Interview: Mel Gibson

Dark Horizons ^ | February 16, 2004 | Paul Fischer

[Robert Drobot]

Unam Sanctam piously writes, "Your slur on "Vatican II Catholics", which improperly implies the existence of a new Church since Vatican II, is unwarranted and unfair."

The Catholic Church leadership is in forbidden denial of His Tradition, while knowing their sin.

Yours attempt to re-define sin as "....slur...." is as transparent as the betrayal by V2 of His Sacred Tradition.

A Sin by any other name remains a sin.

[LisaMalia]

Thanks for enforcing the "Mel Gibson rule!" Made my day!

[Maximilian]

I have never in my years as a Catholic seen anything remotely similar to the scene in your second photo.

Then you have never been to "Youth Renew," World Youth Day, "Youth 2000," etc.

It must be very exceptional to see skateboarding monks, as I have never seen that, and I have been to a large number of Catholic churches in many parts of the world.

My daughter recognized this guy. He's part of Fr. Groeschel's organization. These people are ubiquitous in the "loyal to the magisterium" crowd like Steubenville, EWTN, etc.

Consequently, you are simply producing one photograph, claiming that it represents what you call a "Vatican II Church". Your Vatican II Church is not what I know the Catholic Church to be.

Look, this wasn't my idea. Every member of the hierarchy is more than happy to sprinkle the phrase "Vatican II Church" into his conversation. I didn't make this up. This is the official view, that there is a "conciliar" church versus the "pre-conciliar" church.

It is merely a straw man caricature created by schismatic propagandists who want to justify their unjustified rebellion against the legitimate authority of the Pope.

What you are saying is, "Who are you going to believe, me or your lying eyes?" This stuff is everywhere. This is by no means an aberration. Check out the thread on Fr. Groeschel's car accident. You will see many posters lauding him as a paragon of orthodoxy. This skateboard scene has been going on for many years in many locations.

Another of Fr. Groeschel's friars is Fr. Stan Fortuna, the "rapping priest." Here he is presenting "Youth Revolution":

Original caption: "Fr. Stan rapping a great message!"

Original caption: "Liturgical dance team."

Original caption: "A beautiful church." (Check out the crucifix that looks like Michael Jordan dunking.)

The reality is that you cannot avoid this stuff in today's "Vatican II church," and you especially cannot avoid it if you are an impressionable young person.

[Maximilian]

Unam, I found this stuff just by doing a quick google search for Fr. Stan Fortuna. I don't believe that even you could claim that Fr. Stan, "the rapping priest," is an anomaly or isn't ubiquitous at every Catholic event for "Youth."

Here are some more samples from the web site of the San Isidro Youth group that sponsored Fr. Stan's "Youth Revolution": (on their front page -- I didn't search for this -- this is typical of every "Catholic" youth group):

Tonight's talk we showed how Harry Potter and the Princess Diaries can teach us about what it means to be "born again" in God's spirit. We talked about what it really means to be born again. I added some links in the Links section that shows us how to defend our teaching on salvation and being "born again". Check em out!

Our Luau las night was such a blast! For all of you who didn't make it, we had a great time dancing, eating, doing the limbo, playing human horseshoes, and getting crazy!

And as a special favor to Blackelk:

Original caption: "Chris & Chris jammin' to Kumbaya!"

[Diva]

"The reality is that you cannot avoid this stuff in today's "Vatican II church,"

Well, you can but it can be pretty difficult in some areas. I'm sorry to hear that Fr. Stan is one of Father Groeschel's. I like what I see of Fr. Groeschel even though he had a sort of goofy fuzzy charismatic past. Lots of Charismatics I am familiar with are coming out of the weirder stuff, remember the barking like dogs and spirit slaying of a few years ago. I wonder if any of it is still going on?

[Deo volente]

There are so many errors in this Cleveland claptrap that I don't even know where to begin!

Amchurch has sunk to new lows in their silly attempts to demonize this film.

[ultima ratio]

Reread my post. I made the point that it's the Vatican itself that makes the claim of newness. It's the Vatican which brags it's a new Church and which has done all it could to bury its own history. I only state the obvious. When the entirety of Catholic devotion and culture is deliberately and brutally destroyed in a single generation, that is a revolution, and that is Modernism writ large. We have a Pope who embraces Buddhists and Mullahs warmly even as he disdains traditional Catholics. Call me what you want--it's the only arrow you have left in your quiver. All other arguments collapse in the face of the obvious debacle of the past forty years.

[ultima ratio]

I don't buy what you say. Humility and docility is for another age. It's appropriate when prelates are upright and devout, but not when they are corrupt and heterodox, in which case they need to be admonished by the people. When they impose new doctrines and new liturgies, these need to be resisted. As St. Paul warned, "Even if an angel came down from Heaven," but preached a new Gospel, he was not to be believed or followed.

[GatorGirl]

I was just going to ask you if this was a Mass or some kind of rally. If this had happened at a pep rally at my Catholic High School, they probably would have gotten a few vocations out of it!! LOL!

[MaryFromMichigan]

I just visited your FR home page!
I see why you like the Ann Coulter/Mel Gibson rule!
Glad you like the idea! :)

[LisaMalia]

I've been a fan since I saw him in "Mrs. Soffel", one of his first films.
Now not only do I look at him as eye candy (which he sure is!), but as a man of integrity who's not afraid to stand up in the Hollywood liberal climate for what he believes in.
So I guess he is to us, like Ann Coulter is to some of the male FReepers. He has it all!

[Possenti]

Oh, man!

That is TOO funny!

[MaryFromMichigan]

He has it all!

He sure does!
Let's hear it for the "Mel Gibson Rule"!

[Pyro7480]

I was just going to ask you if this was a Mass or some kind of rally. If this had happened at a pep rally at my Catholic High School, they probably would have gotten a few vocations out of it!! LOL!

This was a pep rally. The monk and the priest jumped over did it on a dare. It reminds me of a fundraiser we did in Catholic high school for the missions where we put money in jars with faculty members' names on it, and the "winner" with the most money in his jar had to kiss a pig. It was really fun! The whole picture reminds me of a T-shirt I saw that had Jesus surfing in the ocean without a surfboard.

[Gerish]

LOL on the pictures! Just finished watching his interview with Ms. Sawyer. He reminds me of what we all are and what we are called by God to do - a sinner trying to become a saint! God Bless him and I can't wait to see the movie.

[Minuteman23]

BTTT!

[FreedomSurge]

There is a great deal of hatred of Christianity amongst Jews. The controversy surrounding “The Passion” is mainly Jewish groups and their supporters acting out on this hatred.

"In truth, that without the anti-Judaism — much of it anti-Semitism — of the New Testament, or at least in the way the New Testament has been interpreted and taught, there would have been no Nazism, and there would have been no Holocaust. I'm not saying that it was inevitable, but it is a direct outgrowth." — Deborah Lipstadt is a professor of modern Jewish and Holocaust studies at Emory University. She also works with the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum.

The Jews feel that, in Christianity, their core teachings had been perverted and abused.

They read some of the New Testament's insidious attacks against them and wondered how a book claiming divine authorship can be so blatantly anti-Semitic.

Although Christianity stemmed from Jewish origin, it took the concept of the Jewish God and associated it with a man; took the concept of sacrifice and associated it with a human sacrifice.

Christianity took their cherished Torah and said that it had been superseded by a new testament.

And finally, it took the concept of the chosen nation itself, claimed that the Jews had been abandoned by God, and called themselves the new Israel.

Jews reacted in outrage.

[potlatch]

Thanks for the ping Max.

ntnychik, here's the thread!

[ultima ratio]

I think this hatred is misplaced and dangerous. People are not fools--they know the situation and react with hostility. For Jews this is self-defeating and irrational, since among all the people of the world Christians are their best friends.

It is late and I have much to say on this. I will write again tomorrow.