Humanae Vitae, NOChurch's crown jewel, is still problematic, but there is good news to be found, if you know where to look - Sunday 22nd of July to Saturday 28th of July

With so much evil going on in the Church and the world, it is sometimes easy to forget that we do have a few bright spots. The most positive bright spot is the traditionalist movement, but we also have a 'negative bright spot' in the form of the implosion of the NOChurch regime.

The McCarrick scandal (to which we shall return) has certainly helped in this regard, but even before that NOChurch was in steep decline, from attendance, to money, to morals, there is simply nothing to keep NOChurch alive, and that is a good thing because it signlas that the revolution has failed and might be reversed, probably incrementally, before too long. The rod to its complete abandonment will be rough though.

Back to traditionalism, we hade the Institute of Christ the King ordaining 4 men to the priesthood. This happened in early July, but it's worth mentioning. The larger FSSP and SSPX have also had more priests ordained to the priesthood this summer. We  had news from Italy that a second personal parish for the Tridentine Mass has been erected. Then we also had news from Spain which had its first traditional family retreat , also in early July. These are all good things, good seeds, all worthy of celebration.

It is true that our numbers are small, but they are steady and impressive, especially when put into a greater context of an institituional Church which is opposed to authentic Catholicism and a wider society which is opposed to even the watered-down Novusordoism. The Catholic counter-revolution started with practically nothing, but now there are more than 1,000 priests associated exclusively with the Old Rite and traditionalism extends an influence in certain places - France, for instance - far in excess of its size, and this influence will only grow as NOChurch seminaries continue to empty. In theory, this ought to lead to a traditionalist becoming a bishop sometime in the not-too-distant future and then all-bets-are-off really, as I am quite certain that will create a domino effect.

We are far from there and things are far from good, but it is not all dark, and we have to recognise these bright spots, all while avoiding a pollyannic attitude which I often see among many political commentators trying to convince themselves that there is a 'Christian' revival going on in Europe, or that the somewhat anti-lefist currents in Europe are solutions to Europe vast suicidal problems - all stemming from immorality and apostasy.

As if to emphasise the continuing failure of NOChurch, in Colombia, a protestant pastor forced himself into a Church in Colombia and smashed a Marian Statue on the Feast of Our Lady of Carmel . This is in spite of NOChurch assuring us with to its great ecumeniacal drive that there is no difference between protestants and Catholics. Some protestants know better, of course.

I shall, however, agree that  if by Catholicism they mean Novusordoism and not the Catholicism which Novusordoism has sought to eclipse, the differences are very slim. In essence, Novusordoism is a protestant belief system, one of plurality, one which does not seek to worship God in the fullest, and one which plays foot-loose with the truth, including that  of Sacred Tradition and Sacred Scripture; actually, especially those.

The crowning moment of NOChurch came with the encyclical Humanae Vitae, which celebrated it's 50th birthday this week. It's pretty much the only thing Paul VI didn't get completely wrong, and which he probably got mostly right. Of course, it was only needed because Pope John XXIII had convened a commission to study the issue of the newly-invented contraceptive pill, and thanks to the modernising effect of Vatican II, it had come to be seen as a commission which would look into the actualy morality of contraception. That was Paul VI's fault and his alone. Still, in the end he did the right thing, just about.

In Humanae Vitae’s Challenge to Modernity, Crisis Magazine pointed out why Humanae Vitae is still as relevant as ever, as well as why it is still so despised. While Humanae Vitae was the crowning moment of NOChurch - at least with regard to its Catholicity - the dissent that followed it could be argued to be one of NOChurch's low-points, although here the competition is very strong, and Bergoglio has not helped in this regard, with a series of low-points vying for lowest point in Church history. In any case, the Catholic Church had hitherto been seen as a giant monument to morality, a bullwark against the worst instincts of man, even by her enemies. In Widespread dissent against Humanae Vitae put me off becoming a Catholic, we are given an insight into how damaging the Humanae Vitae fall-out was to the reputation of the Church among non-Catholics. The  piece was written by Malcolm Muggeridge in August of 1968, and appeared in the Catholic Herald. He did though, finally convert to Catholicism, albeit 14 years later, proving that the essential elements of Catholicism still remain and that God does work for conversion towards the Catholic faith,  in spite of NOChurch, not because of it.

The eminent historian Roberto di Mattei gave his take on Humanae Viate with at least 2 pieces. He is not overly positive in his assessment of the encyclical, and it would seem that he echoes the view of Louie Verrechio who sees Humanae Vitae as part of the problem and not the solution. In "The Birth of Humanae Vitae in light of the Vatican Archives ", he reviews a book written by a Vatican official which purports to trail the creation of the document. He sees in the book an attempt to suggest that the issue may be revisited. He also takes aim against the idea of Humanae Vitae being prohetic, and he wrote:

Humanae Vitae was not a “prophetic” encyclical. It would have been, if it had dared to oppose  the false neo-Malthusian prophets with the divine words “Increase and multiply” (Genesis 1, 28; 9,27). It did not do so, as Paul VI, in fear of coming into conflict with the world, accepted the myth of the demographic explosion,

In "Rereading Humanae Vitae in the light of Casti connubii" he criticises Humanae Vitae for creating a confusion with regards to the hierarchy of the purposes of the marriage. The 2 purposes of marriage outlined in the encyclical are procreation and the mutual assistance of the purposes. Humanae Vitae, though, fails to make it clear which purpose is subordinate to the other, and de Matti is quick to point out that this is a huge flaw, as whenever we have competing or even complementary purposes, one is always subservient to the other. He writes:

Two principles, or values, are never on the same level of equality. One is always subordinate to the other. This happens in the relationships between faith and reason, between grace and nature, between the Church and the State and so forth. It  is about inseparable but distinct, hierarchal-ordered realities. If the order of these relationships is not defined, tensions and conflicts will follow, resulting in the overturning of principles. In this respect, the process of moral disintegration inside the Church, has among its causes, also the absence of a clear definition of the primary purpose of marriage in the encyclical of Paul VI.

The Encyclical Casti Connubii, covering the very same topic but written - crucially - before the Novus Ordo regime, stated the hierarchy of the 2 purposes of marriage very clearly. That kind of clarity has been lacking in anything produced post-Vatican II, to the extent that one only needs to read a Church document for 5 or so sentences before determining whether the document was written prior to or after the Second Vatican Council.

Another thing which clearly distinguishes NOChurch from the Catholic faith is in its approach to other religions. The approach to Judaism is of particular interest , and specifically the approach to a Jewish state.

In Pope Pius X vs. Herzl , Laura Wood published a excerpt from a diary by Theodore Herzl of his meeting with St. Pope Pius X. His purpose was to solicit Catholic support for a Jewish state, and Pope Pius X told him in no uncertain terms that the Catholic Church cannot support a Jewish state, as the Church could not lend the Jews any credibility, given they had rejected Jesus Christ their saviour. Now, Bergoglio, on the other hand, visited the Holy Land and participated in gestures which were interpreted by many as an apology for the Church's previous and theologically-correct stance.  We see in that contrast the difference between NOChurch and the Catholic Church: NOChurch cares only for worldly applause, for which it is willing to discredit the Catholic faith, whereas the Catholic Church prior to Vatican II, acted at its highest levels with only the purpose of fulfilling God's will front and centre, however imperfectly it may have done so at times.

On the topic of Bergoglio, he is never far from the news, mainly because he does everything to stay in the news. The man behind the book titled "The Dictator Pope", H. J. A. Sire, had an articlue publiched on OnePeter5 titled "Two Priests Imprisoned: A Strange Story from Pope Francis’s Buenos Aires Days". It detaisl allegations that Bergoglio was close to the military regime in Argentina when it was abducting people, and that 2 Jesuits priests suffered on account of Bergoglio when he was the Jesuit superior in the country. The main take-away from the story - taken from an Argentinian journalist - writes  Sire, is not necessarrily that Bergoglio was partial to military dictators, which is not entirely provable, but in the image it paints of Bergoglio as duplicitous, saying one thing to one man and another thing to another, one version of events to one and another version of events to another. This describes Bergoglio's antics as pope perfectly. One week he is railing against abortion, the other he is praising the most famous abortionists he can find. We have seen tonnes of examples of this kind of psychotic behaviour.

The McCarrick scandal refuses to go away, as would have been anticipated. This week Bergoglio accepted Cardinal McCarrick’s resignation as cardinal. It is a symbolic gesture at best, designed more as a publicity stunt than as a sanction against the man, even though we are told that the man will have to stay away from public life and do penance - whatever penance for atheistic sodomites is. I care not for whether the man keeps the title cardinal or not, and I would much rather see a strong condemnation of his actions and similar ones from others. This will not be forthcoming from Bergoglio, as he has proved himself very partial to all kinds of perversions.

The last entry is "Clerical Abuse? Yes, but the Church is also Huuuuman" from UnamSanctamCatholicam. It expresses outrage at the often-heard retort that "sure bishops have committed unspeakable crimes, but we are all sinners". The author writes, and rightly so, that the sins that these bishops and priests are often accused of cry out to Heaven for vengeance. Furthermore, bishops are supposed to be better than the general population, and that expectation is rightly placed on them because they are entrusted with a divine mission. The author is tired of hearing excuses made  for unnatural and grievous sins. We should all be!

This week's Bergoglio victim of the week is canonical punishments, what with the news that McCarrick is to live a "life of prayer and penance" until a canonical trial has been carried out. The man is guilty of sexually abusing seminarians. Of that we need no new trial. That we can pretend otherwise just makes a mockery of canonical justice. Furthermore, we know that Bergoglio probably would have liked the whole issue to blow over, so he only accepted the resignation - symbolic as it was - as a media stunt. This is probably McCarrick trying to take the heat off a man he helped get elected to the papacy, or Bergoglio's handlers asking him to do something to save face, more than the actions of a pope upset with grievous sins from one of his closest associates.