Laporta: Benedict’s Renunciation Was Providential. and Francis is Pope.

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Sandro, a dear friend, whose friendship I’m honored of, wrote to me: «Dear Piero, early morning I carefully read your piece. You know that I respect you and I think I’m your friend and as such I have to tell you that I find your words un-Christian, un-evangelical. I have seen and re-watched the film “The Two Popes” several times. It’s extraordinary, I think the narration is absolutely true. The magisterium of Benedict XVI was as high as he was inadequate for the Church today. And he was so inadequate that he had to leave! The new Pope has brought about a turning point. He follows the Gospel much more than his predecessors did and is naturally disliked by those who live by the liturgy, magnificent vestments and incense’s scents. In fact, even Jesus Christ in proclaiming the Gospel was disliked by everyone and ended as we know. Each Pope has a peculiar story, like the commanders who succeed each other in command. Francis is the Pope. Full stop. The rest is not up to us, it is not at our level. We can reason with each other, question ourselves, but no, dear Piero, it’s not up to us to condemn, it’s not up to you! »

Sandro is right on at least two points. The first. Benedict’s retirement was providential. Just imagine what would have happened in the last ten years if he, as Pontiff, should had been share the same waters of the Clintons, the Obamas, the Putins, the Rothschilds, the Gates and of the ineffable Biden, but also the Monti, the Napolitanos and the Draghis. It’s a world filled with hate. The blog “Informazione Corretta”, the most important Italian Jewish blog, bears out this: on Friday and Saturday it did not report a syllable on the funerals of Benedict. I asked the administrator why: silence. It is not an easy world in which the Popes live. It is full of filth, of rancor based only on self-interest. I believe that Francis is far more suited than Benedict to face this reality, to measure up to it every day.

The second one. Sandro is totally right about Francis’ papal legitimacy. Catholics who question it now do harm the Church. The unity of Catholics is more indispensable than ever.

Sandro, on the other hand, is totally wrong about the stilted narrative of the film “The Two Popes” but it is not important. Distorting reality to accredit someone is by now customary, legitimized in contemporary communicative practice, which has nevertheless rules, apparently only formal. At certain levels, however, form is substance, as Sandro well knows.

Before going further, I must remember that Our Lord entrusted his Church to Saint Peter, but for his Most Holy Mother he turned to Saint John. I don’t think it’s trivial or random. At certain moments in history, the Church needs to be guided by those who are at ease with disreputable people, partaking the resources to deal with them. One of the most defamed pontiffs (especially by the British, we’ll see why) was Pope Borgia, Alexander VI; not accidentally he issued the first explicit bubble against slavery, the founding institution of empires, starting with the Roman one and moving on to the British one; a path, as we know, not yet finished.

Current times are not comparable to Alexander VI’s time, who however had neither TV, nor the web nor he had to share his power with a small circle; he was an absolute sovereign like the Popes are no longer, at least from Porta Pia[1].

Let’s go back to communication. A funeral ceremony must convey respect, even before condolence. Thursday’s ceremony was sloppy, worse: it was deliberately sloppy, a premeditated outrage; unbearable. No one can dare to outrage a deceased pontiff as Benedict, while you, dear Sandro, you complain about a non-existent outrage to his successor. One does not outrage a Pope who reigned and had many undeniable merits, starting with the extraordinary homily, for the funeral of his predecessor, Saint John Paul II. Anyone who wants can read the seven minutes of banality of Francis’ homily, comparing them to the exceptional homily of Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger on April 8, 2005. The two are divided by a formal and substantial abyss. Are there no longer in the Curia the necessary pens for writing a homily to accompany a pontiff on his last journey? It’s sloppy, it’s grotesque that this happens. It was a premeditated, wanted and sought outrage, announced by the transfer of Benedetto’s body from the residence to St. Peter’s, not even two hundred meters away, on a funeral police wagon, at night. It had to be carried on the shoulder, accompanied by prayers, not translated as a body of crime, like a whore found dead in the suburbs. It is a wretch who gave such an order. He was therefore not surprised by the spectacle of the twelve servants, clearly inadequate and untrained, unable to keep up in the churchyard, making the coffin grotesquely sway; the worthy conclusion of an overbearing and vulgar outrage. Is it Bergoglio’s responsibility? Not if he removes the perpetrator.

Francis has inherited a Church clearly tormented by a thousand wounds. I pass over pedophilia. The tragedy of Emanuela Orlandi is not the responsibility of the bishop of Buenos Aires, while a Soviet agent was close to Saint John Paul II. Don Antonello Mennini’s role in the Moro case is becoming clearer, precisely because Francis ordered the prelate to testify, without hiding behind a Vatican passport. The looted finances has originated with John XXIII, the “good pope”. The slanders against S.S. Pius XII have been raging since 1963 and only Francis has raised a levee, opening the archives. The list could go on and on.

These funerals can be an opportunity for Francis to understand what and who surrounds him and, using his authority, begin a necessary and urgent cleansing. On the contrary, by leaving the scoundrels in their place, he accelerates his own downfall but the Church will never die, even if reduced to a very few faithful, as Benedict prophesied. Christ Wins and the Gospel, dear Sandro, his application to earthly affairs also passes through respect for a great and humble Pontiff, albeit unsuitable for the times in which he lived. Unfit in our eyes, yet set there and guided by the Holy Spirit, upon Whom the doubts of scoundrels have no hold. Nevertheless, many self-styled Catholics believe neither in God nor in the Holy Spirit. We do not join them. Christ Wins.

[1] It was through an artillery-opened breach in the wall a dozen metres to the west of the gate – known as the “Porta Pia breach” – that on September 20, 1870 Bersaglieri soldiers entered Rome and completed the unification of Italy.

Gen. D.g.(ris.) Piero Laporta

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Aiutate Stilum Curiae

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