Hello all! Recently joined this wonderful forum thanks to Glen Hudson’s Facebook group. I recently heard Francis’ remarks regarding priestly celibacy and got concerned. [ “There is no contradiction for a priest to marry. Celibacy in the Western Church is a temporary prescription: I do not know if it is settled in one way or another, but it is temporary in this sense,” Francis said. “It is not eternal like priestly ordination, which is forever, whether you like it or not. Whether you leave or not is another matter, but it is forever. On the other hand, celibacy is a discipline.” Citing the Eastern Rite Catholic Church, which gives more leeway to its priests, Francis said: “Everyone in the Eastern Church is married, or those who want to. Before ordination there is the choice to marry or to be celibate.” He said of one such priest: “We have one in the curia [papal court] — I ran into him today — who has a wife and a son. There is no contradiction in a priest being married.” ] Almost everything he says is concerning and just infuriates and saddens me that a “Pope” would say things like he does and the more I research the worse it gets. Anyway I wanted to inform you all of St. Bridget’s (Actually Mary, the Mother of God Herself) Warning to any pope who would dare remove the celibacy requirement from the Church. I posted this because all the other issues with Francis are very vague and obvious, but without like concrete evidence, but in regards to celibacy I know this explicit message from the Prophecies and Revelations of St. Bridget Book 7 Chapter 10: (Please read the full short chapter The Virgin Mary, speaking to Lady Bridget, says that in no way is it God's will that clerics should have wives or be contaminated by carnal vice - prohibiting any pope from allowing this marriage of clerics to take place or be established in God's Church. Rejoice eternally, O blessed Body of God, in perpetual honor and in perennial victory and in your everlasting omnipotence together with your Father and the Holy Spirit and also with your blessed and most worthy Mother and with all your glorious heavenly court. To you be praise indeed, O eternal God, and endless thanksgiving for the fact that you deigned to become a human being and that for us in the world you willed to consecrate your venerable Body out of material bread and lovingly bestowed it on us as food for the salvation of our souls! It happened that a person who was absorbed in prayer heard then a voice saying to her: "O you to whom it has been given to hear and see spiritually, hear now the things that I want to reveal to you: namely, concerning that archbishop who said that if he were pope, he would give leave for all clerics and priests to contract marriages in the flesh. He thought and believed that this would be more acceptable to God than that clerics should live dissolutely, as they now do. For he believed that through such marriage the greater carnal sins might be avoided; and even though he did not rightly understand God's will in this matter, nonetheless that same archbishop was still a friend of God. But now I shall tell you God's will in this matter; for I gave birth to God himself. You will make these things known to my bishop and say to him that circumcision was given to Abraham long before the law was given to Moses and that, in that time of Abraham, all human beings whatsoever were guided according to their own intellect and according to the choice of their own will and that, nevertheless, many of them were then friends of God. But after the law was given to Moses, it then pleased God more that human beings should live under the law and according to the law rather than follow their own human understanding and choice. It was the same with my Son's blessed Body. For after he instituted in the world this new sacrament of the eucharist and ascended into heaven, the ancient law was then still kept: namely, that Christian priests lived in carnal matrimony. And, nonetheless, many of them were still friends of God because they believed with simple purity that this was pleasing to God: namely, that Christian priests should have wives and live in wedlock just as, in the ancient times of the Jews, this had pleased him in the case of Jewish priests. And so, this was the observance of Christian priests for many years. But that observance and ancient custom seemed very abominable and hateful to all the heavenly court and to me, who gave birth to his body: namely, because it was being thus observed by Christian priests who, with their hands, touch and handle this new and immaculate Sacrament of the most holy Body of my Son. For the Jews had, in the ancient law of the Old Testament, a shadow, i.e., a figure, of this Sacrament; but Christians now have the truth itself - namely, him who is true God an man - in that blessed and consecrated bread. After those earlier Christian priests had observed these practices for a time, God himself, through the infusion of his Holy Spirit, put into the heart of the pope then guiding the Church another law more acceptable and pleasing to him in this matter: namely, by pouring this infusion into the heart of the pope so that he established a statute in the universal Church that Christian priests, who have so holy and so worthy an office, namely, of consecrating this precious Sacrament, should by no means live in the easily contaminated, carnal delight of marriage. And therefore, through God's preordinance and his judgment, it has been justly ordained that priests who do not live in chastity and continence of the flesh are cursed and excommunicated before God and deserve to be deprived of their priestly office. But still, if they truthfully amend their lives with the true purpose of not sinning further, they will obtain mercy from God. Know this too: that if some pope concedes to priests a license to contract carnal marriage, God will condemn him to a sentence as great, in a spiritual way, as that which the law justly inflicts in a corporeal way on a man who has transgressed so gravely that he must have his eyes gouged out, his tongue and lips, nose and ears cut off, his hands and feet amputated, all his body's blood spilled out to grow completely cold, and finally, his whole bloodless corpse cast out to be devoured by dogs and other wild beasts. Similar things would truly happen in a spiritual way to that pope who were to go against the aforementioned preordinance and will of God and concede to priests such a license to contract marriage. For that same pope would be totally deprived by God of his spiritual sight and hearing, and of his spiritual words and deeds. All his spiritual wisdom would grow completely cold; and finally, after his death, his soul would be cast out to be tortured eternally in hell so that there it might become the food of demons everlastingly and without end. Yes, even if Saint Gregory the Pope had made this statute, in the aforesaid sentence he would never have obtained mercy from God if he had not humbly revoked his statute before his death."
More and more I look on Pope Francis and what is going on in the Church in dumbstruck horror. It is like some endless nightmare from which we never awaken. I honestly often think to myself these days, 'This can't really be happening. I must be imagining all this!'. It wouldn't be so bad if more Bishops and Cardinals spoke out. A few are of course. More and more of them as times goes on. So I suppose there is hope in this. Praying for Our Holy Father at Mass and for all Clergy and Our Dear Holy Mother the Church. I have more nor less given up complaining. The house is on fire and burning down all around us. Praying for the Good God to send us some Fire Trucks. Soon as.
Another pope can take up priestly celibacy issue, says Francis https://aleteia.org/2023/03/14/another-pope-can-take-up-priestly-celibacy-issue-says-francis/
Who knows what he'll get up to? I don't think he even knows himself. It depends what side of the bed he gets out of in the morning.
Yes, he pulled back after putting the idea out there and leaves it to a future pope to revisit it. From a college of cardinals that he has selected. We must pray much for our priests.
in fact he has unfortunately done something worse than if he had supported the end of celibacy since in the same interview he reduced hell to a state of mind and even hinted that the traitor Judas was saved.
—¿Cuál es su propia interpretación del infierno y del paraíso? ¿Y qué les pasa a las personas que van al infierno y qué a las que van al paraíso? —El infierno no es un lugar, si uno va a asistir al Juicio final, y ve las caras de los que van al infierno, se asusta. Si uno lee a Dante, se asusta. Pero son representaciones mediáticas. El infierno es un estado, hay gente que vive en un infierno continuamente. Esto no lo digo por la gente que sufre, el pueblo que sufre, sino por aquellos que se hacen un mundo de autorreferencialidad mal o enfermizo, y terminan viviendo en un infierno. El infierno es un estado, es un estado del corazón, del alma, de una postura frente a la vida, a los valores, a la familia, a todo. Hay gente que vive en un infierno porque se lo busca, hay otros que no, que son sufridos. ¿Y quién va al infierno, a ese infierno, a ese estado? Ya se va viviendo desde aquí. Si usted me pregunta cuánta gente hay en el infierno, yo le contesto con una escultura famosa de la catedral de Deslé, no sé si del siglo XI o siglo IX, sur de Francia, hay un capitel famoso, las columnas tienen capiteles, que era un modo de catequizar en aquella época a través de la pintura y la escultura. Y el capitel ese tiene a Judas ahorcado y el diablo tirando para abajo, y del otro lado tienen al Buen Pastor, a Jesús que agarra a Judas y se lo lleva a babucha con una sonrisa irónica. ¿Qué quiere decir eso? Que la salvación es más fuerte que la condenación. Ese capitel es una catequesis que nos tiene que hacer pensar. La misericordia de Dios está siempre a nuestro lado, y lo que Dios quiere es siempre estar con su gente, con sus hijos y no que se le vayan. https://www.perfil.com/noticias/per...con-las-finanzas-por-jorge-fontevecchia.phtml https://www.prophecynewswatch.com/article.cfm?recent_news_id=5964
Father Riccardo Lombardi, an author, in the interview when he asked her about the possibility of an empty hell, Sister Lucia told him, “No Father, many are in hell.”
what caught my attention is that Francis made this statement in an open interview with the transcript available so it is not possible for the Vatican to deny what he said as in the interview with scalfari in 2018; could it be that with the death of benedict xvi he no longer cares about speaking openly against catholic dogmas?
Hell is a reality and eternal damnation is a self-inflicted punishment, Pope John Paul II told pilgrims attending his weekly general audience Wednesday. “Hell is not a punishment imposed externally by God, but the condition resulting from attitudes and actions which people adopt in this life,” the Roman Catholic pontiff said. “It is the ultimate consequence of sin itself.” “Hell exists, not as a place but as a state, a way of being of the person who suffers the pain of the deprivation of God,” read the editorial in the journal. Speaking in similar terms, the pope told the 8,500 pilgrims attending his audience that “more than a physical place, hell is the state of those who freely and definitively separate themselves from God, the source of all life and joy.” “So eternal damnation is not God’s work but is actually our own doing,” he said. Demons, he said, “are creatures who have already given a definitive ‘no’ to God. These are the spirits who rebelled against God. They serve as a warning for human beings: Eternal damnation remains a real possibility for us too.” https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1999-jul-31-me-61289-story.html
from what I understood from the quote by John Paul II he meant that it is not God who sends us to hell but ourselves with our continual rejection of the divine will, also in that same catechesis he seems to include the deprivation of God as part of hell without excluding the existence of a physical place of eternal torment; already in Francis's interview he seems to indicate that hell is empty and that even the traitor Judas was saved.
https://www.lifesitenews.com/news/p...is-a-place-says-it-is-a-posture-towards-life/ Pope Francis denies that Hell is ‘a place,’ says it is ‘a posture towards life’ The pope's latest scandalous comments contradict the teachings of the Church Fathers on the existence of Hell. VATICAN CITY (LifeSiteNews) — In an interview to mark his 10-year anniversary, Pope Francis appeared to deny the existence of Hell, saying that “is not a place” but is instead simply “a state of the heart” and “a posture towards life.” The pontiff’s comments formed part of a lengthy conversation conducted by Argentinian news site Perfil, one of a number of recent interviews the Pope granted journalists to mark his decade upon the papal throne. Touching on a number of topics he discussed with other reporters, Francis also spoke about his philosophical and theological thought, along with aspects relating to global politics. As part of the in-depth discussion, Francis was asked, “What is your own interpretation of Hell and paradise, and what happens to people who go to Hell, and what happens to those who go to paradise?” Giving a trademark lengthy, convoluted, and somewhat evasive answer, Francis appeared to deny the existence of Hell as an actual place. “Hell is not a place,” he said. “If one goes to attend the Last Judgment, and sees the faces of those who go to Hell, one gets scared. If you read Dante, you get scared. But these are media representations.” Expanding on his answer, Francis described Hell simply as “a state” — a description which appeared to refer to a state of mind. “Hell is a state, there are people who live in Hell continuously.” He clarified that he was not referring to suffering generally, but to “those who make a world of bad or sick self-referentiality, and end up living in Hell.” Hell is a state, it is a state of the heart, of the soul, of a posture towards life, towards values, towards the family, towards everything. There are people who live in Hell because they seek it, there are others who do not, who are suffering. And who goes to Hell, to that Hell, to that state? They are already living from here. Not content with appearing to deny the existence of Hell, however, Francis implied that there was no one actually in Hell — an about-turn in his argument that saw him appear to thus accept that Hell could be real. “If you ask me how many people are in Hell, I answer you with a famous sculpture of the cathedral of Vézelay,” he said. Providing a description of the sculpture, Francis noted that the sculpture “has Judas hanging and the devil pulling him down, and on the other side they have the Good Shepherd, Jesus who grabs Judas and puts him on his shoulders with an ironic smile.” “What does that mean?” he queried. “That salvation is stronger than damnation. This pilaster is a catechesis that should make us think.” “God’s mercy is always at our side, and what God wants is always to be with his people, with his children, and not for them to leave him,” he ended. His remarks echo those made in a controversial interview with atheist journalist Eugenio Scalfari, in which Scalfari claimed that Francis denied the existence of Hell and argued instead that “lost souls” were annihilated upon the death of the earthly body. The Vatican subsequently issued a process of damage control following Scalfari’s publication of the interview. At the time, Fr. Thomas Rosica, English-language assistant to the Holy See Press Office, told LifeSiteNews: “All official, final texts of the Holy Father are found on the Vatican website,” and since they were never published by the Holy See Press Office they “should not be considered official texts.” They were, said Fr. Rosica, “private discussions that took place and were never recorded by the journalist.”
Catholic teaching on existence of Hell Pope Francis earnest attempt to deny the existence of Hell, or the possibility of anyone being in it, runs in the face of the Catholic Church’s teaching on the subject. The Gospels present the words of Christ on the matter. In the parable of Lazarus and the rich man, Christ warns how the greedy and selfish rich man, who died unrepentant, “also died, and he was buried in hell.” (Luke 16:22) So also in St. Matthew’s Gospel, Christ presents the account of Judgment Day and the separation of the just from the unjust. Those who did not follow the law of God “shall go into everlasting punishment,” teaches Christ. (Matt 25:46) In yet another discourse with His disciples, Christ explained the meaning of the parable of the sower, likening it to the final days of judgement. “The Son of man shall send his angels, and they shall gather out of his kingdom all scandals, and them that work iniquity. And shall cast them into the furnace of fire; there shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth.” (Matt 13:41) READ: Yes, Hell is real, and Christians should not take it lightly In his supplement to the Summae Theologiae, St. Thomas Aquinas draws upon the teaching of Scripture to clearly outline and defend the existence of Hell. Writing about where souls are borne immediately after death, the great theologian writes: And since a place is assigned to souls in keeping with their reward or punishment, as soon as the soul is set free from the body it is either plunged into hell or soars to heaven, unless it be held back by some debt, for which its flight must needs be delayed until the soul is first of all cleansed. “This truth is attested by the manifest authority of the canonical Scriptures and the doctrine of the holy Fathers,” he continues, “wherefore the contrary must be judged heretical as stated in Dial. iv, 25, and in De Eccl. Dogm. xlvi.” Later in the same section, St. Thomas reaffirms the physical existence of Hell, drawing as always from the Fathers of the Church and Sacred Scripture. Citing St. Basil, Aquinas writes that: at the final cleansing of the world, there will be a separation of the elements: whatever is pure and noble remaining above for the glory of the blessed, and whatever is ignoble and sordid being cast down for the punishment of the damned: so that just as every creature will be to the blessed a matter of joy, so will all the elements conduce to the torture of the damned, according to Wisdom 5:21, “the whole world will fight with Him against the unwise.” This is also becoming to Divine justice, that whereas they departed from one by sin, and placed their end in material things which are many and various, so should they be tormented in many ways and from many sources. So resolutely did St. Thomas teach regarding the existence of Hell, that he outlined the manner in which the tormenting fire – of which the Scriptures speak – would be real. “However, whatever we may say of the fire that torments the separated souls, we must admit that the fire which will torment the bodies of the damned after the resurrection is corporeal, since one cannot fittingly apply a punishment to a body unless that punishment itself be bodily.” Aquinas further cites the teaching of Pope St. Gregory along with that of St. Augustine to support his writing. In comments provided to LifeSiteNews, catechist and author Deacon Nick Donnelly highlighted the importance of teaching the physical existence of Hell, since doing so “upholds the objective reality of God’s Justice.” “When our Lord referred to the punishments of Hell — the eternal fire and undying worm — He described them in very physical terms, not in terms of psychological or spiritual states of mind,” said Donnelly. The Church Fathers understood Jesus’ depiction of Hell as being a literal description of a physical place. It is essential to teach the nature of Hell as a physical place because it upholds the objective reality of God’s Justice — God determines the punishment of the damned — and the objective reality of the resurrection of the body — the bodies of the damned suffer real punishments. The English cleric slated Francis’ comments on Hell as ultimately being an “example of his dethronement of the true God for one of his own making.” Pope Francis’ caricature of Hell as being a psychological state is yet another example of an idolatrous humanism that reduces everything to this world, as if man’s experience is the measure of God, rather than God’s eternal design and plan as being the measure of man’s destiny. Pope Francis’ offhand dismissal of our Lord’s description of the physicality of Hell is yet another example of his dethronement of the true God for one of his own making.
