Is the Pope Going to Dismiss the Swiss Guard?

(Rome) For months, there have been rumors that the Argentine Pope could abolish the Pontifical Swiss Guard. In recent days, the speculation has intensified. This is due to the dismissal of Colonel Daniel Rudolf Anrig, commander of the Swiss Guard. On December 1, 2014 Pope Francis had fired Anrig a native of the canton of St. Gallen. Reasons were not disclosed. The media claimed that it could have been due to the "severity" of the colonel who commanded the papal guard unit since 2008. Daniel Rudolf Anrig will be  officially dismissed as part of a military ceremony tomorrow.

The fact that Pope Francis has appointed no successor has fueled speculation about the dismissal of the Papal Guard. In an interview with the Argentine newspaper La Nacion, the Pope spoke highly of the dismissed Colonel Anrig. He was a "great person, a good Catholic, with a beautiful family." His dismissal was merely concerned with a "healthy and normal renewal," said the head of the Church. Since then there has been puzzling over what Pope Francis mean by a "healthy and normal renewal".

Quirky gestures, telegenic looseness or ...

Pope salutes Guards

In Rome, it is an open secret that the Argentine Pope knows little what to do with the tradition of the Swiss Guards Corps. Because of quirky gestures it has been speculated that the Pope has little respect for order and work of other show. Once he saluted one guard, as US Presidents are wont to do. So it seems inappropriate when a civilian performs a military salute, as well as  the doubt creating the suggestion around the  papal scene whether the Pope maybe just made a joke.  Another time he went in passing a Guard and shook his hand. The young man laughed sheepishly on the out-of protocol gesture in camera flashes. The protocol was not the focus. The Pope had sufficient opportunity to go off the TV cameras to his guards.

Some observers see in Jorge Mario Bergoglio's phenomenal sense of pleasing and being prone to the media as  the surest guarantee of the continued existence of the 500-year-old guard. They are telegenic and strikingly colorful because of the old uniforms, so they will not be dismissed by the Pope. That the announcement of Colonel Anrig's dismissal was carried out during the ad limina-visit of  the Swiss Bishops speaks for others against this assumption. A mere courtesy toward   the Swiss bishops does not fit.

Protecting the Pope Since 1506

Swearing-in of recruits

The Swiss Guard was established in 1506. Since then it has monitored the Pope and the Apostolic residences for their protection.  It is the only guard  from the Papal States, which has been preserved. Most military corps went down with the Papal States in 1870. The enduring guards, such as the Noble Guard and the Palatine Guard were simultaneously disbanded by Pope Paul VI. with the liturgical reform in 1970.

The Pontifical Swiss Guard is not a  guard of Vatican City or the Church, but a bodyguard of the Pope. They agree to defend the integrity of the Pope with their lives. While the See is vacant, the guards have to ensure the safe conduct of the conclave as a new pope is enthroned.  It is exclusively of Catholic Swiss nationals who have already done their military service in Switzerland and must not be older than 30 on entering and must be single.

In some Catholic Swiss Families the establishment has always been a  tradition that a family member serves the Pope. The swearing in of new recruits will take place in a ceremony every year. Each recruit takes the oath in his native language (see  Defending the Pope With Their Lives - the Swiss Guard recruits sworn in ).

Once there were numerous Swiss Guards of the militarily efficient germanic mountain people. Thus  the King of France had a bodyguard of Swiss and also the Roman-German Emperor in Vienna, which is recalled in the Schweizertor the Hofburg. The Papal Swiss Guard is the only one that still exists today and is one of the most traditional military organizations in the world.

A year ago when Anrig's predecessor, Colonel Elmar Mader, retired, he caused a stir when he spoke of the existence of a homosexual "secret society" at the Vatican, which constitutes a "security risk".

To date, there is only speculation and the familiar shooting in the weeds. Remarkable it is that it could ever come to such speculation. This has to do with certain known signals and especially with a perceived climate.

Link to Katholisches...

See the slideshow...

Trans: vekron99@hotmail.com

AMDG

Swiss Bishops' Conference Insults Bishop of Chur

Diocese of Chur in Pressecommunique: "The diocese hopes that the Bishop of Chur will not be the matter of the subject of discussions of the SBK Bureau, but be one of the participants."

Bishop Vitus Huonder at Pontifical High Mass

Givisiez (kath.net) Scandal in the Catholic Church of Switzerland. The Secretariat of the Swiss Bishops Conference has publicly snubbed the Bishop of Chur, Vitus Huonder. A conversation between a delegation of the anti-Rome-grouping "It's Enough!", which has constantly criticized the Bishop of Chur Vitus Huonder, and the Bureau of the Swiss Bishops Conference (SBK) a few days ago has been interpreted in Chur as a snub. Reason: Bishop Huonder had not been invited to participate. In a pressecommunique presented by Giuseppe Gracia, media relations officer of the diocese of Chur, read that the Diocese hopes "that the bishop of Chur will not be the subject of  the discussions at the SBK Bureau, but one of the participants. The bishop recalled  a communique dated the 5th of March, in which he noted that all Swiss bishops are united in faith."  [Obviously, they don't.]

On the other hand, there should be enough disagreement "from the initiators of 'It's Enough' to show fundamental disunity in essential elements of the faith. Therefore, a meeting will also take place with representatives of the Alliance in Chur. The goal will be a dialogue that does not stop at persons, but is creating clarity about where the initiators expect something different than what is the official teaching of the Church. 

Recently, a disagreement between the initiators and the Episcopal Conference was demonstrated again. The Bishop of Chur has said he was "confident that the way a factual work-up can demonstrate that it is not about people or on questions of communication style, but specific to the rejection of concrete beliefs".  Bishop Huonder is planning a meeting in Chur, which will serve the debate on these issues.

Link to kath.net...

Trans: Tancred vekron99@hotmail.com

AMDG

A Word About Kreuz.net and How Swiss Bishops Imply the Archbishop of Cologne is a Homosexual

Editor: The inveterate and ever steady Tom at AQ has posted the story we translated about how David Berger, a liar and a poseur who's accused the Holy Father of having homosexual tendencies, has been given free run to heap his filth on the Church through the mouthpiece of the Swiss Bishops. How the man conducting the interview who has such a clear allegiance to the Homosexual agenda, enough to give softball questions to Berger and support his agenda, could be a part of what goes on at a Catholic News Service run by the Swiss Bishops is anybody's guess, but will the Bishops make amends for this? The News Service is their bailliwick and what happens there is THEIR responsibility, especially when a known liar and slanderer uses that service to spread his lies and promote his books.

Let's file the following under, "homosexual bullying" for the time being. It's interesting the way the following poster wants to deflect LEGITIMATE criticism away from the Swiss Bishops by accusing kreuz.net of dishonesty and being "obsessed" with homosexuality. It's the self-same tactic employed by Berger and his co-religionists:

Swiss bishops do NOT [Their tacit approval is very much in evidence here] insinuate anything like this, but the website KREUZ.NET which is pornographic in most of it's contents is insinuating that Swiss bishops insinuate.......
I would never allow my children (who are teens) to surf on kreuz.net, not for not wanting them to know about catholic tradition, but because the editorial staff of kreuz.net is obsessed with homosexuality and the users of that forum are commenting in the most vulgar and obscene language possible describing all sorts of homosexual perversions. Kreuz.net is not to recommend and I really wonder who is behind this platform. You can find there also serious and good information, but the way it is presented to the public is very strange. A normal, good hearted and pious traditional catholic needs much holiness to not to have go to confession after having used kreuz.net. I have never understood the mechanisms behind it, even if I use it quite often, as I have to confess.

Yes, try not to confuse kreuz.net with what's going on under your own nose in your own Church.

Pope Announces the Selection of the Bishop of Basel

The old Liberal General Vicar of the Swiss Bishops' Conference is taking over the completely spiritually ruined Diocese of Basel.

Necktie Priest, Father Gmür as Secretary on the Website of the Bishops Conference

(kreuz.net, Basel)  Msgr  Felix Gmür is the new Bishop of Basel, according to the Vatican Press Service.

Pope Benedict XVI, had assumed the choice of the Basel Cathedral on the Feast of the Nativity of Mary on the 8th of September.

Prior to that, Msgr Gmür worked as necktie priest and General Secretary of the Swiss Bishops conference.

A further speculation of the protestant journalist and church-hater Micheal Meier, that it would have been Dennis Theurillat (60), has proven itself to be false.

He Won't be a Second Bishop St. Thomas Becket

Msgr Gmür hales from Luzern.  In May 1999 he was ordained a priest.

Previous to that - from 1997 to 2001 - he worked as the pastoral assistant and then as necktie [secular] priest of the Parish of St. Anton in Basel.

By 2004 he studied Biblical Science at the Jesuit University, the Gregorian in Rome.

Msgr  Gmür received a Doctorate in Philosophy on Ludwig Wittgenstein's Aesthetic.

From 2004 to 2006 he was active for two years as a neck tie- Subregent in the old Liberal Seminary in Luzern.

For four years he has been the General Secretary of the Bishops Conference.

Msgr Gmür will be consecrated a Bishop on January 16th in Solothurn.


Basel is the largest Diocese in Switzerland with over one Million members.

Editor: We said that Basel would get a "good" Bishop out of this, well, we were wrong.

Swiss Bishops show their Internationalist Colors

Like windup automatons, these lunchroom Lenins at the Swiss Bishops Conference have been roused to play their divisive role for globular harmony in the face of Switzerland's auto-immune response against the evils of Islam. Either the Swiss Bishops are eager to please their Masters or they have been effectively conditioned to be hostile to their own motherland. These kinds of divided loyalties are commonplace, for example, a recent poll taken of Vatican Employees showed a clear Obama majority. Will someone put these dinosaurs to pasture and replace them with younger, orthodox men?

We look with hope that some day, real Bishops will come from the Monasteries to replace these men who are more like grocery store managers than prelates.


By John Thavis, Catholic News Service


VATICAN CITY (CNS) -- The bishops of Switzerland said the country's ban on the construction of minarets, the Muslim prayer towers, represents an obstacle to interreligious harmony.

The ban aggravates interfaith tensions and could have negative repercussions on Christian minorities in Muslim countries, the bishops said in a statement Nov. 29.

The prohibition was adopted by Swiss voters in a referendum that passed with a 58 percent majority. There are about 150 mosques in Switzerland serving some 400,000 Muslims; only four have minarets and, unlike in Islamic countries, they are not used to call Muslims to prayer.

The bishops said the referendum campaign, promoted by right-wing parties, had used exaggeration and caricature, and demonstrated that "religious peace does not operate by itself and always needs to be defended."

"The decision of the people represents an obstacle and a great challenge on the path of integration in dialogue and mutual respect," the bishops said. Banning the building of minarets "increases the problems of coexistence between religions and cultures," they said.

The bishops said the measure "will not help the Christians oppressed and persecuted in Islamic countries, but will weaken the credibility of their commitment in these countries."

Swiss authorities said after the vote that the four existing minarets would be allowed to stand, and that there was no ban on the construction of new mosques.

Copyright © 2009 Catholic News Service/U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops
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