HENRY MATTHEW ALT

TO GIVE A DEFENSE

Month: November 2016

Sorry, but I’ve changed my mind about Pope Francis.

BY: Henry Matthew Alt • November 30, 2016 • Amoris Laetitia; Pope Francis

I want to believe Amor­is Laeti­tia is con­sis­tent with Famil­iaris Con­sor­tio. The pope says there that “in some cas­es” cou­ples who are in an irreg­u­lar union but unable to sep­a­rate for the sake of chil­dren can “receive the help of the sacra­ments.” He says that such cou­ples are in “an objec­tive sit­u­a­tion of sin,” even if “not sub­jec­tive­ly cul­pa­ble.” This is stan­dard Catholic teach­ing. If a per­son has a cocaine addic­tion, that impairs free­dom of the will suf­fi­cient­ly that there is no “sub­jec­tive cul­pa­bil­i­ty.” Of course, once he acknowl­edges this prob­lem, he needs to get help to break the addic­tion.

Jesus died for Fidel Castro. This should not be a controversy

BY: Henry Matthew Alt • November 28, 2016 • Apologetics; Exegesis

Or it should not be a con­tro­ver­sy for Catholics. I know that Calvin­ists say Christ died only for the Elect. (Though they also say we can’t know the iden­ti­ty of the Elect, and would amend my title to read, “Jesus May Have Died for Cas­tro, But We Don’t Know.”). Where­as, for Catholics (those who are right­ly cat­e­chized) if we can’t know whether Cas­tro is saved, we do know that Christ died for him. Christ died for him just as sure­ly as he died for Moth­er Tere­sa. We know this from Ezek. 18:23, 2 Cor. 5:15, 1 Tim. 2:4, 2 Pet. 3:9, and the Cat­e­chism of the Catholic Church.

How many times must Amoris Laetitia be clarified?

BY: Henry Matthew Alt • November 16, 2016 • Amoris Laetitia

I mean, real­ly, dear read­er, maybe I am a fool, but didn’t we have a clar­i­fi­ca­tion already from Car­di­nal Schon­born? I report­ed on this all the way back on May 1. If my math is cor­rect, that was two hun­dred days ago. Have peo­ple not been read­ing this blog? Lis­ten­ing to Schon­born? Back in April, the wery month the pope released Amor­is Laeti­tia, Car­di­nal Schon­born addressed “the ques­tion of this lit­tle foot­note.” That’s foot­note 351, if I may refresh your mem­o­ry, dear read­er, the smok­ing gun, the ele­phant in the cor­ner, the heresy in the Church, the pre­vail­ing of the gates of Hell …

Is criticizing priests forbidden to Catholics? In fact, we have a right to.

BY: Henry Matthew Alt • November 15, 2016 • Church Scandals

This is not anoth­er post about Fr. Pavone. But it was dur­ing a dis­cus­sion of that top­ic on Face­book that some­one made the claim that Catholics are “not allowed” to crit­i­cize priests. I am going to lim­it myself, there­fore, to that spe­cif­ic claim. I do not, here, address the top­ic of whether crit­i­cism of priests is impru­dent. Nor do I dis­cuss the extent to which we must do so in char­i­ty, or pri­vate­ly, with respect for the office, and so on. I address only the claim that it is “not allowed.” As near as I can tell, this belief has its ori­gin in an unap­proved pri­vate rev­e­la­tion.

Where is the baby now? Fr. Frank Pavone’s words are inconsistent.

BY: Henry Matthew Alt • November 14, 2016 • Blind Guides & False Prophets; Church Scandals; Politics; Pro-Life Issues

First, Fr. Frank Pavone said that the abort­ed baby he used as a prop in his pro­pa­gan­da film for Mr. Trump was “entrust­ed to us by a pathol­o­gist for bur­ial.” “We have had a funer­al,” he said on Face­book. Then, when the Nation­al Catholic Reporter fol­lowed up with this self­less man of God, Pavone said, “Oh, I’ve returned it to a Protes­tant pas­tor for bur­ial.” Now he says the funer­al direc­tor gave it to a Protes­tant pas­tor, who con­tact­ed Priests for Life and loaned them the corpse, but expect­ed it back for bur­ial. This poor baby keeps get­ting tossed around like a foot­ball.

How long has Fr. Frank Pavone had that fetus?

BY: Henry Matthew Alt • November 11, 2016 • Blind Guides & False Prophets; Church Scandals; Politics; Pro-Life Issues

A dead baby VERY SIMILAR to this one was put on pub­lic dis­play in Char­lotte before the 2012 Demo­c­ra­t­ic Nation­al Con­ven­tion. When asked what hap­pened to the baby’s remains after the “event,” which fea­tured the baby in an open cas­ket on the side­walk out­side a Catholic church … Fr. Pavone would not say any­thing oth­er than that he has a memo­r­i­al to the unborn in New York that his min­istry man­ages. The rea­son I note the sim­i­lar­i­ty … is that the bruis­ing and dis­col­oration are due to the effects of a saline abor­tion. …

But will Fr. Frank Pavone take instruction from his bishop?

BY: Henry Matthew Alt • November 10, 2016 • Blind Guides & False Prophets; Church Scandals; Politics; Pro-Life Issues

In a veiled swipe at this blog, Fr. Frank Pavone of Priests for Life petu­lant­ly stat­ed that he would “not take instruc­tion” from those who say (which I did) that his cute lit­tle stunt of turn­ing a fetus into a polit­i­cal prop for Don­ald Trump was a “sac­ri­lege.” We laity need to learn our place. How­ev­er, Fr. Pavone’s bish­op, the Most Rev. Patrick Zurek, has issued a state­ment of his own on this mat­ter, and I won­der whether Fr. Pavone will wish to “take instruc­tion” from him. Zurek’s words were stronger than mine. He called Fr. Pavone’s actions a “des­e­cra­tion of the altar.”

Our hope is in Christ, not Caesar.

BY: Henry Matthew Alt • November 9, 2016 • Politics

Trump, with­out mean­ing it, could help to reac­quaint Amer­i­can Catholics with some impor­tant fun­da­men­tals. It would be a good if he were to con­vince Catholics who have thought oth­er­wise that the solu­tion to abor­tion must be a moral solu­tion rather than a polit­i­cal one. And it would be good if he were final­ly to con­vince Catholics who have thought oth­er­wise that we must put our hopes in Christ and not in Cae­sar. Cae­sar will always betray us; Christ nev­er will. Trump will be no ally to us; if you think oth­er­wise, he will dis­abuse you of that notion.

The evil of abortion does not justify Fr. Frank Pavone.

BY: Henry Matthew Alt • November 8, 2016 • Blind Guides & False Prophets; Politics; Pro-Life Issues

Fr. Pavone, when you used the naked, burned, uncov­ered body of an abort­ed child, when you placed that child on a Catholic altar which is reserved to the cel­e­bra­tion of the Mass, and when you filmed a video so that peo­ple would vote for Mr. Trump, you did not  treat that child, made in the image of God, whose worth is beyond mea­sure, with “respect and char­i­ty.” If you claim you did, you do no hon­or to the Holy Spir­it. You do no hon­or to turn a tem­ple of the Holy Spir­it into a polit­i­cal prop. Who­ev­er does so com­mits a crime as great as abor­tion itself.

After sick political stunt, Fr. Pavone’s faculties should be suspended.

BY: Henry Matthew Alt • November 7, 2016 • Blind Guides & False Prophets; Church Scandals; Pro-Life Issues

I am going to be, excuse the pun, frank: What Fr. Pavone did was a sac­ri­lege. It is a vio­la­tion of canon law, which states that the altar is con­se­crat­ed for one pur­pose and one pur­pose only. It is con­se­crat­ed for the Holy Sac­ri­fice of the Mass, not so that a dead child can be placed there as part of a polit­i­cal stunt to lob­by for a favored pres­i­den­tial can­di­date. More than that, what Fr. Pavone did is the oppo­site of pro-life. Being pro-life is about respect­ing the dig­ni­ty of the human per­son. It is the antithe­sis of respect for the dig­ni­ty of the human per­son to use a dead child as a polit­i­cal prop.

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