The Intentional and Malicious Infiltration of the Church by Fr. Robert Altier

 The Intentional and Malicious Infiltration of the Church

By , Fr. Robert Altier 

St. Paul tells us that we have to make the most of our opportunity because the days are evil. We aren’t just simply living in days that are evil, we are living in the days that Isaiah spoke about, the days when they will call evil good and good evil. And we have been brainwashed into thinking that evil things are okay, they’re not.

So, from this point forward, what I am about to relay is completely politically incorrect and if you have young ears that you don’t want to hear it, you may want to take a fifteen-minute walk.

In the last couple of weeks, we have heard some pretty unfortunate things. A cardinal of the Church who abused children and young men, and now in Pennsylvania the grand Jury report 301 priests violated more than a thousand children. And on top of that we have the episcopal cover-up, the word episcopal means bishops, so the cover-up by the bishops. And, it’s not just simply a cover-up, it’s an agenda.

If you’ve listened carefully, since 2002 when all this broke, the bishops keep on coming back to the same point, pedophilia, its pedophilia, it’s pedophilia, its pedophilia. No, it’s not. In fact, the John Jay institute, the group that the bishops themselves hired to look at what was going on, came back and said this is a homosexual problem. 86.6% (if I recall correctly) of all of the abuse cases were on post-pubescent males, and the bishops told them “no you go back, and you rewrite it and you say that it isn’t a homosexual problem.” So, they came back and said well 86.6% of this is all about post-pubescent males, but it’s not a homosexual problem; like really?

So, pedophilia is the violation of pre-pubescent children, less than 3% of all of these cases were pedophilia. Ephebophilia is the violation of post-pubescent children, pederasty particularly, post-pubescent males. That’s what we are dealing with here.

Now we need to make an important distinction, there are some very, very good people who struggle with a homosexual orientation. All of us struggle with different things, that doesn’t mean that we’re a bad person just because we have certain weaknesses. And the Church recognizes that that orientation is not evil, it is the activity which is evil. And so, for these men who want to live a good life and who are trying to fight against those temptations and the struggles, this is a cross. And it is a huge cross that they have to carry. In fact, you can think how much God loves these people if he allows them to carry a cross that is that big; its huge.

Now we need, as again we look at our own selves, we can say alright there are some for instance who struggle with alcohol or people who struggle with pornography, whatever. If they’re really trying to fight against those temptations these are good people with a weakness. That’s different for instance from the drug dealer, or from the guy who is making pornography, or the guy who is trafficking the women or something; those people are pigs. The guy who is struggling and trying to live a good life is a good person with a weakness. And that is the distinction that we need to keep in mind.

And so, the Church is very clear that even for men with a deep-seated homosexual tendency, that they are not to go to the seminary. That’s not because the Church is being discriminatory or hates these people, but rather because the same principle if you look at it and say: would you take somebody who is struggling with an alcohol addiction to a bar? It’s a point of temptation. We don’t allow men into women’s convents because it’s not going to be long before somebody’s going to be having problems. And that’s what the Church is looking at to say this is not good.

Go back to when I was in college seminary. I was having a conversation with another seminarian, in the midst of the conversation he looked at me and said would you ever consider taking a shower in the women’s locker room? I said certainly not. He said well why not? I said well the temptations and the problems… and he said you’re right, now you know what I have to go through when I go into a men’s locker room. I thought oh my goodness…yuck. This is why the Church says even for these good men who are struggling and trying to overcome this, we don’t want to put them in a point of temptation.

So those are not the people that we are having a problem with. The people that we are having a problem with come from two different groups and understand there is an intentional and malicious infiltration of the Church for the purpose of destroying her from within.

This is what you need to understand.

When I was in the seminary, it was one of the worst seminaries in the nation. 1983 is when our seminary was at its absolute worst; I started in ‘85. It was getting slightly better. But these people were so arrogant. I should point out when I was in the seminary if you were not homosexual or a radical feminist you were in big trouble. One of the professors actually was arrogant enough to stand up in front of the class and say “Martin Luther had the right idea, but he did it the wrong way – he left the Church. You can’t change the Church from the outside you can only change it from the inside, so we’re not leaving.”

So, these are people with an agenda. And what are the two groups? The two groups are: number one, a group of predatory homosexuals. They started their infiltration of the Church in 1924. You want to look it up? There is a book called The Homosexual Network written in 1982, so this is 20 years before all of this stuff hit. A man named Enrique Rueda looked at all of this, studied all of their own publications, (they were publishing every year the number of seminarians, priest and bishops they had), he traced it back to when they started, it began in 1924. And then five years later, in 1929, the communists began their infiltration of the priesthood and the two groups did exactly the same thing. You want to read about the communist one? There is a woman by the name of Bella Dodd who was a deep-seated communist who got out of communism and converted to the Faith. She testified before congress in 1953 and in that testimony she said that “we got the instructions from Kremlin in 1929 as to what we were to do,” and she said “we were to take the best and the brightest, the guys who were smart enough to live a double life, good looking guys who were sociable so that they would be noticed by their bishop, and they would get promoted, they would become vocation directors, they would become bishops, they would become rectors of seminaries, they would have influential positions” and she said “we were successful beyond our wildest imagination.” She said: “I am personally responsible for more than 1,200 seminarians, priests and bishops.” And in 1953 mind you, again, now they started in 1929, in 1953 she said: “we already have four cardinals in the Vatican.” That was 1953, it’s way worse today.

So, we have these two groups. If you want to read about her, she wrote a book called School of Darkness, that was published in 1954. You want to understand why all of the promotion, the propaganda, the agenda? You can go back and read another book that was written in 1932 by a man named William Foster. William Foster ran for the president of the United States in 1924, 1928 and 1932 for the Communist Party USA. In 1932 he wrote a book called Toward Soviet America. And in that book, he said “we aren’t being able to get to the Americans because of three things, their morality, their family and their patriotism.” And he said: “so the way that we are going to attack these three things is through homosexuality and radical feminism.” They have been extraordinarily successful.

So, what are we dealing with? We are dealing with a group of predatory homosexuals who became priests not to serve the Church but to destroy her from within. In this, they are at every level. There was – there is an article that just came out from the Catholic Register in which six priests from the Newark diocese were interviewed and they spoke about the homosexual network in their diocese. It’s in all of them, not just in Newark. They cover up for another, they share their victims with one another, they do all kinds of horrible things. It is so wide spread now that there is actually talk on the federal level of using the RICO laws against the Church because of this kind of nonsense that’s been going on.

And people ask, why don’t the good priests speak up? I was talking to a friend of mine the other day, he looked at me and he said: “I’ve known about this for 50 years and you’ve known about it for 40 years.” Yep, it’s about time it’s coming out. So why didn’t somebody speak up? Number one if I would have stood here even a couple of years ago would you have believed what I am telling you? Number two, who were we supposed to go to? It was at every single level all the way to the top. You wanted to be ordained a priest, you couldn’t day a word. And even as a priest you can’t.

Again, these priests that were interviewed in the Catholic Register were interviewed only because of anonymity. It required anonymity because they were afraid of what was going to happen to them if the bishops and the people at the chancery found out who it was that spoke. These people have that much power. And so, we need to realize that. So, again just to tell you a quick story about how bad things were. When I was in the seminary, they would put up their communist propaganda, I would rip it down and every time I would do that there would be an announcement “Whoever is taking the notices off the bulletin board…” When I would put up a notice that says we were going to pray the Rosary, that would get torn down immediately and there was never anything said. Now having said that, thankfully the seminary today is way, way better than it was. These young guys are not having to deal with this trash, but that was the climate at the time.

Now if we just use the McCarrick situation, since that’s been in the news, everyone is disgusted with what this man did to boys and to young men, and rightly so. But anybody, by the way, who thinks that all of this is just great – they’re such nice people and they’re no different – look at what McCarrick did: that is what predatory homosexuality looks like.

These are not nice people who are just like everybody else. But as disgusting as all that is, think about the fact that this man was in the pulpit for 50 years, he sat in the confessional, he was in the bishop’s office making decisions about priests’ lives, about diocesan finances, about the direction of the diocese and so on. He served on Vatican commissions, he was a consultant to the Vatican, he made lots of bishops. What kind of advice do you think somebody struggling with some sexual problem in the confessional would have gotten from somebody like this?

What kind of men do you think might have been elevated to be bishops by somebody like this?

You now understand why all that we get is fluff and stuff instead of good homilies? You understand why there are problems in the world that aren’t being addressed? That’s what it is about. Where is the doctrinal integrity? Where is the moral teaching? Someone that is not living it is not going to teach it. Now there are, after this grand jury report came out a few days ago from Pennsylvania, there are several more states already talking about doing their own grand jury investigation. It will probably go all over the place, so I say that to simply say there is going to be more in the news coming up.

And as sad as this is we have to recognize that it is actually something very good. It is the purification of the Church and that is going to lead ultimately to her crucifixion Not many are going to remain faithful, unfortunately. But when we look at it and say: “well if this is what is going on in the Church what are we supposed to do?” We are supposed to look at Jesus and say exactly what St. Peter said, “Lord, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life”.

Jesus founded one Church and that one Church is the only institution in the world for the salvation of souls. It was founded for that purpose and it will remain to the end of the world for that purpose.

I have spoken with a number of people in the last week or two about what’s going on, prayerful, holy people and they have all concurred on the same point – Our Lady’s work has finally begun. Praise God!

She gave the bishops 16 years to clean up this mess and they did nothing. Now we are hearing from the bishops.

Courageouspriest.com

Fatheraltier.excerptsofinri.com

Straight Talk About Gays

Straight Talk About Gays

Rev. John H. Hampsch, C.M.F.

      Among the many letters of inquiry that cross my desk almost daily was an angry letter I received recently from the mother of a gay young man. She had grieved over the discovery of her son's sexual orientation, but through a self-help group for parents of gays, she finally accepted the situation, and went even further to vent her resentment against what she mistakenly thought was "the Church'sattitude toward homosexuals." Besides her son, she had met many truly good persons who, she said were "born with this God-given sexual preference." Reminding me that "God doesn't make junk," she asked why such sexual orientation was associated with sin and the devil in many Christian sermons and articles dealing with this subject. If homosexuality is God's design for these persons, she reasoned, why should they be told to regard it as  something wrong, abnormal, or sinful? And why should they be told to substitute a heterosexual preference-if that is possible at all?

    Her letter, though full of anger, seemed well-reasoned. It deserved an answer more satisfying than a mere statement of platitudes or a naked reaffirmation of traditional Christian teaching on this matter, or an "obey-and-don't-ask-why" response. But since discussion of the morality of homosexuality, like that of abortion, birth control, etc., is often cluttered with emotional arguments and much ignorance about what the Church really teaches, I realized that my answer would probably be unavailing, no matter how well documented Scripturally , ecclesiastically or rationally. In discussion of this matter, reason and God's revelation are often forced to take a back seat. 

     Many TV talk shows, for instance, Or support groups for parents of gays that could and should provide helpful "moral" support, often provide only "immoral" support by ignoring or distorting God's laws, his holy word, and the God-supported teaching of his Church. Even some well-intentioned clergy, in their pastoral efforts to be compassionate, often unfortunately compromise God's revealed truth.

      The Church would certainly agree that "God doesn't make junk." The Church would also agree that most gays are born with same-sex orientation. Jesus seems to agree with that assertion in referring to "eunuchs born that way" (Matt. 19:12). In fact, two recent but debatable researches seem to indicate that there are brain structures unique to homosexuals; this may suggest a genetic cause (if the brain variants do not prove to be an effect) of homosexual thought and behavior .

     It amazes me that there are still so many who do not yet know that the Church has stated in countless documents (both from the Holy See and the various councils of bishops, etc.), that homosexuality as a sexual orientation, in itself, is not a sin. It is the sexual acting out of this tendency by the act of sodomy or other forms of unnatural sex that is sinful in itself. There is nothing to keep a homosexual from becoming eminently holy. Undoubtedly, of the thousands of saints, many were homosexuals, but they were either chaste or repentant homosexuals.

     The Church would also agree that God's love for the sinner is unconditional, but the application of his merciful love in granting forgiveness is not unconditional when actual sin has been committed, for God's word insists on a condition: "They should repent and turn to God and do things that would show they had repented" (Acts 26:20).

     The Church would not agree that we should downplay emphasis on sin--once it is established that the homosexual act is a sin in itself-for "everyone who sins breaks the law" (I John 3:4). Nor would the Church agree that the devil's frequent involvement in sin should be downplayed, because "the devil prowls around like a roaring lion looking for someone to devour. Resist him" (IPet. 5:8-9). To disregard the devil's involvement in human life would be to disregard the counter involvement of Christ himself, since "the very reason the Son of God appeared was to destroy the devil's works" (I John 3:8).

The Church has not only condemned "gay-bashing," but has also consistently affirmed that gays have the same human and civil rights as others. However, these sacred rights may be curtailed when the common welfare or the rights or safety of others is imperiled, just as anyone's civil rights may be curtailed under the same conditions.

Thus, a dangerous psychotic or one under drug influence, or anyone with a contagious disease may be justly confined, limiting the exercise of their rights. Likewise, homosexual couples may be justly prevented from adopting a child, for they would thus deprive the child of a normal family life. Gays who openly advocate or encourage a gay lifestyle should be prevented from teaching school children that pernicious evil, and prevented from exerting such influence on scout troops, etc. Thus, gay rights are as all-embracing as anyone's rights, but also are to be restricted-as anyone's rights-when they endanger the rights of others.

     The Church follows Paul's biblical command to "be prepared in season and out of season to correct, rebuke and encourage with great patience and careful instruction, for the time will come when men will not put up with sound doctrine. Instead, to suit their own desires (lusts ) they will gather around them a great number of teachers to say what their itching ears want to hear. They will turn their ears away from truth" (II Tim. 4:2-4). This was Mary's lament in her Medjugorje apparitions, and in other of her many recent apparitions where it is claimed that she said that the three types of sin that most offend God today are abortion, child abuse and the practice (not inclination) of homosexuality.

     Are there truly "good" gay people? Of course. I know many of them. Many are heroically living a chaste life of prayerful celibacy, many living alone, and a few in prayerful and chaste companionship. I also know many sincere gay people living asexually active gay lifestyle while ignorant of, or unconvinced of, the objective sin involved.

     This brings up another distinction that the inquiring letter neglected to take notice of (one that I explain in my book, "Glad You Asked)." As St. Thomas Aquinas and other great theologians teach, there is a distinction between the objective moral norm (God's law) and the subjective norm (conscience). A person may be sinning objectively, violating God's law, and yet be innocent subjectively by reason of an unformed or malformed but sincere conscience.

   This objectively sinful but subjectively innocent state is found among some homosexuals, abortionists, euthanasianists, cannibals, artificial birth-controllers, etc. Even many prostitutes sincerely regard their lifestyle as good, because they support their children by prostitution. Through ignorance of morality or of God's law, such persons have a retarded or unrefined conscience. St. Paul says the conscience of such persons (depending on the presence or absence of malice), can either "accuse them or excuse them. ..God will judge men's secret thoughts" in this regard" (Rom. 2:15-16).

     Meanwhile, the Church's task of evangelization includes its obligation of enlightening people by moral teachings, so that the subjective non--conscience-will conform to the objective non-God's law: "Those who sin are to be rebuked publicly, so that others may take warning" (I Tim. 5:20). "Rebuke them sharply, so that they will be sound in the faith" (Titus 1:13).

     Notice how Paul presents objective moral truth to homosexuals to correct their subjective moral blindness ("their foolish hearts were darkened"): "In sexual impurity they degraded their bodies with one another. ..exchanging natural relations for unnatural ones. ..Men abandoned natural relations with women and were inflamed with lust for one another. Men committed indecent acts with other men, and received in themselves (in their bodies) the due penalty for their perversion" (Rom. 1:21-27). (Some might conjecture that this "due penalty" in their bodies hints at threatened venereal disease;  today that is mainly AIDS, which originated among gays and,  through bisexuals, infected straight people-abetted by another sin,  drug abuse with infected needles.)

     Among the many scriptural condemnations of the practice (not orientation) of homosexuality, the book of Leviticus calls it a detestable "abomination" (18:22), for which God required Moses to apply the death penalty (20:13) to teach the Israelites effectively that homosexual acts such as sodomy entail objective (intrinsic) evil.

     The Church keeps reminding us of the distinction between the homosexual orientation and the homosexual practice or act. The abnormal sexual orientation is itself not sinful, just as the abnormal disorder of an allergy or asthma is not sinful. Homosexual orientation may be regarded morally as simply a form of deep-seated and persistent temptation, not a sin, just as a heterosexual inclination to adultery  or fornication is a temptation, not a sin-unless the person succumbs to the temptation. Just as a heterosexual person must avoid sins of fornication and adultery, so also a homosexual must avoid the sin of sodomy.

     This comparison, however, may seem to be weak. Many homosexuals (not bisexuals) regard a normal marriage relationship as repulsive, or at least totally unfulfilling. This means that to remain chaste, a gay person must remain sexually non-active, obliged to endure life-long sexual deprivation, possibly feeling "cheated" of sexual fulfillment in a kind of "forced" celibacy (unlike the voluntary celibacy of a priest or religious who finds fulfillment living a consecrated celibate life).

     But is involuntary celibacy or chastity always an unjust imposition by God or by the Church? Countless straight people are subject to the same involuntary ("forced") and often life-long sexual deprivation that is morally required of every gay person. For instance, there are many paraplegics or sexually impotent persons or low sex-drive individuals who feel "cheated" of sexual fulfillment in life. Even many married persons suffer the same "forced" sexual deprivation because their spouse is frigid or impotent, or sexually uncooperative, or chronically ill, or drunk, or emotionally repulsive, or venereally infected, etc. Also sexually deprived are countless prisoners, hostages, institutionalized inmates or patients, family-separated military personnel,  refugees, etc.-not to mention the millions of single persons who have never found a suitable spouse. If unhealed, a celibate, chaste gay  person requires no more sexual self-control than is required of  these countless millions of variously deprived straight persons.

     Of the many kinds of deprivation of normal sex, Jesus spoke of only three: "eunuchs (homosexuals) born that way," those castrated, and those choosing celibacy "for the sake of the kingdom" (Matt.19:12).

A life of freely chosen celibacy (see I Cor. 7:38.) has its special reward from God (Luke 18:29). But even involuntary celibacy is a cross that if accepted as God's will (1 Pet. 4:2 and 19), is rewarded by God. "It is better, if it is God's will, to suffer for doing good (e.g. obeying God's sex laws) than to suffer (punishment) for doing evil" (3:17).

    But what about the possibility of reversing this sexual preference? In my book, "Healing Your Family Tree," I point out that homosexuals can be cured of this "ego-distonic personality disorder ," even if it is proven to be genetic in origin. There are books on curing gays, retreat forms of therapy, psychiatric specialists in the field of orientation reversal, and at least 25 organizations, like "Exodus International," etc. founded by ex-gays, that have lead countless gays to" a new identity through Jesus. " The Catholic group of gays called COURAGE (not to be confused with morally unacceptable group of Catholics called DIGNITY ) offers tremendous help and support for Catholic homosexuals. In my own pastoral experience, almost all of those I have seen cured were ones who submitted with great humility to a deliverance prayer (not full-blown exorcism), in order to be delivered from a spirit of homosexuality. The book explains the scriptural basis for what is often an "inherited" bondage derived from ancestral sin that sometimes leaves one open to demonic intervention (not possession), which is often at the root of this disorder .

     But with or without the use of a deliverance ministry, no homosexual can be cured of this disorder without three pre-conditions: First, he or she must admit that the homosexual act is a perversion and totally "unnatural," as Paul explicitly states in several places in the first chapter of Romans. The act may seem "natural" to the individual but it must be recognized as "unnatural," i.e. not according to nature, in itself. To most people this is obvious from the most elementary study of male/female anatomy and physiology. But amazingly, the "denial syndrome" leads many gays to deny this element of unnaturalness in the homosexual act itself.

     Second, the gay person must admit that any homosexual act in itself is intrinsically immoral. There are several forms of unnatural sexual sin among gays and lesbians (Rom. 1 :26), the most common form of which is the sin of sodomy, detestable to God. In the Bible, this sin is often condemned, and is described as "the sexual immorality and perversion of Sodom and Gomorrah punished by God" (Jude, verse 7). The immorality of the act, just as its unnaturalness, is obstinately denied by many gays, so "God gave them over to a depraved mind, to do what ought not to be done II (Rom.1 :28). 

At this point the devil freezes the person's thinking in this distorted understanding of sexual morality. "To suit their own lusts. ..they will turn their ears away from the truth" (II Tim. 4: Thus, the second obstacle to healing is lodged in place.

     Thirdly-and this is the biggest obstacle to a cure of the disorder-the gay person must want to become heterosexual-a nessrarity among gays. With no sincere desire for normalcy, healing of the sexual preference is impossible. However, even in the cases where this third condition (desire for normalcy) is not fulfilled, still the gay person is always free to practice chastity. (Almost every diocese has pastoral resources to support gays in this endeavor.) .Chastity is not impossible, if one is careful to avoid "proximate occasions of sin II of thought, word or deed, and exercises a prayerful reliance on Jesus for the supportive grace of God. Any gay person that cooperates with God's grace will know the truth of Paul's words: "I can do everything in him who gives me strength" (Phil. 4:13).

     I'm sure that God has a special love for gays and lesbians that sincerely struggle with their disorder; their heroic efforts are most pleasing to him. Those sincere efforts probably carry a great intercessory power to draw down grace from God, not just for themselves but also for their fellow gays struggling to live a chaste life. When they experience the special reward God has reserved for those who faithfully strive to avoid sin and live chastely, these precious ones will praise God for all eternity, aware that their struggle was worth the eternal reward-a thousand million times over!

~~-

Learning can do much good, it is true; but however much it may accomplish, experience teaches us, in the present as in the past, that moral evils never yield to any other force than the grace of God. A learned man may enlighten the minds of his fellow men, and expel their darkness and errors, but unless the grace of God touch their hearts, they will not embrace the truth.

Demise of DOMA: Pathway to ‘Gay Marriage’

Demise of DOMA: Pathway to ‘Gay Marriage’

The Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA) was signed into law by President William Clinton on September 21, 1996. DOMA was a response to the State of Hawaii’s near attempt to legalize gay marriage in 1993. In order to stop this unpopular and threatening trend, DOMA clearly defined marriage as a legal union between one man and one woman as husband and wife. Moreover, the law defended traditional marriage by asserting that each state had the right to refuse to recognize same sex marriage by any other state, and affirmed that the federal government would NOT recognize gay marriage, even if individual states choose to do so.

As just noted, the movement toward the legalization of gay marriage was markedly unpopular when DOMA was signed into law. This was evident by how quickly and overwhelmingly DOMA became the law of the land. DOMA was presented to the House of Representatives as H.R. 3396 on May 7, 1996. Two months later, on July 12 of this same year, DOMA passed through the House, 342 for and 67 against it (eighty percent of the House opposed gay marriage). On September 10, the Senate overwhelmingly supported DOMA, with 85 yeas and 14 nays opposing it (Eighty four percent of the Senate opposed gay marriage). Only eleven days later, the Act was signed into law by President Clinton.

While DOMA temporarily curbed the gay marriage movement, much has changed since then. The most recent figures show a thunderously increasing support for the legalization of gay marriage. According to the March 20, 2013 Pew Research report (Gay Marriage: Key Points from Pew Research), 49% of the population are now in favor of gay marriage and 48% are opposed to it. These results show a significant reversal over the past decade. In 2001, the data showed that 57% opposed gay marriage and only 35% supported it! Moreover, in 2001 none of the States had legalized same sex marriage. Massachusetts was the first state to break this barrier, legalizing same sex marriage on May 17, 2004, only nine years ago. Since this time, eight other States plus the District of Columbia have followed Massachusetts in granting gay couples the “right” to marry (Connecticut, Iowa, Maine, Maryland, New Hampshire, New York, Vermont, Washington).

Further fuel to the fire was added by the Obama Administration (February 2011) when they declared that they believed that DOMA was unconstitutional. In light of this, the Administration refused to defend the law in court. Moreover, President Obama publicly declared his support for the legalization of gay marriage on May 9, 2012. This is without precedent. In 2008, Obama opposed gay marriage. He claimed that his thinking has “evolved” since then and he now views gay marriage differently. Sadly, his political cohorts, such as Bill Clinton who initially supported and signed DOMA into law, have also “evolved” and become more enlightened over the past decade and a half. DOMA’s life on this planet could be a short one. In fact, oral arguments on the constitutionality of DOMA, as of March 26 of this year, are now being argued before the Supreme Court.

One thing is for sure. The legalization of gay marriage will have lethal consequences for us and the generations to come. Gay marriage strikes at the heart of the primary purpose of marriage, which is the generation, nurturing, and education of children. The begetting of offspring by a married man and a woman, as God intended, is the foundation upon which family life is built and the bedrock of a healthy, vibrant, and productive society. Legislation which weakens rather than strengthens traditional marriage will eventually lead, not only to the desolation of families, but to the destruction of society itself. God will not be mocked. Those great nations who have ignored His teachings have crumbled throughout the course of human history. The point of the preceding is that marriage between a man and woman is what God intended. This is why they were created with anatomical differences, complementing each other, and this is why He elevated marriage to the sacramental state, providing special graces to those who chose this vocation. God never taught that marriage between same sex couples was permissible. In fact, He specifically condemned sodomy and homosexual acts as “sins that cry to heaven for vengeance” — sins of impurity against nature that could NEVER be approved of by His Church (Corinthians 6: 9-10; Genesis19:1-29; Romans1:24-27; Cf. http://www.saintaquinas.com/mortal_sin.html). 

Obviously our Lord would not have supported legislation permitting gay marriage or same sex civil unions. In fact, He would have vociferously condemned the notion that gay marriage was a civil right and those who supported this.

In order to get sympathy for their position, gays will trumpet the message that their same sex attraction is genetically caused. Like those who inherit brown or blue eyes, gays will contend that homosexuality is a fixed trait. In other words, they “were born that way” and there is nothing that can be done to change this. However, the evidence indicates otherwise. There is no gay gene or common grouping of such that are responsible for one’s sexual orientation. Rather, a combination of environmental, psychological, social, and cultural factors have been identified as potential causes of homosexuality.

Even though no specific homosexual gene or genetic combination has been discovered, many gays contend that they have inherited a “genetic predisposition,” causing them to be attracted to same sex persons. Again, they will insist that they “were born that way“ and their homosexuality is a natural outgrowth of this inherited predisposition. However, a fixed genetic trait such as eye, hair, or skin color is not the same as an inherited genetic predisposition. We have no control over the former. The latter, on the other hand, differs in this regard. An individual, who is attracted to same sex persons, can stay away from persons and situations, which are “ occasions of sin.” Moreover, he can learn to control his thoughts and behavior when the temptation to engage in homosexual activity arises. This does not mean that exercising such control will be easy, especially if this problem is of a long standing nature. However, with much effort, prayer, and perseverance change is possible. The “genetically predisposed” sufferer can choose to avoid engaging in homosexual thoughts and activity. He or she can seek spiritual and professional help in order to change and better cope with their same sex attraction. Choice, not predetermination, is the critical point here. The genetically predisposed person can choose to act in such a way that he or she does not become the victim of a sensual attraction, leading to mortally sinful behavior. (See the note at the end of this piece for more on the “genetic predisposition.”)

In conclusion, those who support gay marriage will contend that this is a civil rights rather than a moral issue. However, natural law and the laws of God’s Church would dictate otherwise. If gay marriage becomes the law of the land, it will lead to the perversion of this sacrament and the loss of those graces attached to the marital state, given to us by Jesus Christ. This will eventually lead to the weakening of the family and the destruction of the society upon which it is founded.

The politicians will pretend that they have agonized over this issue and claim that they have become more enlightened, leading to a change in their thinking. They will insist that they want to do the right thing. But as we have observed, this is hardly the case.

Rather, they waffle from one position to the other depending upon on the way that the political wind is blowing. The most recent poll Pew Research data (March 13-17, 2013) on Democratic, Republican, and Independent voters’ response to the question: should same sex couples have the same rights as heterosexual couples? would support this contention. The current figures show that 74% of the Democrats, 49% of the Republicans, and 74% of the Independent voters agreed that gay and heterosexual couples should have the same rights. As noted previously the House and Senate overwhelmingly (80+ %) opposed gay marriage when DOMA was signed into law seventeen years ago. What a difference one decade has made!

The current crop of politicians, particularly our Catholic politicians who should know better, are a sad lot. For them, getting elected is what is important. If this means violating natural law and God’s commandments, so be it. Deep down inside, I suspect that the over-riding majority of our politicians and legislators know that gay marriage is an abomination and makes no sense from both a moral and practical perspective. Common sense would dictate that. Unfortunately common sense is not so common, especially when it comes to politics. With the guillotining of DOMA, the legalization of gay marriage is not only likely to accelerate, but it could soon become the law of the land. Those who refuse to comply with it and openly oppose such a law may be persecuted more vehemently than ever. God give us the grace to face such adversity, should it arise. Jesus, Mary, and Joseph — the Holy Family upon which society is founded — pray for us and provide us with the strength to follow Your example.

 * * * * * * * * * * * *

Note on “Genetic Predisposition”: In this article, I used the term “genetic predisposition” toward homosexuality. For the purpose of clarification, I would like to explain what I meant by this term. Let me preface my remarks by stating that I am not a geneticist. However, in my perusal of the literature, two points were evident. First, the various theories that posit a genetic (or epigenetic) predetermination toward homosexuality are scientifically unproven. And secondly, these theories are not in conformity with the fundamental truths of human nature. In light of the preceding, I rejected the notion that a specific gene or combination of genes were responsible for “fixing” one’s homosexual orientation at conception and compelling him or her to engage in a gay lifestyle thereafter. As a psychologist, my operative theory in this area is that certain men and women have a predisposition (a “potency” in philosophical terms) toward homosexuality. This potency might or might not be activated depending upon those environmental circumstances to which the individual becomes exposed.

The “genetic predisposition” of which I speak is a person’s inclination to engage in morally disordered actions when the potency, which I previously mentioned, becomes aroused or activated. For example, Michael is a young man whose family members are afflicted with obesity. This runs in Michael’s family. With such an inherited predisposition, Michael is strongly attracted to food and its consumption. He is constantly fixated on food and experiences gluttonous inclinations, which are most tempting indeed. Monitoring and controlling his food intake will be an ongoing problem for Michael, given his “genetic predisposition.” Raymond, on the other hand, has no difficulty with controlling his food intake or with gluttony. However, the members of Raymond’s family tend to behave violently when stressed. Raymond, like his family members, has a low frustration tolerance. As a result, he can quickly become so violent that he poses a danger to others and could inflict injury or even death upon them. Raymond’s inclination to act violently and the control of his temper may be an ongoing problem, throughout the course of his life, given his “genetic predisposition.”

It is important to note that people and the vices to which they become attracted differ. The old saying that “one man’s meat is another man’s poison” applies here. If someone lacks the particular “predisposition” for a certain vice, it will hold little or no attraction to him. However, if he inherits this predisposition, he could — as if by temperament — easily fall into that sin.

There is also the related question as to what occurs when someone’s predisposition becomes “set off” so to speak. The person’s inclination, which was previously latent and now triggered, will first come to the forefront in the form of temptations. If these temptations are then consented to, they become actual sins. We are all born heterosexual, since God gave us a certain complement of male and female biological traits at conception. If one has a predisposition toward homosexuality, this potency could become activated by one’s own sins against purity, in which he freely chooses to engage. It should be noted that suffering from some sort of trauma: mental or physical abuse, premature exposure to sexual matters, pornography, rape, etc., might also trigger someone’s “predisposition.” In my opinion, even bad parenting habits and parental role dysfunction (all too common today) can have a profound influence in leading predisposed young men to embrace homosexuality. Again, if the temptations are freely consented to, the behavior and thoughts become actual sins. The repetition of these becomes more habitual and deeply integrated into one’s personality.

The theory that I accept does not reject the culpability for sin, nor does it deny the freedom of the human will. Still less does it advance the notion that homosexuals are “born this way.”

The Remarks of Pope Francis on the Legal Recognition of Homosexual Unions

NOVEMBER 13, 2020 BY DCN. TRACY JAMISON, OCDS 2 COMMENTS

In the documentary “Francesco,” which premiered on October 21, 2020, Pope Francis is recorded in an interview as arguing for the legal recognition of homosexual civil unions:

“Homosexuals have a right to be a part of the family. They’re children of God and have a right to a family. Nobody should be thrown out or be made miserable because of it.”

“What we have to create is a civil union law. That way they are legally covered. I stood up for that.”

The following day there were news reports that these remarks were originally made in an interview recorded on May 19, 2019, and then edited out by the Vatican. The director of the documentary denied that report and claimed that the comments were made directly to him. But the footage is clearly from 2019, and the remarks are taken out of context and pieced together in an artificial order for greater effect to suit a personal agenda.

In 2010, before being elected to the papal office, Cardinal Jorge Bergoglio did in fact propose a limited form of legal recognition of homosexual civil unions as an alternative to the political movement in Argentina to approve homosexual marriage and conduct, to which he firmly and publicly objected. Legal recognition of homosexual couples may be made in two essentially different forms.One form simply grants legal rights to any given couple, regardless of sex, to make a contract in which one party designates the other party as his or her “significant other,” allowing them to share their earnings, to file their taxes jointly, to have access to each other’s personal records, to be covered under each other’s insurance, to inherit a preferential portion of the other’s estate, and the like. The other form of recognition is more radical and specifically permits homosexual couples to make a contract which is legally equivalent to marriage and grants legal rights which are proper only to marriage, such as the right for couples to practice sexual intimacy legally as spouses, or the right to adopt children. The latter form of legal recognition treats homosexual civil unions as equivalent to marriage and is clearly immoral and harmful to society, and Cardinal Bergoglio always opposed it.

Cardinal Bergoglio in Argentina explicitly and publicly taught that homosexual practices are intrinsically evil, and that as a matter of moral necessity homosexual friendships and all other friendships outside of true heterosexual marriage must remain chaste. He recognized that the Catholic Church’s position that homosexual conduct is intrinsically evil is not revisable or changeable. Any proposal or endorsement of a limited legal recognition of homosexual civil unions can be controversial for Catholics because it appears to contradict the authentic teaching of the Church. The Church has consistently opposed all proposals of nations to grant legal recognition to homosexual civil unions, but without making any distinction between the two forms of legal recognition. The bishops of Argentina, invoking the authentic teaching of the Church and John Paul II, understandably rejected Cardinal Bergoglio’s suggestion in 2010 to endorse the more limited form of legal recognition in the attempt to avoid the legal approval of same-sex marriage.

In 2003 the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith (CDF) under Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, and with the express approval of Pope St. John Paul II, had published the document “Considerations regarding Proposals to Give Legal Recognition to Unions between Homosexual Persons.” The language used against all such proposals is very strong. The bishops of Argentina carefully considered the papal guidance given this document. It is important to be aware of what the document actually says, so we should take time to review some of its relevant guidelines:

“[A]ccording to the teaching of the Church, men and women with homosexual tendencies ‘must be accepted with respect, compassion and sensitivity. Every sign of unjust discrimination in their regard should be avoided.’ They are called, like other Christians, to live the virtue of chastity. The homosexual inclination is, however, ‘objectively disordered,’ and homosexual practices are ‘sins gravely contrary to chastity’.” (4)

“[R]espect for homosexual persons cannot lead in any way to approval of homosexual behavior or to legal recognition of homosexual unions. The common good requires that laws recognize, promote and protect marriage as the basis of the family, the primary unit of society. Legal recognition of homosexual unions or placing them on the same level as marriage would mean not only the approval of deviant behavior, with the consequence of making it a model in present-day society, but would also obscure basic values which belong to the common inheritance of humanity. The Church cannot fail to defend these values, for the good of men and women and for the good of society itself.” (11)

“As experience has shown, the absence of sexual complementarity in these unions creates obstacles in the normal development of children who would be placed in the care of such persons. They would be deprived of the experience of either fatherhood or motherhood. Allowing children to be adopted by persons living in such unions would actually mean doing violence to these children, in the sense that their condition of dependency would be used to place them in an environment that is not conducive to their full human development. This is gravely immoral and in open contradiction to the principle, recognized also in the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child, that the best interests of the child, as the weaker and more vulnerable party, are to be the paramount consideration in every case.” (7)

“Not even in a remote analogous sense do homosexual unions fulfill the purpose for which marriage and family deserve specific categorical recognition. On the contrary, there are good reasons for holding that such unions are harmful to the proper development of human society, especially if their impact on society were to increase.” (4)

“When legislation in favor of the recognition of homosexual unions is proposed for the first time in a legislative assembly, the Catholic law-maker has a moral duty to express his opposition clearly and publicly and to vote against it. To vote in favor of a law so harmful to the common good is gravely immoral.” (10)

“When legislation in favor of the recognition of homosexual unions is already in force, the Catholic politician must oppose it in the ways that are possible for him and make his opposition known; it is his duty to witness to the truth. If it is not possible to repeal such a law completely, the Catholic politician, recalling the indications contained in the Encyclical Letter Evangelium vitae, ‘could licitly support proposals aimed at limiting the harm done by such a law and at lessening its negative consequences at the level of general opinion and public morality,’ on condition that his ‘absolute personal opposition’ to such laws was clear and well known and that the danger of scandal was avoided. This does not mean that a more restrictive law in this area could be considered just or even acceptable; rather, it is a question of the legitimate and dutiful attempt to obtain at least the partial repeal of an unjust law when its total abrogation is not possible at the moment.” (10)

“Those who would move from tolerance to the legitimization of specific rights for cohabiting homosexual persons need to be reminded that the approval or legalization of evil is something far different from the toleration of evil. In those situations where homosexual unions have been legally recognized or have been given the legal status and rights belonging to marriage, clear and emphatic opposition is a duty. One must refrain from any kind of formal cooperation in the enactment or application of such gravely unjust laws and, as far as possible, from material cooperation on the level of their application. In this area, everyone can exercise the right to conscientious objection.” (5)1

It is apparent from this document that St. John Paul II in his authentic papal Magisterium (his authority to teach and interpret the deposit of divine revelation as a successor of St Peter) taught that the legal recognition of homosexual unions is not morally justifiable as material cooperation in evil. And he reaffirmed that we have a moral duty to practice conscientious objection with regard to all unjust laws. Whenever a CDF document carries the express approval of the pope, as this one does, it participates in the ordinary Magisterium of the pope and is therefore authentic teaching.

It is also apparent from this document that St. John Paul II believed that whenever material cooperation in evil cannot be justified by the principle of double-effect and a reasonable estimation of the proportion of the good intended to the evil tolerated, the act of cooperation is morally wrong and must not be committed. Unjustified material cooperation in evil, like formal cooperation in evil, must always be opposed on the grounds that it is morally evil, not merely imprudent. A morally unjustified act of cooperation in evil is objectively evil in virtue of its circumstances, even though its species and motive may be good. This is a basic principle of natural moral law. We therefore ought not to excuse such cooperation as merely imprudent. If we deliberate carefully but make an honest mistake in thinking an act is permissible when it is actually evil, and we go ahead and do it, then subjectively we are not culpable since no evil was intended, but objectively we have nevertheless committed an evil act.

In the 2003 CDF document it appears that St John Paul II believed and intended to teach that no legal recognition of homosexual unions is ever morally justified, and therefore that no nation state is ever morally permitted to grant any legal recognition to homosexual unions whatsoever. Discerning the specific intention of St John Paul II in the document, however, is complicated by its puzzling terminology. It is clear that the practice of same-sex marriage is intrinsically evil. The legal rights proper to marriage (e.g. sexual intimacy, adoption of children) must be granted only to heterosexual couples. The principle of double-effect and the proportion of the intended good to the tolerated evil cannot morally justify the kind of legal recognition of same-sex marriage as material cooperation in evil. Such unjustified cooperation in evil is morally wrong.

But did St John Paul II intend to require conscientious objection not just to same-sex marriage but also to allowing same-sex couples to enter into non-marital contracts in which one citizen designates another citizen as his or her “significant other”? Canonists who are faithful to the Magisterium think not. Dr. Edward Peters, for example, has cogently argued that the terminology in the 2003 CDF document is problematic.2 Indeed, if a state has civil laws which permit non-marital contracts to designate a “significant other,” then it would seem to be a form of unjust discrimination to prohibit same-sex couples from entering into such non-marital contracts. Every citizen has the moral right to form legal contracts with other people for various purposes other than sexual intimacy and the procreation and nurturing of children. There are moral grounds to restrict marital contracts to adult heterosexual couples, but it was not the intent of the 2003 CDF document to require conscientious objection to same-sex couples forming any contracts whatsoever. The intent was only to require conscientious objection to same-sex marriage, where the legal rights proper to marriage are extended to couples naturally incapable of being married, and thus legal approval is given to immoral conduct. The use of the term “homosexual unions” in an unqualified manner is confusing.

The teaching of the Church in general that the legal recognition of same-sex marriage is gravely immoral is authentic interpretation of natural law. So is the teaching of the Church that all people of good will have a moral duty to oppose unjust civil laws. The authentic (third-level) teaching of the Church, however, is somewhat reformable by the Magisterium itself. It is admittedly not infallible. Only first-and-second-level doctrines (the deposit of faith and morals and all Catholic truths which follow from that divinely revealed deposit by logical and historical necessity) have been infallibly taught. But even though authentic (third-level) interpretations of the deposit of faith and morals could contain errors, every legitimate exercise of the authentic papal Magisterium must be interpreted with a hermeneutic of continuity and a principle of charity. Even though it is possible for a legitimate exercise of the authentic papal Magisterium to be in error, it is nevertheless not probable for it to be in error unless the authentic papal Magisterium itself acknowledges that it made a mistake. The faithful owe every exercise of authentic Magisterium an internal assent of mind and heart, even though the teaching is not infallible. Many Catholics nowadays need to be informed or reminded of that obligation.

It should be clear that a pope’s casual public remarks have no authority in Church teaching. Such remarks are often taken out of context and badly distorted in public media. The Church teaches authoritatively at various levels, but the remarks of Pope Francis or any other pope in an interview are not even Church teaching at all. Even if Pope Francis is again suggesting that a more limited legal recognition of homosexual civil unions is a social structure that is a justifiable material cooperation in evil, as he suggested previously in Argentina before accepting the papal office, he is not imposing this opinion on us as a matter of doctrine. The faithful do not owe any kind of assent to such non-magisterial remarks. Furthermore, the non-magisterial interpretations and comments of any pope or bishop on existing magisterial teaching, even his own, are often in error and are not a reliable guide to the authentic Magisterium of the Church. So we are free to disagree with the casual remarks and opinions of the Pope Francis, just as we are free to disagree with the exegetical opinions offered by Pope Benedict XVI (Joseph Ratzinger) in his Jesus of Nazareth books.

Clarifying the actual intent of the 2003 CDF document through a legitimate exercise of the authentic papal Magisterium could be very helpful, however, though many people might be inclined to misinterpret and condemn any such qualification, especially if it were made by Pope Francis, whose acts are frequently and unfairly interpreted as advancing a progressive agenda. It is true that the Catholic faithful have an obligation to assent to the approved teaching of St John Paul II in the 2003 CDF document on the legal recognition of homosexual unions, but Francis or another pope could decide to revise and clarify it. Any such revision would merely qualify and essentialize the teaching it by an authoritative interpretation. The Church’s position is not that any legal recognition of homosexual unions is intrinsically evil, but that the legal recognition of same-sex marriage would be a material cooperation in evil that cannot satisfy the principle of double-effect because the overall harm that it does is proportionately greater than the overall good that it does.

Those who do not understand the difference between intrinsically evil acts and acts which materially cooperate in intrinsically evil acts find this confusing. The confusion can only be eliminated by good moral catechesis and better education. And the more limited form of legal recognition, which simply grants legal rights to any given couple, regardless of sex, to make a contract in which one party designates the other party as his or her “significant other” for non-marital purposes, is a remote material cooperation in evil that is morally justifiable because it can in fact satisfy the principle of double-effect. The intent is not to approve of homosexual conduct but only to avoid unjust discrimination with regard to unmarried persons, including people who have a homosexual orientation and a same-sex “significant other.” As Pope Francis has emphasized on many occasions, the real world is morally messy, and the real world is getting messier everyday as the infallible moral teaching of Christ and his Church is rejected.

On various occasions, Pope Francis has in fact publicly practiced conscientious objection to legalizing same-sex marriage. It should be clear at the very least that he firmly upholds the infallible moral teaching of the Church. Nothing in his authentic papal Magisterium even comes close to suggesting that the legal recognition of same-sex marriage is morally justifiable. The principle of charity demands that we interpret the comments of Pope Francis with a hermeneutic of continuity. Pope Francis thus in fact believes that true marriage is inherently heterosexual and procreative, that sexual intimacy is moral only in the context of the proper marital act within a true marriage, that homosexual civil unions are not true marriages, that homosexual unions ought to be chaste friendships, that abortion and contraception are intrinsically evil, that we have a moral duty to oppose civil laws which are contrary to the common good, that every person needs a male father and a female mother to help them shape their identity, and the like. None of these moral doctrines is in question or changeable. Catholics who want these doctrines to change are either ignorant or living in denial. Dissenters ignore the inherent conservative dynamic of the Magisterium and unreasonably expect the Catholic Church to reverse its infallible moral doctrines. The Catholic Church will never make any such changes. That which is intrinsically evil will be always be regarded by the Catholic Church as intrinsically evil, even though the secular world will often disagree and attempt to rationalize immoral conduct.

Pope Francis’ primary concern seems to be with material cooperation in evil, which he thinks is morally justifiable in certain legal, political, and pastoral contexts. The conditions under which material cooperation in evil is morally justifiable are sometimes difficult to judge, and Catholic bishops sometimes disagree on how to make particular applications. We might consider for example the recent disagreement over whether voting for political candidates who have a pro-abortion platform is morally justifiable. In my opinion, it is not morally justifiable. But with regard to the legal recognition of homosexual couples, we need to be careful not to become so concerned to avoid material cooperation in evil that we fall into an unjust form of discrimination.

Those who are conservative in their estimation of the respective proportion naturally regard any legal recognition of homosexual unions as imprudent and inexcusable. Those who are more liberal in their estimation of the respective proportion naturally regard the absolute refusal to grant any legal recognition of homosexual unions whatsoever as rigid and intolerant. If Pope Francis were to clarify the authentic teaching of St. John Paul II magisterially and grant that we can tolerate and materially cooperate with the legal recognition of homosexual non-marital civil unions but must resist and conscientiously object to the legal recognition of homosexual civil unions which pretend to be marriages and which unjustly demand legal rights which are proper to true marriage, then there would be a path of reconciliation open between the two opposing positions.

We must keep in mind that since 2003, most of the Western world has rejected Catholic moral teaching on the issue of homosexual unions and has in fact radically legalized them as if they were marriages, as it previously legalized abortion and other evils. Such legalizations are scandalous and morally corrupting of society. They are unjust civil laws which must be opposed and reversed if possible. The most pressing question now is how to help the faithful to function and maintain employment and raise families in societies which are increasingly secularized and immoral. We need more guidance on this issue, and the authentic teaching of the Church on the issue must continue to undergo legitimate development. Pope Francis and his successors must guide us in how to practice conscientious objection to evil, as well as in how to judge correctly the conditions under which material cooperation in evil is morally permissible. Both of these practical judgments are currently unavoidable, and we need pastoral guidance in both. Like it or not, additional pastoral guidance from Pope Francis is probably coming soon. The teaching of St John Paul II might be slightly revised. But the doctrine that homosexual behavior is intrinsically evil is not changeable. Neither is the doctrine that contraception is intrinsically evil. Those who compromise the doctrine against contraception within true marriage inevitably compromise the doctrine against same-sex marriage. Pope Francis, as a disciple of St Paul VI, understands that dynamic and will not compromise the Church’s moral teaching on human sexuality.

In authentic Church teaching there are clear limits on what is reformable. The point is not to undermine what St John Paul II taught about homosexual civil unions, but to adapt it to the present circumstances, bringing out what is essential in it. As a successor of St. Peter and St. John Paul II, Pope Francis has the authority and power to reform that teaching, but he has not yet done so. Perhaps he is indicating that he intends to do so; perhaps not. If he does decide to qualify the 2003 CDF document on the legal recognition of homosexual unions, he will need to give papal approval to some new CDF document or other teaching instrument which would clearly state the conditions under which legal recognition to non-marital civil unions could morally be given. Many ecclesiastical leaders hope that he will allow the 2003 CDF document to stand unqualified, while others regard this attitude as scrupulous. But the document does need clarification. The concern to avoid being too rigid and the concern to avoid being too lax are equally legitimate and fundamental to having a mature Catholic attitude about material cooperation in evil. Toleration of evil is often morally necessary, but approval of evil is never morally permitted.

In the face of public episcopal disagreement about what the pope should do with regard to legitimate development of Catholic doctrine, every Catholic should recognize and affirm that no infallibly taught moral doctrines can ever lose their doctrinal weight or be changed. We must trust the Holy Spirit and not be alarmed. The devil often uses fear in his attempt to undermine divine authority and encourage rebellion. We should reassure the faithful that the moral teaching of the Church is permanent and will not be compromised. At the same time, following the example of St Francis of Assisi, we should help the faithful to maintain due obedience and reverence to Pope Francis, who stands in continuity with Vatican II, St. John Paul II, and Benedict XVI. To abandon the hermeneutic of continuity is to move in the direction of schism. To understand the actions and intentions of Pope Francis correctly requires us to exercise charity and patience. There are many people nowadays who either intentionally or unintentionally misinterpret his actions and intentions to suit their own agenda either to the political right or to the political left. Pope Francis has a difficult job and must maintain a delicate balance. Let us pray for him.

https://www.hprweb.com/2020/11/the-remarks-of-pope-francis-on-the-legal-recognition-of-homosexual-unions/

WATCH: Polish archbishop decries LGBT ‘rainbow disease’ that’s spreading across country

Lisa Bourne

Archbishop Marek Jedraszewski 

August 6, 2019 (LifeSiteNews) – The archbishop of Krakow, Poland, has said that his country is under siege from the “rainbow disease” of LGBT activism.

While his country is no longer beleaguered by the "red plague" of Soviet communism, Archbishop Marek Jedraszewski said, it is now afflicted by the "rainbow" plague of LGBT ideology, which denies human dignity and aims to control the souls, hearts, and minds of the Polish people.

"A red plague is not gripping our land anymore,” the archbishop said, “which does not mean that there is not a new one that wants to control our souls, hearts and minds.” 

"Not Marxist, Bolshevik, but born of the same spirit, neo-Marxist," he said. "Not red, but rainbow."

The archbishop’s remarks came in his sermon during Mass at St. Mary's Basilica marking the 75th anniversary of the Warsaw Uprising, CNS News reports.

Jedraszewski recalled in his homily the heroism of Poland’s Home Army against Nazi occupation, and the country’s struggles under fascism and then decades of 'Bolshevism' rule as a Soviet satellite state, a report from the Irish Times said.

He said that “promoting LGBTI ideology denies human dignity” because the “rainbow disease” was “neo-Marxist” in its absolutist ambition.

The day before at the Polish Catholic pilgrimage site of Czestochowa, Jedraszewski had urged the Catholic faithful to “defend the truth about the creation of a woman and a man to live together and to have children.”

Jedraszewski’s homily remarks about LGBT ideology drew denunciation from U.S.-based LGBT activist Jesuit Father James Martin, who called the archbishop’s comments incendiary, adding that they promote hatred and violence toward LGBT individuals.

The Catholic Church teaches that homosexual tendencies are "objectively disordered," and that homosexual acts are "intrinsically disordered," against natural law and cannot be approved under any circumstances.

People with same-sex attraction are called to chastity, the Church’s teaching says, as are all people.

Same-sex sexual activity has never been criminalized in Poland and its legality was reconfirmed in 1932. Homosexuality does not have special protection in Polish law, and gay “marriage” and the adoption of children by gay couples in Poland remain illegal.

The majority Catholic country is having turmoil and tension between LGBT activists working to advance their agenda and traditional Poles.

Jedraszewski, 70, was appointed auxiliary bishop of Poznań in 1997 by then Pope St. John Paul II, just before Jedraszewski’s episcopal consecration. The two clerics were close friends, CNS reports. 

Pope Benedict XVI appointed Jedraszewski the archbishop of Lodz in 2012, and in 2017 Pope Francis named him archbishop of Krakow. 

In remarks made in 2013, Jedraszewski said gender ideology is the "direct path to the self-destruction of our civilization."

"It is an extremely dangerous ideology that leads directly to the death of our civilization," he said.

https://www.lifesitenews.com/news/polish-archbishop-lgbt-rainbow-disease-is-spreading-across-country

The LGBT Conspiracy and Eros, the Demon of Love

Stefanie NicholasJuly 22, 2019 0 Comments

It’s become impossible to keep up with the activities of the relentless juggernaut known as the “LGBT community.” Seemingly every day, we see a new story more outrageous and shocking than the last. University professors and children’s book publishers are defending the practice of bringing young children to “Pride” events, not by downplaying their sex-fueled and nudity-filled nature, but by assuring us that “nobody likes nakedness more than children” and that witnessing “kink” and nudity is “an excellent opportunity for parents to do unbiased sex education.” In March, a library in Texas hosted one of the now infamous Drag Queen Storytime events, accidentally featuring a 32-year-old convicted sex offender. Let’s not forget Desmond Is Amazing, the 12-year-old drag queen who seems to know a lot about hard drugs.

Many decent people get the sense — and rightly so — that the wholesale normalization of pedophilia is next on the LGBT lobby’s tyrannical to-do list. The above examples of mass child grooming are only a highlight reel, and at any rate, looking at these events in and of themselves is useful only to a certain point. What we are dealing with is, in fact, a global conspiracy made up of tens of thousands of people, poised to reconfigure society as we know it. I’m quite serious. Back in March, I wrote about the dangers of a surface-level opposition to feminism:

The present feminist domination of society and politics is not surprising when we understand that the very language we often use in regard to our opponents is based not on truth, but on usefulness – that is, language that has no regard for truth and therefore no regard for us as human beings created in the image of God. This is justified in the minds of many who use such abusive language (if they consider the implications of their language at all), because we as well as they have accepted a priori that the moral superiority of feminist thought is self-evident.

Thus, it becomes a self-perpetuating system. There is no need for a shadowy cabal of man-hating feminist overlords. All that is required is that the masses never question whether the two statements of belief qualifying radical feminism (listed above) are acceptable or not. All that is required is that the very same people who can see the “problems with feminism today” go on to de facto accept the feminist version of history, of language, of first principles, as gospel truth.

We can observe similar phenomena within the LGBT movement. They’ve been highly successful in their general abuse of history and language, not to mention their ability to frog-boil us to the point where hearing of young boys in women’s outfits stripping for grown men warrants at most an exasperated petition signing or Facebook share. It is difficult to understand the seemingly impossible cohesion of various revolutionary movements when examining only the material evidence.

Not only do various groups work toward their own goals with remarkable efficacy, but they also manage to aid the groups around them in attaining theirs — even those that are completely disparate, such as the aspirations of feminism, LGBT groups, and Islam. In this way, these become the most dangerous and baffling conspiracies of all. Those who decry “conspiracy theorists” are quick to point out that the more people a conspiracy involves, the less likely it is that it will be able to maintain the secrecy it needs to operate. They’re right, and it’s right to ignore them.

They’re missing the point, because they do not understand the supernatural forces guiding these seemingly fragmented conspiracies. It’s true that purely ideological means can bring a conspiracy far, but the more I witness the decay around me, the more I am convinced of the direct influence that God is allowing the prince of the world and his cronies to have in shaping our societies.

I was at a great disadvantage when writing the aforementioned contra-feminism article, as I had not yet read an incredible book called The Four Loves by C.S. Lewis. Understanding the “spirit of feminism” seems obvious enough from Sacred Scripture — it subsists largely within the sin of pride. However, though the LGBT movement shares in the spirit of pride as a root cause (the celebration of it alone should be a warning bell), upon reading this book, I have come to believe that a warped spirit of love — specifically Eros, romantic love — is what plagues them most intensely. More importantly, it is this same spirit that has led the majority of normal, “cisgender,” “straight” people to their incredible tolerance for the collapse taking place around them.

Lewis writes:

The real danger seems to me not that the lovers will idolise each other but that they will idolise Eros himself.

I do not of course mean that they will build altars or say prayers to him. The idolatry I speak of can be seen in the popular misinterpretation of Our Lord’s words “Her sins, which are many, are forgiven her, for she loved much” (Luke VII, 47). From the context, and especially from the preceding parable of the debtors, it is clear that this must mean: “The greatness of her love for Me is evidence of the greatness of the sins I have forgiven her.” (The for here is like the for in “He can’t have gone out, for his hat is still hanging in the hall”; the presence of the hat is not the cause of his being in the house but a probable proof that he is). But thousands of people take it quite differently. They first assume, with no evidence, that her sins were sins against chastity, though, for all we know, they may have been usury, dishonest shopkeeping, or cruelty to children. And they then take Our Lord to be saying, “I forgive her unchastity because she was so much in love.” The implication is that a great Eros extenuates — almost sanctions — almost sanctifies — any actions it leads to.

When lovers say of some act that we might blame, “Love made us do it,” notice the tone. A man saying, “I did it because I was frightened,” or “I did it because I was angry”, speaks quite differently. He is putting forward an excuse for what he feels to require excusing. But the lovers are seldom doing quite that. Notice how tremulously, almost how devoutly, they say the word love, not so much pleading an “extenuating circumstance” as appealing to an authority. The confession can be almost a boast. There can be a shade of defiance in it. They “feel like martyrs.” In extreme cases what their words really express is a demure yet unshakable allegiance to the god of love.

I immediately recognized the painful truth of these words in many regrettable actions I have undertaken in my own life. When Eros becomes a god himself rather than being submitted to God, we give him powerful sway over us. He can lead us to do the unthinkable out of this hollow feeling of intense love — and perhaps even more dangerously to society at large, he can lead us to justify the unjustifiable in the behavior of others.

Mere decades ago, the cry of love became an argument for couples of the same sex having relationships together, with a demand for “marriage” following soon after. Is it so hard to imagine that most people in the not too distant future will find themselves able to stomach “consensual” ephebophilia and pedophilia, slaves as they are to this unchained Eros? The foundation for this acceptance is already being laid.

It’s easy to view the LGBT lobby and especially the pedophilia-as-sexual-orientation faction purely from the perspective of carnal desire. Even aside from the most sex-crazed antics of “Pride” parades and gay bars, they base their entire existence as group on the erroneous concept of “sexual orientation.” We need to understand once again as a society that sexual desires may be complex and nearly infinite, but chastity in spite of temptation is simple and universal (and, with the aid of grace, possible!). This must be emphasized, particularly now, as we see the push for severely disordered pedophilic tendencies to be recognized as an “identity.”

However, though it is undoubtedly important, it is not enough to control what C.S. Lewis calls Venus — sexual love. We must think broadly of Eros, of romantic love, as well in order to truly understand the actions of these confused human beings, particularly when we consider just how many of them are victims of sexual abuse themselves. They, like us, live in a world awash with free pornography, immodesty, and contraception, which no doubt fuels their disordered inclinations even further. Instead of speaking the truth in charity, we await their evil actions with open arms, closing our hearts to the person whom God has made in order to embrace a ghost crafted by human hands. We’re all looking for love, in one way or another, and it is those most starving for love whom Eros is quickest to devour.

It would be foolish to ignore him in this clash of mores, thinking that once we sort Venus out, all will be well. Eros is not to be underestimated. He’s a lot harder to keep on a leash.

https://onepeterfive.com/lgbt-eros-demon/

Image: Joseph Kranak via Flickr.