The natural tendency is to get sexual pleasure from another person even at great harm to the other person. Again, over the years in dealing with so many people, the passion for sexual experience can be so strong that not only, say, for the person not show love in marriage, genuine selfless love, and yet expect a marital embrace.
One will even resort to the most extreme measures to satisfy one’s pleasure and that whether either with one’s spouse or even with someone else. The passion of sex is the single most revealing manifestation of selfish desires. And that is why our nation, which has become, I think I can say this, an asylum of mentally disturbed people whose mental derangement is preoccupation with sex.
And behind this that’s the purpose of bringing out that our fallen human nature being spontaneously and congenitally selfish. Correspondingly, therefore, one’s sexual pleasure at no matter what cost to another person provided I am satisfied. I am sure I’ve said this maybe more than once here in class. When my Jesuit friend told me, remember Fr. John (Rōōk?), one of the few survivors of the Dachau Concentration Camp, remember, he was there about four and a half years, being a linguist so the Nazis kept him alive. After months of the torture in Dachau far into the night we’d sit and talk, professional people. How can human beings be so inhumanly cruel? You never knew on your way to the mess hall whether you would be shot down because part of the, well, schedule someone would regularly be shot down on the way to the meals; inoculation with some dreadful disease and then die in spasms of pain. And, for those of you who have not heard this (I’ve said this by now to, oh, a hundred or more audiences), we found that every single one of those S.S. guards as they called themselves, both men and women, every one was a sex pervert. And the two work together in the measure that a person is selfish to that extent that person’s sex passions are not in control. And in the degree to which they are out of control, to that extent is that person I use the word, bestially and, even stronger, demonically selfish.
—Fr.John Hardon, Servant of God
Excerpted from his talks (Chastity and Charity in Marriage
by Fr. John A. Hardon, S.J.
Institute on Religious Life
Sacrament of Matrimony series
Ann Arbor, Michigan 1993)
The Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith has communicated the outcome of the meeting between Cardinal Víctor Manuel Fernández and Fr Davide Pagliarani, Superior of the Priestly Fraternity of St Pius X, with the consent of Pope Leo XIV.
Rome is proposing a structured theological dialogue to clarify doctrinal questions linked to Vatican II and to identify the minimum conditions for full ecclesial communion and a canonical status for the Fraternity.
The Holy See reiterates that any episcopal ordinations carried out without a pontifical mandate would entail a break in communion; the dialogue presupposes that such initiatives are suspended.
The Fraternity will discuss the matter within its own council and will provide a response to Rome.
A French bishop has ordained a priest using the pre-Vatican II Pontificale Romanum in a ceremony that has renewed unresolved tensions surrounding the implementation of Pope Francis’s restrictions on the traditional liturgy.
On Saturday January 17, Bishop Alain Castet, the 75-year-old emeritus bishop of Luçon, ordained Brother Thomas-Marie Warmuz to the priesthood at Chémeré-le-Roi in western France. The ordination took place within the Fraternity of Saint Vincent Ferrer, a Dominican-inspired clerical fraternity known for its exclusive use of traditional liturgical rites. During the same ceremony, Brother André-Marie Mwanza was ordained as a subdeacon.
The ordination was conducted according to the Pontificale Romanum in force before the reforms of the Second Vatican Council. The Vatican’s Congregation for Divine Worship and the Discipline of the Sacraments stated in December 2021 that bishops are not authorised to confer Holy Orders using the older pontifical. That clarification was issued in the form of Responsa ad dubia, responding to questions raised by Pope Francis’s motu proprio Traditionis custodes.
Traditionis custodes, promulgated in July 2021, declared that the liturgical books promulgated after the Council are the “unique expression” of the Roman Rite. It placed new restrictions on the celebration of the pre-conciliar liturgy, reversing the broader permissions granted under Benedict XVI’s Summorum Pontificum. The Pope said the measure was necessary to protect ecclesial unity and to counter what he described as an ideological use of the older rites.
The December responsa went further by addressing sacramental questions, including ordinations. They stated that the use of the older Pontificale Romanumis not permitted, even in communities where the celebration of the traditional Mass has been authorised. Responsibility for enforcing these norms lies with the diocesan bishop, acting under the authority of the Holy See.
The ceremony at Chémeré-le-Roi therefore raises questions about how Traditionis custodes and its subsequent clarifications are being interpreted and applied in practice. Bishop Castet, who led the Diocese of Luçon from 2008 until his retirement in 2017, has not publicly commented on the decision to use the older pontifical.
More: https://x.com/catholicherald/status/2021562444380885039?s=46&t=IydJ-X8H6c0NM044nYKQ0w
My wife calls me, panicked.
The call is from her number, and her voice is unmistakable- that’s my wife.
‘Babe, our son is hurt. He got in a bike wreck. I’m at the emergency room but they won’t take our insurance and I need cash to get him help. Please send me 3000 dollars as soon as you can, he’s really not doing well.’
Me- ‘Wow, that’s scary. Tell me our passphrase and then I’ll send the money.’
Her (it) - ‘What? What passphrase? This is your wife, our son is hurt. Send the money now!!’
Me- ‘I’ll call you back. I don’t believe that this is my wife. If it is, I’m sorry, but we discussed this.’
The number? Spoofed. Easy to do and there’s no way to tell if a phone number is being spoofed aside from hanging up and calling back to confirm.
The voice? AI generated. Easily done. A few seconds of audio is all it takes to create a realistic audio deepfake.
What can you do?
1) Create a family safe word or passphrase. Ours is definitely not ‘Keep Going’ although we considered it. Discuss the passphrase far away from phones or any recording device. This is as analog as possible. Don’t forget that the trigger for the passphrase is just as important as the phrase itself. So instead of asking ‘what’s the safe word?’ have a separate triggering question. For example, you could say ‘I’m eating banana cream pie’ and this would trigger your spouse to respond ‘purple velvet pillows’ if that’s the safe word.
Make it fun, silly, and easy to remember. And DON’T WRITE IT DOWN.
2) Cognitive security is an essential skill in 2026. Assume every image and video you see online is fake until proven otherwise. Expect scams and spammers, and be pleasantly surprised when it’s not.
3) Figure out a backup communication option with people who you absolutely need to be able to reach. Don’t just rely on a phone number for communication. Have redundant, ideally encrypted methods of communication with family.
What did I miss? I think (hope) Nikita is wrong on the timeframe- agentic bots like Claude bot are impressive but not quite ready to flood the phone lines in just 90 days. But I think it’s going to be a huge problem by the end of the year. I already get dozens of increasingly realistic spam calls and texts daily- it’s only going to get more annoying. Have a plan to keep your family and your finances safe!
Source: Dustin Burnham @ModernDad
The Cardinal’s two-page text—framed as a “careful theological, historical, and pastoral reflection”—was distributed to members of the Sacred College at a Jan. 7–8 consistory convened by Pope Leo XIV. Although it was not formally presented or discussed at the meeting due to time constraints, the report received significant pushback from clergy and faithful after its contents circulated in the media.
… only in the next.”
