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Bear with me, please, as I explain.
The second reading in the Office of Readings for this past Sunday were selections from St. Gregory the Great’s Pastoral Guide which you can find here. (I recommend that you read and ponder it in its entirety). Let me, however,emphasize the following excerpts:
“A spiritual guide should be silent when discretion requires and speak when words are of service. Otherwise, he may say what he should not or be silent when he should speak…Indiscreet speech may lead men into error and an imprudent silence may leave in error those who could have been taught…
The name of prophet is sometimes given in the sacred writings to teachers who both declare the present to be fleeting and reveal what is to come. The word of God accuses them of seeing false visions because they are afraid to reproach men for their faults and they lull the evildoer with an empty promise of safety. Because they fear reproach, they keep silent and fail to point out the sinner’s wrongdoing.
The word of reproach is a key that unlocks a door, because reproach reveals a fault of which the evildoer is himself often unaware. That is why Paul says of the bishop: ‘He must be able to encourage men in sound doctrine and refute those who oppose it’.”
Our shepherds are called to teach the Truth, fraternally correct and call us sinners to repentance. Many have abrogated these duties. We lay folk have similar obligations. But we have frequently avoided those responsibilities as well.
Such failings have consequences as Our Lady of Akita warned Sister Agnes Katsuko Sasagawa on October 17, 1973:
The work of the devil will infiltrate even into the Church in such a way that one will see cardinals opposing cardinals and bishops against other bishops.
Our Lady was correct, as is evident to any Catholic who knows his/her faith and has a properly formed conscience. Tragically, so many Catholics don’t know their faith very well and are therefore unable to recognize the errors propagated by dissident cardinals, bishops and priests.
Recently, the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops reiterated its long-standing teaching that “the threat of abortion remains our preeminent priority.”
Despite that proclamation, two prominent Catholic Cardinals, Cardinal Joseph Tobin, the Archbishop of Newark, New Jersey and Cardinal Gerhard Mueller, the former Prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, issued conflicting explanations as to how that Truth is to be lived out in real life – the type of conflict our Blessed Mother had predicted would occur between cardinals and bishops.
What did they say?
Cardinal Tobin announced that a Catholic “in good conscience could vote for Joe Biden" - this, I add, despite Biden’s radical and unrestricted support of abortion. His Eminence did not offer the “grave moral reasons that he thought might justify a vote for Biden."
“Catholics,” Tobin also stated, “should vote in favor of the
common good, exercise prudence, and avoid reducing an election to how a
candidate stands on a single issue, at least within the current panorama of
issues.”
Now contrast Cardinal Tobin’s comments with those of Cardinal Müller:
"You can't compare apples to oranges. The human right to life is so fundamental that it cannot be equated with other political issues. According to Catholic teaching, not all issues have the same weight.
"Therefore, a candidate who does not clearly oppose abortion and euthanasia is unelectable for a person who believes in God, and especially for every Catholic, because abortion is a heinous crime against the life of the person and against God, the creator of every human life.”
The salvation of your soul and those of your family and loved ones (as well as the lives of millions of children yet to be born) depend on your knowing that Cardinal Müller not Tobin, accurately set forth Church teaching. All of us must conform our conduct to that Truth.
The Church’s teaching on this issue has never changed and will never change: There is no compelling proportionate reason anyone can offer to justify the killing and dismemberment of human life, and the selling of aborted body parts! NONE!!!!!!
Voting for anyone who advocates otherwise is to be complicit in their sin and to place your soul at risk of eternal damnation.
In writing this post, I have taken to heart the wisdom of St. Gregory the Great set forth above: "Indiscreet
speech may lead men into error and an imprudent silence may leave in error
those who could have been taught."
I am just the messenger. Dislike me if you wish. I care too much about the value of human life and the salvation of souls to remain silent anymore.
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Disrespect for ALL human lives, including the unborn, is the greatest tragedy of our age. God will not be silent forever. The creatures He sent to us who were snuffed out cry to Him for vengeance.
ReplyDeleteMay Bishop Tobin shepherd up before He faces the judgement of God.