Still Running Off at the Keyboard

TODAY'S HOMILY

Tonight our visiting priest decided to talk about the scandal, and made it clear that he believes we must realize that we all sin and must be forgiven. He focused on the "do not judge" argument as though he thought we had probably not heard it before, and he was giving us the mind of the Church on the scandal for the first time. He told us we must have patience.

It was a good thing that neither Father nor anyone else could read my thoughts. I did manage to stick around for the rest of the Mass, but probably committed at least a venial sin by receiving in such a state of mind.

I'm still waiting for the homily that says "I am horrified to see what my brother priests have done and what our bishops have allowed them to do. It was wrong. It was wrong not to address the concerns of the abused and their families when it happened. It was wrong to sic the lawyers on them as though the victims were the perpetrators. It was wrong to keep them in the ministry where further abuse was possible. It was wrong to inflict them on new parishes with no warning. The ordained have much for which to atone. May God forgive the priests and bishops who have served Him so badly."

If Cardinal Ratzinger could have the courage to say it, those of lesser stature should be able to find it as well.

I have no more patience. I have no more tolerance for incompetence. I have no inclination to forgive until some action is taken by our bishops to indicate real repentence rather than a bunch of cheap pious words and business as usual. I think the time for talk is over and the time for actions is way overdue. Don't talk to me about forgiveness if you want to retain your credibility. I have come to the point of suspecting that those who do preach forgiveness are part of the problem.

When I can rest assured that there are not going to be any more nasty headlines about nasty activities...when I can sense holiness in American bishops...when I can see that once again Christ is held on high, Wiccan ceremonies have been stamped heretical, and Catholic colleges teach Catholicism, then I will entertain forgiveness. Not until.

Finding the 2005 EarthSpirit Rising Conference online sets back the cause for forgiveness another year. Finding Equinox and Solstice ceremonies and a Course in Miracles in a retreat center in my own diocese is disgusting. Clean up your act, Bishops, or accept that you have lost the laity's respect permanently. And until the Bishops get their houses in order, the priests who don't wish to take Cardinal Ratzinger's approach would do well to remain silent.

Lord have mercy!

I HAVEN'T BEEN KEEPING UP

Apparently while I've been elsewhere involved, there has been a flap over evolution.

Michael Rose has posted this story about a scientist at Case requesting a clarification or Archbishop Schonborn statement. Interesting last paragraph to the story:

In his essay, Schönborn, the archbishop of Vienna, said that the theory of evolution, as it is understood by scientists today, is not true.

Apparently he didn't mince words!

Tough spot, B16! I'm glad I don't have to answer that letter!!

Rose has also linked Terry Mattingly's background article on the flap.

JACOB FRANK

The Awareness Center, a Jewish Coalition Against Sexual Abuse/Assault, offers this description of Jacob Frank:

From among these secret circles of the Shabbethaians came the founder of the Frankist sect, Jacob Frank, born in Podolia about 1726. His father was expelled from the community for belonging to the secret society of hebiists, and moved to Wallachia, where the influence of the Turkish Shabbethaians was strongly felt. While still a boy at school Frank displayed an aversion to Jewish learning founded on the Talmud, and afterward often styled himself "a plain man" or "an untutored man." In the capacity of a traveling merchant he often entered Turkey; there he was named "Frank," a name generally given in the East to a European; and there he lived in the centers of contemporary Shabbethaianism—Salonica and Smyrna.

THE OCCULT UNDERGROUND by James Webb also documents the continuation of Sabbatianism in Poland through Jacob Frank:

During the 17th and 18th centuries, Central European Jewry generally, and Polish Jewry in particular, underwent a series of convulsions. The first concerned the doctrine of the self-proclaimed Messiah, Sabbatai Zevi (1625-75), whose followers preached a new interpretation of the Cabala for a coming new age. One of the most important strongholds of Sabbatianism was Lithuania; one of the most active Sabbatian preachers flourished in Wilno itself. Now, the crucial importance of Sabbatianism is that its Messiah apostasized--became in fact a convert to Islam. There then arose a powerful school of thought which justified apostasy on the grounds that, although the essential purity of the true Cabala could not be harmed, the appearances must be spat upon; and that apostasy was therefore a virtue. This idea of what Professor Scholem calls "the holiness of sin" is a variation on the theories we have observed in some sorts of Gnostic: that the world and its appearances can and indeed must be treated with complete disregard, that the adept is free to do anything he chooses. Twice large groups of Sabbatians apostasized from the Jewish faith in the belief that to do so was the only way to salvation. The second time this organized desertion occurred was in 1759 in the East Galician district of Poland when the Sabbatian prophet, Jacob Frank, led his followers in a body into the Catholic Church. There thus existed a "fifth column" within the ranks of Polish Catholicism, whose mystical object in joining the Catholic Church had been largely to demean themselves in the eyes of the world and whose interior spiritual traditions were wholly other--Jewish, Cabalistic, and in all things Traditional.

Before the death of Jacob Frank in 1791 there had appeared in the areas of Russia and Poland where Sabbatianism was strongest yet another Jewish revivalist movement known as Hassidism. Its founder, the mystic Israel Baal Shem, was responsible for placing the emphasis on an interpretation of the popular elements in the Cabala in an attempt to make of Jewish Tradition a mass movement. In this his followers were largely successful; and during the great age of Hasidism (1760-1810) the new popular Cabalism registered substantial successes even in the face of the strictly orthodox Judaism of the Lithuanian Rabbis. Thus, in addition to the presence of large numbers of converted Frankists, Polish mysticism was augmented by a popular Cabalistic revival, which may well have rendered the often abstruse doctrines of the Jewish mystical philosophers more intelligible to a Gentile. Judaeo-Christian sects sprang up throughout Poland and Russia, with rituals based on esoteric doctrine--and, most significantly, worshipping a Napoleon-Messiah. There can be no doubt that this turn in the affairs of Polish Jewry was to a large extend responsible for the theories of Polish Messianism. (Webb, p. 252-253)

The Jewish Encyclopedia takes note of the Messianic thinking as well:

Messianism at the end of the seventeenth century assumed a mystical coloring, and the open popular movement was transformed into a secret sectarian cult. A half-Jewish, half-Mohammedan sect of Shabbethaians was established in Turkey. In Poland, and particularly in Podolia and Galicia, there were formed numerous secret societies of Shabbethaians known among the people as "Shabbethai Hebiists," or "Shebs" (according to the Western pronounciation of "Shabbethai"). In expectation of the great Messianic revolution the members of these societies threw off the burden of strict Jewish dogma and discarded many relgious laws and customs. The mystical cult of the Shebs included the element of both asceticism and sensuality: some did penance for their sins, subjected themselves to self-inflicted torture, and "mourned for Zion"; others disregarded the strict rules of chastity characteristic of Judaism, and at times gave themselves over to licentiousness. The Polish rabbis attempted the extermination of the "Shabbethaian heresy" in the assembly of Lemberg (1722) and elsewhere, but could not fully succeed, as it was kept alive mostly in secret circles which had something akin to a Masonic organization.

Two thoughts occur. Was this "self-inflicted torture" akin to what takes place in the inner circle of Opus Dei? Was this the source of the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn, an organization which today lists among its linked organizations the Neo-Sabbatianism of Donmeh-West?

The Jewish Virtual Library notes the revolutionary spirit inspired by Frankism.

Accompanied by his daughter, Frank repeatedly traveled to Vienna, and succeeded in gaining the favor of the court. The pious Maria Theresa regarded him as a disseminator of Christianity among the Jews, and it is even said that Joseph II was favorably inclined to the young Eve Frank. Ultimately the sectarian plans of Frank were found out here also; he was obliged to leave Austria, and moved with his daughter and his suite to Offenbach, a small German town. Here he assumed the title of "Baron of Offenback," and lived as a wealthy nobleman, receiving money from his Polish and Moravian adherents, who made frequent pilgrimages to Offenbach. On the death of Frank (1791) Eve became the "holy mistress" and the leader of the sect. As time went on the number of pilgrims and the supply of money constantly diminished, while Eve continued to live in her accustomed luxury. She finally became involved in debt, and died neglected in 1816. Frankist agents acted in times of French Revolution, like Moses Dobruchka who entered the Jacobines as Janius Frey and ascended to the top of Freemasonry. Many of the Frankist saw Napoleon Bonaparte as a potential Messiah.

The Frankists scattered in Poland and Bohemia were gradually transformed from feigned to real Catholics. Their descendants merged into the surrounding Christian population. The sect disappeared without leaving any traces in Judaism, they become (sic) the source of Polish gentry of Jewish origins.

Question...Did the sect leave any traces in Catholicism?

William H. Kennedy, in an excerpt from LUCIFER'S LODGE: SATANIC RITUAL ABUSE IN THE CATHOLIC CHURCH, titled "Messiahs in the Stream" cites the emergence of Jacob Frank:

The next Messiah to emerge was Jacob Frank (1726-91). Frank hoodwinked the Hapsburg Emperor and Empress into believing that he was God and that sex magic was the real gospel of Jesus Christ. Some 40 years after Frank's death Mormon founder Joseph Smith began espousing similar ideas in the United States.

The religion of Sabbatai Zevi is still being practiced today according to E. Michael Jones. In an article in CULTURE WARS magazine, May, 2003, titled "Rabbi Dresner's Dilemma: Torah v. Ethnos", a review of Dresner's book CAN FAMILIES SURVIVE IN PAGAN AMERICA? Among several references to Sabbatianism, he quotes Luke Ford who ran a website devoted to the discussion of pornography in Hollywood:

Luke Ford makes a similar point in his discussion of Jewish involvement in pornography. 'Why does porn attract so many non-Jewish [i.e., Sabbatian] Jews?' Because 'even when Jews live in a society that welcomes them instead of harassing them, many Jews hate the majority culture.' Pornography is a way of weakening the majority culture by moral subversion.

He makes a Jewish/Catholic connection with regard to Poland as well with this statement:

Even when Catholics are involved [in pornography], they are generally involved on Jewish terms. According to one industry insider, 'the leading male performers through the 1980s came from secular Jewish upbringings and the females from Roman Catholic day schools' The standard porn scenario became as a result a Polish Jewish fantasy, the horny Jew schtupping the Catholic shiksa....Pornography becomes a way of defiling Christian women...is another way of defiling Christianity and all that it stands for.

Quoting Al Goldstein, publisher of SCREW, he writes: "'The only reason that Jews are in pornography', Goldstein responded, 'is that we think that Christ sucks. Catholicism sucks. We don't believe in authoritarianism.'"

If that isn't Sabbatianism attempting to defile, it is the same philosophy of "holy sin" that Sabbatianism subscribed to.

Jones also speaks of "Shabbetai Zevi's ecstatic sexual messianism." He cites "latent messianic passions that pointed to a new era of fraternal 'universalism' of belief for mankind," and also indicates that Freud was a follower of the Jewish false Messiah Shabbetai Zevi.

JACOB FRANK AND THE FRANKIST HEBREW ZOHARIC LETTERS

at the Donmeh-West website.

SADLY IT NO LONGER SHOCKS

Catholic university activities

That's pretty much what I've come to expect.

MORE CLEVELAND "CATHOLICISM"

The Ursuline Sophia Center announces its program schedule.

First event on the list:

COME CELEBRATE THE EQUINOX AND SOLSTICE

Most traditional peoples consider these sacred and hopeful times of the year by. They are celebrated by meditation, chant, and drumming. Many spiritual paths mark these spiritual times as moments that foster new life, creativity, healing, beauty, and letting go of what's no longer needed and embracing true values. All persons of good will are welcome!
Presenters: Jan Hauenstein, energy healer; Neal Szpatura, shaman; Marilyn del Torto, energy healer; Judi Bar, intuitive healer; Sarah Weiss, medical intuitive. :
Cost: $20 (ALL PROCEEDS SUPPORT THE SOPHIA CENTER IN ITS MISSION TO PROVIDE SACRED SPACE AND PROGRAMS TO FOSTER HEALTH IN BODY, MIND, HEART AND SPIRIT)
Date/Time: SPRING EQUINOX ON March 21, 2005 and SOLSTICE ON June 21, 2005

Last event on the list:

Gifts From A Course in Miracles

The spirituality of a Course in Miracles is universal in nature, answering the deepest questions of human existence. In this introductory overview of the main ideas, we hope to experience its wisdom and love by reflecting on excerpts from the book, Gifts from a Course in Miracles. Each presentation is followed by a meditation and discussion.
Presenter: Mariella Marck, SFCC, MS Rel Ed, MA psych:
Cost: $35, plus book
Date/Time: Wed., April 13, 20, 27, 2005 (10:30 am - 12 noon)

Forays into heresy are welcome at this retreat center.

Our bishop remains silent. Does his silence signify approval?

I am amazed that you are so quickly forsaking the one who called you by [the] grace [of Christ] for a different gospel (not that there is another). But there are some who are disturbing you and wish to pervert the gospel of Christ. But even if we or an angel from heaven should preach [to you] a gospel other than the one that we preached to you, let that one be accursed! As we have said before and now I say again, if anyone preaches to you a gospel other than the one that you received, let that one be accursed! (Gal 1:6-9)

Or as Cardinal Gagnon put it, as quoted by Jason Berry in LEAD US NOT INTO TEMPTATION: "The church is in schism. American bishops will not obey the Holy Father where he has sought to intervene." (p. 338)

Blogger credit to Novus Ordo Watch.

Our Lady of Fatima, pray for us!

LEVADA

A reader sent in this link to a story about the latest allegations concerning the former Archbishop of San Francisco who is headed to Rome next month.

There was conversation on the topic at Bettnet and at Open Book yesterday if you're interested.

NATHAN OF GAZA

It was a visionary that ushered Sabbati Zevi into fame. According to Eli Goldman, In 1663, the rabbis of Jerusalem sent Shabbetai Zvi to Egypt on communal business. There he studied with the great and famous rabbis of Kabbala. He was accepted into the most distinguished circles and accepted as a true Torah scholar and mystic.

At this time, in Gaza, a man by the name of Nathan lived. Nathan was the son of a distinguished rabbinical family from Jerusalem. Nathan was a well known and respected scholar who studied mysticism. Nathan possessed the secrets of the Kabbala and used it to bequeath blessings on those who came to him. His name soon traveled far and wide and many seeking divine intervention in their problematic lives, sought him out. Because of his lofty status and ability to invoke divine intervention to help others, Nathan declared himself to be a prophet.

Shabbetai Zvi, hearing of the miracle man of Gaza, decided to visit him in hope of procuring a relief for his bouts of melancholy and feeling that he was the messiah. As he set out upon his journey, Nathan of Gaza had a dream that the messiah came and appeared to him. When Shabbetai Zvi came to speak with Nathan, Nathan recognized Shabbetai Zvi as the messiah from his dreams. Instead of curing Shabbetai Zvi from his delusions of being the messiah, Nathan convinced Shabbetai Zvi that he was indeed the true messiah.

The two discussed the matter in the deepest Kabbalistic terms. Nathan explained to Shabbetai Zvi that he had come to bring the world to its perfection. He explained to Shabbetai Zvi the lofty status of his soul and its mission here on earth. Nathan of Gaza announced to the world that the true messiah had arrived. Shabbetai Zvi himself was transferred into a state of elated illumination, becoming certain of his true self and mission to the world.

In 1665, he proclaimed himself the messiah. Gaza, was in euphoria. Nathan the prophet, who was highly respected, independently confirmed Shabbetai Zvi's proclamation. The local population accepted the declaration and even the local rabbis, who spoke with Shabbetai Zvi, were convinced that he, indeed, was the messiah.

According to the article he began changing Jewish law. He "introduced a special blessing to thank G-d for permitting that which was forbidden," specifically to eat certain fats. He announced the ingathering of the ten lost tribes of Israel. In Greece and Turkey he "introduced new practices into the accepted religious life and declared that the fast days commemorating the Temple were abolished. Festive meals should be eaten instead."

Not only were these acts antinomian, they also are reminiscent of some of the changes that have been made to the Roman Catholic Mass, specifically going from the theology of sacrifice to the theology of community celebration.

A "frenzied messianic fever" developed around Zevi. He had support not only in the Jewish community, but also among the Muslim mystics. And he left a legacy. The article closes with a report of "The repercussions of the Shabbatai Zvi incident [which] precipitated the antagonism that erupted some fifty years later as the Chassidic movement began to spread its influence in Europe. The early Chassidim were strongly suspected of being another surfacing of the same Sabatean mysticism that caused much apostasy."

In a book review of POST SABBATIAN SABBATIANISM, by Rav Kook, Bezalel Naor writes:

...the entire phenomenon of Messianism is painted in distinctly antinomian tones. Whereas Torah requires an attitude of shamefacedness and humility, Messiah thrives paradoxically on shamelessness, chutzpah. And Rav Kook is quite explicit as to what the chutzpah consists of: Sexuality, fleshliness, and forsaking Torah. As alarming as all this is, it is well within kabbalistic tradition that again, predates Shabbetai Zevi. One may find in MaHaRaL of Prague and SheLaH, and needless to say, in Zohar, similar expressions of the extralegal origins of Messiah, conceived from the less than immaculate unions of Lot and his daughters, Jacob and Tamar, Boaz and Ruth the Moabitess, David and Bathsheba, and Solomon and Na'amah the Amonitess.

Moshe Idel asks "What prompted Jewish messianic zeal in the 16th and 17th centuries?" and suggests one cause might be the "diffusion of kabbalist literature which was permeated with calculations for the End of Days. He recounts the birth of Frankism:

In 18th-century Europe, a last burst of Shabbateanism occurred with the appearance of Jacob Frank, a former disciple of Shabbetai Zevi who came under the influence of radical Shabbatean trends in the Balkans. Frank declared himself to be an incarnation of divinity and the successor of the Messiah from Smyrna. Frankism advocated outward adherence to Catholicism while secretly believing in a nihilistic version of heretical Judaism. Spreading from Poland to central Europe, the influence of the Frankists persisted well into the nineteenth century.

He suggests that another factor might have been "a great wave of millenarianism in Europe."

A seer cannot invent doctrine out of visionary events. Doctrine is the lifepreserver of the mystic. He should cling to it. A mystic who does not cling to doctrine can easily be led astray as Nathan of Gaze and Sabbatai Zevi demonstrate with their doctrine of "holy sin." Yet antinomianism has plagued Christianity down through the centuries and led to several heresies.

Revelation is closed with the ascension of Christ. New doctrine emerging out of visionary experience has no place in tradition based faith. For a Catholic, CCC 65 explains it:

God has said everything in his Word - "In many various ways God spoke of old to our fathers by the prophets, but in these last days he has spoken to us by a Son." Christ, the Son of God made man, is the Father's one, perfect, and unsurpassable Word. In him he has said everything; there will be no other word than this one. St. John of the Cross, among others, commented strikingly on Hebrews 1:1-2: "In giving us his Son, his only Word (for he possesses no other), he spoke everything to us at once in this sole Word - and he has no more to say...because what he spoke before to the prophets in parts, he has now spoken all at once by giving us the All Who is His Son. Any person questioning God or desiring some vision or revelation would be guilty not only of foolish behavior but also of offending him, by not fixing his eyes entirely upon Christ and by living with the desire for some other novelty.

Abraham Elqayam, in his doctoral thesis titled "The Mystery of Faith in the Writings of Nathan of Gaza" tells us:

The Sabbatian movement was a movement for spiritual redemption and religious renewal, whose principal aim was to deliver religion from its petrification and its errors, and revive religion, faith and the true Godhead. Sabbatianism is thus one of many such trends that sought to remedy the crisis of faith which beset Jews in the late 17th century. The central role of faith in Sabbatian ideology stemmed both from the crisis of faith experienced by Sabbatai Sevi himself, and the rise of scepticism and crisis of faith endured by the Jews in the 17th century.

The present study shows that Nathan of Gaza strove to set up a Sabbataiocentric experience of redemption; i.e., a redeeming religious experience centered on a concrete messiah Sabbatai Sevi. Sabbatai Sevi was thus not an abstract notion, but in his person, embodied both the foundation and the ultimate end of the redeeming religious experience. Therefore it can maintained, (sic) that Nathan of Gaza's most prominent contribution lay in shaping a fideist, heterodox prototype of "The Man of Faith", whose religious experience revolves around the sacramental belief in a fleshandblood messiah, Sabbatai Sevi.

Catholics, it could be pointed out, have such a flesh and blood Messiah in Jesus Christ. If this explanation of the popularity of Zevi is accurate, it demonstrates the potential for corruption in doctrine brought on by the rejection of Christ.

Did a similar crisis of the Catholic faith, stemming from guilt for centuries of ghettoizing the Jews combined with guilt for the complicity of German Catholics in the Nazi atrocities, arise out of the Holocaust, opening the door to "renewal" in the Catholic Church that has permitted an incursion of visionary phenomena not unlike those of Zevi/Nathan? Did the same pathway Zevi followed into moral corruption lead some of our priests into the sexual abuse crisis?

ALEXANDER SWIFT EAGLE JUSTICE

A reader sent in this website where you can see a Member of the Imperial Holy Orthodox Synod of the Holy Orthodox Church of All Russia, and of the International Theological University, in Pasedena. Where you can get your Ph.D. and see His Emminence in a variety of vestments and a big smile.

He is also Metropolitan/Archbishop of the Archdiocese of Native Americans and President of the College of Bishops of the Mexican National Catholic Church; and Metropolitan/Archbishop of the Holy Orthodox Native American Catholic Archdiocese and Chief Patriarch of the Holy Synod of Bishops of the Holy Orthodox Native American Catholic Church (AKA - Keepers of Creation Church).

He has more titles there on his website. This guy has more entries in his bio than most bishops. There are even some Catholic churches on his list.

He's a member of the Knights of Malta too. I guess his calendar is really full.

TAKE A MOMENT TO READ

this WorldNet Daily story on prayer that cleaned up a drug lord's city which was linked in a comments box way down there. Almost sounds too good to be true!

SABBATIANISM

Earlier this week in connection with the Mystery School, the last website I linked in that blog was Donmeh West.

If you looked at that website, you noticed that not only are Sabbatai Zevi, Nathan of Gaza, and Jocob (Yakov Leib) Frank pictured, but also Sri Ramakrishna and Carl Gustav Jung as well. The website spells out the ideaology of the organization:

Donmeh West does not seek to convert Jews to other religions -- or, for that matter, to convert members of other religions to Judaism. It is, instead, a non-sectarian interfaith movement, growing out of the ancient teachings of Esoteric Judaism as radicalized and extended to the non-Jewish world in the 17th century by Sabbatai Zevi, and continued thereafter in a chain of successors now culminating, in the West, with Reb Yakov Leib HaKohain. Like Sabbatai Zevi and then Jacob Frank, Reb Yakov Leib HaKohain "entered" other realms of faith (i.e., Hinduism, Islam and Christianity) not to become a practicing Hindu, Muslim or Christian but, by doing so, to retrieve the Holy Sparks from those great religions and reunite them in his own person with those of Israel, in order to "repair the Face of God". He neither believes nor advocates that other Jews should do the same. Again, like Sabbatai Zevi before him, his multiple religious "conversions" were a sacrificial action performed by him on behalf of others in order to restore the unity of God.

Neo-Sabbatianism is interreligious/ecumenical--can make itself at home, at least temporarily, in any faith.

This branch of Judaism practices "Holy Sin" as Reb HaKohain explains:

The "Holy Sinner" -- he who sins, who lives beyond conventional morality, yet carries in himself the grace of God for others to receive -- is he on whom there rests the "Mark of Cain" -- the Holy Spirit -- bestowed on him by God for reasons only He alone can know. This "Mark of Cain," this indwelling of the Holy Spirit, is neither punishment nor rebuke, as commonly (and mistakenly) believed, but a protection of the Holy Sinner placed there by God "to prevent whoever might come across him from striking him down."

Reb HaKohain says that "we are told, 'Be still and know that I am God'", and indicates that in meditation we "observe our thoughts."

Meditation is the theology on which interreligious dialogue is basing a kind of syncretistic "unity." This is expressed well in the book PATHS TO THE HEART. This "stillness" of meditation can encompass quite a lot of territory.

The same page in the Donmeh-west website shows a diagram of the Lurianic Kabbalah. You can see it here as well where it is explained. I found the phrase "unity of differences" particularly interesting given the "unity in diversity" that has been going around the RCC in interreligious dialogue circles. The website indicated the word "tikkun" means "restoration, or universal correction." How close is that to "renewal", I wonder?

As interreligious dialogue spreads throughout the west, what will be made of Sabbatianism, particularly as those in Catholic parishes who know relatively little about Judaism and mysticism take up the interreligious mantra?

Apparently it has begun to happen already. Reb Yakov Leib HaKohain's bio indicates he has published an article titled "To Die for the People: A Jewish Interpretation of the Crucifixion" in The Priest: A Journal of Catholic Theology. Is that journal Roman Catholic or Gnostic Catholic? I was not able to find it on the web. Reb HaKohain has also published in "The Catholic Critic" and "The Library Journal of the C. G. Jung Institute of San Francisco" and other places. An endorsement of Reb HaKohain by the Past-President of the C. G. Jung Institute of Los Angeles can be read at the website as well.

Think about it. We have a serious sexual abuse scandal in the American Church, and evidence that a Jewish minister who endorses "holy sin" has been published in a "Catholic" journal of theology.

The bio also indicates Reb HaKohain's Orthodox Jewish family are hereditary Levitical priests. Were they Frankists under cover?

You can read more about "The Influence of Sabbateanism" at The Sabbatean Movement website. Here you will learn that Sabbatai Sevi's "Holy Apostasy to Islam" was "perhaps the most significant in Jewish history, and certainly in the development of Jewish Kabbalah. Gershom Scholem's study SABBATAI SEVI: THE MYSTICAL MESSIAH is the source cited.

In "A Brief History of Jewish Sects" by Joseif Yaron you can read that "Shabbatai Tzvi" (there are several spellings of the name) "proclaimed himself the Messiah in the seventeenth century." His conversion to Islam was forced, but his "most ardent followers, those who comprise the Sabbatians today, followed him in his conversion and became Muslims. While they outwardly converted to Islam, the Sabbatians maintained a level of Jewish practice secretly." "Donme" is another name for them, and is "similar to the word Marrano used for Sephardic crypto-Jews." The webpage also indicates they practice "ritual incest and spouse swapping."

Ted Daniels, Ph.D. says of Zevi's best-known follower Jacob Frank that he "was a 'truly corrupt and degenerate' religious leader, 'one of the most frightening figures' in Jewish history, a courageous 'strongman' who led his followers 'into the abyss'.

At Dia-pozytyw: DICTIONARY you can read about another follower of Zevi named Baruchya Ruse, who "identified himself with Jesus-Paraclete, the final Savior" Frank wrote his teachings in Polish. He and Baruchya produced a sort of hybrid JudoCatholicism, using some Catholic terminology with a different meaning. Frank also believed he was the Messiah, the third after Zevi and Baruchya Ruso. While imprisoned in the Czestochowa fortress Ruso "regarded the painting of the Madonna of Czestochowa as being that 'portrait' in which Shechina (the feminine aspect of God) was trapped. Frank's task, according to Ruso was to "liberate Shechina from the Czestochowa painting of the Virgin Mary and [serve] Her as a 'vessel'..." Frank emphasized that "Poland was to become the promised messianic kingdom."

T. Allen Greenfield, Bishop of the Gnostic Catholic Church, a part of the Ordo Templi Orientis, discusses the Frankists in an article published in "Agape" in February, 1998 titled "The Frankist Ecstatics of the Eighteenth Century." He writes:

This was a sect known as the Zoharists or Frankists, after Jacob Frank (1726-91 EV), originally named Jacob Leibowicz. Like the Chassidim, the Zoharists were deeply steeped in Qabala and magick and ecstatic religious expression. Like the followers of Tzvi, they were also messianic. Unique to the Frankists was a doctrine of salvation through sexual ecstasy that had not characterized these other tendencies. Indeed, the Zoharists anticipated the sexual magick that emerged a century and more later under the influence of such luminaries as P.B. Randolph, Max Theon and, ultimately, Aleister Crowley. There is a bare chance, in fact, that the Zoharists may have influenced these later exponents of sexual spirituality.

He indicates that "Ribbinical Judaism denounced the Zoharists as heretics," but that "The Frankists enjoyed some protection in Roman Catholic circles, ever hopeful of making conversions among the Jews....But the Frankists continued to practice sexual orgiastic ecstasy as a spiritual sacrement, and soon ran afoul of the Holy Inquisition....Baron Jacob Frank found himself imprisoned by the Inquisitors in 1760 EV, at the fortress of Czestochowa" where he remained for 13 years and was then freed by the Russian conquest. Relocating to Germany, taking the Zoharist movement with him, his movement was instrumental in the founding of the Hellfire Clubs of England and France, of the Elect Cohens, and later the Martinists of France, and "other communities with similar ideas and practices of sacred sexuality."

Greenfield continues the story:

Be it noted that later in the 19th century another enigmatic Polish Jew, the son of Rabbi Judes Lion Bimstein of Warsaw, came to teach an almost identical sacred sexuality as the Grand Master of the Hermetic Brotherhood of Light. This man was one Louis Maximilian Bimstein, better known as Aia Aziz, and better still as Max Theon. Based in North Africa and France, Theon taught a "fully Tantric" approach to spirituality...

Donmeh is described here as "a Turkish word for a religious convert." The website lists several branches including Ismirli formed in what is now Turkey; Jakubi founded by a successor to Zevi; Othman Baba led by Berechia, who taught Jacob Frank; and Lechli "who are of Polish descent but lived in exile."

The estimate as of 2,000 is that there were 15,000-50,000 members of the Donmeh in the East.

The Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn includes the Donmeh in their Index.

ANOTHER PICTURE FROM THE MAILBOX

They say it's a Hindu temple. Personally I think they must have employed the services of Fr. Richard Vosko.

OAKLAND CATHEDRAL GROUNDBRAKING

A reader sends in the picture (top row center) of women sweeping something or other and asks "What are these women doing?"

Uhmmmmm...I have no idea!

Click the picture for an enlargement and the description indicates this is a Nigerian "ritual sweeping of the ground." Is there some sort of god involved with this ritual, one wonders? In California it doesn't work to take anything for granted.

Photo by way of Seattle Catholic.

VATICAN BANK SCANDAL

A reader sent in this interesting story on a lawsuit stemming from the scandal. E. Michael Jones book THE MEDJUGORJE DECEPTION covers this same evidence.

(Did someone say Ratlines?)

THE BEAST

A reader sent in a link to this picture of what purports to be a rejected drawing for the Cathedral of St. John the Divine. Anyone know if it's for real? It looks hungry. I wonder what they planned to feed it?

JOHN ALLEN'S COULUMN

deserves a read. Ecumenism with the Orthodox, homosexual ordination, and Ex Corde Ecclesiae are all covered.

His reading of the potential "get tough" policy of Benedict on homosexual ordination and on the mandatum appears to provide a lot of loopholes for non-compliance. Regarding the criteria listed for determining whether a university is still Catholic or not, they sound good, but I'd reverse the order. It seems to me that the most important criteria came in in last place.

THE ORDER OF THE BLESSED MOTHER

A Mystery School.

Actually, it's part of this Mystery School. Here you can find out from The Church of The Way how "the 'church' Yeshua personally founded is lost to history."

You will also find this webpage where you can learn about The Church of the Way which presents Dan Brown's DA VINCI CODE theory as fact. And you can read at the very end of the article next to the picture of A Merovingian Queen that "The word Desposyni ("relatives of the Lord") is found in writings of the early primitive Christian Church, indicating he had flesh and blood descendants and they were known."

If you read William H. Kennedy's book LUCIFER'S LODGE: SATANIC RITUAL ABUSE IN THE CATHOLIC CHURCH, you know about the Desposyni.

Kennedy wrote:

The Desposyni believed they were the body, blood, and spirit of Jesus Christ and that they had the right to marry, to have children, to run the Church, and pass on papal leadership to their offspring. This heresy may have been where Celsus received the notion that Jesus was a sex fiend. Most likely this belief was a Desposyni tenet, which they used to justify their own sexual practices.

[Malachi] Martin believed that they died out in the fourth century, but some may have survived and their congregations could have easily kept these sexual teachings alive in the Church by going underground. (p. 99)

The booklist for this Mystery School is interesting. Michael Baigent, editor of "Freemasonry Today" is there. Deepak Chopra is there. Margaret Starbird is as well, and Rosemary Radford Reuther. So is Robert A. Powell. He is the translator for MEDITATIONS ON THE TAROT, which means that Hans Urs von Balthasar is there by default. MEDITATIONS is a "required" textbook for this Mystery School. Ken Wilbur is there. A book by Raphael Patai titled THE HEBREW GODDESS is another required text, as is Margaret Starbird's THE FEMININE FACE OF CHRISTIANITY.

Someone else is there...Israel Regardie, author of the ritual book called GOLDEN DAWN. I've looked at this book...checked it out of the Kent State library...but didn't read it. It's a thick book and consists almost entirely of the rituals used in the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn.

Check out the link for "The Third Millenium Angelic Alliance", keeping in mind there are angels and then there are those other angels. Look at the first angel. He is wearing an Alpha-Omega symbol.

Under Divine Feminine there is a reference to Sophia and the explanation that "Mother Mary and Mary Magdalene take on roles of Goddesses" given at the link for Juedo-Christian Goddesses. There is a link for "Paul invented much of Christianity" and one for "Christo-Pagan Info."

The "Order of Melchizedek" link offers this explanation of the Melchizedek priesthood:

Merkabah is a Hebrew word meaning Chariot of Fire

This Order, a sub-Order under the Order of Melchizedek, follows the oldest system of mysticism in the Bible, older than even Kabbalah. It begins in the book of Ezekiel (Hebrew Bible / Old Testament) where Ezekiel's vision of the fiery chariot spawned the earliest Jewish mystical system. The "Riders" of the Merkabah/Chariot would ascend upward thru seven different "heavens." Special sacred pass words, hand signals, and Guardians marked each level.

This system has been carefully kept alive, and is coupled now with both Jewish and Christian Kabbalah and end-time prophecies. The Initiate is taken up and up, level by level to the Seventh Heaven. Here the divine Presence of YHVH, the four-in-one Deity, the Face is revealed to the climber.....

As in Masonic degrees, one wonders? Gershom Scholem writes about Merkabah mysticism in his book MAJOR TRENDS IN JEWISH MYSTICISM, indicating that it predates the Kabbalah. He indicates there are branches of the study of Kabbalah, including Lurianic Kabbalah which he calls "Gnostic" (p. 280) and Sabbatianism. He writes:

Sabbatai Zevi, the Kabbalistic ascetic and devotee, feels impelled, under the influence of his manic enthusiasm, to commit acts which run counter to religious law. A latent antinomianism is discernible in these acts..."(p. 291)

Here then [in the knowledge that Zevi was manic-depressive] we have a clear description of Sabbatai Zevi's state of mind. Of the temptations to which he was subjected in his fits of depression a great deal is said, especially in the writings of Nathan of Gaza, and we are told that they were of a demonic and erotic character. In brief, we have before us a man who felt himself pursued by demons during periods of melancholy depression which exposed him to a severe physical and mental strain, and who above all was the helpless victim of these forces. (p. 292-293)

Zevi's heretical Judaism promoted antinomian acts of a demonic and erotic character. Scholem indicates this was a "tremendous religious mass movement which spread like wild-fire through the entire Diaspora." (p. 288) and that "the holy spirit and a great 'illumination' had come over him." (p. 292) Scholem adds:

I regard it as important to follow the course of this movement, if only because the part which Sabbatianism played in the spiritual development of Jewry during the generations that followed, is generally underrated. Sabbatianism represents the first serious revolt in Judaism since the Middle Ages; it was the first case of mystical ideas leading directly to the disintegration of the orthodox Judaism of "the believers." Its heretical mysticism produced an outburst of more or less veiled nihilistic tendencies among some of its followers. Finally it encouraged a mood of religious anarchism on a mystical basis... (p. 299)

On the same page he refers to the "aversion of the orthodox against the antimonian tendencies in Sabbatianism...."

Scholem indicates that according to Sabbatianism:

We must all descend into the realm of evil in order to vanquish it from within. In varying theoretical guises the apostles of nihilism preached the doctrine of the existence of spheres in which the process of Tikkun [a form of self-salvation] can no longer be advanced by pious acts; Evil must be fought with evil....That in the religious nihilism of Sabbatianism, which during the eighteenth century proved so dangerous to the most precious possession of Judaism, its moral substance, both these elements had a share, cannot be proved better than by the tragic history of its last phase, the Frankist movement. (p. 315)

The Sabbatian/Frankist movement is still around.

Dan Brown, call your office...

Our Lady of Fatima, pray for us!

FROM TODAY'S BULLETIN AT MY CHURCH

"As you may be aware, the Associate of [a nearby parish] has been transferred to another assignment. This means that there will only be ONE assigned priest --- the Pastor. I'm sure their routines will be changing --- as the Diocese continues to face more and more ONE PRIEST parishes --- because the people of the Diocese do not see themselves as a part of the problem --- and therefore not part of the solution. Again, the AGE and HEALTH of the fewer priests is a factor that parishioners will have to come to terms with."

GOODBYE, GOOD MEN

THE CHANGING FACE OF THE PRIESTHOOD

AMCHURCH COMES OUT

VOWS OF SILENCE

"The Priest Shortage;: Natural Or Man-(And Woman-) Made?"

Unfortunately, for many Catholics a priest shortage continues at their local level. Many parish rectories are understaffed; in many dioceses there are few priests (who are terribly overworked). Thus, while the statistics indicate an increase, it still feels like a shortage to many practicing Catholics -- which raises the question: Is there or isn't there a famine of priestly vocations at this time? The answer depends largely on your geographical location. That is so largely because of the policies of local bishops. And so, if you are a Catholic in America today, where you live is perhaps the best predictor of vocational abundance or scarcity.

Dioceses headed by bishops with a reputation for robust orthodoxy now have full seminaries and an abundance of seminarians.

But it's all the laity's fault.

S...i.......g.........h..........!

Our Lady of Fatima, pray for us!