Pope Francis "slightly unwell."

Maybe it is time for Pope Francis to hold off on kissing little kids and elderly women. 12,000 people came to worship with him on Ash Wednesday. The coronavirus has hit Italy hard. The 83-year-old Pope has cancelled all events today because he is "slightly unwell."



Tim Stickings reports more at Mailonline.

Who is a bigger hypocrite than Pope Francis?

Pope Francis, who lives behind a huge wall surrounding the Vatican and travels around in an enclosed popemobile, is in Panama criticizing people who want to build walls. Read more here.

"fish begin to rot from the head."

In American Greatness, Angelo Codevilla writes that America's Catholic bishops are considering

how better to identify and punish some of their colleagues and the priests they supervise who have been sexually abusing adolescents, 80 percent of them boys and young men.

On November 11, 2018 under pressure from enraged parishioners, and internal resistance notwithstanding, the U.S. bishops were about to vote on some proposals better to identify and expel what, by definition, is homosexual predation. But homosexuality ranks high among the icons of progressives, robed and not. Pope Francis demanded they reconsider and wait for his guidance.

...That guidance arrived this month in the form of 3,800 words of coded generalities the point of which is: take no votes, condemn no one, especially homosexuals in the Church. Place responsibility upon the whole body of bishops, united in prayerful penance, and practice mutual forgiveness. To do otherwise, to “point fingers” at malefactors, is to define the Church as the “idol” of one of humanity’s tribes and as the servant of its mores. This would divert the Church from the overriding need to align itself with greater humanity’s greater causes—protecting the environment as well as incoming Third World migrants.

President of the U.S. bishops’ conference Archbishop Daniel Di Nardo pronounced (most of) his colleagues “not happy” with the pope’s November demand. Presumably, they were even less happy with his guidance. For them to dodge personal accountability by trying to bury the sex abuse scandal in a cloud of operationally meaningless words is to alienate themselves from their flock—which, in America, is also the Church’s sole pecuniary source. But the pope is the pope. As Mao Zedong used to say, fish begin to rot from the head.

...This points to the overriding issue: whether or not the Catholic Church will henceforth purvey a god of their own making that reflects the ruling class’s priorities.

...A god of their own making? Yes, no less. We may see the size of the prize at which this party is grasping in Francis’s change in the words of the “Our Father,” the principal prayer that has defined billions of Christian lives over 2,000 years. The change, from “lead us not into temptation” to “abandon us not when in temptation” is far, far less significant than the attempt to substitute the pope’ own words for Christ’s.

Read more here.

Dealing with priests who commit mortal sins

You thought the Pope wasn't going to do anything? Wrong! Scrappleface has the story.

Pope to Purge Priests Who Drink from Plastic Straws
(2018-09-02) — On the heels of a boldly urgent sermon decrying plastic waste in the world’s oceans, Pope Francis I today announced “zero tolerance for priests who drink through plastic straws, and those in the church hierarchy who cover up these filthy acts.”

“The Lord sees and will judge those in His church who take advantage of the helpless little ones — the baby fishes, precious anemones and even the tiny plankton — by defiling marine habitat with their plastic straws,” the Pontiff wrote in an official decree from the Vatican.

The Vicar of Christ made clear that the Roman Catholic Church is complicit if it shields such sinners from consequences.

“Be assured,” Francis wrote, “that if a Bishop or a Cardinal, or even the Holy Father himself, knows that a fellow priest has committed this mortal sin, and he conceals the matter, he is no better than a man who personally casts a straw into the sea.”

Pope Francis says there is no Hell

Michael Chapman reports at CNS News that

In another interview with his longtime atheist friend, Eugenio Scalfari, Pope Francis claims that Hell does not exist and that condemned souls just "disappear." This is a denial of the 2,000-year-old teaching of the Catholic Church about the reality of Hell and the eternal existence of the soul.

The interview between Scalfari and the Pope was published March 28, 2018 in La Repubblica.

Read more here.

When will His Holiness speak up? When will he attempt to arrest and reverse the closure of churches and their conversion to mosques?

Mark Steyn writes today about Pope Francis's virtue signaling as all over Europe churches close while Mosques open.

And his slur on the people of Bethlehem is perplexing to me - because they are not the villains here but the victims: Bethlehem is where Herod embarked on the slaughter of the innocents.

The Islamization of Christendom is the biggest story of our time - one that will resonate down the centuries when we are gone and forgotten. And this Pope is on the wrong side of this issue - unlike his predecessor, who understood its implications all too clearly. A decade ago, in America Alone, I noted "the future implicit in Cardinal Ratzinger's choice of name for his papacy: Benedict XVI":

Born in Umbria in 480, St Benedict was the man who ensured during the Dark Ages that the critical elements of Roman and Greek civilization were preserved and that, by infusing them with Christianity, they would emerge in a new and stronger form: the basis for Europe and western civilization. Referring to his namesake, Pope Benedict XVI once quoted a Benedictine motto: Succisa virescit – pruned, it grows again.

Pope Francis does not appear not much interested in pruning and re-growth. Imagine if Benedict had not resigned to become "Pope Emeritus". Imagine if we still had a vicar of Christ who understood the stakes, rather than one who sounds like any other run-of-the-mill social-justice EU prime minister. When will His Holiness speak up? When will he attempt to arrest and reverse the closure of churches and their conversion to mosques?

Pope Francis is

a foolish man taking refuge in modish fancies as Christianity is slaughtered in the lands of its birth and shrivels in the continent it made its home. Shame on him, and pity our children and grandchildren who will have to live in such a world.

Read more here.

Manhattan Infidel's exclusive interview with Pope Francis

Manhattan Infidel has another exclusive interview, this time with Pope Francis. They cover everything from super-intelligent aliens to 100 watt light bulbs here.

Cuba tried to deafen US officials stationed there!

Bret Baier's excellent Special Report starts off tonight looking at the crisis with North Korea, then goes to Mueller's pre-dawn invasion of former Trump campaign manager Paul Manafort's home.

Did you hear about Cuba's attempt to deafen US officials stationed in Cuba? I will look into that this evening.

I was pleased to see Bill Bennett on Bret's panel, along with Charles Lane and Eli Lake. They analyzed the relationship between Trump and McConnell, among other news of the day.

"Liberation theology, a Marxist-inspired ideology disguised as concern for the poor..."

Dr. Bob at One Cosmos is taking on Pope Francis today.

...has there ever been a pope this loved by Christ's enemies and persecutors?

...I still remember Pope John Paul confronting that Marxist priest on the tarmac in Nicaragua in 1983 and ripping him a new one: YOU MUST STRAIGHTEN OUT YOUR POSITION WITH THE CHURCH! Truly, the sainted Pope could hammer Francis with the identical words. Marxism or Christianity. It's one or the other, Padre.

...Pope Benedict too "repeatedly warned the faithful to reject 'liberation theology,' a Marxist-inspired ideology disguised as concern for the poor..." But Francis is doing his best to rehabilitate this heresy, praising its "high concept of humanity," reinstating defrocked priests and condemned theologians, and appointing these purveyors of anti-Christian doctrine to important advisory positions.

Read more here.

Respected Catholics ask Trump to investigate America's role in ousting Pope Benedict

William F. Jasper writes at the New American, Catholics Ask Trump to Probe Soros-Obama-Clinton Conspiracy at Vatican.

Did billionaire speculator George Soros, President Barack Obama, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, Vice President Joe Biden, and Obama/Clinton adviser John Podesta conspire to overthrow the conservative Pope Benedict XVI and replace him with a radical, Pope Francis? Did they use America’s intelligence agencies, and our nation’s diplomatic machinery, political muscle, and financial power to coerce and blackmail “regime change” in the Roman Catholic Church?

Far from being some wild conspiracy theory, there is sound prima facie evidence to indicate that this is a serious effort to expose a political scandal of the highest order, involving flagrant, criminal abuse of power at the top levels of the U.S. government. A group of respected Catholic lay leaders have sent a letter to President Donald Trump urging him to launch an official investigation into the activities of the above-mentioned individuals (and others) who appear to have been involved in this alleged Vatican coup. They cite eight specific questions they seek to have answered concerning suspect events that led to the resignation of Pope Benedict, the first such papal abdication in 700 years.

“Specifically, we have reason to believe that a Vatican ‘regime change’ was engineered by the Obama administration,” say the petitioners, in their January 20 letter to President Trump. The five signatories to the letter, first published in the Catholic newspaper/weblog, The Remnant, are: Lieutenant Colonel David L. Sonnier, US Army (Retired); Michael J. Matt, editor of The Remnant: Christopher A. Ferrara, author, attorney, and president of the American Catholic Lawyers Association, Inc.; Chris Jackson, Catholics4Trump.com; and, Elizabeth Yore, Esq., Founder of YoreChildren.

“We were alarmed to discover,” their letter notes, “that, during the third year of the first term of the Obama administration your previous opponent, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, and other government officials with whom she associated proposed a Catholic ‘revolution’ in which the final demise of what was left of the Catholic Church in America would be realized.” The letter includes footnote links that take the reader to documents and news stories underscoring their charges and pointed questions. It first directs attention to the Soros-Clinton-Podesta e-mails disclosed last year by WikiLeaks, in which Podesta and other “progressives” discussed ending the “middle ages dictatorship” in the Catholic Church.

...Podesta, a longtime Clinton adviser/confidante and hand-picked top activist for left-wing funder George Soros, revealed in a 2011 e-mail that he and other activists were working to effect a “Catholic Spring” revolution within the Catholic Church, an obvious reference to the disastrous “Arab Spring” coups organized that same year by the Obama-Clinton-Soros team that destabilized the Middle East and brought radical Islamist regimes and terrorist groups to power in the region. The Podesta e-mail is a response to another Soros-funded radical — Sandy Newman, founder of the “progressive” Voices for Progress. Newman had written to Podesta seeking advice on the best way to “plant the seeds of the revolution” in the Catholic Church, which he described as a “middle ages [sic] dictatorship.” The issue that appeared to be the cause of Newman’s e-mail was opposition by U.S. Catholic Bishops to the federally mandated contraceptive coverage in ObamaCare.

...Cardinal Danneels, a Belgian, has long been viewed as a key subversive in the Church prelature for undermining traditional Catholic teaching against abortion, homosexuality, and “gay marriage,” as well as for his efforts to protect pedophiles in the clergy.

Read more here.

"Pope Francis’s increasing tendency to conflate Catholic wisdom with a left-leaning secular humanitarianism."

Daniel Mahoney, writing at The Quadrant,

is troubled by Pope Francis’s increasing tendency to conflate Catholic wisdom with a left-leaning secular humanitarianism.

...Recently, returning from another World Youth Day in Kracow, Poland, the Pope made the fantastic and disturbing claim that “Catholic violence” is just as much a problem as “Islamic violence”—and this right after the brutal assassination of Father Jacques Hammel by Islamist terrorists in a church in northern France.

The only example of “Catholic violence” that Pope Francis could come up with was that of a baptized young man who had killed his girlfriend for clearly non-religious reasons or motives.

...Recently, in an interview with the leftist Italian journalist Eugenio Scalfari, he claimed that it is the Communists today who “think like Christians.” He ignored the Church’s principled and long-standing opposition to every form of totalitarianism. Communists are said by Francis to have a special Christ-like concern for the poor. The Pope is silent about the tens of millions of ordinary workers and peasants who perished at the hands of ideological regimes of the Communist type in the 20th century. Cardinal Zen of Hong Kong recently wrote in the Wall Street Journal that the Pope has no understanding of Communist theory and practice, that he associates Communists exclusively with those activists and intellectuals imprisoned or killed by the military government during the “dirty war” in Argentina during the 1970’s. In a word, his vision is remarkably parochial and blind to the greatest evil of the twentieth century, a totalitarianisms inspired by viciously anti-Christian ideology.

...And just the other day, he spoke about how he was “grieving” for the dead tyrant of Cuba, a man who turned that fabled island into an island prison and persecuted the Catholic Church for many decades (even outlawing Christmas for thirty years). We Christians are obliged to pray for our enemies, but we are also required to know whom they are and to vigorously oppose those who threaten liberty and human dignity and the fundamentals of political civilization. No pope should confuse a tyrant—especially one who was at the same time ideological and megalomaniacal—with a statesmen deserving of our respect. The Pope’s comments on Communism and Castro do not honor the truth or contribute to intellectual and moral clarity or seriousness.

When Cardinal Burke and three other Cardinals issue a “dubia” requesting clarification on the ambiguities created by a famous footnote in Amoris Laetitia (does the Church still stand with Christ in affirming the indissolubility of marriage and in repudiating “situational ethics”), the Pope remains silent even as he criticizes the “legalism” of those who dare request doctrinal and moral clarity.

Read more here.

Trump changes his mind: converts to Catholicism and runs for Pope

Our Church doesn’t win anymore. We used to win. We don’t win anymore. We lose on dialogue, we lose to the modernists, we lose to the Protestants. When I win, when I become Pope, we are going to take our Church back. We’re going to make our Church great again. We’re going to make our Church reverent again. We’re going to kick the *&^% out of the modernists quickly. So quickly. We’re going to win so much. We’re going to win with conversions, we’re going to win with vocations, we’re going to win with the Mass. We’re going to repeal the Novus Ordo and we’re going to replace it with something so much better. We’re going to win at the altar. We’re going to seal up the sanctuary with a nice big beautiful rail. We’re going to win so much. Win after win after win. We’re going to win so much that you’re going to be begging me, please Holy Father let us lose once or twice, we can’t stand it anymore. And I’m going to say no way! We’re going to keep winning! We’re never going to lose! We’re never ever going to lose! Register and vote! I love you all! Thank you!

Read more here.

Let the voters decide!

Now that he has been scolded by Pope Francis, I fear Donald Trump will regain the momentum he lost in his petulant tantrums in Saturday's debate. Once again, he can now play the victim card. First it was Meygan Kelly of Fox News whom he was able to portray himself as victimized by. By fighting back against the big bully who was "bleeding out of her whatever," Trump was able to gain huge momentum, only to be taken down a notch in Iowa by Ted Cruz's superior ground game. Cruz has been gaining momentum this week after Trump's behavior in Saturday's debate, but now Trump will portray himself as being bullied by that mean Catholic Pope Francis, and will probably ride his poor me act to victory Saturday.

I wish voters could decide without the interference of someone who lives behind walls in Rome or Republican Party Establishment figures who hope to defeat both Cruz and Trump in the convention in Cleveland.

Likewise, in the Democrat Party, Bernie Sanders is giving Hillary a run for her money, but the Democrat establishment makes sure she gets the delegates, even when Sanders wins in votes cast.

Thanks, but no thanks, Pope Francis

Dick Morris says in this video that Trump trumped himself in Saturday night's debate, enabling Ted Cruz to finish ahead of Trump in some of the polls this week. Now, however, with Pope Francis today questioning Trump's religious faith, I see Trump regaining momentum as we near Saturday's South Carolina primary. Thanks a lot, Pope Francis.

Of Popes, would-be presidents, and walls

The big news story of the day is the Pope making these comments about Donald Trump:

"A person who thinks only about building walls, wherever they may be, and not building bridges, is not Christian," he said. While Francis said he would "give the benefit of the doubt" because he had not heard Trump's border plans independently, he added, "I say only that this man is not a Christian if he has said things like that."

Nicole Winfield and Julie Pace of the Associated Press heard the Pope's remarks aboard the papal plane, as the pontiff returned to his walled off compound in Rome. As would be totally predictable, Trump responded immediately, saying it was "disgraceful" for a religious leader to question a person's faith. "I am proud to be a Christian, and as president I will not allow Christianity to be consistently attacked and weakened."

Here is a photograph of the Pope's home in Rome, surrounded by a medieval wall:

I got this photo from the Daily Caller

Shedding the Catholic Church’s historic immunity from American politics

Victor Davis Hanson writes about Pope Francis' visit to America.

Unpopular though it may be to say so, I, for one, grew exhausted by the non-stop pronouncements /commentaries of Pope Francis. The spiritual leader of 1 billion Catholics — roughly half of the world’s Christians — Francis just completed a high-profile, endlessly publicized visit to the United States.

But unlike past visiting pontiffs, the Argentine-born Francis weighed in on a number of hot-button U.S. social, domestic, and foreign-policy issues during a heated presidential-election cycle.

...Hundreds of thousands of migrants are now swarming illegally into the West, whether into Europe mostly from the Middle East, or into America from Latin America. They arrive in numbers that make them difficult to assimilate and integrate, with radical repercussions on the host country’s ability to serve the social needs of its own poorer citizens.

Yet Francis reserves most of his advice for host countries to ensure that they treat the often-impoverished and mostly young male newcomers with Christian humanity. That advice is admirable. But the pope might have likewise lectured the leaders of countries such as Syria and Mexico to stop whatever they are doing to heartlessly drive out millions of their own citizens from their homes.

Or he might have suggested that migrants seek lawful immigration and thereby more charitably not harm the interests of immigrants who wait patiently until they can resettle lawfully.

Or he might have praised the West for uniquely creating conditions that draw in, rather than repel, the world’s migrants.

...Because Pope Francis has shed the Catholic Church’s historic immunity from American politics, for good or bad, he and the church are fair game for political pushback.

But do we really want a priest in the role of Bernie Sanders or Ted Cruz, dressed in ancient Roman miter and vestments, addressing hot-button issues with divine sanction?

Read more here.

What the media did not publicize about Pope Francis

Did you know that Pope Francis had a covert meeting with Kentucky clerk Kim Davis last week, in which he presented her with two rosaries and urged her to stay strong and pray for him? Sarah Westwood reports at the Washington Examiner that the U.S. media is "crushed" that he would meet with Kim.

Austin Ruse reports at Breitbart that the meeting was initiated by the Pope, not Davis.

Jim Yardley and Laurie Goodstein report for the Washington Post that the meeting took place in Washington at the Vatican Embassy.

“I put my hand out and he reached and he grabbed it, and I hugged him and he hugged me,” Ms. Davis said Wednesday in an interview with ABC News. ‘Thank you for your courage.’”

“I had tears coming out of my eyes,” she said. “I’m just a nobody, so it was really humbling to think he would want to meet or know me.”

The Pope also met with the Little Sisters of the Poor, which was forced by Obamacare.to provide abortifascients to their employees.

(Courtesy of The Little Sisters of the Poor)

Sarah Pulliam Bailey and Abby Ohlheiser report for the Washington Post,

The Little Sisters of the Poor, which operates homes for the elderly in cities across the country, has been in a battle with the Obama administration over the law’s requirement that they allow their insurers to offer free contraception coverage to employees. The Becket Fund senior counsel Mark Rienzi, lead attorney for the Little Sisters, who spoke with one of the nuns after the meeting, said the pope was at their home for about 15 minutes and shook hands and spoke with each one of them in their chapel.

How the Pope attacked conservatives

Ben Shapiro writes at Breitbart,

Seven Ways Pope Francis Slapped Conservatives in the United States

He goes into detail on each of these seven points:

The Staged Illegal Immigrant Child Photo-Op.

Comparing Fighting Illegal Immigration to Human Rights Abuses Against Native Americans.
This isn’t just insulting, it’s ridiculous. Americans sent Cherokees along the Trail of Tears. Today’s Americans send illegal immigrants along the trail of free education, emergency medical care, and state-sponsored welfare programs.

Allowing President Obama to Represent Himself as An Advocate of Religious Liberty.
Meanwhile, President Obama’s IRS cracks down on religious charities and his Obamacare regime targets religious institutions

Ripping Capitalism Before Congress.
The Pope has long excoriated capitalism as a brutal system of exploitation. To the celebration of leftists everywhere, the Pope has repeatedly dismissed capitalism as immoral, saying there is no evidence that capitalism brings about “greater justice and inclusiveness in the world.” This is true if you know nothing about world history or economics. The Pope’s excoriation of free markets in the United States came as no surprise, but it came as an unwelcome slap nonetheless.

Pushing Environmental Extremism.

Ignoring Abortion, Talking Death Penalty.
s I noted yesterday, 35 murderers were executed in 2014 in the United States. One million unborn children were killed.

Ignoring Same-Sex Marriage.

The Pope’s visit could have been an incredible opportunity to fight against Godless immorality in the United States. Instead, the Pope largely used the opportunity to push leftism slathered over with paper-thin theology. That’s a tragic loss for both the world and for the religious community fighting for survival against the onslaught of an increasingly aggressive secular left – a secular left that cheered the Pope but will be happy to either coopt or crush his church at the first available opportunity.

Read more here.

Does America no longer care about human rights?

That is what Jim Geraghty claims at National Review.

The Vatican’s greatest success has been the adoption of its strategy by the Obama administration, which has also restored relations with the Castros while excluding the political opposition. Here, too, there have been disappointing results. U.S. exports to Cuba, controlled by Havana, have declined this year, while arrests of opponents have increased, along with refugees. Many Cubans are trying to reach the United States ahead of what they fear will be a move by the Obama administration to placate the regime with a tightening of asylum rules.

Pope Francis may believe that merely by touring the country he will inspire Cubans to become more active and press the regime for change. But two previous papal visits, in 1998 and 2012, did not have that effect. By now it is clear that the Castros won’t be moved by quiet diplomacy or indirect hints. A direct campaign of words and acts, like that Pope Francis is planning for the United States, would surely have an impact. But then, it takes more fortitude to challenge a dictatorship than a democracy.

Between this, our outreach to Iran, the collective shrug over the bloodshed in Syria, the shrug about the chaos in Libya, the refugee crisis arriving at Europe’s door, and the grandiose welcome given to China’s president this week . . . one of the “fundamental transformations” Obama completed was getting America to simply not care about human rights anymore.

Read more here.

Woe is me

Pope Francis ran (or parked) into some difficulty in New York today. Manhattan Infidel has the story here, which you will not see or hear about in any of the mainstream media.