The Dictator Pope is more than the name of a 2018 book penned by Henry Sire, under the nom de plume Marcantonio Colonna. It is a perfect description of what Americans awoke to this Veteran’s Day morning.
In the same three-week period in which serial rapist Marko Rupnik has been accepted and granted faculty as a priest into the diocese of Koper, Slovenia, and in this very same week that the Vatican announced that confused transgender individuals could present themselves for the sacrament of baptism AND stand up as Godparents, Pope Francis has decided to remove His Excellency, Bishop Joseph Strickland, of Tyler, Texas. The irony is too serious to be comical, but not by much.
The Good Bishop’s offense? Well, that seems to be summarized in one of his statements which stood in timely and stark contrast to the atmosphere of Synodality fostered by the leaders of the Catholic Church.
“The Church exists not to redefine matters of faith, but to safeguard the Deposit of Faith as it has been handed down to us from Our Lord Himself through the apostles and the saints and martyrs.” Now the author of these words has been stricken from office.
The statement by the Holy See gave no official reason for dumping Bishop Strickland. But the reality is that the Holy Father and his sycophants have had enough of America’s Bishop exposing them for the positions they have taken which are contradictory to the historical positions of the Church; full Communion into the Church for those in disordered relationships, including active and unrepentant homosexuals. Bishop Strickland believes that while all are welcome in the Church, we must not stay as we are when we arrive. Not every habitual and continued behavior can be tolerated and welcomed in the Church established by Christ.
Harry Truman fired General Douglas MacArthur for a strident unwillingness to fight a limited war. In the same way, Vatican clerics did not appreciate Stricklands public support for, and attendance at, Los Angeles Dodger stadium this summer. Strickland’s blessing of the rally effort against sacrilegious, transgender men tacitly called out each and every prelate too cowardly to do the same. He refused to do his job handcuffed by the new revelations and strictures of the Bergoglian Church. That did not sit well and it was not long afterward when Bishop received an apostolic visitation in his diocese. If there was any dirt whatsoever under Good Bishop Joe’s nails, we would have heard about it. Of that we can be completely certain.
Thus, brings to a head, if not an end, to repeated efforts to mute the Bishop’s social media presence in which he, not unlike Bishop Fulton Sheen, saw a tool for evangelization. Strickland is too unabashedly and proudly evangelizing people. Put simply, for the taste of the current Pontiff, Bishop Strickland is too publicly and authentically Catholic.
In the eyes of Francis, Traditional Latin Mass, strong Catholic Bishops and adherence to the Faith: bad. Clown masses, homosexuality, visits with Bill Clinton, Pachamama, and Bono: good. Got it?
Strickland has been, and hopefully will continue to be, a leader to millions in the American Church whose strident orthodoxy has confounded Rome in recent months. The positions taken by Rome, the new evolution of the Church and Bishop Strickland’s removal casts a pall over the Church Militant that won’t soon be lifted. If God is for us who can be against? That Strickland has Francis as an enemy, and at the same time has the saints and martyrs in his corner, tells us all we need to know. About both men. While Strickland has fought the good fight, woe to Francis upon his Judgement, he is going to have some explaining to do.
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