https://onepeterfive.com/where-is-the-church/ Where is the Church? Steve SkojecJuly 12, 2018 0 Comments Yesterday, I asked a question on my Facebook page that has been on my mind: Does the proposition, “The Catholic Church as we know it no longer exists” seem like an overreach? I think we’ve reached a point where we have to re-define our terms. Dozens of comments later, I can’t say that I have an answer I’m satisfied with. As I explained in a followup to my post, the reason I’m asking is because of the dawning realization I’ve been coming to that reporting on this or that scandal in the Church is not simply a case of exposing corruption or documenting outliers but merely observing the day-to-day status quo. Only holiness and positive developments are outliers now. Bad stories are the norm; good stories are much harder to find. The actual Catholic Church — the one that leads people to eternal salvation and nourished countless saints — is in what appears to be a devastating retreat. Go the average traditional chapel and — if they’re an Ecclesia Dei community, at least — you’ll often hear that they just can’t pay attention to what’s going on in Rome. It’s counterproductive, they’ll tell you. And that’s probably true. But the bunker mentality leads, in a way, to isolation and atomization. Meanwhile, reports filter in about orthodox Bishops and Cardinals who have been forbidden to speak in various dioceses or who think that what is happening in Rome has become severe to the point of apostasy. Yet these same men will not allow any of these reports to be put on the record, such is the obsequiousness cultivated toward the papacy. And through it all, the laity are left perusing the headlines, trying to find the proper mental gymnastics to explain things away. Each day’s news is like a renewed assault on the Catholic sensibility. I’ll give you a taste of what I have open in my internet browser at the moment. From Phil Lawler, quoting the pseudonymous priest “Diogenes” circa 2005: The Washington Times reports that “the U.S. Catholic bishops will sidestep the issue of whether gay men should become priests at their semiannual meeting,” which began today at the Chicago Fairmont. And why, boys and girls, was it a foregone conclusion that the bishops would “sidestep” the issue? Because the question of whether gays should be ordained cannot be addressed without first addressing a considerably more explosive question: the number of bishop-disputants who are themselves gay and have a profound personal interest that there be no public examination of the connections between their sexual appetites, their convictions, and their conduct of office. Thirteen years later, as the fallout from the McCarrick scandal continues to unfold, we’re left to wonder why nothing has changed. From Rod Dreher, at The American Conservative: One former priest who left the priesthood in disgust over the constant gay sex among other priests, and the adamant refusal of his bishop — who is today a cardinal — to do anything about it, wrote me, using his name, and providing details. He says this cardinal was part of a gay clique before he became a bishop, and therefore had no reason to act on the information he (this priest) and others provided him — including information about a gay priest whose sexual crimes landed him behind bars. I’m going to ask that former priest if he’s willing to go public, and name names. I’ve heard rumors about this cardinal, but never details like this. He needs to have a #MeToo moment. From Julia Meloni, at LifeSiteNews: October’s youth synod is about finishing the old business of the St. Gallen mafia. It will mark four years since Archbishop Bruno Forte crafted a manipulated synodal report on the “precious support” found in same-sex relationships – released the very day that two Italian political parties backed homosexual unions. Pope Francis approved the text before it was published, and his homily that day excoriated” doctors of the law” – an “evil generation” – for resisting the “God of surprises.” Archbishop Forte, meanwhile, declared to the media that “describ[ing] the rights of people living in same-sex unions” is a matter of “being civilized.” From Diane Montagna, at LifeSiteNews: The demographic collapse of the West in recent decades was planned in order to create the necessary conditions to usher in a New World Order, and the authors of this collapse are now influencing the Vatican at the highest levels, the former president of the Vatican bank has said. Speaking at the first international conference of the John Paul II academy for human life and the family, Italian economist and banker Ettore Gotti Tedeschi said efforts to decrease the world’s population by globalist elites have set in motion a series of predictable and intended economic, geo-political, and social catastrophes meant to “persuade” people around the world to accept a global “political vision” that would eliminate national sovereignty and institute “gnostic environmentalism” as its “universal religion.” […] According to Gotti Tedeschi, the “greatest enemy” of the New World Order is the family because it provides “education, autonomy and independence” from the state. Its second enemy is the Catholic Church, he said, and yet these gnostic prophets are “rewriting genesis in the halls of the Vatican.” From Dorothy Cummings McLean, at LifeSiteNews: The Vatican has dropped a criminal investigation against Libero Milone, a Catholic layman they hired to audit their finances. This despite the fact that in September the Vatican chief of police, Domenico Giani, told Reuters that there was “overwhelming evidence” against the former Auditor General. Now, however, Edward Pentin of the National Catholic Register has reported that “the separate inquiry conducted by the Vatican promoter of justice with Milone’s lawyers came to the conclusion that no evidence existed to support the accusations that had been lodged against him.” Pentin also cited an unnamed source who had told the Register on July 5 that Milone had “apparent apparently stumbled upon certain and clear abuses of funds, and they could no longer wait to remove him.” How about this, from Matthew Cullinan Hoffman, also at LifeSiteNews? A group of Catholic clergy and theologians, including two bishops, have signed an ecumenical declaration with Anglican clergy published on the Vatican website that affirms the possibility that the Catholic Church might create a “female diaconate” in the future, which would imply a contradiction of Catechism of the Catholic Church and the Church’s 2000-year tradition. Con’t
Con’t Or this, from Andrea Tornielli at Vatican Insider, confirming (in my mind anyway) a report we made last year about the re-visitation of Humanae Vitae in the hopes of finding loopholes: Paul VI, in October 1967, during the first Synod of Bishops held in the Vatican, had the Cardinal Secretary of State ask for an opinion on contraception in view of the publication of the encyclical. Only 26 of the 200 bishops present produced a written response. Of these, most said they were in favor of some opening to the pill, while 7 were against. But Pope Montini, who had already removed the subject from the Council discussion and had listened to the opinions of a commission of experts (the majority of whom were in favor), did not believe that there was any reason to change the position held up to that moment by his predecessors and promulgated a few months after his Humanae vitae, which came out in July – fifty years ago – lacking however the chrism of infallibility, as some would have liked. This is one of the new elements that emerges from the research of Monsignor Gilfredo Marengo, author of the book “La nascita di un’enciclica. Humanae vitae alla luce degli Archivi Vaticaniˮ (Birth of an encyclical. Humanae vitae in the light of the Vatican Archives) published by Libreria Editrice Vaticana; a search in the light of never consulted before documents, which allowed to reconstruct the genesis of the encyclical, its various drafts, the corrections made by Paul VI. […] The news of the Pope’s desire to consult all the members of the synodal assembly is very important – Marengo points out- because one of the most repeated accusations, after the publication of Humanae vitae, was that the Pope had decided in solitude, in a non- collegial way”. Perhaps most striking, among the assortment of stories in front of me, are the words of Michael Brendan Dougherty, who writes in the pages of National Review: There is an undeniable psychological tension between my religious belief that I cannot have hope for salvation outside the visible, institutional Church and my honest conviction that of all the institutions and societies that intersect with my life, the Church is by far the most corrupt, the most morally lax, the most disillusioning, and the most dangerous for my children. In that tension, personal prayer will dry up like dew at noon. [emphasis added] This cross-section of ecclesiastical news, and the reaction to it, is far from comprehensive, but it tells us a great deal. In the Facebook discussion, some mentioned the notion of a faithful “remnant”, as so often comes up in conversations like these. My response was to say: talking in vague terms about a Remnant is fine, but what does that mean? Where is it? How does that play out in the lives and families of those trying to simply stay on the path to salvation? How do we raise kids in this without them becoming bitter or giving up on what seems a quixotic refusal to let go of something dying? How do we boil down what the Church truly is, in her essence, and separate that from what we get in almost every parish we walk into? Just saying “I’m Catholic” could mean virtually anything in 2018, and that’s a problem for us. So I ask again: where is the Church? What does it consist of when 95% of parishes and bishops and priests and laity are actually not, in any substantive sense, Catholic? What does it mean when the handful of orthodox bishops in the Church — those very few who give us hope — would prefer to endure unjust persecution rather than stand their ground and fight on behalf of the faithful? I think paring down the bloat and getting to the lifeblood of what the Church is, and where we find it, is actually where people are going to find some hope. It may feel like going through the motions for a while. But as Michael Dougherty also writes: Where do I find hope? I find it in the faces of other young Catholics. The families at my parish who make real sacrifices for the Faith. I find it in the young writers such as Sohrab Ahmari , B. D. McClay, and Matthew Schmitz who still convert and fall in love as I did. … Even if sometimes my personal piety dries into dust and nothingness, the bell rings at Mass, my knee drops to the floor, and if nothing else, this gesture testifies objectively to the reality that Christ is present in the Eucharist, that Christ is Lord. Hopefully for now, that’s all I need to know. This, as the interminable winter in the Church stretches on, is where I think more of our time could be well spent. Preserving the beloved things. Finding green shoots poking up through the ice. Reminding each other that despite all appearances, hope is not lost. I plan to dedicate more of my time in the coming months to such pursuits. I will spend more time with books. I will attempt to find more time for prayer, and in gratitude. I will seek out the true, the good, and the beautiful. I will, I hope, find a way to recharge somewhat, and seek healing for my battle-weary soul. This means that you may see a bit less of me here for a while, or that my contributions will take different forms, as I seek to prioritize quality over quantity. In the mean time, the work we do here will continue with the help of those capable soldiers ready to carry the standard. We know that the Church continues, but she is being reduced to a fraction of what she once was. This is a hard truth, but one we must come to terms with. What choice have we but to press on? Where is the Church? Its treasures are scattered, but they are present in those who hold to and keep the faith. We need to find each other in the darkness, and gather our light. “Lord, to whom shall we go? thou hast the words of eternal life.” (John 6:69)
The Church is desolate. I think the figure the article cites of only about 5% of "Catholics" are truly practicing Catholics is sadly probably pretty accurate. This is the worst period in Church history by far. The only thing close to it was the Arian heresy when 90-95% of the hierarchy were heretics, but at that time at least the laity didn't lose the faith for the most part. Today probably about 95% of ALL the laity and clergy have lost the faith. That means the Remnant is probably only about 60 million or so in the whole world. That is 60 million out of 7.6 billion. We are a small fraction. Worse yet we are not unified, but splintered into small isolated groups and even individuals. What we need is a leader. We are ready to act, but we don't know what to do. For the most part we are not clergy, theologians or canon lawyers. We have no authority in the Church. We are teachers, housewives, shopkeepers, and nurses. We are ready to do our part but we need unity. We need someone to step up and raise the banner. God please raise us up a leader.
http://www.theamericanconservative.com/dreher/steve-skojec-catholic-benedict-option/ Steve Skojec’s Benedict Option By Rod Dreher • July 13, 2018, 10:18 AM Steve Skojec (One Peter Five screenshot) The orthodox Catholic blogger Steve Skojec is in crisis. In the Facebook discussion, some mentioned the notion of a faithful “remnant”, as so often comes up in conversations like these. My response was to say: talking in vague terms about a Remnant is fine, but what does that mean? Where is it? How does that play out in the lives and families of those trying to simply stay on the path to salvation? How do we raise kids in this without them becoming bitter or giving up on what seems a quixotic refusal to let go of something dying? How do we boil down what the Church truly is, in her essence, and separate that from what we get in almost every parish we walk into? Just saying “I’m Catholic” could mean virtually anything in 2018, and that’s a problem for us. So I ask again: where is the Church? What does it consist of when 95% of parishes and bishops and priests and laity are actually not, in any substantive sense, Catholic? What does it mean when the handful of orthodox bishops in the Church — those very few who give us hope — would prefer to endure unjust persecution rather than stand their ground and fight on behalf of the faithful? I think paring down the bloat and getting to the lifeblood of what the Church is, and where we find it, is actually where people are going to find some hope. More: This, as the interminable winter in the Church stretches on, is where I think more of our time could be well spent. Preserving the beloved things. Finding green shoots poking up through the ice. Reminding each other that despite all appearances, hope is not lost. I plan to dedicate more of my time in the coming months to such pursuits. I will spend more time with books. I will attempt to find more time for prayer, and in gratitude. I will seek out the true, the good, and the beautiful. I will, I hope, find a way to recharge somewhat, and seek healing for my battle-weary soul. Read the whole thing. It sounds to me like this weary pilgrim has found his way to The Benedict Option. Remember that Father Cassian Folsom, the founding prior of the monastery at Norcia, told me that Christians who don’t undertake some version of it, à la the Tipi Loschi community of San Benedetto del Tronto, are not going to have what it takes to make it through the coming darkness with their faith intact. Check out the site Steve runs, One Peter Five. He posted this video there a week ago. Hard stuff. NSFW, incidentally. This is what it looks like when an ordinary Catholic dad gets fed up: UPDATE: Good grief, people, I don’t know that Skojec’s “95 percent” estimate is accurate. I assume it’s overstated for rhetorical effect. But if that’s what you’re focusing on, and ignoring the entirely of his critique, you are straining at gnats and swallowing camels. And if you think the things he’s talking about are limited to the Catholic Church, you’re dreaming. Hope is not optimism, and it can’t be built on sentimentality, whether of the progressive or conservative sort. “Charity is hard, and endures,” said Flannery O’Connor. I think this is also true about hope. I don’t know Skojec personally, but it seems to me that he has reached a point at which he has stopped expecting to be rescued by institutional leaders. He has stopped thinking that criticizing is going to do much effective good. Instead, he is going to work hard to nurture the green shoots, and to focus on prayer, and on finding and cultivating the good, the true, and the beautiful. Why is this not the right thing to do? He’s not doing this because he’s giving up on his Catholic faith. He’s doing this because he wants to save it. All of us — including us non-Catholics — can learn from this. Again, I don’t know Steve Skojec, but he seems to be where I was in 2005 as a Catholic. What’s he’s saying that he’s choosing to do now is the right thing to do if he wants to save his Catholic faith. If I had done it, I might still be Catholic … but then I wouldn’t be Orthodox, for which I am grateful. I had to learn early in my Orthodoxy, after a bad mistake, that I cannot allow myself to get drawn into intra-Orthodox church fights, or allow myself to trust institutions more than I have to. UPDATE.2: I gotta note something. At the same time I’m having Catholic commenters in this thread griping at me for posting something from the horrible, terrible, no-good Steve Skojec, and yelling at me for causing Catholics to lose their faith, I’m getting — seriously, it just came into my e-mail box — a letter from a parish priest in a troubled archdiocese, thanking me for writing about this stuff (especially the Uncle Ted story), and telling in detail, naming names, about how Uncle Ted-dism (gay clerics in positions of real and lasting power) has devastated his archdiocese. Here’s what I think: sooner or later, all Catholics (and all Christians to some degree) who wish to be honest are going to have to face the kinds of things Steve Skojec is facing, and figure out how to continue in the face of those hideous truths. You can avoid it, but doing so means turning your eyes away from some unpleasant truths. Doing so, though, means you aren’t preparing yourself or your children to live in the post-Christian world as it actually is. Our kids aren’t going to stay Christian if all we give them is the religion of relentless suburban cheer, including turning our eyes away from the things that distress us.
It is very sad that Mr. Dreher thinks that he has found a solution by jumping out of the Barque. As bad as things are in the Catholic Church right now there is nowhere else to go. Christ founded One Church. Not many. When the lashes of the Passion start to hit us we are not supposed to run from them.
He was a convert TO Catholicism not long before he LEFT it, so I’m not really concerned about his opinions either way.
The thing is, the evils hurting the Catholic Church have begun to seep slowly into Eastern Orthodoxy in the past couple of years. That is sad, but true. They go pretty well unchecked by the EO metropolitans and bishops, too. If these folks leave the Church for the EO churches in maybe a decade or so, they'll find the same disgusting toxin polluting the waters there, too, and leading souls astray. Most of Protestantism has compromised. Conservative Protestants don't have too many options any more. It's a mess out there, too. I think it really does come down to issues of salvation. How are we saved? Must we give up every sin, even if those sins make us feel like better people? Or "more alive"? Can't God be more understanding? Can't God be more compassionate? Maybe He has been all along, and we just never saw it? Maybe there is no Hell? And on and on and on, and narry a corner of Christiandom will come out the other side. It is so, so hard, but we have to keep going. That is why the Catholic crucifix just enthralls me. It reminds us where our salvation is. Cucified, not alive, leaping, and happy, but dying again and again and fighting the will to do our own will, and getting squeezed and squeezed. Yes, Christ founded one Church. Not multiple, ethnic or national churches with debatable autocephalacy and permissions to divorce and remarry. Yes, there are awesome and Godly Orthodox Christians, too. But we are all so much safer in the Barque of Peter! Neither did Christ found thousands of splintered, heretical little sects who can not agree on the simplest things. And again, there are awesome, Godly Protestants out there, too, genuine fighters and saints. Good for them! We have much in common with them, morally and spiritually. But we are all so much better off and safer in the Barque of Peter. And still we have to pray. And realize a thousand times a day how much danger we are in of falling out. Or else we will.
"That is why the Catholic crucifix just enthralls me. It reminds us where our salvation is. Cucified, not alive, leaping, and happy, but dying again and again and fighting the will to do our own will, and getting squeezed and squeezed." Gracia, Thank you for this thought. Beautifully said and very appropriate for me today. Sometimes I get so tired fighting the daily fight, especially with the Church. The Lord used your words to remind me of my weakness.
I get massively tired, too. It happens. Just keep going! If we are fighting our will, we're probably doing the right thing.
Yes. I concur. Hauling a cross that God has provided does get heavier as we go. I’m feeling it. For me the best way to describe it is the spiritual oxygen is getting thin. It is much harder to breathe.
To the fundamental question; "Where is the Church?" Surely we all know the Head of the Church is Jesus Christ, Who is risen from the dead and ascended to Heaven, where He is seated at the right hand of God the Father. And it is my conviction and belief that we the Baptised and Confirmed are by the Power of the Holy Spirit, the Mystical body of Christ here in exile. Before we judge who is or who is not part of the Mystical Body of Christ, we ought to remember that Jesus Christ saw every sinful thought, word, deed or omission that would ever be perpetrated by every living soul from Adam to the last man, when He was in the Garden of Gethsemani. Jesus was prepared to suffer every torment and agony inflicted on Him at the hands of man; during His Passion and Crucifixion to save US sinners. He never said He came to save the just or the remnant, He did say He came to save sinners. I have to believe Jesus, or we are all doomed. The Irony and mystery remains that the greatest sinners are the ones Merciful Jesus most wants to save. So now look at the gay mafia in our very own beloved Mother Church...I honestly fear these souls must be the most obnoxious, filthy, walking devils on the face of the planet; but who am I to judge. And to think this same human vomit and excrement can hold the helpless Glorified Person of the Man God in their filthy defiled hands at the Altar during Holy Mass simply defies human logic. But Jesus did not opt out when it came to offering the Sacrifice of Atonement for all souls including this modern brood of vipers, whitewashed exteriors full of rotten dead mens bones. The stench of these diabolically possessed men must be causing God to vomit. I become more and more convinced Jesus gave us the Chaplet of Divine Mercy precisely for these times when we would by the grace of God be made aware of the corruption that seems to have been festering even within Mother Church for at least a hundred years. God help us to stay calm, Keep Watch and Pray. IMHO Global warming...my but. No wonder the economies and weather girations are so unstable. Remember the old saying; When Man rebels against God. Nature rebels against Man. And our duty as foot soldiers in Christ are prayer and intercession, unless we are raised to a position of authority; when we should take the example of men like Cardinal Burk or members of government like Jacob Rees Mogg in Somerset UK. Defend the traditions and Faith of our fathers. That I believe is the only way to remain in peace and tranquillity no matter how bad the storm or crisis gets.
What you say is where we are at. The worst time in the history of the Church, one could argue, could be the be the Protestant revolution, as it split the body of Christ form the one, holy, catholic and apostolic faith. It brought about all kinds of heresies that many Catholics today embrace and are fine with it. Mortal sin is not so defined in the protestant faith. Missing church on Sunday is not a mortal or deadly sin. Protestantism is relativism at its best. It is a pick and choose doctrine of well over 55,000 denominations and this is the travesty now being displayed within the Catholic church. Pick and choose. A church of nice, as church of situation ethics, a church of relativism, which Pope Benedict defined as the worse heresy of our times. Many messages from heaven tell us we are living in worse times than Noah's, the worst time in the history of the world. Luke 17: [26] And as it came to pass in the days of Noe, so shall it be also in the days of the Son of man. [27] They did eat and drink, they married wives, and were given in marriage, until the day that Noe entered into the ark: and the flood came and destroyed them all. [28] Likewise as it came to pass, in the days of Lot: they did eat and drink, they bought and sold, they planted and built. [29] And in the day that Lot went out of Sodom, it rained fire and brimstone from heaven, and destroyed them all. [30] Even thus shall it be in the day when the Son of man shall be revealed. We have scripture that forewarned us of these times we are in and we are not to loose heart, but dig in a pray all the more. Do penance all the more. Our salvation is at hand. This is the era of the greatest saints in the making!
An insightful post, Julia, on the incomparable Mercy of God! Thank you! Not to minimize the horrific sins now publicly known, but I'm always reminded that to those to whom much has been given, much is expected. I need look no further than the end of my own nose. Lord Jesus, never allow me to become smug or complacent! For the sake of His sorrowful Passion, have mercy on us and on the whole world! O Mary conceived without sin, pray for us who have recourse to thee!
