The Pope Kissed His Ring?

by Christopher A. Ferrara

        When the so-called "Archbishop" of Canterbury, Rowan Williams, visited the Pope in October 2003, Williams kissed the Pope’s ring, whereupon the Pope kissed his. In doing so, John Paul II suggested that Williams actually possessed the dignity of an Archbishop, when in fact (as Pope Leo XIII taught infallibly in Apostolicae Curiae) Anglican prelates are not validly ordained, but rather are mere laymen pretending to ecclesiastical office.

        Just how devoid of holy orders the Anglican clergy are is demonstrated by recent revelations of the behind-the scenes conflict over Williams’s appointment of the admitted homosexual Dr. Jeffrey John as suffragen "bishop" of Reading. At the time of this appointment, which took place only weeks before Williams’s visit with the Pope, it was widely known that John had been living in a "partnership" with another priest for nearly 30 years.

        As The Guardian reported on June 18, 2004, nearly a year after the appointment was rescinded, Williams had been forced to back down by an international storm of protest by Anglican evangelicals. The Guardian reports that Williams told the author of a book on conflicts within the Anglican "Church" that "forcing his longstanding friend to step down had been ‘a very hard decision to have to take’."

        So, the "Archbishop" whose ring the Pope kissed was willing to name as a "bishop" an openly homosexual friend of his, even though this appointment would outrage Anglicans. This is the ultraliberal apostate with whom the Pope would engage in "ecumenical dialogue."

        During Williams’s visit with the Pope, the Pope read a statement which said in part that "As we give thanks for the progress that has already been made we must also recognize that new and serious difficulties have arisen on the path to unity … These difficulties are not all of a merely disciplinary nature; some extend to essential matters of faith and morals. …"

        With all due respect to the Pope, this is really too much to bear. What progress is the Pope talking about? The longer "ecumenical dialogue" with the Anglican "Church" goes on, the more decrepit this "Church" becomes. And how can the Pope say that differences on matters of faith and morals represent new difficulties in the "Catholic-Anglican dialogue", when the Anglicans have always rejected, and continue to reject, the Catholic Church’s infallible teaching on the divine institution of the Church, the sacrificial priesthood, papal infallibility, the seven sacraments, the Marian dogmas, marriage and procreation — the list goes on and on and on.

        When will the Vatican finally admit that "ecumenism" is a farce and a scandal that makes a mockery of the Church’s divine commission to convert all nations? Will it take a new Pope to put a stop to this insanity? Only Heaven knows. But surely what Heaven knows is revealed in the still-undisclosed text of the Third Secret of Fatima, following the words Cardinal Ratzinger conveniently hid in a footnote to his commentary on the Message of Fatima: "In Portugal the dogma of the faith will always be preserved, etc." What follows these words is, as Cardinal Ciappi tells us, a prophecy of an apostasy in the Church that will begin at the top.