I was originally inspired to post this visual metaphor by the big “Letter” posted and signed by 19 people accusing Antipope Bergoglio of being a heretic a while back. Well, duh, of course he is. But he isn’t now nor has he ever been the Pope, so the whole exercise is built on a false premise. The Venn Diagram of the raging psycho heretic Jorge Bergoglio and the Papacy have zero overlap. Zero.
We love action. There’s no doubt about that. But here’s the problem. The BASE PREMISE from which any action proceeds MUST BE TRUE. Truth is the foundation, and out of Truth proceeds Charity. Out of Charity proceeds works. In order for these actions or works to be effective, they MUST proceed out of the TRUTH. If acts proceed out of a charity built upon a false base premise, the acts will not only never get any real traction, but they will generally lead to more chaos, which yields despair after a while, as we are seeing.
You all have noticed that all of these initiatives never accomplish anything, right? It isn’t because there is “nothing we can do”. The problem is that these actions are like a two wheel drive 1981 Isuzu pickup stuck in the mud. No matter how much you mash the throttle, you’re never getting any traction. In fact, the wheel-spinning just digs the wheels into the mud deeper. You can even get 19 of your friends to push, but they can’t get any traction in the slick mud of error, so it just turns into a big, muddy cluster-bungle. Pretty soon the 19 friends either start fighting with each other in their frustration over their inability to accomplish anything, or they just walk off in despair calling the whole thing futile.
But the man whose works proceed out of a charity built upon the TRUTH is like the driver of a D8 Caterpillar. The mud doesn’t even faze the D8. Its tracks move over mud with complete security. The D8 is the master of the mud. The mud is moved away by the D8, and the mud has nothing to say about it. And while the 1981 2WD Isuzu is being pushed to no effect by 19 men, one man alone, let’s call him ATHANASIUS, can sit in the cab of the D8 and maneuver the big yellow behemoth literally with his fingertips. Alone. The TRUTH gives him that power, because the Truth is Our Lord Himself.
Pope Benedict XVI’s attempted partial abdication and “fundamental transformation” of the Papacy, something he and the entire German theological academy had been discussing AD NAUSEUM since the 1960s (you HAVE READ J. Michael Miller’s ARSH 1979 dissertation, “The Divine Right of the Papacy in Recent Ecumenical Theology”, RIIIIGHT?), into a “collegial, synodal ministry/function” along the lines of “active governance of the Church” and “prayerful contemplative” lines was SUBSTANTIALLY ERRONEOUS, and thus per Canon 188 backed up by Canon 332.2 was INVALID BY THE LAW ITSELF, and thus Pope Benedict XVI, despite his attempt to kinda-sorta-but-not-completely quit, never stopped being the one and only Pope, and remained so until his death on 31 December, ARSH 2022.
As we all know well, ERROR HAS NO RIGHTS, including substantial errors made by a Pope in the context of an attempted resignation. Rights are a claim given ultimately by God, and God has no error in Him, nor ever can have error in Him. Therefore, to say that the Pope, or even more laughably the College of Cardinals, or College of Bishops in toto, can give RIGHTS to ERROR, even a Papal error, is to put both the Pope himself and – wait for it – the College of Cardinals ABOVE GOD (never mind Canon Law!). We have the word Papolatry, now we’re going to have to coin “Episcopalatry” and “Cardinalatry”.
Well, folks. The D8’s idling, and there’s mud to push, and I’ve got a spring in my step, a bee in my bonnet, and a bat in my belfry, so keep a close eye on this space.
Keep your chin up, go to Mass as often as you possibly can, pray the Rosary, and if the priests where you are STILL commemorate “Fwanciss” at the Te Igitur, consider asking Our Lord to give you any temporal punishment, if any, that your priest might be incurring by commemorating an Antipope, as I started doing a while back, in imitation of Our Lord in the Garden. “Oddly”, doing this makes assisting at a Mass at which Antipope Bergoglio might still be erroneously commemorated even more awesome and profitable, and enflames tremendous compassion toward priests today, so many of whom are frightened, confused and internally conflicted by the Bergoglian Antipapacy.
And thanks to one and all, truly, for the incredible continuing support, both financial (which never ceases to gobsmack me) and with your truly kind emails of edification and encouragement, and assurances of prayer. Folks, if I make it to the Beatific Vision, we’re going to have one HECK of a party in whatever room I get in the Celestial Mansion. I’m talking the super-fancy truffle baloney and ALL the smelly cheeses – classy. I hope it has a mini-fridge! And I’m going to let Our Lord bring the wine. Word is He has excellent taste.
St. Athanasius, contra mundum, pray for us!
Lord Jesus Christ, have mercy on us, and on Your Holy Catholic Church, outside of which there is no salvation.
Remember, a few short years ago, parents would have IMMEDIATELY summoned the police in this situation. “Yes, 9-1-1? I need police at the gymnastics studio at 500 Main Street. There is a man in makeup loitering and approaching children….”
I just sat down and explained to my seven-year-old daughter that we'll no longer be going to her gymnastics class.
We've been going to the same facility for several years, but as of this week, they decided to hire an absolutely sasquatch of a transgender man to run the front…
I beg you to make it so, so that hard word will not be said to you as a reprimand from the First Truth, saying, “Cursed be you who were silent.” Oh, be silent no more! Cry out with a hundred thousand tongues. I see that, through being silent, the world is spoiled, the Bride of Christ has paled, her color taken from her …Don’t sleep in negligence any longer. Act at the present time, however you can. I believe that there will come a time when you can no longer act; but now, at the present time, I invite you to strip your soul of all self-love, and dress it in hunger and real, true virtue, to the honor of God and the health of your soul.
(Originally posted in ARSH 2020. Look at the tweet below added as an update in ARSH 2021 citing a MERE 26,000 vaxx deaths, sigh, and wax nostalgic. Latest super-lowball estimates are 17,000,000+ dead. That’s THREE of the “Worst Thing That Ever Happened Ever”. Are we even allowed to suggest the “The Worst Thing That Ever Happened Ever” at 6,000,000 might not be The Worst Thing To Ever Happen Ever? ESPECIALLY now? And it’s just getting warmed up. Nevermind the sterilizations that will go unrecognized and unrecorded.
I had the honor of organizing the Sacrament of Extreme Unction for an elderly friend going into the hospital today for cancer surgery tomorrow. The elderly, especially, were so vulnerable to the relentless satanic propaganda about the mRNA poison via TeeVee. Is his cancer “turbo cancer”? Probably. In your charity, could you say an Ave for my friend Joe? A wonderful oldtimer. Was Airborne in the late-60s. He was tricked. Pure and simple. He wants to continue to live and work, and see his grandchildren grow up. I want that too, but more importantly I want him to go to heaven. -AB ’24)
Folks, every bit of this has been METICULOUSLY pre-planned and anticipated down to the smallest details. Read this excerpt from the master planning document of the CoronaScam Crime Against Humanity in light of the rapidly growing numbers of the dead, maimed and injured by the DeathJab and realize that it is ALL PART OF THE PLAN.
Folks, everything here below was published in ARSH 2017 as a FICTIONAL WAR GAMING SCENARIO which now reads as an obvious and undeniable SCRIPT for a meticulously conceived and pre-planned crime against humanity. There is NO POSSIBLE WAY that what you read below is a coincidence. None.
Understand that mass injuries and death from a “vaccine” are 100% anticipated, down to the craven plans to silence the victims and mollify the masses through manipulative media coverage, sentimental gestures and financial payoffs, but that the injections MUST CONTINUE.
I have included, in full, the final three chapters of the document, which begins on document page 59, PDF page 68.
Again, remember as you read this that it was published in ARSH 2017 as a “hypothetical” war gaming scenario.
VACCINE INJURY
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
In contrast to Alyssa Karpowitz’s story, not all changes in opinion were in favor of public health messaging. As time passed and more people across the United States were vaccinated, claims of adverse side effects began to emerge. Several parents claimed that their children were experiencing neurological symptoms similar to those seen among livestock exposed to the GMI vaccine. By May 2027, parental anxiety around this claim had intensified to the point of lawsuits. That month, a group of parents whose children developed mental retardation as a result of encephalitis in the wake of Corovax vaccination sued the federal government, demanding removal of the liability shield protecting the pharmaceutical companies responsible for developing and manufacturing Corovax.
The growing plaintiff cohort quickly withdrew their suit upon learning that the National Vaccine Injury Compensation Trust Fund (NVICTF) and an emergency appropriation of funds authorized by Congress under the PREP Act existed to provide financial reimbursement to those who were adversely affected by the Corovax vaccine in order to cover healthcare costs and other related expenses.2,3 Given the positive reaction to the federal government’s response and the fact that the majority of US citizens willing to be vaccinated had already been immunized, the negative publicity surrounding adverse reactions had little effect on nationwide vaccination rates. The focus on adverse side effects, however, resulted in a considerable increase in the number of compensation claims filed, and many grew concerned about the long-term effects that Corovax could have on their health. This concern was particularly high among some African American parents who continued to question the government’s motives regarding the Corovax vaccination campaign.
While the FDA, CDC, and other agencies were busy researching possible connections between Corovax and the reported neurological side effects, their efforts were continually undermined by epidemiological analyses produced by various non-governmental individuals and groups. A popular science blogger EpiGirl, for example, began posting interactive maps of the incidence of Corovax side effects in April 2027. To create the maps, EpiGirl collected anecdotes of adverse Corovax side effects using Facebook, Twitter and YouTube and combined them with data downloaded from the HHS Vaccine Adverse Event Reporting System (VAERS), a national vaccine safety surveillance program maintained by the CDC and FDA. EpiGirl also encouraged those among her subscribers who were Apple product users to share health data with her via Apple’s ResearchKit and HealthKit applications. EpiGirl’s maps were consequently shared widely in social media circles and even included in local and national news reports.
The federal government became concerned about the validity of EpiGirl’s anecdotal data and the widespread sharing of patient information via the internet. EpiGirl’s data showed a significantly higher incidence rate of nearly every reported side effect; however, federal officials believed that this was largely due to duplicate entries resulting from compiling data from multiple sources. Additionally, EpiGirl’s data did not seek to address the cause of the reported side effects, only the incidence rate. Publication of similar results from organizations such as Patients-Like-Me, a group closely associated with the natural medicine movement, further legitimized these independent reports. The government attempted to respond to these claims through formal press releases, but these were neither as visually appealing nor as interactive as EpiGirl’s maps and were, therefore, largely ignored.
While the federal government appeared to have appropriately addressed concerns around the acute side effects of Corovax, the long-term, chronic effects of the vaccine were still largely unknown. Nearing the end of 2027, reports of new neurological symptoms began to emerge. After showing no adverse side effects for nearly a year, several vaccine recipients slowly began to experience symptoms such as blurry vision, headaches, and numbness in their extremities. Due to the small number of these cases, the significance of their association with Corovax was never determined. As of this writing in 2030, longitudinal studies initiated by the NIH at the beginning of the vaccination program have not reached the next round of data collection, so formal analysis on these symptoms has not yet been conducted. Furthermore, these cases arose from the initial cohort of vaccine recipients—those in high- risk populations, including those with other underlying health conditions—making it increasingly difficult to determine the extent to which these symptoms are associated with vaccination.
As these cases emerged, patients began filing for compensation under the PREP Act. Due to lingering uncertainties over possible links between vaccination and reported neurological symptoms, their compensation requests were placed on indefinite hold, pending further data analysis. This cohort, many of whom adamantly supported the Corovax vaccine initially, quickly took to social media to publicize their issues.
Despite relatively few reports of neurological symptoms, the social media response was immense. After experiencing initial success with PREP Act compensation policies and working diligently to ensure transparency throughout the claim request and evaluation process, HHS was caught off guard by the new round of negative publicity. They were pressured by the public and media to award compensation to those claiming long-term effects from Corovax despite having no data to support these claims. Displaying a fundamental misunderstanding of scientific research, many demanded proof that the vaccines did not cause long-term effects. HHS Secretary Nagel firmly and vocally supported the decision to postpone evaluation of all claims of long-term side effects and invited an independent Congressional investigation to ensure that the PREP Act was being properly implemented.
In addition to demands for immediate compensation, Congress faced public pressure to increase the PREP Act emergency appropriation. While the initial allocation of funds was sufficient to provide compensation for acute side effects, the prospect of long-term effects and potentially permanent disability gave rise to concerns that additional resources would be necessary in the near future.
COMMUNICATION DILEMMA
Communicating With the Public About Trustworthy Sources of Data and
Options for Legal Recourse in a Climate of Mistrust
FOOD FOR THOUGHT
1) How might advance development and testing of recovery messages that specifically address the topics of adverse side effects and the NVICTF help improve health authorities’ ability to respond to public distress about medical issues emerging after a MCM campaign? What are some messages that would warrant such testing?
2) Despite the uncertain science about the link between Coravax and the reported neurological symptoms, why should health officials still communicate with compassion and genuine sympathy toward those in the vaccinated population who experience medical issues subsequent to being vaccinated?
3) Given growing interest in open data systems and the application of “crowd sourcing” to solve complex problems, how might public health officials take greater advantage of two-way communication with an interested public in the aftermath of the SPARS outbreak? For instance, how might input and analysis from members of the public help improve adverse event monitoring or assess the strengths and weaknesses of a specific MCM campaign?
ACKNOWLEDGING LOSS
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
At the request of HHS Secretary Nagel, ASPR convened a series of meetings among senior leadership of the federal health agencies to address policy and program changes being implemented as a result of a departmental review of the response to the SPARS pandemic. Among the issues considered were the implications of growing negative public opinion regarding Corovax and the government’s perceived indifference to victims of the public health response to SPARS. One senior health official argued that time and a robust medical monitoring program for vaccine recipients—the components of which were already in place—should be sufficient to determine whether public concern about long-term effects was, in fact, warranted: “We have to wait for the data. People need to understand that fact.”
One prominent attendee at these meetings was Dr. Ann Flynn, the director of the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA). Staff from the administration’s Disaster Technical Assistance Center had recently briefed Dr. Flynn on usage data for the SAMHSA Disaster Distress Helpline over the past year, and summary reports indicated that a significant number of helpline users said that their principal worry was associated with the SPARS pandemic and, more recently, uncertainty about potential long-term effects of Corovax. Considering this new knowledge, Dr. Flynn countered the earlier claim that the public simply needed to wait until the science was clear: “Communities around the country went through what some felt was a harrowing public health emergency, only later to confront the possibility, however slim, that the medicine we promised would help them may in fact be hurting them.”
The senior leaders in attendance concluded, after much prompting by Dr. Flynn, that no top political or public health figurehead had publicly recognized the collective sense of vulnerability that the pandemic had elicited or the strength that the public exhibited under threat of grave danger. Moreover, no national leader had publicly acknowledged the public’s broad willingness to accept a prescribed countermeasure that promised to end the pandemic, but whose long-term consequences were not fully understood at the time.
Following the meeting, ASPR recommended to HHS Secretary Nagel that SAMHSA collaborate with stakeholders and devise behavioral health guidance for the states, tribes, and territories on how to strengthen the public’s coping skills, provide support for grieving individuals, encourage a forward direction, and meet other SPARS recovery needs. It was further recommended that Secretary Nagel consult with President Archer about the possibility of acknowledging the emotional toll of SPARS during a future public appearance. The primary message would be one of gratitude to the American people for remaining strong during the pandemic. Another key message would convey appreciation for adhering to public health recommendations, including vaccination, to hasten the end of the pandemic in the face of considerable uncertainty.
President Archer agreed to address the country’s resolve and recovery in the face of SPARS. Top risk communication advisors from the CDC, FDA, NIH, and SAMHSA conferred as a group about how best to frame the President’s remarks. The group vigorously debated whether it was appropriate for the President to acknowledge the sacrifice that vaccine recipients had made on behalf of their communities or to console them in their grief over that sacrifice.
COMMUNICATION DILEMMA
Bringing a Sense of Resolution to a Period of Crisis While Striking a Balance Between the Need to Affirm Collective Grief and Loss and the Need to Move Forward
FOOD FOR THOUGHT
1) Given the uncertain long-term safety profile of the Corovax vaccine, why are both science and sympathy necessary when communicating about a possible correlation between vaccination and adverse events?
2) What general communication principles does the advice of Dr. Ann Flynn suggest with respect to the recovery phase of a public health emergency involving MCMs? What might pre-event planning for recovery-phase communication look like based on her guidance?
SPARS AFTERMATH
CHAPTER NINETEEN
Today, nearly five years since the St. Paul Acute Respiratory Syndrome coronavirus made its global debut, there remain human cases in 14 countries across Europe, Africa, and Asia. The pandemic officially ended in August 2028, but the virus persists in domesticated animal reservoirs. WHO experts hypothesize that small, isolated outbreaks of SPARS were occurring long before the disease emerged on a global scale in 2025, and they anticipate that future outbreaks will continue to emerge unless countries maintain widespread vaccination coverage.
As the pandemic tapered off, several influential politicians and agency representatives came under fire for sensationalizing the severity of the event for perceived political gain. As with many public health interventions, successful efforts to reduce the impact of the pandemic created the illusion that the event was not nearly as serious as experts suggested it would be. President Archer’s detractors in the Republican Party seized the opportunity to publicly disparage the President and his administration’s response to the pandemic, urging voters to elect “a strong leader with the best interests of the American people at heart.” A widespread social media movement led primarily by outspoken parents of affected children, coupled with widespread distrust of “big pharma,” supported the narrative that the development of SPARS MCMs was unnecessary and driven by a few profit-seeking individuals. Conspiracy theories also proliferated across social media, suggesting that the virus had been purposely created and introduced to the population by drug companies or that it had escaped from a government lab secretly testing bioweapons.
After-action reports, government hearings, and agency reviews following the pandemic were too numerous to count. Emergency funding appropriated by Congress to fight the disease became available partway through the course of the pandemic, but federal, state, and local public health agencies struggled to manage the procedural requirements to spend it. As a result, significant amounts of emergency funds remained unused as the pandemic wound down. As the investigations grew in intensity, several high-ranking officials at the CDC and FDA were forced to step down and withdraw from government in order to “spend more time with their families.” Exhausted employees of these agencies, many of whom worked long hours six or seven days a week throughout the pandemic, simply wanted to put the whole response behind them. Little desire remained on the part of decision-makers or those who served in the trenches during the response to rehash the events of the past several years.
The very real possibility of a future SPARS pandemic necessitates continued commitment to vaccination programs as well as accurate, culturally appropriate, and timely communication from public health agencies across the planet. While the communication experiences of the SPARS pandemic of 2025-2028 offer some examples for how this communication can and should occur, they also identify practices that should be avoided, or at least modified, for responses to future public health emergencies.
In this episode Mark and Ann discuss the ongoing global clownshow, from people who still don’t understand that the real “ISRAEL” that is blessed by God (to put it mildly) is the One, Holy Catholic and Apostolic Church – not an atheist state made up out of whole cloth (a cheap polyester blend) in ARSH 1947. How much longer are we going to let pagans squat on OUR land? Why are there still even pagans at all? We then discuss the attack by Antipope Bergoglio (and Touchme Fagnandez) on authentic, approved REAL Marian Apparitions, with a digression into the plethora of fake apparitions that are littering the scene. The Blessed Virgin Mary can NOT be canceled or memory-holed.
“Grant, we beseech thee, O Almighty God, that we who in our tribulation are yet of good cheer because of thy loving-kindness, may find Thee mighty to save from all dangers.” –Collect of the Rogation Mass
The Infant Jesus of Prague handles Ann’s financial stuff. Click image for details. [If you have a recurring donation set up and need to cancel for whatever reason – don’t hesitate to do so!]
Ann – Just a quick note to say Thank You for your perseverance as you continue to hammer home the reality of Pope Benedict’s “resignation”. I have recently watched dozens of podcasts of various Catholic men addressing the “crisis” within the Church. The pusillanimity on display was irritating. All of the same absurd tropes you have brought to our attention were present. To see seemingly intelligent men timidly proffer incoherent arguments on such a grave subject that has scandalized so many to either leave or never enter the Church, was unfortunately not surprising. As Upton Sinclair allegedly said in 1934, “It is hard to make a man understand something when his salary depends upon him not understanding it.”
+Ganswein analogized Pope Benedict’s attempted “expansion of the Petrine ministry” into a “collegial, synodal office”, a “fundamental transformation” such that the Papacy would “never be the same again” …to THE IMMACULATE CONCEPTION.
Hey, remember that time when you quit your job just like any other resignation, and how that was so totally normal and non-extraordinary that your closest associates declared, with your approval, that it was, you know, like the IMMACULATE CONCEPTION? Like God creating His own Mother and holding her free of the stain of Original Sin by the merit of His own death on the Cross 50 years +/- later? You know, completely, totally normal and in no way different than any other resignation?
But remember folks, if you think it even POSSIBLE that there is any sort of problem here, you are a crazy fantasist.
Apropos of nothing at all, here is my essay on the psychological abuse and control tactic of GASLIGHTING, something that anyone who has spent any time working for any of the intelligence agencies would be not only versed in, but expert in deploying. No matter how much clear evidence, no matter how obvious and logical the dataset, just keep calling anyone who points any of it out of being “crazy”. The vaccine is safe and effective, the resignation was legal and valid, the vaccine is legal and valid, the resignation is safe and effective…
But what really leapt out at me after re-reading the FULL +Ganswein address was this little logical pickle:
If Pope Benedict’s “resignation” was just like every previous Papal resignation, and “Pope Emeritus” is just a way of saying “resigned Pope”, why is Pope Benedict XVI referred to by +Ganswein, with Pope Benedict’s approval, as having created a “new institution” as “history’s first Pope Emeritus?”
How can Pope Benedict be simultaneously just exactly like all other resigned Popes, but at the same time “history’s FIRST Pope Emeritus”, “entirely different” from all previous Popes that resigned, and that “to date there has never been a step taken like that of Benedict XVI”?
That is a stone-cold violation of the Law of Non-contradiction. Something can not BE and NOT BE at the same time. Pope Benedict cannot both be and not be the first “Pope Emeritus”. Something cannot be both “entirely different” and “entirely the same” as something else. So, something MUST be wrong with the base premise, because the logical truth table here is yielding first-degree corollaries in violation the Second of the Three Laws of Thought.
Logic, folks. It’s a constitutive quality of God Himself. That’s why the opening 14 verses of John’s Gospel are proclaimed at the end of every Mass in the Traditional Rite. “In the beginning was the LOGOS….”
I urge you to read the entire Ratzinger-approved +Ganswein speech below, and see for yourself how “thought leaders” are actively misleading you when they claim that there is no evidence that Pope Benedict’s failed attempted partial “resignation” was anything other than completely normal and run-of-the-mill, just like all previous Papal resignations… and, apparently “normal” like the Immaculate Conception was “normal”.
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Eminences, Excellencies, dear Brothers, Ladies and Gentlemen!
During one of the last conversations that the pope’s biographer, Peter Seewald of Munich, was able to have with Benedict XVI, as he was bidding him goodbye, he asked him: “Are you the end of the old or the beginning of the new?” The pope’s answer was brief and sure: “The one and the other,” he replied. The recorder was already turned off; that is why this final exchange is not found in any of the book-interviews with Peter Seewald, not even the famous Light of the World. It only appeared in an interview he granted to Corriere della Sera in the wake of Benedict XVI’s resignation, in which the biographer recalled those key words which are, in a certain way, a maxim of the book by Roberto Regoli, which we are presenting here today at the Gregorian.
Indeed, I must admit that perhaps it is impossible to sum up the pontificate of Benedict XVI in a more concise manner. And the one who says it, over the years, has had the privilege of experiencing this Pope up close as a “homo historicus,” the Western man par excellence who has embodied the wealth of Catholic tradition as no other; and — at the same time — has been daring enough to open the door to a new phase, to that historical turning point which no one five years ago could have ever imagined. Since then, we live in an historic era which in the 2,000-year history of the Church is without precedent.
As in the time of Peter, also today the one, holy, catholic and apostolic Church continues to have one legitimate Pope. But today we live with two living successors of Peter among us — who are not in a competitive relationship between themselves, and yet both have an extraordinary presence! We may add that the spirit of Joseph Ratzinger had already marked decisively the long pontificate of St. John Paul II, whom he faithfully served for almost a quarter of a century as Prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith. Many people even today continue to see this new situation as a kind of exceptional (not regular) state of the divinely instituted office of Peter (eine Art göttlichen Ausnahmezustandes).
But is it already time to assess the pontificate of Benedict XVI? Generally, in the history of the Church, popes can correctly be judged and classified only ex post. And as proof of this, Regoli himself mentions the case of Gregory VII, the great reforming pope of the Middle Ages, who at the end of his life died in exile in Salerno – a failure in the opinion of many of his contemporaries. And yet Gregory VII was the very one who, amid the controversies of his time, decisively shaped the face of the Church for the generations that followed. Much more daring, therefore, does Professor Regoli seem today in already attempting to take stock of the pontificate of Benedict XVI, while he is still alive.
The amount of critical material which he reviewed and analyzed to this end is massive and impressive. Indeed, Benedict XVI is and remains extraordinarily present also through his writings: both those produced as pope — the three volumes on Jesus of Nazareth and 16 (!) volumes of Teachings he gave us during his papacy — and as Professor Ratzinger or Cardinal Ratzinger, whose works could fill a small library.
And so, Regoli’s work is not lacking in footnotes, which are as numerous as the memories they awaken in me. For I was present when Benedict XVI, at the end of his mandate, removed the Fisherman’s ring, as is customary after the death of a pope, even though in this case he was still alive! I was present when, on the other hand, he decided not to give up the name he had chosen, as Pope Celestine V had done when, on December 13, 1294, a few months after the start of his ministry, be again became Pietro dal Morrone.
Since February 2013 the papal ministry is therefore no longer what it was before. It is and remains the foundation of the Catholic Church; and yet it is a foundation which Benedict XVI has profoundly and permanently transformed during his exceptional pontificate (Ausnahmepontifikat), regarding which the sober Cardinal Sodano, reacting simply and directly immediately after the surprising resignation, deeply moved and almost stunned, exclaimed that the news hit the cardinals who were gathered “like a bolt from out of the blue.”
It was the morning of that very day when, in the evening, a bolt of lightning with an incredible roar struck the tip of St. Peter’s dome positioned just over the tomb of the Prince of the Apostles. Rarely has the cosmos more dramatically accompanied a historic turning point. But on the morning of that February 11, the dean of the College of Cardinals, Angelo Sodano, concluded his reply to Benedict XVI’s statement with an initial and similarly cosmic assessment of the pontificate, when he concluded, saying: “Certainly, the stars in the sky will always continue to shine, and so too will the star of his pontificate always shine in our midst.”
Equally brilliant and illuminating is the thorough and well documented exposition by Don Regoli of the different phases of the pontificate. Especially its beginning in the April 2005 conclave, from which Joseph Ratzinger, after one of the shortest elections in the history of the Church, emerged elected after only four ballots following a dramatic struggle between the so-called “Salt of the Earth Party,” around Cardinals López Trujíllo, Ruini, Herranz, Rouco Varela or Medina and the so-called “St. Gallen Group” around Cardinals Danneels, Martini, Silvestrini or Murphy-O’Connor; a group that recently the same Cardinal Danneels of Brussels so amusedly called “a kind of Mafia-Club.” The election was certainly also the result of a clash, whose key Ratzinger himself, as dean of the College of Cardinals, had furnished in the historic homily of April 18, 2005 in St. Peter’s; precisely, where to a “dictatorship of relativism that does not recognize anything as definitive and whose ultimate goal consists solely of one’s own ego and desires” he contrasted another measure: “the Son of God, the true man” as “the measure of true humanism.” Today we read this part of Regoli’s intelligent analysis almost like a breathtaking detective novel of not so long ago; whereas the “dictatorship of relativism” has for a long time sweepingly expressed itself through the many channels of the new means of communication which, in 2005, barely could be imagined.
The name that the new pope took immediately after his election therefore already represented a plan. Joseph Ratzinger did not become Pope John Paul III, as perhaps many would have wished. Instead, he went back to Benedict XV — the unheeded and unlucky great pope of peace of the terrible years of the First World War — and to St. Benedict of Norcia, patriarch of monasticism and patron of Europe. I could appear as a star witness to testify that, over the previous years, Cardinal Ratzinger never pushed to rise to the highest office of the Catholic Church.
Instead, he was already dreaming of a condition that would have allowed him to write several last books in peace and tranquility. Everyone knows that things went differently. During the election, then, in the Sistine Chapel, I was a witness that he saw the election as a “true shock” and was “upset,” and that he felt “dizzy” as soon as he realized that “the axe” of the election would fall on him. I am not revealing any secrets here, because it was Benedict XVI himself who confessed all of this publicly on the occasion of the first audience granted to pilgrims who had come from Germany. And so it isn’t surprising that it was Benedict XVI who immediately after his election invited the faithful to pray for him, as this book again reminds us.
Regoli maps out the various years of ministry in a fascinating and moving way, recalling the skill and confidence with which Benedict XVI exercised his mandate. And what emerged from the time when, just a few months after his election, he invited for a private conversation both his old, fierce antagonist Hans Küng as well as Oriana Fallaci, the agnostic and combative grande dame of Jewish origin, from the Italian secular mass media; or when he appointed Werner Arber, the Swiss Evangelical and Nobel Prize winner, as the first non-Catholic President of the Pontifical Academy of Social Sciences. Regoli does not cover up the accusation of an insufficient knowledge of men that was often leveled against the brilliant theologian in the shoes of the Fisherman; a man capable of truly brilliantly evaluating texts and difficult books, and who nevertheless, in 2010, frankly confided to Peter Seewald how difficult he found decisions about people because “no one can read another man’s heart.” How true it is!
Regoli rightly calls 2010 a “black year” for the pope, precisely in relation to the tragic and fatal accident that befell Manuela Camagni, one of the four Memores Domini belonging to the small “papal family.” I can certainly confirm it. In comparison with this misfortune the media sensationalism of those years — from the case of traditionalist bishop, Williamson, to a series of increasingly malicious attacks against the pope — while having a certain effect, did not strike the pope’s heart as much as the death of Manuela, who was torn so suddenly from our midst. Benedict was not an “actor pope,” and even less an insensitive “automaton pope”; even on the throne of Peter he was and he remained a man; or, as Conrad Ferdinand Meyer would say, he was not a “clever book,” he was “a man with his contradictions.” That is how I myself have daily been able to come to know and appreciate him. And so he has remained until today.
Regoli observes, however, that after the last encyclical, Caritas in veritate of December 4, 2009, a dynamic, innovative papacy with a strong drive from a liturgical, ecumenical and canonical perspective, suddenly appeared to have “slowed down,” been blocked, and bogged down. Although it is true that the headwinds increased in the years that followed, I cannot confirm this judgment. Benedict’s travels to the UK (2010), to Germany and to Erfurt, the city of Luther (2011), or to the heated Middle East — to concerned Christians in Lebanon (2012) — have all been ecumenical milestones in recent years. His decisive handling to solve the issue of abuse was and remains a decisive indication on how to proceed. And when, before him, has there ever been a pope who — along with his onerous task — has also written books on Jesus of Nazareth, which perhaps will also be regarded as his most important legacy?
It isn’t necessary here that I dwell on how he, who was so struck by the sudden death of Manuela Camagni, later also suffered the betrayal of Paolo Gabriele, who was also a member of the same “papal family.” And yet it is good for me to say at long last, with all clarity, that Benedict, in the end, did not step down because of a poor and misguided chamber assistant, or because of the “tidbits” coming from his apartment which, in the so-called “Vatileaks affair,” circulated like fool’s gold in Rome but were traded in the rest of the world like authentic gold bullion. No traitor or “raven” [the Italian press’s nickname for the Vatileaks source] or any journalist would have been able to push him to that decision. That scandal was too small for such a thing, and so much greater was the well-considered step of millennial historical significance that Benedict XVI made.
The exposition of these events by Regoli also merits consideration because he does not advance the claim that he sounds and fully explains this last, mysterious step; not further enriching the swarm of legends with more assumptions that have little or nothing to do with reality. And I, too, a firsthand witness of the spectacular and unexpected step of Benedict XVI, I must admit that what always comes to mind is the well-known and brilliant axiom with which, in the Middle Ages, John Duns Scotus justified the divine decree for the Immaculate Conception of the Mother of God:
“Decuit, potuit, fecit.”
That is to say: it was fitting, because it was reasonable. God could do it, therefore he did it. I apply the axiom to the decision to resign in the following way: it was fitting, because Benedict XVI was aware that he lacked the necessary strength for the extremely onerous office. He could do it, because he had already thoroughly thought through, from a theological point of view, the possibility of popes emeritus for the future. So he did it.
The momentous resignation of the theologian pope represented a step forward primarily by the fact that, on February 11, 2013, speaking in Latin in front of the surprised cardinals, he introduced into the Catholic Church the new institution of “pope emeritus,” stating that his strength was no longer sufficient “to properly exercise the Petrine ministry.” The key word in that statement is munus petrinum, translated — as happens most of the time — with “Petrine ministry.” And yet, munus, in Latin, has a multiplicity of meanings: it can mean service, duty, guide or gift, even prodigy. Before and after his resignation, Benedict understood and understands his task as participation in such a “Petrine ministry.” He has left the papal throne and yet, with the step made on February 11, 2013, he has not at all abandoned this ministry. Instead, he has complemented the personal office with a collegial and synodal dimension, as a quasi shared ministry (als einen quasi gemeinsamen Dienst); as though, by this, he wanted to reiterate once again the invitation contained in the motto that the then Joseph Ratzinger took as archbishop of Munich and Freising and which he then naturally maintained as bishop of Rome: “cooperatores veritatis,” which means “fellow workers in the truth.” In fact, it is not in the singular but the plural; it is taken from the Third Letter of John, in which in verse 8 it is written: “We ought to support such men, that we may be fellow workers in the truth.”
Since the election of his successor Francis, on March 13, 2013, there are not therefore two popes, but de facto an expanded ministry — with an active member and a contemplative member. This is why Benedict XVI has not given up either his name, or the white cassock. This is why the correct name by which to address him even today is “Your Holiness”; and this is also why he has not retired to a secluded monastery, but within the Vatican — as if he had only taken a step to the side to make room for his successor and a new stage in the history of the papacy which he, by that step, enriched with the “power station” of his prayer and his compassion located in the Vatican Gardens.
It was “the least expected step in contemporary Catholicism,” Regoli writes, and yet a possibility which Cardinal Ratzinger had already pondered publicly on August 10, 1978 in Munich, in a homily on the occasion of the death of Paul VI. Thirty-five years later, he has not abandoned the Office of Peter — something which would have been entirely impossible for him after his irrevocable acceptance of the office in April 2005. By an act of extraordinary courage, he has instead renewed this office (even against the opinion of well-meaning and undoubtedly competent advisers), and with a final effort he has strengthened it (as I hope). Of course only history will prove this. But in the history of the Church it shall remain true that, in the year 2013, the famous theologian on the throne of Peter became history’s first “pope emeritus.” Since then, his role — allow me to repeat it once again — is entirely different from that, for example, of the holy Pope Celestine V, who after his resignation in 1294 would have liked to return to being a hermit, becoming instead a prisoner of his successor, Boniface VIII (to whom today in the Church we owe the establishment of jubilee years). To date, in fact, there has never been a step like that taken by Benedict XVI. So it is not surprising that it has been seen by some as revolutionary, or to the contrary as entirely consistent with the Gospel; while still others see the papacy in this way secularized as never before, and thus more collegial and functional or even simply more human and less sacred. And still others are of the opinion that Benedict XVI, with this step, has almost — speaking in theological and historical-critical terms — demythologized the papacy.
In his overview of the pontificate, Regoli clearly lays this all out as never before. Perhaps the most moving part of the reading for me was the place where, in a long quote, he recalls the last general audience of Pope Benedict XVI on February 27, 2013 when, under an unforgettable clear and brisk sky, the pope, who shortly thereafter would resign, summarized his pontificate as follows:
“It has been a portion of the Church’s journey which has had its moments of joy and light, but also moments which were not easy; I have felt like Saint Peter with the Apostles in the boat on the Sea of Galilee: The Lord has given us so many days of sun and of light winds, days when the catch was abundant; there were also moments when the waters were rough and the winds against us, as throughout the Church’s history, and the Lord seemed to be sleeping. But I have always known that the Lord is in that boat, and I have always known that the barque of the Church is not mine, it is not ours, but his. Nor does the Lord let it sink; it is he who guides it, surely also through the men whom he has chosen, because he so wished. This has been, and is, a certainty which nothing can obscure.”
I must admit that, rereading these words can still bring tears to my eyes, all the more so because I saw in person and up close how unconditional, for himself and for his ministry, was Pope Benedict’s adherence to St Benedict’s words, for whom “nothing is to be placed before the love of Christ,” nihil amori Christi praeponere, as stated in rule handed down to us by Pope Gregory the Great. I was a witness to this, but I still remain fascinated by the accuracy of that final analysis in St. Peter’s Square which sounded so poetic but was nothing less than prophetic. In fact, they are words to which today, too, Pope Francis would immediately and certainly subscribe. Not to the popes but to Christ, to the Lord Himself and to no one else belongs the barque of Peter, whipped by the waves of the stormy sea, when time and again we fear that the Lord is asleep and that our needs are not important to him, while just one word is enough for him to stop every storm; when instead, more than the high waves and the howling wind, it is our disbelief, our little faith and our impatience that make us continually fall into panic.
Thus, this book once again throws a consoling gaze on the peaceful imperturbability and serenity of Benedict XVI, at the helm of the barque of Peter in the dramatic years 2005-2013. At the same time, however, through this illuminating account, Regoli himself now also takes part in the munus Petri of which I spoke. Like Peter Seewald and others before him, Roberto Regoli — as a priest, professor and scholar — also thus enters into that enlarged Petrine ministry around the successors of the Apostle Peter; and for this today we offer him heartfelt thanks.
Archbishop Georg Gänswein, Prefect of the Papal Household
20 May 2016
