Msgr. Nicola Bux issues a challenge to Francis:

The Vatican theologian says unless the Pope reaffirms Church teaching on morals, the faith and the sacraments, ‘the apostasy will deepen and the de facto schism will widen.’

In a forceful interview with Italian Vaticanist Aldo Maria Valli, Msgr. Nicola Bux has warned that the current pontificate is issuing statements that are generating “heresies, schisms, and controversies of various kinds” and that the Holy Father should issue a profession of faith to restore unity in the Church.

[Now] “theologian consultor to the Congregation for the Causes of Saints,” he said “heretical statements” [by Francis] on marriage, the moral life and reception of the sacraments are now “at the center of a vast debate which is becoming more and more passionate by the day.”

Apostasy, schism, heresy. The man is serious.

Msgr. Bux said the origin of many of these questioned teachings — highlighted in a September 2017 filial correction and at a Rome conference in April on doctrinal confusion in the Church — is the Pope’s post-synodal apostolic exhortation Amoris Laetitia, but they have since become “considerably worse and more complicated.”

He said this has led some senior prelates, such as Cardinal Walter Brandmüller, one of the four cardinals to sign the dubia in 2016, to reiterate a call for a “profession of faith on the part of the Pope.”

Renouncing his syllabus of errors, one might say, using the famous or infamous term by Pope St. Pius X in 1907.

But Msgr. Bux said this would be difficult to achieve given the Pope’s vision of the Church as a federation of ecclesial communities — something Msgr. Bux described as “a bit like the Protestant communities.”

Bux was consultant to the Congregation for Defense of the Faith under Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI. He spoke in a long interview with Italian Vatican specialist Aldo Maria Valli, published Oct. 13, of which more here, reported by American writer Edward Pentin.

Of which some stand out on first reading:

• The Pope cannot “impose his own opinion” on the Church, Msgr. Bux stressed, quoting Joseph Ratzinger, because on matters of faith, morals and the sacraments, the Church can “only consent to the will of Christ.” And yet he said “many points” in Amoris Laetitia are “cumbersome and contradictory” as well as contrary to the thinking of St. Thomas Aquinas, despite the exhortation asserting otherwise.
• “More useful” than a fraternal correction, he said, would be to examine the “juridical validity” of Pope Benedict’s XVI’s resignation and “whether it is full or partial.” Jesus, he said, did not give the keys of heaven to Peter and Andrew but “said it only to Peter.” Such an “in-depth study” of the resignation, he said, could help to “overcome problems that today seem insurmountable to us.”
• “Great change” in the Church is “palpable” under Pope Francis, Msgr. Bux said, along with a “clear intention to mark a line of discontinuity, or break, with previous pontificates.” Such a rupture, he went on to say, is a “revolution” that “generates heresies, schisms, and controversies of various kinds” and “all of them can be traced back to sin.”
• etc. etc.

How’s the Vatican McCarrick investigation coming?

Another California bishop, Bishop Robert Barron of Los Angeles, followed [Archbishop Salvatore of San Fran] Cordileone’s comments by asking about the status of the Vatican investigation into the accusations against former cardinal Theodore McCarrick, and whether the bishops might “bring any respectful pressure to bear” to the Holy See on furthering the investigation.

DiNardo responded, saying that he knew that the four dioceses in which McCarrick had served had opened investigations, but he did not know of the status of a Vatican investigation on the matter.

He’s not in the loop.

Cordileone had touched some hot topics, btw.

Archbishop Salvatore Cordileone of San Francisco then gave a long intervention in which he described what he has been hearing from Catholics in his area.

“We’ve heard how important it is to listen to our people, I’ve held listening sessions in my own Archdiocese” regarding the abuse scandal, he said.

From this listening, Cordileone said he has found that Catholics tend to fall in one of two camps regarding the abuse crisis: the first camp believes that the Church is not talking about the real problem, which is the prevalence homosexuality among the clergy and its correlation with abuse, he said.

Yes? Great to hear this brought out into the open.

The second camp believes that the real problem is an all-male hierarchy, “because women would never have allowed this to happen,” and therefore women must be invited in to all levels of the clergy.

This too:

Cordileone, who clarified that he was merely reporting what he found among his people, said that both conclusions are overly simplistic, but neither are without some merit.

Very good line here:

“We do sometimes act as a good old boys club,” he said, with problems of “cronyism, favoritism, and cover-up.” He urged the bishops to find solutions to these “legitimate concerns” of Catholics in the second camp.

When considering the first camp, Cordileone cautioned against the “overly simplistic” conclusion that homosexuality causes sexual abuse. That “obviously cannot be true” he said, as some priests with homosexual tendencies faithfully serve the Church, while some heterosexually priests serve the Church poorly.

Still, the concern “has some validity,” he said, pointing to a recently-published study by Father D. Paul Sullins, a Catholic priest and retired Catholic University of America sociology professor. Sullins’ analysis found a rising trend in abuse, and argued that the evidence strongly suggests links between sexual abuse of minors and two factors: a disproportionate number of homosexual clergy, and the manifestation of a “homosexual subculture” in seminaries.

“The worst thing we could do is discredit this study so we can ignore or deny this reality,” Cordileone said. “We have to lean into it…to ignore it would be fleeing from the truth.”

He’s really good, isn’t he?

The archbishop recommended further studies into the correlation between homosexuality and sexual abuse, one that avoids “quick and easy answers” and would attempt to find the root causes of this correlation.

What did the other bishops think of this?

Cordileone’s was the first intervention met with applause from many bishops.

Gentlemen, you may have started your engines. Keep them running.

Never say never, say beleaguered bishops.

DiNardo said the bishops have not lessened their resolve for action, and that they are not pleased by the Holy See’s decision. He indicated that they will continue to push for action on the sex abuse crisis: “we’re disappointed, because we’re moving along on this.”
Speaking to how Catholics can trust their leaders, he asked that they retain faith in the bishops’ commitment to reform, watching their efforts. He acknowledged that people have a right to scepticism, but also to hope.

Which springs eternal, they say. You know. They.

The cardinal said he had proposed an apostolic visitation to deal with the problem, but that Rome had disagreed with that approach. [Italics mine]

Rome? Why the circumlocution? As if Francis was sitting there watching a “dicastery” do things? It’s b.s., that’s what it is. Orwell stopped spinning long ago, it’s so obvious.

While acknowledging their disappointment in the decision from Rome, the bishops also spoke of the importance of their own obedience. DiNardo said they were responsible to be attentive to the Holy Father and his congregations, and Bishop Coyne said bishops are by nature collegial, “so when the Holy See asks us to work in collegiality, that’s what we do.”

You can stay on that path, Bishop. But as matters stand, where will it take you and us? Besides, if fraternal correction means anything at all, it’s not the only path.

The pope kiboshed the meeting of bishops trying to do something about the clergy sex abuse crisis, gutting the agenda as the bishops were about to vote and leaving them wondering what the hell is going on.

Not all, however:

“It is clear that the Holy See is taking seriously the abuse crisis in the church, seeing it as a watershed moment not just for the church in this country but around the world in putting so much emphasis on the February meeting,” said Cardinal Blase Cupich, the archbishop of Chicago and a close ally of Pope Francis.

Joined at the hip, actually. (Francis had told the bishops they should hold off until February at the Vatican, where he has a record of controlling agendas and censoring final documents.)

More from Chicago’s archbishop:

Immediately after the announcement, Cardinal Cupich stood up to suggest that the bishops follow the order but schedule a meeting in March to vote on overhauls, moving as soon as possible after the Vatican meeting.

“We need to act soon, without delay,” Cardinal Cupich said.

Soon, without delay. Said with a straight face, immediately after action was delayed from above.

The head bishop tried to explain:

Cardinal [Daniel] DiNardo [of Houston] said the letter from the Vatican noted “some points in one or two of the documents where the canon law needed further precisions.” The letter was sent by the Congregation for Bishops, which oversees all the bishops globally and which includes two American members: Cardinals Cupich and Wuerl, who remains a cardinal despite stepping down as Washington archbishop.

Cupich, positioned at the heart of the matter, has cause to paint a rosy picture.

Another bishop was one of the many harboring and expressing negative thoughts, a Chicagoan born and bred serving now downstate:

The Vatican “doesn’t seem to appreciate the depth of the situation that we are facing here on the streets,” said Bishop Thomas John Paprocki of Springfield, Ill. “People are looking for us to do something. I think this will unfortunately be seen as a delay and an inadequate response.”

Now why would he say that?

But leave it to a layman to provide a pithy frank and earnest, comment.

He is incidentally a member of the Catholic hoi polloi, also known from Vatican 2 days as “the people of God,” but in this case characterized somewhat differently by the pope’s ambassador, who reminded the bishops that lay people’s “assistance is both welcome and necessary,” and their “collaboration . . . is essential,” but “the responsibility as bishops of this Catholic Church is ours.” Pow.

The layman:

“Francis’ record on sex abuse is frankly indefensible,” said Christopher Hale, who helped lead Catholic outreach for President Obama and has been an outspoken supporter of Pope Francis. “Today just continues down this sad road of not getting it and not responding correctly.”

Francis better beware. Even liberals have his number.

Any more of this silence-is-golden stuff, and I will vomit.

The US Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB) will not vote this week on two highly-anticipated proposals to respond to the sex-abuse crisis, after a last-minute Vatican intervention.

As the American bishops gathered for their November meeting in Baltimore, Cardinal Daniel DiNardo, the USCCB president, announced a stunning change in the agenda for the three-day meeting. Because of a directive from Rome, he said, the bishops would not vote on one proposal to institute a code of conduct for bishops, and another to organize an independent investigation, under lay leadership, into the bishops’ response to the abuse scandal. Those two proposals were easily the most visible items on the USCCB agenda, and had drawn enormous media coverage for the bishops’ meeting.

So it goes. The Kremlin speaks, that decides the matter. Or as the Latin says so well, Causa finita est.

Anybody out there still wondering about Pope Francis’ position on clerical abuse? Speak now or shut up for a while.

It’s a long-distance slapping down of the Americans. Let’s see how disappointed reporters and editors react.

Bishops as altar boys. Collegiality, anyone?

Finally, if this ain’t clerical privilege, what is?

Including this if not breathless then blithely half-informed, supposedly neutral observers’ account of Francis and his menu for protecting victims of clerical sexual abuse:

[David] Gibson [go-to comment source for this piece] agrees with Francis the only way to eliminate sex abuse is to wipe out the sense of entitlement and unaccountability enshrined in that culture so dear to Roman Catholic conservatives — clericalism.

“He needs to change this culture of the ‘old boys’ network’ of secrecy, and of self-protection,” Gibson says. “That’s really the ultimate answer here”

But, Gibson adds, that sort of change will likely be a long time coming.

Especially under Francis, who uses the old boys by preference, creating a regular boys’ town of supporters and apparatchiks.

That is the burning question of the day.

The mainstream media for days has been claiming, “without evidence,”* that a clip of CNN’s Jim Acosta tangling with a 98-pound White House intern was somehow “doctored.” The clip was initially shared by InfoWars’ Paul Joseph Watson and then picked up by the White House. It showed a closeup of Acosta’s arm making contact with the intern’s.

If the idea was to discredit the White House’s condemnation of Acosta’s atrocious behavior at Trump’s press conference and its decision to yank his press pass, a “doctored tape” conspiracy theory would be a good way to do that.

As John Sexton Hot Air points out, the virtually indecipherable difference seen in a side by side comparison of the so-called “doctored” tape and the original video is likely “the result of frame rate adjustment that happens whenever a video is converted from one format to another.”

In other words, there’s no there there . . .

Tangled web here, if I ever saw one. Finally, however, (again) discrediting the would-be discrediters. Next? . . .

About time.

Former New York City Police Commissioner Bernard Kerik told Breitbart News Tonight Thursday evening that the FBI should classify Antifa as a “domestic terror group.” He offered his remarks in an interview with SiriusXM hosts Rebecca Mansour and Joel Pollak.

Kerik’s comments were made during a discussion of left-wing activists threatening and intimidating Tucker Carlson’s family on Wednesday night outside of the Carlson family’s home in Washington, D.C.

Kerik said, “In the most minimal definition of terrorism, it’s the unlawful use of violence and intimidation — especially against civilians — in pursuit of political aims. Antifa is a domestic terror group. I strongly believe that the FBI and the Department of Justice should classify them as such.

Has gone without saying for some time.

Oh my, how often have I wanted someone to say that in such a situation.

Did so two days ago, maybe:

Vatican City, Nov 7, 2018 / 04:47 am (CNA/EWTN News).- Pope Francis spoke of the need for creative entrepreneurship in the face of “scandalous poverty” Wednesday, stressing the importance of generosity with one’s possessions.

“If there is hunger on earth, it is not because food is missing!” Pope Francis said in St. Peter’s Square Nov. 7.

“What is lacking is a free and far-sighted entrepreneurship, which ensures adequate production, and a solidarity approach, which ensures fair distribution,” he continued.

Free? From what?

Ensures adequate production? Well, nothing ensures anything. He should know that. But it does a lot towards that goal, more than any un-free system on the face of God’s green earth.

Ensures fair distribution? No it doesn’t (as above). Nothing does. What’s this fair distribution business anyway? Ensured by whom or what?

Fuzzy-wuzzy talk. This pontiff is good at it.