The Synodal Comedy: Act II

Assaults on the city of Rome, the See of Peter, have not been infrequent over the course of the millennia.

Attila attempted. But he failed when he came into the formidable presence of Leo, called “the Great,” resulting in a dramatic volte-face.

Napoleon conquered Rome in 1809.

The Italian Nationalists of the Risorgimento mounted attacks upon Rome in 1848, forcing Blessed Pius IX to flee in a simple black Roman cassock to Gaeta in the Kingdom of the Two Sicilies.

Hitler subdued Rome on June 4, 1944.

Yet none of these can compare to the assault being suffered by Rome today. This time the foe is Synodal Listening—II, and it is nothing less than the squandering of Christ’s salvific inheritance. To witness princes of the Church and assorted empurpled prelates parade about as though in some Rogerian self-actualization exercise makes a Catholic shudder. If not for Christ’s words, “And the gates of Hell shall not prevail against it,” a Catholic would be tempted to think he was witnessing the end of Catholicism. To witness princes of the Church and assorted empurpled prelates parade about as though in some Rogerian self-actualization exercise makes a Catholic shudder. Tweet This

This ruling elite behaved as though they were fanatical participants in a Maoist Struggle Session. Those historic monstrous displays dragged Chinese citizens into the semblance of a court and gratuitously accused them of being “class enemies.” They were then humiliated, accused, beaten, tortured, and put to death.

In the Synodal Sessions, it is the Faith that is so treated. Its majesty trampled upon, then traded for the cheap trinkets of the best psychobabble money can buy. All the more chilling is the gleeful willingness with which the successors of the apostles participated. Imagine. On the very ground consecrated by the blood of Peter and Paul and countless other martyrs, their successors are performing like a troupe of vaudevillians. They exhibit the gravitas of scarecrows.

One hesitates to accuse these synodalists of heresy, for there is far too little there to deserve the weight of such opprobrium. Heresy requires probity and purpose. It is the stuff of serious men. These synodalists are giddy pallbearers for the corpse of a spent Catholic Left.

Before the Synod began, a “retreat” was mandated. You see, the insipid requires preparation. To fool the Catholics masses, folly requires mimicking Old Catholicism, though it be only a hollow shell. Hence the otherwise respectable guise of “retreat.” The Synodal Retreat was as close to an authentic retreat as astronomy is to astrology.

Take a quick glance at a copy of the agenda and prepare to cringe. It begins:

The penitential liturgy is intended to direct the work of the Synod towards the beginning of a new way of being Church. In St. Peter’s Basilica, the penitential celebration, presided over by Pope Francis, will include time to listen to three testimonies of persons who have suffered sin: the sin of abuse: the sin of war: the sin of indifference to the dramas present in the growing phenomena of migrations all over the world. They will confess the:

• Sins against peace.
• Sins against creation, against indigenous populations, against migrants.
• Sins of abuse.
• Sins against women, family, youth.
• Sins of using doctrine as stones to be hurled.
• Sins against poverty.
• Sins against synodality / lack of listening, communion and participation of all.

This is the din of Babel. Where does one begin? The task is akin to nailing down raindrops. The most obvious question: What is the “sin of using doctrine as stones to be hurled”? Could this refer to the defense of the Revelation of Christ? If so, one wonders what then is there to believe? If doctrine is something hurtful, then the purpose of Christ’s Church evaporates. Doctrine is the unchanging teaching of the Faith. If that cannot be used as our buckler and shield, then what is?

That very query calls into question the purpose of martyrdom. Did St. John Fisher go to his death because he “hurled doctrine against his enemies”? Was his beheading then futile? Indeed, a sin? Was the Council of Trent a nefarious episode because it defined doctrines as ways to quell the fires of Protestant heresy?

Reason here stands stupefied. Theological analysis screeches to a halt. Against such stream of consciousness platitudes there is no egress. In his Metaphysics, Aristotle remarks that trying to argue with a man who has taken leave of reason is like speaking to a vegetable. Is this our predicament?

Any Catholic not embarrassed by this fog must look to see if their baptismal character has faded. Pachamama ceremonies along with the new Mayan and Amazonian rites of the Mass were only faint preludes to the soaring inanities of the Synod Retreat. These synodalists fashion themselves a pack of new Moses promulgating a terribly au courant list of sins. It used to be that Modernist theologians of the past years were busy burying any mention of sin. This new crop is now busy reviving it. But sins of a different color. A color bearing no resemblance to Christianity. Any Catholic not embarrassed by this fog must look to see if their baptismal character has faded. Tweet This

Readers of Crisis might smile at all of this. As they should. The tragedy is that ninety percent of the Catholic world will hang on this Synod’s every word and treat it with the reverence of the Gospel.

Perhaps they, and the synodalists, should read St. Gregory the Great’s Pastoral Guide of 599:

To advance against the foe involves bold resistance to the powers of this world in defense of the flock. To stand fast in battle on the day of the Lord means to oppose the wicked enemy out of love for what is right. When a pastor has been afraid to assert what is right, has he not turned his back and fled by remaining silent? Whereas if he intervenes on behalf of the flock, he sets up a wall against the enemy in front of the House of Israel…

The word of reproach is a key that unlocks a door, because the reproach reveals a fault of which the evildoer is himself often unaware. That is why Paul says of the bishop: he must be able to encourage men in sound doctrine and refute those who oppose it…

Anyone ordained a priest undertakes the task of preaching, so that with a loud cry he may go on ahead of the terrible judge who follows. If, then, a priest does not know how to preach, what kind of cry can such a dumb herald utter? It was to bring this home that the Holy Spirit descended in the form of tongues on the first pastors, for he causes those whom he has filled, to speak out spontaneously. 

Is St. Gregory the Great “using doctrine as stones to be hurled”?

What dangerous ground these synodalists have chosen to tread.

But all this must not be met with either rancor or desperation. No room for those exertions in authentic Catholic hearts.  

Call to mind the occasion of St. Ignatius’ visit shortly after the approval of the Society of Jesus in 1540 by Pope Paul III. He traveled to Spain to meet with the Cardinal Archbishop of Toledo, Juan Pardo de Tavera, to ask permission for his newly erected Society to work in his archdiocese. The cardinal flatly refused. The saint then returned to his small band of new priests and announced the news. They were crestfallen. Immediately, St. Ignatius encouraged them, “I know that you are sad, this simply means that Our Lord expects great things of us.”

St. Ignatius repeats that same exhortation to us today from Heaven. In the teeth of unprecedented crisis, there stands an invitation from Christ Victorious. Over two millennia, His Holy Church has risen from far greater crises. She will today. But not without inspired laymen like the readers of Crisis and their friends.

Be assured, the crisis will deepen, and the time for redress will drag on even longer. 

But alert and intelligent Catholics have no recourse now except prayer. Each must examine their actions against the deeply affecting words of Our Savior in the Book of the Apocalypse: “But because thou art lukewarm and neither cold nor hot, I will begin to vomit thee out of my mouth” (Revelation 3:16).

These must be looked upon as times for Catholics to do great things.

Get started.

[Photo Credit: Getty Images]