CRAZY-EYED V2 VISIONS (Part 2d)

I. RECAP. It seems Part 2 of this analysis of SPU/V2 2012 conference attendees will be subdivided even further, with this one and a few more posts, until the conclusions finally come in Part 3. True, overextended, tangents here and there. Although, a lot of subject matter pertaining to Catholic Canada is covered therein and thereabouts. So, perhaps, readers might consider these longwinded posts as an ongoing Chronicle of Catastrophe. In Part 1 we looked at the conference's keynote speakers, that one being a kind of continuation of Ominous Signs, which examined the apostate cesspool that is the Canadian Conference of Catholic Bishops. Part 2a covered some of Professor Catherine Clifford's heretical notions as inspirited by Vatican II, then a summary of Modernism and its principles, ending with a discussion on Bernard Lonergan's transcendental Thomism. Part 2b examined "collegiality" as endorsed by Clifford, followed by a summary of the hydra-headed Neo-Catholic menace, finishing with the internet's role in the Catholic conversation. Part 2c sidetracked, evaluating the increasingly disturbing aspects of the Bergoglio papacy, plus glance at Michael Coren's Neo-Catholic showmanship and of his "support" of sodomites in seminaries.

II. SHOWMAN SUPPORTS FAGGOTRY (AGAIN). Recently in another column, again in Catholic Insight, Coren upholds (inadvertently?) the homolobby, this time with regard so-called "same sex marriage". Sayeth the Showman: "I've heard some pretty compelling arguments for it over the years... gay people can enjoy full rights". Apparently, he maintains the Church's teaching on marriage, "never close to giving in", although an obliviousness to the inimical effects of a homosexualized culture is apparent. With such statements of delicate rationalization, (you know) the wink-wink-nudge-nudge type position that hides an internalized mental struggle with the Church's unconditional teaching on this matter (cognitive dissonance, as one of my commenters said), Coren's writhing tolerance effectively opens up a tiny gateway for justifying, eventually legalizing, "same sex marriage", which is how the presently dictatorial, law-sundering, in-your-face homolobby first gained recognition three decades back. At a time when the movement was relatively small and fringe, and when many Catholics were unafraid of branding sodomy for what it is: a sin against nature, an abomination crying out to God for vengeance. First, the homolobby wanted "rights" because of supposed "hate" and "fear", denaturing the natural revulsion most people felt when encountering such degeneracy. Second, change the language of public discourse (e.g. "homophobia"), disparaging those who deem aberrant sexual activity a grave sin. Third, demand "justice", and to do so construct a flourishing victimhood industry for gradual social acceptance, for further pervasion of perversion into every nook and cranny of the culture. Fourthly, utilize Alinskian tactics to intimidate all foes into silence. Fifthly, judicial activism, arguing so eloquently for the normalization of a behavioural abnormality and discounting natural law. Finally, after new laws are enacted, say goodbye to the family unit, and to society as such, because the family is the cell of society... Continuing, Coren brushes off opponents as histrionic, i.e. those persons unprivileged to wine in dine inside the Magic Circle: "in the last few months, I have seen certain Catholics obsessing about it in anger and extremism".[1] Like falling dominos, legislatures in Western countries are succumbing to homo-marriage, with no concerted counteraction from bishops, a large part of the reason being that many of them are closet queens. Anger isn't justified, then? And there's that word again - "obsess", in a mode reminiscently Bergoglian, recalling the pope's first atrocious interview with the Jesuits. It would be advisable that Coren have a real good, concentrated read of Randy Engel's recently issued "Open Letter to the Pope" or of Fr. Oko's widely-read essay on the homomafia[2] or of this summarizing statement by legal philosopher Mario Palmaro:

Christianity's judgment on homosexual conduct has been undoubtedly very severe for two thousand years: the first losing move consists in progressively softening this judgment of truth, which anyway does not take away the message of forgiveness and redemption for the sinner, as the same for every other sin.

Perhaps, then, Coren would realize the depth of depravity embedded within the Church. Then he might reconsider his "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" policy. Then realize his "extremism" potshot is a boomerang. So, then, in Part 2d additional observations on Pope Francis, further notes on media demagogue Coren, plus final analysis on Clifford's dealings with the secular media.

III. "COUNCIL OF THE MEDIA". A few days after his abdication announcement, Pope Benedict, as if finally released from the triumvirate restraining forces of Sodomy, Marxism and Freemasonry that defile church structures worldwide, spoke candidly about the contributions of the so-called "virtual Council" to the collapse of the Catholic Church since 1965:

"The world interpreted the Council through the eyes of the media instead of seeing the true Council of the Fathers and their key vision of faith... The journalists' interpretation of the Council was political", he continued, and as a result Council was often trivialised with disastrous consequences for the Church..."the Council of the media. It was almost a Council in and of itself, and the world perceived the Council through them, through the media. So the immediately efficiently Council that got thorough to the people, was that of the media... the Council of journalists did not, naturally, take place within the world of faith but within the categories of the media of today, that is outside of the faith, with different hermeneutics. It was a hermeneutic of politics".[3]

Now at the get-go I will opine that the whole idea of media manipulation of the Conciliar documents - by journalists or by whomever commentator or in whatever theological treatise, that this was and is the principal explanation for a currently existent moribund Church, is a symptom, not a cause, of the Nu-Church disease. That incessantly sung melody going by the title "Documents Good, Implementation Bad" is an analgesic, temporarily lasting, an escape hatch, drawing eyes askance from the origins of the debility. That is, ambiguity in the Vatican II texts and assorted declarations therein at irreconcilable variance with pre-Conciliar teaching. Call it "rupture". Call it "discontinuity". I call it an unprecedented breach. And it's not just a non-entity blogger like yours truly who argues this viewpoint. In December 2010 at a conference in Rome Bishop Athanasius Schneider, in addition to calling for a new Syllabus of Errors, said: "From the pastoral nature of the Council's texts it is evident that its texts are, on principle, open to further completion and to greater doctrinal clarification".[4] Recall also Walter Cardinal Kasper, who earlier this year astonishingly stated that "compromise formulas" were deliberately inserted into the Conciliar texts, permitting for open-ended interpretation: "the conciliar texts themselves have a huge potential for conflict".[5] It is astonishing because ++Kasper, not only a big-gun Cardinal, is a well-known liberal.

IV. MODERNIST MESSAGING. Although the V2 compendium of "documents" constitute the core of the crisis, in that it was the launching pad for a doctrine-pillaging Modernism (neo-Catholicism included, partnering as its liberalized and somewhat naive little brother), it still must be admitted that the media's role, even if a piggybacking epiphenomenon, has scored some serious damage over the decades, compounding the crisis. The problem is exponentially worse in 2013 than it was in the 1960s and 1970s, a situation literally gone gonzo ever since. This relates directly to a near-instantaneousness of global dissemination of news and information via satellites and the internet. Signal transmitted, immediate awareness, quick response is now the habit, often done without forethought. The new mediascape is a two-edged sword, however. On one hand, it's fantastic for ostracized outsiders. That is, independent Catholic researchers, journalists, investigators and bloggers who, with some diligence and free access to copious amounts of data in the public domain, can quickly expose, for example, whatever execrable "pastoral plan" Bishop Spineless and his posse of Grima Wormtongues have concocted. Or simply to sidestep the anodyne ramblings published in the diocesan broadsheets, thereby adding a little more, shall we say, excitement and engagement to Catholicism. On the other hand, unfortunately, for the neo-Arians who control the buildings of the institutional Church, with secure investments and financial backing from an antinomian glitterati, their message that the Church is on the ascent, "vibrant", "relevant", also "goes direct" to the Catholic masses. For the bulk of these baptized Catholics, the Faith, of course, plays no significant role in their lives, save for showcasing their kids at First Communion or figuring the Sacrament of Matrimony as a quaint pre-game show for the drunkfest that follows at the wedding reception. And those scantily-clad bridesmaids with "cupcake", "slut", "broad" and butterflies tattooed on their necks and navels - indeed, sophisticated, denoting a profound devotion to the Holy Church. Wielding greater measures of authority or popularity, media messages relayed by the more influential latter group work to circumvent dogma/doctrine, perfectly tailored for the Indifferentist-Universalist sensibilities of the Catholic majority, complacent and nonchalant in their apostasy - sinful behaviours and attitudes, if not completely affirmed, at minimum lessened as to their consequences on eternal destiny after death. "Who am I to judge?" is the motto nowadays.

V. MEDIA CHANNELLING. This is precisely how Pope Francis has been functioning, quite intentionally, with his galling interviews with "the media". He will churn out anti-Catholic, jaw-dropping bombs like: "Each of us has a vision of good and of evil. We have to encourage people to move towards what they think is Good", fully cognizant of its immediate and real effects on the Catholic conversation globally. He is the Vicar of Christ, after all. The evidence is showing unofficial media channels are being implemented to advance an agenda - Peronist, populist, maudlinist, democratic, appeasement, Bread and Circuses. Official channels aren't necessarily used, don't want to be used. His Holiness phones journalists personally. But when you "make a mess", how afterward can you disentangle the spaghetti of "obsessed" pro-lifers; the bizarre ascription of "Pelagian" Rosary devotees; the surrealism of a beach ball offering to the Mother of God; the "solemn nonsense" of proselytizing; the "most serious" evils in the world are youth unemployment and lonely elderly persons; an atheist gaining free entry into Heaven notwithstanding a malformed conscious; "there is no Catholic God"; "nuns must not be too spiritual", hooray says the LCWR; "Jesus Christ has saved you", blatantly Protestant; casual acceptance of a frolicking fruitcake to advise on the Vatican Bank; assigning the attention-seeking Signora Chaouqui as a consultant; the indignity of a pope touring around Rome in a Ford Focus; invitation/private chat with Gustavo Gutierrez, liberation theology pin-up priest; separating the joined hands of a boy in prayer as public instruction, and so on with the antics. When such incidences are taken as a whole, recurrent, seen in pattern - not as infrequent, lighthearted or inconsequential happenings which only scrupulous people admonish, how can you provide any measure of logical consistency to them and at the same time establish an overall coherence to Catholic doctrine? You can't because it's impossible. Mutual exclusivity, when considered in a Catholic framework. Ever listen to Fr. Federico Lombardi's circumlocutions at a press conference? Highly recommended. Here's a classic line from the Director of the Press Office for the Holy See: "Francis is not so much aiming for precision as shooting the breeze".[6] That's hilarious. Poor Fr. Lombardi.

VI. INSIDE OUT. In any case, official channels cannot be used for such purposes because the Holy Ghost ensures heresy cannot be promulgated ex cathedra. Thusly, bewildering messages by the true and legitimate head of the Catholic Church get out per media infidelis, accepted as legitimate and unerring, celebrated as such since they acquiesce to, or approximate, the "spirit of the world" - and all this minus "media spin", despite the drone otherwise by an untrustworthy Catholic MSM. Yet, that which battles against the "spirit of the world", because it is not "of the world", namely the Magisterium, is overridden (true obedience to the latter is of no concern to anyone except a diminutive population of comparatively uninfluential Catholics of traditional bent). It's a typical Modernist trick and rather ingenious when you think about it because it allows for someone to appear orthodox from the inside (dogma remains unchanged) while at the same time hacking away at Church teaching from the outside. But, today, outside is inside. For goodness sake, the interview with Eugenio Scalfari (atheist founder of the secular La Repubblica) was uploaded at the Vatican website, only recently deleted, insisted upon by Cardinal Müller (it's still viewable at The Way Back Machine here). Don't forget: the draft was approved by the pope and he has not formally retracted anything. Besides, it's too late. The poison already has been injected into the system. This modus operandi only exacerbates tensions, fostering clashes between groups, and - yes - finds its antecedent in the Marxist ploy of class division.

VII. BERGOGLIO IMBROGLIO. This is not to overlook those promising statements and actions of Francis, when unambiguously orthodox, connecting to the past and Tradition, albeit rare, of which I believe he must be supported... cautiously, thanks expressed... prudently, prayers for him always. This issue does not question fidelity to the Holy Father, which goes without mention. Nonetheless, Orthodoxy must be the norm, not an anomaly, although the latter is undoubtedly preponderant. The direction to which he is leading seems to be encapsulated in this phrase: "make a mess" - a term, it can be argued, pointing toward reform and amelioration, yet at the same time unsettling because it also denotes recklessness and chaos. Positive and negative intertwined. Which is it? The evidence demonstrates skewing toward the latter, confusion, disorientation. If you get caught with your hand in the Modernist cookie jar, after telling pro-lifers they are "obsessed", or smearing Rosary bead counters as "Pelagians", then do some damage control. Throw a few bones to placate those antediluvian "triumphalists", making sure to incite a strong emotional reaction, then add a dash of more confusion into the mix. Talk about the Devil to counteract the inherent relativism of "Each of us has a vision of good and of evil". Say you are going to consecrate the Immaculate Heart of Mary to the World. Yet, when the appointed day comes, don't even invoke the "Immaculate Heart", leave out "World" from the text, transform the "consecration" into a generalized, almost innocuous, "entrustment".[7] Forbid the Franciscan Friars of the Immaculate from continuing to celebrate the Latin Mass,[8] but show a manufactured empathy, albeit obliquely, for those annoying "restorationists" by celebrating Mass versus Deum. Say "the Church is not an NGO", but then handpick a Cardinal Advisor, Óscar Maradiaga (member of the "Gang of 8"), who proclaims that the Church's "foremost goal is to care for the penultimate (hunger, housing, clothing, shoes, health, education)... a spirit of service to humanity".[9] Back and forth, back and forth, keep them guessing, hodgepodge it, get someone to compile an Apostolic Exhortation, pleasing this faction over here with a little of this, flinging bird seed over there for a little of that. Pretend you're on a fishing expedition by throwing your nets far and wide, beyond the principled limits set by the Magisterium. Because, ladies and gentlemen, the name of the game is Moving Target, and the first person to pounce on any detractor of this charade wins the prize of Establishment Church endorsement, with a big, wet sloppy kiss from Jimmy Akin as an added bonus. Topping it all off, kiss a ailing man whose entire epidermis is plagued by boils.[10] Get a close-up photograph, make it graphic. That will hit the presses, it'll be a smash and, you Professional Catholics, make sure no mention is made of past pontiffs who performed similar gestures, unlucky in the sense of these acts not being captured on film nor of living in an age of split-second information availability. Then everyone is overwhelmed with joy, the tears flow, omnipresent smiles, cartwheels in the Piazza, an unchallengeable awesomeness of personality, of groundbreaking humility. Our new, humble pope: "I have the humility and ambition to want to do something"???!!! [11] Then everyone will forget those statements beforehand causing distress, then all will be sunshine and lollipops. Not really...

VIII. PENALTY FOR PERPLEXITY. Because the passage of time is the best truth-teller in this context, even over a short eight-month duration since coronation... pardon, inauguration. And time, indifferently running its predetermined course through human affairs since Adam and Eve, can be brutal. There are real, dire repercussions to "off-the-cuff" remarks by the Ambassador of Jesus Christ on Earth, once again proving the enormous, supreme authority that is Kephas, since it was conferred directly by Our Lord Himself onto St. Peter. For example, Francis' "who am I to judge him?", a comment issued to the media last July whilst in transit, regarding homo-mafioso Monsignor Battista Ricca[12]:

...sparked a wave of soul-searching by several Catholic lawmakers who had battled to reconcile their religious beliefs with their sworn duty to represent their constituents who were increasingly supportive of gay rights even as Cardinal Francis George remained opposed. "As a Catholic follower of Jesus and the pope, Pope Francis, I am clear that our Catholic religious doctrine has at its core love, compassion and justice for all people," said Rep. Linda Chapa LaVia... House Speaker Michael Madigan also cited the pope's comments in explaining his support for the measure. "For those that just happen to be gay - living in a very harmonious, productive relationship but illegal - who am I to judge that they should be illegal?"[13]

It's the "New Pentecost"! Rationalize away and let's all be pro-gay (wink wink nudge nudge). Hey, he's kept unrepentant pervert-advisor Ricca on board to watch over the Vatican Bank. Think about that for a second. Then look here, then over here. Do you feel the love? Really, think about it. No enabling going on here... and, still, there are those Catholics, online and elsewhere, who, if not conspicuously silent, expecting them to denounce such manifest calamities are, with much exertion, hailing Francis' pontificate as the best event to arise in Christendom since when Our Lady of Guadalupe prompted the conversion of millions of bloodlusting, cannibalizing pagans in Latin America, Bergoglio's homebase. All this stuff is mesmerizing, it's a mystery, and it is also very depressing. Accordingly, it's time for a break. Take a break with Cardinal Bergoglio and watch a puppet "mass". Even better, watch his participation in a tango "mass" (Rationalizers, please insert comments here). For you realists out there, here's some consolation from the battle-wearied Fr. Melchior Cano, theologian (later bishop) at the Council of Trent:

Peter has no need of our lies or flattery. Those who blindly and indiscriminately defend every decision of the Supreme Pontiff are the very ones who do most to undermine the authority of the Holy See - they destroy instead of strengthen its foundations.

More recently, Mario Palmaro again (H/T Tancred):

Whether people "like" the pope is completely irrelevant in the two thousand year old logic of the Church: the Pope is the Vicar of Christ on earth and must please our Lord. This means that the exercise of his authority is not absolute, but subordinate to the doctrine of Christ, which is found in the Catholic Church, in Her tradition, and is nourished by the life of grace through the sacraments. This means that the Catholics may be critical of the Pope himself and criticize under the condition that this is done out of love for the truth and that the tradition, the Magisterium is used as a standard gauge. A pope who would contradict a predecessor in matters of faith and morals should be criticized without doubt. We must be against both the secular logic and suspicious of a pope, assessed according to the good pleasure of the democratic majority, as well as to the temptation of a papolatry, according to a "the Pope is always right".

IX. MICHAEL COREN AS NEO-CATHOLIC DEMAGOGUE. The latent papolatry explodes in all its irrational ferocity - typically by people affiliated with whatever "recognized" Catholic outfit - when any critic of the Bishop of Rome states the obvious, usually reluctantly and with a heavy heart. For example, in yet another column for Catholic Insight, this time a "guest editorial" at the opening pages of the magazine, Michael Coren squeals like a hysterical feminist in his demagogic assault on Traditional Catholics [TH2 insertions]:

...spare me your theological wrangling and talk of Paul rebuking Peter. He's the pope for God's sake; he is, precisely, the pope for God's sake, the sake of God...[i.e. Between God and the Pope there is no distinction, one in the same. Francis speaks, thus the Holy Ghost descends upon him immediately, inspiring, anytime, anywhere, "for God's sake". Not only does this opinion overlook the Magisterium, it in effect this makes God to be a kind of fumbling minion to the Holy Father, because any detrimental statement made by Francis, already numerous, already demonstrated, already published, no "media spin", no recanting, can be rationalized. This mindset also blots out any possibility of, for example, an exiled St. Anthanasius, authentically defending the Faith contra the Arian equivocations of a Pope Liberius, not canonized] Do not shuffle into the bunker of despair and resignation shaking your head, [contrariwise, Traditional Catholics, the reader may have noticed, are coalescing, more emergent, strident, even exuberant, in the Catholic conversation, after decades of shunning and vilification by Coren and his ilk, who now seem to feel threatened] but walk tall and proud into the public square of debate and evangelization [this is exactly what Traditional Catholics are starting to do, infracting upon Coren's self-constructed media fiefdom]. Remember, there are those on the right as well as the left who will pervert the pope's messages.[standard Neo-Catholic tune of transcending the Thesis/Anti-Thesis dualism, ascending to the heady Hegelian heights, floating amongst the clouds of Synthesis, whereat all is balanced, moderate, calm, praise from sycophants below in abundance, and where everything is right with the world and in the Church] They [i.e. "rad trads", as he likes to say on Twitter] thrive on tired cynicism, conspiracy, and misplaced nostalgia, [yawn, standard canards, 23+ documents by the popes against Freemasonry, multiple condemnations of Marxism, precipitous declines in Mass attendance, sodomite/pederast sub-culture worldwide - nah, nothing wrong here, move along] and it's as harmful - if not as influential - as the relativism and liberalism that have enjoyed too much power since the 1960s.[14] [but Coren's "welcome" of sodomites into seminaries, being "compelled" by arguments advocating homo-marriage, and permitting for "full rights" of homosexuals, isn't potentially harmful?]

The voluble tripe Coren has been dishing out lately really needs to be called out. It's now time for Canadian Catholics of traditionalist propensity to stop biting their tongues whenever he broadcasts his version of Catholic-lite from whatever rostrum. That he has been able to publish such words in the last few issues of Catholic Insight, one of the last outposts of orthodox Catholic periodicals in Canada, is intimating the start of a troubling turn in the magazine's philosophy since Fr. de Valk's recent retirement from editorship. Analogous to the Neo-Catholic predominance, if not takeover, eventuating after Mother Angelica departed EWTN. I think it would be a good idea for Coren's unquestioning plaudits to reassess. To understand, firstly, he is not immune from criticism, shattering any preconceived notion of him being this country's indomitable "conservative Catholic voice", just because he has managed to wiggle into acceptability within the realm of mainstream media. Secondly, the transformation into freewheeling demagogue is unmistakable now that he enjoys dominance on TV, radio, print, the lecture circuit, and in the Canadian Catholic conversation. Characteristic of such Neo-Catholic demagogues is to use catchphrases to hook an audience, unsubstantiated claims stated boldly, distinctions begone!, emotions often prioritized over reason, to enflame prejudices of a largely ignorant Catholic populace. Ultimately, to garner influence and, equally, respectability from the right people. The stratagem, of course, must remain in sync with the direction to which the sentimental wind is currently blowing inside the Establishment Church. Otherwise, he would be disallowed from penning a column for the diocesan-controlled Catholic Register. You can push, but only so far, then you must hop like a bunny whenever we command. To guarantee that you not veer off course, make sure you acquire an agent "to assist in development of strategic plans, as well as manage public relations and personal brands".

X. SURFACING TO PROVIDE COVER FOR ENEMIES WITHIN. It's pedestrian, from a Catholic standpoint, to criticize an external secular culture supersaturated with nihilism. Shooting fish in a barrel. Such commentators are a dime a dozen. However, the thought of digging deep into Church matters, "on the inside", locally, specifically, of conducting laborious research thereof, of corroboration, of tackling thorny subjects head-on, regardless of discomfort levels and likelihood of banishment from the Magic Circle, is anathema. This is exactly how and why the Neo-Catholic commentariat rationalize any of the patently stupid statements enunciated by Pope Francis. Popularity, "personalism" and personality supersede, a persistent problem since John Paul II the "rock star". Effectively, all that they are doing here is masking corruption inside the Church. The reader will note that, despite Coren's self-made image as champion of orthodox Catholicism in Canada, regardless of all the grandstanding in defence of the Catholic voiceless, even with a gift to charm almost anyone across the ideological spectrum, never does he address the crux. Yes, admirable work when determinedly contending secular liberals of whatever variety. Though it's all surface analysis when it comes to the crisis in the Church. That is, never does he challenge by name, nor discuss in detail without kid gloves, bishops, clerical/lay leaders, liberals and especially so-called "conservative" ones, inside CanChurch who are, individually and collectively, by their actions and inactions, chiefly responsible for the demolition of the Faith over the last fifty years and, along with it, the loss of countless souls. Why, then, does he provide cover for these people? Here's why.

XI. TRANSPOSITIONS. Let's now bring this subject back to another front in the culture wars. SPU/V2 conference player Catherine Clifford, as discussed previously, is a out-and-out Modernist. Recall that vague language is utilized by such heretics as a shifty way to elevate theories of theologians above Magisterial teaching. Here she is in action:

The Catechism itself is a compendium of traditional teachings. It should not be used uncritically as a catechetical resource. By this I mean that its teachings must be transposed for contemporary believers.[15]

The definition of "transpose" in my trusty Webster's New Collegiate Dictionary (1977) is given as: "to change in form or nature". Hence, change is the operative word here, a synonymous substitute for "transpose", also one of the key motivators of the Modernist mind. Church dogma must be changed to suit the signs of the times. One prime sign being Relativism, where limitless change for the sake of change is its trademark. This transpositioning is effected with defiance-inspired questioning disguised as valid criticism, including phraseological acrobatics, themselves fishing lures in the Modernist tackle box. As St. Pius X stated: "In the name of higher knowledge and historical research (they say), they are looking for that progress of dogmas which is, in reality, nothing but the corruption of dogmas".[16] The thing the reader must understand here is that Clifford has zero concern for the durance, the viability, the demonstrated truthfulness, of Catholic dogma. True, some of it makes us cringe and recoil, much in it is difficult. Yet the causations for these are traceable back to Original Sin. Resolution came with the Cross. It makes no difference to Clifford that, for example, the latest Catechism was promulgated by Apostolic Constitution, the highest decree of the infallible Ordinary/Universal Magisterium. Wrote John Paul II:

...the publication of which I today order by virtue of my Apostolic Authority, is a statement of the Church's faith and catholic doctrine, attested to or illumined by Sacred Scripture, the Apostolic Tradition and the Church's Magisterium. I declare a sure norm for teaching the faith and thus a valid and legitimate instrument for ecclesial communion.[17]

For the record, the 1992 Catechism certainly is not my favourite. There are a issues therein which raise eyebrows, like the "twofold" equalization of the procreative and unitive aspects of marriage (no. 2362). The pre-Conciliar Church always stressed the former, but post-1965 the former is subordinated and the latter overemphasized. This, manifested in NFP hype and abuses presently, let alone a Bay City Rollers-like fanaticism over "Theology of the Body", including Christopher West's Manichean rendering of it. Again, Vatican II ambiguities factor into the situation. The point in my highlighting this, however, is not an endeavour to change or "transpose" dogma. Rather, to note an inconsistency, a Vatican II-instigated novelty, with noticeable injurious ramifications, and to underscore that proper amendment (not wholesale change) can only be accomplished by backtracking to Tradition.

XII. WOLVES ATTACK VULNERABLE ANIMALS. In their attempts to overstep dogma, because it is impossible to actually change it, especially for a layman, what heretics do, if wanting to market a pet theory directly to the public, so as to goad skepticism, leading to dissent (then rebellion, the unspoken aim), is to assail from outside Church structures. The most popular and easiest way to do this in the Information Age, now bolstered by "social media", is to consort with those members of the secular press based in large metropolitan centres. As everyone this side of the Underworld knows, they are no friend of Catholicism, orthodox Catholicism specifically. However, sympathy for Modernism abounds, since its advocates yearn for changes which mimic what these urban elitists want changed in the Catholic Church. As discussed above, this also appears to be the Bishop of Rome's methodology. As it turns out - big surprise, Clifford is a go-to-girl for prominent newspapers here in Canada. Here is one of her quotations from an interview with the Toronto Star earlier this year [TH2 emphasis]:

Any of these questions - expanding roles for women, ordaining married men - for these things to change, the style of the church's governance has to change. We have to create spaces for dialogue. We don't have to look upon people as being disloyal Catholics for raising these questions. One far more consultative, with more space for the voices and experiences of Catholics from different regions of the world... Not everything can be decided at the centre. Is the present form of the priesthood adequate? Are we receiving all the gifts women and lay people have to bring to the service of the church? Is there a space to think about human sexuality in a different way? What is the relationship between Christianity and other religions? But trying to think about them in new ways is often greeted with suspicion. These questions are not just raised by radical theologians but also by bishops who are responsible pastors. These questions are being raised by very faithful Catholics.[18]

The opportunism is evident as this was published just four days after Pope Benedict announced his resignation from the papacy, an extraordinary event in that the last abdication occurred about 600 years ago. To the Modernists, 7+ years of Benedict exhibited an alarming trend back to Tradition, after 4+ decades of "change". But then the stunning announcement. Yes! A moment of vulnerability in the Church. The time is now, attack!, go for it, pull out all the stoppers. In the interview, Clifford rolls out an extensive array of issues necessitating "change" and "questions", as per usual expressed euphemistically: (1) "expanding roles for women", i.e. female ordination, (2) "ordaining married men", i.e. ending of priestly celibacy, (3) "church's governance has to change... Not everything can be decided at the centre", i.e. collegiality, democracy, anti-hierarchical, (4) "gifts women and lay people", i.e. feminism, even more laymen participation in liturgy, commissions, etc., (5) "dialogue... relationship between Christianity and other religions", i.e. inutile ecumenism, doublespeak for Indifferentism and Universalism, (6) "think about human sexuality in a different way", i.e. pro-sodomy, lesbianism, pro-contraception, (7) "questions are not just raised by radical theologians but also by bishops", i.e. goes to obedience, theologians elevated above Magisterium. Did Clifford call the reporter to get the word out, or vice versa? The reporter is one Leslie Scrivner, notorious for her stream of anti-Catholic articles. The Vox has also noticed Scrivner's handiwork.

XIII. CONTORTING CANON 915. Let's now head back to 2005 and peruse another interview, this time in the Ottawa Citizen via the Canadian Press. In this one, ignorance is shown on a subject that should seem to be rudimentary for a theology professor. The piece concerns the denial of Holy Communion (by parish priests) from two public figures, due to their stands against Catholic Church teaching. The first was Charlie Angus, NDP Member of Parliament, who at the time was backing the federal government's homo-marriage bill. The second was pro-abortionist Celina Symmonds, past manager of a Planned Parenthood "office" in Medicine Hat, Alberta. To any Catholic with even a dribble of catechesis, it is axiomatic that these two persons be denied Holy Communion. Not so to the Professor of Systematic and Historical Theology at Saint Paul University. Catherine Clifford to the rescue! [TH2 emphasis/insertions]:

We receive the body and blood of Christ, represented by the bread and wine... The reality that it signifies for us is union with Christ. But it's also unity in the body of Christ, that is the church... Only those who are baptized may receive the eucharist... [denial of Communion is] a very serious and painful thing... It's a form of exclusion from the community... Because you're labelling someone as heretical. You're saying they do not hold the faith of the church and are therefore excluded from the sacramental life of the church... [It is odd] to just withhold communion and say but you're not really excommunicated. Withholding communion is excommunication. It means the person is not welcome to receive any of the sacraments. The way back for them is through the sacrament of reconciliation.[19]

Firstly, notice what is not being addressed, what is left unsaid: no connections are made to the particular reasons why Holy Communion was denied, namely pro-homosexual and pro-abortion stances. As if no corollary is involved. A form of quiet affirmation. Emphasis, rather, is on emotional effects (e.g. "painful thing", "not welcome"). I dare anyone to straightforwardly ask Clifford about her positions on abortion and homosexuality. In all likelihood, the response will be mealy-mouthed or she will simply refuse to reply, nor even to acknowledge your existence, as we shall see momentarily. Secondly, it is interesting that she characterizes Holy Communion as that which merely "signifies", but I'll let the reader ponder the implications of that one (hint: John Calvin, Institutes of the Christian Religion, book IV, chapter xvii). Thirdly, the statement "withholding communion is excommunication" is false. To demonstrate, I'll quote a canon lawyer [TH2 emphasis/insertions]:

Denial of holy communion... is quite distinct from excommunication. Excommunication is an ecclesiastical penalty. It is imposed or declared on those who have committed a certain type of canonical crime. In most cases, specific procedures have to be followed for the effects of excommunication to be fully visited upon an individual... one of the consequences of excommunication is the loss of the right to the receive holy communion, but it is only one of the consequences that accompanies excommunication. Finally, an excommunicated individual has to follow, in most cases, certain formal steps to have the penalty lifted... denial of the Eucharist under canon 915 is not an ecclesiastical penalty but a sacramental disciplinary norm. It is designed to prevent the immediate harm that can be caused by the reception of the Eucharist by those whose own actions have demonstrated a fundamental disregard for the teachings of the Church...[like Mr. Angus and Ms. Symmonds] Canon 915 allows the Church to respond more quickly in the face of public sin.[19]

Those good parish priests did respond quickly to public sinners. Quite unlike our current caboodle of irenic, confrontation-averse bishops, regardless of their mellifluous speechifying at "Theology on Tap" get-togethers.

XIV. DEFENESTRATION FROM THE IVORY TOWER. Being all Chatty Cathy with a wicked secular press is perfectly acceptable. Certainly, it is encouraged by Magic Circle dwellers, as they hunger for those subtle nods of approval from their secular masters. You are not going to be challenged by any self-regarding "investigative reporter" from the Toronto Star or Ottawa Citizen. Media productions, instead, will be customized to promote whatever sub-Catholic cause you fancy. However, if, ill-fatedly, you are a journalist from an unapproved Magic Circle media agency, don't expect anything from them except to be expectorated upon. Take the case of LifeSite News, a stellar organization defending life and the family, whose reporting is consistent with Catholic teaching. In 2009 LSN provided coverage of a speaking event at the Faculty of Theology, St. Paul University (advertised by the Archdiocese of Ottawa, incidentally). Featured keynote speaker was ex-priest Gregory Baum, adversary of the Church's teaching on homosexuality and contraception, amongst a multitude of others. The article ends: "LSN did not hear back from the St. Paul University contact for the event, Dr. Catherine Clifford, after repeated attempts".[21] Then in 2012 LSN gave coverage to the SPU/V2 conference, currently written about in this blog series. An omnibus of heretics, a cornucopia of CanChurch personages, and a conference organizer by the name of Catherine Clifford. The article ends: "Saint Paul University did not respond to LifeSiteNews.com by press time".[22] The reason no responses came is the simple fact that LSN, if given the chance to converse with you know who, would have posed challenging questions, at loggerheads with the heresy quoted above. You have to be one of the right people, think the right way, the groupthink way. So much for the touting of "dialogue". Modernists do not tolerate criticism.

XV. THE MAGIC CIRCLE SHIELD. Whenever coming across such occasions of unfairness levelled by our so-called respectable Catholic intellectuals, I'm always reminded of a dictum by Erik von Kuehnelt-Leddihn: "The intolerance toward criticism is the certain sign of characteriological inferiority. It is the masses and the mass man that cannot bear contradiction".[23] Yet for Professor Clifford, there is really nothing about which to worry. She has the support of her bishop, as is evidenced in this photograph[24] - and that's the thing even more ominous. Most Catholic universities in Canada have an ensemble of these heretic theologians who disseminate dissent by mingling with a sympathetic secular media. Yet they are rarely, if ever, publically corrected or disciplined for doing so. It's as if they have an all-encompassing invisible magical shield blocking and deflecting away all inquiry by suspicious onlookers, and the point of emanation of this magical shield seems always to originate from Chancery HQ. Resultantly, such theologians develop within themselves, as if psychologically, a kind of "diplomatic immunity" whereby they feel that they have been awarded free license to violate laws of the Magisterium, making scandalous pronouncements at their leisure, without an iota of concern for punishment... Hey, you pathetic peasant Catholics, deal with it. That's how us cool cats swing down at the Casbah, beyotch.


NOTES / REFERENCES
 
1. M. Coren, "What we are called to so", Catholic Insight, October 2013, vol. 21, no. 9, p. 13.

2. R. Engel, "An open letter to Pope Francis: On a Papal Commission of Inquiry into Homosexuality, Pederasty and La Lobby Gay in The Catholic Church", November 9, 2013. Published at Renew America; D. Oko, "Z Papiezem przeciw homoherezji", Fronda, 63, June 2012, pp. 128-160. An English translation of Fr. Oko's detailed analysis is all over the internet.

3. "Pope Benedict's last great master class: Vatican II, as I saw it", Radio Vaticana, February 14, 2013.

4. A. Schneider, "The Second Vatican Ecumenical Council: A Pastoral Council. Historical-Philosophical-Theological Analysis", Conference of Studies on the Second Vatican Council Toward a Right Hermeneutic in the Light of the Tradition of the Church, Istituto Maria SS. Bambina, Rome, December 16-18, 2010.

5. Quoted/translated from an interview in L'Osservatore Romano, April 12, 2013.

6. Quoted in M. Schmitz, "Vatican Spokesman: Don't Parse Pope Francis", First Things, October 4, 2013.

7. J. Vennari, "Pope 'Consecrates' World to Immaculate Heart with no mention of 'Consecration' or the 'Immaculate Heart'", Catholic Family News, October 15, 2013.

8. Cf. G. Warner, "Ban on Latin Mass has put Pope beyond the pale", The Scotsman, August 4, 2013.

9. Quoted in J.A. Esteves, "Francis: 'The Church is not an NGO'", ZENIT, June 11, 2013; The importance of the New Evangelization", Keynote speech by Cardinal Oscar Andrés Rodríguez Maradiaga at Synod Closing Assembly, Archdiocese of Miami, October 28, 2013

10. "Pope Francis embraces man with tumorous disease", Catholic News Agency, November 6, 2013.

11. E. Scalfari, "The Pope: how the Church will change", La Repubblica, October 1, 2013. Transcript of Scalfari's interview with Pope Francis.

12. Cf. S. Magister, "The Prelate of the Gay Lobby", L'Espresso, no. 29, July 19, 2013.

13. Quoted in M. Garcia and M. Long, "Illinois lawmakers approve gay marriage in historic vote", The Chicago Tribune, November 6, 2012.

14. M. Coren, "Successor to St. Peter", Catholic Insight, November 2013, vol. 21, no. 10, p. 4.

15. C.E. Clifford, "The Joint Declaration, Method, and the Hermeneutics of Consensus", Journal of Ecumenical Studies, Winter 2001, vol. 38, no. 1, pp. 79-94.

16. Lamentabili Sane, Syllabus Condemning the Errors of the Modernists, July 3, 1907.

17. Quoted in On the Publication of the Catechism of the Catholic Church Prepared Following the Second Vatican Ecumenical Council. Promulgated on October 11, 1992.

18. Quoted in L. Scrivener, "Challenging the Vatican: Progressive Catholics say reform must begin with church governance", Toronto Star, February 15, 2013.

19. Quoted from Edward Peters' book Excommunication and the Catholic Church, posted by M.C. Abbott, "Excommunication and the Catholic Church", Renew America, April 4, 2013.

20. Quoted in "Ontario Member of Parliament, Woman Activist Denied Communion", Ottawa Citizen, July 6, 2005.

21. P.B. Craine, "Ottawa's Saint Paul University to Feature Dissidents Gregory Baum and Bishop Remi De Roo", LifeSite News, October 1, 2009

22. P.B. Craine, "Catholics urge Vatican Cardinal to skip dissenting conference on Vatican", LifeSite News, July 23, 2012.

23. E.R. von Kuehnelt-Leddihn, The Menace of the Herd or Procrustes at Large (Milwaukee, WI: The Bruce Mill Publishing Company, 1943), pp. 301-302. Published under the pseudonym Francis Stuart Campbell.

24. D. Gyapong, "Research centre on Vatican II launched", Prairie Messenger, October 19, 2011.

CRAZY-EYED V2 VISIONS (Part 2d)

GLAM AND GLITTERATI AT SPU OVER V2

 Fr. Ray Blake:

...there is an "anti-Church" within the Church arguing against Orthodoxy and undermining all that might be done. Before anything else there must be a purification, a clear proclamation of Catholic Truth. Heresy is an attack on Truth... Heresy and heretics are the enemies of Christ and we really must pray for the Grace to recognise them for what they are and to learn to hate them for the terrible damage they do to the Church's ability to make Christ knowable. They are our enemy and the enemies of the Church... heresy tends to make truth obscure to the point where good becomes evil and evil becomes good.

Fr. Simon Henry:

There is an "anti-Church" within the Church labouring in parishes, deaneries and curial offices in complete opposition to Pope Benedict's teaching that the Second Vatican Council should be interpreted in a hermeneutic of continuity... This anti-Church seems to have existed in hidden form underground for many decades but grasped the Second Vatican Council to come out into the open and now openly preaches in opposition to the public teaching of the Magisterium of the Church.

                                               PART 1
I. Those comments are apropos lead-ins for the subject matter treated herein, a kind of addendum to Ominous Signs. Another post late after the fact - which will come in three parts, yet the "Vatican II: For the Next Generation" conference held last year at St. Paul University is worthy of a post hoc assessment of involved participants and elaboration on critical points, for three reasons. Firstly, because of a cosmic teleconnection. The 2012 CCCB Plenary took place from September 24 to 28 and the SPU conference from September 27 to 29. There was date and location overlap, a convergence in the apostatic/heretical space-time continuum, so to speak. Where the personages and productions of the CCCB are embodiments of the Modernist hijacking of Vatican II Council, attendees at the SPU conference are its marketers and salesmen. SPU is in Ottawa, located just 131.1 kilometres west-southwest of Hotel Mont-Gabriel in Sainte-Adèle, Québec, according to Google Earth. So, for those conference participants at the CCCB plenary - like salesman/jetsetter Fr. Gilles "I love Armani suits" Routhier, it was just a matter of a short limousine drive up to the airport at fashionable Mont-Tremblant. Check-in, luggage drop-off, redeem those Air Miles, slug down a chocolate martini in the lounge, then board a Porter Airlines' Bombardier Q400, business class, wink to the sexy stewardess, honey roasted almonds snack-pack, fasten your seat belts, METARs read clear and sunny skies on the horizon, activate transponder, go for ignition, runway clear for take-off - and we're rockin' and rollin'. Short flight over the St. Lawrence to Ottawa Macdonald-Cartier International Airport. Touchdown on Runway 25. "On time". Yeah, baby, yeah!

II. Secondly, the conference provided a perfectly composed snapshot of the careerist/intelligentsia from assorted sectors inside the establishment church, of how they are working to undermine the Church in Canada from within, and recreating it in their own perverted image. Accordingly, an assessment of their views with a just few volley's will allow for a sizeable flock of Dodo birds to be exposed for the damage they do. These are the people that interact with, and are approved by, the Canadian bishops, consulting, advising, confidants. These are the people the bishops read and to whom they lend their ears. These are the ladder climbers, the celebrity seekers, the aggrandizers, the Professional Catholics, the people who always seem to almost magically obtain key positions in the religious bureaucracy, who get the write-ups in diocesan newspapers, who get the interviews on Salt+Light TV, who win the "awards" and get to hobnob with the right people. These are the enemies of the Church to whom Fr. Blake and Fr. Henry make reference. The SPU conference was a Canadian example of this "anti-Church" in action, actualized, asserting itself for everyone to behold so as to admire and to wonder a great wonder.

III. Thirdly, it was the 50th anniversary of the opening of Vatican II, so glitz, glitter and glamour at a gala were necessitous, to formally justify the Modernist-actuated catastrophe we see all around us today, which cries out for criticism. The Canadian stars of the Nu-Church came out, gathered at a Pontifical University now undeniably gone heretical, its loyalty to the Pontificate spent long ago, to celebrate five decades since the Council, to proclaim and hail it as the ultimate triumph of the Church since when the Lord of History was impaled at the intersection of two wooden beams. Not as if these Magic Circle luvvies actually ever contemplate the utter brutality of the Crucifixion, as will be evidenced later. Really, if you mine into the psychological subsurface, if you go way down deep... deep, you will discover the SPU confab to be Swan Song disguised as a Victory Cheer. Conference subtitle: "Reflecting on the importance of the council's teaching for the Church of the 21st century". How majestic, how spectacular, how far-reaching and life-altering. Again, there's that false, anticipatory sense of being on the verge of a new era in global affairs, a "new order of human relations", as the CCCB president voiced a few days earlier at the plenary. The worldwide ennui is about to cease and humanity will imminently be reinvigorated. The future's so bright, I gotta wear shades...

IV. In reality, however, time is running out. Orthodoxy/traditionalism is re-emerging, accelerating since 2005 with Pope Benedict. The Age of Aquarius has run its course. That mesmerizing, magnetic, hope-inducing, soul-energizing, purple and orange psychedelic sky seen down range along the horizon - now that we've come in closer proximity to it after a 50-year ride on a party bus with the booze and broads flowing aplenty - has shockingly turned out to be but a mirage. And the aged adolescents who refused to grow up are now aghast in their realization that post-Vatican II playtime is over. Identities are being challenged. Whole careers invested in cornball liturgy, "social justice", ecumenical indifferentism, liberation theology, transcendental meditation, proportionalism,  ecofeminism, gender neutrality, homosexuality - these, and more, have proven naught. A reversal is occurring, that which was once theirs is being retaken by an outside force. The desperation, and they're still reluctant to jump from the ship which goes by the name S.S. Minnow. Destination: Gilligan's Island. Everything is imploding around them. You can smell it.

V. Yet if you read the official take on what happened at the conference, of its luminaries and their interpretations of Vatican II, you'd think everything is proceeding as planned. All is well, ye Catholic peoples. Expectedly, an egregious report came from the Associate Editor at the Catholic Register, purportedly "Canada's Catholic News Source". Mr. Swan quoted five persons in his piece, the number skewed to the Left/Modernist end, with the customary pot shots against orthodox Catholicism. Two conference participants, namely Catherine Clifford (SPU professor) and Council peritus Gregory Baum (conveniently omitting he's an excommunicated ex-priest, as Fr. Rosica did in a recent interview with him), including Janet Somerville (associate editor of the now defunct Marxist/radicalist New Catholic Times, Canadian Council of Churches bureaucrat[1]), plus suit and tie Jesuit historian Fr. John O'Malley. After hearing Barry Obama's infamous commencement speech at the University Notre Dame in 2009, O'Malley got so excited he wet his pants, afterward fawning that Obama "embodied and professed in his public persona the spirit of the council".[2] No, that wasn't a quote from Tiger Beat magazine. Of these four favourites, a total of 294 words were quoted, according to my count, and to the token "conservative" (how quaint), namely Fr. Alphonse de Valk (not a conference attendee), only 80 words. And that's the thing about CR's Associate Editor - he evidently thinks everyone is unaware of his unbalanced write-ups, believing his reporting to be fair-minded and neutral, by stating in his article, for example, that the purpose of Vatican II:

...was to weave the past and the future - resourcement and aggiornamento - into a seamless garment. As hard as the Church has worked to pull together those two impulses, other Catholics, conservative and liberal, have tried to pull them apart - or make one end of the spectrum more important than the other.[3]

You read this ostensible exercise in disassociation, a reporter supposedly rising above it all, being "objective", allegedly impartial. But then you come across mocking stunts like this, where Mr. Swan lets slip his derision for traditional-minded Catholics and, by implication, a hatred for resourcement. Let's not pretend anymore: the Associate Editor at the Catholic Register has demonstrated himself to be an adversary of anyone or any group with any shade of Orthodoxy, for years reflected in his reporting. The blatant bias, the selectivity of topics skewed Left, the parsing out, if not eschewing of, notable persons/positions which would otherwise bring wider contexts to a subject, the nonchalant citations of dissenters as reliable sources and escaping responsibility for doing so by a plausible deniability always afforded to an editor, the innuendos in his multiple articles plastered throughout each CR issue. It sure is fantastic to make a living from pewsitter donations while dishing out this baloney, and he has only been able to do so for such a long time because his diocesan overlords approve or deem nothing adverse involved, which says much.

VI. With the likes of CR's Associate Editor, then, a colossal effort is continuously, vigorously made to conceal the incontestable evidence that a wild, undisciplined, out-of-control aggiornamento has, since 1965, dominated, engulfed, eclipsed the so-called resourcement. Not the inverse and between the two "impulses" never has there been an equilibrium. This is the dirty little secret of the Modernists, of the SPU conference participants. Until recently with the internet emergence, the mainstream CanCatholic media successfully diverted eyes away from this actuality by bombarding us with editorials and accounts on the beauties and beneficences of the "spirit" of Vatican II, and anyone who disagreed was shooed away as some kind of antediluvian crackpot. For instance, here is Baum quoted in the aforementioned CR report:

There are people for whom religion means security. The world changes, everything changes, nothing is reliable. But the one thing that's reliable and is unchanging is the religion they have inherited - not God, but the religion we have inherited. It is a frightening thing.[4]

Conceit and contempt just bleed from that statement. Those who point to the past and Tradition live by the "old time religion", they're out of date, unhip, scared little children. Even akin to Protestant fundamentalists, rigid, irrational, plastic, phoney, cold, cruel, unfeeling, unimaginative, uncreative, as if there was no doctrinal development in the 19+ centuries prior to the watershed year 1962. That's what Greg is communicating to the reader, a particular message of which Mr. Swan made sure to incorporate into his lovely synopsis. Just stick it to 'em. Drill it home, boys.

VII. Fortunately, in the last few years we've had fair, balanced and objective reporting from Deborah Gyapong, who is a godsend as far as I'm concerned. Especially after National Catholic Reporter dude Art Babych was at CCN. Three months before the SPU conference Gyapong provided it coverage, plus giving mention to an online petition started by John Pacheco at SoCon or Bust. It was directed to Abp. Pedro López Quintana, Canada's Apostolic Nuncio, summarizing dissenting views of the more prominent conference participants, requesting it to be sent to one keynote speaker, Peter Cardinal Turkson, asking him "to decline his invitation" thereat. The petition received a total of 582 signatures. Pretty impressive, but to no effect. +Quintana, ordained a priest and appointed bishop by John Paul II, entered the Holy See's diplomatic service in 1984. He served the nunciatures at Madagascar and Philippines, was advisor for the General Affairs of the Secretariat of State to the Apostolic Nuncio office, and is past nuncio for India and Nepal.[6] Accordingly, his reaction to the petition would have been just that: diplomatic, subdued, pleasantries, careful language, no waves. You get a sampling of these in +Quintana's innocuous interview in 2010 with the ever meddlesome and ubiquitous CEO of Salt+Light TV. The latter (drum roll) making sure to mention on-air his awe-inspiring role at World Youth Day 2002, thrice for greater impact. Anyway, when the petition got going in April 2012, +Quintana was probably already scheduled to deliver - and eventually did deliver - an address at the CCCB Plenary later in September,[7] coinciding and closely connected with the SPU conference challenged by the petition. Canon law does stipulate a legate "to send information to the Apostolic See... everything that touches the life of the Church and the good of souls" (no. 364/1). Plausibly, an e-mail was shot off to some intern working in a Dicastery basement. Though it's more likely +Quintana didn't even pass along the information, considering the silence. "Chiquita, file this under Miscellaneous for me. Gracias". Which goes to show that these days a better strategy is to bypass the nunciature altogether. Just cc your complaint letter to the MacNab Manor House as a formality then go direct to Rome. But, then, there is the Vatican bureaucracy with which to contend, let alone the numerous wolf packs stalking throughout the loggias, as Pope Benedict's abdication announcement made obvious.
 
VIII. KEYNOTE ADDRESS SPEAKERS: The SPU conference had three of them, none Canadian. First, ++Turkson, a Ghanaian prelate and  president of the Vatican's Pontifical Council for Justice and Peace, gave an address entitled "Vatican II: A Council of Justice and Peace". Helped by his good looks, amicable character and origin from an exotic land, ++Turkson has that special ability to charm the pants off even heterodox Catholics, as evidenced in an interview with an adoring Bobby Mickens at The Tablet.[8] He likes the press and the press likes him, which is a bad sign. Papabile rumours have floated about ++Turkson since at least 2010.[9] And, soonafter Pope Benedict's stunning announcement, he was letting the international media know that if we "have an African pope, that would be a great recognition of a church that has come of age and a church that is able to contribute to the universal church".[10] A big time no no. Translation: ++Turkson will not be our next pope, if I may make a prediction. Too publicly self-assertive and it appears His Eminence's celebrity has gotten to his head. Unless the canvassing is premeditated to attract criticism, thereby making his authenticity questionable amongst cardinal-electors, hence minimizing election chances. In actuality, the secular media's excitement about him becoming pope is due not so much to ++Turkson's African cultural heritage, and the distinct mode/approach that it might bring to the papacy. Rather, it's his skin colour. A sort of inverse racial profiling by Whitey the Liberal who has that irrepressible desire to showcase his moral superiority and thus feel really, really good about himself. Like those people who put "COEXIST" bumper stickers on their Prius'.

IX. Not to suggest ++Turkson is part of this "anti-Church", nor that he is somehow out of step with the Magisterium. His view against the secular West's racist-inspired population control agenda via abortion in the Third World is on the mark. Additionally, it has been wonderful to see the press go into hysterics after he recently said (correctly) that the Church's priest sex abuse scandal is mainly resultant of homosexual pederasts,[11] which goes to the whole Lavender Mafia network, its sickening entrenchment within Church structures now emerging into public light, thankfully. However, his wishy washy perspective on condoms does gives pause.[12] Nonetheless, ++Turkson was the delegate from Rome, meaning that, as a conference participant, he was the outsider to be tolerated with smiles, sunshine and lollipops. SPU was even gracious enough to confer him an honorary doctorate, which you can see Ottawa's Abp. Prendergast doing here. That +Prendergast is disallowing John Pacheco at SoCon or Bust from organizing a conference in Ottawa - an initiative with a prominent keynote speaker to countervail the SPU/V2 conference, pretty well verifies that, when it comes down to the uncomfortable crunch, +Prendergast is a poser and that all his tough talk (e.g. pro-abort politicians must not receive Communion) is just that: talk. Another good, loyal Catholic layman given the shaft. Another dead end bishop. He's a Jesuit, published by Novalis, so I guess it should have been expected, and we certainly hope +Terry has fun at the next "Theology on Tap". We also observe in the photographs the heresy-pimping Publishing Director at Novalis, which sponsored the SPU/V2 extravaganza, courtesy of Canadian tax dollars. Getting back, had ++Turkson been a CDF rep, instead of a "justice and peace" darling, you can bet Bill Shatner's toupee that the welcome wagon would have performed a U-turn. There is also the question of whether or not anyone in-the-know on the other side of the Atlantic properly advised ++Turkson on all the incestuous Magic Circle intrigue going on betwixt and between St. Paul's, Novalis, OMI and the Canadian bishops. My guesstimate is that Rome is largely oblivious and/or has higher priorities, which explains why St. Paul's undeservingly still retains its status as a Pontifical University. It is also noteworthy that, unlike the other two keynote speakers - giving their addresses in the SPU auditorium (capacity 300), ++Turkson the outsider was relegated to the less capacious university chapel for his talk. A chapel with cafeteria chairs instead of pews, minus kneelers. Groovy.

X. Next up we have another suit and tie Jesuit, a German, by the name of Christophe Theóbald. He's Professor of Fundamental and Dogmatic Theology at the Centre Sèvres in Paris. His keynote address went by the title "Vatican II: A Vision for the Future, a Pedagogy of Faith, a Way to Resolve Particular Questions". Purpose: to "illustrate how the corpus of the Council's teaching present new avenues of transmission enabling present and future generations to envision the future of the Church". Excepting technical journals, Theóbald is cited infrequently in popular North American theological conversation (although, his Transmettre un évangile de liberté is distributed by Novalis via Bayard France, and former Timmins Bishop Paul Marchand had a liking in that Theóbald was referenced in a Pastoral Letter [14]). In the context of the SPU conference, however, Theóbald's take on Vatican II necessitates highlighting. This is because he is a disciple of the notorious "Bologna School", founded by the late historian/theologian Giuseppe Alberigo. In terms of influential accomplishments, between 1995 and 2001, Alberigo, along with colleague Fr. Giuseppe Dossetti, were responsible for History of Vatican II. A grand, multi-tome article compilation project (translated into seven languages) covering every aspect and detail of the Council wherein Theóbald,[13] including aforementioned Jetsetter Gilles, contributed articles. Theóbald and company deem the Second Vatican Council as a significant, tantamount irreconcilable, break from ecclesiastical tradition. A taste of Theóbald in action:

None of the twenty preceding councils showed so much daring and ambition: allowing a consensus to emerge among those more than two thousand prelates from all continents and obtain their agreement on the responses to be made to virtually all the questions facing the Church at the dawn of a new age for humanity - such is the absolutely unheard-of legacy of these great twentieth-century assizes.[15]

Here we see the customary, quasi-utopian "dawn of a new age" formula being invoked for V2, after downgrading the previous twenty councils (running a course from AD 325 to 1870, i.e. 1545 years) to a non sequitur. Sure, there is change, things form anew. Yet the sense here sides toward the revolutionary, not to a developmental sense, and there is a distinction between the two. Language like "absolutely unheard-of legacy" implies a radical breach from something, that which is torn asunder, void of antecedent association. Development, on the other hand, suggests profounder understandings in Church teaching, liturgy, canon law, and so forth, adjusted and made pertinent to the present circumstance, yet still corroborating, affirming and accessing the past, i.e. continuity. To our demise, the revolutionary sense has predominated for the last five decades, and unfortunately its proponents thereof have usurped Newman's theory of the Development of Doctrine, claiming it for themselves.
 
XI. Things were moving along swimmingly for the "Bologna School" for quite a time until 2005, when a certain Josef Cardinal Ratzinger was installed as pope. It was just a few days before Christmas in that same year when Pope Benedict chucked a wrench into the well-oiled, smooth-running post-Conciliar machine. In Clementine Hall, the Holy Father gave the traditional greeting to the Roman Curia, including statements on "discontinuity and rupture", the "problems" that eventuated after particular "interpretations" of Vatican II were popularized. And let me tell you, the Principesse Bolognesi no likey what e Bavarian speaky. The Pope's now famous remarks, disseminated worldwide, called for a response from his opponents, a counteraction from the now sometimes ascribed "rupturists". This eventually came in 2007, in the form of four essays published in Cristianesimo nella storia, a magazine by the Institute for Religious Studies in Bologna.[16] Herr Christophe was one of the dissenting authors. Still, even with his forthcoming departure, Pope Benedict, with a detectable bluntness, is telling the world that, what Theóbald and his ilk have wrought, has been nothing but decay and dissolution:

...this Council created many calamities, so many problems, so much misery, in reality: seminaries closed, convents closed, liturgy trivialized... and the true Council has struggled to materialize, to be realized: the virtual Council was stronger than the real Council.[17]

My reasonable deduction is that the Bolognese Rupturists were overjoyed when first hearing the news of the Holy Father's abdication.

XII. The third keynote speaker was an American, Richard Gaillardetz, a theologian at Boston College. His SPU conference talk was called "Setting the Agenda for the Church of the Twenty-first Century". Indeed, quite an agenda. Beforehand, however, a little background for context, controversial to say the least. One red flag, among scores, is that, during the U.S. election campaign in 2008, Gaillardetz was a member of Obama's National Catholic Advisory Council.[18] Evidently, Gaillardetz - like those two other intellectual giants Barbra Streisand and Pauly Shore - is absolutely infatuated by a "community organizer" with a Marxist-based educational upbringing. He clearly has no disagreements with Obummer's pro-abortion platform, which can be philosophically categorized as nihilistic Prometheanism, in that the criminal who now occupies the White House believes that babies surviving abortions should be left to die. Hope. This Gaillardetz is so twisted he even had the gall at the time to write that "there is a pro-life candidate out there and it turns out he's a Democrat!"[19] Go team! After that op-ed, he received a rebuke from his bishop, although it was hardly a tough counterpunch. Toledo's Bishop Leonard Blair responded by stating Gaillardetz's heterodox views on abortion "do not reflect the clear and consistent moral position of the United States Catholic bishops".[20] The USCCB? Bishop's Conferences have zero infallibility in Catholic teaching and specific reference should have been made to the Magisterium's infallibility, universally valid, where abortion in all circumstances always has been censured as a grave evil. Well, at least the USCCB finally - after outside criticisms - pulled some of Gaillardetz's antinomian writings from it's For Your Marriage resources website. That said plenty, considering the USCCB/NCCB has been a hive for the "synthesis of heresies" for decades.
 
XIII. Gaillardetz, a theologian-turned-popularizer, a kind of Catholic version of the "public intellectual", does the standard fare: multiple articles written for America, U.S. Catholic, Commonweal, National Catholic Reporter - all well-known dissenting magazines with weighty measures of defiance against the Holy See. But not the entire gamut of American Catholic periodicals. No entries in his CV for publications at Crisis, certainly not New Oxford Review. The useful idiots at Vox Nova think he's an alright guy, but no need to worry because only effete, make-believe intellectuals write at that blog. Gaillardetz admits standard progressivist influences: Congar, Curran, Küng, Schillebeeckx, Rahner and, if I'm not mistaken, Rodney Dangerfield. He also has the standard dissenter disdain for Orthodoxy, in that he disparagingly speaks of "the youngest generation of priests, too many of whom seem more interested in birettas, cassocks and clerical prerogatives" (i.e. feels threatened by the resurgence of traditionalism), the "Vatican's hounding of American women religious" (as if the politicized/paganized LCWR didn't deserve reprimand/correction by the CDF), "leaders' lack of interest in the laity's insights" (as if a Dictatorship of the Laity hasn't been the case for the last 50 years), "ideologically driven, poor translation of the Roman Missal" (as if current, widespread liturgical abuse is not a problem).[21] Gaillardetz also co-authored a book on Vatican II with SPU professor and conference participant Catherine Clifford, available from Novalis, which is also a standard, insofar as "Catholic" book publishing goes in Canada.

XIV. To compress things into a summary, then, there are three areas where Gaillardetz demonstrates himself to be a heretic and an enemy of the Faith. The first relates to his opinions on moral/life issues (e.g. contraception, homosexuality). Here is Gaillardetz discussing Fr. Francis Sullivan's (colleague at Boston College, another Jesuit, winner of the "John Courtney Murray Award" along with two Canadians, Aquina-kantian Fr. Bernard Lonergan, SJ and excommunicated ex-priest Greg Baum) views on "polygenism and artificial contraception":

For a time it was possible to recognize a theological consensus on the Church's condemnation of polygenism, particularly in the years between Vatican I and Humani generis, but that consensus did not "persevere" among theologians after Vatican II. In like manner, a long-standing consensus regarding the Church's teaching on artificial contraception was shattered in the years after Humanae vitae. In each case, an apparent unanimity dissolved in the face of significant new developments or new interpretive frameworks. I would extend this judgment to include both the teaching on the ordination of women and the moral character of homosexual acts; both have been the subject of considerable theological reflection drawing on new interpretive contexts. Consequently, it would seem difficult to judge any purported consensus regarding these two teachings as one which "perseveres and remains firm".[22]

Notice specifically: "the Church's teaching on artificial contraception was shattered" in the years following Vatican II. Yet again, the Council is designated as a drastic rift in Christian history, something dazzling happened, the galaxial expansion reverses and the universe implodes into a singularity. Church affairs are "shattered", thus justifying the dissenting viewpoint. No "consensus", he claims, now exists on contraception because of "new developments or new interpretive frameworks" (never precisely defined, of course), and these also apply to Church teachings on homosexualism and women's ordination. Really?

XV. Proscription against contraception has constantly been taught by the Church. The Catechism precisely states it to be "intrinsically evil" (no. 2370). Paul VI's Humanae vitae never has been abrogated, save in the minds of theologians (who aren't part of the Magisterium) and bishops teaching out of communion with the pope (cf. "Winnipeg Statement" of the Canadian bishops). Moreover, the condemnation of contraception has been promulgated by Apostolic Constitution, the highest decree of the infallible Ordinary/Universal Magisterium, as in, for example, Familiaris consortio:

...the Church condemns as a grave offense against human dignity and justice all those activities of governments or other public authorities which attempt to limit in any way the freedom of couples in deciding about children. Consequently, any violence applied by such authorities in favor of contraception or, still worse, of sterilization and procured abortion, must be altogether condemned and forcefully rejected... couples, by means of recourse to contraception... act as judges of the divine plan, and they manipulate and degrade human sexuality (and with it themselves and their married partner) by altering its value of total self-giving.[23]

Rather uncomplicated. The same applies to homosexuality and women's ordination.[24]

XVI. The second area where Gaillardetz falls astray, which helps to justify the heresy in the first area outlined above, involves his take on role theologians play in relation to the Church's teaching authority. Unless you're a Protestant, or if you were one of those Gen-X Catholics crappily catechized by a crew cut lesbian nun named Boris, remaining Catholic readers will know without a doubt that the Magisterium alone is the official interpreter and adjudicator of Scripture and Tradition, and that it is the source from which Church doctrine springs. Theologians, like Gaillardetz, do not comprise any part of the Magisterium. Period. Our Yankee friend, of course, balks from this longstanding reality of the Catholic Church. Two examples - the first:

...where there is no universal and constant consensus of Catholic theologians the infallibility of a teaching of the ordinary Magisterium might itself be called into question.[25]

The second:

It is my contention that appeals to the infallibility of the ordinary universal magisterium are ill-suited for resolving controversial matters related to the Christian faith precisely because of the inevitable ambiguities involved in verifying the fulfillment of the conditions for the exercise of the ordinary universal magisterium as outlined in Lumen gentium.[26]

What he is doing here, obviously, is making the infallibility of the Ordinary/Universal Magisterium to be a direct function of the acumen and consent of theologians. Specifically, theologians effectively supersede the Magisterium. But never has there been a "consensus" amongst theologians in the Church's two-thousand year history. Perhaps that was one reason why, err, Christ actualized Peter into a Rock, made him Pope, the Supreme Pontiff, Number 1, the buck stops here. Anyhow, with the handiness and versatility of Gaillardetz 's "inevitable ambiguities", which can be adhered to any subject or anyone at odds with his agenda, never can there be certitude with respect to Church teaching on, say, moral/life issues, like abortion, contraception, buggery and so on. This, of course, is the very intention and trick of Gaillardetz - keep everything suspect, unresolved, in a state of suspended animation, always. He says: "When a truth of divine revelation is taught infallibly by the ordinary universal magisterium, what results is, in effect, a 'non-defined dogma'".[27] This is the reason why he writes that "there are no solemnly defined dogmas that pertain to morals",[28] which seems like a solemnly self-defined dogma to me, if not your run-of-the-mill moral relativism. It is also the reason why he writes, as against the Catechism's definition of heresy (no. 2089), that "the obstinate denial of a definitive doctrine would not necessarily place one outside the Roman Catholic communion",[29] a denial which automatically excuses himself from heresy. Anything goes. The reader will note that infractions against the principle of non-contradiction is commonplace with such people.
 
XVII. The third area where Gaillardetz comports himself into the realm of the heretical involves ecclesiology, directly correlated with the second area outlined above. He was quoted in an interview around the time of the SPU/V2 conference. The traditional, vertically-inclined, transcendent-orientated structure of...

The older Church model took an "illuminist theory of divine revelation," in which revelation came "from on high", illuminating Church leaders, with divine revelation "trickling down to the rest of us", Gaillardetz said.[30]

This is antiquated, according to Gaillardetz - and I really like that allusion to the Illuminati, with its secret society/Masonic/ Rosicrucian/Enlightenment connotations. Oooooooo scary stuff, kids. Instead, a horizontalist configuration is preferred, based on Vatican II, when all was "shattered". There must be "less reliance on Formal Authority", he argues elsewhere. "Conceptions of authority" must "flow from the life of ecclesial communion. A renewed teaching authority, one that is properly situated and exercised within the Church as a communion".[31] This is the New Ecclesiology, prevailing throughout the post-Conciliar era. There is nothing novel here that hasn't been put forward a trillion times since when Flower Power and rebellion against The Man became orders of the day. That is, authority of the Pope/Magisterium is slanted, smudged, collectivized, egalitarianized toward "collegiality", bishops' conferences, coalitions of theologian oligarchs, careerist laymen networks. The pope is merely "the first among equals", as Fr. Rosica recently averred in an orchestrated interview with our State broadcaster.

XVIII. Where Gaillardetz begins to push matters even further to the extreme is when he transmogrifies religious authority into something wholly dependent on a popular vote: "The election of the bishop by the local community is an alternative means of episcopal selection that may reflect the democracies of our modern age".[32] Jean-Jacques Rousseau couldn't have said it better. And so we come to an old error with a new label, to use Bishop Sheen's phraseology. That is, the Conciliarist heresy occurrent around the time of the Great Western Schism. Specifically, that of Marsilius of Padua (ca. 1275-1342), as advocated in his work Defensor pacis (1324). Although God is the source of all power, religious authority is restricted from directly wielding it. Rather, the bishops are sidetracked, overridden, because God's power is conferred directly to, and stems from, the people, the so-called "human legislator":

The universal body of the citizens or its prevailing part is the human legislator... the election of any principate or other office to be established through election... depends solely on the express will of the legislator... no bishop or priest, as such, has any principate or coercive jurisdiction over any clergy man or layperson, even if that person is a heretic... all bishops are of equal authority.[33]

That's just a fancy, medieval way of saying Mob Rule, and those extracted sentences surely have a totalitarian undertone. Note that Marsilius' concept of the "human legislator" was a precursor to Rousseau's "General Will". It's not for nothing some historians refer to Marsilius as The Rousseau of the Conciliar Movement.[34] Plus, we all know what followed in Rousseau's wake. Reminder: French Revolution, Communist Revolution.

XIX. Taken in an ideational context, there really is nothing outstanding in Gaillardetz positions. Visit any dollar store in whatever Modernist neighbourhood and you discover an entire gallery of heretics expounding the same: moral teachings put in doubt via nebulous language so as to justify personal sinful behaviour with an unwillingness to change (which is always the root cause here); magisterial authority placed under suspicion based on some yet to be resolved anomaly upraised into an ultimate determining factor; theologians overstepping their limits as only conduits and clarifiers of doctrine because of a pet theory or a longing for prestige; democratized ecclesiology; Vatican II as the zenith in Church history with its concomitant negation of the past. It's all been done before, a thousand times, and the pattern remains unchanged: no resolution, ever, subtlize everything or push the margins to even greater extremes, all is left open-ended and possibly permissible, which only perpetuates dissent and further destabilizes the Church in the process. Let alone its detrimental trickle-down effect to Catholics on ground level, most of whom are already apathetic, if not ignorantly antagonistic to the two-millennia-old basics of Catholicism.

XX. Hence it's arguable that space has been wasted here covering Gaillardetz's views in these last paragraphs, redundant, useless, sort of like any insight Matthew McConaughey may have on the collapse of the Weimar Republic. Still, it's done for the record and, again, I repeat the important but mostly neglected, unseen, unreported trickle-down effect such criminals have on those Catholics situated at the pyramid's base. This is because Gaillardetz has an exceptional knack for popularization. He's a proficient self-promoter and marketer, which distinguishes him from most heretics. Go to his slick-looking website. "Shop" for books and DVDs, the lecture circuit, listing of "upcoming events", password-only access for special website features. Being an American, Gaillardetz is a Modernist strain of those more populous Neo-Cat salesmen apologists scoping out for big bucks in the blogosphere, a characteristically American phenomenon. And lest we forget, the perfumed beta-males constituting the CCCB were tickled pink to have Gaillardetz give a keynote address at its 2009 plenary. Thus, his influence runs from the bottom right up to the peak of the pyramid.

XXI. So there you have it. Three foreign keynote speakers: a Cardinal figurehead to be stomached for the sake of decorum, a suit and tie Jesuit from the rupturist Bologna School, and an antinomian Conciliarist with an aptitude for salesmanship. In Part 2 of this series we shall analyze the Canadian roster of the SPU/V2 conference participants.

Catch you on the flipside. TH2 signing off.

NOTES / REFERENCES

1. Cf. "Roman Catholic (Janet Somerville) new CCC (Canadian Council of Churches) general secretary", Presbyterian Record, September 1, 1997.

2. J.W. O'Malley, "Barack Obama and Vatican II", America, May 25, 2009.

3. M. Swan, "The Church's past weaved into the future", Catholic Register, October 7, 2012.

4. Quoted in ibid.

5. D. Gyapong, "Meeting condemned as conference of 'dissenters'", BC Catholic, June 25, 2012. See also P.B. Craine, "Catholics urge Vatican Cardinal to skip dissenting conference on Vatican II", LifeSite News, July 23, 2012.

6. See CCN, "Spaniard named nuncio for Canada", Western Catholic Reporter, December 21, 2009.

7. D. Gyapong, "Apostolic Nuncio warns of religious freedom threats in Canada", BC Catholic, September 26, 2012.

8. R. Mickens, "The rising star of justice and peace", The Tablet, October 31, 2009.

9. Cf. "The young tearaway who's in the running to be next Pope", The Independent, August 29, 2010.

10. Quoted in J. Bone, "Ghana's Cardinal Peter Turkson eyes papacy", The Australian, February 14, 2012.

11. See D. Gyapong, "Abortion pushed on Third World may have racist agenda, says Cardinal Turkson", Catholic Register, October 1, 2012; and S. Caldwell, "Cardinal tipped to become first black pope in modern times blames gay priests for abuse scandals facing Catholic church", Daily Mail, February 19, 2013.

12. "Cardinal Turkson on Condoms and HIV/AIDS", ZENIT, October 5, 2009.

13. C. Theóbald, "The Church Under the Word of God" In: eds./trans. G. Alberigo, J.A. Komonchak, M.J. O'Connell, History of Vatican II (Maryknoll, NY: Orbis Books, 2006), vol. 5, The Council and the Transition, The Fourth Period and the End of the Council, September 1965 - December 1965, pp. 275-320. It's worth subnoting that Orbis Books is notorious for publishing works of dissenters, for years. Orbis is also affiliated with Canada's Novalis, the former listed as a "Distributed Publisher" at the latter's website.

14. P. Marchand, "Being Catholic, a Call, a Challenge", Pastoral Letter, A/3, October 1, 2010.

15. C. Theóbald, "The Theological Options of Vatican II: Seeking an 'Internal' Principle of Interpretation," In: eds. A. Melloni, C. Theóbald, Vatican II: A Forgotten Future? (London: SCM, 2005), Continuum 1005/4, p. 87. See also F. Mastrofini, "The first fifty years of Vatican II", Vatican Insider/La Stampa, February 7, 2012.

16. S. Magister, "Confirmed: The Council was a 'Historic Transition', The School of Bologna Annexes the Pope", Chiesa, December 11, 2007.

17. "Pope Benedict's last great master class: Vatican II, as I saw it", Vatican Radio, February 14, 2013.

18. See membership list at end of article "Donohue and Obama advisors scuffle over Catholic identity, abortion", Catholic News Agency, May 12, 2008.

19. R.R. Gaillardetz, "Who really is the pro-life candidate?", Toledo Blade, September 27, 2008.

20. L.P. Blair, "Reject the Freedom of Choice Act", Toledo Blade, October 4, 2008.

21. R.R. Gaillardetz, "We have the pillars, but the building is still unfinished", National Catholic Reporter, October 11, 2012.

22. R.R Gaillardetz, "The Ordinary Universal Magisterium: Unresolved Questions", Theological Studies, September 2002, no. 3, pp. 147-171.

23. Apostolic Exhortation Familiaris Consortio of Pope John Paul II to the Episcopate, to the Clergy, and to the Faithful of the Whole Catholic Church on the Role of the Christian Family in the Modern World, pt. 3, II, 30, 32. Given on November 22, 1981.

24. For homosexuality: cf. Catechism (no. 2357); CDF, Considerations regarding proposals to give legal recognition to unions between homosexual persons (June 3, 2003). For women's ordination: cf. Catechism (no. 1577); Code of Canon Law (no. 1024); John Paul II, Apostolic Letter, Ordinatio Sacerdotalis (May 22, 1994); CDF, General Decree regarding the delict of attempted sacred ordination of a woman (December 19, 2007).

25. R.R. Gaillardetz, Witnesses to the Faith: Community, Infallibility, and the Ordinary Magisterium of Bishops (Mahwah, NJ: Paulist Press, 1992), p. 28.

26. R.R. Gaillardetz, "Infallibility and the Ordination of Women", Louvain Studies, vol. 21, no. 1, Spring 1996, pp. 3-24.

27. R.R. Gaillardetz, "The Ordinary Universal Magisterium: Unresolved Questions", Theological Studies, September 2002, no. 3, pp. 147-171.

28. R.R. Gaillardetz, Teaching with Authority: A Theology of the Magisterium of the Church (Collegeville, MN: The Liturgical Press, 1997), Theology and Life Series, vol. 41, p. 110.

29. Ibid., p. 263.

30. From D. Gyapong, "Vatican II sets agenda for ongoing renewal, scholars say", BC Catholic, October 4, 2012.

31. R.R. Gaillardetz, Teaching with Authority, pp. 290, 293.

32. Ibid., p. 281.

33. Marsilius of Padua: The Defender of the Peace, ed./trans. A. Brett (Cambridge University Press, 2005), Cambridge Texts in the History of Political Thought, pp. 548-550 (Disc. III, ch. 2). Cf. also commentary by L. Salembier, "Marsilius of Padua", In: The Catholic Encyclopedia (New York: Robert Appleton Company, 1910). Available online.

34. E.g. F. Hendricks, Vital Democracy: A Theory of Democracy in Action, trans. R. Stuve (Oxford University Press, 2010), p. 116: "In Marsilius of Padua's normative theory of the city republic... notions of self-governance and developmental republicanism clearly dominate, which makes him one of the most important predecessors of Rousseau".

GLAM AND GLITTERATI AT SPU OVER V2