Most people are tired of this. And by that, I mean a Congress that is monkeying around with bills that aren't going anywhere and are of the nature of throwing gasoline on a fire. We know that this impeachment is going nowhere. We know that a recent bill to do away with the Department of Education isn't either. We know that shutting the government down, which is going to happen soon, just causes the government to lose money.
Some people out in the audience of society may believe that all of this serves to get something done, but it sure isn't obvious. Most people are simply tired. Of course, this helps whip up a pre convinced base even though nothing is actually going to happen on a lot of these things.
Relating to fatigue, on another topic I posted on, that being the upcoming Synod on Synodality, I suspect a lot of Catholics are tired of this topic:
At some point, constant change and the search to change things wears people down. A good argument can be made right now that after Covid, and after a lot of people, would just like things to calm down for a while. That's part of the reason, I suspect, that younger people are looking back to more traditional times, and maybe that the whole culture is, except in certain quarters.
That may explain why the leaders of the Church, or some of them, are keen on a synod on synodality, as difficult as it is to figure out what that means, while globably, in the pews, only at most 2% of Catholics participated in the survey process. That alone should give the participants in the synod pause, as it may very well mean that the 2% that responded doesn't reflect anywhere near a statistically signficant number of Catholics. It may well be that the maybe 5% or whatever of Trads in the parish this morning do.
Of course, part of the reason changed, including unwanted ones, occur is that most people are just busy living their lives. That means people who have what a lot of us do not, surplus time, tend to be reflected in change. In some instances, that's because of the way that people are employed. It's ofen noticed by some that institutions are resistant to change, but by the same token, change can be forced on members of an institution simply becuase somebody in charge wants to change things, and everyone else just has their shoulder to the wheel and can't really take note until the change arrives.
On people in different quarters, and obviously wanting things to be different, Saturday I was driving up a really busy city street and saw, on the sidewalk headed towards the center of downtown, which was far away, a young woman riding a bicycle.
She was probably around twenty, fairly thin, had a large tattoo running up her side, and was topless.
It was impossible not to see, and I wonder if she had done it before, as quite frankly she looked nervous. She probably should have, as she wasn't like the late middle-aged woman, now deceased, who used to ride a Vespa around here topless. It was always a shock to encounter her, but as impolite as it may be to say it, she wasn't attractive. This young woman was, and for any normal male, she was going to be noticed, an impact added to by the fact that she was well-endowed.
My guess is she was headed to David Street Station, where her breasts were going to be oggled at by many. And the look on her face belied the fact that she no doubt would maintain that she was there to make some other point.
Another reason we really need to put the brakes on things until we take a look at Chesterton's Fence on all sorts of things.
There exists in such a case a certain institution or law; let us say, for the sake of simplicity, a fence or gate erected across a road. The more modern type of reformer goes gaily up to it and says, “I don’t see the use of this; let us clear it away.” To which the more intelligent type of reformer will do well to answer: “If you don’t see the use of it, I certainly won’t let you clear it away. Go away and think. Then, when you can come back and tell me that you do see the use of it, I may allow you to destroy it."
Indeed, something of this type, although not quite of this type, lead commentator Amy Otto, in an Op Ed written some years ago, to maintain "Men Did Greater Things When It Was Harder To See Boobs". The caption on the article, which was flippant but which addressed a serious topic, if not idential one, not too surprisingly went viral.
Also not too surprisingly, this is a topic that's been pretty widely studied and the entire observational nature of this is hard-wired into men. That some don't get this is another defiance of science.
And one putting all the burden, I'd note, on men. I don't really want to be in the position of taking note of some 20-year-old woman's bare breasts, and I don't want to be seeing something that only a spouse should. But now I have, and I can't get that back, nor can she, nor can the probably hundreds of men, most with fewer reservations than me, that saw her on Saturday and whose thought went where every they let them go.
US Suicide Rates at all-time high
US suicides hit an all-time high last year
By MIKE STOBBE - AP Medical Writer
Updated
0
About 49,500 people took their own lives last year in the U.S., the highest number ever. That's according to new government data posted Thursday. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has not yet calculated a suicide rate for the year. But available data suggests suicides are more common in the U.S. than at any time since the dawn of World War II. Experts caution that suicide is complicated, and that recent increases might be driven by higher rates of depression or limited availability of mental health services. The American Foundation for Suicide Prevention says a main driver is the growing availability of guns.
A horrific story, to be sure.
It occured to me for some reason that all things being equal, a record number would likely to be set every year, as the American population continues to grow. Having said that, the rates are very high, which is referenced in this article.
Predictably, the reporter blames it on the "growing availability of guns", but firearms have been easy to get throughout American history. Availability has grown from the mid 20th Century, which saw a lot of gun control provisions come in which have later faded, in part due to being found unconstitutional, with the 1970s probably the high watermark of that, but if we go back prior to the 1930s, we'd find that things were, in most places, wide open. Even children could buy firearms in most of the US prior to the 1950s.
What has really changed is a society within any kind of foundation whatsoever. In the entire Western World, the culture built on Catholicism, but heavily impacted by the Reformation, has seen the foundation attacked and dismantled to be instead one that's now centered on radical individualism. It's not healthy, and it's killing people. Added to that, the increasing corporatist culture work in a box life throughout the developed world, that removes people radically from nature, is levying a toll. The combination of both is deadly.
Everyone claims to want to do something about this, which seems to amount to doing something about it sort of clinically, rather than existentially.
Storm Warning
At least 55 people died on Maui. Residents had little warning before wildfires overtook a town
By TY O'NEIL, CLAIRE RUSH, JENNIFER SINCO KELLEHER and REBECCA BOONE - Associated Press
Maui residents who made desperate escapes from oncoming flames have asked why Hawaii’s famous emergency warning system didn’t alert them as wildfires raced toward their homes. Officials have confirmed that Hawaii emergency management records show no indication that warning sirens were triggered before devastating fires killed at least 55 people and wiped out a historic town. The blaze is already the state’s deadliest natural disaster since a 1960 tsunami. The governor warned the death toll will likely rise. Hawaii boasts what the state describes as the largest integrated outdoor all-hazard public safety warning system in the world. But many of Lahaina’s survivors said in interviews that they only realized they were in danger when they saw flames or heard explosions nearby.
I really have to wonder how long a large segment of American society, and the official leaders of the GOP, are going to continue to pretend there's nothing going on climate wise. It's extremely difficult to grasp why they won't face reality on this, unless of course it's an example of worshiping money as if it was as religion.
People are now dying. Shouldn't this be taken seriously?
Without fail, one of our state's Congressional delegation comes on television or other media to promote fossil fuels and at least two out of the three like to talk about "Biden's radical climate agenda". Keeping a natural climate isn't a "radical agenda" and simply refusing to discuss this topic is foolish.
Speaking of the Maui fires, some real goofballs are claiming that it was caused by a "direct energy weapons", which they also claim the last devastating California fires were.
It's scary to realize that people who believe something so idiotic have the right to vote.
Lil Tay is not dead.
I'd never heard of Lil Tay, aka Tay Tian, aka Claire Hope, aka Claire Eileen Qi Hope, but this line from her Wikipedia entry says a lot:
Tay's father and manager sought for Tay to become more focused on professionalism, suggesting a music career for her, though her mother and half-brother encouraged her to continue her original boastful character.
Keep in mind, she hit the music scene as a foul-mouthed rapper at age 9.
That's frankly sick, and not "sick" in the good pop culture lexicology way. Her parents deserve a dope slap for letting that happen in the first place.
Whatever her legitimate name is, her story illustrates the poverty of values in the Western World. Her parents were simply shacked up over a prolonged time, never married. At some point, they separated and shared custody of the child. Somehow, they allowed her to enter into the world of hip hop, which is marked for its celebration of criminal culture and high death rate. That made the stories of her death seem pretty credible. Hardly a week goes by without some hip hop artist with a made up name dying young, in all the ways that tragic young deaths occur. Just this week, it might be noted, one such artist was sentenced for shooting another, the victim of the shooting being Megan Thee Stallion (yes, that's a made up name).
When it was revealed she wasn't dead, I wondered if it was a PR stunt. I'ts being claimed her social medial was hacked. I see I'm not the only one who was speculating on the stunt possibilities, however.
Regarding Tay, even at age 9 to 14 she's an interesting example of a certain public pseudonym phenomenon.
Entertainers have always affected false names, often due to being required to do so by reporters. Actors with Jewish names, for example, almost had to take another name early on. Paul Newman, an exception to so many rules in the acting community, is notable here as his real name actually was Paul Newman.
That's pretty much stopped as cultural prejudice of that type diminished. A peculiar modern phenomenon has been people, particularly women, of mixed Asian and Euro-American heritage adopting their Asian mother's surname as a stage name. It seems clear enough that Chinese American Tay was given the name at birth of Claire Eileen Qi Hope, i.e., Clair Hope, a pretty generic European name, and when she was drop-kicked into hip hop she became Tay Tian, or at least around there somewhere she did, taking her mother's last name. Priscilla Natalie Hartranft, a Korean American, took her mother's name Ahn, becoming Priscialla Ahn for the stage. The surprising exception is the very successful Michelle Zauner (Michelle Chongmi Zauner) a Korean American born in Korea, who has kept her given name. Zauner is the front for Japanese Breakfast, which is eclectically named, however, as Koreans are not particularly fond of hte Japanese.
I guess that takes us to Asian Pop, or maybe K Pop. It's bad, but seems huge. I don't know why. Like a lot of Japanese group, K Pop tends to be very Kwaaii
But not all Japanese music actually is:
While I should not note it, by the way, I'm going to note it anyhow. And what I'm going to note is that the children of European ethnicity people and Asian ethnicity people look very Asian as a rule.
It's simply an observation. But as a genetic observation, the genes that contribute to appearance are obviously dominant for the contributing Asian partner.
When I was in college, I knew a student whose father was British and mother Japanese. He looked very Japanese. Zauner looks Korean (and yes, I've been to Korea). Ahn also looks Korean, and Tay looks Chinese. This is merely an observation.
"If your brother sins against you, go and tell him his fault between you and him alone. If he listens to you, you have won over your brother. If he does not listen, take one or two others along with you, so that 'every fact may be established on the testimony of two or three witnesses.' If he refuses to listen to them, tell the church. If he refuses to listen even to the church, then treat him as you would a Gentile or a tax collector.
Amen, I say to you, whatever you bind on earth shall be bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven.
Again, amen, I say to you, if two of you agree on earth about anything for which they are to pray, it shall be granted to them by my heavenly Father.
For where two or three are gathered together in my name, there am I in the midst of them."
As previously noted, the young parish priest delivered his homily on the first reading.
Canon lawyer Edward Peters, having reflected on the same reading, noted on his Twitter feed:
I am edified to think back on how many priests have told me that today’s first reading keeps them awake at night. I am saddened that I can’t recall there being more such clerics. To say nothing of bishops, of course. And, yes, I include parents among those warned by this passage.
The priests' homily was, as usual, a little blunt, warning us that as a priestly people, we were bound by Ezechial's charge ourselves, an uncomfortable thought, but that's not why I noted it here.
Rather, I note it as while the upcoming Synod will not, I'm certain, radically refine any doctrine, it could create confusion in an era when we have plenty of that already and give comfort, through the voices of progressives in the Church who would suspend the Gospel's difficult parts, to those who would not bear their crosses. Plenty of that is going on already, with a well funded German church angling to adopt a modern view of personal sin to some degree, rather than the more difficult, but more natural one, that St. Paul sets out.
Vatican II opened with the following prayer:
Almighty God, we have no confidence in our own strength; all our trust is in you. Graciously look down on these Pastors of your Church. Aid their counsels and their legislation with the light of your divine grace. Be pleased to hear the prayers we offer you, united in faith, in voice, in mind.
Mary, help of Christians, help of bishops; recently in your church at Loreto, where We venerated the mystery of the Incarnation, you gave us a special token of your love. Prosper now this work of ours, and by your kindly aid bring it to a happy, successful conclusion. And do you, with St. Joseph your spouse, the holy apostles Peter and Paul, St. John the Baptist and St. John the Evangelist, intercede for us before the throne of God.
To Jesus Christ, our most loving Redeemer, the immortal King of all peoples and all ages, be love, power and glory for ever and ever. Amen.
Perhaps the Synod, each day, should open with Ezekiel.
This has, I guess, turned into a post on the Synod on Synodality.
The Synod on Synodality is a three-year process of listening and dialogue beginning with a solemn opening in Rome on October 9 and 10, 2021 with each individual diocese and church celebrating the following week on October 17. The synodal process will conclude in 2024.
Pope Francis invites the entire Church to reflect on a theme that is decisive for its life and mission: “It is precisely this path of synodality which God expects of the Church of the third millennium.” This journey, which follows in the wake of the Church’s “renewal” proposed by the Second Vatican Council, is both a gift and a task: by journeying together and reflecting together on the journey that has been made, the Church will be able to learn through Her experience which processes can help Her to live communion, to achieve participation, to open Herself to mission."
United States Council of Catholic Bishops.
I am, if the truth be told, in such a tone of mind that I shun every assemblage of bishops, because I have never yet seen that any Synod had a good ending, or that the evils complained of were removed by them, but were rather multiplied….
St. Gregory of Nazianzus writing to Procopius in 382.
Originally, when I started this post, I was going to post Bishop Strickland's letter to his flock, and then held back on it as it generated so much controversy, from this already controversial Bishop, whom I don't know much about, that I thought better of it. Immediately, the terms schism and the like came in.
Then two things occured, followed by a third.
The first was a weekend homily from our young priest on the principal reading for August 27, which was:
Jesus went into the region of Caesarea Philippi and he asked his disciples,
"Who do people say that the Son of Man is?"
They replied, "Some say John the Baptist, others Elijah, still others Jeremiah or one of the prophets."
He said to them, "But who do you say that I am?"
Simon Peter said in reply,
"You are the Christ, the Son of the living God."
Jesus said to him in reply,
"Blessed are you, Simon son of Jonah. For flesh and blood has not revealed this to you, but my heavenly Father.
And so I say to you, you are Peter, and upon this rock I will build my church, and the gates of the netherworld shall not prevail against it.
I will give you the keys to the kingdom of heaven. Whatever you bind on earth shall be bound in heaven; and whatever you loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven." Then he strictly ordered his disciples to tell no one that he was the Christ.
Mathew, Chapter 16.
This is one of the most important Gospel readings in the New Testament, as in it, Christ gives the keys to St. Peter, the first Pope.
In his homily, without referencing Bishop Strickland or the Pope at all, the young priest stated that the Catholic Church was the only thing holding back the destruction of the culture in the United States. That's a big claim, but frankly, correctly understood, he may be very well correct.
Another thing, which I learned of after Sunday, was that the Pope spoke to a group of young Jesuits in Portugal, where he was asked as series of question. He's been quoted in part (but largely only in part) regarding one question, which was about the Faith in the United States. As is so often the case with Francis, he was not quoted in full, or fully in context.
The question, and his answer, were:
Q. Pope Francis, I would like to ask you a question as a religious brother. I am Francisco. Last year I spent a sabbatical year in the United States. There was one thing that made a great impression on me there, and at times made me suffer. I saw many, even bishops, criticizing your leadership of the Church. And many even accuse the Jesuits, who are usually a kind of critical resource of the pope, of not being so now. They would even like the Jesuits to criticize you explicitly. Do you miss the criticism that the Jesuits used to make of the pope, the Magisterium, the Vatican?
Let us get to specifics. Today it is a sin to possess atomic bombs; the death penalty is a sin. You cannot employ it, but it was not so before. As for slavery, some pontiffs before me tolerated it, but things are different today. So you change, you change, but with the criteria just mentioned. I like to use the “upward” image, that is, ut annis consolidetur, dilatetur tempore, sublimetur aetate. Always on this path, starting from the root with sap that flows up and up, and that is why change is necessary.
But some people opt out; they go backward; they are what I call “indietristi.” When you go backward, you form something closed, disconnected from the roots of the Church and you lose the sap of revelation. If you don’t change upward, you go backward, and then you take on criteria for change other than those our faith gives for growth and change. And the effects on morality are devastating. The problems that moralists have to examine today are very serious, and to deal with them they have to take the risk of making changes, but in the direction I was saying.
You have been to the United States and you say you have felt a climate of closure. Yes, this climate can be experienced in some situations. And there you can lose the true tradition and turn to ideologies for support. In other words, ideology replaces faith, membership of a sector of the Church replaces membership of the Church.
I want to pay tribute to Arrupe’s courage. When he became superior general, he found a Society of Jesus that was, so to speak, bogged down. General Ledóchowski had drafted the Epitome – do you young people know what the Epitome is? No? Nothing remains of the Epitome! It was a selection of the Constitutions and Rules, all mixed up. But Ledóchowski, who was very orderly, with the mentality of the time, said, “I am compiling it so that the Jesuits will be fully clear about everything they have to do.” And the first specimen he sent to a Benedictine abbot in Rome, a great friend of his, who replied with a note: “You have killed the Society with this.”
In other words, the Society of the Epitome was formed, the Society that I experienced in the novitiate, albeit with great teachers who were of great help, but some taught certain things that fossilized the Society. That was the spirituality that Arrupe received, and he had the courage to set it moving again. Some things got out of hand, as is inevitable, such as the question of the Marxist analysis of reality. Then he had to clarify some matters, but he was a man who was able to look forward. And with what tools did Arrupe confront reality? With the Spiritual Exercises. In 1969 he founded the Ignatian Center for Spirituality. The secretary of this center, Fr. LuÃs Gonzalez Hernandez, was given the tasks of traveling around the world to give the Exercises and to open this new panorama.
You younger ones have not experienced these tensions, but what you say about some sectors in the United States reminds me of what we have already experienced with the Epitome, which generated a mentality that was all rigid and contorted. Those American groups you talk about, so closed, are isolating themselves. Instead of living by doctrine, by the true doctrine that always develops and bears fruit, they live by ideologies. When you abandon doctrine in life to replace it with an ideology, you have lost, you have lost as in war.
The Pope, who seems to get caught off guard with his comments relatively frequently, is trying to move past this one right now. This was sort of accidentally helped when he made a comment praising Russian imperial rulers, which may have been taken out of context, but which was bad timing. That brought a disappointed comment from the head of the Ukrainian Catholic Church. Indeed, Ukrainian Catholics have been loyal to Rome in spite of persecution both by the Communist in the USSR and historically by the Russian Orthodox Church. Imperial Russia, after the schism, was not a friendly place for Catholicism.
Now, frankly, the Pope's comments overall regarding the US, which have been extracted down to just a few lines, are not nearly as incendiary as they're being portrayed. But Pope Francis has a tendency to speak without a lack of clarity, as well as offhand. His comments caused some very orthodox and mainstream American Catholic apologist to ask "who are you speaking of"" and it frankly isn't very clear.
There's an enormous fear right now that Francis is going to follow the wayward German bishops into destruction. I don't think he will, and he likely knows that if that were to be attempted, which I don't believe he wants to attempt anyhow, it will cause a schism in the church. Added to that, for devout, orthodox and believing Catholics, the Church cannot be lead into error due to the protection of the Holy Spirit, so a lot of the criticism shows a certain element of disblief.
That doesn't mean, however, that Pope Francis must be viewed as a great Pope.
Right now American, and other conservative, Catholics are routinely mentioning schism as a fear, and while its hardly noticed here, the Eastern Rite Catholic Syro-Malabar Church is in outright defiance of Rome, and darned near in schism, over an issue in their liturgy that didn't need to become one and which Pope Francis has elevated to the level of a contest between their clergy and him. It recalls, in serious ways, the issues that partially gave rise to the Great Schism, or the separation of some Eastern Rite Catholics from the Roman Catholic Church and into the Russian Orthodox Church about a centuray ago, and is something we truly don't need. Rome should back off.
All of this now comes in the context of the Synod on Synodality.
More than a few rank and file loyal Catholics are pretty skeptical on the Synod on Synodality. Indeed, I suspect, without knowing, that part of the Syro-Malabar Church crisis is due to this as well. The Eastern Churches are famously dedicated to tradition, and the Vatican has been upsetting that, and then retreating from the upset, and then upsetting it again, since 1965. Added to that, anyone who has ever sat on a Parish Council probably is, as so often the people drawn to such matters in terms of organizing them, and this Synod involves laity, are the people who have time to do it. That doesn't tend to be the busy Catholic orthodox businessman, or the highly educated Catholic lawyer or engineer. It tends to be older people who formed their views in the 1970s on the left and who are massively out of touch with the young people in the pews, or at least older people. The Catholics that Trads like to point to, the young couples with children at a Latin Mass, aren't likely to have time to attend synods.
Maybe the laity delegation will be different here, but if it omits the orthodox, Trads, and the Rad Trads to any significant degree, there's reason to fear that it'll be made up of let wing Catholics who often have all kids of complaints about the Catholic Church, or so many orthodox, conservatives, and Trads (and they aren't all the same thing) fear.
These fears amplified a great deal are what caused highly traditional Bishop Joseph Strickland, much in the news recently, to issue his recent letter, which read:
August 22, 2023
My Dear Sons and Daughters in Christ:
May the love and grace of Our Lord Jesus Christ be upon you always!
In this time of great turmoil in the Church and in the world, I must speak to you from a father’s heart in order to warn you of the evils that threaten us, and to assure you of the joy and hope that we have always in our Lord Jesus Christ. The evil and false message that has invaded the Church, Christ’s Bride, is that Jesus is only one among many, and that it is not necessary for His message to be shared with all humanity. This idea must be shunned and refuted at every turn. We must share the joyful good news that Jesus is our only Lord, and that He desires that all humanity for all time may embrace eternal life in Him.
Once we understand that Jesus Christ, God’s Divine Son, is the fullness of revelation and the fulfillment of the Father’s plan of salvation for all humanity for all time, and we embrace this with all our hearts, then we can address the other errors that plague our Church and our world which have been brought about by a departure from Truth.
In St. Paul’s letter to the Galatians, he writes: “I am amazed that you are so quickly forsaking the one who called you by {the} grace {of Christ} for a different gospel {not that there is another}. But there are some who are disturbing you and wish to pervert the gospel of Christ. But even if we or an angel from heaven should preach {to you} a gospel other than the one that we preached to you, let that one be accursed! As we have said before, and now I say again, if anyone preaches to you a gospel other than the one that you received, let that one be accursed!” (Gal 1:6-9)
As your spiritual father, I feel it is important to reiterate the following basic truths that have always been understood by the Church from time immemorial, and to emphasize that the Church exists not to redefine matters of faith, but to safeguard the Deposit of Faith as it has been handed down to us from Our Lord Himself through the apostles and the saints and martyrs. Again, hearkening back to St. Paul’s warning to the Galatians, any attempts to pervert the true Gospel message must be categorically rejected as injurious to the Bride of Christ and her individual members.
Christ established One Church—the Catholic Church—and, therefore, only the Catholic Church provides the fullness of Christ’s truth and the authentic path to His salvation for all of us.
The Eucharist and all the sacraments are divinely instituted, not developed by man. The Eucharist is truly Christ’s Body and Blood, Soul and Divinity, and to receive Him in Communion unworthily (i.e. in a state of grave, unrepentant sin) is a devastating sacrilege for the individual and for the Church. (1 Cor 11:27-29)
The Sacrament of Matrimony is instituted by God. Through Natural Law, God has established marriage as between one man and one woman faithful to each other for life and open to children. Humanity has no right or true ability to redefine marriage.
Every human person is created in the image and likeness of God, male or female, and all people should be helped to discover their true identities as children of God, and not supported in a disordered attempt to reject their undeniable biological and God-given identity.
Sexual activity outside marriage is always gravely sinful and cannot be condoned, blessed, or deemed permissible by any authority inside the Church.
The belief that all men and women will be saved regardless of how they live their lives (a concept commonly referred to as universalism) is false and is dangerous, as it contradicts what Jesus tells us repeatedly in the Gospel. Jesus says we must “deny ourselves, take up our cross and follow Him.” (Matt 16:24) He has given us the way, through His grace, to victory over sin and death through repentance and sacramental confession. It is essential that we embrace the joy and hope, as well as the freedom, that come from repentance and humbly confessing our sins. Through repentance and sacramental confession, every battle with temptation and sin can be a small victory that leads us to embrace the great victory that Christ has won for us.
In order to follow Jesus Christ, we must willingly choose to take up our cross instead of attempting to avoid the cross and suffering that Our Lord offers to each of us individually in our daily lives. The mystery of redemptive suffering—i.e. suffering that Our Lord allows us to experience and accept in this world and then offer back to Him in union with His suffering—humbles us, purifies us, and draws us deeper into the joy of a life lived in Christ. That is not to say that we must enjoy or seek out suffering, but if we are united to Christ, as we experience our daily sufferings we can find the hope and joy that exist amidst the suffering and persevere to the end in all our suffering. (cf. 2 Tim 4:6-8)
In the weeks and months ahead, many of these truths will be examined as part of the Synod on Synodality. We must hold fast to these truths and be wary of any attempts to present an alternative to the Gospel of Jesus Christ, or to push for a faith that speaks of dialogue and brotherhood, while attempting to remove the fatherhood of God. When we seek to innovate upon what God in His great mercy has given us, we find ourselves upon treacherous ground. The surest footing we can find is to remain firmly upon the perennial teachings of the faith.
Regrettably, it may be that some will label as schismatics those who disagree with the changes being proposed. Be assured, however, that no one who remains firmly upon the plumb line of our Catholic faith is a schismatic. We must remain unabashedly and truly Catholic, regardless of what may be brought forth. We must be aware also that it is not leaving the Church to stand firm against these proposed changes. As St. Peter said, “Lord to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life.” (Jn 6:68) Therefore, standing firm does not mean we are seeking to leave the Church. Instead, those who would propose changes to that which cannot be changed seek to commandeer Christ’s Church, and they are indeed the true schismatics.
I urge you, my sons and daughters in Christ, that now is the time to make sure you stand firmly upon the Catholic faith of the ages. We were all created to seek the Way, the Truth and the Life, and in this modern age of confusion, the true path is the one that is illuminated by the light of Jesus Christ, for Truth has a face and indeed it is His face. Be assured that He will not abandon His Bride.
I remain your humble father and servant,
Most Reverend Joseph E. Strickland
Bishop of Tyler
That's the letter as written. Let's break it down again, with some text in bold.
In this time of great turmoil in the Church and in the world, I must speak to you from a father’s heart in order to warn you of the evils that threaten us, and to assure you of the joy and hope that we have always in our Lord Jesus Christ. The evil and false message that has invaded the Church, Christ’s Bride, is that Jesus is only one among many, and that it is not necessary for His message to be shared with all humanity. This idea must be shunned and refuted at every turn. We must share the joyful good news that Jesus is our only Lord, and that He desires that all humanity for all time may embrace eternal life in Him.
Once we understand that Jesus Christ, God’s Divine Son, is the fullness of revelation and the fulfillment of the Father’s plan of salvation for all humanity for all time, and we embrace this with all our hearts, then we can address the other errors that plague our Church and our world which have been brought about by a departure from Truth.
In St. Paul’s letter to the Galatians, he writes: “I am amazed that you are so quickly forsaking the one who called you by {the} grace {of Christ} for a different gospel {not that there is another}. But there are some who are disturbing you and wish to pervert the gospel of Christ. But even if we or an angel from heaven should preach {to you} a gospel other than the one that we preached to you, let that one be accursed! As we have said before, and now I say again, if anyone preaches to you a gospel other than the one that you received, let that one be accursed!” (Gal 1:6-9)
As your spiritual father, I feel it is important to reiterate the following basic truths that have always been understood by the Church from time immemorial, and to emphasize that the Church exists not to redefine matters of faith, but to safeguard the Deposit of Faith as it has been handed down to us from Our Lord Himself through the apostles and the saints and martyrs. Again, hearkening back to St. Paul’s warning to the Galatians, any attempts to pervert the true Gospel message must be categorically rejected as injurious to the Bride of Christ and her individual members.
Christ established One Church—the Catholic Church—and, therefore, only the Catholic Church provides the fullness of Christ’s truth and the authentic path to His salvation for all of us.
The Eucharist and all the sacraments are divinely instituted, not developed by man. The Eucharist is truly Christ’s Body and Blood, Soul and Divinity, and to receive Him in Communion unworthily (i.e. in a state of grave, unrepentant sin) is a devastating sacrilege for the individual and for the Church. (1 Cor 11:27-29)
The Sacrament of Matrimony is instituted by God. Through Natural Law, God has established marriage as between one man and one woman faithful to each other for life and open to children. Humanity has no right or true ability to redefine marriage.
Every human person is created in the image and likeness of God, male or female, and all people should be helped to discover their true identities as children of God, and not supported in a disordered attempt to reject their undeniable biological and God-given identity.
Sexual activity outside marriage is always gravely sinful and cannot be condoned, blessed, or deemed permissible by any authority inside the Church.
The belief that all men and women will be saved regardless of how they live their lives (a concept commonly referred to as universalism) is false and is dangerous, as it contradicts what Jesus tells us repeatedly in the Gospel. Jesus says we must “deny ourselves, take up our cross and follow Him.” (Matt 16:24) He has given us the way, through His grace, to victory over sin and death through repentance and sacramental confession. It is essential that we embrace the joy and hope, as well as the freedom, that come from repentance and humbly confessing our sins. Through repentance and sacramental confession, every battle with temptation and sin can be a small victory that leads us to embrace the great victory that Christ has won for us.
In order to follow Jesus Christ, we must willingly choose to take up our cross instead of attempting to avoid the cross and suffering that Our Lord offers to each of us individually in our daily lives. The mystery of redemptive suffering—i.e. suffering that Our Lord allows us to experience and accept in this world and then offer back to Him in union with His suffering—humbles us, purifies us, and draws us deeper into the joy of a life lived in Christ. That is not to say that we must enjoy or seek out suffering, but if we are united to Christ, as we experience our daily sufferings we can find the hope and joy that exist amidst the suffering and persevere to the end in all our suffering. (cf. 2 Tim 4:6-8)
In the weeks and months ahead, many of these truths will be examined as part of the Synod on Synodality.We must hold fast to these truths and be wary of any attempts to present an alternative to the Gospel of Jesus Christ, or to push for a faith that speaks of dialogue and brotherhood, while attempting to remove the fatherhood of God. When we seek to innovate upon what God in His great mercy has given us, we find ourselves upon treacherous ground. The surest footing we can find is to remain firmly upon the perennial teachings of the faith.
Regrettably, it may be that some will label as schismatics those who disagree with the changes being proposed. Be assured, however, that no one who remains firmly upon the plumb line of our Catholic faith is a schismatic. We must remain unabashedly and truly Catholic, regardless of what may be brought forth. We must be aware also that it is not leaving the Church to stand firm against these proposed changes. As St. Peter said, “Lord to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life.” (Jn 6:68) Therefore, standing firm does not mean we are seeking to leave the Church. Instead, those who would propose changes to that which cannot be changed seek to commandeer Christ’s Church, and they are indeed the true schismatics.
I urge you, my sons and daughters in Christ, that now is the time to make sure you stand firmly upon the Catholic faith of the ages. We were all created to seek the Way, the Truth and the Life, and in this modern age of confusion, the true path is the one that is illuminated by the light of Jesus Christ, for Truth has a face and indeed it is His face. Be assured that He will not abandon His Bride.
Bold words.
But in large degree, Bishop Strickland is correct on the spirit of the times. That doesn't mean he can't be questioned on everything. He certainly can, and some of his other statements, including some regarding a radical traditionalist priest, and some regarding Pope Francis, would nearly require a loyal Catholic to hold some reservations about him.
Where we may start off with a bit of doubt is here. Has an "evil and false message. . . Invaded the Church, Christ’s Bride" and is it "that Jesus is only one among many, and that it is not necessary for His message to be shared with all humanity"? I'm not sure what the Bishop is referring too, but I don't see evidence of that inside the Church's structure or its clergy.
It's long been the case that the Church has held that salvation can only come through the Church, but we don't really know how that occurs, so those who are not Catholic may be saved. I don't think Bishop Strickland is questioning that, but it could be read that way.
Beyond that, Bishop Strickland is expressing fears that are widely held, and not without good reason. The German Bishops, presiding over a Church that's rich due to the Church tax but poor in terms of parishioners actually in the pews, is in fact expressing views that orthodox Catholics view as not only wrong, but immorally wrong. The fear is that they're going to bring their errors into the synod, the need for which is not largely appreciated.
Those fears may be misplaced, and I've written on that earlier. Declared doctrine cannot be changed, and there's no evidence that Pope Francis is going to attempt to do so. But Pope Francis' managerial style is simply maddening. Having come up in Argentina, which really only turned to democracy recently, he appears to be attempting to somewhat democratize the Church while not really grasping that the conveyance of clear information is a vital feature of that.
A potential result of the Synod may well be a correction of the errors of recent years in more liberal wings in a way that those liberals have to accept, or which will require them to go into outright schism. I basically expect that to occur, which is not the expectation that most are expecting. Fr. John Zuhlsdorf, a very conservative, orthodox Priest who runs a significant blog, posted:
My view is that there are two, not three, possible outcomes for the Synod (“walking together”). They are a) it’ll fizzle into pointless posturing after which there will be a mainly yawn-inducing document with a couple of crowbar-inviting ambiguities or b) something disastrous will swiftly emerge out of a spirit of radical discontinuity.
What will not happen is c) sound, pastoral proposals will be brought to light based on a clear ecclesiology rooted in tradition.
He makes it plain that he expects number "b" to occur. Fr. Dwight Longnecker has more or less indicated that something less than "a" will occur in his view.
I frankly expect something more like "c".
We may, and I feel likely will be, surprised. But the Pope's words certainly aren't calculated to derive comfort for the loyal orthodox in the pews.
Indeed, and ironically, what the Pope might be seeking to achieve may be a necessary, or not, restructuring, which also not only brings risks, but is problematic due to the ongoing problem of the Boomers in control.
What the Pope has noted is that the Eastern Orthodox govern themselves through synods. There have come to be some doctrinal differences between the Orthodox and the Catholic Churches, but they are not huge, and the East does have apostolic succession. What the Pope seems to admire is the individual synods those Churches have within themselves, and he might be aiming to establish them in the Catholic Church.
If that is the aim, and there is reason to think it is, it has a problem right off the bat in that the local synod for the Latin Rite would be one big synod. It would dwarf the largest of the Eastern synods. Maybe, however, he's thinking of more local synods and giving those local synods something that approaches autocephalous status. If that's the case, however, his recent actions in regard to the Syro-Malabar Church cut the other way. That doesn't mean it isn't the goal, however.
If that is the goal, however, it automatically has a problem in that the German Church, which is unfortunately supported by taxes, has already pretty much gone in another direction and, if it keeps heading that way, is going to disappear a law Episcopal Church. That pathway is so clear, with the Episcopal Church operating to take away crosses in much of its territory (although it had dissident portions that remain very traditional), that its lost its meaning and, at the same time, its members. If the German Church was seeking to address attendance, what it ought to do is support orthodoxy and demand that the Bundestag eliminate the Church Tax, which really is an unfair tax on average Germans.
What the Church Tax reveals, however, is the mentally lax way that many Catholics in Catholic countries view the Church. Southern Germany, which is where most German Catholics live, is pretty much all Catholic, but people have acclimated themselves to being Christmas and Easter Catholics and ignoring everything else, and still conceiving of themselves as good Catholics. In Catholic countries that have vast geographies, which includes most of South America, that's also the case. Even the clergy in these regions often takes that sort of view, not really challenging the faithful to live up to the Faith, and being comfortable with "we're all Catholic", as if that's enough.
St. Paul clearly stated it wasn't.
Pope Francis is an Argentine, and that's probably, as already noted, one of the problems here. The US, which he is criticizing, is a Protestant country, and to be a real Catholic here always meant to be part of a fighting faith.
Indeed, everywhere the Church as been strong in the last century, it's had to be a fighting faith. It was in the US, that was true in Ireland, and that was true in Southern Germany. The Catholic Church, with its adherence to the Faith, tends to suffer when times are really good and when there's little societal opposition to it.
There is a lot of societal opposition to it right now in the US, and it's been interesting to see the growing strength of orthodoxy in reaction to it.
Indeed, it's hard for American conservative Catholic not to feel, at some point, that the Pope is one of the group of at least somewhat liberal Catholic attacking them. An author in First Things, whose article postdates everything written in this essay above, put it well for a lot of them, and at least somewhat for myself, when he noted:
I am a “conservative” Catholic, but I am no traditionalist, in the TLM sense. I was deeply formed by John Paul II and Benedict XVI, and am committed to the Novus Ordo (the Mass of Vatican II). I embrace the universal call to holiness as developed during Vatican II. I love the Scriptures. I support the preferential option for the spiritually and materially poor. I view the Catechism of the Catholic Church as a north star for our faith. I think the Church has much to say to the modern world.
I also reject the notion that doctrine can change, as opposed to develop. I think certain actions are intrinsically evil. I do not think it is compassionate to affirm individuals in their sin. I think the Church’s tradition is a great spiritual treasure.
These things should be uncontroversial, and yet the impression the Holy Father creates is that to hold all of these positions is to be a rigid, backward-looking Catholic as opposed to one led by the Holy Spirit. He seems to think that the rock-solid belief many American Catholics have in the deposit of faith and the Church’s historical moral teachings is a rejection of authentic development of doctrine. But this portrayal is a cartoon.
Pope Francis notes that doctrine “progresses,” but that this “change develops from the roots upward, growing in accord with [St. Vincent Lerins’] three criteria [for authentic development articulated].” I don’t know a traditional Catholic who disagrees with this. But I do know many who vehemently disagree that the Vatican’s free-wheeling questioning of long-held teaching meets these criteria. Pope Francis oversees a curia where the Relator General for the Synod on Synodality claims the Church’s teaching about homosexual acts is “false,” where the head of the Pontifical Academy for Life endorses a book that calls for a complete reversal of the Church’s teaching on contraception, and where the head of the Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith espouses an openness to blessings for same-sex couples—to name just a few recent examples of churchmen flatly opposing the authentic development espoused by the Holy Father. Meanwhile, Francis gives the Germans freedom to push heretical positions. And yet somehow, he brands as “backwards” the Catholics who dislike it when high-ranking Vatican prelates bandy about serious errors.
And for this reason, it's not surprising that many conservative Catholics, who weren't already at least somewhat lacking in enthusiasm for the upcoming synod, are losing their enthusiasm for it. That doesn't mean that there's going to be big doctrinal changes. There will not be. But it may mean that the results will either be surprising or that they will be disappointing.
Indeed, Catholics must recall that the Church is protected from error. So fears about the Synod are overdone. And not every change that is proposed is an attack on dogma, such as the often suggested lifting on married clerics.
But we also might remember that we're not promised that everyone who steps into the shoes of the Fisherman is promised to really well them well. They're still people. And Pope Francis, who is no doubt a holy man, is also a very old one in an age in which it seems that the world is full of old leaders whose vision often looks back to a liberalism of their youth, while the younger mass of humanity looks back to the best things that the same liberalism lost.
