False pope distorts sacrament of Extreme Unction…
Bergoglio the Naturalist: If You Think Anointing of the Sick is Only for the Dying, You’ve Given Up Hope!
For years we’ve been pointing out that ‘Pope’ Francis (Jorge Bergoglio) is a Naturalist. The supernatural is typically not his primary concern, and often it is of no concern at all to him. Although he does verbally admit the supernatural on occasion, he is often quick to downplay it, or he misappropriates it to serve his ideological agenda.
We see this, for example, when the apostate Jesuit from Buenos Aires speaks about the Last Judgment. He either doesn’t mention it at all, or he downplays its significance. The only time he does bring it up to emphasize its great consequence is when he warns people of the importance of practicing the corporal works of mercy — those having to do with the temporal needs of bodies. That’s because emphasizing the temporal and the bodily is compatible with his Naturalist agenda, and can easily be made to serve it; but the spiritual life of the soul and eternity, not so much.
Yes, it is true that we will be judged on how we treated “these my least brethren” (Mt 25:40). That is perfectly legitimate to point out, but not at the expense of hiding other truths, such as the fact that we will also be judged on whether we believed the doctrine revealed by God and whether we kept the commandments: “He that believeth and is baptized, shall be saved: but he that believeth not shall be condemned” (Mk 16:16); “Circumcision is nothing, and uncircumcision is nothing: but the observance of the commandments of God” (1 Cor 7:19); “Marriage honourable in all, and the bed undefiled. For fornicators and adulterers God will judge” (Heb 13:4); “That all may be judged who have not believed the truth, but have consented to iniquity” (2 Thess 2:11).
During the month of July, the Vatican takes a summer break, and even Francis has almost no official events scheduled. Nonetheless, even for this month the false pope once again managed to inject some frightful heresy into the minds of those who follow him. He did this by means of his latest ‘Pope Video’.
The ‘Pope Video’ is a monthly clip that promotes the ‘papal’ prayer intention for the given month, in which Francis explains the intention and urges people to join him in prayer. (The first such ‘Pope Video’ was released in January 2016, and it boldly promoted religious indifferentism.)
For July 2024, the prayer intention is “for the pastoral care of the sick” — not a terribly explosive topic, one would think. But the fake pope from Argentina knows how to introduce heresy anywhere, even while looking merciful and compassionate in the process.
Before we continue, here is the 91-second video:
In case the video won’t display, you can access it directly on YouTube here.
Here is a transcript of Francis’ words in the video. We have underlined the most offensive portion:
[introduction:] Let us pray that the Sacrament of the Anointing of the Sick grant the Lord’s strength to those who receive it and to their loved ones, and that it may become for everyone an ever more visible sign of compassion and hope.
[main video:] This month, let us pray for the pastoral care of the sick.
The Anointing of the Sick is not a sacrament only for those who are at the point of death. No. It is important that this is clear.
When the priest draws near a person to perform the Anointing of the Sick, it is not necessarily to help them say goodbye to life. Thinking this way means giving up every hope.
It means taking for granted that after the priest the undertaker will arrive.
Let us remember that the Anointing of the Sick is one of the “sacraments of healing,” of “restoration,” that heals the spirit.
And when a person is very ill, it’s advisable to give them the Anointing of the Sick. And when someone is elderly, it’s good that they receive the Anointing of the Sick.
Let us pray that the Sacrament of the Anointing of the Sick grant the Lord’s strength to those who receive it and to their loved ones, and that it may become for everyone an ever more visible sign of compassion and hope.
(The Pope Video, July 2024; underlining added.)
In the above words Bergoglio naturalizes the supernatural virtue of hope. He outrageously claims that those who are resigned to “saying goodbye to life” — a somewhat corny euphemism for the reality of dying — and call a priest for an anointing to help them exit this life in the grace of God, have “given up every hope”. Such an assertion only makes sense if by ‘hope’ we mean a confident expectation of improvement of one’s personal health or some other conditions pertaining to a better temporal, bodily life. That, however, is not at all what Catholic hope is about, and to use the term ‘hope’ in that sense in the context of receiving Last Rites is a genuine scandal.
Hope in the Catholic sense is a theological virtue that has God for its object and is infused into the soul directly by God. That is the only hope that matters, and in fact this hope is not only not excluded by wishing to receive Extreme Unction, it is a necessary precondition for its valid and fruitful reception. The fact that a dying Catholic wishes to see a priest and receive the sacraments from him — Extreme Unction would typically be accompanied by Confession and Holy Communion — is a great indication that he hopes in Christ as His Savior and in Christ’s Church as the Ark of Salvation.
The true supernatural and theological nature of the virtue of hope is brought out in the Act of Hope Catholics pray:
O my God, relying on Thy almighty power and infinite mercy and promises, I hope to obtain pardon of my sins, the help of Thy grace, and life everlasting, through the merits of Jesus Christ, my Lord and Redeemer. Amen.
(source)
In order to go to Heaven, anyone, without exception, must die with the supernatural virtue of hope — in addition to Faith and charity — in his soul.
For ‘Pope’ Francis to tie the concept of hope exclusively to the improvement or continuation of earthly life — as if this present life were the goal of our existence — is a terrible affront against God, against the Faith, and against sinners in need of God’s mercy.
Those who seek their hope and happiness in this world will ultimately only reap death: “There is no man that liveth always, or that hopeth for this…” (Eccles 9:4); “For whosoever will save his life, shall lose it; for he that shall lose his life for my sake, shall save it” (Lk 9:24); “For the wages of sin is death. But the grace of God, life everlasting, in Christ Jesus our Lord” (Rom 6:23).
From these truths we can glean the great importance of the true Gospel, of genuine evangelization and missionary activity — indeed, of proselytism! No wonder Bergoglio is so bitterly opposed to it!
In his Pope Video for July 2024, Francis emphasizes that the Anointing of the Sick — the Novus Ordo name for Extreme Unction — is not merely for those who are at the point of death, and that much is true. However, neither is the sacrament to be administered simply “when a person is very ill” or “when someone is elderly”, as he claims in the video.
Rather, the true Catholic position is that Extreme Unction is for those who are so ill that death is likely to follow soon; that is, they must be in acute danger of death. On this condition depends not merely the lawful but even the valid administration of the sacrament: “The recipient must be in danger of death from sickness or old age. The danger need not be imminent but it must be at least probable”, writes the Dominican Fr. Nicholas Halligan (1917-1997) concerning the validity of Extreme Unction in his formidable work The Administration of the Sacraments (Cork: The Mercier Press, 1963), p. 344.
As regards the effects of Extreme Unction, they are chiefly and directly spiritual; they concern the natural health of the body only secondarily and accidentally:
It [Extreme Unction] has three effects: the principal effect is to strengthen the soul to overcome the remains of sin or the weakness in the soul due to a proneness to evil and a languor in the pursuit of good, anxieties, fear, torpor and all such debilities left behind in the soul from original sin and accentuated by personal sins, and to withstand the final assaults of the devil; secondary effects following upon the grace of strength are the remission of sins and bodily health. As a sacrament of the living, Extreme Unction presupposes divine friendship and grace in the soul, but accidentally, if sins are present, they are remitted, with at least attrition, both as to guilt and punishment. This is most important in the case of the dying who are unconscious and unable to confess or receive Viaticum. When in the disposition of divine providence it is expedient for the welfare of the soul, sometimes bodily health is restored by aiding and sustaining the natural forces in combatting the dangerous sickness.
(Halligan, The Administration of the Sacraments, pp. 343-344; underlining added.)
As regards the Novus Ordo transformation of the sacrament of Extreme Unction into the Anointing of the Sick, the changes made by ‘Pope’ Paul VI in his ‘Apostolic Constitution’ Sacram Unctione Infirmorum of Nov. 30, 1972, are significant and impact both the sacramental matter and form.
Whereas Extreme Unction requires for validity olive oil that has been specially consecrated by a valid bishop, Anointing of the Sick permits the use of any vegetable oil as the matter of the sacrament, as long as it has been “properly blessed”, which can even be done by a mere priest: “In case of true necessity, a priest himself may bless the oil” (Michael Glazier and Monika Hellwig, eds., Modern Catholic Encyclopedia [Collegeville, MN: Liturgical Press, 2004], s.v. “Sacrament of Anointing”, p. 733).
But the form of the sacrament has changed as well: “We thought fit to modify the sacramental formula in such a way that, in view of the words of Saint James, the effects of the sacrament might be better expressed”, writes Antipope Paul VI in his fake bull. The sedevacantist Radecki Fathers explain the difference between the old and the new form:
Extreme Unction has specific prayers for the anointing of each sense: “Through this holy unction and His own most tender mercy, may the Lord pardon you whatever sins you have committed by (sight, hearing, smell, taste, speech, touch and walking).”
The form used in the (Vatican II) Anointing of the Sick is: “Through this holy anointing may the Lord in his love and mercy help you with the grace of the Holy Spirit. Amen. May the Lord who frees you from sins save you and raise you up. Amen.”
At first sight, the wording for the Anointing of the Sick may seem to be very similar to Extreme Unction. Nevertheless, upon further examination it is found to be very ambiguous. The new form also omits the important words “May the Lord pardon thee whatever sins you have committed.” These words express the primary effects of the sacrament: the healing and strengthening of the soul, the remission of venial sins and the cleansing of the soul from the remains of sin. According to St. Thomas Aquinas, Extreme Unction was instituted for “…the health of the soul which is effected by strengthening of the soul through grace and by the remission of sins.”
In his encyclical Apostolicae Curae, Pope Leo XIII taught that the sacraments “…ought both to signify the grace which they effect and effect the grace which they signify.” He also declared, “That form consequently cannot be considered apt or sufficient for the sacrament which omits what it ought essentially to signify.” Accordingly, the change in wording has resulted in an essential change in meaning, more than likely rendering this sacrament invalid.
(Fr. Francisco Radecki and Fr. Dominic Radecki, Tumultuous Times: Twenty General Councils of the Catholic Church and Vatican II and Its Aftermath [Wayne, MI: St. Joseph’s Media, 2004], p. 476-477; italics given. #CommissionLink)
Traditionalist author Daniel Graham, who is not a sedevacantist, points out parallels between the Novus Ordo Anointing of the Sick and the Anglican so-called ‘Visitation of the Sick’:
Traditional Extreme Unction does not anoint the forehead or breast. Like the Anglican rite, the Novus Ordo rite also anoints [only] two body members: forehead and hands. The Novus Ordo rite mimics the Anglicans in selecting only two body members and by anointing the forehead, which is not anointed in Traditional Extreme Unction.
The purpose of the Novus Ordo rite anointing is ambiguous: help, save, and raise. All these verbs might apply to spiritual healing. Most likely, the verbs might apply to physical healing described in the Anglican service. The words save and raise up refer to bodily healing in the context or Mark 2:1-12 from the Novus Ordo liturgy readings [that are part of the expanded Novus Ordo rite of Anointing]. Raise up equals the physical cure of the paralytic. Jesus had already forgiven the paralytic’s sins. Therefore, the contextual evidence indicates that help, save, and raise refer to physical healing alone, which is consistent with the rest of the Novus Ordo rite.
The phrase May the Lord who frees you from sin does not associate the anointing with pardoning sin. Rather, the phrase affirms the Lord’s ability to forgive sin, which happens in Confession, if the dying person is lucky enough to get that option.
(Daniel Graham, Lex Orandi: Comparing the Traditional and Novus Ordo Rites of the Seven Sacraments [Preview Press, 2015], p. 152; italics given. #CommissionLink)
Indeed, the Anointing of the Sick, especially in how it is actually given in practice, has made Extreme Unction into what the Radecki Fathers have aptly called “the spiritual equivalent of a get well card due to essential changes in the sacrament” (Tumultuous Times, p. 478).
Daniel Graham, too, hits the nail on the head in his summary of the differences between the true Catholic Last Rites and the Novus Ordo counterfeit:
A comparison of the two rites [Extreme Unction vs. Anointing of the Sick] shows that they are completely different in what they intend and what they teach. The Traditional sacrament of Extreme Unction, also called Last Rites, prepares the soul for the final battle against the devil, for death, and to face judgment and eternity. The sacrament also has the power to heal the body as well as prepare the soul. The Novus Ordo Sacrament of the Sick primarily attempts to heal the body or at least alleviate physical suffering. Spiritual healing is a secondary concern and is, according to the text, more a matter of managing psychological distress.
(Graham, Lex Orandi, p. 143)
The Novus Ordo wrecking of this important sacrament explains Francis’ emphasis on it being for the sick and not only for the dying. But Bergoglio being Bergoglio, he had to add insult to injury, and so he audaciously accused those who still correctly understand the Last Rites to be a preparation for death of having abandoned all hope, when the exact opposite is the case!
Associating hope with staying alive and being happy in this world, rather than associating it with God helping us to attain our supernatural end in the Beatific Vision, is not a new theme for the papal pretender.
In fact, this false, Naturalist distortion of hope is also the underlying principle that governs his opposition to the death penalty, and, worse still, his opposition even to life imprisonment. Both of these punishments, the apostate Jesuit falsely claims, deprive the delinquent of hope:
Jorge Bergoglio is clearly a Naturalist. The here and now is all he really cares about. Hence his excessive emphasis on the corporal works of mercy, to the neglect of the spiritual works of mercy. Hence his obsessive ‘proselytism’ for human fraternity, peace, environmentalism, human dignity, migrants, etc., all the while considering conversion to Catholicism optional at best. “They are of the world: therefore of the world they speak, and the world heareth them” (1 Jn 4:5).
What Francis has done with his latest ‘Pope Video’ is thus a terrible thing that will, potentially, aid in the damnation of many. By redirecting the focus from dying a holy death to living this temporal life a little while longer, Bergoglio is helping to keep people’s thoughts away from the four last things (death, judgment, heaven, hell), instead encouraging them to stay focused on temporal, earthly life.
It may sound ironic and nonsensical to Novus Ordo ears, but dying is the most important part of one’s life. If we die well, we will be saved; if we die badly, we will be damned. Hence the Last Rites are of the greatest importance for Catholics.
“He that loveth his life shall lose it; and he that hateth his life in this world, keepeth it unto life eternal” (Jn 12:25).
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