By Michael Vance
One has to wonder what’s wrong with some of our Catholic prelates these days. Instead of trying to save souls they seem to be fixated on saving the planet or other worldly matters.
A case in point is Archbishop Dermot Farrell of the Archdiocese of Dublin, Ireland.
As the Catholic News Agency reported on Sept 1, 2021, “In his first pastoral letter since he was installed in Dublin in February 2020, Archbishop Dermot Farrell encouraged his flock to undergo an “ecological conversion” [emphasis added].
A Liberal Bishop
Writing about the new Archbishop in The Irish Catholic, Michael Kelly said, “The appointment of Archbishop-elect Farrell signals a new chapter for Dublin and for the Church in Ireland at large. He is a man of huge energy unafraid of embracing reform and new ways of doing things.” The headline on the story is “Dermot Farrell is the right man for a challenging appointment in Dublin.”
The phrase “unafraid of embracing reform and new ways of doing things” should be an alarm. It’s a tip off that the incoming bishop is a liberal prelate. And it certainly didn’t take long for Farrell to show his colors.
Considering that Ireland over the last 40 years has descended from being one of the most Catholic countries in the world to being “open, progressive, liberal, outward-looking and dynamic” as Aer Lingus proudly proclaims, one can’t help but wonder, “What was Ferrell thinking?”
Instead of getting a man of God as their prelate, it seems Dublin Catholics got a man of the world. The words of 1 John 2:15 come to mind: “Do not love the world or the things of the world. If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him.”
Ireland’s Fall from Grace
An article in The Guardian concisely sums up that changes that have taken place in Ireland, so I won’t belabor them here. And now the Catholics in Dublin have an archbishop who is encouraging them the “to undergo an ecological conversion.” He should be trying to re-evangelize them.
Certainly we all have a duty to care for the planet we live on and for each other. But first and foremost we have duty to keep God’s Commandments.
As Dom Cingoranelli wrote recently, we should all be following our Blessed Mother’s example in saying to God, ‘Thy will be done.’ We say this every time we pray the Our Father, but how many of us truly mean it?
Farrell’s keen sense of what the faithful need to hear is certainly being felt. Just four men entered seminary in all of Ireland’s 26 dioceses this year.
Vaccine Stupidity
And then there is Bishop Robert Anthony Daniels of the Diocese of Grand Falls. Grand Falls is in the province of Newfoundland and Labrador, Canada.
Bishop Daniels “issued a letter stating, “Effective October 22, 2021, it will be mandatory for all persons 12 and older wishing to attend Masses or Services in our churches to demonstrate proof of vaccination by using the Vaccine Passport.”
As noted at Catholic World Report, however, Grand Falls is not the only Canadian diocese requiring vaccinations. The Catholic bishops of Quebec have also “accepted the province’s imposition of COVID-19 vaccine passports as a requirement to attend religious services . . .”
Someone might want to point out to these bishops that the Covid vaccines do not stop the spread of Covid. In Ireland, where 91 percent of the population over 12 years of age has been vaccinated, the number of patients in Irish hospitals with Covid recently reached the highest level in seven months.
Ireland’s health director, Dr. Tony Holohan, did not divulge the breakdown of vaccinated vs. unvaccinated hospitalizations. Instead he only offered that a “substantial amount . . . are not fully vaccinated.” This is called being ‘intentionally vague’ so as to not spread information that is counter to the approved conversation.
Of course when any information that is counter to the prevailing approved new speak comes out, censorship rears up. The mainstream media and social media censor or otherwise try to stop the information from being shared. So it’s possible the Canadian bishops do not possess the necessary information to justify civil disobedience.
In any case, telling folks they must violate the dictates of their fully formed consciences to attend Mass is unconscionable.
Greenlighting Sodomy
But the topper here has to be Jesuit Cardinal Jean-Claude Hollerich. He is the Archbishop of Luxembourg. He’s also president of the Commission of the Bishops’ Conferences of the European Community (COMECE). He was also appointed by Pope Francis as Relator General of the 2021–2023 “Synod on Synodality.”
Hollerich says he believes Catholic teaching on homosexuality “is false.”
“I believe that the sociological-scientific foundation of this teaching is no longer correct” he said. Say what? Jesus did not become man to instruct us in sociology or scientific matters. The foundation of His teachings, and, by extension, the teaching of His Apostles, is truth. And what Jesus and His Apostles said was true 2,000 years is still true today.
Why has Hollerich not been called on the carpet for proclaiming that Catholic teaching on homosexuality is false?
Some Advice for Bishops
So to all the priests, bishops and archbishops who are caving in to secularism and modernism or becoming ecology warriors, here’s a bit of advice. Remember the words of Luke 19:10: “For the Son of Man has come to seek and to save what was lost.”
Jesus Christ did not die a horrible death to save us from a virus or to save the planet. He came to save souls from hell. That’s every cleric’s #1 job.
16 thoughts on “Bishops Caving in to Secularism, Modernism, and Scientism”
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There is a word for what these bishops are : pagans.
The author should have shown details on how the Cardinal is incorrect? Give comparisons and quotes. Do you want science articles and links.
Regarding ecology and the environment: Is not pollution a major cause of disease?
Glen, God, speaking to us in the Old Testament, says the Cardinal is wrong. Jesus, speaking to us through St. Paul, says the Cardinal is wrong. The Didache – the Teachings of the Apostles – also says he wrong.
Regarding ecology, a bishop’s job is to save souls from hell, not keep people healthy.
Glenn, The religion of most who read here is that of Jesus’s one, true, holy Roman Catholic Church. It is not the religion of science. Nor are those in power in the church listened to, followed or respected because they invoke a particular view of “science” in trying to maintain their positions or to buttress their claims or declarations. Guy, Texas
Please show details on how the Cardinal is incorrect? Give comparisons and quotes. Do you want science articles and links.
Regarding ecology and the environment: Is not pollution a major cause of disease?
Thing is there not doing much about pollution such as pesticides , herbicides contaminating food – there are actually more and more causing an astonishing burden of illness adding to the vaccine damage of 72 injections by 18 years.
Its as if God forget to give us an immune system.
The climate zealots home in on CO2 – a trace gas which is 100% necessary for every plant and is part of God’s oxygen / CO2 cycle when I was at school.
The climate always changes – long term or short term and
if God is not in charge of the climate like he tells us then we are in deep trouble.
When God decides to warm the sun as in Revelations there will be nothing to stop him.
Volcanos spout out enormous amounts of CO2 even when inactive as also do termites – how would you stop this ?
The deacons, priests, bishops, cardinals, and man currently wearing papal white are not “caving in” to anything or anyone-they are hand-in-glove with those who want to destroy Jesus’s church. What these evil ones do is intentional. They will fail, but will, according to plan, take many souls to hell with them. https://the-american-catholic.com/2021/09/16/insert-name_________e-g-priest-prelate-politician-predator/. Guy, Texas
The author should have shown details on how the Cardinal is incorrect? Give comparisons and quotes. Do you want science articles and links.
Regarding ecology and the environment: Is not pollution a major cause of disease?
It is not anti-Catholic to care about what kind of planet we will leave to our children and grandchildren. There Church already has spoken authoritatively on this. John Paul II named St. Francis as the patron saint of ecolog (to give one example).
It is also not anti-Catholic to care about protecting parishioners from plague. I don’t know what the numbers are in Ireland but in the U.S., based only on the number of identified Covid cases, 1 out of 350 are now dead. In the past, the Church has gone further and even closed churches and entire dioceses during plague times.
Well said. Thanks from one with a compromised health issues.
But what did the 1 out of 350 die of ? How many have died from the vaccine ? Have you not read that many health professionals are declaring that the vaccine is killing and injuring more than covid the irony being that the vax does not stop covid or transmission .
Also dying with covid is not the same as dying from covid which is a flu like illness .
This is not like the eg black death caused by rat fleas and had a high kill rate – very high. The chances of surviving covid without having comorbidities is over 99% – about the same as the flu .
“ Have you not read that many health professionals are declaring that the vaccine is killing and injuring more than covid the irony being that the vax does not stop covid or transmission “
Not true. You are making things up.
Hard to believe that you have not investigated the vax’s dubious efficacy from Dr Malone the inventor of mrna technology or Dr Yeadon the former vice president of pfizer who was involved in vaccines and with the company for 40 years.
There are hundreds more health professionals who think the jab is highly dangerous as opposed to politicians and desk bound bureaucrats who have never treated anyone and
can be involved in revolving door appointments with big pharma.
And these drs are not even anti vax.
Much of the decline of the church in Ireland is an understandable reaction to the sex abuse scandal and the revelations about the treatment of women in the Magdeline laundries. The church has to reestablish itself.
Another point why can’t the bishop promote ecological conversion and re evangelization at the same time? The two are not mutually exclusive or contradictory.
I’m okay with Church leaders promoting good stewardship. But “ecological” and “conversion” should not be in the same sentence.