Concerned Catholics from across southern Pennsylvania gathered on September 8 for a special talk on October’s Synod on Synodality in Rome. The American Society for the Defense of Tradition, Family, Property (TFP) and its America Needs Fatima campaign sponsored the event at the TFP headquarters near York, which included a book launching and pizza dinner.
TFP Vice President John Horvat spoke about “How the Coming Synod Could Radically Change Your Parish and the Church.” A crowded auditorium of Catholics gathered on the Feast of the Nativity of Our Lady to discuss the October Synod of nearly 400 bishops and laity soon to meet.
Mr. Horvat introduced the book The Synodal Process is a Pandora’s Box: 100 Questions & Answers, co-authored by TFP authors Jose Antonio Ureta and Julio Loredo de Izcue. Cardinal Raymond Burke wrote the foreword. The book was offered for sale to participants, many of whom bought 5, 10 or even 20 copies of the work.
Since its release on August 22, news of the book has appeared daily in the media, including major secular outlets like The New York Times, The Washington Post, Breitbart, the Associated Press and others. The book is also at the center of the discussion in Catholic media, which includes The Catholic Herald, the National Catholic Register, America Magazine, the Religious News Service, The National Catholic Reporter and other sites.
Get the book now! The Synodal Process Is a Pandora’s Box is now available for $10.95.
Click here to get your copy now.
Mr. Horvat, author of the best-selling book Return to Order, highlighted three main points regarding the Synod, often using quotes from Synod documents and promoters as evidence.
The first point was that, if taken to its final consequences, the Synod could represent a revolution inside the Church. This is the conclusion of Cardinal Burke in his foreword. He says that “Synodality and its adjective, synodal, have become slogans behind which a revolution is at work to change radically the Church’s self-understanding, in accord with a contemporary ideology which denies much of what the Church has always taught and practiced.”
This revolution would invert and change the divinely instituted pyramidal structures of the Church in favor of leveling and top-heavy models.
The second danger is that the Synod could change how doctrines and morals are decided in the Church by turning it into a process of listening to “the spirit” rather than a reference to tradition and scriptures. The process becomes the way the people of God hear what is to be believed and can even take on an infallible character.
Third, the Synod will introduce those outside the Church into orienting the Church. It promotes what they call “radical inclusion,” which will invite everyone into the Church without requiring anyone to change, including atheists, non-Catholics, LGBTQ+ advocates and others.
All these elements could radically change the Church. Indeed, the German Synod way, which the book describes in detail, has provided a sampling of what might be expected if the synodal ideology is imposed upon the faithful. Indeed, the Germans have already approved blessings of same-sex couples, support for a woman’s diaconate and allowing lay preaching.
Get the book now! The Synodal Process Is a Pandora’s Box is now available for $10.95.
Click here to get your copy now.
“As Cardinal Burke says, this synod could introduce radical changes based on an ideology different from Church teaching,” Mr. Horvat noted. “The book quotes Synod sources that show where they want to go in the name of “synodality.”
The Pennsylvania event is one of many now taking place across the country, addressing the concerns of clergy and laity alike. The book gives them solid arguments to defend Church teaching.