What Really Happened in Ireland’s Gay ‘Marriage’ Referendum?

LifeSiteNews.com May 29, 2015:

Last Friday’s 62% vote in Ireland to legalize “gay marriage” has been hailed as a triumph of progressive thinking by the mainstream media and the political establishment. The outcome shocked many in the pro-family movement. But what the mainstream press isn’t reporting is even more shocking.

There is no question that the secularization of Ireland, the weakness of the Catholic Church and refusal of the Pope to intervene, the corrupt political class, and the relentless pro-gay media were all contributing factors to the “gay marriage” vote.

But the “Yes” vote would still have most likely failed if it had been a normal Irish election. Those same general conditions existed in many places here in the U.S. from California to Maine where “gay marriage” failed to win a popular vote.

This “culture war” election was conducted under extraordinary conditions that have never been seen anywhere before in the West. As we described in our pre-election article virtually all of the effort to pass “gay marriage” in Ireland came from massive funding from the United States – primarily a billion-dollar pro-gay foundation, Atlantic Philanthropies –  in a sophisticated campaign spanning over a decade.

Background: Years of referendum losses by the LGBT movement

To understand how this Irish election was won, a bit of history from the U.S. is in order.

Most of us forget that for over 20 years, the idea of a “gay marriage” referendum passing anywhere seemed next to impossible. From 1998 to 2009, there were 31 statewide votes to completely ban “gay marriage.” All of them won. Some won by majorities as high as 80%. Even in Massachusetts, the LGBT lobby fought furiously to keep a “gay marriage” ban from coming to a vote. Their own leaders had come to believe that the only way they would make any “progress” in the U.S. was through the courts.

The big LGBT turnaround in 2012

Then, after the their 2009 “gay marriage” referendum defeat in Maine, the homosexual movement decided to craft an entirely new approach toward elections.

They brought together groups of political strategists, psychologists, pollsters, organizing experts, and various “think tank” types. They meticulously studied the data and their election experiences and designed a new set of strategies and tactics to win against their “right wing” adversaries.

They created a sophisticated propaganda campaign. They shipped thousands of activists into key voting areas to canvass door to door. In order to soften the average people toward homosexuality and create an animus against traditional religious values, they resurrected many of the “big lie” techniques used by the 20th century totalitarian movements. For example, people were told over and over that not allowing “gay marriage” was bad for the economy and that only backward, ignorant, and superstitious people still were against it. Homosexuality was said to be the next phase of the Civil Rights movement. A key talking point was that by supporting “gay marriage” you are “on the right side of history” – a Marxist concept (later used by the Third Reich).

Fundraising became a major part of the strategy. For earlier elections they had casually raised about the same amount (or less) than the pro-family side. But now, they would tap the “gay” moneymen for very large sums of money.

And it all worked. In November 2012 they won all four statewide “gay marriage” referendum votes: Maine (a re-vote), Minnesota, Maryland, and Washington. In those races they spent between five and ten times as much as the pro-family side. Their propaganda was shrewd – for instance, putting forward friendly faces of “gay” couples who seemed just liked everyone else. Their winning margins were not large (between 51% and 53%), but they won.

Shortly after the 2012 wins, the LGBT movement published an article in a Maine newspaper describing much of their “turnaround” process. And since then, they’ve been virtually unstoppable.

Laying the groundwork in Ireland over a decade earlier

Funded primarily by Atlantic Philanthropies, the Irish LGBT lobby groups started laying the groundwork over a decade in advance. Their ambitions multi-year plan (which they later outlined HERE) included a very sophisticated and aggressive lobbying effort targeting Ireland’s key politicians, which resulted in a long string of “incremental” parliamentary successes for the LGBT movement.

The National Catholic Register recently published a very good article chronicling this.  Also, the Catholic Action League of Massachusetts has compiled a complete list of the major anti-family political actions over the past decades that helped bring Ireland to the state it’s in.

However, from the beginning the main goal from all of this for both the Irish LGBT groups and their American funders was to soften up the Irish citizenry to eventually win a nationwide “gay marriage” vote, which for constitutional reasons had to be done by a nationwide referendum. The referendum finally took place on May 22, 2015.

Ramping up for a nationwide “gay marriage” vote in Ireland

It’s one thing to get a country’s parliament to chip away at the moral underpinnings through legislation. But it’s a much different challenge to get a country with a thousand-year Catholic culture to accept “gay marriage” through a nationwide vote.

So to take on the Irish election, the LGBT movement ramped up their effort tremendously over what they did for the elections back in the U.S.

The total LGBT funding to achieve “gay marriage” in Ireland has been estimated at between $17 and $25 million – roughly 50 times what was raised and spent by the pro-family side. Their execution was planned and focused rather than scattered and haphazard as our side’s tended to be.

The campaign with lengthy and intense (and expensive) nationwide propaganda using psychological manipulation techniques to pound the entire country. The average person could barely grasp the force that was coming at him. And that was just the beginning.

The arguments were not rational or truthful, but completely emotional.

People were told over and over that those opposed to “gay marriage”:

• Are opposed to democracy
• Will damage lives
• Are against human rights
• Will hurt Ireland’s international reputation
• Will hurt Ireland’s economy
• Are in favor of discrimination
• Are against love
• Are hateful and bigoted
• Are stupid and backwards

This all had a horrible effect on our side while galvanizing their supporters. It got to a point where people who persisted in holding these “backward” beliefs were considered inferior humans by the supporters. One could literally lose his job over it. A particularly nasty venom was directed at religious believers and the Catholic Church. Many of our people became frightened and confused, while the other side became bolder and more vicious.

Ireland gets a lesson in ‘election mechanics’

As the election neared, the polls showed a 78% “Yes” vote coming up. But the homosexual movement knew they still weren’t safe.

Their brain trust realized early on that a great many people would simply “go underground” with their views and would vote their conscience on election day, but would respond to pollsters in a “politically correct” manner. They also knew that the bulk of hardcore “gay marriage” supporters were young people who had a terrible record of voting or even being registered.

They could still lose if those they really needed (those responding emotionally) didn’t register or vote. So months before the election – with the help of the country’s police force – they set up pro-gay marriage voter registration areas at college campuses. According to eyewitness reports, these booths illegally skipped required steps in the registration in order to process more people.  Over 50,000 college students were registered in this manner, and others already registered were identified. In addition, according to reports, they also had paid canvassers make sure that their likely supporters in the cities were registered to vote.

Then on election day, using sophisticated social media and other techniques, they had the most massive “get-out-the-vote” effort ever seen in Ireland. As a result, over 90% of  known pro-gay marriage supporters voted, and 95% of registered college voters, according to one report. On the other hand, many pro-family people, we were told, feeling overwhelmed and beaten down by the psychological techniques used against them and with no overall get-out-the-vote organization, never made it to the polls.

Nobody in Ireland had ever seen anything like this. There is no question that if the election had been conducted on an even playing field from the beginning (or even with just a 2-1 funding advantage) the “Yes” side would not have prevailed. As one Irish voter observed, "If usual voing patterns had prevailed this would have been easily defeated."

The pro-family Irish opposition – a valiant stand

Given the odds against them and the terrible psychological battle focused against religious believers, the Irish pro-family people stepped up quite admirably. But they were on their own. "These groups received their funding from personal donations by private individuals. There was no big financial backing coming from anyone," we were told by one of the Irish pro-family people.

They put up as many signs as possible, even though a great many were vandalized. They passed out many thousands of leaflets in cities and also went door to door in rural areas. one organization distributed over 91,000 pamphlets. A group of 12 Baptist churches put some ads in newspapers.

We were told that the Catholic Church was very weak on this issue and did not officially call for a "No" vote. According to the Catholic Action League, at least 15 priests publicly endorsed the "Yes" campaign and at least one bishop criticized the pro-family "efforts. Nevertheless, many individual Catholic priests were outstanding in their outrcy for a "No" vote.

Lacking sophisticated planning, there was no unified message. “Every child needs a mother and father” was the common refrain, which has a much stronger meaning in Europe because of outrage over the child trafficking. Others used MassResistance information on what “gay marriage” brings to the schools and other social institutions. A few focused on the dangers of homosexual behavior.

Can this be stopped in the future?

There is talk about Italy being their next “gay marriage” target. They are also eying some of the African countries that have been holding out on “LGBT rights”. 

Can this juggernaut be stopped? Of course it can – with proper resources. Everything the other side does can be picked apart and be countered. Plus, working with the truth normally has a big natural advantage. Their lies, irrationality, and thuggish tactics only work because there’s no effective opposition.

Their biggest triumph has been the LGBT movement’s ability to cut off the  money supply to frontline groups. The millionaires and billionaires ostensibly on our side could easily donate many times the money necessary to fight this effectively. But they have virtually all become emasculated by fear of the “gay mafia”. It’s quite pathetic to see, and it has had terrible consequences. So we need to create new methods of funding. Average people are more becoming more important than ever.

Also, many people in the  pro-family movement (and many donors) still do not see this as a “war” to subvert society, but as a kind of religious/secular disagreement among individuals. This often causes our tactics to be skewed and usually only marginally effective. So even when we have the money, it often gets squandered on dumb things.

Ireland is worse than the pagans for legalising gay marriage, says senior cardinal

See http://www.thetablet.co.uk/news/2108/0/ireland-is-worse-than-the-pagans-for-legalising-gay-marriage-says-senior-cardinal

The Irish vote is worse than perverse. It is blasphemous

From http://blog.newadvent.org/2015/05/the-irish-vote-is-worse-than-perverse.html

By Father George Rutler 

The Constitution of Ireland begins: “In the name of the Most Holy Trinity, from Whom is all authority and to Whom, as our final end, all actions both of men and States must be referred, / We, the people of Éire, / Humbly acknowledging all our obligations to our Divine Lord, Jesus Christ, . . .” 

The landslide vote in Eire for legalizing the fictitious form of marriage between persons of the same sex, in contradiction of all laws natural and divine, unearths the pulsating Druidism that Saint Patrick and his fellow saints defied. The estimated $17 million from pressure groups in the United States is no excuse, for people will only be pressured if they are willing to be pressured. The other dismal fact is that over 90% of the young people influenced to subscribe to this vote were formed in Catholic schools. The vote was less in favor of perversion and more in hostility to a Church whose Jansenism and clericalism had incubated corruption and lassitude. While most of Europe suffers from the deadly sin of indifference, or sloth, Ireland is in adolescent rebellion, virulent and irrational. This was exploited by political interests hostile to Christian civilization, and their propaganda combined legitimate accusations against ecclesial failings with a left-wing, secularist agenda. 

Ireland helped to bring the Faith to America, and when the flourishing of that Faith degenerated here, that donation was returned in the form of a bacillus. Ireland today has one of the highest rates of suicide and mental illness in all Europe, and one-third of children there are born out of wedlock. Things are worse in the United States. Look at the Saint Patrick’s Day Parade in New York City to see what happens when the honor of a saint is dishonored, and when ambassadors for Christ become nothing more than goodwill ambassadors. 

What happened in Ireland was not sudden. Like a dead elephant that remains standing for a sort while before collapsing, so the Flame that Patrick kindled on Tara had died long before Catholicism was mixed up with political causes, and ethnic drollery replaced dogma. In mordant irony, just a few weeks ago the Stormont in Northern Ireland rejected a motion favoring same–sex unions, a motion more indicting for having been introduced by the Sinn Fein, which had long persuaded naïve Americans that it was a Catholic cause. 

The Archbishop of Dublin, hardly a firebrand, said: “Marriage is not simply about a wedding ceremony or about two people being in love with each other. Marriage, in the Constitution, is linked with the family and with a concept of family and to the mutuality of man and woman as the foundation for the family.” 

In light of the fine invocation of the Irish Constitution, the Irish vote is worse than perverse: it is blasphemous. All the great saints of once-verdant Ireland would have used stronger language. 

Father Rutler is pastor of the Church of Saint Michael in New York City.

Secularism has filled the vacuum left by the decline of Irish Catholicism

From http://www.catholicherald.co.uk/commentandblogs/2015/05/25/the-irish-churchs-failures-have-caused-its-people-to-choose-secularism-over-faith/

Saturday’s vote for same-sex marriage in Ireland is one for the history books. It’s the first time a country has legalised gay marriage by popular vote.

The question on everyone’s lips is: what changed Catholic Ireland into a post-religious country where gay marriage has been enshrined in law by the will of the majority of people?

The vastly diminished role of the Church has left an elephantine emptiness in Irish life. One very important factor is how ashamed many Irish people feel about the sexual abuse crisis. Perhaps the people who ought to feel that shame are the guilty priests and nuns. But Benedict XVI was right, in his book-long interview with Peter Seewald, when he pointed out that most Irish families had a member who had a vocation either as a priest or a nun. Therefore most Irish people felt very deeply the disgrace caused by the revelations of clerical sexual abuse. This was the case even if the priest or nun in a family was totally innocent.

Growing up in Ireland, I saw this first-hand, when a friend or acquaintance who had a brother who was a blameless priest, they would feel embarrassed to say that their sibling was a good priest, for fear that people would think they were “covering up”.

Humiliation and regret have gone hand in hand, and increasingly in the past few decades, the Irish, who have, by an average margin of two to one, legalised gay marriage, convinced themselves that if the Church was wrong, then the opposite of the Church’s teaching must be right.

When the Church lost power and influence in Irish life, that same power and influence was inherited by the forces of secularism. Have no doubt: the vacuum was filled by secularism: The Irish did not turn to another religion such as Pentecostal Christianity. When tens of thousands of people stopped practising as Catholics, they did not en masse convert to any other Christian denomination.

Jon Anderson hit the nail on head when he recently wrote: “Many Irish believe in Jesus in the same way that Hindus believe in Gandhi, an interesting historical figure.”

It’s not as simple as saying that the Irish have rejected the Catholic Church. It goes much deeper: the truth is that the majority have abandoned traditional Christianity and will not let it guide their choices and their way of life.

It’s a strange irony that the Irish constitution, dedicated to the Most Holy Trinity, will now enshrine same-sex marriage. An austere portrayal that even the most formally Catholic legal charters for a formally Catholic country can be usurped by secularism. 

Ashamed to be Irish: Ireland set to vote Yes to same-sex marriage

See http://www.rte.ie/news/vote2015/2015/0523/703205-referendum-byelection/

Christian bakery found guilty of discrimination by refusing to make pro-gay marriage cake

From http://www.catholicherald.co.uk/news/2015/05/19/christian-bakery-unlawfully-discriminated-by-refusing-to-make-pro-gay-marriage-cake/

Ashers Bakery refused to make a cake with an image of Sesame Street's Bert and Ernie and the phrase, 'Support gay marriage'

A judge has ruled that a Christian-owned bakery in Northern Ireland discriminated against a customer after it refused to make a cake bearing a pro-gay marriage slogan.

The Northern Ireland Equality Commission brought the case against Ashers Baking Company, which is based in Co Antrim, on behalf of Gareth Lee, whose order was declined.

District judge Isobel Brownlie delivered the guilty verdict at Belfast County Court earlier today.

“The defendants have unlawfully discriminated against the plaintiff on grounds of sexual discrimination,” she said.

“This is direct discrimination for which there can be no justification.”

The judge said Ashers was not exempt from discrimination law because they were “conducting a business for profit” and are not a religious group.

She added that she accepted that Ashers have “genuine and deeply held” religious views, but that they were not above the law.

“The defendants are not a religious organisation. They conduct a business for profit. I believe the defendants did have the knowledge that the plaintiff was gay,” Judge Brownlie said.

“As much as I acknowledge their religious beliefs this is a business to provide service to all. The law says they must do that.”

Both parties have agreed that £500 of damages are to be awarded to Mr Lee.

Ashers Bakery, run by the McArthur family, was accused of discrimination on the grounds of sexual orientation after it refused to make a cake carrying an image of Sesame Street characters Bert and Ernie below the phrase ‘Support Gay Marriage’.

Mr Lee had ordered the cake for an event marking International Day Against Homophobia last May.

Ashers, which employ 80 staff across nine branches, have had their legal fees paid by the Christian Institute.

Speaking outside court on Tuesday morning before the ruling was announced, Ashers general manager Daniel McArthur said: “We happily serve everyone but we cannot promote a cause that goes against what the Bible says about marriage. We have tried to be guided in our actions by our Christian beliefs.”

Only One Group supporting No Vote in the Gay Marriage Referendum in Ireland

Please see http://mothersandfathersmatter.org/ for more information

Catholic Church in Ireland may no longer perform civil marriage part of weddings if gay marriage referendum passes

See http://www.rte.ie/news/2015/0414/693972-same-sex-marriage/

Cardinal Nichols celebrates Requiem Mass for King Richard III

From http://en.radiovaticana.va/news/2015/03/23/cardinal_nichols_celebrates_requiem_mass_for_king_richard_ii/1131463

(Vatican Radio) Hundreds of people have been queuing up Monday to view the coffin of the last Plantagenet King of England, Richard III. The coffin is on public view in Leicester Cathedral until Thursday when it will be lowered into a tomb following a ceremony presided over by the Archbishop of Canterbury, Justin Welby.

Richard was killed in battle against Henry Tudor in 1485.

The University of Leicester confirmed in February 2013 that the skeleton found in an excavation under a car park in the city of Leicester, formerly the site of a Franciscan church, was that of the King.

On Monday evening the Archbishop of Westminster, Cardinal Vincent Nichols is celebrating Mass for the repose of the soul of Richard III in the Holy Cross Priory in Leicester.

Speaking to Vatican Radio’s Lydia O’Kane, the Cardinal said that King Richard was a man of prayer. “the Archbishop of Canterbury when he comes to the interment on Thursday will bring with him Richard III’s book of hours, so his prayer book… and in that prayer book there an annotations and there is a prayer that Richard wrote himself, so he was clearly a man who had his own prayer book and who prayed.”

Richard III was a Catholic King in a Catholic country at the time and there have been ceremonies this week marking his internment at Leicester Cathedral celebrated by both the Anglican and Catholic Churches.

“Well, I’m glad to say”, said Cardinal Nichols, “that the co-operation between our Churches and the preparation of these events has been first class”.

On Sunday, hundreds of people in Leicester looked on as a procession carrying the coffin of King Richard made its way to Bosworth, the battlefield where the monarch was killed, before heading to the Cathedral.

Richard III was found to have had scoliosis, which is a form of spinal curvature, consistent with contemporary accounts of Richard's appearance, such as in Shakespeare’s play which paints a dark picture of the British King as a murderous villain.

LEGENDARY GAY DESIGNERS OPPOSE GAY MARRIAGE, GAY PARENTING, SURROGACY

See http://www.breitbart.com/big-government/2015/03/14/legendary-gay-designers-oppose-gay-marriage-gay-parenting-surrogacy/

What made a non believer Chadian citizen; die for Christ, along with his “20 Coptic Christian friends”?

From http://bombayorthodoxdiocese.org/what-made-a-non-believer-chadian-citizen-die-for-christ-along-with-his-20-coptic-christian-friends/

ISIS announced the execution of 21 Copts but only 20 names were confirmed, most of them were from the province of Minya(Upper Egypt). There was an inaccuracy in the number of Egyptian Hostages; there were only 20 Egyptians(Copts). Then who was this remaining one non-Coptic victim?


Ahram-Canadian News was able to gather information about this man. He was a Chadian Citizen who accepted Christianity after seeing the immense faith of his fellow Coptic Christians to die for Christ. When Terrorist forced him to reject Jesus Christ as God, looking at his Christian friends he replied, “their God is my God“ so the terrorist beheaded him also.


Think about the faith, shining through those 20 Christians who made a non believer, a true believer in Christ, even at the point of death. In Bible, Gospel of Luke describes about two thieves, being on either side of Jesus as they were crucified. At that very point of death by Crucifixion, one of the thief accepted Christ saying, ‘LORD, remember me when You come into Your kingdom.’ Here this Chadian citizen showed the same faith in Christ.

Can we put ourselves into his place? The faith he showed was not a mean faith, at such a moment, he could believe in Jesus as Lord and King.


May God help us to strength our faith so that the world may see our good works, and glorify our Father which is in heaven. (Mathew 5:16)

(News referred from Ahram-Canadian news)

Irish Ambassador Appointed to Holy See

See http://en.radiovaticana.va/news/2014/11/12/irish_ambassador_to_holy_see_speaks_to_vatican_radio_/1110899

Pope Paul VI Beatified On October 19th

CNA October 17, 2014:

He had the unenviable task of being Pope during a most “tumultuous” era for the Church, but  Paul VI stood “deeply rooted in Christ” through it all, a theology professor has said.

“Pope Paul VI suffered greatly from the growing apostasy of the world from Christian values and from the distortions of the teaching of Vatican II,” said theology professor Dr. Alan Schreck of the Franciscan University of Steubenville. “Through it all, he remained deeply rooted in Christ and the Holy Spirit.”

Giovanni Battista Montini – soon to be Blessed Paul VI -- will be beatified Oct. 19, at the conclusion of the Synod on the Family.

His cause for beatification moved forward after a miracle was attributed to his intercession by the Congregation for the Causes of Saints and approved by Pope Francis in May.

Benedict XVI had affirmed his “heroic virtue” in 2012, officially recognizing him as “Venerable.”

As Pope, Paul VI lived “heroic virtue” because though he “suffered” much turmoil and dissent in the Church, he directed major church reforms and supported renewal of faith amongst the laity and religious, was a prophet about the errors of the age, and was even a well-traveled “pilgrim pope.”

The reforms of Paul VI included reforms of the Roman curia and the College of Cardinals, as well as support for renewal movements within the Church.

“He was an able administrator who reformed the Roman Curia, as Vatican II had directed,” Schreck said. Paul VI also “internationalized the College of Cardinals” by “markedly increasing the membership in the college from the global South and East.”

Amid the cultural wreckage of the age, he saw “the need for a deep and profound prayer life for every member of the Church,” Schreck said, and supported “spiritual renewal movements.”

Paul VI also was a forerunner of St. John Paul II’s stand against Communism.

“He sought religious freedom concessions from Iron Curtain countries, paving the way for the downfall of communism in Eastern Europe,” Schreck said.

Perhaps Paul VI is most well known for his encyclical Humanae vitae in which he upheld the Church’s discipline of priestly celibacy and its teaching against the use of artificial contraception. The stand was widely “controversial” then and now, yet Paul VI has been vindicated by time as a prophet of the destructive effects of contraception.

“Though this teaching sparked dissent among some Catholics, today Paul VI’s specific warnings of the negative effects of the widespread use of artificial contraception – such as increased sexual promiscuity and the decline of respect for human life – have certainly come to pass,” Schreck affirmed.

Yet as St. John Paul II was known as the well-traveled pope, Paul VI was also a “pilgrim pope,” Schreck said, citing his travels to Australia, South America, Asia, and the United States. And he promoted ministry through the end of his papacy with his “brilliant apostolic letter ‘On Evangelization in the Modern World,’” as well as his calling a synod on catechesis.

Through his faith, he guided the Church “in this most challenging period in which Western culture began to be dislodged from her Christian moorings,” Schreck concluded.

Pro-Family Catholics Reject Pro-Gay Synod Mid-Way Report, Calling It 'a Betrayal’

Voice of the Family October 13, 2014:

An international coalition of pro-family groups has rejected the mid-way report of the Extraordinary Synod on the Family, calling it “a betrayal”.

Voice of the Family http://voiceofthefamily.info responded to the report (relatio post disceptationem), published this morning and presented by Cardinal Péter Erdő (See “Synod on Family: Midterm report presented, 2015 Synod announced“, Vatican Radio, 13 October) The report has been welcomed ecstatically by liberal Catholic commentators.

John Smeaton, co-founder of Voice of the Family, said:

“Those who are controlling the Synod have betrayed Catholic parents worldwide. We believe that the Synod’s mid-way report is one of the worst official documents drafted in Church history.

“Thankfully the report is a preliminary report for discussion, rather than a definitive proposal. It is essential that the voices of those lay faithful who sincerely live out Catholic teaching are also taken into account. Catholic families are clinging to Christ’s teaching on marriage and chastity by their finger-tips.”

Patrick Buckley, Voice of the Family’s Irish representative, said:

“The Synod’s mid-way report represents an attack on marriage and the family. For example, the report in effect gives a tacit approval of adulterous relationships, thereby contradicting the Sixth Commandment and the words of Our Lord Jesus Christ on the indissolubility of marriage.

“The report undermines the Church’s definitive teaching against contraception, by using the coded language of ‘underlin[ing] the need to respect the dignity of the person in the moral evaluation of the methods of birth control”. This language is the code of those who wish to reduce the Church’s doctrines to a mere guide, thus leaving couples free to choose contraception in so-called ‘conscience’.

“The report accepts wrongly that there is a value in the homosexual orientation. This contradicts the Congregation of the Doctrine of the Faith’s 1986 Letter on the Pastoral Care of Homosexual Persons:

“Although the particular inclination of the homosexual person is not a sin, it is a more or less strong tendency ordered toward an intrinsic moral evil; and thus the inclination itself must be seen as an objective disorder.”

Maria Madise, Voice of the Family’s coordinator, said:

“What will Catholics parents now have to tell their children about contraception, cohabiting with partners or living homosexual lifestyles? Will those parents now have to tell their children that the Vatican teaches that there are positive and constructive aspects to these mortal sins? This approach destroys grace in souls.

“It would be a false mercy to give Holy Communion to people who do not repent of their mortal sins against Christ’s teachings on sexual purity. Real mercy consists of offering people a clean conscience via the Sacrament of Confession and thus union with God.

“Many of those who claim to speak in the name of the universal Church have failed to teach the faithful. This failure has created unprecedented difficulties for families. No responsibility is taken for this failure in this disastrous mid-way report.”

“The Synod’s mid-way report will increase the incidence of faithful Catholics being labelled as ‘pharisees’, simply for upholding Catholic teaching on sexual purity.”

John Smeaton concluded:

“We urge Catholics not to be complacent or give in to a false sense of obedience, in the face of attacks on the fundamental principles of the natural law. Catholics are morally obliged to oppose the course being taken within the Synod.”

Here is the part of the Synod Mid-Way Report titled: Welcoming Homosexual Persons.

     50.        Homosexuals have gifts and qualities to offer to the Christian community: are we capable of welcoming these people, guaranteeing to them a fraternal space in our communities? Often they wish to encounter a Church that offers them a welcoming home. Are our communities capable of providing that, accepting and valuing their sexual orientation, without compromising Catholic doctrine on the family and matrimony?

     51.        The question of homosexuality leads to a serious reflection on how to elaborate realistic paths of affective growth and human and evangelical maturity integrating the sexual dimension: it appears therefore as an important educative challenge. The Church furthermore affirms that unions between people of the same sex cannot be considered on the same footing as matrimony between man and woman. Nor is it acceptable that pressure be brought to bear on pastors or that international bodies make financial aid dependent on the introduction of regulations inspired by gender ideology.

     52.        Without denying the moral problems connected to homosexual unions it has to be noted that there are cases in which mutual aid to the point of sacrifice constitutes a precious support in the life of the partners. Furthermore, the Church pays special attention to the children who live with couples of the same sex, emphasizing that the needs and rights of the little ones must always be given priority.

To see the entire Vatican Document click here: http://press.vatican.va/content/salastampa/en/bollettino/pubblico/2014/10/13/0751/03037.html

Synod's Mid-Term Report "Lacks a Solid Foundation in the Sacred Scriptures and the Magisterium"

Catholic World Report October 14, 2014:

Yesterday's presentation of the mid-term report (Relatio post disceptationem) of the Extraordinary Synod of Bishops on the Family was met with a remarkable level of interest among both Catholic and non-Catholic media outlets. The Vatican Radio site, in its introduction to the document, stated in part:

In the mid-term report the Synod Fathers speak of how it's the task of the Church to recognize those seeds of the Word that have spread beyond its visible and sacramental boundaries.  They appeal to the "law of graduality," as a reflection of the way God reached out to humanity and led His people forward step by step.

Reaction to the report ranged from positive declarations of "a shift in tone toward gays and divorce" (New York Times) to more pessimistic assessments. Mary Jo Anderson, reporting for Catholic World Report from Rome, remarked, "The Extraordinary Synod on the Family is at its midpoint and certain degrees of separation are clear: There is a divorce over divorce, remarriage, and Communion."

Cardinal Raymond Burke, prefect of the Supreme Tribunal of the Apostolic Signatura and a contributor with four other cardinals (and four additional scholars) to the new book, Remaining in the Truth of Christ: Marriage and Communion in the Catholic Church (Ignatius Press), has expressed concern over several aspects of the Synod, including the push for changes in the handling of Communion for divorced and remarried Catholics and the way that information about the Synod is being, in his words, "manipulated."

Cardinal Burke responded late yesterday to questions from Carl E. Olson, editor of Catholic World Report, about his concerns, his view of the mid-term report, and why he thinks a statement from Pope Francis is "long overdue."

CWR: In what way is information about what is happening in the Synod being either manipulated or only partially reported and made public?

Cardinal Burke: The interventions of the individual Synod Fathers are not made available to the public, as has been the case in the past. All of the information regarding the Synod is controlled by the General Secretariat of the Synod which clearly has favored from the beginning the positions expressed in the Relatio post disceptationem of yesterday morning.

While the individual interventions of the Synod Fathers are not published, yesterday’s Relatio, which is merely a discussion document, was published immediately and, I am told, even broadcast live. You do not have to be a rocket scientist to see the approach at work, which is certainly not of the Church.

CWR: How is that reflected in the Synod's midterm document, released yesterday, which is being criticised by many for its appeal to a so-called "law of graduality”?

Cardinal Burke: While the document in question (Relatio post disceptationem) purports to report only the discussion which took place among the Synod Fathers, it, in fact, advances positions which many Synod Fathers do not accept and, I would say, as faithful shepherds of the flock cannot accept. Clearly, the response to the document in the discussion which immediately followed its presentation manifested that a great number of the Synod Fathers found it objectionable.

The document lacks a solid foundation in the Sacred Scriptures and the Magisterium. In a matter on which the Church has a very rich and clear teaching, it gives the impression of inventing a totally new, what one Synod Father called “revolutionary,”teaching on marriage and the family. It invokes repeatedly and in a confused manner principles which are not defined, for example, the law of graduality.

CWR: How important is it, do you think, that Pope Francis make a statement soon in order to address the growing sense—among many in the media and in the pews—that the Church is on the cusp of changing her teaching on various essential points regarding marriage, “remarriage,” reception of Communion, and even the place of “unions” among homosexuals?

Cardinal Burke: In my judgment, such a statement is long overdue. The debate on these questions has been going forward now for almost nine months, especially in the secular media but also through the speeches and interviews of Cardinal Walter Kasper and others who support his position.

The faithful and their good shepherds are looking to the Vicar of Christ for the confirmation of the Catholic faith and practice regarding marriage which is the first cell of the life of the Church.

Vatican accepts resignation of Cardinal Seán Brady, leader of Catholic Church in Ireland

See http://www.bbc.com/news/uk-northern-ireland-29109314

Pope Benedict Was Right about Islam at Regensburg. The World Owes Him an Apology

LifeSiteNews reported on August 20, 2014:

As I write, the headlines and my various news feeds are filled with images of some of the most loathsome barbarities we have seen since the end of World War II. The horrific images invading our internet space from Syria and (the country formerly known as) Iraq: Mass murders, crucifixions, beheadings – even of tiny children – torture, and systematic gang rapes; women and girls abducted en masse and sold into slavery; thousands chased out of their homes in terror, allowed to carry nothing with them; homes, ancient churches, monasteries and shrines looted and burned…

Beyond horrific, the images and the news they depict are bizarre and surreal, as though the violent chaos of the 7th century had burst insanely into a quiet Midwestern suburb. We are being shown, in graphic detail on YouTube, Twitter, Facebook and Google, some hint of what the Islamic conquest of those ancient Christian lands we now call the Middle East must have looked like. We are reminded now of the long centuries of darkness, of misery and oppression of non-Muslim indigenous populations by their Islamic overlords, that spurred Christendom to attempt their rescue in the Crusades.

We are close today to the 8th anniversary, September 12th, of the address given by Pope Benedict XVI at the University of Regensburg in 2006, in which he quoted a long-dead Christian emperor who was facing similar reports. About a week ago, an editorial writer for the Catholic Italian newspaper Il Foglio, Camillo Langone, wrote that the world owed Pope Benedict – and Emperor Paleologus – an apology over their reaction to that speech. 

“Today, when the news from ex-Iraq is once more making history, and is showing to anyone who has eyes to see what the Koran translated into action truly is, they need to apologize to both of you.” But, Langone said, with obvious disgust, the modern secularized European “won’t do it”. Such a man, he wrote, “doesn’t believe in sacred texts…doesn’t believe in the Gospel.”

“For a European to believe that someone believes in religion is impossible… One who is no longer able to believe in God is not even capable of believing in reality, [and] does not even recognize a sword when it is pressing into his neck.”

Returning to that address with our current more graphic knowledge, it is hard to imagine a more mild response to Islamic extremism. Pope Benedict spoke about a discussion, a dialogue, “carried on - perhaps in 1391 in the winter barracks near Ankara - by the erudite Byzantine emperor Manuel II Paleologus” on the subject of Islam, the threat of which, in the form of the Ottoman Empire, was forcefully before him.

It is recorded that the Emperor, whom Pope Benedict described as “an educated Persian on the subject of Christianity and Islam,” asked, “Show me just what Mohammed brought that was new, and there you will find things only evil and inhuman, such as his command to spread by the sword the faith he preached.”

The pope noted that the comment was recorded sometime “during the siege of Constantinople between 1394 and 1402.” The pope also noted that the Emperor spoke with “startling brusqueness, a brusqueness that we find unacceptable.” But it is obvious that the emperor was also a man in a position to speak from personal experience.  

Since his talk, Pope Benedict has heard the constant accusations, endlessly repeated by the western press, that his “offensive” remarks, his “blunder” about Islam, caused the violence that followed.

But what did he say? He called quietly for a return to the supremacy of reason in religious discourse, and he politely asked Muslims to abjure violence.

The smug western secular media, busy with their attacks on one of their favorite targets, failed to quote the rest of the paragraph. But there can be found the thesis not only of Pope Benedict’s lecture, but of Christianity’s real response to both the uncontrolled violence of Islamism and to our own intellectually impoverished pleasure-obsessed libertinism: reason and faith, “fides et ratio” and their harmonious collaboration to create a moral and just civil order.

“The emperor, after having expressed himself so forcefully, goes on to explain in detail the reasons why spreading the faith through violence is something unreasonable. Violence is incompatible with the nature of God and the nature of the soul,” Pope Benedict said.

He quoted Paleologus: “God…is not pleased by blood - and not acting reasonably (σὺν λόγω) is contrary to God’s nature. Faith is born of the soul, not the body. Whoever would lead someone to faith needs the ability to speak well and to reason properly, without violence and threats... To convince a reasonable soul, one does not need a strong arm, or weapons of any kind, or any other means of threatening a person with death...”

Given the images burning like acid into our minds now, how mild, how utterly calm and reasonable do the words now seem. And how plainly wicked the demands that he retract and apologize because of the “offence” they had caused Muslims: how feigned and deceitful, how self-serving the manufactured “outrage”.

When we can work up the nerve to look at these images coming from the new Islamic State, the new “Caliphate”, we are stunned and overwhelmed, and wonder if indeed this could possibly be happening in the age of near global market saturation of western consumables. How can this be happening in a “globalized” world? What has happened to our “global village”? Hasn’t modernity, with all its comforts and distractions, friendly, western secular Coca Cola imperialism, succeeded in civilizing everyone and taming the whole world?

One photo stands out this week, of a boy, about eight years old, reported to be the young son of one of the “Islamic State” terrorists, dressed in a blue Polo For Kids t-shirt, plaid checked summer trousers, what look like Birkenstocks and baseball cap, proudly holding up a decapitated head. Heads must be heavy, since the little boy needs two hands to hold it up by the hair. The Sydney Morning Herald, that carried the photo, with the boy’s face pixeled out, ran the caption, “A boy believed to be Australian Khaled Sharrouf’s son holds the decapitated head of a soldier.  From Khaled Sharrouf's Twitter account.” One does not usually imagine an apocalyptic dystopia featuring so many name brands.

In the face of this terrifying modern resurgence of the ancient threat, of such gross and unnatural barbarities, it is getting harder for western intellectual liberals to continue echoing the old mantras. The hard truth must be faced eventually, even by the most determined; not everyone in the world thinks the same way we do, holds the same values, has the same goals. Not every culture is of equal value. Not all men are equally “right” in what they believe.

And if the message of the photos and videos were not getting through our thick western skulls, we have today a direct warning from the leader of the ancient Christian community that has been decimated by ISIS. The Chaldean Catholic Church traces its heritage to St. Thomas, the doubting Apostle of Christ. A few days ago, we all saw the headline saying that, for the first time in 1600 years, Mass was not being said in the ancient Christian town of Mosul because all the Christians, all the Chaldean Catholics, had been either killed, expelled or kidnapped, to be sold later into chattel slavery.

Speaking from his exile in the dubious and perhaps temporary safety of the northern Iraqi town of Erbil, the head of this lost and grieving community, Archbishop Amel Nona, the Chaldean Catholic Archeparch of Mosul, told us quite bluntly, and without the niceties required by Pope Benedict’s civilized academic audience, that the time for indulging our comfortable liberal fantasies is over.

“Our sufferings today are the prelude of those that you, Europeans and Western Christians, will also suffer in the near future,” said the archbishop in an interview with Corriere della Sera. “I lost my diocese. The physical setting of my apostolate has been occupied by Islamic radicals who want us converted or dead. But my community is still alive.

“Please, try to understand us. Your liberal and democratic principles are worth nothing here. You must consider again our reality in the Middle East, because you are welcoming in your countries an ever growing number of Muslims.”

He warns us, “Also, you are in danger. You must take strong and courageous decisions, even at the cost of contradicting your principles.”

Erbil is 55 miles east of Mosul, in territory currently holding off IS attackers, but it is certainly in their path. Corriera della Sera reports that the bishop has asked for material aid for the exiles huddling in shock there. “8,000 people, many elderly, a disproportionate number (for us Westerners) of children, babies of a few months, many dehydrated with diarrhea. A septuagenarian asks for insulin. Others write on scraps of crumpled paper the names of medicines that nobody knows where to find. 

“Tens of rusty wheelchairs were donated by humanitarian organizations for the sick and are used as chairs for the old. The local Christian organizations together with UN agencies have improvised a canteen service that distributes white rice, bread, bottled water. The toilets are almost useless.”

The archbishop continues: “You think all men are equal, but that is not true: Islam does not say that all men are equal. Your values are not their values. If you do not understand this soon enough, you will become the victims of the enemy you have welcomed in your home.”

“My people are being slaughtered!” ISIS = Genocide with impunity

See http://www.patheos.com/blogs/theanchoress/2014/08/06/my-people-are-being-slaughtered-isis-genocide-with-impunity-update-and-now-the-satanists/

Oklahoma City Catholic archbishop calls for prayer to counteract 'Black Mass'

See http://newsok.com/in-an-open-letter-the-oklahoma-city-catholic-archbishop-calls-for-prayer-to-counteract-black-mass/article/5130824

Bishop Athanasius Schneider: ‘We Are in the Fourth Great Crisis of the Church’

CatholicHerald June 6, 2014:

Liberals, collaborating with the “new paganism”, are driving the Catholic Church towards a split, according to Bishop Athanasius Schneider, the liturgical specialist who is carrying on a rearguard fight against “abuses” in the Church.

So serious are the problems, Bishop Schneider said in an interview last week, that this is the fourth great crisis in the history of the Church, comparable to the fourth-century Arian heresy in which a large part of the Church hierarchy was implicated.

If you have not heard of the Soviet-born bishop, you will. The sincere, scholarly clergyman is auxiliary bishop of the distant Archdiocese of St Mary in Astana, Kazakhstan. But this month he has received a rock star welcome from congregations across the country on his tour of England and he has embraced cyberspace to put over a trenchant, traditional defence of the Church. “Thanks be to God, the internet exists,” he said.

His views are not popular with everyone, especially not some of his liberal colleagues, or, he says, with the mainstream media of the secular world. But his audiences tell another story.

Bishop Schneider is best known for arguing that Holy Communion should be received on the tongue while kneeling, which he insists is the more efficient way to foster respect for the Sacrament and to prevent abuse of the Sacred Hosts. The 53-year-old bishop has called also for clarification (a new Syllabus of Errors), aimed at the clergy, to put a stop to liturgical and doctrinal freewheeling on a range of issues in the “spirit of Vatican II”.

In his interview, Bishop Schneider said the “banal” and casual treatment of the Blessed Sacrament is part of a major crisis in the Church in which some laity and clergy, including some in positions of authority, are siding with secular society. At the heart of the problems, he believes, is the creeping introduction of a man-centred agenda, while in some churches God, in the tabernacle, really is materially put in a corner, while the priest takes centre stage. Bishop Schneider argued that this situation is now coming to a head. “I would say, we are in the fourth great crisis [of the Church], in a tremendous confusion over doctrine and liturgy. We have already been in this for 50 years.”

How long will it last? “Perhaps God will be merciful to us in 20 or 30 years.”

In the autumn, the synod of bishops will meet in extraordinary session to discuss the family, in the light of the questionnaire which Pope Francis invited the faithful to complete, giving their views on marriage and sexuality. Expectations are growing that rules will be relaxed on a range of sexual matters and in terms of divorced people receiving Communion as a sign of “mercy” from the Church.

Such views, according to Bishop Schneider, reveal the depth of the problem. “I think this issue of the reception of Holy Communion by the remarried will blow up and show the real crisis in the Church. The real crisis of the Church is anthropocentrism and the forgetting of Christo-centrism…

“This is the deepest evil: man, or the clergy, putting themselves in the centre when they are celebrating liturgy and when they change the revealed truth of God, for instance, concerning the Sixth Commandment and human sexuality.”

Although he says talk of change is mainly coming from “the anti-Christian media”, he sees clergy and lay Catholics “collaborating” with what he calls the new paganism. Bishop Schneider is particularly critical of the idea that these changes should be made so as to be merciful to those currently barred from receiving the Sacraments. “[This is] a kind of sophism,” he said. “This is not mercy, this is cruel.”

He suggested this was “a false concept of mercy”, saying: “It is comparable to a doctor who gives a [diabetic] patient sugar, although he knows it will kill him.”

The bishop believes there are clear parallels with great crises of the past, when leading clergymen were complicit with heresies. In the Arian heresy, he said, naming them on his fingers, only a handful of the hierarchy resisted. “We [Christians] are a minority. We are surrounded by a very cruel pagan world. The temptation and challenge of today can be compared with the first centuries.”

He added: “Unfortunately there were … members of the clergy and even bishops who put grains of incense in front of the statue of the emperor or of a pagan idol or who delivered the books of the Holy Scripture to be burned. Such collaborationist Christians and clerics were called in those times thurificati or traditores.”

And today, he maintained, we also have those who collaborate, our “traitors of the Faith”.

Pope Francis is perceived to be at the forefront of a new liberal attitude coming from Rome. But Bishop Schneider says: “Thanks be to God, Pope Francis has not expressed himself in these ways that the mass media expect from him. He has spoken until now, in his official homilies, very beautiful Catholic doctrine. I hope he will continue to teach in a very clear manner the Catholic doctrine.”

The bishop said he hopes “the majority of the bishops still have enough Catholic spirit and faith that they will reject the proposal and not accept this”.

Nevertheless, he can foresee a split coming, leading to an eventual renewal of the Church on traditional lines. But, he believes, this will not be before the crisis has plunged the Church further into disarray. Eventually, he thinks, the “anthropocentric” [man-centred] clerical system will collapse. “This liberal clerical edifice will crash down because they have no roots and no fruits,” he said.

In the turmoil, Bishop Schneider, fears traditional Catholics may, for a time, be persecuted or discriminated against, even at the behest of those who have “power in the exterior structures of the Church”. But he believes those involved with the “heresy” will “not prevail against the Church”. And, in hope, the bishop said: “The Supreme Magisterium will surely issue an unequivocal doctrinal statement, rejecting any collaboration with the neo-pagan ideas.”

At this point, Bishop Schneider believes, the modern thurificati et traditores will leave the Church. “I can presume that such a separation will affect each level of Catholics: lay people and even not
excluding the high clergy,” he said.

Such comments are unlikely to win Bishop Schneider popularity in some circles, but he argues: “It is quite insignificant to be popular or unpopular. For every member of the clergy, their first interest should be to be popular in the eyes of God and not in the eyes of today or of the powerful. Jesus said a warning: ‘Woe to you when people speak well of you.’”

He added: “Popularity is false… Great saints of the Church, such as Thomas More and John Fisher, rejected popularity… those today who are worried about the popularity of the mass media and public opinion… will be remembered as cowards and not as heroes of the Faith.”

Bishop Schneider observes ruefully that there are many whose views coincide with those of the pagan world who “declare themselves Catholics and even faithful to the Pope”, while “those who are faithful to the Catholic faith or those who are promoting the glory of Christ in the liturgy” are labelled
extremists.

Such critics may assert that Bishop Schneider’s concern over Holy Communion is like worrying over the numbers of angels on a pinhead. But the bishop insists that treatment of the Eucharist is at the very heart of the crisis. “The Eucharist is at the heart of the Church,” he said. “When the heart is weak, the whole body is weak.”

He argued that receiving Communion in hand “contributes gradually to the loss of the Catholic faith in the Real Presence and in transubstantiation”.

Bishop Schneider also rejected the idea that concern for the liturgy is less important than, or even separate from, concern for the poor. “This is erroneous. The first commandment which Christ gave us was to adore God alone. Liturgy is not a meeting of friends. It is our first task to adore and glorify God in the liturgy and also in our manner of life. From a true adoration and love of God grows love for the poor and our neighbour. It is a consequence.”

The bishop’s views have been shaped by his early childhood, growing up as a persecuted German Catholic in the Soviet Union, where he even had to attend atheism lessons at school. His book Dominus Est discloses
how the German Catholic community kept alive their faith despite severe hardship and persecution. In his own experience, his mother and great aunt took great risks for their faith and on behalf of others in the community. So Bishop Schneider and his family were horrified at the liberal attitudes and practices in the West, especially in respect of Holy Communion, which had been so rare and so precious to the persecuted German Catholics of the Soviet Union.

Seemingly like the little boy in the story of the Emperor’s New Clothes, the bishop now feels compelled to speak out and he cannot understand why others do not do the same. “It seems that the majority of the clergy and the bishops are content with this modern use of Communion in hand… For me this is incredible. How is this possible, when Jesus is present in the little Hosts?”

He continued: “There is the grievous fact of the loss of the Eucharistic fragments. And the fragments of the consecrated Host are crushed by feet. This is horrible! Our God, in our churches, is trampled by feet!”

Bishop Schneider admitted that he is “very sad that I am feeling myself as one who is shouting in the desert”.

He said: “It is time that the bishops raise their voices for the Eucharistic Jesus who has no voice to defend himself. Here is an attack on the Most Holy, an attack on the Eucharistic faith.”

But despite his concerns, Bishop Schneider is not pessimistic and believes that there is already a groundswell of support for traditional values that will, in time, renew the Church: “Little ones in the Church have been let down and neglected,” he said. “[But] they have kept the purity of their faith and they represent the true power of the Church in the eyes of God and not those who are in administration.

“I spoke with young students in Oxford and I was so much impressed by these students. I was so glad to see their purity of faith and their convictions, and the clear Catholic mind. This will renew the Church. So I am confident and hopeful also in respect of this crisis in the Church. The Holy Ghost will win this crisis with this little army.”

He added: “I am not worried about the future. The Church is Christ’s Church and He is the real head of the Church, the Pope is only the vicar of Christ. The soul of the Church is the Holy Spirit and He is powerful.”