What Are We Doing About It?

By Deacon Mike Manno

(The Wanderer) – Once again, the story of the FBI infiltrating the Catholic Church is in the news — where it should be. This column reported on this back in February when it contained our radio interview (Episode 351, see below) with the FBI whistleblower Kyle Seraphin. Now, finally, the U.S. House of Representatives will be questioning FBI director, Christopher Wray, in open session to try to get some explanation for that action.

The issue came to light when Kyle obtained a report by the Richmond Field Office which set out the rationale for such an investigation and follow-up infiltration. The theory, boiled down, was that there were groups of white conservative Christians who, along with parents who don’t want their kids brainwashed in their schools, had become the source of violent extremists who were threatening the world that Joe Biden was attempting to build.

The real danger these white supremacists posed is if and when they joined with white conservative Catholics to raise holy hell against the current regime in Washington, as well as those “Dark Aged” states aligned with the nation’s intellectually superior political intellectuals.

So, in the FBI’s opinion, which the Richmond office shared with other field offices throughout the nation, efforts must be made to keep those two groups, the white conservative Christians and the white conservative Catholics, from meeting up to form some form of mega threat to the very existence of such wonderful institutions as abortion on demand, trans forming your little boys into little girls, and teaching them how the country was built on racism which continues to hold so many people of color — except Asians — in perpetual bondage.

Naturally they looked for white conservative Catholics in the Traditional Catholic liturgy, the Traditional Latin Mass, apparently because those folks were products of the Inquisition and inclined to burn modern witches at the stake.

Thus, if only the FBI could infiltrate those TLM communities, the Evangelical bomb throwers could be kept separate from meeting their Catholic counterparts. All for the glory of the Biden administration, praised be Joe the all-devout.

Of course, what the DOJ is not looking for are those responsible for the 300 plus incidents of vandalism against churches and pro-life clinics. Oh, excuse me — there have been four indictments. Those vandals are a pesky bunch, they do all their work when its dark and that is why it is so hard to find them, according to the attorney general in D.C.

But don’t you worry none, if anyone so much as takes a knee in front of a Planned Parenthood clinic in the daylight, the FBI will storm your house early in the morning with a swat team to arrest you in front of your horrified family. That is what justice demands, say the acolytes of the ruling party.
Of course, it was necessary to increase investigations of pro-life prayer warriors outside abortion facilities, because Roe v. Wade has been overruled, explained Associate Attorney General Vanita Gupta to a civil rights gathering at the Justice Department only a few months ago. See, it all makes perfect sense now.

Well, you can easily see how silly this whole thing was, even without my sarcastic description. But it doesn’t stand alone in its challenge to our faith.
Just recently, the Army’s Walter Reed Hospital discontinued its contract services for Catholic chaplains from the nearby Franciscans with a “cease and desist” order which halts a two-decade practice. The Administration (don’t worry, he’s still a devout Catholic) replaced the Franciscans with a private for-profit company, and made the announcement just before the start of Holy Week.

Now we have a bunch of angry Republican congressmen who are vowing to get to the bottom of this nonsense and they’re going to make a lot of noise doing so. Of course, how much of that gets the public’s attention is only conjecture at this point.

But my question is why is a band of Republican congressmen doing what the leadership of our Church should be doing: Crying from the high heavens and calling out the Biden administration for what it is, a heretical, atheistic organization, that only tolerates the worship of a god of its own making.

That’s really the question for the day. Where are our leaders? And where are we in this fight? Are we just a bunch of privates thrown up against the enemy while our colonels and generals sit comfortably behind the lines?
Recently we had Brian Burch, president of CatholicVote, on our radio program (Episode 357). He made some interesting comments. First, he suggested that those who are engaged in much of this anti-Catholic activity, whether physical violence or legal harassment, are doing so because many have a deep hatred of what we are and what we believe.

As a group, these folks are bent on the elimination of the Church and represent the principalities which we have fought for over two thousand years. Their leaders are completely hostile to the Church; but not all religions. Catholics are specifically targeted.

So why don’t our bishops sound a warning cry to rally the Catholic faithful? Many good bishops do. But some make weak responses, some make no response at all.

I looked up the response of the USCCB to the original FBI-Latin Mass story. I found this response by the bishops’ religious liberty chairman, New York Archbishop Timothy Cardinal Dolan:

“Let me first be clear: Anyone who espouses racism or promotes violence is rejecting Catholic teaching on the inherent dignity of each and every person. The USCCB roundly condemns such extremism and fully supports the work of law enforcement officials to keep our communities safe.

“I agree with my brother Bishop Barry Knestout that the leaked memorandum was nonetheless ‘troubling and offensive’ in several respects — such as in its religious profiling and reliance on dubious sourcing — and am glad it has been rescinded. We encourage federal law enforcement authorities to take appropriate measures to ensure the problematic aspects of the memo do not recur in any of their agencies’ work going forward.”

Weak? Strong? It’s a message all right, not quite a clarion call to action, but a call nonetheless. It’s as if we can hear the guns on the other side of the hill but there is no bugle to call us to formation. Without the trumpet’s call, we are left to sit on our side of the hill and wait until it blows the sad cadence of taps.

But we needn’t wait for a general to act; as Mr. Burch pointed out, we attend Mass every week, we hear a homily every week, and we read our church bulletin every week. This is where he says the rubber meets the road and this is where we need our pastors to make a bold response, supported by our bishops, to counter the plans of the Evil One.

Pray, then stand up to the enemy, no matter what form he takes, or with whom he stands.

(You can reach Mike at: DeaconMike@q.com and listen to him every weekend on Faith On Trial or podcast at https://iowacatholicradio.com/faith-on-trial/)