Pretty much all bishops and priests in this fallen world hold as “precious” the indignant reaction of the little flock of Jesus over against being told that they are to kill the image of God in the womb so as to protect the most venerable among us: “Get the vaccine! You stupid people! You must kill babies in the womb to get vaccines! Feel the POWER! Get yours! You know nothing! Don’t you know that it is better to kill babies in the womb than that the whole world perish?!”
- “So the chief priests and the Pharisees convened the Sanhedrin and said, “What are we going to do? This man is performing many signs. If we leave him alone, all will believe in him, and the Romans will come and take away both our land and our nation.” But one of them, Caiaphas, who was high priest that year, said to them, “You know nothing, nor do you consider that it is better for you that one man should die instead of the people, so that the whole nation may not perish.”
To crucify the Son of the Living God is the most horrific sin the entire universe has ever witnessed. Jesus is God, our Creator, the Creator of all there is, including time. Jesus holds all of time in His hands, all at once. But some say:
- “We live today and so we are innocent of that Man’s Blood. We are distanced from that Man’s Blood. We are better than those damned Jews of the past. They crucified Jesus, not us! Time is malleable, surreal. We can manipulate time! Jesus said that His time on the cross was His hour. And it is. But that’s it. One damned Hour. And now it’s over, and we are free from that Hour.”
There are those who think that if we only only take those hands of His, those hands cupping within them His creation of time like so much blood and water, nailing one hand in one direction to one side and the other hand in the other direction to the other side, that time like so much blood and water will drop from those hands of His so that He will not be able to reach through time so as to judge us. But no, Jesus draws all to Himself in that one Hour, either to give us the privilege of being crucified with Him in the greatest manifestation of love this universe has ever known, or to judge us. But He will draw all to Himself across time into that one Hour as He is lifted up from the earth on the cross for our redemption and, please God, our salvation. We cannot so easily escape by holding that we are aloof. We are always before Him. Our sin is always before Him. To Him comes with its burden of sin all mankind. But if we insist that any such redemption and salvation is only in the past, because we are now “distanced” from Caiaphas’ sin so that we have no part in it at all, ever, then we also distance ourselves from any possibility of forgiveness from that Cross when Jesus, having obeyed the Father unto death, now commands the Father: “Father! Forgive them!” We claim we are not sinners, giving ourselves a license to kill, if we say that we are absolutely “distanced” from the sin of Caiaphas.
Bishops and priests who do this have the pretense that the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass is only an historical meal with no significance for us today, the pretense that there is no sin and therefore no forgiveness of sin, no divinity of Christ, that the only think important is to murder the image of God in the womb. It’s always the same in every culture in every time and place since Adam’s sin: “There but for the grace of God go I, all of us.”
Imagine that, bishops and priests who think the Mass is not a Holy Sacrifice. It’s because they are in one accord of heart and mind with the murderous High Priest Caiaphas, who complains with all self-entitlement so fierce that he thinks his own momentary self-preservation is a rationalization for the murder of Jesus. And so are all who rationalize the murder of the image of God in the womb for self-aggrandizement. They are hypocrites, the worst of all. Jesus said: “What you have done to the least of these you have done to me.”
But those who refuse vaccines developed with or tested on babies murdered for the purpose have a prayer:
- Psalm 94 — LORD, avenging God, avenging God, shine forth! Rise up, judge of the earth; give the proud what they deserve. How long, LORD, shall the wicked, how long shall the wicked glory? How long will they mouth haughty speeches, go on boasting, all these evildoers? They crush your people, LORD, torment your very own. They kill the widow and alien; the fatherless they murder. They say, “The LORD does not see; the God of Jacob takes no notice.” Understand, you stupid people! You fools, when will you be wise? Does the one who shaped the ear not hear? The one who formed the eye not see? Does the one who guides nations not rebuke? The one who teaches humans not have knowledge? The LORD does know human plans; they are only puffs of air.
But don’t think I’m virtue signaling here. I am Caiaphas if I am without the grace of God. Without the grace of God I am the worst of hypocrites, the most entitled, murderous. I thank God who saves such a wretched man as myself. And that honesty gives me the right to accuse Caiaphas and his present day death minions of virtue signaling:
- “Father George, you don’t understand! We are virtuous. We get the vaccine not only to save our own lives, but we are also concerned for the elderly comorbidity people. We are good and kind and nice! And you, Father George, you are an old meanie, a murderer who needs to be marginalized, deposed, cast beyond the darkest of existential peripheries. Father George, you are bad and evil.”
But to these virtue signalers I have some questions:
- Do you yourselves go and buy groceries and go on errands for the elderly co-morbidity people? No?
- Are you not the most damned hypocrites, spitting on the image of God and proclaiming your virtue as bishops and priests, you know, glorious in virtue signaling like the high priest Caiaphas?
Thus begins Tuesday of Holy Week, 2021, for this back-ridge Appalachian priest.
P.S. I remember listening to “Keep the Faith” cassette tapes waaaay back in the day, like in the 1980s. There was a conference given on moral theology by Msgr William Smith who was at the time teaching at Dunwoody, the major seminary for the Archdiocese of New York. He has many quotable quotes, none of which I can remember verbatim, but I think I recall correctly his mockery of those liberal bishops and priests who claim with all condescending gnostic authority from one high that church teaching on life is PRECIOUS, but since we are mature people we can decide for ourselves that which is good for us, and, really, who gives a damn what some precious God, some precious Scriptures, some precious Tradition, and whatever ever so precious constant teachings of the Magisterium of the Church have to present to us as sure and certain doctrine and morality: we are arbiters of the truth because we live today and we are therefore today better than anyone in the past, especially that out-of-date Jesus, those out-of-date Apostles, those out-of-date Scriptures with their out-of-date Tradition, all of which makes any Magisterium commenting on that which is out-of-date to be out-of-date itself. And then they scream with God-is-dead Nietzsche that they are sole arbiters of that which is a WILL TO POWER!
Did I mention that High Priest, as in the High Priest Caiaphas, comes from the Greek ἀρχιερεὺς or “Arch-Priest”? The “Arch” bit refers to origin and derivatively to ruler itself derivatively from POWER. The High Priest is the Power Priest.
In all his glory, if he thirsts for power, any bishop or priest, however high and mighty in his own eyes, is merely playing the Gollum: “My Precious! Power! Mine! All mine! My Precious! Power to kill the image of God! My precious!”
Oh, and don’t worry, I’m trying to hunt down my commentary on the 1990s appendix to the medical ethics ever revised document of the USCCB, an appendix which cleverly turned all morality upside-down, inside-out, back to front, having it that all that which is cooperation in evil, such as formal and proximate cooperation, is merely material and remote cooperation, with the latter being not immoral at all. In other words, do whatever you want, like abortions in Catholic hospitals, and it’s all O.K. I remember that the new ethics director for the Catholic Hospitals within the Archdiocese of New York, in a first press-conference, said that abortions in Catholic Hospitals are good to go, you know, because abortion is an outpatient procedure, which means that the hospital has nothing to do with it. !!! But if the girl stays overnight in the hospital, then, yeah, precious feelings of some overly devout people might have to be considered.
Anyway, I handed my commentary over to friends in the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, which brought it to the Holy Father, who commanded that the USCCB be directed to retract that appendix, condemning the appendix and all those bishops who followed the bad advice of that appendix, to the end that they had to reverse all the decisions they made with that appendix. Great. That’s about never happened before. But meanwhile, people died because of that appendix.
And now that appendix has been revived, meaning that pretty much all bishops and priests cleverly turn all morality upside-down, inside-out, back to front, having it that all that which is cooperation in evil, such as formal and proximate cooperation, is merely material and remote cooperation, with the latter being not immoral at all. In other words, do whatever you want, like developing and testing vaccines with babies who are purpose-aborted and it’s all moral and good.
Dear Caiaphas: it’s not all moral and good. Time will catch up with you from the cross, and then what are you going to do in eternity? Just asking.
ARISE! LET US BE GOING! 