News Item: : A Whole Hill of Beans...
(Category: Torch of The Faith News)
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Saturday 14 January 2017 - 14:08:18

This week's Catholic news even featured a Bogeyman - No, not him!

Dames, Bogeymen and Maltese Idolatry: there were times this week when you weren't sure if you were reading Catholic news items or watching classical film noir. In the best traditions of that genre, we have therefore tried to lighten the mood a little with some photo-captions inspired by famous lines from the movie, Casablanca. At the end of the day, though, and as our final sentence demonstrates: It ain't funny...

The Dame 

Round up the usual suspects!

International readers might be interested to know that Dame Louise Carey is the (Orwellian sounding) ''integration advisor'' to the British Government.

Just before Christmas, we noted that Dame Louise had spoken of supposedly ''regressive attitudes'' which somehow wanted to take religion ''backwards and away from 21st-Century British values and laws on issues such as gender-equality and sexual orientation; creating segregation and pulling communities apart.''

We were reflecting, in our article, on the danger of the British Government seeking to impose an ''Oath of Allegiance'' - one that reflected the ''values'' of post-modernity - on all elected officials, civil servants, council workers and possibly staff of the BBC and NHS (National Health Service). As we said back then, employment prospects for faithful Catholics just got a whole lot better (not!).

Anyway, Dame Carey was prominent in the Catholic news again this week, due to her criticism of Catholic schools - remember them?!!! - during an official parliamentary hearing. On Monday, Dame Carey suggested that ''it is not OK for Catholic schools to be homophobic and anti-gay marriage. That is not OK either - that is not how we bring children up in this country.''

Predictably, the so-called Catholic Education Service (CES) - hardly noted as a bulwark of Catholic orthodoxy - swiftly retorted that Catholic schools in Britain were ''tolerant'' and ''not guilty of homophobia''. Catholic parents in this country have long known that they cannot rely on the CES to protect, much less to implement, the orthodox formation of their children. It is not for nothing that many orthodox parents began home-schooling their families during the last decade. 

As usual, it seemed that the Bishops' Conference of England and Wales left it to the good Bishops Mark Davies and Philip Egan to deliver a more developed articulation and defence of Catholic teaching to the wider culture.

Speaking to the Catholic News Service (CNS), Bishop Davies recalled that it was actually Britain's Christian heritage that had shaped the country's values. He noted: ''These values would be undermined if an ''equalities agenda'' in schools became the vehicle for an increasing intolerance of Christian teaching.'' 

Also speaking to CNS, Bishop Egan pointed out the descent into irrationality which typifies so much in our present cultural situation. His Lordship suggested that trying to teach sexual morality in contemporary Britain has become a bit like arguing with an alchohoic: ''After a while, they won't argue with you on grounds of reason, they just become furious and respond that way. There is something in our culture increasingly like that.''

The irrationality of Dame Carey's discourse is certainly worth highlighting. In her presentation to the parliamentary hearing, she contended: ''I have a problem with the expression 'religious conservatism', because often it can be anti-equalities. We have got to be careful that people can choose, obviously, to live the lives that they want to live, but they cannot condemn others for living differently. That is a grey line, and the more we can talk about it the better.''

Well, let's talk about it, shall we? Notice how, in a moment of unguarded ''anti-equality'' (!), Dame Carey condemns ''religious conservatism'' at the same time as suggesting that no-one can condemn others for living differently? See, too, how she seeks a clear line of demarcation between what she deems to be acceptable, and what she does not; but only has the ability to call this a ''grey line''. This is because the first principle of her argument is not based in the acceptance of objective truth, such as the divine and natural law, but in the shifting post-modern sands of feelings, opinion and, ultimately, will to power.

This type of scenario was classically parsed in Hilary White's recent article at 1 Peter 5; in which she discussed the essential differences between Positivism and Epistemological Realism.

In the end I can only sum up with the splendidly insightful Tweet of Edward Leigh, the Member of Parliament for Gainsborough, which said: ''Equalities czar says 'we can't condemn others for living differently' then condemns Catholics for living differently.''

The Bogeyman   

Of all the buildings in the whole of the city of Rome, he had to walk into ours...

In the days of Pope Francis, the Vatican's scandal-giving policy of inviting Culture of Death globalists to host conferences has been legion. However, most previous scandals were surpassed this week with the news that Dr. Paul Ehrlich has been invited to speak at an upcoming 'Biological Extinction' conference. This is because, of course, Ehrlich has long been an infamous advocate of sex-selection abortion and mass forced-sterilization to reduce the global population. In his 2014 book, Hope on Earth, a Conversation, Ehrlich even went so far as to suggest that the Catholic Church, and Her authentic teachings on sexual ethics, represented a threat to the future of the earth. This is because Ehrlich is one of those mistaken ''thinkers'' who suggest that unchecked population growth will lead to catastrophic environmental destruction. Good grief, Ehrlich's book even claimed that the Pope and Bishops were one of the most evil and regressive forces on the planet!

None of this has prevented him from being invited as a keynote speaker at the Vatican in the distressing days of Francis. The respected population expert Steve Mosher told LifeSiteNews that Ehrlich's attendance at this event could be likened to Raul Castro being invited to give a talk on human rights.

Of course, Castro has himself already been affirmed with a couple of very high-profile meetings with Francis. Last April, we even did an article here about various other Marxists and fellow-travellers who have spoken at the Vatican since Francis took the helm.

All of which gives us an opportunity to speak of something we first read recently over at Tradition in Action. Last November, their team reported that Francis had welcomed to the Vatican the III International Meeting of Popular Movements. During that meeting, Francis called on all those present to reform present day society and prepare for the future.

The leaders that Francis greeted at the end of his talk included Jose Mujica, ex-president of Uruguay and former terrorist, together with Jose Pedro Stedile, leader of the Communist Landless Movement in Brazil. Both of these men have given presentations under the aegis of the mass-murdering Communist Che Guevara. The Landless Movement is itself notable as a violent group; given to occupying farms and land in the countryside, and provoking confrontation in the cities.

At the end of their article, Tradition in Action asked if Pope Francis were not therefore the biggest promoter of Communism in the world today. Certainly, this news gives a particular flavour to the invitation of the pro-death and mass-sterilization population-control advocate Paul Ehrlich to speak at the Vatican...

Now what was it Blessed Anne Catherine Emmerich said again? Ah, yes: ''Heretics of every kind came into the City of Rome.'' She also warned faithful Catholics to pray much for the ''Church of darkness to leave Rome''.

Maltese Idolatry

You know how you sound? Like a man who's trying to convince himself of something he doesn't believe in his heart.

How disgracefully sacrilegious that the Bishops of Malta and Gozo, headed by Archbishop Charles Scicluna, have put out the most clearly-worded adoption of Amoris Laetitia-inspired mass-sacrilege to date.

Their claims that sexual activity may be impossible for some to avoid says more about their own hearts, and the quality of their own vows, than about the reality of the human person; at least when aided by God's redeeming and sanctifying grace. Put simply: it owes more to Sigmund Freud and Martin Luther than it reflects anything to do with Our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ.

Let us compare their un-Catholic garbage with the perennial teaching articulated in the Council of Trent.

These sacrilege-enabling Maltese and Gozo Judas-bishops write: ''If a separated or divorced person who is living in a new relationship manages, with an informed and enlightened conscience, to acknowledge and believe that he or she are at peace with God, he or she cannot be precluded from participating in the sacraments of Reconciliation and the Eucharist.''

Now enlighten and inform your consciences with Trent: specifically Council 11, 13th Session, October 11th, 1551, regarding the worthy reception of Holy Communion: Those whose conscience is burdened with mortal sin, no matter how contrite they may think they are, first must necessarily make a sacramental Confession - If anyone presumes to teach, or preach, or obstinately maintain, or defend in public disputation the opposite of this, he shall by the very fact be exommunicated.

And so, to Archbishop Scicluna, and other sorry Bishops who have signed up to this sacrilegious travesty which so offends Our Lord, rends the unity of His Church, and leads countless souls with all of you toward the very pit of eternal damnation in Hell, and to Pope Francis who has thus far led the Church to this demonic impasse, we address those timeless words of Humphrey Bogart: Here's Lookin' at You Kid!

ALL OF THIS PROVOKES THE WRATH OF ALMIGHTY GOD: REPENT WHILE THERE IS STILL TIME!

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This news item is from Torch of The Faith
( http://www.torchofthefaith.com/news.php?extend.1527 )