“True Freedom Demands Justice” — The Ukrainian Conflict and the Church

We continue to publish articles on the Ukraine conflict in order to give space to different opinions and to shed light on as many aspects as possible.  Today we publish a letter from the sociologist Pietro De Marco* to the Vaticanist Sandro Magister.

 Dear Magister,

I request your hospitality for some considerations prompted by the ongoing war in Ukraine.  The news horizon and the proliferation of chronicles and reflections on the pages of the media indicate duplicity, rather dystonia.  On the one hand there is the conflict with its facts: the acts of war and the political decisions about the present and future of the entire European area.  On the other hand, the demonstrations, prayers, moral and political declarations for peace.  Demonstrations and prayers that speak of war in its truth, without ever touching it or considering it as such;  eyes are on the suffering, on the migrants, on peace.

The duality would be an invariable complementarity if in the compassionate or peace-seeker there was also a rational engagement with the conflict, an instance of judgment of merit, and finally a non-dualistic positioning between good and evil.

To say: “There is war, long live peace” is, in my opinion, tantamount to moving in an exclusive “rationality by values” and ignoring the necessary “rationality by goals”.  Because of this indifference to outcomes that are not absolute (the peace that flourishes), everything can be heard in the squares, to the point of the absence of any judgment or the reverberating "Anything, as long as we stop fighting".  And there is also too much playfulness.  There are young people, but also adults, women and men, who seem to live more in the comedies of Aristophanes ("There are too many hormones in this matter," we heard exclaimed on TV, "If women were in power...  ’) than to meditate on Herodotus.

Today, in view of the history of peoples, the “peacemakers” can no longer hide behind the veil of their horror at hatred and bloodshed, nor under that of a love of neighbor that disregards everything.  In this order of reality which is the conflict that is taking place, the less gracious virtue of justice must dominate.  Less gracious, because justice in relations between peoples, if granted at all, must be justified: its judgment must have consequences.  And these will, and already do, coincide with the mechanics of war, since they concern it: weapons and means made available to the weaker party to fight, penalties for the aggressor to injure him on multiple levels and  certainly causing distress, as well as symmetrical threats to intimidate him.  In the end, one side will inevitably give way (or give up terrain with losses).

If the words of peace do not see this chain of necessary facts realistically aimed at ending the conflict, if they consider it abstractly to be an evil not worth examining iuxta propria principia, they condemn themselves of it. And these self-satisfied words are pecked away by the sparrows.

It is not war in general, but this or that war determines the place of decision.  Prayer, the most intense and theologically conscious, is necessary and undoubtedly pleasing to God, but it falls within the inscrutable realm of His will.  Or are we as a Church tempted to use prayer as an "excuse" not to take a stand and not work in and on this war?  We would not succumb to this temptation if we had retained the ability to think about events in terms of a theology of history.  Instead, the dominant theologies are antithetical to Paul, hostile to Augustine, they would mock Bossuet or de Maistre.  They flirt with the philosophies, but even Hegel's heretical, but very high theology of history is alien to them.  They think small or utopian, and utopia is the product of emotional ethics.

What am I getting at?  "War is therefore an act of violence to force the enemy to do our will," is one of Clausewitz's well-known definitions.  Turning away the Christian distinction of war as such, and saying no to evade the careful scrutiny of an event that will go far beyond the evils and sufferings of the moment, is not just a mistake.  It's running away from a responsibility.

Nothing relieves the Catholic Church of this responsibility.  The Holy See, a spiritual power but a power nonetheless, has so far moved tentatively, as if walking between prayer - with the Pope admirably acting, but acting as an individual rather than the human head of the Church - and passed over action, the actions of others.  I have followed with great interest the distant years of Giorgio La Pira's international political activity (Cuba Crisis, Vietnam), which may not have been very fruitful, but which was a bearer of reason, analysis and the ability to influence.

We know that the famous "Divisions of the Pope" are just the worldwide Catholic people.  But offering the Vatican as a place of encounter and negotiation does not mean turning the Ukraine conflict into a mystical place.  The Holy See will only mediate if it has the power and authority to do so;  if, for example, in the play of the moral, religious and political forces in the world it can say: The Catholic Church, whether in agreement with the Orthodox Churches or not, can neither accept nor endure the present showdown which consciously and according to a clear plan consciously deny  the  decisive freedoms, the large nations in new self-determination, which the world and all churches gained with the collapse of the USSR.  The collapse of the Soviet system was wanted by its own people, it is in a way a world historical fact that one would like to know is irreversible.

The Catholic Church, as Holy See, has the power, if it wishes, to oblige Catholics in conscience not to provide any alibi or scope (moral, ideological, political) to the project of a neo-imperial Russia, and thereby to put an end to the unwise pro-Putin New Constantine Catholic positions.  That means, having said that, to contribute with all your strength as an expert on humanity and as a sister of the Orthodox churches to ensure that peace negotiations can be carried out over a limited area (guarantees, possible border corrections) and not politically and religiously retrospectively (no return based on history of large European areas under the arbitrary rule of an autocrat).

There is no sign of this or any similar determination on the part of the Holy See.  It is to be hoped that the difficulties Rome has had to date in raising its declarations to the level of the Catholic Church's international standing are due to caution in seriously investigating the situation and the open questions, and not to recognizing that there meanwhile, it has disbanded its worldwide moral army and retired its special forces, those capable of realistic judgment.  Among them, the Society of Jesus once stood out.  History will do without them.

Pietro DeMarco

 *Emeritus Professor of Sociology at the University of Florence and at the School of Religious Studies in Florence with a focus on sociology of religion and culture.  As a doctor of philosophy, he also deals with the European history of the ideas of the Renaissance and the early modern period as well as Jewish, early Christian and Islamic-medieval thought.  In 2015, on the occasion of the second synod on the family, he was one of the first to sign the international appeal to the Pope on the future of the family.

Two "little notes" from Sandro Magister

Two small remarks on the activity of the Church in this war.  The first concerns the ban on the word "war" in Russia, which has been replaced by "military operation".  At the Angelus on Sunday, March 6, Pope Francis responded explicitly: "This is not just a military operation, but a war that sows death, destruction and misery".  Andrea Tornielli, editor-in-chief of the Holy See's communications department, wrote on the front page of the Osservatore Romano that "Pope Francis has rejected the 'fake news' that seeks to present events with verbal subterfuges to cover up the gruesome reality of the facts."

But one only has to go back a few days to see that the Holy See itself, in its first official statement — issued on February 24 by Cardinal Secretary of State Pietro Parolin — after the Russian aggression, or, as the document puts it, “after  resorting to these “verbal subterfuges” after the start of Russian military operations on Ukrainian territory”.

The second comment concerns the proposal of the Community of Sant'Egidio, and in particular its founder Andrea Riccardi, to make Kyiv an "open city".  The declared aim is to “avoid armed conflict, house-to-house and street-to-street fighting” because “Kyiv is the Jerusalem of Russian Orthodoxy and thus of Belarusian, Russian and Ukrainian Orthodoxy.  It must not become Aleppo.”

Few know, however, that an "open city" is technically a city which, by express agreement of the conflicting parties, can be occupied by the enemy, in this case Russia, without resistance.

And some hints

So much for Magister's comments, to which a few notes should be added:

 1

 Riccardi apparently recognizes the all-Russian commonality that has been expressed in the title by the head of the Church, originally sent by the Patriarch of Constantinople, since Christianization in the 10th century.  For the first 300 years, this had its seat in Kyiv, the capital of the still unified Rus, and was metropolitan, later patriarch of “all Rus”.

Relevant: The advance of the Central Powers (German Reich, Austria-Hungary etc. until March 1918 (dark green line)

 2

The conquests of the Mongols led to a divergence in the late High Middle Ages, because the liberation struggle against the Mongols was carried out on the one hand by the self-liberating northern Rus, especially Moscow, and on the other hand by the Kingdom of Poland and the Grand Duchy of Lithuania.  Two catholic powers.  This laid the foundation for today's linguistic, but above all cultural and religious division of the country.

 3

When it comes to the question of who bears responsibility for a war, what matters is not only who fired the first shot, but above all what happened before the shot was fired.  Historical science will pursue this question one day, away from the general public.  In fact, the winner writes history.

4

Those who advocate a unitary state of Ukraine, which in its extent was a more accidental product of the turmoil of the end of World War I (see map above), run the risk, willfully or criminally, of misjudging Ukraine's complex reality.  Depending on your point of view, this consists of two parts (Ukrainian West, Russian East) or three parts (Russian East Ukraine, Orthodox West Ukraine, Catholic West Ukraine).  A statehood can be established and justified for each part.  One of the serious mistakes that led to the current war is that these facts have been ignored in recent years and the Kiev government has been encouraged in this by the West.  There are a number of possible and suitable instruments for a peaceful solution: partitioning the country, transforming it into a confederation of states, transforming it into a federal state with strong internal ethnic and religious guarantees, to name just three.  A fair division, as history teaches, would often have been the better solution and would have prevented millions of suffering, war, death and displacement.  However, most states, including Brussels, have declared border changes an idolatrous taboo.

What does that mean?  One example among many: If Austria and Prussia had recognized and guaranteed ethnic relations in 1848 based on the Swiss model, or had organized some crown lands and provinces according to ethnic criteria - even while maintaining the historical borders - the ethnic struggles that later broke out would have been defused from the outset and the the tragedies of exile and expulsion of the 20th century would probably have never materialized.

The maximalism of the strongest doesn’t merely entail tragedies to come, but also tragedies for them, because today's strongest can soon become the weaker.

 Translation/Notes: Giuseppe Nardi

 Image: Wikicommons

Trans: Tancred vekron99@hotmail.com

AMDG

Secret Agreement Between Red China and Vatican Has Failed

The zero balance of the secret agreement between the Vatican and the People's Republic of China. Pictured: Episcopal ordination of Monsignor Anthony Yao Shun, Bishop of Jining, in August 2019.

(Rome) The 2018 secret agreement between the Holy See and the Communist rulers of the People's Republic of China has "failed". The well-known Vaticanist Sandro Magister comes to this conclusion and explains why.

On June 7, Msgr. Celli said:The 22nd of September 2020 marks the second anniversary of the signing of the agreement between the Vatican and the Chinese state, the content of which is still being kept secret by both sides. However, some elements could be reconstructed: The focus of the agreement is the appointment of bishops. A new detail was revealed a few days ago. According to the Vatican diplomat Claudio Maria Celli, who was instrumental in creating the agreement, the agreement expires on September 22nd should it not be extended. In fact, the Vatican had always spoken of a “provisional” agreement.

In fact, on June 7th Msgr. Celli said:

"I think we should probably extend it for another year or two. The Holy See has not yet made a decision in this regard, which will then be communicated to the Chinese authorities. ”

The Vatican diplomat also spoke of a “not an easy path”. There were "knots left" that could not be loosened and "situations that are very considerable, I would say, make you worried".

Did the Vatican Denounce Scalfari?

by Giuseppe Nardi

The column published yesterday by Eugenio Scalfari led to a brief reaction from the Vatican Press Office. Scalfari revealed in the daily La Repubblica that Francis entrusted him, in a personal conversation, with the conviction that Jesus Christ was "not God at all". But how did the Holy See react to this nuclear bomb of atomic bombs?

Strictly taciturn. So far, only the new Vatican spokesman Matteo Bruni has reacted. He said:

"As has been said on other occasions, the words that Dr. Eugenio Scalfari ascribed to the Holy Father in conversations with him, are not as a faithful representation of what has actually been said, but above all are a personal and free interpretation of what he has heard, as it quite obviously seems, what is written today concerning the deity of Jesus Christ."

Will the Vatican spokesman say that Scalfari is senile or even malicious? Or did he just want to say that the doyen of Italian left-journalism no longer hears well, and put together something in good faith that Francis has neither said nor meant?

And that was it?

Various media today claim that "Pope Francis" or "the Vatican" has denied Scalfari.

Why does Francis talk to a journalist, not to any journalist, but to Eugenio Scalfari, who he knows will then make the conversation public and, by reason of his position, will be well received? Not once, but repeatedly.

Given the long list of scandalous statements attributed to Francis by Scalfari since 2013, papal behavior is not explained by what has been said on other occasions. All the "corrections" made by the Vatican press office, which had previously been made to Scalfari, were everything, just no real denials. Why?

As any observer can convince, the Vatican press office knows very well to express a clear distancing. Exactly that has never happened to Scalfari.

As in the past his two predecessors Federico Lombardi SJ and Greg Burke also Bruni denied the said. Rather, it is each more or less confirmed, so even yesterday. Scalfari just simply interpreted the pope's words a bit "freely".

As usual, Francis is silent

Pope Francis is silent. He was silent on every Scalfari scandal produced in his name. Scalfari is very public with his media and its international reputation. Francis knows that too. Still, he talks to Scalfari again. Why? Especially since, according to Scalfari, he is "not converting" anyway.

The fact is that Scalfari, as spokesman for Pope Francis, is accustoming the public, above all the Catholic community, to the incomprehensible and unthinkable with a constant increase. This creates a stagnation that could accelerate the process of erosion in the Church in unexpected ways. And everything happens as usual:

As usual, Scalfari publishes a scandal "in the name of the Pope".

As usual, the Vatican signals without really denying that this is not to be taken literally.

As usual, Francis continues to contact Scalfari.

As usual, the "not so literal" Pope's opinion circulates in public and draws its circles.

As usual, the Scalfari Teaching Office follows a precise worldview that today is that of the mainstream and, for a long time, that of Freemasonry.

As usual, in today's edition of La Repubblica, we do not say a word about a Vatican denial. Why?

Not true, but probably

It is not only clear that the Pope should choose his interlocutor better. The matter is much more serious.

It is clear that the weak reaction of Vatican spokesman Bruni is not an adequate answer to the incomprehensible scandal, Pope Francis denied the deity of Jesus Christ.

After all, his Jesuit General, Arturo Sosa Abascal, has already doubted the genuineness of the Gospel and the words of the Lord handed down in it, for after all, there are no electronic recordings of it.

"Unbelievable, but true," wrote Vatican writer Sandro Magister at the time.

The bottom line is not just another unpleasant aftertaste (how much does the Church tolerate?), But far more worrying, because the statement may not be true, but likely.

Picture: MiL

Trans: Tancred vekron99@hotmail.com

AMDG

Francis Actually Reads Blogs He Fears For His “Mental Hygiene”

 Pope Francis yesterday warned the apostolic nuncios (ambassadors) with an unusual footnote.

(Rome) "Because of the mental health", so Pope Francis assured, he does not read internet pages and blogs that criticize his administration. Yesterday, he warned the apostolic nuncios from "blogging" or "even joining groups," who are critical of him. In the same speech, however, Francis quoted just one of those websites that he says he does not read at all. Such as?

On January 16, 2018, Pope Francis met in Santiago de Chile with the Jesuits of that South American country. The main reason for the trip to Chile and Peru was the imminent Amazon Synod  as his confidant, Cardinal Lorenzo Baldisseri, explained. That was only a few days before the storm of homosexual abuse scandal in the Church began to break over Francis.

Francis also approached his confreres of the Society of Jesus SJ) about heresy allegations that had been made to him indirectly a short time before in connection with the controversial post-synodal letter Amoris laetitia. Contentwise, he did not respond to the criticism, but demanded “not to read” such websites and blogs for reasons of "mental hygiene.”

Yesterday, the Pope received in audience all the Apostolic Nuncios who are doing their diplomatic service in different countries worldwide. Their meeting, to which he called them to Rome, ends tomorrow.

In his speech  which was published only in Italian, Francis warned the ambassadors of the Holy See against criticism of his person. The head of the Church said:

"It is therefore incompatible to be a Pontifical Representative and to criticize the Pope behind his back, to have a blog or even to join groups hostile to Him, the Curia and the Church of Rome." 

The third person in which Francis spoke of himself is capitalized in the original Vatican publication. The speech was published on the official website of the Holy See and in today's edition of Osservatore Romano. It should not be forgotten that Archbishop Carlo Maria Viganò, a retired apostolic nuncio, criticized the current pontificate with the greatest publicity so far and called for the resignation of Francis.

When the pope quotes what he does not read out of "mental hygiene"

Remarkably, Francis quoted yesterday for the nuncios, just one of those websites, of which he - as a directive to the Jesuits (and not just them) - said not to read them. The reference can be found in footnote 14. The source quoted by Pope Francis is Corrispondenza Romana, whose founder and editor, Professor Roberto de Mattei, is one of the intellectual critics of the current pontificate.

Footnote 14: an essay by Prof. Roberto de Mattei on Corrispondenza Romana.

The Bergoglians tried to correct this  "embarrassment" immediately, first of all Il Sismografo, the digital press review hosted somewhere between the Vatican Secretariat of State and the Communications Dicastery, led by Luis Badilla, a former Chilean Minister of Popular Front Government of Salvador Allende. There, in tortuous form, an apology is sought,  cited in Santa Marta for what was considered there a scandalous "Faupax", from such an illustrious and honorable, intellectually outstanding and deeply traditional source as the historian Roberto de Mattei:

"After numerous checks and verifications, we have come to a conclusion and present it to our readers, just as this conviction has formed in our editorial staff in these hours: in all probability the Pope was not adequately informed, without complete information and not consciously aware of the very nature of the source used in footnote 14 of his speech.” 

Luis Badilla must have swept aside this formulation like the  beads of sweat on his forehead. There were "so many" references to this source that Il Sismografo felt compelled to respond in order to protect the image of the Pope. Prof. de Mattei is presented by Badilla as an "anti-Bergoglian Italian intellectual" who "in those years did not spare Pope Francis allegations, epithets, adjectives and criticisms, often morally aggressive and not very polite to the Bishop of Rome.”

Il Sismografo: semi-official press review of the Vatican.

But what did Pope Francis quote from Corrispondenza Romana? At first glance "only" the litany of humility of Cardinal Secretary of State Rafael Merry del Val (1865-1930). Francis recommends it to the apostolic nuncios, stating that it comes from a "colleague," Merry del Val, son of a Spanish diplomat, himself serving many years as a diplomat in the service of the Holy See.

However, the essay by Roberto de Mattei on the Spanish-Irish cardinal cited in the source not only includes the litany, but a tribute to the "true aristocrat" whom St. Pius X, though only 38 years old, made Vatican secretary of state.

The red cape for the close circle of Francis, however, is Roberto de Mattei, the quoted author himself: historian, university professor, like his father and grandfather, descendant of the Sicilian nobility and one of the leading figures in Catholic tradition. It was about them he wrote under the title "Defense of Tradition," a book that was published in 2017 in translation by the theologian and philosopher Wolfram Schrems and with a foreword by the writer Martin Mosebach in German and is to be regarded as a standard reference work in German. 

Text: Giuseppe Nardi

Image: Vatican.va (screenshots)

Trans: Tancred vekron99@hotmail.com

Book is available in English.

AMDG

With New Sexual Abuse Case Francis May Go From Cleanup Man to Accused

(Rome) In July 2017, Bishop Gustavo Oscar Zanchetta, although only 53 years old, became emeritus diocesan bishop of the Argentine diocese of Oran. The reason given was his health. "Many were worried that he was suffering from a deadly disease, because it was not even enough to celebrate a mass for farewell," said the US Daily Beast on January 4th. The departure from the diocese was extremely abrupt. Now the evidence is mounting, that the reason for it was a completely different one.

A true Bergoglian

Monsignor Zanchetta belongs to the circle of Bergoglians among the bishops with whom the Pope's former Primate of Argentina is rebuilding the Episcopate of his native land. On July 23, 2013, Francis Gustavo had appointed Oscar Zanchetta Bishop of Oran.

Four years later, the bishop left his diocese in a shambles on August 1, 2017. He subsequently justified his hasty disappearance from an unknown location with unspecified "health problems". He merely said that these problems would have to be dealt with elsewhere. 

Then, as is now known, he stopped in Corrientes, 900 kilometers away, and then reappeared further away in Madrid - and apparently in good health again.

Heresy Charge Against "Black Pope" -- Pope Francis and Cardinal Müller Are Presented With Heresy Charge Against Jesuit General

Jesuit General Arturo Sosa Absacal left of Pope Francis: is the
"Black Pope" spreading heresy?

(Rome) Next Sunday, Pope Francis will visit the small diocese of Carpi in the Po Valley.  A courageous priest of this diocese is currently pestering the Pope. He raises the question with a memorandum of whether the new Jesuit Father General, Arturo Sosa Absacal, spreads heresies.

Memorandum against the "Black Pope"

The priest is Don Roberto Bertacchini and is a pupil of three priests of stature, the German Jesuit, Father Heinrich Pfeiffer, art historian at the Gregoriana in Rome, and the two Italian Jesuits, Father Francesco Tata, former religious prosecutor of Italy, and Father Piersandro Vanzan, Augustine connoisseur and leading author of the Roman Jesuit paper, Civiltà Cattolica . The reference to his Jesuit teachers is not without significance in the matter. Bertacchini was ordained priest in 2009 by the then Archbishop Carlo Ghidelli of Lanciano-Ortona.

Last week, as the Vaticanist Sandro Magister reports, Don Bertacchini sent both Pope Francis and Cardinal Gerhard Müller a memorandum. On six pages, the priest critically comments on a recent interview of the new General Superior of the Jesuit Order, who has been in office since October 2016. The Venezuelan Arturo Sosa Abasca  stands very close to Pope Francis, himself Jesuit.

Does the Jesuit General Want a "Christianity without Christ"?

The Jesuit general had represented theses in the interview, which are "so serious that they can not be passed over without silence, without making one's self complicit." Bertacchini accuses the "Black Pope", as the Jesuit general is traditionally called, of speaking of  "a Christianity without Christ".

Magister published Bertacchini's memorandum . Giuseppe Rusconi, the Swiss Vaticanista, published the interview where he criticized him last February 18. Arturo Sosa had reviewed the text and released it for publication.

Bertacchini's criticism is centered on the massive doubts expressed by the Jesuit General about the credibility of the Holy Scriptures. Arturo Sosa made fun of it. Rusconi addressed himself to criticism of the controversial papal Amoris laetitia . The words of Jesus were opposed to the admission of remarried divorced persons to the Sacraments. Sosa replied sloppily that nobody could know exactly what Jesus had said "really," because no one had "a tape recorder" with him.

According to Bertacchini, the Jesuit General says that the words of Jesus on the indissolubility of marriage are not a theological fixed point, but only the point of departure for the doctrine, which must then be developed "comfortably." In this way, however, the exact opposite could be represented, in other words the compatibility of divorce and Christian life."

Jesuit genius "too smart" to openly represent a heresy

Bertacchini emphasizes that Arturo Sosa Absacal SJ, "is too smart to fall into an obvious heresy, which in some respects is even worse. It is, therefore, necessary to follow the thread of his reasoning."

In an interview, the Jesuit General asked whether the evangelists were credible or not. His answer: One must distinguish. He thus implied, by way of a roundabout way, that it is not said, about the credibility of the Gospels. He thus questions the truthfulness of Jesus' whole doctrine of faith. The Jesuit had been careful to go into details. He remained general, but nevertheless offered a statement destructive in its core. If we consider that, in all his statements on marriage and the newly remarried divorced, Pope Francis never cited the words of the Lord on the indissolubility of marriage, the thrust of the Jesuit General would be clear. Bertacchini added:

"If the Pope does not quote these passages, it means that he has made a distinction and does not consider it authentic. They are therefore not binding. But all the popes have taught the contrary! So what? They will be wrong. Or they have said true things and taught for their time, but not for ours. "

The Jesuit General does not say it apertis verbis, but interprets it and lets it show through.

"This gives the Pope's a reading to the  family pastoral, which deviates from the traditional doctrine."

Jesuit General: "We know today that Jesus never taught that marriage is indissoluble"

Sosa asserts nothing less than that

"We know today," that Jesus probably, probably almost certainly, never taught that marriage is indissoluble. The evangelists would have misunderstood this."

"On the other hand, the Sensus fidei tells us that the evangelists are credible. Our Jesuit General, however, rejects this credibility and even ignores the fact that St. Paul received this doctrine from the teaching as directly following Jesus, and passed it on to his congregations." (1 Cor 7: 10-11).

According to Bertacchini, the consensus of the Synoptics is "too clear" in the rejection of  adultery.  Moreover, St. Paul reaffirms this doctrine in the Epistle to the Ephesians and even strengthens it. He reaffirmed it by quoting the passage from the book of Genesis, which Jesus also quoted, and strengthened it because Christ loved the Church in an indissoluble way, so much so that he gave his life for it and beyond his earthly life. This faithfulness of the Lord is what Paul calls the model of marital fidelity.

There is, therefore, evidently a continuity between the pre-Easter and the post-Easter teachings. Equally obvious is the break with Judaism, which retained the possibility of the repudiation. Bertacching asks the following questions: "If Paul himself refers to Jesus for this break, what is the meaning of the Gospels? Where should this leap come from which determined the practice of the early Church, if not of Christ?"

It should be remembered that divorce was also permitted in the Greco-Roman sphere, and that a form of the concubinage existed, which could easily lead to a later marriage, like the life of St Augustine shows. The rejection of a abandonment, divorce, concubinage constitutes a cultural breach, a phenomenon which is decisive in the history of culture, what should it point back to, if not to Jesus? And if Jesus is the Christ, why should the faithfulness of the Gospels be doubted?

"Apart from this, if Jesus is not to have said these words, from whence comes the drastic commentary of the disciples in Matthew 19:10 (" then it is not good to marry at all?") Among these disciples was also the evangelist himself who does not strike a good figure. They understood late what Jesus taught them because they were then still dependent on the traditions of their time that Jesus criticizes. "From a historical point of view, the pericope Mt 19, 3-12 is credible in every respect," the priest said.

Bertacchini then goes into detail on the "dogmatic horizon" of the statements of the Jesuit General. In it, he expanded his criticism and extends it to a recent article in the Roman Jesuit journal Civilta Cattolica, with the Jesuit Giancarlo Pani, where the prohibition of female priesthood is questioned. Bertacchini criticizes the fact that the solemn gospel, which calls for infallibility, is questioned without hesitation. The priest criticizes this work of subversion with the aim of destroying safe dams.

What will Pope Francis do with the inscription of Don Roberto Bertacchini? What will CDF Prefect Müller do with it?

Link to Katholisches...
Trans: Tancred vekron99@hotmail.com
AMDG

Knights of Malta -- The Double Truth About that 30 Million

[Magister] The reply of Eugenio Ajroldi di Robbiate, director of the communications office of the Order of Malta, to what was published on March 23 by Settimo Cielo on “the mystery of those 30 million Swiss francs,” has not been passed over in silence by other knights of the Order, closer to the mental workings of former Grand Master Fra' Matthew Festing, forced to hand in his resignation last January 24 to Pope Francis in person.

This is what is attested to in the following letter, from a person very well-informed on the affairs of the Order, rich in information that in its turn contradicts, corrects, or completes what has been stated by the official spokesman.

*

Dear Magister,

Sometimes even those responsible for the external communications of big organizations make mistaken or imprecise statements. There is no exemption to this rule for the Order of Malta, which recently has generated great confusion, especially on the New Zealand CPVG trust with its Swiss fiduciary, at first denying its existence and then creating a great deal of confusion on the legal circumstances that have led to opposition between the Order and the trust.

A few clarifications need to be made on the latest position statement of the Order, to correct or contradict its contents.

Albrecht Freiherr von Boeselager was not removed as an elected member of the Sovereign Council, but because a disciplinary procedure had been initiated against him. The circumstance had determined his suspension as a member of the Order, and therefore his automatic disqualification from the position of Grand Chancellor. The whole procedure had been examined by the Office of the Advocate General, which had confirmed its validity. All the circumstances were reported in a statement on the website of the Order, which was later removed. The Grand Master had attached a copy to a letter sent to numerous personalties connected to the Order on January 14, 2017. Over the last 15 years, two members of the Sovereign Council, both Italian, have resigned from their positions at the request of the Grand Master.

Benedict XVI's Criticism: Far From an Example, the German Church is a Black Hole

Benedict XVI's criticism of the worldly German church with the faithful
of a "Trade Union Mentality" because there are "too many" employees
of the church (pictured is Cardinal Marx of the German Bishops'
Conference) 

(Rome) "From because good example for the world. The German church is a black hole," was the unflattering judgment of Vaticanist Sandro Magister on the Catholic Church in the Federal Republic of Germany, whose highest representative office is the German Bishops' Conference. The Vatican expert summed up the damning verdict by Benedict XVI. about the German church, which he expresses in the new interview book with Peter Seewald.

In Germany there were some people who have always wanted to destroy him, says Benedict XVI. As an example, the former head of the church was deceitfully accused of anti-semitism by some countrymen when he changed the Good Friday prayer for the Jews.

The interview book, says Magister, was an "accusation" by Benedict XVI. against the German church. He accuses it of being too worldly. He had already hurled charges of worldliness on the 25th September 2011 in Freiburg, and called for a "detachment from the world." Although at that time everyone understood what was meant, an entire church apparatus, including courtiers and minions started to move in order to claim that what was meant what not what was meant, and everything would remain as it is.

"Too many Catholics as Church employees with a Trade Union Mentality"

Secularization is a danger that accompanies the Church constantly. Where it has gone too far, the Church has suffered serious damage in its history. To focus on Germany: The outbreak and even more so, the success of Luther's "Reformation" revolution had largely to do with the secularization [laicization] of the Church and especially with the benefice saturated Prince Archbishop of Mainz, who was at the same time Archbishop of Magdeburg, Elector, Archchancellor of the Empire and Primate Germaniae, in one person, Albrecht of Brandenburg (House of Hohenzollern). By today's standards he would be the President of the German Bishops' Conference .

Joseph Cardinal Ratzinger

In Freiburg in 2011, Benedict XVI did not mention the church tax system by name. In the interview book he does, probably to prevent a renewed "reinterpretation" of his words. Benedict does not criticize the levy in itself because every baptized person is bound by his means  to contribute to the maintenance of the clergy and to provide support, so that the Church can fulfill its apostolic and charitable tasks. However, Benedict criticized the linking of church tax with excommunication.That is, says the former Pope, untenable.

The result of the church tax system is a highly organized Church, but in the - so the downside - Catholics are often merely employees of the Church and a "trade union mentality" prevails. The Church will no longer be perceived by them from the dimension of faith, but more as an employer, which is  to be criticized as such. The motivation of faith is lacking. Also it becomes an expression of the secularization of Church life.

"Impressive contrast between Benedict's criticism of German Church and Francis' favor for the German Church"

The Church in Germany is, after the government, Germany's second largest employer. The gigantic apparatus has transformed the church into a "secular bureaucracy."   It's a situation that Benedict XVI.  finds tragic.  That much money is not good for the Church is because in the end it is still too little and creates only sarcasm from  intellectual circles.

"It impresses the contrast between this harsh criticism of Benedict XVI. and the favor the same German Church enjoys today from Pope Francis, as if it were the vanguard of the hoped-for renewal of a world Christendom defined by poverty and mercy, while in reality, in front of everyone, it is obvious that the Church is neither poor nor merciful in Germany but - even worse - is smothered by its own apparatus, and especially by the world where many central themes of morality and dogma is on its knees. "

What Magister does not explicitly mention: Currently there are German bishops and subordinate representatives on their knees in "Luther fever." Cardinal Reinhard Marx, President of the German Bishops' Conference, declared Luther a "bombastic figure" while Cardinal Walter Kasper announced: "Luther was right."

Magister explains the German church tax system with its compulsory payments that level the threat of excommunication for non-compliance. The Vatican expert points out that the German Bishops' Conference last year, received more than five times what the Italian Episcopal Conference received through voluntary church donations.

Modern indulgences: disobedience and heresy do not matter, the main thing is that you pay the church tax

Whoever doesn't pay the church tax in Germany will be excluded from the Church. This was confirmed again by the German bishops in  2012. Who does not pay, is excluded from the sacraments.

Of "mercy" says Magister, there  is no trace. In Germany, a considerable part of the church is disobeying doctrine and discipline of the Church. Schismatic and heretical tendencies are tolerated without the slightest suspicon. The remarried divorcees "go unabashedly Communion everywhere, and aberrosexual unions are increasingly being blessed in church."   Excommunication was nowhere mentioned however much it might encourage some. "But woe", if someone does not pay church tax. One could speak of a new "indulgence." The main thing is you pay, then you can do it any way you want, the services of the Church are always available.  Subservience to the zeitgeist prevails accordingly in a deafening silence about the mass murder of unborn children through abortion.

This past July 17  Curial Archbishop Georg Gänswein, the secretary of Benedict XVI., also lamented this contradiction in an interview with the Swabian newspaper .

A lot of money: influence on the many poor diocese and also in Rome

"There is no mention of the influence which the German Church has on many poor dioceses in the southern hemisphere, they support financially," said Magister. The same applies to the Holy See in Rome, who is also a big beneficiary of German monetary flows.

As early as 2011 there the church in Germany was peeved at Benedict XVI.'s critique of the worldliness of their church.  Since he is then no longer Pope, they no longer have to take out all the stops to appease public opinion. This part was adopted at this time by the Jesuit Andreas Batlogg, editor of the Jesuit magazine "Stimmen der Zeit". He said that the interview book by Benedict XVI. "should never have appeared", and Cardinal Marx would do to silence criticism.

The German church knows, so the impression, that a nerve has been struck when one criticizes her luxuriant flowing money.

Text: Giuseppe Nardi
Image: MiL / ACIprensa (screenshots)
Trans: Tancred vekron99@hotmail.com
Link to Katholisches...
AMDG