In-flight press conference from Slovakia…
Francis jokes about Jewish Woman receiving “Communion”, addresses Amoris Laetitia and Abortion
Today the false pope, Francis (Jorge Bergoglio), concluded his trip to Hungary and Slovakia. On his return flight aboard Airhead One, he held another one of his notorious press conferences, where he answers questions from journalists more or less spontaneously and candidly.
A full video of the 28-minute conference has been provided by Vatican News (Italian), with a full English transcript, available here:
- “Pope: Abortion is murder, the Church must be close and compassionate, not political” (Vatican News)
- “Il Papa: l’aborto è omicidio, la Chiesa sia vicina e compassionevole non politica” (Italian original)
Most of the tidbits came in his lengthy answer given to American journalist Gerard O’Connell, who asked:
You have often said we are all sinners, and that the Eucharist is not a reward for the perfect but a medicine and food for the weak. As you know, in the USA after the last elections, there was a discussion among the bishops about giving communion to politicians who have supported abortion laws, and there are bishops who want to deny communion to the president and others who hold office. Some bishops are favourable, others say not to use the Eucharist as a weapon. What do you think and what do you advise the bishops to do? And have you as a bishop in all these years publicly refused the Eucharist to anyone?
Francis’ answer was lengthy. Before we comment on individual things he said, for context we will first present it in its entirety:
I have never refused the Eucharist to anyone, I don’t know if anyone has come in these conditions! As a priest, that is. I have never been conscious of having a person like the one you describe in front of me, that is true. The only time I’ve ever had an interesting thing happen was when I went to serve Mass in an old age home. I was in the living room, and I said: who wants communion? All the old people raised their hands. One little old lady raised her hand and received communion and said: “Thank you, I’m Jewish”. And I said: “The one I gave you is Jewish too!” [“Anche quello che ti ho dato è ebreo!”]
Communion is not a prize for the perfect – think of Jansenism – communion is a gift, a present, it is the presence of Jesus in the Church and in the community. Then, those who are not in the community cannot take communion, like this Jewish lady, but the Lord wanted to reward her without my knowledge. Out of the community – excommunicated – because they are not baptised or have drifted away.
The second problem, that of abortion: it’s more than a problem, it’s murder, whoever has an abortion kills, no half words. Take any book on embryology for medical students. The third week after conception, all the organs are already there, even the DNA… it is a human life, this human life must be respected, this principle is so clear! To those who cannot understand, I would ask this question: is it right to kill a human life to solve a problem? Is it right to hire a hitman to kill a human life? Scientifically it is a human life. Is it right to take it out to solve a problem? That is why the Church is so hard on this issue, because if it accepts this it would be like accepting daily murder. A Head of State told me that the demographic decline began because in those years there was such a strong law on abortion that six million abortions were performed and this left a drop in births in the society of that country.
Now we go to that person who is not in the community, cannot take communion. And this is not a punishment, the person is outside. But the problem is not theological, it is pastoral, how we bishops deal with this principle pastorally, and if we look at the history of the Church we will see that every time the bishops have not dealt with a problem as pastors, they have taken sides politically. Think of the night of St Bartholomew’s Day, heretics, yes, let’s cut their throats…. Think of the witch-hunt…. at Campo di Fiori of Savonarola. When the Church defends a principle, it does so in a non-pastoral manner, it takes sides on a political level, and this has always been the case, just look at history. What must the pastor do? Be a pastor, don’t go condemning. Be a pastor, because he is a pastor also for the excommunicated. Pastors with God’s style, which is closeness, compassion and tenderness. The whole Bible says so. A pastor who does not know how to act as a pastor… I am not very familiar with the details of the United States… But if you’re close, tender, and give communion? It’s a hypothesis. The pastor knows what to do at all times. But if you go beyond the pastoral dimension of the Church you become a politician, and you can see this in all the non-pastoral condemnations of the Church… If you say you can give or not give, this is casuistry… Remember the storm that was whipped up with Amoris laetitia? Heresy, heresy! Fortunately, there was Cardinal Schoenborn, a great theologian, who clarified things… They are children of God and they need our pastoral closeness, then the pastor resolves things as the Spirit indicates to him.
And now for some commentary.
The fact that a Jewish woman received Holy Communion — albeit the invalid Novus Ordo version — is objectively a great sacrilege because not only are Jewish people outside the Catholic Church, they also deny and reject the very Lord who redeemed us and whose true Body and Blood are present in the (real) Holy Eucharist! As St. Paul warned: “For he that eateth and drinketh unworthily, eateth and drinketh judgment to himself, not discerning the body of the Lord” (1 Cor 11:29).
It is clear that this is a most serious matter. That Francis would respond to it by cracking a joke about it — one that appears blasphemous, to boot — is utterly revolting but not really surprising, considering he also jokes with Jews about the Crucifixion! A truly godly priest who found out that through his own culpable negligence an unbaptized person has received Holy Communion, would be stricken with grief and would immediately seek to make reparation for the grave outrage which through his fault had been committed against the very Body and Blood of Christ!
Francis’ sacrilegious joke thrives on the ambiguity of the word “Jewish”. Was Christ Jewish? Certainly, He was in terms of His physical descent (see Mt 1:1-16) as well as in His religion, for He adored the God who had revealed Himself in and through Judaism: “…we adore that which we know; for salvation is of the Jews” (Jn 4:22). However, this Judaism later became apostate when the high priest definitively rejected Jesus’ claim to being the Messias: “Then the high priest rent his garments, saying: He hath blasphemed; what further need have we of witnesses? Behold, now you have heard the blasphemy: What think you? But they answering, said: He is guilty of death” (Mt 26:65-66).
The Church’s greatest biblical scholar, St. Jerome, comments:
And by this rending [of] his garments, [Caiaphas] shews that the Jews have lost the priestly glory, and that their High Priest’s throne was vacant. For by rending his garment he rent the veil of the Law which covered him.
(St. Jerome, Commentary on Matthew 26:65; quoted in St. Thomas Aquinas, ed., Catena Aurea: Commentary on the Four Gospels collected out of the Works of the Fathers Vol. I, Part III [Oxford: John Henry Parker, 1842], p. 926.)
The people today known as the Jews are those who adhere to this apostate new religion that takes its origin in Caiphas’ rejection of the Messias. As St. Peter did beginning on the first Pentecost, we must charitably seek the conversion of all souls to Christ and His Church, including the Jews, who “are most dear for the sake of the fathers” (Rom 11:28):
Therefore let all the house of Israel know most certainly, that God hath made both Lord and Christ, this same Jesus, whom you have crucified. Now when they had heard these things, they had compunction in their heart, and said to Peter, and to the rest of the apostles: What shall we do, men and brethren? But Peter said to them: Do penance, and be baptized every one of you in the name of Jesus Christ, for the remission of your sins: and you shall receive the gift of the Holy Ghost. For the promise is to you, and to your children, and to all that are far off, whomsoever the Lord our God shall call. And with very many other words did he testify and exhort them, saying: Save yourselves from this perverse generation.
(Acts 2:36-40)
For Francis to make a joke about the Jewish lady’s sacrilegious Communion is of course offensive to God, first and foremost, but it is also deliberately misleading, for to say that “the one I gave you is Jewish too” is to falsely equate the woman’s apostate religion, on the one hand, with the true religion of Our Lord and His genuine Jewishness in the sense explained above, on the other.
Bergoglio’s subsequent remark that “the Lord wanted to reward her without my knowledge” is idiotic, since obviously God does not desire anyone to receive Holy Communion unworthily, especially not someone who has no Faith and has not even received baptism, which is “the gateway and foundation of the Sacraments…” (1917 Code of Canon Law, Canon 737 §1).
Besides, God does not reward sin, and being so utterly unfit to receive Jesus Christ in Holy Communion, the lady in question obviously could not possibly derive any spiritual profit from it. Quoting St. Jerome, Pope Pius VIII taught that “he who eats the lamb [=Holy Eucharist] outside this house [=the Church] will perish as did those during the flood who were not with Noah in the ark” (Encyclical Traditi Humilitati, n. 4). One may surmise that the woman acted out of ignorance more than malice, but in neither case can one speak of her being “rewarded” by God.
Addressing the question of abortion, Francis once again uttered tough words, yet we know that his actions tell a different story (cf. Mt 23:3):
By maintaining such a hypocritical double standard, his conservative adherents have “papal” quotes they can throw at “pro-abortion Catholics”, while the advocates of pre-born child murder can boost their power and influence on account of “papal” approval.
After over eight years of the Argentinian Jesuit occupying the Vatican, Bergoglio’s two-facedness is well known. He says that a pastor is never to condemn because “he is a pastor also for the excommunicated” — what utter nonsense! — and yet at the same time, of course, he has no problem condemning and disciplining those he really believes worthy of condemnation. You know, Traditionis Custodes comes to mind.
Anyone who doubts that condemnation is sometimes necessary for the good of souls, even if there is very little expectation that it will accomplish the reform of the offender, should consult Chapter 23 of St. Matthew’s Gospel. That too is “God’s style”, not just “tenderness”. Making and using a whip of little cords, by the way, is also included (see Jn 2:13-17).
St. John, the Apostle of Love, gave clear instructions concerning heretics: “If any man come to you, and bring not this doctrine, receive him not into the house nor say to him, God speed you. For he that saith unto him, God speed you, communicateth with his wicked works” (2 Jn 10-11). Similarly, St. Paul warned the Corinthians that “if any man that is named a brother, be a fornicator, or covetous, or a server of idols, or a railer, or a drunkard, or an extortioner: with such a one, not so much as to eat. For what have I to do to judge them that are without? Do not you judge them that are within? For them that are without, God will judge. Put away the evil one from among yourselves” (1 Cor 5:11-13).
Lastly, it is interesting that Francis brings up his controverted exhortation Amoris Laetitia without any real cause. He knows very well, of course, how heretical that rag is. So he points people to the infernal “Cardinal” Christoph Schönborn of Vienna and thinks that “clarifies” or “solves” the matter? Hardly:
By the way, as far as “the pastor resolv[ing] things as the Spirit indicates to him”… remember this story?
Actions speak louder than words.
“Wherefore by their fruits you shall know them” (Mt 7:20).
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