Francis: Jesus Wasn’t Rigid, He Changed His Attitude!

The gospel according to Bergoglio…

Francis: Jesus Wasn’t Rigid, He Changed His Attitude!

Probably one reason why ‘Pope Francis’ (Jorge Mario Bergoglio) loves to talk so much is that it is the best way for him to change the Gospel and communicate his false doctrines. Barely a Sunday goes by on which he doesn’t use the opportunity to put his own spin on the teaching of Christ found in the Gospel reading of the day, sometimes to the point of distorting completely the message the Son of God actually transmitted.

For a long time now, one of the false pope’s favorite themes has been that of condemning “rigidity”. While he never quite defines what he means, of course, it is easy to glean from the contexts in which he speaks that his target is essentially that of the unbending adherence of the Catholic to the Deposit of Faith as communicated from the sources of revelation — Sacred Scripture and Tradition — via the true Catholic magisterium (i.e. from Pope St. Peter to Pope Pius XII).

“Rigidity” is a thorn in Francis’ side especially in three specific instances: in fundamental theology, because he needs a flexible concept of revelation so he can justify new (false) doctrines — this is where the Synod on Synodality comes in with its “signs of the times” and the “god of surprises”; in liturgy, because the Traditional Latin Mass is a great hindrance to people’s complete acceptance of the Vatican II religion — this is where Traditionis Custodes comes in; in moral theology, because he cannot get people to accept his new, “merciful” morality unless people let go of some fundamental Catholic moral principles — this is where Amoris Laetitia comes in.

Not surprisingly, therefore, Francis zeroes in on any opportunity, no matter how absurd, to present Jesus Christ as teaching, affirming, or supporting his own false ideas — the ‘gospel of Bergoglio’, we might call it (cf. Gal 1:8-9).

This past Sunday, Aug. 20, the Gospel reading for the day, according to the Novus Ordo missal, was the following:

And Jesus went from thence, and retired into the coasts of Tyre and Sidon. And behold a woman of Canaan who came out of those coasts, crying out, said to him: Have mercy on me, O Lord, thou son of David: my daughter is grievously troubled by the devil. Who answered her not a word. And his disciples came and besought him, saying: Send her away, for she crieth after us: And he answering, said: I was not sent but to the sheep that are lost of the house of Israel. But she came and adored him, saying: Lord, help me. Who answering, said: It is not good to take the bread of the children, and to cast it to the dogs. But she said: Yea, Lord; for the whelps also eat of the crumbs that fall from the table of their masters. Then Jesus answering, said to her: O woman, great is thy faith: be it done to thee as thou wilt: and her daughter was cured from that hour.

(Matthew 15:21-28)

This beautiful meeting between the Lord and the Canaanite woman has always been understood by the Catholic Church as teaching the importance of perseverance in prayer. For the same compassionate and merciful Lord who told us to pray always, also taught us how to pray so that we might obtain our petitions:

And he said to them: Which of you shall have a friend, and shall go to him at midnight, and shall say to him: Friend, lend me three loaves, because a friend of mine is come off his journey to me, and I have not what to set before him. And he from within should answer, and say: Trouble me not, the door is now shut, and my children are with me in bed; I cannot rise and give thee. Yet if he shall continue knocking, I say to you, although he will not rise and give him, because he is his friend; yet, because of his importunity, he will rise, and give him as many as he needeth. And I say to you, Ask, and it shall be given you: seek, and you shall find: knock, and it shall be opened to you. For every one that asketh, receiveth; and he that seeketh, findeth; and to him that knocketh, it shall be opened.

(Luke 11:5-10)

Our Blessed Lord’s delayed and unusual reaction to his Gentile petitioner was by no means a sign of indifference, rejection, or contempt on His part. On the contrary, by His seemingly dismissive responses to her, Our Lord draws out of this dear woman her virtues of Faith, confidence, humility, patience, and perseverance, so important for efficacious prayer. In this way He made her an example for posterity to follow.

In the Great Commentary of Fr. Cornelius à Lapide (1567-1637), we read regarding the Canaanite woman that “by this her constancy, humility and perseverance she deserved to be heard. For God, when He is invoked, often does not answer at first, in order that he who is praying may continue and intensify his prayers and supplications, so that he might receive with even greater thanks the favor that he is asking for, since the desire for it was increased and the asking protracted.”

Fr. Cornelius explains further that Christ “goads her, as it were, by calling her a dog, to whom it is customary to throw crusts of bread. … In like manner Christ often stings, humbles and mortifies holy souls, that they may ask yet more humbly and ardently, that they may obtain.” Of course none of this really jibes with Bergoglio’s false gospel of Vatican II joy, which is why — spoiler alert! — he mentions none of these things, as we will see shortly.

The woman demonstrates her utter humility when she in no wise shows offense at being compared to a dog but instead fully embraces the metaphor — Fr. Lapide notes that “Christ speaks after the manner of the Jews, who were wont to call the gentiles (such as the Canaanite woman), dogs because they were vile idolators — and points out that even the dogs “are wont to eat the crumbs of bread which fall from the tables of the masters and of their children. Nourish me then as Thy dog. I cannot leave my master’s table.”

Fr. Lapide provides a good summary illustrating just how the Canaanite woman teaches us to pray: “1. With great ‘humility’, in that she acknowledges herself to be a dog. 2. With ‘faith’, because she calls Christ the son of David, i.e., the Messias, the God and Savior promised to the Jews. 3. With ‘modesty’ because she sets before Christ the right of dogs and her own misery; yet does she not draw from thence the conclusion that Christ should heal her daughter, but leaves that to Him. 4. With ‘prudence’, in that she takes hold of Christ by His own words, and gently turns His reasoning against Himself, into an argument for obtaining her desire. 5. With ‘reverence’, with religion and devotion, because she made her supplication on her knees. 6. With ‘resignation’ in that she did not say, ‘Heal my daughter,’ but, ‘help me, in the manner which shall seem to Thee best.’ 7. With ‘confidence’, because although a gentile, she had a firm hope that she would be heard by Christ. 8. With the ‘ardor’ with which she cried out to Christ. 9. With ‘charity’, in that she made intercession for her daughter, as if she were anxious for herself, saying, help me. 10. With ‘constancy’ and ‘perseverance’, in that she persisted when she was repulsed by Christ a second time and became yet more earnest in prayer.”

(All of the above quotations are from The Great Commentary of Cornelius à Lapide: The Holy Gospel according to Saint Matthew, vol. II, trans. by Thomas W. Mossman, rev. and compl. by Michael J. Miller [Fitzwilliam, NH: Loreto Publications, 2008], pp. 87-89. Alternate edition and translation available here.) More details regarding the traditional interpretation of this passage from the Church Fathers can be found in the famous Catena Aurea (“Golden Chain”) of St. Thomas Aquinas, and also in Father George Haydock’s Bible commentary.

There is so much spiritual nourishment to be found in this beautiful Gospel passage of Our Lord’s encounter with the Canaanite woman, but what does ‘Pope’ Francis do with the sacred text? Here’s what he says:

We see that Jesus changed his attitude. What made him change it was the strength of the woman’s faith. So, let us pause briefly over these two aspects: the change in Jesus and the woman’s faith.

The change in Jesus. He was directing his preaching to the chosen people. Later the Holy Spirit would push the Church to the ends of the world. But what happens here, we could say, is an anticipation through which the universality of God’s work is already manifested in the episode of the Canaanite woman. Jesus’ openness is interesting. On hearing the woman’s prayer, “he anticipates the plan”; faced with her concrete case, he becomes even more sympathetic and compassionate. This is what God is like: he is love, and the one who loves does not remain rigid. Yes, he or she stands firm, but not rigid, they do not remain rigid in their own positions, but allow themselves to be moved and touched. He or she knows how to change their plans. Love is creative. And we Christians who want to imitate Christ, we are invited to be open to change. How good it would do our relationships, as well as our lives of faith, if we were to be docile, to truly pay attention, to soften up in the name of compassion and the good of others, like Jesus did with the Canaanite woman. The docility to change. Hearts docile to change.

(Antipope Francis, Angelus address, Vatican.va, Aug. 20, 2023; underlining added; italics given.)

Bergoglio’s tactic is clear: He misuses the Gospel text to promote an “openness-to-change” attitude, which is a necessary prelude to his upcoming Synod on Synodality. Unless people first be persuaded that accepting change is to imitate Christ, they may not be “open” enough to accept the next step in the endless doctrinal revolution that has been coming down the pike since Vatican II. That’s all this is about.

As usual, the Argentinian apostate simply tries to shoehorn his own false and dangerous ideas into the sacred text. Quoting Scripture is something anybody can do, even the devil (see Lk 4:9-11) — it is the right interpretation that matters. Notice that Francis does not cite a single Church Father — nor any other authority — to support his bogus reading of the passage, which is an indication that there is none, for the adherents of the ‘New Theology’ like to present themselves as being well-versed in the Fathers.

Affirmations such as “the one who loves does not remain rigid” are practically meaningless, since they are not sufficiently specific. Certainly someone who loves God and neighbor in a genuine way will be very rigid in some things — for example, in defending and protecting his beloved, and in maintaining his adherence to the divine law.

It appears that in the words quoted above, the false pope says God, not being rigid, does not remain in His own positions. Rather, He was “open to change”; He softened because He had the “docility to change”. What blasphemy!

It is Catholic dogma that God is altogether immutable, that is, unchangeable.

The Fourth Lateran Council in 1215 proclaimed: “Firmly we believe and we confess simply that the true God is one alone, eternal, immense, and unchangeable, incomprehensible, omnipotent and ineffable, Father and Son and Holy Spirit: indeed three Persons but one essence, substance, or nature entirely simple” (Chap. 1; Denz. 428). In 1870, the First Vatican Council reiterated that God “is one, singular, altogether simple and unchangeable spiritual substance” (Vatican I, Dogmatic Constitution Dei Filius, Chap. 1; Denz. 1782).

It is because God does not and cannot change that His definitive Revelation, the Gospel of Jesus Christ (cf. Heb 1:1-2), is perennially true and valid:

“For I am the Lord, and I change not” (Mal 3:6a); “Heaven and earth shall pass away, but my word shall not pass away” (Mk 13:31); “But though we, or an angel from heaven, preach a gospel to you besides that which we have preached to you, let him be anathema. As we said before, so now I say again: If any one preach to you a gospel, besides that which you have received, let him be anathema” (Gal 1:8-9); “Every best gift, and every perfect gift, is from above, coming down from the Father of lights, with whom there is no change, nor shadow of alteration” (Jas 1:17).

It is true that there are numerous passages in the Old Testament in which the sacred text appears to be saying, on the surface, that God has changed His mind. For instance, we are told that at the time of Noah, God regretted creating man (see Gen 6:5-7). However, this is not to be taken literally but is rather a mere figurative use of ‘anthropomorphism’, which is defined as follows:

The ascription to the Supreme Being of human form and activities, with human passions and feelings. It designates the natural tendency of man to represent the Divinity as like to himself, having the same figure, senses, passions and powers. This tendency is to be found in all religions: but true religion does not think of God in this wise except in a metaphorical sense. Anthropomorphism attained its apogee with those Greeks who deified human nature and its passions. The true philosophy teaches all human perfections which of themselves do not involve any imperfection are in God in a transcendental and infinite way; they are said to be in him not univocally but analogously (q.v.).

(Donald Attwater, ed., A Catholic Dictionary, s.v. ‘Anthropomorphism’; underlining added; italics given.)

With this in mind, we can understand St. Thomas Aquinas’ response to the objection based on Genesis 6: “These words of the Lord are to be understood metaphorically, and according to the likeness of our nature. …God is said to have repented, by way of comparison with our mode of acting, in so far as by the deluge He destroyed from the face of the earth man whom He had made” (Summa Theologica, I, q. 19, a. 7, ad 1).

Thus, contrary to what some may think, prayer to obtain a petition does not actually change God’s mind, as if at first He were unwilling to grant us our request but, after repeated begging, He changes His mind. Rather, as St. Thomas explains succinctly, “we pray not that we may change the Divine disposition, but that we may impetrate [beseech] that which God has disposed to be fulfilled by our prayers, in other words ‘that by asking, men may deserve to receive what Almighty God from eternity has disposed to give,’ as Gregory says (Dial. i, 8)” (Summa Theologica, II-II, q. 83, a. 2c).

Put differently, the prayer of petition is reconciled with God’s unchangeability by understanding that God has resolved from all eternity to grant us certain petitions if we ask for them in a particular way (e.g., with humility, confidence, attention, etc.), especially if we persist in our petition for a certain length of time (e.g., St. Monica prayed for her son’s conversion for 20 years, and not only did he become a Catholic eventually, he became a bishop, a great theologian, and a saint — we know him today as St. Augustine of Hippo).

Returning now to ‘Pope’ Francis, he next speaks of the woman’s great Faith, which he is quick to contrast with “a wealth of concepts” and a “religious label” — totally ignoring the fact that there was indeed a concept she adhered to, namely, that of Jesus being the true Messiah, the Son of David, which alone is the reason why she approached Him in the first place.

The Argentinian fraud ends his Angelus address as follows:

Brothers and sisters, in light of all this, we can ask ourselves a few questions beginning with the change in Jesus. For example: Am I capable of changing opinion? Do I know how to be understanding and do I know how to be compassionate, or do I remain rigid in my position? Is there some rigidity in my heart? Which is not firmness: rigidity is awful, firmness is good. And beginning with the woman’s faith: What is my faith like? Does it stop at concepts and words, or is it truly lived with prayer and deeds? Do I know how to dialogue with the Lord? Do I know how to insist with him? Or am I content to recite beautiful formulas? May Our Lady make us open to what is good and concrete in the faith.

Thus we see what Francis’ blather about Christ changing is worth: It is blasphemy! As if God were not pure compassion already but first had to be ‘converted’ to being compassionate — from rigidity to compassion!

No, Christ did not change; He simply tested the woman’s faith, her resolve, her virtue. As we read in the Benedictine Father Bernard Orchard’s commentary: “The Sacred Heart is won by a faith that stood so sharp a test” (A Catholic Commentary on Holy Scripture [London: Thomas Nelson and Sons, 1953], n. 703b, p. 880).

Much worse than Bergoglio’s, however, was ‘Father’ Antonio Spadaro’s reflection on the same Gospel passage, which was published in the Italian paper Il Fatto Quotidiano:

In the article, the Jesuit and director of La Civilta Cattolica displays what we could call the new Arianism, which, without expressly denying the divinity of Christ, conceives him in practice as a mere human being, fallible and full of defects and limitations like the other children of Adam.

…

[According to ‘Fr.’ Spadaro,] When the woman pleads with him, “Jesus remains indifferent” to the astonishment of his disciples. “Jesus does not care” and gives the Canaanite woman an “angry and insensitive response”, in which “the hardness of the Master is unshakable”, because “Jesus plays the theologian” (something that, in Spadaro’s vocabulary, is clearly negative) and considers that “mercy is not for her”.

As if this were not enough, when the Canaanite woman says “Lord, help me!”, thus recognizing his authority, Jesus “responds in a mocking and disrespectful way towards that poor woman”, with “a fall in tone, style and humanity”. According to Spadaro, “Jesus seems blinded by nationalism and theological rigorism”. There is no pedagogy of Jesus here, as in the interpretation of the Church Fathers, but rather a manifestation of serious defects and limitations of Jesus himself, due to the contagion of his time, which prevent him from responding with mercy.

In the face of Jesus’ lack of humanity, the words of the Canaanite woman, humbly saying that even the little dogs eat the scraps that fall from their masters’ table, change everything. They are “few words, but well put and capable of upsetting Jesus’ rigidity, of confusing him, of ‘converting’ him to himself”.

That is to say, although the daughter is cured by Jesus, the true savior is the woman, because “Jesus also appears cured and in the end shows himself free from the rigidity of the dominant theological, political and cultural elements of his time”. It was Jesus who needed to be cured of something much more serious and, when he receives that healing and “gives reason” to the pagan woman, that fact is “the seed of a revolution”.

(Bruno, “El P. Spadaro SJ y el Nuevo Arrianismo”, InfoCatólica, Aug. 23, 2023; translation by Catholic Conclave.)

What an abominable heretical blasphemer!

‘Fr.’ Spadaro is not just anyone, though. We might say he is one of Francis’ buddies. A member of the Jesuit order like his boss, he is in fact the editor-in-chief of the formerly Catholic Jesuit periodical (now Modernist rag) La Civiltà Cattolica. It was he who got the pseudo-pope’s first written interview, in September of 2013. Four years later, Spadaro captured the limelight in the international press by accusing conservative religious voters in the U.S. of an “ecumenism of hate”. It belongs to Spadaro, clearly one of Francis’ favored collaborators, to transcribe and publish the regular conversations the false pope has with other Jesuits when he goes on foreign trips. It’s not out of the question that perhaps Spadaro floats some of Francis’ own secret heretical ideas openly to see how they resonate with the public, to see if they’re ready for “prime time” yet.

It is most telling that when St. Paul told the Hebrews that Christ would never change, he followed it up with a warning not to be led astray by false teaching: “Jesus Christ, yesterday, and today; and the same for ever. Be not led away with various and strange doctrines” (Heb 13:8-9a).

This passage has perhaps never been more timely than in our day, when a false pope and a false church have infested the Catholic structures.

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