By Br. Alexis Bugnolo
There are two things, which in my youth, greatly attracted me to attend mass: that at Church you could receive Jesus Christ in the Most Blessed Sacrament, and that at Church you could hear the Truth preached.
I did not yet recognize how important and great those 2 gifts were, for I just assumed everyone in the world was a Catholic, and did not know even of the existence of Anglicans until I was about 12 years old.
But with the passing of years, I have grown to appreciate those 2 gifts more an more, even though one of them is disappearing and rarely found anymore.
I speak here of the preaching of the truth.
The vocation to be a priest, is a call from God to be an Ambassador of Jesus Christ, first and foremost. I like this analogy because it makes it clear why a priest should open his mouth and what the purpose of his preaching and teaching should have. It also indicates clearly Whom he represents and the authority of his august office.
I read in a book in my youth, somewhere, that when the priest enters the Church at the start of Mass, one should recognize that Jesus Christ has entered the Church just behind His Ambassador and that He has come to offer His Sacrifice for us and with us.
And when a priest ascends the pulpit he preaches in the Name of Jesus.
Things were not so bad in the Church when I was young, you often heard homilies which touched your heart, and pricked your conscience. But with the passing of the years we faithful have been subject more and more to blather. And it is not only in the English speaking world, it is just as common even in Italy.
All this does not have to do with the priesthood. And not even with the abilities of the priests, all of whom, as far as I know, are quite cogent and precise outside of Mass, when they speak. It has to do with the growing persecution and ideological control of priests by their superiors. More and more is declared intolerable or insufferable. There is simply a long list of do’s and don’ts for each priest when he speaks.
And the problem comes from fellow priests, because you can see that the best priests preach most clearly and fervently when there are no other priests present.
We have to pray for priests and offer the acceptance of personal sacrifices to obtain graces for them, because they are in an awful battle.
This is why, though many priests recognize that Bergoglio is a heretic and that Benedict did not resign according to the norm of law, that they do not speak about the matter, and flee any discussion of it.
And part of the reason they do this, is because we the faithful are not strong backers of good priests. Priests know that no one or very few will remember them or help them if their superior transfers them to another parish, overnight. They know that the level of punishment and persecution they will receive will increase 100 fold if they even admit the kind of abuse they are receiving from their Bishop or fellow priests.
For these reasons, a good priest today has before his eyes Christ in His Passion whether he meditates on that during prayer or not, because as soon as he leaves the privacy of his own room, he knows that whatever he says or does can and will be used against him by wicked clergy.
I know a lot of good priest who for things far less than naming Pope Benedict XVI in the canon of the Mass were punished with loss of faculties or removal from the ministry. This is why so many priests are trying as hard as they can in public to pretend there is nothing substantially wrong with the Vatican.
A priest, however, has to be a disciple of the truth, not a pastor of the truth. That is, he has to follow Jesus, the Truth, and not try to shepherd truth to where he wants it to go.
As the Saints say, a priest is never alone. He goes to heaven with thousands of souls, or he goes to hell with thousands of souls. He cannot escape that reality.
As a Franciscan brother who lives by divine providence, and who decided more than 20 years ago to trust in God, I can assure priests that if they make the heroic decisions, God and His holy Angels and His Blessed Mother will be there for them, even if many laity are not. It is just impossible, that God would help a Franciscan brother more than a priest. Therefore, if He has helped me, he will help you.
Because, that is the one thing that only a good priest has, which a bad priest does not have. Heroism for priests consists in acting on that belief.
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CREDITS: The Featured Image is a photo by Br. Bugnolo of the Chapel Crypt of the Congregation for the Propagation of the Faith, where the Cardinals and Bishops who served there up until c. 1930 are buried. It is found in the Cemetery of the Verano, here at Rome.
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Yes, the shutting down of good priests from preaching the Gospel Truth cries out to the Lord for vengeance.
However until the current Church crisis is resolved why can’t priests preach the Truth and set up their own ‘living room’ congregations if they are expelled? This is based on the perhaps misguided concept that Bishops have lost their authority due to anti-pope Bergoglio and his heretical teaching. If I was a priest this is what I would think of doing. Please comment.
Michael,
Priest have more power than they think. Bishops don’t have enough priests to serve in their churches. If priests started declaring the truth and said mass in communion with Pope Benedict, the Bishop would have to tolerate it or shut the diocese down. Banding together, then, good priests have a lot of leverage. However, there are no so many of them. Most of them are isolated to one per diocese.
Lately there was a Diocesan Priests’ Retreat which could have provided a much needed & hard-hitting talk with the Bishop, but I dare say didn’t. Priests have unions now which could take-up their spiritual concerns if they had any but, as far as I can see, are only involved in agreeing to conditions of work, pay & pension, housing & leisure time. Prior to VII it was a 24 hour vocation & house visits were made on an annual basis so that the clergy knew their congregations. Now there is no attempt to get to know what the problems are in their parishes & what families need spiritual counselling. With PF saying all can get to Heaven, there is no Catholic God & Hell doesn’t exist, I imagine they don’t believe it is necessary anymore.
MD, I would not think that your solution of a ‘living room’ church would be based on anything misguided. A bishop removing or persecuting a priest over his acknowledgment of the true pope is not only in schism but is an enemy persecutor of the true “Remnant Church” of Benedict. To me its necessary to acknowledge that the schism is already a reality PARTICULARLY (and then most certainly) when a bishop INSISTS on others submitting to an allegiance to a apostate anti-pope.
Reblogged this on PASSAPAROLADESSO.
Thank you for this plea. Almost every priest I know already knows the Truth, but they have been bought off and trained since they were in the seminary, to never question the system or they very easily risk losing economic dependence from their bishops and also risk losing their reputations as schismatics and loonies. It takes lots of holiness and like one retired bishop I know said: “they lack apostolic balls”.
Bravo, Brother Bugnolo.
Christ is as He Himself said: “I Am the Way, and the Truth, and the Life.”
Crisis of faith. Crisis of belief. Crisis of charity. As Miss Milan notes, the hierarchy has “other priorities.” So too most religious orders and communities; likewise most priests. All of the latter two groups are more likely than not cowering for fear of the homosexual jihadists in the bishops robes lurking in the chanceries. Donald Wuerl anyone? McCarrick? Mahoney, Cupich, Bernardin?
The sheer viciousness of such men–who infest and dominate the hierarchy here in the U. S. & Italy and Germany and most other places (England, Canada, Ireland, France, for example) simply cannot be overstated, nor even imagined by someone who has not had the illfortune to serve as their “employee.”
Crisis of the clerical Homosexual Network Strangling the Church.
Not one word of Viganò’s valiant Testimony of August 22, 2018 has been impeached in the slightest, much less proven to be false.
Not one word.
And this despite the False Pope’s request to the press (MSM, Catholic and secular) to investigate the claims. Meaning slander Viganò personally, because that is all they did or ‘discovered.’
Priests go mute at the very mention of Viganò and his Testimony.
Priests go mute for fear of Francis the False Pope.
But. Not all. Some still preach Christ. Some do not fear the False Pope.
May the Blessed Virgin inspire more priests, and more men of good will, to simply hew to–and speak–the Truth.
I proposed a Feb 28 initiative to call an inquest to investigate corruption at the Vatican. Noticeably, most noticeably, Trad Inc entirely ignored it. The ecclesiastical Mafia has non ecclesiastical members.
Oh, and Happy Feast of Saint Mathias, Apostle
Thank you! This is the Day Saint Francis received his vocation!