Fatima, the Pope's homily was so far from 'generalities'. He was trying to explain his whole approach to his role as head of the Church on earth. He has to follow the Holy Spirit (as do we all) and be ready to do that in ways which may surprise or even upset some. You are simply on a totally different 'wavelength' to Francis and are not understanding him in any way.
So this pope says there was no "multiplication of loaves and fish". What happened was a Cuba-style "sharing of loaves" where 5,000 people shared a few loaves and fish. Just like in Cuba where every family gets an egg a week. In other words, everybody went hungry but happy and the Gospel writers wrote a bunch of lies. Pathetic. Why would it be so hard for the Son of God to multiply loaves of bread? Or heal the sick - is that another symbol (for what? healing their hearts from capitalist greed?). And calming the storm - another symbol? Walking on water? If the gospel writers lied about the multiplication of loaves they might as well have lied about everything else. The ressurection - merely symbolic? What is also absolutely amazing is that hundereds of men and women also performed astounding miracles - and they were not the Son of God! The story of Christianity is full of accounts of bilocation, levitation, reading of souls, premonition, prophecy, stigmata, healings. So maybe this pope also thinks that their accounts are merely symbolic. Maria Esperanza would materialize roses that came out of her chest: http://spiritdaily.com/mariaesperanzarose2.htm Again, why would Our Lord have any trouble performing miracles that would be replicated by hundreds of saints and mystics in 2,000 years of church history! Modernism is indeed firmly established at the very top of the church of Christ!
This kind of thing exasperates me! Pope Francis in no way or sense stated or believed that the miracle of the loaves and fishes did not happen! If you are determined to speak badly about our Pope, please try to keep to the facts instead of making up your own version of what he says.
So, for those who think the Pope is okey dokey, a simple question. Why do I get a bad feeling when I hear and read what is going on? I get a "that doesn't sound/feel right" . In fairness, feelings are not always a good barometer as they often lie. But some of what this Pope says, words, does not sit right in my mind or my feelings. I do not want to go along to get along and go over a cliff into hell. I am not qualified to judge the Pope. I have stayed out of many discussion and read many posts, articles, actual words of the Pope, so I can try and learn. I really want to understand and stand with him. I don't dislike the Pope but I feel he is so confusing and so ambiguous that it is hard to rally behind him. I was always under the impression that chaos came from the devil and order came from God. And I see a lot of chaos around this Pope. I disagree that he is one of our best Popes but that is just an opinion and everyone is entitled to one. I have actually learned somethings from reading his homilies and they often seem quite beautiful and feel good. But what seems to be missing, in my unlearned opinion, is hard hitting words. Others have mentioned he speaks in generalities and not specifics. I prefer specifics. I prefer hard hitting truths as I want to grow in holiness and I want truth and not wishy washy squishy Jesus. But he is not only MY Pope and so he must speak to many. I pray for our Pope, our Bishops and all clergy and religious....daily. I also pray for discernment and clarity of things I hear and things I read. There is so much info out there and not all of it is good, in fact, most of it is not good. I want to be certain what is coming out of the Church hierarchy is something I can rely on and recently, I question the reliability. It is a hard place to be and often very frustrating. I have had more than one conversation with Jesus and how hard it is. Maybe, as I have said before on a post, I am not supposed to understand what is going on. Maybe I am only supposed to trust in Jesus and the 2000 years of teaching in the Church and live my Catholic Christian life. I will tell you, sometimes I feel helpless and I don't like feeling helpless.
A simple question with a simple answer. The devil's most powerful weapon in his armory is the whispering of negative thoughts into man's consciousness. The Holy Spirit will never provide such negative thoughts but the devil's thoughts are always negative.
Pope Francis made quite clear what he thinks of the multiplication. He thinks it is a Parable. 'The parable of the multiplication of the loaves and fish teaches us exactly this: that if there is the will, what we have never ends. On the contrary, it abounds and does not get wasted'
What the Pope said was, 'It isn’t magic, it’s a “sign”: a sign that calls for faith in God, provident Father, who does not let us go without “our daily bread”, if we know how to share it as brothers.' 'It isn't magic' I'm sorry but he is talking of miracles as, 'magic', here and he does not believe a miracle happened. This is a clear common sensed understanding of what the guy said. Clearly he believes that miracles are , 'Magic' and he does not believe in miracles/magic which he believes are one and the same. Give the guy credit. He knows what he is saying, he is quite clear. I understand him quite well too. I don't agree with him him. I am horrified by what he says. But I give him the credit of explaining his position quite well. Miracles are , 'Magic' ..and he does not believe in them. Fair enough. That's his opinion which he puts forward quite clearly I happen to be a Catholic and I do believe in miracles.That's what Catholics do ; they believe in miracles. Please move the argument forward from there. Give the guy some credit. He is saying what he is saying. Let's argue on on whether he is right or wrong in this, but the guy said what he said. Miracles are, 'Magic', please, be honest with yourself, in the Name of God and take it on from there.
I really shouldn't be getting involved with this but I really do get upset when Francis is misrepresented. Pope Francis certainly believes the multiplication of the loaves and fishes is a parable AS WELL AS a miracle. The question of what is the difference between magic and a miracle is a significant one. The best answer is to say that God performs miracles but the devil can perform magic. Both involve the supernatural but the source is very different. For those who have read the Poem of the Man god, they will recall how Judas was fascinated by magic and miracles. But he treated miracles like magic, disconnected from God's action. The Pope's point about God's miracles 'not being magic' is deliberate and well made.
it’s a “sign”: a sign that calls for faith in God, provident Father, who does not let us go without “our daily bread”, if we know how to share it as brothers.' "....if we know how to share it as brothers" - the key word here is 'if'. The miracle, or sign, is conditional on the people sharing as brothers. The Holy Father may believe that the loaves and fish were multiplied, I don't know, but here he is emphasising the 'miracle' of everyone sharing their lunch. There is a way of explaining this miracle in human terms; ie, that many people had brought a packed lunch with them, as the boy with the bread and fish had, but they kept schtum about it, not seeing how it would be possible to share with so many. The miracle happened when the sharing began. Or this was the true 'miracle', that people felt inclined to share. I am a bit of a biblical literalist, and believe that Jesus multiplied the few loaves and fish to feed the many. It's a Eucharistic miracle anyway in the way that the 'sharing' interpretation isn't.
Bultmann here is , 'Deconstructing' . the Traditional understanding of the miraculous. He is saying that the traditional understanding of , ''Miracle' , is a magical one. The Protestant/Lutheran Bultmann understands the miracle of the loaves and fishes like this (and Pope Francis concurs) the bread and fishes were not actually physically mutiplied but what they had they shared. This was the miracle. Hence Pope Francis speaks of , 'No magic' This understanding is not miraculous in any real sense. This is not the Traditional Mind of the Church. I , together with the Catholic Traditional understanding of the Mind of the Church is that the loaves and fishes were in fact physically multiplied. That it was a miracle. Not magic. Not a parable. A miracle. I wouldn't give a toss so much about this so much but this miracle is a type of the Institution of the Eucharist.
By the way my, 'Magical', understanding of this as a physical miracle was the understanding of my mother and father and of Catholics for two thousand years. I am not stupid , they were not stupid and I do not need a Protestant Lutheran like Bultmann or Pope Francis to tell me we are believing in , 'Magic', and to set us straight. The loaves and fishes were actually physically multiplied. A great miracle. ...and when, later, Jesus turned the bread into His Body, it actually changed into His Body. No magic .. no parable....a miracle that we witness every day at the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass.
I am sick to my heart at all this. Sick and angry. Who ever knew we would come to this? May God forgive them and turn His Holy Wrath from upon us all. But GOD IS NOT MOCKED. Galatians 6:7 Do not be deceived: God cannot be mocked. A man reaps what he sows.
Tanker, Don't worry. You don't have to have it all figured out. I think in this information age, with so much information floating around, we feel we need to have an opinion on everything. Part of this comes from living in a democracy where we are taught to have opinions on issues large and small. Many Catholics however lived throughout the centuries without knowing much more about the Pope than his name. Some may not have even know that. We live in an age when the transfer of information is almost instantaneous and so when the Pope sneezes, people 3 continents away know about it within minutes. In a sense this is not "normal". We are only the laity. The lowest level in the Church hierarchy. We are not called upon to judge every little thing the Pope says and does. If you feel overwhelmed then take a step back. We only need to do our job, which is to pray for the Pope and the clergy, work out our personal salvation, help others to get to Heaven, and follow the Magisterium. That's all
From what I understand of the Pope's beliefs regarding the afterlife they are that there is no eternal punishment for anyone (although he might have excluded arms manufacturers and mafia members from the blanket assurance, I sometimes get confused by what he says) and that the worst that anyone can expect is 'annihilation' - per his conversation with Scalfari. Now, once one excludes the possibility of eternal damnation for anyone (or almost everyone?) then one can stop worrying about converting people to the one, true faith and saving souls and almost any other spiritual work except perhaps trying to pretend that religious differences are unimportant so that everyone is at ease with his/her beliefs and spend most of your time worrying about saving everyone from poverty, unemployment and loneliness in this life. So, religious concerns are superseded to a large degree by the secular and time is spent pursuing political objectives to increase prosperity and well-being - And which parties have been promising these outcomes for the last century and more - the socialists and their slightly more committed kin, the communists (in spite of its historic and current abject failures to provide either). He should read Pope Leo's encyclical 'Rerum Novarum' which explains why socialism is a one way road to hell on earth (which was truly prophetic - ask anyone living in Venezuela). I have a friend who is a 'catholic' (but doesn't see the need to attend Mass except when he is 'moved' to do so - to do otherwise would be to be dishonest with oneself - so he tells me), he is also a very left wing socialist and lives in south America. He recently visited friends that he had made through the internet in Cuba which he has long regarded as the model for the under-developed world. He hasn't given me details but he now says that the Cuban police are a mafia worse than any other he has encountered in South America and that the country is a gangster state leeching of its citizens who live in fear. What a pity we can't get them all to visit Cuba and then to Venezuela perhaps.
Aren't we supposed to want everyone in heaven with us? If that is true, then even annihilation should be abhorrent to us. Not that I believe that is true anyway. Either way we should be spreading the faith in my opinion.
Yet, Pope Francis seems to like Fatima. I wonder what he thinks of the children's vision of hell, which they spoke of, wrote on and did rigorous penance so that one would end up there.
Yes, spreading the one true faith as it has been handed on since the time of Christ on earth is essential. What want don't want to be doing is giving anything less and that is what is happening today at the highest levels within the church.
My biggest concern, and I would assume that of God himself, is the misinformation that is taking place that is taking many souls in the wrong direction today. We are not saved by faith in lies, but faith in truth. Not partial truth! Jesus said, I am the Way, the Truth and the Life. Jesus is Truth and truth does not and cannot change, for scripture also attests, "I am the same yesterday, today and always". If one follows scripture, taught and defended by 2000 years of magisterial teachings within the Church you will be fine. Any thing less is not of God. God is so merciful, but no generation has had the truth so ever present at their finger tips as we do today. For this reason, our generation will be held much more culpable than any other time in history.
