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                   September 3, 2009

What's Good For Teddy Is Good For Benny

by Thomas A. Droleskey

One of the reasons that the death and funeral of the the apostate named Edward Moore Kennedy has provided the fodder for so much commentary is that it encapsulates the entire ethos of the counterfeit church of conciliarism in a series of snapshots that could have come from any number of formerly Catholic parishes now under conciliar captivity at this time (see yesterday's commentary, Spotlight On The Ordinary). Ordinary Catholics are permitted to remain in "good standing" in the structures of the counterfeit church of conciliarism despite holding--and advancing most publicly and proudly--views that are outside the parameters of even the "officially" approved apostasies of the "Second" Vatican Council and the "magisterium" of the conciliar "popes."

The treatment given to Edward Moore Kennedy in life and after his death by officials of the counterfeit church of conciliarism is given by "bishops" and "priests" of that false church to ordinary Catholics who support contraception and abortion and special "rights" for those steeped in unrepentant acts of perversity and to those who only go to the Novus Ordo service only occasionally. Even Joseph Ratzinger/Benedict XVI has said that he has "nothing against" those who go to Mass irregularly in violation of the Third Commandment and the First Precept of the Catholic Church:

"I have nothing against people who, though they never enter a church during the year, go to Christmas midnight Mass, or go on the occasion of some other celebration, because this is also a way of coming close to the light" (EWTN.com - CARDINAL RATZINGER ON THE FUTURE OF CHRISTIANITY, October 1, 2001)

 

Such a sanguine attitude about the horrors of personal sin, examined in Having No Regard for the Horror of Personal Sin, permeates the structures of the counterfeit church of conciliarism down to its last nook and cranny. Most "conservative," "pro-life" Catholics who as of yet attached to the structures of the counterfeit church of conciliarism keep believing the utter fiction that "things" will get "better" if they just keep fighting to "take back" their parishes without realizing they are fighting battles that are just as futile as those that were fought by the Japanese soldiers who were hunkered down on Mindanao for decades after the Empire of Japan had surrendered formally to the Allied forces sixty-four years ago yesterday, September 2, 1945.

Many of these "conservative" Catholics have continued to rail about the travesty that took place at the Basilica of Our Lady of Perpetual Help in Boston, Massachusetts, five days ago now, on Saturday, August 29, 2009, the Feast of the Beheading of Saint John the Baptist, without coming face to face to the simple fact that one man, Joseph Ratzinger/Benedict XVI, could have stopped this travesty if he had wanted to do so.

The same man, Joseph Ratzinger/Benedict XVI, could have stopped the administrators of the University of Notre Dame du Lac in Notre Dame, Indiana, from bestowing an award upon the pro-abortion Barack Hussein Obama on Sunday, May 17, 2009.

The same man, Joseph Ratzinger/Benedict XVI, could have excommunicated Edward Moore Kennedy--and others of his ilk, instead choosing to maintain the man's "good standing" in his counterfeit church.

Indeed, as noted two days ago in Spotlight On The Ordinary, Joseph Ratzinger/Benedict has not only maintained men such as the late Edward Moore Kennedy and Vice President of the United States of America Joseph Robinette Biden, Jr., and Speaker of the United States House of Representatives Nancy Pelosi, et al., in "good standing" in his false church, he has accepted the forced resignation of the now "retired" conciliar "bishop" of Scranton, Pennsylvania, Joseph Martino, who was deemed to be too "tough" on pro-abortion Catholics in public life.

Joseph Ratzinger/Benedict XVI has thus put "conservative" Catholics yet attached to the structures of his false church in quite a bind. How can a "conservative" Catholic remonstrate with a "progressive" Catholic over Edward Kennedy's defections from the Catholic Faith when the false "pontiff" himself treats such defections so casually, when he punishes an outspoken "conservative" "bishop" rather than to use the staff of correction upon pro-abortion Catholics in public life?

The scenario that has played out in the last nine days since Edward Moore "Teddy" Kennedy's death could lead to a conversion such as this one between a "conservative" Catholic and a "progressive" Catholic attached to the structures of the counterfeit church of conciliarism:

Progressive Catholic: "What do you say now after Ted Kennedy got all those accolades from Catholic bishops and priests? Still want to contend that Ted Kennedy was a bad Catholic?"

Conservative Catholic: "Ted Kennedy supported abortion-on-demand. He excommunicate himself from the Church by means of his constant and unrepentant support for baby-killing?"

Progressive Catholic: "How could the Catholic Church have given a Mass of Christian Burial for Teddy if, as you say, he had excommunicated himself from the Church?"

Conservative Catholic: "The American bishops are to blame for this travesty. They never take action against leftists and statists such as Kennedy."

Progressive Catholic: "What did Pope Benedict XVI do? Did he declare Kennedy to be out of the Church?"

Conservative Catholic: "His hands were tied by the American bishops."

Progressive Catholic: "How can the hand of the Vicar of Christ be tied. I asked you a simple question. You said that Kennedy had expelled himself from the Church. Our pope said no such thing. Who are you to declare Kennedy to have excommunicated himself from the Church when the pope himself made no such declaration."

Conservative Catholic: "It doesn't take a decree from the pope to know a skunk when you see one. Kennedy had excommunicated himself from the Church by virtue of supporting one of the four sins that cry out to Heaven for vengeance. No one can deny that Teddy Kennedy defied the binding precepts of the Fifth Commandment."

Progressive Catholic: "Why wasn't a declaration of this made by the Vatican?"

Conservative Catholic: "You don't need a declaration to know that Kennedy was a pro-abort, do you?"

Progressive Catholic: "You need a declaration for someone to be excommunicated, don't you?"

Conservative Catholic: "Do you need a declaration for that which is obvious, that which is inarguable?"

Progressive Catholic: "You are begging the question. Don't you need a declaration for someone to be excommunicated?"

Conservative Catholic: "There are certain actions that carry with them an automatic self-excommunication. Participating in or facilitating procured abortion is one of these cases of automatic self-excommunication. A declaration from the pope or a bishop merely states publicly and formally what the person has already done to himself."

Progressive Catholic: "Aren't you judging the state of the late Senator Kennedy's immortal soul?"

Conservative Catholic: "Not at all. God alone knows the state of the late Senator Kennedy's immortal soul at the time of his death. I can use my own judgment to assess whether, objectively speaking, Edward Kennedy's words and actions were consistent with the Catholic Faith."

Progressive Catholic: "So you are saying that you can use your own judgment to know whether one was a public sinner who had defected from the Faith?"

Conservative Catholic" "Precisely. It is clear. It is plain. We can use the sensus Catholicus to know whether one has cut himself off from the body of believers."

Progressive Catholic: "Why doesn't the pope have this sensus Catholicus himself? Why don't the bishops or the priests who praised Ted Kennedy for his commitment to the poor and to immigrants and his support for universal health care have this sensus Catholicus of yours? Why is what is clear to you is not as clear to them?"

Conservative Catholic: "We're not getting anywhere. You just don't want to see that Teddy Kennedy was a bad Catholic."

Progressive Catholic: "We're not getting anywhere because you are trying to put your own private judgment about Ted Kennedy's political positions ahead of how the authority of the Catholic Church treated him in life and in death: as a Catholic in perfectly good standing."

Conservative Catholic: "I have to go now."

 

Joseph Ratzinger/Benedict XVI has made it very difficult for "conservative" Catholics to rail against the treatment given to the late Edward Moore Kennedy in life and after his death.

There is also another aspect to this difficulty. A "conservative" Catholic who makes advertence to his ability to judge the public positions of the likes of Edward Moore Kennedy has to contend with simple fact that his "pope" sent the pro-abort Kennedy his "blessing" without demanding a public abjuration of Kennedy's errors so as to start the process of undoing the grave harm that he did as a public official and to educate his own family members and those in public life, especially Catholics, that one cannot say that he is "pro-choice" be a Catholic in "good standing" at the same time.

Such a "conservative" Catholic, who sees fit to judge whether Kennedy had excommunicated himself from the Church and should, therefore, have been denied a funeral in the conciliar structures might find himself in the following kind of conversation with a Catholic who has accepted that the canonical-doctrine of the Church is that a heretic cannot hold ecclesiastical office legitimately--and that said doctrine applies at this time:

Sedevacantist Catholic: "That was quite a funeral for Ted Kennedy that your pope and your bishops permitted to be celebrated, wouldn't you say?"

Conservative Catholic: "Oh, no. Don't use the Kennedy funeral to advance sedevacantism. What does sedevacantism have to do with the Kennedy funeral."

Sedevacantist Catholic: "Just about everything."

Conservative Catholic: "I shouldn't ask this. All right, tell me how this is the case."

Sedevacantist Catholic: "Most gladly. You say, if understood your conversation with Mr. Progressive Catholic. . . .

Conservative Catholic: "Were you eavesdropping?"

Sedevacantist Catholic: "I didn't have to eavesdrop. The two of you were going at it pretty hot and heavy, and the fact that Mr. Progressive Catholic was broadcasting the conversation on Twitter made it pretty easy to follow."

Conservative Catholic: "Oh."

Sedevacantist Catholic: "May I proceed now?"

Conservative Catholic: "I guess have no choice. My leaving now would kind of defeat the purpose of the man who is putting words into both of our mouths."

Sedevacantist Catholic: "Thank you. As I was saying, you told Mr. Progressive Catholic that you could use your private judgment to determine that the late United States Senator Edward Moore Kennedy had expelled himself from the bosom of Holy Mother Church."

Conservative Catholic: "Yes, that is correct. I said that."

Sedevacantist Catholic: "That is, you used the reason that God gave you to judge Kennedy's words and actions to determine that they were not consonant with the Catholic Faith."

Conservative Catholic: "Yes, yes, yes. I said all of that. Yes. So what?"

Sedevacantist Catholic: "You came to this conclusion because Teddy Kennedy supported baby-killing, both chemical and surgical, under cover of the civil law, because he supported Federal funding for fetal tissue research, because he said that he could separate his allegedly private beliefs from his public actions, because he supported special 'rights' for those engaged in unrepentant acts of perversity in violation of the Sixth and Ninth Commandments, right?"

Conservative Catholic: "Yes, yes, yes. All of that is clear. So what?"

Sedevacantist Catholic: "Are crimes against God more serious in the hierarchy of evils than crimes against men?"

Conservative Catholic: "What kind of crimes are you talking about?"

Sedevacantist Catholic: "You're begging the question with me just as you did with Mr. Progressive Catholic. Let me restate the question: Are crimes about God more serious in the hierarchy of evils than crimes against men?"

Conservative Catholic: "I suppose."

Sedevacantist Catholic: "You suppose? All right. Let us suppose that the late Teddy Kennedy said that a mosque was a 'sacred' place, a 'jewel' that stood out on the face of the earth. Let us suppose that the late Teddy Kennedy went to great lengths to esteem the symbols of false religions with his own hands. Let us suppose that Teddy Kennedy said that Judaism was a valid means of salvation for its adherents. Let us suppose that Teddy Kennedy said that false religions could contribute to the "building" of the "better" world. Would you be able to use your sensus Catholicus to judge these words and actions."

Conservative Catholic: "Yes, of course. No one who says and does such things is a member of the Catholic Church. I agree with that. When did Kennedy do and say those things? I knew that he tried to palm off government-run universal health care and health-care and his version of 'immigration reform' as consistent with the Catholic Faith. When did he do or say the things that you just mentioned. Boy, he was worse than I thought."

Sedevacantist Catholic: "Well, Teddy certainly believed all of those things. What if I substitute the name 'Pope' Benedict XVI for Edward Moore Kennedy? What if I told you that it was your 'pope' who said those things about a mosque? What if I told you that your 'pope' took off his shoes to enter into two different mosques so as to signify that he was in a 'holy' place? What if I told you that your 'pope' esteemed the symbols of five false religions with his own priestly hands?What if I told you that your 'pope' constantly praises the 'ability' of false religions to 'contribute' to the building of the 'better' world? What would you say?"

Conservative Catholic: "I would say that I can't judge the pope. That's what I would say."

Sedevacantist Catholic: "How can you say that you can judge the words and actions and beliefs of the man Edward Moore Kennedy, who maintained his 'good standing' with your 'pope' until the very end of his life despite doing and saying and believing things contrary to the Catholic Faith, and that you cannot judge the words and actions and beliefs of the man Joseph Ratzinger, who has spent his entire priesthood doing and saying things contrary to the Catholic Faith based upon the condemned beliefs of his New Theology."

Conservative Catholic: "I can't judge the pope. That's what I would say."

Sedevacantist Catholic: "In other words, you must suspend your sensus Catholicus to assess, objectively speaking, the fidelity of the words and actions and beliefs of Joseph Ratzinger before his 'election' to head your false church on April 19, 2005?

Conservative Catholic: "I can't judge the pope. That's what I would say."

Sedevacantist Catholic: "Joseph Ratzinger was not the 'pope' when he said the following things that have been condemned by the authority of the Catholic Church:

"In theses 10-12, the difficult problem of the relationship between language and thought is debated, which in post-conciliar discussions was the immediate departure point of the dispute.

The identity of the Christian substance as such, the Christian 'thing' was not directly ... censured, but it was pointed out that no formula, no matter how valid and indispensable it may have been in its time, can fully express the thought mentioned in it and declare it unequivocally forever, since language is constantly in movement and the content of its meaning changes. (Fr. Ratzinger: Dogmatic formulas must always change.)

 

Conservative Catholic: "Who says that this is not Catholic?"

Sedevacantist Catholic: "The [First] Vatican Council and the saint whose feast we celebrate today, Pope Saint Pius X:

Hence, that meaning of the sacred dogmata is ever to be maintained which has once been declared by Holy Mother Church, and there must never be an abandonment of this sense under the pretext or in the name of a more profound understanding.... If anyone says that it is possible that at some given time, given the advancement of knowledge, a sense may be assigned to the dogmata propounded by the Church which is different from that which the Church has always understood and understands: let him be anathema.  [Vatican Council, 1870.]

Hence it is quite impossible [the Modernists assert] to maintain that they [dogmatic statements] absolutely contain the truth: for, in so far as they are symbols, they are the images of truth, and so must be adapted to the religious sense in its relation to man; and as instruments, they are the vehicles of truth, and must therefore in their turn be adapted to man in his relation to the religious sense. But the object of the religious sense, as something contained in the absolute, possesses an infinite variety of aspects, of which now one, now another, may present itself. In like manner he who believes can avail himself of varying conditions. Consequently, the formulas which we call dogma must be subject to these vicissitudes, and are, therefore, liable to change. Thus the way is open to the intrinsic evolution of dogma. Here we have an immense structure of sophisms which ruin and wreck all religion.

"It is thus, Venerable Brethren, that for the Modernists, whether as authors or propagandists, there is to be nothing stable, nothing immutable in the Church. Nor, indeed, are they without forerunners in their doctrines, for it was of these that Our predecessor Pius IX wrote: 'These enemies of divine revelation extol human progress to the skies, and with rash and sacrilegious daring would have it introduced into the Catholic religion as if this religion were not the work of God but of man, or some kind of philosophical discovery susceptible of perfection by human efforts.' On the subject of revelation and dogma in particular, the doctrine of the Modernists offers nothing new. We find it condemned in the Syllabus of Pius IX, where it is enunciated in these terms: ''Divine revelation is imperfect, and therefore subject to continual and indefinite progress, corresponding with the progress of human reason'; and condemned still more solemnly in the Vatican Council: ''The doctrine of the faith which God has revealed has not been proposed to human intelligences to be perfected by them as if it were a philosophical system, but as a divine deposit entrusted to the Spouse of Christ to be faithfully guarded and infallibly interpreted. Hence also that sense of the sacred dogmas is to be perpetually retained which our Holy Mother the Church has once declared, nor is this sense ever to be abandoned on plea or pretext of a more profound comprehension of the truth.' Nor is the development of our knowledge, even concerning the faith, barred by this pronouncement; on the contrary, it is supported and maintained. For the same Council continues: 'Let intelligence and science and wisdom, therefore, increase and progress abundantly and vigorously in individuals, and in the mass, in the believer and in the whole Church, throughout the ages and the centuries -- but only in its own kind, that is, according to the same dogma, the same sense, the same acceptation.'" (Pope Saint Pius X, Pascendi Dominci Gregis, September 8, 1907.)

 

Conservative Catholic: "This is not as clear as killing a baby. That's clear. This is murky."

Sedevacantist Catholic: "Murky. What's murky about 'that sense of the sacred dogmas is to be perpetually retained which our Holy Mother the Church has once declared, nor is this sense ever to be abandoned on plea or pretext of a more profound comprehension of the truth"? It's as plain as it can be.

Conservative Catholic: "I can't judge the pope."

Sedevacantist Catholic: "Joseph Ratzinger wasn't the 'pope' when he made those remarks in 1971. Anyone who is intellectually honest can see that the then Father Ratzinger held then--and holds now as 'Benedict XVI'--a notion of dogmatic truth contrary to right reason and that has been condemned solemnly by the authority of the Catholic Church. To believe as he does is to render asunder the very immutability and omnipotence of God by claiming that He has revealed Himself to us in such obscure ways that His doctrine can never be expressed adequately at any one time, requiring adjustments over the course of time. This is a blasphemous denial of the infallible guidance of God the Holy Ghost that has been granted to our true popes and dogmatic councils in the past. No one can believe this and remain a Catholic in good standing as one is attacking the very nature of God Himself."

Conservative Catholic: "I have to go now."

Sedevacantist Catholic: I am sure that you do."

 

Some might protest that I have created "straw men" in these imaginary conversations. I have done nothing of the sort. I have conversations quite similar to these. Remember, I did not come out of the womb fully formed. I was a "conservative" Catholic for a long, long time. I defended the conciliar "pontiffs" for a long, long time. I had arguments with "progressive" Catholics that were quite similar to the one presented in composite form above, and there were sedevacantists as early as 1985 who were making most of the same arguments about Karol Wojtyla/John Paul II that I make now about Joseph Ratzinger/Benedict XVI. These conversations are not "straw men" inventions. They are, more or less, composites of how I attempted to defend the conciliar "popes" against solid Catholic reason for far, far too long!

Thus it is that what's good for Teddy is good for Benny. That is, if one can judge the words and actions and beliefs of the late Edward Moore Kennedy to conclude that he had indeed excommunicate himself from the Catholic Church without any formal declaration being made by the conciliar authorities, one can also judge the words and actions and beliefs of Joseph Ratzinger before his "election" on April 19, 2005, to conclude that he has defected from the Catholic Faith on numerous points throughout his priesthood, defections that have been reaffirmed during his time as head of the counterfeit church of conciliarism (see Ratzinger's War Against Catholicism). Crimes against God are indeed more grievous, more heinous that crimes against men. The daily slaughter, both by chemical and surgical means, of the preborn, as horrific as that is, is secondary to the grave crimes committed against God by the conciliar "pontiffs," including Joseph Ratzinger/Benedict XVI. One simply has to use his sensus Catholicus to come to this realization.

 

That Ratzinger/Benedict did not make the sort of demands upon Edward Moore Kennedy on matters of Faith and Morals that he has made upon Bishop Richard Williamson on a matter of secular history speaks volumes as to the desire of Joseph Ratzinger/Benedict XVI to appeal to the sensitivities of "modern man" at the price of sounding "too Catholic" in the midst of an "unbelieving" world. It is for appearing to be "too Catholic" that the recently retired "bishop" of Scranton, Joseph Martino, was shown the way to the conciliar gang plank. Nuance and obscurity , not the open profession of Catholicism with absolute clarity, certainly not the open profession of the Social Reign of Christ the King, are the pathways of of conciliarism. This stands in open contrast to the firmness of Pope Saint Pius X as he opposed Modernism without any compromise whatsoever (see Modernism's Eternal Foe, Our Eternal Friend).

Pope Saint Pius X was fairly unique in that, unlike his immediate predecessor, Pope Leo XIII, and each of his three successors (Popes Benedict XV, Pius XI, and Pius XII) prior ot the dawning of the age of conciliarism on October 28, 1958, with the "election" of Angelo Roncalli/John XXIII, he was not a diplomat, prone to make compromises with enemies of the Faith. He was a pastor of souls throughout the course of the nearly forty-five years of his priesthood (ordained on September 18, 1858) prior to his election as the Vicar of Our Blessed Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ on August 4, 1903. He was not prone to compromise, and, most unlike Ratzinger/Benedict, he boldly spoke truth to those in civil power:

"There was no shade of weakness in him", Cardinal Merry del Val wrote, "He had the inflexible firmness of a ruler convinced of the responsibilities his high office imposed on him, and he was determined to fulfill them, cost what it might."

The Russian ambassador to the Vatican once discovered the firmness of the Pope. Shortly before his death [in 1914], Pius X granted this ambassador an audience. But he received him sternly, without a trace of a smile on his face. Full of majesty, he turned to his visitor. "I cannot accept good wishes from the representative of a power that fails to keep the promises it makes. Until now Russia has not kept a single one of the promises she made to the Catholics of Russia."

The ambassador had not expected such a greeting, and he was frightened. "Holy Father," he stammered, "this is not true!"

The Holy Father rose from his throne and, with a gesture that betrayed deep indignation, cried, "I will repeat what I have said: not a single promise has been kept! And you dare to say that I lie, Mr. Ambassador! I must ask you to leave this room!"

As pale as death, the ambassador stumbled out the door.

So with firmness and mercy, Pope Saint Pius X carried on his work--a worthy successor to Peter, of him it was said, "Upon this rock I will build my church." (Father Walter Diethelm, Saint Pius X: The Farm Boy Who Became Pope, published originally by Farrar, Straus and Cudahy, Inc., in 1956, republished by Ignatius Press in 1994.)

 

Although the passage below, taken from the diaries of the founder of international Zionism, Theodore Herzl, as he described his audience with Pope Saint Pius X on January 25, 1904, has been quoted twenty-nine times on this site, including in Modernism's Eternal Foe, Our Eternal Friend, it is worth repeating once again in this article to demonstrate the glaring contrast between the beliefs of a true pope, Pope Saint Pius X, and those of a false "pope," Joseph Ratzinger/Benedict XVI:

HERZL: Yesterday I was with the Pope [Pius X]. . . . I arrived ten minutes ahead of time, and without having to wait I was conducted through a number of small reception rooms to the Pope. He received me standing and held out his hand, which I did not kiss. Lippay had told me I had to do it, but I didn’t. I believe this spoiled my chances with him, for everyone who visits him kneels and at least kisses his hand. This hand kiss had worried me a great deal and I was glad when it was out of the way.


He seated himself in an armchair, a throne for minor affairs, and invited me to sit by his side. He smiled in kindly anticipation. I began:


HERZL: I thank Your Holiness for the favor of granting me this audience. [I begged him to excuse my miserable Italian, but he said:

POPE: No, Signor Commander, you speak very well.


HERZL: [He is an honest, rough-hewn village priest, to whom Christianity has remained a living thing even in the Vatican. I briefly laid my request before him. But annoyed perhaps by my refusal to kiss his hand, he answered in a stern categorical manner.


POPE: We are unable to favor this movement [of Zionism]. We cannot prevent the Jews from going to Jerusalem—but we could never sanction it. The ground of Jerusalem, if it were not always sacred, has been sanctified by the life of Jesus Christ. As the head of the Church I cannot answer you otherwise. The Jews have not recognized our Lord, therefore we cannot recognize the Jewish people.


HERZL: [The conflict between Rome and Jerusalem, represented by the one and the other of us, was once again under way. At the outset I tried to be conciliatory. I said my little piece. . . . It didn’t greatly impress him. Jerusalem was not to be placed in Jewish hands.] And its present status, Holy Father?


POPE: I know, it is disagreeable to see the Turks in possession of our Holy Places. We simply have to put up with it. But to sanction the Jewish wish to occupy these sites, that we cannot do.


HERZL: [I said that we based our movement solely on the sufferings of the Jews, and wished to put aside all religious issues].


POPE: Yes, but we, but I as the head of the Catholic Church, cannot do this. One of two things will likely happen. Either the Jews will retain their ancient faith and continue to await the Messiah whom we believe has already appeared—in which case they are denying the divinity of Jesus and we cannot assist them. Or else they will go there with no religion whatever, and then we can have nothing at all to do with them. The Jewish faith was the foundation of our own, but it has been superceded by the teachings of Christ, and we cannot admit that it still enjoys any validity. The Jews who should have been the first to acknowledge Jesus Christ have not done so to this day.


HERZL: [It was on the tip of my tongue to remark, “It happens in every family: no one believes in his own relative.” But, instead, I said:] Terror and persecution were not precisely the best means for converting the Jews. [His reply had an element of grandeur in its simplicity:]


POPE: Our Lord came without power. He came in peace. He persecuted no one. He was abandoned even by his apostles. It was only later that he attained stature. It took three centuries for the Church to evolve. The Jews therefore had plenty of time in which to accept his divinity without duress or pressure. But they chose not to do so, and they have not done it yet.


HERZL: But, Holy Father, the Jews are in a terrible plight. I do not know if Your Holiness is aware of the full extent of their tragedy. We need a land for these harried people.


POPE: Must it be Jerusalem?


HERZL: We are not asking for Jerusalem, but for Palestine—for only the secular land.


POPE: We cannot be in favor of it.


[Editor Lowenthal interjects here] Here unrelenting replacement theology is plainly upheld as the norm of the Roman Catholic Church. Further, this confession, along with the whole tone of the Pope in his meeting with Herzl, indicates the perpetuation of a doctrinal emphasis that has resulted in centuries of degrading behavior toward the Jews. However, this response has the “grandeur” of total avoidance of that which Herzl had intimated, namely that the abusive reputation of Roman Catholicism toward the Jews was unlikely to foster conversion. Further, if, “It took three centuries for the Church to evolve,” it was that very same period of time that it took for the Church to consolidate and launch its thrust of anti-Semitism through the following centuries.

HERZL: Does Your Holiness know the situation of the Jews?


POPE: Yes, from my days in Mantua, where there are Jews. I have always been in friendly relations with Jews. Only the other evening two Jews were here to see me. There are other bonds than those of religion: social intercourse, for example, and philanthropy. Such bonds we do not refuse to maintain with the Jews. Indeed we also pray for them, that their spirit see the light. This very day the Church is celebrating the feast of an unbeliever who became converted in a miraculous manner—on the road to Damascus. And so if you come to Palestine and settle your people there, we will be ready with churches and priests to baptize all of you.


HERZL: [At this point Conte Lippay had himself announced. The Pope bade him be admitted. The Conte kneeled, kissed his hand, and joined in the conversation by telling of our “miraculous” meeting in the Bauer beerhall at Venice. The miracle was that he had originally intended to stay overnight in Padua, and instead, it turned out that he was given to hear me express the wish to kiss the Holy Father’s foot. At this the Pope made no movement, for I hadn’t even kissed his hand. Lippay proceeded to tell how I had expiated on the noble qualities of Jesus Christ. The Pope listened, and now and then took a pinch of snuff and sneezed into a big red cotton handkerchief. It is these peasant touches which I like about him best and which most of all compel my respect. Lippay, it would appear, wanted to account for his introducing me, and perhaps ward off a word of reproach. But the Pope said:

POPE: On the contrary, I am glad you brought me the Signor Commendatore.


HERZL: [As to the real business, he repeated what he had told me, until he dismissed us:]


POPE: Not possible!


HERZL: [Lippay stayed on his knees for an unconscionable time and never seemed to tire of kissing his hand. It was apparent that this was what the Pope liked. But on taking leave, I contented myself with shaking his hand warmly and bowing deeply. The audience lasted about twenty-five minutes. While spending the last hour in the Raphael gallery, I saw a picture of an Emperor kneeling before a seated Pope and receiving the crown from his hands. That’s how Rome wants it.]   (Marvin Lowenthal, Diaries of Theodore Herzl, pp. 427- 430.)

 

Close to the pastoral heart of Pope Saint Pius X was the re-establishment of the Catholic City. He wrote firmly that Catholicism was the one and only foundation of personal and social order, and anyone who thinks that Joseph Ratzinger/Benedict XVI believes this is permitting himself to be willfully deluded by an abject falsehood to avoid facing the truth that there is absolutely no way to reconcile Pope Saint Pius X's call for the restoration of the Catholic Church with Joseph Ratzinger/Benedict XVI's contentment with a "healthy laicism" that has produced the monster civil state of Modernity that was served with such servile devotion by the likes of the late United States Senator Edward Moore Kennedy:

This, nevertheless, is what they want to do with human society; they dream of changing its natural and traditional foundations; they dream of a Future City built on different principles, and they dare to proclaim these more fruitful and more beneficial than the principles upon which the present Christian City rests.

No, Venerable Brethren, We must repeat with the utmost energy in these times of social and intellectual anarchy when everyone takes it upon himself to teach as a teacher and lawmaker - the City cannot be built otherwise than as God has built it; society cannot be setup unless the Church lays the foundations and supervises the work; no, civilization is not something yet to be found, nor is the New City to be built on hazy notions; it has been in existence and still is: it is Christian civilization, it is the Catholic City. It has only to be set up and restored continually against the unremitting attacks of insane dreamers, rebels and miscreants. omnia instaurare in Christo. (Pope Saint Pius X, Notre Charge Apostolique, August 15, 1910.)

 

The miscreants of Modernity and Modernism will pass from the scene when the Triumph of the Immaculate Heart of Mary is made manifest by the fulfillment of Our Lady's Fatima Message by a true pope. In the meantime, of course, we must offer up our own prayers and sufferings and sacrifices to the Most Sacred Heart of Jesus through the Immaculate Heart of Mary in reparation for our sins and those of the whole world, being careful to pray as many Rosaries each day as our states-in-life permit. We, each of us, have much for which to make reparation, do we not?

We must continue to pray and to live penitentially as the consecrated slaves of Our Blessed Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ through the Sorrowful and Immaculate Heart of Mary, and we must not look for results as we do so, content only with the fact that we are attempting to make some small bit of reparation for how our sins have wounded Our Blessed Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ once in time and how they have wounded His Church Militant on earth today.

We do not know when the Triumph of the Immaculate Heart of Mary will take place. We must, however, remain faithful to our lives of daily Mass, Eucharist piety, True Devotion to Mary by means of Total Consecration, devotion to Saint Joseph and the other saints, home enthronement to the Most Sacred Heart of Jesus and the Immaculate Heart of Mary, frequent Confession, worthy receptions of Holy Communion, and a desire to be more and more detached from the world in order to store up at least a bit of treasure in Heaven so that the Divine Bridegroom will find us awake with our lanterns lit at the moment of our Particular Judgments. 

Pope Saint Pius X made no concessions to Modernism or to the Modernists. Neither should we as we cling to our true bishops and our true priests in the Catholic catacombs who carry on the warfare against Modernism that was waged by Pope Saint Pius X with great fortitude and zeal. Heaven awaits the souls of the just who remain faithful to the point of their dying breaths as they invoke Our Lady in the Ave Maria to pray them "nunc, et in hora mortis nostrae."

Isn't it worth the effort to suffer a little bit now for eternal glory later?

Immaculate Heart of Mary, triumph soon.

Isn't it time to pray a Rosary now?.

Our Lady of Fatima, pray for us.

Saint Joseph, Patron of the Universal Church and Protector of the Faithful, pray for us.

 

Vivat Christus Rex! Viva Cristo Rey!

Saints Peter and Paul, pray for us.

Saint John the Baptist, pray for us.

Saint John the Evangelist, pray for us.

Saint Michael the Archangel, pray for us.

Saint Gabriel the Archangel, pray for us.

Saint Raphael the Archangel, pray for us.

Saints Joachim and Anne, pray for us.

Saints Caspar, Melchior, and Balthasar, pray for us.

Pope Saint Pius X, pray for us.

See also: A Litany of Saints

 

 






© Copyright 2009, Thomas A. Droleskey. All rights reserved.