De Omnibus Dubitandum Est.

The Rt. Reverend Jean-Marc Micas, bishop of Lourdes, the town in the French Pyrenees which is the site of the apparitions to Bernadette Soubirous in 1858 and a huge centre of Marian devotion and pilgrimage, has announced he “cannot ignore” the “great distress” that mosaics commissioned from the workshop of disgraced Jesuit rapist and serial abuser Marko Rupnik cause. The mosaics illustrate the luminous mysteries of the Holy Rosary instituted in Rosarium Virginis Mariae , by Pope Saint John Paul II in 2002. The mosaics, located on the façade of the Rosary Basilica have been controversial since they were installed, as is acknowledged by the bishop in his statement, although, he says, on the whole they have been admired. Bishop Micas says he is concerned that the controversy surrounding the artist may cause victims, he considers this "cannot be ignored" and is therefore considering whether they should be taken down. The bishop has already met with the Rector of the Shrine, Fr....

In this episode we talk about the posthumous publication of a new book by Pope Benedict XVI. Many were wondering if the timing of this book's release meant we would finally see Joseph Ratzinger settling scores with Jorge Mario Bergoglio, who genuinely had humiliated him by trashing his ruling on the Latin Mass? The answer is, in fact no, as anyone who knew Pope Benedict XVI should have guessed. The book is a collection of essays, infinitely better written and far more theologically literate than Pope Francis’s writings — but the late Pope Emeritus would have considered it just as wrong to break his promise to show loyalty to his successor after his death as before it. It did, however, contain some interesting relationships about problematic and influential groups within the Vatican! We also discuss the strange overturning of Fr Rupnik's ex-communication as this scandal, which integrates the Pope in an unclear way continues to rumble on as more and more victims come forward and ...

  Recorded on the 29th December before Pope Benedict XVI died. We discuss the incongruity between the laicisation of pro-life hero Frank Pavone & the cover up of abuse committed by Marko Rupnik. I wrote extensively about Pavone here . Although the problems that led to this sanction are well documented, it is extremely difficult to reconcile the removal of his vocational calling, given he has responded with humility and always sought obedience while maintaining the mission he has been a part of for numerous years, with the leniency given to disgraced Jesuit abuser Rupnik.  I was one of the first to report on the Rupnik scandal for the Catholic Herald (see my article here ). On the 21st December, I was asked to write a summary for Rorate Caeli , which you can read here . Pavone was laicised, according to the letter to US bishops from the Nuncio, for disobedience and blasphemy. What precisely was the blasphemy that Pavone committed and what precisely was his disobedience? As ...