Let's not only wrestle with thorny brambles when we need to dig the problem out by its roots

Torch of The Faith News on Thursday 06 November 2014 - 23:34:50 | by admin

We recently highlighted the fact that the Kasper 'thesis' is merely the evil flowering of the Modernistic roots expressed in his 1976 book Jesus the Christ. If one views the Son of God through a reductionist lens, it is only logical that all the other dogmas and doctrines of the Church will be similarly perceived. 

In the present battle for the soul of the Church, the denigration of marriage may be likened to harmful shoots and fruits. It is the blasphemous attack on Jesus Christ's divinity and universal kingship which constitutes the deeper root of the problem.

The Modernist attempt to dethrone Christ the King is the true point of departure from orthodox Catholic faith. It is here that the contemporary battle to defend the Faith should be focused. The effective gardener does not wear himself out by consistently clipping at thorny brambles. (This is especially true when they keep sprouting up like topsy!). Rather, he identifies harmful roots and harnesses his energies to remove them. 

In like manner, the truth about marriage, confession, the papacy and the very nature of the Church will be best defended by attending to the defence of authentically Catholic Christology and Ecclesiology. Indeed, such a defence is found as early as the writings of St. Paul, who presented indissoluble marriage as an image of Christ and the Church in the 5th chapter of his majestic letter to the Ephesians.

Our analogy of shoots, fruits and roots continues to hold when we turn to consider Pope Francis' tolerance of Kasper's position and the whole debacle of the manipulations at the Rome Synod.  

It has not yet dawned on many that the Church and society have just witnessed an apocalyptic event which calls to mind Dostoevsky's interpretation of the Grand Inquisitor.

To allow and to partake in a vote on giving Holy Communion to divorced people who have attempted re-marriage is not only to fly in the face of 2,000 years of Scripture, Tradition and Magisterium. It is akin to putting Jesus Christ, the God-man, and the Sixth Commandment of the Decalogue on trial.

What blasphemy! Have these men no fear of God? Do they not care for the souls who may be lost because of their temerity? Will they not even shrink from such unprincipled arrogance to save their own souls? Where is the righteous indignation of the orthodox? Will no-one defend Christ?

And yet, to focus only on this spectacle, terrifying though it be, is to risk spiritual myopia. It is to become embroiled in the cutting thorns, choking shoots and stinking fruits. For those who must defend the Faith, this will not do. No, they must learn from the prudent gardener and deracinate the grubby roots.

It seems to us that the clearest view of these roots may be glimpsed in a central garden in Rome on Pentecost Sunday, 2014. To grasp the marrow of the problem, we must consider the inter-religious prayers of the Invocation for Peace in the Vatican Garden and the Assisi 'spirit' which prepared the ground for it. At the first Pentecost, the Holy Spirit came down on St. Peter and the Apostles and brought unity and peace through them in the context of the dawning Church. Pentecost 2014 witnessed an attempt at unity with a different locus. 

Where was the holy zeal for Jesus Christ, the Most Blessed Trinity, the Church, or for souls on the day when Pope Francis took the unprecedented step of praying with representatives of other religions? The day when no-one would even whisper the word 'Apostasy'.

Did anyone stand up to bring the good news of the Gospel to these people? Was there a single voice to defend Christ's Great Commission to teach the True Faith He revealed with His imperative to baptize all nations in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Did any of the successors of the Apostles even question this u-turn of 2,000 years of Tradition?

On the footage that we witnessed, there were plenty of prelates - even men considered to be orthodox leaders during Pope Benedict XVI's reign - who fawned their way through the event in the garden that day. What a chill reminder it all was of another garden with another group of Christ's own picked-men at another crucial Hour. Is there again no-one to wait with Christ for one hour?

And closer to home, where was the voice of the Catholic intellectuals with whom we have worked to hand on the True Faith? If they will not raise their heads above the parapet at so crucial a moment, will anyone? Even our own concerned critique which was posted on this blog that day was too politely restrained. Thankfully, some other Catholic blogs did lament in strong terms the religious indifferentism which emanated from Rome that day. And a good number of commentators on blogs joined in. However, when one considers the gravity of the moment, why were the members of the Body of Christ so generally mute? Has there ever been such a time in Church history? Will we yet re-awaken and groan again to find the whole world once more Arian?

One trembles to recall the words of Our Blessed Lord Himself: 'When the Son of Man returns will He find faith on earth?' (Luke 18:8).

Enough of this collusion with Apostasy. Peace without Christ we will not have! Something truly evil entered into the Church - as far as such a travesty is possible - and into the world that afternoon. The apostasy took a deeper hold and dark events around the globe accelerated. 

The Synod on Marriage and all the troublesome manipulations and confusion before, during and after it are evil, but they are merely the fruit. Apostasy from Jesus Christ, from the Blessed Trinity, from the Decalogue, from the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass, and indeed from all the truths of the Deposit of Faith are the filthy root of the problems facing the Church in our day. By all means let us defend true marriage, but let us also engage with this much deeper problem.

Let us each repent of our silence and collusion with this faith-quenching Apostasy. Everything is now at stake. The salvation of billions of souls - including yours and mine - hangs in the balance. Let us renounce Satan and easy compromises with the world. Let us renew our loving commitment to Jesus Christ and His Church through our Baptismal vows. 

Every Catholic from the Pope down to each one of us in the pews needs to repent of dallying with this disorientation and affirm that Jesus Christ is the One True Saviour of the World; and that there is therefore no salvation outside of His Catholic Church. That is where Divine Mercy reigns and issues forth.

We want Jesus Christ to be our King! And we want His Church to be presented - as it is by nature and always was in the past - as His Kingdom.

And as we discern the roots, fruits and shoots of our predicament, let us not lose sight of Christ's own teaching that: 'A good tree cannot bring forth evil fruit, neither can an evil tree bring forth good fruit' (Matthew 7:18).  

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