Francis points toward an enigmatic ‘conversion of the papacy’: a new idea of ecclesiastical government

Through the centuries, the Church has moved from triumph to triumph, though it continually endures attacks, persecutions and hatred from all quarters, all promoted by one leader: the infernal enemy who has the illusion of one day destroying it. The Church suffers insult and violent injury from pagans and apostates, the powerful and lowly, the cultured and unlearned and even – though it pains us to say so – from the very sons who should most defend her. However, she remains, as Saint Paul affirmed: ‘holy and without blemish’ (Eph 5:27), unshakable amid the torrents of hatred hurled against her.
The enduring capacity to withstand all aggression is based on the promise of her Divine Founder: ‘you are Peter, and upon this rock I will build my church’ (Mt 16:18).

Accordingly, the one doctrine that all heretics have in common is the negation of papal authority. Those who love and defend the papacy remain united to the Church, and those who reject this foundation, separate from the Church, and irremediably wither away.

Such a vital question; the manner of exercising the Petrine ministry, has been defined by the Fathers of the Church and the popes with great exactitude. This solid and clear doctrine is recorded in numerous documents of the Magisterium.

If Francis is wanting: ‘suggestions which can help make the exercise of my ministry more faithful to the meaning which Jesus Christ wished to give it’ and ‘wanting opinions of how the Church should be governed’, we affirm that the very Magisterium of his predecessors has all the answers. Here we present some of them. Let us not forget that, throughout History, those who have wished to distance themselves from a ‘centralization’, and sought to change the way of governing the Church were qualified in no uncertain terms. Those who have ears to hear… Read on…

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