Author: Mark Docherty

Or, as I have written dozens of times, the Diabolical Inversion of Truth.  I don’t know where this papacy is headed, but whatever it is, we are now sprinting towards it.

“the great majority of our sacramental marriages are null”

That’s right, the “great majority” of human beings are incapable of entering into a valid sacramental marriage.  God created the sacred institution of marriage, created it specifically for humans, created it perfectly because He Himself is perfect, yet today the pope says the great majority of humans are incapable of contracting marriage. Because they don’t know what they are doing.
Where does one even begin?
I’m not attaching links, because I’m late to this and there has already been a lot of commentary.  Frankly, I don’t have much to add to what I’ve already seen out there.
Note that he is specifically referring to “our sacramental marriages”.  So he is excluding not only natural marriages, but also, it would seem, sacramental marriages outside the Church.  He’s talking about Catholic marriages, possibly to include mixed marriages as well (one spouse Catholic, the other a baptized non-Catholic).
The distinction is important, because IMHO one could make a case today that many, many marriages in proddy world, and certainly in the civil realm, are very questionable for one simple reason:  Divorce is on the table before the marriage is even consummated.  Not just divorce, mind you, but so-called “no-fault” divorce.  Walk away for any reason or no reason at all.  Can someone really take their vow seriously, even as they are speaking it, when they know (or rather think) that divorce is a legitimate option from day one?  I guess that is another topic.
Notice also the absolute concrete nature of what he said.  He’s not proposing this as a possibility.  He’s stating it as fact. “The great majority of our sacramental marriages are null.”  Talk about having the humility and the ambition.  It’s unbelievable. Of course, we all should have seen this coming, since the groundwork had already been laid with previous statements and Chapter Eight of AL.
There are such grave implications here.

• It means we need to presume at the outset that any particular marriage is null, then try to find evidence to the contrary
• It stands the tribunal process on its head
• It is a grave scandal to the spouses to encourage them to think it is more likely their union is null, discouraging them from sacrificing and striving for perfection
• Think of the harm this will cause children
• It makes the Church complicit, abrogates the sacrament itself, because why is She marrying this “great majority” of people She knows have impediments to marriage?!!

Not satisfied with overturning the Church’s millennial presumption of validity, Pope Francis goes full monty, or rather full diabolical inversion of truth, with his institution of the sacrament of cohabitation.

“I’ve seen a lot of fidelity in these cohabitations, and I am sure that this is a real marriage, they have the grace of a real marriage because of their fidelity”

So according to Francis, public fornication is full of grace and is a real marriage, but chances are your sacramental marriage is not real.  This is straight from the pit of Hell.
Again, not a lot of nuance here. Not “maybe”, not “possibly.”  No.  “I am sure that this is a real marriage” and “They have the grace of a real marriage”.  It is flat out heresy, to the point where you have to wonder if the man is so astonished at what he’s already gotten away with, he just can’t resist throwing out bigger and bigger heresies to see if anyone challenges him.
Well, red hats, when will you rise up?

Francis, 9 June 2016 HERE:

It is not Catholic (to say) ‘or this or nothing:’ This is not Catholic, this is heretical.  Jesus always knows how to accompany us, he gives us the ideal, he accompanies us towards the ideal, He frees us from the chains of the laws’ rigidity and tells us: ‘But do that up to the point that you are capable.’ And he understands us very well.  He is our Lord and this is what he teaches us.

Trent, 13 January 1547 HERE:

For God commands not impossibilities, but, by commanding, admonishes thee both to do what thou art able, and to pray for what thou art not able, and aids thee that thou mayest be able; whose commandments are not grievous; whose yoke is sweet and whose burden light…If any one shall say, that the commandments of God are, even for a man that is justified and constituted in grace, impossible to keep; let him be anathema.

About those “ideals”, those “Chains of the law”, remember, morality is always dreadfully complicated to a man who has lost all his principles….HERE.

I could speculate further, but I really have no idea what Benedict is up to here in terms of an endgame.  It seems like a course of last resort.  He knows it’s all gone terribly wrong, time is short, and it’s better to do something, anything, rather than sit there and do nothing. He’s thinking about his Particular Judgement, to be sure.
Mr. Verrecchio thinks the concept, in the mind of Benedict, is rooted in the novel teaching of Lumen Gentium.  LG elevated the teaching authority of the bishops, which, supposedly, in modernist machinations, elevated the papacy at the same time HERE.  Of course, this concept had already been proposed and debated vigorously at the First Vatican Council, and finally put down with Pio Nono’s famous “I am the Tradition.”
Before we get further into this, please remember that the Catholic world was not turned upside down in February 2013.  The Catholic world hit the iceberg decades earlier, and has been sinking steadily since, even if the sinking had appeared to slow for a brief time under Benedict.  If you don’t yet understand that Francis was inevitable, start HERE.  Then decide on the red or blue pill.
Don’t waste a lot of time saying to yourself, “Well, I just need to meditate on this a little deeper.  Benedict is so smart (yes, he is) I just need to push my tiny brain a little harder. A Contemplative Pope versus an Active Pope.  Two heads must be better than one!”
Instead, push your brain a little harder on the next paragraph.
Let’s talk about Immutability. The Petrine office was instituted by God, Jesus Christ, the Second Person of the Trinity, who is perfect.  Not only is He perfect, He also exists outside of time, because it was He who created time.  John 1:1-3. Time is a construct, just like all other created things.  Being as He is co-eternal with God the Father, He exists both before the beginning of time as well as after the end of time, plus everything in between, AND… it is all happening at once.  All of eternity exists for Him in the same instant. Without the construct of time, change is impossible.  If this seems to be putting a limit on God’s omnipotence, it does not, because a) in His omnipotence, He could have designed it any way He wanted, b) He designed it this way because that is His will, and c) HE’S PERFECT.
Applying all this to the situation at hand, we can see plainly that Jesus Christ, who is immutable and perfect,  most certainly did NOT institute an imperfect, defective, ‘version 1.0’ of the papacy, not yet beta tested. And he most certainly did NOT, 2000 years later, send the Third Person of the Holy Trinity down to Benedict in a Geek Squad van to deliver ‘version 2.0’, with bug fixes, increased compatibility, and an enhanced user interface.
Furthermore, ponder the idea that a human being, even a pope, could have the authority to alter the intrinsic nature of the divinely instituted Petrine office, the Vicar of Christ, in order to make it more perfect than God made it.
Please make it stop.

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UPDATE 12 April 2018 – I repudiated what follows in this post on 3 July 2017

Only three possibilities exist for the “situation” of the current papacy.

1. BXVI validly resigned, followed by a conclave where Francis was validly elected
2. BXVI was forced out under threat, rendering his resignation invalid, followed by an invalid conclave where Francis was, a jure, invalidly elected
3. BXVI validly resigned, followed by a valid conclave where Francis was invalidly elected by a gang who conspired to the end result beforehand (the +Danneels admission)

#1 seems less and less likely, given a great many things, although this is what Benedict himself has insisted upon up until now.  It’s also what 99% of the Catholic world believes, and the only version you’re allowed to talk about at the parish social.
I think there are multiple reasons to believe #2 is true, from threats to shut the bank to Vatileaks.  But when asked directly about concerns his resignation may have been coerced, Benedict called the idea “absurd”, so I don’t think this is going anywhere.
#3 seems most likely, weighing all the observable facts.  It’s a bombshell.  It would mean that Francis, +Danneels, and all the co-conspirators at the conclave have been excommunicated since 2013.  This scenario has lots of benefits, like being able to wipe the entire Franciscan era off the books.  In fact, it may be the only way, since I’m not seeing any kind of “imperfect synod” coming together to charge him with heresy and depose him. But it doesn’t, by itself,  fix the root problem; it’s only a start.
The entire Great Facade must be torn down.
 

Only the Italian text has thus far published, but Vatican Radio offered this small snippet in English:

In a new Apostolic Letter, issued motu proprio, Pope Francis has established new norms providing for the removal of Bishops (or those equivalent to them in Canon Law) from their offices in cases where they have “through negligence, committed or omitted acts that have caused grave harm to others, either with regard to physical persons, or with regard to the community itself.”

This is being spun by +Lombardi as relating specifically to the abuse of minors.  Which is exactly what the pope wants you and the press to believe.  Count me doubtful.
Go read the full release HERE.
First of all, this has nothing to do with retroactive punishment. “Father Lombardi noted that because the Apostolic Letter concerns new procedural norms, the question of retroactivity does not apply.”  It will only apply to new situations after 5 Sept.
Second, “the “lack of diligence” necessary for removal from office can exist even be “without grave moral fault” on the part of the Bishop.”
Third, it’s going to be oh so collegial, with “a new “dedicated College of jurists”, which will assist the Holy Father before he makes a definitive decision. Father Lombardi said the College would be expected to be composed of Cardinals and Bishops.”
Now let’s go back to the first quote block, tidy it up a bit, and maybe you’ll see where this is going.

Pope Francis has established new norms for the removal of Bishops where they “through negligence have caused grave harm to the community itself.”

Still not seeing it?  Well, in other news…

Archbishop Chaput to lead USCCB response to Amoris Laetitia HERE and HERE.

“Our goal is to gather what the bishops of the USA are doing and share that information with the other bishops, and then also send a report to Cardinal (Lorenzo) Baldisseri who has asked for reports from the various conferences.”

This ain’t gonna be no Humanae Vitae, where Truth is promulgated and then ignored.  No.  AL is where error is promulgated and then ENFORCED. We already know exactly where +Baldisseri stands, with his numerous heretical statements disputing the immutability of the Church and Her teachings. So really the only mystery that remained was how the new paradigm would be enforced.  Now we know.  Any bishop failing to implement the heresy with full force in his diocese will “through negligence have caused grave harm to the community itself.” He will be tried and convicted by a college of his peers, then deposed by the pope.
I am calling it right now.
 

#AmorisLaetitia

The silence continues to be deafening.
Bishop Athanasius Schneider has responded to The Remnant’s open letter to him regarding AL.  It is a bombshell.  The Remnant publishes the response on their website HERE.  This is nothing less that a bishop of the Catholic Church calling out the Holy Father for preaching heresy, or at the very least, purposely promoting deception.  Maybe not outright, but certainly in so many words.

“I am agreeing with your observations as to those expressions in AL (“Amoris laetitia”), and especially in its VIII’s chapter, which are highly ambiguous and misleading. In using our reason and in respecting the proper sense of the words, one can hardly interpret some expressions in AL according to the holy immutable Tradition of the Church.”

This is a really big deal.  Yet I can’t seem to find ANYONE reporting on it, not even so-called Catholic blogs, news services, etc.  Go right now and search for “bishop schneider responds to remnant.”  Crickets!
I will write more on the substance of the original open letter, and this his response. But first I just had to notice the crickets.

I have been on the run all this month between graduations, work travel, etc.  I guess some stuff happened?
Two credible accounts rehashing anew the Fatima double secret non full-disclosure disclosure HERE and HERE.  If you’ve never studied this controversy, it boils down to the existence of a second text, not yet revealed, and what it might say.  The evidence for its existence is strong, but what it might say is hearsay/rumor.  Here is the thought that always comes to my mind on this subject:  If parts of the secret or its interpretation from Our Lady have been deliberately withheld by six popes since 1960, against the direct orders of Our Lady, that’s a pretty big deal. Think about it objectively. If you were pope, just how bad would the secret have to be for you to intentionally disregard a direct order from the Mother of God.  I mean, provided you actually believe in your own religion, taking that decision would be the single most terrifying act of your life, right?  It would have to be something so over the top, so unbelievable, so unthinkable, that even as I sit here pondering the question, I’m probably still shooting low.
What happens next?  The Vatican Press Office, at warp speed, issues a denial of the Hickson account HERE.   The structure of the announcement is very strange, as it’s made to appear as excerpting an interview with Benedict.  Except those quotes!  Seriously?  Could they have at least made it sound just a little like it was actually him? “Pure inventions, absolutely untrue.”  Yeah, okay.
Next it was +Ganswein out of the blue with the “expanded Petrine ministry” HERE.  What kind of move is this?  No way he comes out with this without the full blessing of Benedict, or in fact at the direction of Benedict.  So was this concept created intentionally by Benedict in the particular manner with which he resigned? It sure sounds like that’s what’s being promulgated. It’s like a computer programmer who writes a ‘back door’ into the code, so he can get back in if necessary.  If that’s the case, make popcorn.  And the concept itself, the expansion of the ministry into a duality?  Sounds a lot like the expansion of the Latin Rite into two Forms, Ordinary and Extraordinary, doesn’t it?
Then the Vatican Press Office, at warp speed, issues a retrac…..  oops. Nope. Nothing.
It can’t be said we live in uninteresting times.  If anyone should preach normalcy bias, let him be anathema.
Stay confessed.
 

Oh yes, he did.  HERE
Not ambiguous, not confusing, not mistranslated, not misunderstood, no, no, no.  As you digest this, reflect back also to all those footnotes in Chapter Eight, and admit those weren’t ambiguous either.
First, here is today’s Gospel.  It’s not an obscure reading (Mark 10:1-12).

Jesus came into the district of Judea and across the Jordan.
Again crowds gathered around him and, as was his custom,
he again taught them.
The Pharisees approached him and asked,
“Is it lawful for a husband to divorce his wife?”
They were testing him.
He said to them in reply, “What did Moses command you?”
They replied,
“Moses permitted a husband to write a bill of divorce
and dismiss her.”
But Jesus told them,
“Because of the hardness of your hearts
he wrote you this commandment.
But from the beginning of creation, God made them male and female.
For this reason a man shall leave his father and mother
and be joined to his wife,
and the two shall become one flesh.
So they are no longer two but one flesh.
Therefore what God has joined together,
no human being must separate.”
In the house the disciples again questioned Jesus about this.
He said to them,
“Whoever divorces his wife and marries another
commits adultery against her;
and if she divorces her husband and marries another,
she commits adultery.”

Jesus restores the true fullness of the marriage covenant.  He’s pretty direct about it. It’s a Revealed Truth of the First Class HERE.  The same episode is recounted in Matt 19:9 and Luke 16:18.
Now here is what Francis the Destroyer had this to say about it:

“But Jesus, so merciful, He is so great, that he never, never, never, closes the door to sinners. In the world in which we live, with this culture of the provisional, this reality of sin is so strong. But Jesus, recalling Moses, tells us: “But there is hardness of heart, there is sin, something can be done: forgiveness, understanding, accompaniment, integration, discernment of these cases”…   May Jesus teach us to have at heart a great adhesion to the truth, and also at heart a great understanding and accompaniment for all our brothers who are in difficulty. And this is a gift, this is what the Holy Spirit teaches us, not these enlightened doctors, who to teach us need to reduce the fullness of God to a casuistic equation.”

As I have written over and over again, this is the diabolical inversion of truth.  There is no other way to say it.  It’s not just a twisting, a bending of the truth.  It is nothing less than stating as true, the very thing that has just been demonstrated to be NOT TRUE.
He actually admits that the truth about adultery is in fact the truth as far as adultery goes, but to stop at that is to be a narrow-minded doctor of the law.  The fullness of the Gospel requires to also acknowledge that “the reality of sin is so strong.”  In other words, again, gospel truths are merely “Ideals” that are impossible to live up to.  As Christians, we need to move beyond the law, grow in maturity, and embrace the reality of sin with accompaniment, integration, discernment, etc.  We must combine the truth of the ideals with the truth of a humanity incapable of resisting sin, thus arriving at the GREATER TRUTH.
None of this is a surprise.  All of this was laid out in the Exhortation, chapter and verse. All of this has been covered extensively, HERE HERE HERE HERE HERE and especially HERE.
The man must be deposed.
 
 
 

And so it came to pass, 13 May 2016, the Obama administration announces it will cut federal funding to schools who do not allow transgender students to use the bath/locker room of whichever gender they identify with.  We love the little children so much, it simply must be done. HERE
Today is the day we decide if we are going to take back our country.
That’s a pretty big deal, so we should probably examine some facts and try to determine exactly what’s at stake here.  Without getting into some of the more bizarre claims of the Trans movement, where there may be oh a thousand genders, let’s just stick with the simple case of “the gender I identify with is the opposite of my biological sex.”
Indoctrination of children in “gender studies” and forcing them to “choose” genders is child abuse.  Gender Dysphoria in children is not unusual, especially among girls.  Ever hear of a “tomboy”?  They’re not exactly rare.  In the vast, vast majority of cases, everything works itself out during puberty, when the sex hormones do their thing.  To force or encourage hormonal treatment of a pre-pubescent child should be a crime.
Gender Dysphoria in adults is a mental illness.  It’s a disorder.  As such, treatment is the rational course, even if the effectiveness of treatment varies.  Celebration and encouragement lead to further misery.  Ten minutes of research into life outcomes of this group will astound you.  41% attempt suicide.  The movement will try to convince you that’s all about bullying and social stigma, but it’s not.  Even those who have “fully transitioned” (in quotes because that’s not physically possible) are still overwhelmingly very sad, regretful, and yes, still very suicidal.  Please, ten minutes, do the research.  There are entire websites dedicated to this.
The irony of the bath/changing/locker room signage battle is inescapable.  The Trans movement has spent years attempting to disconnect gender from biological sex.  Yet the sign on the locker room isn’t referring to your feelings (even if those feelings are very real).  The sign is referring to your biological sex, which is a metaphysical certitude.  The X and Y don’t lie.
We’re going to hear a lot of talk about hatred and bigotry.  I want to talk about love.  Love and charity.  When you profess to love someone, or to be charitable to your fellow man, you are professing that you care for them.  These people are hurting; there is no doubt about that.  They deserve to have their human dignity upheld and respected.  Sometimes, caring means sharing hard truths for the well-being of another.  If you really do care, then it’s your duty to call it out.  Because the opposite of love isn’t hate, the opposite of love is indifference. Doing nothing, staying silent, is the opposite of love.
Let me assure you, what’s going on here with fedgov intervention has nothing to do with Trans rights.  Do you really think the political ruling class gives a shit about 0.0016 of the voting population?  No.  This is about pushing the envelope to see where the breaking point lies.  This is about testing the moral fabric of this country to see just how outrageously they can overreach until somebody decides to do something about it.  This is a weighing of the sheeple.
I hope everyone understands this: If you support biological men in girls’ locker/bath/changing rooms, you are making a conscious choice to place the feelings of a tiny minority above the physical safety of all women and children.  If that’s your opinion, just get comfortable with the fact that, in your mind, an increased level of violence against women and children in the form of rape, assault and murder by sexual predators abusing this new paradigm is simply the price of progress.
This is an appeal to every father, brother, husband.  Do you willfully submit to putting your daughters, sisters and wives at grave risk for the sake of the “feelings” of 0.0016 of the population?  Are you okay with giving the green light for every sexual predator to claim he “feels like a woman” and to freely enter, by federal law, any girls’ bathroom, changing room, or locker room he wants? If not, what are you going to do about it?  Do you even have the balls to share this post?
Here’s an idea:  Withdraw your kids from public school on Monday.  Give the schools and the states the summer to stand up to the fedgov overreach.  That action brings zero risk to you and your family, yet if done on a massive scale, could do some real good. HERE
This is a war on women and children.  Period.
Gentlemen, into the breach…

Just yesterday, I typed this:

Everything will continue to accelerate.  These people will be further emboldened with each brazen move that goes unchallenged, save for the dozen bloggers who will call it out.  They must be even more amazed than we are at the pathetic lack of response.  And we already know the next target is Infallibility, because if they crack that, it’s open season.

Okay, so I got that last part wrong.  First, we are going to ordain women to the diaconate.

“Pope Francis has announced he will create a commission to study the possibility of allowing women to serve as deacons in the Catholic church, signaling an historic openness to the possibility of ending the global institution’s practice of an all-male clergy.”

Do you think there is a possibility that the outcome of the commission could already be predetermined?
In her twin gem postings last week, Hilary White had such an insightful comment about +Francis.  Not only was he inevitable, not only do we deserve him, but he is also exactly what we need – no, really.  He has pulled the mask off – the Great Facade is finally exposed for all to see and which no one can now deny.  Unless they intend to surrender all intellectual honesty, the Hermeneutic of Continuity crowd will now have no choice but to admit they got it wrong, as I did for so many years. The infestation has reached the point that it cannot be rooted out except by taking a flamethrower to the whole place.  Remember, it’s way bigger than just +Francis:  a majority of the bishops voted for all the nastiest bits at the synod, even if some parts did not get the 2/3rds majority.
Pope St. Pius X, pray for us.

Archbishop Forte has in fact revealed a “behind the scenes” [moment] from the Synod: “If we speak explicitly about communion for the divorced and remarried,” said Archbishop Forte, reporting a joke of Pope Francis, “you do not know what a terrible mess we will make. So we won’t speak plainly, do it in a way that the premises are there, then I will draw out the conclusions.”
“Typical of a Jesuit,” Abp Forte joked.

Yeah, we agree on that last point.
Imagine… an archbishop accuses the reigning pontiff of deception, heresy and sacrilege –  and it is meant AS A COMPLIMENT.   Do you understand how far down the rabbit hole we are?
Read the rest HERE.
The short paragraph from the archbishop, who was hand picked by +Francis as secretary of the synods, sums up everything that has happened in the past year and a half.:

1. Undermining 2000 years of constant Church teaching in the name of (false) Mercy
2. Endless pronouncements of error from +Francis without a single correction and many explicitly confirmed by other officials
3. Endless insults and condemnations of anyone who believes in the law
4. Two fake synods where the outcome was predetermined
5. Premeditated deception to draw attention away from the gravity of what is being done
6. Suppression, and in one case theft, of ideas and materials supporting Truth
7. A heretical final document not condemned by a single prelate

Everything will continue to accelerate.  These people will be further emboldened with each brazen move that goes unchallenged, save for the dozen bloggers who will call it out.  They must be even more amazed than we are at the pathetic lack of response.  And we already know the next target is Infallibility, because if they crack that, it’s open season.