The Flying Buttress: What Inquisitors' Minds Want to Know

An archive for issues of The Flying Buttress newswire, whose purpose is to comment satirically on dissent within and relating to the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Cincinnati. Disclaimer: These publications are works of satirical fiction. Any similarity to persons living or dead is purely coincidental, but it all depends on what you mean by the word "is." May the Lord bless you and keep you!

Sunday, April 08, 2007

A quintessentially Jesuit apparition

+ If our readers, heaven forbid, are anything like us, you've often wondered how it is that the Jebbies fell so quickly from their noble Ignatian vocation to become such degenerate apostles of sordid sexual disorder and libertinism, shallow sloganeers for Marxist "liberation," and arrogant rebels against the Church.

+The Flying Buttress has uncovered a document that, we believe, contains an important but heretofore unchronicled clue to the driving force behind this radical transformation and free fall into the abyss. We cannot disclose the source of this document; suffice it to say that it was obtained by our Reviled Publisher at great personal risk.

+If we understand this crumpled monograph correctly, it appears that the late Father General Pedro Arrupe, on the eve of his election in 1965, claimed he was visited by an apparition of a dazzling female personage, who gave him specific instructions as to the "renewal" of his Order. Of course, upon examination of this narrative, the well-formed Catholic will readily perceive that Arrupe's visitor could not possibly have been who Arrupe mistook her for - Our Lady - and that, in fact, such a presumption is sheer vile blasphemy. However, with a credulous aplomb characteristic of post-Conciliar Jesuits, this visitation story - if this document is to be believed - spread like wildfire to fuel the euphoria of "renewal.” The rest, as they say, is history.

The mysterious visitor apparently acquired a name, which this monograph bears:

"Our Lady of Pedro Arrupe"

+Here are some highlights from Arrupe's first person narrative and tragic delusion:

"A woman in shining white clothes came to me with a golden basin full of snow. She took me and split open my body; then she took my heart and split it open and took out from it a black clot that she flung away. Then she washed my heart and my body with that snow until she made them pure...

...then she took me to a cave, where suddenly the Truth descended upon me. The shining woman came to me holding a little red book and asked me to read. I replied, 'I do not know how to read in this language,' for the characters were written in Chinese hieroglyphs.

The shining woman caught me forcefully and pressed me so hard that I could not bear it anymore. She then released me and again asked me to read, and I replied, 'I do not know how to read in this language,' whereupon she caught me again and pressed me a second time ‘til I could not bear it anymore. She released me and asked me again to read, but again I protested, 'I do not know how to read in this language.'

Thereupon she caught me for the third time and pressed me and then released me and said, ‘Read these “Sayings of Chairman Mao,” in the Name of the Prophet Marx, Who has created all peoples equal. He created the bourgeoisie from a clot, but the proletariat from the golden calf. Read “And The Party is Most Generous”...up to.......that which I knew not.....

Then, seeing I was exhausted and shaken with fear and doubt, the shining woman spoke again unto me, saying 'You are the Prophet of Justice and Liberation. Be anxious for the welfare of the poor, the destitute, the victims of heterosexism. Beware the opiate of the people! Steer the mighty ship of Ignatius to the Blessed Harbor of Inculturated Base Communities, and you will be richly rewarded.'

Suddenly, she took me back to my room. Mustering my courage, I asked, 'But Dear Lady, who are you?' 'I am the Mother of All Aggiornamento,' she replied. She extended her left hand toward the window and the sash opened silently, letting in the cool night air. For a moment I thought I saw wisps of smoke curling furtively into the room, but she spoke again, distracting my attention: ‘Behold! The Church has opened itself to the world - and now, the Society of Jesus must do likewise.’

'But Mother,' I replied, 'How can I do this? The Holy Father is watching, the Curia is watching. What will they say?' 'O ye of little faith,' she retorted, 'Fear not! You shall use the language of old, understood and accepted by those who watch you, but you shall change the meaning of the words to suit my purposes.'

‘Would you deign to give me an example, O Blessed One?’ I pleaded. With a stern look, she said, 'These are my final words, after which you must go forth and use your instincts. Speak only of devotion to the Primitive Charism of the Mother of All Aggiornamento. How is this devotion to be expressed? Through experimentation, consultation, self-acceptance, emotional and sexual integration, communal decision-making, and above all, by an individualism consecrated to the new unbroken threads that make up my shining garment. Now go! I shall be watching.'

She disappeared in a puff of smoke, and the open window closed as silently as it had opened. I was trembling with excitement, words and phrases racing through my mind, eager to proselytize my brothers and the world with my new vision! And - oh yes, I must go out first thing tomorrow and purchase ‘The Sayings of Chairman Mao’....”

+ (Beyond this point, the manuscript is illegible)

Miscellanea CATHOLICA

+Could it be that The Enemy has made such devastating inroads into the Church because it takes 40 years for Rome to respond to a crisis? Even then, the response is spineless and off the mark.

+Case in point: since the 2005 Bishops’ Synod, the hierarchy has been clucking that belief in the Real Presence has all but disappeared. This after a mere 40 years of ongoing disappearance. But did they identify the real culprits? Of course not: not a whisper about the disastrous Novus Ordo, which is not a sacrificial Mass but a Protestant fellowship meal. Nor was there mention of this. (NOTE: this is a sedevacantist website. If you object to the source, judge the article on its own merits.)

+The American TFP on General Pace.