Jorge Mario Bergoglio Insidiously Sides with All That is Sick and Evil

Jorge Mario Bergoglio never misses an opportunity to insidiously side with all that is sick and evil whenever there is the occasion arises to reaffirm that which is sick and evil after one or more of his “bishops” has called evil by its proper name.

For example, it was shortly after the so-called Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith issued a response to a dubium on February 20. 2021, denying permission to “bishops”/priests/presbyters within the conciliar structures to “bless” sodomite unions that Jorge Mario Bergoglio started to undermine the very document to which he had given his “antipapal” approval:

Today too, many people, often without saying so, implicitly would like to “see Jesus”, to meet him, to know him. This is how we understand the great responsibility we Christians and of our communities have. We too must respond with the witness of a life that is given in service, a life that takes upon itself the style of God – closeness, compassion and tenderness – and is given in service. It means sowing seeds of love, not with fleeting words but through concrete, simple and courageous examples, not with theoretical condemnations, but with gestures of love. Then the Lord, with his grace, makes us bear fruit, even when the soil is dry due to misunderstandings, difficulty or persecution, or claims of legalism or clerical moralism. This is barren soil. Precisely then, in trials and in solitude, while the seed is dying, that is the moment in which life blossoms, to bear ripe fruit in due time. It is in this intertwining of death and life that we can experience the joy and true fruitfulness of love, which always, I repeat, is given in God’s style: closeness, compassion, tenderness. (Angelus Address, March 21, 2021.)

As a Modernist, Jorge Mario Bergoglio is a seasoned practitioner of speaking out of both sides of his mouth. He knows full well that news of his refusing to approve the “Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith’s response to the “dubium” about “civil unions” would have been leaked if he chose to reject it. Clever little demon that he is, I believe, he “approved” the response but set about undermining so that “both sides” could “play ball,” so to speak, as he has absolutely no problem with the de facto practice of “blessing” “civil unions” as he his own appointees have permitted lesbians to have their children, conceived by artificial insemination or by “surrogate” mothers, baptized, and he has shown his own openness to sodomite-friendly priests/presbyters and he has said to private individuals that God does not “care” about homosexuality.

As we know, of course, “Pope Francis” overruled the response to the dubium when he authorized the Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith’s new prefect, Victor Manuel Fernandez, to issue Fiducia Supplicans on December 21, 2023, to mandate sodomite “blessings” (see Jorge Demands That His Clergy Suborn Sins That Cry Out to Heaven for Vengeance, Jorge Demands that His Clergy Suborn Sins That Cry Out to Heaven for Vengeance, part two, Two Argentine Fiends Patronize African “Bishops” In Defense of Sodomy, and Bergoglio and Fernandez: Men Who Extol and Enable the Impure).

The Argentine Apostate also specializes in making that no action on the part of one of his “conservative” “bishops” to correct those in public life who support baby-killing and sodomy goes undermined, which is what he did in 2022 shortly after the conciliar “archbishop” of San Francisco, California, Salvatore Cordileone, barred then Speaker of the United States House of Representatives Nancy Patricia D'Alesandro Pelosi from receiving what purports to be Holy Communion in the Protestant and Judeo-Masonic Novus Ordo liturgical abomination:

Pope Francis on Sunday named as cardinal San Diego Bishop Robert W. McElroy, a Roman Catholic leader who had spoken out against the calls for bishops to exclude pro-choice politicians like President Biden and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi from Holy Communion over their stances on abortion.

The move comes in the wake of San Francisco Archbishop Salvatore Cordileone's announcement earlier this month that he would bar Pelosi from receiving Holy Communion due to her stance on abortion. In naming McElroy, Francis passed over Cordileone, who holds a higher rank

McElroy, one of 21 new cardinals Pope Francis announced Sunday, will be installed Aug. 27 at St. Peter's Basilica in Rome, the diocese of San Diego announced.

The San Diego bishop warned against the idea of denying Communion to pro-choice politicians in 2021, when U.S. bishops were considering altering their policy on Communion, which Catholics also call the Eucharist.

"The proposal to exclude pro-choice Catholic political leaders from the Eucharist is the wrong step," McElroy wrote for the Jesuit magazine America. "It will bring tremendously destructive consequences—not because of what it says about abortion, but because of what it says about the Eucharist."

The bishop warned that "[t]he Eucharist is being weaponized and deployed as a tool in political warfare. This must not happen."

Cordileone, whom Pope Francis passed over, congratulated McElroy on his appointment.

The San Francisco archbishop had previously written to Pelosi, "You are not to present yourself for Holy Communion and, should you do so, you are not to be admitted to Holy Communion."

In a public "letter to the faithful," Cordileone said he took the action "After numerous attempts to speak with her [Pelosi] to help her understand the grave evil she is perpetrating, the scandal she is causing, and the danger to her own soul she is risking."

The Catholic Church's Code of Canon Law states that those who have been excommunicated or who are "obstinately persevering in manifest grave sin are not to be admitted to holy communion."

Cordileone clarified that his move had "nothing to do with" the leak of the Supreme Court draft opinion in Dobbs v. Jackson Women's Health Organization, which would strike down Roe v. Wade, but rather with Pelosi's "advocacy for codifying the Roe decision into federal law—it’s becoming more and more extreme and more and more aggressive."

Despite Cordileone's clear declaration, Pelosi received Holy Communion at the 9 a.m. Mass at Holy Trinity in the Georgetown neighborhood of Washington, D.C., last Sunday. (Abortion-Communion controversy: Pope Francis elevates bishop who defended serving pro-choice politicians.)

This is no accident.

Indeed, this is quite by Jorge’s diabolical choice.

The Argentine Apostate has spoken loud and clear by making the egregious Robert McElroy, the conciliar “bishop” of the Diocese of San Diego, a “cardinal” even though McElroy holds a lesser ecclesiastical rank as the “bishop” of a diocese in comparison to the two conciliar metropolitans of California, the supposedly “conservative” Jose Gomez, the conciliar “archbishop” of Los Angeles, and Salvatore Cordileone, the conciliar “archbishop” of San Francisco, neither whom is a “cardinal” within the counterfeit church of conciliarism.

McElroy’s elevation is a slap at “Archbishop” Cordileone and it, most unsurprisingly, places Jorge Mario Bergoglio unapologetically on the side of every single Catholic pro-abortion official, elected or appointed, in public life in the United States of America and throughout the world.

This meant that he had thrown not only Salvatore Cordileone but Robert Vasa of Santa Rosa, California, and Joseph Strickland of Tyler, Texas, under the proverbial bus for the stands they had taken against administering what purports to be “Holy Communion to pro-abort Catholic pols, who are now emboldened and reaffirmed as never before in the past fifty years, and it was only eighteen months later that Strickland was removed from his position as the conciliar ordinary of Tyler, an action taken after he had received an “apostolic visitation” and had dared to travel to the Archdiocese of Los Angeles, California, shortly after that “visitation” to condemn the ~~Brooklyn~~ Los Angeles Dodgers for awarding the scandalous “Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence with an award for their “community service.” (See Perpetual Indulgence of Perversity Must Lead to Its Institutionalization, part one, and Perpetual Indulgence of Perversity Must Lead to Its Institutionalization, part two. For a review of how Senor Jorge dealt with “Bishop” Joseph Strickland, please see Nota Bene: "Bishop" Joseph Strickland: "Whoever is Holy Does Not Dissent from the Pope" (Pope Saint Pius X), "Bishop" Strickland Must Learn That a True Pope Can Never Promote Errors on Faith and Morals, and Jorge Mario Bergoglio is Intent on Making the Protection of Sin Great Again.)

Insofar as directly undermining “Archbishop” Salvatore Cordileone, it was no less than three weeks after the conciliar metropolitan of San Francisco banned Nancy Patricia D’Alesandro Pelosi from the reception of what purports to be Holy Communion in the Novus Ordo service that Jorge Mario Bergoglio personally invited his fellow octogenarian (who is three years, three months his junior) to the Vatican, whereupon he made it a point to give her what purported to be Holy Communion with his own lay revolutionary hands on the Solemnity of Saints Peter and Paul, June 29, 2022, just five days after the decision of the Supreme Court of the United States of America in the case of Thomas E. Dobbs, Mississippi State Health Officer v. Jackson Women’s Organization:

VATICAN CITY (LifeSiteNews) – Speaker of the House Rep. Nancy Pelosi has reportedly received Holy Communion at a Mass presided over by Pope Francis this morning, despite being banned from receiving Communion by her local ordinary, San Francisco Archbishop Salvatore Cordileone.

The Democrat leader flew to Rome for a special meeting with Pope Francis, at which she received a blessing, before attending Mass in St. Peter’s Basilica.

According to the teaching of the Catholic Church, Pelosi’s vocal and persistent support for the killing of unborn children precludes the high-profile politician from receiving the Body and Blood of Christ, due to the gravely sinful and scandalous nature of both murder and the sacrilegious reception of Holy Communion.

“[Y]ou are not to present yourself for Holy Communion and, should you do so, you are not to be admitted to Holy Communion, until such time as you [publicly] repudiate your advocacy for the legitimacy of abortion and confess and receive absolution of this grave sin in the sacrament of Penance,” Cordileone wrote to Pelosi in a “notification” last month.

Pope Francis, however, previously expressed opposition to barring pro-abortion politicians from Holy Communion, claiming that priests should accompany such legislators with “compassion and tenderness”.

Joe Biden told reporters last year in Rome that Pope Francis recommended he continue receiving Holy Communion, despite the U.S. president’s long-standing support for killing unborn babies.

Fresh from condemning the Supreme Court’s ruling to overturn Roe v. Wade on Friday, Pelosi’s decision to receive Holy Communion on the Solemnity of Saints Peter and Paul at a Mass presided over by Pope Francis represents a significant development in her dissent from Church teaching.

Responding to Archbishop Cordileone’s move to ban her from Holy Communion in May, the 82 year-old Democrat had said she didn’t respect pro-life people “foisting” their views on others.

Today she told diplomats in Rome that “faith is an important gift, not everyone has it but it is the path to so many other things.” (Pelosi receives Holy Communion at Novus Ordo service presided over by Jorge Mario Bergoglio.)

Bergoglio knew exactly what he is doing, and the fact that he gave what he thought was a “blessing” Pelosi is one of the stunningly outrageous and boldly calculated signal that he, a man known for doing and saying outrageous things over and over again, a man who once said “"“I feel like saying something that may sound … heretical”, has done or said in the past in the 4,167 days since he walked out on the balcony of the Basilica of Saint Peter and told “Monsignor” Guido Marino to ditch the papal mozetta as “carnival time is over, monsignore.”

Jorge’s words and gestures, to say nothing of the times when he keeps his ever-flapping mouth shut when things such as the Supreme Court of the United States of America in the case of Thomas E. Dobbs, Mississippi State Health Officer v. Jackson’s Women Organization, June 24, 2022. happen that he does not believe are worth his time or trouble to comment, have said it all.

Yes, Jorge Mario Bergoglio used the Solemnity of Saints Peter and Paul in 2023 to mock the papacy, which is the infallible guardian of the Holy Faith. Although matters of discipline are not covered by the mantle of infallibility, it is nevertheless true no one can name a single one of our true popes who have gone out his way to show that a Catholic woman in public life who supports sins that cry out to Heaven for vengeance enjoys his benediction in spite of episcopal sanctions leveled against her.

Well, this brings us to how Jorge Mario Bergoglio made it a point to visit a religious sister who has made the “support” to men and women who have paid to have their bodies chemically and surgically mutilated in the ontologically and physically impossible task of “becoming” a member of the gender opposite to which God gave them in their mothers’ wombs just four days after the opening ceremonies of the 2024 Summer Olympics in Paris, France, contained a display enacted by those who called themselves “drag queens” that mocked the Last Supper of Our Blessed Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ:

OSTIA, Italy (LifeSiteNews) — Pope Francis made a visit to a favored nun, and the circus group she lives among, who regularly brings transgender groups to meet the pontiff during his weekly audiences.

In a statement issued to the Vatican press corps July 31, news of the Pope’s visit to Sister Geneviève Jeanningros in the Roman coastal town of Ostia was announced:

Today, July 31, Pope Francis left the Vatican and arrived in Ostia at 3 p.m. to visit Sister Geneviève Jeanningros, Little Sister of Jesus, and the community of carnies and circus performers at the Luna Park in Ostia Lido.

The Holy Father blessed a statue of Our Lady Patroness of the Traveling Show and Circus and greeted the families and children present.

Footage of the event was subsequently posted online by Vatican News’ social media portals, showing Pope Francis seated alongside Sr. Jeanningros greeting the members of the circus troupe and watching various performances that they staged for him.

Jeanningros has lived in a trailer park with the circus performers in the coastal town of Ostia for over five decades. From here she has operated her “ministry,” which includes working as a religious alongside circus groups, homeless people and transgender individuals.

In recent years, the nun has cemented her long friendship with Pope Francis by monthly bringing groups of transgender individuals from the nearby town of Torvaiacina – a seaside town southwest of Rome infamous for its prostitution and drug trade – to the Pope’s weekly audiences, at which they are given seats of honor in the front row.

However, it seems from the sparse details provided by the Vatican about the pope’s visit – which was not listed on his calendar or pre-announced to the press corps – that Jeanningros’ transgender group was not present at the papal event in Ostia.

Jeanningros’ presence at the Vatican has increasingly become synonymous with the transgender or homosexual groups she brings with her.

She has been joined in her work of bringing the transgender groups to the Vatican by Father Andrea Conocchia, the Torvaiacina parish priest.

The Torvaiacina transgender group – mostly sex workers – first formed during the COVID-19 restrictions when they were without their regular form of income due to the restrictions, and thus gathered together in Torvaianica.

The group first came to Pope Francis’ attention when they wrote to him presenting their financial needs. In 2020, Francis instructed his almoner, Cardinal Konrad Krajewski, to send money to the group after they contacted the Vatican for financial assistance.

Then on Holy Saturday 2021, Holy See officials brought the “transgender” individuals to the Vatican to receive the abortion-tainted COVID-19 injections. According to Juan Carlos Cruz, the openly homosexual man appointed by Francis to the Pontifical Commission for the Protection of Minors, Francis instructed officials to “ask for their names, ask for anything they need, but do not ask them about their sex.”

In 2022, Jeanningros led a group of transgender “women” to thank the pope for his actions for them during the COVID restrictions, and the relationship has continued since.

Most recently, she led a group of self-professed homosexuals, “transsexuals,” and others from Torvaianica to the weekly audience in early June before leading another group of homosexuals to meet him a week later.

Argentinian man “Carla” Segovia, currently living as a woman in the Torvaiacina group, said last November that “we transgenders (sic) here in Italy feel a bit more human because the fact that Pope Francis brings us closer to the Church is a beautiful thing.” His comments came as part of the much-publicized papal invite which they received to an annual Vatican lunch.

In 2022, Jeanningros led a group of transgender “women” to thank the pope for his actions for them during the COVID restrictions, and the relationship has continued since.

Once again, Jorge Mario Bergoglio knew exactly what he was doing as he made it a point just four days after the Olympics sacrilege to visit a woman who thinks that that mutilating one’s body is perfectly acceptable and must be “mainstreamed” into society. The Argentine Apostate was thumbing his nose at those of his “bishops” who publicly condemned the mockery of God Himself that had taken place in Paris just four days previously, and it appears that he added this visit to his schedule as it was not announced in advance.

Additionally, “Pope Francis” has made it a point once again to support the “ministry” of the notoriously nefarious “Father” James Martin, S.J., who believes that those inclined to commit perverse sins in violation of the Sixth and Ninth Commandments do not suffer from any kind of “intrinsic disorder” but are, quite to the contrary, “differently ordered”—yeah, “different ordered” in direct violation of human nature itself.

So, naturally, what does the Argentine Apostate do?

Write yet another handwritten note to Martin prior to a hootenanny to reaffirm those who base their human self-identification on the propensity to commit sins that cry our to Heaven for vengeance:

Pope Francis has once again sent a handwritten letter of support to Father James Martin SJ, expressing his closeness with the priest’s pro-LGBT Outreach conference being held this weekend.

Shortly before the commencement of its 2024 conference held in Georgetown University this weekend, Outreach published a photo of a hand-written letter sent from Pope Francis to Fr. Martin – the group’s founder.

Sent by Francis on July 11, the message reads:

Dear brother,
Thank you very much for your email.
I am glad that Cardinal Gregory will celebrate the Mass; I will be spiritually with him and with all of you, united in prayer.
Thank you for praying for me. I do the same for you.
May Jesus bless you and the Holy Virgin care for you.

Fraternally,

Francis

The Pope’s letter came in response to a July 10 message sent to him by Martin, asking if the Pontiff had any message he wished to share with participants of the conference as has become custom in recent years.

Welcoming Francis’ letter, Martin told Outreach that “[w]e are honored by the Holy Father’s greetings and his promises of prayers and are grateful for his own outreach to LGBTQ Catholics over the years. We will be praying for his intentions this weekend as we gather together at Georgetown.”

This year’s Outreach conference is billed as drawing together “LGBTQ lay people, clergy, scholars, artists, educators, students and family members to build community, share best practices and worship together.”

Cardinal Wilton Gregory of D.C. and Fr. Martin will be the chief celebrants and the weekend’s two Masses. The advertised panel discussions for the 300-plus participants include:

LGBTQ Ministry in Parishes
Telling LGBTQ Catholic Stories
The Bible and Homosexuality
LGBTQ Ministry in Higher Education
Transgender Catholics and the Church
Race, Intersectionality and LGBTQ People
Parenting LGTBQ Children
Catholic LGBTQ Women and the Church
Gifts of a Life of Chastity
Outreach Outlook from Rome
“Preach” Roundtable Discussion

Outreach itself operates “under the auspices of America Media,” which oversees the left-wing, Jesuit-run America Magazine. The group is the brainchild of Martin and his past pro-LGBT activities, as it aims to become a global resource center “where church leaders, both clergy and lay, can encounter the LGBTQ faithful, in their ‘joys and hopes’ and ‘griefs and anxieties’ as well as engage in respectful dialogue.”

Since its inception, Outreach has enjoyed a close relationship with Pope Francis, chiefly due to the personal friendship between Francis and Martin.

Indeed, the Pope has now sent at least five publicly-known letters to Martin and the Outreach group in relation to the LGBT conferences they stage, although the first in 2021 was before Outreach was officially launched.

In 2021, just prior to Martin’s online LGBT conference, Francis wrote to the Jesuit thanking him for his “pastoral zeal” and “ability to be close to people, with that closeness that Jesus had and that reflects the closeness of God.” The Pope described Martin’s LGBT advocacy as being an imitation of the “style of God.”

Outreach was then launched on May 1, 2022, and only days later Francis replied to a letter Martin sent him in which he argued that a “selective” Church is “a sect,” and decrying what he styled as the Church’s “rejection” of “LGBT Catholic[s].”

Francis decried “rejection from the Church,” saying that for so-called LGBT individuals “I would have them recognize it not as ‘the rejection of the Church,’ but instead of ‘people in the Church.’ The Church is a mother and calls together all her children.”

Following the June 2022 Outreach conference, Francis again wrote to Martin in August 2022 after the Jesuit priest had sent the Pontiff details about the 2022 event. Francis praised Martin for “working in the culture of encounter,” which, he said, “shortens distances and enriches us with our differences, just as Jesus did.”

Then for the 2023 event, Francis continued the established practice by sending another hand-written letter. He thanked Martin “for all the good you are doing,” and also expressed his closeness to all at the conference.

Martin has met with Francis privately on a number of occasions, and was personally selected by the Pope to participate in the current Synod on Synodality. He is also a papally appointed member of the Dicastery for Communications.

Martin’s favor with Pope Francis comes alongside his longstanding record of promoting LGBT ideology in dissent from Catholic teaching. The Jesuit priest is described as “arguably the most prominent activist” in the Church for LGBT issues.

His record also includes promoting images drawn from a series of blasphemous works by homosexual artist Douglas Blanchard and describing viewing God as male as “damaging.” Martin has additionally promoted homosexual unions and called for openly homosexual individuals to kiss during the sign of peace at the Novus Ordo Mass. (Pope Francis tells pro-LGBT conference: 'I will be spiritually with all of you'.)

This, of course, is utterly disgusting, but not one bit of it can come from the hand of a true and legitimate Successor of Saint Peter, who would never be silent about sacrilege and who would never given his support, whether overtly or covertly, to anything that was in the least bit offensive to God and thus injurious to the sanctification and salvation of the souls for whom His Co-Equal, Co-Eternal Divine Son, Our Blessed Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ, shed every single drop of His Most Precious Blood to redeem during His Passion and Death on the wood of the Holy Cross on Good Friday.

How telling it is, therefore, that Recep Tayyip Erdogan, the Mohammedan president of Turkey, whose capital Istanbul was once the seat of Byzantine Empire when it was named Constantinople before being overrun by Mohammedans in 1453, berated Jorge Mario Bergoglio for his refusal to condemn the blasphemous sacrilege that took place at the Olympics on July 27, 2024:

Following the blasphemy at the Paris Olympics, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan has called on Francis to "speak out together".

Francis loves to speak out on almost everything, but only when he knows he has the media activists of the oligarchs on his side, who, however, love blasphemies against Christ.

According to Abc.es (1 August), Francis "finished his holidays" on Wednesday, which allowed (sic) him to take the phone call with Erdoğan.

In reality, Erdoğan forced Francis to take the phone call because he had publicly announced on Tuesday that he would call Francis to share his "indignation" at the "immoral demonstrations during the opening ceremony of the Paris Olympic Games".

Turkish government sources said on social media that during the conversation Erdoğan criticised that "under the pretext of 'freedom of expression and tolerance', human dignity is being trampled upon and religious and moral values are being mocked, which offends both Muslims and the Christian world".

As a result, he said, "it is necessary to raise a united voice and show a common attitude against these offences".

The embarrassed Vatican did not give details of Francis' response, but the Turkish government has assured that Francis thanked Erdoğan [very privately] for "his sensitivity to the humiliation of religious values".

When Erdoğan publicly explained the reasons for the call to members of his AKP party on Tuesday, he told them he wanted to "share with the Pope the immorality committed against the Christian world and against all Christians".

He noted that "the Olympic Games have been used as an instrument of perversion that corrupts human nature". (Erdoğan Calls on Mute Francis to Defend Christ.)

Many commentaries on this site have pointed out that believing Mohammedans care more about offenses given to their false, blasphemous prophet, Mohammed, than do most Catholics are about offenses given to Our Blessed Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ, His Most Blessed Mother, Saint Joseph, and to the Holy Faith. Recep Tayyip Erdogan shamed “Pope Francis” with his phone call, and the best that, according to Turkish sources, the false “pontiff” could say was that he appreciated Erdogan’s “sensitivity to the humiliation of religious values.” Bergoglio cares not for the honor and glory of God as his false religion cares first and foremost about not offending those he considers “marginalized” and “excluded.” It is not of this wicked revolutionary’s nature to be in the least offended by legitimate sacrileges, although it should be pointed out that his own participation one sacrilege after another makes his silence about what happened a week ago today in Paris is demonstrative of his own disbelief in the Faith of our Fathers, the immutable Holy Catholic Faith.

We need to beg Our Lady during this month of her Immaculate Heart to restore a true pope on the Throne of Saint Peter sooner rather than later, and to this end may our Rosaries each day include this as a special intention.

Immaculate Heart of Mary, pray for us now, and at the hour of our death.

Saint Joseph, pray for us.

Saints Peter and Paul, pray for us.

Saint John the Baptist, pray for us.

Saint John the Evangelist, pray for us.

Saint Michael the Archangel, pray for us.

Saint Gabriel the Archangel, pray for us.

Saint Raphael the Archangel, pray for us.

Saints Joachim and Anne, pray for us.

Saints Caspar, Melchior, and Balthasar, pray for us.

Saint Stephen the Protomartyr, pray for us.

Father Francis X. Weninger on the Finding of the Body of Saint Stephen the Protomartyr

After St Stephen, the First Martyr, had been stoned to death by the Jews for having uncontestably proved that Christ, Whom they had Crucified, was the true Messiah, some pious men, filled with deep sorrow, buried him with all due reverence. Foremost among these was St Gamaliel, who had formerly been a rabbi and later a disciple of St Paul. He arranged everything, so that the body of St Stephen was carried, during the night, by some Christians, from the spot in which it lay, to his country-seat, which was a few miles from Jerusalem.

“In the course of time and in consequence of the persecution of the Christians in Juda, the location of his tomb was forgotten, until it pleased the Almighty to reveal it, in the time of the Emperor Honorius. There lived, at that period, in the place where St Stephen was buried, a Priest of the Church of Jerusalem, named Lucian. St Gamaliel appeared to this holy man in his sleep and disclosed to him where the bodies of St Stephen, St Nicodemus, his son St Abibon and his own body, were lying, telling him, at the same time, to inform St John, Bishop of Jerusalem, of this fact and to say that it was the will of God that he should exhume them for the benefit of many men. Lucian awakening and fearing it was but a dream, or perhaps even a delusion from Satan, did not tell the Bishop but humbly prayed to God that, if it were a revelation from on high, He would grant him a repetition of the vision. To this effect, Lucian continued in prayer and fasting for eight days, when Gamaliel again appeared to him and repeated all he had said before.

Lucian did not yet obey but, to be more certain, fasted and prayed eight days more. St Gamaliel appeared to him for the third time and, with a severe countenance, reproving him for not believing his words, commanded him to make the Bishop acquainted with the facts immediately, in order that the faithful might no longer be deprived of the benefits which they would obtain by the intercession of St Stephen and the other Saints.

After this third apparition, Lucian could no longer doubt and, betaking himself to the Bishop of Jerusalem, he communicated to him all that had happened. The joy of the holy Bishop was exceedingly great. He called the Bishops and Priests of the neighbouring Churches and, accompanied by them and a great number of Christians, he went to the place indicated and had the satisfaction of finding four coffins, on which were engraven the names of the Saints abovementioned – St Stephen, St Nicodemus, St Abibon, St.Gamaliel. When the coffins were reverently opened, there issued from them a fragrance as if the place had been filled with blooming flowers.

More than seventy persons, some of whom were sick and others possessed by evil spirits, were instantly restored to health, or relieved of their torments, upon touching the Sacred Relics, especially those of St Stephen. The body of the Protomartyr was carried with great solemnity to Jerusalem, and deposited in the Church of Sion, the oldest and largest Church in that City.

During the reign of Theodosius the Younger, it was transported to Constantinople, and thence to Rome in the reign of Pope Pelagius I. The rearkable discovery of the relics of St Stephen and the miracles, which had been wrought at their touch, were soon known all over the Christian world. The heretics, who, at that time persecuted the Church, were ashamed and the faithful strengthened in the True Faith and animated in their veneration for the Protomartyr.

All Countries and Cities applied for portions of the Relics and many were favoured with them, to the great benefit of the people. Many received only some of the earth in which the holy body had rested; others, a piece of linen which had touched his coffin but, by the pious use of them, as many miracles were wrought as by the relics themselves.

In St Augustine, we have an indisputable witness of this, as he lived at the time of the discovery. Among other things, he tells us, in the twenty second book of the “City of God,” of many great miracles wrought, in his presence, by these relics, in the city of Hippo, of which he was bishop, as also in adjacent Countries. A few of these we will here relate.

A blind woman’s sight was immediately restored, by touching her eyes with a flower, which, at her request, had been laid on the Relics of St Stephen. Lucillus, a Bishop, was cured of a dangerous fistula by devoutly carrying the Sacred Relics. Eucharius, a Priest, arose again to life, when they placed upon his corpse, a tunic which had rested on St Stephen’s body. Two men suffering with gout were cured by the same. A lad who was killed by being run over by a carriage, was not only restored to life, but his broken limbs were healed. A nun who had died, retuned to life and health, when her habit was laid upon her, ,after it had touched the Sacred Relics. Eleusinus placed the corpse of his child upon the spot where the Relics of the Saint had rested, and immediately, the child lived again. Upon the head of Marial, a hardened Jew, his brother-in-law–a Christian–laid a flower, which had been on the Altar near the Relics and the next day the Jew requested to be Baptised. Two sisters, who were afflicted with epilepsy, were instantly cured by these relics. Many other miracles are narrated by St Augustine and he concludes with these words: “If I alone were to relate what I know of the miraculous cures performed by St Stephen at Calama and in its neighbourhood, I should have to write many books and yet, not be able to collect all of them!”

What does a non-Catholic think or say on reading or hearing these and many other things which the holy Fathers have written of the Sacred Relics? He rejects all these histories and accuses St Augustine and other great teachers, of falsehood and superstition. But, if he believes even one of these miracles, how can he, according to the doctrines of his religion, condemn the veneration of Relics and the invocation of the Saints!?” (Father Francis X. Weninger, S.J., Original, Short and Practical Sermons for Every Feast of the Liturgical Year: Three Sermons for Every Feast, published originally by C. J. H. Lowen, Cincinnati, Ohio, 1882.)

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Jorge Mario Bergoglio Insidiously Sides with All That is Sick and Evil

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