You can't always trust the veracity of what you read at LifeSiteNews, but they accurately described last Thursday's episode of "The World Over" on EWTN. During a discussion of Amoris Laetitia, Raymond Arroyo, the show's host, and Robert Royal had this exchange:
This "gives the feeling of a schism," Arroyo remarked. "It’s not a schism, but it gives the feeling of one."
Arroyo said that a "fairly common" question now is "if there is schism, is the Church automatically on the side of the Pope? How do we discern which side is correct?"
"This is a very difficult question, because we’ve never had a circumstance with a pope obstinately teaching something that seems to be contradictory to the longstanding, permanent tradition of the Catholic Church," said Royal. "I think that we’ll find ourselves sorting this out and it’s gonna be very, very painful. It may go on for decades. Things like this have happened in the past...I don’t think there’s any automatic mechanism here, or automatic principle that you can apply."
Schism? I see Arroyo's schism and raise him one interdict. Bishops of the United States: Shut down EWTN.
At Politico, "Trumps lays the groundwork for mass deportations." I predicted last week that those of us who care about migrants and refugees need to not worry so much about the wall, for all its symbolic significance, but about an increase in deportation agents and a ramping up of aggressive actions against immigrants. I will be returning to this issue in the days ahead.
Three important articles in this morning's Washington Post.
First, a profile of Sebastian Gorka, who is, curprise, surprise, a regular guest on Arroyo's show. Gorka is also one of the scariest people in the new administration.
Second, Catherine Rampell on how the Trump White House is already cooking the numbers.
Third, Michael Gerson delivers another penetrating look at just how scary Trump is.
