Wednesday, 4 June 2014

Don't Worry...


It's a charismatic prayer group 'raising of hands'.

Not a Nazi salute.

Bizarre. What must Blessed John Henry Newman make of it all?

Still...always good to see the Pope kneeling which is the model of prayer for us all.

Just for a moment there, His Holiness looked a little pious.I say this because His Holiness has issued from on high another insult to Catholics...

"Oi! Angel face! Stop looking so pious! Putting on your sweet angel face, closing your eyes and pretending to be a Saint! Yeah, that's right! You! Isn't that right?!"


16 comments:

Damask Rose said...

From the Catholic Herald:

"Focusing on the gift of piety, the Pope said he wanted to clarify its meaning right away [...hehe...] “because some people think that being pious is closing your eyes, putting on a sweet angel face, isn’t that right? To pretend to be a saint” and holier than thou."

Bless him, Pope Francis. His little sermonette does seem to make sense. It did make me chuckle, though.

Pelerin said...

Having received an email from one of my sons this morning telling me that he was in St Peter's Square waiting to see the Pope, I later watched the recording on kto. I understand the Pope is giving a series of talks on one of the gifts of the Holy Spirit and today as you say it was on Piety.

I gathered that Pope Francis was distinguishing between interior Piety which he described as gratitude and praise to God and exterior religiosity and did not take it to be an insult. However it was a little confusing and even the Italian interpreter for kto was lost for words at one point!

Incidentally does anyone know why Charismatics wave their arms about in the air? Does it make them feel better or are they perhaps trying to catch the attention of God?

JB said...

he's a clear, obvious tropism for hurling insults. must be the way he was brought up and/or raised. too bad he doesn't have better manners.

Our Lady of Good Success-pray for us. said...

I wonder if Charamaticathlics think the crucifix is a sign of the devil like protestant charismatics do?
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it's not for nothing that as chazcaths increase in number, respect for the True Chruch diminishes. Everyone can create their own 'jesus' when all one needs to do is wave and sway amidst a group mind that isn't the slightest bit interested in an objective Truth Who is Jesus Christ. I will add that chazcaths are the most heretical catechists one might ever have the misfortune of having to be 'instructed' by.
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this catholic-church one sees all around these days like some perfidious pop-up is something that is becoming increasingly alien to me.

Anonymous said...

Depressing , cultish , hardly Catholic, which includes a purification of the will and emotions. - you cannot re-build civilisation with happy-feel-good - ..forced "contact" with God. It's really fake. Real intimacy with Our Lord through the Sacraments in another thing completely . This is the tragedy ...we don't need this hyped up protestant stuff..we have everything we need already ...

I went once to one of those charismatic prayer meetings ...the whole thing was emotion-induced ..I couldn't wait to get out of there....even if the people were kind...

Actually some of that video I found quite eerie...

Barbara

Jacobi said...

@Damask Rose

I admire your equanimity.

Personally, I’m getting a bit fed up with being told that if I genuflect to the Body Blood Soul and Divinity of Christ under the outward appearance of bread and wine, as my mother told me to do, l am narcissistic, or pretending or whatever. None of my pals would say that to me. They know me too well !

As for closing my eyes in Church I do it more and more – to shut the distraction of the awful banality, misleading liturgy I would otherwise see around me.

JB said...


You really can't win with him. On the one hand he doesn't want any "sour faced" saints, and on the other, he doesn't want any "angel faces" either. It's a continuous barrage of insults.

it is his way of making points I guess. He first lays out a straw man, then knocks it down, then gets to the point. A habit I guess.

Eccles said...

So HF stands for "Heil Francis" and not "Holy Father"?

Anonymous said...

If you're not waving your arms vigorously, swaying with abandon, shouting out continually to the Lord, you do not have a sufficiently deep personal relationship with God (!!!)

John Vasc said...

That charismatic event was very instructive. Apart from all the 'Om'-type mantra thingy, I heard Portuguese tourists speaking Portuguese, and Spanish visitors speaking Spanish.
Not exactly a miracle along the lines of Acts 2.
Maybe it should be re-written: "And how have we heard, every man speaking erm, his own tongue wherein he was born?.. we have heard them speak in our own - sorry, in *their* own tongues the wonderful works of God...What meaneth this?"
But Peter lifted up his voice saying: 'Men of Judea, these men are not full of new wine, or from a samba school, as ye may think: they are just a bit high on themselves and have learnt only one disco move.'

Damask Rose said...

Jacobi

What's a gal gonna do?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Nld4DcRHME0

Go tell 'em, Father.

John Vasc said...

...And I think Bones has pretty well nailed it.
To kneel in a prayerfully pious attitude with bowed head, closed eyes, hands clasped in prayer and solemnly soulful expression - not at Holy Mass, but at a noisy public prayer meeting, and then a couple of days later to go off on a little public rant about those who - hehe - do just that, needs a remarkable amount of unreflective insouciance.
A more, let's say, *judgmental* sort of person might describe it as a severe case of double standards.

Mary K said...

John Vasc, I love your comments! And Laurence has nailed it---distilled the essence of our HF (whichever HF means!)

I was actually dragged to a Billy Graham 'meeting' as a child, by a babysitter. Even then, I knew they were a bit off. Years later, one of my sisters joined a Catholic 'charismatic' group at her university, and insisted I join her. Of course we had a bit of a disagreement afterward. It was really hard not to laugh, as they 'spoke in tongues' and 'interpreted'. The interpretation sounded much like my protestant brother's prayers: "Well, Lord, we just want to thank you, and we just want to ask you for blessings, and we just want to....' I never understood the hand waving and the repetition of prayers, which they accuse Catholics of. I would rather repeat a Pater and Ave than 'We just want to...whatever.'

Our Lady of Good Success-pray for us. said...

This is a good example of why people with a Catholic brain should stay away from the charismatic movements - all the kinds. I've said this before, the 'spirits' they channel are demonic:

listen to this from a former Novus Ordo seminarian about the charismatics they brought to seminary (they also brought in marxists (they could even have field trips to Nicaragua to the Sandinistas) and feminists and gay activists), but anyway around 71 minutes in:

http://www.blogtalkradio.com/restorationradio/2014/06/02/true-restoration-flagship-xxxvii-confessions-of-a-novus-ordo-seminarian

Anonymous said...

Viterbo.....the HF himself has stated that there are Marxists whom he likes very much, so .....there you go dissing Marxists and Radical Feminists and the like, just as the HF has told us NOT TO. (sarcasm)

Our Lady of Good Success-pray for us. said...

@Anon - your review of 'papal' five star worthies is spookily true.

33

33 The really, terribly embarrassing book of Mr Laurence James Kenneth England. Pray for me, a poor and miserable sinner, the most criminal ...