Pope Benedict to deliver 'intense' message during Fatima visit

EWTN News ^ | 5/5/2010

[markomalley]

"Fatima is a particularly significant place for this Pope," said Vatican spokesman Fr. Federico Lombardi on Tuesday, noting that it was also a destination for two former Popes. The Holy Father has a thorough knowledge of the history of the Marian sanctuary, he added.

Fr. Lombardi held a press conference at the Vatican to prepare the media for the Pope's next trip out of the Vatican. He will be visiting Portugal from May 11-14.

The spokesman referred to the Pope's stop in Fatima on May 13 as the highlight and "heart" of the upcoming four-day trip to Portugal, according to Vatican Radio. But, he pointed out, Benedict XVI will not be the first Pope to visit the Marian shrine.

Two other Pontiffs have been to Fatima. In 1967, the sanctuary hosted Paul VI, and John Paul II visited in 1982, 1991 and 2000, at which time the visionaries Jacinta and Francesco were beatified.

The Portuguese shrine is not unfamiliar to Pope Benedict, since as head of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, then-Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger extensively studied the message of Fatima. Fr. Lombardi said on Tuesday that the Pope has been involved with history of the Marian sanctuary in a "very deep, personal way."

It was him, for example, who was called upon to give a theological perspective when the third secret of Fatima was made public in 2000.

The Vatican spokesman said that the Holy Father will also deliver an intense message during his Fatima visit. Upon his arrival at the sanctuary on May 12, he will remember John Paul II and the 29th anniversary of the assassination attempt that nearly took his life on May 13, 1981.

This visit marks the Holy Father's 15th Apostolic Journey abroad in his five years and is his first to Portugal as Pope.

During today's general audience, the Holy Father greeted the people of Portugal in their language, telling them that he will be there this coming weekend at the invitation of the president of the nation and the episcopal conference.

He said he was "happy to be able to visit the 'land of Holy Mary'" on the 10th anniversary of the beatification of the shepherd children.

According to Portuguese press reports, local police are planning for a cumulative total of 450,000 people at the celebrations in Lisbon, Fatima and Portugal during the four-day visit.

[Iscool]

That is a false statement. Furthermore, you have dragged it here from another thread.

I didn't drag it...It just keeps following you around...

[Judith Anne]

I didn't drag it...It just keeps following you around...

Please do not make this thread about me. Please do not drag false versions of my statements on other threads to totally unrelated threads. This is not the first time, but it should be the last.

[cmj328]

"The Catholic League is delighted to see that one of the most outspoken ant-Catholic bigots in the Clinton administration has been axed. Joycelyn Elders was nominated to the office of Surgeon General by President Clinton in 1993 and confirmed later by the Senate. The Catholic League opposed her nomination and confirmation from the beginning. Her anti-Catholic statements...should have alone disqualified her from a position of national influence and authority...The Catholic League continued to speak out against her during her tenure as Surgeon General."

[Mad Dawg]

Is someone feeling sexually frustrated? Is that why they introduced the off-topic question of masturbation?

Time to close the thread.

[Mad Dawg]

That is rather humorous.

It's also argumentum ad hominem AND dragged from another thread.

Congratulations to the non-catholics. They've managed to trivialize another thread.

Time for this thread to go.

[Mad Dawg]

How do you square this reality with the ideals you espouse? It doesn't square. The church has been corrupted. It's been notably corrupted numerous times over recorded history.

The cognitive dissonance must be quite jarring.

As Tom Sowell often says, you can prove anything if you exclude the data which conflicts with your theory and include the data that confirms it.

For you to make this argument requires excluding the data on the enabling and concealment of sexual misbehavior in the non-Catholic denominations and in the world, and, more seriously, the efforts in the non-Catholic world to declare perversion normal and good.

AND you have to exclude the teaching of church, indeed, of the Bible, that the treasure is contained in earthen vessels.

The Catholics who read the Bible, which your side wants to pretend is very nearly the empty set, are not surprised that the clergy are assaulted by Satan or that many of them succumb. We understand sin and are aware of our own.

That many people, clergy and lay, sometimes slip into grotesque and awful moral failure does not touch the question of whether to be moral, sexually and otherwise, is to be free. Raising the question of the failings of one group, however, is a fine way to reduce the probability of a decent useful conversation.

[Running On Empty]

“Time for this thread to go”

It degenerated a long time ago.

Thank you for telling it like it is.

[RegulatorCountry]

For you to make this argument requires excluding the data on the enabling and concealment of sexual misbehavior in the non-Catholic denominations and in the world, and, more seriously, the efforts in the non-Catholic world to declare perversion normal and good.

I've not gone into the world as a whole in this discussion because it's fallen and has been since Eve was corrupted and Adam listened to her instead of God. The condemnation of such worldly behavior as sexual immorality is a given, and such condemnation cannot possibly be detailed thoroughly enough on this forum.

As far as apparently systematic, widespread concealment and protection of sexually immoral church priests, pastors, preachers or other individuals in positions of authority, who sexually abuse minor congregants or even congregants of any age at all, you're going to have a hard time demonstrating anything on the scale of the Roman Catholic Church.

Individual cases, certainly. I've yet to see an instance of such cases not being dealt with swiftly and the offending individuals removed from any position of authority if not the church itself, once the offense became known. It's been alleged that repeat offenders just move on to another Protestant church and are able to do so, due to the lack of any overarching hierarchy. That claim might be plausible, but I've yet to see evidence of it.

Again, man is fallen and prone to sin, and some will fall prey to their particular weaknesses. But an entire denomination apparently dedicated to moving sexual predators around, publicly defending them and sending them off to another church instead of removing them and handing them over to civil authorities?

No. The Protestant world just does not work that way. Neither should the Catholic, as you're learning, painfully.

[Running On Empty]

“You can prove anything if you exclude the data which conflicts with your theory and include data that confirms it.”

Which makes this MO much more like an agenda than a reasonable, “useful conversation”.

“Come let us reason together” is a scriptural counsel, which apparently doesn’t apply here.

[Iscool]

For you to make this argument requires excluding the data on the enabling and concealment of sexual misbehavior in the non-Catholic denominations and in the world, and, more seriously, the efforts in the non-Catholic world to declare perversion normal and good.

A little problem with that theory...It's called a lack of evidence...

For who knows how many years the defense of the Catholic church has been 'don't pick on us, other groups molest kids just as much as we do'...

Now the new twist now is, 'don't pick on us, other groups cover it up and hide the crime and shuffle their people around to cover it up as well'...

Well, in a word, that's not at all true...And that's why your church is in everyone's sights...

And that's a lousy job of trying to stick the Protestants into your immoral non-Catholic world...

[Iscool]

“Time for this thread to go” It degenerated a long time ago. Thank you for telling it like it is.

But you're still hanging around the thread that so offends you...What's up with that???

[joseph20]

What in the world are you talking about man?

[cmj328]

So would you care to share with us your thoughts on Onanism? Do you, like your fellow anti-Catholic extremist Joycelyn Elders, think it should be taught to schoolchildren regardless of parental objection?

Or are you going to fail to answer the question as well, and let us draw our own conclusions about where Protestants really stand?

[Hacksaw]

Time to close the thread.

You reported Alex to himself?

[Mad Dawg]

Did I?

Oh.

My bad

I still think that the headline should be "major intense" or, better, "heavy intense".

But no one listens to me.

[Mad Dawg]

Well, we were talking about self-abuse. It seemed like the thing to do.







(Alternate, funnier answer)

[Mad Dawg]

MY observation about data stands.

Two things have to be neglected: First the misguided advice of shrinks at the height of this atrocity. Second, and I readily admit that this is lousy data, of the cases of sexual misbehavior in the Episcopal Church of which I know (back in the 70's) -- which admittedly is not that many -- they were ALL buried right away, unless they hit the news before they hit the diocesan level. One perp was later made a bishop.

BUT it is important to admit that we have done a lousy job until recently.

[Iscool]

So would you care to share with us your thoughts on Onanism?

You guys are really big on 'isms'...You put a label on everything...I have no idea what Onanism is...

[Mad Dawg]

But an entire denomination apparently dedicated to moving sexual predators around, publicly defending them and sending them off to another church instead of removing them and handing them over to civil authorities?

No. The Protestant world just does not work that way. Neither should the Catholic, as you're learning, painfully.

Yep. Does it get anybody's attention WHY the data is MORE available about Catholics?

And to exaggerate, to say "an entire denomination" may be fun, but it leaves the truth far behind while ignoring that at the peak of this disaster psychiatrists, in their own self-satisfied way, were saying this behavior was largely treatable.

AND, while we are far to slow in cleaning this up, we ARE cleaning it up and with increasing openness. These days the allegation alone gets a priest out of his parish and into some kind of suspended situation.

It is worthy of note that until other data came out, the accusation was that celibate Catholic clergy were more prone to this atrocity than others.

As more data appeared and that contention was harder to maintain, our enemies turned without missing a beat to the concealment issue. And now you are overstating it "an entire denomination" while ignoring the implications that in all the world (okay, maybe Mormons are as organized) we are the only outfit with the capability of producing the required data.

I am hoping that more and more men of courage will be made bishop. I do think that there is a tendency to go with either efficient bureaucrats or ivory-tower types.

[Mad Dawg]

It’s in the Bible.