#odium fidei

[cristianesimocattolico]

Quaranta pazzi per Gesù: i martiri di Sebaste

Sono quaranta santi soldati provenienti da diverse parti della Cappadocia, arrestati nel 320 durante le persecuzioni di Licinio perché convertiti alla religione cristiana. Lasciati nudi al freddo invernale di Sebaste, in Armenia, preferiscono morire assiderati piuttosto che apostatare dalla fede. (more…) “”

[chunky-ruckus]

Unfinished fic: Did the Eagle Envy Prometheus?

Hi gang! I'm pretty much done writing fanfiction for this fandom (just lost interest). I have a few fics I was excited for, and I figure I'd share the bones of what they were. So here's fic 1! I think there are 3-4 half written fics in total. This fic was basically a VTMB au wherein Marvus gets turned into a nosferatu.

___

Prose written:

You see him many times in your life, but he saw you first when you only caught him looking.

Leaned up against the sign for Santa Monica’s Protestant Church of the Blood and Body (God’s got a plan for you!), the smoke he exhaled gave the impression he was fading away from the world, only here as a visitor.

  He smiled at you then, Cheshire cat smile sharp with canines, his lips as full and flushed as cherries. And the smoke was all around you.

You know now that his eyes are a rich, laughing brown. But back then, you would have sworn you saw purple.

And when the girl at the counter of the 7-eleven joked that you looked like you’d seen a ghost- the resume in your hand crumpled where you held it tight- you weren’t entirely sure you hadn’t. 

___

Snippets / Ideas:

You stroke his hair as he convulses, continue to soothe even as your fingers catch on locs that refuse to stay rooted in his skull. He curls around you, clenches his body tight like a comma, like it’s not over yet. Just stopped for a breath, carry on! And he doesn’t move but to tremble. 

“God, please,” he says, with eyes closed tight as if he can pretend it’s not happening. 

Whether he’s praying to you or to God Himself, you aren’t sure. You aren’t sure it matters. You hold him there tight against your chest while he screams, muscles pulling skin taught through the tension.

And nobody saves him. Nobody is here to catch his soul.

___

You hold him tight around the middle and he thrashes and writhes, bringing you both to the ground, his own muscles his puppet strings. “I believed,” you breathe into his skin, “I believed in you.” And he?

He believed in God.

His ashen skin is feverish, tugged tight over his straining muscles like it could split open at any moment, spilling out like overripe fruit, his pomegranate blood all over you and the ground. He curls around you, a comma curl, as if to say, just pausing for a moment, or more to come, just need a breath! 

And you hope, you hope, you hope.

“God,” he says. “Please,” he says, with eyes and body clenched tight as fists.

Suddenly, that very heat spears you through, to your core. It spills in rivulets down your cheeks, pattering on your shirt above your collarbones. 

He dies there in a pool of blood that could be his shadow, with no cross on his chest, no gospel in his gasping: death, in odium fidei.

___

Working the graveyard shift has always suited you; some symbolism of death has always surrounded you anyway. [Insert here about how they’re amnesiac, though whether it’s because of how good they’ve gotten at denial or something real is up for interpretation]

[more here]

And here you are, home sweet home. Su casa.

Flipping the light switch is mostly a psychosomatic quirk; the lights outside are as bright as it’s getting, here in your home.

You’re not in denial; you know you’re considered homeless. This could all be taken away from you with a bad brush with the authorities, or a worse brush with the local teenagers.

It’s nice enough, anyway, to be homeless in the city. You’re not paying the electric bill to keep the McDonald’s sign across the street on, and it’s just enough light through the window to read your book by. 

It is homelessness absit invidia; you don’t know any other life, and you’ve built your superego around it. Karl Marx, eat your heart out. You’ve never had a dream job, never dreamed of working, but you’re living well despite. You have enough money to keep this place clean. Enough wits to steal food. And friends who have your back.

Nobody needs to know how much your life is your grave, how your habits build your tomb.

The graveyard shift you work is only half of the metaphor. Pressure radiates like you could rip open your ribcages on hinges.

You don’t know where you came from. You can’t remember a life, lived. Some days, it feels like you simply crash landed here, right in the McDonald’s parking lot across the street. You have no memories of home, no memories of your parents. There are days where you aren’t even sure you’re one of the local species, some alien life form that just appeared here in all of their collective narratives.

You let the dark swallow you whole; day will break in a few hours, and you won’t squander the light.

___

You stare down at your receipt, zeroed out by Chixie at the till.

The plastic bag hangs by your side, cutting into your fingers, condensation from the gatorade wetting your thigh.

Zero, as a number, did not exist naturally as the other numbers did. There has always been one atom, two people, millions of shades of feeling: all countable, all present. But the concept of nothingness as a meaningful, mathematical concept came later, from an Indian mathematician who’s name has been lost to time.

You wonder, with Marvus’s absence so conspicuous in your home, if that mathematician felt like this at the time. Now you see: you are not currently one minus one, but have always been one plus zero. The evidence is in what’s missing. What’s always been missing. 

___

MSPAR asks for Marvus’s number and he gives them bible verses instead.

John 6:55: For My flesh is true food, and My blood is true drink. // Matthew 26:28: for this is My blood of the covenant, which is poured out for many for forgiveness of sins.

___

Outline:

Meet Marvus → He befriends them slowly → He gets them to break inside the church with him at night so he can pray. He’s been a very bad protestant, so he’s making his own forgiveness here on earth. Talk about fear of dying (So when you said God had a plan for me, you meant you had a plan for me) He’s a soundcloud rapper (or so MSPAR thinks), and he sends them a link to his mixtape. They don’t listen to it, not having internet at home, but are intrigued by the titles.→ Weeks go by without seeing Marvus at all. → They break into the church late at night on a hunch one night (the stained glass of cain and abel is smeared with blood) and find Marvus holding his neck. MSPAR investigates and notices two bite marks, burst capillaries spreading away from them like a map. They joke about someone fancying themselves a vampire and Marvus laughs lowly. Parallel to his bad end: at least, if he’s dying, he’s somewhere where he feels safe. MSPAR holds his hand and he drifts off to sleep. → MSPAR wakes up to the sounds of Chahut opening the doors to the church. They drag him- he’s sleeping heavily- to their beat up old car. Then they put on their hat and go to work. → Marvus isn’t in their car when their shift is over, and they notice that their monster has been drained of drink and their car doors were all locked.  → Chixie is playing at a jazz bar one night and MSPAR goes to watch her sing. Once her set is over, they notice Marvus standing outside the window, watching. He waves once MSPAR sees him. He plays cat and mouse with them, leading him through the streets and towards a club with loud, pulsing base. MSPAR notices his eyes are more predatory, and he looks sick. He wears an ascot even though it’s hotter than hell, and they get a little hot and lusty out on the dancefloor. MSPAR licks a bead of sweat off his neck and Marvus shudders, nearly fainting. MSPAR thinks thats just the sexy mood, but it ends up that Marvus needs to leave. He’s clutching his elbows and grinding his teeth. → They make it out, MSPAR suggests a slushie run, hoping to keep the tone light. And there’s nobody on duty right now, it should be safe. Under the flourescent lights, Marvus transforms a bit more into a monster. (Insert snipper here). Include: he stumbles and pulls one of the levers for a red slushie, and red slushie is all over him like blood. He’s so cold, colder than even the ice should make him. Once he finally settles down, MSPAR desperately searches for a heartbeat and, upon finding none, rips open his shirt to press their ear to his chest. His body is a nightmare, full of pockmarks and pale and sinewy. They’re about to call emergency services before he grabs them suddenly by the wrist and says no. Just take him back to his car. His car is this bougie ass limo with tinted windows. MSPAR is p much hysterical, and Marvus tries to calm them down as best he can. → A few more weeks go by, MSPAR hasn’t seen Marvus. They end up hunting him down to an abandoned building behind a church; you can hear the church music playing muffled through the walls. He looks awful, fully transformed into a nosferatu. MSPAR tries to act like they aren’t scared; Marvus talks about his worth now that he isn’t beautiful anymore. There’s wires all over the floor; he’s watching his old music videos. [insert feeding scene here; should parallel a sex scene].  

[europahoynews]

Francisco en el Ángelus: El Señor deposita en nosotros las semillas de su Palabra

Comunicado de http://www.vaticannews.va — Junto a los peregrinos de la Plaza de San Pedro el Papa Francisco reflexionó sobre la imagen de la siembra y la semilla que propone el Evangelio. Y también expresó su preocupación por los asesinatos “in odium fidei” en la República Democrática del Congo. Johan Pacheco – Ciudad del Vaticano El XI domingo del tiempo ordinario el Papa Francisco dirigió la…

[valeria-manzella]

\Continuano a giungere notizie dolorose di scontri e massacri compiuti nella parte orientale della Repubblica Democratica del Congo\Rivolgo il mio appello alle Autorità nazionali e alla Comunità internazionale, affinché si faccia il possibile per la cessazione delle violenze e per la salvaguardia della vita dei civili\Tra le vittime, molti sono cristiani uccisi in odium fidei\Sono martiri\Il loro sacrificio è un seme che germoglia e porta frutto, e ci insegna a testimoniare il Vangelo con coraggio e coerenza\Papa Francesco\Angelus\

[amicidomenicani]

Dear Father Angelo, First of all, I thank you for this beautiful column that you make available to the faithful, which I always find full of many interesting ideas. I come to my question. It is a period in which, even in the media, there is a fine line between "euthanasia" and "aggressive medical treatment", but I would like to ask you a specific question, relating to an event that involved me indirectly, and personally a friend and colleague of mine. This quite young friend (32 years, 5 younger than me) was diagnosed with testicular cancer some time ago. He had to undergo surgery to remove the affected testicle, and then have a mostly preventive cycle of chemo. Now he's fine, thank God. Doctors have said that with just one testicle he can very well have an active sex life and the ability to fertilize is not impaired either. I wondered what I would have done in his place, perhaps also because of a depression - due to job insecurity - that I try to fight but that has been affecting me for years; I don't know if I would have found the strength to face all this. Therefore I ask you: in similar cases, if a person refuses to be treated (with more or less invasive surgery, chemotherapy, etc.) allowing the disease to progress to death, does one die in the grace of God, or is it the same as a healthy person who commits suicide and therefore, goes straight to hell? Thanks for the answer you want to give me, my best regards. Andrea Answer  Dear Andrea, 1. I state that none of us can say that a particular person having refused a certain treatment has committed a mortal sin and ended up in hell. We can say what is legitimate and dutiful from an objective point of view. However, only the Lord reads within consciences. 2. The Church herself, while decreeing that certain people are Saints and that it is right to give them honor and cult, has never decreed that a particular person is in hell. 3. For the saints, in fact, a canonical process is carried out which assesses the heroic degree of their virtues or the martyrdom in odium fidei. Furthermore, as regards the saints, the Church obtains sure signs from God about their holiness such as miracles. Instead she does not even say for the greatest criminals who have died unrepentant that they are in hell. In fact, we judge according to the outside. But what happens in the depths of conscience, especially at the point of death, only God knows. This is why we can hope for everyone and, at least privately, we are encouraged to pray for everyone. 4. Having said that, since the treatment modalities are by no means disproportionate in the case you presented to me, it is dutiful to undergo treatment. John Paul II in Evangelium vitae said: "Certainly there is a moral obligation to care for oneself and to allow oneself to be cared for, but this duty must take account of concrete circumstances. It needs to be determined whether the means of treatment available are objectively proportionate to the prospects for improvement. To forego extraordinary or disproportionate means is not the equivalent of suicide or euthanasia; it rather expresses acceptance of the human condition in the face of death" (EV 65). 5. Health and even life are not purely individual goods. And not only because we have received them from others and it is our duty to reciprocate the gift received. But also and above all because it is only through self-gift that man realizes himself according to God's plan. For this reason, the Catechism of the Catholic Church says that "Life and physical health are precious gifts entrusted to us by God. We must take reasonable care of them, taking into account the needs of others and the common good" (CCC 2288). As we have seen, John Paul II speaks of moral obligation. And since the moral obligation here has to do with very high values, the resulting obligation is grave. I thank you for the question, I remind you to the Lord and I bless

[foreverpraying]

December 15 is the feast day of Blessed János Brenner priest and martyr

János Brenner was born on 17 December 1931 in the Vas province as the second of three children. His two brothers also became priests.

Brenner began his novitiate in 1950 with the Cistercians at Zirc and took the religious name "Anasztáz" (Anastasius: Greek for Resurrection). But a few months after, he had to interrupt his monastic formation when the communist regime began to suppress all religious houses in Hungary.  On 19 June 1955, Janos was ordained to the priesthood in the diocesan cathedral of Szombathely by Bishop Sándor Kovács.

Brenner's first assignment was to be a chaplain in St. Gotthard,a parish which had over previous centuries been in Cistercian care. After the communists made personal threats against the enthusiastic and idealistic chaplain, his bishop offered to send Brenner elsewhere, but he said, "I'm not afraid" and affirmed his desire to remain where he was.

Around midnight on 15 December, 1957 (Brenner was preparing his sermon for 16 December) he was called to give last rites to a supposedly ill man in a neighboring town; he failed to realize that it was a trap. The 17-year-old boy who summoned him had been known to Brenner as an altar server. The young priest took anointing oils and the Eucharist with him in his bag. He was soon ambushed in the woods and stabbed 32 times. He was found dead that morning with the Eucharist still in his hands, earning him the title "Hungarian Tarcisius" since he died in similar circumstances to Tarcisius.

Brenner was interred in the family vault in the Salesian church of Saint Quirinus on 18 December.The authorities made a failed attempt to disperse the crowd at his funeral.His ordination motto, taken from Romans 8:28, was inscribed on the tomb: "All things work together for good to those who love God."

Pope Francis confirmed that Brenner died as a victim "in odium fidei" (in hatred of the faith). On 8 November 2017, the pontiff approved the priest's beatification. The solemn liturgy took place on 1 May 2018, in Szombathely's City Park.

source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/J%C3%A1nos_Brenner

[anastpaul]

Saint of the Day – 9 December – Blessed Liborius Wagner (1593-1631) Priest and Martyr, Teacher, Confessor, Apostle of Charity, Teacher – born on 5 December 1593 at Mühlhausen, Unstrut-Hainich, Thuringia, Germany and died by being beaten to death with swords and firearms on 9 December 1631 near the River Main, Schonungen, Schweinfurt, Germany. He administered throughout his pastoral mission in Würzburg and was killed “in odium fidei” (in hatred of the faith).   He performed a wide range of charitable acts and he was more than willing to shed his blood for his beliefs and for his fellow Christians. Patronage – of persecuted Christians.

He grew up in a Protestant household during the Counter-Reformation period.   His decision in 1613, to learn Counter-Reformation theological matters in Würzburg and this was a decision that his parents disapproved of.   This led him to convert to the Catholic Faith which earned the ire of his parents especially when he continued his studies in order to become a Priest.

He became a teacher in 1617 and was ordained as a priest on 29 March 1625.  Thereafter, the became the parish priest of an area split between Protestants and Catholics.   He attempted to reconcile both, as best he could but the divisions made this process extremely painful and difficult..

Fr Liborius was driven from his parish to another town during a time of conflict in Central Europe.   Swedish Protestant soldiers apprehended him in a schoolhouse and tortured him for almost a week.   He refused to renounce his faith and killed him on 9 December 1631.   The immediate cause of his death was beating with firearms and swords.

His body was stripped of his priestly garments to make identification more difficult and thrown into the River Main but was recovered from the river by Catholics living nearby and buried.   Following the end of Swedish rule in the area, his body was re-interred in the chapel of the castle of Mainberg and finally re-interred in the parish church of San Lorenzo, Heidenfeld, Germany on 15 December 1637, where his Shrine now resides, see the images below.   It is a place of pilgrimage for many Catholics, especially those suffering persecution.

St Pope Paul VI declared Blessed Liborius a Venerable in 1973 then Beatified him on 24 March 1974 as a Martyr.

Saint of the Day – 9 December – Blessed Liborius Wagner (1593-1631) Priest and Martyr Saint of the Day - 9 December - Blessed Liborius Wagner (1593-1631) Priest and Martyr, Teacher, Confessor, Apostle of Charity, Teacher - born on 5 December 1593 at Mühlhausen, Unstrut-Hainich, Thuringia, Germany and died by being beaten to death with swords and firearms on 9 December 1631 near the River Main, Schonungen, Schweinfurt, Germany.

[berniesrevolution]

JACOBIN MAGAZINE

Pope Francis recently canonized Oscar Romero, making the martyred Salvadoran bishop an official saint in the Catholic Church. Romero is a favorite of the religious and secular left, assassinated because he advocated for victims of US-funded state terror during the civil war in El Salvador. His canonization is the culmination of Pope Francis’s efforts to open the deeply reactionary halls of the Vatican to liberation theology, an interpretation of Christianity that argues that God suffers when the oppressed suffer, that the physicality of the Christ story is an endorsement of humanity, and most importantly, that God isn’t on some other plane, elevated and distant, pie in the sky when you die: rather, this life and its physical conditions matter tremendously. The Latin American theologians who developed the ideas were suppressed under the previous two papacies.

It’s important that Romero has been named a saint. But the movement he has come to represent can’t be understood by the example of an individual great man. What made liberation theology revolutionary and dangerous to church and state alike is that it was about the collective — and it came from the bottom.

The archbishop’s bravery was in response to a religiously grounded social movement that swelled when farm laborers and shantytown workers began to see their religion as something that offered a blueprint for a more equitable society. It was their practice of claiming the stories in the Christian bible as their own that changed what church meant. The innovation came from a thousand reflection circles up and down the spine of Central America. If we recognize saints of that era, we need to recognize these lay Catholics, too.

A Saint Produced by a Movement

Romero was killed by a sniper’s bullet while celebrating mass for the mother of a murdered journalist, the hit arranged by the country’s wealthy. He had won the coffee oligarchs’ enmity by using the church to build a network of human-rights observers who documented the brutality of the right-wing government and by turning the grand colonial buildings of San Salvador into shelters for families fleeing the terror of an indiscriminate counterinsurgency campaign (guided by US advisors who learned their trade in Laos and Vietnam).

The weekend before he was killed, Romero used his nationally broadcast radio homily to urge soldiers to lay down their arms, reminding them that God did not require they follow an unjust command. He knew his death was imminent, but he continued. If there is such a thing as a saint, clearly Romero is one.

Canonizing him highlights the face of the church most Catholics would rather think about: the one that advocates untiringly with and for poor people, as opposed to the corrupt and criminal cabal the recent Pennsylvania grand jury report on sexual abuse revealed (again) or the ugly scheming and self-reverence in the most patriarchal of organizations. It’s a step in the right direction for a church forever torn in its allegiances between the words of the Gospels and the prestige of its princes.

The next step is to honor the tens of thousands of ordinary Central American Catholics killed during the proxy wars of 1980s because they took their faith seriously. The Central American martyrs offer something to aspire to as examples of commitment under tyranny, but they also suggest an alternative model of organization for an institution desperately in need of one.

These lay Catholics applied liberationist Christian values under viciously unjust regimes in El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, and Nicaragua. Operating in lay-led and female-empowered small communities that doubled as centers of activism and resistance, ordinary Central Americans offer a lesson this endlessly disappointing institution needs to remember: it’s the people in the pews who constitute the church. They were the ones who led a mass movement animated by liberation theology. Brave and good as he clearly was, Romero was responding to a movement that rose from below.

The bishop has been venerated as a saint by poor Salvadorans and people throughout Central America since the time he died, his stoic face staring out from a thousand village ofrendas, his photo hidden beneath many mattresses during the war and hung on so many walls today that its absence is a disconcerting statement. But it took the Roman Catholic Church longer to decide on his holiness.

A church version of Cold War politics slowed down Romero’s sainthood. Too political, enemies whispered. Pope Francis pushed the cause along, declaring that Romero was a martyr: killed because of odium fidei, hatred of the faith. This is significant, because it establishes that the work of advocating for justice, acting in defense of the organized, standing against the gross accumulation of wealth, is the religion. If you hate those things, you hate this religion. The bishop wasn’t killed for his prayers, he was killed for his actions.

Likewise, the tens of thousands of Salvadorans and Guatemalans, Hondurans, and Nicaraguans who moved from church to street were religious in their conviction. The faith doesn’t happen somewhere else in the clouds. It’s applied here. They were thrown from helicopters and buried in shallow graves because they practiced their belief — a dangerous belief that God was close and wanted better for them.

(Continue Reading)

[sakrumverum]

Was bedeutet Martyrium "in odium fidei"?

https://de.catholicnewsagency.com/story/was-bedeutet-martyrium-in-odium-fidei-11523

[cristianesimocattolico]

La strategia di Tito: "infoibare" la Chiesa cattolica

Il regime comunista della ex Jugoslavia mirava a colpire la vita ecclesiale per fare pulizia etnica degli italiani. Chi non si piegava finiva nelle foibe. Ne fecero le spese anche don Miroslav Bulešić e don Francesco Bonifacio, due sacerdoti (oggi beati) barbaramente torturati e uccisi dai miliziani. La loro colpa? L’odio comunista per la religione. (more…) “”

[urbanhermit]

St Maximilian Kolbe was a Polish Conventual Franciscan friar most famous for volunteering to die in place of a stranger at Auschwitz. On February 17, 1941, he was arrested by the Gestapo and imprisoned in the Pawiak prison. On May 25, he was transferred to Auschwitz I as prisoner #16670. In July 1941, a man from Kolbe’s barracks vanished, prompting SS-Hauptsturmführer Karl Fritzsch, the deputy camp commander, to pick 10 men from the same barracks to be starved to death in Block 13 (notorious for torture) to deter further escape attempts. (The man who had disappeared was later found drowned in the camp latrine.) One of the selected men, Franciszek Gajowniczek, cried out, lamenting his family, and Kolbe volunteered to take his place. During the time in the cell, he led the men in songs and prayer. After three weeks of dehydration and starvation, only Kolbe and three others were still alive. Finally, he was murdered with an injection of carbolic acid on August 14, 1941. He was canonized by the Catholic Church as Saint Maximilian Kolbe on October 10, 1982, by Pope John Paul II, and declared a martyr of charity. He is the patron saint of drug addicts, political prisoners, families, journalists, prisoners and the pro-life movement. Pope John Paul II declared him the “The Patron Saint of Our Difficult Century.” Father Kolbe was beatified as a confessor by Pope Paul VI in 1971 and was canonized by Pope John Paul II on October 10, 1982, in the presence of Franciszek Gajowniczek. Upon canonization, the Pope declared St. Maximilian Kolbe not a confessor, but a martyr. Although the canonization of St. Maximilian Kolbe is uncontroversial, his recognition as a martyr is, given that a Christian martyr is one who is killed in odium Fidei, and Kolbe wasn’t assassinated strictly out of hatred for his faith. He is one of ten 20th-century martyrs from across the world who are depicted in statues above the Great West Door of Westminster Abbey, London. https://www.instagram.com/p/ChPRbMxO0DN/?igshid=NGJjMDIxMWI=

[thewahookid]

Interrupted while saying Mass at his parish church in Saint-Étienne-du-Rouvray, the 85-year old priest struggled to repel his two 18-year old attackers with his feet. “Go away Satan!”, he repeated. Fr. Jacques Hamel was murdered, in odium fidei, a martyr to the Faith, his throat slashed by Islamic terrorists. Five years ago today. His cause has been opened.

[nonesistesperanza]

Il 9 maggio 1993, nella valle dei templi di Agrigento, San Giovanni Paolo II pronunciò parole forti contro la mafia. “Dio ha detto una volta: ‘Non uccidere’. Non può uomo, qualsiasi, qualsiasi umana agglomerazione, mafia, non può cambiare e calpestare questo diritto santissimo di Dio! Questo popolo, popolo siciliano, talmente attaccato alla vita, popolo che ama la vita, che dà la vita, non può vivere sempre sotto la pressione di una civiltà contraria, civiltà della morte. Qui ci vuole civiltà della vita! Nel nome di questo Cristo, crocifisso e risorto, di questo Cristo che è vita, via verità e vita, lo dico ai responsabili, lo dico ai responsabili: convertitevi! Una volta verrà il giudizio di Dio!”.

Oggi 9 maggio 2021 nella cattedrale di Agrigento, a nome di Papa Francesco, il cardinale Marcello Semeraro, prefetto della Congregazione delle cause dei santi, ha proclamato Beato il giudice Rosario Livatino. Il Vaticano ha riconosciuto che quello del "giudice ragazzino" di Canicattì è stato martirio in odium fidei. Come reliquia sull’altare è stata esposta la camicia che il giudice Livanito indossava quando fu ucciso.

“Quando moriremo nessuno ci verrà a chiedere quanto siamo stati credenti, ma credibili”

[anastpaul]

Saint of the Day – 13 November – Blessed Karl Lampert (1894-1944) Priest and Martyr – born on 9 January 1894 in Göfis, Feldkirch, Austria and died, aged 50, by being guillotined on 13 November 1944 in Halle an der Saale, Germany.   Fr Karl served as the Pro-Vicar for the Diocese of Feldkirch in addition to being an outspoken critic of Nazism during World War II.   This led to constant surveillance against him and his eventual arrests on several occasions.   This all culminated in his final arrest in 1943 and his death from the guillotine in 1944 alongside a fellow Christian prisoner.   He was declared to have been killed “in odium fidei” (in hatred of the faith) and was Beatified on 13 November 2011 in Austria. Cardinal Angelo Amato presided over his Beatification on the behalf of Pope Benedict XVI, who had approved the cause.   Patronages – Prisoners and Persecuted Christians.

Fr Karl Lampert was born as the last of seven children of Franz Xaver Lampert and Maria Rosina Lampert in Feldkirch in 1894.   He attended school in his hometown and would attend a state high school after the completion of his first studies, the death of his father seemed to jeopardise this but an uncle of his provided financial aid to assist him to further his education.

He commenced his studies for the priesthood in 1914 in Brixen and received his ordination from Bishop Franz Eggar on 12 May 1918 during World War I.   He celebrated his first Mass on 26 May 1918.   Following his ordination he worked as a chaplain in Dornbirn and was involved in pastoral work with adolescents.

In 1930 he moved – with the financial support of Bishop Sigismund Waitz – to Rome for studies in canon law and moved to new quarters at the Collegio Teutonico di Santa Maria dell’Anima until 1935 as a secretary to the Roman Rota.   Pope Pius XI later made him a Monsignor in 1935.

On 1 October 1935 he was stationed in the Diocese of Innsbruck where Bishop Waitz wanted him to perform several administration duties.   Around this time he was considered to be the Diocese’s new Bishop but Pius XI did not choose him, instead he was made Pro-Vicar of that Diocese on 15 January 1939.   In 1940 he attempted in vain to secure the release of Blessed Otto Neururer and when he was killed Lampert published an obituary in a church newsletter for him.   However he was arrested for this due to violating what was Nazi confidentiality laws and was deported to Dachau on 25 August 1940.   (Blessed Otto Neururer was arrested for opposing “a Germanic wedding” when he told a young lady she could not marry a divorced man.   He would eventually become the 1st priest martyred inside a Nazi concentration camp, (Buchenwald), in 1940 – he was Beatified by St John Paul II in 1996 – see image below.)

He was then sent to Sachsenhausen in Berlin on 1 September 1940 where he was forced to do labour in a penal colony.   A popular saying of his – while there – was “in the name of Christ for the Church.”   He was sent back to Dachau on 15 December 1940 and remained there for eight months, before being released on 1 August 1941 and sent to Stettin.   Despite being freed he was put under intense surveillance and was regarded with much suspicion, his phone calls were tapped and all correspondence was read.   He continued to work as a pastor but also worked as a hospital chaplain.

Fr Karl was arrested for the last time on 4 February 1943 and endured intense interrogations and was also tortured.   He was found to be guilty of both treason and sedition on 30 December 1943 and was sent to Torgau on 14 January 1944 where he spent seven months in solitary confinement.   A third trial ordered the death sentence on 8 September 1944.   Lampert – alongside a fellow priest – was executed in a guillotine on 13 November 1944 at 4:00pm.

His remains were cremated and buried in Halle an der Saale and were returned to his hometown in 1948.   In the Domskirche – the Cathedral of Innsbruck, there are side Altars devoted to both Blessed Otto and Blessed Karl, below is Blessed Otto’s Altar and Plague.

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The Beatification process commenced on 5 September 1997 under Pope John Paul II and granted Lampert the title Servant of God.   The Diocesan process spanned from 1 October 1998 to 18 November 2003 and had to ascertain the facts about whether or not Lampert died in hatred of his Christian faith.   The process was validated on 14 March 2008 and allowed for the drafting of the Positio – documenting his life and reasons for how he died in hatred of the faith – which was submitted to the Congregation for the Causes of Saints in 2009.

On 27 June 2011 his Beatification was approved as Pope Benedict XVI acknowledged the fact that Lampert had indeed been killed in the camps for his faith.   Cardinal Angelo Amato presided over the Beatification in Austria on the behalf of the pope on 13 November 2011.   The current postulator assigned to the cause is Dr Andrea Ambrosi.

Saint of the Day – 13 November – Blessed Karl Lampert (1894-1944) Priest and Martyr Saint of the Day - 13 November - Blessed Karl Lampert (1894-1944) Priest and Martyr - born on 9 January 1894 in Göfis, Feldkirch, Austria and died, aged 50, by being guillotined on 13 November 1944 in Halle an der Saale, Germany.   

[spiritualdirections]

It was a kick to the gut when Sr. Leonella was killed in Somalia because of something Pope Benedict XVI said in Germany. In 2006, Pope Benedict in an academic talk quoted a Greek emperor who criticized Muslims for using violence to promote their religion. Argued the emperor,

“Faith is born of the soul, not the body. Whoever would lead someone to faith needs the ability to speak well and to reason properly, without violence and threats... To convince a reasonable soul, one does not need a strong arm, or weapons of any kind, or any other means of threatening a person with death..."

The response of some Muslim clerics was to call for the murder of random Catholics. The Friday after the talk...

hardline Somali cleric Sheikh Abubakar Hassan Malin had told worshippers at his mosque to hunt down and kill whoever offended the Prophet Mohammed.

The cleric’s call was a direct response to a speech that then-Pope Benedict XVI had delivered in Ratisbona, Germany, the previous Tuesday. The German pontiff gave a 40-minute academic lecture at the University of Regensburg on the relationship between reason and faith.

...and by Sunday, Sr. Leonella was shot dead.

Sister Leonella Sgorbati, a Consolata Missionary Sister, and her bodyguard, a Muslim named Mohamed Osman Mahamud, where shot on Sept. 17, 2006, in Mogadishu. She was rushed to a hospital, but died soon after as a result to her wounds. She had spent her religious life working in Africa, mostly in Kenya.

“I forgive, I forgive, I forgive,” were her last words, whispered to Marzia Feurra, another sister of her congregation...

Sgorbati and her body guard were ambushed by two men who’d been hiding behind vehicles and kiosks. When the first shot hit her thigh, the body guard responded and shielded her with his body. He died at the scene, while she was rushed to the hospital the two were already headed to. However, her wounds were too severe: she’d been hit seven times. At the time, Sgorbati was one of only two Westerners left in Mogadishu because the city was in the grip of Islamic militants.

Next year, she will be beatified as a martyr, says Pope Francis:

Francis’s ruling, which took place on Wednesday but was announced by the Vatican on Thursday, declared her a martyr, meaning that it’s been recognized that she was murdered in odium fidei, in hatred of the faith.

Now, this virgin martyr, whose clothes have been washed white in the blood of the Lamb, will be raised to the altars. God brings goodness even out of evil.

[anticattocomunismo]

Baris, se la basilica è okkupata con il consenso del Vescovo

Il 16 luglio la basilica di San Nicola, a Bari, è stata teatro di una protesta di un gruppo di braccianti-migranti, guidati da sindacalisti dell’Usb. Una vera profanazione. L’evento era concordato con il vescovo Cacucci. Segno che si è perso il senso del sacro, innanzitutto in quella parte di Chiesa che vuole compiacere il mondo.

di Manuela Antonacci (19-07-2019)

La scristianizzazione dell’Europa, e dunque anche dell’Italia, procede ormai a passo spedito: uno dei segni più evidenti di questo tragico processo è la profanazione delle chiese. E per profanazione non si intendono solo gli atti vandalici compiuti spesso “in odium fidei”, ad esempio nella cattolicissima Francia, ma tutti i gravi usi impropri che vengono fatti della Casa di Dio, spesso senza che i pastori alzino un dito per impedirlo anzi, in diversi casi, facendosi essi stessi promotori di simili deturpamenti.

E così, dopo i vari pranzi natalizi allestiti dalla Comunità di Sant’Egidio in numerose chiese italiane, “aperimesse” consumati tra altari e reliquiari e chi più ne ha più ne metta, ecco in arrivo l’ultimissima moda della desacralizzazione 2.0: l’organizzazione, nella Casa del Signore, di scioperi di protesta, con la complicità dei sindacati e, udite, udite, dello stesso vescovo, dormendo tra due cuscini, certi di rimanere non solo impuniti ma accolti a braccia aperte dalla “Chiesa in uscita”.

Stiamo parlando di ciò che è avvenuto a Bari, il 16 luglio scorso, nella splendida basilica di San Nicola in cui si è svolto un “sit-in” di protesta con i braccianti-migranti, provenienti dal ghetto di Borgo Mezzanone, in provincia di Foggia, insieme alla delegazione dell’Unione sindacale di Base, per alzare la voce contro lo sfruttamento nelle campagne del foggiano. Puntando il dito contro il governo giallo-verde e chiedendo un incontro con l'arcivescovo Francesco Cacucci, “perché la Regione Puglia e il governo latitano in totale indifferenza”.

Una protesta che, in un contesto gravemente inadeguato, come quello di un luogo sacro, sembra tralasciare per di più (volutamente?) un piccolo particolare e cioè che la piaga del caporalato, che i contestatori denunciano come forma di schiavismo, in realtà si nutre perlopiù di immigrazione clandestina. Dunque, in una situazione già insensata di suo, siamo di fronte all’assurdità della pretesa di un lavoro regolare e di una casa, da parte di chi è arrivato in Italia clandestinamente e se la prende pure (con il governo di uno Stato di cui trasgredisce le leggi). Oltre il danno, la beffa.

Ma la cosa più grave è che lo sciopero in questione si è configurato come una vera e propria occupazione di un luogo sacro, addirittura una Basilica. Occupazione di cui, per quanto nel comunicato dello stesso Cacucci, diffuso sul sito dell’arcidiocesi di Bari-Bitonto, ci si affretti a sottolineare lo svolgimento “pacifico” (ma la stampa locale riporta che sarebbe stato necessario l’intervento delle forze dell’ordine per spegnere il clima di tensione), rimane la gravità. Inoltre, dallo stesso comunicato della diocesi, apprendiamo che si sarebbe trattato appunto di un evento concordato con il vescovo. Il quale, infatti, non solo non si è opposto a quella che è a tutti gli effetti la profanazione di una chiesa, ma ha accolto più che benevolmente gli “occupanti”.

Monsignor Cacucci si sarebbe recato in Basilica appositamente per incontrare il dirigente dell'Usb, Aboubakar Soumahoro, un trentanovenne italo-ivoriano, e avrebbe risposto alla sua richiesta, rivolta alla Chiesa locale, di fare da tramite con le istituzioni, per risolvere la questione dello sfruttamento dei braccianti nelle campagne pugliesi, con le seguenti parole: “Volentieri  mi faccio interprete di questi che sono l'espressione del riconoscimento dei diritti della dignità umana”, ha detto Cacucci, assicurando che “da parte nostra c’è un atteggiamento di difesa senza se e senza ma della dignità umana. Quello che non riusciamo ancora a realizzare in Italia è la seconda accoglienza, mi permetto di sottolineare questo e da parte vostra bisogna insistere su questo”.

Poi ha aggiunto: “Non basta accogliere ma fare in modo che poi questa accoglienza sia dignitosa. Questo è il vero problema. Fino a quando non riusciremo a realizzare questo, si alimenterà da una parte l'idea di invasione e dall'altra non si riconoscerà dignità umana. Mi permetterò di indicare concretamente le proposte da fare. Non basta la denuncia se non arriviamo a fare proposte concrete”.

Ma nonostante questo ostentato altruismo, a noi cattivoni viene spontaneo invece il riferimento all’episodio, narrato nel Vangelo, della cacciata dei mercanti dal tempio, insieme a tutta l’indignazione con cui Cristo stesso rovescia le tavole dei cambiavalute e le sedie dei venditori di colombe, esclamando: «Non è scritto: "La mia casa sarà chiamata casa di preghiera per tutte le genti"? Ma voi ne avete fatto un covo di ladroni».

E in questi casi, in cui l’uso profano delle chiese, per le più disparate questioni sociali, la fa da padrone, assistiamo, proprio come nell’episodio del Vangelo, davvero a un latrocinio e a uno squallido commercio: “latrocinio”, inteso come furto, “deprivazione” bella e buona del senso del sacro, iscritto nel cuore dei fedeli; e “commercio”, in riferimento allo svilente scambio con cui l’immagine di una chiesa che ama piacere al mondo, facendosi portavoce di tutte le iniziative sociali più “politicamente corrette”, sostituisce quella di una Chiesa che accetta la croce di Cristo, non vergognandosene e sopportando di apparire antiquata agli occhi dei più, rimanendo ferma sull’annuncio della Verità immutabile del Vangelo.

Così anche l’arcidiocesi di Bari-Bitonto, in buona compagnia con molte altre realtà ecclesiali, sembra aver dimenticato che la prospettiva “orizzontale” con cui guardare alla realtà si nutre di quella verticale. E che la trascendenza non è un mero concetto filosofico, ma la base su cui la Chiesa dovrebbe costruire la sua vera missione. Invece, tra le singolari iniziative svoltesi all’interno della cattedrale di Bari in questi ultimi anni, abbiamo visto come protagonisti un imam intento a recitare le sure del Corano e rituali neo pagani per il solstizio d'estate, con ballerine ornate di veli trasparenti e fluttuanti che intrecciano danze per il dio sole. Ma soprattutto, viene da pensare che in questo “solco spirituale”, così privo del soprannaturale, si collochi il silenzio-assenso della curia vescovile che precede e segue ogni Bari Pride.

Insomma, duole constatare ancora una volta, in questa come in tante altre circostanze che hanno visto la Sposa di Cristo trasformata in una banalissima Onlus e la Sua casa in un centro di accoglienza, che la secolarizzazione interna alla Chiesa è, senza ombra di dubbio, la più grave di tutte.