An Open Letter to Pope Benedict XVI

Perfect.

An open letter to Pope Benedict XVI

Most Holy Father,

It's been a tough couple of weeks. You did what you thought was the right thing in reaching out another helping hand to fellow Christians who have left the Church. Then, detractors within seized the opportunity to accuse you of abandoning the teachings of the Council, critics without called you an anti-Semite, and many asked that you step down as Pope.

There was no doubt in our mind that you disagreed with Bishop Williamson's comments. We, too, found them reprehensible. To be sure, we're angry at him for all the trouble and grief he has caused for you and the Church. We're angry at his arrogance and ignorance. We have witnessed the furor caused by his remarks and we've felt the tremors as old, anti-Catholic fault lines quaked.

But we want to make one thing clear. We support you, we appreciate your efforts in bringing about unity, and we hope you won't be fazed by those who are angry at you. Who are we?

We're the millions of faithful Catholics who fill the pews at Mass every Saturday evening and Sunday morning. We're the Catholic families who send our children to parochial schools, who follow the Church's teaching on contraception, and who continue to support the Church financially during this difficult time.

We're the young people who give up promising secular careers to enter a life of service to our Holy Mother Church. We're the sinners who go to the confessionals seeking God's forgiveness. We're the Church Militant who seek the prayers of our brothers and sisters in the Church Triumphant. Most importantly, we are the people who pray for you, our Holy Father, every day.

The enemies of the Church, both within and without, don't speak for us. We embrace a return to Tradition. We want to be part of a counter-cultural movement that affirms life and love in a world set on death and utility. We welcome a return to Catholic culture and identity. We appreciate the "hermeneutic of continuity."

While others hurl insults at you because you challenge them, we will cling to our lifeboat, the unsinkable Bark of Peter and continue to pray for your health and ministry.

Respectfully yours,


Faithful Catholics around the world

Support the Pope

Fr. Trigilio put this up on his blog.

ENOUGH IS ENOUGH. The recent 'demand' of German Chancellor Angela Merkel that Pope Benedict XVI make an 'adequate' clarification on the Vatican's position on the Holocaust in light of Bishop Richard Williamson's unfathomable and unconscionable remarks is equally as unfathomable and ludicrous. The Holy Father already stated UNEQUIVOCALLY that he and the entire Roman Catholic Church express FULL AND INDISPUTABLE SOLIDARITY with Jews and warned against ANY DENIAL of the horror of the Nazi Holocaust. She is merely pandering to the press for publicity.

Liberal Catholic theologian Hermann Haering was even more outlandish and uttered this incredible (as well as horribly offensive) statement:

"If the pope wants to do some good for the Church, he should leave his job," as told to the German daily Tageszeitung. (We know who SHOULD leave, or rather should be thrown out, and it ain't B16, that's for sure)

This GERMAN Pope made a visit to a synagogue in Germany and the USA; he has reiterated the total condemnation of the Shoah (Holocaust). But there are those who have another agenda. One seeks to derail the reconciliation of the SSPX (Society of Saint Pius X) with Rome, the other seeks to discredit anything and everything Pope Benedict does and says, regardless of the issue. Bishop Williamson may have intended this to happen, I do not know. His offensive remarks went beyond imprudent, they were reprehensible. If he calculatingly did this after the excommunications were lifted in order to sabatoge the reconciliation, then he is more cunning than anyone suspected. If, however, he was just stupid, then someone else is taking advantage of the faus pax and cranking it up to thermonuclear proportions. There is more than meets the eye here, to be sure. We know that dissidents who hated Cardinal Ratzinger also loathe Pope Benedict for the same reasons: orthodoxy. Restoring the Extraordinary Form of the Roman Missal angered many liturgical-nazis and ultra-liberal ideologues who perverted the documents of Vatican II to advance their own agenda. These lefties would love to discredit B16 AND the SSPX in one fell swoop and ride the wave which they hope would also eliminate the Fraternity of Saint Peter and the Institute of Christ the King.

I say it is time for all loyal Catholics, whether you like the Ordinary or Extraordinary Form, Latin or Vernacular, Oriental or Roman Rite, to stand up and be counted. UBI PETRUS IBI ECCLESIA. WE STAND WITH PETER. The sad reality is that the far left and far right have something in common: their dislike and disobedience for the Holy Father. And they say politics makes stange bedfellows.

Posted by Padre Giovanni Trigilio at 8:53 PM

Well, Fr. Trigilio can comment on this so much better than I can that I even bother if its worth me writing at all. But I will say that I am so sick and tired of things being blown out of proportion and context. So many of my friends are non-Catholics or non-practicing Catholics and when the media makes up outlandish claims about the Pope that is what they hear about. There are plenty of people on this planet who deny the holocaust, and hate the Jewish people, so I have no idea why so many would rather focus on a man and a church that does not.

H/T to Esther

Pope Benedict lifts excommunication of bishops ordained by Lefebvre

Pope Benedict lifts excommunication of bishops ordained by Lefebvre

Vatican City, Jan 24, 2009 / 09:20 am (CNA).- Pope Benedict XVI has lifted the excommunication of the four bishops from the Society of St. Pius X (SSPX) ordained by Marcel Lefebvre in 1988 in a decision he hopes will lead to “real and final unity.”

A press release from the Vatican reveals that after dialogue between the Holy See and SSPX, represented by its Superior General, Bishop Bernard Fellay and his request in a letter on behalf of the other three bishops in the Society, Most Reverend Bernard Tissier de Mallerais, Most Reverend Richard Williamson and Most Reverend Alfonso del Gallareta, the Holy Father has decided to lift “the excommunication in which they had incurred twenty years ago.”

The statement, released in Italian, recalls that because the Episcopal consecrations of June 30, 1988 were performed by Marcel Lefebvre without pontifical mandate, “the four aforementioned Prelates had incurred the excommunication latae sententiae, formally declared by the Congregation of Bishops on date July 1st 1988.”

More

Offer to SSPX

The New Liturgical Movement has up the apparent pre-conditions given by the Vatican to the SSPX, to which they are supposed to have a response to by June 28th.

Conditions resulting from the 4 June 2008 meeting between Cardinal Darío Castrillón Hoyos and Bishop Bernard Fellay:
1) The commitment to a proportionate response to the generosity of the Pope.
2) The commitment to avoid any public intervention that does not respect the person of the Holy Father and that could be negative for ecclesial charity.
3) The commitment to avoid the claim of a magisterium superior to the Holy Father and not to propose the fraternity as opposed to the Church.
4) The commitment to demonstrate the will to act honestly in full ecclesial charity and respect of the Vicar of Christ.
5) The commitment to respect the date - set at the end of the month of June - to respond positively. This will be a condition required and necessary as immediate preparation for the adhesion to have full communion ("come preparazione immediata all’adesione per avere la piena comunione").

The New Liturgical Movement has a lot of information on this subject, and is much more learned in these things than I, go check it out.