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

 

Pope Leo XIV's encyclical is sadly political not theological, apologizing for slavery without mentioning Pope Leo X's role in the transatlantic slave trade

 

Not all the Leos were lions, I guess.

On the problem of Just War, the author comes close to concluding that this pope is guilty of immanentizing the eschaton, which is about right. 

The more I watch this new pope the more I sense that he's not filling the big shoes any more than the previous guy did.

The story of our times. 

 

Contra Pope Leo in “Magnifica Humanitas,” Just War Theory Is Not Outdated

... Fully aside from its length—245 paragraphs and 42,300 words—one is justified in questioning the overall coherence of the document. ... he injects other topics that appear unrelated. Among these are ... the Church’s past complicity in slavery and slave trade (no. 176).

In a footnote, Leo identifies four papal bulls from the years 1435, 1442, 1452 and 1455 that are said to have expressly “relativized” the “problematic incompatibility of slavery with the Christian conscience” (n. 174). Not included in this list is one of his earlier namesakes, Pope Leo X, who in 1514 renewed the authority of earlier papal bulls that had granted Portuguese authorities the right to subjugate non-Christians and reduce them to slaves. This, in turn, would help lay the foundation for the transatlantic slave trade.

As it concerns the Church’s formal complicity regarding slavery, in the encyclical Leo confesses, “I sincerely ask for pardon” (no. 176). But if such confession, repentance, and need for pardon were a true and heavy burden that the Vatican actually carries, it would then seem appropriate that, at minimum, an entire encyclical in fact be devoted solely to the excruciating problem of the Church’s complicity in such evil. Perhaps such will be forthcoming. ...

 

I thought Pope Francis died?

 

Well, Mr. Pope, sir, the ladies aren't going to shut up about that Mary co-redeemer of the world stuff lol

 

Mary Helped Jesus Save the World

Monica Miller, Crisis 

 

Monica Miller must have had this essay in her desk drawer ready to go, just waiting for this moment to arrive. She begins right out of the gate reminding the pope, an Augustinian, that none other than St. Augustine had said

Two parents have generated us for death; two parents have generated us for life. 

The observation is as true as the comparison is false. Adam and Eve were husband and wife. Mary and the Holy Ghost were not.

Yes, St. Augustine's mother was also named Monica.

Later in her essay our Monica reminds the pope that Mary instigated her son's mission at the Wedding at Cana, dontchaknow.

She is the New Eve, the true and effective helpmate of the New Adam. 

Apart from how this is creepy connubial Christ talk, our Monica apparently sees herself in a similar light, trying to move her son the pope along in the right direction.

But kinda more like the old Eve than St. Monica, to be perfectly frank, our Monica finds her "hath God said" opening:

The [pope's] Note doesn’t say that the Co-redemptrix title for Mary is heretical but, rather, “inappropriate” and is discouraging its use for the reasons indicated. It is important to note that the document certainly acknowledges that Mary is “the first and foremost collaborator in the work of Redemption and grace.”

Doesn't say?

This is absolutely comic.

But wait! There's more:

My purpose here is to clarify and highlight that while, thus far, the Vatican has rejected the Marian title “Co-redemptrix,” nonetheless, Mary was and is God’s chief co-worker in the salvific mission of her Son.       

Thus far?

Monica is nothing if not hopeful about the future for Mary, Co-Redemptrix. And subversive:

And while the Church, for now, will not honor Mary formally under the title of Co-redemptrix, this doesn’t necessarily mean that the faithful cannot, in our private devotions, honor her in this way. 

For now?

You see what I mean. 

But our Monica rightly has every reason to be hopeful, because she understands the logic of her position, a logic which was born when the early followers of Jesus decided that their crucified master wasn't dead but was a resurrected god.

Once you introduce that first novelty, however, you have to explain where this god came from, hence the virgin birth idea, which is totally absent from Mark's Gospel, and under attack in John's. From there the novelties just multiplied.

It took a long time for that logic to do its work to elevate Jesus' mother, although our Monica highlights it already acting upon the imaginations of early Christian luminaries like Justin Martyr, Tertullian, Irenaeus, and others.

We did not get, formally, the Immaculate Conception of Mary until 1854, and the Assumption of Mary until 1950. These are modern age developments! Papal infallibility dates to 1870, Daily Reception of Holy Communion to 1905.

Mary The Co-Redeemer in 2052 anyone?

The Reformation tried, not entirely successfully, to rescue the church from this line of thinking through its rediscovery of Paul, whose thinking was nowhere Marian but Christ-centered.

The first Adam, completely counter trend, was the only man not born of woman until the last Adam. Of course Paul was not thinking this through when he said that Jesus was "born of a woman" in Galatians 4:4.

Well how did Jesus escape original sin then?

We are not told, only that as Paul's theology developed Paul plainly said that Jesus "knew no sin" (II Corinthians 5:21), and was made of different stuff:

Nevertheless death reigned from Adam to Moses, even over them that had not sinned after the similitude of Adam's transgression, who is the figure of him that was to come.

-- Romans 5:14

For as in Adam all die, even so in Christ shall all be made alive. ...

And so it is written, The first man Adam was made a living soul; the last Adam was made a quickening spirit. ...

The first man is of the earth, earthy: the second man is the Lord from heaven.

-- I Corinthians 15: 22, 45, 47.

The answer of Matthew 1:18, 20 and Luke 1:35 is that that different stuff was "of the Holy Ghost". And that pretty much explains how the fourth and fifth centuries came to be spent, not on Marian concerns, but Christological.

The Marianists major in the minors. 

Pope Leo attempts to put an end to all that Mary "co-redeemer" jibber jabber

 

 Jesus, not Virgin Mary, saved the world, Vatican says

... In a new decree approved by Pope Leo, the Vatican's top doctrinal office instructed the world's 1.4 billion Catholics not to refer to Mary as the "co-redeemer" of the world.

Jesus alone saved the world, said the new instruction, settling an internal debate that had befuddled senior Church figures for decades, and even sparked rare open disagreement among recent popes.

"It would not be appropriate to use the title 'co-redemptrix'," said the text. "This title ... (can) create confusion and an imbalance in the harmony of the truths of the Christian faith." ...

Those, His brethren, all died, the coup de grâce for the parousia

 And he said unto them, Verily I say unto you, That there be some of them that stand here, which shall not taste of death, till they have seen the kingdom of God come with power.

-- Mark 9:1 

Pope Leo XIV, a so-called Augustinian, and current Catholic social teaching are the incoherent ones, from the death of Augustine in 430 to the death of Aquinas in 1274

 Therefore, it is in no way contrary to the commandment, 'Thou shalt not kill' to wage war at God's bidding, or for the representatives of public authority to put criminals to death, according to the law.

  If a man be dangerous and infectious to the community, on account of some sin, it is praiseworthy and healthful that he be killed in order to safeguard the common good.

 

Pope Leo XIV continues Pope Francis' legacy of inclusion for LGBT after maintaining in 2012 that their behavior should not be promoted

 Pope Leo meets LGBTQ+ Catholic advocate and vows continuity with Pope Francis’ legacy of welcome

 ... The meeting, which lasted about half an hour, was officially announced by the Vatican in a sign that Leo wanted it made public. It came just days before LGBTQ+ Catholics participate in a Holy Year pilgrimage to the Vatican in another sign of welcome. ...

 

Pope Leo graduated in 1973 from Saint Augustine Seminary High School in Allegan County, Michigan, which closed in 1977

 

... The estate was built by inventor Dorr Felt in 1925 and bought by the Augustinian order in 1949 for use as a school, with the goal of educating between 50 and 60 students at a time who were interested in becoming priests. The mansion included the dorm and chapel and a garage was converted to host classes and include a library. By 1965, the Felt Estate said, the school was serving 180 students and had a waiting list of 400. But interest later waned and enrollment was below 70 by the mid-1970s. The school closed in 1977. The state bought the land and Laketown Township bought it for $1 in 1996. The mansion is now a venue and museum. ...

More.

The new pope's a wiener in Chicago

I am not ecumenical when it comes to hot dogs.

The Chicago style is without doubt the very best, the top dog, yes, the pontifex maximus of salsicce, as long as it comes from Vienna or Frankfurt.

 

 

Leo XIV, the first pope born in America, in the city of Chicago, had an extensive career in Peru for the Augustinians from 1985

He had been created cardinal by Pope Francis only recently, in 2023.

He's also a tweeter.