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The Pope Francis Mercy Monopoly; Is this a Joke? [Catholic Caucus]
The Remnant Newspaper ^ | Saturday February 6, 2016 | Christopher A Ferrara

Posted on 02/06/2016 8:42:56 PM PST by ebb tide

It seems to be impossible to get off the Francis beat on which Remnant writers and other tradition-minded Catholic commentators around the world have found themselves over the past three years. Not a week passes without something from the Vatican, orchestrated by Francis and his public relations team, designed specifically to call attention to the latest sensational development in what is being marketed shamelessly as Pope Francis' Revolution of Tenderness and Love.(r) Many journalists have devoted entire careers to covering the Vatican beat, but this Pope's endless of train of publicity stunts has made Vatican-watchers of the rest of us.

Take, for example, the Missionaries of Mercy,(r) the super-confessors whose still mysterious super powers will be activated by Francis in Rome on Ash Wednesday, when he will personally present 700 of the 1000 Missionaries of Mercy with their "mandate."

Why the mocking tone, you ask? Because the whole affair is patently ridiculous, as was shown last week when Monsignor Rino Fisichella, President of the Pontifical Council for Promoting the New Evangelization(r), explained the initiative:

[T]he Missionaries of Mercy are a select number of priests who have received from the Pope the charge to be privileged witnesses in their respective Churches of the extraordinariness of this Jubilee event. It is only the Pope who nominates these Missionaries, not the Bishops, and it is he who entrusts them with the mandate to announce the beauty of the mercy of God while being humble and wise confessors who possess a great capacity to forgive those who approach the confessional... So what are the rest of the approximately 400,000 priestly confessors in the Holy Catholic Church supposed to be during the Jubilee of Mercy(r)? Chopped liver? Doesn't every priest with faculties to hear confessions have precisely the same "great capacity to forgive those who approach the confessional"? For example, everyone knows that ordinary parish priests are already authorized to forgive the sin of abortion and that they do so regularly. Has Francis now withdrawn that authorization or placed it in doubt? The Vatican has been mum on the point, allowing the media to create the false impression--immensely disturbing to many women who have confessed this sin--that abortion was not previously forgivable at the parish level.

In fact, no one really knows exactly what the Missionaries of Mercy will be able to do that God Himself does not already do when the Sacrament of Confession is administered by an ordinary priest acting, in persona Christi, to a sincere penitent with a firm purpose of amendment. The Missionaries of Mercy will come forth from Rome surrounded by a carnival cloud of tinted steam--an impressive display, but what does it really mean?

At any rate, why should a mere 1000 priests, or 0.25 percent of the total Catholic priesthood, be given a special papal "mandate to announce the beauty of the mercy of God"? Doesn't every priest in the world already have the same mandate from God Himself by virtue of his ordination? And, since this is the Year of Mercy(r) and God's mercy toward the repentant is boundless, why such a strictly limited number of specially deputed dispensers of mercy? Why does Francis, hailed by the world as the First Merciful Pope, not simply declare that during the Year of Mercy all priests shall be able to do whatever he thinks his Missionaries of Mercy can do?

In short: Why so stingy with the mercy? Here is Mons. Fisichella's revealing explanation:

We have received a great response for participation [in the Missionaries of Mercy] but must place a limit on the large number of requests in order to ensure that the specific sign value, one which expresses how truly special the initiative is, be maintained. That's right, the number of Missionaries of Mercy is being kept low so that each of them will be just that much more valuable as a "sign" of "how special the initiative is"--meaning how special Francis is for having invented it. It would hardly do simply to declare that during the Year of Mercy every priest-confessor shall exercise to the fullest the capacity for absolution he already has, given a properly disposed penitent. No, there must be a select group of priests, monopolized by Francis, who are given the appearance of being a cut above all the others in the absolution department because Francis alone has conferred that special status. We have here a kind of spiritual monopoly in which one supplier controls the supply.

Thus, Fisichella is pleased to inform the press that on account of this papally- enforced scarcity of Missionaries of Mercy, "Father Richard from Australia will visit 27 communities in his rural Diocese of Maitland-Newcastle where there is only one church and no priests in residence. Traveling in a camper, he will journey from community to community as a 'Missionary of Mercy on Wheels'! This is but an example of the way in which the Jubilee is meant to reach all, allowing everyone to touch the closeness and the tenderness of God."

Is this a joke? The Diocese of Maitland-Newcastle has 30 priests ministering to 150,000 Catholics in 39 parishes, whereas "Father Richard" appears to be Father Richard Lennan, the only Father Richard in the diocese, who is listed as being on leave while living at Boston College. If the Jubilee is "meant to reach all" so that everyone can "touch the closeness and mercy of God"--as if God and His mercy were inaccessible before Francis--then why not declare that all 30 priests are Missionaries of Mercy, available at the 39 parishes? Why recall just one priest from the other side of the world, put him in a camper and have him drive from parish to parish? Or why not put all 30 priests on the road and divide the Diocese of Maitland-Newcastle between them in order to increase the possibility of everyone being able to "touch the closeness and Mercy of God?"

Again, why so stingy with the mercy? The answer, evidently, is that one priest in a camper sent specially by Francis into the Outback, endowed with a special "mandate" of mercy that only Francis, "not the bishops," can give, naturally focuses all the attention on Francis by insuring the conspicuousness and exclusivity of his innovation. The absolution of sins and the good of as many souls as possible are apparently beside the point.

Now, there are only two ways to view this thing: Either Francis has indeed somehow invested his Mercy Monopoly with special powers of absolution not available except through the monopoly, in which case he is literally hoarding mercy, or else there is no real difference between the Missionaries of Mercy and a regular parish priest in terms of the capacity to absolve sins, in which case the thing is an elaborate sham whose only purpose is to advance the papal personality cult.

Finally, what sinner would expose himself to public humiliation by approaching a roaming Missionary of Mercy for confession as opposed to his own parish priest, thereby signaling that his sins are so grave that only the Mercy Monopoly can absolve him?

Yes, this is a joke.


TOPICS: Catholic; Ministry/Outreach
KEYWORDS: francis; francischurch; mercy
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1 posted on 02/06/2016 8:42:56 PM PST by ebb tide
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To: vladimir998

Ping

Is this better?


2 posted on 02/06/2016 8:43:40 PM PST by ebb tide (We have a rogue curia in Rome.)
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To: ebb tide

All hail Pope Che, the Red Pope.

Put in place by a cabal of leftists so as to further the agenda of the elites.


3 posted on 02/06/2016 8:50:48 PM PST by T-Bone Texan (The economic collapse is imminent. Buy staple food and OTC meds now, before prices skyrocket.)
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Comment #4 Removed by Moderator

To: ebb tide

Classic Bergoglio:

1) Conceptually incoherent;

2) Practically meaningless;

3) All about Bergoglio.


5 posted on 02/06/2016 9:34:41 PM PST by Arthur McGowan
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To: ebb tide

Save


6 posted on 02/06/2016 11:46:58 PM PST by Eagles6 ( Valley Forge Redux. If not now, when? If not here, where? If not us then who?)
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Comment #7 Removed by Moderator

To: SkyPilot

These “missionaries of mercy” are actually Francis’ way of getting into every parish in the Church, overriding the local bishops and canceling out anything done or preached by the local clerg. In other words, they’re a combination of spies and enforcers, making sure that every parish is in line with Francis’ New Church.

It is stunning that they have been given authority over bishops (who are not allowed to refuse them or question their presence) and report only to Francis. Nobody sees, to be paying attention to this aspect.


8 posted on 02/07/2016 5:12:31 AM PST by livius
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To: livius

Can you get me more information on that please, thank-you!


9 posted on 02/07/2016 5:17:12 AM PST by Biggirl ("One Lord, one faith, one baptism" - Ephesians 4:5)
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To: ebb tide

“Is this better?”

Don’t you think it is?


10 posted on 02/07/2016 5:39:47 AM PST by vladimir998 (Apparently I'm still living in your head rent free. At least now it isn't empty.)
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To: SkyPilot

Doubtless we are about to enter The End Times, the final seven years of the Daniel Prophecy for the seventieth week. Watch the Middle East ...


11 posted on 02/07/2016 6:52:49 AM PST by MHGinTN (Democrats bait then switch; their fishy voters buy it every time.)
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To: MHGinTN

Amen.


12 posted on 02/07/2016 7:00:52 AM PST by SkyPilot ("I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me." John 14:6)
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Comment #13 Removed by Moderator

To: metmom

What part of Catholic Caucus do you not understand?

Or have you reverted?


14 posted on 02/07/2016 9:50:50 AM PST by ebb tide (We have a rogue curia in Rome.)
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Comment #15 Removed by Moderator

Comment #16 Removed by Moderator

Comment #17 Removed by Moderator

To: MHGinTN

Did you miss “Catholic Caucus” on this thread?


18 posted on 02/07/2016 2:04:37 PM PST by Salvation ("With God all things are possible." Matthew 19:26)
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To: StoneWall Brigade

Did you miss “Catholic Caucus” on this thread?


19 posted on 02/07/2016 2:05:43 PM PST by Salvation ("With God all things are possible." Matthew 19:26)
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Comment #20 Removed by Moderator


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