lunes, 31 de octubre de 2016

Some Observations on the Major Heretics who Created Protestantism. 3

Some Observations on the Major Heretics 

who Created Protestantism

(Continued)

By Horacio Bonfiglioli

 

Taken from: http://lascadenasdeobligado.blogspot.mx/2016/08/algunas-observacionessobre-los.html

Translated from the Spanish by Roberto Hope

[Translator´s note: book page numbers quoted refer to those in the Spanish editions cited]

Luther, Descartes, Kant.

Words uttered by professor Jordán Bruno Genta, in one of his private philosophy lectures on November 24, 1959: “There is a perfect continuity between Luther, Descartes, and Kant, who is the philosopher of secularism, of the secularization of life...Luther begins by stating that 'reason does not really reach the spiritual', proposition continued one century later by Descartes, who was a Catholic but formed in the Suarist spirit, reaching the conclusion of the total uselessness of speculative reason; to reconcile his Catholicism with Lutheranism he would say he was not so daring as to think about God... and that it was necessary to substitute scholastic speculation by a practice that makes it possible to know the functions of the soul through the body... in other words, that everything has come out from mathematical physics... As a consequence, in the realm of science and praxis, we have the progress of secularism and modernism, derived from Protestantism... This idea that everything ends in the usefulness of things, this exaltation of the praxis, is nothing more than the last consequence of the religious rebellion against the fixity and the unity of Truth. Once this unity is broken, from which all other truths derive, we necessarily arrive at materialism.

Elizabeth Tudor

Elizabeth Tudor, who began her reign after she had just had Mary Stuart killed in 1558, was a worthy daughter of her unworthy progenitors, Bastard fruit of the sacrilegious intercourse between the immoral Henry VIII ― while his legitimate wife was still alive ― and the opportunistic aristocrat Ann Boleyn, was the vicious Queen of England who consolidated the Anglican heresy and the corrupt life model which English nobility has imitated until our time.

Christopher Hollis in “The Monstrous Regiment” wrote that the Protestant religion was imposed by Elizabeth of England against the 1000 years of Catholicism of the English people... and that Elizabeth's and Cecil's policy, moved by their hatred of the Catholic faith, had the intention of 'de-catholicizing' England; not so much breaking up with the Pope to have their hands free to do what they wished with religion, but directly to banish the Mass from England “Because as long as the people could demand the mass, they would demand the priest. And so that Cecil and his friends could feel secure in their stolen lands, it was necessary to persuade the people that they could very well do without the priests.

On the contrary, thousands were the Catholic martyrs who died immolated for refusing to accept the new Protestant mass which Elizabeth imposed through blood and fire. With the collaboration of apostate Thomas Cramner, named Archbishop of Canterbury in 1533, she validated the usurpation of the property of the Church by the new rich. She “hated the Mass as if it were a living enemy, and denied the transubstantiation, Jesus' real presence, and the sacrificial oblation of our Savior... she moved in a surreptitious and resolved manner towards the total elimination of the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass... transforming it into a Protestant meal”; you cannot avoid comparing this sacrilege with the method employed hypocritically by Bugnini during Vatican II.

Flaunting an implacable anticatholic hatred ― wrote Candidus in SI SI NO NO of the Summer of 2011 ― Elizabeth made it obligatory, under the gravest of penalties, to participate in the new Anglican rite established by Cramner (who in the meantime had died in the stake. Watch out then! He who attacks the Eucharist runs the risk of having a bad ending)”. The lacking of the Holy Mass was the greatest disgrace for the English Catholics.

“This is how the era of the English Martyrs would begin ― Candidus goes on ― and Catholic blood began to bathe the British soil. But who speaks or writes about this? Who asks the Catholic Church's forgiveness for that?... Elizabeth, meanwhile, mobilized spies and henchmen to hunt 'popists', culpable only of one crime: being priests and offering the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass, or. if they were laypersons, of remaining Catholic and attending the same Sacrifice... The penalty for that offense was being hanged and then quartered while still alive...”

Vice, violence, and hatred followed her perfidious reign; being it a scandalous decision, after innumerable political snares, to decree the death by beheading of her cousin, Queen Martyr, Mary Stuart, the truly legitimate Catholic Queen who could have saved Great Britain from falling into Protestantism, and the world from the evils of British imperialism.

Father Luis Coloma narrates in his “La Reina Mártir” (The Martyr Queen) (ed.Austral), the demented death of Elizabeth Tudor. Could it have been a purifying punishment for her many crimes? “It saddens and afflicts the spirit to go over the long series of mishaps of the Queen of Scotland, and even gets to be outraged, to find at the end of the journey, her noble figure and her Holy cause beaten, while haughty and triumphant the repulsive Elizabeth and her heretical church, But it is not a good judge he who judges without noting the entire process ― and if the days of the impious are long, his death is certain and it comes at a point. That is why it is appropriate to examine this last page of the process of Elizabeth and compare life with life, death with death, and, up to what can be inferred, eternal destiny with eternal destiny” (page 219)

Being Elizabeth 55 years of age, and in a deplorable state, aged and ugly, toothless and bald, and above all evil, she fell hopelessly in love with one of her many lovers, only 21 years of age; he tolerated his amatory relationship with that 'ridiculous old woman' as he used to call her, to make use of her, but so disgracefully that Elizabeth, having been snubbed, in one of her hysterical outbursts, had him hanged. That is how her Calvary began; for ten days she remained, lying on the floor on a rug, like an idiot, without uttering a word or changing her position, unceasingly sucking a finger of her left hand, always the same, her eyes disengaged and fixed on the floor. “Once the first fits of rage and fury had passed, she stayed there, motionless and silent, possessed of that somber desperation which in the haughty spirits infuses the fixed and constant thought of the things that could have been and, because of our own fault, were not, and which can no longer be remedied... And without a word of remorse, or of forgiveness to ask, or of consolation she might need, her existence faded slowly in that same position... This is how Elizabeth died and this is the way her black soul fell into eternity, where one of her major torments was, without a doubt, to contemplate the glory of Mary Stuart in heaven.” She died as miserably as she had lived.

Politically, during her calamitous reign, she opened the doors to the new millionaires, a new plutocracy, who had become wealthy by stealing the property of the Church, sheltered under the Calvinist slogan; wealth sanctifies. Elizabeth lived in submission to William Cecil (Lord Burghley) the main one of them, who began governing England and Elizabeth in 1558 (Belloc “How the Reformation Happened”) “The prime task of the new millionaires, with Cecil at their head, was to uproot the Catholic Church to secure their robbery; at the same time that Elizabeth was forced to submit herself, as she was terrorized with supposed conspirations and popular Catholic rebellions. “In all important matters, she had to yield, because the royal power had already been radically weakened and that of the rich had already begun to supplant it,”

“Catholics (the petty rural nobility) were dispossessed of their property in the time of Elizabeth I of England by force of reiterated penalties imposed on those who refused to attend the Protestant 'offices'; those who said Mass or heard it or simply hid a priest, were hanged on charges of 'treason', sometimes after terrible torture” (Father Leonardo Castellani “El Apokalipsis” page 214),

But she was not far behind as regards her love of money, as with one of her other lovers and also partner, buccaneer Raleigh, considered a hero by Protestants, she organized piracy with four objectives: contraband, black slave trade, assault on Spanish galleons, and the bloody sacking of American towns by his pirates. These criminal activities of the queen and her beneficiaries had a decisive influence on British development and capitalist economic prosperity, and for that reason, they are glorified in the cinema.

To better understand her mentality and that of Protestantism with respect to Judaism, this little tale comes to mind; Cecil Roth (“The Secret Jews..”) says: “a ship with Marranos on board, which headed towards England, was captured and taken to London. Among the passengers was a Jewish woman of such beauty, that an English nobleman tried to take her as his wife; and the Tudor, also captivated by her charm, rode in the same carriage with her and ordered the liberty of all the jews. But the Hebrew “left the pomp of England for love of Judaism, leaving the philosemite queen slighted”

(t be continued)

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lunes, 24 de octubre de 2016

Some Observations on the Major Heretics who Created Protestantism, 2

Some Observations on the Major Heretics 

who Created Protestantism

(Continued)

By Horacio Bonfiglioli

Taken from: http://lascadenasdeobligado.blogspot.mx/2016/08/algunas-observacionessobre-los.html

Translated from the Spanish by Roberto Hope

[Translator´s note: book page numbers quoted refer to those in the Spanish editions cited]

Calvin, the most fanatical of Israel's false prophets, 

He was another one of the false prophets of Israel, the most fanatical of the Hebraists... his system was more Roman than Christian and more Jewish than the two put together. When Prophetism no longer proceeded after the incarnation of the Messiah, he fabricated a cohabitation between Jesus and Moses, giving Moses priority over Jesus, from which a dreadful religious doctrine emerged, which is still the soul of the current North American protestant sects, (in the Cadenas del Obligado blog you will be able to read about the blasphemies of Mormon James Talmage, in “El Mormonismo” which will be published shortly). Despite their having put aside certain 'stinging' Calvinist doctrines, the Protestant culture “is in its most intimate ideals, impregnated with the spirit of John Calvin”. This is how Belloc puts it ('How the Reformation Happened')... because Calvin's book, “Christian Institution” changed the future of the Protestant Reformation in its entirety... “Nowadays we can find this man's influence in unsuspected regions of thought,”. The people wanted to reform the abuses and immoralities of certain clerics, maintaining themselves within the Catholic faith, but the reformists took advantage of this to ally themselves with ambitious princes and capitalists, razing the true religion of Christ with blood and fire.

That is how a new theology arose; a new church government; a new morality; a new conception of God, “new and strange”, similar to the Manichaean, but where God is the only principle both of good and of evil, and the condemnation and sufferings in this life are the work of Him. Still worse, Nicolás (Auguste Nicolás, “Protestantismo y Comunismo” ed NOS) says that, to Calvin, “God not only sees perdition, but He premeditates it, he wants it, he pre-disposes it (250) ...and condemns us without there being a fault in our part..." Calvin did not deny the Incarnation but he forced it to wear the ancient compulsive pagan horror: fatality; and he distorted it thus. ”Christ's merits are bt an attribution and nothing more. God is Chance, and  Chance is an immutable whole. Man is condemned or saved but this does not depend on him”.

He founded his doctrine on the negation of personal liberty ― as he would say that the despotic Judeo-Calvinist Jehova would elect his saints and his damned disregarding the moral life of any of them ― and also on the negation of public liberties, under the political and social tyranny which he imposed in the name of Jehova himself. The Calvinist creed, ardently Hebraic, sought to establish a totalitarian theocracy (a new Sion), saturating public and private life with the directives of a Judaic religion, similar to the one of the Old Testament, transforming the NewTestament into the Old Testament and Christianity into Judaism.. he sees Christianity as the crowning of Judaism”... and then he affirms that “it is not Christ the object of Judaic law but the law the object of Christ”; even to the point of adulterating the doctrine of the Holy Trinity: “It is not the Holy Spirit who judges Scripture, on the contrary, Scripture is the judge... of the Holy Spirit. If this is so, the Law of the Father is the object not only of the Son but also of the Spirit: the One is the object of the Three”. Definitely, “Calvin gives the impression of not having ever understood this: Christ the Redeemer seems not to have ever come for him. Unconsciously and thinking he is serving Christ he proceeds as though He had not existed; thinking he was 'glorifying the Lord' he wanted to invert the order of things established by God over time, distort it in a monstrous deviation, thus carrying out an impossible enterprise, a crime no longer moral but metaphysical.” (Dimitri Merejkovsi in 'Calvino', ed Castelar). “Calvin suppressed that pledge of divine love (the Eucharist); suppressed Jesus Christ in the Sacrament, in the same way as Luther had suppressed Him in the teaching; and with this, he broke the communion of the hearts as Luther had broken that of the spirits.” (A. Nicolás).

Merejkovsi described dismal aspects in the building of the Genevan theocracy: ”...a census of the confession of the Calvinist faith was taken among all the population in Geneva... those who refused to go along in making an oath of professing the new creed were banished from the city... Police invaded homes and dragged the people to make their oath .., the cornerstone of the theocracy is the Calvinist creed sustained by discipline... and this by ex-communication, and then by torture... the city seethes with spies called 'guardians'...  the walls of houses are for them transparent as glass. Not only acts are monitored, but also thoughts and sentiments... Geneva was then the 'city of sorrows', Dante's Inferno ... It was thus converted into a secular world of a gigantic monastery, where the toughest discipline ruled, maintained by means of the Law, torture and fire. It was called the 'War on Happiness'. Some years later, the protestants would organize a new unhealthy Puritan Theocracy in New England, similar to that in Geneva.

“His defendants would have considered the tyranny of which posterity accused him praiseworthy,. In the struggle between liberty and authority, Calvinism sacrificed liberty... To the Calvinist at heart, the dictatorship of the ecclesiastical ministry appeared as inevitable as the Committee of Public Safety appeared to the men of 1793, or the dictatorship of the proletariat appeared to the enthusiastic Bolsheviks... The Calvinist social theory began as an authoritarian theocracy but ended up as an almost utilitarian individualism... or as a rigorous Christian Socialism, one standing out over the other in accordance with national circumstances. (Tawny op cit. Page 239, 120, etc.) Some of his followers would ask in fear whether Calvin was a saint or a demon...

Calvin, misinterpreting the Old Testament, preached that men and the entire world belonged exclusively and entirely to God... through him, as he considered himself to be administrator of the divine goods. It is not surprising, then, that Calvin and his 'puritan saints' would lay claim to imposing their ideology on the rest of Europe, in accordance with a divine mandate, they believed they had such a right on account of their condition as the pre-destined 'hand of God'. This is the idea that engendered the Anglo-Saxon imperialism. Belloc in 'Charles I' wrote. "It needs to be remembered that Calvinism was cosmopolitan, the same way as is Catholicism [but opposed in their methods: Catholicism by means of apostolate; Protestantism by means of gimmicks and violence]: a Calvinist sufficiently extremist for the purpose was ready to call foreign Scottish arms in aid against his own country. The Calvinist spirit wanted [Ënglish] foreign policy to lean towards supporting his Calvinist brethren abroad”.

With the same Genevan brutality acted the Calvinists in the English Civil War. In his same book, Belloc wrote that, after the battle of Naseby, “the Puritan soldiers finished their battle with a slaughter of women”. Then, in Chester, the end of Charles I war prowess, a small group of prisoners “surrendered [before the Puritans] on the express condition of saving their lives, but then, at the special request of the Calvinist clergy, its members were knifed. Not only were men killed but also the throats of women and children who happened to be there were slit in cold blood. This kind of brutality in the civilized English protestants was not in isolated acts, but commonplace, as Calvinists always claimed that they did that at Jehova's mandate..(I will publish Dave Armstrong's “The Protestant Inquisition, Reform, Intolerance, and Persecution”)

You will also be able to read my articles “Theological Hatred and Protestant Inquisition” and “Protestantism is an enemy of our Homeland:” These Calvinist ministers considered themselves pre-destined, and acted in a manner similar to that of the “Pilgrim Fathers”, idealized by official history, who invaded the United States, murdering the native populations, with not the least intention of evangelizing them.

Along with the creation of this totalitarian theological state, the making of the Old Testament the birth and consolidation of Capitalism, that is usury arises as a political function. In its origin, we find the barbarian theory of Judeo-Protestant pre-destination. Frederick Wilhelmsen wrote: “Although my acts are not worth one jot for my salvation, they are nevertheless a signal or a symbol of that salvation. Said differently, a man saved by God can become aware of his salvation, can separate himself from the mass of the damned, if God has blessed him with the goods of this life. Material prosperity is proof that God has elected me.” (“El problema de Occidente y los cristianos” ed del Requeté page 45). Calvinist Capitalism has then an irresistible attraction for the faithful since the more riches they own the more delightful is this earthly life and most assured is the salvation of their souls. It is the apogee of human life exalted without limits with the power of gold, without remorse whatsoever or without qualms for disobeying Christ's mandate, who had preached exactly the opposite, but rather with the satisfying certainty of the entry into Paradise, thanks to a saintly life behind the counter. These ideas completely upset the protestant social ethics and common sense. Then, it was logical that the imperious need to become rich would legalize usury, that kind of alchemy which produces gold from gold. Capitalism is then the accumulation of wealth and usury in order to acquire political power. We live in the Age of Usury. Imperialism has thus its justificative theology.

Wilhelmsen continues: “It is frequently said that Calvinism was the cause of Capitalism. This is not exactly true, Capitalism had begun to develop in England and the Netherlands before the advent of Calvinism, due to the inception of that economic transformation which later became the Industrial Revolution, and due to the decline of the guilds and of their ancient liberties because of the centralization of the states and the presence of a new class, the bourgeoisie. But nascent Capitalism received its spirit from Calvinism, which was the spur that drove men to become rich at all cost” It is logical, then, to deduce that the Judeo-Calvinists who have managed to accumulate the greatest riches in the world consider themselves to be pre-destined and inheritors of the materialistic interpretation of the Old Testament, to dominate the world. Calvinism, by means of its collateral sects, would emerge with such a strength in the United States that it would rule the religious life and the very spirit of that nation,

(ti be continued)
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lunes, 26 de septiembre de 2016

Some Observations on the Major Heretics who Created Protestantism. 1

Some Observations on the Major Heretics 

who Created Protestantism

(First in a series being published on Judeo-Protestant Imperialism)


By Horacio Bonfiglioli
Taken from: http://lascadenasdeobligado.blogspot.mx/2016/08/algunas-observacionessobre-los.html
Translated from the Spanish by Roberto Hope

[Translator´s note: book page numbers quoted refer to those in the Spanish editions cited]

It happened in a certain historical time, which Belloc called the “Dark age” because it was the preparation for the luminous splendor of the Middle Ages ― so maliciously denigrated by the enemies of Catholicism ― in which God Our Lord, maybe to test the religious integrity of men, allowed certain hurtful words to be cast to the wind, which offended human reason, mumbled by spurious philosophers and Talmudic theologians, affirming the pretension of 'deifying' man; uttered in almost unnoticed conventicles, against Aristotle's and Saint Thomas' philosophy based on the reality and the truth of beings and on human nature, in order to desacralize theology.

Luther, the friar who separated man from God:

Many years later, Luther, standing on the stump of an enormous fallen tree, in the clearing of a forest surrounding Wittenberg, casting his habit to the wind, was anointed by the furies of pride, as all around him a coven of the cursed of all times, his inspirers and servers: heretics, satanic, Talmudic, gnostics and Manichaeans, and the reneged nun, exalted with lust, gamboled at the cry of Master and lord! Then Luther, the new prophet which embodied the resentment and pride accumulated throughout the centuries, in the middle of the rabble, looking at the distance, in the valley, the towers of the Wittenberg Cathedral, began bellowing his imprecation: I am the one who is predestined to demolish them! I will put an end to the prostitute of Rome!

(This is the way I imagined this scene, as close to reality as if I had contemplated it with my own eyes, and even though, as it is to be assumed, there are no historical records to testify to that, it could have happened in no other way.)

In Si Si No No of the Summer of 2015, 'Speculator' described perfectly and definitively Luther's true personality, commenting on Professor Georg May's excellent book, “The Trap of Ecumenism”, written when 'progressive' Vaticanists began aggrandizing Luther to satisfy their ecumenical infatuation: “First of all, the initiative that the ecumenists have been pushing for a long time already, to re-evaluate Luther as though he had not been properly understood or interpreted, should be rejected. There are pious and exemplary men in Lutheranism, but its founder is not among them.” His moral and intellectual defects are very well known: a friar who broke his vows, who yielded to sensuality, to pride, to rage, and to hatred. He idolized himself (he had an astute and aggressive personality, he was a violent and very skilled polemicist and at the same time, subtle and self-confident in his hermeneutical sophistry). He would incite hatred against the Pope on the masses, making use of a mean lampoonery. It is unjust to treat him as a 'reformer'. He was a destroyer of the faith, of the Church, a sower of discord, a true Attila. He made use of the mischiefs that afflicted the militant Church of his time, as an excuse to reject the sane doctrine and substitute it with a personal interpretation of Scripture (an interpretation which tried to achieve the squaring of the circle; that is, to reconcile salvation with the liberty of an individual who wishes to go on following the impulses of the flesh and of pride)”

Free examination', the foundation of the heretic Lutheran theology, in addition to being the wellspring of all kinds of philosophical nonsense, has very grave political implications. I consider it necessary to reproduce a few paragraphs of an enlightening conference titled: “Free examination and Communism” [which we will reproduce separately in its entirety] delivered in the Hall of the Huemul Bookstore [in Buenos Aires] on April 2, 1960. in which professor Jordán Bruno Genta, with his metaphysical profundity, related the political consequences of Protestant free examination:

“What does Luther's rebellion consist of? ― Professor Genta would ask ― The true sense of the rebellion is to disintegrate Christ in the conviction of thought, it is to divide Christ because that is the secret, the key to every heresy.  Luther says: “Only faith justifies, without works, ... The only agent of salvation is God... Man is absolutely not free to do good... whatever you do in life, if you are among the called and justified, you will be saved, if you are among the damned, you will be lost.

“The eternal has been severed from the temporal; this temporal life has nothing to do with the eternal. Man's world has nothing to do with the world of God; God will have to do with Man after this life but not in this life; what is going to happen in eternity has already been resolved. Man's liberty is divided from Grace. Christ has been split, it has been divided, in Luther's thought, and this is the true origin of communism because communism is pure nihilism.

“Communism is the confusion of everything with everything, it is the confusion of all hierarchies and of all distinctions, it is the leveling at the insubstantial in the indeterminate and formless matter. All of these consequences are entailed at the moment we reject Christ, we reject Him the same way as Luther began rejecting him, letting what is human entirely freed to itself.

“This division was reflected afterward in the philosophical realm with Descartes, the father of modern philosophy. Descartes separates the truths of Faith, that is, the truths revealed about the mysteries of God, from the truths of reason. But the purpose of Faith is to understand. Faith is a grace given by God to enhance human intelligence on things that are essential ― professor Genta continues his dissertation ― which are fundamental, which are the things about God, the things about the soul, and the things about the destiny of man. Faith is something to make the mind more powerful for the end to which he was created. And, logically, once human intelligence has been severed from the faith, under the pretext that reason had been the servant of the Faith and of Religion ― as though being subordinated to what comes from God Himself were not its proper place ― the contemplative life of intelligence had to become extinguished little by little, and the intelligence had to be promoted ever more exclusively in the handling of temporal things... [and thus] the sense of the question of man and his destiny has been lost, that which even pagans had had.

“And so, what happened after this division of the truths of faith and the truths of reason? It happened that theology and metaphysics were eliminated from civil life ... and man, freed to himself began to disown ― already by the Eighteenth Century ― the existence of original sin when the idea of the  Natural Goodness of Man emerges, and selfishness is made the law of nature.

“It is in this manner that such a monstrous thing as is the true revolution against Christ and against the natural order which reflects Him, is proposed; in place of the sense of natural societies, of societies which meet the demands of human nature, confirmed by divine law, as is the family, and the state itself; the political society, the perfect society in the temporal realm is reduced to such a contrived, conventional and histrionic thing which is what it means to convert it into a free association, in the product of a contract and of a convention.”

“Little by little, everything has been subordinated to the human will; little by little, man has set himself up as the starting point, as the absolute beginning, even in the order of the religious, thus the infinite variations of Protestantism; in the philosophical order, the infinite variations of subjectivism, of idealism, of immanentism in all of its forms; and, in the political order, everything is to be subjected to that liberty, to that absolute principle which man has proclaimed himself to be. The family is to become a contract, social classes to become conventions of interests, of coincidences, of group interests, of parties, and so on. Little by little, all things which refer to God, which signify the Divine Word, Creator, and Redeemer, are being torn down, all distinctions, all hierarchies, are being suppressed. And then comes the confusion of all creeds, all creeds become equally and relatively valid, all thoughts and all opinions become equally valid or invalid, and the societies where man has to conduct his life and develop his personality are also conventions and arbitrarinesses...”

Then Professor Genta quotes the famous tract “On the Community of Goods”, written in 1535 by the great Spanish humanist, Juan Luis Vives: “In other times, in Germany, matters of piety were constituted in such a manner that they maintained themselves stable in the most agreeable quietude. But someone turned up who dared to discuss some of those matters, moderately and timidly at first, but very soon openly, not only to dispute about them but to deny them, suppress them or reject them, displaying so much security with respect to many of them as though the objector had descended from heaven knowing God's secret designs or as though it was just a matter of sewing a shoe or a dress.... From the discrepancy of opinions, the discord of life arose, and then, those who had  aroused the war in the false name of liberty and most unjust equality of inferiors with superiors were succeeded by those that requested and demanded no longer such equality but the community of all goods”

When the barbarous notion of the Bible's free examination and this began to apply to all orders of life ― in accordance with Vives' words quoted by Professor Genta ― many bloody popular mutinies arose among the sectarians, with most cruelty on both sides, which terrified Luther,  since even though he had first incited the common people with his free examination, he then retracted himself, inciting the Princes to impose a very violent bloody repression.

On November 24, 1959, in one of his private philosophy classes, Professor Genta said: “There is a perfect continuity between Luther, Descartes, and Kant, the philosopher of secularism, of the secularization of life... Luther begins by saying that “reason does not truly grasp the spiritual”, proposition continued one century later by Descartes, who was a Catholic but molded in the Suarist spirit, reaching the conclusion of the total uselessness of speculative reason; to reconcile his Catholicism with Lutheranism, he would say that he was not so bold as to think about God....and that it was necessary to substitute scholastic speculation with a practice that makes it possible to know the functions of the soul through the body ... in other words, that everything has sprung forth from mathematical physics... In consequence, in the realm of science and of praxis we have the progression of secularism and modernism both derived from Protestantism. This idea, that everything ends in the use of things, this exaltation of the praxis is nothing but the ultimate consequence of the religious rebellion against the fixedness and unity of Truth. Shattered this unity of the Truth, from which all other truths derive, we would arrive at materialism.

“Luther severed reason from faith, radically denigrating human reason (that thing which makes us be in the likeness of our Creator). He then despised Church authority...but  “The  doctrine of Truth requires the Cathedra of Unity”, said Saint Augustine. Disregarding this Cathedra, Luther did away with the unity of reason, of interpretation. Luther is an opinion giver and behind him are a multitude of opinion givers... throwing himself into the multiplicity. Dionysius said that multiplicity always participates in unity for being to occur. Where that multiplicity cannot refer itself to the unity of being, chaos results.  The character of the multiple is participating of the one... Free examination applied to divine matters is communism ... Luther put himself above Peter´s Cathedra. What equality is not to be reclaimed after this one? What is interesting is the leveling of judgment in the interpretation of God´s Word; the latter disappears amidst the opinions.

This is how the learned English historian, R. H. Tawney, (Religion in the Origin of Capitalism) commented: “Above all, the peasant war, with its emotive appeal to the Gospel and its tremendous catastrophe, not only terrified Luther, moving him to declare: 'To him, one who can in this way attack, bite, strangle or stab, in secret or in public... so marvelous are these times, that a prince can make himself worthy of heaven, better by shedding blood than by elevating his prayers to God...' and in one of his public writings, inciting the mob: 'it is licit to use all kinds of arms against the Pope and the Cardinals, and wash our hands in their blood' (cited by Father Hartmann Grisar in a book which is indispensable to understand Protestantism; 'Martín Lutero, su vida y su obra' ed. Victoriano Suárez, Madrid.― English edition: 'Martin Luther, his life and work'  Arthur Preuss, editor,

Luther's hate of the Pope broke out like a plague when his pride rejected the just condemnatory sentence of his work and his polemics. In one of his writings, he says “(Catholic) hierarchy should be suppressed, and civil power (the Protestant German princes) has power over her... such secular authority power should be exercised against the priests, the bishops, and the Pope”... in that way instituting the right of the State to act against the Church... So much is this so, that “in reality, the Prince Elector, John of Saxony, has been the true patron of Lutheranism, and the true promoter of the progress of Protestantism...” (page 235)

It happened then that Luther could only rest on the power of the princes, the State church becoming a necessity.

“Ín the early Sixteenth Century”, wrote Father Castellani in a tremendous book, Cristo y los Fariseos (Jauja ed. page 20) [Christ and the Pharisees] “If half of Europe ended up following and embracing the religious rebellion it was because all Europe was sunk in the greatest religious crisis in world's history ― the one before last. Phariseeism was about to drown religion. Externalities devoured the faith... But Protestantism did not remedy the wrong but made it worse.” Protestantism took on popular indignation against 'indulgences´, protested, handed the sects over to the public power, kept on protesting, and left it at that; “to live protesting is not a religious ideal”. It is a negative way of trying to survive. Handing the sects over to the princes became graver to such a degree, that Protestantism is nowadays a religion manipulated by the State.

Despite that, Protestants and ´progressive´ Catholics hypocritically criticize these days what they call the ´Constantinian' Church since they argue that it was subjected to the State. This was not so, it is simply another lie with which they think they can satisfy their 'Jehova'; to lie for a 'lofty' cause as Luther asserted. What is fundamental of this attitude is that they intend to separate the State from the Church in a Catholic country, which is the same as to degrade the State to atheism, to atheistic humanism, leaving it defenseless, with no soul, a field propitious for them to appropriate it and to sow their discord... . This political maneuver to separate the Church from Catholic states, repudiating their religious traditions, is used by them to better introduce themselves in equal terms, by means of the promoted freedom of conscience and freedom of worship, creating spiritual chaos, and even, waiting for a propitious opportunity to assault the State and convert the country into a Protestant colony.

Paradoxically, it has been demonstrated historically that these Protestants without moral scruples, lacking seriousness, maintain their sects under the sponsorship of their respective governments; in the same way, as Luther survived turning himself over to the ambitious and irreligious hands of John of Saxony, They rejected the spiritual power of the Pope, to surrender to the political power of the princes and of the oligarchy. Denying Christ´s reign over the souls, they promote the totalitarian, secular State, Marxist, or masonic, with the churches subjected, the same way as they are in the Protestant States.

The Corrupt Henry VIII, wielding greater religious powers than the Pope; 

and Archbishop Cranmer´s hatred.

The immorality into which Henry VIII fell is so well known, we think it is not necessary to repeat it here, but I must highlight some political and religious consequences of his reign, to refute some of the falsities which Protestants argue against the Church. Exactly the same thing happened in England as in Germany and in Geneva; Protestantism, separated from Rome, was converted into the State's religion;  new, secular law was imposed, thanks to which Henry VIII (the king) was, without qualification, immediately designated Head of the Church of England, as later were all the succeeding kings, both in spiritual as well as temporal matters and was the last resort to appeal on all ecclesiastical matters. In another article, we shall see the consequences of the airs of infallibility, on all orders of life, of the Yankee protestant pastors and theologians. The English Parliament, as is to be supposed, recorded this stunning innovation (in 1534) turning it into law within England. A sworn oath of loyalty to the royal supremacy was exacted from the bishops and members of monasteries. It was almost unanimously accepted” (H. Belloc, 'How the Reformation Happened')

Tawney in his quoted book denounces that Protestantism in England was saturated of an almost servile dependence on secular authorities, and that “in the Sixteenth Century the Church turned into an ecclesiastical department of the State (i.e. of the Crown), and religion was used to give moral sanction to secular policy... clerics were at the same time public officials, and the Parish was also subordinated to the King... canon law was nationalized, leaving it in the hands of citizens who acted under the Crown's authority”... and so on and so forth,

Despite the fact that Henry VIII “in his character and in his faith was deeply Catholic”, at least until defecting in front of skirts; Belloc affirms that he “broke with Rome influenced by Thomas Cromwell, a man indifferent to the national consequences as long as he could fill his pockets (Belloc 'Cómo Aconteció la Reforma” pág. 88  'How the Reformation Happened') He was a usurer and usurped a fortune which gave origin to his family´s predominance in politics until a century later emerged his descendant, the nefarious Oliver Cromwell.

Pillage, primordial characteristic of English policy, culminated, as is well known, stealing the property of the Church to enrich the noblemen and keep them under political power. W. Sombart, in “Lujo y Capitalismo” (ed. G. Dávalos ― in English: “Luxury and Capitalism”) narrates: “At the end of the War of the Two Roses, all but 29 of the houses of the ancient nobility had disappeared, and those that remained were impoverished and in a pitiful situation. The first thing that Henry VIII did was to reintegrate the power and the fortune to these stately houses, subjecting them in that way to the Crown, who from that moment on maintained its undisputed predominance over them.

Confiscation of the property of the Church gave the King the means to carry out this restoration of the nobility.” But to attain better political control, Henry VIII creates numerous new titles; better said, he sells dignities; hundreds of titles were sold during the XVII and XVIII centuries. That is how from behind the counters of the bourgeois merchants emerged the English haughty nobility which considered itself predestined to govern the world. “It is at this time, then, that the power of money begins to make its influence be felt in a notorious way, an influence which becomes decisive in the XVIII century”, Defoe says “Commerce is so far from being incompatible with the gentleman, that without circumventions commerce in England makes gentlemen: because after one or two generations the sons of merchants, or at least their grandsons, become as perfect gentlemen as those of the highest cradle or those of the most ancient families.” (page 28)

But in addition to subjecting Protestantism as State religion, which from then on it would be the characteristic relationship between the two, the substitution of the Holy Mass by the Protestant Meal was consummated by Archbishop Cramner. In Si Si No No of March 2014, I read an interesting article commenting Michael Davies' book “The Anglican Liturgical Reformation”, an important work because it makes us understand that the creation of the Anglican Meal was introduced in England in a stealthy way, with ambiguous texts and implicit heresies, so as not to frighten the faithful which passed inadvertently to the educated few. To achieve this end, Anglicanism imposed a book, insignificant in appearance, the Book of Common Prayer, the character of which was so prodigiously ambiguous that the 'conservatives' would accept it without the 'progressives' rejecting it.

The arguments adduced by Davies are impressing [...] Cramner was a crypto-Lutheran and already had been married under the reign of Henry VIII; the King named him Archbishop of Canterbury; the Pope excommunicated him for having declared Henry VIII´s marriage with Ann Boleyn valid [...] But as Henry VIII would not have permitted entry of heresy in his kingdom, Cramner waited until the reign of Eduard VI, “and began to protestantize the nation, transforming the cult in a Lutheran way” [...]; Cramner “conceived the audacious purpose of modifying the faith of the English people radically, resorting only to the transformation of the liturgy, In accordance with the lex orandi, lex credendi axiom, liturgy is, in effect, the faith prayed. If the way of praying is changed, the faith also mutates. In England the unforeseen and en masse change of an entire people had not as its principal cause the preaching of a reformer, as was the case of Luther in Germany or Calvin in Switzerland, because Cramner judged that through liturgy he would change mentalities with greater effectiveness than by means of any sermon [...]; but little by little he eliminated sixteen prayers from the Catholic Missal to erase the idea of satisfactory and propitiatory sacrifice [These omissions are perfectly described in Hugh Ross Williamson´s Historical Summary of the Introduction of Protestantism in England” “Resumen Histórico de la Introducción del Protestantismo en Inglaterra” published in Spanish in www.statveritas,com.ar] Cramner was successful, eliminated Catholicism in England in an inconceivable way, achieving an almost general apostasy, affirmed definitively during Elizabeth's reign: Catholics who perceived the heretical change and resisted were savagely martyred and murdered by the protestant Inquisition. Without the Church, without the Holy Mass, England was left in the impious hands of the 'predestined Jehova's saints', which went on building the imperialism that devastated the world.

A parenthesis: Davies' article also demonstrates that the creation of the Novus Ordo Mass by Paul VI, the crypto Lutheran mass of 1969 was a masterful move, since it is similar to Cramner's Protestant Meal in a scandalous way, as was denounced by so many priests. Then the anti-modernist environment's erosion was secured with the indult given by John Paul II in 1984, and lastly, with Benedict XVI the Roman Apostolic Rite is intended to be bastardized by mixing it with the Novus Ordo, to attain a third most novel mass.”  The method employed by Vatican II was similar: write ambiguous texts which may be interpreted in one way or another, creating confusion, bewilderment, and perplexity, which is how modernism enters.

Concluding this rough sketch I quote this paragraph from Vicente Sierra´s “Historia de la Argentina”, demonstrating that Anglicanism appealed to blood and fire against those who did not accept its heresy: “England's Henry VIII, in the space of thirty-eight years, sent to death two queens, two cardinals, two archbishops, eighteen bishops, thirteen abbots, five hundred priors and monks, thirty-eight doctors, twelve dukes and counts, hundred and sixty-four gentlemen, hundred and twenty-four plain citizens and hundred and ten plain women”


(To be continued)
Go to Part 2

domingo, 11 de septiembre de 2016

Malos Teólogos de la Moral (MTM)

Malos Teólogos de la Moral (MTM)


por Kevin Aldrich


  Tomado de: http://www.catholicstand.com/bad-moral-theologians-bmts/
4 de agosto AD2016

Traducido del inglés por Roberto Hope

Hay cosas malas que alguna gente de veras, de veras quiere hacer. Hay alguna gente que no sólo quiere hacer cosas malas, sino que también quiere estar justificado de hacerlas. Quieren que otros digan que sus obras malas son buenas-

Entonces ¿qué hacer si uno es uno de ésos? Llamar a un Mal Teólogo de la Moral, Lo llamaré MTM para abreviar.

Repasemos algunos de los fundamentos:

En la auténtica teología moral católica, para decidir si un acto es bueno o malo, lo examinamos desde tres ángulos. Primero consideramos el objeto, luego la intención, y por último las circunstancias.

El objeto es el acto en sí mismo: cosas como hacer un donativo, decir una oración, hacer una tarea, tomar un bien ajeno, hacer trabajo por un salario, o un billón de cosas más.

Según el Catecismo,”El objeto que se elige especifica moralmente el acto de la voluntad, en la medida en que la razón reconoce y juzga si está en conformidad con el verdadero bien. Las normas objetivas de moral expresan el orden racional del bien y del mal, atestiguadas por la conciencia,” (CIC 1751). Usando nuestra razón, entonces, juzgamos si el acto será objetivamente bueno o malo en sí mismo.

La intención es el motivo para qué se hace el acto, por ejemplo, atenuar el sufrimiento de alguien, evangelizar, poner a alguien en aprietos, saciar el hambre física, lograr un pago, o experimentar placer.

Las circunstancias son las cosas que rodean el acto y que lo afectan. Por ejemplo, robar es malo, pero tomar una libra de arroz de una tienda Whole Foods en San Francisco no es tan malo como tomarlo de una viuda y sus hijos hambrientos en Calcuta. Decir la verdad es bueno, pero decir la verdad aun teniéndose el temor de que eso lo meta a uno en problemas porque uno hizo algo malo, podría ser todavía mejor.

Aquí van dos verdades básicas importantes de la moral:

La primera es una que la mayoría de la gente entiende: un acto cuyo objeto es bueno en sí mismo puede hacerse aun mejor por la intención o las circunstancias, pero también las circunstancias pueden hacer el acto peor o de plano malo.

Por ejemplo, cuando alguien te ha prestado un bien de su propiedad, es bueno devolvérselo, Sin embargo ¿qué pasa si el bien es una escopeta y cuando el propietario te la pide está borracho y furioso? Si se lo devolvieras en esas circunstancias, tu acto sería malo. O si le devolvieras el arma porque crees que el amigo que te la prestó atacará con ella a tu enemigo, tu mala intención haría malo el acto. De hecho para que un acto sea bueno, el objeto, la intención y las circunstancias deben también ser buenas.

Así pues, cuando evaluamos un acto cuyo objeto es bueno en sí mismo, no podremos saber completamente si el acto es moralmente bueno o malo hasta que tomemos en consideración la intención y las circunstancias.

La segunda verdad básica de la moralidad de un acto es algo muy confundido hoy en día y mucha gente lo entiende mal:

Un acto cuyo objeto es malo en sí mismo, no puede volverse bueno por más que se tenga una buena intención o lo rodee cualquier tipo de circunstancias. La intención y las circunstancias pueden hacer el acto menos malo, pero no pueden hacerlo bueno. Esta es la razón por la que matar directamente a una persona inocente, que es el objeto de actos tales como el aborto, el asesinato o la eutanasia, es intrínsecamente inmoral. Ninguna multitud de buenas intenciones o de circunstancias extenuantes pueden excusar el acto, y mucho menos hacerlo bueno.

Entran los MTMs


La razón por la que mucha gente está confundida acerca de esta última verdad es porque muchos sacerdotes y laicos fueron enseñados por los MTMs. en sistemas erróneos de teología moral

Estos MTMs dicen: “Sí, hay normas objetivas de moral que se expresan en los diez mandamientos o en la ley moral natural. Pero esas son recomendaciones, puntos de partida, principios abstractos. Deben ubicarse en las experiencias concretas vividas por la gente.”

Estos MTMs arguyen que las motivaciones y las circunstancias podrían invalidar los principios y hacer que algo malo se convierta en bueno.

Juan Pablo II criticó y condenó estos sistemas en su encíclica Veritatis Splendor (1993)

Crítica de Juan Pablo II

Esto es lo que escribió Juan Pablo II:

Algunos han propuesto una especie de doble estatuto de la verdad moral.  Además del nivel doctrinal y abstracto, sería necesario reconocer la prioridad de una cierta consideración existencial concreta. (VS 56).

Los MTMs dicen que cuando la ley moral objetiva y la situación real de una persona están en conflicto, la situación de la persona tiene “prioridad” sobre la ley moral objetiva.

El Papa pasa a decir, refiriéndose a la situación del individuo:

Ésta, teniendo en cuenta las circunstancias y la situación, podría establecer legítimamente unas excepciones a la regla general y permitir así la realización práctica, con buena conciencia, de lo que está calificado por la ley moral como intrínsecamente malo.

En otras palabras, una persona que se guíe por el consejo de los MTMs podría hacer algo que la ley moral determina ser intrínsicamente malo, como robar, engañar, o utilizar drogas, cuando en realidad esa especie de teología moral errónea usualmente no se aplica para aquellos tipos de pecados. Con frecuencia se usa para acciones que tienen que ver con el sexo, como fornicación, adulterio, sodomía, contraconcepción, aborto, fertilización in vitro, y cosas parecidas.

Siguiendo esa línea de razonamiento engañoso, el papa explica:

De ese modo se establece una separación, o aun una oposición en algunos casos, entre la enseñanza del precepto, que es válida en lo general, y la norma de la conciencia individual, que es la que tomaría la decisión final acerca de lo que es bueno y lo que es malo. (VS 56)

En otras palabras, el MTM diría, “Sí, el adulterio en general es malo, pero no en tu caso” o “Tú eres el único que puede decidir si lo que estás haciendo es bueno o malo”.

¿Qué hay detrás de la línea de pensamiento del MTM? Juan Pablo II lo explica de esta manera:

Sobre esta base se hace un intento de legitimizar las llamadas soluciones 'pastorales' que son contrarias a las enseñanzas del Magisterio, y justificar una hermenéutica 'creativa' según la cual la conciencia moral no está de manera alguna obligada, en todos los casos, a cumplir un precepto negativo particular. (VS 56)

En otras palabras, aun cuando el Sexto Mandamiento (“un precepto negativo particular”) diga “No habrás de cometer adulterio,” el MTM tendrá una manera de interpretarlo en tu caso, que te dejará cometerlo de todos modos.

Es complicado – o no

En realidad, el proceso de razonamiento moral es muy claro y directo en lo que concierne a las cosas que la ley moral no permite.

Digamos que yo quiero hacer el acto sexual con una determinada persona. Primero, traigo a mi mente la ley moral, que es también la Ley de Dios, “de conformidad con el bien verdadero.” Ésta dice que yo puedo hacer el acto sexual sólo con mi legítima esposa. Luego, utilizando mi capacidad de razonar, me hago la pregunta “¿Es esta persona, con la que deseo hacer el acto sexual, mi legítima esposa?”. Finalmente, utilizo mi razón para llegar a una conclusión. Si la respuesta es no, entonces la conclusión será “no debo hacerlo”.

Cuando se trata de preceptos morales negativos ¿por qué se ponen complicadas las cosas? Una razón son los MTMs. Otra es que a la gente le gusta que se le mienta si eso les deja hacer lo que quieren.

Con frecuencia, a la gente le gusta engañarse a sí misma por esa misma razón.
Hay cosa malas que algunas personas de veras, de veras quieren hacer. Hay alguna gente que no sólo quiere hacer malas cosas sino también tener justificación para hacerlas. Quieren que los demás digan que están haciendo bien. Los MTMs son los facilitadores.

lunes, 5 de septiembre de 2016

El Mártir que obsesionaba a Isabel I

El Mártir que obsesionaba a Isabel I

 

Reseña del libro: Edmund Campion, escrito por Gerard Kilroy, publicado por Ashgate.

Por Simon Caldwell

CatholicHerald.co.uk/commentandblogs/2016/03/03/the-martyr-who-haunted-elizabeth-i/

Tomado de: http://angelqueen.org/2016/03/04/the-martyr-who-haunted-elizabeth-i/


De todos los mártires isabelinos, sin duda el más ilustre fue Sir Edmundo Campion. Un académico profundamente santo y respetado internacionalmente, que en otra época habría alcanzado la santidad por la erudita contribución que habría hecho a la vida de la Iglesia y a la sociedad en general. Pero en la turbulencia sangrienta de la Reforma Protestante, “la mayor gloria de Dios” sería hallada por él en un via crucis en el que participaba la cámara de tortura de la Torre de Londres y el cadalzo de Tyburn.

Es extraño que un hombre de tan ejemplar virtud y vastos  conocimientos hubiera sido sujeto a más sentencias de tortura que ninguna otra persona en la historia de Inglaterra. Su tortura, junto con su ejecución pública, en diciembre de 1581, escandalizaron a Europa y fue objeto de controversia por décadas, obsesionando a Isabel hasta su muerte en 1603.

Se han escrito varias grandes biografías sobre “El Diamante de Inglaterra”; más notablemente aquéllas escritas por Evelyn Waugh y Richard Simpson. Esta nueva biografía es una valiosa adición al canon. Kilroy nos da un soberbio retrato del carácter y las cualidades que hicieron de Campion un hombre tan grandemente respetado, y nos ofrece una vívida percepción de su vida espiritual.

A todo lo largo, Kilroy llega a extremos para enfatizar el desagrado del santo de meterse en la política y las luchas de poder de su época. Esto parece incluir algunas intervenciones papales, dado que Campion estaba en desacuerdo con Regnans in excelsis, la extralimitada bula de San Pio V, que excomulgó a Isabel e hizo a su régimen tan criminalmente paranóico acerca de la agitación católica que se suscitó por aquéllo que ahora llamamos “cambio de régimen”. Es aquí donde Kilroy va más allá de una hagiografía y nos conduce a través de las motivaciones, tanto de los católicos ingleses que tomaban enormes riesgos para aferrarse a su fe, como de las autoridades, desesperadas por suprimirla.

Quizás más que en cualquier biografía anterior. Kilroy conecta el destino de Campion con la rebelión católica de Irlanda, del Dr. Nicholas Sander, y el temor de que se extendiera a otras partes del reino, así como con la hostil reacción protestante inglesa al cortejo de Isabel por el Duque de Anjou, un católico francés.

Kilroy desecha algunos gastados prejuicios históricos, como aquéllos expresados más recientemente en God's Traitors (Traidores de Dios) de Jesse Childs, de que Campion era algo así como un maniático que sembraba el caos en las vidas de los católicos comunes, al insistir en que debían rehusarse totalmente a asistir a los servicios religiosos de la Iglesia de Inglaterra.

Ciertamente, Campion sostenía esa política pero, ni era suya ni era de los Jesuitas, habiendo ya sido acordada mediante una convocación de destacados seglares y sacerdotes diocesanos. Mas bien, por obediencia religiosa, regresó a Inglaterra a administrar sacramentos y predicar el Evangelio entre los católicos pero fue atrapado por los acontecimientos, con frecuencia más allá de su conocimiento y, no se diga, fuera de su control.

Para Kilroy, Campion jamás fue un traidor, punto que se enfatiza en su conclusión de que Campion se reunió con Isabel en secreto y la reconoció como su verdadera soberana. Kilroy piensa que ella le ofreció un arzobispado si él aceptaba prestar sus servicios en la iglesia establecida de ella. Días después, fue condenado como traidor por un régimen que no tenía manera de responder a sus argumentos. Isabel, por su parte, repudió su juicio y su ejecución, culpando de ellos a su Consejo de Asesores.

También dijo ella que no creía que los sacerdotes que vinieran a Inglaterra fueran traidores, pero de todos modos los veía como servidores de sus enemigos; el estado, por lo tanto, no haría distinción entre el ministerio pastoral y la rebelión. El martirio de Campion, mientras tanto, vigorizó la causa católica, y el temor que esto infundió en el régimen condujo al reino de terror que duró décadas.

domingo, 4 de septiembre de 2016

Personajes de la Reforma

Revisitando “Personajes de la Reforma”, de Hilaire Belloc


Por K. V. Turley
Tomado de: http://www.catholicworldreport.com/Blog/4927/revisiting_bellocs_characters_of_the_reformation.aspx July 16, 2016 12:00 EST

Traducido del inglés por Roberto Hope

Este estudio, publicado hace 80 años, demuestra cómo la historia toma forma y es marcada por el carácter de hombres y mujeres.

En estos días de confusión, cuando el bien es atacado y el mal es elogiado, se está re-escribiendo el pasado. En ningún lugar se nota más que en la inversión reciente de la historia de la Reforma en Inglaterra, ahora con Tomás Moro como villano y Tomas Cromwell como héroe.

Confrontados con esto, y cumpliéndose el año próximo el quinto centenario de las Noventaycinco Tésis de Lutero, nos parece oportuno tomar y leer Personajes de la Reforma de Hilaire Belloc.

Belloc pudiera requerir poco de presentación para nuestros lectores. Sólo la amplitud de los temas que abarcó puede equipararse con su prodigiosa producción. Al igual que su contemporáneo y amigo, G.K. Chesterton, Belloc produjo,  año tras año, poesía, prosa, novelas, ensayos, biografías, historias, polémicas; con temas que van de política a teoría económica; de viajes a pie a cruceros en alta mar; de historia de la Iglesia a detalladas historias militares. Éste fue un escritor católico tan activo creativamente como involucrado en los debates y controversias de su época.

Innecesario es decirlo, Belloc fue un escritor dotado, algo que sus críticos tuvieron que admitir. Tenía un modo de escribir que parecía tan natural como convincente. En lo mejor  escrito uno encuentra una mente y una personalidad; en el caso de Belloc, uno encuentra inteligencia y fuerza, ritmo y mordacidad.

Personajes de la Reforma fue publicado hace 80 años, en 1936 (también, el pasado 16 de julio fue el aniversario de la muerte de Belloc, y el 27 de julio fue el 146° aniversario de su nacimiento [y, casualmente, el 80° de mi nacimiento – nota de éste su poco discreto traductor]) La obra consiste en 23 retratos y un ensayo introductorio. De Enrique VIII a Luis XIV, los personajes abarcan desde el ocaso del siglo XV hasta la cruda nueva realidad del XVIII. Al principio del libro, Europa — excepto partes del Este, ortodoxas o bajo la cimitarra del Turco — estaba unida en una sola fe, a su cabeza el Obispo de Roma. Como sabemos demasiado bien, esta unidad habría de fracturarse. Para cuando murió Luis XIV en 1715, Europa todavía era predominantemente católica, pero estaba dividida, con una cierta estabilidad luego de casi doscientos años de derramamientos de sangre a lo largo y ancho de las tierras cristianas.

De entonces en adelante, la que había sido más débil —política, militar y numéricamente — Europa protestante, habría de expanderse de una manera que no podía haberse previsto: principalmente mediante el poderío marítimo de algunas de las naciones, y los imperios y riquezas subsiguientes que fluían de y hacia ellas. Belloc fue muy hábil para hacer referencia a esos grandes movimientos de la historia y, al hacerlo, deja al lector sintiendo que esos mismos movimientos siguen siendo muy relevantes para el siglo XX.

El genio de este libro no radica, sin embargo, en ese análisis. Más bien en el uso que hace de la historia personal de estos 23 hombres y mujeres — vidas que, para bien o para mal, fueron arrastradas a la vorágine de los tiempos en que vivieron. De manera significativa, Belloc ve la historia como algo que fluye del carácter. Es de esta fuente que se hacen decisiones que, dados los tiempos y la prominencia de los caracteres de este libro, resultan en consecuencias profundas. Si a Usted le gusta la historia contada a través de los personajes que la moldearon, entonces no busque más. No simplemente historiador, Belloc es también un juez experto del carácter. Ve derecho a través de las diversas maquinaciones para alcanzar al autoengaño que yace detrás de ellas. A las vidas de estos 23 personajes de la Reforma, él une muchas otras vidas y formas de vivir, antes de abrir la narrativa entera a la gran corriente de la historia. En este proceso, ve uno cómo las cosas pequeñas, algunas con frecuencia intensamente personales, tienen repercusiones que siguen afectándonos en nuestros días.

En este libro están los usuales personajes que uno esperaría encontrar: Tudores y Estuardos, reyes y reinas, la Reina Catalina de Aragón y Ana Bolena, Cromwell, y más, pero hay otros menos conocidos para el lector general. Y algunos de ellos son los verdaderos arquitectos de la Reforma en Inglaterra, Cecil, el más notable, así como Cramner y Laud, en tanto que otros son los manipuladores del poder que utilizaron la Reforma como excusa para moldear a Europa para fines tanto políticos como religiosos. En este aspecto, Richelieu sale mal librado, poniendo a Francia por encima de la fe; Jaime I, sorprendentemente, un poco menos, Hay otras sorpresas. Descartes y Pascal aparecen también. No son tanto personajes de la Reforma, sin embargo, aparecen como figuras que representan lo que surgió de ella. El lienzo de Belloc es vasto. Comenzando con los Tudor, acabamos con la llegada de Guillermo de Orange — alguien a quien Belloc particularmente aborrecía, casi tanto como a Oliverio Cromwell.

Esto nos lleva al antepasado de ese personaje, Tomás Cromwell, Dado que recientemente se ha estado re-escribiendo quién y qué fue el primer Cromwell, uno se preguntaría ¿qué escribió Belloc de él? Es interesante observar que él concordaría con los revisionistas en una conclusión importante: específicamente que Cromwell era un hombre de genio. Belloc lo pinta como un hombre sin pasado pero determinado a arrebatar el futuro, movido únicamente por una sagacidad nativa, aguzada con la lectura de Maquiavelo. Belloc le toma la medida. Él piensa que el papel de Cromwell está subestimado en los libros de historia de entonces, Uno se preguntaría ¿qué pensaría Belloc de la moda actual de ensalzar a Tomás Cromwell?

Esa búsqueda de la verdad histórica exige simplificación. Belloc tiene un modo de desenmarañar hasta las historias más complicadas, las dinásticas en particular, y, de esa manera las hace no solamente narrativas comprensibles sino convincentemente diferentes de aquéllas que sus contemporámeos habían sido hechos creer.

Tomen, por ejemplo, la casa de Orange y su tan cacareado “protestantismo”. De hecho, su religión tenía más que ver con los piratas ingleses que abordaban los navíos españoles cargados de tesoros que venían del Nuevo Mundo y, haciéndolo, precipitaron una crisis económica dentro del Imperio Español. Esto tuvo como resultado que se impusieran tributos en el Flandes español, lo que, a su vez, dio combustible, y resguardo, a la guerra que se llevaba entre los Reformadores nativos y sus gobernantes católicos, alterando el curso de la nación holandesa y, con el tiempo, también de las Islas Británicas.  Ésta es una versión más miserable de la historia, admito yo,  una basada en la economía y el poder — o dicho más sencillamente, de avaricia y orgullo — más que de teología. Belloc no tiene tiempo para versión alguna de lo que entonces era la 'historia recibida': la versión político-liberal de la historia. Ésta era la historia nacional inventada por la oligarquía inglesa que había triunfado. En vez de ella, narra los hechos, y son éstos por sí solos los que exoneran o condenan.

El asociar la revolución protestante del siglo XVI con la acumulación de riqueza personal es una de las más notables características del libro. Belloc pone de cabeza el mito entonces aceptado de un distanciamiento popular de Roma. La Reforma en Inglaterra para muchos, si no para todos, no fue una disputa teológica con principios. En lugar de ello, fue para los poderosos y los ya ennoblecidos un medio de volverse todavía más poderosos, tanto política como económicamente. Esto se hizo a costa de la mayoría del populacho y de su fe de siglos, que ya se habia vuelto una inconveniencia que tenía que desecharse mediante mentiras patrocinadas por el Estado y por la fuerza de ser necesario.

En la Inglaterra de 1930, el pensamiento de Belloc sobre los hechos del siglo XVI estaba lejos de ser la opinión aceptada. Si no una 'herejía' formal para la clase dirigente de entonces, por lo menos la de Belloc era una interpretación que hubieran preferido no ver propagada. No obstante, a lo largo del texto, Belloc es como un hábil cazador que constantemente tiene a la historia político-liberal en la mira.

En su campaña de 1906 para ser elegido Miembro del Parlamento, representando a Salford South, Belloc fue abucheado por ser 'papista'. Sacando su rosario del bolsillo respondió: “Señor, tanto como me es posible, oigo misa todos los días y cada noche me pongo de rodillas y rezo con estas cuentas. Si eso le ofende, entonces ruego a Dios que me libre de la indignidad de representarlo a Usted en el Parlamento.” Fue elegido. Su desilusión posterior con la política — habría de abandonar el Parlamento luego de un único período — habría de dejar por lo menos un resultado positivo: le dió más tiempo para su carrera literaria.

De esa salida tan pronta, debemos estar agradecidos, no en menor grado por sus libros tales como Personajes de la Reforma. En éste y sus otros escritos, Belloc empuñó la espada de la verdad, abriéndose paso entre un breñal de mentiras que en los siglos que pasaron  habían sido eregidas alrededor de esos hechos históricos tempranos. De esa manera, ayudó a que se diera una auténtica revisión de todo ese período. Los revisionistas de hoy en día harían bien en recordar que, no importando qué tan ampliamente se hayan dicho mentiras, al final solamente conjuran la irrealidad. Con Hilaire Belloc, tenemos no sólo un compañero valiente, sino a un hombre honesto.

lunes, 29 de agosto de 2016

A prophet of the end of times. VI

Reverend Father Leonardo Castellani
 

A prophet of the end of times


By Father Juan Carlos Ceriani

Translated from the Spanish by Roberto Hope


Part VI and Conclusion



The preceding text implies a whole spirituality. Nothing better than to express it poetically as did Father Leonardo Castellani in his poem No hago nada (I do nothing), published in Los Papeles de Benjainín Benavides, page 399, and in El Libro de las Oraciones, page 385:
Heart, stand there firm and without budging
to the iniquitous oppresion and effrontery
although I am crazed, I my art do posses
for anger often turns into injured patience
Fighting unarmed but for my saddened heart
against the worst of evils that there are
I fight and bleed but do not hit the dust
I do not much, but more than I can do.
A hardened sentry
I do not let suspect that I am wounded,
nor do I let them know that I'm afraid,
injured and frozen, hold the flag erect
and the inhospitable foxhole not desert.
Although I know that death has overcome me
I´m still on foot and, facing her, keep upright
transmitting the SOS signal of the fight
to some reinforcements that will never come
but a moment too late, if they do at all
and that dead on my feet is how they'll find me...
The other half 'll be done over my grave
by some other poor wretch after I am dead.
Heart, your half 's already been completed!

D) Two combats,.. Two tactics

As a synthesis of our reflection on all of these texts, it is only left for us to say that it is more evident every time that the counterrevolutionary struggle comprises two combats which are to be conducted at two different times: a conservation combat of resistance and a combat to re-establish the Kingdom of Christ the King.

In the first place, we must combat to hold the last bastions that still remain. It is necessary, by all means, to keep our Seminaries, our Novitiates, our Priories, our Chapels, our Mass Centers, our Retreats and Retreat Houses, our Catholic Families, our Schools and Associations, our Publications...

Over these innumerable conservation commitments, the combat for the re-establishement of the Kingdom of Our Lord Jesus Christ will be waged.

These two struggles have their times and will have, at some moment, the same combatants. It is very important not to confuse both combats; it is necessary to distinguish them, because they have different objectives, and for the same reason, they have different tactics.

Very often, the erroneous behaviors of the traditionalist chiefs and soldiers are due to an incomprehension that exists with respect to these two combats and their objectives. That is to say, it is thought very often that there is only one combat and the objectives of the conservation battle are confused with the ends of the subsequent struggle; the part that corresponds to men is mixed with the actions that have to be done by Christ the King and his Most Holy Mother. Therefore, it is of the greatest importance to consider the tactics of these two superimposed confrontations.

How should the defensive, conservation combat be fought? Before all, it is necessary to make two clarifications: this battle points to secondary objectives only, and no extraordinary divine assistance is given to it.

Additionally, this battle possesses peculiarities which depend on its historical roots and impose three limits on the combatants, which should be respected:

1) The mission of the counterrevolutionary forces is not one of rupture, but of resistance, to conserve the remains. The spontaneous tendency of our ranks is toward restoration, but the battle we should wage is not a scuffle of rupture, of assault. The means at our disposal are not supplied to try to break the siege. Our mission is to watch, conserving the remains which will perish. If we were to attempt the rupture, we would get the tactic wrong.

2) The counterrevolutionary forces are humanly impotent. The battle of conservation is carried out by a minority, vigorous and courageous certainly, but humanly impotent. The revolutionary forces are impregnable. The enemy has built up a close siege which, though artificial, is imposed in an absolute way. The counterrevolutionary forces are incessantly neutralized, mutilated and annihilated.

3) The counterrevolutionary forces are constrained by means of the revolutionary «legality» which, additionally, will be more rigorous every day, reducing our means of defense more every time. The counterrevolutionaries are conscious of defending God's rights against the power of the Beast. It is from that source that they extract their zeal and their confidence. But they too easily imagine that this position of principle gives them a juridical preeminence over the secular State. It is now too late to demand recognition of the rights of the Church from the secular State, to pretend the recognition of Jesus Christ's rights from the apostate State, to expect recognition of the rights of God from the godless State. In the combat we carry out, we are constrained to the means of revolutionary «legality»
The ulterior battle, the one which will have as an objective to tear off the power from the Beast and restore it to Christ the King, will be a personal act of God. Nevertheless, the Divine Teacher expects that the small number take part by means of prayer and penitence, to remove the obstacle which opposes the Divine action, and to a certain extent, to unleash it.

The situation is such, that we take part in a conservation combat and in a preparatory combat by means of prayer at the same time. It is necessary to be men of action to assume the custody of the remnants, and to be men of prayer to take part in the battle of supplication.

These two attitudes are difficult to reconcile; this explains the divergencies in the appreciation of priorities. What should be privileged, action or prayer? This problem, of the cohabitation of the man of action and the man of prayer is resolved, knowing that there is time for prayer that must precede action, and a time for action that should follow prayer. Moreover, we have to be very active in contemplation and very contemplative in action; to stay and at the same time leave, leave and at the same time stay.

While we combat keeping our posts of resistance, by prayer and penitence we shall obtain the divine decision of doing mercy, we will advance the triumph of the immaculate Heart of Mary and the definitive re-establishment of the Kingdom of Christ the King.

Conclusion

We want to conclude this work with the ending words of the quoted text of Monsignor Marcel Lefebvre:

There would be two congresses, the universal political one which will rule the world and the congress of religions which would go in aid of this world government . We run the risk of seeing these two events coming. It is necessary to prepare ourselves. But then, facing these things, what ought we do?

In his Encyclical on Freemasonry, Pope Leo XIII said: They want to destroy the Christian institutions from end to end. That is their objective. Well, they are accomplishing it.

We have to rebuild them. Facing this destruction we have to rise. We have to re-construct the Social Kingdom of Our Lord Jesus Christ in this Christian world about to disappear.

You will say: «But Monsignor, it is the fight of David against Goliath» Yes, I know, but David came out the victor. How did he gain such victory? With a small rock he went to look for in the torrent. What is the rock we have? Jesus Christ our Lord.

We will say like our Vendeean ancestors, who shed their blood for their faith: «We have no other honor than the honor of Jesus Christ, we have not more than one fear in this world, and it is that of offending Jesus Christ» This is what they sung when they marched to their death in defense of their God.

We will also sing with ardor, with all our heart «We have not but one love, and this is Jesus Christ our Lord, and we have not more than one fear, which is that of offending Him»