Charlie Johnston.

Trouble is, CrewDog, that we don't know whether there is obedience to the Church because nobody is answering the two relevant questions:
1. Did Catholic priests hear Confessions in that Protestant school?
2. If the answer to question 1 is "yes", did they request and receive permission from their superiors to do so, and if not why not?
Two straightforward questions that shouldn't be hard to answer.

Nobody knows for sure whether someone else's soul is saved at Confession. We can hope and have confidence that they made a good Confession, but only God knows. We also don't know whether the same people would have gone to Confession at their local parish anyway. Obedience matters whether we like it or not, and it matters especially where Christ's Church, His Ministers and His Angels appear to be at odds. That's not to say that the priests intentionally disobeyed their superiors. We don't know whether they were aware that they might need permission. Perhaps they had permission, or perhaps they weren't RC priests.

It isn't about winners or losers. I don't know Harper, you or Charlie, so I can only dig through people's understandable emotional responses in an effort to get to what matters. Obedience to the Bishop and criteria set down by the Church for when or where priests can hear Confessions matter to me.

I like your usual straightforward approach, CrewDog, so I don't want to get into an argument with you about this.

 

Oh DeGaulle, this response is SO disappointing! When I saw those two things in my quote, I thought the 'right wingers' will be in moaning about communists and the like but I didn't expect it from you. Can't you see that discernment of people and behaviour must go much deeper than such 'cliche' thinking?

 

And since no one knows the details, Harper should not be criticizing Charlie!

 

It's no cliche. Read 'Jesuits', by Father Malachi Martin for a comprehensive and detailed exposure of the outrageous and heretical behaviour of many Jesuit priests in the Liberation Theology movement in South America. This is the main reason why so many South Americans have switched from Catholicism to the Pentecostals. The people wanted Christ and all the Liberation Theologian crowd could offer was Marx. As for the Greenham Common crowd, they were, at best, useful idiots for Sovietism. We never heard a squeek from them about bilateral disarmament nor witnessed any demonstrations outside embassies of the USSR, did we? There are still nuclear weapons, where are they now?

I don't entertain notions of 'left' and 'right' in Catholicism. Now, that would truly be cliche thinking. These categories are political children of the French Revolution and have absolutely nothing in common with Christianity. It's either Truth or Untruth and there is no neutral ground.

 

I don't think that there should be any criticisms on either side but there's a trend with all these unapproved apparitions, locutions, etc. for people to get emotional and over-react. Being new to this Charlie stuff, I don't know who started all the angst and when, so there's nothing to be gained by getting dragged into point scoring.

From what I have read (and I admit that I haven't done a whole lot of reading on the matter), Charlie has been forbidden to promote his messages on Church property in at least one Diocese. That shouldn't be dismissed as a minor issue. If the priests defied Church criteria for hearing Confessions (I don't know the correct terminology), that's another point against Charlie's claim to be receiving messages from Heaven.

Sometimes it's easier to accuse the person raising questions of having an ulterior motive than to answer the questions. In this case, it seems to me that answering the questions would be the easier option.

 

Quite a few allegations, some of them quite serious, have been made in the last few weeks on this thread but I have yet to see convincing corroboration. The allegations resemble Charlie's prophecies-they are up in the air at the moment. Personally, I continue to put my trust in Our Lord, but intend to follow Charlie (a bit like the old Haughey days, isn't it?) until events either confirm or deny him or unless some irrefutable and unacceptable skeleton emerges from some dark closet.

 

Charlie once stated that Jesus has a "wicked sense of humor". That bothered me to hear Our Lord's name and the word "wicked" in the same sentence. Still on the fence about Charlie. Harper, your questions are legitimate. Time will tell.

 

Fr G.W. Hughes denied the physical resurrection of Christ as an historical event.
Questioned the authenticity of Holy Scriptures.
He also denied that there is punishment for sin.
Did not believe in venial or mortal sin.
He taught universal salvation.
Could not accept church teaching on Humanae Vitae.
Gave communion to non-Catholics.
Believed in the potential of self awareness and meditation to bring world peace.

One might conclude that these 'errors' might have led people astray. Only God knows.

I suppose on the plus side he seems to have been a very pleasant person who understood the transcendence nature and gratuitousness of God and the mystery of faith.

My prayer is that in death that he has encountered the historical Christ who did indeed rise from the dead and appeared to “the twelve”, and subsequently to over five hundred people at once, most of whom were still living eyewitnesses at the time St. Paul wrote his letter.

 

If salvation was universal, God would be a monster. Creating a world with all its inherent suffering...for no purpose. Why not just stick us all in Heaven to begin with? Of course, he didn't believe in a physical resurrection. There would be no need for one, nor any need for a Cross, either.

Teaching universal salvation is simply telling people they might as well do whatever they feel like.

 

There are nuances of meaning. The word used in this context may not necessarily, and usually doesn't, represent its conventional meaning. It is probably intended to connote that Our Lord had a robust sense of humour, which He had. 'Get thee behind me, Satan' was taking no prisoners! Certainly a withering sense of humour in that case. Or, if you like, a 'wicked sense of humour'.

For my own part, it's not the phrase I would use but not a hanging offence, either.

 

Pope Francis asked people to reflect, “Am I attached to my things, my ideas. Am I closed?”

“Am I at a standstill or am I a person on a journey? Do I believe in Jesus Christ, in what Jesus did,” dying for humanity’s sins and rising again? he asked.

“Am I able to understand the signs of the times and be faithful to the voice of the Lord that is manifested in them?”

 

I know, love and serve Jesus Christ. I know Him. I walk with Him and He walks with me. He is at the centre of all that I do.

 

You know the truth of God can from strange places even the lyrics of a song.

Well my goodness gracious let me tell you the news
My head's been wet with the midnight dew
I've been down on bended knee talkin' to the man from Galilee
He spoke to me in the voice so sweet
I thought I heard the shuffle of the angel's feet
He called my name and my heart stood still
When he said, "John go do My will!"
(Johny Cash "God's gonna cut you down")

 

I'm not [you're friend] MMM.

Tho the baggage you carry from your upbringing seems to be clouding your judgement; you're bordering on paranoia Crewdog, I'm jackzokay. And I'm from Ireland.

But I digress; let me state it clearly, AGAIN!
I have a negative 'thing' with any group or organisation that kills people.

One more time: I have a 'negative thing' with people killing people.

Many people on the site appear to agree with the most basic premise: the right to life.

Except - EXCEPT - when it doesn't match-in with their specific ideology.
The ethos seems to be, 'thou shalt not kill'. And the group-think response is:
"Yay, yay, we here all agree....god bless all here...wait!...hold on a sec...does that apply to the Jews too?....course not....don't be silly...they're okay to kill...and maim....really?....yay...,in that case...'I stand with Israel too'....yay....me...too".

Does the above sound silly???

This is precisely how silly your logic regarding the Jews and their right to kill sounds to me!

...now, who was it that said 'love thy enemy'. Ha!! What does he know!
Am I right?
Kill em all boys. Kill em all!!!

PS. I don't support the Palestinians (or any other groups right to kill either! So please PLEASE don't hit me with Israels 'right to defend itself! Or this group did that or that group did this).

Violence begets violence people!

Killing is wrong. And, frankly, I'm a little surprised that Padraig hasn't questioned Charlie on this particular issue, how can this be?

Though let's be clear, I'm not attacking Charlie. I enjoy his writing and insight.
Sometimes he gets it right and sometimes he must discern.
For me however there isn't that much discernment needed regarding murder (under whatever guise it happens to appear). To this end I urge Charlie to seek guidance from his angels, or his priests or even his conscience.
I have a feeling interpreting their answers won't be too difficult.

Group think isn't for me. I must also tell it true.

Peace, and Gods blessings..

 

I try to avoid politics. Once you get started on politics you would never get finished. I suppose whenever we get to heaven we wil lfind some folks up there who supported Israel and some folks who were very much against it. Perhaps even God must get confused about all the arguments on both sides..

I really want to concentrate on mystical , spiritual isues and related content. There are few enough places purely spiritual, it would be a ptiy to get sidetyracked on politics, also politics by itsw very nature tends to be devisive. We have enough divsions to do us.

 

I have nothing against Charlie either. In fact as I mentioned several times, I enjoyed his writing.

I have no political allegiance. I detest politics. And i wholeheartedly echo your sentiments on 9/11. I cannot overstate this enough.
Violence as we know begets violence. And as you rightly say, it's the ordinary people that die and suffer.

People laugh when I say this: but I genuinely think it's a con of the devil, that he convinces us to take sides in justifying murder.

My issue is that I regularly looked-for and sought out Charlie's writings. As I do with mark mallet. And I try to live their excellent moral and peaceful advice in my daily life.

Then I stumbled across Charlie's avatar rather by accident; and was shocked as it seemed to me to endorse violence....and here was I taking advice from this holy-man regularly, seeking counsel through his writings.

All violence is wrong. I don't have answers to big problems but it seems people are keen to prove that they are loyal to their particular cause; by killing another human being. This is wrong weather you be a terrorist or politician.

Killing is wrong no matter who pulls the trigger. There can't and shouldn't be justification for it.
I have stopped visiting Charlie's site now.

Jack

 

I understand that stance Padraig.

I don't feel however that this is a political issue. If it were political I wouldn't have got involved. I detest politics.

For me, this is a holy-man apparently supporting a nations right to kill and maim. As I posted to Carol55 just now, I think my disappointment comes from the fact that I have been eagerly seeking out Charlie's writings this last year or so....much like I do mark mallets writing. And then trying to live their excellent advice. So to stumble across Charlie's choice of avatar was a little shocking to say the least.
I was shocked and annoyed and disappointed, and all that.....

But I respect the ethos of your forum. And you're right, there are few places for truly spiritual discussion. It is my nature to challenge tho, but also to be respectful.

God bless you Padraig. There's a 7:30 evening mass in the cathedral in Derry, these days.
It's a great mass if you happen to enjoy hiking in donegal on a fresh Sunday morning....give me a shout sometime. I'd enjoy the company.

 

I have to agree with Harper, I don't think that the man meant 'wicked' in any negative sense.
It's just language; ever been to London? 'Wicked' is slang for 'cool' ....that type of thing is the meaning...

 

Do you deny the 'Just War' doctrine of the Catholic Church?

Do you assert that it is always wrong to 'pull the trigger'?

Was Lepanto wrong? Vienna?

'Killing is wrong'. Not always. More precisely, murder is. To stand idly by, while having the ability to intervene, when someone is being violently attacked, when one could save the victim, even if it involved killing the perpetrator, would not be considered the correct moral response by the Catholic Church.

This is not a matter of politics. It is a question of meticulously elaborated moral theology over many centuries. It is part of the Magisterium.

Our Lady of Victory, pray for us.

 

St. Hippolytus (170-235 AD) was an interesting character. Trying to find out more about him, I was struck by some similarities between the Church in his time and the present time. (Hippolytus wasn't always on the best of terms with the Bishop of Rome.) He believed that the AC would come from the tribe of Dan, would restore the kingdom of the Jews and rebuild "the stone temple". Interesting stuff. Here's a link to his discourse: http://www.newadvent.org/fathers/0504.htm

The fate of the Jews/Israel is so important to the end times yet it is very hard to figure out how today's state of Israel fits into the puzzle. People tend to write off unjust killings by the Israelis because of God's promise to the Jews while at the same time ignoring the Jews' failure to hold up their end of the covenant. That's not to say that we have any right to tell the Jews that they lost their claim to the promised land because that's God's call. Nevertheless, as a sovereign State subject to international law, they don't have the right to extend their boundaries or use excessive force in response to attacks on them. With so much spin and falsehood from both sides of the Palestinian issue it's a mess that I fear only God can resolve. Truth is always the first casualty of war, and innocent civilians always comprise the majority of victims.

Paragraph 48 of the discourse has me reflecting on my own attitude to the current refugee/immigration situation.