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We post this link with trepidation and guarded hope: Rorate Caeli, quoting the italian Archivum, claims that the long-awaited universal indult freeing the traditional Mass may have been signed by His Holiness already, yesterday! We await confirmation with bated breath.
Archive for March, 2006
Universal Indult? Rumor Crescit
Patriarch of the West vs. King Mswati III
I was looking through today’s pictures of the Arena Liturgy at everyone’s favorite Religious Education Conference (see here for more…) and I realized what the good Patriarch’s dancing girls remind me of: Swaziland’s Umhlanga, or Reed Dance, where more than 25,000 scantily clad virgins dance before the King for the chance to be one of his many wives. Not that the King isn’t a Christian - he has just, as we say, fallen into unsound doctrines. Perhaps he needs to study more closely that Synod proposal which I so unwisely dismissed in the first days of this blog.
A Prayer for Peace
I’m not the kinda guy to post “peace prayers” but I thought some of you might like this one . . .
I returned from Corea on Tuesday night and, though it’s now Thursday night, I’m still not sure what universe I’m living in. I took the long way home, got hit with one delay, and had a slight cold on top of it, so I’ve been slow getting up some of the good stuff I found during my 10 days in Seoul. It will take me a little while to get up all the stuff I would like to post, but I thought that I would start with this gem of prayer I found permanently affixed to the wall in the Lady Chapel at the Shrine of the Corean martyrs in Mirinae.
Ah, they don’t write’em like they did in old days, eh?
I guess the idea is that this prayer was to be said between each decade of the Rosary? That’s serious. I’m scandalized by those comments about Russia, the pagans, and the so-called “evil” inhabitants of the country. Weren’t they afraid of offending those people? Surely, dialogue would have been a better road than this name calling business.
For ease of distribution, I’ve typed out the prayer:
Inter-decade Prayer of Rosary for Peace (17 November 1948)
Lord Jesus Christ, forgive our sins, take care of the pagans for the peace of our nation and lead the evil minds among them who persecute [the] Lord God onto the just path, redeem Russia for the peace of the world. Sacred Heart of [our] Lord Jesus Christ, Immaculate Heart of [the] Virgin Mary, make our hearts like the heart of our Lord.
Make this world free of evil inhabitants and tolerate our prayers offered with distraction. The most Sacred Heart of [our] Lord Jesus Christ, the Most Immaculate Heart of [the] Virgin Mary make our hearts fervent.
Imprimatur: Bishop Daniel H. Tji
Litany of Saints vs. the People of God
Ever since Ambrosius first gave me Bugnini’s “Reform of the Liturgy,” I’ve been meaning to post this gem. Anyone who has spent much time going through the Latin prayers at the end of the Litany of Saints knows just how awesome they are. Unfortunately, awesomeness does not count for much when stared down by the Consilium, that solemn body charged with bringing the tired and ancient liturgy to the People of God. The first two principles of revision listed by Bugnini on page 327 of his tome are the elimination of doublets, and…
-to revise the text, that is, to make a new list of saints that would be more universal in its inclusion of historical periods and parts of the world; to re-examine the various categories of saints; and to correct some formulas in the third part that were no longer in harmony with the spirit of the conciliar documents (for example: “that you would humble the enemies of holy Church”; “that you would restore to the unity of the Church all who have gone astray and lead all unbelievers to the light of the Gospel”)
Schism, together, eh?
This 26 page statement by the Canadian Religious Conference has been making the rounds recently. The document notes several issues, and then lists things recognized, regretted, and hoped for about each in the Canadian Church. Though reading it in its entirety is liable to cause brain damage, I think a few classic lines bear repetition, so here is lent-appropriate selection:
- [We recognize] That communal celebrations of reconciliation with general absolution are the occasion of a beautiful catechesis on the mercy of God.
- [We regret] The unconditional alignment of our Church with directives issued from Rome: the disappearance of the practice of general absolution in communal celebrations;
- [We regret] The prohibition, by Roman authorities, from holding communal celebrations of penance with general absolution despite the fact that the People of God had expressed their positive support for this practice.
- [We hope] That our Bishops intervene with Roman authorities to seek the recognition and restoration of the practice of general absolution, at the very least during high times of the liturgical year: Advent and Lent.
I think I finally understand their motto, “Together for a reconciled world“.
Popes and Patrons through Modern Glass
A-visiting this Sunday in the realm of His Most Recent Eminence Sean Cardinal Patrick O’Malley deep in the heart of historical witch-country, I decided to play the good ecumenical officer, and deign to spin-the-bottle, as it were, with the local Catholic parish, St. Richards of Danvers.
We all know the marks of your average American parish, and all were there, including that liturgical signature - holy water fonts dry and draped purple. What really grabbed my attention though, and made me so glad I brought my camera, were the stained glass windows. You see, this parish was built in 1967, the very cusp of the liturgical revolution, when the Popes we love to quote were still well known to Catholics. And what thing more natural than to remember them in stained glass, albeit in a certain modern style and under interesting, but happy titles. Remember you can click to enlarge the photos…
My first and worst picture is of Pope St. Pius V under that grand heading, Reformer of the Liturgy.
Next, we have the now Blessed Pope Pius IX (but strangely listed as a Saint), under a title which I think he would have approved - Proclaimer of the Immaculate Conception.
I’m sure Iosephus will hearken to the likeness of that stately pontiff Leo XIII, whom we all know as Patron of Working Men.
Finally, our patron St. Pius X, whose image was so gallantly placed over the entrance to the side room reserved for the Blessed Sacrament, and remembered as the Sponsor of Early Communions.
Miracles Mundane
A couple Sundays back, a delegation of the Cornell Society for a Good Time was in Scranton, at St. Michael’s, after Mass, to hear Mr. Dale Ahlquist, President of the American Chesteron Society. None of the group has a particular love of affair with Chesterton, as some Catholics do, but we were curious enough to hear what Mr. Ahlquist had to say. He shared some passages from Chesterton relating to the Blessed Sacrament; the talk wasn’t exactly memorable, but I did come away thinking about the title which Mr. Ahlquist has given to Chesterton, “The Apostle of Common Sense.”
This title came back to me as I read Lectio III from the old Roman Breviary (not to be confused with the old old Roman Breviary) for the fourth Sunday in Lent. The reading was from Tractatus 24 on the Gospel of St. John by St. Augustine.
The miracles, which our Lord Jesus Christ performed, are indeed divine works, and they move the human mind, by means of visible things, to perceive God. For He is not such a substance as may be seen with the eyes; and His miracles, by which He rules the whole world and governs the entire creation, are accounted nothing by their constant occurence, so much so that hardly a soul deigns to notice the marvelous and stupendous works of God in any grain of seed: according to His own mercy, He has reserved certain miracles to himself, which He performs, at an opportune occasion, beyond the common course and order of nature; in order that they might marvel by seeing, not greater things which they had despised as daily occurences, but those to which they are unaccustomed.
Miracula, quae fecit Dominus noster Iesus Christus, sunt quidem divina opera, et ad intellegendum Deum de visibilibus admonent humanam mentem. Quia enim ille non est talis substantia, quae videri oculis possit; et miracula eius, quibus totum mundum regit, universamque creaturam administrat, assiduitate viluerunt, ita ut pene nemo dignetur attendere opera Dei mira et stupenda in quolibet seminis grano: secundum ipsam suam misericordiam servavit sibi quaedam, quae faceret opportuno tempore praeter usitatum cursum ordinemque naturae; ut non maiora, sed insolita videndo stuperent, quibus cotidiana viluerant.
St. Augustine’s words reminded me of the following passage from Chesteron’s Orthodoxy:
All the towering materialism which dominates the modern mind rests ultimately upon one assumption; a false assumption. It is supposed that if a thing goes on repeating itself it is probably dead; a piece of clockwork. People feel that if the universe was personal it would vary; if the sun were alive it would dance. This is a fallacy even in relation to known fact. For the variation in human affairs is generally brought into them, not by life, but by death; by the dying down or breaking off of their strength or desire. A man varies his movements because of some slight element of failure or fatigue. He gets into an omnibus because he is tired of walking; or he walks because he is tired of sitting still. But if his life and joy were so gigantic that he never tired of going to Islington, he might go to Islington as regularly as the Thames goes to Sheerness. The very speed and ecstacy of his life would have the stillness of death. The sun rises every morning. I do not rise every morning; but the variation is due not to my activity, but to my inaction. Now, to put the matter in a popular phrase, it might be true that the sun rises regularly because he never gets tired of rising. His routine might be due, not to a lifelessness, but to a rush of life. The thing I mean can be seen, for instance, in children, when they find some game or joke that they specially enjoy. A child kicks his legs rhythmically through excess, not absence, of life. Because children have abounding vitality, because they are in spirit fierce and free, therefore they want things repeated and unchanged. They always say, “Do it again”; and the grown-up person does it again until he is nearly dead. For grown-up people are not strong enough to exult in monotony. But perhaps God is strong enough to exult in monotony. It is possible that God says every morning, “Do it again” to the sun; and every evening, “Do it again” to the moon. It may not be automatic necessity that makes all daisies alike; it may be that God makes every daisy separately, but has never got tired of making them. It may be that He has the eternal appetite of infancy; for we have sinned and grown old, and our Father is younger than we. The repetition in Nature may not be a mere recurrence; it may be a theatrical encore. Heaven may encore the bird who laid an egg. If the human being conceives and brings forth a human child instead of bringing forth a fish, or a bat, or a griffin, the reason may not be that we are fixed in an animal fate without life or purpose. It may be that our little tragedy has touched the gods, that they admire it from their starry galleries, and that at the end of every human drama man is called again and again before the curtain. Repetition may go on for millions of years, by mere choice, and at any instant it may stop. Man may stand on the earth generation after generation, and yet each birth be his positively last appearance.
This was my first conviction; made by the shock of my childish emotions meeting the modern creed in mid-career. I had always vaguely felt facts to be miracles in the sense that they are wonderful: now I began to think them miracles in the stricter sense that they were wilful. I mean that they were, or might be, repeated exercises of some will.
The Rochester Diocese “Orthodoxy Hotline”
I believe that I have finally found a group in the diocese of Rochester I can support: CREDO:
CREDO Rochester, Inc. is a not-for-profit Catholic lay apostolate that is located in Rochester, NY. We are a dedicated group of orthodox Catholics who are completely faithful to the Church’s Magisterium. Our apostolate was formed in response to the obligation of all Catholics to be engaged in both the corporal and spiritual works of mercy. We are engaged in this obligation on two fronts.
First, we believe that the spreading of the gospel message is essential to the success of our ministry. It is essential, in this age of moral confusion, that more and more people understand the truths that are taught by the Catholic faith. . . .
Secondly, we are very involved in pro-life ministry in the Rochester area. CREDO is the American Life League Associate (ALL) group in Rochester. . .
By far my favorite aspect of the site, though, is their Orthodoxy Hotline, of which they say:
This page is for those of you who have a particular concern about questionable activities in your parish or in the Rochester Diocese at large. Many times we hear complaints about liturgical irregularities or teaching errors in the Rochester area. Many of you have tried to have these concerns addressed, but have met with indifference or resistance. Our purpose here is to process your particular concern and relate it to the proper authority.
They look pretty thin in their offerings as yet, though. Perhaps they are new? In any event, they are clearly seeking a Good Time, and of that quest we cannot but heartily approve.
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Polemics and Politeness
It is occasionally said of the members of this Society that we are too strident in our rhetoric; that we might “catch more flies with honey than vinegar”; or that we are not properly filled with Christian charity, what with our criticisms of sodomites and occasionally polemical language. While I will not vouch for the impeccability of anyone who writes here, these criticisms are more a reflection of the sorry state of modern Christians’ historical perspective and a rather profound misapprehension of what constitutes that great virtue of Charity. Sometimes, like Hamlet, one must be cruel only to be kind.
To help illustrate this, I excerpt a passage from a very nice article by David Mills, Recovering the Art of Christian Polemics:
Most well-read Christians know the two most famous stories of the early Church’s approach to dialogue. St. Polycarp tells us that the apostle John once went to the public bath in Ephesus and found inside a Gnostic teacher named Cerinthus. John ran out crying, “Let us fly, lest even the bath-house fall down, because Cerinthus, the enemy of the truth, is within.”
Polycarp himself once met the heretic Marcion walking down the street. Marcion hated the creator-God of the Hebrews, and to get rid of Him had tossed out the Old Testament and much of the New and rewrote the bits he kept. Marcion asked Polycarp, “Do you know me?” and Polycarp answered, “I do know you. You are the firstborn of Satan.”
The point of quoting this is not just to remind us all of what cool guys Sts. John and Polycarp were, though it also serves that purpose. The point is to realize that it was not uncharitable for them, and it is not uncharitable for us, sometimes — indeed, quite often — to call a spade a spade, or a sin a sin. As I have often discussed with Iosephus, we are all of us tainted with the spirit of modernism — we are loath to insist strongly on the truths of the Faith or the prerogatives of the Church. We all believe in dialogue and hate making enemies. Many of us, indeed, have a nagging temptation towards the heresy of Origen — that Satan either doesn’t really exist, or if he does that, well, can’t we just make some sort of a mutually beneficial arrangement with him, just for a time? One wouldn’t want to be extreme, would one?
Well, occasionally, yes, we have to be extremists. Not in the sense of abandoning logic or becoming fanatics, as that word seems to imply, but in the sense of being unyielding: to make others, and ourselves, stand out a bit — or a lot — because of our adherence to the truths of the Gospel and, these days, to the truths of the natural law with which God made men. It makes us uneasy to do so — divisive, unfriendly, dogmatic! But as Fr. Bryce Sibley reminds us in a recent podcast, we cannot, we must not dialogue with evil. And part of what we do, as charitable Christians, is do whatever it takes to avoid dialogue with evil, conversation with Satan — both for ourselves and for those whom we love, which includes everyone. And sometimes you might have to yell at someone a bit to make him stop talking with Satan. And that’s ok. Not all the time, of course — tireless advocates of patient, peaceful conversation and conversion whenever possible, we! — but God gave us righteous indignation for a purpose. Let’s not be afraid to use it.
De Nyew Testament
I read a fascinating article in the Wall Street Journal today on the Gullah New Testament, or, in Gullah, De Nyew Testament. Being a huge fan of the most popular work ever written in Gullah, Joel Chandler Harris’ Tales of Uncle Remus, and its corresponding movie version, and Disney’s best, Song of the South, I decided to look a little deeper into this translation, which you can buy here.
Very quietly noted in the WSJ article is that the main author is working with Wycliffe Bible Translators. It would be right to regard suspiciously the intentions of any group that takes its name from such a vile and impious heretic, but this Adoremus article from 1997 denounces this very translation, or at least its rendering of the Gospel of Luke.
My favorite line, quoted from that Adoremus article, is de nyew version of the institution narrative:
Luke 22:19, 20
De Good Nyews: Jedus take some bread an tank God. Den e broke de bread op, gem ta e postle dem. E say, “Dis bread me body wa A gibe ta God fa oona sake. Oona mus eat um fa memba me.”
Same way, atta de Passoba suppa, Jedus take de cup ob wine and gem ta e postle dem. E say, “De wine een dis cup is de nyew greement tween God an e people. A da make dat greement come true wid me blood, wen A gree fa leh people kill me fa oona sake.
Now that’s the kind of inculturation that ought to get into the new Eucharistic prayers!
With allies like this, who needs terrorists?
As we all know, Afghanistan’s Taliban government was overthrown several years ago by American and allied forces. What many Americans do not know is to what extent the current government of Afghanistan is run according to Sharia (the Mohammedan religious code). The most recent example: one Abdul Rahman. Rahman, age 41, has been charged with the crime of having converted from Islam to Christianity (of what precise denomination, I do not know). According to Afghan law, he is subject to the death penalty and is being prosecuted accordingly. Is this why so many young Americans went over to Afghanistan and died — so Afghans would focus on killing their own Christian countrymen instead of attacking us? With allies like this, who needs terrorists? For more information, see also Pat Buchanan’s column.
New Indults in Diocese of Arlington
Breaking news in Arlington, VA is that Bishop Paul Loverde, the much reviled successor to famed conservative Bishop John Keating, has decided to permit two new indult Tridentine Masses in his Diocese, in the cities of Arlington itself and Front Royal, VA, home of Christendom College. The two priests given the right to say these indult Masses are Fathers Christopher Mould and Edward Hathaway, the latter pictured below at his parish, St. John the Baptist in Front Royal. More in keeping with his modernist history, his Excellency has also, alas, decided to permit that abomination: female altar servers!
Of course, God willing, we may have a Papal widening of the use of the old Rite very soon. But in any event, more Bishops giving even grudging permission for the widening of the availability of the Traditional Rite is always good news. The allowance of female altar servers is much more saddening: Arlington, once a veritable fertile crescent for priestly vocations, is now joining the deplorable “mainstream”. Let us hope that many good priests exercise their right to continue to bar women from serving the altar despite their bishop’s cowardly allowance of this insidious practice.
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A New Eucharistic Miracle in Dallas, TX?
The internet is a bearer of all manner of news, and so we of the Society for a Good Time are ever wary of surprising reports of prodigies that bear no means of external authentication. We thus mention this story to our readers in hopes of spreading awareness of its existence, with the hope that some one will be able to provide us with more information on this purported happening, which was passed on to us, with some measure of healthy scepticism, by one of our Society’s dear friends. Note that St. James Church is in Oak Cliff, part of the city and diocese of Dallas, TX.
Update: It appears the “blood” coloring comes from the growth of bacteria and is therefore not miraculous. Sorry, folks!
It has been said that a month ago someone received Holy Communion at Mass and either threw up in or just spat the Host in a waste basket. A man found It and told the priest. The priest put the Consecrated Host in a glass of water and covered the glass and set it aside. He forgot about The Host until this last Sunday and told a man to check on the glass to see if the Host was dissolved. The water in the glass had gone down a bit, but the Host was not dissolved, so he pour some fresh water in the glass and immediately the Host began to bleed.
Our Bishop was out of town but will be back in Tuesday and is suppose to go to the church to investigate.
No one seems to know how long the Host will remain at St. James Church, but the church will open at 9:00 am this Tuesday for people to come and see the Host.
Russian Religion v. Sodomy, Again
The Patriarch of the Russian Orthodox, Alexis II, that fierce enemy of phony ecumenism and fearful schismatic, has nonetheless joined his fellow Bishops and the Chief Mufti of Russia’s Muslims in a new inter-religious initiative for pastorally confronting homosexuality:
In his letter to the Moscow Mayor, Alexis explained the position of the Orthodox Church saying, “the Church has invariably supported the institution of the family and condemns untraditional relations, seeing them as a vicious deviation from God-given human nature.” He continued, “The Church treats people with such inclinations with pastoral responsibility urging them to reform and resolutely opposes any attempts to present this sinful tendency as a ‘norm’ and example to follow. The Church does not accept any propaganda for immorality.”
I guess this is why the Communists use to brand political enemies as gays to destroy their character: they’re a pretty intolerant lot over there in the so-called third Rome!
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Consistory and SSPX News Week
As many of our readers may know, this week of the Incarnation is a big one, and not just because there will be a new group of Cardinals created at its end. This is because of the steady stream of rumors and reports that some document will be released, or at least discussed, by the Pope this week regarding the FSSPX and the old Rite of the Mass. The purpose of this post is merely to direct those among our readers who are interested to the very fine coverage of these reports provided by Rorate Caeli.
I would also note that this being Spring Break here at Cornell, I am left with the defense of the blog while our other usual contributors wander the wider world. So if you don’t like things so much this week, fret not: we’ll be back to normal next week.
St. Louis-Marie de Montfort,
Pope St. Pius X,
St. Joseph,
St. Ambrose of Milan,
St. Thomas Aquinas,
St. Francis (and St. Clare),
St. Catherine of Siena,
St. Alphonsus Ligouri,
St. John Chrysostom,