"It would be an anachronistic mistake" - Francis interprets St. Pius V.

(Rome) On Saturday, September 17, Pope Francis received pilgrims from the Italian Diocese of Alessandria and young people from the Archdiocese of Spoleto-Norcia preparing for Confirmation in the large [and ugly] “Paolo VI” Audience Hall in the Vatican. For this reason, Francis divided his speech into two parts and addressed the pilgrims from Piedmont in the first part. However, the papal address was not so much intended for them, but as a message apparently intended for a different, far larger audience, since the reason for the pilgrimage was the 450th anniversary of the death of Pius V, that holy pope who is inseparably connected with the traditional Rite.

Francis warned in his assessment of Pius V against an "anachronistic error" and against reducing the holy pope to a "nostalgic, embalmed memory". Instead, it is about “grasping his teaching and his testimony”, but Francis himself seems to have his problems with that. Contrary to history, the reigning Pope gives the impression that the “Tridentine” Mass was autocratically unilaterally introduced by Pius V, while the liturgical reform of 1969 was introduced by the Second Vatican Council. However, the Council had already ended in 1965 and by no means had decided on the Novus Ordo Missae subsequently created by Annibale Bugnini.

The Dominican Antonio Michele Ghislieri, born in Bosco Marengo near Alessandria in 1504 and died in Rome on May 1, 1572, ruled the Church for six years. With the Bull Quo primum in 1570 he established the Missale Romanum as the so-called Tridentine Mass "forever" and prohibited its abolition or change. During his pontificate, the Battle of Lepanto, victorious for Christianity, also took place, ending the Islamic threat in the Mediterranean after centuries. In 1712 he was canonized.

After years of unequivocally expressing his rejection and even more his complete lack of understanding for those priests and faithful who are connected to the traditional Rite, Francis took action with the motu proprio Traditionis custodes and went on to the frontal attack. Pope Francis countered the Missale Romanum written “forever” by St. Pius V by saying that the liturgical reform introduced in 1969 was the “single form of expression of the lex orandi of the Roman rite”.

Francis warned his listeners accordingly in his address on Saturday. An exhortation apparently not addressed to the pilgrims from the Diocese of Alessandria, but to the priests and faithful committed to the traditional rite. In doing so, Francis even attempts a hussar ride by suggesting that the life and work of Pius V must be “interpreted”, which Francis does immediately in the spirit of the post-conciliar liturgical reform. 

"Pius V was a reformer of the Church who made courageous decisions, but..."

Francis  said:

“Dear brothers and sisters of the Diocese of Alessandria, the 450th anniversary of the death of Saint Pius V, the only Piedmontese Pope born in Bosco Marengo, in what is now the Diocese of Alessandria, gives rise to some very timely reflections.

Pope Pius V, born Antonio Ghislieri, faced numerous pastoral and governmental challenges in just six years of his pontificate. He was a church reformer who made bold decisions. Since then, the style of Church governance has changed and it would be an anachronistic mistake to assess certain works of Saint Pius V with today's mentality. Likewise, we must be careful not to reduce him to a nostalgic, embalmed memory, but to grasp his teaching and testimony. From this we can see that faith was the backbone of his entire life.

How can we interpret his teachings today? First, they invite us to search for the truth. Jesus is the truth, not only in a universal sense, but also in a corporate and personal sense; and the challenge is to live the search for truth today in the daily life of the Church and Christian communities. This search can only be done through personal and community discernment, starting from the Word of God (cf. Evangelii Gaudium, 30, 50, 175).

This commitment, translated into discernment, makes a community grow in an ever more intimate knowledge of Jesus Christ; and then he, the truth, the Lord, becomes the basis of community life woven with bonds of love. Love is expressed in acts of sharing, from the physical to the spiritual dimension, acts that reveal the mystery that we carry in our 'clay pots' (cf. 2 Cor 4:7).

The Word of God comes alive especially in the celebration of the Eucharist, both at the 'Table of the Word' and at the 'Table of the Eucharist', where we touch, as it were, the flesh of Christ. Pius V was concerned with reforming the liturgy of the Church, and after four centuries the Second Vatican Council introduced another reform to better meet the needs of today's world. Much has been said in recent years about the liturgy, especially its outward forms. But the greatest effort must be made to ensure that the celebration of the Eucharist actually becomes the source of community life (cf. Sacrosanctum Concilium, 10).

In fact, faced with the crossroads on the path of communities, as well as the crosses of our personal life, the liturgy incorporates us into the priesthood of Christ and gives us a new modality that Saint Paul sums up in this way: 'I rejoice in suffering 'which I bear for you, and make up what is lacking in my flesh from the sufferings of Christ, for the sake of his body, which is the Church' (Col 1:24). At the end of the liturgy, having touched the Eucharistic flesh of Christ, the evangelizing community is sent out and 'puts itself into the daily lives of others through works and gestures, shortening distances, humiliating themselves if necessary, and embracing human life, in which they come in contact with the suffering flesh of Christ as a people.' (Evangelii gaudium, 24)

And then we must not forget that Saint Pius V recommended prayer, especially the Rosary. In fact, 'the Church's first steps in the world were preordained by prayer. The apostolic writings and the great record of the Acts of the Apostles give us the image of a Church on the way, an active Church, but which finds in the prayer meetings the basis and impetus for missionary activity' (Catechesis, November 25, 2020 ).

In this way, dear friends from Alessandria, I have reminded you of the four coordinates that guide us in our ecclesial journey, as it says in Acts 2:42: 'They clung to the teaching of the apostles and to the communion,  in the breaking of the bread and at the prayers.' Follow the teaching of the apostles, the teaching of the Church; live in community, not at war among us; living the Eucharist, breaking bread and praying: beautiful, isn't it? It is possible."

 

Text: Giuseppe Nardi

Image : Vatican.va (screenshots)

Trans: Tancred vekron99@hotmail.com

AMDG

Cardinals Expected to be Silent in the Next Consistory

The cardinals of the Church will meet in a consistory next week, but Pope Francis has set unusual rules for them.

In a few days a cardinal consistory will begin in Rome – with special rules

(Rome) A regular Consistory of Cardinals has been convened by Pope Francis for Monday, August 29th. On Monday and Tuesday the Cardinals will gather in Rome to "reflect." Francis used this word on May 29 when he announced the convocation of the consistory at the end of the Regina Cæli. The convocation consists of several parts. In the first, the Extraordinary Consistory, next Saturday, Francis will create new cardinals with the next conclave firmly in view.

What is certain is that the reflections to be undertaken by the cardinals will not be free and open, clear and honest exchanges with parrhesia [freedom of speech], as Francis is wont to say, but on the contrary: none of the cardinals will be able to intervene or even ask questions.

This "detail" was revealed yesterday by the voyeuristic, sleazy website Dagospia, which, however, has surprisingly good contacts in the Church sector.[We'll definitely take that into account!] It also reported that the Cardinals read the “detailed introductory report of Monsignor Marco Mellino, Secretary of the Council of Cardinals [ex C9 Council of Cardinals], on the Roman Curia in the light of the Apostolic Constitution Praedicate Evangelium, with a general presentation, news, times and methods of application.” This report was already mentioned in a report by the Italian press agency ANSA on May 9th, which had as its subject the purpose of a meeting between Francis and the heads of dicasteries at the Roman Curia that took place on that day.

Dagospia published the document in its entirety, that is, the report read by Mellino at that meeting to the dicastery leaders “with laughter and unflattering comments” and then sent to the cardinals around the world who will be gathering at the Vatican in a few days will. Msgr. Mellino prepared them, recte warned them that no interventions or questions from the cardinals were planned.

Those who thought - and this is of course primarily true of the cardinals themselves directly concerned - that the Consistory would be an opportunity to ask Francis for clarifications on, or even to comment on, the curial reform that came into force on June 5th, will have to postpone these expectations. The College of Cardinals is the Senate of the Church and is intended to advise the Pope. But apparently the expectations of the current governing pontiff, who says "think about it" but means silence, are "too high".

According to Dagospia, the text has already drawn criticism from some members of the College of Cardinals, who consider it an idiosyncratic "potpourri of reflections" by Paul VI, John Paul II and Francis. The missing mention of Benedict XVI. is no coincidence.

On Sunday, between the extraordinary consistory on Saturday and the ordinary one beginning on Monday, Pope Francis will pay a pastoral visit to L'Aquila, the old imperial city of Frederick II of Hohenstaufen, which was almost leveled by a severe earthquake in 2009. A visit to the tomb of Celestine V, the only pope in church history who voluntarily resigned before 2013, is also planned. 

In 1294 Celestine, who until then had lived as a hermit in the mountains, resigned after just a few months. It was only on this condition that he had consented to his election, after the cardinals had been unable to elect a new pope for two years since the death of his predecessor. The two major factions, Guelfi and Ghibellini, who divided Italy, also balanced each other out in the Church senate. Some were close to the Guelphs and were considered the "papal party", the other to the Waiblingen, meaning the Staufers, i.e. the "imperial party". However, Celestine, now Pietro da Morrone again, was not allowed to return to his hermit life, but was held in honorable custody by his successor - honored, but in prison.

Pope Benedict XVI visited Celestine's grave in 2009. Francis' visit to the tomb sparked speculation and led to the "mistaken reading" that Bergoglian Vaticanists tirelessly assert that Francis also intends to resign and announce his abdication at the forthcoming consistory. 

It remains to be seen how many of the Church's 206 cardinals will be present in Rome in the coming days to be mere extras, now that they know what role they are destined to play. In addition, neither the WHO nor the Vatican, where particularly radical and disproportionate Corona measures were taken, officially declared the “pandemic” to be over, which is why there is a harmless excuse not to make the trip to Rome in the first place.

Text: Giuseppe Nardi
Image : Vatican.va (screenshot)

Trans: Tancred vekron99@hotmail.com

AMDG

Sandanista KGB Retreat Before Blessed Sacrament Held by Bishop During Siege

Edit: somebody please write Amnesty International. Sorry, just kidding. Please pray and consider sacrifices for Catholics living under oppression in the Vatican and everwhere there are Communists calling the shots!  Thanks for donating to Katholisches.

Nicaraguan National Police and a special unit cordon off the Curia of the Diocese of Matagalpa, where Bishop Álvarez and his vicar general are staying.

(Managua) The National Police and a special unit of the Sandinista Ortega regime besieged the Curia of the Diocese of Matagalpa and prevented the bishop from entering it.

Similar repressive attempts at intimidation had taken place several times in the past few months. The bishop himself was followed at every turn by plainclothes police, which is why he even went on a hunger strike. Since the strongest critic of the socialist regime among the bishops was retired by Pope Francis, Bishop Álvarez has taken over this position.

Because the police are besieging parishes in his diocese, Bishop Rolando Álvarez announced that he would celebrate a Mass with the intention of asking for protection for his priests. A celebration in the cathedral was impossible because of the police presence. So the bishop went with the vicar general, six priests and six laymen to the episcopal curia to celebrate in the chapel there.

Bishop Álvarez reported on the radio that he was going to go to the besieged parish to celebrate with the faithful when he was told that the curia had also been surrounded by police forces. The bishop went to where his vicar general was already.

The Chief of Police of the Department of Matagalpa, Sergio Gutiérrez, who was present, asked the Bishop to cooperate, to which the Bishop replied: "You are the ones who do not cooperate".

"Those who don't cooperate are the police forces because they don't let priests into churches or seminarians into seminars for Eucharistic adoration, liturgy, communion and prayer.
And now the police are asking me to cooperate. The police say we are the ones causing fear, when they are the ones blocking access to the Curia, the ones standing on my doorstep and not letting anyone in."

  

Bishop Álvarez accused the national police, led by Francisco Díaz, a close confidant of President Ortega, of "not allowing freedom of movement, freedom of expression and freedom of religion".

"I ask the police, in all courtesy and before the Lord, to let us celebrate the Eucharist, to adore Jesus in the Blessed Sacrament, and to leave the door of my house, the door of the Curia, and let in the faithful who are entering the Church coming to worship his Lord."

And further:

"The devil wants to lead us into the temptation of hate, despair and division. Hate is answered with love, division is answered with unity, and despair with hope."

  

If the police want to enter his home, he welcomes them, the bishop said, but they should end the cordon that prevents him from entering and others from accessing him.

The bishop tried to hug the police chief and officers present "as a sign of peace, but they wouldn't allow it."

The bishop knelt down in the street to pray and had the Holy of Holies brought to him by the Vicar General. With this he finally approached the police, who backed off. This made it possible for the bishop and his vicar general to enter the curia. The six other priests and six lay people who were with the bishop were denied entry.

According to the bishop, he will remain in the curia together with his vicar general. In the chapel there he celebrated the mass to protect the priests, which was broadcast on the church radio station.

In his sermon, he complained that plainclothes police officers attended masses, recorded sermons, and "investigated us as if we were plotting a conspiracy."

Recently, in the Diocese of Matagalpa alone, the Sandinista regime shut down six Catholic radio stations in a bid to choke off the Church's voice.

Text: Giuseppe Nardi
Image : Twitter/César Jiménez Mtz

Trans: Tancred vekron99@hotmail.com

AMDG

Scalfari, The Bard of the Bergoglian Double-Magisterium Has Died

 

Eugenio the friend of the pope, or: The pope who had a freemason and atheist as a friend and did not convert him.

(Rome) Eugenio Scalfari, the atheist friend of Pope Francis, died yesterday. The newspaper La Repubblica published an obituary by Pope Francis today about the founder of this newspaper. The relationship between Pope Francis and Masonic atheist Eugenio Scalfari is among the most telling and enigmatic pages of the current pontificate. It is significant and puzzling, if not surprising, that the obituary is a eulogy.

Eugenio Scalfari, born in 1924, was a journalist and publicist all of his professional life, he came from an upper-class family with a long Masonic tradition, earned his first spurs in fascist daily newspapers and was a co-founder of the radical-liberal, anti-clerical Radical Party in 1955, 1962-1968 editor-in-chief of the weekly magazine Espresso (comparable to the German Spiegel), as an independent member of parliament for the Socialists till 1972, in 1976 he founded the daily newspaper La Repubblica to the left of the upper-class liberal Corriere della Sera, of which he was editor-in-chief until 1996 and then its publisher. His self-description was, an atheist. Although he never described himself as a Freemason, he was happy to show the ancestral gallery of his direct ancestors, who were brothers in the lodge.

The editors chose the following words as the headline for the papal obituary:

"Eugenio, my laicist [secularist] friend, I will m[iss talking to you."

 

Son from a good family with a generation-old credo of the Grand Orient

Since the 1950s, Scalfari himself has been involved in every socio-political struggle intended to lead the world a little further to the left. In addition to the political right, the main targets of his media activism were the indissolubility of marriage, the inviolability of human life and again and again the Catholic Church and its dogmas. He was successful as an extra-parliamentary spokesman in many struggles: in the 1970s, divorce and abortion were legalized, as were “gay marriage” and euthanasia a few years ago.

It was all the more striking that Pope Francis found his most enthusiastic fans, one cannot call it any other way, in the ranks of the anti-Church Radical Party, that radical liberal micro-party which, as a hinge between the Marxist left and left-liberal bourgeoisie, exerted great influence on political developments in Italy and beyond. The bandwidth of these fans ranged from Marco Pannella to Emma Bonino ( after all, former Foreign Minister, EU Commissioner and Soros Prize winner and for Pope Francis a "very big one") to the now deceased Eugenio Scalfari.

All of them came from well-to-do bourgeois families, were open to Socialism, but never joined communism, but internalized the emancipatory drive of liberalism, which still predates socialism, which is why they were able to become leading exponents of the political left in numerous struggles. Their fight was for the legalization of divorce, abortion, euthanasia, drugs and "gay rights". As a powerful doyen of Italian left-wing journalism, Eugenio Scalfari led this struggle from the columns of the daily newspaper he had founded.

Marco Pannella, the "Mangiapreti" (priest-eater), another of Scalfari's friends, became an "electrified" fan of Francis. Pannella, who died in 2016, still had under Pope Benedict XVI. demonstrated against the Church on St. Peter's Square with the slogan "No Taliban, No Vatican" and put the Vatican on the same level as the Islamist Taliban. Under Pope Francis, the same Pannella exclaimed, unforgettably: 

"Viva il papa! We radicals love him very much”, so much so that Pannella wished: “I want to become a citizen of the Vatican”.

 

Pannella and Scalfari were two leading founders of the Radical Party.

Eugenio Scalfari is decorated by the Duce of Fascism Benito Mussolini.

Eugenio Scalfari's interviews with Pope Francis became downright notorious. In November 2014, Katholisches.info wrote for clarification:

"The jubilation of the Scalfari and Pannella is not the jubilation of those who have found or rediscovered faith, but of those who feel they have 'conquered' even the Vatican with their positions."

How could such adamant abortion lobbyists see Francis as a "friend"? Were they even deceived by the Pope, as some of their supporters suspected? Nothing like that.

Bergoglio made it clear at the beginning of his pontificate that the struggle for "non-negotiable values" is not his struggle. Rather, he made a serious break and described the attitude of his predecessors in the question of the right to life as "obsessed". Francis did not formally change the Magisterium in a very Bergoglian way, but in fact he did, entirely in accordance with the principle he advocated that practice comes before theory. For Scalfari and Pannella, this counted for far more than an occasional but inconsequential criticism of the killing of unborn children. Francis' recent stabs in the back at the majority of US bishops on the communion issue for abortion politicians reinforced this papal maxim.

In this way, Francis was able to establish an unofficial, parallel teaching post , the bard of which was his friend Eugenio Scalfari. This "new magisterium", also known as the " Scalfari magisterium" and never really denied by the Holy See, promulgated a new doctrine more like that of the Lodge than the Church. In 2019, all the conversations, interviews and phone calls that Scalfari subsequently reported to the world were collected in the book I l Dio unico e la società moderna' ('One God and Modern Society'). It contains all the statements of the reigning pope that caused considerable irritation in the church in the past and will probably do so in the future. Scalfari always insisted on their authenticity - unchallenged. Scalfari clarified a bridging in the subtitle of the book, because the publication included all "meetings with Pope Francis and Cardinal Carlo Maria Martini". The latter had already died in 2012, not without Benedict XVI two months before his death. vigorously urged to resign.

In 2019, Katholisches.info wrote :

“Eugenio Scalfari is twelve years older than the Catholic Church leader. How can their relationship, which is obviously deliberately surrounded by an aura of the unclear and opaque, be described? Most likely as congenial, since a certain kinship of spirit can hardly be denied after six years of irregular 'collaboration', which has continued despite all the criticism."

Tenets of the Bergoglian Scalfari Magisterium are:

• 
  
• that for Christians there is no "absolute truth";
• that good and bad are merely subjective opinions;
• that there is "no Catholic God";
• that Mary the Blessed Mother under the cross perhaps wanted to ask herself whether she had been "tricked" because the messianic promises must have seemed like "lies" to her;
• that Jesus Christ is “not” the Son of God;
• that "sin is done away with";
• that "hell is abolished";
• that mankind should merge into a “mestizo” through racial mixing;
• that conversion is not necessary.

The atheist Scalfari wanted to "build a tailor-made, fluid and relativistic Christianity", according to Il Giornale at the end  of 2013. And Francis supported him in this.

The Vatican spokesman at the time, Fr. Federico Lombardi, objected embarrassed and half-heartedly, but soon realized that Santa Marta had not issued any order for a denial. So the statements remained unexplained in the room. It was obviously intentional. Even more: The Vatican publishing house even published the first and most irritating interview in book form . It probably doesn't need any more confirmation. 

In 2019 the second book " Grand Hotel Scalfari. Confessioni libertine su un secolo di carta” (“Grand Hotel Scalfari. Libertine Confessions over a Century of Paper”, Marsilio Editori, 2019), a benevolently conceived biography in the form of a conversation book. Katholisches.info wrote enlighteningly :

Handshake between Christian Democrat De Mita (right) and Communist Berlinguer. Eugenio Scalfari acted as mediator of the "Historical Compromise". Keep moving the country to the left.

“Scalfari, who has long since given up the editorship, has retained his weight and his column. Some, including Catholics, lulled by accusations of spreading conspiracy theories, don't like to hear it, but it's important for Scalfari: he's proud of his Masonic heritage. Although he is silent about his own affiliation with a lodge, he likes to point out that his grandfather and his great-grandfather and his great-great... were brothers and founders of the lodge. 'My ancestors founded lodges all over the Catanzaro area', Scalfari himself quotes in the book as a Masonic friend who said of his grandfather, a 'staunch socialist', that he was 'like an old Lucifer who catches fire'. Similar allusions abound throughout this book, while he suggests, more clearly than before, that he entered the lodge in San Remo immediately after the war. He does this, not without pointing out that in 1874 the Lodge in San RemoLiguria , predecessor of the lodges that work there today, and published the newspaper Lucifero ( Lucifer ). For the brothers in the lodge, Lucifer is not the personified evil of Christianity, but the 'bringer of light' who is worshiped in lodges and whose knowledge is striven for.”

Having said that, we publish Pope Francis' obituary of his friend Eugenio Scalfari:

"Eugenio, my lay friend, I will miss talking to you"

by Pope Francis

I am saddened by the death of Eugenio Scalfari, founder of La Repubblica newspaper. In these painful 

hours, I am close to his family, loved ones and all those who knew and worked with him. He has been a loyal friend to me. I remember him telling me at our meetings at Casa Santa Marta how he was trying to grasp the meaning of existence and life, exploring everyday life and the future through meditation on his experiences and his great readings. He described himself as a non-believer, although in the years I've known him, I've also thought deeply about the meaning of faith. He always wondered about the presence of God, about the last things and about the life after this life.

Our conversations were pleasant and intense, the minutes with him flew by, punctuated by the cheerful confrontation of our respective opinions and the exchange of our thoughts and ideas, but also by moments of joy.

We talked about faith and worldliness, about everyday life and the great horizons of humanity in the present and future, and about the darkness that can envelop man and the divine light that can illuminate his path. I remember him as a man of extraordinary intelligence and an ability to listen, always searching for the ultimate meaning of events, and always eager for knowledge and testimonies that might enrich the understanding of modernity.

Eugenio was an intellectual open to the present, courageous, transparent in describing his fears, never nostalgic for the glorious past but looking forward, with a touch of disillusionment but also with high hopes for a better world. And he was excited and in love with his work as a journalist. He left an indelible mark on the lives of many and charted a career path that many of his collaborators and successors have followed.

At the beginning of our exchanges by letter and telephone, and during our initial conversations, he had expressed his astonishment at my decision to call me Francis and wanted to understand the reasons for my decision. And then he was very fascinated by my work as a chaplain of the universal church, and in this sense, he argued aloud and in his articles about the church's commitment to interreligious and ecumenical dialogue, about the mystery of the Lord, about God, source of peace and Source of paths of concrete brotherhood between individuals, nations and peoples.

He emphasized the crucial value - for our society and for politics - of sincere, fruitful and continuous relations between believers and non-believers. He was fascinated by various theological issues, such as mysticism in the Catholic religion and the passage in Genesis that states that man was created in the image and likeness of God. And the composition and characteristics of the population groups that will inhabit the common house in the coming decades.

From this day on, I will keep in my heart the kind and precious memory of the conversations I had with Eugene during those years of my pontificate. I pray for him and for the consolation of those who mourn him.

And I commend his soul to God for eternity.

Text/Translation: Giuseppe Nardi

Photocredit: Wikicommons

Trans: Tancred vekron99@hotmail.com

AMDG