The John-Henry Westen Show - July 02, 2019


Episode 16： Professor Roberto de Mattei explains the crisis in the Church - Part 2 of 2

Topics
crisis in Church
Hosted by
John-Henry Westen
Mentioned
Francisco Franco Roberto Di Mattei Fatima Angel Plinio Correa Boniface VIII Benedict XVI Antichrist Saxarubra Emeritus Lucifer DeMatte Luther Rita
Episode 15： Professor Roberto de Mattei explains the crisis in the Church - Part 1 of 2 Episode 17： 10 signs Pope Francis is moving towards women's ordination

Episode Stats


Length

22 minutes

Words per minute

95.01

Word count

2,173

Sentence count

105

Harmful content

Hate speech

3

sentences flagged


Summary

Summaries generated with gmurro/bart-large-finetuned-filtered-spotify-podcast-summ .

In this episode of the John Henry Weston Show, Professor Roberto Di Mattei, Emeritus at the University of Rome, talks about the need for a militant resistance to the silence of the church, and the role of a militant witness.

Transcript

Transcript generated with Whisper (turbo).
Hate speech classifications generated with facebook/roberta-hate-speech-dynabench-r4-target .
Topics generated with Qwen2.5-3B-Instruct.
Hosts, guests, and mentioned names generated with spaCy (en_core_web_sm), reconciled against Wikidata.
00:00:00.260 Hello and welcome to this edition of the John Henry Weston Show. We're very pleased to bring
00:00:04.960 you this part of a two-part interview with Professor Roberto Di Mattei. Described as
00:00:10.440 the greatest historian on the Catholic Church alive today, Professor Di Mattei is Professor
00:00:15.120 Emeritus at the University of Rome. He served as advisor for international affairs to the
00:00:19.540 Italian government. He cooperated with the Pontifical Council for Historical Sciences
00:00:24.140 and was awarded the Order of Knighthood of St. Gregory the Great by Pope Benedict XVI.
00:00:30.000 Between 2003 and 2011 he was Vice President of the Italian National Research Council.
00:00:35.880 He was also a member of the Board of Directors of the Italian Historical Institute for the
00:00:40.360 Modern and Contemporary Era, a Board of Directors of the Italian Geographical Institute, and
00:00:46.300 member of the Board of Guarantors of the Italian Academy at Columbia University in New York.
00:00:52.880 He is President of the Lepanto Foundation and directs the magazine Radici Cristiane and the
00:00:58.200 Correspondenza Romana News Agency. He has published countless articles and nearly 20 books, including
00:01:05.280 his latest, which has been recently translated into English, The Second Vatican Council, An Unwritten Story.
00:01:12.480 He considers himself a disciple of Professor Plinio Correa d'Olivera, the great founder of the TFP.
00:01:20.240 He, he and his wife Rita, have five children. Without further ado, our interview with Professor
00:01:27.280 de Matte. You're a great historian, you've studied church history probably better than most in the
00:01:35.260 world, and you're regarded as such, even in Italy as a historian, nationally so. But what kind of
00:01:43.320 reactions did Catholics in the past have when they had troublesome pontiffs, and how might
00:01:50.400 that be applied to today?
00:01:52.400 I think that it is important a respectful resistance, so not to be silent. There is time for silence,
00:02:05.400 but there is also time for speaking, and today we have to break the wall of silence of the church. We
00:02:19.120 have to be faithful to the tradition of the church, to all the popes, to all the magisterium of the church. We
00:02:32.000 have faith, we have a moral, we have a gospel, and so our duty is to remain faithful to the law, to the
00:02:45.840 philosophy of the gospel. And above all, what it is important in my view, it is to have a militant spirit, a militant
00:03:00.960 spirit means to refuse some temptation of a catacombism, what I define a catacombism, to escape,
00:03:15.840 to avoid the struggle. But on the contrary, we have to fight with pacific means,
00:03:27.280 fight with the prayer, with the word, with our witness, with our example, and above all, to wait for an
00:03:42.240 extraordinary help of the divine grace, because from a human point of view, the situation is desperate,
00:03:53.280 but there is the supernatural virtue of hope. You have spoken very well about this in your speech at the Roman life
00:04:06.080 forum. I think that today the virtue of hope is perhaps the more important for having hope. It is necessary to have
00:04:20.880 before the faith, because the faith, because the faith is the fundament of our hope. So,
00:04:28.880 faith, more hope, means confidence. We have to trust in this help of the heaven for all the faithful,
00:04:43.120 who in this so difficult situation, continue to be faithful, to fight, to witness the gospel.
00:04:53.920 One of the different witnesses that you gave, you were involved in organizing,
00:05:01.600 and others as well, the Asias Ordinata. Can you explain about that? What was it?
00:05:07.280 And, you know, what does it signify? The 19th of February of this year, before the meeting of the President
00:05:18.960 of the Bishops' Conference in Rome, we organized in the center of Rome, Piazza San Silvestro,
00:05:27.280 a militant meeting, I mean 100 laymen in the square for more than one hour, where they stand up in silence,
00:05:48.400 praying, praying, praying the rosary, and reading some religious, meaningful books,
00:06:00.240 for witnessing with their attitude a militant spirit, the idea to break with their silence,
00:06:14.880 the silence of the church, above all, at this moment, on pedophilia, but more than this, the
00:06:24.240 homosexuality diffused within the church, because it was scandalous to speak about pedophilia without
00:06:35.360 quoting, ignoring the drama of homosexuality in the church. This manifestation,
00:06:44.880 and had a very strong impact, it was a symbolic act. I am convinced that today,
00:06:56.160 it is very necessary, of course, to publish documents, write books, articles, I mean, a cultural presence,
00:07:05.200 but it is also important, a symbolic presence, addressed to God before the public opinion. And from this point of view,
00:07:23.440 we are organizing a next access ordinata, access ordinata means, it is a traditionally attribute of the Blessed Virgin,
00:07:38.560 the Virgin, it is an army ordered in a battle, so a next access ordinata for witnessing the presence of a
00:07:57.200 a resistance of many Catholics, of a worldwide resistance of Catholics. And I think that Rome, it is the best 0.53
00:08:14.160 place where we give this witness.
00:08:19.840 These kinds of symbolic gestures, these symbols, they really do confront a symbolic kind of a war that
00:08:30.560 we are receiving from those in the church that are proposing the other side. A lot of what we talked about before about Pope Francis's actions
00:08:39.200 are symbolic, rather than, you know, change in doctrine per se, or anything like that. But, you know, there's these,
00:08:46.640 those are symbolic things. Now, from a historical perspective, is there precedent for that kind of
00:08:52.400 war of symbolism, if you will? Yes, I think that all the history of the church has been made by historical acts.
00:09:08.320 For example, we remember the revolution of Luther, the Protestant revolution, because Luther
00:09:17.440 put his thesis on the Church of Wittenberg in November 1517. It was a symbolic act or when the Pope Boniface VIII was outraged
00:09:43.280 in Anagni by an emissary of the king of France. We can quote many, many, many symbolic acts committed against the church or also act
00:10:00.080 good acts, because all of the martyrs, with their martyrdom, they give a witness, a symbolic witness. But what is the difference
00:10:18.800 between the good Catholic symbolism and the bad diabolical symbolism? It is that our symbolic acts are addressed to God. So are acts
00:10:39.520 which want to connect, to connect, to link the earth and the heaven, and it is, so the symbolic act is like a prayer, which links the heaven and the earth.
00:10:56.640 On the contrary, on the contrary, the symbolic acts of our adversaries are addressed to the men, and it is in the mediatic era,
00:11:10.640 the importance for our adversaries. I would like to speak of a mediatic act for our adversaries is very important, but the mediatic era gives us a very strong opportunity
00:11:36.960 for opposing strong symbolic act, which have a mediatic impact to the mediatic gestures of our adversaries.
00:11:53.440 And I think that we have to confront, during the pontificate of Pope Francis, I think that this confrontation could be very, very important and useful.
00:12:09.440 And what kind of appeal to heaven do we need to make? What would you suggest? We are entering an era of real
00:12:21.920 demonic powers, demonic powers, obviously. Where have you gone in your appeal? What was the first Asia's Ordinata? What was the appeal to heaven in that one?
00:12:35.920 I think that today, as always, the struggle is between two armies. One army is headed by Our Lady, by the Blessed Virgin, the other by Lucifer, the head of the Diabolical Legions.
00:13:04.240 The Blessed Virgin wins. The Blessed Virgin wins always, because the devil is an instrument of God. So we have not to put on the same level as the two armies. One army always wins and the other has already lost
00:13:28.240 For the beginning of the time. Anyway, I think that, as Saint-Louis, the Grignon de Montfort says in his Treaty of the True Devotion, this struggle, it is perhaps the characterises above all our time.
00:13:56.240 Above all our times, which are the last times, not in the sense that we are necessarily at the eve or the end of the world, but last times in the sense that are very, very, very strong times where the last decision, the more important decision of the history will be taken.
00:14:22.240 And in this struggle, I think that it is very important, not only the role of Our Lady, but also the role of the Angels, because the Angels are the instruments of the Divine Providence for governing things, not only all the physical things in the Earth, but also for
00:14:50.240 For helping the faithful, for punishing the enemies of the Church. All the history of the Church has the presence of the Angels. For example, in the Crusades was very important, the presence of the Angels near to the Crusaders.
00:15:16.240 For example, in the Crusades, and also in the Crusades, the message of Fatima is characterised since the beginning by the presence of the Angels.
00:15:29.240 From the Crusades, from the Crusades, from the Crusades, they announced the Angel who preceded the Blessed Virgin until the Angel of the Third Secret. So I think it is very important today to pray the Angel.
00:15:52.240 Beautiful.
00:15:53.240 Beautiful. And so, any final thoughts, just with regard to where the Church is right now, how we are to comprehend the Holy Father and still hold Him as the Holy Father when it seems so crazy in the Church?
00:16:09.240 Yeah, so how are we to comprehend the situation in the Church? It seems, how should we regard the Holy Father as the Pope still while all of this is going on?
00:16:27.240 Yes.
00:16:28.240 He seems to be the author of so much of the confusion in the Church.
00:16:32.240 I think that there is, of course, an error, which is the pepolatry. I mean, the idea that the Pope is always infallible and all what the Pope says and makes is perfect and infallible.
00:16:59.240 But I think that there is the danger of the opposite error. I mean, to say that the Pope is the centre of all, also in a bad way, I mean, that he is the author of all the evil in the Church.
00:17:19.240 So, today, I think that perhaps we are sometimes too concentrated in the figure of Pope Francis or imagining that he is perfect or imagining that he is the Antichrist.
00:17:39.240 I think that, imagine, for example, that tomorrow there is no more Pope Francis because he dies or resigns or, I don't know, how can he be out of the scene.
00:17:58.240 But the crisis of the Church will be always present. For the reason that we spoke at the beginning, I mean, that it is a crisis with roots in the Second Vatican Council.
00:18:22.240 And before this, before this, in the modernism of the beginning of the 20th century. So, I think that it is not really so important to think that eliminating Pope Francis
00:18:43.240 Pope Francis all will be in a good way.
00:18:50.240 So, what, in terms of getting back to order, because I presume that we are headed back to order.
00:18:59.240 Yes.
00:19:00.240 Our Lady, it says in Fatima we learned that in the end her Immaculate Heart will triumph, so we are expecting that triumph.
00:19:08.240 What do you see as even some steps along that road to eventual restoration?
00:19:14.240 I think that if it is true that the value of a man depends on his idea, our idea has to be the greater possible.
00:19:39.240 And so, our goal has to be the restoration of the Christian order in his total integrity, without exceptions and without compromise. 0.76
00:19:58.240 The Catholic civilization is more perfect than in the Middle Ages. 1.00
00:20:05.240 Of course, this seems very far from the current situation.
00:20:13.240 But, I quote often an example in the moment more difficult, perhaps one of the more difficult moments in the history of the Church.
00:20:26.240 The persecution of Dioclesian at the beginning of the 4th century, when all seemed to be lost, because Christians were persecuted, killed,
00:20:42.240 jailed, there was really total darkness.
00:20:48.240 Who could imagine at that time that only five, six, seven years after, with the Emperor Constantine, with the victory of the Milvian Bridge, Saxarubra, the history had a complete change.
00:21:11.240 And the Constantinian era opened a new period in history with the beginning of the Christianity.
00:21:26.240 So, I think that towards the future, we have to be very confident and to trust not in our forces, but in our weakness and in the force of God, who can change very rapidly, in a very rapid way, all the situation.
00:21:55.240 The deepness of the crisis is, for me, an element of hope, because the situation is so terrible that the moment of a restoration of the Renaissance of the Church cannot be so far.
00:22:22.240 I hope so, and I fight for this.
00:22:26.240 Beautiful.
00:22:27.240 On that note, we're going to leave you from Rome with Professor DeMatte.
00:22:32.240 May God bless you, and I hope you enjoyed this edition of the John Henry Weston Show.
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