches a proportionate atonement.

250. Objections:

1. Man is too noble a being to be slaughtered as a warning to others. Answer. Such certainly he is if he has done no wrong; not, however, if he has degraded himself by a monstrous crime.

2. The present doctrine would justify "Lynch law," and mob violence, which are evident evils. Answer. A mob has no authority to inflict death: civil society receives such authority from God, its founder.

3. Every man has an inalienable right to his life; therefore the State cannot condemn him to death. Answer.When we say that a right is inalienable, we mean that no one can take it away except God and one delegated by Him for that purpose; now the State has a commission from God to inflict the death penalty for enormous crimes.

4. In some States the death penalty has been abolished; therefore it is not necessary. Answer. That consequent does not follow from the antecedent. It is not clear that the purposes of civil government are sufficiently attained in those States. If they are, it is owing to special circumstances, and constitutes an exception to a general rule.

5. Desperate men are not restrained by fear of the death penalty. Answer. Nevertheless it is the most potent restraint that the State can use; besides, such men are prevented by the prompt infliction of the penalty from multiplying their enormities. Moreover, few criminals have been found so hardened as not eagerly to desire a commutation of capital punishment to imprisonment for life.

Archbishop Dolan Redefining Human Dignity

2011-12-08T15:17:00.001-05:00

The modernist crisis is alive and well within the Church hierarchy. In reading a recent article concerning Archbishop Dolan's teaching regarding human dignity and the death penalty, we can see what happens when the seminaries quit teaching Thomistic principles in moral theology. The archbishop nonsensically stated ,"“If even a man on death row has a soul, is a human person, an ‘is’ that cannot be erased even by beastly crimes he may have committed, then we ought not to strap him to a gurney and inject him with poison.” The Archbishop obviously does not understand that the death penalty cannot be against the dignity of the human person if carried out by a lawful authority. In fact it upholds it by sustaining the common good of society. If we read past documents by Saints and past Popes we all know that the death penalty does not in any way violate a person's "human dignity." Does the archbishop think himself wiser than St Thomas Aquinas, Pope Pius XII, or the entire Church of the year 1210 when it formally mandated that the Waldensians accept the use of the death penalty as a legitimate form of punishment? Did they think it contrary to human dignity? No.

St. Thomas Aquinas addressed this issue in depth long before Archbishop Dolan, and the Church has firmly stood by his point of view concerning this matter throughout the centuries. St. Thomas clearly views capital punishment as being in keeping with the fundamental principles of human dignity. If we read the ST 1-2.85 we can see how St. Thomas understands the effects of sin. He understands that even a criminal does not lose their fundamental dignity, which is that they are made in the image and likeness of God. This however never compelled St. Thomas to advocate abolishing capital punishment. What is true then is true now. Cultural variation does not change truth and Pope Pius XII told us this specifically in regard to capital punishment. (cf. Acta Apostolicae Sedis 47 (1955): 81-82.) The Archbishop here is clearly railing against 2000 years of the Church's voice repeatedly telling us that the death penalty does not in any manner violate human dignity. If it did, it would be malum in se, that is it would be evil in itself and it would never be justified as a licit moral act upheld by the Church in past centuries. When are the few Thomists that are left in the hierarchy going to challenge this kind of modernist theological rubbish? Is it not time that the seminaries and bishops honored Pope Leo XIII's wishes to restore Thomism to the Church?

"Among the Scholastic Doctors, the chief and master of all towers Thomas Aquinas, who, as Cajetan observes, because "he most venerated the ancient doctors of the Church, in a certain way seems to have inherited the intellect of all. The doctrines of those illustrious men, like the scattered members of a body, Thomas collected together and cemented, distributed in wonderful order, and so increased with important additions that he is rightly and deservedly esteemed the special bulwark and glory of the Catholic faith... But, furthermore, Our predecessors in the Roman pontificate have celebrated the wisdom of Thomas Aquinas by exceptional tributes of praise and the most ample testimonials. Clement VI in the bull In Ordine; Nicholas V in his brief to the friars of the Order of Preachers, 1451; Benedict XIII in the bull Pretiosus, and others bear witness that the universal Church borrows lustre from his admirable teaching; while St. Pius V declares in the bull Mirabilis that heresies, confounded and convicted by the same teaching, were dissipated, and the whole world daily freed from fatal errors;...the words of Blessed Urban V to the University of Toulouse are worthy of recall: "It is our will, which We hereby enjoin upon you, that ye follow the teaching of Blessed Thomas as the true and Catholic doctrine and that ye labor with all your force to profit by the same."...We think it hazardous that its special honor should not always and everywhere remain, especially when it is established that daily experience, and the judgment of the greatest men, and, to crown all, the voice of the Church, have favored the Scholastic philosophy.

Moreover, to the old teaching a novel system of philosophy has succeeded here and there, in which We fail to perceive those desirable and wholesome fruits which the Church and civil society itself would prefer. For it pleased the struggling innovators of the sixteenth century to philosophize without any respect for faith, the power of inventing in accordance with his own pleasure and bent being asked and given in turn by each one. Hence, it was natural that systems of philosophy multiplied beyond measure, and conclusions differing and clashing one with another arose about those matters even which are the most important in human knowledge. From a mass of conclusions men often come to wavering and doubt; and who knows not how easily the mind slips from doubt to error? But, as men are apt to follow the lead given them, this new pursuit seems to have caught the souls of certain Catholic philosophers, who, throwing aside the patrimony of ancient wisdom, chose rather to build up a new edifice than to strengthen and complete the old by aid of the new-ill-advisedly, in sooth, and not without detriment to the sciences. For, a multiform system of this kind, which depends on the authority and choice of any professor, has a foundation open to change, and consequently gives us a philosophy not firm, and stable, and robust like that of old, but tottering and feeble.

Taken from Pope Leo III, Aeterni Patris

Excellent Article On Capital Punishment

2011-12-04T01:00:00.001-05:00

Christopher Ferrara has written a great article regarding Capital Punishment in Crisis Magazine.

"Clearly, the Church has no authority to abandon the radical moral distinction between capital punishment of the guilty and the killing of an innocent. To reject that distinction is to undermine belief in divine justice itself, which demands the supernatural death of unrepentant souls for all eternity. It is manifestly impossible for Catholic doctrine on the death penalty to “develop” from an approbation based on revealed truth to a condemnation based on the teaching of the last Pope. And, if we are not discussing the immorality of capital punishment in itself, when all is said and done it is not a question of “development” of doctrine, but only the debatable application of a morally legitimate penalty. Here Catholics, and civil authorities, remain free to make their own prudential judgments."

Christopher A. Ferrara (Can the Church Ban Capital Punishment)

New Documentary on Archbishop Lefebvre

2011-12-03T08:08:00.001-05:00

Coming in the very near future is a documentary on Archbishop Lefebvre. It looks to be very interesting. In the meantime if you are interested in learning more about him and the modernism he opposed in the Church, there are a few good books worth reading listed below the video.

Marcel Lefebvre: The Biography-
I am reading this now and it very well written. It is well over 600 pages so it is not for the light reader.

Horn Of The Unicorn
For those who want a more abbreviated and headline type biography, this may be the book you want to start with.

I Accuse The Council
Don't be put off by the title. This book summarizes the interventions that Lefebvre was involved in during the Second Vatican Council. It makes for interesting reading.

They Have Uncrowned Him
This is his work detailing his thoughts on the history of modernism and how he perceived it to be creeping into the Church.

The Savannah Cathedral of St. John the Baptist

2011-11-28T22:00:00.001-05:00

The Savannah Cathedral of St. John the Baptist
By. Matthew J. Bellisario 2011

I once again had the opportunity to visit the lovely city of Savannah Georgia. I spent the past weekend in the historic district and I was able to attend the Latin Mass on Sunday in the Cathedral of St. John the Baptist. I spent many hours walking around the scenic historical district and I could not help but ponder the many men and women who walked these very streets over the past 280 years or so before me. Savannah began as a settlement in 1733 by General Olglethorpe. In 1751 when Georgia became an actual colony of the Crown, Savannah was designated as the capital. There is a lot of history to be taken in when visiting the alluring town. If you are a book lover, there are several charming bookstores in the historic district which offer many books on Savannah’s rich history. My primary interest of course was the history of the Catholic Church, and how this splendid Cathedral arose from the hanging moss of a predominately Protestant town in the Southeast U.S.

The Cathedral of St. John the Baptist seems to me to have been a miracle of sorts. Although the town was formally founded by English Protestants, Catholics were the first to actually arrive in the area under the Spanish monarchy. As early as the mid 1500s Spain had explored and set up missions in Florida, and Georgia, and into the 1700s there were at least 20 missions set up along the Georgia coast. There were many native converts, and there were Catholic martyrs as well. For example, five Franciscan missionaries lost their lives to an enraged native convert to Christianity who refused to accept the Church’s teaching on monogamy. The French Catholics in the late 1700s started the actual first Catholic recognized congregation of Savannah called St. John the Baptist. It was a long and hard road for Catholics to survive in the city. Many people often forget the harsh discrimination and persecution that Catholics faced in the early years of our country by the hands of the Protestants. It is a fact, in Savannah it was illegal to be a Catholic and reside in the city up until 1782, when the British finally departed the city after the revolution.

Savannah originally fell under the Diocese of Baltimore. The first small wooden church of St. John was constructed between Liberty, Montgomery and State streets was built in 1800. It was later replaced by a brick church in 1839. In 1820 Savannah was moved under the Diocese of Charleston, and finally in 1850 Pope Pius IX granted Savannah her own Diocese under her first bishop, the Right Reverend Francis X. Gartland. Bishop Gartland used the brick church as his first Cathedral. He died in 1859 to the yellow fever while caring for the city's sick and dying. It was in 1873 with Savannah’s fifth bishop, the Right Reverend William H. Gross who laid the cornerstone for what was to become the new Cathedral of Savannah. In 1876 the Cathedral was dedicated and opened its doors for its first Mass.

In 1896 the two spires were completed but tragedy struck in February of 1898 when the Cathedral caught fire and much of it was destroyed. Miraculously the Cathedral was rebuilt in under two years and in October of 1899 it reopened, however lacking in much of its interior decor. As the years went by the interior of the Cathedral began to take shape. In 1912 the Cathedral was finished with its murals, which were shipped from a New York studio. They are truly a sight to behold. In the 50’s and 60’s more murals were added as well as other structural improvements such as heating and air. In the mid 80s it was discovered that the building’s foundation was deteriorated and had to be repaired. Finally between 1998 and 2000 there were repairs made to the stained glass and the roof and the pillars of the nave received a gold leaf and marbleization. This is the building that we see today. There are few Catholic churches in the southern US that can compete with this Cathedral in size or beauty.

As I walked down Abercorn street gazing through the Spanish moss, I could see her spires towering above the trees and houses from several blocks away. I imagined how it must have been in the early 1900s when families traveled by foot and carriage along the dirt and cobblestone streets to attend Mass on Sundays. They must have come from the far corners of the city to hear those wonderful words, “In nomine Patris, et Filii, et Spiritus Sancti.” Those were the very words I would hear as well since the Diocese offers the Latin Mass at the Cathedral every Sunday at 1PM. I arrived a little early and watched as the faithful emptied out of the Cathedral from the 11:30 Mass. I saw Bishop Hartmayer come down the steps to greet the people after Mass. I had the opportunity to stop over and kiss his ring and thank him for keeping the Extraordinary Form of the Mass available here at his Cathedral. It seems that the Latin Mass was begun at the Cathedral in 2007 under Bishop Boland. Is there a more fitting place to have it celebrated? It was truly an amazing experience to have gone to the Latin Mass in such a historically rich setting. As I kneeled on the floor during Mass I contemplated that I was truly a part of the history of this marvelous Cathedral. Although I was not physically there in the late 1800s or the early 1900s, I was there in spirit. As we all know, the Mass is not something that exists in time alone, it is eternal. And so I was there with all of those Catholics who came before me who sat under the same roof, gazed upon the same stained glass windows and heard the same Mass in Latin that I did. Unless you are able to go to Europe and experience the Latin Mass in one of those age old churches, this is truly a gem of the Southern United States for Catholics.

What Can An Icon Tell Us?

2011-11-26T22:40:00.001-05:00

What Can An Icon Tell Us?
Matthew J Bellisario 2011

    The world today is largely iconoclastic. The image of God and all that is His is despised by the secular culture. Sadly, even those who proclaim to be Christians often scoff at sacred imagery, not realizing that when they oppose it, they actually oppose Christ and His incarnation. Iconography is one constant affirmation of the incarnation by every ancient apostolic Church world wide. The Catholic, Orthodox and Oriental Churches share the praxis of using the sacred image in worship, while Protestantism largely rejects it. Why did the Church fight so hard to retain the use of sacred imagery against the heretics who sought to destroy it?

    The Church has always affirmed that the confrontation over sacred imagery was doctrinal to the core. Christ’s incarnation was at the center of the contest, but it goes even deeper. What good is sacred imagery aside from underpinning a core doctrine of the Church? It can be said that what was preached by the apostles, and then later written down in the Scriptures, is certainly amplified by sacred imagery. Not only do our ears hear, but the eyes see as well. We are taken in by the life of Christ in all of His glory when we embrace the gospel. As we participate in the Church’s liturgical worship, we realize that we as Christians are immersed in the life of Christ. It can be said that unless one has proper liturgical worship, then one cannot have a proper private prayer life or devotion to Christ.

    Christ in the liturgy, made present in the Eucharistic sacrifice, is the central focus of Christian worship. From that central point everything else revolves. Those who do not share in Christ’s liturgical sacrifice are seriously deficient in their worship of almighty God. The entire liturgical year engages the Christian in the very life of Christ. The sacred image illustrates this important fact quite well. Just how much can one sacred image tell us? I will look to one icon from The Holy Mother Of God Church in Conyers, Georgia to answer this important question. I will use the icon of the crucifixion to illustrate the depth of the sacred image. As we will see, the icon is much more that just
an artistic Biblical snapshot of particular point in time. The sacred image transcends time. It brings to life the past, the present, the future, and ultimately eternity.

    When we engage this particular icon of the Crucifixion, we immediately see Christ, God made man, as the central figure of the image. Almighty God is the center, the Alpha and the Omega, the God-man repairing the breach between God the Father and the fallen human race. We see Christ above the tomb, conquering death. As the Divine Liturgy of St. John Chrysostom proclaims in the East, “By death He trampled death!” We do not have merely a past event remembered as a historical event, but we see here an eternal transcendence of Christ conquering death. Around the Saviour is the halo with the traditional symbols which appear to be an ‘O’ ‘W’ ‘N’. The symbols actually stand for “I Am Who I Am.” There is no question as to Who it is being depicted in the central figure of this particular icon. We then observe the head piece above Christ in which the Greek symbols etched into it abbreviate, (Iésous o Nazóraios o Basileus tón Ioudaión) or “"Jesus of Nazareth, the King of the Jews."

    As we move out from the center of the image, side to side, we then observe the contrast of good and evil in mankind; those who will receive eternal life, and those who will receive eternal damnation. It is a contrast of life and death, light and darkness, man’s yes to God, and man’s no to God. To the right we see light and life, and to the left we observe darkness and death. If we observe closely, this reality is largely depicted by the good thief and the unrepentant thief on each side of Christ on the cross. We see on the right of Christ, the good thief’s soul being carried away to heaven by the angel, while on the left side of Christ we see the demon pulling the soul of the unrepentant thief down into the abyss of hell. Likewise we see the sun over the good thief and the moon over the unrepentant. One soul is bright and full of life, the other darkened.

    We then observe the traditional depiction of the Blessed Mother of God and Saint John the Evangelist at the foot of the cross, meditating on Christ’s sacrifice. Of course we see the halos around the Theotokos and St. John. Next to the Theotokos we see an inscription of the symbols which look like an MP-OP, which actually stands for ‘The Mother of God’, or ‘God Bearer’. This is yet another core doctrine of the Christian faith, and it is also observed by every ancient, apostolic Christian Church. We then are able to contemplate the words of Christ as He gave the Theotokos to St. John, and in turn to us as well, as a central part of our family. “Jesus saw his own mother, and the disciple standing near whom he loved, he said to his mother, "Woman, behold your son". Then he said to the disciple, "Behold your mother". And from that hour, he took his mother into his family.” Here it is illustrated that we have the communion of Saints in the bosom of the Church. We also witness the sorrowful Mother grieving for her child, and hence we reflect on the 5th sorrow of Our Lady’s Seven Sorrows. On the far left of Christ’s side we also see the soldiers gambling for Christ’s robe, while we see the rest of the figures of those contemplating Our Lord’s crucifixion to His right. This one icon has amply illustrated several core doctrines of Christianity.

    As we can see just from this brief explanation, there is a ton of theology packed into the sacred imagery of one icon. When you have an entire church adorned with many icons, as is common in most traditional Christian churches, you then have the entire gospel of Jesus Christ presented in sacred imagery! The central theological teachings of the Church are all presented in some form from within the sacred image. The icon is the gospel of Jesus Christ presented in a visual form, and that is why sacred imagery is so important to the Church. Those today in the Catholic Church who are iconoclastic, and wish to discard the sacred images from church architecture are tools of the devil, whether they realize it or not. For example, anyone who understands sacred imagery could never purchase an iconoclastic monstrosity like the ‘Crystal Cathedral’, which the Diocese of Orange has recently done. Do they realize that the Saints gave their lives to defend the sacred images? Yet today we still have heretics in the Church who oppose them with an obstinate and perverse attitude. Pray that these wretched tools of the devil may be converted to the true faith, or cast out of the Church. Iconoclasm is a heresy, and it should be opposed with as much vigor and tenacity as any other heresy.

Orange Diocese Buys Monstrosity 'Crystal Cathedral' Monument to Modernism

2011-11-20T06:56:00.001-05:00

It seems that the bankruptcy judge has ruled that the Catholic Diocese of Orange will get the monstrosity 'Crystal Cathedral' for a mere 57.7 million dollars! The LA Times gets it right when they write, "the Crystal Cathedral, a monument to modernism in faith and architecture..." And so we see what happens when we let modernism infect the Church, rather than amputating it. It grows and grows, and now 57.7 million dollars given to the Orange Diocese by Catholics will pay for a monument to the modernist heresy that has been ransacking the Church for years now.

An Orange County bankruptcy judge ruled Thursday that the Crystal Cathedral, a monument to modernism in faith and architecture, will be sold for $57.5 million to the Roman Catholic Diocese of Orange, which plans to consecrate it as a Catholic cathedral. (Nov 18th)
Link to entire article here.

My Visit to Conyers Georgia

2011-11-19T18:25:00.001-05:00

The statue of the Blessed Mother at the Conyers site.

I am driving up to South Carolina over the weekend to visit my family for Thanksgiving. I decided to stop over at Conyers Ga to visit the Trappist monastery, the Ukrainian Catholic Church as well as the alleged apparition site. My first stop was the Trappist monastery, 'Monastery of the Holy Spirit', which was disappointing, but not unexpected. Their gift shop, which is quite large, carries a huge spectrum of books ranging from garbage like Elizabeth Johnson and Richard Rohr to good stuff like Fr. Faber's books published by TAN. They did have some nice icons and statues, but again, overall it was a disappointment. I did pick up a couple of loaves of fresh blueberry and apple bread. So all was not lost. That was about the extent of that visit. I then went on to the alleged apparition site where the Blessed Mother is said to have appeared. It appears that the bishop is now behind the movement to build a new Church for the site. I prayed for awhile at the site and went inside the house to the apparition rooms. I had no visions or extraordinary experiences, not that I would expect any, but I did have a nice period of quiet prayer and meditation. After spending about an hour there, I then went over to the Ukrainian Catholic Church, 'The Blessed Mother of God', which is around the corner from the site. The two properties are actually adjacent to each other connecting through the woods, or perhaps it is all one piece of property. I was very impressed with the little church, which puts most large multimillion dollar Catholic churches today to shame. The icons are incredible and they draw you into contemplation once you are able to take it all in. The entire gospel is depicted in sacred image, so you are immersed in the life of Christ. I was able to attend the Divine Liturgy at 4PM, and I was in heaven! It is amazing to contemplate what is actually happening when we attend the Divine Liturgy. We are actually stepping into the passion, death and resurrection of Our Lord! The entire liturgy was sung, and nothing was rushed or hurried. This was definitely the highlight of the trip. All in all it was good day, a personal pilgrimage of sorts. Here are some of the pictures that I took on my journey.

The apparition room in the house.

The Blessed Mother of God Ukrainian Catholic Church, Conyers Ga.

What Happened to the Black Sheep Dog?

2011-11-15T17:51:00.001-05:00

After all of the commotion that was made over Fr. Corapi a few months ago, it seems as if he has gone dark. His last post was Sept 30th, and he has yet to launch his weekly newsletter or finish up constructing his new website. He has put together a couple of videos, one being his own documentary, and then he kind of vanished. I just thought it odd that he remain quiet for so long. I was personally quite disappointed that he gave up on fulfilling his vocation to the priesthood, so I have not supported him since his departure. I am however curious enough to stop by his website just to see what he is up to. Either he is busy enjoying life, riding around on his motorcycle, or maybe he is preparing something else for his audience. It would be nice however if he was trying to reconcile with his order and fulfill his priestly vocation. Any thoughts?

Zero Tolerence?

2011-11-06T17:53:00.001-05:00

Zero Tolerence?

Matthew J. Belisario 2011

    There is much talk today about the zero tolerance policy regarding accusations of child abuse towards Catholic clergy. Yes, we must have no tolerance for those who are in spiritual authority over their flock, who prey on young children. Many lives have been destroyed by these men. Rightly so, this kind of action should have zero tolerance within the Church. The most effective way to exercise this policy is certainly a matter of debate. There is a question however that we should be asking ourselves, which also pertains to this issue. What can possibly be some of the reasons for such a widespread problem like this among the clergy? I am not talking percentages here, for we could argue that the percentage of abuse cases compared to the clergy numbers are less that the Protestant sects. But it really does no good to boast of such a thing, for if we cannot best the largely secular Protestant groups, then we are in big trouble. Although we now have a zero tolerance policy for those who commit such acts, what about eradicating this problem at the root? In other words, it is all well and good to stop these men once they have been found out, and uncovered, but what of stopping them before they commit these acts? Are there ways to strike at the heart of the matter to effectively limit the types of individuals who would commit such crimes? I believe there is an indicator that can eliminate some of these men. A litmus test for orthodoxy is a most sure way to eliminate a large portion of these criminals. Unfortunately, there seems to be a laxity within the Church for eradicating heresy.

    Certainly I cannot claim that most heretics are abusers, but I would venture to claim that many abusers are certainly heretics. Many of the priests who committed such heinous crimes towards our youth are mostly acting homosexuals, and most do not recognize the Church’s teaching regarding sexual morality, and they even have taught against it. Many of these men openly challenge the exclusivity of marriage between men and women, or that sex outside of this marriage is entirely forbidden. They are the same men who challenge the male priesthood of Christ, the theology of the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass, etc. This was ushered in because the Church allowed heresy to go unchecked for so long that it took over the seminaries. The great Thomstic scholar Ralph Mcinerny once wrote concerning the scandals, “… the behavior in many seminaries has turned them into Augean stables. It is not enough to turn hitherto sheltered offenders over to the public prosecutor. The bishops have to get to the root of the problem. And the root of the problem is that many of our seminaries have been producing clueless clerics.” As we should all know by now, when heresy goes unchecked among the clergy, the laity will soon follow in large. As the laity became blinded by heresy, they tended to look past some of the abhorrent acts of clergy (liturgical abuse, bad catechesis, immodesty, etc), some even condoned their heretical theology, and embraced it with open arms. Yet, when the consequences of that heresy is felt, they only reacted to the symptom, not the disease.

    What we see in the modern media is also certainly worthy of condemnation. The modern Luciferian media loves to promote Catholic clergy who openly support heresy, yet when that heresy takes it logical course, which in part leads to the problems such as sexual abuse, they then cry foul, as if no one had any idea something like this was coming. This is like someone championing drinking themselves into serious excess, enjoying the high they get from the drink and the apparent fun that comes with it, and then complaining of the terrible hangover they have the next morning. This is how the world thinks, and people act this way everyday. This is to be expected for the average secularist, but unfortunately for us, many in the Church follow this same line of muddled, confused, and I might add, foolish thinking. They champion the sweet taste of heresy, the apparent freedom it brings with it, and yet loath the hangover of the abuse crisis that came the morning after. Of course, homosexuality and sexual abuse are not the only byproducts of heretical minds, but they are surely a byproduct. People act according to how they believe. We could write an entire thesis pertaining to the damage that heresy causes to those who are duped by it, but that is not within the scope of this brief article.

    If there is anything that deserves zero tolerance in the Church today, it is heresy. When a person in authority within the Church chooses to ignore or teach against certain doctrines of the Church, by their own will, such as is the state of many clergy today, what will keep them from choosing to act rightly towards their fellow man? If they choose to ignore God, what of men? Many today would probably be scandalized by the words of the great Saint Thomas Aquinas in the Summa Theologia, Secunda Secundae, Question 11, which concerns heresy. I cannot improve on his thought, so why try? In article three St. Thomas warns of the severity of heresy, and why it should never be tolerated. In fact, he compares the heretic to counterfeiters. “On their own side there is the sin, whereby they deserve not only to be separated from the Church by excommunication, but also to be severed from the world by death. For it is a much graver matter to corrupt the faith which quickens the soul, than to forge money, which supports temporal life. Wherefore if forgers of money and other evil-doers are forthwith condemned to death by the secular authority, much more reason is there for heretics, as soon as they are convicted of heresy, to be not only excommunicated but even put to death. On the part of the Church, however, there is mercy which looks to the conversion of the wanderer, wherefore she condemns not at once, but "after the first and second admonition," as the Apostle directs: after that, if he is yet stubborn, the Church no longer hoping for his conversion, looks to the salvation of others, by excommunicating him and separating him from the Church, and furthermore delivers him to the secular tribunal to be exterminated thereby from the world by death.”

    These words of the great Saint may seem to be a bit outdated by many in the Church today. Many may claim that we have all advanced beyond the simple way of Aquinas and his medieval mentality. Has not modernity brought us beyond simple truths, and beyond the simple yes and no that Jesus himself spoke to his apostles? “But let your speech be yea, yea: no, no: and that which is over and above these, is of evil.” (Matthew 5:37) Or, could it possibly be that the modern mind has regressed compared to that of the medieval mind? I think that we must conclude that the later is the case concerning heresy. Modernity has brought to us all of the errors of the past in a highly compact and potent form. We could call it “heresy concentrate”, and when consumed, even in small quantities, it kills the souls of those whom consume it. Why then do many of those who are in the care of souls in the Church tolerate heresy? We see some of the horrific ramifications in the abuse crisis, which is loathed world wide, by both Catholics and non-Catholics alike. Many souls have left the Church or refuse to convert to Catholicism because of the crisis. What is more important than the salvation of souls? Is heresy not the natural enemy of salvation? Is it not also a breeder of scandal, and moral decay? Is the heretic not a carrier of a killer disease to the soul, which is passed on from person to person like so many physical diseases? Yet, so few are bold enough to speak out against these enemies of the faith, and it seems that fewer are wise enough to recognize what havoc such tolerance for it has brought upon us. Let us pray that our bishops and priests will oppose heresy in every form with zeal. Not only for the well being of our fellow man in the physical sense, but for that of his eternal salvation.

Assisi Meeting 2011 Summary

2011-10-28T13:28:00.000-04:00

Here is a link to the video from the Assisi meeting. Some of the talks were given in English if you are interested. Here is a link to the Holy Father's address, which I must say was quite lackluster and largely void of any meaningful content when it comes to evangelization. No mention was given to Christ as being the only way to salvation, nor was any attempt made to convey the fact that the Catholic faith was the one true faith. World peace was of primary concern, and the Pope actually made a connection to the first Assisi meeting and the fall of the Berlin Wall a few years after. The Holy Father did call into question the violence that atheism has brought upon mankind, and dispelled the myth that religion is the source of most violence. Towards the end he makes reference to agnosticism. He blames "believers" as a partial reason for their inability to convert. "Their inability to find God is partly the responsibility of believers with a limited or even falsified image of God." Overall, in my opinion, there was just not much offered here other than an appeal for men of all religions to live peacefully with one another. Below are a few excerpts from his address.

Twenty-five years have passed since Blessed Pope John Paul II first invited representatives of the world’s religions to Assisi to pray for peace. What has happened in the meantime? What is the state of play with regard to peace today? At that time the great threat to world peace came from the division of the earth into two mutually opposed blocs. A conspicuous symbol of this division was the Berlin Wall which traced the border between two worlds right through the heart of the city. In 1989, three years after Assisi, the wall came down, without bloodshed...

As a Christian I want to say at this point: yes, it is true, in the course of history, force has also been used in the name of the Christian faith. We acknowledge it with great shame. But it is utterly clear that this was an abuse of the Christian faith, one that evidently contradicts its true nature...

The enemies of religion – as we said earlier – see in religion one of the principal sources of violence in the history of humanity and thus they demand that it disappear. But the denial of God has led to much cruelty and to a degree of violence that knows no bounds, which only becomes possible when man no longer recognizes any criterion or any judge above himself, now having only himself to take as a criterion. The horrors of the concentration camps reveal with utter clarity the consequences of God’s absence.

Tom Woods Weighs In On New Vatican Response To World Economics

2011-10-25T16:46:00.001-04:00

The well spoken and well respected Catholic author and speaker Tom Woods has weighed in on the Vatican's recent statement regarding world economics. He wrote an article for NPR here, and on his website he has various links to other articles as well. The one link on his website to Phil Lawler's article is also quite interesting. Check them out and let me know what you think about the whole situation.

The Vatican and Economics

2011-10-24T16:44:00.000-04:00

We have a new statement by the Vatican on world economics. Is this the Pope's idea, or the Vatican pontifical council's idea?

A Vatican document called for the gradual creation of a world political authority with broad powers to regulate financial markets and rein in the "inequalities and distortions of capitalist development."

The document said the current global financial crisis has revealed "selfishness, collective greed and the hoarding of goods on a great scale." A supranational authority, it said, is needed to place the common good at the center of international economic activity.

The 41-page text was titled, "Toward Reforming the International Financial and Monetary Systems in the Context of Global Public Authority." Prepared by the Pontifical Council for Justice and Peace, it was released Oct. 24 in several languages, including a provisional translation in English.

(Full article here)

Assisi "building of a better world" ??

2011-10-20T00:01:00.000-04:00

Here is the latest on the Assisi debacle. In our age its no longer about spreading the gospel so that man may reach his eternal reward in heaven, its all about building a better world you know.

Vatican City (AsiaNews) – Christianity will be represented by 31 delegations, Judaism by the International Committee on Interreligious Consultation, the Chief Rabbinate of Israel and other international Jewish organisation. Other religions will be represented as well. Five Hindu leaders, 3 Jains, 5 Sikhs, 1 Zoroastrian and 1 Baha’i, 67 Buddhists and the heads of 16 delegations from 11 countries, including the People’s Republic of China. The president of the Confucian Association will come from South Korea, the president of the Taoist Association will come from Hong Kong, and two Shinto delegations will come from Japan. Representatives from four new religions will also be present. There will be 48 Muslims, from Jordan, Israel, Egypt, Lebanon, Algeria, Morocco, Iran, Turkey, Saudi Arabia, Albania, Bosnia-Herzegovina, Bulgaria, Azerbaijan, Tajikistan, as well as some Western countries. Representatives of traditional religions will come from Africa, America and Asia as well as four invited non-believers. More than 50 nations will be represented.

These are the numbers of the ‘Day of reflection, dialogue and prayer for justice and peace in the world’ that will held in Assisi on 27 October, that were presented this morning in the Vatican. The theme of the Day, said Card Peter Kodwo Appiah Turkson, president of the Pontifical Council for Justice and Peace, is “Pilgrims of truth, pilgrims of peace”. It aims “to show, with simplicity, that as religious men and men of good will, we want to offer our own articulated contribution to the building of a better world, whilst at the same time acknowledge the need to grow in dialogue and mutual esteem so as to improve the efficacy of our actions.”

At the initiative of Benedict XVI, this event is designed to mark the 25th anniversary of the first Assisi meeting (pictured) and is meant “to be a dream that continues, becoming more and more a reality. As everyone is with others, no one is against others. Marching from various points on earth, all nations come together as a one family.”

Read the entire story here.

Thomas Woods On The Economy

2011-10-14T22:40:00.002-04:00

Thomas Woods has a point on the economy.

Evangelize Those Outside the Church

2011-10-13T18:53:00.001-04:00

I recommend listening to this sermon, and then think about all of the people you know who are outside the one true Church.

Gesu Church Miami Florida

2011-10-02T22:18:00.003-04:00

The Gesu parish in Miami Florida was founded in 1896. Earlier this year I took a road trip to Miami and took some pictures of it. I thought I would share some of them with you. As they say, they just don't make em like this anymore.

The Father Pavone Debacle and Canon Law

2011-10-01T19:57:00.001-04:00

I am sure there are some people who are interested in the "suspension" of Fr. Pavone, who is well known for his work for 'Priests for Life'. There are a series of blog articles that you may be interested in checking out from a canon law perspective. The name of the blog is 'In The Light of the Law' and is penned by Edward N. Peters, JD, JCD, who is a canon lawyer. He has some interesting views on the whole debacle.

Edward Feser on Capital Punishment

2011-09-29T06:40:00.001-04:00

Check out this article. It is Edward Feser's response to Christopher Tollefsen's view on capital punishment. Tollefsen unreasonably holds that the death penalty is completely contrary to human dignity. Feser presents the proper teaching of the Church on this matter in his article. Below are a few points of thought taken from the article.

Traditionally, the aims of punishment are threefold: retribution, or inflicting on a wrongdoer a harm he has come to deserve because of his offense; correction, or chastising the wrongdoer for the sake of getting him to change his ways; and deterrence, discouraging others from committing the same offense. Retribution is necessarily the most fundamental...

If wrongdoers deserve punishment and the punishment ought to be proportional to the offense, then at some point we are going to reach a level of criminality for which capital punishment is appropriate at least in principle. To claim that no crime could justify capital punishment—to claim, for instance, that a cold-blooded genocidal rapist can never even in principle merit a greater punishment than the lifelong imprisonment inflicted on a bank robber—is implicitly to give up the principle of proportionality and, with it, any coherent conception of just punishment...

It is one thing merely to assert that capital punishment is against human dignity; it is quite another actually to show that it is...

What is intrinsically wrong is the intentional killing of an innocent human being. That is why, contrary to what Tollefsen insinuates, those who oppose abortion and euthanasia but support capital punishment are perfectly consistent in their thinking...

Above quotes taken from Edward Feser's article, 'In Defense of Capital Punishment' 2011

Refuting Mark Shea's Rant On The Death Penalty

2011-09-24T02:29:00.000-04:00

The Magisterium has said, “Not all moral issues have the same moral weight...” and “if a Catholic were to be at odds with the Holy Father on the application of capital punishment or on the decision to wage war, he would not for that reason be considered unworthy to present himself to receive Holy Communion.” That means that no, one is not a dissenting Catholic if their opinion differs from Evangelium Vitae, etc. However, we have a clear evidence that the mountebank Mark Shea has falsely proclaimed this foolishness from his lofty high throne.
Matthew Bellisario

As promised, here is my response to Mark Shea’s claims on the death penalty. I will keep it concise and to the point. I will quote his text in an indention and then put my responses between his texts.

I got het up yesterday about the execution of Troy Davis and spoke out of turn about his "innocence" when what I really was protesting was the dodginess of the evidence against him, dodginess that seemed to me to introduce an element of reasonable doubt concerning his guilt for the crime for which he was executed.

My response: Speaking out of turn is a common occurrence for Shea. I wonder how much research and time Shea has put into the case to make such a judgement? I believe the state concluded that there was ample evidence to convict the man. Moving on.

This in turn led to understandable confusion among some readers given the fact that, innocent or guilty, I oppose the infliction of the death penalty. Some people assumed (wrongly) that I was trying to say anything just to stop infliction of the death penalty, which was not my intent. You don't (as I have been at pains to say for some time to Liars for Jesus) achieve good ends by evil means. And lying that somebody is innocent when they are not is an example of that. So I would not lie to achieve that end.

My response: No confusion from the readers, they took Shea at his word. As far as lying goes, I am sure that he did not intend to deceive anyone, he just has no clue as to what he is talking about.

What really happened was this: I had an emotional outburst and, as is my custom, indulged hyperbole. That was wrong.

My response: An emotional outburst from Shea? You don’t say? An apology here, which really is not an apology at all, because as we will see, he does the very same thing later in this post. Most of the entire post is an emotional outburst.

Permit me, however, to talk about what provoked the outburst. It was provoked by a number of things, or rather one thing that keeps manifesting itself in lots of different ways. That one thing is Christian *zeal* for death.

My Response: So here we begin with the emotional non-arguments. Shea here pulls the classic ad-hominem labeling anyone who in any way supports capital punishment as zealots for death. Then he moves on to attack a US governor personally, who I am sure he does not even know. This is typical Shea style, no substance, just character attacks.

That zeal for death expresses itself in numerous ways, such as Rick Perry's conscience-free cock-a-whoop swaggering and boasting over being the most efficient executioner in Texas history and his cloudless lack of concern over the question of executing people who may be innocent.

My response: This attack on Perry of course has no bearing on the discussion at hand, since Perry is not committing any sin in allowing the legal system to carry out a just punishment. But Shea wants to build an emotional case here on the fact that innocents may be put to death accidentally by the State. Has this not always been the case? Was Pius XII so stupid that he did not realize that legal systems were not perfect when he wrote, “We also note that the Church in theory and in practice has kept the two forms of capital punishment (medicinal and vindictive) and that this is more in line with what the sources of revelation and traditional doctrine teach about the coercive power of legitimate human authority.” Shea must think so. Stop all just punishment! Someone might not be guilty! Until we have a perfect system lets not punish anyone. In fact, there are probably some people in horrible prisons being raped and abused by prisoners and they are innocent! As you can see, this fact has little bearing on the argument at hand. We all would be saddened to know that an innocent person was put to death or imprisoned wrongly. That is a matter for individual cases, and we all hope that modern technology has helped in improving those odds. But as far as using this as a reason to shut down the state's right to exact such a punishment is certainly untenable.

It manifests in treatment of Just War theory, not as an attempt to minimize killing, but as a sort of maze to be navigated with the hope and promise that we will *get* to start killing if we just outwit the Church's ivory tower restrictions on "real world" brutality. It manifests in the utterly appalling and embarrassing sophistry of Catholic torture advocates over the past decade. It manifests in the zealous Christian defenses of the slaughter at Hiroshima and Nagasaki every August.

My response: No it does not manifest itself in the just war theory, since those who actually understand moral theology do not just lump all of these issues into one pile and then make sweeping pronouncements on them as Shea usually does. Again, nothing more than emotional nonsense. What Hiroshima and Nagasaki have to do with this is anyone’s guess, since any moral theologian worthy of the name would never compare means used in a war to just punishment exacted by the State. They are two totally different moral issues. Torture is also one of Shea’s topics of choice when he gets on his soap box. Again, not relevant here. So far, in all of his ranting all we have read up to this point in Shea’s post has amounted to nothing more than hot air. Let us continue.

It manifests in the open and naked contempt heaped on Evangelium Vitae, the Catechism, Popes JPII and Benedict (and virtually every bishop in the world), when the Church's very clear desire to abolish the death penalty is bruited.

My response: Here at least we get to something more substantive. Neither Evangelium Vitae, nor the Catechism however has defined anything regarding the death penalty in any doctrinal or dogmatic fashion. We must read such documents in light of tradition, which means that you should read what the Church has said on the matter up until these two documents were written as well. This means that if you are going to be making pronouncements on the matter you need to know more than a total amount of text that amounts to not much more than a couple of paragraphs. You also have to have a general understanding of moral theology, which is rooted in the natural law. The Church’s desire has never been to completely abolish the death penalty around the world. In fact, I have pointed out this fact in other articles that I have written. This position is not a tenable one to hold. We can call for a more prudent use of it yes, but to force a legitimate state to give up a just means of punishment for heinous crimes is not something the Church can outrightly force on a nation, since the act itself is not immoral. Of course nations should look to the Pope and take his advice on the matter seriously, and make prudent decisions regarding it use. I also realize that we can disagree on the issue without anathematizing each other. Yes my position on this matter is quite strong, but I have never said that anyone who agrees with JPII is outside the Church or a dissenter. I have however vigorously disagreed with their position, which as you will see, I have a right to do. But this all means nothing to Shea. There is no difference to him when the Pope speaks on any number of issues. They are all on the same level of doctrinal certainty for him. But as we will see, the Magisterium does not even agree with him.

Minimum Daily Adult Requirement Catholicism is rife on this question. The argument is perpetually made that because the death penalty is not intrinsically immoral, opposition to it is obviously stupid, the abolitionist is somehow mysteriously supporting abortion, and the whole thing can be blown off as "liberal". So I get mail from embarrassing "witnesses" to the compassion of Jesus like this:
The Judeo-Christian DEATH PENALTY!!!!

Jesus told us that IN OUR PERSONAL LIVES, we should forgive the people who wrong us, 7 times 70 times. However, Jesus NEVER told the GOVERNMENT to forgive murderers and rapists and terrorists 7 times 70 times.

On the contrary, God, who is absolutely PRO-LIFE and who knows the full value of each human life, told Moses that the GOVERNMENT should promptly execute anyone duly convicted a HEINOUS CRIME.

CAUTION: Today we have APOSTATES who consider themselves ... HOLY THAN GOD ... WISER THAN GOD ... MORE LOVING THAN GOD ... , who think hard-working taxpayers should reward duly convicted heinous criminals with a lifetime of ... FREE housing and meals and medical care and education and recreation ... .

PS: The LIFE-IN-PRISON SENTENCE often costs taxpayers more than $1 Million ... !!!!!!!!!
Then the King will say to them, "I was in prison and you thirsted for my blood, because I was expensive." And people wonder why Christianity is repellent to many people.

My response: Here we see the depth of Shea’s understanding concerning the level of teaching on the death penalty. All you have to own is a Catechism and you are now able to tell everyone what matters of faith and morals puts you as a Catholic outside the faith. For Shea, everything is on the same level. The death penalty is on par with abortion and contraception for him. Shea has in effect made himself head of the CDF. Did we all miss the installment that Pope Benedict made when he replaced Cardinal Leveda’s seat on the CDF with Shea?

I've even seen appeals to the glories of the death penalty like this:
Don’t any of you self-righteous death penalty opponents ever read the Bible? As he was hanging on the cross Jesus promised Paradise to the felon who confessed the justice of the death penalty (cf. Luke 23: 39-43).
The strange conflation of dogmatic death penalty maximalism with some sort of core doctrine of Catholic faith is a classic illustration of how a tribal shibboleth can get fuddled with the heart of the faith. For, of course, the actual biblical teaching is that Jesus promises paradise to the one who placed his faith in Him, not to those who place their faith in the death penalty. Such enthusiasts for killing never seem to get around to acknowledging the corollary to their argument: namely, that not just the death penalty, but crucifixion is, by their twisted logic, sanctioned as legitimate.

My response: Here come the straw men! Burn them down Mr. Shea! They are easy targets. Now Shea equates everyone who thinks the death penalty should not be completely abolished as a “death penalty maximalist.” Everyone who has argued for the consistent teaching of the Church up until recent times are death enthusiasts! Fry the kid who stole a sucker from the convenient store! Hang the guy who jaywalked across the intersection! Do you see how childish Shea’s post is? How can a grown man act like this? It appears to me that Shea has never bothered to read the scholarly work of competent theologians like Dr. Steven Long. He has not dealt with their arguments. He would rather just call them “death enthusiasts” and sweep them all into one neat pile to be burned! He would rather make sweeping generalizations about the character of people who disagree with his assessment of the matter, rather than actually deal with the arguments they have brought to the table. It is all twisted logic to Shea, yet Shea never attempts to refute any real argument.

The bottom line is and remains this: The Church does not say the death penalty is intrinsically immoral. So what? The Church is on the side of saving and redeeming human life, not snuffing it out for the sake of cost efficiency.

My response: No, the bottom line is that this subject of discussion is open for debate by the very fact that a just punishment is not immoral. I, nor have any of the theologians I have quoted, said that redeeming human life is not important. As far as I know, the core arguments that folks like Dr. Long have put forth have not been for “snuffing” out life to save a few dollars. If this is the shallow level that Shea wants to continue to engage this matter on, he should leave it alone. He is only making a fool out of himself.

So the Magisterium--that would be the teaching office of the Church founded by Jesus Christ to conserve and articulate the Tradition--urges minimal use of the death penalty with an eye toward abolishing wherever possible. That is the teaching of the Church and those who are at war with this teaching are, in fact, dissenting Catholic every bit as much as those who are at war with the Church's teaching on contraception. Something does not have to be dogma (as, for instance, Humanae Vitae, like Evangelium Vitae, is not dogma) for it to be normative teaching of the Magisterium to which we owe our obedience and not our weasel-worded dissent and contempt.

My response: Here we have it folks! What we have all been waiting for! The Magisterial pronouncement from the new head of the CDF! Shea has spoken, the case is closed. Let us see what the real head of the CDF had to say on the matter and see if matches up with what the charlatan Mark Shea has written, shall we? When the present Pope was head of the CDF he wrote the following concerning general principles regarding moral issues, which pertained to Catholics and voting, “Not all moral issues have the same moral weight as abortion and euthanasia. For example, if a Catholic were to be at odds with the Holy Father on the application of capital punishment or on the decision to wage war, he would not for that reason be considered unworthy to present himself to receive Holy Communion. While the Church exhorts civil authorities to seek peace, not war, and to exercise discretion and mercy in imposing punishment on criminals, it may still be permissible to take up arms to repel an aggressor or to have recourse to capital punishment. There may be a legitimate diversity of opinion even among Catholics about waging war and applying the death penalty, but not however with regard to abortion and euthanasia.” You see, it is fools like Mark Shea who have no idea what they are talking about, who are causing more problems for Catholics than those outside the Church. No Mr. Shea, one who goes against contraception is not in the same boat as one who argues for a different application of the death penalty. They are not dissenters Mr. Shea, and those who you have told this rubbish to should withstand you to the face! You owe them an apology, and if you are a man who knows whats best for him, you owe them your resignation as an "apologist." The CDF says they are not dissenters, yet clearly Shea says otherwise. This is the type of nonsense that really makes my blood boil. You see, someone like Mark Shea should not be in the business he is in. He is not capable of teaching the Catholic faith properly. Moral issues like these are not open to amateurs who think they can go around making grand pronouncements, essentially excommunicating everyone, labeling them as dissenters from the faith when they disagree with them. Yet, Shea insists on going on to his blog and essentially damning everyone who does not agree with him. I take serious issue with that.

So: Watching this spectacle of *eagerness* to kill and the (as I took it) reluctance to take a look at the reasonable doubt about Davis, I got ticked. What bugged me was not that I was certain he was innocent, but the apparent disinterest in finding out. If I'm wrong about the facts in Davis' case, I can live with that. I'm opposed to the DP nonetheless (per Evangelium Vitae). But cases where there's a reasonable doubt that we are even executing the guilty just exacerbate the issue, because so many Christians are willing to fight for the death penalty, to be *zealous* for death, despite the fact that they *know* this means a certain percentage of the victims are going to be innocent. That's because our legal system is not perfect. To embrace the DP is, at the end of the day, to say "Better the innocent should perish than the guilty survive." I don't buy that "Kill all! God will know his own!" moral reasoning. Neither do two Popes and virtually all of the world's bishops. There are other reasons I oppose the DP too, but that's not a small one.

My response: So, now its all about an “eagerness” to kill. I do not know whether or not there was a disinterest in finding out if the guy was guilty. I have read that the execution was postponed 3 times, so they must have looked into it more than once. Yet again, that is all beside the point. Shea here is trying to paint a grim picture here to sell his story. The picture he paints looks like this. All of the Popes, bishops and priests, as well as Catholic nations the world over were nothing more than maximum death zealots eager for death when they used capital punishment for heinous crimes. They just wanted blood and more blood, and were all eager to kill, and those who think it is OK to use the death penalty now are the same. Anyone who argues that it is important that we do not completely abolish the death penalty are likewise nothing more than eager killers seeking fresh blood. They are all just zealots for death. Yet in the several articles that I have written, and the several articles I have referenced, have never exhibited this foolish caricature that Shea has painted for his audience. What a masterpiece of imbecility.

How anyone can take this guy seriously is beyond me. I really cannot imagine anyone wanting this guy’s opinion on much of anything, let alone inviting him to speak at parishes, or having him write for Catholic publications. The Magisterium has said, “Not all moral issues have the same moral weight...” and “if a Catholic were to be at odds with the Holy Father on the application of capital punishment or on the decision to wage war, he would not for that reason be considered unworthy to present himself to receive Holy Communion....There may be a legitimate diversity of opinion even among Catholics about waging war and applying the death penalty” That means that no, one is not a dissenting Catholic if their opinion differs from Evangelium Vitae, etc. However, we have clear evidence that the mountebank Shea has falsely proclaimed this foolishness from his lofty high throne. Do yourself a favor. Stay far, very far away from this man when it concerns your Catholic faith, and warn others to do the same.

For more info on the Catholic teaching regarding the death penalty see the sidebar on the right side of this blog, under moral theology.

Mark Shea Has Spoken, The Case Is Closed

2011-09-23T17:09:00.002-04:00

I'll let you chew on this comment by the self proclaimed "Catholic apologist" Mark "the Magisterium of One" Shea regarding capital punishment. It comes from this latest post on his blog, which I will address when I get a chance over the next few days. Until then, let these words of the bombastic Shea sink in a bit. One has to wonder how many times Shea has to make a fool of himself before he will go away. Stay tuned for my retort.

"The bottom line is and remains this: The Church does not say the death penalty is intrinsically immoral. So what? The Church is on the side of saving and redeeming human life, not snuffing it out for the sake of cost efficiency. So the Magisterium--that would be the teaching office of the Church founded by Jesus Christ to conserve and articulate the Tradition--urges minimal use of the death penalty with an eye toward abolishing wherever possible. That is the teaching of the Church and those who are at war with this teaching are, in fact, dissenting Catholic every bit as much as those who are at war with the Church's teaching on contraception.... To embrace the DP is, at the end of the day, to say "Better the innocent should perish than the guilty survive." I don't buy that "Kill all! God will know his own!" moral reasoning. Neither do two Popes and virtually all of the world's bishops."

Mark Shea

When Protestantism Fails: The Story of Swan and Van Til's Epiphany

2011-09-20T22:02:00.000-04:00

Although I have for sometime moved away from the realm of apologetics, I could not pass this one up. So if you are starving for a polemic apologetics post, here it is. I'm In the mood. I was browsing the net today and I ran across a laughable post by the Protestant James Swan. As usual he is lampooning Catholicism, while at the same time shooting himself in the foot. He quotes a fellow heretic by the name of Cornelius Van Til, whom Swan claims to have been a great preacher of "the whole council of God." What is amusing is that Van Til put himself above anyone who read Sacred Scripture and disagreed with him. Of course this is the Protestant legacy. Find people who agree with your interpretation of Scripture, join them and form your own Church. What is more amusing is that Van Til ignorantly put himself above the very Scriptures themselves, or at least on the same pedestal. Get a load of this quote that Swan cut and pasted from Van Til.

"It is but natural to expect that, if the church is strong because its ministry understands and preaches the whole counsel of God, then the church will be able to protect itself best against false teaching of every sort. Non-indoctrinated Christians will easily fall prey to the peddlers of Russellism, spiritualism and all of the other fifty-seven varieties of heresies with which our country abounds. One-text Christians simply have no weapons of defense against these people. They may be able to quote many Scripture texts which speak, for instance, of eternal punishment, but the Russellite will be able to quote texts which, by the sound of them and taken individually, seem to teach annihilation. The net result is, at best, a loss of spiritual power because of loss of conviction. Many times, such one-text Christians themselves fall prey to the seducers voice."

What Van Til really says is that those who quote the Scriptures in any way that disagrees with his interpretation, is in error. Indoctrination means that you let Van Til brainwash you with his interpretation of the Scriptures. Yet, who is to say that Van Til is interpreting the Scriptures correctly? You guessed it, Van Til, and those who agree with Van Till. So the claim that Van Til is making, is almost the same claim that the Catholic Church is making, yet, are we to believe one man and a few charlatans that agree with him, or the entire Church which has passed along the proper interpretation since Christ Himself established it? Those with a half a brain will choose the later.

Swan then asks a silly question as if he has just had an apple fall on his head! He has discovered gravity! Is he the new Newton of his religion? Well no, he has exposed his religion for the sham that it really is, all the while thinking he has had some brilliant epiphany. Eureka!

Swan writes,

"Of course, I had the converts to Roman Catholicism in mind, rather than Russellites. I wonder how many of these Catholic converts actually attended churches that proclaimed the whole council of God? A question I would ask is how many Catholic converts previously went to churches with strong systematic confessions of faith, like the Westminster Confession, and how often were they taught the confession, like in a Sunday School class, and how well did their minister cover all the doctrines in the confession of faith? I would expect some rather weak answers."

Well James, the whole council of God is His Word, both written and oral, which resides in the one Church that Jesus gave us, which are all infallible. The whole council of God comes from God, not men. The Catholic Church is the inventor of the confession of faith, and is not an imposter like those who wrote the Westminster Confession well over 1500 years after the one true Church was established, and had already given us the confession of faith. Yes we have Sunday school class and catechism too! Swan is surely hellbent on pushing "systematic theology", yet again this proves that the Scriptures are not enough for Swan, or for Van Til. In order for Van Til's "systematic theology" to be of any use, it must have a God given authority behind it. If it is God given, then it is absolute. If it is absolute authority, then it cannot err. Thus we have man vs God's Church. Is Van Til now infallible? Is his "systematic theology" infallible? Of course Swan would have to answer no, it is not. If he says that it is not, that means that Van Til's systematic theology can contain error. If it can err then it can err on any number of doctrines, the same as the Russellites. If Swan says Van Til's systematic theology is infallible, then he has put Van Til above God's written word, or at least on equal footing with it. No more Sola Scriptura. Ouch, that apple must have left a huge bruise! Big bruises however do not mean great ideas, and band aids don't heal the crooked, half-witted theology that result from bad ideas.

As Catholics we do not have this problem. No, we have the infallible Scriptures, contained within the living breathing infallible Church, which gave birth to them, guided as a whole by Jesus Christ, the Holy Spirit, and God the Father, three persons, one God, infallible! So much for the Van Till example. Are you going to trust Jesus and His Church or are you going to gamble on Van Till's "systematic theology" which obviously contains error? We can thank Swan for making it easy for us in proving that the man made "systematic theology" he follows is nothing more than foul rubbish spewing from the mouth of a twisted arrogant mountebank. Pray for those who are seduced by these foolish man made theological systems of heresy. Van Till calling the Russellites heretics is like the pot calling the kettle black. Fallible means fallible. Fallibility means error is present in their doctrine. Error in doctrine is not a product of God. Therefore Van Til is not from God, his interpretation of Scripture is not from God, nor is his authority from God.

Dr. Steven Long Addressing The Death Penalty and New Natural Law Theory

2011-09-20T19:26:00.002-04:00

"The New Natural Law Theory is in a way ingenious, in that it is materially far more rich than pure Kantian deontology; while nonetheless, it refuses the speculative wisdom that is necessarily the font of all practical right judgment. New natural law theorists do not acknowledge the teaching of Aquinas in Summa theologiae I.79.11 that only the accident of the ordering of a known truth to the good of an operation distinguishes practical knowledge from speculative knowledge... All knowledge, as such, has a speculative root; but the accident of ordering some knowledge to the good of an operation renders knowledge to be “practical” by reason of its end. By contrast to this clear teaching of Aquinas, new natural law theorists — with far greater likeness to Kant or Hume than to Aquinas — take the “practical” to be in no way derivative from the speculative"

Dr. Steven A. Long.

Dr. Steven Long of Ave Maria University is one of the most prolific Thomistic scholars of our time. He has written several books, one which I wrote a book review on, 'The Teleological Grammar of the Moral Act' as well as many articles concerning the writings of Saint Thomas Aquinas. He has recently written a response to one of the New Natural Law theorists, Christopher Tollefsen, who has criticized Saint Thomas Aquinas' view of human dignity and the death penalty. Tollefsen writes of St. Thomas' view on human dignity "To begin with Aquinas’s view, it appears to border on incoherence..." Dr. Long responds in a charitable yet direct manner refuting the convoluted New Natural theorist, topping it off with, "To hear advocates of this erroneous theory accuse Aquinas of incoherence would be comic were the theory not harmful to the common good of civil society and with respect to the actual teaching of the Church." Dr. Long demonstrates very clearly that the New Natural Law theorists do not understand Aquinas. As you know I have referred to Dr. Long's prior work concerning the death penalty many times in the articles I have written on the subject. This is yet another great article to take to the bank. Those who are trying to change the Church's teaching on the death penalty are not going to get one over without a fight. I would love to see Dr. Long debate Helen Prejean publicly so that her erroneous, noxious nonsense would be put to a halt. Below is a small clip from the article. I recommend reading it over. No it is not light reading, but if you take the time to read and comprehend what Dr. Long is saying, you will see just how absurd this particular argument is.

Nowhere does the Church identify capital punishment as a malum in se, and all the Fathers and Doctors of the Church — with the exception of Tertullian, who died outside the Church — affirm its principled validity (Lactantius did not argue that it was morally invalid or unjust — he expressly affirms the contrary in On Anger — but merely that Christians realize the superiority of charity to the law of the state.). Simply for the benefit of those interested in the Church’s doctrinal teaching, it should be noted that Pius XII taught that the principled legitimacy of the death penalty is not subject to cultural variation — although of course its prudential reasonability would still be subject to social variability (cf. Acta Apostolicae Sedis 47 (1955): 81-82, recounting this teaching of Pope Pius XII). One notes also the high theological note characterizing the profession required of the Waldensians in 1210 in order to re-establish ecclesial communion. The Waldensians were required to acknowledge among other things the essential justice of the death penalty for grave crime (cf. Denzinger, 425: “Concerning secular power we declare that without mortal sin it is possible to exercise a judgment of blood as long as one proceeds to bring punishment not in hatred but in judgment, not incautiously but advisedly.”). Clearly to require this oath for the re-establishment of ecclesial communion at one moment, and then to require its opposite — where what is at stake is not prudential application but the principled possibility of just penalty of death — would constitute not a development of doctrine, but rather a mutation. Note, again, that the statement directly refers to the death penalty in principle and that it indicates that as such it cannot be a malum in se...

These last words are offered with the aim of making an objective judgment about the place of New Natural Law Theory in priestly formation. There is no wish to question the orthodox intention of the Catholic New Natural Law Theorists. Their sincere desire to serve the truth—and their sacrifices and good example in doing so, particularly with respect to Humanae vitae—should be evident to all. But on matters of decisive import for the truth and for the understanding of Catholic faith and morals, the dangers implicit in their account noted above need correction; and the genuine teaching of St. Thomas remains a superior basis for formation in moral theology and philosophy.

Dr. Steven A. Long

Archbishop John Hughes on Justification and the Errors of Protestantism

2011-09-19T20:23:00.001-04:00

For those of you who are interested in apologetics, I think you will find this lecture given by the great Archbishop John Hughes of New York, a real treat. This is apologetics as it was meant to done. The subject here is imputation and justification. Hughes is commenting on a book related to Anglicanism. At this time the Catholic Church was just returning to the stage in England with the rise of the Tractarian movement. Not only does Hughes explain the difference between how Catholics and Protestants view justification, but he also paints a clear picture of what the consequences are for the heretical Protestant view. Ever wonder why there are no real self sacrificing men and women that are born from the bosom of Protestantism? Why are there no Protestant versions of Saint Vincent de Paul or Saint Francis Xavier? You guessed it. They simply don't believe in it! Their faith alone heresy leaves no room for that type of self sacrifice for Christ. This lecture is a bit long, and Hughes was never short on words, but I think it is well worth the time to read this if you want to explain to people why the Catholic faith is the bearer of true Biblical Christianity. Reading this is a breath of fresh air after having been bombarded with the modern cut and paste model of Catholic apologetics. Forgive me if there are any grammatical errors. The text comes from a scanned book which is now out of print. I went through it a few times correcting as many errors as I could find. Now, I present to you Bishop (Later to be Archbishop) John Hughes.

INTRODUCTION BY THE RIGHT REV. BISHOP
HUGHES TO MR LIVINGSTON'S BOOK ON
"IMPUTATION."

"Within the last forty years, there has been, in the public mind of almost all Protestants nations, a growing disposition to reconsider the grounds of the great schism of the Sixteenth century, in consequence of which so many have been separated from the unity of the Christian Church. During this period, numerous conversions to the Catholic faith have occurred, among men high in rank and station, and eminent in the walks of science and literature. England, the Low Countries, Switzerland, and the different States of Protestant, as well as Catholic Germany, have all furnished remarkable instances. These examples, appeared, at the time, to have had no effect on the general feelings of the nations in which they occurred. Nevertheless, it is almost impossible, in the good providence of God, that they should not have had great influence in predisposing the minds of others remotely, and perhaps without their own consciousness of the fact, to take a more calm and sober view of the whole controversy. The new religious had been undergoing the experiment of practice", for nearly three hundred years, side by side with the ancient faith. The results were before men's eyes; and it required only a dispassionate and sincere mind to judge of them. On the one hand, the Catholics were seen held together, under the most adverse circumstances of civil and social relations, in the universal communion of one church. On the other side, Protestants always disagreed among themselves. Every effort made towards attaining unity, resulted, among them in fresh divisions. The Catholic Church was seen moving onward, amidst the convulsions and disorders of the times, in the same undeviating course which had been traced out for her from the beginning;—the Protestants, on the other hand, exhibited the new system of religion as resting on no permanent or immutable basis; but dependent on temporal circumstances, and the vicissitudes and uncertainty of human opinion. Under the former, reason recognized the dominion of faith in all matters of revelation; under the latter, reason was made the judge of faith itself: and the practical consequences could be traced, from the wild and fitful outbursts of religious feelings, which marked the first days of the great schism, especially in Germany, down to the cold and Christ-denying speculations of its rationalism in our own times.

The individual instances, to which we have alluded, of a return to the ancient faith, must have served as occasions for bringing these comparative results before the minds of serious and reflecting men of both communions. But they must have done more. The Catholic religion had been represented as suited only to ages of ignorance and mental darkness; and thin prejudice must have been confounded, as men of the purest character, and most powerful intellects, were seen, from time to time, passing over to Catholicism, in the full light of the nineteenth century. Such examples, and in increasing 'numbers, are witnessed from day to day. But within the last fifteen or twenty years, the controversy between the two communions has assumed new features, altogether favorable to Catholicity. Among the Protestant clergy on the continent, several distinguished authors have come forward to vindicate certain portions of ecclesiastical history as well as the character of certain Popes, from the foul aspersions and misrepresentations of the earlier Protestant writers. In England, on the other hand, the venerable dogmas of the Catholic faith have been, to a great extent, vindicated in the writings of the Oxford Tractarians. In both cases, it is to be remembered, that the testimonies in favor of truth are those of adversaries; but it is this circumstance that gives them additional weight, on the general bearing and issue of the great question. Protestants would not receive, generally, the testimony of Catholic witnesses on these subjects; but when some of the first men in their own ranks bear similar testimony, the effect is calculated to shake, to its very centre, the foundation of 'heir prejudices against the ancient faith.

Accordingly, these writers are no longer to be regarded as individuals merely, but as leaders, representatives of whole classes; organs, giving utterance, with a faltering voice, to the uneasiness, doubts, and struggles that agitate the breasts of thousands of their Protestant countrymen. If there be one impression that has seized on the minds of all sects and parties, except themselves, with the grasp of a conviction, it is, that the Oxford movement must lead its votaries into the bosom of the Catholic Church. There is but one other alternative possible; and that is, that they should abandon the ground they have taken, retreat to the point from which they started, and rest satisfied with the religion which the laws of their country have prescribed for them. It is, however, a painful contest, between the spirit and the flesh. May Almighty God strengthen them by his grace, to accomplish the sacrifice which will best promote his glory, and secure their own salvation.

But the social as well as religious condition of England, at the present time, is enough to convince wise men that the country requires a spiritual renovation,which the barrenness of Protestantism is incapable of producing. The moral sympathies, that should knit and bind together all classes, have been ruptured or dissolved. The wealthy aristocracy, the poor, and the middle classes, which should blend into each other at a thousand points of social and religious contact, are as distinct and separate, except in the material relations of self-interest, as the castes of Hinduism. Pauperism, unknown in that country during Catholic times, is now universal throughout the land. The domains of the monasteries, and of the Church, were formerly the patrimony of the poor, of which the monks and clergy were as the administrators for their benefit; now these domains belong to the princes of Protestantism; and for the poor, work-houses have been constructed from the ruins of the abbeys. In Catholic times, the clergy, by their state of voluntary celibacy, left the resources of the poor almost undiminished; now, the whole church-, livings are hardly sufficient for the extravagant modes of life and domestic ambitions of the married clergy. The extent of ignorance among the working classes, respecting the first principles of Christianity, would be incredible were it not attested by Reports of Parliamentary Committees. So that whether you regard the gilded corruptions of excessive wealth on the one side, or the squalid depravities of extreme destitution on the other; or contemplate the ignorance of religion, the infidelity, and desperate confederations of those who occupy the middle ground between them, it will appear evident, that the regeneration of such a people, even under the social aspect, requires the presence and the action of a religion which can infuse into its masses the warmth and vitality of the Christian virtues reduced into daily practice.

In alluding to these things as betraying, to the eyes of discerning Protestants themselves, the evidence of a moral and religious want, which the established church is obviously, through its own intrinsic deficiency, unqualified to supply, we would by no means present them as the only, or even a prominent cause, of the general movement which is now going on in England, in the direction of a return to the Catholic faith. No; we would rather believe, humbly, that the progress of this movement is directed through the operation of that Grace which is invoked by the united prayer of millions, for the conversion of the English nation. But neither is it to be forgotten, that God, in his designs of mercy, may make use of outward things as well as interior convictions, to hasten the period of their accomplishment. He must be but a superficial reader of things, who does not see, in the actual condition of England, what a powerful vindication of the Catholic faith, has been wrought out by the silent progress of human events—and what a deep stamp of failure has been fixed on Protestantism, as a social and religious experiment, by the same unspeaking, but intelligible test. It can hardly be supposed, that it was the mere learning or piety of the Oxford divines, that Las won for their views the sympathy and approbation of high secular powers in the state. Statesmen, no less than theologians, have advocated, and continue to advocate their views; and although these views do not yet avow the adoption of the whole Catholic truth, still, they are manifestly adverse to the essential principles of the entire Protestant system. Now, it is worthy of remark, that in every defense of these views which they have deemed it expedient to put forth, the moral and social, as well as religious condition of the country, entered into their grounds of justification. Indeed, so much is the case, that it is avowed in the brief title prefixed to the writings by which they have become so celebrated, " Tracts Foe The Times."

It is remarkable, under this view of the subject, that the Oxford divines should have overlooked the matter which is treated of in the following pages. Among all the errors owing their birth to the innovations of the sixteenth century, there is not one so subtle as that which the Reformers adopted on the subject of justification by faith alone. It lies at the root of the whole system of Protestantism. It pervades, with but little modification, the doctrines of all the various sects, comprised under that comprehensive term. To it may be traced the peculiar and distinctive moral, as well as social features, that characterize every community or nation in which it has prevailed. It has chilled every generous emotion of self-sacrifice, and Christian heroism, which the charities of the Christian religion are wont to excite in the human breast, and which the ancient faith knows so well how to cherish, and ripen into the means of temporal and eternal benedictions to the whole human race. Why is it that Protestantism has produced no institutions for the welfare of mankind, which can be traced to the inward efficacy of any of its principles, acting on the human heart and soul? No universities, no hospitals, no churches, no asylums for the poor? Some of all these, it has unquestionably produced; but there is not so much as one, that can be traced to the inward power of any principles of Protestantism operating silently and secretly in the souls of men. Human legislation will be found to have intervened in all the Protestant countries of Europe; whereas those same countries had been almost paved with such institutions resulting from the inward operation, without the aid of human laws, of the Catholic faith, in the hearts of men, before Protestantism began. Why has the latter system never produced an Xavier, an order for the redemption of captives, a Vincent of Paul, or even a Sister of Charity? No one could fill the place of either of these, without being prepared to offer himself a daily sacrifice, or if need be, once for all, for the good of his neighbor, which is only the second part of the Lord's commandment, carried to its point of heroism; and why is it that Protestantism has never been able to inspire this heroism into a single member of its communion? Who has ever heard even of a Protestant Sister of Charity?

We know, indeed, that such works have a place in the theory of the Protestant system; but in that theory itself, their sphere is restricted; within it, too, they are controlled by an arbitrary rule of divine economy; and even then, they are pronounced utterly unprofitable to the soul of him who performs them! How, then, can the Tractarians realize, in the Anglican communion, so long as this doctrine is not repudiated, those practical results which religion, operating internally on the hearts of men, is constantly producing in Catholic lands? Do men gather figs of thorns, or grapes of thistles?
Still, it must be admitted, that the idea of justification by faith alone, as it presents itself to minds trained up in the Protestant system is plausible and seductive. As this subject, however, is seldom treated of in a popular way, it may be well to give a brief statement of the question and a definition of the terms involved in it.

"Justification" is that action or operation of divine grace on the soul, by which a man passes from the state of sin; from an enemy, becomes the friend of God, agreeable in the divine sight, and an heir to eternal life. This act of transition from the one state to the other, with its operating causes, is called "justification." From the circumstance of its being a spiritual and interior operation, it is evident that it affords an opportunity for theological subtleties, to those who would make use of it; and at the same time, renders it difficult to expose the error which those subtleties may be employed to foster. The Church, therefore, has always preserved her ancient and orthodox teaching under the form of sound words—which heresy has ever betrayed itself by refusing to adopt.

Thus, in both communions, justification is acknowledged to be, as to its efficient source, from and through and by Jesus Cubist, alone. But in the Catholic system, this justification, occurring in the modes of the Saviour's appointment, is not only the imputation, but also in the interior application of the justice of Christ, by which guilt is destroyed, pardon bestowed, and the soul replenished by the inherent grace and charity of the Holy Spirit.

According to the Protestant principle, justification is when a man believes with a firm and certain faith or conviction, in his own mind, that the justice of Christ is "imputed" to him. This is that "faith alone," by which they profess to be saved. The sacraments, for them, have no other end or efficacy, except as signs to awaken this individual and personal faith, so called, and as tokens of communion. Neither is it, that any intrinsic or interior operation takes place in the soul, by this, in which she is changed by a transition from the state of sin, now remitted and destroyed, to a state of justice wrought for her and in her, by the application of the merits and infusion of the grace of Christ. No; this is the Catholic doctrine. But, according to the Protestant principle, no such change takes place. According to that principle, the impious man is not made just, even by the adoption of God, or the merits of Christ. But leaving him in his injustice, it is conceived that his sins are no longer imputed to him, but that the justice of Christ is imputed to him. Thus a criminal is under guilt and condemnation'; but in consideration of a powerful and innocent intercessor, the chief magistrate pardons him. It is only by a certain fiction of thought and language that such a person can be considered innocent; or that his intrinsic guilt can be conceived of as still existing, but as imputed to the one who interceded for him, and the justice of that intercessor imputed to him. Such is the exact likeness of justification as taught in the theology of Protestantism. But it is to be observed, that the sphere which is assigned as the seat of this species of fiction, is the mind of God himself! The sinner is not intrinsically, or really justified, in this system, but we are told that God, on account of the merits of Christ, is pleased to regard and " repute" him as such ; that is, God "reputes" him to be, what, in reality, He knows him not to be.
St. Paul in his Epistle to the Romans, speaks of the faith of Abraham as having been reputed to him unto justice. And Luther, to meet the exigencies of his case, seized on the letter of this passage, and distorted its spirit and meaning. God had made rich promises to Abraham and his posterity. The hope of this promise was in his son Isaac. And God, to try the faith of his servant, directed Abraham to immolate this, his only son, as a sacrifice to his name.

Such an order, under such circumstances, was calculated to throw deep and impenetrable mystery over the previous promises, treasured up in the mind of the patriarch. Nevertheless, he falters not in his confidence, but obeys without a moment's hesitation. He sinks all the apprehensions arising from the suggestions of flesh and blood, and in the simplicity of his confidence, prepares to execute what had been commanded. And it is only when his hand is uplifted to strike, that God manifests his acceptance of the will, which, however, embraced the work itself, that he is no longer permitted to execute.

Such was the faith of Abraham. But it is evident that it embraced the works, and that so far as obedience, will, intention, purpose, and even feelings, were concerned, Abraham had already completed the sacrifice. This, the same Apostle writes in the Epistle to the Hebrews, ii. "By faith Abraham, when he was tried, offered Isaac; and he that had received the promises offered up his only begotten son."

As, however, the outward immolation was not actually or physically consummated, Luther was pleased to exclude it altogether from the faith of Abraham, contrary to the express words of St. Paul himself. The error of Luther has been incorporated, with but slight modifications, into the theology of all the other Protestant denominations. Hence the doctrine of salvation by "faith alone."' By faith, to use their own phraseology, the sinner "seizes" on the merits of Christ—by believing firmly that they are "imputed" to him. It is not that by this, he is made just or innocent, but God is pleased to declare, to suppose, to repute—let us say it with reverence —to imagine him as such. It is all God's work, he has not the smallest share in it—and then, the seductive boast of the system, that thus, "all the glory returns to God, and nothing to man." Under the same plea, good works were decried as hindrances, rather than helps, in the matter of justification. It was supposed, indeed that by a necessary consequence, they would appear in the life of the believer, as the fruit and evidence of his faith. But, even then, they would be of no advantage to the soul. Neither could sin, except that of unbelief alone, defeat its salvation. To such a point of of insanity did Luther carry his doctrine on this subject, that he declares, that "if adultery could be committed in faith, it would not be a sin. Luth. Disput. t. 1, b. 523.
This doctrine is the root of all those distinctive features of Protestantism, which place its moral, as well as dogmatical code, so much in opposition to the ancient teaching of Christendom, and of the Catholic world. Calvin moulded it into his own system of Election, Predestination, Reprobation, and Inadmissible Grace. The different confessions of faith have mitigated somewhat the harshness of language with which it was first set forth in the writings of the two great Continental Reformers. But its substance pervades them all. The extent to which it has prevailed in the Anglican Church, which is supposed to have departed least from the ancient faith, will appear in the little work which is now presented to the public. And humanly speaking, there is no hope for the Protestant world, even through the piety and learning that are represented by the Oxford divines, until they themselves shall have burst through the intricate and subtle meshes of this elaborate net of primitive Protestantism. They seem to repine at not beholding among themselves those fruits of religion, which they witness among their Catholic neighbors. But how could they expect it, while they teach that man's righteousness is solely by the mere imputation of the righteousness of Christ—and that this imputation is by faith alone, to the utter exclusion of good works, either before or after justification? Do they not see that this system leaves them no ground whereon to place the fulcrum, or apply the lever of either a moral, religious, or social regeneration?

We would not be understood by these remarks, to assert or insinuate, that the moral virtues awe not attended to in the practice of Protestant communities as well as elsewhere. Far from it. But it is seldom that the conduct of men is in strict consistency with their creed, and in the present instance it is well known, that Catholics living up to the principles of their holy faith, would be infinitely better than they are; Protestants, on the same grounds, would be immeasurably worse.
In the Catholic Church, every age witnessed the spectacle of thousands of individuals rising by the power of Grace, above the ordinary range of righteous living, and devoting themselves by a perpetual sacrifice of all that is selfish, for the good of their neighbor; and this for God's sake. Protestantism, after three hundred years of existence, cannot point out even one such example! Why is it? Now, the true type of the faith and the grace of the Catholic religion, is to be found in those higher examples to which we have just referred, —whilst, if you seek a corresponding type, something that will exemplify the essence of Protestantism, you must be satisfied with the concentration of it in the coarse uncharitableness and unchristian exhibitions of it in Exeter Hall, and in kindred assemblies on this side of the Atlantic. It is true, and honorable as true, that the vast majority of Protestants, in both countries, look upon such exhibitions with regret, and virtuous indignation; but it is not less true, that for this, the genuine interpreters of their creed, regard, and denounce them as only half Protestants, and half " Papists." There is more of truth in this uncourteous statement than either side is aware of. Truth, and charity, and meekness, and patience, and all good works, are contemplated as implied conditions of justification in the Catholic system; whilst they are as implicitly discarded from the Protestant justification, except, indeed, as consequences which, it is supposed, must necessarily follow.

But the stumbling-block, with many, is the idea that according to the Catholic doctrine, man is himself the author, in part, at least, of his own justification, through the supposed efficacy of good works, and human merits; and that thus Christ is robbed of the glory which belongs solely to Him. Having stated briefly the Protestant doctrine, we shall now exhibit, with equal brevity, the Catholic teaching on the subject of justification.

The Catholic Church teaches, also, that Christ is alone the author and finisher of our salvation—that of ourselves we can do nothing without his grace—that all grace is the pure gift of God—that to Him belongs the whole and undivided glory. This is the faith of the Catholic Church. But from this point the two systems begin to diverge.

Supposing the existence of faith in the soul, which is regarded in the Catholic system as the "root of our justification," God imparts additional grace, by which it is increased and developed into the tree of a holy life, laden with its proper fruits of Christian charity. The operation of this grace is in the soul itself, renovating its powers, impaired and decayed as they had been by the contagion of original and actual sin. The sacraments are appointed channels by which Christ communicates this grace, and applies now, individually, to those who receive it, the merits of its own infinite sacrifice, once offered up on the Cross. He may communicate grace otherwise than by the sacraments, but however communicated He is its source and author. One of the effects of this grace, is to enable the soul to co-operate with the inspirations which it communicates. Thus it disposes itself to receive further aid from heaven; and being still faithful in its correspondence with the new grace, it goes on in a progress of holiness, by which it approaches nearer and nearer to the perfect and adorable Author of its being.
In all this, what are termed good works, must necessarily enter. Sin must be avoided; for sin would displease God, and destroy his grace in the soul. Charity, the love of God, becomes the impulse by which such a soul is actuated. She will endeavor to keep the commandments, for this is given as the test of love. Nay, more, she will sometimes, for his sake, resolve on the sacrifice which is always necessary in order to accomplish those things which He has counseled, —without having reduced them to the rigor of a universal precept. She will sell all that she has, and give it to the poor, in order to have treasures in heaven. Here the Catholic doctrine of the "merit of good works, comes in. Is it, that according to our faith anything that man can do, even with the aid of grace, creates a right in virtue of which he may claim a recompense from God? Certainly not. Is it that any works of his can enter, as a portion, into the price by which he was redeemed? By no means. Nevertheless, the Church teaches, founding her doctrine on the express word of God, and the excess of his goodness and mercy, that He himself bestows on works thus performed through his grace, for his sake, and his love, a merit which lie will recompense with eternal rewards. But are these rewards on account of any intrinsic merit in the actions themselves as the mere works of men? Surely not. Long before Luther began to pervert the writings of St. Paul, St. Augustine declared in two words what had ever been, and still is, and ever will be, the faith of the Church on the subject, viz.: God in rewarding his saints, but crowns in them the effect of his own grace. "Where, then, is there room for that calumny which the radical error of the sixteenth century put forth against the Church of God, viz.: that she robbed Christ of his glory in the justification of sinners, by making it partly the work of man himself? This calumny is still propagated, and by it thousands are prevented from returning to the fold of Christ.
We have exemplified the Protestant doctrine of justification by a human comparison; we shall endeavor to represent the Catholic tenet by another.

A man gives capital for trade to a number of persons who are utterly penniless and starving—more to one,'less to another. He places them in a sphere of commerce, in which, if they are attentive, industrious, and prudent, they will acquire much wealth; but in such a way, that the measure of the increase is also owing' to the goodness of him who gave the original capital. In this, two things concur to the same end—his liberality, and their co-operation; but can they glory on this account, as if their fortune was owing to themselves, or their works? Certainly not; and yet the same goodness of their patron, may induce him to reward, as merit in them, that industry with which they employed his money. And what is this, after nil, but the lesson of our Lord's teaching in the parable of the talents—and for the proper use of which it was said, "Well done, thou good and faithful servant, because thou hast been faithful over a few things, I will set thee over many ; enter into the joy of the Lord."

This is the doctrine of justification, as taught in the Catholic Church; the grace of Christ, which is his gift, is the capital, renovating the powers of the soul, and enabling her to enter into the commerce of charity, which has God and the neighbor for its objects, and by which "treasures," in the language of Scripture, may be laid up in heaven. See how this commerce has been carried on in the Church from the beginning! See the apostles, the martyrs, the confessors, the virgins, the missionaries, the teachers of the ignorant, the friends of the poor, of the sick, of the captives, even buriers of the dead, give up the world, renounce their own ease, embrace voluntarily the mortifications of the Cross, and by a perpetual sacrifice of self, become the living, and, not unfrequently, the expiring victims of their love for their fellow beings, and of Him who died for all! The world has always been full of wickedness, and always will be; but, notwithstanding this, amidst its social convulsions, and its hereditary corruptions, see, how in every age since the beginning of Christianity, men rose and girded themselves up for Christ's sake, to battle in the armor of faith, and with the weapons of holy charity, against the peculiar disorders of the times. The infidel corsair sweeps the sea, carrying Christians into slavery. But the grace of Christ has inspired other Christians with the heroism of charity, by which they bind themselves in a solemn vow, to seek the captive in a barbarous land, to redeem him with money, or, if need be, to take on their own limbs the chains of bondage which they have stricken from his! Plague and pestilence are desolating the land, and thousands of delicate and tender virgins are ready to rush into the atmosphere of death, and ministering at the bed-side of the sick and dying, occupy the place which the cowardice of mere flesh and blood had caused even relatives to abandon! But all this, again, is through Christ, who inspires this supernatural courage, and crowns as merit in the members of his mystical body, the fruits of his own grace. Now, if such things occur at all times, and in all places of the Catholic Church; and if, on the other hand, the world has yet to witness the first example of them in the Protestant communities, does it not follow- that there is, there must be, some deep and radical cause to account for the difference? Unquestionably, there is. The Protestant dogma of a forensic imputation of the merits of Christ, and of justification by " faith alone," explains it all. No other key is necessary.

It is not pretended that in the ordinary virtues of social and domestic life, Protestants are inferior to any others. Still, even these, it is manifest, derive no support from their doctrine of justification, and must be accounted for on other grounds. But above the range of every-day duties, performed in a genteel and respectable manner, where is there a name that stands prominent on the page of self sacrifice for the good of others? We have sometimes heard the names of Howard and Wilberforce mentioned as instances. They, certainly, especially the former, were above the ordinary standard in the reformed ranks; but yet how immeasurably below any corresponding type in the Catholic church! The one visited the institutions for erring and suffering, or destitute humanity, which had been founded by the spontaneous charity of Catholic lands, or the civil laws of Protestants states—and recorded the reflections of his mind, and the sympathies of his benevolent heart. Even this was much. The other poured out his eloquence, and his gold, if you please, to meliorate the condition of an afflicted portion of his fellow men. But neither of them showed anything like a willingness to undergo themselves, for their Maker's sake, a portion of the sufferings they would mitigate or remove.

The Oxford school is the only one in the history of Protestantism that seems to have caught a ray of the light and warmth of Catholic faith on the subject of justification. Neither is this so manifest in what are called their principles, as in the tone of a deeper spirituality, piety, meekness, and a desire to. foster more the love of God, and of man. These feelings appear under the surface of their writings as if struggling for an issue, and a right direction. Hence the innovations with which they are charged. Fasting, confession, and most of the practical devotions of the Catholic Church, are reported to have found favor in their sight. But, alas! so long as the fundamental error of the Anglican system on justification remains, what practical progress can they make with the masses of their people? It is said they would establish Protestant monasteries; but who will be the monks? That they would have daily service in their churches; but who will attend the worship, except a few devout females whose hearts unconsciously obey the instinct of that Catholic faith against which their understandings have been so perversely instructed? That they would rid the churches of pews, so that, as in Catholic times, the rich and poor may worship together; but do they imagine that the haughty lords of England, who, fenced round in their exclusive boxes, will hardly kneel before their Maker, albeit they are tempted by soft and velvet cushions to do so,—will mingle in any direct contact of equality with the poor? No, no! such results cannot be anticipated, so long as both are taught to believe that justification is by "faith alone." But going beyond the precincts of the temple, how will the Oxford divines be able to infuse into the Anglican system any principle of spiritual fruitfulness, whilst this tenet prevails? How will they go forth to their rich and proud countrymen, preaching, like St. Paul, the chastisement of the body," and the "crucifixion of the flesh?" How will they meet the dark, sour discontent of religious, as well as civil chartism, in the millions of their countrymen, with the words of the Saviour Himself, "Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of God." How will they reduce to the simplicity of faith, and the obedience of Christ, the spiritual haughtiness and double-dealing of their middle classes? How, in a word, can they renovate their church, or distill a healing balm for any of the wounds, religious, moral, social, or physical, of their suffering land, so long as they and their countrymen remain alike paralyzed by the frozen grasp of the fundamental error of their system to which we have alluded? They may, indeed, preach and write with the force and eloquence, and even unction of a Chrysostom or a Paul, but yet so long as the present system of the Anglican Church remains, their words will return on them as feathers cast against the wind. Still, however, all these things are in the hands of God—who can employ the things that are not, to confound the things that are.

Archbishop John Hughes on Protestant Bibles

2011-09-18T12:49:00.001-04:00

One of the great champions of American Catholicism was Archbishop John Hughes of New York (June 24, 1797 – January 3, 1864). I will be presenting a full article regarding his life and times in the near future. In the meantime, here is a brief excerpt from one of his addresses concerning Catholics using Protestant Bibles, and the error of hi-jacking the Scriptures outside the Church.

"I pass now to the reasoning of one learned gentleman who spoke yesterday, and defended the Protestant Bible. Now this was unnecessary in that gentleman—it was in him a work of supererogation to vindicate the Protestant Scriptures—it was useless to defend a point which had not been attacked. It was time lost; and yet, perhaps, not altogether lost; for in some respects it may have been profitable enough. In entering on its defence, he said it was the instrument of human liberty throi»ghoiit the world—wherever it was, there was light and liberty; and where it was not, there was bondage and darkness; and he brought it round so, that he almost asserts that our Declaration of Independence has been copied from the Bible. No doubt the just and righteous principles on which that Declaration has its foundation, have their sanction in the Bible, but I deny their immediate connection, and on historical grounds,for it is known that its author looked upon St. Paul as an impostor; consequently their connection is not historically true. But while the gentleman referred to our notes (but which we disown and repudiate), as containing principles of persecution—how was it that after the Protestant Bible, " without note and comment," came into use, every denomination of Protestants in the whole world that had the misfortune, for it must have been a misfortune, to be yoked to civil power, wielded the sword of persecution, and derived their authority for so doing from the naked text? Yes, in Scotland, in all her confessions of faith—in England, and I appeal to her penal laws against Catholics, and those acts by which the Puritans and Dissenters were pursued, men who had the misfortune, like ourselves, to have a conscience, were driven out, and all was done on the authority of the Bible, without note or comment, and for the public good and the good of the Church. I do not say that the Bible sanctioned persecution, but I deny that the absence of notes is an adequate preventive. I refer to history. And almost to this day, though the Bible has been translated three hundred years, even in liberal governments, the iron heel of persecution has been placed on the dearest rights of Catholics. The gentleman to whom I alluded said, no doubt, what he knew would be popular out of doors, for he seems, with others, to imagine that the world began at the period of the Reformation. He seems to think that everything great originated at that period. But does he not know that eight hundred editions of the Bible had been printed before the Reformation? And does he not know that two hundred editions had been circulated in the common tongue, in the common language of the country ? And has he yet to learn that the first prohibition to read the Bible came not from a Catholic, but from a Protestant—from Protestant Henry VIII., of "glorious memory?" He was the first to issue a prohibition, and it was not till Catholics saw the evil—not of the Bible, but the bad uses men were making of the Bible, that they placed its perusal under certain restrictions, and cautioned their people against hastily judging of it for themselves. All had been united and harmonious, but by the use, or abuse, which men made of the Bible, all became doubt and speculation, the positive revelation of Christ was shaken or destroyed. They saw this Bible, and what then? But, while these school gentlemen contend that it is a shield against infidelity, and that all sects here agree, how is it out of the schools? Why, no sects agree upon it. How is it that the Bible, which is given by the inspiration of God, the God of truth, is made use of in this city even, to prove a Trinity, and to disprove a Trinity? How is it that Trinitarians quote it to prove their doctrines, and Unitarians quote it to establish the opposite doctrines ? How is it that whilst one says from the Bible that God the Father is God alone, and that Christ is not equal to Him, for He says, "The Father is greater than I," another argues from the same Bible that the Father and Son are equal, because Christ says "The Father and J are one?" And another comes with the Bible in his hand, andsays, I believe, and I can prove it from this Bible that Christ alone is the Almighty God, and the Father and the Spirit are only attributes of the same person! Why, this Bible which they say is the foundation of all truth, and they say well, when it is truly understood, a grace which God can vouchsafe, and, no doubt, lie does to many, this Bible is harmonious in its every doctrine. But that is not the point—the point is the uses we see men make of it, and this is the sum of our reason that we wish our children not to be taught in the manner in which Protestant children are taught in reference to the Bible.

And then, again, if you teach that there is a hell, according to the Bible, others will contend that the Scriptures teach no such doctrine, and so I might pass on to other points, to show you whilst they thus contend for the Bible as the guide to truth, there is this disagreement among them, at least in this country, where human rights and liberties are understood as allowing every man to judge for himself. Is there not, then, danger—is there no ground to apprehend that when our children read this Bible, and find that all these different sects father all their contradictions on the Bible as their authority, they will derive their first notions of infidelity from these circumstances? But there is another ground on which it is manifest we cannot allow our children to be taught by them. Whilst we grant them the right to take, if they please, the Protestant Bible as the rule of their faith, and the individual right to judge of the Bible—and this great principle they proclaim as the peculiar and distinctive, and most glorious trait in their religious character and history—and let them boast of it, there is no difficulty on the subject—they interpret the Bible by the standard of reason, and therefore, as there is no given standard of reason—as one has more and another less—they scarcely ever arrive at the same result, while the Bible, the eternal Word of God, remains the same. But this is not a Catholic principle. Catholics do not believe that God has vouchsafed the promise of the Holy Spirit to every individual, but that He has given His Spirit to teach the Church collectively, and to guide the Church, and therefore we do not receive as the Bible except what the Church guarantees; and wanting this guarantee, the Methodist gentleman failed to establish the book, which he produced with its notes, as a Catholic Bible. We do not take the Bible on the authority of a " King's Printer," who is a speculating publisher, who publishes it but as a speculation. And why ? Because by the change of a single comma, that which is positive may be made negative, and vice versa, and then is it the Bible of the inspired writers ? It is not. They proclaim, then, that theirs is a Christianity of reason; of this they boast, and let them glory. Ours is a Christianity of faith; ours descends by the teaching of the Church; we are never authorized to introduce new doctrines, because we contend that no new doctrine is true, from the time of tho apostles, unless it has come from the mind of God by a special revelation, and to us that is not manifest among the reformers.

We are satisfied to trust our eternal interests, for weal or woe, on the security of that Catholic Church, and the veracity of the divine promises. You perceive, therefore, that Protestants may agree in the system where this Bible is thus introduced; but it is not in accordance with the principles of Catholics, that each one shall derive therefrom his own notions of Christianity. It is not the principle of Catholics, because they believe in the incompetence of individual reason, in matters of such importance. It is from this self-sufficiency and imputed capacity that men derive such notions of self-confidence, which, owing to a want of power to control in some domestic circles, if taught to our children, lead to disobedience and disregard of the parental authority."

Shea vs Shea

2011-09-16T14:09:00.000-04:00

A reader sent me his observation of the "Magisterium of One", Mark Shea, and how he contradicts himself at every turn concerning the authority of bishops.

A reader writes,

Two examples. One of Mark Shea attacking his own Bishop based upon mere hearsay, and another example of Shea pretending to be the model christian we should all emulate. Problem is, as evidenced by some quotes below by a priest, Shea is only about being obedient to Shea. Keep in mind these blog posts are only a day apart. Regardless of what the rightful position one should take on each of the cases Shea is disscussing, it is plain as day that this man is a hypocrite and a liar.

A few days ago, Mark Shea on his own bishop without knowing all the facts:

"I don't get the guy. His reasoning isn't even internally consistent since the USCCB (rightly) has no problem at all with 40 DFL, a perfectly peaceful, non-confrontational, non-gory form of civil witness for life. Plus, he's just taken over a diocese that's been through the ringer financially due to abuse lawsuits. So he deliberately spits in the eye of the most dedicated and loyal Catholics, provoking them to withhold their appeal funds out of conscience? What gives?
God grant him a change of heart through Christ Jesus.
By the way, in stark contrast to Bp. Cupich, here is a story about Abp. Vigneron of Detroit, manfully leading people in prayer outside two abortion mills--in the rain. God be praised for good shepherds!"

A priest (a member of the clergy, mind you) cautions Shea on jumping the gun without hearing from the bishop first:

Fr Maurer:
"I call shenanigans. Citing un-verifiable "multiple Spokane priests" just doesn't cut it when making such a huge - and potentially damaging - claim about a bishop.
and...
With respect to all of the kind folks who have piped in from the Diocese of Spokane, it would be prudent (as many have said) to seek or await some verifiable information from the bishop himself. We risk a great dis-charity towards the bishop if we come to conclusions based on the words of others - even priests!..."

Mark Shea a couple of days later describing his own pious example of obedience to the hierarchy and prudent judgment in always allowing the facts to speak for themselves (yea, right...hypocrite):

"I continue to do what every sensible Catholic should do: defer to the bishop's rightful authority, let the facts emerge from the investigation (and the appeal to Rome) and let the chips fall where they may. The reflexive, kneejerk tendency of alleged "faithful" Catholic to perpetually assume that every American bishop is a fifth columnist working to destroy the Church is foreign to the mind of Christ."

Death Penalty: JPII and Pius XII

2011-09-16T05:27:00.001-04:00

Alan, who visits here quite often dropped a quote off that is translated from the Italian document of Pope Pius XII, Acta Apostolicae Sedis 47 (1955) 81-82, regarding the death penalty. As we know, most the cut and paste "apologists" out there like Mark Shea, who have limited understanding of anything regarding the Catholc faith, love to cut and paste JPII's stance on the death penalty as if its an infallible statement. Well what about Pope Pius XII's statement, which clearly says the opposite of the later JPII? It just goes to show you that you do not have to hold JPII's opinion on the matter, since it is he who has gone against the consistent tradition of the Church, if his documents are to be taken on their own. AS I have said before, JPII's opinion cannot be taken on its own. Can we get two more opposite opinions on the matter if we are to take them each as standing on their own?

JPII

It is clear that, for these purposes to be achieved, the nature and extent of the punishment must be carefully evaluated and decided upon, and ought not go to the extreme of executing the offender except in cases of absolute necessity: in other words, when it would not be possible otherwise to defend society. Today however, as a result of steady improvements in the organization of the penal system, such cases are very rare, if not practically non-existent.

In any event, the principle set forth in the new Catechism of the Catholic Church remains valid: 'If bloodless means are sufficient to defend human lives against an aggressor and to protect public order and the safety of persons, public authority must limit itself to such means, because they better correspond to the concrete conditions of the common good and are more in conformity to the dignity of the human person.'"

(46) Catechism of the Catholic Church, No. 2266

Pope Pius XII

"We also note that the Church in theory and in practice has kept the two forms of capital punishment (medicinal and vindictive) and that this is more in line with what the sources of revelation and traditional doctrine teach about the coercive power of legitimate human authority. One does not give a sufficient answer to this assertion, noting that the above-mentioned sources contain only thoughts that correspond to historical circumstances and the culture of the time, and that therefore one cannot attribute to them a general and always durable value."

Doctrinal Preamble Given to SSPX

2011-09-15T19:36:00.001-04:00

As you may know, the SSPX has been given what is called a doctrinal preamble by the Holy Father in an effort to bring about reconciliation of the SSPX with the Vatican. Many have wondered what this preamble entails. Bishop Fellay gives a hint as to its contents in an interview he gave yesterday. It seems that we may have some sort of official statement by the Pope as to the limits of the statements made in the Vatican II documents, which could be huge for the entire church. Lets hope all goes well, and that Archbishop Lefebvre's wish of reconciliation and proper defining of the Vatican II documents comes to fruition. Below is an excerpt from the interview.

Question

On the subject of this doctrinal preamble, to the extent that this does not concern its confidentiality, can you confirm that it contains, as announced in the press release, a distinction between what is de fide [essential to the faith]—to which the Society fully adheres—and what is dependent on a pastoral council, as Vatican II itself claimed to be, and thus could be subjected to criticism without calling the faith into question?

Answer

This new distinction was not only announced in the press release; I have personally heard it from various sources. As early as 2005, Cardinal Castrillon Hoyos told me, after I spent five hours explaining to him all the objections to Vatican II that the Society of St. Pius X had formulated: “I cannot say that I agree with everything that you have said, but what you have said does not mean that you are outside the Church. Write to the pope therefore and ask him to lift the excommunication.”

Today, for the sake of objectivity, I must acknowledge that in the doctrinal preamble there is no clear-cut distinction between the inviolable dogmatic sphere and the pastoral sphere that is subject to discussion. The only thing that I can say, because it is part of the press release, is that this preamble contains “certain doctrinal principles and criteria for the interpretation of Catholic doctrine, which are necessary to ensure faithfulness to the Church’s Magisterium and to "sentire cum Ecclesia" [thinking with the Church]. At the same time, it leaves open to legitimate discussion the examination and theological explanation of individual expressions and formulations contained in the documents of Vatican Council II and of the later Magisterium.” There you have it; no more and no less.

Heretic Watch: Biden on the 14th

2011-09-15T19:20:00.001-04:00

Vice President Joe Biden makes the sign of the cross after receiving Communion during a memorial Mass for Vatican diplomat Archbishop Pietro Sambi Sept. 14 at the Basilica of the National Shrine of the Immaculate Conception in Washington. Archbishop Sambi, served as nuncio to the United States from 2006 until his death July 27. In the foreground is New York Archbishop Timothy M. Dolan, left, and Msgr. Walter R. Rossi, rector of the basilica. (CNS/Leslie E. Kossoff) Complete story.

More Protestant Nonsense: Divorce Her!

2011-09-14T16:18:00.001-04:00

A friend sent this over to me via email. Again, we see why Protestantism fails on so many levels. They just keep going, and going, and going, and going.....further off into secular foolishness. Got a sick wife, divorce her! Another feather in the cap for Luther and Co.

America, Politics and the Absence of God

2011-09-13T23:09:00.000-04:00

America, Politics and the Absence of God
Matthew James Bellisario 2011

    We are moving towards one of the most important presidential elections the Unites States has ever seen. We find ourselves on the verge of financial collapse, driven primarily by greed, materialism, irreligion and gross arrogance. The president who now wields his warped will, like many dictators before him, finds himself at odds with the common good, decent morals and the Catholic religion. His distaste for all that is right is made known by his actions, which brew a mad pot of hate for his fellow man. How can a man who promotes the killing of innocent babies be a trustful human being? How much can a man care for his fellow man when he tells them lie after lie? Can such a man be taken seriously as the “leader” of a nation? How can such a man have been elected to such a lofty position among men? The answer is very plain and very simple. The people of America put him there, and they wanted him there. This crisis that we have in our nation today is not due to the ill will of one man, this noxious president, no, but it is due to the ill will of many men who collaborated to put him in power.

    As we ponder the dethronement of this madman, who is to replace him? Yes, any of the GOP candidates are surely an improvement. But a slight improvement on a huge failure fails to instill in me a feeling of grandeur. Do we jump for joy when we find ourselves narrowly escaping from a ravaged burning plane, only to find that our parachute is not opening on the way down? Sure we have not burned, but we only extended our breath for a few short moments before we either find our spare chute, or we hit the ground. We find ourselves on the burning plane as we speak, and surely we will take our chances with the parachute. But where will we ultimately find ourselves as a nation, if those who we elect into office put themselves above God and the natural law?

    As I watched the GOP candidates last evening I was hardly impressed with any of them. Again, yes, I would vote for any one of them to get off of the burning plane, just to have that chance for survival, but, are any of them that solid parachute that will land us all safely on the green grass below? From what I can see, the answer is no. Not one of the candidates mentioned God one time. They all talked about how they were going to repeal Obama Care, change our foreign policy, drill for oil, build a giant fence, etc, etc. But none of them mentioned the origins of their moral character. It was as if they were all going to single handedly change the direction of the country on their own. My favorite candidate so far, despite his lack of charisma, is probably Ron Paul. He makes the most sense out of the candidates on most of the issues. He has the common sense not over extend ourselves militarily and financially. Likewise he sees the necessity of the Church, not the State, as having the responsibility to care for those who need help. He also seems to understand the basic principles of the Constitution, as it was originally intended. Yet, among all of these positive and melodic notes, there is a melancholic dirge playing in the background. He has denied core tenets of the Christian faith while yet claiming to be a Christian. So, we must realize that where God does not rule, man will rule, and when man rules without reference to God and all of God’ laws, man and nation will fail miserably. If we put a man in office based only on dollars and cents, so that we can all continue living our lives based on materialism, we are not going to make it far.

    One of the traits that most of our early American bishops possessed, was the understanding and drive to point this reality out to the average American. Catholic or not, the early American bishops went to great lengths to promote the truth of Catholicism. They viewed America’s soil as being rich, yet uncultivated. God was of primary importance to most of them, and their actions and words revealed this reality. They knew that if the country did not move further to embrace God and His Church, that it would eventually deteriorate. Unless this country is largely converted to the true faith, where men and women have the moral compass to live in and run a morally licit society, we are all going to end up dead on the ground. Unless we have moral, upright Catholics running for office, and moral upright Catholics who will vote for them, we are going to have the same miserable failures that we are witnessing today. America, largely based on Christian principles over the past 250 or so years has been a nation above the rest because of her embrace of that moral code. Has it ever been perfect? No. Were the founding fathers saints? No. But most of them at least had a grounding in Christian morality, and that can take a nation down the path a good stretch. Yet, we as Catholics should know that America deserves to have the full truth written on her heart. We can compare the country to the common person. Like a man who grows up having a decent upbringing, and yet does not possess the true faith, can go one of two ways. He can turn and go about his way eventually losing his moral compass, giving up what little regard he had for God, or he can continue to seek the truth and gradually come to know Him, finally embracing Him. Like a man, a nation or state can either convert, or it can spiral into itself ending in total ruin.

    At this point in time, America is that man who has turned away from that decent upbringing, and has now embraced a life of debauchery and immorality. He is the man who cheats on his wife, spends money beyond his means, picks fights in the bar with anyone who looks at him wrong, and then acts as if God did not exist. He laughs at those who tell him that his lifestyle is wrong, and he mocks those who live a life that embraces God. America as a nation has become that pitiable man, alienated from God, void of most goodness, and on the brink of hell. Yet, somewhere deep inside there is that light that still burns for the truth. There is a hope that the nation will wake up and realize what a sham it has embraced, which will only lead it to total ruin. The Catholic man and women is bound to live and act on the truth which has been instilled in him by God. Every Catholic, clergy and laymen alike is responsible for this country in as much as we are duty bound to God for the form of government which he has placed over us. Is it the most desirable form of government? Perhaps not, but Catholics in the past have been dealt worse hands than the one we have been dealt at this table. They did not give up on converting those in power in their trying times, finding themselves often under the most cruel rule of tyrants.

    Yes, I think that we must try and stop the bleeding of our nation with this upcoming election, and I intend to vote out the beady eyed villain who sits arrogantly in the White House with his spindly legs propped up on the desk, watching our country burn, with a snide smirk on his face. I do however doubt that whoever is elected is going to get us more than out the door of that smoking, burning plane, that is spiraling towards the earth. How the one true faith is preached and embraced among the citizens of this country is going to determine whether or not this country survives in any recognizable form or fashion. Without God, we are on a burning plane with a parachute packed by a hack, and its a long way down to contemplate that big thump at the end of the fall. It is time that the Catholic Church steps up to promote Christ and the truth, which can ultimately set us all free. Its not about shady politics anymore, its about who we choose to serve. The same choice is put before us that has been put before man since the fall of Adam. God or man? Serviam or non-serviam?

Father James M Gillis, Having Fun With Aquinas

2011-09-11T15:16:00.002-04:00

"You may perhaps be tempted to think that “devastation” is caused only by war, pestilence, famine, earthquakes, tornadoes, tidal waves, and such. The truth is that false philosophies have done more harm to mankind than all of these other scourges."

"Do I hear someone exclaim, “What! The Summa Theologica as a bed time book?” Why not?...I keep it there partly for the fun that is in it. Fun in St. Thomas? Yes..."

As you may know, given my prior article, I am having a wonderful time reading the works of Father James M. Gillis, C.S.P. Father Gillis was a no nonsense kind of guy, yet, he also had a great sense of humor. His love for Saint Thomas Aquinas shines through as you delve into his work. Below I have retyped an article that he published in the syndicated Catholic publication, Sursum Corda, titled, 'Finding Fun In St. Thomas Aquinas.' The brief article gives you a glimpse into the character of Father Gillis. His unflinching love for the truth did not put a damper on his sense of humor.

Finding Fun In St. Thomas Aquinas

By: Father James M. Gillis C.S.P.

(Reprinted from the book 'On Almost Everything.'

If there is one subject to which I have returned more often than to any other in this column, it is that of popularizing Catholic philosophy, especially the philosophy of St. Thomas Aquinas.

I have maintained that it can be done, and that it must be done if the people at large are to be saved from the devastating influence of false philosophies. Yes devastating. You may perhaps be tempted to think that “devastation” is caused only by war,pestilence, famine, earthquakes, tornadoes, tidal waves, and such. The truth is that false philosophies have done more harm to mankind than all of these other scourges. I mustn’t go off on that tangent. It would take not a column but a book.

So, back to the idea of making true philosophy popular. I say it can be done. One reason I think so it that it has been done- in spots. One instance is the book ‘A Companion to the Summa’ by Father Walter Farrell, O.P. It looks formidable- three big fat volumes thus far and more to come- but don’t let that frighten you. For over a year now I have had it at the head of my bed and have been dipping into it incessantly. Perhaps that’s why I don’t sleep so well.

Do I hear someone exclaim, “What! The Summa Theologica as a bed time book?” Why not? Abbe Hogan used to tell us, when I was a student at Brighton seminary, that the best spiritual reading of all was the Secunda Secundae of St. Thomas. And that was the original reason that I had it at hand the last thing at night. But now- I hope the Lord and Father Farrell with both forgive me- I keep it there partly for the fun that is in it. Fun in St. Thomas? Yes, in St. Thomas as well as Father Farrell presents him.

For example, would you expect to find what is at once a translation and a running commentary on the Summa, wit and humor and epigrammatic expression? There are there.

For example: speaking of the need of order in one’s life (order is fundamental with St. Thomas), Father Farrell says, “This does not mean that a badly cluttered desk or a pile of unwashed dishes in the sink is evidence of a satanic visitation.” I wonder if anyone else ever discovered in the Summa so much as a hint of unwashed dished in the sink.

On confusion of mind about things just and unjust: “The good intentions of champions of, euthanasia, industrial laissez faire and birth control may be an inspiring thing; but the damage they do to society is not lessened by their sweet simplicity.”

On telling the truth, or rather on telling fibs:”When a wife asks her husband, ‘How do I look?’ She is not seeking a diagnosis; prudence will teach him to restrict his comments to a few large and fairly obvious objectives.” However we must not fib too much or too often: “Imagine the turmoil if bus conductors, ticket agents and traffic policemen answered all questions with artistically fluent lies; indignation would be a timid word for the outburst of the explorer in search of Brooklyn who was deposited in the Bronx.”

Again: “No matter how much of a nervous release it may be for a man to commit murder, no matter how innocently he deprives a laborer from his wages, no matter what pleasure it may give him or how much good it may do the State to choke a crooner- these things remain unjust.”

“A doctor is seriously obliged to know something of surgery before he throws open his beautifully-equipped operating room to defenseless patients; a priest must know moral theology before he opens the confessional slide; and a wife should know something of the fundamentals of cookery before she serves up the products of her art.”

“It is easy to deal with a boaster: all we need do is listen, sprinkling our silence with appropriate exclamations, ‘Oh’ ‘Ah,’ ‘How Wonderful.’ But it is a much more serious problem to deal with the belittler who says, ‘I haven’t a brain in my head,’ or ‘Now wasn’t that a silly thing for me to do?”

The author of this unique and delightful interpretation of the mind of St. Thomas doesn’t hesitate to make a point by reference to a Saturday Evening Post cartoon, or to the drive, who on Pennsylvania Avenue in Washington or some other of its “slanting streets” starts in one direction and finds himself going in the other.

Or consider this quietly humorous sentence that ruins a whole philosophy: “Even a poet cannot lie long on the bosom of Mother Nature. The picture of nature as kindly mother and man as easily masterful are fictions of the French Encyclopedists concocted from the dreams by which they tried to escape the gutters of Paris. Nature is not they type of friend to be chosen for a stroll along a dark quiet street; at least not until she has been searched for weapons.”

In place of humor often Father Farrell throws in an epigram: “Pettiness in human nature is as revolting as squalor in a hospital or laughter at a funeral.”

Years ago I rad in a book on the priesthood a recommendation to pastors that they should not have the eyes of a hawk for the imperfections of their people. “There is great virtue,” the author said, “in the blind eye.” Father Farrell says, “We can see too much for our own good, particularly when we meander about the universe like a women who saunters through a department store “just looking.”

As of looking, so of speaking: “No one has the right to wader through the hours of the day scattering judgements with the same abandon with which he makes comments on the weather.”

And so it goes: wit, wisdom, humor. And the marvel of it is that as the author says (he is an author though he might call himself only a translator and expositor), “the whole work is not a book about the Summa, but the Summa itself reduced to popular language.”

I wouldn’t give the impression that all those pleasantries interfere with the solid worth of the amazing tour de force. On the contrary. Thus far three volumes have appeared. There are to be four. I know one reader who will pounce upon the remaining one when it appears with eager anticipation. For philosophy after this fashion is, as Plato said, “a dear delight.”

New York City Committing Racial Suicide

2011-09-11T12:37:00.003-04:00

The abortion rate for New York city is reported to be a staggering 41%! That means almost half of the future population is being snuffed out before they see the light of day. This is an absolutely disturbing statistic. The national abortion rate is about half of what is being reported for NYC, which is a sickening thought on its own. Any nation or state that kills the unborn is not going to last long, and any politician who thinks that abortion on demand is a good thing is not fit for office, so vote them out. There is nothing at this point and time as important as this issue when it comes to the survival of our country as we know it. This atrocity strikes at the heart of humanity and the at the heart of the family.

When we see something this heinous going on all around us, I pity the clergy and laypeople who are wasting their time and money addressing capital punishment. Lets get our priorities straight. If one has the time to write an appeal letter for every convicted killer about to receive a just punishment for their heinous crime, and yet one fails to write a letter every time an innocent life is snuffed out, they are committing a most grievous hypocrisy. I find it quite disturbing that we have diocesan conferences and meetings to abolish a just means of punishment for guilty murderous criminals, and yet we have so few to stop the crime of mass murder. Until I see letters going out from these bishops each day to abortion clinics and the politicians who are supporting murder, I cannot take seriously their stand or efforts to stop abortion, and therefore I cannot take them seriously in their efforts to curb capital punishment. Enough is enough. If Catholics were united and serious in their efforts to stop abortion, we could do it very quickly.

On Rick Perry: Why Abortion and The Death Penalty Are Worlds Apart

2011-09-09T21:24:00.001-04:00

Why Abortion and The Death Penalty Are Worlds Apart

Matthew James Bellisario 2011

    In today’s Catholic media there seems to be much confusion in the realm of moral theology. Those who have abandoned the Church’s long held tradition of using Thomistic principles to shed light on moral theology, have fallen into error and no longer are able to discern the nature of an act in regards to morality. The internet has made it easy for anyone to market themselves as experts in Catholic theology, and once they work their way into the pop-apologetics realm, they can cause havoc. Take the ignorant and arrogant Mark Shea for example, who regularly makes a fool out of himself on his blog. He pontificates in matters of moral theology, of which he has no business engaging in, because quite simply, he has no idea as to what he is talking about half the time. In one of his latest rants he has made the issue of the death penalty tantamount to murder. He has also slandered the governor of Texas, where he blatantly accuses him of taking innocent human life.

    The problem for Catholics who do not study their faith in any kind of depth, is that they may read a mountebank windbag like Shea and think that they are obligated to follow his lead when it comes to voting on moral issues. This can become a problem, since one may mistakenly think that the death penalty is just as important of an issue as abortion. With the damage done over the past four years by the Big Zero administration, it is of the utmost importance for Catholics to vote him out of office. It would be a mistake for a Catholic to vote for the Zero, or a candidate who cannot win, over a Republican candidate who is against abortion, and yet supports the death penalty. Just in case you are wondering, the death penalty, when used in proper proportion as a means of just punishment, by a legitimate government, is not in any way an immoral act. Abortion, which is murder, is always immoral, period.

    The nonsense that we hear today which puts abortion and the death penalty on the same moral playing field is causing a huge problem in the realm of how the average Catholic comprehends moral theology. For instance, we have charlatans who are saying that if you are pro-life, you cannot be in favor of the state using the death penalty. They also have a track record of calling capital punishment revenge killing, which was refuted by Pope Pius XII, who by the way had no issue with the death penalty. “When it is a question of the execution of a man condemned to death it is then reserved to the public power to deprive the condemned of the benefit of life, in expiation of his fault, when already, by his fault, he has dispossessed himself of the right to live.” So the Pius XII, like those popes before him, recognized that a person who takes a life can legitimately have his life taken in expiation for his crime. Likewise Pope Pius IV approved the following text, “The end of the Commandment is the preservation and security of human life. Now the punishments inflicted by the civil authority, which is the legitimate avenger of crime, naturally tend to this end, since they give security to life by repressing outrage and violence.”

    When we deal with the death penalty, we are usually dealing with guilty, heinous criminals. At least that is the case here in the US. We have very few criminals in the US being sentenced to death, and they are most often for the most heinous of crimes committed against innocents. Anyone with any common sense knows that the judicial system will never be 100%, but that obviously does not mean that we quit punishing criminals. I think it could also be argued that in the US, we have probably the lowest percentage of innocents being executed than ever before in the history of civilization. Prior civilizations simply did not have the means or even the system in place as we have, to verify the guilt or innocence of a man. The death penalty is rare in this country, yet the state should always have recourse to it for the redressing of heinous crimes.

    Finally, when we are dealing with crimes that have the ability to wreak havoc on society, such as multiple rape, murder, kidnapping etc, then the state has the right to use the means of the death penalty to restore the moral order. This has been the consistent teaching of the Church, and up until John Paul II’s encyclical, Evangelium Vitae, which cannot hold up to the scrutiny of a reductionist reading, this teaching has never been officially challenged. Evangelium Vitae must be read in light of tradition in order for it not to be a complete contradiction to every pope’s statement prior to his. In light of such a reading, this would make the future protection of society only a secondary reason for punishment, not a primary one. The primary being for retribution, or as Pope Pius XII wrote, “in expiation of his fault.” That means that the criminal is not being punished primarily for the reason of him not being able to commit the same crime in the future, but for the crime that he committed in the past.

Let me also be clear on a point before Shea and his blundering buffoons again misrepresent me as being a “maximum death” proponent. I am not saying that the state should ever omit the act of mercy from its system of punishment. There may be times when a person is repentant and sorry for his actions, which then the state may or may not decide to forgo the just sentence of death, but it is never required to do so. Without justice, there cannot be mercy. So if we read John Paul II’s encyclical in light of tradition, we can only hold his reasons for using the death penalty as secondary in nature. Just because we can keep a criminal behind bars does not necessarily mean that the death penalty cannot be used. The redressing of the crime, or the expiation of the criminal always comes first, for the restoration of the moral order. Keeping him incarcerated to prohibit him from committing the same criminal act again is only secondary in importance.

    In summary, the death penalty is not an intrinsically evil act, and when it is carried out by a legitimate government, in proper proportion, it is not at all immoral to support. The governor of Texas, Rick Perry has done nothing immoral by allowing his state to continue using the death penalty. It is also not his job to go and retry criminal cases and decide who is innocent or guilty, to decide whether or not a just punishment for a crime should be carried out. He is not judge jury and executioner. Mark Shea and his gidrules like Red Cardigan are slandering the character of Perry when they accuse of him intentionally killing innocent human beings. The death penalty and abortion are not equal issues of importance when it comes to voting on morality. The Pope has never said that the two are equal, and that has never been taught by any pope or the ordinary magisterium. One act deals with innocent human life, and the other with those who are guilty for heinous crimes. One “gives security to life by repressing outrage and violence”, the other an abomination before God, do not equivocate the two. One act is murder, the other is just punishment, and as Pope Pius XII said forgoes, “the right to life.” Do not be fooled by the “seamless garment” nonsense, where the proponents of this foolish idea equate the two and then accuse you of not being pro-life because you support the death penalty. Below are three prior articles that I have written on this subject, which are well documented. These “apologists” who are hailing themselves as experts on this matter of moral theology by virtue of cutting and pasting a couple of lines from the new Catechism and one encyclical, are doing a disservice to Catholic moral theology. I would recommend reading Dr. Steven Long’s article on Evanglium Vitae, if you want to educate yourself on the matter. Do not let the Big Zero stay in office because the likes of Mark Shea tell you that these two moral issues are of equal importance. Nothing can be further from the truth.

As the great moral theologian Ralph McInerny once wrote, "Some have said that retribution is no longer part of the church's view of punishment. This is false. Some will speak as if there is an equivalence to be made between the life of a guilty and condemned murderer and an unborn child, and seek, on that basis, to link opposition to abortion and opposition to the death penalty. This too is nonsense, incubated in a society which, permitting some citizens to take the lives of other innocent citizens, sees a moratorium on the death penalty as a moral imperative...But keep in mind that protecting society is only the secondary purpose of punishment. If, however rarely, the state's right to take the criminal's life is legitimately exercised, only recourse to the primary purpose of punishment--redressing the wrong--can justify it. It will not do to say that locking Adolph Eichmann up will prevent him from continuing with the Final Solution and give him a chance to repent. By his crimes, Adolph Eichmann had forfeited own life. One life compared with six million seems risibly disproportionate, but it is the most that could be exacted from Eichmann, and it justly was."

Keeping the Death Penalty Alive

The Corrupt Theology of the Seamless Garment

Fr. Barron and the Death Penalty: A Refutation

Discovering Father James M. Gillis C.S.P: A Guardian of Truth

2011-09-05T21:42:00.009-04:00

Discovering Father James M. Gillis C.S.P: A Guardian of Truth

By Matthew J. Bellisario September 2011

“A bold warrior, he did not hesitate to unsheathe his sword for unpopular causes when convinced of their truth or righteousness. Scorning cant and the mere weight of popular opinion, he struck out manfully for what he believed was right.” John A. O’Brien

    I hope you will be entertained as well as somewhat educated by this lengthy article which I have put together over the past couple of weeks. We have few heroic Catholic figures in America who are well known to us American Catholics today. Bishop Fulton Sheen is certainly one of the few. We most often learn about Catholics from other countries or Saints of the past who lived in Europe. Yet, there is very little attention given to our own Catholic heritage here in our own country. So it is my pleasure to bring you a bit of American Catholic history, much of which most of us younger folks may not be very familiar with. Catholicism in America has been through some tough times, and the man I am about to introduce you to went through a crucial and significant time as a Catholic priest in America. In fact, he was often thought of as the protector or guardian of America during the early and mid 20th century. He was a no-nonsense kind of guy. After reading his work, as well as two biographies about him, I have a great admiration for him. I want to introduce you to Father James M. Gillis C.S.P. I apologize for the length of this post, but in order to do justice to this priest, I could not abbreviate it.

    Every so often you come across a book that was meant just for you. I frequently visit the three Goodwill bookstores in my area and I find some great used Catholic books from time to time. Several weeks ago I ran across a book titled ‘This Our Day’, by Father James M. Gillis. I had never heard of the priest before, and I thumbed through the book skimming over the many articles that the work was comprised. The first article in the book was written in 1922 and the last in 1933. The book looked interesting, covering a series of topics related to Catholicism, and the problems American Catholics faced in this era. After I got the book home I did a bit of research on Father Gillis. The Paulist Father, James M. Gillis (1876-1957) was to my surprise, almost as popular a public figure for Catholics in America as the great Rev. Fulton Sheen. I quickly got on the internet and ordered the second volume in the series as well as his two biographies and a few of his other books. It is from these sources that I have composed this article, relying most heavily on Father James F. Finley’s work, yet I have also used Father Richard Gribble’s work to add in more detail. The bibliography follows the article.

    Fr. Gillis’ was most well known by Americans for his many magazine articles and radio programs. From 1928 to 1955 he consistently wrote a weekly column for syndicated Catholic newspapers in America. He was appointed the editor for ‘The Catholic World’ Paulist magazine. His voice was well known across the American airwaves, and he, along with the well known Fulton Sheen, for a time hosted the radio program, ‘The Catholic Hour’. He was also well known for his great preaching ability and he spanned the US and many foreign countries giving countless lectures and talks. For example, when he preached at Saint Paul the Apostle in New York in 1923 it is reported that the church was packed wall to wall to when he began his series, ‘False Prophets,’ and wall to wall meant that 4000 plus showed up to hear what he had to say. They stood in the aisles to hear him. He addressed figures such as Neitzche, Twain, Doyle, and Shaw. What I find appealing in reading Father Gillis’ writings is that he never minced words, and many American Catholics at the time loved him for it. Sadly his direct demeanor and willingness to stand up for the truth of Jesus Christ, no matter what the consequences were, are largely lost today among the Catholic clergy. Some may have disliked Father Gillis for his direct manner of writing and preaching, but one thing was certain, you always knew where he stood concerning what he wrote or spoke about. His yes was his yes, and his no was his no. His conviction for the truth was very clear.

    Father James Martin Gillis was born of Irish descent in Boston on November 12th of the year 1876. Gillis was one of four surviving children and his father was keen on bringing them up in the Catholic faith. Gillis often referred to the piety of his mother whom he always had a great affection for. Gillis’ father often quizzed his children on the Catholic faith and he insisted that they never neglect their prayers. James Gillis was always known for his keen intellect, even as a young student at Boston Latin. Eventually he advanced to a college education at St. Charles where he also excelled in leading his freshman class in overall average. He was known to have an excellent sense of humor, a great love for satire and yet, he was also known for his disgust for mediocrity as well as his serious posture for the love of truth. After one year at St. Charles, Gillis entered seminary in Brighton at St. John’s in September of 1896. While laboring at St. Johns he reports in his personal diary that a certain priest named Father Walter Elliiott, a civil war veteran and now a Paulist, caught his attention with a lecture. The lecture seems to have motivated him, Gillis wrote, “We had a talk today by Father Elliott, the celebrated Paulist. It was fine! He spoke for about an hour on the general topic of the Paulist work.... He explained how this immense country, most bountifully blessed in many ways by God, is peopled with millions who actually long for the truth and will listen to it.... It seems to him, then, that all of these favorable circumstances have been so placed by God, and for a purpose, the great purpose of the conversion of a mighty nation. In such a case our duty, he says, is obvious. Priests must be thorough apostles, they must be deeply penetrated with the conviction that the work is laid out for them and they must pursue that work with energy and devoted zeal.” What a motivating lecture that must have been for him. Gillis then continues, “It is to be feared that there are far too few priests such as he describes.... The impression left on me by his address was wonderful- for some time after I could hardly speak, being filled with admiration for the man and for his work.” This priest Elliott, and his lecture would be recounted many times by Father Gillis to lay people, religious, and priests over the course of his life, and in fact told the story when he was 80 years of age as if he just walked out of the auditorium where he had heard the lecture.

    Young Jim Gillis closed out his first year at seminary with one of the highest averages in his class. Over the next couple of years he discerned his priestly vocation, making lengthy novenas, begging God to show him where his vocation was to be. He went back and forth debating whether or not he should join the Paulists or serve his own diocese. He eventually received a call from his own bishop to receive tonsure. Following the advice of his spiritual director, he received tonsure at the hands of his bishop. But, as he spent more time investigating the Paulists, as well as hearing them preach, the more interested he became. Inspired by what he had seen and heard, Gillis later visited the Paulists for a retreat to continue his discernment. The vocation director bluntly asked Gillis what objections he had to joining the Paulists. After he answered, the vocation director told him that the reasons were trivial, and that he thought he was called to be a Paulist. After that moment his direction for the priesthood was sealed and he found himself in 1898 in Washington at the St. Thomas House beginning his training with the Paulists. In the seminary, he again encountered Father Walter Elliott during a seven day retreat, comprising of four lengthly lectures a day! Gillis writes, “Thank God for this retreat. I think I shall never forget it. I hope I may look back to it as the beginning of a new epoch wherein I shall have devoted myself to pursue faithfully my ideal of the priestly, religious, missionary life.” Likewise Gillis listened to the spiritual advice given by Elliott, “The fear of the Justice of God, the terror of hell, must never be banished from the spiritual life.” Gillis took this to heart, and his spiritual life was built upon this reflection. Gillis then entered Catholic University as a student, which was only eleven years old at the time, and struggling for survival. The Paulists were the first community to settle at Brookland, supporting the university by enrolling their students there for classes.

    While Gillis was at Catholic University a huge controversy surrounded the Paulists. I think it is important at this point to note the importance of the “Americanism” controversy that enthralled the Paulist community in 1899. Father Isaak Hecker, the founder of the Paulists, was quite outspoken about the compatibility of the American democracy with Catholicism. It was a heated debate in the Church at the time. Hecker had an idealistic view of converting America to Catholicism, yet remaining within the democratic system. This caused a controversy for those who had understood the destruction of the French Revolution and the French monarchy, as well as the loss of the Papal states. Debates ensued among the American bishops. Quickly Hecker was labeled as an Americanist. Hecker however has since been exonerated from any “Americanist” heresy, and it is well known that he was uncompromisingly Catholic. So much so, that his entire order was founded upon the principle of converting a Protestant nation to a Catholic one. Hecker instituted preaching requirements for the Paulist missions. Certain subjects had to be preached on including, salvation, mortal sin, death, and eternal damnation. It is also interesting to note that the particular issue concerning democracy vs monarchy is still a hot topic for debate among Catholics. I will not engage in that discussion here. Nonetheless, Gillis lived through this controversy, and it affected how he viewed America. To him it was mission territory in need of conversion, yet, he was all for the survival and prosperity of the nation as well. This however never excluded his demand for justice and right action in the nation. In fact, Gillis often criticized those in America and the world who denied God, in trade for a national self interest. He was prophetic in predicting the economic crash in 1929 and constantly denounced prosperity over morality and God. Jingoism, nor moral degradation was not an option in the mind of Gillis, whether it be in America or anywhere else.

    In 1900 James Gillis received the first of the major orders, the subdeaconship, and was officially admitted into the Paulists. One year later he was ordained to the priesthood at St. Paul’s Church in New York City. Miraculously his sick mother along with his father made it to the ordination ceremony where he gave his first blessing to them. In 1901 Father James M. Gillis, C.S.P. went back home for Christmas and celebrated his first Mass at St. Ceclia’s parish. He then returned to Washington where his superiors informed him that he would be continuing his education to earn theology degree as well as teach at the Paulist college. There he became well known for his great speaking ability. One of his best friends attested to this fact, as well as many others throughout his life. Back at St. Charles, Father Gillis had met a man who he remained friends with his entire life. He would also go on to become a priest, his name was Father Joseph Gibbons C.S.P. Fr. Gibbons was ordained in 1902, and he invited Fr. Gillis to preach at his first Mass. Father Gibbons recalls, “Jim came out for the sermon and I sat amazed to watch him- erect, self possessed, completely in control as he walked to the pulpit.... I think everyone thought he was ordained for years the way he stood in the pulpit and surveyed the crowd.... Never a word, never a gesture out of place. He was all preacher, even then in 1902, only seven months out of the seminary... almost perfect, I’d say.” This reputation was to follow him his entire life.

    In 1904 he received his Licentiate of Sacred Theology at Catholic University and then was transferred to Chicago to assist at the parish of Old St. Mary’s. He would remain there until 1907. There he experienced the life of a priest in the harshest of cities. He recalled going to sick calls in the red light district to give last rights to a man, and also to a women dying of consumption in a bad part of town, to which he gave her the sacraments. Those few years he labored to serve all who came to him in need of the Catholic faith. He spent hours teaching possible converts, debating those who looked for arguments against conversion. While in Chicago he also started going out on missions with an older Paulist priest who Gillis had previously known, Father Elias Younan, Syrian by nationality, Jesuit turned Paulist. This would be his mission band test, which would last until 1906. Soon Father Gillis’ gifts developed further on the mission band. In 1906 he was given a full schedule on the mission circuit, which would be one his favorite engagements.

    It is said that Father Gillis put his heart and soul into his missionary work, and his sermons were described as being zealous, and coming from the fire that was ignited years ago when he had first heard Father Elliott preach. Although things seemed to be going well, he was to learn, like of all us do, that not everything comes in a nice pretty box with a red bow on top. Father Gillis began to experience disapproval from his superior, and was even charged with being disobedient towards him, to which Gillis had no idea as to his notions, until his superior exploded in rage one day after Father Gillis, on his own authority, postponed a mission so that another Paulist priest could join him. He also wrote that his superior was dismayed by his sermons. After being severely chastised he wrote, “I am weary... chagrined, disappointed- and pained beyond expression... I must pound away tho’...And may God give me some spiritual courage and patience and tolerance- in all of which I have been woefully lacking...” Gillis pressed on with the same zeal and fire that he was known for, taking the reprimand, and moving on. It must also be noted that most Catholics loved his candid and straight talking nature, though he was to ruffle a few feathers during his lengthly service in the priesthood. During one of his first sermons in Chicago it is noted that he offended some actors and actresses in the congregation after criticizing the immorality of modern day programs, plays and the like. One even got up and left, offended by his stark plain preaching. Perhaps incidents like this are what landed him in trouble at times. In reading his journal, he reflects back on the style and means he used in delivering his sermons, and at times pondered toning down his delivery technique. Over the years he tried to refine his preaching style, but most Catholics always agreed that he always packed his preaching arsenal with a high powered charge. That was just his style and demeanor.

    Difficulties did not end for Father Gillis, and soon his mother’s health took a turn for the worst and his father and family struggled to pay for their house. He felt obligated to help them financially, to which he had none to offer. Gillis under great duress considered leaving the Paulists to help his family. It seems that Father Gillis felt guilty that he was not able to help them in such dire times. Keeping himself in prayer, he was soon to be appointed by his superiors to the master of students in Washington D.C. Although Father Gillis stuck with his vocation, it is said that he always felt a deep sorrow for not being able to help his family more than he did. Gillis was not so exited about going to teach, but he obediently accepted his new duties and again excelled in them. Priests who went through his classes spoke of the excellent job he did in teaching them theology and history. Father Gillis took seriously Pope Pius X’s Syllabus of Errors, and it is said that modernism never entered into the seminary classroom under Gillis’ watch. Gillis once wrote, “Compromise is always a mistake. Compromise works for a time. It is good politics. It is bad statesmanship, and it is bad- very bad religion.” In the mean time while taking on the duties at Washington, he also tried as best as he could to continue mission trips in the area. Many times however his dedication to his teaching duties often forced him to decline offers to preach. In 1909 his mother passed away and he was again distraught by the fate of his family. Due to the overload of preaching missions that the Paulists had on the books, Father Gillis then took upon himself more missions, and this quickly lead him to a health breakdown, where for 6 weeks he had to take time off. After recovering he resumed his teaching duties at Washington, and later he was sent to Lake Placid for summer rest. During that time he asked to be relieved of his duties at Washington, and he was then assigned full time to the New York Mission Band, which instilled a fire in him.

    Although excited to be back on the band, Gillis shares some of his mission experiences in his journal. It seems that he traveled to many isolated areas of the south where there were few Catholics and many anti-catholic bigots who tried to thwart his missions. He was told to leave by anti-Catholics in the town of Bentonville, Arkansas, where he ended up preaching between two red hot stoves in an old wood court house with a few men spitting tobacco on the stoves. Not disheartened after being declined to speak at the opera house, he went to the local newspaper who took to the underdog. Surprisingly he was then able to book the opera house, and for the situation he found himself in, had a well attended crowd. On Jan 31st, 1915, Gillis and his new counterpart Father Conway held a non-Catholic mission at Saint Paul’s in New York, where about 800 non-Catholics attended. It is attested that there were 90 converts to the true faith for this mission. The two priests put together a mission tour which ended in January 1917 at Saint Patrick’s Cathedral. After this, Father took ill and was forced to take a leave of absence for the next two years, during which he traveled from coast to coast preaching in 10 states. Yes that is correct. A sick priest on a leave of absence preaching unrelentingly for two solid years across the country. This was his “leave of absence.” Father Gillis was always known to be about God’s work. There was little time in his 50 plus years as a priest that he remained inactive. He ended his mission work in 1920 where he was then forced to take leave to South America so that he could truly get some rest. Father Gillis had a strong belief that a priest should always be in study. Always an avid reader, on the voyage he read 34 books, and used the time to meditate on the future of his priestly vocation. All of the God given talents and traits of Gillis came together and were cemented by all of the experience he had gained up to this point. The next 26 years would be shaped further by this Caribbean voyage, and his voice was soon to be heard by the masses. Not long after his trip, Father Gillis would soon be a household name for American Catholics, and furthermore he would be well known on the other side of the Atlantic as well. After his Caribbean vacation, everything would change for the great priest. As Father Gillis’ first biographer, Father James F. Finley C.S.P. wrote, “the world was in for a sound spanking.”

    In September of 1922 Father James Gills was made editor of the Paulist magazine, ‘The Catholic World,’ a position he would hold for 26 years. His articles would be read by millions of Catholics, and covered numerous topics. Father Gillis became even more popular after September 24th 1925 when the Paulist Fathers launched America’s 12th large high powered radio station, WLWL, with the voice of Patrick Cardinal Hayes. Father James Gillis followed on the air less than a month later. The radio show was broadcasted from the Paulist rectory. Satan of course wanted this radio show shut down, and in October of 1926 the radio band was taken from them and given to another company by the Department of Commerce. The Paulists would have to apply for another radio spot, which they then would have to share with another company, and in 1927 they resumed. The discrimination however continued, and the number on the dial changed sometimes two or three times a year, only to finally end up on 1100. Gillis, never one to mince words, delivered a scathing rebuke on the air, “The Paulists have been fretted and harassed and tormented with delays and reversals of judgement apparently to wear down our patience until we should cry ”quits.” But through it all we have labored at vast expense and with considerable self sacrifice to provide an educational and cultural program for persons of intelligence and good taste, for those recoil with disgust from the bunkum, the hokum, the vulgarity, the asininity, the crudity, the imbecility of the usual commercial programs...” The battle continued to rage through the 1930s. Unfortunately the Paulists lost the ongoing battle, and in 1937 their station was bought out from under them and the Paulist broadcasting venture came to an end. Father Gillis gave a somber final broadcast for Paulist radio on June 16th, 1937.

    During the time that the Paulist network was battling for its existence, The National Broadcasting Company had allowed Cardinal Hayes to set up the ‘Catholic Hour’ radio show, to which Father Gillis had also been a part of since 1930. In 1930 he gave a series of radio talks on the moral law which was very well received. By 1939 Gillis was as popular as Fulton Sheen was on the radio, and they even shared Sunday evening as a “one two punch.” Gillis was known for his November and December radio series, and many Catholics knew Christmas was around the corner when they heard his voice come over the airwaves in November. Times however were about to change when the “Catholic Hour Controversy” ensued in 1940. It was a huge event for Gillis, and it seems that he never really got over it. Father Gillis wrote a critical editorial in the ‘Catholic World ‘magazine concerning the third re-election of FDR. The title of the article was ‘The Third Term a Bugaboo?” Although Gillis had earlier in his career written positive things about FDR, this was not to be one of them. The article may have come and gone without much notice had it not been for someone reprinting the article and then mailing it out to “thousands and thousands of people.” As a result, ‘The Catholic Hour’ also received the handbills, and a huge controversy ensued over Gillis’ periodical. If you were an FDR fan you were enraged, if you were against his re-election you were emboldened. Just to give you a further idea as to Father Gillis’ writing style, here is an excerpt from his piece on FDR, which caused the huge controversy. “What interests and puzzles me is that the President should say and do a hundred things, which he is not called upon by his office to do, judging, condemning, challenging, threatening other nations, all but daring them to war, yet blandly declare before God and man, “I work and pray for peace.” It is a psychological riddle. I confess I don’t understand the man. A “dangerous,” “reckless,” “audacious,” “inconsistent,” “unpredictable” is no man to be three times President of the United States.” After this type of statement, you either loved him or hated him. As his presidency carried on, Gillis remained more critical towards the president, and the growing centralized government he was perpetuating. He condemned the New Deal and prophetically wrote, “Bureaucracy, if we permit it to live, will extend its tentacles, grasp all business large and small and strangle them, meanwhile darkening the waters (the governmental octopus, being a freak, is also a cuttlefish) so that no one can see what is going on.”

    Father Gillis continued to preach and write on many controversial topics, and he was sometimes asked in formal letters to rewrite some of the topics of his radio talks, which although he sometimes balked at, complied with. It appears that Gillis kept his radio topics focused mostly on the Catholic religion, and avoided any blatant political statements regarding party affiliation. However, like a good Catholic theologian, he knew very well that politics could never be separated from religion. On the air in 1941 he called it a psychological blunder to even to try and do so. (Click the link, here to listen one of his radio shows from 1941, just when Pearl Harbor was bombed. The audio is a bit ragged, but what a neat slice of American Catholic history!) The radio show however equated his written articles, sometimes focused more heavily on political philosophy, particularity the one criticizing FDR and his policies, with his radio presence on their program. In 1942 after serving 12 years on the Catholic Hour, Father Gillis was not invited back on the show. In fact, until he wrote a letter asking what the status of his invitation was, he was offered no reason as to not being invited back. Finally in a written exchange he was given the reason as to his dismissal, which was being too political. Father Gillis responded by defending his position, pointing out that he never violated the rules of the radio program. He also never sought to push any particular political party per se on air or in writing. He merely applied Catholic principles to the moral dilemmas that the country found itself in, on the brink of a world war. If these included addressing those in the political realm, then so be it. Father Gillis was all for speaking the truth, no matter who it offended. Even if you did not agree with his position, you had to admire his tenacity and conviction.

    Gillis would be well known for his anti-war stance in general, and thought that it should always be of last resort. Although he was at first opposed to America’s intervention in the second world war, after the 1941 bombing of Pearl Harbor, he never once questioned America’s involvement. In fact after the bombing he wrote, “We have tried hard to keep out. We have failed, not because any lack of sincerity, or of honest vigor of argument, but because of that wicked and stupid action of the Japs in the Pacific. Now that we are in we must fight with honor and chivalry.” Gillis was now sidelined from the ‘Catholic Hour’ for no good reason other than giving his strong opinions in the realm of political philosophy, which was in my opinion, his duty as a priest to do. The radio station’s reasons for dismissal appear to be quite unfounded and this obviously angered Gillis. He readily prepared a sharp response, containing the written correspondence between the radio station and himself, along with a complete defense of his position. Gillis was not one to shy away from a debate, and he was not going down without a fight. His order got wind of his forthcoming response and asked him to refrain. Like a well grounded Catholic priest, he also sought advice from his spiritual director, who told him not to print it. He then sought advice from his good friend Monsignor Gibbons, who read the article and told him that he was completely justified and correct about what he had written. After saying that, he then told Father Gillis, “You shouldn’t print it.” Gillis responded, “That is what my spiritual director told me.” So Father Gillis humbly took it on the chin, never printed his defense, and never again spoke on ‘The Catholic Hour.” Father Gillis did continue for a bit on two other radio stations for a few years after, but never to the popularity that he had on the ‘Catholic Hour.’

    Father Gillis however was not nearly done with his mission as priest, and he continued on until 1948 as the editor of ‘The Catholic World’ magazine, dealing with the most controversial topics of his day, as well as maintaining an active preaching schedule. Being the editor of ‘The Catholic World’ really meant that he was the primary author of the editorial as well. He was not afraid to engage in debate and give his opinion based on the moral truths as instilled by his Catholic faith. His articles covered everything from agnosticism, atheism, prohibition, prize fighting, corruption in baseball, literature, contraception, communism, the degradation of the family, the over-centralization of the federal government, etc. He was outspoken against the use of contraception and often referred to it as “racial suicide.” One of his subjects of focus was also on international relations, and between the years of 1925 and 1948 he published 73 articles dealing with relations between America, Russia, Italy and Germany. Among these articles he addressed figures such as Hitler, Stalin, Mussolini and FDR. What I find so interesting in reading his articles is that you can get an idea of how Catholics looked upon these particular times and events. He wrote of Mussolini in 1926, much to the chagrin of Catholics who supported him, “The dictator is acting like a madman... His bulldozing and fire eating, his particularly ill-times militarism, his foolish and frantic speeches... make Kaiser Wilhelm, even in his most Gott-und-ich days, seem like a pacifist... If the bulldozing dictator is not quite crazy, he will come out of his frenzy. But if he continues to plunge along, like a ma buffalo, with wild mouthings and threats of violence, he will ruin Italy and perhaps bring on another horrible European war.... I hate to assume the role of a prophet, and most of all, a prophet of woe. But, barring the entrance of some entirely unforeseen element into the Italian situation, Mussolini’s regime will end in something akin to disaster.” So Father Gillis’ words rang true as we now know what fate awaited Italy and Mussolini only a short time later.

    Likewise Gillis lambasted Stalin and Hitler along with Mussolini. “Follow me,” says Stalin. “Not him but me,” says Mussolini. “Neither of them but me,” says Hitler. Medicine men! All of them. Mountebanks! As a cure for the ills that afflict the world we might as well carry a horse-chestnut in the pocket, kiss a rabbit’s foot or rub a hunchback’s spine. What we really need is a John the Baptist to run up and down through the nations crying out, “The ax is laid to the root of the tree. Repent or parish...” When Hitler first came on the seen Gillis compared him to Julian the Apostate. What a treasure it is to read a priest with such conviction! Can you imagine a priest today on radio or television coming out and saying, “Obama, what a medicine man! A man who promotes the slaughter of innocent children is not fit to be a President.” They would be removed in an instant. It must be noted that through all of the turmoil and controversy that surrounded Father Gillis, the Paulists never disowned him or shut him down. Even when the order was threatened to be expelled from Rome by Mussolini, because of the harsh criticism Gillis unleashed upon him, they did not shut him up. They let him preach the truth in season and out of season. This is something we rarely see today. If a priest was to make a stir today as Gillis did back then, you would never see or hear from them again.

    Another impressive feat of Father Gillis was his unique ability to generate new material for his articles and talks. Rarely one to repeat any of his lectures, he was always compiling new information for new articles or talks. His research was impeccable and he was always prepared to repel hecklers who may engage him in debate. Father Finley tells of his impressive file drawer, which contained many of his preaching topics, kept together almost like a diary of sorts. The Paulists were required to keep a preaching log. This was one of the requirements that Father Hecker put in place for his order. Father Finley said there was folder after folder containing typed or handwritten copies of the topics he had given talks on. Finley writes, “The volume of work that this suggests is incalculable. Even allowing for the repetition of a speech or editorial on a couple of occasions, the number of single and different compositions is hardly believable.” Father Gillis had articles syndicated across the entire US. In fact, the columns he wrote in “Sursum Corda” counted 1368 articles treating all different topics of discussion. He did this over the course of 27 years for this particular publication! This is just for one of his columns, not including those written for his own magazine, ‘The Catholic World.’

    It would be a mistake however to view Father Gillis as only speaking and writing on the hot button issues of the day. Much of his work of course was tied to his missionary zeal to preach the Catholic faith. His efforts were focused on converting Protestants, whom he felt were so far off in dogma that they even denied Christ’s divinity. At one of his missions he preached, “I have said before- I repeat it now, and I stand prepared to prove my statement, that here in America Congregationalist, Presbyterian and Baptist, if not Lutheran clergymen, in spite of the gospel, in spite of the creeds of their churches, in defiance of all the disastrous consequences of this belief, have rejected the cornerstone of Christian doctrine, the Divinity of Jesus Christ our Savior.” Gillis also frequently refuted Protestants of the day, and often referred to popular Protestant preachers like Billy Sunday as “misguided mountebanks.” Many Protestants however respected Gillis’ tenacity and open criticism, and as result he gained converts. Later in his life he wrote four books on the spiritual life, two of them being ‘Son Near is God’ and ‘This Mysterious Human Nature.’ Throughout his priesthood he always recommended solid reading material to Catholics and Protestants alike for the salvation of their souls.

    No summary of Father Gillis would be complete without recognizing his attention to prayer, and his life dedicated to holiness. From the very beginning of his priesthood he had written about the importance of the holiness of life for a priest. He stuck to this conviction. Many of his peers called him a priest’s priest. He was dedicated to perfection and frequently mulled over his perceived faults, and then asked God for aid to overcome them. His mentor Father Elliiott once said, “Gillis is a star, he’s as bright as he can be, and he is so pious he shames me.” His identity of the priesthood was closely aligned with the great Henry Cardinal Manning of England. It is said that he often quoted from Manning’s book, ‘The Eternal Priesthood.’ His attention given to the celebration of the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass was second to none, and his sister attested to the fact that he celebrated his Masses throughout his life as if each was his first and his last. His reverence for the Mass was well known among his fellow priests as well.

    It is also a fact that Father Gillis suffered from various illnesses throughout his life and suffered from them quite often. In the later years of his life he suffered from acute arthritis and in 1955 he finally gave up writing his syndicated articles all together when he resigned from his column in ‘Sursum Corda.’ He spent the last years of his life assisting seminarians and young priests in the Paulist house, frequently helping them in the formation of their priesthood. He also continued to preach publicly throughout the 50s. In 1951, on the celebration of his fiftieth year of his priesthood, he was given an honorary degree of Sacred Theology from the Angelicum in Rome. The Very Reverend Emanuale Suarez, Master General of the Dominicans gave him the award in the presence of Francis Cardinal Spellman at St. Paul’s in New York. Fulton Sheen praised the Father Gillis as being a hard man to follow in the pulpit. In his final years his acute arthritis hospitalized him and a stroke left him walking on a cane. In 1955 Archbishop Richard Cushing of Boston announced that an information center would be built in honor of Father Gillis on Park St. in Boston. He said, “I know of no better way of perpetuating the unique contributions that Father Gillis has made to the Church of this country than to call the proposed new Center, ‘The Father Gillis Catholic Center.” Despite his physical setbacks Father Gillis completed four books of spiritual depth in his final years before he left this world. In 1957 after suffering severe heart attack, it seemed that once again he may recover and continue on possibly publishing yet another book, but this was not to be. On March 14th 1957 Father James M. Gillis C.S.P would pass into the presence of the Lord after 56 years as a hard working priest.

    It has been a pleasure so far in reading the biographies, articles and work of Father Gillis. His writing style is an absolute pleasure to read, and I highly recommend getting your hands on them. There are a few of his books available on Amazon, most of them out of print. There is one biography that is in print (Guardian of America) which I found to be a bit more critical, yet more detailed and gives more background than the first written by Father Finley. His two volume set titled, ‘This Our Day’ is fairly easy to find online at used books stores, which is a compilation of articles he had written between 1922 and 1949. Whether or not you agree with all of his articles, there is much you can learn about the history of the American Catholic Church from the 1920s through the early 1950s from his work. Likewise it is a breath of fresh air to see a priest with such conviction and tenacity as to speak the truth, despite whether or not it was going to tick someone off. The foes which Father Gillis fought and warned against in his time are even more formidable in our day and age. He once said on his radio show, “The battle ground is the campus, the classroom, the psychological laboratory, the newspapers, books, magazines, the stage, the screen, the law courts, the divorce courts, the legislatures, State and Federal. It is computed that we are fighting on 69 fronts. We must fight on 6900 fronts anywhere, everywhere that the subversive forces of materialism, immoralism and irreligion are to be found.” I say damn the torpedoes, give us another Father Gillis! For the state that we find our culture and nation in today is in dire need of one.

Bibliography

James Gillis Paulist: James F. Finley C.S.P. 1958
Guardian of America: Richard Gribble, C.S.C 1998
False Prophets: James M. Gillis 1925
This Our Day Vol I and II: James M. Gillis 1933 and 1949
So Near Is God: James M. Gillis 1953

Article Puts Germans at the Top of the CDF List

2011-09-04T13:23:00.003-04:00

I have tried my best today to refrain from negativity, yet this recent article has gotten the best of me. Stay tuned, I do have an extensive article coming up which is more positive! That being said, here it is. There has been talk over the last month or so regarding who will fill the role for the prefect of the CDF. With Cardinal Levada set to retire several names have come up as to who will fill the role next. A recent article named two Germans as being at the top of the list. Both are quite young, and if given the role, they could be there for years to come. One of the candidates named is Cardinal Christoph Schönborn of Vienna. This would certainly be disastrous to have such a sloppy theologian heading one of the most powerful offices in the Church. Well known for his irreverent liturgical practices (Watch this video as he makes a complete mockery of the Mass) and his sloppy modernist style of theological writing, he would possibly bring theological confusion in the Church to an unprecedented level. It is said that the Pope favors the German theologians who he has befriended over the years, which is shame. This has in my opinion been a weakness for Pope Benedict XVI. What other reason would he keep a feeble, apathetic character like Schonborn hanging around so close? It seems that he surrounds himself with German theologians, which is in my opinion promulgating a very narrow theological system, much of which is not based on Thomistic principles. Modernism has been a trademark of Schonborn. For example, in 1996, it is reported that Cardinal Schönborn on Austrian TV said that someone who had AIDS may use a condom as a "lesser evil," but he quickly cautioned, "no one could affirm that the use of a condom is the ideal in sexual relations." Such is the track record of the sloppy Janus face Cardinal, who in my opinion has no business being a Cardinal or Archbishop, let alone the head of the CDF. Hopefully the Holy Father will pass him over without a second thought.

The other candidate mentioned, Cardinal Gerhardt Ludwig Muller of Regensburg, I am not very familiar with. I do know that he is very familiar with Pope Benedict's theological positions since he is appointed to compile all of his works. He has also has served within the CDF for a time, and has an extensive theological writing career with over 100 scholarly works concerning dogmatics, ecumenism, the priesthood and other subjects relating to the faith. Muller was outspoken when the excommunications of the SSPX were lifted by the Pope, wanting the SSPX seminary of Zaitzkofen closed down. He is also quoted as saying, "The four bishops of the SSPX should all resign..." He has worked extensively on the ecumenical front, yet I have little information on his particular theological positions. We will have to see how this all shakes out, but let us pray that the Holy Father makes a solid choice.

Catholicism and Nostalgia.

2011-09-02T02:22:00.001-04:00

Catholicism and Nostalgia.

Matthew James Bellisario 2011

    There is a tendency today among traditional Catholics to look back upon the past as if the Church has been lost in time, and I have been guilty of this as well. Sure it is sometimes easy to get discouraged by the mess we see today in the Church. But, it is as if many today are lulled into a fanciful trip down memory lane when it comes to the Church. They long for the golden days of the Church where Popes excommunicated heretics and burned apostates at the stake. They speak only of what their minds perceive the middle ages to have been, and how bad the Church is today compared to the good old days. Yet, the Church is a living entity, and she knows her own history better than any one individual. Sure times are bad today, but haven’t they always been? Knowing what little I know about the good old days, I know few, if any Catholics, including myself, who would have hacked it back in the middle ages. One day away from the internet, the iPod, the air conditioning, the nice comfy clothes, the hot meals, the hot water, the easy 5 Hail Mary penances and the 30 minute liturgies, and most of us wouldn’t have lasted very long back in the “good old days”. Many wouldn’t have made it through Mass because there wasn’t a cry room for the kids. How many times have I seen people get upset, looking back scathingly upon a poor mother who’s child made a peep during Mass? They wouldn’t have made it 10 minutes in the middle ages back in one of the crowded Cathedrals in Italy. Many of us who rightfully treasure the past, need to take care not to get caught up in the wiles of nostalgia.

    What is the point of my brief article? Obviously it is not to criticize those who came before us, for they set before us a high standard, one in which we are to strive to obtain today. We have their great wisdom and accomplishments printed on the pages of the many books we own. We rightfully seek to understand the great theologians like Saint Thomas Aquinas, yet I am sure Aquinas would be disappointed if we just reveled in his glory and accomplishments, and neglected our own time. It does no good to know Aquinas and not put his wisdom to use in our lives within the Church today. To be relevant, we too like Saint Thomas must reside in the living wisdom of the Church. Sure, we can criticize problems today, and there are times to do so. But if we become obsessed with this it does little good. A pinch of salt is plenty for the pot of soup, no? The efforts we put forth to make the Catholic Church relevant today is worth more than a trip down memory lane where we compare the Pope of today to one of yesteryear. There is only going to be one Pius IX and one Gregory the Great. There is no way to roll the clock back. We have what we have now concerning the Church because it is in God’s divine providence. The Catholic Church does not consist of a nostalgic trip back to the halcyon days of old. It is not a religion of yesteryear. No, the Church today is the same Church as it was back in the “good old days.” We can either get on the ship and paddle like those who came before us, or we can sit back on the shore and reminisce about the bygone days where everything was “perfect.”

    The Church still stands strong preaching the Gospel to the world, despite the heretics within and without who try to subvert it. She is the only one who condemns the foolish immorality of contraception, divorce and the like. Where the impostors have miserably failed, the true Church has stood erect and strong, yes even today. She understands humanity and its relationship with God because she was sent to foster that relationship through the Sacraments, the liturgy and in her preaching, all in the Divine Person of Jesus Christ. When the Pope speaks, guess what? Everyone listens. Why do the pathetic Protestants take the time to attack the Pope when he speaks, if he means nothing? According to them he is nothing, yet many of them go out of their way to talk about and criticize this great “nobody.” Do we really care what Billy Graham says? How about the “great” Reformed” apologists R.C. Sproul, the pathetic “apologist” James White, or the anonymous pitiful Turretin Fan? No one cares what they say because they matter little to the world, and their opinions also mean little. They have no bearing on the souls of men. Their high opinion of themselves that accompanies their ramshackle theology poses little threat to Satan and his meddling minions. These men are on his side. They are his puppets and they serve their master well. When they speak no one listens because they simply do not matter. The world sees them as no threat. Of course I will not paint the Orthodox in the same light as the Protestants, but does the world scoff at the Patriarch of Constantinople? With all due respect to the Orthodox, few in the world even know who he is. Yet, when the Pope speaks, everyone listens because he is the Pope.

Let us not forget the great Catholics who came before us, but let us not dishonor them either by acting as if our time is so much worse than theirs. They had their bad Popes, evil heretics and scandals that stunk to high heaven. We all say our age is the worst. I think many of them would beg to differ. Let us not insult them by acting as if the Church is dead and gone today, and only alive in the nostalgic memories of men. The Church will survive the turmoil it finds itself in every age, including this one of grave scandal and apostasy. The only question we have to answer is if we are going to be on board the ship or not, because it is’t going to stop for us, and it isn’t going back in time for us. What matters is what we all do now, and how we are going to live our Catholic faith today. Are we going to live our faith and convert the world one person at a time, with the same grace that was offered to the Saints who came before us? Or are we going to live our lives looking over our shoulders wishing that we were more like them? The choice is before all of us.

Cardinal Donald Wuerl Takes Money From Catholics To Support Episcopal Heretics

2011-09-01T17:58:00.000-04:00

The Catholic martyrs of England have been mocked today as the Cardinal of D.C., Donald Wuerl gave 25,000 dollars given by Catholics to his care, to the heretical Episcopal Church. Apparently the Washington National Cathedral was damaged in the earthquake last week, and now the dear Cardinal has given them 25,000 dollars form his Archdiocese to help repair the center for heretical worship. "It was with both shock and sadness that I learned of the damage sustained by Washington National Cathedral," said Wuerl in the press release. "The National Cathedral holds a special place in the hearts of all of us in Washington. So many recognize it as a national house of prayer, and indeed its magnificent Gothic towers are a reminder of our constant need to raise our hearts in prayer to God in the midst of all of our daily preoccupations." To hell with the Catholic families who can't afford a good education in D.C., or put food on their tables. What about the many beautiful Catholic parishes being closed in the US? What a waste of 25,000 dollars given by Catholics under his care, to support a heretical sect, not worthy of being called a "Church." If that was money that I gave to his Archdiocese, I would not be a happy camper.

Members of faith communities locally in Washington and across the country have rallied around Washington National Cathedral in its time of need following last week's magnitude-5.8 earthquake. In the first gesture of a faith community's financial support, Cardinal Donald Wuerl sent a check for $25,000 on behalf of the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Washington to help toward the costs of repair work, according to a press release. Read entire article here.

Who Will Head the CDF?

2011-08-31T01:24:00.002-04:00

Pope Benedict XVI Continues to Push Female Altar Servers

2011-08-27T01:35:00.001-04:00

An article in German just came out concerning the Pope's use of female altar servers. It appears that he will use them in his upcoming papal visit to Freiburg in September. Given the problems that this practice has caused in regard to vocations to the priesthood, as well as theological continuity, I find it a bit perplexing as to why the Pope sees this practice as a benefit to the Church. Although in 1994 a change was made allowing for female altar servers in the Church, as far as I know not even John Paul II used them in his papal visits. Correct me if I am wrong here. I could find no papal Mass by JPII using them. Again, one wonders why Pope Benedict XVI, who is largely viewed as being much more conservative regarding liturgy, has pushed this envelope even further.

If we look back into history we see several Popes condemning this practice. It seeped into the Greek Church back in the mid 1700s, and was out rightly condemned by Pope Benedict XIV. An encyclical of Pope Benedict XIV promulgated on July 26, 1755 titled Allatae Sunt, addressed problems with the Oriental Churches. Female servers was one of the problems addressed. Pope Benedict XIV plainly referenced two of his predecessors who also condemned this practice, "Pope Gelasius in his ninth letter (chap. 26) to the bishops of Lucania condemned the evil practice which had been introduced of women serving the priest at the celebration of Mass. Since this abuse had spread to the Greeks, Innocent IV strictly forbade it in his letter to the bishop of Tusculum: "Women should not dare to serve at the altar; they should be altogether refused this ministry." We too have forbidden this practice in the same words in Our oft-repeated constitution Etsi Pastoralis, sect. 6, no. 21." So we have here at least three Popes calling this practice, "evil" and an abuse, yet we have the Pope today plainly contradicting his predecessors. I am aware that this is an issue of praxis, and is not strictly dogmatic in nature, nonetheless it seems to me to be quite perplexing for the Pope to be furthering this practice rather than taking it back in the other direction. Any thoughts?

Freiburg im Bresgau, 8.26.11 (KIPA) The Vatican has given a green light for female altar servers for the papal visit to Freiburg (Germany). Nine female and eight male servers from the Freiburg Archdiocese will minister at the youth prayer and the closing liturgy on September 24-25, the diocese announced on Friday. It is customary that no female serves are used at papal liturgies in the Vatican. By contrast, there were female servers at the liturgies for Benedict XVI’s visit to Bavaria in 2006.

Link to German article.

Saint Augustine Saved From the "Reformed" Hijacker Turretin Fan

2011-08-25T21:52:00.001-04:00

If you are into Catholic apologetics and not familiar with the blog, Spes mea Christus, then you should be. It is an apologetics blog penned by Paul Hoffer. In his latest couple of posts he has completely dismantled a false claim made by the "Reformed apologist" who goes by the cover name of Turretin Fan. Turretin Fan is one of those guys who loves to cut and paste a few things from the internet, then proclaim he is an expert on the subject, which unfortunately happens to pertain to Catholicism much of the time. I have debated Mr. Fan on the topic of Sola Scriptura, as well as a host of other topics over the past several years. Mr. Fan has been threatening to debate Mr. Hoffer on Saint Augustine for quite sometime, and I have been eagerly awaiting. The topic at hand is whether or not Saint Augustine believed in the Catholic doctrine concerning the Eucharistic consecration, or what is now understood by the term transubstantiation. So far Paul has written two outstanding, in depth articles on the subject, which completely dismantle Mr. Fan's claim that Saint Augustine did not hold to the Catholic teaching on the matter. If you are interested in these types of debates then I encourage you to check the two latest articles out. You are sure to learn a ton from reading them.

What Saint Augustine, Bishop, Saint and Doctor of the Catholic Church Actually Held Pertaining to Transubstantiation: A Response to Turretinfan [Parts One and Two]

What Saint Augustine, Bishop, Saint and Doctor of the Catholic Church Actually Held Pertaining to Transubstantiation: A Response to Turretinfan [Part Two Continued].

Saint John of Avila: Next Doctor of the Church?

2011-08-25T21:09:00.002-04:00

It appears that Saint John of Avila will possibly be the 34th Doctor of the Church. I do not know much about him aside from what I have read about him on the net. I have a book coming in from Amazon so I can do a bit more research. He seems to have been a huge reformer of the corrupt priesthood of his time. Is this possibly one of the Holy Father's means of instituting a reform in today's Church?

"St. John of Avila was a parish priest and theologian in 16th century Spain who exercised some influence over ideas concerning the reform of priestly reformation at the Council of Trent. Avila linked the priesthood closely to the Eucharist and regarded holiness as the preeminent quality of a priest, who must serve as a mediator between God and man. To this end, he recommended painstaking selection of candidates followed by rigorous spiritual and intellectual formation within a community. For Avila, renewal of the priesthood demanded the priest's conformity to Christ as both Good Shepherd and High Priest...

To bring about reform of the clergy, Avila wanted the bishops to remedy the two root causes he saw for the ruin of the priesthood: the acceptance of men unsuited for the priestly vocation and the poor formation given to candidates.

The cause of the ruin of the clergy has been the entrance of worldly people who have no knowledge of the grandeur of the state they are undertaking and whose hearts are on fire with earthly ambitions. Once they enter, they are formed in an atmosphere of false liberty without discipline of study or virtue.

The first step that Father Avila recommended to the bishops was that they take great care in the choice and acceptance of men to be prepared for ordination. He stressed that no unsuitable candidate should be accepted for the priesthood under any condition, no matter who supported his entrance. In fact, entrance into the ecclesiastical life should be made difficult so that those unsuited for such a lofty vocation would not want to enter. Avila compares the situation in his own day to that at the time of Jeroboam in the Northern Kingdom of Israel when anyone who wanted could become a priest (1 Kgs. 13:33). In the same way, many bishops and superiors accepted and ordained men who had no sound understanding of the priestly state or who desired it for worldly reasons. Avila complains that some candidates conceive of the priestly life as compatible with the concupiscence of the flesh and the eyes and the pride of life. "Because of this, we are as we are," he says. And because of this, reform requires that the entrance to the ecclesiastical state be guarded and that only those qualified to live it well be accepted into it. To take any other is to cause great harm to the Church. The Body of the Lord in the Eucharist will be unworthily treated by such priests and the holy Mystical Body will be greatly harmed as "those who were supposed to be shepherds turn themselves into wolves and make carnage in the souls of those they were supposed to bring to life."

The most important qualification for candidates is the intellectual and spiritual capacity required to profit from the formation and education for which the Council was to provide. If bishops are going to accept men without this capacity, then Avila comments that they should change the topic of their discussion from formation to that of "the cultivation of fields in barren lands." He is not saying that all candidates must be capable of the highest academic achievement, but that all should see the importance of study and be willing to engage in it according to their capacity. The lack of spiritual capacity is a far greater hindrance. At all costs, men who enter "to have something to eat without having to work for it," must be refused. The Christian people pay dearly when such men enter in response not to God's call, but to "the call of money and an easy life...

He insisted that, before ordination, candidates undergo a rigorous program of spiritual and intellectual formation in accord with the Gospel and the Church's teaching, and that they continue to grow in these areas after ordination. Any review of the formation and education of priests today can only profit from being so strongly reminded of the nature of the priesthood and the indispensable role of the priest in the sanctification and salvation of the members of the Church. "

From Sr. Joan Gormley's article in the Homiletic & Pastoral Review April 2004

There are also other candidates which may be considered in the future. So far thankfully no mention of Newman.