A Prophet Among Bishops

The autumn sky above the old shot-and-beer city was a deep and endless blue. Woodsmoke hung in the air and small boats chugged out purposeful routes on waterways. The Ravens are playoff-bound, and the youth-strapped Orioles made it to the postseason again. All was right on Baltimore’s harbor Wednesday—perfect even—as joggers politely zig-zagged through the 200 or so folks who’d gathered to pray the Glorious Mysteries of the Rosary alongside the world’s loneliest bishop. 

Sunlight poured onto the face of Joseph Strickland when he rose from the concrete after leading the Catholic blue-collar symphony in the Salve Regina. Leaves scraped the ground, seagulls called, and a few of the faithful readied themselves to see if the bishop might not mind having his picture taken.

It was as picture-postcard an autumn day as you’re going to find in Baltimore; all seemed just perfect—until that bishop just had to go and spoil everything. 

He picked a fight; he confronted the expanding Babylon. 

Ah, but wasn’t it such a lovely day to go and die?

Directly after the Rosary, the outcast from Tyler, Texas read aloud a letter he’d written to his episcopal brethren. After just a few words, some in the gathering stood gape-mouthed. The bishop-with-no-flock seemed to have transmogrified into Ezekiel—albeit, a humble and soft-spoken Old Testament version—but still, one who had been commissioned by God, or perhaps by Mary (to whom he had given his priesthood) to address the silence of his old friends in the aftermath of the Synod on Synodality. 

Keeping to O.T.-prophet form, Bishop Strickland dismissed pleasantries from the beginning of his letter, a letter that might as well have been written with a reed onto parchment and discovered a thousand years from now in a cave outside of Baltimore. From the top:

You gather here today, present-day apostles, as the Church and, therefore, the world stand perched on the edge of a cliff. And yet you who are entrusted with the keeping of souls choose to speak not a word of the spiritual danger which abounds. Today we stand on the cusp of all that has been prophesied about the Church and the abominations which would come forth in these times, a time when all of hell attacks the Church of Jesus Christ, and a time when the fallen angels of hell no longer seek entry into her sacred halls but instead stand inside, peeking out of her windows and unlocking doors to welcome in more diabolical destruction.

If sinews, flesh, and bones are to reconnect in the valleys of dry bones—in the valleys of both the morally-collapsing world and the Catholic Church— the voice and message should be pointed and strong. Still—in his innermost recesses—even the bishop knew that spinal columns and all the rest wouldn’t be reconnecting inside the high-end hotel. I have to imagine, he believed things would just keep running their course.

But that’s the glory of supernaturalists—those who believe in everyday miracles, the guiding light of guardian angels, and the way in which the flames of Hell or Purgatory consume those who neglect properly shepherding souls. Supernaturalists, like Bishop Strickland, understand God has the power to take a letter, shunned by bishops, and place it as a sacred icon into long-slumbering or timid souls.

Prophets just do what they’re told, and leave the rest to God. 

Supernaturalists believe in miracles of wide sweeping scope.

Bishop Strickland finds himself in the middle of both, which is why he finds himself on the fringes. 

But on Wednesday, he was more the prophet, who was considering the millions of Catholic youth, the college-aged, and young adults who pour from the Church like biblical plagues, even on a day when Pope Francis urged an international community at the United Nations’ COP29 event to respond swiftly to climate change and to implement billion-dollar plans to make it happen. 

Prophets pick strange words and images-rarely heard anymore in this world-to make substantive points about a natural worldview supplanting the spiritual. 

Do you not know that Our Lord will send forth His avenging angels to heap coals of fire upon the heads of those who were called to be His apostles and who have not guarded what He has given unto them?

And yet almost all of you, my brothers, stood by silently watching as the Synod on Synodality took place, an abomination constructed not to guard the Deposit of Faith, but to dismantle it, and yet few were the cries heard from you – men who should be willing to die for Christ and His Church.

The Synod’s final document has been released, yet with the sleight of hand which is so characteristic of the Francis-controlled Vatican. By drawing attention to the issues which worried many, they have slipped in what was always their real goal without anyone even noticing. What they were after in the first place was the dismantling of Christ’s Church by replacing the structure of the Church as Our Lord instituted it with a diabolically-inspired new structure of “synodality” which in actuality is a new church that is in no way Catholic.

Is Bishop Strickland a prophet—or is he a madman? Who would speak such words of the Vicar of Christ?

What is he trying to get beneath here? You’ll have to decide—and for the side on which you stand—but the bishop might tell you he believes the Synod on Synodality was initially commandeered to subvert, distort, or shift the moral doctrine of the Church, and to steer it to becoming a gentler handmaiden to the world. He might start at the simplest place and suggest: Don’t miss what’s hiding in plain sight: Pope Francis appointed homosexual-friendly cardinals and bishops to lead the synod—and Fr. James Martin was a star over there! Is Bishop Strickland a prophet—or is he a madman? Who would speak such words of the Vicar of Christ?Tweet This

Although the synod thus far—even after three-plus years—has been unsuccessful in changing the Church, Bishop Strickland—and all bishops—know the synod is not ending anytime soon. So, what’s the problem with more dialogue?

Well, if a bishop or two had left the hotel on Wednesday to greet Bishop Strickland, he might have mentioned in his aww-shucks way: here’s the problem: the watered-down sensus fidei of the synod is marching the Spotless Bride toward a different place, to a place it has never been.

For starters, the primary definition of the sensus fidei of synodal participants is that any baptized person possesses reliable sensus fidei—which includes separated brethren eager to advance ecumenism. All of this, Bishop Strickland might tell them, is a betrayal of the principles of ecumenism elaborated in Vatican II’s Unitatis redintegratio. 

Bishop Strickland might also tell you there is something building that wants to take away doctrinal authority from the Pope and the collective Magisterium—and give it to national episcopal conferences. This goal, he would say, is clearly laid out clearly in the synod final report. 

Bishop Strickland knows the danger—and one can imagine many other silent bishops know it as well—of the promotion of situational ethics (changing moral theology on sexuality) under the guise of “inculturation” and “discerning” the Spirit in the local churches. Listening to Christians’ “lived experiences” and exploring “pastoral theologies” loom at future synodal gatherings. 

Lastly—and we could go on and on—rebellious bishops in Germany and Belgium have already charted the way of the rupturing in the same fashion as the Anglican Communion. One preliminary synodal report outlines goals by an “expert” group—appointed by Pope Francis—to examine “controversial doctrinal, pastoral and ethical issues” in the Church. Why were these people invited to Rome even in the first place, any shepherd might reasonably ask.

But only Bishop Strickland will ask. He does so in the open, out loud in his soft but commanding voice.

Which is why Wednesday was a wonderful day to pick and fight—and (likely) die.

Who knows? The humble man may already be laicized. That’s just the way these things go in today’s Church.

He made a promise, though. About eight years ago, when he first began to see the deepening crisis in the Church, he told Mary that he would become her martyr to proclaim the fullness of Truth.

Bishop Strickland knows that what appears “losing’ in this world is actually the Lord’s way of “winning.” Those who engage in the necessary and relentless work of shouldering Christ’s Cross are those closest to the agonized face of Ecce Homo. Bishop Strickland’s home now, in a real way, are the forlorn places in the landscapes of the Sorrowful Mysteries of the Rosary. It is at those brokenhearted stations where his might and power grow. Why? Because he’s huddled closely to the broken-bodied Christ, who, like him, had nowhere to lay His head. 

Only prophets venture into these boneyards. They remain in these desolate places, because they know that sinews and joints can snap back together, that renewal is always possible. 

They understand that, in God’s mysterious way, He will ensure that it happens.

[Image Credit: LifeSiteNews video screenshot]