News Item: : Dissenters? Oh No, We're Not! Seasonal Pantomime Fun with Austen Ivereigh
(Category: Torch of The Faith News)
Posted by admin
Wednesday 14 December 2016 - 23:47:31

Mr. Austen Ivereigh making one of those, ahem, unusual hand-signs. Keen observers might discern the hand of Francis as Austen speaks. He's behind you...

I still chuckle sometimes when I recall a pantomime I attended at the Crosby Civic Hall when I was about 10-years old. There was a bloke dressed as a peasant during a peasant-revolt scene in a mock-up village on the stage. He had a daft looking ventriloquist's puppet on one arm and was boisterously shouting, ''We are revolting!'' At that point, the silly puppet scrunched up its nose, looked at him sideways, and grimaced in a Liverpool accent: ''You speak for yourself, I think we look pretty good actually!''

Mind you, I was always one of those kids who cringed with embarassment when all the other children used to join in with the ''He's behind you!'' and the ''Oh no, he's not!'' pantomime routine.

When I first heard about Austen Ivereigh's latest Crux article, I thought perhaps the British pantomime season had begun early this year. After all, Austen's wild claims in that piece did rather appear as a bit of amateur dramatics, with some grotesque caricature mixed in for good measure!

As time is pressing today, we will provide some brief responses to Mr. Ivereigh in the best of the British pantomime spirit that his article seems to invite. Please do feel free to share in the jolly festive fun by joining in with the underlined panto' responses at home!

Austen: The critiques of Amoris Laetitia have crossed a frontier into a territory marked ''dissent''.

Torch of The Faith: Oh no, they haven't!

Yesterday's orthodox Catholic does not become today's dissenter just because a reigning pontiff issues an ambiguously worded document; and then fails to answer a politely worded request from faithful prelates for it to be clarified in the light of Sacred Scripture, Tradition and the constant Magisterium of the Church.

Austen: These critics look every day more and more like the lobbyists who argued for women priests or an opening in the area of contraception.

Torch of The Faith: Oh no, they don't!

The ''lobbyists'' for women priests and ''openings'' in the area of contraception represented a rupturing breach with Sacred Scripture, Tradition and the Church's constant Magisterium. Those seeking to be faithful to Christ's clear teachings on Holy Matrimony, the state of grace and Holy Communion are defending the Faith from such a rupturing breach in our own day.

Austen: What they have in common is that they are largely lay, educated and from the wealthy world.

Torch of The Faith: Oh no, they're not!

There are many priests who share grave misgivings over the ambiguities in Amoris Laetitia. Some, though sadly too few, of these have already spoken out clearly. We know others who do not speak out for fear of having their faculties, parishes and homes removed from them by persecuting Modernists in the hierarchy. We know one priest who has said that, if he were ever ordered to give Holy Communion to adulterers, he would simply refuse and go and get a secular job in order to maintain himself; even if this meant cleaning the streets with a dust-cart.

On the other hand, ''uneducated'' lay people, the world over, have been able to understand and live from the Church's clear teachings for many centuries. Assuredly, they would have resisted the present novelties as strongly, if not more so, as any present-day blogger armed with a lap-top. In the old days, resistance to heresy would more likely have involved sharpened pitch-forks than merely sharp words...

Then again, it is often the ordinary lay folk who today find themselves being confused and undermined by the so-called ''educated'' types, like the German though not germane Walter Kasper for example, who have made the clear teachings seem to be somehow ambiguous.

Interestingly, I had to pay to get my own orthodox Catholic education. I did this by selling our newly-wed home and spending two years in America with my wife in rented digs. In one rough and ready place we couldn't even lock some of the windows at night. I did this in order to receive some solid Catholic teaching, comprehensive catechesis and a bit of healing from the battering I had received from Modernists in an English seminary several years earlier.

In terms of wealth, therefore, we don't have much more than the proverbial two dimes to rub together these days. This website was funded with the last monies we had left over from our house sale.

Like too many Catholics we find that my orthodox MA in Theology is not wanted in a culture which is so dominated by Modernist dissent and dissenting Modernists.

There are many dissenters, and even non-Catholics, who manage to find well-paid employment in supposedly Catholic education centres in roles as diverse as teachers, headteachers, catechists and so-called ''lay-chaplains''. As our last article explained, even anti-life former MPs like Greg Pope get taken on and given massive salaries to run the Catholic Education Service (into the ground...)! 

On the other hand, our sincere efforts to spread the Faith in such a culture have left us without a salary, a pension or any life-savings. When we ran this apostolate as a business a few years ago, it used to just about break-even at the end of each financial year.

Austen: Clinging to the pain of their betrayal, they take refuge in their progressive or traditionalist liturgies and incandescent websites.

Torch of The Faith: Oh no, they don't!

Progressive or traditionalist... Which is it to be Mr. Ivereigh; for it cannot be both!

In any case, it is Christ that we cling to in the Traditional Latin Mass. This was the Mass of Ages which sanctified generations of Catholics throughout the world.

However, I'll not argue with the suggestion that the Traditional Latin Mass is a refuge. It is certainly a refuge from all the irreverence, sacrilege and heretical teaching that, sadly, prevails in far too many places today.

In terms of this website, we originally started it 8 years ago to bear witness to Jesus and His holy Church. When it became clear that Pope Francis was consistently undermining the Faith, and the faithful, we began to respond in order to help Catholics to keep going. We often get told by Catholics at the parish level that blogs such as ours make them happy to know that there is, at least, some voice being raised out there to defend the True Faith. It seems that one man's incandescence might be another's sign of hope.

Austen: Everything in Amoris Laetitia - including the controversial Chapter 8 - received a 2/3 majority in a synod that was notoriously frank, open and drawn out. 

Torch of The Faith: Oh no, it didn't!

The Rome synods might have been notorious and drawn out. Then, too, they may have been ''Frank''; but perhaps not in the way Mr. Ivereigh suggests... No-one could justly accuse them of being truly open.

In any case this myth of the 2/3 majority must be demolished.

In the first instance, it is not legitimate for Catholic bishops to vote on aspects of the revealed Deposit of Faith as though they were in a disgruntled meeting of Shelby Spong-esque episcopalians.

Secondly, the Kasper proposal was rejected in the Synod of 2014. Therefore, by the synod's own rules, it should never have been inserted into the Final Relatio document.

Thirdly, and in spite of the fact that Francis stacked the decks - by not inviting several key orthodox prelates, inviting instead modernistic predator-protectors like the disgraced Godfried Danneels, and having the prelates vote on the final document without sufficient time to peruse all the paragraphs in their own languages - the Synod of 2015 still failed to reach even a qualified majority of votes for the most problematic paragraphs.

Oh yes, the Holy Spirit is still protecting Christ's holy Church! This itself should be a cause for many new converts in our own days.

In short, no matter how many times the ''Big Lie'' of the 2/3 majority is told, nor by whom it is repeated, it will always remain an ugly untruth in its very essence!

Austen: Roma locuta, causa finita. Therefore, the critics should be left standing at the platform as the train leaves the station.

Torch of The Faith: Oh no, they shouldn't!

So much for mercy and accompaniment, hey!

I've often thought of St. Peter's Barque in terms of a rescue ship seeking to extract battered survivors from the roaring tempest and give them a safe deck to reach their heavenly home. I would hate to think of scoffing at folks getting left behind...

In any case, it is true that Rome has spoken definitively on the issues of the state of grace, Holy Communion and Holy Matrimony. It's just that, that teaching - so clearly spelled out in the Council of Trent, Canon Law, various official catechisms and Familiaris Consortio - clearly outweighs an ambiguous footnote in a document which even begins by saying that it is not in any way intended to set out a universal set of norms to be followed.

The Holy Spirit does not say one thing in one age and something contrary in another. It would be blasphemy to suggest otherwise.

Whilst Mr. Ivereigh might wish to scoff at the bystanders he wishes left behind on the platform, it is to be feared that it is he, and not they, who have boarded the wrong train... 

Austen's article is so concise that we can satisfactorily conclude our fun pantomime interactions at this point.

Torch of The Faith: Oh no, it isn't!

Alas, Mr. Ivereigh's Crux article runs on into an epic of Amoris Laetitia proportions. However, no volume of words can make the overall result any less ambiguous or meaningful. We find this to be the case even if one reads it very s-l-o-w-l-y indeed, a la Schonborn or Aguila.

Still, we feel some necessary responses have already been made to Mr. Ivereigh. And we express our thanks to him for an evening's hilarity. Let us then conclude with a final jovial exchange.

I say, Austen old boy, is that the hand of Francis we seem to discern behind you?

Oh yes, it is!

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( http://www.torchofthefaith.com/news.php?extend.1496 )