Topsy and Tuptim Start Part 3 of the Synod Working Document at the Opthalmologist's Office

Topsy and Tuptim sit in the opthalmologist's waiting room.

Topsy: Thanks for driving me. I have a terrible time seeing when they dilate my pupils. All this studying the document has done a number on my eyes. Last night while I was reading Part 3 everything went blurry. Thank God I was almost finished. I just needed to review a few footnotes from the last chapter. But the page looked like the Russian alphabet. I think I probably need a stronger prescription.

Tuptim: (Sarcastically...) Gosh, do you think the Russians are colluding in the synod and conspired to make your eyesight deteriorate so we couldn't finish critiquing the working doc?

Topsy: (Laughing...) No... it was the Germans in collusion with the South American liberation theology gurus.
Have you noticed all the references to the pope's document Laudato Si on the environment? A lot of the language comes straight out of it. Leonardo Boff bragged that he contributed to the encyclical at the express invitation of the pope and the synod working document leans heavily on the encyclical for its environmental wackoism. Boff was a founder of liberation theology and he says Francis asked him for his input on the encyclical and I can believe it. I bet a bunch of it is direct quotes! I wonder if he was a contributor to the synod Instrumentum. He describes the pope as "one of us."

Tuptim: Wow! Boff is a real piece of work! He was a Franciscan priest. The Vatican silenced him in 1984 for a year when Ratzinger was head of the CDF (Congregation for the Defense of the Faith).

Topsy: Why?

Tuptim: It was over his book Church: Charism and Power.  There's a brief analysis on the Vatican website. Boff doesn't believe Jesus intended to establish a Church; it just evolved and so the Church has to change over time. He's a complete moral relativist which is confirmed by his personal life.

Topsy: Wow! He sounds like the Darwin of Church evolution. When people get that far off, you wonder if they even believe in God any more.

Leonardo Boff

Tuptim: (Shrugs...) He left the priesthood in 1992 when CDF was going to silence him again. He also had an on-going affair with his secretary, a married mom of six. She's divorced now. I don't know if they ever married or if they just live together.

Topsy: Yikes! So much for belief in Christ and his Church and His teachings on marriage and the family. (Thoughtfully...) It's kind of sad. Boff looks like Santa Claus.

Tuptim: (Shaking her head...) Have you ever seen a photo of Karl Marx? I think he channels Marx. Besides...If St. Nick were alive today he would not be happy with Boff. The story of his slapping the heretic Arius at the Council of Nicea may be apocryphal, there's no evidence he was even there, but it emphasizes the dangers of heresy. How many souls will be lost because of Leonardo Boff and his poisonous, Marxist ideas?

Karl Marx

Topsy: (Thoughfully...) Dangerous ideas that will expand and spread now through the synod.

Tuptim: Part 3 contains the most radical of the synod agenda -- namely, revolution in the Church. Listen to paragraph 106:

The new paths for pastoral ministry in the Amazon require “relaunch[ing] ... with fidelity and boldness” the mission of the Church (DAp. 11) in the territory and deepening the “process of inculturation” (EG 126) and interculturality (cf. LS 63, 143, 146). This demands “brave” proposals of the Church in the Amazon, which in turn presupposes courage and passion, as Pope Francis asks of us. Evangelization in the Amazon is a set of tests for the Church and for society.

Topsy: Hmm...seems like the entire synod is about "relaunch[ing] the mission of the Church." Remember earlier when they talked about a "new Pentecost." Calling for "brave proposals" sounds like code speech for changing fundamental doctrines and facing the flack from those "rigid" orthodox Catholics like us who don't believe in evolution of doctrine. And notice the reference to Laudato Si -- three paragraphs worth!

Tuptim:  Their "evolution of doctrine" means reinterpreting it to express exactly the opposite of what it's meant over millennia. That's what Boff does in his writing. The CDF said he interpreted Vatican II's Lumen Gentium in a way that was the opposite of what the Council Fathers intended.

Topsy: Well...I sure don't look forward to the "new pathways" the document mentions. (Searches for the line...) Here it is, "new pathways are opened for the local Church and they continue towards the universal Church." They plan to launch the torpedo here in the Amazon and aim it right at the heart of the Universal Church. The synod isn't really about the Amazon; it's about "new paths" that will cut down central doctrines of the Church and lay them flat.

Tuptim: Yup! The universal Church is in the cross hairs and they make no bones about it. (Reading...)

...it is hazardous “for us to utter a unified message and to put forward a solution which has universal validity”Certainly the complex, plural, conflictive and opaque socio-cultural reality prevents the application of “a monolithic body of doctrine guarded by all and leaving no room for nuance” (EG 40). universality or catholicity of the Church, therefore, is enriched by “the beauty of the Church’s varied face” (NMI 40) in which the different manifestations of the particular churches and their cultures form a polyhedric Church (cf. EG 236).

Topsy: That is pure moral relativism. It attacks one of the four signs of the Church, its universality. All of this gobbledygook is the same message Joseph Fletcher preached in his book Situation Ethics. Their "polyedric Church" is a monstrosity created in the image and likeness of the Father of Lies!

Tuptim: Did you notice the heading, "A Defiant Face Facing Injustices?" That's bringing in the Marxist, liberation theology approach to dealing with problems. Between that and all the suggestions for Alinsky-style community organizing, we've got a document the Communist party would be proud of.

The face of Communism: Fr. Jerzy Popieluszko:
chaplain of Solidarity in Warsaw, beaten to
death by Communist thugs in 1984.

Topsy: Speaking of Communism, just a few days ago the Jesuit magazine America had an article called The Catholic Case for Communism. Talk about a propaganda piece eulogizing Communism! My suspicious mind immediately went to the synod even though it wasn't mentioned in the article. Liberation theology was, though. Capitalism was demonized and communism was glorified. The author, who's a Catholic and a communist, talked about how the Communist Party is buddying up with Catholic movements and isn't that great! The party in the U.S. has done articles praising the Nuns on the Bus, for example.

Tuptim: (In disgust...) "Useful idiots and fellow travelers!" Those people are the first ones executed when Communists take over...after the martyred Church, of course. To paint Communism as a heroic movement for the workers is to ignore the gulags, the murders, the reeducation camps, the poverty imposed on the people with multiple families living in small apartments and forced to stand in line at stores with empty shelves. Ask the people of Venezuela or Cuba how they're doing under Communism. He had the gall to eulogize Cuba and Castro!

Topsy: (Shaking her head...) He talked about the abuses by Amazon, (Tuptim looks confused)...NOT the synod, the company. He specifically mentions a factory in the UK. But the fact is Amazon has factories in Communist countries with horrendous working conditions. Why didn't he mention those? Perhaps it didn't fit his agenda of the-capitalist-West-is-evil and communism is good.

Tuptim: Hmm...what we're really seeing is capitalism and communism linking arms. Unbridled crony capitalism and communism are both evil and both exploit the worker. (Shakes her head...) But that isn't the whole picture of capitalism. My sister-in-law's family runs a small factory in West Virginia. Some of the employees are family members, but they also provide jobs for the local community. They treat their workers with respect and when the company does well, they share profits through bonuses. When my brother-in-law founded the company he used talents he learned at his former job to create his own business. Do you think that could happen under communism where the government owns all the industry?

Topsy: No way! As I read the article, I kept hearing echoes of the working document with phrases about "colonialism" and "transnational companies" exploiting the poor and "sustainability."  (Pauses...) Honestly...I think this is one more propaganda piece preparing the way for the synod. The author is a member of the Communist party in Canada and clearly supports liberation theology. The timing is just too...too...mmm...coincidental?...or convenient!

Tuptim: I saw that language too. Did you read Rod Dreher's response? America must be getting a lot of flack because they wrote a defensive piece explaining its publication. They don't really support communism; they're just soooooo open minded.

Topsy: So open minded their brains are falling out! What hypocrisy! The Jesuits are riddled with commies. The pope talks like a Marxist... and the working document (rolls her eyes)....sheesh! Capitalism has some serious flaws; unbridled crony capitalism is downright evil. Solzhenitsyn pointed that out at Harvard in 1978, and suffered for it. I don't think he ever spoke publicly again after the criticism resulting from that talk. (Thoughtfully...) You know, if one goes far enough to the left or far enough to the right, the two end up meeting and joining hands -- like Amazon and the Chinese communists who run an Amazon factory. Hmm...Do you think the communist party is in any way involved in the synod preparations. We need some good investigative journalists to do some digging.

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Tuptim: I wouldn't be surprised. The Communists hate the Church and have spent over a century trying to destroy her. Communists are thugs and murderers, not the great philanthropists depicted in the article. As for the synod document, I'm sick of reading that we need a Church with an Amazonian face...like this from chapter 2. (Reads...)

The Church has come a long way, but deepening and updating are needed for it to be a Church with an indigenous and Amazonian face.

Topsy: "Deepening and updating"? (Throws her hands up in disgust...) Undermining and wrecking is what they really mean. We don't need a Church "with an indigenous and Amazonian face;" We need a Church with Christ's face!

Tuptim: Amen!

The nurse calls Topsy in for her exam.

Topsy: Let's finish chapter 2 on the way home. It gets really dicey from here!

To be continued....