Editor’s Note: This article was originally published in The Fatima Crusader magazine, Issue 74, Summer 2003. It is being reprinted (slightly edited) here and on subsequent days as a series of three much shorter articles. [Continued from Part 1.]
What will happen to us, especially at this time of General Apostasy, if we do not love the Truth above our fellow men, above the love we owe our priests and bishops, above the love we owe even Popes? What will happen if we do not love the truth above wealth, position and human respect? Then we can come under the following curse of God:
“And in all seduction of iniquity to them that perish; because they receive not the love of the truth, that they might be saved. Therefore God shall send them the operation of error, to believe lying: That all may be judged who have not believed the truth, but have consented to iniquity.” (2 Thess. 2:10-11)
This recovery of the certitude, of the vital importance and the absolute necessity of dogmatic truth as infallibly defined for all times is crucial if people are not going to be taken in by the general apostasy all around us.
To save your soul it is not enough to follow this or that priest, this or that Cardinal or bishop – not even this or that pope – no matter how widely acclaimed they are, if they contradict even one infallibly defined dogma.
Some ignorant priests and teachers say, “We do not pay attention to dogmatic definitions of a previous age; we follow the ‘living Magisterium’.” (I do not exaggerate; I heard them with my own ears. At first, I could hardly believe what was being said – by priests who claim to be faithful, fervent, and traditional.)
In other words, what these foolish and ignorant “teachers” are saying is: We will follow Cardinal Ratzinger or some other Cardinal of the Vatican or even the Pope himself, no matter what – even if one of them contradicts explicitly the solemn infallible definition of a previous pope, or of a previous Ecumenical Council infallibly confirmed by a previous pope.[4]
These blind leaders reason as follows: God is pleased with us because we are humble, because we are obedient; and God placed those men as Pope and Prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith over us. These people go on to say that it is you who will not submit who are in error, who will be punished by God for not believing the “living Magisterium”.
Such thinking is, in fact, “the operation of error” to “them that perish” (see 2 Thess. 2:10-11) that “God shall send them” because they “have not believed the truth” and they “have consented to iniquity”.
Would God allow a person to be deceived like this? How could He, someone asks? In answer, we have the teaching of St. John Eudes and of Sacred Scripture.
St. John Eudes explains that the most terrible chastisement God can send to His people are bad priests (that obviously includes bad bishops, Cardinals and could include even a pope). Here is what St. John Eudes says:
“The most evident mark of God’s anger and the most terrible castigation He can inflict upon the world are manifested when He permits His people to fall into the hands of clergy who are priests more in name than in deed, priests who practice the cruelty of ravening wolves rather than charity and affection of devoted shepherds …
“When God permits such things, it is a very positive proof that He is thoroughly angry with His people, and is visiting His most dreadful anger upon them. That is why He cries unceasingly to Christians, ‘Return O ye revolting children … and I will give you pastors according to My own heart’ (Jer. 3:14,15). Thus, irregularities in the lives of priests constitute a scourge upon the people in consequence of sin.”[5]
As is documented in The Devil’s Final Battle[6] and elsewhere,[7] we have the infiltration of all kinds of corrupt people into the priesthood. It is obvious that God is very angry with His people because of all the bad priests we now see in the Church, most visibly in the clerical scandals.
We must remember that God sends punishments and chastisements and warnings to us in this life, as St. Alphonsus notes, so that we will take heed to His warnings while there is still time, before it is too late for us. The scandals in the clergy are clear signs that God has very much reached the end of His warning. The hour is late; we at least must wake up by doing penance for our sins and praying most fervently for God’s grace and mercy at this time, for ourselves as well as all those God has entrusted to our care. But those scandals are not limited to perverted and corrupt priests and bishops. Worse yet is the corruption of our Catholic faith by so-called “defenders of the Faith”. Those who claim the “living Magisterium” takes precedence over the infallible, unchangeable dogmatic definitions are misleading countless souls to hell.
The perversion by priests, bishops and Cardinals who tell us that there is no need for unbelievers to convert to the Catholic faith[8] is a greater perversion than pedophilia – as horrid as pedophilia is. This heresy – even if it is promoted by Vatican Cardinals, even if it were to have the support, implicit or explicit, of the Pope – does not change one bit the perversity of such teaching. Those who defend such teaching of the “living Magisterium” have either lost their faith or have been completely ignorant of it all their lives. But their ignorance does not necessarily excuse them from grievous sin in this matter.
The Catholic Faith – the Deposit of Faith handed down to us from Jesus Christ that every Catholic must believe in order to save his soul – teaches us among other things:
1) God is the author of our Faith.
2) God must be believed because what He tells us is the Truth.
– Since God is all-knowing, He cannot be mistaken or only have part of the truth;
– Since He is all holy, He cannot lie to us. He may permit us to be deceived because we do not love the truth, but He would not ever lie to us.
3) Since God tells us the Truth and since each and every article of the Faith is true because God has revealed it, it follows that:
1) What was true in 33 A.D. is also true in 2003 A.D.;
2) What was defined as true by the Church
• in 325 A.D. at Nicea
• in 1438-1445 A.D. at Florence
• in 1545-1565 A.D. at Trent
• in 1870 A.D. at Vatican I
is still true today.
That is, Jesus Christ is the same, yesterday, today, and forever. So when the Council of Florence defines that neither Jews nor heretics nor schismatics will enter the Kingdom of God unless they repent of their error before they die, then that is the truth for all time.
Yet the objection is raised: But if a later pope says something different, says the opposite, is he also not the Pope? Does he not have the same power as a previous pope? How therefore can you go wrong following a later pope who contradicts an earlier pope?
[Continue reading Part 3.]
Photo Caption: Father Gruner on the set of FATIMA: “The Moment Has Come”, the only television program spreading the full Fatima Message and the authentic teachings of the Catholic Church.
END NOTES
[4] Editor’s Note: See the example given by Father Paul Kramer in his article “The Impending Great Chastisement Revealed in the Third Secret” in this issue, on pp. 48ff.
[5] Saint John Eudes, The Priest: His Dignity and Obligations, (New York: P.J. Kennedy & Sons, 1947) pp. 9-10.
[6] The Devil’s Final Battle, edited and compiled by Father Paul Kramer, (The Missionary Association, Terryville, Connecticut, 2010) pp. 40, 49-51, 53, 56, 61-62, 65, 116, and 146-147; or on the web at https://fatima.org/wp-content/uploads/2018/02/Devils-Final-Battle-Book-One.pdf, pp. 28, 34-36, 37, 39, 42-43, 45, 81, and 102. [Note: Footnote updated.]
[7] For documentation on the homosexual infiltration of the Catholic Church, see “Clerical Scandals and the ‘Negligence of the Pastors’” by John Vennari, The Fatima Crusader magazine, Autumn 2002, Issue 71, pp. 15ff.
[8] Cardinal Walter Kasper, based in the Vatican, defied the defined dogma that “outside the Church there is no salvation” when he said, “…today we no longer understand ecumenism in the sense of a return, by which the others would ‘be converted’ and return to being ‘Catholics’. This was expressly abandoned at Vatican II.” Adisti, Feb. 26, 2001. English translation quoted from “Where Have They Hidden the Body?” by Christopher Ferrara, The Remnant, June 30, 2001. See also The Devil’s Final Battle, pp. 75-76; or online at pp. 52-53.