Tradcast Express
In the joint document, Francis declared that it is God's will that there should be a diversity among human beings not only in terms of sex, race, color, and language, but also religion.
The exact quote is,
The pluralism and the diversity of religions, color, sex, race, and language are willed by God in his wisdom through which he created human beings.
Signing that document,
was a public act of apostasy on Francis' part, meaning that by agreeing to the statement Francis manifested to the world once more that he has completely abandoned the Roman Catholic religion.
Whereas heresy denies only one specific dogma of the faith, apostasy denies everything, as explained in the last podcast.
Meanwhile, a few weeks have passed and Novus Ordo apologists have reacted in different ways.
We already examined some of the reactions in the last podcast, and among them was the Reverend John Zuhlstorf, who insisted that we needed to find a way to read the statement so that it would be orthodox.
He wasn't interested in discovering the meaning intended by the authors, which is what genuine interpretation is about, but only in spinning it to get Francis off the hook for apostasy,
since that would have some really unpleasant consequences.
And so his argument was that Francis must have been referring not to God's positive and active will, but only to his permissive will, the way he permits all sorts of evils, such as natural disasters, diseases, and error.
We weren't the only ones who blew that idea out of the water.
Even other Novus Ordos had to concede that that was an impossible way to understand the text, since all the other items he listed as willed by God,
diversity in race, language, color, and sex, were willed positively by him and not merely tolerated as an evil.
Well, there's been a development on that now.
In a follow-up post, Zuhlstorf backtracked on that explanation a bit after he conceded that a fellow Novus Ordo believer, the Canadian Dr. John Lamont,
had made a good case that his argument was a bunch of baloney, for the very same reason just given.
And then Mr. Zuhlstorf said,
Zuhlstorf did something else.
He examined how the controversial statement in question had been translated into languages other than English.
And so he looked at the wording in Italian, French, German, Spanish, and Portuguese,
and he concluded that the way it had been translated there made his argument about permissive will even less likely to be correct.
So in other words, although Zuhlstorf sugar-coated it a lot,
he basically conceded that his argument,
But you know what's missing from the post?
Consequences.
As if nothing really followed from the fact that Francis committed an act of apostasy.
And this is a very common problem seen among those self-declared traditional Catholics who recognize the Vatican II antipopes as legitimate.
No matter what, they simply will not ever allow any of these apostates and heretics to not be what they consider.
to not be what they consider.
In this way, they think they're saving the papacy, when in fact what they're doing is the very opposite.
If the pope can be an apostate and still be pope, then the papacy is not only useless, but also extremely dangerous.
In which case, it could not come from God.
But hey, not every Novus Ordo apologist has bent over backwards trying to argue that Francis meant,
Although Mr. Zuhlstorff and also Patrick Madrid, for example, have tried that,
their colleague Dr. Robert Fastigi, who teaches systematic theology at a Novus Ordo seminary,
doesn't beat around the bush and confirms that, of course, Francis meant that God positively and actively wills the diversity of religions.
And, Fastigi says, Francis is entirely right.
In an article published,
Vatican Insider, entitled
Pope Francis and Papal Authority Under Attack,
Fastigi joins Francis in his apostasy and argues,
quote,
God positively willed that diverse religions would arise within various cultures
because the elements of truth and holiness found within them could serve as a preparation for the gospel.
This is a fundamental principle of the Second Vatican Council,
one of its most significant contributions to the Church,
the Church's understanding of its relationship with other religions and its call to mission.
To question this teaching is to question the authority of the Council itself, unquote.
Well, what's wrong with questioning the authority of the Council?
Doesn't God want a diversity in that, too?
I mean, what an idiotic thing to say.
False religions are a preparation for the gospel?
Funny, I thought the Old Covenant,
was the preparation for the new,
and not the golden calf and the idolatry of Solomon and the priests of Baal and so forth.
But, hey, what do you know?
Vatican II explains it all.
What's curious here is that Fastigi apparently missed one obvious problem in his argumentation.
Islam came centuries after the gospel was revealed
and therefore can hardly be a preparation for it.
Oh, but of course, Fastigi says that,
it is the elements of truth and holiness found in the false religions
that serve as a preparation for the gospel,
not those religions in their entirety.
Yeah, well, except that they only come as a total package, right?
You can't just get the true elements divorced from the rest.
So this is a very misleading idea because the so-called elements of truth
are offered together with plenty of elements of error.
And of blasphemy, heresy, impiety, and whatnot.
Look, if I offer someone a cake that's poisoned,
the nutritious and healthful elements in the cake don't do a shred of good.
Okay?
If anything, they serve to cloak the poison and make it all the more dangerous
because without them, no one would even touch the thing, right?
So, as soon as you test this false theology,
and with a...
a common sense analogy, you can see immediately how absurd it is.
They wouldn't make this argument for anything else, right?
It's only for their false theology that they come out with these
ooh, elements of truth and holiness and whatnot.
It's just stupid.
By the way, has anyone noticed the obvious contradiction
between Francis' statement that the diversity of religions is willed by God
and what he says when it comes to ecumenism,
how the division between...
called Christians is a scandal that must be overcome?
Well, excuse me, but if God has willed a diversity of religions,
why would that not also include all sorts of religions that claim the name of Christian?
I mean, where do you draw the line?
Or has God told Francis which religions are willed by him
besides the Catholic religion,
and Protestantism isn't among them, or what?
Well, in which case, one has to ask,
well, why then do they not urge Protestants to convert to Catholicism?
Huh.
You see, ladies and gentlemen, as soon as you apply a little bit of reason
to these idiotic ideas, you realize it's all a bunch of hooey.
Francis will say whatever is to his advantage at that particular moment.
There is no coherence, no real theology behind any of it.
It's just whatever he wants to say at the present time.
And, of course, after a while, he just can't keep it all straight anymore.
So...
I think that with regard to that contradiction between saying on the one hand
that God wills a diversity of religions,
and on the other that it's a scandal that all those claiming to be Christians
are not united in the same doctrine,
I think Francis really just didn't think it through, right?
He just didn't think that far, and that's why he didn't recognize the contradiction.
Or maybe he did and figured that the more confusion there is, the better.
I don't know.
By the way, speaking of chaos, Frank, and switching gears a bit,
did you hear about what he said concerning sins of impurity?
We posted about it on our blog on February 14th,
where you can find all the details at novosortowatch.org.
But here's a quick overview.
In 2017, the French sociologist Dominique Volton
published an interview book with Francis,
which was published in English translation last year,
under the title,
A Future of Faith, The Path of Change in Politics and Society.
At one point, the conversation between Volton and Francis
turns to the subject of sexual sins,
and Francis says this, quote,
And no, that's not taken out of context.
And the translation is the official translation,
that was released last year.
Now, you can see the full context and all the details.
There's a lot to say about this.
You can see all of that at our blog, novosortowatch.org.
Look for the post dated February 14th, entitled,
Moral Advice from Pope Francis.
The least serious sins are the sins of the flesh.
He says that they're among the least serious of sins,
because they're sins of weakness and not of malice.
Well, maybe someone could tell that doofus
that that is precisely why they're so dangerous.
People are more prone to committing sins of weakness
than sins of malice.
Okay, that doesn't mean that they're no big deal.
In fact, it means that we have to guard against them all the more.
Impurity in all its various forms does not admit of light matter.
It is always grave matter.
And therefore, if committed,
with knowledge and consent,
it will always be a mortal sin.
But hey, for Francis,
sins of the flesh are among the least serious of sins.
Yeah, I guess that's why they now have to have
a sex abuse summit at the Vatican, right?
It looks like Francis isn't the only one
who thought that sexual sins are among the lightest.
Certainly, Uncle Ted McCarrick agrees completely, doesn't he?
Sick.
All right, one more thing before we go.
Did you hear...
What Bergoglio said to the Hospitaller Brothers of St. John of God
earlier this month?
I guess he was trying to sound Catholic for a change
and said this, quote,
There can be no authentic compassion for others
if there is no loving passion for Jesus, unquote.
That was on February 1st, as reported by Crux.
Now, that statement is false.
The definition of compassion is,
of course, a person can have genuine compassion for others
without even so much as believing in Christ, okay?
That compassion won't get such a one to heaven or anything.
That's clear because it has no supernatural value before God
if he doesn't believe in Christ.
But that doesn't mean that it's not real compassion, okay?
That doesn't mean that non-Christians,
non-believers can't have authentic compassion.
It's just that it's a natural virtue,
in their case, not a supernatural one.
So, you see that even when Francis is trying to sound Catholic,
he gets it wrong.
But in any case, let's pretend for a minute
that he were right on that.
Let's say you cannot have real compassion
unless you love Christ.
So, does that mean that he believes
that his Jewish and Muslim friends, for example,
can't have real compassion?
That all their compassion is fake?
Is that what he tells them in their interreligious dialogues?
I didn't think so.
Now, actually, wait a minute.
I seem to remember something from last year on that.
Oh, yeah, here it is.
A message from the Vatican's Council for Interreligious Dialogue
to Hindus on the Feast of Deepavali 2018,
entitled,
In Defense of the Vulnerable of Society.
And in one place, the message says,
quote,
Opportunities for service are all around us,
since the vulnerable can be found
in every community and society.
Greater efforts, inspired by our sense of solidarity,
are needed so that they can feel
the presence of brothers and sisters
who are concerned for them
and by opening the doors of their hearts and lives
make them feel like friends and family.
In the end, the true measure of civilization
of any society is the way it treats
its most vulnerable members.
Unquote.
It sounds like a call for compassion to me.
But hey, according to Francis,
their compassion isn't even real.
Look, the fact of the matter is
that Francis is a Peronist,
as Henry Sear pointed out in his book,
The Dictator Pope.
He custom-tailors his message
according to his audience.
He will tell his audience
not necessarily what they think,
not necessarily what they want to hear,
but whatever is in his best interest at the time,
whatever best serves his agenda in the long run.
And just what that agenda is,
we saw earlier this month in Abu Dhabi.
Tradcast Express is a production of Novus Ordo Watch.
Check us out at tradcast.org
and if you like what we're doing,
please consider making a tax-deductible contribution
at novusortowatch.org
slash donate.