"serious Catholics stand firm and will withstand every storm, there's no meltdown."
How can you stand firm in the teachings of Vatican I? Have you read Vatican I? Have you read Lumen Gentium 25 of Vatican II? I understand that most Roman Catholics today operate under the myth that "you only have to believe in the ex-cathedra statements", but this is supported nowhere in official Roman Catholic teaching and is in fact condemned by the First Vatican Council (the Roman Catholic ecumenical council responsible for defining the role and authority of the papacy). If anyone disagrees with Vatican I, he or she is automatically excommunicated and anathematized by the highest authority in the RCC. It's too bad 99.9% of Roman Catholics have never read the decrees of Vatican I (it's only about 15 pages long) and have no idea what their own official magisterial teaching is regarding what the faithful have to believe and follow from the pope.
I take it you must have been a Sedevacantist if you're familiar with those documents. No, I haven't, most saints haven't either. It's not absolutely necessary for salvation.
I'll respond sometime this week why I haven't faltered, and why I don't see any better place to go. It's on my mind, I only signed up to respond in this thread, which I wanted to do since February, to bring certain things to the attention of the remaining Catholics. There aren't many left, most bailed out when Roosh switched the forum to EO only, there are ten times more Orthodox messages than Catholic ones, so I thought it wasn't worth it, but I'll do it. I respond to faster developing threads first, before I forget to revisit what I've seen as worthy of commenting on.
but I'm very much in shock that basically no one has noticed.
It was business as usual this past Sunday at my church. We're sailing through a storm, but I remember the great past and think about the future. Time takes care of everything. If we put our hope in the mortality tables for Italian and American residents, the responsible people will be gone before me.
From magoo's link- Pope Francis approved this scandalous pilgrimage, they don't seem contrite looking for guidance, but prideful. Yet it never appeared on the official agenda due to
“internal resistance” from Holy Year organisers in the Vatican’s Dicastery for Evangelisation. Pope Leo didn't see to its being included in the Jubilee Calendar either, it didn't make it there.
In my life of faith I'm focused on different issues than you. I'm not preoccupied with the automatic excommunication of suspected homosexuals. I still believe that the Pope is the successor of St.Peter, and everything else that the Church teaches. This does not change. The way the world is created, a leader always emerges from a group of men, there's no way around it. Jews had one High Priest elected to a term. Peter was always with Jesus at the most important moments- spoke for everyone and called Jesus the Christ, walked on water towards the Lord, was at the Transfiguration, drew the sword alone like Saint Michael, denied Jesus- therefore the Pope can have moments of weakness too- but at least he was there while all the others have fled, entered the Lord's tomb first- John saving that honor for him, was the first to see the resurrected Jesus, spoke for everyone at the Pentecost. Antioch was a stepping stone on his way to the capital of the world, a stop. He appointed the bishop to succeed him there when he left, the bishop of Antioch did not appoint him to his Roman office, and did not succeed him in that position. They were contemporaries, and there can be no two popes at the same time. Rome never fell as a Christian capital, the barbarians converted. Antioch was razed to the ground by Muslims. Byzantine subjects were welcoming them as their taxes were low, selling out like Judases to escape the Constantinople bureaucracy's oppression. The Byzantine Emperor, and later the Sultan appointed the Patriarch, this is not how it should work. Following in this tradition, the Tsar was the head of the ROC. I'll stay with St.Peter, where else would I go.
I didn't want to write this as I don't want to make the devil happy (an oxymoron), but since there is nothing hidden that will not be brought to light I can mention Pope Alexander VI who had children. But was a sound theologian and a good administrator. I haven't left the RCC because of that past scandal either. Communists delighted in teaching the outrageously fake historical news to high school and college students, how he'd had incestuous relations with his daughter Lucrezia. My cousin used to bring this filth to family gatherings when I was a kid. My father once snapped back-
Urbans write, and dumbasses believe, referring to the propagators of lies from the Renaissance.
*
Urban was the last name of the ugly- even by Jewish standards- spokesman of the communist government who was the editor and owner of an anticlerical magazine.