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“This blog is like a fusion of the Baroque ‘salon’ with its well-tuned harpsichord around which polite society gathered for entertainment and edification and, on the other hand, a Wild West “saloon” with its out-of-tune piano and swinging doors, where everyone has a gun and something to say. Nevertheless, we try to point our discussions back to what it is to be Catholic in this increasingly difficult age, to love God, and how to get to heaven.” – Fr. Z
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I’d rather look at someone else’s mildewy bathroom tiles than that.
“Your terms are acceptable.”
I thought this was some kind of parody.
This is the messaging of a hierarchy that is totally and completely out of touch with the world and their flock. This is not Catholic. It the message of people with an agenda who have absolutely no interest in “listening” to the Church or anyone who isn’t lock step with their agenda.
SSPX, necessity proven yet again. Every day we see more and more evidence in their favor.
The smoke of Satan in the air?
What on earth were they thinking when the Committee for Artistic Design for Important Events approved that creepy logo for the Synod of Synods?
It looks like a combination of giant scarecrow and the headless horseman of Sleepy Hollow chasing after a small, slow moving group of people. They do not appear to be in a hurry to escape from the 20 foot tall straw monster. They might be in line to get tickets for a movie, barely shuffling along. Or maybe standing at a crosswalk, waiting for the light to change.
The group is led by a small child, who appears to be standing still, and a man in a wheelchair. There is a nun, wearing a veil and a floor length habit, and a yellow bishop near the back of the line, also standing still.
I’m not sure what to make of those two women, standing shoulder to shoulder, grinning from ear to ear. One, a habitless Catholic woman religious, and the other one, reminding us of what Pope Leo XIII said about Anglican ordinations, “absolutely null and utterly void.”
Does one represent the Endless Synod, and the other Endless Ecumenical Dialogue with Anglicans? And we cannot have one without the other? If one goes, so does the other? … Hmmm?
Is that Austin Powers in disguise in the purple cassock?
Great googley-moogley.
Of all the childhood stories I’ve read my kids over the years, nothing resonates as clearly with our current times as the story of “The Emperor with No Clothes.”
Sadly, unlike the story, when one points this out to others, instead of everyone admitting the truth, one is labeled a schismatic and an enemy of the Church among choruses of “don’t you know that if the Emperor says he’s wearing clothes than it means your own lying eyes are deceiving you!”
Or, for a cinematic parallel, it’s like living in Don Siegel’s “Invasion of the Body-Snatchers” world.
I thought the “deal” between Jesus and Satan, as reported by Pope Leo XIII, for Satan to attempt to destroy the Church was to last only 100 years. We’re in “overtime” now.
Speaking as the least fashionable woman in the world…
Holy cow. I would not let my worst enemy walk around with one of those terrible hairstyles.
Or the glasses. Or the dorky bishop cosplay. Or the giant cross hanging askew.
At least the jacket chick has some respectable clothing on, but that hair!!!
If you were really God-focused, you wouldn’t want to be poster women for an entirely different Church. They are smug grifters, happy to create scorched earth for other people’s children, while destroying their own churches.
Gross.
Listening to others can be dangerous if one doesn’t know how to think critically and examine what is being said. We should constantly be using our brain to determine if what someone says is reasonable, if it makes sense, aligns with the truths we already know and things like that. Otherwise it can turn into a situation where the blind is leading the blind. It’s for those reasons that I don’t listen to many people, not only is it exhausting to have to think so much about what others are saying but it’s also a distraction and can cause people to lose their peace.
The Church should focus more on teaching the faith as it was taught in the past. Art and beauty were often used. Stained glass windows showing the lives of the saints and important events in the lives of Jesus and Mary helped people learn the faith when they couldn’t read. Now, more people can read but they can’t think well so trying to discuss with certain people is often the wrong starting point.
The Church needs to recover sacred music and the beautiful way this can evangelize people and strengthen them in their faith. Church leaders should dress with intention and with a great knowledge of their dignity. The Pope should be loved and respected by all. This will happen naturally if he is a humble man of prayer, but I think people need to recover a love for the Pope even when they disagree with him, keeping in mind that God is with His Church always.
@L.,
There was no guarantee when those 100 years would begin… hopefully no later than the mid-2oth century, right?
“B”, as in blowittoo, “S” as in “…smithereens”!
You mean I can’t be synodal unless I’m ecumenical? Or I can’t be ecumenical without being synodal? Oh…. alright then. I’ll manage.
PURGE THE UNCLEAN! *Ahem* drifted 40,000 years into the future there….
my read on the logo: synodality is a gigantic straw man collapsing onto everyone regardless of state of life.
A good April fools joke. Too far to be true but just believable enough to make you look twice.
Frog and Toad are
FriendsPriests?Playing Dress UpWeird.Any communication, in any form, from the Vatican (or any dicastery), that does not contain any mention the Triune God can be ignored.
Somehow, our Church’s leadership has the time and attention for finding commonality in very unlikely places. I guess that’s OK, since the Church’s immemorial truths, clearly expressed, cannot help but eventually lead mistaken souls like Ms. Canterbury to Immortal Rome. That certainly worked for Cardinal Newman! Sadly, I very much doubt that’s the synodal church’s idea of ecumenism.
And it’s disturbing to me that while our Church’s current leadership has endless time and attention for dialogue with these nice ladies, there is no similar eagerness to find commonality with the SSPX, who begged for
a meeting and got stony silence.
I get the feeling that when the synodal church says “Todos, todos, todos”, the fine print reads (“except for people who ask tough questions”).
Alfred E. Newman is back!
I suspect that within a few years, Rome will permit female deacons as the first step.
Clearly, Rome has lost the plot.
Where did this image come from? Is it AI or something from ELCA or an Episcopal diocese with a liberal bent?
Over the years secular newspapers have covered something like this in the religion section. I remember reading about organizations circa 1980s about Rent a Priest and renegade women priests in certain parts of North America. There are Catholics who read these articles and think “oh the Church has changed its teachings.” I reluctantly admit that in my younger days I was more gullible.
“There can be no synodality without ecumenism” and viceversa.
The problem with those slogans without a context and an explanation is that they can mean everything or anything.
“There can be no justice without virtue, there can be no virtue without justice”
“There can be no light without warmth, there wan be no warmth without light”
“There can be no inclusion without topology, there can be no topology without inclusion”
“There can be no accidentality without substantiation…”
And anything in between.
No synodality without ecumenism, and no ecumenism without synodality?
Okay. I vote to get rid of synodality. There. Done.
Does this qualify as killing two birds with one stone? I didn’t realize it would be this easy to fix the Church.
Sister Nathalie and Mrs. Mullally … an image worthy of The Far Side. Surely evidence of the absolute necessity of the veil for religious women and an apron for Mrs. Mullally.
Recently I became aware that Mrs. Mullally’s husband is/was an Irish Roman Catholic. Now that is ecumania! How far over the cliff we have come.
I know a dozen Traditional Nuns. They are pious, humble, knowledgeable and have a great sense of humor. Those two and all the women who want to be Deacons couldn’t hold a candle to them.
These humble Brides of Christ teach school and travel the US giving retreats to young women.
They are powerfull.
Brits and Anglophiles will be familiar with the sitcom “The Vicar of Dibley” wherein a hapless middle-aged, female vicar is assigned to a dysfunctional, provincial parish, and hilarity ensues. Dawn French portrays someone who is surely unqualified for the dignity of such an office, but manages to be so endearing that things just work out for the best in 30 minutes or less.
Recently a “Comic Relief” skit was released onto YouTube that is several years old at this point. The bumbling Vicar is tapped to blunder into Westminster and compete for an episcopal appointment. More hilarity ensues, of course, with an ensemble cast of comics, including Emma Watson, as the youngest and most vivacious bishop-to-be, quite stylish in her tailored clerics with a tasteful, feminine soft pink shirt.
I’ve watched all this with a rather incredulous curiosity, knowing how incongruous and fundamentally sad it all is, that the gender-bending isn’t just edgy feminism but a profound misunderstanding and perversion of the person of Christ himself. And to think that loyal British subjects are simply accepting this into their homes as endearing comic relief, as it were, and the edgy feminism made palatable by a good sense of humor, and a very powerful suspension of disbelief!
Do they realize how insulting this is? This is a slap in the face to all the English martyrs, especially to St. Thomas of Canterbury. What a mockery to use this usurper, this phony woman, as a model of ecumenism! Shame on whoever came up with this.
How far the Church has fallen! No, I will not participate in the humiliation of the Church.
The logo gives an unpleasant echo of the Last Chance Armada…which also counted a bishop among its company.
The slogan sounds like a threat. And the picture looks like an ad for a stupid comedy.
They think this is appealing?
I’d rather watch the WNBA than go synodalling.