By FR. KEVIN M. CUSICK
Catholics who wish to worship the way every Catholic did before Vatican II have been hounded for years now by the Pope and bishops. Treated worse than second-class citizens, their faith considered suspect and less than fully Catholic, and slandered as sources of disunity, members of the faithful who attend the Traditional Mass now find themselves, incredibly, the target of an FBI undercover operation as well.
National Review reported:
“As part of its effort to identify extremists in the Catholic Church, the FBI recruited at least one ‘undercover employee’ to ‘develop sources among the clergy and church leadership,’ Representative Jim Jordan (R., Ohio) revealed Monday [April 10].
“Jordan, the chairman of the House Judiciary Committee, issued a subpoena demanding FBI director Christopher Wray testify and provide more information to Congress about the federal agency’s intelligence-gathering initiative targeting Catholic Americans.”
“Extremists”? Extreme love of God is the only purpose of Catholic worship of which I am aware. And there is often more a lack than an “extreme” of such even among the most ardent, for what it’s worth.
Whether any justice or correction will come of a congressional investigation we cannot know. If history is any indication there will be much drama and little action. After the furor, things may very well go back to the way they were. Such is the story of bureaucracies.
What upon first revelation was spun as a “policy paper” was later revealed to be a full-scale funded operation of a federal agency, their own government spying upon citizens as they exercise their constitutional right to worship.
Monica Showalter, writing in American Thinker, had the following reaction:
“Who the heck was this informant for this illegal act, how’d they find this character, how did the FBI make the recruitment pitch, and how much taxpayer money was the informant paid?
“Meanwhile, the leftists dominating the Catholic Church itself have been attempting to stamp out the Latin Mass, too — so why was the FBI trying to uselessly duplicate its efforts? Or was it a government-private ‘partnership’ here?
“Those seem like valid questions for Jordan to ask as his subpoena brings Wray back to testify under oath.
“We could leave it to the Catholics to sort out whether he went to confession afterward for his misdeed, informing on his fellow parishioners for an intrusive government agency in a blatantly illegal act.”
A further development revealed that non-traditional Catholic parishes were also targeted for investigation. Perhaps this common experience might, ironically, provide a catalyst for unity between liturgical camps?
Steve Bannon offered a take on Rumble. He commented that these Catholics under persecution by Church and State “. . . are the ‘Hobbits.’ This is MAGA. These are the most patriotic, working class or lower middle class — no money, but super devout. These are the best people in the world and that’s what the FBI’s going after.”
Bannon may have tapped into the real source of the problem here: power and politics. The powerful are going after each other and Catholics may simply be just caught in the crossfire. The ongoing Democrat-Republican war that is destroying what is left of justice, our government, and the Constitution is adding victims through collateral damage.
The Catholic League is on the case as well. In “FBI Asked About Probing ‘Mainline Catholics’,” Catholic League President Bill Donohue explains why he wrote to the director of the FBI:
“Today I asked FBI Director Christopher Wray to make public those documents that are related to the FBI’s outreach program to ‘mainline Catholic parishes’ and ‘local diocesan leadership.’ They were targeted because of alleged ‘radicalization’ within the Catholic Church. (A copy of my letter was sent to Rep. Jim Jordan, Chairman of the House Judiciary Committee.)
“ ‘This is taking the FBI into new, and disturbing territory,’ I said.
“We know from previous disclosures that the FBI was probing ‘Radical-Traditionalist Catholics’ (RTCs). Such Catholics may not be the typical ‘in-the-pew’ Catholics, but to this day we have not seen any evidence that they are a threat to anyone. Now the FBI has upped the ante, going after ‘mainline’ Catholics and dioceses.
“On February 9, I made public my concerns about the FBI’s interest in RTCs. ‘What’s next?’ Will it be a war on ‘Catholics who are orthodox?’ It appears my worst fears have been realized.
“The First Amendment provides for a healthy measure of autonomy between church and state, so when the state encroaches on religious bodies, it had better have unambiguous and very serious reasons for doing so. ‘I would like to know what they are in this instance,’ I asked the FBI Director.
“We have seen too many instances lately where the government is trespassing on the affairs of religion; it is not the other way around. Church and state separation cuts both ways. But under the Biden administration, this fundamental constitutional principle is being summarily ignored. This includes the Department of Justice and the FBI.
“Catholics have a right to know what the FBI is up to. The evidence is clear: Violence against Catholic churches and crisis pregnancy centers are largely going unattended to, yet probes of innocent Catholics are being conducted. This raises important questions that go to the heart of the FBI’s legitimacy.”
My conclusion? Anti-Catholicism is the last acceptable prejudice. Don’t take it from me, as Protestant historian Arthur M. Schlesinger Sr. put it, the hatred and suspicion of Catholics going back to this nation’s founding is “the deepest bias of the American people.”
As society, academia, the media, and institutions and corporations of all kinds become increasingly unhinged from nature and nature’s God, our unchanging Catholic doctrines on the sanctity of marriage between one man and one woman only, the sanctity of human life from the moment of conception and the inability to change one’s sex will make our much-desired peaceful coexistence with the world ever less so. As the Lord taught, “And you shall be hated by all men for my name’s sake: but he that shall persevere unto the end, he shall be saved” (Matt. 10:22).
Thank you for reading and praised be Jesus Christ, now and forever.
@TruthSocialPadre
Powered by WPtouch Mobile Suite for WordPress