1. Events in the life of Christ.
Events in the life of Christ have eschatological significance. It describes what will happen to the Catholic Church in the future. Or it explains in a deeper way Catholic teachings. And so the Gospel of the 10th Sunday is not a mere small incident of Christ meeting a widowed mother accompanying her young dead son. It explains the relationship between the Catholic Church and her imperfect children.
To understand this Gospel better it is important to keep in mind the description of the Catholic Church as described in the Nicene Creed or the expanded version according to St. Robert Bellarmine. These visible signs will come in handy here so we can, sort of, know the genetics of the widowed mother to know whether the dead young man is really her son. This is important in the Gospel narrative. For correct interpretation we have to be sure that the dead young man is truly the son of the widowed mother.
See the advantage of knowing the four visible signs of the true Church. It is a big help for the interpretation of many Gospel events.
2. The widowed mother.
The widowed mother is a symbol of the Catholic Church. She is a mother because she has sons in her sons and daughters around the world. And she is a widow because her husband, Jesus Christ,- is no longer here on earth. He is in heaven.
Because the widowed mother is the Church she must have the four visible signs of the Catholic Church mentioned in the Nicene Creed; One, Holy, Catholic and Apostolic. Or she must have the 15 expanded Marks of the true Church mentioned by St. Robert Bellarmine. This will serve as the genes and chromosomes by which we can identify if the dead young man is truly her son.
The widowed mother should have all the visible signs of the Church; she must have these because she is Holy Mother the Church. She cannot have less than that. She must perfectly have the Oneness, the Holiness, the Catholicity and the Apostolicity mentioned in the Creed.
3. The dead young man.
The dead young man is the son of the mother. Being the son, he must have all the qualities of the mother; he must have Oneness, holiness, Catholicity and Apostolicity. The reason he was described as dead is because he does have these four visible signs in their perfection. Maybe, he has the four visible signs in some degree only. In which case he would be considered not yet a Catholic. He is leading towards being a Catholic but is not yet completely a Catholic; therefore, ‘dead’.
This is the same description we used for some Bishops who fought Pope Francis in defending the indissolubility of marriage. We said they have some signs of being Catholics in that they defended a Catholic doctrine thus showing ‘apostolicity.’ But their being Catholic is not perfect as proven by the fact that their parishes or dioceses do not have the four visible signs of the true Church. They are like the dead young man but had no widowed mother in their parish and dioceses. They had to depend on the universal Catholic Church as their widowed mother.
However when they wavered in their Faith when reading ‘amores laetitia’ they lost their little apostolicity and suddenly did not belong to the widowed mother.
This is the description of the young dead man. He has a little of the four visible signs, but they are not yet perfect because he is still a young man whose training in the Catholic Faith is not yet perfect.
4. What the mother Church can do for an imperfect son.
But because the dead young man is in some degree inside the Church, though he is dead, the widowed mother is able to go to Christ to pray to bring back to life the spiritually dead young man. This is through the prayers of the Church, the widowed mother.
The bishops who have a little of the visible sign of the Church, though they do not have a visibly Catholic parish or diocese can depend on the prayer of the Catholic Church hidden somewhere in the world. Because the fall under the description of the dead young man, son of the widowed mother.
This is the advantage in being part of a community that has all the visible signs of the true Church. First, the community can teach and help you acquire the four visible signs mentioned in the Nicene Creed. Secondly, if for some reason you do not reach becoming a perfect member of the Catholic Church, that community or parish, because they have the four visible signs can pray to God to bring you back to life spiritually so you can finish your being a true Catholic.
5. Qualifications
If you are a part of a true Catholic community but does not have a single visible sign of the true Church, then you are not the son of the widowed mother. And the mother cannot pray for you.
If on the other hand, you have a few of the visible signs of the true church but your community or parish is not the widowed mother because she does not have a single visible sign of the true Church, then God will not listen to the prayer of one who is not the widowed mother but will listen top the widowed mother somewhere around the world.
6. Conclusion
As we have applied the four visible signs of the true Church as mentioned in the Nicene Creed to Pope Francis and many bishops and finding that they do not have those signs we can safely say that they do not represent the widowed mother. And because they do not have any of the signs, then they are not even the dead young man.
Pope Francis’ suggestion that those of other Faiths are our brothers shows a lack of knowledge of genetics and genes. If they belong to other sects or religion they would not have the four visible signs of the true Church. They would not be my brothers, and neither would they be the son of the widowed mother. The interpretation should be very strict.
The widowed mother has all the four visible signs; the dead young man has the beginnings of the four visible signs, and for this reason is spiritually dead.
When the brave bishops who went against Pope Francis during the debate on the indissolubility of marriage their ground for three Synods, they showed signs of being the ‘dead young son.’ As least they were the sons of the true Church represented by the widowed mother. But when they begun to succumb to ‘amores laetitia’ that had the same errors they fought against, then they ceased being the son of the widowed mother. Because they no longer showed the visible sign of Catholicity they showed before.
Applying the four visible signs and the expanded 15 signs of the true Church on Pope Francis showed that he did not have a single visible sign of being a Catholic. How much more the bishops and priests under him. We have a Catholic Church that cannot be considered as a young dead man because they are not even the widowed mother.
And so? Being spiritually dead for not having all the visible signs of being truly a Catholic, who can pray for us, as did the widowed mother? No one, because the Vatican is not our mother.
So what should we do? Absolutely nothing else than to have some gene and hormone implant and have the beginnings of being One, Holy, Catholic and Apostolic. Or the 15 Marks of St. Robert Bellarmine, namely, Catholicity, antiquity, long duration, multitude of believers, apostolic succession of bishops, agreement with the ancient church…..etc. etc.