De Omnibus Dubitandum Est.

Please read  Countercultural Father's blog on Cardinal Nichols' Rebuke . I join the chorus of dismay which has broken across the UK Catholic community this morning, at the bizarre phenomenon of a Cardinal Archbishop of the Catholic Church blatantly attempting to suppress an authentic expression of the constant teaching of the Magisterium and criticising loyal priests. Fr. Ray Blake comments in the Catholic Herald: I too signed, though I regret having offended Cardinal Nichols by doing so, I thought I was being loyal to the Holy Father's call to 'open speech', parrhesia . I was deeply disturbed by the nameless 'discussion' document from the Bishops, which seemed to imply those who hold what the Church has always held are to be compared to Donatists, hardly a balanced document. The discussion process at the Synod leaves me and many priests concerned that the discussion process in this country might itself be manipulated, especially as His Eminence ...

This morning, The Bones broke the news that the Bishops of England and Wales have released a document entitled Preparing for the 2015 Synod: A Time of 'Reflection' which is available for download from their website here . Although it poses some appropriate and valuable pastoral questions, it also utterly misappropriates Church history in order to sell a heretical idea that contradicts established doctrine. It not so subtly attempts to shove the clergy in a particular direction: the questions direct the answers: The followers of Donatus wanted no contact whatever with Catholics whom they believed were contaminated and could not represent the Church of Christ. They considered themselves the sole representatives of the true Church because of their steadfastness during the persecution. Taking his cue from the parable of the wheat and tares Augustine argued strongly and insistently for patience and tolerance, and that to uproot the tares would mean damaging the good seed as ...