Google+
 
Pagina precedente | 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 » | Pagina successiva

THE CHURCH MILITANT - BELEAGUERED BY BERGOGLIANISM

Ultimo Aggiornamento: 03/08/2020 22:50
Autore
Stampa | Notifica email    
16/10/2017 05:50
OFFLINE
Post: 31.588
Post: 13.676
Registrato il: 28/08/2005
Registrato il: 20/01/2009
Administratore
Utente Gold



The Fatima centenary is too important for the Church and for mankind as to simply fade away after the great celebration of the final apparition and its Miracle of
the Sun... Aldo Maria Valli had a most original way of commemorating Oct. 13 - by quoting Benedict XVI from his pilgrimage to Fatima seven years ago, and
relating those statements to timeless observations he made in his 2007 encyclical Spe salvi (in my opinion - which I was most happy to see was also that of
Fr. Schall - his greatest encyclical, if not also his best 'short work' as Joseph Ratzinger and as Benedict XVI. We shall mark its tenth anniversary on Nov. 30).

I believe I am seeing a pattern in Valli's commentaries lately - since he avowed his disillusion with the reigning pope. Somehow, he always manages to end up
citing Benedict XVI as a counterpoint to whatever current Church development he is commenting on - and find it a wonderful way to 'correct'
Bergoglio without doing so directly and 'in his face'. And it is wonderful that someone like Valli has made Benedict XVI his constant reference
point for commenting on current events in the Church
...


‘Who watches in the night?’
Benedict XVI on the message of Fatima,
and on God’s justice

Translated from

Oct. 13, 2017

Today on the 100th anniversary of the last Marian apparition in Fatima and the Miracle of the Sun that came with it, I remember words that Benedict XVI said seven years ago, on May 13, 2010, when, in his homily at a Mass in the shrine at Fatima, he asked:

Who keeps watch, in the night of doubt and uncertainty, with a heart vigilant in prayer? Who awaits the dawn of the new day, fanning the flame of faith?...

We would be mistaken to think that Fatima’s prophetic mission is complete. Here there takes on new life the plan of God which asks humanity from the beginning: “Where is your brother Abel […] Your brother’s blood is crying out to me from the ground!” (Gen 4:9). Mankind has succeeded in unleashing a cycle of death and terror, but failed in bringing it to an end… In sacred Scripture we often find that God seeks righteous men and women in order to save the city of man and he does the same here, in Fatima, when Our Lady asks: “Do you want to offer yourselves to God, to endure all the sufferings which he will send you, in an act of reparation for the sins by which he is offended and of supplication for the conversion of sinners?” (Memoirs of Sister Lúcia, I, 162)

At a time when the human family was ready to sacrifice all that was most sacred on the altar of the petty and selfish interests of nations, races, ideologies, groups and individuals, our Blessed Mother came from heaven, offering to implant in the hearts of all those who trust in her the Love of God burning in her own heart. At that time it was only to three children, yet the example of their lives spread and multiplied, especially as a result of the travels of the Pilgrim Virgin, in countless groups throughout the world dedicated to the cause of fraternal solidarity. May the seven years which separate us from the centenary of the apparitions hasten the fulfilment of the prophecy of the triumph of the Immaculate Heart of Mary, to the glory of the Most Holy Trinity.”


They are very clear words. As clear as what he told newsmen on the flight from Rome to Lisbon when, replying to a question about the Third Secret and on the possibility of including in the vision of a persecuted Church the sufferings of the Church as a result of the the sexual abuse of minors by priests, he said:

As for the new things which we can find in this message today, there is also the fact that attacks on the Pope and the Church come not only from without, but the sufferings of the Church come precisely from within the Church, from the sin existing within the Church. This too is something that we have always known, but today we are seeing it in a really terrifying way: that the greatest persecution of the Church comes not from her external enemies , but arises from sin within the Church, and that the Church thus has a deep need to relearn penance, to accept purification, to learn forgiveness on the one hand, but also the need for justice. Forgiveness does not replace justice.

In a word, we need to relearn precisely this essential: conversion, prayer, penance and the theological virtues. This is our response, we are realists in expecting that evil always attacks, attacks from within and without, yet that the forces of good are also ever present and that, in the end, the Lord is more powerful than evil and Our Lady is for us the visible, motherly guarantee of God’s goodness, which is always the last word in history.


To relearn the theological virtues (faith, hope, charity), to do penance, to practice forgiveness not dissociated from justice, to convert, to pray. Benedict XVI’s ‘prescription’ cannot be more crystal-clear. His reflection took off from the issue of priestly sexual offenses, but certainly when he spoke of sin in the Church, he was not just thinking of that. In the Church today, so many sins, so much infidelity [to the faith, and therefore, so much betrayal of the faith, of the Truth which is Christ].

Recalling those words by Benedict XVI seven years ago, we also recall what theologian Joseph Ratzinger said in 1969 [just four years after the end of Vatican II] in a series of radio conversations during which, in what was soon defined as a true and proper prophecy of the Church of the future, he imagined a Church that would be small, downsized, forced to abandon many of her places of worship, humiliated, no longer socially relevant, and called on to return to her origins. A Church that would undergo an ‘enormous upheaval’ but precisely because of this, could be reborn purified.

“To me it seems certain that very difficult times are in store for the Church. Her real crisis has barely begun. She must be prepared to deal with great upheavals. But I am also sure of what will ultimately remain: not a Church of political ends, but the Church of faith. Of course, she will no longer be the dominant social force as it had been for centuries, until recently. But the Church will see a new flowering and will once again be a home for man, where he can find life and hope beyond death.

Then, he said, we shall see ‘the small flock of believers as something totally new’, and people will find them “as a hope for themselves, the answer that they had always been seeking in secret”.

Regarding justice and the need for the faithful to recover the very notion of justice, Benedict XVI wrote unforgettable pages in his second encyclical Spe salvi. After noting that “In the modern era, the idea of the Last Judgement has faded into the background”, he explains that when there is no God to render justice, then it is man himself who sets his own standards for justice – which, as history has shown, simply opens the way to injustice. “It is no accident that this idea has led to the greatest forms of cruelty and violations of justice; rather, it is grounded in the intrinsic falsity of the claim”.

It is true, he underscores, that the image of the Last Judgment may appear terrifying to man, but it is more correct to say that “it is an image that evokes responsibility, an image, therefore, of that fear of which Saint Hilary spoke when he said that all our fear has its place in love.

God is justice and creates justice. This is our consolation and our hope. And in his justice there is also grace. This we know by turning our gaze to the crucified and risen Christ. Both these things —justice and grace — must be seen in their correct inner relationship.

Grace does not cancel out justice. It does not make wrong into right. It is not a sponge which wipes everything away, so that whatever someone has done on earth ends up being of equal value.
Dostoevsky, for example, was right to protest against this kind of Heaven and this kind of grace in his novel ‘The Brothers Karamazov’. Evildoers, in the end, do not sit at table at the eternal banquet beside their victims without distinction, as though nothing had happened.


I wish everyone a happy October 13.

[The quotations from Benedict XVI in Fatima appear to constitute a reproach to the reigning pope who has downgraded the message of Fatima to just another call for peace, as well as a reminder that the greatest threat to the Church today comes from within! While the quotations from Spe salvi appear aimed at Scalfari's recent reportage about Jorge Bergoglio's idea that there is no Hell because evil souls will simply be annihilated [implying Bergoglio does not think all souls are immortal], which, Scalfari rightly concludes, would make the Last Judgment unnecessary. The Vatican, as expected, has not commented on this latest Scalfariade, much less corrected or denied it. As if Jesus himself did not speak about Hell many times as well as the idea of the Last Judgment.]
Amministra Discussione: | Chiudi | Sposta | Cancella | Modifica | Notifica email Pagina precedente | 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 » | Pagina successiva
Nuova Discussione
 | 
Rispondi
Cerca nel forum

Feed | Forum | Bacheca | Album | Utenti | Cerca | Login | Registrati | Amministra
Crea forum gratis, gestisci la tua comunità! Iscriviti a FreeForumZone
FreeForumZone [v.6.1] - Leggendo la pagina si accettano regolamento e privacy
Tutti gli orari sono GMT+01:00. Adesso sono le 13:44. Versione: Stampabile | Mobile
Copyright © 2000-2024 FFZ srl - www.freeforumzone.com