De Omnibus Dubitandum Est.

Good heavens! I could hardly believe my ears when I watched this edition of Russell Brand's The Trews in which he rants about the popularity of the newly released film of the notorious book Fifty Shades of Grey. One has to wonder if the long-haired-lothario has been secretly reading Pope St. John Paul II's Theology of the Body lectures? Certainly, many of the ideas he articulates here are straight from Church teaching and he mentions a priest who said that porn affects us not because it shows too much, but because it shows too little. In other words, it removes sex from its proper context, i.e. a mutual respectful, loving relationship. Porn effects the way adults relate to each other and the reality of our sexuality which is ultimately—factuality—scientifically—about pro-creation. Porn removes the essential context of our humanity and reduces it to image or idea. In reality, intimacy is about building a consensual, respectful relationship where we share each other in an i...

Being a Bishop means leading from the front, it means being a visible sign, both of Christ and of Catholic unity. Leading people has always meant living up to the principles and ideals you want to inspire in others. Here is a man who is doing that. Here is a man who is not afraid to pick up his Cross and follow Christ. Here is a man who knows that he must face vitriol and attack in order that Christ might live in the Archdiocese he is responsible for. Salvatore Joseph Cordileone (born June 5, 1956) is an American prelate of the Roman Catholic Church and the archbishop of San Francisco, California. He is notable for being unflinchingly, unequivocally, courageously Catholic. He is utterly fearless . He lives up to his Italian surname Cor di leone , which means " heart of lion " and is renowned for outspoken opposition to same-sex civil marriage and LGBT life-styles. He is chairman of the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops' Subcommittee for the Defense of M...

Books? What books? I haven't seen any books. Look, I'm sorry, I have no idea what you're talking about. A really shocking story broke late last night which presents further evidence that there is a real attempt underway at the Vatican to manipulate the Synod process. Edward Pentin, a very well respected journalist probably most well known for recording Cardinal Kasper's dodgy comments about African prelates last year , broke the story that a Vatican department allegedly intercepted over a hundred copies of a new book written by five cardinals in order to prevent it being read by the majority of participants of the synod last October called by Pope Francis. The book called Remaining in the Truth of Christ , is a commercially successful reaffirmation of Catholic teaching on marriage and the family. It was mailed to all the synod fathers in the Paul VI Hall, where the meeting was taking place. Pentin reports that reliable and high level sources allege the head of s...

Some great news from Malta. Bishop Charles Scicluna is to be named Archbishop of Malta on Friday. Bishop Scicluna was Cardinal Ratzinger's right hand man at the CDF. The Archbishop of Malta has recently resigned on grounds of ill health and Bishop Scicluna will become the new Archbishop.  He served from 2002 to 2012 as Promoter of Justice in the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith – that is, as the Vatican's public prosecutor – personally handling the sex abuses crises of 2002 and 2010 and carrying forward the ‘zero tolerance’ line wanted by St. John Paul II and Benedict XVI to tackle the issue. His job was to investigate what are known as  delicta graviora ; i.e., the crimes which the Catholic Church considers as being the most serious of all: crimes against the Eucharist and against the sanctity of the Sacrament of Penance, and crimes against the sixth Commandment ("thou shall not commit impure acts") committed by a cleric against a person unde...

Father Ed Tomlinson writes: One of the treasures of the Ordinariate of Our Lady of Walsingham is undoubtedly the scholarly figure of Father John Hunwicke. A most English of clerics who combines gentle demeanour and razor sharp mind with a twinkle in the eye and a clear delight for mischief. This is a man whose impressive intellect enables him to help people think things through. At present Father Hunwicke, a former chaplain of Lancing College, is at Silverstream Priory where he is the guest speaker. I am delighted that his speech on the Ordinariates has  been made available in public  and I wholeheartedly commend it to you. Make yourself a cuppa and settle down. It is worth it.

This is the Pastoral Letter from Brentwood's Bishop Alan Williams which was read out on Sunday: We have now begun the great journey of Lent. All of us, whether as catechumens preparing to enter the Church, or as experienced Catholic Christians, are called to go forward towards the Passion and Resurrection of Jesus. Lent is a grace-filled time, a sacred time; a time for conversion and a time for change. In today’s Gospel on this first Sunday of Lent we hear that Jesus went into the wilderness for forty days where he struggled with temptation and the extremes of the desert. This example of Jesus had a profound effect on the early Church when many Christians followed Jesus into the desert and it was in the desert that the first flowerings of Christian monasticism were found. These brothers and sisters consecrated themselves to God and embraced the struggle alongside Christ. In the desert, “human life is precarious, indeed almost impossible… the only living things are thorns...

Fr. Thomas Rosica, CEO of Sue & Litigate Salt & Light TV and English Speaking Assistant to Fr. Lombardi at the Vatican states baldly in his speech as part of Assumption University's Christian Culture Lecture Series, that doctrine changes (as reported earlier; full transcript here ). This flies in the face of basic theology, for the Catholic faith is a revealed faith grounded in a deposit given to us by Jesus and the Apostles. This is what we mean when we say it is "Apostolic". Doctrine cannot change. The fundamental Doctrine of God have not. They CAN NOT. These are the blueprints of what it means to be human. We mess with this, we become sub-human. The Decalogue was a start, then Jesus came to fulfill that Law - which is not one of petty legalistic 'small-minded rules' - but the means of enlarging our hearts to be made ' capax dei '. The well-known pseudonymous commentator Augustine has contacted me with the following comments: Compare...

Further to the revelations regarding Fr. Thomas Rosica's legal threat to a Catholic Blogger , here are some more details to consider. I have written and posted this because I believe this is very important. It is important because it reveals a very dangerous agenda in the light of the forthcoming Synod - which is what many people have suspected - namely that what Rosica and his fellow travellers are planning is a change in doctrine and morals (and not "mere pastoral practice"). If that is so, then this needs to go global. Wikipedia on the Fr Thomas Rosica affair (emphasis mine): "In the document issued from Folger, Rubinoff LLP, Domet is accused of having made false and defamatory statements about Rosica. David Domet has been critical of the outspoken and progressive positions of Fr. Thomas Rosica on church affairs. If a lawsuit does come to fruition, it would be an unprecedented action for a Vatican official to bring litigious action against a private ci...

I couldn't help but wonder over the bizarre news over the last few days about Fr. Thomas Rosica , the Vatican spokesman & CEO of Canadian Salt & Light TV , who seems unable to avoid embroiling himself in what can best be described as embarrassing polemics. A full explanation of what's going on here from Michael Voris: It is a bit shocking that a Vatican official would engage on this level and make a legal threat against a small part-time blogger who wants to defend Church teaching. Especially in the light of the Pope's call to engage in a "no-holds barred debate" regarding the controversial issues raised by the Synod last year regarding homosexuality and communion for divorced and married Catholics, as reported in the mid-term relatio document which read like nothing I've ever seen out of the Church before in my life! It could make you think that the no-holds barred debate is only allowed if you are challenging what the Church holds and tea...

This is the address given by Mgr Mark Langham to the Ordinariate Clergy Plenary on Thursday 12th February. The Catholic Chaplain to Cambridge University said that the Ordinariate is "a model of realised unity" and urged the personal ordinariates for former Anglicans to continue in their exemplary witness to "prophetic" and "truthful" ecumenism. It strikes me as a quite remarkable and positive explanation of the ecumenical importance of the Apostolic Constitution particularly from a former official at the Anglican and Methodist Dialogues at the Pontifical Council for Promoting Christian Unity. Describing the current rifts within Anglicanism, in which some Anglican bishops "refuse to accept the authority of [other] Anglican bishops... and declare themselves out of communion with them", Mgr Langham said that both "consistency" and "communion" are "essential qualities of ecumenism." They are concepts that "....