Editor’s Introduction

There's no getting around the fact that the perplexing and even scandalous pontificate of Pope Francis has caused the late Pope John Paul II to emerge as the Rock of Gibraltarian Catholic orthodoxy.   But does this reflect how things actually were back in the day, or is it more a case of comparative wishful thinking?

My recently departed mother always admonished her children against speaking ill of the dead, and I have no wish to break that rule, especially with respect to dead popes. In point of fact, John Paul did defend the family and speak out for the unborn like no one else did at the time. But let’s not get carried away—he was the Pope, for heaven’s sake. It’s to be expected that the Holy Father would frown on the idea of murdering babies in their mothers' wombs. One can only hope the bar of orthodoxy isn't buried quite that deep.

So the Vatican has ramped up its preoccupation with sex. As has been widely reported here and elsewhere, they've now got their very own sex-education program up and running. Published by the Pontifical Council for the Family, “The Meeting Point: The Adventure of Love,” purports to bring young people up to speed on the question of sex and chastity. And who better to do that than those paragons of virtue over at that Vatican.

More than three years into the Bergoglian pontificate there is no mistaking its principal line of development, which is Francis’s grand obsession: the admission of unrepentant public adulterers in “second marriages” to Holy Communion, the “Kasper proposal” he has been promoting almost from the moment of his election. To that end, Francis has relentlessly put in place a kind of moral mafia to carry out his design. Let us meet some of its soldiers.

First, meet Archbishop Vincenzo (“the Enforcer”) Paglia, head of the (now) ludicrously misnamed Pontifical Council “for the Family”:

Over a decade ago, with typical hubris, George Soros bragged, that he “is the Pope’s boss, now.” It appears that his boast became a self-fulfilling prophecy in the Francis pontificate.

The two most powerful men in the world joined forces to form a curious and troubling alliance. One of them, often referred to as the most dangerous man in the world, the other, the Vicar of Christ.

Among the many smoking guns uncovered in the Wikileaks data dump, lurks documents that should give Catholics great concern. The latest Wikileaks data dump of internal documents from George Soros’ Open Society Foundation exposes the most shocking of all his political alliances. According to the leaked Open Society Foundation documents, George Soros funds efforts to promote his radical socialist agenda of income inequality by using the bully pulpit of Pope Francis. Soros seeks to “engage the Pope on economic and racial justice issues” by lobbying the Vatican.

Bishop Zubic prays at Franklin Graham's 2014 praise festival in Pittsburgh

In his apostolic exhortation Evangelii Gaudium, Pope Francis famously, or rather infamously, accused tradition-minded Catholics of exhibiting the “self-absorbed promethean neopelagianism of those who ultimately trust only in their own powers and feel superior to others because they observe certain rules or remain intransigently faithful to a particular Catholic style from the past.”

CIC Organizers Light the BLESSED BONFIRE

In the continuing efforts to restore Catholic Identity, organizers and friends of the “Catholic Identity Conference” held annually in Weirton, West Virginia (this upcoming September 9 – 11, 2016), met on a family farm earlier this summer to host a traditional Catholic bonfire commemorating the Vigil of the Birthday of Saint John the Baptist. Led by the Knights of Columbus Woodlawn Council 2161 Traditional Latin Mass Guild, numerous fervent Catholics gathered at the peaceful farm of a Traditional Latin Mass family to observe this most ancient of Catholic ceremonies.

American Mommies in Combat

Back in December, Defense Secretary Ash Carter announced that the military would open all combat jobs—from the infantry to special-operations forces—to women. In January 2016, all branches of the military were required to submit their plans to the Defense Department for the gender integration of combat units.  And just like that, America put the world on notice: We've lost our mind, lost our heart, lost our soul.

There she sat, a beautiful little child, peering into the camera with wide, almond eyes; her skin was olive-colored and her hair was a deep brown. Her eyes were tearless, which was surprising considering why this little one was being featured in a nightly news story. Her mommy was going away, you see, for a long time; and no one could tell her when her world would be restored. Blank and empty was the expression she wore on her face; she didn’t understand, she couldn’t understand.

On December 8, 1854, in the Constitution Ineffabilis Deus, Bl. Pope Pius IX defined the dogma of the Immaculate Conception of the Blessed Virgin Mary. Many non-Catholics mistakenly believe the Immaculate Conception refers to the virginal conception of Jesus Christ in the womb of His mother. In reality, the term refers to the conception of the Virgin Mary in the womb of her mother, St. Anne. Through the merits of Jesus Christ, the Blessed Virgin Mary received the singular privilege of being exempt from the universal law of sin from the moment of her conception. The dogmatic definition reads as follows: “ the most Blessed Virgin Mary … in the first instance of her conception, by a singular privilege and grace granted by God, in view of the merits of Jesus Christ, the Savior of the human race, was preserved exempt from all stain of original sin".