From: Louise
Dear Fr. Moderator:
I agree with all that is said by our beloved Pope St. Pius V and agree that the Novus Ordo is not Catholic, but help me -- I have been told that a pope can overturn another pope's ruling and that this is what JPII has done; that no one pope can bind a future pope. Help clarify, please.
Fr. Moderator Replies.
This is a false line that the Novus Ordo tries to put over as an excuse for destroying the true Mass and substituting a Protestant service. All popes are sworn in fact and by virtue of the office of the papacy to be the guardians of Sacred Tradition. They have no authority to change it. Otherwise, they set themselves above Christ and become blasphemers.
In accidental matters, of course, a positive law can be changed. For example, the pope can increase the number of cardinals (whether it be wise or not). However, in essential matters, all popes are supposed to be serving the same Tradition and can certainly bind for the future.
For example, Pope Pius IX defined the doctrine of the Immaculate Conception in 1854 and bound the whole Church to it as a matter of dogma. Could his successor Pope Leo XIII rescind that dogma? Of course not.
Another example. Pope St. Pius V formally defined the precedential rite of Holy Mass, the Mass of the Roman Rite, the rite of the Apostolic See, handed down from St. Peter in accordance with Sacred Tradition. Can some future pope rescind that decree pertaining to the central doctrine and practice of the Church, and substitute some "New Mass" outside of Apostolic Tradition? Of course not.
Moreover, every doctrinal decree of twenty oecumenical councils, which after all must be promulgated by a pope, is certainly binding on the future. Could a modern pope rescind the doctrinal decrees of the Council of Nicaea, from which we get the Nicene Creed? Of course not.
It appears that you are speaking to one of those "lay theologians," who speak about matters they do not understand. Next time someone tells you that a pope cannot bind a future pope, you can tell him he's dead wrong. Popes are subservient to the Deposit of Faith, Sacred Scripture and Sacred Tradition, and have no authority to change it. If he doesn't accept that point, tell him that it is a dogma defined at Vatican I and that if he denies that doctrine, he's a heretic.
From: Fr. Moderator
Once again the New Order shows that it is not part of the Roman Catholic Church.
Here is what the pope said:
It shall be unlawful henceforth and forever throughout the Christian world to sing or to read Masses according to any formula other than that of this [Traditional Roman] Missal published by Us; this ordinance to apply to all churches and chapels, with or without care of souls, patriarchal, collegiate, and parochial, be they secular or belonging to any religious Order, whether of men (including the military Orders) or of women, in which conventual Masses are or ought to be sung aloud in choir or read privately according to the rites and customs of the Roman Church.
Furthermore, by these presents and by virtue of Our Apostolic authority We give and grant in perpetuity that for the singing or reading of Mass in any church whatsoever, this [Traditional Roman] Missal may be followed absolutely, without any scruple of conscience or fear of incurring any penalty, judgment or censure, and may be freely and lawfully used. Nor shall bishops, administrators, canons, chaplains, and other secular priests, or religious of whatsoever Order or by whatsoever title designated, be obliged to celebrate Mass otherwise than enjoined by Us. We likewise order and declare that no one whosoever shall be forced or coerced into altering this [Traditional Roman] Missal and that this present Constitution can never be revoked or modified, but shall for ever remain valid and have the force of law. Pope St. Pius V, Quo Primum.
Thus, the pope clearly speaks of the Traditional Latin Mass as not only a right, but an obligation. Yet against this perpetual Apostolic decree, we have some petty potentate Perl of the "Ecclesia Dei" Commission on January 18, 2003, responding to an inquirer in direct contradiction of this pope, concerning SSPX Masses:
You also state in your letter that the Holy Father has given you a "right" to the Mass according to the 1962 Roman Missal. This is not correct. It is true that he has asked his brother Bishops to be generous in providing for the celebration of this Mass, but he has not stated that it is a "right." Presently it constitutes an exception to the Church's law and may be granted when the local Bishop judges it to be a valid pastoral service and when he has the priests who are available to celebrate it.
This is just another instance of a Novus Ordo jezebel attempting to deprive the orthodox Roman Catholic faithful of their right and obligation to the Roman Catholic Mass. In this ecclesiocrat's letter, the Immemorial Mass of the St. Peter and the Apostolic Roman See is reduced to a mere "valid pastoral service"! I challenge anyone to read the papal decree and have any doubt about the Apostolic Tradition that Pope St. Pius V was guaranteeing to all Catholics in perpetuity.
Why anyone would rationally believe that such people should be trucked with, negotiated with, let alone "obeyed," is beyond credulity. Just as in the time of Pope St. Pius X, non-Catholics have invaded the highest offices of the Church, and to protect the Church, they must be routed out as aggressively and unconditionally in our time as did that sainted pope in his time.
Dear Fr. Moderator:
I, a Britain, recently contributed to a U.S., allegedly "Catholic" web site discussion and, although it was clear from replies that my views found a deafening echo among readers, my submission was expunged after publication. Clearly, the leader judged me opprobrium hominum et abjectio plebis.
The discussion was "our pope" and whether he had fixed the rules for the election of his successor. I suggested that this was small beer when one considered that this pope and his "brothers in the episcopate" had attempted to suppress the Catholic Mass and Catholic Sacraments, only to give us ersatz replacements.
I confess that I used the expression "bastard worship service, bastard rites, and bastard presbyterate." I had no intention of offending anyone's sensibilities, but the word "bastard" means "illegitimate, adulterated, and plainly not what it should be." The truth is great and not only must prevail, but must, on occasion, be shouted from the rooftops.
What is this spineless avoidance of frank and free debate? Why do these "Catholics" feel that false obedience to purple or scarlet is more important than anything else, even to the point of shutting their eyes and stopping their ears when they see or hear that which they do not like? Aures habent et non audiunt?
Fr. Moderator Replies.
Yours is a common experience of traditional Catholics when they deal with conservative "chat" sites. That is one of many reasons I don't recommend that people waste time in them. Invariably, it is a question of caeci caecos ducunt, "lay theologians" who simply want to prattle mindlessly and purposelessly like the Areopagites in the Acts of the Apostles, upon whom St. Paul turned his back.
That is one of the main reasons why TRADITIO has never been a "chat" site. Rather, it consists of answers and commentaries by a seasoned observer of the Traditional Catholic Movement for over 40 years, and other correspondents from inside the Vatican, inside traditional organizations, and around the world.
The worst thing that you can do against the Novus Ordo is to speak the truth. Since it is in essence based on a lie, a "New Order," it hates the light of truth. Therefore, it ruthlessly attempts to suppress the truth. And this organization that like to call itself the Church of Love barbarically puts down those who speak the traditional Faith by threats and defamations.
The New Order is basically a schoolyard bully, who backs off when you confront him. His power lies in people's fear of confrontation. That is why the Traditional Catholic Movement must confront Novus Ordoism at every turn and, in doing so, will win far more battles than it loses.
Dear Fr. Moderator:
The SSPX, besides using the rubrics of John XXIII, does a number of other strange things. For example, the readings are in the vulgar tongue, except for High Mass, when they are chanted in Latin and immediately afterwards (not during the sermon) repeated in the vulgar tongue as if that were all that necessary. Masses are dialogue Masses. I wrote to the now banished District Director, but he told me that nothing traditional is at stake here. I find this hypocritical.
Fr. Moderator Replies.
Hypocritical, perhaps, but certainly dead wrong. Historically, we know that the vulgarization of the Epistle and Gospel was the first step that the Anglican heretics took to disassemble the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass. Now, the invalid Anglican service is all in the vulgar tongue, just as is the Novus Ordo service.
We also know from the writings of the Modernist "liturgiacs," as Fr. DePauw once called them, that their plan was to introduce a counterfeit "New Mass" by first introducing "readings" in the vulgar tongue. That they did in the "Transitional Mass" of 1965. With that start, by 1967 the words of Consecration had been changed to invalidity, and by 1969 an entirely "New Mass," in which only about one-third of the Traditional Latin Mass remained, was imposed by force upon the Church.
Whenever this subject of the Epistle and Gospel at the altar comes up, I get messages from SSPXers on both sides. I think that it is fair to say that some sites do it; others don't. If it is in fact the "official" policy of the SSPX to do it, there are certainly many sites that don't. From the many correspondents that TRADITIO has within the SSPX, its bishops, priests, and laity, I know that there are many who do not share the error of the banished District Director and refuse the profanation of introducing the vulgar tongue at the altar.
However, a distinction must be made here between this profanation of the Holy Sacrifice at the altar and the acceptable practice of reading the Epistle and Gospel in the vernacular before the sermon from the pulpit after the celebrant has removed himself from the altar and seated himself at the sedile. At that point, according to the rubricians, Holy Mass has been suspended, as the sermon is not part of Mass. Only when the celebrant returns to the altar for the Credo (if said) or Offertory antiphon does Mass resume again.
Although the Johannine rubrical changes of 1960 are of dubious quality (and affect the Divine Office more than the Mass), being in the line of the changes introduced in 1956 by the Modernists (like Bugnini) who had already insinuated themselves into the Vatican during the reign of Pius XII, as is the case with the "dialogue" Mass, they certainly do not invalidate the Mass. It is unfortunate, however, that the SSPX has chosen to go with this "modernized" version (1962) instead of staying with the traditional form before 1956, which is certainly the safest thing to do. In fact, there are a number of SSPX priests who reject the 1960 (and 1956) rubrics and do remain with the more traditional rubrics before 1956.
This is just another reason why the Traditional Catholic Movement must not be equated with the SSPX exclusively. Even many traditional Catholics are surprised to learn that the SSPX comprises less than one out of five (less than 20%) of all traditional Catholics. It is only because of certain members of the SSPX leadership and the religious ignorance of the secular press that the impression is given that the SSPX is the "only game in town."
Thank the Lord, that is not the case. Whereas the SSPX has done much good, some of its leadership (as opposed to many of its rank-and-file clergy and laity) has displayed a predatory and internecine attitude toward other traditional Catholics that does not reflect well its founder, Abp. Lefebvre, who is described by all as a Catholic gentleman. The leadership's current predilection to "negotiate" with the New Vatican bespeaks a confusion of its real position, or perhaps an attempt to play both extremes of its membership against the middle.
If it should ever happen that the SSPX goes Novus Ordo, as did its satellite Campos, the Lord has well provided that more than four-fifths of the Traditional Catholic Movement will be unaffected. Moreover, even if the SSPX leadership should ever cave in to the Novus Ordo, there is no doubt from the information I have that there would be a schism within the SSPX, in which a large proportion of the clergy and faithful, and at least one bishop, would remain loyal to the traditional faith and form another organization if necessary, just as the SSPV was formed out of the SSPX in the 1980s.
They bamboozled the pope, so that instead of the flail, they received tea in the papal library. They bamboozled their congregations by hiding crimes under bureaucratic processes. But God will not be mocked. Now several Novus Ordo bishops are being charged with conspiracy and racketeering, fraud and conspiracy to commit fraud, and defamation, among other charges. The net has ensnared a coven of Novus Ordo bishops: Manual Moreno of Tucson, Gerald Kicanas of Tucson, and Patrick Ziemann of Santa Rosa. Even William Cardinal Keeler, of Baltimore, has been declared a "participant" in the legal proceedings.
The statement of charges has to be one of the most accurately-put descriptions of the evil corrupting the bishops who rule the Church of the New Order:
Persons in pursuit of their own secular interests who used the structure of the Roman Catholic Church as a shield behind which they could conduct their affairs in wanton and intentional disregard of the criminal and civil law, and in contempt of the tenets of their faith, and in deliberate flaunting of their nominal positions as officials and managers within the Roman Catholic Church.
The only exception I would take is the use of the term Roman Catholic Church. There is nothing of the Roman Catholic Church about this. It is strictly the Counterfeit Church of the New Order.
Finally, the putrifaction of the New Order is being exposed for the rot that it is. This is not a "sex scandal." It is a power trip on the part of the highest "authorities" in the Church, up to and including the pope, who treats the matter as insignificant and serves tea in the papal library to disgraced cardinals rather than using the flail on them.
This is a web of deceit, in which these Novus Ordo bishops put themselves out as "Roman Catholic," all the while chastising true traditional Roman Catholics, at the same time they corrupt their offices and themselves in a web of anti-Catholic words and action. They "approve" the counterfeit "New Mass," but they don't "approve" the Traditional Latin Mass and Sacraments, except maybe a half-hybrid "indult" Mass.
The real question is: when will the Catholic faithful turn their backs once and for all on this "approved" debauchery of the true Faith? One is reminded of St. Gertrude's harsh words against the errant pope of her time. She called him a murderer, and worse than a murderer, because he was killing not just bodies, but souls.
I know that many Catholics are rightfully concerned about abortion, but, in the end, abortion is a grave offense against God's moral law. The Counterfeit Church of the New Order, on the other hand, with its unCatholic "New Mass," "New Sacraments," and "New Doctrine" is blasphemy and sacrilege, and that is an offence directly against the majesty of God Himself -- a far more serious offence, according to traditional Catholic theology, than even abortion is.
These Novus Ordinarians still need to get their priorities straight. Even if they were to stop every abortion, the Sodom and Gomorrah of their New Order would still condemn the New Order far more gravely.
Who is it that:
Why, according to the Virginia-Pilot of June 24, it's a Novus Ordo presbyter, one Thomas Quinlan, of Virgina Beach, Virginia! It would be blasphemy to call this "Catholic."
What to do? Let's write the dean. Oh, no, that won't work. Msgr. Thomas Caroluzza calls this jerk a friend and encourages him. Well, surely the bishop will put his foot down. Oh, no, that won't work. Novus Ordo Bishop Walter Sullivan of Richmond has no problem with it. After all, it was his basilica where the motorcycle gig was staged.
And to add to this New Order extremist presbyter's dossier, he commits two of the cardinal liberal sins: (1) he smokes like a chimney and advocates the same to the "Catholic" school children and (2) he's a dipsomaniac who has been arrested for drunken driving. But even this isn't enough for the Dean and the Bishop to pack him off to a monastery.
Yet I don't blame Quinlan. I do blame Dean Caroluzza and Bishop Sullivan. Even more, I blame the Novus Ordinarian congregation that puts up one second with this nonsense. These individuals are addle-brained enough even to pony up tithes to fund this production!
The solution: quit the Novus Ordo cold. Don't fund it, don't attend it, don't set foot in its buildings. That's how our predecessors in the Church handled these situations. Are we moderns too gutless to do the same? The New Order would come crashing down in short shrift if these simple actions were taken. Without money and a congregation, these Novus Ordo ecclesiocrats would just have to play their church games by themselves.
I suppose that traditional Catholics shouldn't be concerned about this, as the Novus Ordo "communion" is putatively just a piece of bread -- or rather a cookie in most places. However, this matter appears to be sacrilege to most pew Novus Ordinarians, so we cover it.
I have often said in the past that traditional Catholics don't have to speak about the invalidity of the Novus Ordo and its defects of form, matter and intention, because the Church of the Novus Ordo itself makes it clear that what it is doing is not Catholic and not real. Here we have yet another instance in which the Novus Ordo itself admits by its actions that its "communion" is not Catholic.
Remember in 1998 when Southern Baptist Bill Clinton presumed to receive "communion" at a Novus Ordo service in South Africa? He was criticized at the time by American Catholics and media outlets like the New York Post. New Vatican officials, as well as South African bishops, also publicly rebuked Rev. Mohlomi Makabane, the presbyter who "served" him. Then it came to light that the South African bishops themselves had "approved" it.
Oops! The Novus Ordo caught with its pants down again. Of course, these Novus Ordo bishops always deny the truth for the press. It is all part of the Great Deception of the New Order. Invariably, it is later discovered that what was denied was the truth all along -- and they knew it.
Now we have the same thing going on in Canada. (Just shows how much of a paper-tiger the New Vatican is.) The Ottawa Citizen of January 21 reports that the Governor General of Canada, Adrienne Clarkson, a Protestant, receives "communion" regularly at the basilica in Quebec City, at none other than the hands of Archbishop Marcel Gervais himself! Madame is hardly an unknown person: she is the Queen's representative for the entire nation of Canada and is frequently featured in Canadian news.
Now let's get the theological "spin" on this from Rev. Bill Kokesch, a spokesman for the Canadian Conference of Catholic Bishops: "The rule in general is that there is no inter-communion between Catholics and other religions. But what often happens is that when someone might be embarrassed by being turned away, it is not done, just for civility." I've heard sacrilege excused for all kinds of reasons, but for "civility"?
In any case, even if one incident had slipped through on account of surprise or confusion, how does that explain the Governor General's "frequent"? Ah, well, the truth comes out. At least the Protestant Madame is more honest than the Novus Ordo Archbishop. According to her spokesman, Madame, shortly after becoming Governor General, spoke to senior clergy of the archdiocese because she knew that she would be attending funerals and other public services in Roman Catholic churches. She expressed her wish to take communion, and was told it was fine. Of course, the archdiocese can't find any of the "senior clergy" who gave their permission. Sounds like the Clinton lie all over again, doesn't it?
Now let us hear from Msgr. Jean Pelletier: "It is a personal choice. It is difficult to go into consciences. Personally, not only do I not judge her, but I understand her." In effect, he is saying that if Madame wishes to take the cookie, that's a matter for her conscience, not the Novus Ordo's.
Fiddlesticks! This is a matter of public sacrilege. If these Novus Ordo presbyters, monsignori, and archbishops really believe that what they are "serving" is the Body and Blood, Soul and Divinity, of Our Lord Jesus Christ, they would be taking every action possible to ensure that such sacrilege never happened again. There is no indication that any steps whatever have been taken subsequent to this scandal.
The truth of the matter, of course, is that the Church of the Novus Ordo doesn't believe in the Real Presence. In 1992, four out of five presbyters did not, according to a Gallup Poll. One can readily infer that now, over ten years later, that number is pretty close to five out of five.
For the Novus Ordo, "communion" is merely a club token. If you are a member of the club, you get in. If not, you don't, unless a member sponsors you. The Novus Ordo service really has little, if anything, to do with Our Lord Jesus Christ or the Roman Catholic Faith. It simply provides a podium for presbyters and bishops to spout their political beliefs.
Well, that's their reality. The frightening thing is how many pew Novus Ordinarians still promote obedience to this truly sick structure, which once unCatholic is turning anti-Catholic. Pope Paul VI's words in 1972 are now becoming blatantly obvious to anyone who has eyes to see and ears to hear: the Novus Ordo is the "smoke of Satan."
Several TRADITIO correspondents have sent me a news report and asked for comment about the fact that a former seminary student has filed a $2 million lawsuit against the Novus Ordo Diocese of Rockville Centre, Bishop William Murphy and top officials of its seminary, charging they promoted teachings in contradiction to authentic Roman Catholic doctrine.
I greet such news with very mixed sentiments. Anyone who has read the history of the Church knows that some very bloody battles were fought to protect the Church from the interference of secular law. For instance, until fairly recently, clerics could not be tried in civil court, but only in an ecclesiastical court.
Since Vatican II the Church of the New Order has turned its back on the history of the Catholic Faith and has played right into the hands of civil authorities, who are certainly not its friends. It was the New Vatican that forced all nations having Catholicism as their state religion to expunge that provision from their constitutions. When one country in South America refused, the New Vatican threatened it with interdict. Shades of the Lefebvre "excommunication"!
Appealing to civil courts for religious matters is a potentially lethal boomerang. What's next? Some Novus Ordinarian suing a traditional church because it doesn't teach the "approved" Novus Ordo religion? Don't think it can't happen. Better to keep the state out of religion period, if it isn't Catholic.
The basic flaw in this lawsuit is the presumption that this seminary, or any Novus Ordo seminary, is Catholic. What if the New Vatican comes out tomorrow with one of its modernistic bombshells? What if the New Vatican declares at some point that adultery, fornication, and homosexuality can't be controlled and are therefore morally neutral? Don't think it can't happen.
No, the temporary response should be to call the New Order what it is: not Catholic. Not to play into its attempted power grab. Just to reject it wholesale.
That's exactly what the great Saints and ordinary faithful of the Church did with the New Order called Arianism that was rampant in the Church in the fourth century. They rejected it publicly. They took public oaths against it. They refused to follow the New Order pope of the time. They wouldn't set foot into the New Order churches. Here is how St. Basil the Great described the situation:
Matters have come to this pass: the people have left their houses of prayer and assembled in the deserts, -- a pitiable sight; women and children, old men, and men otherwise infirm, wretchedly faring in the open air, amid most profuse rains and snow-storms and winds and frosts of winter; and again in summer under a scorching sun. To this they submit because they will have no part of the wicked Arian leaven.
Compared to our courageous predecessors in the Faith, how many of us moderns blithely walk into Novus Ordo churches, worship a sugar cookie, listen to a bastardized "liturgy" that is hardly valid, let alone Catholic? Do we make excuses: my family goes there, the bishop approves it (the same bishop that "presides" at "gay masses," of course), it's too much trouble to get to a real Mass, I won't be "in communion" with the "Church" (the Church of the New Order, of course, not the Roman Catholic Church)?
Those who still pander to the New Order I leave you with St. Basil's image of those women and children, old and an infirm men, worshipping outdoors under the hot sun and cold rain rather than give any quarter to a counterfeit New Order. Do we have their Faith? Do we have their courage? Or will Our Lord treat us like the lukewarm Laodiceans and vomit us moderns out of his mouth [Apocalypse of St. John, 3:16/DRV]?
Thomism, named after St. Thomas Aquinas, is the recognized philosophical and theological system of the Roman Catholic Church. Thomism, a system based upon objective reality, counters the various forms of Modernist philosophy: empiricism, positivism, pragmatism, materialism, communism, and phenomenology, and instead argues that rational arguments for the existence of God complement revealed truth.
As Bishop Sheen once put it: "Faith depends on reason. People who try to get to religion without using their brains usually end up believing that some crackpot is God, because he says so. The Church won't take you without your thinking things through to the full extent of your ability."
Beyond emphasizing reason, Thomistic thought also stress the existence of objective rights and wrongs (natural law), free will (making one responsible for one's actions), and the importance of personal moral virtue.
Well, the Church's philosophy is apparently not the philosophy of the head of the Congregation for the Doctrine of Faith in the Church of the New Order. Card. Ratzinger confesses that as a seminarian he had "difficulties in penetrating the thought of Thomas Aquinas, whose crystal-clear logic seemed to me to be too closed in on itself, too impersonal and ready-made" (Milestones: Memoirs 1927-1977).
Wait a minute: Ratzinger denies "crystal-clear logic"! What does he substitute, then, for it? Well, true to his Protestant German provenance, he seems to be like Martin Luther, who rejected the whole of Thomastic philosophy, arguing that human reason was "Frau Jezebel," whereby Satan had deluded so many Catholics. To Luther (and Ratzinger?), salvation was by faith alone. Scripture was the sole authority of Christian truth. Divine predestination reigned in place of man's free will.
No wonder we have heard so many novel and unCatholic doctrines emanating from Ratzinger and his congregation -- denial of Christ as the Messias for the Jews, denial of the Real Presence, etc. They are rooted in Protestant philosophy, not Catholic!
According to ACN, Time, and other reports, Mel Gibson said that his private life, his banking records, the charities he supports, friends, business associates, and family members have all undergone scrutiny. He added that his 85-year-old father has been approached and harassed. When asked if there was a connection between these incidents and his film The Passion, Mel Gibson said: "I think there is."
Hollywood has been less than friendly towards Mel Gibson during the entire project. Mr. Gibson has been entirely on his own in selecting Matera, Italy, as the site for the filming, selecting the actors, creating the script, and funding the project.
Mel Gibson, the Academy Award-winning director of Braveheart, is not deterred. He is going "full steam ahead" on the filming project that will take about 10 weeks to complete. He started filming in early November of 2002, so the filming may be complete by early February of 2003. The release date of the much-anticipated film is not yet available, but may be Christmas 2003 or Easter 2004.
The film The Passion, which recreates Jesus Christ's last hours from the Garden of Gethsemane to his death on the Cross, promises to be a classic. The script, which Mel Gibson co-wrote, is based on the New Testament Gospels by Sts. Luke, John, Matthew, and Mark, with some speculative supplementary material from the diaries of Anne Catherine Emmerich (1774-1824) that are collected in the book The Dolorous Passion of Our Lord Jesus Christ and on Mary of Agreda's The City of God.
One unique feature of the film is that it will be entirely done in the ancient languages spoken during Jesus Christ's time. These languages were, first of all, Latin, the language of the Roman Empire of which Judaea was a part, as well as Greek, the lingua franca of the eastern part of the Roman Empire, and locally Hebrew and Aramean.
More and more Catholics are concerned about this pope's grinding out Saints like sausage. Not only is the number totally out of line with the traditions of his predecessors, but he has seen fit to reduce the previously unassailable canonization criteria to the ridiculous.
Fortunately, there is an escape clause. Canonizations, contrary to the "lay theology" you hear all over today, are not infallible. The Church's most authoritative theologian, St. Thomas Aquinas, prudently makes exception (as do other theologians, such as St. Robert Bellarmine), for at least errors of fact. And when these Johannine-Pauline "canonizations" are rushed through as if there were no tomorrow, mistakes can be made. Many Catholics are appalled by the purported canonization of Jose Maria Escriva de Balguer, the founder of Opus Dei, a highly suspect group that anticipated and developed 30 years before Vatican II a revolutionary, new, secular theology of the laity, and accepted the principle of pluralism and indifferentism, accepting into itself men of every faith and religion.
Even the secular press is beginning to pick up on this untraditional "glut" of canonizations. Christopher Hitchens, writing for the London Mirror, criticized the Vatican decision to beatify Mother Theresa in October. In the article, Hitchens asks why the usually long interval between death and beatification was ignored and why the requirement of miracles attributed to her intercession was reduced.
Hutchins accuses the Macedonia-born nun of exploiting her fame and receiving funding from questionable sources such as the Duvalier dictatorship in Haiti. He claims she was more interested in mixing with the rich and famous than helping the poor in Calcutta and never gave proper account of the huge sums of money donated to her. Hutchins claims that "the media have created a 'collective hallucination' of her life." Others claim that she was an Oecumenist, who compromised Catholic doctrine amongst the Hindus.
Another point on the Mother Theresa beatification is that the one miracle claimed by the Vatican is highly suspect. The husband of the woman cured says (in Time magazine) that she still had the tumor after the medallion relieved the stomach pain. He claims (and his wife does not deny it) that the doctors at the clinic were still treating her for the tumor after the medallion allegedly took away the pain.
It was to allow such issues full time to be investigated and for the faithful to come to a complete consensus that the traditionally long periods before the Church took any action existed. Abraham Lincoln has been dead over 150 years, and still Americans can't determine clearly whether he was the Great Emancipator or the Great Usurper, who violated states rights and deprived American citizens of their most basic civil right, that of habeas corpus.
So much the more does a candidate for canonization need to be investigated and evaluated -- even for centuries. For if the facts are in the slightest dispute, the purported canonization is suspect and brings scandal upon the Church and upon true Saints of God.
Today the United States celebrates a federal holiday, Martin Luther King Day. Interestingly, King is the only U.S. citizen who has a holiday named after him. (Even George Washington no longer has a federal holiday named after him, being subsumed into an anonymous Presidents Day.) It is interesting to note the scandalous background of King, which is totally ignored by the secular press, while it conducts a witch-hunt against Catholic clergymen for alleged "abuses."
There really isn't any dispute about King's moral nadir. Even King's friends have admitted them and written about them. But since it isn't "politically correct" to talk about King's gaping flaws, they are simply ignored, whereas every pecadillo Catholic clergymen have allegedly committed is exaggerated and trumpeted, even to the point of defaming a great pope and humanitarian of World War II, Pius XII, as every Jewish leader of the time admitted.
First of all, it is known that King's Boston University doctoral dissertation, "A Comparison of the Conception of God in the Thinking of Paul Tillich and Henry Nelson Wieman," was plagiarized from Jack Boozer's doctoral dissertation. A committee of researchers at Boston University admitted that King plagiarized his dissertation; however, they make no moves to revoke his doctorate degree. If another student had been found cheating to such a large degree, his degree would have been revoked without question. Yet, no motion is made to extend King the "equal justice under the law."
As if that moral breach were not enough, it was long ago confirmed that King used funds from his civil-rights organizations to hire prostitutes on numerous occasions for adulterous assignations. This fact was confirmed by investigations conducted by then Attorney General Robert Kennedy, hardly an enemy of King.
Given all the overplay of "scandals" in the Catholic Church, one might think that at least some mention would be made, in all fairness, that immoral behavior is equally, if not more, rampant among Protestant and Jewish clergy, and certainly among its leaders. At least no Catholic clergyman has ever been guilty of adultery, which is so grave a sin as to require a separate Commandment all to itself.
Yet even more shocking to Christians should be the degree to which King was an heretic not only from the Catholic Faith, but even from Christian Protestantism. And this information comes from black minister and professor Michael Dyson, of DePaul University's and Columbia University's African American Studies department, who calls King "arguably, the greatest American ever produced on our native soil" (I May Not Get There With You: The True Martin Luther King, Jr., Free Press, 2000). Thus, this information hardly originates from a critical source.
And what are the anti-Christian heresies that King believed and preached?
While you read the lurid, exaggerated, and even phony charges made against the Catholic Church every day in your newspaper, I encourage you this Martin Luther King Day to find a single background article alluding to this cheating, adultery, and heresy. If King were a Catholic, you know full well what vilification would be printed.
You don't have to look any farther than the modern vilification of Christopher Columbus, a devout Catholic, whose primary purpose in undertaking his courageous voyage across the Atlantic was not gold, but faith, as he wanted to open the souls in the New World to the Catholic Faith (so his recently-discovered memoirs indicate). And in this he succeeded, and thus has become the object of modern vilification, while King gets a "pass."
Granted the "sex scandal" in the Church of the New Order has been way overblown by an anti-Catholic press and granted that the appointment of a lay board to oversee corrections violates important ecclesiastical principles, still it appears that the U.S. Bishops who created the National Review Board to investigate the scancal will treat it with the same disregard with which they have treated their Episcopal Oath to guard the Roman Catholic Faith, Mass, and Sacraments.
According to a New York Times article of January 15, it seems that New York's Edward Cardinal Egan is playing the same old games that got Bernard Cardinal Law and the others in trouble. Egan has refused to say "Mass" (the Novus Ordo service) for the group and has banned it from attending a Catholic function going on at the time. Interesting that Egan has been personally implicated in the scandal, even before he came to New York.
These cardinals have entirely failed to understand their immorality. They have tea with the pope in the papal Library, they pass resolutions and form committees -- all for show. If these people had any Catholic morality left in them at all, they would voluntarily consign themselves to the silence of a monastery for the rest of their lives.
Instead, they continue to play the same ecclesiastical games with the lives of Catholics that has led to their wholesale abandonment of the true Mass, true Sacraments, and true Faith. But, after forty years of the devastation of the New Order, why should we expect anything different?
I saw Mel Gibson's interview with Bill O'Reilly on Fox News January 14 and am appalled that Mr. Gibson is actually being harassed for making this film. I guess it goes to show that there really are anti-Christian forces at work.
Fr. Moderator Replies.
The interview included some scenes from "The Passion" in still shots. The Passion will be a graphic portrayal, but even at that it cannot represent the truth depth of the pain and brutality involved in the Passion and Death of Our Lord to redeem humanity. Gibson is still holding to his plan to shoot the film in Latin and Aramean, with no subtitles to be used. He is aiming at absolute authenticity.
The second half of the interview discussed someone from the press who was trying to "dig up dirt" on Gibson. The man supposedly got onto private property and pumped Gibson's 85-year-old father for information. O'Reilly asked whether he thought this activity had anything to do with the film, and Gibson several times said yes, that "a subject like this it does bring out a lot of enemies." Gibson had earlier said: "There's a lot of things that don't want it [the film] to happen."
One statement that O'Reilly made seemed to indicate that the spy might be out to portray Gibson "as a fanatic and perhaps a bigot" because of his traditional Catholic Faith. Gibson's comments, however, were very graciously phrased, and he handled well some touchy questions (anti-Semitism, for example).
A Reuters story states that "Gibson is very much of the old school, and a Latin service is still held at the private chapel of his California home. He also had some sharp words for the modern-day Catholic Church." So, it is pretty commonly known that Gibson is an independent traditional Catholic (not associated with the SSPX, for example), who makes no bones about his Faith in public and who openly criticizes the Church of the New Order.
Dear Fr. Moderator:
I'm looking for an explanation of the term "in communion with Rome." Is there an authoritative definition?
Fr. Moderator Replies.
Since Vatican II this phrase has little meaning for the New Order other than polemic. Originally, it excluded the formally schismatic churches, namely, the Eastern Orthodox and the Old Catholics, who have valid liturgies and sacraments, but do not accept the definition of papal authority adopted by Vatican I.
The trouble now is that New Rome (post Vatican II) doesn't really use the term "schismatic" for these churches any longer and accepts them de facto and even de jure. When an Eastern Orthodox bishop and an Old Catholic bishop recently applied to the New Rome to convert from schism to Roman Catholicism, the New Rome told him: don't bother; you're fine just as you are!
Moreover, the New Rome itself doesn't seem to accept the Church's dogmatic definition on the papacy. The current pope says (in Ut Unum Sint of 1997) that he is willing to "reconfigure" the papacy to make it more acceptable to non-Catholics. The Church's dogmatic definition defines the end of the papal office as guarding and faithfully expounding the Deposit of Faith transmitted by the Apostles, not to "make known some new doctrine." Yet the post-conciliar popes make new doctrine all the time since Vatican II. The recent pronouncements on the Jews and Luther are just two examples of the New Rome's falling away from the teaching of the Roman Catholic Faith.
Then there is the question: what is Rome? Is it center of the Roman Catholic Mass, Sacraments, and doctrines of the Faith, from which the Church of the New Order departs? Is it the conveyer of Christianized classical Rome and its culture to the world, which the Church of the New Order eschews?
The only authoritative and realistic definition of "in communion with Rome" is to be within the Roman Catholic Faith, that is, the Catholic and Apostolic Deposit of Faith, consisting of Sacred Scripture, Sacred Tradition, and the 2000-year tradition of the Church's teaching of that Faith called magisterium, from which the Church of the New Order departs.
This is the dogmatic and authoritative teaching of Vatican I and is one that the Fathers of the Church readily accept. This is Rome. This is what we must be in communion with. Any "New Rome" or "New Order" or "Newchurch" or "New Mass" or "New Theology" is not in communion with Rome.
Dear Fr. Moderator:
Please give me an assessment on the Legionaries of Christ and their organization, Regnum Christi. They seemed to be a conservative order, but so lacking that they don't see the Traditional Latin Mass and Faith as a necessity. They are starting a school nearby. Some say it is the best Catholic school to be found in our area. Schools here, as everywhere, are pretty bad. Would you suggest this school to a parent who is looking for a school?
Fr. Moderator Replies.
I tend toward Archbishop Fulton Sheen's advice. He noted with deep concern what was happening in Catholic education and the fact that many young people were losing the faith since Vatican II (1962-1965). His advice, given around 1967, was as prophetic as it was startling:
You are better off going to a state school where you will have the chance to fight for your faith, than going to a modern Catholic school where you will have the new watered-down, modernist version of the faith spoon-fed to your unsuspecting minds, so that you will be apt to lose your faith.
His argument is that people are better off in public schools making no pretense at religion, which can then be supplied by the parents at home. The trouble with the "conservative" New Order "Catholic" schools is that they very aggressively pump a false Catholicism, which the kids cannot distinguish from real Catholicism.
The New Order is the New Order period. Whether conservative or liberal, it's all part of the same tree, which is corrupt at the root and not Catholic. In some sense, its liberal side is easier to deal with, because then one can see clearly the errors. The conservative side is more insidious. It pretends to be Catholic and uses some of the vocabulary, but believes in the same phony "liturgy," phony "sacraments," and phony "new faith" as the liberals do.
The best policy is to protect your Roman Catholic Faith by staying away from any part of the New Order -- its "liturgy," its "sacraments," its "new theology." Don't support it; don't contribute to it. And, for heaven's sake, don't expose your children to it. Also be sure to check into homeschooling opportunities in your area. More parents are finding this to be the best and most Catholic solution of all.
Dear Fr. Moderator:
Discovering traditional Catholicism saved my faith. I attend an "indult" site because it is the only one which is geographically feasible, and, up to this point, it has not had a "pseudo-traditional" Mass.
About six months ago, however, a new bishop came into the diocese, and trouble is now brewing. This morning the priest, apparently foreseeing defections when the Novus Ordo is introduced, talked about remaining in "the Church." We must all be "filial" and "obedient."
Well, Father, I can't do it. I pray regularly that John Paul II will begin to act in accordance with his office, but his papacy has been a disaster -- from the misstatements of doctrine, to the mutilation of canon law, to the blasphemous conduct, to the complete failure to discipline rogue U.S. bishops. He's intelligent? Yeah, I'll grant that one, but then he cannot plead ignorance of the crisis in the Church and the effects of his own actions.
The indultarian logic has more holes than Swiss cheese. Following it, someone like Hans Kung remains in the Church, though he denies Christ's divinity. Someone like Archbishop Lefebvre is excommunicated because he follows Catholic doctrine. A "cafeteria Catholic" who attends a Novus Ordo service is "inside the Church" and Catholic -- never mind the fact that he rejects 80 percent of Catholic doctrine.
I know that "indult" priests face daunting pressures from the Novus Ordo apparatus, but it just doesn't compute. I want the traditional Latin Mass, Faith, and Sacraments, and I'll take them wherever I can get them. Is this outlook unusual among traditional Catholics?
Fr. Moderator Replies.
No, it's not. The "indult" apparatus, which did mislead a number of traditional Catholics in 1988, when it was set up as a ploy to undo the Society of St. Pius X, was exposed by Protocol 1411 of 1999 as just an arm of the New Order. More and more indultarians have seen the reality and have gravitated away from anything associated with the New Order to 100% traditional Catholicism.
The Nazi-istic argument on false obedience, that one must obey evil, is more and more falling on deaf ears for the very reasons that you adduce. Although the recent "scandals" have been exaggerated by the press (who never tell you that relatives are 6000% more likely to commit such offices on their own children than the less than 0.01% of presbyters who have been involved in such things), it has become patently clear that bishops, cardinals, and even the pope have been accomplices to these acts.
Rather than be "obedient" to prelate-criminals who use their ecclesiastical offices to destroy the Faith, more and more Catholics, conservative and even Novus Ordo, are returning to the Roman Catholic Faith as it has been known for 2000 years, not as it has been corrupted by corrupt churchmen. They are finding this Faith, as you have, sometimes in "indult" places, but more often in independent churches and chapels or those under the auspices of traditional groups (CMRI, SSPV, SSPX, etc.).
First, we couldn't speak about what Pope Pius IX called the "darkness of Islamism." Then school officials had our children indoctrinated into Islamism by prescribing six-week "units" of practicing Islamism, complete with prayer rugs and heads to the floor. One could just imagine what would be said if a six-week unit on Roman Catholicism were prescribed, complete with a traditional Latin Mass!
Now, a former U.S. Attorney General, a well-known radical named Ramsey Clark, called Jesus Christ a "terrorist" during a media event for a new anti-war group. The remarks were apparently made in response to the Rev. Jerry Falwell's statement that Mohammed was a "man of war." Well, he was! The Muslims don't deny that fact; they take great pride in it. Christ, on the other hand, was not a general, and he never spoke on secular questions of war. In fact, the Jews railed against him because he would not call for the overthrow of the Roman government
And what did these "peaceable" Mohammedans do? Why, they threatened the Rev. Falwell and two other ministers with death for publicly criticizing Mohammedanism. This unofficial fatwa, or holy war, is already being compared to the intimidation perpetrated upon British author Salman Rushdie, who was accused of blaspheming Islamism. The Rev. Falwell had said: "Jesus set the example for love, as did Moses, and I think Mohammed set an opposite example."
And this Islamism, which on four major occasions attempted to conquer Europe and make it Muslim, cannot be criticized, cannot be shown for what it is without violating the standards of "political correctness." Meanwhile, even the pope panders to radical elements when he "apologizes" for the Holy Crusades, which were instrumental in keeping Islam out of Europe for centuries. I say: thank God for the Crusaders! Without them, we'd all be speaking Arabic now!
Aren't we always hearing that the New Order listens to the "people"? We traditional Catholics know that such statements are just another deception and hypocrisy.
The Toledo [Ohio] Blade of January 11 reports that as representative of a "renewed interest in Tradition," Linda Peters, a 54-year-old wife and mother who always felt that something was missing when she stood to receive Novus Ordo "communion," is among those who has gone back to kneeling. She said she wants to show more reverence for the Holy Eucharist.
You would think that a pastor would want to encourage such a reverent attitude about the Blessed Sacrament. Dream on! For her devotion the Novus Ordo presbyter refused her "communion" and ordered her to stand up. When she remained kneeling while he distributed "communion" to others around her, he relented and said he would give her "communion," but that if she ever returned, she should expect to stand.
That courageous lady has never gone back to that church and now worships at a traditional Catholic church where everyone kneels to receive real Holy Communion, not a phony Novus Ordo cookie. And she is just one of many who have turned their back on the Novus Ordo as a result of the incompetent ecclesiastics of the New Order, whose actions have led to invalid Masses and Sacraments, to an unCatholic New Theology, and to endless scandals.
Sometimes I get chided when I say that the Novus Ordo rites are de facto invalid. Yet, like most things I say, the Novus Ordo eventually agrees with me. I only echo what they know themselves. It is only the "conservative" Novus Ordinarians who try to deny reality.
The Montreal Gazette of January 12 carries a story that the diocese of St. Jerome has admitted that 300 of its recent baptisms were invalid. Apparently, the presbyter and some layman assisting got so mixed up about how to baptize that they botched it.
And who discovered this? The bishop? No. The presbyter? No. It was a grandmother of one of the children, who knew enough basic catechism to realize that what was going on was phony.
And then the greater truth started coming out. No only these recent 300, but another flurry in Quebec were openly declared invalid. One wonders how many hundreds, even thousands and tens of thousands are invalid in other dioceses in Canada, the United States, and around the world, as the same invalid procedure is used in many other places. Moreover, these children of the Novus Ordo are walking around, thinking that they are baptized, whereas in fact they are not. The diocese can't find them. What a horror!
And what is even worse, a bureaucrat of the Canadian Conference of Catholic Bishops spoke falsely to the parents of the unbaptized children when he said that even though the children were not baptized, they were baptized. What self-serving rot! If proper form, matter, or intention is lacking in a sacrament, that sacrament is invalid. Period. No bureaucratic shennanigans can make it valid. There is no way that a shortbread cookie can become the Sacred Body or that Welch's grape juice can ever become the Precious Blood!
What is the moral of this story? Stay away from the Novus Ordo entirely. Not only is it unCatholic and invalid, but it doesn't even know what it's doing any more.
Dear Fr. Moderator:
The topic of "online confession" seems to be in the news these days since the New Vatican has condemned the idea. What is the traditional teaching?
Fr. Moderator Replies.
As usual, the news reports show a total ignorance of Catholicism. For validity, the priest and penitent must be in physical proximity: no phones, no internet. To be sure, there would certainly be additional practical difficulties with these, but the point is that they would be sacramentally invalid. Period. Such confessions would be no more valid than watching a Mass on television.
Dear Fr. Moderator:
The recent issue of a "conservative" magazine has sunk to barbs about the Novus Ordo's ICEL (International Committee on English in the Liturgy). What do you think?
Fr. Moderator Replies.
Isn't it wonderful to stand back and see these "conservatives" get into fistcuffs with one another over "vernacular translations," a red-herring brought in by the Novus Ordo? Now they are suffering the consequences of their errors.
Meanwhile, we traditional Roman Catholics stand aloof with the Traditional Latin Mass of the millennia, not worrying about phony, politically-correct, manipulative "vernacular" translations by some "committee." The clarity and beauty of the Latin of the traditional Mass remains as it tripped off the tongue of a St. Jerome or a St. Ambrose.
The etymology of the word vernacular is interesting in itself. It means literally, "characteristic of a slave," as a verna was a slave in ancient Rome. Those who pander to the "vernacular" in the Sacred Liturgy are simply enslaving themselves to error and corruption of the sacred rites that cannot be identified with Catholicism.
Dear Fr. Moderator:
Although I do not subscribe to it, I keep getting one of those throw-away conservative publications. The latest issue is filled with the word obedience. Letters to the editor keep worrying about being obedient to the bishop when they are disobeying God by sacrilege, such as standing rather than kneeling to what they believe is the Body of Christ (in the New Order, that is quite unlikely). One wonders why they don't see that their obedience is not to the Roman Catholic Church, but to the unCatholic Church of the New Order?
Fr. Moderator Replies.
Obedience, as St. Thomas Aquinas explains, is a secondary virtue subordinate to charity, or love of God. Obviously, the necessity of obedience depends upon the person and thing to be obeyed. Obedience to evil is a vice, not a virtue, and participation in irreverence and, more so, sacrilege, is certainly a vice.
Catholic moral theology has always taught that even if the Pope were to command something that is against the divine or natural law, then it would certainly be sinful for anyone to obey him, since the virtue of obedience is opposed not only by disobedience, but is also violated by excessive or indiscreet obedience, which is the sin of servility. The Church traditionally has been marked by free will. The Novus Ordo, far from freedom, is characterized by servility to men who must not be obeyed when they command error, evil, and immorality rather than good.
No Catholic, for example, would argue the Nazistic principle befehl ist befehl [an order is an order], e.g., that obedience to the lawfully-elected German Chancellor Hitler would be necessary if he or his representatives commanded one to kill an innocent man in a gas chamber. It is a stark analogy, but to Catholics the Faith, the Mass, and the Sacraments are as dear as life itself. This is the clear example that was set for us by our predecessors, the Christian martyrs of every age, and that has been set before us by the Church through the ages by its veneration of martyrs for the faith as the greatest class of saints.
Those who use the excuse of obedience to do evil are not to be praised, but rather to be condemned as immoral and gravely sinful. It was St. Peter himself who said: "We ought to obey God rather than men" (Acts of the Apostles 5:29/DRV), when the laws of God and the commands of men come into conflict.
Dear Fr. Moderator:
From what I can see, the only liturgy or doctrine that some of these "conservative" Catholics believe is dogmatic depends on what is currently "opinionated" by the current pope and bishops, the "living magisterium" as they call it. Do the conservatives' arguments on the fluidity of liturgy hold any water?
Fr. Moderator Replies.
These Novus Ordo "lay theologians," whether "conservative" or otherwise, wouldn't know enough dogmatic and sacramental theology to fight their way out of a paper bag! They've been so imbued with the Novus Ordo that they can no longer distinguish between what is Catholic, as measured by 2000 years, and what is New Order propaganda.
I'm sure that you have heard the lex orandi, lex credendi tag, but most people haven't stopped to think what it really means, particularly in its full form given by Pope St. Celestine against the Pelagian heretics: legem credendi, lex statuit supplicandi. It is clear that it is the lex orandi (supplicandi) that comes first. And what is that law of praying? Essentially, it is the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass, most particularly the precedential rite of St. Peter, that of the Apostolic Roman See. So it is actually the Catholic and Apostolic Sacred Liturgy that provides the essential dogmata.
That, together with Pope St. Pius V's Solemn Bull, together with the teaching of various councils, blows out of the water the false notion that the Sacred Liturgy, instead establishing all the essential dogmata of the Roman Catholic Faith, is simply a matter of "living tradition" (a condemned Modernist notion in itself), which can be changed willy-nilly by any committee composed of a Freemason archbishop and six Protestant ministers, as was the Novus Ordo service (it is too flippant to be called a "liturgy"). Such a notion is so contrary even to common sense that it is laughable. Yet the "conservatives" continue to pander it to the uncritical.
I write concerning the apparent approval at many Mass sites of children making noise and disrupting during the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass. Such behavior is not only discourteous to those who attend the true Mass, but more importantly, an affront to Almighty God. Catholics should remember that each Holy Mass is "equal" in value to the Sacrifice of Calvary. There, thus, should be the silence of prayerfulness and contemplation of this wondrous event. This, of course, is not meant as a criticism of children, who don't know any better, but of parents who bring children that are incapable of remaining silent.
I have noticed this behavior at "Indult" sites, independent chapels, and, strangely enough, SSPX locations, where there is even "adult" noise and talking. One expects such behavior at a Novus Ordo service, but such action at a Traditional Mass is unconscionable! The Church teaches that no child under the age of reason has any obligation whatever to assist at Holy Mass. If there is no special area set off for children (a "crying room"), and if the child is not able to sit quietly during Holy Mass without distraction, the child is not yet ready to be brought to church, and the parents should make alternative arrangements. Focus should be on the altar, not the distractions that are going on in the pews. For many Catholics, the Sunday hour is the only sustained period of prayer and meditation on the Most Blessed Sacrament that they have all week.
In this spirit, my wife and I attend two different Masses each Sunday with one spouse staying outside of church with our child, or we alternate on Sundays. It is certainly an inconvenience, but we would rather be inconvenienced than cause scandal.
If there are those out there who do not consider Holy Mass the most important "activity" that they can engage in on earth, then maybe they should think of a symphony concert or an opera. The focus of those attending is upon the stage. If anyone in attendance were providing a persistent distraction, even incessant coughing, they would receive the condemnatory glances of the others and be asked to remove themselves by the ushers. Of how much more significance is the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass than a secular concert?
To modify a common saying: With a pope like this, who needs a devil?
What is the image we are left with in the (admittedly overblown) scandals? The pope sitting in his library having tea with the U.S. cardinals who lied, cheated, and stole from the Church and left it perceived as a moral wasteland. What if, instead, the pope had commanded the cardinals to go with him to St. Peter's Basilica and prostrate themselves before the altar in reparation, while reciting the Miserere? An entirely different picture, an entirely different moral.
One of the U.S.'s most outspoken liberal archbishops, Weakland, succumbed personally to the immorality and embezzled hush monies to pay off his paramour. Was this thief of Church money prosecuted? Was he even chastized by the pope? No. He was allowed to retire quietly. We think back to all those nasty statements he made about traditional Catholics, only to realize that all that time he was engaging in perversion and theft.
I am inclined to believe that we are entering the next phase of the Traditional Catholic Restoration and that the hand of the Lord in this is becoming clearer and clearer. He is a God that deigns to give us free will. All of us, including popes, can use that free will to remain loyal to the true Mass and Sacraments or to corrupt them, to remain loyal to the Roman Catholic Faith or to abandon it.
But then there follow the consequences. Even the great King David, the author of the Miserere (Psalm 50), after he engineered the killing of an innocent man (Urias, the husband of Bersabee) had to be brought down until he repented. The spiritual mechanics of this process are well explicated by St. Paul in the first chapter of his Epistle to the Romans.
Yes, the ordinance of God will eventually bring down popes, cardinals, bishops, priests, and laymen when they set themselves up against the law of God. We have survived through the heyday of the New Order and preserved the Traditional Latin Mass against all odds. We have survived a sly ploy to coopt traditional Catholics by a spurious "indult" under the control of the same corrupt bishops to whom we owe the "other" scandal.
Now we must simply remain loyal and patient. The Great Facade of the New Order is suffering an earthquake of its own doing. God willing, traditional Catholics will be there to take up the solitary ruined bricks and rebuild the cathedral of the Roman Catholic Church.
This is what the faithful before Vatican II justly expected -- and got -- from the Catholic Church. No longer. The Church of the New Order has breached all of that -- the Church that is not a Church; the Church for which anything is more important than the true Mass, Sacraments, and Faith; the Church that is only a Great Facade, a Counterfeit Church of its former self.
In 1988, with the Apostolic Letter Ecclesia Dei, the Vatican panicked. Its denial of the Roman Catholic Mass and its substitution of a bogus ovus Ordo had become evident to faithful Catholics over the previous twenty years. Abp. Lefebvre had courageously stood up to the New Vatican and called a spade a spade. Ecclesia Dei was the New Vatican's stop-gap measure to prevent millions of Catholics from leaving the New Order and standing by the traditional Roman Catholic Faith.
Acute observers pointed out from the beginning that Ecclesia Dei was a ruse, but many traditional Catholics were still wedded to the idea of "obedience" to corrupt bishops and semi-Catholic popes and craved the Good Housekeeping Seal of "approval" from them, even if it meant a half-Mass, half-Sacraments, and half-Catholicism. We heard much about "approved" Masses as opposed to "unapproved," as if twenty councils of the Church and 260 popes were to be swept aside, including the dogmatic Quo Primum, which freed Catholics, in perpetuity, from any fear of celebrating or assisting at the Mass of St. Peter, the Mass of the Roman Catholic Church, what we call the Traditional Latin Mass.
The Vatican waited eleven years to act, then lowered the boom with Protocol 1411 of 1999. From then on, no priest could refuse to say the Novus Ordo service if the local bishop required it. No fraternity had the right to the "exclusive" use of the traditional liturgy. The New Vatican had perpetrated a ruse. The indult societies had lied to the faithful in their multitudinous brochures that proclaimed the contrary. The emperor indeed was wearing no clothes.
And now we are entering the next phase. Indultarians, still desperately trying to cling to "obedience" to the bureaucrats of an unCatholic New Order, even as they see the pope kissing the abominable Koran and bishops suborning (or participating in) every kind of perversion imaginable, are being challenged by those who brook no compromise with the New Order.
The venerable Latin Mass Society of the United Kingdom, 5000 members strong, which had complacently been in the "indult" column, has now been challenged by independent traditional Catholics who want to have nothing to do with the Church of the New Order and its corrupt bishops, but instead want to remain loyal to the Roman Catholic Faith.
According to a December 28, 2002, report in the Daily News Telegraph. The executive committee of the Latin Mass Society fell only one vote shy of rejecting Indultarianism and turning the focus of the Society to organize Traditional Latin Masses in defiance of New Order bishops and in rejection of the previous "appeasement" policy. Even the article, which displays all the usual anti-traditional bias of the press, accuses "a significant number of them [New Order bishops] of actively discouraging the [Traditional Roman] rite, despite evidence of its continuing popularity."
Well, folks, the gauntlet has been thrown down. No longer are Catholics who stand foursquare for the traditional Roman Catholic Mass, Sacraments, and Faith going to roll over to corrupt ecclesiastics who brazenly and illegally subvert their right to assist at the true Mass of the Roman Catholic Church, the Mass of St. Peter, the Traditional Latin Mass. The New Vatican, because of its unCatholic and unjust actions, based on might rather than right, is rapidly losing credibility among real Catholics, and more and more are finding their way back to the true Mass, Sacraments, and Faith. Those real Catholics have had it, and they're not going to take it any more!
One of the puzzling things about the Church of the New Order is how the Novus Ordinarians can be so duped as to think that any of it is Catholic. Have they no eyes? Have they no ears? What is worse is when they not only overlook the sacrilege and invalidity, but even attempt to justify them!
There can be no doubt that the Church of the New Order is not Catholic, but Modernist, even pagan. Interesting, isn't it, that none of the "exposes" of the recent sex scandals in the Church mentioned the existence of witchcraft and its pagan principles in the New Order seminaries as one of the origins of the scandals. I kid you not.
Look at the Witches' Emblem above. It espouses pantheism and indifferentism. How often have we heard, in one form or another, even from the pope and the prefect of doctrine, the statement: "We all worship the same god"? Really?! Christ is like the death-dealing Mohammed? Like the many-handed goddess Shiva of the Hindus? I think not.
But I am not just speculating on far-away events. Here in our own country, we have public examples of witchcraft practiced with the full knowledge and "approval" of the Church of the New Order. Here, for example, is what is going on in a Dominican house in New York.
Winter Solstice Celebration. Sunday, December 22, at Motherhouse of Sisters of St. Dominic, 555 Albany Avenue, Amityville. Beginning at 5:30 p.m. Circle Dancing of Universal Peace helping us to remember our oneness with the Universe and with all living things on this planet. The dances are simple and all dances are taught. They will be held in the auditorium which can be entered from the parking lot, at 7 p.m.
A ritual connecting us to the rhythm of winter and inviting us to enter into the darkness and there find the light at the core of core of our being will be held in Rosary Chapel which can be entered from the street on Albany Avenue. Come for the whole evening of for part. Bring simple refreshment to share if you wish. If coming, please call so we know how many to expect.
This is pure witchcraft and the seed of Satan. Isn't Amityville where that haunted house is? I guess the devil has moved from the house into the Modernist "Dominican sisters." Remember, it was Pope Paul VI himself who said that "the smoke of Satan" had entered the Church. Too bad that nobody listened to him, nor that he listened to himself. Just another reason to have nothing to do with the Church of the New Order, its phony "mass" and "sacraments," and its perversion of the Roman Catholic Faith. At this point is the New Order that far away from a Black Mass?
The more one reads about Card. Ratzinger's crazy, unCatholic theological notions, one wonders how the Indultarians ever trusted this man, unless the Indultarians' own theology was already corrupted by Modernism. It turns out that this Cardinal has, for all intents and purposes, denied the dogma of the Real Presence in the Holy Eucharist in a little-known German work entitled Die Sakramentale Begruendung Christlicher Existenz. Ratzinger in effect denies that the Holy Eucharist is the sacramental Body and Blood of Christ, that Our Lord is present in the Tabernacle, that the church is the House of God:
Eucharistic devotion such as is noted in the silent visit by the devout in church must not be thought of as a conversation with God. This would assume that God was present there locally and in a confined way. To justify such an assertion shows a lack of understanding of the Christological mysteries of the very concept of God. This is repugnant to the serious thinking of the man who knows about the omnipresence of God. To go to church on the ground that one can visit God Who is present there is a senseless act which the modern man rightfully rejects.
Now, who are these people Ratzinger says "lack understanding of the Christological mysteries"? Let's start with the principal theologian of the Church, St. Thomas Aquinas, who wrote not only theological works, but even mystical poetry on the subject of the Holy Eucharist. Let's add every Doctor of the Church, every theologian, every pope. Ratzinger stands in the outer darkness.
Remember, folks, Ratzinger is not a friend of the Traditional Catholic Movement. Sure, he's dropped a few crumbs while playing politics for the next papal conclave and to sell his incessant potboiler-books, but this is the same man who maneuvered with the Protestants to get Vatican II to confuse the dogma that the Catholic Church is the one true Church of Christ.
No, it's clear without doubt that Ratzinger is a crafty Modernist, denying the faithful the graces of Eucharistic devotions, but instead urging them to participate in the cult of "modern man" in the Church of the New Order.
Flawed as Vatican II was, it was not nearly as flawed as what the Modernists made of it in the years afterward. Even today, one sees inaccurate statements in the press, both religious and secular, that "Vatican II instituted the Mass in the vernacular." Vatican II did not. It was the Modernists like Hannibal Bugnini and his six Protestant ministers who did that. Some of us were around at the time, so we know the truth of the matter. But many current-day Catholics were not around at the time, so they become prey to all kinds of nonsense spread around by Novus Ordinarians, desperately trying to justify (as if that were possible) the thorough corruption of the Mass, Sacraments, and Faith that they introduced.
Alfons Cardinal Stickler, now 92, was around at the time. In fact, he participated in the Council. On December 26, 2002, he gave a lecture to the priests of the diocese of Linz, Austria, which treated of the travesty of the Novus Ordo liturgy, showing that it did not come from Vatican II, that this allegation is simply a ruse by the Novus Ordinarians to try to give credibility to what is invalid and unCatholic.
As to the Latin language, for example, the cardinal remembers that Vatican II was absolutely in favor of maintaining it during Holy Mass. Thus, at the time when some radical liturgical propositions were discussed at the Council, a Sicilian bishop stood up, warning that the Mass would be celebrated "soon in the people's language". Those words, according to the cardinal, provoked a general outburst of laugh of the fathers of the Council. The principle to keep Latin would have been approved by the Council by 2152 voices, with only 4 voices against. According to the cardinal, the Latin language, besides its precision to define the faith and its utilitarian symbol for the universal Church, guarantees the mysterious character of the Holy Sacrifice, comparable to the iconostasis in the oriental churches.
Dear Fr. Moderator:
What document can I refer to as an authoritative source for why women are required to wear headcoverings in Church?
Fr. Moderator Replies.
How about the Holy Bible? This practice follows a custom received from very early in the Church. St. Paul, in his First Letter to the Corinthians (11:4-5/DRV), writes: "Every man praying or prophesying with his head covered, disgraceth his head. But every woman praying or prophesying with her head not covered disgraceth her head." In other words, such a woman wounds her feminine dignity.
From this custom arises Canon 1262.2 of the traditional Canon Law of the Church, which requires that at the sacred rites men should be uncovered, women covered, particularly when they approach for Holy Communion.
Dear Fr. Moderator:
Why do we celebrate the Feast of the Circumcision of Our Lord?
Fr. Moderator Replies.
Actually, the date of January 1 celebrates a number of things, in addition to the current beginning of the civil year (it was not always on January 1), including the Octave Day of the Nativity and an ancient feastday of the Blessed Virgin Mary. The significance of the Circumcision itself, as the Divine Office explains, is that it was an adumbration of the shedding of the Precious Blood on Calvary. Moreover, the day of circumcision is the day on which the Child's name was given, and we then received Our Savior (the meaning of Jesus in Hebrew).
Return to Commentaries from the Mailbox.