I was just remembering today a delightful homily given by Fr. Carl Gismondi two years ago, and I thought I would share a memorable snippet from it in honor of All Saints’ Day. In this homily, he was describing for us the multitudes of white-robed saints and martyrs in heaven, and pointing out that there have undoubtedly been many, many more people who have been saved than the Church will ever formally canonize. Of course, saints are recognized by the Church only so they can serve as examples to us in the Church Militant. Many of history’s truly holy souls may have been utterly forgotten here below, but of course, the just will never be forgotten among the heavenly courts. This is why, as Fr. Gismondi explained, we must have a day for those scores of other saints who we don’t happen to know about individually. So, if you’re in heaven, and you haven’t been given a particular day of your own, then today is your special day.

I find it very comforting to think of those multitudes of holy ones, looking down on us tenderly even though we’re quite ignorant of them. Forgotten saints from across the ages, pray for us!

I attended the sappy, irreverent, obnoxiously feel-good Novus Mass up the street this morning, and it started a train of thought that might in a perverse way be called hopeful. I thought I’d post it here, to see what others think. It’s about Novus hymns, and suffering.

My feelings about Novus hymns reflect, I imagine, the feelings of most of the readers of this blog. The songs are sappy and irritating, and sometimes seem disrespectful as well (as when the congregation is asked to intone words in persona Christi). From a purely musical standpoint, they are mediocre at best, and it seems that the worst ones are always chosen as Communion hymns, making it extremely difficult for me to pray at that time. (I try, but the infernal noise often makes it impossible to lift myself out of the distasteful atmosphere, and sometimes my “prayers” become so uncharitable that I judge it better to give up entirely and just sit in my pew thinking about football or my weekly activities, rather than furthering such unkind and prideful thoughts in the presence of the Lord’s Body.) As with Christian pop music, they seem to skim the lightest, fluffiest, most soothing parts of the faith off the top, without bothering about the really sobering or substantial aspects of Christianity. Needless to say, the result is not inspiring; it’s more like therapy than faith.
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Et per omnium orbem terrarum! Hardly do we need the reminder which comes in the second verse of the hymn at today’s Vespers, “Scelesta turba clamitat: ‘Regnare Christum nolumus!’” While the rabble thus cries in Seoul and throughout the whole world, yet there is a remnant, a faithful flock which, despite the cries of the scelesta turba, proudly and boldy proclaims Christ to be the King of every land and nation. Thus Fr. Thomas Ononda (SSPX/FSSPX) exhorted us before leading us into the streets of Seoul for a Eucharistic Procession in honor of Christ the King.

Ad hoc in aris abderis
Vini dapisque imagine,
Fundens salutem filiis
Transverberato pectore.

For this on Altar dost bide,
In form of wine and feast dost hide,
That from that pierced breast may flow
Salvation’s stream on us below.

The flock at the Immaculate Conception chapel of the SSPX in Seoul, Corea is small, but their reasons for seeking out Tradition are the same as many of ours. For instance, one Corean man there with whom we spoke said that he had been a protestant, had been turned off by the guitars and drums, and so left. But when he found the Catholic Church, the same happy clappy met him. After some reading, he found his way to Latin the Mass.
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Fr. Zuhlsdorf reveals that the Holy Father, in his great benevolence, will insist on Pro Multis being rendered non-idiotically in the upcoming Missal translation, expressly against the concensus of the Bishops. Fr. Z also provides four articles he wrote for The Wanderer arguing the point. Recall, if you will, the humorous scene from 2005:

Bishop Skylstad: All right. Thank you. The next item, then, that we need to discuss is number 58. Who proposed that? Bishop Foley.

Bishop Foley: It’s really a question. You mentioned in your answer “the expressed intention of the Holy See to speak definitively on the question in the near future”. What would be the background of that? Where have you heard that?

Bishop Trautman: Please recall that we did have a consultation on this. Overwhelmingly the American bishops favored the wording that we have now. And we do have some word from the Congregation that this is under active advisement right now. We expect the Holy Father and the Congregation to respond in the near future. So that’s what the response of the committee indicates. But we have declined, at this point, to change it.

Bishop Foley: Because pro multis is used quite extensively in the Scripture. And I look forward to hearing the Holy See, because I feel that it is an important point.

Bishop Trautman: At this point, though, the committee is saying we will stay with the wording that reflects the vast majority of bishops through the consultation. If the Holy See were to change then there will be a proper adjustment.

Bishop Skylstad: Okay, Cardinal George.

Cardinal George: Just to complete the conversation. This was debated at great length in the ICEL Committee itself. And the wording we have here is not only from our own conference’s consultation, but is the choice for all of the ICEL bishops throughout the world. At this point, depending on what the Holy See might raise.

Bishop Skylstad: Okay, thank you. Anyone else? I think that completes the discussion then. Yes, Bishop Cordileone.

Bishop Salvatore Cordileone (aux. San Diego): And I add my thanks to the committee for your Herculean effort here. I just want to reiterate the principle about the significance of Scriptural language. Since “the many” is used throughout Scripture and in the Lectionary why the decision was made to deviate from that principle? If I understand it correctly, it’s different from the principle mentioned by Bishop Roche. And I believe he also had mentioned that in his letter of June 2005.

Bishop Trautman: Again, the committee’s judgment must reflect the results of the consensus of the vast majority of American bishops. It is in possession; it is familiar to our people; it has been used for over thirty-five years. We think there’s a good Biblical foundation for it as well, too. So it’s a difference in prudential judgment here.

Cardinal George: Again, I would say something from the ICEL discussions. The original use of “for all” as a translation for pro multis was approved explicitly by the Holy See at a certain point. The background is somewhat speculative because of the Aramaic. Supposition of what it might have been isn’t very probative.

Other conferences, for example, in French it’s pour la multitude, “for the many”. The basic reason, I would say, for what it’s worth in the argumentation, was to not give force to the argument that some have made, particularly among the Lefebvrites, that our present consecratory words of institution are not valid, that this is in fact a valid translation of the Latin. And the Latin text, though it quotes in a sense Scripture, it is a liturgical text, not a Scriptural text.

In other words, we’re not doing a tableau or a pantomime of the Last Supper when we consecrate bread and wine in the context of the Canon of the Mass. So, it was more a prudential judgment again of where we are right now in the discussions around liturgy, not only within Catholic Communion but also with the Lefebvrite people. Again, I think the Holy See is looking at this with some caution, again, but that is sort of where the argument was, so it was an extrinsic argument, if you like, not an intrinsic from the text itself.

Bishop Skylstad: I think we’re ready for the vote; I don’t see any other hands. Yes, Bishop Bruskewitz.

Bishop Bruskewitz: Are we voting on 52, or whatever that one is?

Bishop Skylstad: Fifty-eight, number 58. I think we’re ready for the vote. All of those in favor of Bishop Foley’s intervention, amendment say “aye”. [Weak “aye”]. Those opposed. [Strong “no”]. Obviously the “no”s have it. Thank you.

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I’d like to commend to the attention of our readers, especially our readers on college campuses, the following invitation from Mr. Stephen Heiner of True Restoration:

The Angelus is getting ready to launch a “student offensive” by sending posters to various Catholic colleges – both Traditional and otherwise – in an attempt to stir interest in the various issues it discusses, be it religious or cultural. I am trying to help promote this project.

Please send email addresses and telephone numbers of college students you know that would be willing to help support the Angelus by placing these posters in prominent places or near offices/high traffic areas to truerestoration@gmail.com

These posters offer a special $4.95 six month subscription (with a $19.99 one year renewal rate) to all college students and are well and attractively designed.

Please try and get names and numbers to me by November 5th.

Stephen Heiner
TrueRestoration.com

This was the last night of 40 Hours devotions at St. Alphonsus in Baltimore. Beginning on Sunday with a high Votive Mass of the Blessed Sacrament, procession and chanted Litany of Saints, it ended tonight with another procession and chanted Litany, as well as benediction. St. Alphonsus has the great distinction of having as its first Rector St. John Nepomucene Neumann, who later as Bishop of Philadelphia initiated the wonderful practice of maintaining continual 40 hours devotions throughout his dioceses by designating a parish for each weekend of the year. The german Redemptorists continued at St. Alphonsus until 1917 – Blessed Francis Xavier Xeelos also served as Rector during this period – when it was transferred to the Archdiocese and a large Lithuanian parish. The Messe de toujours is said at 11:30AM on Sundays and at 7PM on Holy days of Obligation.

Consider my surprise when a Google news search on “Pope” brought up an article from our very own Cornell American. The American is an amusing conservative publication, once staffed almost exclusively by Catholics, which delights in stirring up trouble on campus. Though some of the content is questionable, it has initiated a number of protests, much to its credit. The October 23rd cover story (they try to publish once a month) is about a Cornell Catholic Community bulletin which we posted and commented on some time ago. The author, a student known to our Society, speaks without fear in a manner sure to raise division in the Big Red People of God – although I found her piece a little weak for a feature. Then again, even though I might bicker with her arguments, or note her failure to address some of the more outrageous aspects of the original bulletin, I am glad to see Cornell students heeding our call to unending war on the Cornell Catholic Community.

I hope that I won’t try the patience of our readers if I continue to write about the Breviary. Once the old Mass is restored to its proper place within the liturgical life of the Church, some attention, I suppose, will also shift towards considering the state of the other liturgical books from that time, especially the Breviary. I have written before about the fact that many supporters of the old liturgical books are yet convinced that the Breviary, as it stood in 1962, is badly in need of reform. And here, “reform” would really be something true to the word, that is, a return to an older arrangement as, for example, in the psalms to be said at Lauds and Compline.

But one other glaring defect in the 1962 Breviary is the lesson on the Gospel at Matins on Sundays. While I have remarked this defect before and even given an example of it, yet this Sunday I noticed a most hideous example of it. The lesson on the Gospel for the 20th Sunday after Pentecost is taken from a homily of St. Gregory the Great. I copy the texts from breviary.net:
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So, I’m going through my mail, and as usual about 50% of it comes from various organizations writing to beg support for this or that good cause. With Thanksgiving and Christmas around the corner, these mailings are soon to double. Given the processes that these organizations go through in collecting names, your stack of junk mail does tend to be somewhat individualized, so maybe other people get different stuff, but mine generally falls into the following categories:

1. Organizations that help people overseas who are very poor or devastated by natural disasters.
2. Religious orders and other Catholic organizations that advertise themselves as defenders of the faith.
3. Academic organizations that claim to support scholarship in some way (including requests from my alma mater), or to fight for intellectual freedom. (A few months ago I was sent a special, personalized invitation to join the ACLU, ha ha.)
4. Organizations that fight the good fight for conservatism in a world swamped with evil liberals.

As a graduate student, it’s pretty much a given that I’m not going to make any organization’s list of top donors. But I do try to give my “widow’s mite” if you will by making small donations here and there. So the question becomes: to whom should we give? I’ve hashed this one out with my students in political philosophy courses, but here I’d like to consider it from a more overtly Catholic perspective.

So, to begin with, a Catholic is obliged to give some of his income to his parish, and this is always the best place to start. You can’t start writing large checks to Save the Children if you aren’t already making substantial donations to your home parish. I can see a possible argument that, unless you are a person of very substantial means, you ought to put all your donations towards the parish. Sort of a “think globally, give locally” philosophy.

If everybody did that, though, then a lot of other charitable causes would suffer, and that would be a shame. I tend to think of giving to my parish as somewhat on par with paying my rent or my bills – it’s important, but it doesn’t really count as almsgiving. I probably ought to give more (for example, perhaps I ought to tithe, which I don’t) but it still seems to me that even the relatively poor might still have the privilege of selecting other charities to which they may donate a few dollars.

Among those charities remaining, one strategy is to give to those who are most desperately needy. This will probably turn you towards internationally-focused organizations like Catholic Relief Services. I’ll put my cards on the table and admit that the bulk of my meager donations do go to those kinds of organizations. I am really concerned about the needs of the global poor, and I always tend to feel that I can make more of an impact overseas, where I know from experience that even very small amounts of money can mean a lot. I like giving to organizations like CRS because it seems most obviously to be helping the poor, and it doesn’t seem too overtly political. And Our Lord does seem to have commanded us to do this when he told his parable of the sheep and goats. “For you saw me hungry,” he tells the sheep, “and you gave me meat. You saw me thirsty and gave me drink.” I guess we all know how it ends. Taking his words literally, internationally-focused organizations are attractive, because the developing world has a lot more hungry, thirsty or homeless people than we have in the United States.

However, there is also a strong case to be made for supporting more directly Catholic organizations, like, for example, religious orders. I often get requests for money from orders of priests or nuns advertising that they have a “vocation problem” – so many vocations that they can’t feed and house them all. Obviously, there is a keen need for more religious in the world today, and particularly if they are contemplatives, they will have to depend on the generosity of others. Surely that is a worthy cause? Or consider, as another example, the five Catholic families who sponsored Mother Angelica’s Shrine of the Blessed Sacrament. I am persuaded that this wonderful place is going to grow steadily in popularity as a pilgrimage destination; anyone who hasn’t been there yet should definitely plan to go. It’s absolutely beautiful, a magnificent temple for Our Lord – and the building of it clearly took millions. That money could have gone a long way in a microcredit program or a disaster relief effort… but somehow I can’t feel that the families who (anonymously) put up the money made a mistake. In our times we’ve almost lost a sense of the importance of building beautiful things for God, and we need more places like this.

There might also be something to be said for trying to give to organizations that have benefited you or others close to you, or that might benefit your own community. We might reasonably feel obligations of loyalty to those with whom we have some kind of connection, which might mean literal neighbors, compatriots, fellow Catholics, members of one’s own ethnic group, and so forth. This might inspire us to give money, not to CRS, who will spirit your money away to help people you’ll never see or know, but rather to a local food bank or safehouse or crisis pregnancy center (and here, in addition to our money, we might also be able to give our time.) It might inspire us to take money out of our pocket and give it to a beggar or a Salvation Army bell-ringer. We might feel obligated, too, towards organizations that helped us out in some way. This is why schools and high school/university clubs always rely on their own alums as a steady source of support. The Royal Banner (the student newspaper of Fairview High School in Boulder, CO) may not be the neediest organization on Earth, but I have many happy memories of my time working for that little publication a decade or so ago, so I might reasonably feel a debt of gratitude towards them which would inspire me to give. This doesn’t seem like a bad thing. After all, human community is very important and necessary to life, and building communities involves forming particular loyalties. Sometimes it might be good to show our support through financial donations.

Finally, we might feel some draw to give to those who most obviously fight the ideological battles that we identify as worthy. This might mean giving to the Thomas More Society, or to pro-life organizations around the country. Or we might give to printing presses like TAN that publish books that we want to keep in print. We might even, if we really like a particular candidate, give money to support a campaign or to a lobbyist group to push a particular issue. Given the amount of confusion and doubt in the world, “idea-pushing” donations don’t seem like a waste, and they can give you the satisfying of having expressed your views through your pocketbook.

I’ve already said that I give most of my extra donations to international aid organizations; I also make occasional donations to particular Catholic groups (i.e. religious orders.) No matter how many trees are killed in urging me, I never give money to 1) my alma mater, 2) any political campaign, 3) the Phi Beta Kappa Society, 4) other “cause-based” organizations like the Thomas More Society or Ave Maria University. With the money I earn, I’m not going to be able to transform the world through material giving in any case, but at someplace like Ave Maria my check might cover, say, one morning’s sprinkler bill. That just doesn’t give me a winning feeling.

The bottom line is that there are so many worthy causes that, no matter how much or little you can afford to give, it can be tough and even agonizing deciding who is most worthy. What should be the most important determining factor? Dire need? Closeness to God? Closeness of connection to ourselves? Closeness to Truth? Or is there some way to strike a nice balance between these? I open this subject up to our readers. To whom do you give financial donations? How do you choose? What is the most Christian way to “give alms?”
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Well the blog has been quiet the last few days. I suspect our main contributor is out of touch for a bit, so I thought I’d throw something up just for fun.