De Omnibus Dubitandum Est.

The Royal Wedding sermon did some real good: it gave us a base line for what it completely vapid and useless. I love Gavin Ashenden I truly do. He is gentle and softly spoken, but quite prepared to identify problems and those who contradict what is good and true and right. He has utter conviction & is able to articulate with absolute clarity what he is passionate about & why! This is what a bishop should be: a teacher, someone utterly committed to Christ and prepared to explain what that means in today's mad world!

Athanasius Schneider, O.R.C. Auxiliary Bishop of Astana, Kazakhstan Recorded 26 May 2018 at the pilgrimage of the "National Association of Catholic Families" to Walsingham, England, a few hours before the official outcome of the Irish referendum on abortion

*SIGH* This was last week's big scandal which I sort of covered here . As reported in ALL the secular press, here in The Tablet , every Chilean bishop has offered his resignation to Pope Francis after a series of closed-door meetings with all 34 bishops at the Vatican this week, to discuss the abuse crisis in the country. The dramatic announcement followed the leaking of a 10-page letter to television channel T13, reportedly handed to the bishops at the start of this week’s discussions, in which Francis said removing bishops may be needed but would not be sufficient to solve the abuse crisis in Chile. In the letter Francis cites clericalist, elitist and authoritarian attitudes dominating in the Church and an urgent need to put Christ back at the “ecclesial centre”. "It would be irresponsible on our part not to delve into looking for the roots and the structures that allowed these [abuses] to happen and to be perpetuated,” the Latin American Pope explained. ...

On Wednesday Damon Linker in The Week proposed that Pope Francis is "effectively promulgating two truths". He rightly asserts that Pope Francis is implicitly affirming the official doctrine while subtly undermining it with a less stringent pastoral teaching. Instead of seeking to change the underlying rules, which would risk divisiveness and even schism, he shows that it's perfectly alright for a priest or layperson to diverge from or ignore the rule in the name of welcoming as many people as possible to Christ's church. Linker reckons that Pope Francis is playing a very craft long game to change doctrine: But I think the pope's strategy for a longer game displays greater psychological acuity — and Machiavellian cunning. Francis may be betting that once the church stops preaching those doctrines that conflict most severely with modern moral norms, the number of people who uphold and revere them will decline rapidly (within a generation or two). Once that h...

Louise and I are fortunate enough to be friends with this wonderful family, the Wards. Recently, Sarah was invited to Rome to receive an award for her commitment to life. She was also asked to speak to the newly formed John Paul II Academy for Human Life and the Family in Rome about her experience of being a Catholic Mother with eight children. LifeSite News have reported on it here . In her speech, Sarah explained how “Fifty years of silence” on Humanae Vitae has been “catastrophic” as she explained how reading Humanae Vitae after the birth of her second child changed the course of her life. Sarah was speaking at an Academy conference, titled Human Life, the Family, and the Splendor of Truth: Gifts of God , which focused on the topic of two crucial encyclicals of the Church, Humanae Vitae and Veritatis Splendor . Both are absolutely essential reading for any informed Catholic,  Humanae Vitae was utterly prophetic and spoke with absolute clarity about the family & t...

I have long wanted to get to Chartres for the  Paris-Chartres Pilgrimage , which occurs every year on the Feast of Pentecost in early summer, and is a multi-generational, multi-national gathering of Catholics who draw closer to God through the centuries-old act of pilgrimage. The walk is roughly 62 miles over 3 days—beginning at daybreak on the Saturday before Pentecost, and ending with an afternoon mass on the Monday after Pentecost. The trek takes approximately 8,000-15,000 pilgrims from the Cathedral of Notre Dame in Paris, through the French countryside to the Cathedral of Notre Dame in Chartres. Participants brave the weather, blisters, and humble food and accommodations as an act of faith and an act of reparation in these modern times. My good friend Counter Cultural Father does it every year and usually writes a series of blogs recounting his experiences. He hasn't posted this year's yet, but keep checking his page for updates! I am generally excluded from joi...

There's been loads of chat about the religious dimension to the Royal Wedding at the weekend. I have bucket loads of respect for Her Majesty the Queen and Prince Phillip who I see as stalwart servants of the United Kingdom & the Commonwealth, but I am unimpressed with the "woke" new generation of Royals, doing everything they can to be hip and relevant. Now we have political idealist Meghan, who seems to be a bandwagon for every progressive modern meme going. Have at look at Queen Elizabeth II if you want a feminist role model, and not a single one of us has any idea what she thinks about any political issue! That said, I wish Meghan and Harry every happiness; the kind of happiness I have experienced in my own marriage. A happiness born of respect and service and sharing good times and bad times together. A happiness found in family and struggle and occupying yourself with the job of caring for others. I thought the celebrity-filled guest-list addressed itself...

So yesterday brought another great shock as ALL the Chilean Cardinals offered to resign en masse . Some background to this can be gleaned from  this post . If you are cynically minded, you might be thinking that is rather convenient. A resignation accepted closes the narrative without full process or assignment of culpability and application of penalty, it merely allows malefactors to assume indistinct responsibility and go quietly into retirement. Pope Francis' Motu Proprio - As A loving Mother  written by the Pope and published by the Vatican on 4th June 2016 makes it clear bishops CAN be removed from office, so why is this process not being used in regard to the guilty bishops in Chile? It would lead a cynical person to consider that this could even be some sort of stage managed PR stunt. Indeed, one might think this is a way for the Chilean bishops to avoid culpability, but it also leads to bigger questions. The whole debacle is about a priest, Father Ferna...

Priests Appeal to World’s Bishops to Address ‘Pastoral Crisis’ in the Church Their plea to reaffirm the Gospel comes in response to errors in teaching which they say have their roots in ‘secular mentalities and the false moral theology of past decades.’ A group of priests has issued a plea to all the world’s bishops to “reaffirm Christ’s teaching” in the face of today’s “pastoral crisis” in the Catholic Church. Fifteen American and European clergy, including Father Gerald Murray, a frequent guest on EWTN’s The World Over program, highlight a resurgence of “gravely harmful moral errors” regarding the feasibility of living Jesus’ teachings, the nature of conscience, and the role of the Church. With measured and respectful words, A Pastoral Appeal to the Bishops for an Apostolic Reaffirmation of the Gospel expresses the hope that “much of the damage” caused by this trend “could be healed or mitigated” if bishops were to “reaffirm Jesus’ teachings and to correct those erro...