Tough Words But True

I've been meaning to post a link to this for awhile now. I think it is good medicine from a lady, Dr. Jennifer Roback Morse, who has been fighting the good fight against queers, liberals and pagans for some time now. Excerpt:

Some of you are hysterical over the Synod, as though the Holy Father were plotting to change Church doctrine. Haven’t you seen this report from the National Catholic Register? The four American bishops said at their press conference, “There must have been two synods, and the four of us must have happened to be at the wrong one.”

I don’t know what in the world you kids are thinking. You certainly realize that the Holy Father has no authority to change Church doctrine. And he knows it.

Some of you are upset because all the wrong people seem to like the Holy Father. I realize there is a battle to capture the symbolic value of the Papacy. The “Progressives” who want the whole Sexual Revolution, would love to claim the moral authority of the Papacy and the Catholic Church for their team. But do you realize that every time you repeat the liberal media talking points like this, you are scoring for the “Progressive” team?

You kids know me well enough to know that I don’t generally go around scolding people. As a matter of fact, refraining from scolding is how I get away with my unabashed presentation of Church teaching on marriage and sex, in front of non-Catholic and Catholic audiences alike. (Check out this and this, for instance. Surely you will not accuse me of soft-pedaling Church teaching!) Scolding people is not very attractive. And I like to keep my powder dry for situations that really call for a full-on Mom-Mad.

I don't think she is talking so much here about people like William Oddie or Father Longenecker who have presented constructive criticisms of Pope Francis. I think she mainly means the hysterical slashing of people like an acquaintance of mine who suggests in his rant emails that surely all true faithful Catholics realize that Pope Francis is a heretic and probably the anti-Christ, or least a sub-anti-Christ under President Obama.

I realize that Pope Francis is not necessarily your style. He talks about issues you would rather not discuss. He talks about things in a way that is alien to you.

Too bad. He is still your father, even if you don’t like everything he says or does. You owe him the respect due to his office, as father.

I insist that you respect your father. That’s what good moms do.

I have made a point of publishing this column on a non-Catholic website. Can you imagine how we look to our Separated Brethren? Do you realize that many of them wish us well? Faithful Evangelicals know their lives will be a lot harder if the Catholic Church goes soft on the sexual issues.

Pope Francis is not a "conservative" by temperament, but ideologically and theologically he's the same as the last two Popes. I don't think any thing is going to change either of these realities.

Look at Archbishop Kurtz’s blog, where he talks positively about the Synod. People don’t become Catholics because someone literally or metaphorically bludgeons them into submission. People become Catholics because they are attracted to the person of Jesus Christ.

Your basic question should always be: am I drawing people closer to Jesus Christ? If the answer is yes, you are doing something right. If the answer is no, you need to do something different.

If you are going to wear the Catholic label on your forehead, kindly make yourself as attractive as you can. Moaning and complaining and tearing each other down is NOT attractive.

I think all her points should be taken by Catholics. Even if they then want to explain how Pope Francis has fallen short, in their humble opinion. Recently there was a total bullshit story about the Pope saying that your dead pet dog will end up in heaven. The thing was sewn together out of whole cloth and fragments from a story about remarks from Pope Paul VI.

The moral is to not believe anything you hear about the Pope until you verify it from a real news source. Everyone hysterical about Pope Francis has forgotten all the supposedly awful things that Pope JPII did in the way of introducing Satanism, Wicca, Alchemy and Altar Girls into the Catholic liturgy. This was 20 years ago when I joined the Catholic Church, and obviously it was all either a bunch of crap or, as in the case with altar girls, it didn't split the Church the way the traditionalists predicted (or hoped in some cases). The non-factuality of all the lies didn't stop the haters from spewing them; plus ca change.