by Br. Alexis Bugnolo

A leading Italian newspaper has confirmed the story in the Reggio Today: Pope Benedict XVI has named an Ambassador of Peace for Benin.

The clamorous news broke on the morning of Tuesday, March 16, and was promptly reported in English by FromRome.Info just hours later. But as of Wednesday morning, the silence was deafening, as the international press both secular and “Catholic” sat on the news. I commented on that the same morning.

But by Thursday morning, the absolute silence of the “Catholic” Press in the English speaking world has received a journalistic slap on its face.

For in the printed copy of Il LIbero,  (March 18, page 9) Andrea Cionci confirmed the appointment and reported on it after by speaking with Lorenzo Festicini. — Here is the full PDF for doubters. — The title of the article will be hard to swallow for fake Catholics, too:  Ratzinger nominates an Ambassador, just as a reigning Pontiff would do. — Here is a partial screen shot of the PDF.

The action of the Roman Pontiff in naming an ambassador is something reserved by Divine right to the Roman Pontiff. He normally does this by appointing Apostolic Nuncios or Papal Legates. The former are his official representatives to the governments of the world, with which the Apostolic See has diplomatic relations. The latter he does in regard to Churches and special events. The Vatican, being a sovereign state, also has de jure the capacity to name Ambassadors. In Canon Law, neither Nuncios, Legates or Ambassadors have to be clergy or even male. Naming a Humanitarian Ambassador, thus, in canon law, is a possible, through it has no canonical consequence and pertains more to the authority of the Roman Pontiff as Monarch of the Vatican City State as a nation. In fact, it is a honorarium, more than an official act.

Lorenzo Festicini, when asked by Cionci explained it thus:  “It regards a purely spiritual nomination, a blessing for his humanitarian work in Benin“.

For Catholics who believe, however, the Papal Office is in its essence, power, grace and authority, a purely spiritual institution, which however, is set up by God Himself over all institutions of mankind and of men. “Purely spiritual” is not as the Modernist would conceive it, as equivalent to “purely imaginary”, but as a St. Thomas Aquinas or St. Bonaventure would expound it, as “plenipotentiary in right”, the act of a Vicar of a Monarch who is King of Kings, and Lord of Lords.

It remains, thus, that Pope Benedict XVI knows and accepts, and believes and has now begun to act once again, as the one and only Pope, Vicar of Jesus Christ and Roman Pontiff.

The eclipse of the Church, which Melanie of La Salette, had warned us of, has begun to end. The moon of fraud has begun to withdraw, and the Sun which never went away, is beginning to sends its powerful and intense rays of light back down to the earth.

FromRome.Info explained this back on January 29th, and it is a joy to see that the Holy Father has given the Catholic World this sign of great hope.