When men ask ABS why he is always complaining about Jorge Bergoglio instead of just silently picking up his cross and bearing it, ABS replies that even Jesus prayed the cup pass Him by and even Jesus asked the soldier why he struck Him?
(Quotes and commentary from Catena Aurea)
42. Saying, Father, if you be willing, remove this cup from me: nevertheless not my will, but yours, be done.
CHRYS. Now every art is set forth by the words and works of him who teaches it. Because then our Lord had come to teach no ordinary virtue, therefore He speaks and does the same things. And so having in words commanded to pray, lest they enter into temptation, He does the same likewise in work, saying, Father, if you be willing, remove this cup from me. He said not the words, If you will, as if ignorant whether it was pleasing to the Father. For such knowledge was not more difficult than the knowledge of His Father’s substance, which He alone clearly knew, according to John, As the Father knows me, even so have I known the Father. Nor says He this, as refusing His Passion. For He who rebuked a disciple, who wished to prevent His Passion, so as even after many commendations, to call him Satan, how should He be unwilling to be crucified? Consider then why it was so said. How great a thing was it to hear that the unspeakable God, who passes all understanding, was content to enter the virgin’s womb, to suck her milk, and to undergo every thing human. Since then that was almost incredible which was about to happen, He sent first indeed Prophets to announce it, afterwards He Himself comes clothed in the flesh, so that you could not suppose Him to be a phantom. He permits His flesh to endure all natural infirmities, to hunger, to thirst, to sleep, to labor, to be afflicted, to be tormented; on this account likewise He refuses not death, that He might manifest thereby His true humanity.
AMBROSE; He says, then, If you will, remove this cup from me, as man refusing death, as God maintaining His own decree.
BEDE; Or He begs the cup to be removed from Him, not indeed from fear of suffering, but from His compassion for the first people, lest they should have to drink the cup first drunk by Him. Therefore He says expressly, not, Remove from Me the cup, but this cup, that is, the cup of the Jewish people, who can have no excuse for their ignorance in slaying Me, having the Law and the Prophets daily prophesying of Me.
DION. ALEX. Or when He says, Let this cup pass from me, it is not, let it not come to Me, for unless it had come it could not pass away. It was therefore when He perceived it already present that He began to be afflicted and sorrowful, and as it was close at hand, He says, let this cup pass, for as that which has passed can neither be said not to have come nor yet to remain, so also the Savior asks first that the temptation slightly assailing Him may pass away. And this is the not entering into temptation which He counsels to pray for. But the most perfect way? of avoiding temptation is manifested, when he says, Nevertheless, not my will, but yours be done. For God is not a tempter to evil, but He wishes to grant us good things above what we either desire or understand. Therefore He seeks that the perfect will of His Father which He Himself had known, should dispose of the event, which is the same will as His own, as respects the Divine nature. But He shrinks to fulfill the human will, which He calls His own, and which is inferior to His Father’s will.
ATHAN. For here He manifests a double will. One indeed human, which is of the flesh, the other divine. For our human nature, because of the weakness of the flesh, refuses the Passion, but His divine will eagerly embraced it, for that it was not possible that He should be holden of death.
GREG NYSS. Now Apollinaris asserts that Christ had not His own will according to His earthly nature, but that in Christ exists only the will of God who descends from heaven. Let him then say what will is it which God would have by no means to be fulfilled? And the Divine nature does not remove His own will.
BEDE; When He drew near His Passion, the Savior also took upon Him the words of weak man; as when something threatens us which we do not wish to come to pass, we then through weakness seek that it may not be, to the end that we also may be prepared by fortitude to find the will of our Creator contrary to our own will.
23. Jesus answered him, If I have spoken evil, bear witness of the evil: but if well, why smite you me?
THEOPHYL. When Jesus had appealed to the testimony of the people by, an officer, wishing to clear himself, and show that he was not one of those who admired our Lord, struck Him: And when He had thus spoken, one of the officers which stood by struck Jesus with the palm of his hand, saying, Answer you the high priest so?
AUG. This shows that Annas was the high priest, for this was before He was sent to Caiaphas. And Luke in the beginning of his Gospel says, that Annas and Caiaphas were both high priests.
ALCUIN. Here is fulfilled the prophecy, I gave my cheek to the smiters. Jesus, though struck unjustly, replied gently: Jesus answered him, If I have spoken evil, bear witness of the evil: but if well, why smite you Me?
THEOPHYL. As if to say, If you have any fault to find with what I have said, show it; if you have not, why do you rage? Or thus: If I taught any thing unadvisedly, when I taught in the synagogues, give proof of it to the high priest I but if taught aright, so that even you officers admired, why smite you Me, Whom before you admired?
AUG. What can be truer, gentler, kinder, than this answer? He Who received the blow on the face neither wished for him who struck it that fire from heaven should consume him, or the earth open its month and swallow him; or a devil seize him; or any other yet more horrible kind of punishment. Yet had not He, by Whom the world was made, power to cause any one of these things to take place, but that He preferred teaching us that patience why which the world is overcome? Some one will ask here, why He did not do what He Himself commanded, i.e. not make this answer, but give the other cheek to the smiter? But what if He did both, both answered gently, and gave, not His check only to the smiter, but His whole body to be nailed to the Cross? And herein He shows, that those precepts of patience are to be performed not by posture of the body, but by preparation of the heart: for it is possible that a man might give his cheek outwardly, and yet be angry at the same time. How much better is it to answer truly, yet gently, and be ready to bear even harder usage patiently.
The plain and simple truth is that as a soi disant traditionalist, ABS is in the midst of a covey of quail who love to grouse.
