Note to all Priests and seminarians: Don't be a "little monster!"
What a gem to add to my collection.
What a gem to add to my collection.
Keep them coming, Your Holiness!
In all seriousness, however, His Holiness is 100% correct that seminaries should be places in which the Holy Spirit forms the hearts of seminarians unencumbered by the spiritual evils that blighted the seminaries during the 1970s and 80s. This was said to be a time when an atmosphere that bred a subculture allowing such alarming trends as homosexual activity was allowed to develop and then to flourish amid rampant heresy, doctrinal confusion and with seemingly nobody to 'police' the situation. A proportion of these men would later go on to be the subject of police investigations, as well as ecclesiastical investigations once they had become priests whose 'calling' had become confused with 'cruising'.
Seminaries should also be places in which charity is a way of life and the truth of Catholic doctrine can be embraced, guided by the Holy Spirit, in the minds and hearts of seminarians in an atmosphere of holiness, prayer and unity, unencumbered by heretical teachings that destroy Faith and bad literature that leads souls into error, so that, free from the tyranny of worldly values, these houses may foster a deepening of love for Christ and for His Teaching in His One, Holy Catholic and Apostolic Church, enabling these men to lead souls to Salvation. They should be places in which men who desire to make an oblation of their lives to God are given the preparation they need to be wholly set apart, consecrated to Jesus Christ, ordained to be 'other Christs'.
The last thing the Church needs, as His Holiness suggests, is seminaries that create 'little monsters' who go on to drag the Priesthood through the muck, teach falsehood and impiety, that create men who prefer the vanity of human respect to the Judgment of God and take souls with them to Hell, having never taught souls of its existence and our need for repentance. They say that the 1970s was a particularly bad time for this and that, under Benedict XVI, things in seminaries were greatly improving, but not being a seminarian, who am I to judge?
While we're on the subject, has anyone heard what happened to that report on the powerful homosexual lobby in the Church yet?
9 comments:
Just in case you're ever commissioned to write the 'Pope Francis Little Book of Irony', Laurence
"I summarise by some advice I once received as a young man:"If you want to advance, think clearly and speak obscurely". That was a clear invitation to hypocrisy. We need to avoid that at all costs"
I think the dossier on the lobby is in the white box on the table between His Holiness and Pope Francis. What Pope Francis did with it, perhaps he decided he simply could make no judgement.
@ Anonymous above -
I was given similar advice on the writing of reports: the effect should be that of a jelly; it has form, shape, colour, but when you try to pick it up there's nothing there.
I think that's a mistranslation which the Vatican will clarify shortly. What Francis actually meant was The Munsters.
May I make this incidental comment, since you raise the subject, and please scrub it if you feel it is out of order.
Voris is a phenomena.
He talks orthodox, logical, direct, mainstream, sensible, true, clear, Catholicism. I could go on. He is exactly the sort of layman the Church so desperately needs.
As such he will be reviled. But that simply underlines his essential rightness.
Another mistranslation perhaps, Laurence. But by you this time.
What was reported (via la Civilta Cattolica) seems to be:
"We must form their hearts. Otherwise we are creating Little Monsters"
However, you have interpreted it as
"..[the pope] is 100% correct that .....in which the Holy Spirit forms the hearts of seminarians.."
Precisely. Thank you so much for helping the Holy Father out so graciously in this extraordinary 'all hands to the deck' time in which we are living.
kfca
@Jacobi
I have always found Michael's reports, (those I've seen), to be very insightful, have been dismayed by the immaturity and petty envy of some of his detractors (who should know better!), and regret that I didn't go along to his lecture the last time he was in the UK, as I would agree that he deserves our support.
kfca
This Pope speaks far too informally. Too often he does not speak with the authority that belongs to his office. He truly is dismantling not only the papacy but even the timeless moral teaching of the Church.
see this for those who read Italian: ....http://www.tgcom24.mediaset.it/cronaca/2014/notizia/papa-da-gay-nuove-sfide-
> educative-_2018986.shtml
"Gay couples - new educative challenges"
I can hardly bear anymore.
Thank you Mr. Laurence - for a place to come - you are one of the few on the blogsphere who truly see the absolute disaster that we are in.
Barbara
Yes, Barbara, the majority of Catholic bishops, priests and laity with a public forum, seem to be caving in to the pressure not to continue to speak the truth since the election of Pope Francis - it is truly shocking. I had hoped and expected more of our leaders would not cease to speak the truth and condemn falsehood (which is endemic).
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