Pope Sixtus V renewed the excommunication of Queen Elizabeth I in 1588 in support of the Spanish Armada

 

 In 1588 there sat in the see of Rome a fierce thundering friar, that would set all at six and seven, or at six and five if you allude to his name.

-- Francis Bacon 

Which are the schismaticks?

 

When a schism is once spread, there grows at length a dispute which are the schismaticks: in the sense of the law the schism lies on that side which opposes itself to the religion of the state.

-- Jonathan Swift 

 

June 30th:

Pope Begs Breakaway Trad. Group to Back Off Bishop Consecrations

AP News

 

... “I plead with you and ask you with all my heart: please turn back!” Leo wrote in a letter to the Rev. Davide Pagliarani, the superior of the Society of St. Pius X. ... “Far be it from us to separate ourselves from the Roman Church. We desire, on the contrary, to serve her by means that are extraordinary, as one would assist a mother in distress who requires particular help, even if such help is not understood by everyone,” Pagliarani wrote. ...

 

July 2nd:

Vatican Declares SSPX in Schism, Excommunicates Bishops

AP News

 

... By declaring a schism and extending excommunications to potentially thousands of Catholics, the Vatican’s doctrine office went above and beyond the minimum sanctions foreseen by the church’s canon law to respond to the consecrations Wednesday of four new bishops.

 

The society, known by its acronym SSPX, celebrates the ancient Latin Mass and opposes the modernizing reforms of the Catholic Church, which it considers to be rife with heresies and errors. While a fringe movement on the Catholic right, the SSPX has been a thorn in the Vatican’s side for five decades because it claims to be even more Catholic than the Holy See.

 

... The SSPX doesn’t have an exact count but estimates around 400,000-600,000 people attend its Masses, meaning Thursday’s decree could potentially involve the excommunications of thousands of rank-and-file SSPX faithful. 

 

... The Vatican responded so aggressively in part because the group poses something of a threat by representing a parallel, ultra-Catholic, pre-Vatican II church that has grown in the decades since its original break from Rome. While representing a fraction of the 1.4-billion strong Catholic faithful, the SSPX now has six bishops, 751 priests, 264 seminarians, 145 religious brothers, 88 oblates and 250 religious sisters representing 50 nationalities, according to SSPX statistics. 

 

... “He’s brought the hammer down,” said Joseph Shaw, head of the Latin Mass Society of England and Wales, which is in communion. Shaw expressed sympathy with the plight of ordinary SSPX faithful, saying the invalidation of marriages especially is going to cause “massive” pastoral problems. “It’s a sad day.” ...                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                Update O.M.G. ↓

 

Vance: Christianity Can Help Overcome Divisions

Matthew Schmitz, Washington Post

 

I'm so old I remember when the pope excommunicated Martin Luther for doing this very thing Pope Francis recommends American Catholics do in this election

 

“Not voting is ugly,” the 87-year-old pontiff said. “It is not good. You must vote.”

“You must choose the lesser evil,” he said. “Who is the lesser evil? That lady, or that gentleman? I don’t know."

"Everyone, in conscience, (has to) think and do this.”       

-- Pope Francis, quoted here

 

Since your most serene majesty and your highnesses require of me a simple, clear, and direct answer, I will give one, and it is this: I cannot submit my faith either to the pope or to the council, because it is clear that they have fallen into error and even into inconsistency with themselves. If, then, I am not convinced by proof from Holy Scripture, or by cogent reasons, if I am not satisfied by the very text I have cited, and if my judgment is not in this way brought into subjection to God's word, I neither can nor will retract anything; for it cannot be either safe or honest for a Christian to speak against his conscience. Here I stand. I cannot do otherwise. God help me. Amen.

-- Martin Luther, quoted here 

 

Centuries before the East-West Schism, the schismatic Roman Pope Victor I broke with the Christians of Asia Minor over celebrating Easter on Nisan 14

 

 Aka the Quartodecimans, the fourteenthers.

Victor [died 199 A. D.], who presided over the church at Rome, immediately attempted to cut off from the common unity the parishes of all Asia, with the churches that agreed with them, as heterodox; and he wrote letters and declared all the brethren there wholly excommunicate.

-- Eusebius, Ecclesiastical History, V.XXIV.9.

 

Orthodox Easter 2024 is Sunday, May 5th, five weeks after Easter in the West:

Orthodox Pascha often occurs later in the spring ... especially out of sync with the actual astronomical phenomena linked to an accurate calculation of the Paschal date. ... During the 21st century, the Orthodox and Western Churches will share a common celebration of Pascha only 31 times.

 

Victor's unbrother-like heat towards the Eastern churches, in the controversy about Easter, fomented that difference into a schism.                                                                           

-- The Causes of the Decay of Christian Piety  

Hero priest almost instantly excommunicated in Livorno, Italy for calling Pope Francis the anti-pope, a usurper, and a mason

 From the story here:

Jesting, he said he received the decree of excommunication Jan. 1, and that “It’s nice, it’s really nice. It’s written well, very precise.”

“In the decree there are specific citations of canon law, which appear as such when it is necessary to strike a priest who shouts the truth, but for defending the Throne of Peter, it doesn’t exist,” he said.

Guidetti referred to a band of red that runs along the top of the decree, saying red is “the color of martyrdom, of blood, of witness.”

“It is a beautiful picture; I’ll make a nice frame for it and hang it on the wall. It will be something I will gladly brag about,” he said, but admitted that he feels “a little bitterness for this blindness and harshness on the part of one who should be a mother, the church, which should be maternal, and who in reality is a tyrant.”

 

Unbeliever excommunicated from Science Mike's church for unbelievers

The following comment stream was deleted from here today by Science Mike.

Priceless!

The intolerance of religion is eternal, especially heretical religion.

Martin Luther wanted to drain the Vatican swamp, using as his Twitter his German translation of the Bible and the Pamphlet

Peter Stanford, here:

The 95 theses – and much of what Luther subsequently said in public as his message spread across the continent, right up to his excommunication in 1521 – were the work of a classic disrupter who, in today’s terms, wanted to drain the “Vatican swamp”.

Fluent in the language of the street, the undeniably charismatic Luther wrote most of his best-known and most inflammatory texts not in church Latin but in German, going on to produce in 1522 the first translation of the New Testament into everyday German, and in 1534 a translation of the whole Bible.

Those in the pews no longer had to rely on the word of priests and bishops instead of the word of God. He realised the force of appealing over the head of “experts” long before Michael Gove hit upon it in the Brexit push.

And in working with the owners of newfangled printing presses, he was among the first to spot the potential of what was the social media of its day as an alternative means of spreading his new anti-establishment gospel. Pamphlets of edited versions of his tracts spread like ripples through Germany, then Europe, Rome and even England. In an age of widespread illiteracy, he made sure he engaged those who could not read by including illustrations, using crude, often satirical woodcuts from the studio of his close friend and fellow Wittenberger, Lucas Cranach the Elder.

So when he stood before the Holy Roman Emperor and the princes and prelates of Germany at the Diet of Worms in 1521, defending his writings on pain of death, Luther had crowds outside on the streets rallying to his defence, stirred up by leaflets and posters saturating the town.

Much as they wanted to be rid of “this petty monk”, as pope Adrian VI labelled him, the establishment could not hand him over to his fate for fear of igniting an uprising. So Luther, unlike those earlier would-be reformers, lived to put his theories into practice.

WaPo's Jennifer Rubin, a so-called conservative, decides to play Pope and excommunicate Evangelicals as hypocrites for defending Trump

Her Holiness Pope Jennifer

 

 

 Because the original excommunication in the 16th Century just wasn't enough, you see. For excommunication to really mean something post-Holocaust, it has to come from the Jews.

Jennifer Rubin, WaPo's elitist "however" girl and answer to another so-called conservative, David Brooks at The New York Times, failed to shame Evangelicals into not voting for Trump, so now she presumes to shame them as the hypocrites they really are, here:

For now, however, these Trump supporters are mute at best, and some even stoop to defend Trump and Bannon. That suggests a permanent abrogation of their role as guardians of Judeo-Christian values. ... If, however, Christian conservatives are now making amoral, political calculations, they cannot very well set themselves up as arbiters of values or tell their congregants how faith should influence their votes. ... However, in embracing a candidate who painted an entire religion as the enemy, for a time wanted to ban all its adherents and favored a “Muslim registry” (!) these evangelicals have been revealed to be egregious hypocrites and, yes, even religious bigots. At least we know with whom we are dealing.

So there!

As if the political question just answered were the choice between Satan and Ste. Joan of Arc.

This example of liberal preening will keep Jennifer hopping in the party rotation right through the holidays, don't ya think?

Welcome to the 496th anniversary of Luther being branded a heretic by the Roman Catholic Pope

Bulla contra Erro res Martini Lutheri 

Luther burned it 10 December 1520 and was excommunicated 3 January 1521.

Like much else, Islam got "irja" from Pauline Christianity

From a recent discussion, here, about how ISIS seeks to immanentize the eschaton:

'Unless you have some knowledge of medieval Islamic theology you probably have no idea what irja means. The word translates literally as “postponing.” It was a theological principle put forward by some Muslim scholars during the very first century of Islam. At the time, the Muslim world was going through a major civil war, as proto-Sunnis and proto-Shiites fought for power, and a third group called Khawarij (dissenters) were excommunicating and slaughtering both sides. In the face of this bloody chaos, the proponents of irja said that the burning question of who is a true Muslim should be “postponed” until the afterlife. Even a Muslim who abandoned all religious practice and committed many sins, they reasoned, could not be denounced as an “apostate.” Faith was a matter of the heart, something only God — not other human beings — could evaluate.

'The scholars who put this forward became known as “murjia,” the upholders of irja, or, simply, “postponers.” The theology that they outlined could have been the basis for a tolerant, noncoercive, pluralistic Islam — an Islamic liberalism. Unfortunately, they did not have enough influence on the Muslim world. The school of thought disappeared quickly, only to go down in Sunni orthodoxy’s memory as one of the early “heretical sects.” ...

'In fact, there are hundreds of millions of Muslims around the world who are also engaged in irja, even if they are unfamiliar with the term. Some of them are focused on the Quran, instead of the medieval Shariah, and hold on to the famous Quranic verse that says, “There is no compulsion in religion.”' 

--------------------------------------------------------

Therefore do not pronounce judgment before the time, before the Lord comes, who will bring to light the things now hidden in darkness and will disclose the purposes of the heart. Then every man will receive his commendation from God.

-- 1 Corinthians 4:5

Each one must do as he has made up his mind, not reluctantly or under compulsion, for God loves a cheerful giver.

-- 2 Corinthians 9:7

To prevent losing in court, churches need to remove "standing" by excommunicating the doctrinally unsound

Consider the hypothetical posed here:

"Imagine a same sex couple who consider themselves deeply Catholic want to get married at the Catholic church of their choice. They approach the pastor and he declines to officiate the wedding or be a party to it. The spurned couple might then file a non-discrimination lawsuit against the pastor and his parish making the simple argument that because same-sex marriage is a right protected under the Equal Protection Clause of the 14th Amendment, a parish cannot discriminate in who it weds and who it doesn't."

-----------------------------

A number of things come to mind, which church leadership throughout the country ought to begin discussing with their legal counsel as soon as possible.

One, couples who want to marry in church should be required as a condition of membership to get married in their own parish. Churches need to state this explicitly in order to have control of their own affairs. Couples should not be free to roam and pick a "patsy" church of their choosing.

Two, all members should be required to sign doctrinal statements which specifically delineate that they agree with the church's teaching about sexuality and marriage as a condition of membership. Members who transfer to new parishes should have to do the same.

Three, churches should state in writing as a matter of principle that the benefits provided by clergy are only for members who have also completed a course of catechesis, affirmed it and have been publicly accepted into membership.

And four, a clear process of excommunication should be in place and followed in order to remove from membership individuals who come to disagree with the church's teaching.

If taken, these steps ought to help protect churches qua religious institutions, and in a court of law make it difficult for plaintiffs to sue because they do not have standing to sue and have executed evidence which contradicts their claims.

Doctrinally rigorous churches such as the Lutheran Church Missouri Synod and the Wisconsin Evangelical Lutheran Synod already are well prepared in these respects and represent a good resource for clergy and denominations who are not. 

Rod Dreher Can't Pass Up The Chance To Slam Protestantism

Rod Dreher blows a gasket because some Catholic parish educators actually resigned! resigned! rather than sign a loyalty oath, here:

Of course this being the Washington Post, the story is written with a liberal bias that distorts the story. Note that “to all the teachings of church leaders” above. That is simply not a factual statement of how the Roman Catholic Church understands itself, or has ever understood itself. For Catholics, the Church has the right to teach authoritatively on faith and morals — an authority that is exercised through its leadership. This is what the Protestant Reformation was about! It is beyond embarrassing that this has to be explained to a reporter for The Washington Post. Then again, it has to be explained to liberal Catholics that they can’t pick and choose what to believe, and remain as Catholics in good standing. This is something I will never understand about modern Catholics. They want to have their church, but only on their own terms. Which is not Catholic.

Oh for the days when the heretics went quietly to the gallows, eh?

Note to Rod Dreher: The educators who resigned aren't Protestants. Protestants don't resign. They stand on their principles until they get excommunicated by Catholics. These teachers, whatever else they are, decided it was more important to back down than do that, however petulantly they may plead their case now in the pages of The Washington Post.

It is beyond embarrassing that this has to be explained to Rod Dreher.

Get a grip buddy.