Posted on 05/02/2006 7:44:25 AM PDT by concernedAmerican1
Hanover, Pennsylvania – As the controversy around the upcoming Da Vinci Code movie grows, the American Society for the Defense of Tradition, Family and Property (TFP) and its America Needs Fatima campaign announced plans to hold 1,000 peaceful prayer vigils outside theaters nationwide beginning May 19.
“These public acts of reparation will literally blanket the country. From Alaska to Alabama, from California to Connecticut, dedicated volunteers are banding together for protest prayer vigils in front of movie theaters showing the blasphemous Da Vinci Code movie,” said America Needs Fatima director Robert Ritchie.
“Wrapped in Gnostic heresy, The Da Vinci Code is a broadside attack against the Divinity of Christ, the Papacy, and the hierarchical structure of the Catholic Church,” continued Ritchie. “Together with the so-called gospel of Judas, The Da Vinci Code is outright blasphemy.
Our Lord Jesus Christ is the highest ideal of moral perfection; any detraction from this moral perfection takes on a defamatory character, since it lowers and denies His unique and most excellent position as God-man.”
According to the TFP web site (www.tfp.org), protests are already scheduled in most major cities in the country. The group is also sending a protest instruction booklet to interested parties, which shows how to organize a protest.
Several Catholic bishops and priests have applauded a book published by the TFP, Rejecting The Da Vinci Code, including Archbishop Raymond L. Burke of St. Louis.
“Interest is overwhelming. The phones haven’t stopped ringing. Catholics are joining in droves. We have protest leaders of all ages who are very devoted people: priests, college students, parents, and grandparents,” Ritchie explained. “They’re motivated because they realize that if our culture doesn’t respect the rights of God, it won’t respect its own leaders and fellow citizens.”
Referring to the woman who according to tradition wiped Jesus’ face on the way to Calvary, the TFP spokesman said: "Veronica is a good example for us to follow. She saw Our Lord wounded and bleeding, carrying the Cross. Her love for Jesus moved her to take her veil and wipe His face. God inspired her. What she did was heroic. Alone, she faced the guards to console Jesus. Today we have the chance to console Our Lord at hundreds of movie theaters, where He will be mocked again by blasphemy.”
To find a protest location near you, visit this link. The entire country is covered!
http://tfp.org/davincicode/local_protest_listing.htm
Protest signatures top 88,000!
The American TFP and its America Needs Fatima campaign have collected over 88,000 signatures protesting the making of The Da Vinci Code movie. Help us reach our goal of 100,000 letters, protest coupons and e-mails. Click here to send your protest.
http://tfp.org/student_action/php/da_vinci.php
Join the modern world --
"Protesting" something this way
advertises it!
The news will cover
this or that vigil, people
will see the story,
and they'll say, "Let's go
see the film to figure out
what they're protesting."
Movies come and go.
If a film makes you angry,
DON'T TALK ABOUT IT
in the media
(online or anywhere else!)
until it is gone.
This isn't just about "protesting." It's about making reparation for the blasphemies in the book and the movie.
Sony Pictures doesn't want protest. If protest prayer vigils helped the intertainment industry, why are they fearful???
Described by Variety as “Hollywood’s most prominent crisis specialists,” it is no coincidence that Sony pictures has hired Sitrick & Co. to handle the sensitive controversy surrounding The Da Vinci Code movie. Films perceived as blasphemous are serious business.
As the Wall Street Journal article “Da Vinci Damage Control” notes, Sony is doing everything possible to avert backlash from religious groups. “Sony is particularly concerned about appearing insensitive to religious beliefs,” the Journal’s Hollywood Report observed.2
For more details, see.
http://tfp.org/davincicode/why_does_sony_fear_publicity.htm
Does the American TFP think the consecration to Mary was done?
why don't you call them or email them with your questions
Joining the American splinter group of this cult is unwise. Their fidelity to the Bonds of Unity in Worship, Doctrine, and Authority are questionable, at best.
This post found on EWTN's website is interesting, if you're interested in knowing the truth:
"My friend sent me an article on the internet which makes this group look bad. It calls them a cult started by Prof. Plinio Correa De Oliveira in Brazil. I don't know who writes these things. Those I have spoken to in the organization in the United States are very sincere in their Catholic faith. As far as I know they have only done good. As this information seems to be going round on the internet, who is correct? I don't know the situation in Brazil but are good people being wrongly condemned here? Please advise me. Respectfully, Caroline"
"Answer by Fr. Robert J. Levis on 06-15-2005:
Dear Caroline, The TFP is a social action group, not officially Catholic, but "Catholic inspired", founded by a brilliant and pious professor who had serious disagreements with a Brazilian cardinal. This disagreement brought on a Brazilian rejection. In the rest of the world, TFP stands and works 110% in union with the Catholic Church, sometimes leads some Church efforts, e.g. the effort "America Needs Fatima", anti-porn efforts, family life, etc. Some Vatican officials have approved the group which in effect balances TFP as an orthodox lay group which is not approved by some Brazilian church leaders. I find all this group stands for as exemplary, pious, loyal both to country and the Church in all its aims and objectives. Fr. 'bob Levis"
Answer by Catholic Answers on 03-25-2003:
Dear Vic,
America Needs Fatima is indeed a legitimate Catholic organization. Like other such Catholic organizations, it has its enemies. Log on to its web site: "http://www.tfp.org/anf/".
Fr. Vincent Serpa, O.P.
This is from EWTN:
http://www.ewtn.com/vexperts/showresult.asp?RecNum=294238&record_bookmark=2&Forums=0&Experts=0&Days=2003&Author=&Keyword=tfp&pgnu=1&groupnum=0&ORDER_BY_TXT=ORDER+BY+ReplyDate+DESC&start_at=
This is a copy of a letter sent to Prof. Plinio:
Lima, July 24, 1961
Distinguished Professor,
The reading of your book Revolution and Counter-Revolution made a magnificent impression on me because of the courage and mastery with which you analyze the process of the Revolution and shed abundant light on the true causes of the crumbling of moral values disorienting consciences today. and also because of the vigor with which you indicate the tactic and the methods to overcome it.
I especially appreciated the second part of your book, highlighting the efficacy of Catholic doctrine and the spiritual remedies the Church possesses to combat and vanquish the forces and errors of the Revolution.
I am certain that your book has rendered an important service to the Catholic cause and that it will help gather the forces of good in order to soon solve this great contemporary problem. This is, in my opinion, the way repeatedly indicated by the present Vicar of Christ, who, with so much conviction and solicitude, has insisted on a profound renewal of Christian and sacramental life as a sure remedy for the evils afflicting the world, evils that government leaders vainly seek to solve through the precarious efficacy of weapons. technology, and purely human progress. I wish, most dear Professor, a widespread diffusion of and a well-merited response to your book from Catholic leaders wishing to join the ranks of the counter-revolutionary movement.
Please accept the testimony of my sincere admiration for your work and the expression of my deepest esteem.
Romolo Carboni
Titular Archbishop of Sidon
Apostolic Nuncio
Note: Archbishop Romolo Carboni was born in Fano, Italy, in 1911. Ordained in 1934, he was made a bishop in 1953. He was raised to the archepiscopate and appointed Apostolic Nuncio to Peru in 1959. He served as Nuncio to Italy from 1969 to 1936 and now lives in retirement in Fano.
http://tfp.org/what_we_think/rcr_book_online/rcr_letters.htm
Rome, February 10, 1993
Distinguished Professor,
(letter sent to TFP founder, Prof. Plinio Correa de Oliveira)
It was with extreme interest, pleasure, and personal benefit that I read the Spanish copy of Prof. Plinio Correa de Oliveira's work dedicated to me with expressions of great affection and esteem, for which I am grateful.
Revolution and Counter-Revolutionis a masterly work whose teachings should be disseminated far and wide so as to penetrate the conscience, not only of all those who consider themselves truly Catholic, but I would say even more, of all other men of good will. In it, the latter would learn that salvation can be found only in Jesus Christ and His Church; the former would feel confirmed and fortified in their Faith and psychologically and spiritually forewarned and immunized against the cunning process that employs many of them as useful idiots or fellow travelers.
Its analysis of the revolutionary process is impressive and revealing on account of its realism and profound understanding of history, from the end of the Middle Ages in decadence, which paved the way for the paganizing Renaissance and the pseudo?Reformation, thence for the terrible French Revolution, and. soon after, atheistic Communism.
That historical analysis is not only external. The actions and reactions it deals with are also explained in light of the human psychology, both the individual psychology and the collective psychology of the masses. However, it is necessary to recognize that someone directs this profound and systematic de?Christianization. Man undoubtedly tends toward evil - pride and sensuality - but were not someone holding the reins of these disorderly tendencies and sagaciously coordinating them, they most probably would not have produced such a constant, skillful, and systematic action, which, tenaciously maintained, profits even from the ups and downs caused by the resistance and natural "reaction" of the opposing forces.
Revolution and Counter-Revolutionalso foresees, although using caution in its prognoses and by means of hypotheses, the next possible evolution of the revolutionary action and, in turn, that of the Counter-Revolution.
The book abounds in perspicacious sociological, political, psychological, and evolutive insights and observations, not few of which are worthy of an anthology. Many of them outline the intelligent "tactics" that favor the Revolution and those that may and should be used in a general counter-revolutionary "strategy."
In sum, I would dare to affirm that this is a prophetic work in the best sense of the word. It should be taught in the Church's centers of higher education so that at least the elite classes become fully aware of a crushing reality about which, I believe, they do not have a clear notion. This, among other things, would contribute to revealing and unmasking the useful idiots or fellow travelers, among whom are found many ecclesiastical figures, who act in a suicidal manner by playing the enemy's game; this group of idiots, allies of the Revolution, would in good measure disappear....
The second part of the book well explains the Counter?Revolution's nature and the courageous and "aggressive" tactics that counter?revolutionaries must implement while always avoiding excesses and improper and imprudent attitudes.
Before such realities, one doubts there is a true "strategy" in the Church as there is in the Revolution. One does find many "tactical" elements, actions, and institutions, but they seem to act in isolation, without a notion of the whole. The concept of a Counter-Revolution and the realization that a Counter-Revolution is acting could unify and provide a greater sense of collaboration within the Church.
I must congratulate the TFP movement for the stature and quality of its founder, Prof. Plinio. I foresee and desire with all my soul a vast development and a future full of counter?revolutionary successes for the TFP.
I conclude stating that the spirit with which this work is written greatly impresses me: It is a profoundly Christian spirit, one with a passionate love for the Church. This book is an authentic product of Christian wisdom. It is moving to find in a layman such a sincere devotion to the Mother of Jesus and ours - a clear sign of predestination. "Uncertain, like everyone, about tomorrow, we prayerfully raise our eyes to the lofty throne of Mary, Queen of the Universe.... We beseech the Virgin, therefore, to accept this filial homage, a tribute of love and an expression of absolute confidence in her triumph" (pp. 165, 167).
Rome, September 8, 1993
Feast of the Nativity of Our Lady
Fr. Anastasio Gutierrez
Note: Fr. Anastasio Gutierrrez, C.M.F., is one of the Catholic Church's most renowned canonists.
Born in Buenos Aires, Argentina, in 1911, Father Gutierrez is a Spanish citizen who has lived in Rome for the last fifty years.
In Rome, he received his doctorate in Canon Law from the Pontifical Lateran University Later, he held a chair at that university's School of Canon Law, eventually becoming its dean. Father Gutierrez served as a peritus during the Second Vatican Council, and for many years was Cardinal Larraona's assistant in the Congregation for the Religious. He also is a founder of the Institutum Iuridicum Claretianum of Rome.
He participated in the commission charged to write the new Code of Canon Law, and is presently a consultant to the following Vatican dicasteries: Congregation for the Oriental Churches, Congregation for the Clergy, and Congregation for the Institutes of Consecrated Life and Societies of Apostolic Life. He is also a consultant to the Pontifical Council for the Interpretation of Legislative Texts, the highest Church organ for canonical questions.
More recently, Father Gutierrez became postulator of Queen Isabella of Castile's cause of canonization.
http://tfp.org/what_we_think/rcr_book_online/rcr_letters.htm
"Boycott Da Vinci Code film": top Vatican official
Amato suggested that Catholics around the world should launch organized protests against the "The Da Vinci Code" film just as some had done in 1988 to protest against Martin Scorsese's "The Last Temptation of Christ."
http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20060428/en_nm/vatican_davinci_dc_3
Source?
There are several reasons for this. In the first place, outside of Latin America, TFP generally keeps a low profile or operates through front organizations which the left usually does not understand. Skinhead-scalpers will turn elsewhere when they find a group like TFP whose writings are difficult to read, which is generally unobtrusive, and was founded by a man who sympathized for the British conservatives during the War (so much so that they took a pro-British stance during the Falkland War). TFP always viewed Fascism, with its optimistic cult of the State and the Nation, as a deviant form of "revolutionary socialism".
Another reason is that TFP is actually far to the right of virtually every other right-wing organization. Whatever feelings people may actually harbour deep down, I know of no other right-wing organization which publicly holds that the rich are better than the poor. Even the most extreme Catholic traditionalists tend to blame the modern world on "International Freemasonry" or on "the banker Mafia", whereas TFP puts the blame squarely on the rebellious poor, to whom it opposes its self-styled "rightism".
The third reason is doctrinal. Catholic traditionalists have problems with the "official" Church because of its supposed doctrinal deviation; but TFP is only interested in fighting agrarian reform, not in doctrine, which is why it was able to accept Vatican II and the reform of the liturgy. After all, the Pope has more battalions than Monsignor Lefèbvre ever had.
Also, Plinio's denial of the future role of priests - and the exclusion in the present of priests from all the more secret aspects of the group - led Monsignor Castro de Mayer, for decades Plinio's patron among the Brazilian bishops, to state:
"TFP is a heretical sect since, although they do not say so in words or in writing, lives and acts according to a principle which undermines the very basis of all true Christianity, that is the Catholic church". (Tradizione Famiglia Proprietà: Associazione cattolica o setta millenarista?, Rimini 1996, p. 6)
The extent of TFP's doctrinal deviation can be seen from the following document. I apologize to Catholic readers for including it, since it sounds very much like some of the more ribald songs nineteenth-century anticlericals used to sing after having had a drink too many. This "hymn" is however serious: a parody on one of the most revered hymns to the Virgin in the Catholic tradition, this is dedicated to Dona Lucilia, the mother of Plinio Corrêa de Oliveira:
Lady Lucilia, pray for us
Mother of Mister Doctor Plinio, pray for us
Mother of the Doctor of the Church, pray for us
Mother of our Father, pray for us
Mother of the Unspeakable, pray for us
Mother of all of us, pray for us
Mother of the coming centuries, pray for us
Mother of the Axiological Principle, pray for us
Mother of the Temperament of Synthesis, pray for us
Mother of all purity, pray for us
Mother of the Trans-sphere, pray for us
Mother of Seriousness, pray for us
Mother of the Counter-Revolution, pray for us
Restorer of Temperaments, pray for us
Source of Light, pray for us
Procreator of Innocence, pray for us
Preserver of Innocence, pray for us
Consoler of Mister Doctor Plinio, pray for us
Mediator of the Grand Retour, pray for us
Mediator of all our graces, pray for us
Dawn of the Kingdom of Mary, pray for us
Lady Lucilia of the smile, pray for us
Lady Lucilia of Flashes*, pray for us
Most beautiful flower of all, pray for us
Our refuge, pray for us
Our consoler, pray for us
Our help in the Bagarre, pray for us
Reason of our perseverance, pray for us
Vase of logic, pray for us
Vase of metaphysics, pray for us
Martyr of isolation, pray for us
Queen of serene suffering, pray for us
Queen of loveliness, pray for us
Queen of serenity, pray for us
Lady Lucilia, our Mother and Lady, help us
Lady Lucilia, our greatest mediator before the Virgin, help us
* In English (quoted in Tradizione Famiglia Proprietà: Associazione cattolica o setta millenarista?, Rimini 1996, pp. 70-71)
The most extraordinary claim here is also the most obscure,other of the Axiological Principle": this means a principle requiring no previous principle, in other words God himself. This hymn came into public domain when it was revealed by Prof. Orlando Fedeli, a member of TFP for over 30 years, who asked Mons. Antonio de Castro Mayer for his opinion on its orthodoxy. One can see where the roots of Introvigne's dislike for "apostates" lies. TFP did not deny the allegation; it simply shifted the blame on over-zealous young followers, and claimed the hymn to be perfectly orthodox ((Carlo Alberto Agnoli e Paolo Taufer, TFP: la maschera e il volto, Ed. Adveniat, S.Giustina di Rimini, s.d., p. 17 ss). - shifting the blame onto the boys is a time-honoured practice in certain kinds of organizations. It also claimed that use of the hymn had long been discontinued. The current official version of this issue is given by Roberto de Mattei in his hagiography of Doctor Plinio (Roberto de Mattei, Il crociato del secolo XX: Plinio Corrêa de Oliveira, Piemme, Casale Monferrato, 1996, p. 249):
"It is true that for a certain period some co-operators of the association used a litany with invocations to Lady Lucilia, composed by two adolescents late in 1977. This litany was forbidden by Prof. Corrêa de Oliveira as soon as he got word of it"
Oddly, this hymn by Brazilian adolescents seems to have spread across the ocean, since it was certainly used in France in the early '80s, and a former AC member recently told me that some TFP affiliates were still using it in Italy in the early '90s. When nothing else works, shocked TFP sympathizers who discover this hymn are told that "things are different in Latin America": this happened to be a favourite stratagem in my group, New Acropolis, which came from Latin America too.
If Plinio's mother is the Virgin Lucilia, her offspring of course must be quite special. Just how special appears from an extraordinary episode, which can hardly be blamed on over-zealous adolescents, since it is based on a statement made by Plinio, repeated in many works on him, and - as usual - proudly narrated in Cristianità. ("In memoriam: Plinio Corrêa de Oliveira", November-December 1995, p. 6): "February 1st, 1975, in view of the increasingly difficult situation of the Catholic Church, and hence of the Catholic world, during a meeting of the Brazilian TFP, he offered himself as an expiatory victim. Thirty-six hours later he was seriously wounded in a car accident, the consequences of which followed him until his death"
More than its political character, it was this highly suspect theological nature of the group which led to its demnation by the Council of Brazilian bishop
During its 23rd plenary assembly, the Council of Brazilian bishops approved a note concerning the 'Brazilian Society for the Defence of Tradition, Family and Property', advising Catholics not to join the above mentioned Society […]. Its esoteric character, its religious fanaticism, the personality cult of the founder and of his mother, the abuse of the name of the Virgin Mary […] can absolutely not be approved of by the Church" (Osservatore Romano, July 7, 1985, p. 12, n. 408, weekly Spanish edition quoted in Tradizione Famiglia Proprietà: Associazione cattolica o setta millenarista?, Rimini 1996, frontispiece)
The terms "cult" or "sect", with their double meaning of "deviant religious behaviour compared to an institutional religion" and a "closed totalist group", are certainly ambiguous. But this condemnation of TFP reveals why the organization was certainly considered by some to be a "cult" in the first sense of the word; and why therefore this organization took a special interest in the issue of "cults" in 1985, that is exactly when Introvigne too started involving himself in this matter.
Former TFP members have written that Plinio was well aware of this association. Referring to cult accusations, he used to tell them:
"This must not come as a surprise; since you belong to TFP, you will be treated as if you belonged to a cult, by your very parents and friends! It will be terrible, and it will be hard indeed to stay faithful."
(Tradizione Famiglia Proprietà: Associazione
Thanks for posting this.
Why do you insist on bringing these off-the-wall calumnies against this group?
I suspect you've never even addressed your questions honestly them with them. Did you ever ask them for an explanation?
If this is true, then why does the American TFP seek the endorsement of priests for their books? If this is true, then why does a smart man like Fr. Triglio of EWTN endorse one of their books?
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.