One news source I saw this morning says that the theologians who are consultants for the Congregation for Causes of Saints have put their stamp of approval on a second miracle for Bl. John Paul II.
Without going into details (you can read the story I saw HERE), the process for a claimed miracle has to get experts in to study the claim that what happened (a cure, protection from harm, etc) is truly beyond our ability to explain in merely material, natural terms. Another panel needs to study the claim that the miracle was worked through the intercession of Bl. X, Y or Z.
You will notice when you get cards or communications from a cause for a beatification, that there is a prayer precisely worded to focus on the servant of God or blessed. If you are praying to Bl. X, but also to Jesus, Mary and Joseph and all the saints, etc., you “muddy” the claim that X interceded. This is one reason why I will sometimes ask people to ask for miracle through the intercession of a specific Venerable, such as Pauline Jaricot, and I correct those who say, “HEY, Also pray to A, B, and C! They are great too!” The idea is to invoke a certain blessed, asking for intercession, in such a way that a potential miracle could be part of a process and cause.
So, you can find the details about the miracle elsewhere, but I thought you might be interested in those distinction. Meanwhile, the second miracle still needs a couple more steps, including approval by members of the Congregation, presentation to the Pope, and promulgation by the Pope. Then canonization can go forward.
I have little doubt that this is being jammed through fast. After all those involved in the cause are very well organized.
Hmmm… since I was ordained by John Paul, would I become a 3rd class relic or something? Since it is I, perhaps a 4th or 5th.
Finally, if you don’t ask for miracles they will not be given.
Ask for miracles.
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There are good reasons against jamming these sorts of things through fast.
For one thing, it makes the cause look dubious even if it isn’t. If John Paul II is canonized, I’d rather it be something done after many years of study and sober reflection, not something that comes across looking like the Obamacare of sainthood.
This is the one part that makes me uneasy about the canonization process; it almost seems in secular terms to be a ‘clinical trial’ for a saint. In the same way that a patient may get a placebo if we concentrate all our prayers to a particular individual do we not risk missing a miracle if there is something about this person we do not know? In the same way that the person was getting the experimental medicine and lives don’t we risk missing the miracle? I know I’m in way over my head with such speculation but still it always bothered me.
[I can’t get my head around this.]
Legisperitus, while it is certainly prudent to not rush these things, sometimes sanctity is self-evident.
Saint Anthony of Padua, for example, was raised to the altars less than a year after his death. Compared to that, the process for Blessed Pope John Paul II has been leisurely!
Hmm Fr. Z., some type of relic, not sure third class…I wish all the canonizations would be a slower process. However, miracles do show holiness and unity with God.
There have been many canonizations that were done much faster than this, as Thom mentions. In the end, the will of God prevails.
Beate Ioannes Paule Magne, ora pro nobis!
The idea is not that it’s a clinical trial, but that we ask humbly for God to show us His favor through His grace and the holy person’s intercession. The Church, like Mary at Cana, is bold to ask for a sign, not distrustful like that guy who told the prophet he wouldn’t dare tempt the Lord by asking for a sign even when the Lord told Him to. If we cooperate with God’s grace by asking, and if it is His will, He will give the saint the joy of interceding for us successfully.
If we pray for the intercession of someone who is not a saint or if God does not plan to reveal His favor at this very moment, such a prayer is not fruitless. God hears all our prayers and gives us what we need, and does not give us what He does not will to give; but the merit of our prayers is still there. God will surely give something to the person we pray for, whether in this life or in Purgatory. Also, if the person we ask to intercede is in Purgatory, no doubt he and the other Poor Souls will be delighted for the chance to pray, and will receive benefits from having that chance.
If we inadvertently should pray for the intercession of someone who is in Hell, that person will never know about it (being outside the Communion of Saints entirely), but God will hear our prayer as it was meant to be addressed — to a saint or a soul in Purgatory — and deal with it in His own way.
In any of these cases, we can expect that God will treat these prayers seriously, but His means of granting such prayers (should He choose) would tend to be not clearly a miracle, or clearly natural.
If people pray for Bob’s miraculous healing through a possible saint’s intercession, then, God has a lot of different possible responses. He might send a new doctor or a new treatment instead of a miracle. He might heal Bob’s soul instead of his body and take him to Heaven or Purgatory instead of Hell. He might offer Bob a special second chance, which Bob would be free to take or leave. He might heal others around Bob, which might make Bob happier than being healed himself. He might give Bob a gift of sharing in the Cross by suffering, which might be what Bob needs to become a better person. Lots of possibilities, none of them bad.
What we know is what Jesus told us: if a son asks for a fish or an egg, even an earthly father would never give him a snake or a rock instead. God wants to give us good things, and we should ask Him. Even His no is better than anybody else’s yes.
Allow me please to stick my neck out.
I have a special intention that I have been praying for since January 2011 and that I have entrusted to Blessed John Paul II since August last year. We were in Poland staying with my husband’s relatives, and his cousin suggested a day trip to Wadowice. I had never prayed for his intercession before, and went with an open mind on the visit to Wadowice. I just asked him whether I should carry on with my intention, and if so to give me a particular sign. The sign came in the Basilica in Wadowice.
In October I took the petition to him at his tomb in Rome. Before I went a priest in Canada said a novena of Masses for the intention, invoking the intercession of Blessed John Paul. When I returned a priest here in England said another novena of Masses. Both these novenas were said in nine days. At the moment another priest is saying a series of nine Masses, but this time over a period of a few weeks, from May to July. He said one of the Masses in Spain.
So what I’m saying is, Fr. Z and readers, can you please take on this intention in your prayers? Even if the news of the second miracle means there is enough already for the canonisation, there is no limit to Almighty God’s generosity, and it might be His Will that there should be more.
Thank you all in advance.
PS Fr. Z I say the prayer for BJP’s canonisation last thing at night before going to sleep. Any chance please that you can post the prayer here on your blog so that readers can join in?
Thanks again
Hmmm… since I was ordained by John Paul, would I become a 3rd class relic or something? Since it is I, perhaps a 4th or 5th.
Come now, Fr. Z, you’re not THAT old!
I think the Church has processes for a reason, and that it is a mistake to rush these processes, regardless of the goodness of the intention. Consider what would have happened if the translation process for the Ordo of Paul VI had been less hurried. If the Church raises His Holiness to the honors of the altar, well and good, and thanks be to God. I would like to see a more thorough examination of his writings and actions if for no other reason than these writings and actions are going to be used people in future ages (even if only 6 months into the future).
I remember a while back someone posted some information on a Saint from France, young man, defended his town against invaders or some type of thugs… He used guns for defense. Seemed like a pretty wild story. If anyone knows please tell me his name..
If I am way off with this; my bad
I too would urge caution in the canonization of Pope John Paul II. I was not a practicing Catholic, sadly, during his pontificate. When I come back to the Church, via RCIA, I devoured as much as I could about the Church. I was very curious about John Paul II. Yes, I learned he was very devoted to Our Lady and many novelties (ie altar girls) were implemented while he was ill and unable to resist the progressives. Still, what I saw was not very favorable. I have to admit, it is hard to get over the images of his kissing the Koran, being ‘blessed’ by a pagan, and his invocation for the protection of Islam by John the Baptist. The images of the events of Assisi I and II are pretty depressing as well. One wonders if the push to canonize John Paul II, as well as the recent fervor to canonize Paul VI and John Paul I is really about ‘canonizing’ Vatican II and the New Mass. I hate to be so cynical, but we live in strange times in the Church. Tradition and pious customs are mocked, the Mass is now to be ’emancipated’, the pending celebration by the Church of the Protestant revolt in 2017, and the ecu-mania that is favored over the truth of the Catholic Church (see: Methodist use of a Catholic cathedral). However, if the Holy Church says Pope John Paul II is in heaven, then it is binding on us to believe it. Papa Ioannes Paulus Secundus, ora pro nobis. +JMJ+
One of my favorite monologues from Father Guido Sarducci:
——————————————————————————–
“Saturday Night Live: Margot Kidder/The Chieftains (#4.15)” (1979)
Father Guido Sarducci: To be made a saint in-a the catholic church, you have to have-a four miracles. That’s-a the rules, you know. It’s-a always been that-a. Four miracles, and-a to prove it. Well, this-a Mother Seton-now they could only prove-a three miracles. But the Pope-he just waved the fourth one. He just waved it! And do you know why? It’s-a because she was American. It’s all-a politics. We got-a some Italian-a people, they got-a forty, fifty, sixty miracles to their name. They can’t-a get in just cause they say there’s already too many Italian saints, and this woman comes along with-a three lousy miracles. I understand that-a two of them was-a card tricks.
It seems to me that prudence would demand some more time to let clear the ugly scandals that crept up in the JP II pontificate and to be sure that they were in no way the result of a lack of due diligence on the Pontiff’s part – we just don’t have that level of certitude yet. In our mediatized age, we are still within a timeframe where something could be uncovered that, were JP II already canonized, could seriously discredit even the whole process of canonization.
johnnyDmunoz says: I remember a while back someone posted some information on a Saint from France, young man, defended his town against invaders or some type of thugs… He used guns for defense. Seemed like a pretty wild story. If anyone knows please tell me his name..
St. Gabriel Possenti.
In his excellent work of apologetics, Dialogue Concerning Heresies (which in my judgment should be required reading in RCIA), St. Thomas More tackles the question of the implications of honoring as a saint someone who was really a scalawag. Such an error would do us no harm, he says, because the honor we give to the saints really goes to God, without Whom the saints would not be what they are. So none of the honor given to those whom we believe in good faith to be saints would ever be wasted, even if it should turn out that they are not in fact saints.
Personally, I wish the cause for JPII’s canonization would slow down. As I watch bad bills being rammed through legislatures throughout the Western world, I feel particularly sensitive about huge things that look like they’re being done without due deliberation. But if it is in fact the case that the canonization of saints is an infallible act (which I don’t think was clear in St. Thomas More’s time), then if he is canonized, then we can be certain that he is a saint and need not entertain any doubts about it.
I was a recipient of Pope John Paul II’s intercession the morning after his funeral.
I prayed to him, because I needed help for myself for the sake of my family. And it happened, that next morning and he was in the dream as I awoke and it was fixed.
So, I am convinced that he is in Heaven, but however long it should take to be canonized, I don’t know enough to have an opinion on.
Sorry for being so convoluted up above. My basic point is if we dedicate all our prayers to a person who turns out to be not a saint, do we miss out on the chance for a miracle?
I always pray directly to God. I know the saints can be very powerful, but am I going to get into any trouble by praying directly to God? I know at work there are things I need to discuss with my immediate supervisor, but if I brought them up with the CEO, I’d be laughed at. Is it like this with prayer requests? Even things that don’t seem major, I usually bump right up to the Big Guy. I take some comfort that Jesus taught us to pray with the words “Our Father”, and I begin all prayers with “Heavenly Father.”
My now departed great aunt, Maria, suffered for 2 years from debilitating head aches. she was watching the final hours of JPII on TV, shortly after he died she prayed ” if it is possible, Holy Father, through your intersession, please take these headaches from me”. She was headache free from then on for the final 5 years of her life. To her, a miracle, she thanked him and God every day after.
Perhaps once the lobby that has been working behind close doors to undermine The Doctrine of Faith is exposed, the canonization of Pope John Paul II will move forward.
Fr. Z,
Could you weigh in on this please: Is sainthood infallible?
Well, my reply was equally convoluted, but my answer was that, if God favors your petition but not the person you’re asking to intercede (or if God just doesn’t want the saint to get canonized at this time), God is perfectly capable of intervening without an actual miracle.
Look, miracles aren’t “better” than any other way that God can fix things. Everything God does is a perfect act of God, right? If we get our daily bread and our health, does it really matter if God leads some people to it through the Red Sea and allows others to have a friend stop by with bread and a recommendation for a great doctor?
So no, you’re not going to lose any chances by picking the wrong person to ask for help. If you were going to get a miracle through the intercession of a person God wants canonized, God would inspire you with the desire to ask for the intercession of the person He wants canonized. Heck, He apparently inspires people who aren’t even Catholic, these days, so clearly He’s not too proud to bonk people over the head with His providence.
Now, if you were the sort of person who deliberately doesn’t pray for intercession, and God inspired you to pray and you turned Him down, that would be a possible way to “lose” a miracle. But it would seem that God sometimes does miracles very gratuitously for such people, and some repent, but others refuse to see miracles as being from God even when they stare them in the face. So it would seem that even deliberately trying to deny miracles doesn’t stop God from doing miracles when He feels like doing ’em. Because He’s God.
So I conclude that there is no reason to worry about “losing” a miracle by anything we can do. Rather, I would worry about not having gratitude and a loving response to miracles when they do come. God loves us, but we don’t always love Him.
Catholic Encyclopedia says canonization does go with papal infallibility, and that the argument between theologians is mostly over just how infallible and certain it is.
This doesn’t necessarily apply to traditional local saints that were never canonized or made official by local bishops, which is why we have saint history researchers. Most saints of such reputation were real holy people, even if most of what we know about them is either legends or just their name, but occasionally there have been exceptions.
Hmm…if I’ve already muddied the waters can I start over? Would a good way be to ask another person to pray for the intercession of the Blessed/Venerable? Or…I guess it sort of is too late for this one, huh?
Canonization only carries the protection of papal infallibility if the canonization is a teaching ex cathedra. That demands that the Holy Father be speaking as shepherd and teacher of all Christians, in virtue of his supreme apostolic authority, and defining a doctrine concerning faith or morals to be held by the whole Church. I posit that there is no necessity for raising an individual to the honor of the altar and listing amongst the saints that it be done ex cathedra…and state also that the current formula used for canonizations is not an example of ex cathedra teaching:
In honour of the Holy Trinity, for the glory of the Catholic faith and the development of the Christian life, with the authority of Our Lord Jesus Christ, of the Holy Apostles Peter and Paul and of Ourself, after long reflection, invoked divine assistance many times and listened to the opinion of many of our Fathers in the Episcopate (Bishops) declare and define as Saints the Blessed Stanislaw Soltys, Andre Bessette, Candida Maria de Jesus Cipitria y Barriola, Mary of the Cross MacKillop , Giulia Salzano, Battista Da Varano and inscribe their names in the Canon (list) of the Saints and establish that throughout the Church they be honoured devoutly among all the saints.
I am open, however, to an explanation as to how I am in error. :)
Also, I fail to see why the congregation for the causes of the saints would have approved said “miracle” of Sr. Marie Simon-Pierre Normand’s cure from Parkinson’s disease as proof of the Holy Father John Paul II’s intercession in her behalf to God. Parkinson’s disease, with which she claimed to have been diagnosed, has NO diagnostic test… That makes the whole approval of her cure as a miracle very questionable…
I always wondered why the Church has double standards for assessing what is truly or not a miracle.
In Lourdes, since the beginning of the apparitions, more than a century and a half ago, there were something like 8000 healings (and possibly much more) officially proposed to the evaluation of a group of doctors, some among them weren’t catholic, even atheist. So far as I know only about 80 healings were declared “truly unexplainable by the science”. About one miracle every 2 years.
In the case of the Pope John Paul II, already 2 “miracles” have happened, chosen among how many healings attributed to him? I guess certainly not 200 if we keep the same ratio as Lourdes. Is our late Pope more efficient than our Lady with the aim to reach his canonization?
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Jeanette, I work in a hospital, and there are many cases each year of patients who have unexplained cures. If those cures coincided with prayers to a saint and prospective saint, they can be called miracles attributed to the saint. But God did the miracle. (The difference between causation and correlation. Or possibly a post hoc ergo propter hoc issue.) However, if they aren’t correlated with a specific saint, they can certainly have happened by God’s will alone. God is doing amazing things all of the time. I tend to think He is doing it on His own, and not through the intercession of a prospective saint. God already knows what the saint will ask for, and most saints would probably only ask for things in accordance with God’s will – I cannot imagine them asking them for something otherwise. But who knows? The whole process of praying to saints baffles me a bit. I always pray directly to God. I do wonder if praying to a saint or prospective saint might speed up timing – God will either do the miracle or not as He sees fit, but perhaps a saint can speed things up.
Well he did a great job kissing the Koran.
Giuseppe – St. Thomas Aquinas makes a differentiation in his Summa between those deeds which are true miracles being wrought by the divine and those deeds which are illusory being only completed by preternatural or natural cause. It’s not logical to state, as if one has an infallible certitude, that an unexplainable cure, merely because it happened in the wake of/coincided with prayer to a saint, is a miracle. How does one render a certain conclusion with either no direct observation of the invisible grace, no credible witness of the invisible grace, and no authority rendering a binding judgment that the invisible grace was there?
What I am taking exception with (in the specific case of the Holy Father John Paul II) is not that an unexplained cure happened to Sr. Marie Simon-Pierre Normand of whatever affliction, but rather the statement going around that she was cured of Parkinson’s disease. My point is if there is NO diagnostic test for Parkinson’s disease, how then, did anyone come to the determination she was cured of Parkinson’s?? There seem to be a lot of other “miracles” being purported as surrounding the Holy Father John Paul II…so why choose such a dubious flag-ship for his beatification?
Also, that which no one else seems to be pointing out is how scandalous the proposed canonization of the Holy Father John Paul II is. He published two editions of a Catechism with self-contradiction contained therein (not to mention contradiction/contrariness to, for example, the Council of Trent) and also called the Catechism a “valid and legitimate instrument for ecclesial communion” and a “sure norm for teaching the faith”. He made public prayer gatherings with pagans and other non-Catholics (Assisi) as if this were morally neutral or even good. There are photographs of him on the internet with half-nude men and women at Masses. He failed to consecrate Russia to the Immaculate Heart of the Holy Theotokos in the course of his lengthy (~27-year-long) pontificate. He also is reported to have had some sort of dubious relationship with Fr. Marcel Maciel Degollado, &c.
I am not disputing in the least that the Holy Father John Paul II was a great man. He was a great man, just apparently not a good man. It seems to me that the congregation which is advancing his cause for sainthood is trying to pull a fast one on the laity.
Dear @Jeannette,
once you’ve found to ascertain for at least one given case, quotes, “observation of the invisible grace” or “credible witness of the invisible grace”, end quotes, then you may have a point. Not saying that about the specific cause about Parkinson may not be a right.
He was a great man, just apparently not a good man.
If anything, the reverse.
If you do not suppose that Pope Bl. John Paul II was a hypocrite through-and-through, then he was obviously a holy and good man. I cannot see any middle ground here. Of course, holy and good men may make mistakes, theoretically even many of them.
As for your points of criticism,
He published two editions of a Catechism with self-contradiction contained therein (not to mention contradiction/contrariness to, for example, the Council of Trent)
Self-contradiction? Direct self-contradiction? Contrariness to Trent? Don’t believe that’s the case. It must, of course, be always born in mind that a mere “saying something less explicitly than it would be wise” does not make a self-contradiction and “omitting something that was said in Trent” does not make a contradiction.
He made public prayer gatherings with pagans and other non-Catholics (Assisi) as if this were morally neutral or even good.
There is, indeed, nothing morally bad in the prayer gathering itself which does which does not come from prudential observations, or positive law given for reason of prudential observations. The Catholic Church at that time had decided to view paganism and certainly non-Catholic Christianity under the aspect of the good within them. This is not demonstrably false as long as the tiniest little thing of good is indeed within them. Do not insinuate that the Pope violated the 1st commandment at Assisi; it was others that did so (objectively), the Pope tolerating but not accepting. Whether he made that sufficiently clear is another thing.
There are photographs of him on the internet with half-nude men and women at Masses.
Nude is one thing, but “half-nude” is another. What is “half-nude”? If it means that their clothes were in an absolute sense, independent of an standards of time and fashion, unchaste, then that would be wrong (and still, one sin only, and we know that saints also have sinned). If they just did not, say, meet the standard of what some time would have liked to see in a Church, then the charge falls away.
He failed to consecrate Russia to the Immaculate Heart of the Holy Theotokos in the course of his lengthy (~27-year-long) pontificate.
That had happened before, by Pope Pius XII. What this charge really is about is that he, supposedly, failed to do so in community with all bishops, which he cannot just do from the spot. Whether the consecration of all the world of 1983, with Russia in mind, did not perhaps achieve this is at least a contested issue. But anyway, I read in a traditionalist-enough source which did say “it did not”, that it was all that John Paul II could sincerely hope to achieve.
Waiting periods exist for good reasons.
In this case, Maciel, etc.
This canonization will be a slap in the face to victims of sexual abuse. And the entire church is a secondary victim.
Dear Imrahil,
I appreciate your reply. However, I do not see your reasoning behind the refutation that the Holy Father John Paul II was not a good man.
I do not dispute that good and holy men can make mistakes, even numerous mistakes, and even venial sins (even the just man shall fall seven times, Proverbs 24:16). That being the case, though, I am not addressing mistakes or venial sins, but rather grave sins.
We know implicit in many teachings of the Church that the Pope is not impeccable by his mere accession to the Petrine throne; impeccability is a singular grace and was not promised to the Supreme Pontiffs in Holy Peter. The Pope CAN sin gravely, even mortally.
The proposition “that a mere ‘saying something less explicitly than it would be wise’ does not make a self-contradiction and ‘omitting something that was said in Trent’ does not make a contradiction” are your own claims as to what I may be getting at. I am well aware of what you propose, however, and agree with it. Obviously then, please take me at my word not to be saying other than what the words I used mean when I posit that there is self-contradiction and that which is contrary or in contradiction to oecumenical councils such as Trent in the Catechism.
The easiest place to point out self-contradiction in the Catechism of the Catholic Church is to open to the articles on the Necessity of Baptism.
1257. opens with the proposition that His Divine Majesty, Jesus Christ, “affirms that Baptism is necessary for salvation” and references the Gospel acc. to St. John, chapter 3, verse 5. This article then flows into muddy contrariness, hedging the first absolute proposition, making it a mere generality: “is necessary for salvation for those to whom the Gospel has been proclaimed” referencing the Gospel acc. to St. Mark, chapter 16, verse 16. (This verse if very similar to John 3:18, of which we understand that the belief of which St. John is speaking is by a faith which lives through charity (which, when reading the sixth (and fourteenth) session of the Council of Trent, one sees Holy Baptism as a pre-requisite for this spiritual disposition).)
1258.-1260. go on to contradict the first proposition of 1257.
1258. is contrary to the Decree of the Council of Vienne: “All are faithfully to profess that there is one baptism which regenerates all those baptized in Christ, just as there is one God and one faith.”
1261. is contrary to a condemnation of an error (of either Wyclif or Hus) at the Council of Constance: “Those who claim that the children of the faithful dying without sacramental baptism will not be saved, are stupid and presumptuous in saying this.” (this is a positive statement of the error, not a statement negating the error; this IS the error)
1261. is also contrary to the Bull of Union with the Copts (Council of Basel-Ferrara-Florence): “With regard to children, since the danger of death is often present and the only remedy available to them is the sacrament of baptism by which they are snatched away from the dominion of the devil and adopted as children of God, it admonishes that sacred baptism is not to be deferred for forty or eighty days or any other period of time in accordance with the usage of some people, but it should be conferred as soon as it conveniently can; and if there is imminent danger of death, the child should be baptized straightaway without any delay, even by a lay man or a woman in the form of the church, if there is no priest, as is contained more fully in the decree on the Armenians.”
Also, 1258.-1261. contradict the canons of the Council of Trent in its seventh session, on Baptism: “If any one saith, that true and natural water is not of necessity for baptism, and, on that account, wrests, to some sort of metaphor, those words of our Lord Jesus Christ; Unless a man be born again of water and the Holy Ghost; let him be anathema.”
“If any one saith, that baptism is free, that is, not necessary unto salvation; let him be anathema.”
This list is not exhaustive even in this small section of five articles. All I needed was one example to support my claim, and I have shown several. This sort of error is MOST specious and grave.
Regarding Assisi and such prayer gatherings: there is evil in facilitating or supporting the evil deeds of another; there is grave evil in the facilitating or supporting of the gravely evil deeds of another. The express purpose of the Assisi prayer gatherings was to pray for peace. If I know a man worships and prays to the devil, is it a morally neutral action to bring him to me and ask him to pray to the devil to supply world peace, and then do everything in my power to aid him to this end (prayer to the devil)? Acknowledging the good in all that exists is not connected by any necessity with calling together demon-worshippers to pray to their demons for peace.
I have personally viewed these photos online of the Holy Father John Paul II at Mass with bare-torsoed (half-nude) men and women. There are several photos floating around the internet of the woman from Papua New Guinea who wore little more than a grass loin cloth and paint to serve some function during the Mass. She was almost completely bare. This has never been in line with the Christian standard of modesty of dress in public, much less at the Holy Sacrifice. This is not an issue of chastity (the virtue by which one chastens/chastizes his members into conformity with his rational spirit), but rather modesty (the virtue by which one protects the inner man and his relations in all fora with God and neighbor). This is not a matter of moral neutrality, but rather very serious/grave. Christianity can foster what is good in societies which it assimilates, but always actually steers individuals in those societies away from the errors of their pagan ancestors (whether these errors involve failure to apprehend God correctly by what is revealed in nature, or failure to act in conformity with what nature reveals man is for) and raises them to the supernaturally revealed knowledge of God and what He holds in store for man. This “aboriginal” attire is a looking back to pagan roots, rather than looking forward to the regenerated man after Baptism.
The Holy Father Pius XII consecrated the world in 1942 to the Immaculate Heart of the Holy Mother and the people of Russia in 1952, all alone. He failed in meeting the prescriptions of the Holy Mother in uniting the world episcopacy to make the consecration together at the same time. There have been several repeats of consecrations of the world by the Holy Fathers Paul VI (1964, I think) and John Paul II (1981, 82, 84, and 2000) all failing to meet the simple requirements. The Holy Father John Paul II is reported to have admitted not to have consecrated Russia and that the Russian nation is still waiting for the consecration. Beyond that, if it was done in 1942 or 52, then the Holy Mother has failed thus far in converting Russia, saving us from the spread of Russia’s errors and the spread of communism, and ultimately is with-holding the promised peace.
To my knowledge, there is no requirement of all the Bishops to consecrate Russia in unison with the Supreme Pontiff IN THE SAME PLACE, merely only at the same TIME. There is nothing preventing the Holy Father from doing as the Holy Theotokos bids other than his own will. Are you really going to posit that our Holy Father was a victim of the Holy Mother in her command to consecrate Russia? that she would command what she knows cannot be done to make her Son’s vicar appear disobedient?
Dear @Jeannette,
thank you for your reply, also.
As to your points of criticism,
regarding the necessity of Baptism. An internal controdiction is not there. The first sentence in No. 1257 is followed by an explanation what precisely does this sentence mean. So are the following numbers. If you say that No. 1258 is contrary to No. 1257 and a dogmatic statement, you surely don’t reject Baptism of blood and Baptism of desire? That, if anything, is most firm Catholic teaching. (The explanation: Baptisms of water, blood and desire are one Baptism in that the latter two contain desire of the first-mentioned.) As for the Council of Constance, first “stupd and presumptous” (other than “anathema” or arguably “heretical”) bears no infallibility and can hence possibly be reversed, second, the Church does not say that she knows (what the canon of Constance was directed against), but that she considers it possible because she does not definitely know the contrary. As for the Council of Florence, there is not even the tiniest bit of a contradiction, and the Council’s canon holds just as full today as it did then. What the Catechism deals with is the ones where others did not act accordingly. As to the Council of Trent, it talks about the matter necessary (for the actual conferring of a Baptism, not as far as the necessity of Baptism goes, for it well acknowledged, or knew and did not contradict, the Baptism of desire). It talks about that you cannot baptize with fuel, perfume or the like.
regarding Assisi, that’s the one instance of those you presented where I’d most tend to agree with you. Nevertheless, even here, I don’t. First, while there’s one Bible verse that says that the gods of the heathens are demons, there’s another that says they are nothingnesses. They have to be interpreted in each other’s light. The most simple meaning of “the Gods of the heathens are demons” is that their worship is gravely wrong. There’s more to it, of course, but to say “devil-worship” when what has happened is idolatry, is rhetorics and not factual report.
Second, the purpose of Assisi was not to pray to all these idols, but to symbolize an “united mankind”, united at least in that in which they “are at one”, and thus to rather bring about, than receive preternaturally, peace in the world. Having that organized as a prayer was rather the pretext than the aim.
Do not think I like this sort of unity. But it is what it is and nothing else, and the in-itself-correct, although dangerous, are still in-itself-correct.
So the Pope assembled (showing, at least, by his own role in the gathering the kingship of Christ whose vicar he is) the religions to gather together (and pray for peace). The others, he thought, believe in their idols anyway. To worship an idol if you believe in idolatry is no subjective sin; unless, or though, believing in idolatry may be, if you have resisted Grace (and who knows that).
As for half-nudeness, I rest my case on your own saying that This is not an issue of chastity […] but rather modesty. Exactly. And while there are perhaps and probably some absolute rules of chastity (and many about justice), the whole area of modesty is almost entirely subjective and/or cultural. I’m not saying that cultural means dismissible, when ones actually part of the culture are concerned, but we were talking about Newguineans, and apparently they did follow their own culture. Among the many points we disagree with the Mormons, there’s also that one: the tuxedo has a very loose connection with morality. (Have you read Chesterton, On American Morals? I can only recommend it!)
As to Russia, first, there cannot be the question of disobedience (in the strict sense that is). The Blessed Virgin bids, she does not issue orders to the Supreme Pontiff. Though there may be the simple problem that, when you don’t do as you’re told, you may not receive what you are promised for doing so. (Nor did Pius XII fail to meet “prescriptions” properly so-called. According to pious opinions [and our very limited insight in world history], the consecration done by Pius XII [and the one by John Paul II] were accepted in Heaven – though [or respectively, even if – I won’t pronounce an opinion here] they still were not the whole thing.)
And then: the Pope apparently showed – and if it is true that he said he did not achieve to consecrate Russia, it would only show this more clearly – apparently everything he could to to have the consecration done. It is true that all bishops need not assemble in a place; time suffices. But, and this is the striking point which I meant, the bishops must agree to do this in the first place. The Pope of course can issue orders, but what if he thought that they would not have been obeyed anyway? Don’t you think that among the thousands of bishops, it is at least possible that there is one who’d reject to do any such reactionary, old-school, and anti-communist thing as to consecrate the entire world to Russia?
Thank you, again, for your reply, and please allow that I, for simplicity’s sake, got a little straightforward.
Addition to the first part of the reply:
St. Augustine taught the Baptism of desire, and Bl. Pius IX taught the same thing the Church teaches now.
pre-last paragraph: I meant, of course, “consecrate Russia to the Immaculate Heart of Mary”.