Please pray for Bishop Richard Williamson, a noble
prelate whose wisdom and zeal for the truth have inspired many.
On October 23, 2012, the good Bishop was cast out of the SSPX, where he had labored tirelessly for 36
years.
His continued membership in the SSPX would have made a premature union with Rome more difficult.
"I have loved justice and hated iniquity; therefore I die in exile." - Pope Gregory VII..."
I hope many are reading this statement at the end of your blog.
I think I missed it a few times at first myself.
*
If you'd slow down, you would have seen it.
You're basically admitting how bad you are at taking in the whole situation before acting.
That message has been there for a while, but before that a very similar message supporting +W has been
there for a LONG time.
If you could miss that, what else have you blown past?
Has Pablo read the open letter? It's doing the rounds in various languages.
"I have loved justice and hated iniquity; therefore I die in exile."
- Pope Gregory VII..."
For the record, Pope Gregory was quoting Scripture, and thereby giving
us a message that we would not understand by just reading the words he
wrote, but only by interpretation of the context and the source of his
words:
Which Scripture is it?
Well, that is not simply answered, for it occurs twice in Scripture, once in
the OT and then again in the NT where St. Paul is quoting the OT. So it is
not plagiarism, but rather the Apostle of the Gentiles teaching us how to
properly apply Scripture to learning about our religion.
"Thy throne, o God, is forever and ever : a scepter of justice is a scepter
of Thy kingdom. Thou hast loved justice, and hated iniquity : therefore
God, thy God, hath anointed thee with the oil of gladness above thy
fellows" (Heb. i. 9).
But St. Paul here quotes not only Ps. xliv.* 7-8, but also Ps. ii. 7, II Kgs.
vii. 14, Ps. xcvi. 7, Ps. ciii. 4, Ps. cx. 26, and Ps. cix. 1 - all in the last half
of Hebrews cap. i. The summary of this chapter given by Dr. Challoner and
Dr. H.J. Ganss, is this: "God spoke of old by the prophets, but now by his
Son, who is incomparably greater than the angels."
Nor is Scripture the only reference for these words. For Pope Gregory was
one of our recent popes (less than 200 years ago - the time span that Trent
held as the touchstone of less than that which constitutes antiquity) who
used the Canonized Traditional Latin Mass prayers exclusively, in which is
to be found quotations of Hebrews 1:9 or xliv. 8 in the Mass, such as for
the Feast of St. Lucy, Dec. 13th (Graduale), which is the same Scripture as
the Introit for the First Mass of Virgin Not a Martyr (Dilexisti), getting its
name from the first Latin word in the Introit:
Dilexisti judiciam et odisti iniquitatem : proptera unixit te Deus, Deus tuus,
oleo laetitiae prae consortibus tuis, (P.T. Alleluia, alleluia.) Ps. ibid 2.
Eructavit cor meum verbum bonum : dico ego opera mea Regi. v. Gloria
Patri.This same Psalm is also used in the Masses For a Virgin Martyr, starting
with the Gradual for the First Mass,
Loquebar, and then the Offertory for
the Second Mass,
Me Expectaverunt (v. 15-16, 3 respectively).
What does Pope Gregory say, "Thou hast loved justice?" No, he says "I
have loved justice." And what of the rest: does Pope Gregory say,
"...therefore God, thy God, hath anointed thee with the oil of gladness
above thy fellows? No, he says, rather: "...therefore I die in exile."
What can we adduce from this difference? We are not prohibited from
saying that since the Pope borrowed from Scripture words that he would
apply to his own condition, the words he kept intact can be said to give
the same meaning to his statement that they give in the Bible; but in
regard to the other parts, the words he uses for his own condition can be
said to have a meaning not entirely unrelated to the words of the Bible
that they replace. I.e., "...therefore I die in exile" can be thought
perhaps similarly to
...therefore God, my God, hath anointed me with
the oil of gladness above my fellows. That is to say, Pope Gregory
is saying it without saying it, for the truth is one, and a good Pope would
not be quoting Scripture to teach the opposite of what the Bible would
have us believe. And it is up to the reader to discern his message, if he
can, and if he cares to do so. Many who are able to do so, choose not
to do it. Is Pope Gregory complaining about his death in exile? No, he
is rather rejoicing to be anointed with the oil of gladness above his
fellows, that is, to suffer this cross of dying in exile, which he loves, not
because he loves to suffer, but because it is the manifest will of God
that he endures this death in exile, and he therefore embraces it so as
to be in even closer union to Our Redeemer and Lord, Who suffered His
passion willingly to free us from our sins.
*Note: Depending on the Bible version that you're using, the Psalms
can be rather difficult to verify, because they had suffered a lot of
changes in numbering due to the Protestant Revolution. I tried to
verify online using the so-called Douay-Rheims version at
drb.scripturetext.com and found that this verse, "7 Thou hast loved
justice, and hated iniquity: therefore God, thy God, hath anointed thee
with the oil of gladness above thy fellows," is showing up as Psalm
45, not Psalm 44. A quick check of Ps. 22 proves they have renumbered
it "Ps. 23," like all the Protestant bibles do. So one must wonder how
many other inaccuracies there are at drb.scripturetext.com ?
-- But this discrepancy seems to have made it into the St. Andrew
Daily Missal as well, for it has Ps. xliv. 8 where my 1924 Cardinal Hays
Douay-Rheims Bible has Ps. xliv. 7 (not verse 8). At least they got
the chapter number correct, no?