Posted on 09/22/2018 2:54:31 PM PDT by ebb tide
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BlogsCatholic Church Sat Sep 22, 2018 - 2:49 pm EST
September 22, 2018 (LifeSiteNews) – Today, the German magazine Der Spiegel, one of the most influential political magazines in Europe, published a report on the failures of the papacy of Francis. LifeSiteNews already summed up the parts of this report about the involvement of Pope Francis in a cover-up of abuse cases in Argentina. But the Spiegel authors also make a report from their conversations with unnamed prelates in the Vatican who spoke quite critically about Pope Francis.
According to the magazine, one cardinal not only called the Pope effectively a liar, but he also said: “From the beginning, I did not believe one word of his.” The Spiegel's own comments on this papacy, as we shall see, are no less strong.
One of the high-ranking interlocutors told the journalistic team that, in the Vatican there reigns “a climate of fear and of uncertainty.” “Francis is very good at getting things in motion,” a German prelate is quoted as saying, “but when, in the end, there is only wavering, that for sure does not help.” Examples of such waverings are to be found, as the Spiegel says, in Pope Francis' handling of the debate about Communion for Protestant spouses of Catholics. One German cardinal tells the magazine about lies, intrigues, “and a Holy Father who, unlike anyone before him, puts into doubt the truth of the Faith.”
Marie Collins, herself a prominent abuse victim and advocate for victims, speaks about the Pope's and the Vatican's handling of abuse cases thus: “beautiful words in the public and [then] opposite actions behind closed doors.”
The Spiegel comments that the Pope might very well ignore the “indications of crimes within his own inner circle” because “he is interested, for reasons of power politics, in keeping one or another cardinal or bishop in his office.” So, in the German magazine's eyes, “Francis [thereby] makes himself vulnerable.” He fights for years “against global capitalism, but took – like his predecessors – sums of millions from the now-rejected Cardinal McCarrick which he himself had received from donors.” Additionally, “the Pope praises the value of the traditional family, but then surrounds himself with counselors and collaborators who live the opposite – in a more or less obvious concubinage with representatives of either sex.”
“Is the Pope still master of the situation?” asks the Spiegel. It points out that “criticism [of this papacy] meanwhile comes from a circle much larger than that of globally connected arch-conservatives.” One of the problems of this Pope, according to the magazine, is that “he is silent in delicate matters” such as the dubia of the four cardinals concerning his post-apostolic exhortation Amoris Laetitia, but also concerning the petition of 30,000 women who have recently requested that he answer the questions arising from the Viganò report. He does not answer these women, he is mute, and “he, rather, leaves the accusation unchallenged that he has known, since June 2013, about the doings of the child-abuser McCarrick.”
When speaking about one of the Pope's close collaborators, Cardinal Reinhard Marx, and his own Archdiocese of Munich, the Spiegel points to the crisis of Faith in Bavaria. “A part of the problem in the Archdiocese, however, is homemade,” it explains. The credibility of the Church there, it adds, is being undermined by the facts that “a high-ranking clergyman of Munich shamelessly places his concubine right in the first pew, and that also in this city, there is indignation about openly homosexual pastors and about an unpredictable Pope.”
“From the beginning, I did not believe one word of his.” These are the trenchant words of a cardinal within the walls of the Vatican: “He preaches mercy, but is in truth an icecold, sly Machiavellian, and, what is worse – he lies.”
yes, Francis does indeed appear (from afar, anyway) to be the church’s Obama...someone trying to tear her apart from within
i do believe he will not be successful, however
True.
It is an unfortunate tendency to treat Marx as some sort of defining point, and everything is either Marxist or not.
Marx was just one political theorist, and there was a left wing and there were statist systems before Marx and after him, that owed him nothing.
There are innumerable bad ideas that didn’t come from Marx.
Didn’t he seek to nationalize the banks, and other industry?
Plus, "Der Spiegel" is one of the most widely circulated mags in Europe, left-liberal, roughly comparable to Time or Newsweek (but more influential).
For "Der Spiegel" to say this is OMG level.
"Tio Juan, This is totally unacceptable!" he emoted. "You agree with diametrically opposed positions, you pretend you're on everybody's side. This is so wrong!"
And Tio Juan nodded sagely and replied, "You're absolutely right."
Yes, although this was more about national self-determination than about marxist creation of the international proletariat.
Many large companies were foreign-owned. As well, the government saw itself more as the intermediary between the corporate class and labor, rather than the creator of a classless society.
In the genealogy of really bad ideas, communism and marxism, and various forms of fascism, corporatism, national socialism, Peronism, etc., are related in various ways (Mussolini was originally a communist, after all), but they aren’t all the same, and they don’t all draw entirely from the same sources.
Yes, I am quite familiar with the differences between fascism, socialism, and communism. Marxism, in a nutshell, is just the theory that capitalism must give way to socialism, which must give way to communism (which Marx saw as the purest form of socialism). Stalinism and Leninism are both communist ideals, but with a different power structure. Fascism is a form of socialism but allows for some private industry, but that private industry can only produce what the state tells it to produce, and how much, and can only charge what the state says it can charge. All in all they are ALL nightmarish concepts. Give me capitalism any day.
But, you know what? I may have been thinking of Allende in Chile instead of Peron in Argentina.
Well, I prefer the broader term “typical Jesuit left wing hack,” but your more precise description is serviceable as well
"19 page full report, headlined “Thou shalt not lie” and subtitled “The silence of the shepherds”, attacks the Pope’s handling of the abuse crisis and his attempted Church reforms."
Really, it's shameful, and yet I feel a grim satisfaction, even gratitude. I hope my reaction is a legitimate part of being one who "hungers and thirsts for justice", because I am convinced this unfaithful Pope needs to have his misdeeds exposed.
I hope it is for the best, this uncovering of evil at the highest spot in the Church.
I hope in the end he is repentant. Isn't that what I would want for myself?
Pray for Pope Francis; for his downfall and his salvation.
I hope in the end he is repentant. Isn't that what I would want for myself?
Pray for Pope Francis; for his downfall and his salvation.
Exactly the sort of behavior discussed in Romans 12:19-21.
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