F irst Things, a journal published by The Institute of Religion and Public Life, an educational institute aiming to advance a religiously informed public philosophy  has thoroughly exposed the new Netflix movie  The Two Popes , featuring Anthony Hopkins as an irritable Pope Benedict and Jonathan Pryce as a beaming Cardinal Jorge Bergoglio, today is known as Pope Francis. The plot has Bergoglio considering retirement but instead is beckoned to see Pope Benedict in the Vatican. The two then spend days becoming friends and Benedict tells Bergoglio he is going to resign and anoint Bergoglio as his successor. Wrong . None of this happened. As John Waters  writes  in  First Things: Bergoglio did not in 2012 fly to Italy to meet with Pope Benedict at Castel Gandolfo to ask for permission to retire. The two men did not spend days together getting to know each other. Pope Benedict did not give Cardinal Bergoglio advance knowledge of his intention to resign...

W hat Christianity shares with Judaism (and Islam,  for  that matter) is a belief that God created all things (though all three religions understand God differently). We are creatures. We owe our being, our existence, to Him. We are stewards of His creation, stewards, even, of our own bodies. Acknowledgement of God’s creative power leads to religious awe, a sense of the sacred. This means that each creature/creation has a nature, a manufacturer’s (God’s) instruction manual. Masculinity and femininity are aspects of that nature for human beings. When belief in God becomes irrelevant, we can throw away this instruction manual and refuse to see ourselves as a creature who has responsibilities to God and to society. To understand ourselves, we need to start at the beginning. What kind of being are we? The traditional answer–originating with the Greeks, continuing in the Middle Ages, and persisting into our own time -- and the answer given by common sense intuition -- is ...

  A s Jonathan Coe has recently observed, When we look at the contemporary ecclesial landscape, we should never limit what the Holy Spirit can do, but any optimism needs to be tempered by certain realities. For example, in looking at the Catholic Church in America, (1) our de facto leader is the heterodox, zeitgeist puppet Cardinal Blaise Cupich; (2) homosexualist priest Fr. James Martin has been given almost carte blanche in peddling his lavender gospel; and (3) the USCCB voted 137-83, with three abstaining, to not encourage the Holy See to release all documents concerning allegations of sexual misconduct by the recently defrocked ex-Cardinal McCarrick. The list goes on and on . In the face of these disheartening developments, Coe highlights the shepherding of 3 prominent churchmen; Archbishop Charles Chaput, Cardinal Robert Sarah, and Bishop Athanasius Schneider. Let’s sample the thinking of the first shepherd. In his talk at the ...

Bottom of Form Indianapolis archbishop revokes Jesuit prep school's Catholic identity 7.4K1313 Top of Form Bottom of Form Indianapolis, Ind., Jun 20, 2019 / 01:49 pm ( CNA ).- The Archdiocese of Indianapolis announced Thursday that a local Jesuit high school will no longer be recognized as a Catholic school, due to a disagreement about the employment of a teacher who attempted to contract a same-sex marriage. “All those who minister in Catholic educational institutions carry out an important ministry in communicating the fullness of Catholic teaching to students both by word and action inside and outside the classroom,” the archdiocese said in a statement Thursday. “In the Archdiocese of Indianapolis, every archdiocesan Catholic school and private Catholic school has been instructed to clearly state in its contracts and ministerial job descriptions that all ministers must convey and be supportive of all teachings of the Catholic Church.” Teachers, the ar...

N ow, what would the prince of this world like to see more than what ex-priest James Carroll has called for in   his recent screed in the Atlantic :  the abolition of the priesthood of Jesus Christ. Why? He says because the Church’s reputation and membership have suffered under the continual revelations of sexual abuse by those he  erroneously labels "pedophiles,  in reality  the homosexual network  of priests aided by bishops(homosexual and heterosexual), and cardinals who’ve protected each other at the expense of many victims.  In his own words:  Clericalism is both the underlying cause and the ongoing enabler of the present Catholic catastrophe. Only by dismantling the clerical hierarchy can the Church end the perpetual scandals, move into the modern age, and preserve the faith of its believers. Let us set the record straight by  quoting a victim of priestly sexual abuse : "both clericalism and homosexuality in the ...

A s I mentioned in my most recent post, we are on the eve of the Vatican summit on  The Protection of Minors in the Church . My intention was to point out that the New York Times, concerned that the homosexual orientation will be blamed as the cause of the crisis , mounted an attack priestly celibacy. The Times suggests that celibacy is the cause of the current crisis in the Church, having previously championed abortion on demand, “gay marriage” and transgenderism in arguing that sex—in any way, with anyone—is the final expression of individual desire and personal self-actualization.                                                                      ************ As I discussed in The Smoke of Satan , the big lie of the Sexual Revolution is that human beings must act on their sexual impulses, howeve...

The Holy Father has summoned the bishops for  conference on the homosexual priest crisis in Rome,  Feb. 21-24. Elizabeth Dias of the Times has used the occasion to  relate half-truths concerning the crisis brought about by the Mr. McCarrick unchastity of many, not all priests with homosexual orientations in the Body of Christ.  No doubt the idea that the homosexual sexual orientationis behind the abuse crisis will be of paramount importance in the discussions. Anyone wishing to fully understand the nature of the current crisis facing the Church brought about by not "gett(ing) it right sexually." (to paraphrase one priest interviewed in Dias' article), will be led further from the truth of things after reading the Times exposeˊ. In his work, Goodbye, Good Men , author Michael Rose documents the abuses that took place in American seminaries and diocesan vocation offices not long after the Second Vatican Council ended. Mr.  Rose did not set out to explai...