Tradicat

+ JMJ According to Google, the series “Examining the Calgary SSPX School Policy” generated a fair number of 'views'. What is interesting is the distribution of the views. Basically, aside from the 'Gullible and those like him' post, the majority of views were on part 4b – where I dealt directly with the offending texts. Meaning that a number of the readers are focusing on only 17% of the posts. In fact the majority of readers passed right over part 4a, where I focused on the immediate context of the offensive text. Some of the responses that Google picked up were over at CathInfo (see bottom of article for texts that I copied on January 10, 2020). A look at the distribution and comments on CathInfo support my conclusion: People don't have patience to read a thorough analysis of a topic.  They seem to go along with their confirmation bias (see linked article) and look for elements that support their feelings instead of a rational conclusion....

+ JMJ So, whether or not Fr. Couture found that the text was 'bad' as related by Mr. Verrecchio is not relevant to the analysis. Instead of relying on hearsay, I'm forming my own opinion based upon the facts that I was able to obtain. In the full context, the school was not obliged to sin and  the "context is that St. John Bosco is a Catholic school and it will foster an "inclusive, safe and caring learning environment within our district must be in accordance with the teachings of the Catholic Church." Following the principle of obedience they had an obligation to either obey or withdraw from the sphere of authority.   Was the mandated inclusion of those phrases in the policy desirable?  Of course not. However, that is not the point. Many things in Canadian Law are not desirable. Is what was required sinful?  The answer is no. As a judge recently said to a plaintiff, "we deal with reality here".  That the 'resistance' ...

+ JMJ As mentioned in the previous post, up to the mandated section, the context is that St. John Bosco is a Catholic school and it will foster an "inclusive, safe and caring learning environment within our district must be in accordance with the teachings of the Catholic Church." https://www.stdennis.ca/st-john-bosco-school-blog The mandated section is titled "Inclusive Communities" and starts on page 45 and continues until page 48.  NB: I have used bullets instead of number resolve some errors in numbering. First the background section: Consistent with its mission and vision, St. John Bosco Private School is committed to a safe, caring, respectful, inclusive and welcoming learning and teaching environment for all staff and students having charity above all other considerations. Catholic charity (Love of God) is the greatest of all virtues.  Charity should guide all of our actions as we need to love God as He loves each of us sinners. In other wo...

+ JMJ We have four key elements as a starting point in the analysis: The NDP was a lawfully elected government. As such they received authority from God. Catholic have an obligation to obey the legitimate commands of their superiors - both secular as well as religious. Otherwise society falls into anarchy with everyone wanting to be their own prime minister, or like the protestants all want to be pope. If an order involved immediate or proximate sin ( see this series of articles ) then a Catholic is obliged to disregard it. The NDP passed legislation (ie laws) that required actions on school management in 2015 and then again in 2017 that closed some loopholes. The goal of the analysis is to determine if in fact the legislation required a sinful act (immediate or proximate).  If it did, then the SSPX should have disregarded the order and, in my opinion, relied on a charter challenge to the act. Including the title page etc, the policy is 62 pages in length and is ...

+ JMJ Sometimes codified as in the 2009 Criminal Code of Canada : " Ignorance of the law by a person who commits an offence is not an excuse for committing that offence." Source As I write this I have a cold, so I have had time to think about my interactions with Gullible and the blogger of Restore DC Catholicism. What occurred to me is that ignorance is the root of the issues that motivate both the blogger and Gullible. The blogger, when confronted with Church Teaching on the required intention for confecting the Sacraments replied: That's a bit of a stretch that I don't believe. It is useless to argue facts so I invite the blogger to not take my word for it.  They should look up the facts from reliable sources. Then they can judge if I am right or wrong. The same goes for Gullible. Like most 'resistors' that I've encountered (... NTS: I am making an assumption that Gullible is a 'resistor'), Gullible is hasty in judgement...

+ JMJ A quick apology to Gullible.  I should not have let my frustration come out in my post here . I should not have started adding the 'him or her' / 'he or she' references. It was inappropriate for  a Catholic and I apologise. P^3

+ JMJ Context The SSPX School in Calgary (St. John Bosco Private School) has been in operation in various forms for around 20 years.  I am aware that the school has, like many Traditional Catholic schools, faced challenges - such as how to pay for professional teachers and navigate the Albertan education system at the same time. With a long history of conservative governments there was little to fear from accepting government funding for the school.  However, that changed dramatically in 2015 when an NDP government was elected ( Wikipedia ). Just a quick refreshers on Catholic Doctrine on this point: Lawful Governments, even those elected by the governed, receive their authority from God.  It would be the height of liberalism to believe that, just because they pass illegitimate laws we can disregard the laws of the land.  That would lead to anarchy.  Government ministers are our superiors and their laws need to be assessed with the same principles a...

+ JMJ Introduction Gullible made a number of comments regarding the SSPX school in Calgary and the wording that they were compelled to add to the school policy. Actually, as noted here , Gullible made lots of comments, but they don't contain the reflections on why these proof texts are important and how they apply. This is where I find most people (even myself upon occasion) fall short.  In essence, when we just react (posting proof-texts) we become the blog equivalent of script kiddies . Context is king and if you don't make the message explicit you lose your impact ... and your readers. There is one thing worse than not communicating your message, it is communicating the wrong message. However, there is a problem. Humans read correspondence through a perceptual lense.  This lense causes them to misinterpret and even miss whole sections of the text.  Why?  Is it on purpose?  Not usually,  its just that our brain continually seeks the ...

+ JMJ I promised Gullible that I would pull together my thoughts on the Calgary School issue. In addition, I determined that it would be necessary to pull together all of his 'comments'. Gullible's thoughts and approach come up periodically so I've decided to add a new label to the blog: Series - Gullible Theme. In this post I will reconstruct the exchanges with Gullible and draw out some themes. Since it is a long series, I will present my conclusions below, followed by the exchange. Themes Psychological Projection : Accusing others of something they themselves are guilty. A good example is Gullible's statement that "people get mad without verifying the evidence". Gullible needs to examine the evidence before making accusations. Proof-Texting: Throwing down the proof-text gauntlet without providing their own thoughts on the matter, apparently expecting me to know how this proves their point. Intellectually Lazy: I know this sounds harsh bu...

+ JMJ A patient man hath a great and wholesome purgatory, who, receiving injuries, is more concerned at the person's sins than his own wrong; who willingly prays for his adversaries, and from his heart forgives offences; who delays not to ask forgiveness of others; who is easier moved to compassion than to anger; who frequently does violence to himself, and labors to bring the flesh wholly under subjection to the spirit. (Imitation of Christ Book 1, Chapter24) I received a posting from Gullible today ( Gullible November 29, 2019 at 5:43 PM ) and frankly I was frustrated. I believe that I clearly answered his various objections and yet, like people I know with diagnosed mental illnesses, when confronted with reality, he or she just moves on without acknowledging the fact that they are wrong. Why is this? Because they are holding onto a belief to justify their actions. My takeaway is that Gullible is not looking for the truth. When able, I am going to invest some ...

+ JMJ Gullible posted another comment in the SSPX 50th - Lourdes article . For clarity I will post it here with my responses. Hi Tradical you know what the Archbishop said if called to Rome, He would lay out the anti modernist encyclicals of the pre V2 popes and ask them if they accept them, if not , call me again and it will be the same thing.[1] secondly the Conciliar Church is modernism which is every error under the sun, it is the new religion, it is being promoted by the heiarchy in the Catholic Church, that's how the simple man understands it.[2] What is the pronouncement of the definition of the Conciliar Church from the Catholic Church? please explain your theory of the 2 chapters you laid out[3] Gullible Tradical: In answer to [1] Archbishop Lefebvre said many things about 'what if' he was called back to Rome.   However, I don't recall him saying that he did this when he was called by a Cardinal to see if there was a way to reconcile:...