Month: June 2024

Four years ago, the supermassive black hole at the heart of the galaxy SDSS1335+0728 woke up with a loud bang and announced its presence with a burst of radiation. It was the first time astronomers observed the sudden activation of a supermassive black hole in real time.

“Imagine you have been observing a distant galaxy for years and it always seems quiet and inactive,” says Paula Sánchez Sáez, an astronomer at ESO in Germany and lead author of the study on this object. “Suddenly its [core] begins to show dramatic changes in brightness, unlike any typical event we have seen so far.”

This is what happened to SDSS1335+0728, which is now officially classified as an active galactic nucleus (AGN) galaxy. It has experienced what is known as a “nuclear transient.” Essentially, this means that the galaxy now has a very bright, compact region. However, it wasn't always this bright, and astronomers want to understand what caused it to wake up.

This artist's impression shows two stages in the formation of a disk of gas and dust around the massive black hole at the center of the galaxy SDSS1335+0728. The core of this galaxy lit up in 2019 and continues to shine brighter today—the first time astronomers have observed a massive black hole become active. Credit: ES M. Kornmesser

Looking for transients in the right places

The unusual brightness variations were discovered by the Zwicky Transient Facility in California, which provides constant real-time information about things like temporary flares and brightenings in the hearts of galaxies like SDSS1335+0728. In addition, several other facilities also observed the variations, and brightness changes were found in archival data from several other observatories.

The sudden brightening could have many causes, including cannibalization of stars and gas clouds that get too close to supermassive black holes. How often they brighten and how a dormant galactic core turns into an active one are topics that astronomers are trying to understand with such surveys and observations. They are studying not only distant galaxies but also the activity in the vicinity of our own galaxy's supermassive black hole.

A galaxy and its supermassive black hole

Most galaxies have massive black holes in their cores. They usually hold at least a hundred thousand times the mass of the Sun (sometimes even more). Everything is trapped by gravity and nothing escapes, not even light. “These huge monsters are usually asleep and not directly visible,” said study co-author Claudio Ricci of Diego Portales University in Chile. “In the case of SDSS1335+0728, we were able to observe the massive black hole waking up. [which] suddenly began to feed on the gas present in its surroundings and became very bright.”

A black hole itself doesn't emit any light at all. Instead, it sucks everything in, including light. However, the region around the black hole – called the accretion disk – is a pretty active place. There, material trapped by the black hole's strong gravitational pull swirls around like water flowing down a drain. All of this stuff – mostly gas, some dust – is laced with magnetic fields. The friction between the accretions of material heats it up. And that heating releases radiation. When there's enough of it, we see light being emitted. Intensely active regions emit X-rays, which indicate the level of activity.

The slice-and-dice activity of gravity

There's also something called a tidal stream, which happens when something like a star or a cloud of gas gets caught in the gravitational field. These things take time – on the order of years. When they happen, the black hole's gravitational pull eventually tears the star or cloud apart, also releasing radiation. In fact, a very slow tidal stream event may be happening at the heart of SDSS1335+0728. If true, it could be one of the longest and darkest events ever observed.

Regardless of what causes the brightening, some of the material will ultimately end up inside the black hole. The rest will be superheated in the accretion disk and reveal its fate through increased radiation.

Growth of black holes and a wake-up call

The supermassive black holes at the heart of galaxies grow by merging smaller ones into larger ones. We don't see these growth patterns in real time because they take place over millions of years. The merger scenario states that when galaxies merge, their central black holes (if they have them) also merge.

Simulation of the merger of supermassive black holes. Image credit: NASA Goddard Space Flight Center/Scott Noble

Eventually you get these gigantic monsters. They just sit there and nibble on passing gas clouds to gain extra mass. So they gain mass through acquisitions that happen over shorter periods of time. That's apparently what the object in SDSS1335+0728 is doing now. It's just not often that astronomers see one wake up and start nibbling in a short period of time.

So many questions remain about this star, especially about its formation history. Since mergers take a long time, it is difficult to say what happened to this star in the past. If it is a tidal event, astronomers would like to know how often something like this happens.

This artist's impression shows what astronomers call a “tidal disruption event” (TDE). This is when an object, such as a star, comes too close to a black hole and is destroyed by the tidal forces created by the black hole's strong gravitational pull. (Source: NASA/CXC/M.Weiss.)

Currently, there is no direct evidence for SDSS1335+0728 of previous outbursts that would indicate previous awakenings of the supermassive black hole. Astronomers will need to make many follow-up observations to understand what is really happening there and perhaps find evidence of other outbursts and activities related to the black hole, says Sánchez Sáez. “Regardless of the nature of the variations, [this galaxy] provides valuable information about how black holes grow and evolve,” she said, noting that advanced instruments on ESO's Very Large Telescope should give astronomers a better picture of the processes taking place at this black hole. In addition, further time-domain sky surveys with the upcoming Vera C. Rubin telescope should be able to follow the core brightenings of this galaxy.

For more informations

Astronomers observe the awakening of a giant black hole in real time
SDSS1335+0728: The awakening of a ~10^6 M_sun black hole
arXiv preprint

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Former Papal Nuncio to the US summoned to Rome for undermining the green agenda

“One must seriously ask oneself whether it is compatible with the Catholic faith to passively watch the systematic destruction of the Church by its leaders.”

Beware of false prophets

Announcement of the start of the extrajudicial criminal proceedings for schism
(Art. 2 SST; can. 1364 CIC)

The Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith informed me by email that an extrajudicial criminal procedure had been opened against me. I am accused of having committed the crime of schism and of having denied the legitimacy of “Pope Francis”, of having broken communion “with him” and of having rejected the Second Vatican Council. I have been summoned to the Palace of the Holy Office on June 20, either in person or represented by a canon lawyer. I assume that the verdict has already been prepared, since this is an extrajudicial procedure.

I consider the accusations made against me an honour. I believe that the wording of the accusation confirms the theses that I have repeatedly defended in my various addresses. It is no coincidence that the accusations made against me refer to the questioning of the legitimacy of Jorge Mario Bergoglio and the rejection of Vatican II: the Council represents the ideological, theological, moral and liturgical cancer of which the Bergoglian “synodal Church” is the necessary metastasis.

It is necessary for the episcopate, the clergy and the people of God to seriously ask themselves whether it is compatible with the profession of the Catholic faith to passively watch the systematic destruction of the Church by its leaders.just as other subversives destroy civil society. Globalism calls for ethnic substitution: Bergoglio promotes uncontrolled immigration and calls for the integration of cultures and religions. Globalism supports LGBTQ+ ideology: Bergoglio authorizes the blessing of same-sex couples and forces believers to accept homosexuality, while covering up the scandals of his protégés and promoting them to the highest positions of responsibility. Globalism imposes the green agenda: Bergoglio worships the idol of Pachamama, writes insane encyclicals about the environment, supports Agenda 2030 and attacks those who question the theory of man-made global warming. In matters that strictly concern science, he goes beyond his role, but always and only in one direction: a direction diametrically opposed to what the Church has always taught. He has ordered the use of experimental gene serums that caused very serious damage, death and infertility, calling them “an act of love”, in exchange for money from pharmaceutical companies and philanthropic foundations. His complete agreement with the Davos religion is scandalous. Wherever governments, in the service of the World Economic Forum, have introduced or expanded abortion, promoted vice, legitimized homosexual partnerships or sex reassignment, encouraged euthanasia and tolerated the persecution of Catholics, not a word has been said in defense of the threatened faith or morals or in support of the civil struggle of so many Catholics who have been abandoned by the Vatican and the bishops. No word for the persecuted Catholics in Chinawith the complicity of the Holy See, which values ​​Beijing's billions more than the lives and freedom of thousands of Chinese faithful to the Roman Church. In the “synodal Church” led by Bergoglio, no schism is recognized among the German episcopate, or among the government-appointed bishops ordained in China without a mandate from Rome. Because their actions are compatible with the destruction of the Church and must therefore be covered up, downplayed, tolerated and finally encouraged. In these eleven years of “pontificate”, the Catholic Church has been humiliated and discredited above all because of the scandals and corruption of the leaders of the hierarchy, who were completely ignored even when the most ruthless Vatican authoritarianism raged against faithful priests and religious, small communities of traditional nuns and communities tied to the Latin Mass.

This one-sided zeal recalls Cromwell's fanaticism, typical of those who oppose Providence, believing that they are finally at the top of the hierarchical pyramid and are free to do whatever they want without anyone objecting. And this work of destruction, this willingness to renounce the salvation of souls in the name of a human peace that denies God, is not an invention of Bergoglio's, but the main purpose (and unspeakable goal) of those who used a council to contradict the Catholic Magisterium and destroy the Church from within, in small steps but always in a single direction, always with the indulgent tolerance or culpable inaction – if not the explicit consent – of the Roman authorities. The Catholic Church was slowly but surely taken over, and Bergoglio was given the task of making it a philanthropic agency, the “Church of humanity, of inclusion, of the environment” at the service of the New World Order. But This is not the Catholic Church, but its counterfeit.

The resignation of Benedict XVI and the appointment of a successor by the St. Gallen Mafia, in accordance with the dictates of Agenda 2030, was intended to – and succeeded in – enabling the global coup with the complicity and authoritative support of the Roman Church. Bergoglio is to the Church what other world leaders are to their nations: traitors, subversives and definitive liquidators of traditional society, assured of impunity. Bergoglio's lack of consensus (vitium consensus) in accepting his election is precisely due to the obvious alienation of his governing and teaching activities to what every Catholic of every age expects from the Vicar of Christ and successor of the Prince of the Apostles. Everything Bergoglio does is an insult and provocation to the entire Catholic Churchits saints of all times, the martyrs killed for Odium Fidei, and the popes of all times up to the Second Vatican Council.

This is also and above all an offense against the divine Head of the Church, our Lord Jesus Christ, whose sacred authority Bergoglio claims to exercise to the detriment of the Mystical Body, with an approach too systematic and coherent to appear as the fruit of mere incompetence. Through the work of Bergoglio and his circle, the Lord's warning is put into practice: “Beware of false prophets, who come to you in the form of lambs but are in reality ravening wolves” (Mt 7:15). I am honored not to have ecclesial communion with them – nor do I want to: they operate a lobby that conceals its complicity with the masters of the world in order to deceive many souls and prevent any resistance to the establishment of the kingdom of the Antichrist.

In view of the accusations of the Dicastery, I claim, as Successor of the Apostles, to be in full communion with the Roman Catholic Apostolic Church.with the Magisterium of the Roman Pontiffs and with the unbroken doctrinal, moral and liturgical tradition which they have faithfully preserved.

I reject the neomodernist errors of the Second Vatican Council. and in the so-called ‘post-conciliar magisterium’, particularly in questions of collegiality, ecumenism, religious freedom, the secularity of the state and the liturgy.

I reject the scandals, errors and Heresies of Jorge Mario Bergoglio, who manifests an absolutely tyrannical exercise of powerexercised against the purpose that legitimizes authority in the Church: an authority that is vicarious of the authority of Christ and as such must obey Him alone. This separation of the papacy from its legitimizing principle, namely Christ the High Priest, transforms the ministry into a self-referential tyranny.

No Catholic who deserves the name can be in communion with this “Bergoglian Church.” because he is in clear contradiction and break with all popes in history and with the Church of Christ.

Fifty years ago, Archbishop Marcel Lefebvre was summoned to the same Palace of the Holy Office and accused of schism for rejecting Vatican II. His defense is mine, his words are mine, and his arguments are mine – arguments in front of which the Roman authorities could not condemn him for heresy, but had to wait until he ordained bishops in order to have the pretext of declaring him a schismatic and then lifting his excommunication when he was already dead. The pattern repeats itself even after half a century has proven the prophetic decision of Archbishop Lefebvre.

In these times of apostasy, Catholics will find in the pastors who remain faithful to the mission of our Lord an example and an encouragement to remain in the truth of Christ.

Depositum custodi, according to the admonition of the Apostle: As the time approaches when I must render an account to the Son of God for all my deeds, I intend to persevere in the bonum certamen And he must not slacken in the witness of faith that is required of everyone who, as a bishop, has been endowed with the fullness of the priesthood and appointed successor of the apostles.

I invite all Catholics to pray that the Lord will come to the aid of his Church and encourage those who are persecuted for their faith.

+ Carlo Maria Viganò, Archbishop

20 June 2024
St. Silverius Pope and Martyr
B.ti Dermitius O'Hurley, Bishop and Martyr

Source: https://exsurgedomine.it/240620-attendite-eng/

WUWT has previously written about the activities of Bergoglia, now known as Pope Francis.

The Catholic Church in the United States has long been a center of resistance to Pope Francis's global push for green communism, but to my knowledge this is the first time such an open split has occurred.

If anyone is causing schism, it is Pope Francis with his outrageous demands that all submit unconditionally to his authority, even when their consciences scream at the radical, woke globalist demands Pope Francis is making of the faithful.

Archbishop Carlo Maria Viganò could have simply submitted. Instead, we see a good man putting his conscience and principles above submission, traveling to Rome to challenge a pope whose demands go far beyond what most would consider a reasonable exercise of religious authority.