Claims of Vatican Freemasonry from 1999

A news article at Gloria TV about Masons involved at the highest levels of the Vatican caught my eye. The report was based on an Italian article which can be found here. I ran the whole thing through Google Translate so hopefully it will be coherent enough to read. The pictures with their captions come from the original article.

I’ll try have a professional translation made of “Gone with the Wind in the Vatican” – that book may provide the evidence needed to prove the claims made below

The publication of the book, Gone with the Wind in the Vatican, in 1999, by Edizioni Kaos, written by a group of personalities, probably ecclesiastical, who collectively signed Themselves The Millennials, unleashed, at the time, a real hornet’s nest in the upper floors of the Catholic Church, as well as in the world of public information. But it was, as we then saw, a storm in a glass of water: in practice, the strategy adopted by the leaders of the Church, with the connivance and complicity of all the major press organs and public and private television (confirming that there is no real competition between them, since they belong to the same owners and take orders from the same centers of occult power: exactly as we see in recent months) was that of or the rubber wall of silence to the terrible revelations contained in that book, and wait for public opinion, overwhelmed and dazed by new news from a hundred other directions, to forget about the scandal with the same speed with which it had been invested.

A strategy that has always worked, because, in the world of so-called information, the rule is that the mind of the public must always be “occupied” by a tumultuous succession of news, true or false, objective or exaggerated, and possibly minimized, without ever being able to form a clear and overall idea of the situation, precisely because it is always committed to “digest” new materials that are constantly pressing, in which truth and falsehood are wisely dosed in such a way that they can no longer distinguish them and lose the very taste for truth and the innate contempt for lies.

This is the strategy adopted today towards Monsignor Carlo Maria Viganò: to ignore him completely, at first; then, subject it to the barrage of criticism and denigration, often in the form of “friendly fire”, that is, the subtle attacks launched by those who, until yesterday, seemed to share its objectives and the need for moral cleanliness; finally silence again, because the globalist power immediately realized that it had made a mistake in talking about him, even if to denigrate and ridicule him, because of the real enemies it must never speak, for any reason. It is the surest way to let the effect that their words and actions exert on the masses be praised: since, for the latter, there really is only what the newspapers and televisions talk about; while what they do not talk about, in practice it is as if it did not exist, even if it were a truck launched at insane speed that is running over the highway, arriving in the forbidden direction of travel.

Roncalli was the modernist and Freemason pope, who surprisingly called the infamous Second Vatican Council: a true “Revolution” that upset the Catholic Church and the message of Christ!

Monsignor Marinelli was not the author, but one of the authors of the book-revelation, as he himself admitted during some interviews, calling himself simply “a spokesman” for the group. He had become aware of a series of scandals in the Vatican linked both to the widespread practice of homosexuality, to the careerism and profiteering of many high figures of the Roman Curia, and, finally, to the practice of occult rites linked to Freemasonry and even black masses, a direct expression of Satanism; and he was shocked.

For a long time he had wondered what his duty was, whether to speak or be silent, however for the love of the Church; he had also counseled with the well-known exorcist Don Gabriele Amorth, who had encouraged him in the second direction. And so the book Gone with the Wind in the Vatican was born, originated, whatever one may say, not by speculative intent, but, on the contrary, by the sincere desire to see a brake and a remedy put in place to a moral drift that for years had been proceeding without obstacles in the upper echelons of the Church. Hope that went frustrated: the book was promptly made to disappear from bookstores, because all the 100,000 copies sold, or most of them, were purchased by the Vatican, which eliminated them; and the press dealt with it very little, so that the resonance was modest, if at all.

The bulk of public opinion did not know about it; no debate was ignited; the scandalous careers of the prelates in the smell of perversion, business and Freemasonry, did not suffer substantial obstacles, at most some promotions were frozen, on a prudential basis. But in short, the lid of the nauseating pot was not lifted, and no one rolled up their sleeves to purify the miasmas that were hanging the atmosphere of the Bride of Christ.

Cardinal Gianfranco Ravasi, author of “Dear Freemason Brothers” that appeared in Il Sole 24 Ore in February 2016.

Those who had to answer uncomfortable questions did not answer; and those who had reason to scratch their mange, as father Dante would say, were spared a similar, public humiliation. A great opportunity for reflection and rethinking was wasted; and the malpractice now consolidated, tolerated or perhaps even accepted by Paul VI and then by Giovani Paolo II, who cared more about carrying out his anti-communist plots directed against the Soviet Union than ascertaining the origin of the money destined for this (money anticipated by Masonic and mafia financiers such as Calvi, Sindona and Ortolani), continued as before and worse than before.

By now a real Masonic dome had been consolidated inside the Vatican (there are those who speak of four different lodges that dominate and even compete with each other), in which, scandal in scandal, flourished and still flourishes, so to speak, a real gay lobby, cemented and strengthened by the sad solidarity of the humorous type that binds, its members, united by the same vice and well determined to continue to practice it with impunity, even in the most brazen forms, but not to let anything leak outside, at the cost of passing over corpses, and not only in a figurative sense (those of Albino Luciani, Emanuela Orlandi and the Vatican gendarmes Estermann and Tornay, for example).

St. Pio of Pietralcina: with Pope Pacelli they courageously fought Freemasonry and its inexorable infiltration into the Church!

Against Monsignor Marinelli, who was the head of the office of the Congregation for the Oriental Churches, and therefore had known well, and from within, the “dome” of power of the Curia, a criminal proceeding had been opened, on charges of defamation and disclosure of state secrets, but the accused had decided not to appear at the hearings at the Vatican Chancellery building. Shortly afterwards he died, towards the end of October 2000, before the trial reached a formal conviction and just one year after the publication of the “incriminated” book: a rather timely death, which allowed the Vatican, for the umpteenth time, to sweep the dirt under the carpet and go on as if nothing had happened, deaf and insensitive to any moral call or warning.

In any case, the most scandalous, and most disturbing, aspect of the revelations contained in the book was the one that was least talked about, namely the massive and widespread infiltration of Masonic lodges within the Church and especially in the Roman Curia. And even in this case it was certainly no coincidence that the few articles that appeared in the press in relation to the Millennials have overlooked, or treated only in passing, this topic: in fact, if even a part of the revelations contained in it were true (and this was also the opinion of Father Amorth: not everything was true, but most of them did), this would have made indispensable a profound reflection on the direction that the post-conciliar Church had taken, in the sense of shortening the distances from the Masonic order and to build a bridge, more than suspicious, towards it (a bridge that would culminate in the Dear Masonic Brothers of Cardinal Gianfranco Ravasi, which appeared in Il Sole 24 Ore in February 2016.

It would have been necessary to reflect on a whole series of “openings”, or ostrich policies, starting with the laws on divorce and abortion, which certainly had been promoted by the lodges, but which were not reconciled at all with the true Magisterium of the Church, and are not reconciled even today, in spite of what all the cardinals of the Curia and all the modernist theologians who today go crazy with the greatest ease can say, supported by a wicked pontificate that, for eight years now, speaks only of breaking down walls and building bridges, as if pervaded by a frantic spirit of self-destruction.

They want the destruction of Catholicism: their general program has already come a long way on the road to realization. There is still little left, and then they will throw off the mask altogether: and they will show themselves for what they are and have always been: sworn enemies of Christ and his holy Name, and therefore satanic and implacable enemies of the good, of the true and of the beautiful!

Shortly after the publication of the book Gone with the Wind in the Vatican, it was the journalist Luigi Baldo, who at the time collaborated with Giorgio Bongiovanni’s magazine, Terzo Millennio, who wanted to publish an interview with Monsignor Marinelli. The reader should forget, or put in brackets, the more than dubious figure of Bongiovanni, and not be blocked by a legitimate preconception towards him; but keep in mind that, sometimes, the truth shines through even where one would least expect to find it, precisely because, when the most forbidden conformism and systematic control of information apply, it happens that some flash of truth appears precisely in the newspapers or on television networks that, although questionable in many respects, nevertheless, at that particular moment, and perhaps for reasons all of them, they are determined to put a spanner in the works to the consolidated system of totalitarian consensus, so they offer some space for true information where all the others have been closed or duly tamed.

And here is the part of the interview that concerns the theme of Freemasonry within the Church (from: Lorenzo Baldo, Interview with Monsignor Marinelli, on Terzo Millennio, S. Elpidio a Mare (AP), n. 3 of Sept. 1999, pp. 74-75):

Q: Let’s get to the problem of Freemasonry…

A. Padre Pio, four years before the prophecy of Fatima, wrote to his spiritual father about a revelation that the Lord had made to him, namely that he saw many ecclesiastics, many prelates enrolled in Freemasonry.

Q. So what should be done to expel Freemasonry from the Church?

A. As you know Freemasonry continues to be a secret sect that reveals the first two or three degrees, no one knows for sure the other higher degrees, no one knows them. I think that in order to expel Freemasonry, the rooting of Freemasonry within the Church, it is necessary to have seminarians and students of pontifical Catholic universities study a subject on Freemasonry. Until now, seminarians were instructed on all questions of human knowledge, without knowing a word about how Freemasonry manages to infiltrate the Church. no one knows, yet a seminarian who tomorrow will become a priest, can meet with any Freemason in his parish, without knowing how to behave. It is evident that no one wants to “fight” something without knowing it first. If Freemasonry within the Church is to be fought, it must be known first and to know it must be studied. Freemasonry cares, in the same way as the devil, to make believe that “it does not exist”. In all the articles that appeared in the newspapers on the book of the Millennials, there is barely any mention of Freemasonry, one or at most two questions, when instead this is precisely the “purulent plague”…

Freemason Paul Marcinkus, nicknamed: “The banker of God”

Q. What is the practice for entry into Freemasonry?

A. In the books it is clearly written. In Freemasonry one does not enter by “question”, but by “invitation”; at the limit you can show yourself by those in charge, as a valid person, intelligent, at most… But it is the Superior Council of Freemasonry that judges the suitability or not for a “new entry” and when the response is positive one is “invited to enter the Masonic Order”.

“They” first study the characters to be inserted and when everyone agrees, with a secret vote, we proceed to the invitation of that person… to make a cleric “enter” they make him certain promises that are then in fact kept, such as that of becoming a bishop, nuncio, secretary of a cardinal, etc., then at a certain point he is reminded of the reason why he had this type of facilitation and if he does not intend to continue all negotiations are interrupted… and since “they” abound “careerist” people, greedy for success, it is very difficult for someone to back down, since he has now entered a “game” too big…

In the last century there were many priests who, at the end of their lives, dissociated themselves from Freemasonry by converting, but now they are not. Now we tend to do something else, the opposite, let’s take the example of the Jesuit Father Caprile and others, who said; that Freemasonry is not really against God and against the Church and that one can very well to be Catholics and Freemasons at the same time.

Since there is no longer “excommunication”, the Catholic-Mason can go to communion and approach the high sacraments… Here is the scam! Whereas before you were excommunicated, now the deception takes place without problems… and remember what Paul VI said: the smoke of Satan entered the temple of God… it has the key to understanding.

What “smoke” more dark, oppressive than that of Freemasonry? Here we speak of spiritual smoke. And if we take note that it is the pontiff himself of that time who makes such statements. the issue increases in importance.

A month ago the news came out, that in London the Masonic Order has established a chair in the faculty precisely on Freemasonry, so I wonder, if “they” do it because we can not do it too, telling the truth about how they were born and what they do?

When a professor has to teach a subject, obviously he must study it first, document himself, in this way he would delve into the most total fund of Freemasonry discovering new implications. All this is very worrying… While we are still anxious about how the new millennium will open, let us leave out this “piece” that is literally flooding humanity and the Church.

Q. How much more is not known about this link with Freemasonry?

A. The things you don’t know are 95%… Regarding this matter I read a book of 500 pages and it is something to make the skin cringe… the UN is a conclusion of the purpose of Freemasonry of 1717, NATO is a conclusion of what was proclaimed, the same dollar bears exposed the pyramid, which is the coat of arms of Freemasonry and many other things… such as for UNESCO and organizations that want to eliminate the power of States and “regionalize” them, as happened in the Balkans, they want to regionalize it in order to better dominate them.

It is time to move towards a universal government, a world government in which there are the most important religions, where it is accepted that the “universal architect” is this supreme being who can be called Christ, Allah, Jehovah. The important thing is to get to the global government of the world…

Q. The links between the Church and economic speculation…

A. It is enough to remember the scandals of the IOR linked to Freemasonry, also broadcast on television in front of millions of viewers.

Q. How is the scandal of pedophile priests possible, or of ecclesiastical homosexuality linked to “careerism”?

A. I do not give myself a reason, I was very impressed by the Pope’s forgiveness to the victims of these sexual abuses, in the book, the question is just raised, but it undoubtedly remains a terrible plague. The use of homosexuality as a form of careerism has been one of the most frequent practices and there are clear examples in the book.

Q. What about mafia infiltrations inside the Vatican?

A. I am not aware of it.

A. For what reasons, even within the Church, has there been a real persecution of Padre Pio?

A. Padre Pio has always been a “target”, as Simeon said to the Lord, a point of reference and contestation. even from the inside..

The famous and appreciated “Exorcist” Don Gabriele Amorth, who died a few years ago.

What about the words of Monsignor Marinelli? How to judge them, in the light of all that has happened in the last twenty-two years, and that he could not have imagined, as probably almost none of us? Once again, it is clear that the policy of opening up to all and of dialoguing with all, inaugurated by the self-styled “good pope” with the Second Vatican Council, has produced, and continues to produce, disastrous fruits, to say the least.

Since then it has been said, and made to believe by the faithful, that the Church no longer has enemies, and therefore, implicitly or explicitly, that she must disarm, lower her guard and place herself in an attitude of understanding, appreciation and dialogue also with those parts of society that have always opposed and strenuously fought her. At the heart of them is Freemasonry whose summit, whatever the low-ranking affiliates are told, is the destruction of Catholicism and the cancellation of Christ’s redemptive work, to establish a New World Order, dominated by some powerful men who want to be worshiped as gods, or almost.

And already now they have reached a good point in their program: in the meantime, in fact, they have managed, for the second Christmas in a row, to pass on the idea that man is not saved by the Incarnation of Christ, but by the inoculation of the “sacred” vaccine (which is not a vaccine at all, but an experimental gene serum). Their general programme, therefore, has already come a long way on the road to realization.

There is still little left, and then they will throw off the mask altogether: and they will show themselves for what they are and have always been: sworn enemies of Christ and his holy Name, and therefore satanic and implacable enemies of the good, of the true and of the beautiful.

03 January 2022

Rapprochement from 2017

FROM KATHOLISCHES – NOVEMBER 2017

In 2017 the Masonic lodges will celebrate their 300th anniversary. Since 1717 the relationship between Lodge and Church has been rife with tension and conflict. In Syracuse there is a new attempt at an understanding with a spectacular aspect: For the first time a Catholic bishop takes part in a public box event and will discuss with the master of the chair. Some insights into the background of a controversial experiment.

Truth and the search for truth

For the Catholic Church the prescribed relativism and the factually practiced syncretism of the Lodge Brothers are incompatible with the truth of reality revealed by God. The lodges reject this revelation as a truth of faith. The orientation of the lodges is not only deistic, agnostic or atheistic, depending on obedience, but was from the beginning significantly shaped by the esoteric “search” for a “different” truth than the Christian one. In the Catholic states the lodges saw and organized themselves as direct opponents of the church. Following their relativistic credo, they want to eliminate the public influence of the church, which is why Freemasonry has always been attached to a striving for power. This battle has been raging for three centuries.

The history of the lodges, however, also knows the phenomenon of church representatives who allowed themselves to be initiated and thus became apostates according to the church’s understanding. Your covert work in the church as “agents of the lodges” is still awaiting investigation. A particularly striking example is the magnificent Benedictine Abbey of Melk on the Danube. At the end of the 18th century there was not only a monk’s convent in the monastery, but also a lodge. A part of the monks belonged to her and thus formed a convention of the “initiates” in the convent.

The status as a secret society, to which the lodges cling to this day, allows the abbreviated brothers undetected to infiltrate other organizations, parties and churches and to create an invisible network.

“Relaxation Exercises” after the Council

One consequence of the Second Vatican Council it was that lodge-friendly church districts ventured with newfound confidence from obscurity. The 1970s were marked by efforts, also in the German-speaking area, to bring about a “reconciliation” between lodge and church. Faithful bishops in the countries and the election of Pope John Paul II put an end to these attempts in the early 1980s.

Lists of alleged or actual church representatives, including cardinals, who are said to be lodge members, circulate repeatedly. The sociologist of religion, Massimo Introvigne, warned against false suspicions and in May 2013 formulated a sure way to clarify the suspicion of lodge membership:

“The crucial core of Masonic ideology is relativism, with all the related political implications, which often lead Masonic obedience to promote laws to legalize abortion, euthanasia, and gay associations. So if you hear about a Catholic church representative or politician saying that he is a Freemason, the question should be: does he represent relativistic ideas? Is he an abortion advocate? Is he in favor of euthanasia or the legal recognition of gay partnerships?

If the answer is ‘yes’, then he is – according to the definition used by the current Grand Master of the Grand Orient of Italy – a ‘Freemason without an apron’, a companion of Freemasonry, and the question of whether he has an official membership card or not is then only secondary.

If the answer is ‘no’ and the church official or Catholic politician openly opposes relativism and its consequences, then there is good reason to conclude that the allegations are defamatory. “

New signals of rapprochement

Although Freemasonry failed 35 years ago in its attempt to be recognized by the Church, the Lodge Brothers have neither given up their fight for repression against the Church, nor have they tried to make them spiritually submissive to their thinking. Since Pope Francis was elected, the curtailed or unvarnished “brothers” believe they see a new opportunity outside and inside the Church .

Among the signals that point in this direction include not only praise of the pope from Latin America, but also the sensational letter from Cardinal Gianfranco Ravasi to the ” Brethren“.

The latest example is a discussion meeting of the Masonic Grand Orient of Italy , to be held at Syracuse next November 12 in the cathedral square. The invitations show Jesus Christ with a compass in hand, a typical Masonic instrument. The circle is one of the “three great lights” of Masonic symbolism, which lies on the altar in the lodge temples.

The theme of the event is: “ Church and Freemasonry – so close, so far? “The portrayal of Jesus is part of the title picture showing the creation of the world. The representation has nothing to do with the Lodge Brothers and their world of ideas. It was created around 1220, 500 years before Freemasonry was founded. The panel discussion is part of the 300-year-anniversary celebrations of the Grand Orient.

The purpose of the event is to present an understanding between lodge and church as possible. It gives the impression of a compatibility that the Church has rejected for 300 years.

Despite the provocative image and an even more provocative title, a Catholic bishop will take part in the discussion. Msgr. Antonio Staglianò, Bishop of Noto and Msgr. Maurizio Aliotta from the Archdiocese of Syracuse will discuss with two Honorary Grand Masters of the Greater Orient, Santi Fedele and Sergio Rosso. The host is the Master of the Chair of Syracuse, Alessandro Spicuglia.

“Communitarianism” as common ground?

Nuova Bussola Quotidiana (NBQ) reports that there are violent protests from devout Catholics against the event. People ask the Archdiocese of Syracuse what this “hug” is about with an organization condemned by the Church.

“It’s about an organization that in southern Italy has always had to do with (often occult) power and always had an esoteric streak between rites and brotherhood that was never really revealed.”

The Catholic Internet newspaper asked Bishop Staglianò what his participation was about. The bishop referred to the spectacular and equally controversial letter from Cardinal Gianfranco Ravasi to the “Brothers Freemasons”. The chairman of the Pontifical Council for Culture had “clearly shown” that there could be similarities between the Church and Loge, namely the “communitarianism”. Bishop Staglianò said:

“I assume that he meant the opposition to unbridled individualism, anti-materialism, a certain idea of spirituality and finally also the philanthropy, that is, the solidary aspect.”

However, the Church gave a negative answer to all these alleged “similarities”, which not least had to do with the “danger of a relativistic and deistic methodology”, according to NBQ, which the lodges are trying to do.

“Hug process in progress”

“The reality is that there is a hugging process going on today,” NBQ said. The most recent example: On the discussion in Syracuse, there appeared in the daily newspaper of the Italian Bishops Conference an article by the priest Ennio Stamile, who argued for the “dialogue” with the Freemasons. Bishop Staglianò was one of his theology professors, the priest defends the bishop’s participation. Stamile also refers to Pope Francis, who called for a dialogue “with everyone, no one excluded”.

The priest accuses the critics of rapprochement as “ignorant” and “superficial” because they “have no idea” about Freemasonry. The claim that the lodges are a “power lobby” is a fairy tale that must finally “disappear”.

Fr Ennio Stamile is one of the most famous priests in southern Italy. He is chairman of the Libera Calabria (Free Calabria) association, an umbrella organization “against the Mafia”. The association proves to be a firmly integrated part of the political left through language, symbols, actionism and contacts, and in any case it is fully recognized by this side. Stamile comes from the circle of Don Ciotti, the founder of the association, whom Pope Francis kissed on the hand in March 2014.

The union has received several hundred hectares of agricultural land by the state, confiscated from the members of the ‘Ndrangheta. The ‘Ndrangheta is the group of organized crime in Calabria and the Mafia in Sicily is comparable. The association runs farms on these areas with those who have been released from prison, former drug addicts, immigrants and those who have dropped out of the Mafia.

Lodge and Mafia?

Don Stamile’s request to speak is important not only because of his anti-Mafia reputation. His partisanship for the dialogue with the lodge is interesting. More information could explain this and open the door to a remarkable circular if the entanglement with organized crime – mafia and lodge are “occult” powers, as it has already been said – may even be a regional problem.

Since the 1960s there have been indications that mafia bosses have entered the lodges. Within the Calabrian mafia, the ‘Ndrangheta, there were violent conflicts about it. The initiative for this cooperation seems to go back to Gioa Tauro’s boss, Girolamo Piromalli (1918–1979).

Since then, investigative files by the public prosecutor have repeatedly referred to a “mass mafia”, a merger of Freemasonry and mafia into a Masonic mafia. 2014 protocol extracts were the interrogation of the former Grand Master of the Grand Orient of Italy, Giuliano Di Bernardo (1990-1993), known. Di Bernardo left the Grand Orient in the wake of the scandal surrounding the mysterious Propaganda Due Lodge (P2). Today he is Grand Master of the Grand Lodge of Italy . According to the data Di Bernardo early 90s were 28 of 32 Calabrian boxes from , ‘Ndrangheta has been inspected.

In 2007 mafia boss Sebastiano Altomonte said in a conversation with his wife that had been recorded by the police through acoustic room surveillance:

“There is one you know about and one you don’t know about. There is the visible and the invisible that nobody knows about, except the invisible. “

The statement has been associated with the “Santa” – the group created by Girolamo Piromalli at the highest management level; the ‘Ndrangheta , whose members are all members of Freemasonry. However, this thesis has not yet been confirmed in a court-relevant manner.

In a conversation between mafia boss Pantaleone Mancuso, overheard by the police in 2013, said during a walk:

“The ‘Ndrangheta no longer exists… It once existed. Today ‘Ndrangheta is part of Freemasonry … Let’s put it this way: It is under Freemasonry but has the same rules! … The ‘Ndrangheta no longer exists, all that remains are Freemasonry and the four idiots who still believe in the’ Ndrangheta. “

Against this background, the words of Don Ennio Stamile may have a slightly different meaning, who mentions a connection between Mafia and Freemasonry in his statement, but dismisses it as an invention and attempt at disinformation by people who want to become something without “merits and competencies” and by to whom the Church is not free either.

But it is also a fact that the former President of the Higher Regional Court of Catanzaro (Calabria) and Honorary President of the Supreme Court of Italy, Giuseppe Tuccio, has to answer in court for membership of the Mafia. It was only in 2016 that Tuccio, who was not unknown to Libera Calabria , published a book about the fight against the Mafia. “The Piromalli had judge Tuccio, a Freemason, in their hands,” a key witness had testified in a court case. Even in the wheels of justice of senior judges came in the wake of anti-mafia Operation Gotha .

Bishop Staglianò: Hans Küng and “why I talk to the Freemasons”

But back to the discussion event in Syracuse. Bishop Staglianò justifies his participation with a statement from Pope John XXIII: “Let us look more for what unites us than what divides us.” Despite all condemnations by the Church, especially Leo XIII. With the encyclical Humanum genus and the letter Inimica vis , or the declaration of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith of 1983, the bishop sees no problem in “having a dialogue with the lodge brothers, for example when these Freemasons should organize themselves to fight against injustice “. It should be examined where one can act together for the “common good”.

The question remains, according to NBQ, what “common good” means from a Catholic point of view and what it means, however, from the point of view of Freemasonry. Bishop Staglianò admitted that he was not “competent” to answer this question. Literally he let it be known:

“Look, I don’t know anything about Freemasonry. I am in the process of reading up, starting with the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith declaration [from 1983]. I think that one can have no other opinion on the condemnation of the Masonic theses. I will say more: it is the first time that I have found myself in the situation of speaking to Freemasons. I think that I will begin my remarks with the text by Hans Küng on the ‘Magic Flute’ by Mozart, who was both a Freemason and a Christian. But we cannot ignore the church at the time of the genius from Salzburg as a bureaucratic institution. Not true?”

Criticism of the “integralist” dialogue

NBQ asks whether it is “credible” when a recognized theologian and bishop like Staglianò describes himself as “not competent”. The bishop’s statement could also be seen as a provocation, since he seems to be saying one thing in a few sentences but seem to mean the opposite.

When asked about the Freemason’s invitation with the representation of Jesus Christ, the bishop said that this “does not scandalize” him:

“Didn’t Arius also attribute the cosmogonic traits of a demiurge to Jesus? If Arius made a mistake, it was – if he did – that he did not ascribe God’s features to the demiurge. “

And further:

“I will go like Jesus to the tax collectors and prostitutes and proclaim Christ. The Freemasons will then determine how close or how far they are to this proclamation. “

Bishop Staglianò condescendingly described criticism of the dialogue with the Freemasons as “stupid, superficial and integralistic”. He used one of those “magical” terms with which progressive church circles bludgeon devout Catholics. Ultimately, the bishop insulted the popes of the past 300 years, who condemned Freemasonry, as “stupid, superficial and integralist”. Leo XIII. wrote in Humanum genus :

“The sect is, according to its whole being and its innermost nature, corruption and vice; therefore it is not allowed to join her and to be of any help. “

Finally, Bishop Staglianò also refers to Pope Francis, who urged to go to the “existential fringes”, “and Freemasonry seems to be one”.

Is the Church still equipped for “dialogue” with Freemasonry?

The question that remains, according to NBQ, goes beyond Bishop Staglianò. In the past few years the church has tried to hardly speak about the Freemasons anymore. The intellectual and scientific preoccupation with the lodges at the relevant academies, institutes and faculties had almost completely come to a standstill. There are hardly any more coherent and thorough studies on the subject. The declaration by Paolo Maria Siano, of the Franciscan Friars of the Immaculate, form a remarkable exception.

It is almost as if one does not want to be labeled with the stigma of a “conspiracy theorist”. However, the boxes are a reality, as the celebrations show. Other church districts have elevated dialogue to the “highest dogma” in which they believe, which is why any form of exclusion is frowned upon – at least any form contrary to the spirit of the times. The attempt at a more or less open distancing from the past with its condemnations of Freemasonry is obvious. This raises the question of “how the Church wants to meet Freemasonry, since its younger representatives have hardly any knowledge of the Lodge and reflexively tend to dismiss criticism of it as a“ yesterday’s conspiracy theory ”of an“ integralism ”that has been overcome.

The signals for a new “dialogue” are increasing, although the church staff seem less and less prepared for it. Or is the willingness to dialogue growing parallel to the loss of knowledge?

Dazu NBQ:

“Dialogue is not a gospel term. Does the church want to use the excuse of dialogue – after the radicals, the Protestants, the anti-clerical atheists and the plutocratic elites – to break the last taboo that lodges, which were once enemies, are now only ‘different’? “

Text: Giuseppe Nardi
Image: Wikicommons / Grande Oriente d’Italia (Screenshots)

(Note – the original article was published in German. An online translation rendered some phrases unintelligible.)

Cardinal Ravasi flatters the Masons

This 2016 article by Cardinal Ravasi calls for dialogue with Freemasons. The Cardinal disingenuously implies that the penalties cited in Canon Law no longer apply to that ideology which Pope Leo XIII called, “pernicious,” “perverse” and “evil.”

Anonymous Catholic

From Rorate Caeli :

A few days ago, we published a few excerpts of the article published by Cardinal Ravasi, President of the Pontifical Council for Culture, in the Italian paper Il Sole 24 Ore last Sunday, February 14, 2016, calling for dialogue with Freemasons. We now have the full text of the article — followed by a response given by the Cardinal to a reader who asked him for a clarification.
***

DEAR BROTHER MASONS

Over and above our different identities, there is no lack of common values: a sense of community, charitable works and the fight against materialismby Cardinal Gianfranco RavasiI read some time ago in an American magazine that the international bibliography on Freemasonry exceeds more than a 100,000 articles. Certainly contributing to this interest is its aura of secrecy and mystery, more or less with good reason, its different “obediences” and Masonic “rites” shrouded in a sort of murkiness, not to mention its origins, which, according to the English historian Frances Yates, “are one of the most discussed and questionable problems in the entire field of historical research” (curiously the scholar’s study was dedicated to the Rosicrucian Enlightment, translated by Einaudi in 1976).We obviously do not want to go into this archipelago of “lodges” “orients” “arts” “affiliations” and denominations of which history has often weaved – for better or for worse – into the politics of many nations (for example, I’m thinking here of Uruguay where I took part recently in various dialogues with proponents of traditional Masonic culture and society), just as it is not possible to trace the lines of demarcation between the authentic, the false, the degenerate, or para-masonry and the various esoteric or theosophical circles.
It is also arduous to illustrate a map of the ideology which holds such a fragmentary universe, which is why we can speak of a horizon and a method more than a codified doctrinal system. Inside this fluid setting some rather distinct crossroads meet, such as an anthropology based on freedom of conscience, intellect and equal rights, in addition to a deism that acknowledges the existence of God, allowing however, for flexible definitions on His identity. Anthropocentrism and spiritualism, are, therefore, two somewhat excavated paths within a very changeable and flexible map that we are not able to outline in any precise way.


We are content, though, to indicate an interesting little volume which has a clearly distinct aim: that of defining the relationship between Freemasonry and the Catholic Church. Let’s be clear immediately though: it is not a historical analysis of this relationship, neither does it treat of possible contaminations between the two subjects. In fact, it is evident that Masonry has assumed Christian models – even liturgical ones. We must not forget, for instance, that in the 17th century many English lodges recruited members and maestros among the Anglican clergy and it is a fact that one of the first and fundamental Masonic “constitutions” was drawn up by the Presbyterian pastor, James Anderson who died in 1739. In it, among other things, it was affirmed, that an adherent ”will never be a stupid atheist nor an irreligious libertine” even if the creed proposed was, in the end, the vaguest possible, “that of a religion which all men agree on”.


Now, the vacillations of contacts between the Church and Freemasonry have had many varied movements, reaching even manifest hostility, marked by anticlericalism on the one side and excommunication on the other. Indeed, on April 28th 1738, Pope Clement XII, the Florentine Lorenzo Corsini, promulgated the first explicit document on Freemasonry, the Apostolic Letter In eminenti apostulatus specula, in which he declared: “that these same Societies, Companies, Assemblies, Meetings, Congregations, or Conventicles of Liberi Muratori or Francs Massons, or whatever other name they may go by, are to be condemned and prohibited”. Condemnations reiterated by subsequent pontiffs, from Benedict XIV to Pius IX and Leo XIII, affirmed the incompatibility between membership in the Catholic Church and Masonic obedience. Concise was the 1917 code of Canon Law in which canon 2335 reads: “Those who join a Masonic sect or other societies of the same sort, which plot against the Church or against legitimate civil authority, incur ipso facto an excommunication simply reserved to the Holy See.”


The new Code of 1983 tempered the formula, avoiding explicit reference to Freemasonry, conserving the substance of the punishment even if destined in the most generic sense “a person who joins an association which plots against the Church” (canon 1374). However the most articulated Church document on the irreconcilability between adhesion to the Catholic Church and Freemasonry is the Declaratio de associationibus massonicis issued by the Vatican Congregation for the Faith on November 26th 1983, signed by the then Prefect, Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger. It specified precisely the value of the new Code of Canon Law, reaffirming: “the Church’s negative judgment in regard to Masonic association remains unchanged since their principles have always been considered irreconcilable with the doctrine of the Church and therefore membership in them remains forbidden.”


The small volume to which we now return, is interesting since it attaches – along with an Introduction by the present Prefect for the Congregation, Cardinal Gerhard Muller – also two documents from two local Episcopates, the German Episcopal Conference (1980) and the Philippine one (2003). They are significant texts as they address the theoretical and practical reasons for the irreconcilability of masonry and Catholicism as concepts of truth, religion, God, man and the world, spirituality, ethics, rituality and tolerance. It is significant particularly for the method adopted by the Philippine Bishops, who articulate their discourse along three trajectories: the historical, the more explicitly doctrinal and the pastoral. All is examined along the lines of the question-answer type of catechesis. There are 47 question-answers and they go into details, such as the initiation ceremony, symbols, the use of the Bible, the relationship with other religions, the oath of brotherhood, the various levels of the hierarchy and so on. These various declarations on the incompatibility of the two memberships in the Church or in Freemasonry, do not impede, however, dialogue, as is explicitly stated in the German Bishops’ document which had already listed the specific areas for discussion, such as the communitarian dimension, works of charity, the fight against materialism, human dignity and reciprocal knowledge.


Further, we need to overcome that stance from certain Catholic integralist spheres, which – in order to hit out at some exponents even in the Church’s hierarchy who displease them – have recourse to accusing them apodictically of being members of Freemasonry. In conclusion, as the German Bishops wrote, we need to go beyond reciprocal “hostility, insults and prejudices” since “in comparison to past centuries the tone and way of manifesting [our]differences has improved and changed” even if these differences still remain in a clearly distinct way.

[Translation: Contributor Francesca Romana]
***
After being contacted by a Rorate reader, Cardinal Ravasi sent the reader the following message:

Dear [X],
You are probably reacting mainly to the article’s title, which was added by the newspaper’s staff.
My article actually presented the 1983 document from the Congregatio pro Doctrina Fidei, signed by Cardinal Ratzinger, and also the documents on the Masons from the German and Philippine Episcopal Conferences, with clear doctrinal precision as well as practical indications.
Sincere regards,

Gianfranco Card Ravasi