How Many Popesplainers Can Dance on the Head of a Pin? – “Pope Francis recently added yet another item to the long list of doctrinally problematic statements he has issued through the course of his pontificate.” The popesplainer’s safety dance (Edward Feser)
Lost Chesterton Essay – “The essay in the Strand is linked to Chesterton’s membership in the Detection Club, which Ahlquist in his introduction calls a “secret society of mystery writers … who met regularly in a private room at L’Escargot” in Soho, in central London.” Lost GK Chesterton essay about detective stories published for first time (The Guardian)
Crossing Ideological Wires – “In the New York Times, Michelle Goldberg has described me as ‘the right-winger calling for social democracy.’ Meanwhile, one of my many critics on the Reaganite right has labeled me a ‘pro-life New Dealer.’” The Workers and the Church (Plough)
Prefect Failure? – “The prefect for the Dicastery of Bishops, Cardinal Robert Prevost, has been publicly accused of never having opened a canonical case into alleged sexual abuse carried out by two priests in the Diocese of Chiclayo, Peru, which he led from 2014 until 2023, when he was called to Rome.” Cardinal Prevost never investigated abuse claims, alleged victims say (The Pillar)
AI and Ourselves – “What a machine does is not a matter of ‘intelligence.’ It simply uses a series of algorithms for logical calculations to achieve programmed results.” AI, Its Promise and Its Peril (What We Need Now – Substack)
Synod’s Concrete Proposals – “The October gathering could lead to several big changes that impact daily life in the Catholic Church.” 7 Ways That the Synod on Synodality Can (Still) Change the Church (National Catholic Register)
Diocese of San Diego Disses Homeschoolers – “A newly issued policy in the Diocese of San Diego forbids homeschool groups from using space at area parishes, while allowing parishes to rent space to non-Catholic schools on a case-by-case basis.” San Diego diocese bans homeschool groups on parish properties (The Pillar)
Vatican Chastises the U.N. – “The future should be constructed on a foundation of principles, including the inherent, God-given dignity of every individual, the promotion of integral human development, the equality and sovereign dignity of all nations, and the establishment of trust between them.” Cardinal Pietro Parolin Delivers Statement at the Summit of the Future (Permanent Observer Mission of the Holy See to the United Nations)
Garrigou-Lagrange and Sanctifying Grace – “This theology may come and go out of style, but it cannot ever be truly defeated or irrelevant or antiquated, for its source and end is Victory, Being, and Eternity Itself.” Vatican II and the Lasting Influence of Garrigou-Lagrange’s Mystical Theology (Church Life Journal)
Delayed Benefits – “We grow when we decouple ourselves from obsessions over outcomes. Detachment permits the denial of the insatiable beast of instant gratification in exchange for joy in the present wait.” The Rebuilding Year (Theology of Home)
(*The posting of any particular news item or essay is not an endorsement of the content and perspective of said news item or essay.)
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@ How Many Popesplainers Can Dance on the Head of a Pin?
It happens only very rarely, it is possible for popes to make serious doctrinal errors when not speaking ex cathedra (Feser). And certainly Francis I has the record. Popesplainers can’t bring themselves to embrace the reality that a pope outside of divinely instituted infallibility exclusive to ex cathedra pronouncement he can manipulate, deceive, and outright lie. On that score I had a vision. Or was it a daydream? It went like this.
All of us expect [or expected] to see fireworks, great happenings and wonders [although that black may be white and good evil is wondrous indeed], Christians put to death, others rejoicing. Well, it seems it’s happening but not quite so enlivened as expected. Who would’ve thought a kindly [generally speaking] old man kissing babies kissing feet kissing off goodbyes to his enemies surrounding himself with the fallen outcast, a man of extraordinary empathy for the disordered and time forgotten Earthmama. Who would have thought?
Garrigou-Lagrange and Sanctifying Grace – “This theology may come and go out of style, but it cannot ever be truly defeated or irrelevant or antiquated, for its source and end is Victory, Being, and Eternity Itself.” Vatican II and the Lasting Influence of Garrigou-Lagrange’s Mystical Theology (Church Life Journal)
CWR, a few years ago, interviewed Matthew Minerd, Prof. of Philosophy and Moral Theology at Ss. Cyril and Methodius Byzantine Catholic Seminary. Minerd has translated a number of works by Garrigou-Lagrange. He has also translated a lovely pastoral sort of lecture-treatise, “The True Christian Life” on prudence, divinization, religion, and prayer by Ambrose Gardeil, a theologian who influenced and ??taught Garrigou. It is LOVELY, with chapters on supernatural self-government and self-education accessible and valuable to the non-theologians among us.
I fortunately encountered Garrigou early in my revert adult life, after an immersive re-baptism by the Carmelite doctors. Garrigou’s mind is no match for mine, but his humility, his fervor, and his unrelenting logic held my unequal head to study and to heed him. His large body of work is varied and astounding. He has a short volume on “The Priesthood and Perfection.” I’d wish each ordinand that gift.
Garrigou’s hefty, detailed tome on the interior life may be too detailed for some, but his condensed version “The Three Conversions in the Spiritual Life” is short and just. He also has an interesting tome on predestination….
Minerd’s newly translated “The Sense of Mystery,” contains Minerd’s learned contextual footnotes–a valuable aid and addition to Garrigou’s text. Garrigou’s wise words grace the book’s front matter:
“Each one of our acts contains a mystery; if the act is morally good and salutary, it is the mystery of grace; if it is evil, it is the mystery of the divine permission of evil for the sake of a higher good.”
I wish everyone would find Garrigou and come to appreciate him for the gift of God to the Church that he is. He is heady and heavy reading, but rewarding for the glints of humility his heaven will give.
Fr. Brian Harrison, STD, of the Oblates of Wisdom, theologian at the Roman Theological Forum, has an article at OnePeter5 on Francis’ latest teaching on all religions. He deduces that Francis’ latest is “not only materially heretical, but downright un-Christian. Nevertheless, we have no right to pronounce him a heretic or an anti-pope, and much less an apostate. The most charitable explanation of this scandalous message, and other similar statements the Holy Father has made, is that he thinks they can somehow be derived from the Church’s teaching about God’s mercy toward those who are inculpably ignorant of the Gospel and strive to follow the light of conscience. He certainly needs our prayers.” https://onepeterfive.com/francis-doubles-down-but-has-he-apostatized/
@ Synod’s Concrete Proposals
2, 5, and 7 pose detrimental dynamics within the Church. 2 Super-Charged Episcopal Conferences fragments centralized papal authority leaning toward each conference becoming an island in itself, or independent church.
5 Permits all comers meaning laity to make pastoral decisions which undermine ecclesial authority established by Christ.
7 An unending Synod spells unending questioning of doctrine resulting in loss of permanence.
Perhaps all the good things mentioned today, Cdl Parolin’s rebuke of the UN on its progressive abortion and LGBT policies, Pope Francis condemning pornography were more window dressing. In this mind warfare between the Vatican and the Apostolic faithful [some use the word backwardist] we’ve got to read between and under the lines to determine what language is being spoken and where it leads.
How Many Popesplainers Can Dance on the Head of a Pin? The pope’s recent silliness on God and truth, is an example of the kind of theological drivel that only the simplest of 1960’s hippies would babble about. This poor fellow is not a deep thinker; worse, he appears to be rather academically deficient.
Can truth be found in all religions? Yes, of course. However, the issue is not finding a shred of truth but finding truths sufficient to guide one into holiness on the surest route. It is knowing where the source of truth is expounded upon and taught daily, weekly, and for a lifetime.
How Many Popesplainers Can Dance on the Head of a Pin? The pope’s recent silliness on God and truth, is an example of the kind of theological drivel that only the simplest of 1960’s hippies would babble about. This poor fellow is not a deep thinker; worse, he appears to be rather academically deficient.
Can truth be found in all religions? Yes, of course. However, the issue is not finding a shred of truth but finding truths sufficient to guide one into holiness on the surest route. It is knowing where the source of truth is expounded upon and taught daily, weekly, and for a lifetime.
Further, and more importantly, he avoids the entire discussion on authority, the priesthood of God. When Jesus taught repent and be baptized, he was teaching the vital importance of the priesthood to salvation. The fact that Francis ignores its importance is deafening.
How many targets and dimensions and platforms are encompassed in the Synod, synodality and the Synod’s Concrete Proposals? – Really.
The Council Documents already address what synod is, how it is used and what it will do. Synodality is clearly doing something else and so far it wants to elude the clear definition of its own plainly demonstrated activity. The trajectory would suggest a Dicastery for Synodality …. yet they couldn’t see it for themselves.
While I appreciate -many appreciate- that the Holy Father is concerned enough to listen to what commentary offered at large, if he is going to respond to them it should at least be pertinent to the points being raised.
Not resolved by stressing “not a democracy”. It’s as if the Holy Father is forcing everyone to have to live through a “discernment” that merely needs to be corrected. Jarred. At the same time only listening for what will affirm the “discernment”.
Synodality synodalism is displacing the natural thing projected from the Council.
‘ “The Synod of Bishops was born from an insight of St. Paul VI, because the Western Church had lost the dimension of synodality, while the Eastern Church had preserved it. St. Paul VI, at the end of the Council, created the Secretariat for the Synod of Bishops so that all bishops would have a synodal dimension of dialogue,” the pope continued in remarks published this week in La Civiltà Cattolica.
In 2001 I was at the Synod of Bishops. I was collecting the material and arranging it. The secretary of the synod would go through it and say to take out this or that item that had been approved by vote of the various groups. There were things that he didn’t think were appropriate, and he would say to me, ‘No, there’ll be no vote on that, no vote on this.’ It was not understood what a synod was, in short,” he continued.
Another issue is whether only bishops or also priests, lay people or women can vote. In this synod, this is the first time women can vote. What does this mean? That there has been a development to live out this synodality,” Francis said.
And this is a grace from the Lord, because synodality has to be achieved not only at the level of the universal Church, but also in the local Churches, in parishes, in educational institutions. Synodality is a value of the Church at all levels. It has been a very good journey. This involves another thing, the ability to discern. Synodality is a grace of the Church. It is not democracy. It is something else, and it requires discernment,” he said. ‘
https://cruxnow.com/vatican/2024/09/in-meeting-jesuits-in-asia-pope-francis-says-synodality-is-not-democracy
How does one such as Pope Francis forget about the importance of the priesthood? To attempt to wrap up a conversation on truth with this kind drivel (How Many Popesplainers Can Dance on the Head of a Pin?) is disheartening and stunning.
Michael B I would like to fault your points. But we have to pray for the Pope and the Popesplainers. It could be helpful to overcome some prior anxiety, to imagine Popeslpainers dancing on the head of a pin and what it would look like one foot slipping off the side and the other ones grabbing his elbow and his ears to pull him back in with the dance. They must needs huddle and it offends the communion!
Even saying the right thing can make it the worse for them too. The inspiration is not in the religion but in grace won by Jesus Christ. Yet man distorts himself and the virtue of religion, there is no fulfillment without God’s grace.
So do not object to some trifle expression or other, because, it is allowing the prayerful faithful to make the petitions and the intercessions with a piece of mind.