I Wanna See You Be Brave!

OMM writes a heartfelt open letter to the Bishops of the US on the eve of their annual autumn meeting.

From One Mad Mom

Dear Bishops,

We’re about to head into the Fall meeting of the USCCB. Most of us are thinking “Oh, joy.” since it’s usually a train wreck in the mind of those who pay attention to it. Quite honestly, though, most pew sitters don’t even know it’s happening.

Last spring, however, some of us actually got a dose of hope in the form of the Eucharistic Coherence debate. For once, it seemed faithful bishops actually cared about the Real Presence, their flocks, the lives of the unborn and stood up for something. Not only was it something, it was the Source and Summit of our Faith.

For once, the less than 25% of liberal but loud bishops who care more about their elite status than their flock, got a dose of reality. Can you please make this the norm?! Without Eucharistic coherence, the Catholic Church in the U. S. will continue down its doomed path. If you don’t stand up for the Faith because you’re worried you will be rejected, flogged by the media, or removed from your post, what really is the point? You will have failed to protect the Eucharist and, with that, the faithful at large. That’s everyone from the mom and dad struggling to survive this world and who are trying their best to keep their kids’ faith intact, to the already corrupted Nancy Pelosis and Joe Bidens of the world who do not have long to atone. I get the whole “Well, I can’t do anything if I’m not here to do it!” thought, but the reality is “With God, all things are possible!” And they are far more possible when you are in the faithful majority. Some days, it’s like you’ve forgotten this. This is the Battle of Lepanto for the Church in the U.S., and you need to decide if you’re going to trust Our Lord and Our Lady to win the victory for the Church or not. Our entire history shows that faithfulness, not calculations, wins in the end. Our Savior and all but one of his apostles were killed for Truth and we still go on because of it, not despite it. Shouldn’t the Eucharist be your hill to die on?!

We all know that Cardinal Cupich and club are planning to try to win the PR war next week on everything from tanking Eucharistic Coherence, to mandatory vaccines, to a unilateral implementation of Traditionis Custodes. That supposed “collegiality” goes right out the window. Let’s not pretend. They’ve told us this, repeatedly. They’ll do their usual dog and pony show, complete with accusations that anyone that disagrees with them disagrees with the Holy Father, and the liberal mainstream media and, much worse, the liberal catholic media (small “c” intentional) will parrot the narrative like good little soldiers. Unless you band together like you did earlier this year, they will indeed win and, quite frankly, we will end up as the Church in Germany – no faith, lost souls, and empty pews. That is completely the intent and you know they all have their matching soundbites ready to go. Unless you come out with a loud, faithful cry that the only people trying to cause a rupture in the Church in the U.S. is the Cupich contingent, they will succeed. Unless you stand up against their fallacies, their fallacies will win the day. You saw what a little dose of truth did to reduce Cardinal Cupich and Bishop McElroy to puddles of stammering messes earlier this year. They could not comprehend that someone actually spoke the truth and they simply had no answer to it than to run off to Rome and whine and manipulate, but let’s remember, even Cardinal Ladaria couldn’t help them.

So, let’s go over this again. Cardinal Cupich doesn’t care about the Eucharist. He would give it to anyone and everyone who gives him status. The only one that uses the Eucharist as a “political football” is him and his ilk. You actually have Canon Law on your side. Don’t let them get away with their whataboutisms. If you can’t point out the difference between a private sinner approaching for Communion and Joe Biden (or even non-Catholic Lori Lightfoot), you may want to ask the Holy Spirit for a little help. You know it’s coming. Make some notes. BTW, the first bishop that uses the term “whataboutism” to dismiss the seamless garment rhetoric will receive “The Mother Angelica Call It Like It Is” award. If you actually believe in the Real Presence and want the rest of the people in your pews to believe it, ACT LIKE IT! A Eucharistic Revival will get nowhere if you can’t stand up for the Source and Summit of the Faith yourselves.  STAND UP FOR TRUTH!

How hungry is the laity for this? Well, as I was preparing to write, this tweet popped up in my feed from Bishop Strickland:

Bishop J. Strickland
@Bishopoftyler
Nov 7

The Catholic faithful are crying out for clear truth. Abortion is murder. Advocating for murder is sinful. Communion is the Body & Blood, Soul & Divinity of Jesus Christ, receiving Communion with no repentance or Confession of sin is itself sinful, no matter who you are. Truth!

THOUSANDS of likes in less than 24 hours. People will support you if you boldly speak the Truth.

Oh, and if vaccinations come up, can somebody remind Cardinal Cupich and the gang that the Vatican actually stated that they must be voluntary? It’s always amazing that “Cardinal I Will Apply Primacy of Conscience Incorrectly” tries to thwart the true application of it.

And, lastly, Traditionis Custodes… I’m going to put the “NOT EVEN A TRAD” alert here because we all know the drill. Trads are just a bunch of meanies who are set on rebelling against the Church. Blah, blah, blah. Sorry, there are a ton of people like me out here who will totally stand up for our traditionalist brethren against Cardinal Cupich’s tyrannical moves. You KNOW Cardinal Cupich wants to make this a thing. Of course he wants to because then he gets to tell you yet again how you don’t listen to Pope Francis. He’s not concerned about division. He’s all about creating that. That’s the reason for his article last week, for the meeting with his priests to discuss phasing out the Extraordinary Form, and the rumored institution of said phasing out set to drop before you all meet. It’s a big ol’ let’s change the focus from Eucharistic Coherence to “I’m the only one who is truly following Pope Francis” (even though anyone who read it knows the document left it up to the local bishops – collegiality and all). It’s a soundbite that he’s going to cling to because, let’s be honest, his last soundbites didn’t quite pass muster with the average person in the pew every Sunday. “Let’s throw the babies under the bus!” didn’t go so well. “Look over there at all those meanies!” is the best he has. Somebody should just ask him if this is really a priority when his flock is being abused due to his incompetence in, say, stopping the priests who came through Casa Jesus. 

Not only is he trying to extend as much rope to the traditionalists as possible, he’s also trying to divide you from them with it. You know manipulation is his game and he’s trying to get all of us tied up in his puppet strings. Never mind the fact that the Archdiocese of Chicago is failing. Never mind that they’re in such bad debt they’ve been downgraded by Moody’s. Never mind that parishioners are treated to form letters when abusing priests get caught. (Even I could not believe it when I noticed that! Too busy persecuting the faithful, Cardinal?) Never mind he’s threatening peoples’ livelihoods if they don’t comply with him.  Never mind he’s sidelined multiple good priests when we have a shortage. Never mind that the sacrilege of the Eucharist has occurred regularly in his archdiocese, multiple times with his direct involvement. He’s got nothing better to do than to persecute the traditionalists. It seems like he believes there’s nothing that should get higher importance than him scattering them. The Eucharist? The abuse victims? Having priests? Meh. 

Is it just me or when you are such an abysmal failure in running a diocese you might not want to start attacking the people who embrace the teachings of the Church and who are faithfully in the pews every week? Why is this a priority when most of the bishops have admitted there are far bigger things to worry about in the Church in the U.S.? Let me tell you why, in case you haven’t figured it out. He can’t tolerate any resistance to his failings. None. Zip. He’s going to lop off any heads he feels might inconvenience him: any priests that might teach the Truth, any employee who may have faithful leanings, any pew sitter that thinks we might just want to adhere to the teachings of the Church – traditionalists and non-traditionalists alike. And, he will definitely go after any bishop who dares point out that there is a Truth that supersedes Cardinal Cupich’s desire to hang with the elitists. Benjamin Franklin had it right when he said “We must, indeed, all hang together or, most assuredly, we shall all hang separately.”

So, please, dear bishops, help us out here. Hang together with Christ and with the Body of Christ. Don’t be like the apostles hiding in the upper room. Be like the apostles who received the Holy Spirit. DO NOT LET CARDINAL CUPICH (and his ilk) control the narrative. It’s not the Cupich Show. The Church isn’t his personal sandbox. Just say “No!” You are the vast majority. Remember that. The future of the Church in the U.S. depends on it. You want to keep your churches open, refill your pews, fill your seminaries? You had better act like the Real Presence is real and that evil is evil and fight the division Cardinal Cupich is trying to sow among us.

St. Catherine of Siena said it best when she said

We’ve had enough of exhortation to be silent!  Cry out with a hundred thousand tongues. I see that the world is rotten because of silence.  

I will also exhort you with the same exhortation as St. Catherine – “I beg of you, on behalf of Christ crucified, that you be not a timorous child but manly. Open your mouth and swallow down the bitter for the sweet.”

Prayers for you all!