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| Fourth Sunday after Pentecost |
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Posted by: Stone - 06-20-2021, 06:51 AM - Forum: Pentecost
- Replies (6)
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INSTRUCTION ON THE FOURTH SUNDAY AFTER PENTECOST
From Fr. Leonard Goffine's Explanations of the Epistles and Gospels for the Sundays, Holydays, and Festivals throughout the Ecclesiastical Year 36th edition, 1880
THE Introit of the Mass is: The Lord is my light and my salvation; whom shall I fear? The Lord is the protector of my life: of whom shall I be afraid? My enemies that trouble me have themselves been weakened and have fallen. If armies in camp should stand together against me, my heart shall not fear. (Ps. xxvi. 1—3.) Glory be to the Father, &c.
PRAYER OF THE CHURCH. Grant, we beseech Thee, O Lord, that both the course of the world may
be peaceably ordered for us by Thy governance, and that Thy Church may rejoice in tranquil devotion. Through.
EPISTLE. (Rom. viii. 18 — 23) Brethren, The sufferings of this time are not worthy to be compared to the glory to come, that shall be revealed in us. For the expectation of the creature waiteth for the revelation of the sons of God. For the creature was made subject to vanity, not willingly, but by reason of him that made it subject, in hope: because the creature also itself shall be delivered from the servitude of corruption, into the liberty of the glory of the children of God. For we know that every creature groaneth, and travaileth in pain, even till now. And not only it, but ourselves also, who have the first-fruits of the spirit, even we ourselves groan within ourselves, waiting for the adoption of the sons of God, the redemption of our body: in Jesus Christ our Lord.
Quote:INSTRUCTION. There is no greater consolation under crosses and afflictions, no more powerful support in the adversities of a pious and virtuous life, than the thought that all sufferings are as nothing when compared with the coming glory of heaven, and that by a slight and momentary suffering in this life is obtained a superabundant happiness in the next, (ii Cor. iv. 17.) Thus St. Augustine says: "Were we daily to suffer all torments , even for a short time the pains of hell, in order to see Christ and be numbered among His saints ; would it not be worth all this misery to obtain so great a good, so great a glory?"
ASPIRATION. Ah Lord, when shall we be delivered from the miserable bondage of this life, and participate in that indescribable glory which Thou hast prepared for Thy children, where free from the misery and many temptations of this life, they enjoy eternal bliss. Enable us to see more and more into the misery of this life that we may thus be urged to strive for freedom and glory in Thy kingdom. Amen.
GOSPEL. (Luke v. 1 — 11.) At that time, When the multitude pressed upon Jesus, to hear the word of God, he stood by the lake of Genesareth. And he saw two ships standing by the lake: but the fishermen were gone out of them, and were washing their nets; and going up into one of the ships that was Simon's, he desired him to draw back a little from the land. And sitting, he taught the multitudes out of the ship. Now when he had ceased to speak, he said to Simon: Launch out into the deep, and let down your nets for a draught. And Simon, answering, said to him: Master, we have labored all the night, and have taken nothing, but at thy word I will let down the net. And when they had done this, they enclosed a very great multitude of fishes: and their net broke. And they beckoned to their partners that were in the other ship, that they should come and help them. And they came and filled both the ships, so that they were almost sinking. Which when Simon Peter saw, he fell down at Jesus's knees, saying: Depart from me, for I am a sinful man, O Lord. For he was wholly astonished, and all that were with him, at the draught of fishes which they had taken; and so were also James and John, the sons of Zebedee, who were Simon's partners. And Jesus saith to Simon: Fear not: from henceforth thou shalt catch men. And having brought their ships to land , leaving all things, they followed him.
What are we to learn from the people who came to Christ to hear the word of God?
We should listen with great zeal to the word of God, because from it man receives the life of the soul, (Matt. iv. 4.) and eternal happiness. (Luke xi. 28.)
Why did Christ teach from Peter's ship?
By this He showed that the true doctrine is preached only from that Church of which Peter is the head, (John. xi. 15.) which is here represented by his ship. mid storms of persecution Jesus has preserved and will preserve this ship, His Church, until the end of time. Peter still guides the bark in the unbroken line of his successors, and Jesus still teaches from this ship the same doctrine through the bishops and priests, as His cooperators, with whom He has promised to remain to the end of the world. (Matt, xxviii. 20.)
Why was it that Peter and his assistant took in such a draught of fishes after they had labored all night in vain?
Because at first they trusted in themselves, and did not throw out their nets in the name of the Lord, relying on His blessing and assistance. "This example," say St Ambrose, "proves how vain and fruitless is presumptuous confidence, and how powerful, on the contrary is humility, since those who had previously labored without success, filled their nets at the word of the Redeemer." Let us learn from this our inability, that we begin onr work only with God, that is, with confidence in His help, and with the intention of working only for love of Him. and for His honor. If we do this, the blessing of the Lord will not be wanting.
What is represented by the nets and the draught of fishes?
"The word of truth which, so to speak, forms the network of gospel preaching," says St. Ambrose, "with which the successors of the apostles, the bishops and priests, draw souls from the darkness of error to the light of truth, and from the depths of the abyss to raise them to heaven."
What is meant by the apostles calling to their partners for help?
We are instructed by this that we should assist the preachers of the gospel, the priests, in the conversion of sinners by prayer, fasting, alms-deeds, and other good works, especially by good example, for this is a most meritorious work. (James v. 20.)
Why did Jesus choose poor and illiterate fishermen to be his apostles?
To show that the founding and propagating of the holy Catholic Church is not the work of man, but of God; for how could it be possible, without the evident assistance of God, that poor, illiterate fishermen could overthrow proud paganism, and bring nations to receive the doctrine of the crucified God-Man Jesus, who to the Jews was an abomination, to the Gentiles a folly!
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INSTRUCTION ON A GOOD INTENTION
Master, we have labored all the night, and have taken nothing, but at thy word I will let down the net. (Luke v. 5.)
THERE are many people who by a special, but loving-decree of God, seem to be born only for a miserable life, and who, with all this, can have no hope of a reward in the next world, because they do not avail themselves (by a good intention) of the miseries which God gives them as a ladder to heaven.
In what does a good intention consist?
In performing all our works, even the smallest, and in offering all our thoughts and words in the name of God,
that is, for His honor and in accordance with His most holy will; that we receive all sufferings and afflictions cheerfully from His hand, and offer them in union with the passion of Jesus.
How should we make a good intention?
In the morning we should offer to the Lord all our thoughts, words, and deeds, all our crosses and afflictions, and all our steps during the day:
1. as a sacrifice of homage, to pay to Him the service, honor and adoration due Him;
2. a sacrifice of thanksgiving for graces received;
3. a sacrifice of propitiation to render some satisfaction to divine justice for our own sins and the sins of others;
4. a sacrifice of impetration to obtain, through the merits of Christ, new graces and gifts for ourselves and others.
We must not forget however in making a good intention, to unite all our works with the merits of Jesus, by which alone they acquire worth and merit before God, and we must guard against impatience or sinful deeds by which we lose the merit of the good intention made in the morning, for a good intention cannot exist with sin. It is also very useful to place all our actions into the wounds of Jesus, offering them to Him by the hands of His Blessed Mother, and it is advisable frequently to renew our good intention during the day, by making use of these or similar words: "For the love of Thee, O Lord! For Thy sake! All in honor of God ! With the intention I made this morning!" Endeavor to instruct the ignorant, how to make a good intention, and thus share in their good works.
What benefit is derived from a good intention?
St. Anselm says: "It renders all works, even the smallest, golden and divine;" and St. Gregory: u It makes all thoughts, words, and deeds meritorious, and causes us to expect in the hour of death, like the wise virgins, the heavenly bridegroom, Jesus, and be richly rewarded by Him."
ASPIRATION. Incline my heart. O God, to Thy holy commandments. Guard me, that I work not in the night of sin, and thus gain nothing by my works. Assist all pastors that by Thy divine will, they may win souls for Thy kingdom, and bring them to Thee.
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| June 20th - St Silverius, Pope and Martyr |
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Posted by: Stone - 06-20-2021, 06:46 AM - Forum: June
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June 20 – St Silverius, Pope and Martyr
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Papal succession is one of the principal facts wherein is demonstrated the working of the Holy Ghost, from the very first day of his descent upon our earth. The legitimacy of the popes as successors of Peter is indeed closely linked with the legitimacy of the Church herself, in her character of Bride of the Man-God; and therefore, his mission being to lead the Bride to the Spouse, the Holy Ghost cannot suffer her to wander in the footprints of intruders. The inevitable play of human passions, interfering in the election of the Vicar of Christ, may perchance for a while render uncertain the transmission of spiritual power. But when it is proved that the Church, still holding or once more put in possession of, her liberty, acknowledges in the person of a certain Pope, until then doubtful, the true Sovereign Pontiff, this her very recognition is a proof that from that moment, at least, the occupant of the Apostolic See is as such invested by God himself. This doctrine the Holy Ghost confirms, by giving thereto, in the pontiff we are celebrating today, the consecration of martyrdom.
Saint Agapitus I died at Constantinople, whither Theodorat, the Goth, had persuaded him to go, in order to appease the anger of Justinian excited against this king by reason of his treasons. Scarcely had the news of this death reached the Arian prince than he, in terror of perhaps seeing someone unfavorable to his pretensions raised to the pontificate, imperatively designated as successor to the deceased Pope, the deacon Silverius. Two months later, the Justice of God struck the tyrant, and the Church was set free. Doubtless Rome would have but exercised her proper right bad she rejected the Head thus imposed upon her by main force: for not to earthly princes has the Lord consigned the election of his Vicar upon earth. But Silverius, who had been an utter stranger to the violence used on his personal account, was in reality a man in every way fitted to the supreme pontificate. Therefore, when the Roman clergy became free to act, they had no wish to withdraw from him their adhesion, until then certainly disputable. From that moment undoubtedly, Silverius could not but be Head of the Church, the true successor of Agapitus, the Lord’s Elect. In the midst of a period thronged with snares, he proved how well he understood the exigencies of duty in his exalted office, and preferred an exile which would eventually cost him his life, to the abandoning of a post wherein the Holy Ghost had truly placed him. Holy Church gratefully bears witness to this, in her short eulogy of him; and the army of Martyrs opened their ranks to receive him, when death at length struck the Pontiff in his land of exile.
Quote:Silverius was a native of Campania, and succeeded Agapitus in the Papacy. His doctrine and holiness shone forth in his pursuing of heretics; and his strength of soul, in his firmness regarding the upholding of the sentence passed by Agapitus. Agapitus had deposed Anthimus from the Patriarchate of Constantinople for defending the heresy of Eutyches; and Silverius would never allow of his restoration, although the Empress Theodora repeatedly asked him to do so.
The woman was enraged at him, on this account, and ordered Belisarius to send Silverius into exile. He was accordingly banished to the island of Ponza, whence, it is said, he wrote these words to Bishop Amator: “I am fed upon the bread of tribulation, and the water of affliction, but nevertheless, I have not given up, and I will not give up, doing my duty.” Soon, indeed, worn out by grief and suffering, he slept in the Lord, on the twelfth of the Kalends of July: His body being taken to Rome, was laid in the Vatican Basilica and was made illustrious by numerous miracles. He ruled the Church for more than three years, and ordained in the month of December, thirteen priests, five deacons, and nineteen bishops for divers sees.
The waters of tribulation passed indeed over thy soul, O holy Pontiff! Thy persecutors were not pagan Cæsars: nor was it even (as in the case of John I who so shortly preceded thee on the papal throne and in the arena of martyrdom), a heretical prince that overpowered thee with sectarian hatred. No: a worthless woman, having in her service treason emanating from the very sanctuary, was thine oppressor. Even before death had done its work in thee, there was to be found a son of thine coveting thy dominion, heavy though such a burden was! But how could man rend asunder the indissoluble bond that bound thee to holy Church? The usurper could but be an intruder; until such time as the all-powerful merits of thy glorious death had obtained the transformation of the hireling into the legitimate Pastor, and had made this Vigilius become the heir of thine own courage. Thus did the invisible Head of the Church permit, unto hell’s confusion, that ambition should carry scandals even into the very Holy of Holies. The unshaken Faith of nations, in the age in which thou didst live, suffered naught from all this; and the light resulting from these lamentable facts would but all the better serve to teach future ages that the personal character of a pope, nay, even his faults, cannot in any way affect the heavenly prerogative assured by God to the Vicar of his Christ. Keep up within us, dear Saint, the fruit of these teachings. If the Faithful be but well penetrated with true principles, they will never see waning in them that respect due to God in His representatives, whosoever or whatsoever they may be; and scandal, no matter whence it come, will be powerless to trammel their faith.
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| June 19th - Sts. Gervase and Protase & Juliana Falconieri |
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Posted by: Stone - 06-20-2021, 06:38 AM - Forum: June
- Replies (1)
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June 19 – Sts. Gervase and Protase, Martyrs
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There being but a simple commemoration made to day of these two glorious brethren, whose names were formerly so celebrated throughout the West, must not lessen their merit in our eyes. The Holy Spirit, whose function it is to maintain within the Bride of Jesus that divine mark of Holiness, whereby she is to be, up to the day of doom, forever recognisable both to angels and to men, ceases not in every generation to raise up new saints, who more especially attract the devout homage of that particular period to which their virtues have served as an example, and of which they are the distinctive glory. But while in thus honoring these children of hers, whose brilliant virtues add fresh jewels to her vesture, holy Church is moved by a sentiment of gratitude to the Paraclete for present benefits; these his later manifestations can never make her forgetful of those wrought within her by the same divine Spirit in her earlier days. Gervase and Protase are indeed no longer honored by a solemn feast, preceded as heretofore by a Vigil, whereof the Sacramentary of Gelasius preserves the memory; but they still occupy an important place in the Roman Litanies as representatives of the great Martyr host; which position none have been allowed to assume in their stead. To these two in preference to a vast array of Martyrs whose festivals are now of a rite superior to theirs, does Holy Church turn in the more solemn of all her supplications; whether it be in holy processions to implore the averting of scourges and the obtaining blessings of this present life; or whether the sacred assembly of the whole Christian people, prostrate together with the Pontiff, unite in imploring the grace of abundant consecration to flow upon altars and temples or upon future priests, virgins, or kings.
We learn from the historians of sacred rites, that the Introit of the Mass of our two holy Martyrs: The Lord will give peace unto his people, is a monument of the confidence of Saint Gregory the Great in their powerful succor. Filled with gratitude for results already obtained. he committed to their care, in the selection of this antiphon, the complete pacification of Italy, then a prey to Lombard invasion and to the petty vengeance of the Byzantine Court.
Two centuries previously, Saint Ambrose had a first experience of the special power of pacification which it seemed Our Lord Christ had attached to the very bones of these his glorious witnesses in return for their having given their life for Him. The empress Justina and the Arian Auxentius now for a second time directed against the Bishop of Milan a united assault of the powers of earth and of hell; and Ambrose, thus again ordered to abandon his Church, replied: “It were unseemly in a priest to deliver up the temple.” Upon the soldiers sent to lend main force to the invaders of the sacred precincts he denounced sentence of excommunication, if they passed one step farther; and they, knowing that they had been engaged to God by their baptism before being so to their prince, thereupon made fitting estimate of such a proposed act of sacrilege. To the court, terrified at the universal indignation that had ensued and now praying him to quell the popular excitement aroused by these odious measures, he replied: “It is in my power not to excite it; but to appease it, belongs only to God.” When such troops as could be assembled composed exclusively of Arians, were at length surrounding the Basilica wherein was Ambrose, his faithful people were there to be seen gathered around him in the name of the undivided and ever tranquil Trinity, sustaining by the sole force of divine psalmody and sacred hymns a novel kind of siege. But the last act of this two years’ war levied against a disarmed man, the event which completed the overthrow of heresy, was the discovery of the relics of Gervase and Protase, precious treasures unconsciously possessed by Milan and now revealed to their bishop by a heavenly inspiration.
Let us hearken to the bishop himself recounting to his sister Marcellina these facts, in all the sweet simplicity of his great soul. Long consecrated by the Supreme Pontiff himself to the Spouse of virgins, Marcellina was one of those all-powerful in humility, who are almost invariably placed by Our Lord side by side with the great historic names of holy Church, to be their stay and support before God; ignored co-operatrices in deeds the most brilliant, whose intervention by prayer and suffering must, for the most part, remain concealed until the day when eternal realities shall be revealed. Ambrose had already kept his sister informed of the details of the first campaign directed against him: “In almost every letter,” he says, “thou dost anxiously inquire about what affecteth the Church; well, then, here it is. The day after that on which thou didst send me the account of thy dreams, the weight of heavy disquietude fell upon us.”
The following letter, on the contrary, breathes already of triumph and liberty regained:
Quote:“The Brother to the Lady, his Sister, dearer to him than are his eyes and his life. It is my wont to leave thy holiness ignorant of nothing that passeth here in thine absence: know also then, that we have found Martyrs. For of a truth, when I was engaged about the dedicating of the Basilica which thou knowest, many began to call upon me with one voice, saying: Dedicate it after the manner of the Roman Basilica. I replied: I will do so, if I find relics of Martyrs. Thereupon there came upon me, as it were, the glowing heat of a presage. What shall I say? The Lord hath bestowed his grace. Despite the fears of the very clerics themselves, I ordered the earth to be dug up about the spot facing the balustrade of Saints Felix and Nabor. I found the wished-for signs. Men even came forward bringing possessed persons on whom we might impose hands; and it so fell out, that at the very first sight of the holy Martyrs, while we as yet had not broken silence, a [Urna in the Latin text, is taken for una by the best interpreters.] woman from among them was instantly seized and thrown to the ground before the holy tomb. We found therein two men of wondrous stature, as in the times of the ancients; all the bones entire, and a quantity of blood. There was a vast concourse of people during these two days. Wherefore these details? Towards evening we transported the holy bodies (in their entirety and laid out in a fitting manner) to the Basilica of Fausta; there vigil was kept all night, and imposition of hands. On the morrow, the translation to the Basilica that they call the ‘Ambrosian.’ During the transit, a blind man was cured.”
Ambrose then goes on to relate to Marcellina the discourse pronounced by him on this occasion. We can cite only one passage: “O Lord Jesus, I give thee thanks for having raised up in our midst the spirit of thy holy Martyrs, at a time in which thy Church is in need of greatest succour. Be it known unto all what kind of defenders I desire; such as can defend and yet attack not. Holy people, lo! I have gained such for you, they are useful to all, hurtful to none! Such are the guardians I ambition, such my soldiers. On their account I have no envy to fear; yea, I wish their succour to be profitable to those even who are jealous of me. So then let them come, let them behold my guards: I deny not my being surrounded by arms such as these! Even as in the case of the servant of Eliseus, when the Syrian army was besieging the prophet,—God hath opened our eyes. Behold us, Brethren, freed from no light shame: to have had defenders and not to have known it! … Behold how from an ignoble sepulchre, noble remains have been taken, trophies at last brought to light. Gaze upon this tomb still wet with blood, glorious stains marks of victory! See these relics inviolable in their hiding place, laid just in the very same order wherein they were placed the first day! Look at this head separated from the shoulders! Our old men now begin to remember having formerly heard these Martyrs named, and to have read the inscription on their tomb. Our city had lost her own Martyrs, she who had borne away those of foreign cities! Although this is God’s gift, still I cannot refuse to see therein a great grace, whereby our Lord Jesus has vouchsafed to render the time of my episcopacy illustrious. Not deserving to be myself a Martyr, I have procured these Martyrs for you. Let them be brought in then; bring hither these victorious victims, let them take their place there where Christ is the Victim; but, on the Altar be He who suffered for all, and under the Altar be they whom His Passion redeemed. I had destined this spot for myself; since fitting it is. that the Pontiff should repose there where he hath been wont to present the Oblation; but I cede my right to sacred victims: this place was due unto Martyrs.”
In fact, Ambrose did come, ten years later, to take his own place under the altar of the Ambrosian Basilica; he occupied the Epistle side, leaving that of the Gospel to the two Martyrs. In the ninth century, one of his successors, Angilbert, placed the three venerable bodies together in one same sarcophagus of porphyry, which was placed length-ways of the altar, above the two primitive tombs. There, after the lapse of a thousand years, on August the 8th in the year 1871 owing to necessary repairs being made in the Basilica, they once more reappeared; not this time amidst blood, as the fourth century had disclosed our Martyrs, but under a sheet of water, deep and limpid; a touching image of that water of Wisdom that flowed so copiously from the lips of Ambrose himself, now the principal occupant of this holy tomb. There, not far from the tomb of Saint Marcellina, itself also an altar, the pilgrim of these days, with soul brimful of by-gone memories, may still venerate these precious relics; for they are united together in one crystal shrine where, placed under the immediate protection of the Roman Pontiff, Pius IX, they await the glorious day of resurrection.
The brief legend of these two Martyrs runs as follows:
Quote:Gervase and Protase were the sons of Vitalis and Valeria, who both testified even unto death, for the Lord Christ’s sake, by martyrdom,—the father at Ravenna, and the mother at Milan. After the victory of their parents, Gervase and Protase gave all their inheritance to the poor, and set free their slaves. This act of theirs stirred up against them savage hatred, on the part of the heathen priests, and when the Count Astasius was about setting forth to war, they believed they had got a good occasion for the destruction fo the two holy brethren. They persuaded Astasius that their gods had revealed to them that they had no chance of conquering in the war, unless he had first made Gervase and Protase to deny Christ, and to offer sacrifice to the gods. Being commanded so to do, they refused with horror, and Astasius then ordered Gervase to be beaten with rods until he died under the stripes, and Protase to be beaten with clubs, and his head to be struck off. A servant of Christ named Philip took away their dead bodies by stealth and buried them in his own house; and in after times, St. Ambrose, being warned of God, found them, and bestowed them in a hallowed and honorable place. They suffered at Milan, on the thirteenth of the kalends of July.
Though short is the account of your combat, O holy Martyrs, because few are the details handed down to us concerning you, still may we cry out with Saint Ambrose when he first presented you to the populace: “That eloquence is best that springs from blood; for blood is a voice of thunder, re-echoing from earth to heaven.” Oh! make us to understand its potent accents! Ever must the veins of a Christian be ready to pour forth testimony to God, our Redeemer! Say, is there no blood left in our impoverished veins? Oh! cure our generation of such a hopeless state of lingering decline; what physicians may not, Jesus Christ can always do!
Up then, glorious Brethren; teach us the royal road of devotedness and suffering! Surely not in vain have our feeble eyes been granted to contemplate you in these our days even as did Ambrose; if God, after the lapse of so many ages, has once more revealed the sight of you, he must therein have intentions not unlike those he had in by gone times! Therefore, dear Saints, may he perchance vouchsafe to raise up, through your intercession, mankind and our present society from the degradation of a fatal servility; to banish error, to save the Church who cannot indeed perish, but whom he loves to deliver by means of her Saints. Doth it not behoove you, generous Martyrs, to recognize by signal favors, the protection lavished by the successor of Peter on your relics, despite his own captivity? Be Milan worthy of you and of her Ambrose! Deign lovingly to visit the various lands both near and afar, formerly enriched with the blood found near your tomb. France was specially devout to you, placing no fewer than five of her cathedrals under your glorious invocation; may she not look for particular help at your hands? Oh! rouse up once more her piety of by-gone days; free her from false sects, from traitors! Let the day soon come when she may step forth once again the soldier of God!
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| US bishops vote to draft doc on Eucharist, address worthiness to receive Communion |
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Posted by: SAguide - 06-19-2021, 10:10 AM - Forum: Pandemic 2020 [Spiritual]
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BREAKING: US bishops vote to draft doc on Eucharist, address worthiness to receive Communion
Abp. Cordileone: ‘If we fail now and do not act courageously in presenting Church teaching …
how can we expect to be taken seriously when speaking on any other topic?’
June 18, 2021 ( LifeSiteNews) — The U.S. bishops’ conference voted 168-55 to move forward with the drafting of a formal statement on the Eucharist. The document will address Church teaching on worthiness to receive Holy Communion, and thus directly affect the reception of the Eucharist by pro-abortion Catholic politicians. The proposal for a document “On the meaning of the Eucharist in the life of the Church” was initiated at the request of Archbishop José Gomez of Los Angeles, in part as a response to what Bishop Liam Cary called an “unprecedented situation in the country,” that is, the circumstance of a self-professed Catholic president “who is opposed to the teaching of the Church,” particularly the teaching on the grave intrinsic evil of abortion.
Bishop Kevin C. Rhoades, chairman of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB) doctrine committee, explained in a pre-recorded address to his fellow bishops that the document would “address the fundamental truths we believe” about the Eucharist, including “the Real Presence” and its sacrificial character. It would also “focus on the need to celebrate the sacrament with reverence and beauty,” and a third section would express “how participation in the Eucharist compels us to conversion.”
A subset of this third part of the document would address “Eucharistic consistency,” said Rhoades, referring to the need for Catholics to receive our Lord in Holy Communion only in a state of grace.
The outline for the document has sparked controversy among some Catholic clergy and laymen because of worries that, in the words of Cardinal Cupich, “there is an expectation” “that we deny communion to the president, to Speaker Pelosi, and to other people that are being named.”
Despite a lively streak of opposition to the drafting of the document, and particularly to its planned reference to Church teaching on worthiness to receive Holy Communion, the bishops’ debate on the issue revealed that the proposal had strong support.
“There was a consensus among the members of the committee on doctrine, that one cannot discuss the centrality of the Eucharist as the source and summit of the Christian life without addressing those actions that inflict damage to the honor due to the sacrament, or cause scandal to the faithful,” stated Rhoades in his pre-recorded address, aired yesterday during the USCCB’s Spring General Assembly.
Rhoades further explained, in anticipation of objections to the proposal, “It was never our thought to propose national norms for denying Catholics Holy Communion, but to provide a clear understanding of why our Church has these laws, outlining the rich tradition and profound teaching that is the basis for these canons.
“In addition, the statement was never considered by the committee on doctrine to be a statement about any one individual, or about any one category of sinful behavior. Rather, it would bring heightened awareness among the faithful of the need to be conformed to the Eucharist and to bear public witness to the faith through a call to conversion and the abandonment of sinful behavior,” Rhoades continued.
During the bishops’ discussion, Archbishop Salvatore Cordileone of San Francisco issued a stirring call for support of the proposal: “The eyes of the whole country are on us now. If we fail now and do not act courageously in presenting Church teaching — again, this is a teaching document, comprehensive — in presenting this teaching clearly and convincingly, on this core Catholic value, how can we expect to be taken seriously when speaking on any other topic?”
“I would remind all of us of the biblical injunction that Saint John Paul II repeated throughout his pontificate … ‘Be not afraid,’” concluded Cordileone.
Archbishop Joseph Naumann, chairman of the USCCB pro-life committee, unapologetically argued for the pressing need for the proposed document in the face of a pro-abortion president who identifies as Catholic.
“Those who advocate for abortion no longer talk in the language of choice. They talk about it as a right … our president talks about it as a right,” said Naumann. “This is a Catholic president that’s doing this, the most aggressive thing we’ve ever seen in terms of this attack on life when it’s most innocent.”
Bishop Strickland, who urged his fellow bishops to “emphasize the clear connection between repentance, confession of sins, firm purpose of amendment, and worthily receiving our Lord,” also insisted that “prominent persons can’t be held to a different standard.”
Bishop James D. Conley of Lincoln, Nebraska, added, “I converted when I was in college and it was really the Catholic teaching on the Holy Eucharist, the Real Presence that drew me into the Catholic Church. I think we have a wonderful opportunity, a stage, a national, an international stage to do something really beautiful and powerful.”
Cordileone commented in response to the vote to move forward with the document, “At this historic time in the Church, I would exhort us all to remember the Eucharistic martyrs who died to protect the Most Blessed Sacrament from profanation, and to take heart.”
“I look forward to continuing fruitful dialogue with all my brother bishops, and I place my trust in the Holy Spirit to guide us to a real and not feigned unity in Christ. I ask all Catholics to pray for their own bishop, and for all of us bishops as we discern the best way to speak these profound truths about the Holy Eucharist.”
The document draft will be discussed by the bishops in November when they re-convene for their Fall General Assembly.
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| Death rate from variant CV virus six times higher for vaccinated than unvaccinated |
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Posted by: SAguide - 06-19-2021, 10:03 AM - Forum: COVID Vaccines
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Death rate from variant COVID virus six times higher for vaccinated than unvaccinated, UK health data show
LONDON, England, June 18, 2021 ( LifeSiteNews) – The death rate from the Delta COVID variant is six times higher among those who were fully vaccinated for two weeks or longer than among those who never received a shot, according to data published by Public Health England on Friday.
Twenty-six people died among 4,087 who were fully vaccinated 14 days or more before testing positive for the Delta COVID variant. This equates to a death rate of 0.00636 percent, which is 6.6 times higher than the rate of 0.000957 deaths – or 34 deaths among 35,521 positive Delta cases among the unvaccinated, according to data published in a June 18 report titled “SARS-CoV-2 variants of concern and variants under investigation in England, Technical briefing 16.”
Both death rates among the unvaccinated and vaccinated are exceedingly low (less than one percent of all positive tests) for a variant that Public Health England describes as the “dominant variant” in the UK, comprising “91 percent of sequenced cases.”
A risk assessment of the Delta variant of the pandemic coronavirus published Friday describes it as being more readily spread between people, but it is also described as a variant with “low infection severity.”
Mainstream media have latched onto the possibility that the Delta variant is producing higher hospitalization rates in parts of Scotland and England than the “first wave” of the Alpha variant, but according to the UK public health report, these data are based on “early evidence” and “limited understanding of the clinical course of the disease.”
Higher hospitalization among vaccinated
Since hospitalizations are of concern, fully vaccinated people are being hospitalized in the UK at a higher rate than unvaccinated people. According to most recent technical briefing report, public health data show that 2.0 percent of vaccinated individuals (84 of 4,087) who tested positive for the Delta variant were admitted to hospital (including those tested upon entering the hospital for any other reason) compared with 1.48 percent of unvaccinated individuals (527 of 35,521).
The current data is in keeping with data published last week by England’s public health agency that also showed a six-times greater death rate among the fully vaccinated than the unvaccinated and a hospital admission rate of 2.3 percent among those fully vaccinated at least two weeks earlier compared with just 1.2 percent among the unvaccinated.
Antibody-dependent enhancement?
This is reminiscent of the ADE (antibody dependent enhancement) phenomenon that has been seen for other vaccine and that has been expressed as a point of concern among many scientists for the COVID vaccines,” Stephanie Seneff, a senior researcher at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology’s Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Laboratory told LifeSiteNews.
ADE blighted previous attempts at coronavirus vaccines and frequently resulted in enhanced lung disease among vaccinated lab animals. It led researchers in 2012 to advise scientists to proceed with “caution” for any human coronavirus vaccines which could lead to enhanced lung disease.
Seneff said research has shown that coronavirus vaccines alter the ways immune systems respond to infection and can activate other sleeping infections in the vaccinated person such as herpes virus, creating symptoms of Bell’s palsy or shingles.
“It is conceivable to me that the laser-beam specificity of the induced antibodies is offset by a general weakening of innate immunity,” Seneff said.
“I also suspect that massive vaccination campaigns may accelerate the rate at which the vaccine-resistant mutant strains become dominant among all the SARS-Co-V2 [coronavirus] strains.”
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| June 18th: Sts. Mark, Macellinus, and Ephraem the Syrian |
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Posted by: Stone - 06-18-2021, 12:38 PM - Forum: June
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June 18 – Sts Mark and Marcellian, Martyrs
We have already met with these noble athletes of today’s feast, for on January 20th, when celebrating Saint Sebastian, the brave defender of holy Church, Mark and Marcellian appeared at his side as the noblest conquest won by the sainted head of the prætorian guards. There are other heroes likewise, gained over by his zealous intrepidity, whose names gild the pages of the Martyrology; but these two whose festival we are keeping were the immediate occasion of Sebastian’s leading to God so goodly a troop of valiant Christians. Their conversion prepared Sebastian’s martyrdom by reason of his apostolate in their regard; and their glory eternally redounds to him around whom in heaven they form a resplendent phalanx.
Captivity, torments, and even the sentence of death pronounced upon them, had failed to shake the courage of these two brethren. A trial yet more terrible awaited them, namely, the sight forced upon them of the heart-broken grief caused to all they loved on earth, by this their sentence of condemnation; for their family not being Christian knew no bounds to sorrow. Their father and mother bent down by years, the wife of each, leading by the hand or in her arms a group of weeping children, all uttering bitterest reproaches against these soldiers of Christ, for the destitution into which their coming death would plunge the survivors; such was the dire attack! Sebastian, profiting by the liberty his position afforded to approach the Christians in prison, was ever their comfort and encourager. He failed not to be present at this scene, for his noble heart fully realized how dangerously severe such a trial must be for souls as yet unscathed by any personal peril. The danger he knew might be imminent, at that moment; wherefore scorning his own safety, he there and then revealed himself a Christian, in order to hold out a strengthening hand to the two brethren. Moreover, God lent such wondrous efficacy to his words that they converted even the pagans there assembled. Thus Mark and Marcellian had the joy of beholding those whose piteous complaints had, a moment before, so painfully thrilled their souls, now applauding their constancy and demanding baptism. Their unbounded happiness was evident all through their final conflict, which opened heaven to them, and which is related as follows in this short Lesson:
Quote:Mark and Marcellian were two brothers, Romans, who were arrested by the Prefect, Fabian, for believing in Christ, and were fastened to a beam, to which their feet were nailed. The judge said to them: “Wretched creatures, do think for a moment, and free yourselves from such suffering.” But they answered him: “Never did we enjoy any banquet so much as we do what we are now undergoing for Jesus Christ’s sake, in whose love we now begin to be firmly fixed: would that He might let us suffer this as long as we are clad in this corruptible body!” Still suffering, they for a day and a night sang the praises of God continually, and in the end were thrust through with darts, and so attained the glory of martyrdom. Their bodies are buried in the Via Ardeatina.
The Holy Ghost filled you with strength, O glorious Martyrs; and the love which he poured into your hearts changed into exquisite delights, torments that terrify our cowardice. Yet, after all, of how much less account are those tortures that touched but your perishable body, compared with that intense anguish of soul over which you so nobly triumphed? The dire grief of those whom you held dearer far than life, and whom, to all appearance, you needs must leave in hopeless woe, was verily the culminating pitch of your martyrdom. Only such can fail to realize this, who deserve the reproach cast by Saint Paul upon the pagans of his day, that they are without affection; yes, when the world once more presents such a hateful spectacle as this, then will the sign of the last day’s near approach, so says the same Apostle. Nevertheless, human love must needs cede to that of God: He that loveth father or mother more than Me, is not worthy of Me: and he who loveth son or daughter more than Me, is not worthy of Me. You understood all this, dear Martyrs; your relatives who would separate you from our Lord, became but enemies in your eyes. At that very instant, our Jesus, who can never let himself be outdone in generosity, restored these dear ones to you, by taking them, through a miracle of grace, together with you and because of your example, unto himself. Thus do you complete for us the instructions already given, by a Julitta and her boy, by a Vitus and his glorious Companions. Obtain for us, ye victors in such keen trials, an ever-growing courage and love proportionate to our increase in the light and knowledge of our duty to God.
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| Conciliar maneuvers against the FSSP in Dijon, France |
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Posted by: Stone - 06-17-2021, 07:58 PM - Forum: Vatican II and the Fruits of Modernism
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Archbishop Lefebvre clearly and plainly saw the traps laid for traditional priests by Conciliar Rome - firstly with the 1984 Indult, and then under the newly formed Ecclesia Dei (e.g. the Fraternity of St. Peter) in 1988: they must accept Vatican II and the New Mass (see here, here, and here, for example).
In 1999, the FSSP experienced an 'internal crisis' where several priests demanded to be able to celebrate the New Mass. At the conclusion of a general assembly in 2000 convoked by the Holy See, the FSSP came to an agreement with Rome. This article from the traditional-SSPX, appropriately entitled The Fiasco of the Fraternity, summarizes what the Fraternity agreed to/gave up: "... not only is the New Mass recognized as legitimate, but it is, for the Fraternity of St. Peter, the official rite of the Church." It is my understanding that the FSSP priests are obligated to celebrate a Novus Ordo Mass once a year on Holy Thursday "on account of its special character, signifying the unity of the Church," according to then Superior of the FSSP, Fr. Bisig.
Thanks be to God that Archbishop Lefebvre navigated his traditional-SSPX through these Conciliar maneuvers and warned repeatedly against this entrapment - at least 10 years before the FFSP's complete capitulation:
Quote:“Availing ourselves of the Indult is tantamount to putting ourselves into a state of contradiction because at the same time that Rome gives the Fraternity of St. Peter, for example, or Le Barroux Abbey and other groups authorization to say the Mass of All Time, they also require young priests to sign a Profession of Faith in which the spirit of the Council must be accepted. It is a contradiction: the Spirit of the Council is embodied in the New Mass. How is it possible to desire to preserve the Mass of all time while accepting the Spirit that destroys this Mass of All Time? It is completely contradictory.” ssspx.org/en/archbishop-lefebvre-indult-mass
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French diocese justifies kicking out two Latin Mass priests
If the reasons for the FSSP’s eviction are accepted without question by Rome, it could mean that
difficult days are ahead for other traditional apostolates in France and perhaps elsewhere.
June 17, 2021 (LifeSiteNews) — After the sudden and unexplained eviction of the Priestly Fraternity of Saint Peter (FSSP) from the archdiocese of Dijon, in Burgundy, France, the archdiocese’s website published a statement this Thursday giving the reasons for the move. Under the title: “To put things back into perspective,” the unsigned communiqué accuses the FSSP of being responsible for the break that has led local Archbishop Roland Minnerath to drive the traditional fraternity from its apostolate in Dijon as of August 31.
Several realities and attitudes are held against the priests of the FSSP: their refusal to concelebrate occasionally within the diocese in the Novus Ordo, and the functioning of the apostolate as a “quasi-parish,” with an “exclusive rite” and the offering of services, including catechesis and activities for the young, to faithful who are still “part of their territorial parish.”
The unsigned statement recalls how the apostolate of the Basilica of Saint-Bernard, in Dijon, originated 23 years ago in 1998 under the condition that “the priest of the Fraternity” should also “concelebrate now and again with the other priests so that there would be no watertight separation between the two rites.”
Already in 2007 (when the motu proprio Summorum Pontificum was published), the diocese decided it wanted to take over the celebration of the “old rite,” but this finally did not happen and the Fraternity was allowed to send another priest to Dijon: the diocese made “occasional concelebration” with his diocesan confreres a condition for the FSSP to remain.
Father Garban of the FSSP accepted this condition and remained until 2016.
Since then, the priests named by the FSSP have refused to concelebrate, which is presented by the diocese as the refusal of a “gesture of sacramental and priestly communion,” suggesting that a “parallel community” of faithful has been created.
The diocese is also unhappy that there are now two priests from the FSSP looking after “a small group of faithful” and accuses part of these of “rejecting what they call ‘the conciliar Church.’” It insists that it now has a diocesan priest, “helped by others,” who is willing to celebrate the “old rite” for this community, while its members will be expected to turn to the Novus Ordo parishes of Dijon for catechesis, chaplaincies, youth clubs, and preparation for the sacraments.
The statement concluded:
Quote:“If like their predecessor, the priests of the Fraternity had accepted to demonstrate their unity with us by joining at least some concelebrations, and if they did not consider their group of faithful as their exclusive domain, we would have welcomed their contribution.”
The accusations are harsh indeed, for they suggest that the FSSP’s apostolate has created a kind of parallel Church whose communion with the diocese — and therefore with the hierarchy of the Church and the Church itself — is at best doubtful.
The issue of concelebration is a thorny one regarding the acceptance of institutes and fraternities attached to the traditional Latin Mass (TLM) by French bishops.
Different kinds of situations exist: some dioceses absolutely refuse to call in priests hailing from these communities, following the lead of the now-deceased cardinal Jean-Marie Lustiger in Paris, who was quite open to the traditional form of the Roman rite, even before the 2007 motu proprio — as long as it was under his authority and celebrated by “bi-ritualist” priests.
In other dioceses, the FSSP, the Institute of Christ the King Sovereign Priest, the Institute of the Good Shepherd and others have obtained apostolates of different types. Some dioceses, such as Versailles or Toulon, have set up “personal parishes” for the faithful who practice in the traditional, “extraordinary” form of the Roman rite, allowing them to have access to all normal parochial activities in the spirit of the traditional Mass, sacraments, and religious instruction, offered by diocesan priests, often priests who were trained in a traditional fraternity (including the SSPX), or by Ecclesia Dei communities.
In other dioceses, coexistence with the Novus Ordo is imposed within the place of worship assigned to the local traditional institute or fraternity, and daily traditional Masses, let alone catechism and other such activities are not nominally included in the services these priests can offer.
Also, some priests from these communities accept to join a yearly concelebration with their local bishop and the diocesan clergy at the “Chrism Mass” on Holy Thursday; others do not — those of the FSSP, as a rule, do not, considering that they were ordained for the Vetus Ordo (in the same way that Catholic priests of the Oriental rites assigned to groups of faithful in France only celebrate their particular rite, no questions asked).
The concelebration issue is one that exists in these sometimes tense relationships with local bishops.
Concelebration is certainly not the norm in the Vetus Ordo: it is restricted to the newly-ordained priest’s ordination Mass together with the ordaining bishop, without the visual form it takes in the Novus Ordo, where several priests — sometimes a great number of them — form an arc around the main celebrant, facing the public and taking turns to speak in a ritual that turns away attention from the sacrificial aspect of the Mass and the fact that in consecrating the bread and the wine, the priest acts “in the person of Christ.” Concelebration is evidently out of place in the Traditional Latin Mass, and such has been the case for centuries.
The FSSP itself went through a crisis starting in 1999 when a group of its priests in favor of concelebration at the Chrism Mass asked for an apostolic visitation that would allow for this to happen. The crisis would lead to a number of priests leaving the FSSP to join the diocesan clergy, while the FSSP itself remained attached to the exclusive celebration of the Latin Mass.
In a recent interview with “Le Salon beige,” a news website run by lay Catholics, the superior of the French district of the FSSP, Father Benoît Paul-Joseph, noted that the Fraternity faces tensions in some dioceses where its apostolates attract as many (and often more) faithful as the local Novus Ordo parishes, and appear to be only “tolerated” within them while being more “dynamic.” He sees the solution in the creation of “personal parishes.” In the present situation, “[t]he priest and the faithful involved give the impression of going beyond the limits of the framework, but this is because it does not fit” their needs.
This is obviously what has taken place in Dijon, where the Vetus Ordo community that has grown around the FSSP is lively and observant, while Novus Ordo parishes often have less regular faithful from older age-groups.
Regarding concelebration, Father Benoît Paul-Joseph told “Le Salon beige:”
Quote:The question of concelebration is a delicate one, especially in our institute, because of our internal history and a crisis that we have gone through. As a preamble, let me recall that if the majority of FSSP priests do not concelebrate, this is not due to an unofficial prohibition by their superiors, nor to an impossibility linked to their constitutions (which would be impossible), but to their personal choice, as the Church allows.
Secondly, it is also important to remember that the priests of our institute are in full ecclesial communion because of their membership in the Fraternity of St. Peter, an Apostolic Society of Pontifical Right, whose history and very name originate in fidelity to the See of Peter. There can be no doubt about this.
The Motu Proprio does not speak directly of concelebration, but recalls the dignity of the Paul VI missal, asking priests not to exclude it on principle. In our case, our constitutions, definitively approved by the Holy See in 2003, recognize that celebration in the Extraordinary Form is constitutive of our charism. This means that a priest of the FSSP cannot receive a mission that would include the celebration of the liturgy in the ordinary form.
As for concelebration (in the ordinary form), if it is one of the signs proper to express communion with the bishop, it is not the only one, nor the highest (it has been practiced only since quite recent times), and it is not binding.
Also, the priests of the FSSP, because of the liturgical choice they have made, which is based on objective theological reasons, do not wish to concelebrate Mass in the Ordinary Form as provided for by canon and liturgical law. I can understand that this is difficult for some bishops to accept, but it seems to me unjust to suspect or penalize people who make use of a right, or to put them on trial for their motives in making their choice. The priests of the FSSP have never questioned the validity of the Mass celebrated according to the missal of Paul VI, but they have always underlined its insufficiencies and ambiguities, in a filial spirit. For this reason, since they have permission, they prefer not to concelebrate it.
In this regard, I would like to point out that the question of concelebration was submitted to the Pontifical Commission Ecclesia Dei in 2010 and that it recalled that it is always a possibility, never an obligation.
These are all important points, and they raise the question of the legitimacy of the FSSP’s eviction: Does a bishop have a (canonical) right to drive away and cast suspicion on a legitimate fraternity whose mission is the celebration of the Traditional Mass, because its members proclaim their steadfast attachment to that Mass?
In the same way, can it be expected of the faithful to give up the natural context of the Traditional Latin Mass, which includes access to all the sacraments in the traditional form, in all “Catholic” activities, together with a solid and well-structured catechesis? Many traditionally-minded Catholics have issues with diocesan catechesis because it does not adequately teach the faith and is often sadly lacking in substance. One need only look at the continual plummeting of religious practice in the younger generations and their widespread if not universal ignorance of many points of doctrine, even when having attended diocesan Catholic schools, to realize that this is a real problem.
From the diocese of Dijon’s statement, it clearly emerges that this desire for a coherent, unified “traditional” practice of the faith within a group of faithful attached to the Latin Mass is precisely what the local bishop finds problematic.
If the reasons for the FSSP’s eviction are accepted without question by Rome, it could mean that difficult days are ahead for other traditional so-called “Ecclesia Dei” apostolates in France and perhaps elsewhere, especially given the fact that the latest developments in the Vatican point to restrictions on the Traditional Latin Mass. These developments include the banning of individual Masses in Saint Peter’s Basilica, and a possible rewriting of the motu proprio Summorum Pontificum which is said to be favored by Pope Francis.
Here below is LifeSite’s full translation of the statement of the diocese of Dijon:
Priestly Fraternity of Saint Peter — Dijon: to put things in perspective …
The Diocese would like to make some clarifications.
1. FSSP — the list of requirements
The Fraternity of St. Peter (a society of priests attached to the pre-Vatican II rite) was welcomed in the Diocese of Dijon in 1998 in response to requests from some of the faithful to have Mass according to the pre-Vatican II tradition.
It was agreed that the priest of the Fraternity should also celebrate from time to time with the other priests so that there would be no watertight separation between the two rites.
After the departure of the first priest of the Fraternity in 2007, the diocese wanted to provide these celebrations in the old rite by diocesan priests. This plan could not be carried out and the Fraternity was told that another of their priests could come to Dijon on the condition that he would not refuse to concelebrate occasionally with his diocesan confreres.
Appointed in 2007, Father Garban fulfilled this condition quite naturally. His superior wanted to transfer him elsewhere in 2010. We insisted on having a priest who was willing to concelebrate. Since the Superior could not find a replacement for him, he extended Father Garban’s mandate until 2016.
Since then, the priests appointed by the Fraternity have refused to make this gesture of priestly and sacramental communion. Such an attitude reveals a conception of their ministry that we do not share. The old rite must not create a parallel community. Priests must be free to celebrate in either rite, and the faithful are still part of their territorial parish.
2. The faithful are attached to them
The priests of the Fraternity have gradually developed in an autonomous way a quasi-parochial pastoral ministry, which goes beyond the specifications of our initial agreement. Since 2017 there are even two priests who are sharing the assistance of a small group of faithful. Little by little this group has consolidated around them since they were in fact providing all the services normally provided by the parishes.
We understand this attachment. Part of these faithful easily go from one rite to the other. Another part does not accept the ordinary form of the Mass and rejects what it calls “the conciliar Church.” The diocesan authority must see to it that the Catholic community is not divided. It is clear that this is not only a question of rite, but of exclusive rite and separate community.
3. Proposition
The blockage comes from the attitude of the FSSP which has excluded that its priests celebrate in the ordinary rite. The faithful do not understand this blockage and say they are victims of this intransigence. The Superior of the Fraternity has appointed two priests when we had requested only one. The FSSP is imposing the formation of a community, part of which (as recent messages show) casts suspicion on the diocesan Church.
Since today a diocesan priest, assisted by others, has said that he is ready to provide ministry according to the old rite to this community, we remain consistent with the line that the diocese has taken for 23 years. Mass according to the ancient rite will be assured and the services of catechesis, chaplaincy, patronage, preparation for the sacraments will be offered by the parishes, in particular those near Fontaine-lès-Dijon and Dijon-Saint Bernard.
If the priests of the Fraternity had accepted, like their predecessor, to mark their unity with us at least in some concelebrations and if they did not consider their group of faithful as their exclusive domain, we would have been delighted with their contribution.
[Emphasis mine.]
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| Supreme Court delivers narrow victory for religious freedom over LGBT ‘rights’ |
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Posted by: Stone - 06-17-2021, 06:49 PM - Forum: General Commentary
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Supreme Court delivers narrow victory for religious freedom over LGBT ‘rights’
‘The Court has emitted a wisp of a decision that leaves religious liberty in a confused and vulnerable state,’ argued Justice Alito. ‘
Those who count on this Court to stand up for the First Amendment have every right to be disappointed — as am I.’
WASHINGTON, June 17, 2020 (LifeSiteNews) — The U.S. Supreme Court has delivered a unanimous judgement in favor of religious freedom in a case which had pitted so-called homosexual rights against a Catholic foster care agency’s conscience rights. Meanwhile, conservative justices as well as pro-homosexual activists are characterizing the ruling as having no relevance for similar cases before courts.
In a ruling issued this morning, all nine justices sided with Catholic Social Services (CSS) against the city of Philadelphia in a case known as Fulton v. The City of Philadelphia.
Philadelphia had stopped referring children to CSS for foster care because CSS would not vet same-sex couples as foster parents, as the Catholic agency believes that marriage is a bond between one man and one woman. The question before the court was whether the actions of Philadelphia violated the First Amendment Rights of CSS.
Chief Justice Roberts, who delivered the opinion of the Court, wrote:
The refusal of Philadelphia to contract with CSS for the provision of foster care services unless it agrees to certify same-sex couples as foster parents cannot survive strict scrutiny, and violates the First Amendment.
Justice Alito noted that the city government had threatened the welfare of children awaiting placement in foster homes at a time when there was already an “acute shortage of foster parents,” and “went so far as to prohibit the placement of any children in homes that CSS had previously vetted and approved.”
“The City apparently prefers to risk leaving children without foster parents than to allow CSS to follow its religiously dictated policy, which threatens no tangible harm,” continued Justice Alito.
Today’s ruling is being hailed by many as an important victory.
“With more than 400,000 kids in foster care, we should be doing everything we can to support organizations that connect children in need with loving families. Discriminating against faith-based foster care providers because of their beliefs is not only unconstitutional, it makes it harder to get more kids into the safe, stable homes they deserve,” declared Sen. Roy Blunt of Missouri. “The Supreme Court’s decision is a victory for religious liberty and for every child in the foster care system.”
“The decision today by the Supreme Court is a substantial win for religious liberty. In a time of growing hostility towards religion the Supreme Court’s reaffirmation of this fundamental freedom is even more critical,” said Family Research council President, Tony Perkins in a statement.
“Increasingly, the Left refuses to tolerate the slightest deviation from their political orthodoxy regardless of who suffers as a result. While we stop to celebrate and thank God that the Supreme Court reaffirmed religious liberty today, we are fully aware and prepared for the attacks of the Left on this fundamental, God-given freedom to continue unabated,” concluded Perkins.
“The Supreme Court’s decision today is a great win for all children who are in need of a forever home. The staggering number of children in foster care demands an all hands on deck approach that allows for all people, no matter their religious beliefs, to open their homes and their hearts to a son or daughter who needs a family,” commented Leigh Fitzpatrick Snead, an adoptive mother and Fellow for The Catholic Association. “The state should not require foster care agencies to compromise, violate, or abandon their religious beliefs or identities as a condition of serving these children in need.”
A “wisp of a decision”
While clearly a victory for religious liberty in general, and Catholic social service organizations in particular, Justice Samuel Alito, who was joined in his concurring opinion by Justice Clarence Thomas and Justice Neil Gorsuch, warned that today’s ruling did not go far enough:
Quote:This decision might as well be written on the dissolving paper sold in magic shops. The City has been adamant about pressuring CSS to give in, and if the City wants to get around today’s decision, it can simply eliminate the never-used exemption power. If it does that, then, voilà, today’s decision will vanish — and the parties will be back where they started …
Not only is the Court’s decision unlikely to resolve the present dispute, it provides no guidance regarding similar controversies in other jurisdictions. From 2006 to 2011, Catholic Charities in Boston, San Francisco, Washington, D. C., and Illinois ceased providing adoption or foster care services after the city or state government insisted that they serve same-sex couples. Although the precise legal grounds for these actions are not always clear, it appears that they were based on laws or regulations generally prohibiting discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation. And some jurisdictions have adopted anti-discrimination rules that expressly target adoption services.
Today’s decision will be of no help in other cases involving the exclusion of faith-based foster care and adoption agencies unless by some chance the relevant laws contain the same glitch as the Philadelphia contractual provision on which the majority’s decision hangs. The decision will be even less significant in all the other important religious liberty cases that are bubbling up.
LGBT organizations interpreting today’s ruling on behalf of religious freedom are echoing Justice Alito.
“Supreme Court in Fulton rules in favor of religious adoption agency, but on narrow grounds (specific to the City of Philadelphia contract),” wrote Shannon Minter in a tweet.
“A narrow decision that leaves existing law largely unchanged & creates no sweeping new religious exemption,” said Minter, Legal Director of the National Center for Lesbian Rights (NCLR).
“The Court has emitted a wisp of a decision that leaves religious liberty in a confused and vulnerable state,” concluded Justice Alito in his 77-page opinion. “Those who count on this Court to stand up for the First Amendment have every right to be disappointed — as am I.”
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| June 17th - Sts. Nicander and Marcian |
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Posted by: Stone - 06-17-2021, 12:28 PM - Forum: June
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SS. NICANDER AND MARCIAN, MARTYRS
ABOUT THE YEAR 303
THESE saints, as appears from the circumstances of their acts, suffered under Diocletian, and probably in Mœsia, a province of Illyricum, under the same governor who condemned St. Julius; though some moderns place their martyrdom at Venafro, at present in the kingdom of Naples. They had served some time in the Roman troops, but when the edicts were every where published against the Christians, foregoing all expectations from the world, they forsook the army. This was made a crime in them, and they were impeached before Maximus, the governor of the province. The judge informed them of the imperial order that all were commanded to sacrifice to the gods. Nicander replied, that order could not regard Christians, who looked upon it as unlawful to abandon the immortal God, to adore wood and stones. Daria, the wife of Nicander, was present, and encouraged her husband. Maximus interrupting her, said: “Wicked woman, why would you have your husband die?” “I wish not for his death,” said she, “but that he live in God, so as never to die.” Maximus reproached her that she desired his death, because she wanted another husband. “If you suspect that,” said she, “put me to death first.” The judge said his orders did not extend to women; for this happened upon the first edict, which regarded only the army.
However, he commanded her to be taken into custody; but she was released soon after, and returned to see the issue of the trial. Maximus, turning again to Nicander, said: “Take a little time, and deliberate with yourself whether you choose to die or to live.” Nicander answered: “I have already deliberated upon the matter, and have taken the resolution to save myself.” The judge took it that he meant he would save his life by sacrificing to the idols, and giving thanks to his gods, began to congratulate and rejoice with Suetonius, one of his assessors, for their imaginary victory. But Nicander soon undeceived him, by crying out: “God be thanked,” and by praying aloud that God would deliver him from the dangers and temptations of the world. “How now,” said the governor, “you but just now desired to live, and at present you ask to die.” Nicander replied: “I desire that life which is immortal, not the fleeting life of this world. To you I willingly yield up my body: do with it what you please, I am a Christian.” “And what are your sentiments, Marcian?” said the judge, addressing himself to the other. He declared that they were the same with those of his fellow-prisoner. Maximus then gave orders that they should be both confined in the dungeon, where they lay twenty days.
After which they were again brought before the governor, who asked them if they would at length obey the edicts of the emperors. Marcian answered: “All you can say will never make us abandon our religion, or deny God. We behold him present by faith, and know whither he calls us. Do not, we beseech you, detain or retard us; but send us quickly to him, that we may behold him that was crucified, whom you stick not to blaspheme, but whom we honor and worship.”
The governor granted their request, and excusing himself by the necessity he lay under of complying with his orders, condemned them both to lose their heads. The martyrs expressed their gratitude, and said,—“May peace be with you, O most clement judge.” They walked to the place of execution joyful, and praising God as they went. Nicander was followed by his wife Daria. with his child, whom Papinian, brother to the martyr St. Pasicrates, carried in his arms. Marcian’s wife, differing much from the former, and his other relations followed him, weeping and howling in excess of grief. She in particular did all that in her lay to overcome his resolution, and for that purpose often showed him his little child, the fruit of their marriage; and continually pulled and held him back, till he having rebuked her, desired Zoticus, a zealous Christian, to keep her behind. At the place of execution he called for her, and embracing his son and looking up to heaven, said,—“Lord, all-powerful God, take this child into thy special protection.” Then with a check to his wife for her base cowardice, he bade her go away in peace, because she could not have the courage to see him die. The wife of Nicander continued by his side, exhorting him to constancy and joy. “Be of good heart, my lord,” said she, “ten years have I lived at home from you, never ceasing to pray that I might see you again. Now am I favored with that comfort, and I behold you going to glory, and myself made the wife of a martyr. Give to God that testimony you owe to his holy truth, that you may also deliver me from eternal death;” meaning that by his sufferings and prayers he might obtain mercy for her. The executioner having bound their eyes with their handkerchiefs, struck off their heads on the 17th of June.
Faith and grace made these martyrs triumph over all considerations of flesh and blood. They did not abandon their orphan babes, to whom they left the example of their heroic virtue, and whom they committed to the special protection of their heavenly Father. We never lose what we leave to obey the voice of God. When we have taken all prudent precautions, and all the care in our power, we ought to commend all things with confidence to the divine mercy. This ought to banish all anxiety out of our breasts. God’s blessing and protection is all we can hope or desire: we are assured he will never fail on his side; and what can we do more than to conjure him never to suffer us by our malice to put any obstacle to his mercy? On it is all our reliance for the salvation of our own souls. How much more ought we to trust to his goodness in all other concerns!
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| Vatican-backed interfaith complex to open in 2022 |
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Posted by: Stone - 06-17-2021, 12:03 PM - Forum: Pope Francis
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Vatican-backed interfaith complex to open in 2022
The proposed "Abrahamic Family House," which equates Christianity, Judaism, and Islam, is "closely followed" by Pope Francis.
![[Image: abrahamic_family_house_810_500_75_s_c1.jpg]](https://assets.lifesitenews.com/images/made/images/remote/https_www.lifesitenews.com/images/local/abrahamic_family_house_810_500_75_s_c1.jpg)
Virtual image of the proposed Abrahamic Family House complex
June 16, 2021 (LifeSiteNews) – The “Abrahamic Family House,” a juxtaposition of three places of worship on Saadiyat Island in Abu Dhabi – one Muslim, one Jewish and one Christian – will open in 2022, according to a release from Higher Committee of Human Fraternity echoed by the Abu Dhabi Government Media Office and by Vatican News, the Vatican’s own media service run by the Dicastery for Communication.
The “Abrahamic Family House” is an architectural complex in which the three so-called “Abrahamic” religions, or (abusively), the “religions of the Book” born of God’s promise to Abraham, are presented side by side in places of worship of equal proportions, set in a triangle around a “common ground,” a garden where believers can meet and enter into “dialogue” with each other.
The projected interfaith complex presents itself as an embodiment of the Abu Dhabi Document on Human Fraternity signed by Pope Francis and Imam Al-Tayeb of the Sunni Al-Azhar University of Cairo, and the “Higher Committee for Human Fraternity” to which the joint declaration gave birth, and has been “endorsed” and is being “closely followed” both by Pope Francis and the Grand Imam.
Together with photos of the construction site, which show the foundations of the three religious buildings while one of them appears to be nearing completion, the release revealed the names officially chosen for the three religious buildings.
The synagogue will bear the name of Moses Ben Maimon Synagogue, named after a 12th-century Sephardic rabbi who is commonly compared to the Muslim thinker Averroes, born in Cordoba as Maimon was. Both are touted as innovators who sought to reconcile faith and reason, and presented as having adopted this “modern” point of view before the Catholic philosophers such as Saint Thomas Aquinas.
Averroes was rejected in his time as a heretic by the Islamic community. Maimon, under the persecution of the Christians and the Jews by the Muslim occupiers of Al Andaluz, was forced to flee his home town with his family, possibly after a forced conversion to Islam, and went on to Egypt where he would write abundantly, opposing the literal interpretation of the Talmud and seeking to conciliate Judaism and philosophy.
The mosque will receive the name of Imam Al-Tayeb himself, presumably as a homage to his implication in the whole project. In a recent, syrupy book by Mohammad Abdulsalam, a close collaborator of Al-Tayeb at Al-Azhar University and the man who played a major role in the development of the Document and the Higher Committee, the Grand Imam is presented as an eminent scholar of Islam endowed with all possible qualities, including, of course, an unsurpassable “humbleness” that makes him reject any kind of flattery.
In The Pope and the Grand Imam: A Thorny Path: A Testimony to the Birth of the Human Fraternity Document, Abdulsalam presents his master, page after page as “a man of the greatest honor and integrity, and of noble birth.” One of the book’s major conclusions is that “no one system or doctrine should claim to be superior to any other system or doctrine.”
This does not really square with the fundamental idea of Islam that holds that all individuals are originally Islamic and should return to this “true faith” if they are not yet Muslims, with hellfire promised to all those who resist. Nor does it agree with rational thought in that it holds that different, contradictory ideas or doctrines should be at the same level and therefore in a way simultaneously true – unless if dogma and tenets of different faiths are seen as mere cultural differences in a world where dogma is seen as the ultimate evil: this is the Masonic viewpoint.
It should be added that in Islam, the concept of Taqiyya allows for a precautionary dissimulation or denial of religious beliefs and practice in countries where Islam is not dominant, while working for the expansion of the Ummah – the Islamic community.
Abdusalam’s book also explains that “Today, men of faith are facing a new reality with voices that call for atheism as a way of life, denying the values that bring communities together, breaking the unity of the family, promoting immoral sexual behavior, and fomenting racism and hatred.”
While cooperation in favor of natural law is a legitimate endeavor, the problem remains of fostering religious confusion and relativism by putting different and in fact incompatible religions on the same plane as is being done in the “Abrahamic Family House.” This was also the mindset of the Abu Dhabi Document that said:
Quote:The pluralism and the diversity of religions, color, sex, race and language are willed by God in His wisdom, through which He created human beings. This divine wisdom is the source from which the right to freedom of belief and the freedom to be different derives.
This is a faulty presentation of religious freedom, which is properly defined as meaning that none should be prevented from embracing the true faith, and none should be constrained to embrace it, by creating a confusion between culture and belief. It shows God as positively willing false religions when Our Lord, who is the Truth and the Way, instead commanded His disciples to go forth and baptize all nations in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. For Islam, at any rate, the mere mention of God, of the Holy Trinity, in such a way, is blasphemous.
As to the Christian church in the Saadiyat Island project, it was not clear at the beginning of the plans whether it would be generically “Christian,” so to speak, or Catholic. With the unveiling of its name, the “Saint Francis Church,” underscored on the Human Fraternity website with architect’s impressions of the interior of the finished building showing an obviously Catholic nun, plus the close implication of the Vatican which is amply represented in the Higher Committee for Human Fraternity, appears as a Catholic church.
Why Saint Francis? Many Islamic media repeat the same line: The three places of worship have been named after Dr Ahmed Al Tayeb, Grand Imam of Al Azhar; Pope Francis, Head of the Catholic Church; and Moses Ben Maimon, 12th century Jewish philosopher.” This rather hasty canonization of Pope Francis is probably due to ignorance on the part of the Emirati press regarding Catholic facts and vocabulary.
While the name “Francis” was certainly chosen to honor the present Pope, it in reality refers to Saint Francis of Assisi, whose evangelic zeal and love of nature are often invoked in a somewhat twisted way to turn him into the model not only of “green” ecologism, but of inter-religious dialogue, because at Damiette, in 1219, he went to speak with the sultan, head of the Muslim enemy of the Crusade.
Contemporary accounts described the meeting as fraught with danger, with Francis facing the Islamic chief “as Christ facing Pilate.” It was only in later centuries that the scene was turned into the amiable dialogue of mutually respectful representatives of different religions.
The Abrahamic Family House project has the support of the United Arab Emirates. Launched in 2019, it has now reached 20 percent completion and is expected to be inaugurated next year together with a cultural center, the fourth main construction on the site.
Vatican News comments: “As such, the complex innovatively recounts the history and builds bridges between human civilizations and heavenly messages. (…) Besides the 3 places of worship, the site includes a cultural center that aims to encourage people to exemplify human fraternity and solidarity within a community that cherishes the values of mutual respect and peaceful coexistence, while the unique character of each faith is preserved.”
The Emirati press gave its own commentary:
Quote:The design is characterized by an iconic geometric architecture of three cubes that evokes the features of traditional architecture and preserves its uniqueness.
The structures will represent the unified commonality and mutual coexistence between the three religions while evoking the traditional architecture and retaining the individualism of each of the three faiths. […]
In addition, the complex will offer a variety of daily programmes and activities and will host international conferences and world summits that promote harmonious coexistence within communities.
For more gobbledygook, the forhumanfraternity.org website offered these enthusiastic, if obscure comments from prize-winning African architect Sir David Adjaye:
Quote:We were led towards these powerful plutonic forms with a clear geometry, three cubes sitting on a plinth – though not aligned, they each have different orientations. The story then starts to become apparent through the power of the silhouette, unified with commonality and the articulation of the three forms. These structures represent a safe space, each volume illustrated with colonnades, screens and vaults to represent the sacred nature.
Our discovery continued with the common ground, the public space in-between, where the difference connects. I saw the garden as a powerful metaphor, this safe space where community, connection and civility combine – this space exists between the three chambers, the three faiths. The podium allows you to interact with each space, there’s no preventative threshold, and this way you dissolve the perceptions of not being included and encourage the celebration of this collective history and collective identity.
And this is only a start. The Higher Committee for Human Fraternity hopes to expand in the future, as its website signals to the rest of the world:
Quote:Today, we are religious leaders representing Islam, Christianity and Judaism. Tomorrow, we hope to represent many more –those seeking to bring peace through mutual understanding. We aspire to have an impact at a global scale–and we soon will be sharing that emerging purpose and vision with influential and prominent leaders from different religions, organizations, governments and more.
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| A Group Of Parents Sent Their Kids' Face Masks to A Lab for Analysis. Here's What They Found |
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Posted by: Stone - 06-17-2021, 11:52 AM - Forum: Pandemic 2020 [Secular]
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A Group Of Parents Sent Their Kids' Face Masks to A Lab for Analysis. Here's What They Found
We've been told for well over a year that widespread forced public masking should be implemented because, even if only moderately to slightly to negligibly effective at curbing the spread of COVID-19, there are ZERO drawbacks.
"What's the harm?" they ask.
"It's only a minor inconvenience," they bleat.
"If it saves ONE LIFE, it's worth it!" they implore.
Meanwhile, we on Team Reality have not only continued to point to real-world data that shows masking to be entirely ineffective, we've also maintained that forced public masking, especially long-term, has negative societal and even health ramifications that the powers-that-be are all-too-happy to ignore in subservience to their newfound face mask god.
It only stands to reason that one of those health ramifications would be the fact that millions of people, particularly children, have been forced to wear and carry around pieces of cloth they've continually breathed through for hours on end. What lurking pathogens might be found on these disgusting contraptions being incessantly handled, stuck in pockets, and mindlessly tossed on books, tables, and desks? Well, one group of Florida parents sent a batch of masks worn by their children to a lab to find out. And yeah, you'll probably need to make sure you aren't eating dinner anytime soon before you digest THESE results.
Via press release:
Quote:Gainesville, FL (June 16, 2021) – A group of parents in Gainesville, FL, concerned about potential harms from masks, submitted six face masks to a lab for analysis. The resulting report found that five masks were contaminated with bacteria, parasites, and fungi, including three with dangerous pathogenic and pneumonia-causing bacteria. No viruses were detected on the masks, although the test is capable of detecting viruses.
The analysis detected the following 11 alarmingly dangerous pathogens on the masks:
• Streptococcus pneumoniae (pneumonia)
• Mycobacterium tuberculosis (tuberculosis)
• Neisseria meningitidis (meningitis, sepsis)
• Acanthamoeba polyphaga (keratitis and granulomatous amebic encephalitis)
• Acinetobacter baumanni (pneumonia, blood stream infections, meningitis, UTIs— resistant to antibiotics)
• Escherichia coli (food poisoning)
• Borrelia burgdorferi (causes Lyme disease)
• Corynebacterium diphtheriae (diphtheria)
• Legionella pneumophila (Legionnaires' disease)
• Staphylococcus pyogenes serotype M3 (severe infections—high morbidity rates)
• Staphylococcus aureus (meningitis, sepsis)
Half of the masks were contaminated with one or more strains of pneumonia-causing bacteria. One-third were contaminated with one or more strains of meningitis-causing bacteria. One-third were contaminated with dangerous, antibiotic-resistant bacterial pathogens. In addition, less dangerous pathogens were identified, including pathogens that can cause fever, ulcers, acne, yeast infections, strep throat, periodontal disease, Rocky Mountain Spotted Fever, and more.
The face masks studied were new or freshly-laundered before wearing and had been worn for 5 to 8 hours, most during in-person schooling by children aged 6 through 11. One was worn by an adult. A t-shirt worn by one of the children at school and unworn masks were tested as controls. No pathogens were found on the controls. Proteins found on the t-shirt, for example, are not pathogenic to humans and are commonly found in hair, skin, and soil.
A parent who participated in the study, Ms. Amanda Donoho, commented that this small sample points to a need for more research: “We need to know what we are putting on the faces of our children each day. Masks provide a warm, moist environment for bacteria to grow.”
These local parents contracted with the lab because they were concerned about the potential of contaminants on masks that their children were forced to wear all day at school, taking them on and off, setting them on various surfaces, wearing them in the bathroom, etc. This prompted them to send the masks to the University of Florida’s Mass Spectrometry Research and Education Center for analysis.
![[Image: 7ec515e4-ae08-4ecf-b6e2-fc97cf6abaf0.png]](https://media.townhall.com/townhall/reu/hv/images/2021/166/7ec515e4-ae08-4ecf-b6e2-fc97cf6abaf0.png)
The below chart, put together by the group of parents, shows the potential dangers from each pathogen:
![[Image: 699c871d-4481-4df4-b5a0-19899c91069a.png]](https://media.townhall.com/townhall/reu/hv/images/2021/166/699c871d-4481-4df4-b5a0-19899c91069a.png)
Appetizing, eh? Of course, nothing above, or anything else, will deter the extremists in the masking cult, some of whom now want to see masking in schools forever.
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| June 16th - Sts. Cyr and Julitta |
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Posted by: Stone - 06-16-2021, 07:06 AM - Forum: June
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June 16 – Sts. Cyr and Julitta, Martyrs
All the Churches of the East, in the different tongues of their several liturgies, celebrate the glory of Julitta and of Cyr: they all extol the holy duality of the son and the mother containing in itself the perfect worship of the Trinity (Sticheron Byzantii, ad diem xv. Julii.). For the oblation of this mother and her son is of itself united to the sacrifice of the Son of God: such are in very deed the rights of the Holy Trinity, rights resulting in the case of every Christian from the first of our sacraments; absolute rights over both body and soul of even the smallest baby; such were the rights confessed by Saint Julitta and her little Cyr; yea, consecrated by their blood in one common oblation. The world was reminded yesterday in St. Vitus, of a truth too easily forgotten by a generation, such as ours, more destitute of knowledge than of love: God’s paternity is more complete than that of any earthly father, and likewise outstrips all other in the gravity of the duties it imposes on his sons. This teaching is still more strongly repeated today, and it is addressed in the first place to parents, more particularly.
Iconium, the native land of Thecla, the proto-martyr of the female sex, was likewise the home of Julitta. She, a fair flower budding forth from a royal stock of ancient kings, was to secure to her native town a renown far more lasting than did all the mighty deeds of her princely ancestors. The splendid fame inherited by this daughter of the ancient kings of Lycaonia, was nothing in her eyes compared to that which came to her through Christ. The title of Christian was the only one she made any account of, in presence of the judges on the day of her glorious triumph. Her gifts of fortune were considerable; but never did earth’s riches captivate her thoughts; and still less so from the moment God granted her a son. All treasures heaped together in one could never be comparable to that which she now held in her arms, to that child confided by her Lord to the watchful care of her maternal love. Had not Baptism turned this frail little body into a temple of the Holy Ghost? Was not this peerless soul an object of delight to the Eternal Father, who could see mirrored in its limpid innocence the true features of his well-beloved Son? Therefore, with what ineffable tenderness, with what religious watchfulness, did not this mother surround her babe who still continued to draw life from her own breast; there developing, day by day, like a delicate plant under the genial ray of the Sun of Justice! Far was she from being one of those who, without sufficient reason, pass on to another the care of nurturing the fruit they themselves have borne. As if nature itself must not recoil from such substitution, too often as disastrous to the body as to the soul of these tender little beings; as if, above all, it were not the incommunicable duty of a Christian mother and her most glorious privilege, to be ever on the watch about her child, so as to turn to God the first dawn of its wakening intelligence and the first movement of its free will. Julitta overflowed with gladness, for she knew and felt that God was blessing that which was henceforth to be her life-long cherished labor. The milk which she was giving him was impregnating her little son with the manly boldness of her race, made braver still because over-ruled by the dear name of the Lord Jesus. Rome, all conquering as she deemed herself, was soon to make trial thereof and own herself vanquished.
The frightful persecution of Diocletian’s day was then convulsing the earth; his bloody edicts were already posted up in Iconium. Julitta feared nothing for herself, but she dreaded the probability of pagan masters educating her boy, were she violently torn from him by torments and death. She saw that she must needs sacrifice all to this her primary duty of preserving her child’s soul, of which she was guardian. Without hesitating a moment, she fled to a foreign land, leaving home, family, and riches, bearing away her one life’s treasure. Two handmaids who followed her through devotedness, could not prevail upon her to let them ease her occasionally of her precious burden. When God, who delights in sating his angels gaze with a spectacle fair as this, permitted her to fall into the hands of the persecutor, ever was she beheld bearing still her boy in her arms. Julitta and Cyr are inseparable; together, they needs must appear before the judge, through whose cruelty they are to be together crowned in bliss.
Further on, we give the admirable scene that at once graced earth and ravished heaven. Let us remark that these details are as authentic as can possibly be, and are admitted by Dom Ruinart into his collection of Actes sincères. But let us also remember that he alone thoroughly honors the saints by the study of their history, who profits by the lessons they have left to the world. Recent attacks on education have but too well proved that the heroism of Julitta is by no means intended to lie by, as a dead letter, or as an object of mere futile admiration, but rather that it is meant to serve as an example, called in thousands of cases into absolute and practical requisition by the troubles of these present times. Duty does not alter from century to century; the difficulty of fulfilling it, which may indeed vary with circumstances of time and place, removes nothing of the inflexibility of its imperative demands.
On the other hand, let us not forget that the Church herself is likewise a Mother, and that she too owns it her bounden duty to suckle her children. Never have her protestations been hushed against the tyrants of any century who would separate her little ones from her. If then it should happen that a violent blow be so dealt as to tear a child from the arms of Mother Church, then he must know that it becomes a duty for him to imitate the brave little son of Julitta. Is he not likewise a son of the Dove? Then let him prove himself so; let him become holily obstinate in repeating that one word “Holy Church;” let him struggle to reach her, all the more vigorously in proportion as efforts are made to drag him further from her. How could he but abhor the odious caresses of one who would dare to assume her place in his regard? All other help failing, who could but applaud if he, like Saint Cyr, were to repulse by such means as his feebleness can permit, the hand that would kill his body? And is the soul that is in him less precious? and if need be, must he not sacrifice even his own body to save his soul? We certainly ought to think so: and does it not seem that Providence had the future in view when, at so early a date, he permitted the precious relics of this son and mother to be brought to France?
The century that witnessed their bloody sacrifice to God had not ran out, ere Cyr and Julitta seemed to choose the Gallic shore for their adopted home: an emigration fraught with graces for France! Scarce had the turmoil of invasion ceased, than numberless sanctuaries were raised in honor of their loved name; which circumstance proves how popular was their cultus amongst the chivalrous sons of the Franks. The symbol used in Christian art to distinguish Saint Cyr is a wild boar; the reason is that Charlemagne was miraculously delivered from the fangs of one of these savage brutes by the intercession of Saint Cyr. In thanksgiving, the Cathedral of Nevers rebuilt by this emperor was placed under the invocation of this sainted child who, together with his mother, is patron of the whole diocese, wherein no fewer than four feasts are celebrated in their honor during the year.
The various Churches that keep the feast of Saints Cyr and Julitta borrow the Lessons of their Office from the following celebrated letter written regarding them in the 6th century by Theodore, Bishop of Iconium. The text we here give is taken from the Proper of the Church of Villejuif near Paris, which is richly endowed with their relics. Indeed the name Villejuif is said to be a popular corruption of Villa Julittæ.
Quote:Julitta was born of the royal stock of Iconium. Persecution raging under Domitian, the Governor of Lycaonia, she fled from her native city, together with two handmaids and her son, named Cyr, aged three. Having thus abandoned all her property, which was considerable, she came to Seleucia. But there, she found the Christians suffering even more. Alexander, the President placed there by Diocletian, had just received the Emperor’s edict ordering to subject to every kind of torture, all such as refused to adore the idols. Julitta therefore travelled to Tarsus. Now, just as though he were fain purposely to pursue her, it so fell out, that Alexander, that hard and harsh man, arrived at Tarsus as soon as she. Our noble victrix Julitta the martyr was arrested, bearing in her arms her little son Cyr of tender age. Being brought before the tribunal, Alexander demanded her name, condition, and country. She boldly replied, sheltering herself under the only name of our Lord Jesus Christ: “I am a Christian.” Alexander inflamed with rage, commanded that the child should be taken from his mother and brought to him, while she was being beaten cruelly with the sinews of oxen.
Only by main force could they drag the child from his mother’s bosom, for he kept clinging close unto her; and when at last torn from her, he kept urging towards her with all possible movements of his little limbs, nor would he take his eyes off her, and thus the executioners handed him to the President. He having got him in his grasp, began caressing the child, striving to stay his tears, dancing him on his knee, and trying to force the poor babe to let him kiss him. All to no purpose; the boy would fix his eyes only upon his mother, pushing the President away and turning his little head from him: then making use of his hands he began to scratch the President’s face; at last like to the little nestling of the chaste dove, he would imitate the voice of his mother, and pronounce the very same confession he heard his mother making, crying out thus: “I am a Christian.” Then did he kick with his feet against the sides of the Judge. No longer able to restrain his fury, this savage beast (for man he cannot be termed, who could not be touched by this tender harmless age), seized the babe by the foot, and ruthlessly flung him to the ground. The brains of this noble martyr were thus dashed out against the sharp corners of the steps, in the very act of this his confession, and the ground all about the tribunal was bespattered with his blood. Julitta exulting for joy cried out aloud: “I give Thee thanks, O Lord, that thou hast been pleased that my son should consummate his sacrifice, before myself, and that thou hast therefore given unto him the fadeless crown!”
The judge ashamed of himself and still more infuriated, caused Julitta to be now hoisted on the rack; commanding her sides likewise to be torn, and boiling pitch to be poured upon her feet. During the execution, a crier proclaimed: “Julitta, take pity on thyself and sacrifice to the gods; dread the same unhappy death that hath befallen thy son.” But the valiant martyr unmoved in the midst of torments cried out, in her turn: “I will never sacrifice to demons, but I pay homage to Christ, the Only Son of God, by whom the Father created all things; I am in haste to rejoin my child, and so be united to him forever in the heavenly Kingdom.” Then the cruel Judge, pushing his folly to the last extreme, pronounced his sentence against her whose constancy he despaired of vanquishing in combat: “This woman,” so ran the sentence, “shall have her head cut off by a sword, and the body of her son shall be thrown where criminals’ corpses are cast.” It was on the seventeenth of the Kalends of August that Julitta the noble martyr, and Cyr her glorious son consummated their triumph, through the grace of Jesus Christ. The Church of Nevers claims them as her patrons, as do likewise many other Churches and Monasteries of the kingdom, amongst which the parish of Villejuif, near Paris, glories in possessing a considerable portion of the relics of these two Martyrs, and surrounds them with highest veneration.
Thy desire is fulfilled, O Julitta, thou hast rejoined thy child! Ye form conjointly a fair ornament of the heavens, just as on earth ye did ever abide in one. The angels are in admiration at the sight of such a mother and child united thus in endless praise unto the thrice holy God. They realize the great truth that the creation of their sublime hierarchies exhausted not the Wisdom of the Creator. The nine choirs, all unfolded simultaneously beneath the gaze of the Eternal, communicated light and love one to the other, in perfect order; there was naught to betoken in the wondrous assemblage any further design of the Lord, conceived in favor of other created beings to be equally brought into relationship with himself, for his glory’s sake. Yet so it was to be: human nature has this advantage over the angelical, namely, that it imitates, in its manner of intercommunication, the essential relation of God the Father and of his Word; that which the highest Seraphim can say to none, man in his own person can repeat to his fellow man that utterance of God himself: “Thou art my son!” This filiation, without which man cannot attain to the terrestrial, perishable life of this lower world, he again receives a second time, nonetheless really, yea, eternally,—in the supernatural order; for nature is but a frail image of the realities which are the portion of God’s Elect. Thus was it, O Julitta, that thou didst become, twice over, the mother of that saintly child thou didst bear in thine arms; ah! how far was thy first maternity outstripped by the second, whereby thou didst bring him forth unto glory! In intensity of suffering likewise did this second child-birth of thy martyrdom outdo the first; but this is only the law common to all maternity since the fall: the sentence that touched Eve has its echo even in the world of grace.
Now dost thou remember no longer thy travails! The sacrifice of mother and of son, begun in the anguish of a dolorous confession, is this day become a sacrifice of praise and of gladness. For this your mutual oblation is continued in heaven: it remains for ever the basis of those powerful and sweet relations wherein God finds his glory; it is the source of those benedictions which the Lord showers upon earth on your account. Would, then, O holy Martyrs, that you could hasten the return of the East to the true Light, that East which gave you life and to which, in return, you gave your precious blood! Bless the West also, where so many churches are raised to your honor and celebrate your feast. May France, especially, your second country, ever feel the potent effects of a patronage that can be traced on historic annals, up to the earliest dates of her existence. Charlemagne, that mighty emperor, on his knees before thee, O Cyr, is a fact all eloquent of thy powerful intercession, O thou little son of Julitta! Nevers too, in these our own days, can prove the same; for to thee she justly attributes her preservation from the Prussian invasion, when all the neighborhood was devastated by the hostile troops!
At present not only France, but other countries, are suffering from trials worse even than invasion, trials in many ways resembling yours, O holy Martyrs! Uphold the faith in the breasts of Mothers, O Julitta; uphold their Christian instincts to the full height of the lofty teachings conveyed in the story of thy glorious combat. In the face of tyranny which would fain lay grasping hold on education in view of poisoning the immortal souls of children, do thou, O Cyr, stir up among these little ones, faithful imitators of thyself! Not long ago, some have shown this noble spirit; under the hateful pressure of impious masters who persisted in dictating to them lessons condemned by Holy Church, they dared to write out nothing but the Credo they had learned at their mother’s knee. Well done, brave and noble-hearted children! Thou, O Cyr, didst surely thrill with gladness at such a sight rivaling thee in magnanimity. All, then, is not lost for France and these other afflicted lands. May thine intercession, blended with that of thy mother, develop more and more in the breasts of the little ones of God’s Church, this consciousness of the holy liberty which is their portion by their very baptism. Such consciousness as this maintained and exhibited the while it bends them in dutiful submission to all power emanating from God, will nevertheless prevail at last over the prince of this world with his Cæsarism! Yea, the very safety of society depends on such noble independence as this, in the Christian sense, in face of all abuse of power!
![[Image: QuricusJulietIconLife0.jpgw_.jpg?w=400&ssl=1]](https://i0.wp.com/sensusfidelium.us/wp-content/uploads/2019/06/QuricusJulietIconLife0.jpgw_.jpg?w=400&ssl=1) |
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| In new interview, Abp. Viganò discusses ‘failure’ of Vatican II, Novus Ordo Mass |
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Posted by: Stone - 06-16-2021, 06:42 AM - Forum: Archbishop Viganò
- Replies (2)
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It is interesting to anyone familiar with the words and writings of Archbishop Lefebvre (see here and here, as examples) how the conclusions of these two prelates surveying this spiritual battlefield are nearly identical. All emphasis mine.
In new interview, Abp. Viganò discusses ‘failure’ of Vatican II, Novus Ordo Mass
The next Pope will have to restore all the liturgical books and banish from Catholic churches their unseemly parody, in whose realization notorious modernists and heretics collaborated.
June 15, 2021 (LifeSiteNews) — Archbishop Viganò has given a new interview, this time to Abbé Claude Barthe, a French expert of the liturgy and a great supporter of the motu proprio Summorum Pontificum allowing the traditional Latin Mass to flourish in the Church. The interview dwells on liturgical questions, the Second Vatican Council, as well as the Society of St. Pius X.
Abbé Barthe, who authored numerous books on the traditional liturgy of the Church, had a year ago entered into a supportive, public discussion with Archbishop Viganò after the latter had started publicly to criticize the Second Vatican Council and its aftermath. This new interview is a sort of a follow-up of that discussion, and these two clergymen also differ on some points. As Abbé Barthe puts it, Viganò “agreed to answer our questions on the theme of the new liturgy and in a rather astonishing way (astonishing even to ourselves as he goes after a process of the 'reform of the reform', a process which we support).” Barthe adds that he is “very glad to offer our readers this interview, as we believe it serves the debate and promotes reflection.” He presents the interview in the journal Res Novae in French, Italian, and English.
The English translation of this new interview has been made by Diane Montagna for Arouca Press. Arouca Press is soon going to publish a book edited by me with Archbishop Viganò's criticisms of the Council, the liturgical reform, as well as the message of Fatima. The book will also include the responses of other clergymen and laymen to his criticisms of the Council.
As our readers will see, Archbishop Viganò once more finds strong words of criticism of the Second Vatican Council (1962 – 1965) as well as the Novus Ordo Mass (promulgated in 1969). He states that “we must be very clear that the Second Vatican Council was conceived as a revolutionary event.” He goes on to say that “if Vatican II was a revolutionary act, both in the way it was conducted and in the documents it promulgated, it is logical and legitimate to think that its liturgy is also affected by this ideological approach.”
When commenting on Pope Benedict XVI's attempts at restoring the traditional liturgy (which was effectively suppressed after 1969) and the movement referred to above by Abbé Barthe as the “reform of the reform”, Viganò concludes that these attempts were defective:
Quote:I believe that behind these attempts, which seem to be motivated by pious intentions, lies a fact that none of these prelates [Pope Benedict and Cardinal Robert Sarah] dare confess: the failure of the Council and even more so of its liturgy. Returning to the ancient rite and definitively archiving the squalor of the Novus Ordo would require great humility, because those who would like to save it from shipwreck today were yesterday among the most enthusiastic supporters of the liturgical reform, and of Vatican II with it.
That is to say, Archbishop Viganò rejects the idea of the “reform of the reform” (further making changes to existing rites), but rather proposes a return to the old liturgy and its faith.
In another field of the liturgical debate, the archbishop also adds new comments, that is to say about the first grave changes of the liturgy made under Pope Pius XII by Annibale Bugnini: the change of the rite of Holy Week in 1955.Quote: “Archbishop Annibale Bugnini,” Viganò writes, “was one of the collaborators in the drafting of the Ordo Hebdomadae Sanctae instauratus promulgated during the pontificate of Pius XII. The serious deformations of the new Missal are in nuce [essentially] contained in the rite of Holy Week, demonstrating that the demolition plan had already begun.”
Last, but not least, the Italian prelate also comments on the situation of the Society of St. Pius X with regard to its relationship with the Vatican. Unlike with the Franciscans of the Immaculate Heart of Mary, who had been more and more inclined to embrace the traditional liturgy and whose order has been essentially destroyed by Pope Francis, the SSPX still has a certain institutional independence from the Vatican. For Viganò, this seems to be a positive thing in light of the current papacy:
Quote:With regard to the Society of St. Pius X, we are witnessing a more subtle maneuver: Bergoglio maintains “good neighborly” relations, and while recognizing certain prerogatives of its Superiors — thus demonstrating that he considers them living members of the Church — on the other hand he may want to barter their complete canonical regularization for an acceptance of the “conciliar magisterium.” It is clear that this is an insidious trap: once an agreement is signed with the Holy See, the independence which the Society enjoys in virtue of its position of not being completely regular would be lost, and with it, its economic independence. Let us not forget that the Society has assets and resources that guarantee sustenance and security for its members. At a time when the Vatican is experiencing a serious financial crisis, those assets are certainly enticing to many, as we have seen in other cases, starting with the Franciscans of the Immaculate, and the persecution of Father Mannelli.
Full interview with Archbishop Viganò
Father Claude Barthe: Your Excellency, you have sometimes spoken of “revolutionary actions” in connection with the creation of the new liturgy after the Second Vatican Council. Could you clarify your thoughts on this matter?
Archbishop Carlo Maria Viganò: First of all, we must be very clear that the Second Vatican Council was conceived as a revolutionary event. Obviously, I am not referring to the good intentions of those who collaborated in the drafting of the preparatory schemas. I am talking instead about the innovators who rejected those schemas together with the condemnation of Communism that the Council should have pronounced, as a large part of the world’s episcopate desired. Now, if Vatican II was a revolutionary act, both in the way it was conducted and in the documents it promulgated, it is logical and legitimate to think that its liturgy is also affected by this ideological approach, especially if we bear in mind that it is the chief means by which the faithful and clergy are catechized. It is no coincidence that Luther and the other Protestant and Anglican heretics used the liturgy as their main method to spread their errors among the faithful.
Having said that, our legitimate suspicion is also confirmed when we consider who the architects of that liturgy were: prelates often suspected of belonging to Freemasonry who were notoriously progressive and who, with the Liturgical Movement of the 1920s and 1930s, had already begun to suggest more than questionable ideas and spread practices that were influenced by archaeologism, which was later condemned by Pius XII in the encyclical Mediator Dei. The versus populum altar was not an invention of Vatican II but of the liturgists who made it practically obligatory at the Council, after having introduced it decades earlier as an exception under the pretext of a supposed return to antiquity. The same can be said for the so-called “Gothic chasuble” in the forms that preceded the Council, especially in France. It became a sort of poncho that was passed off after the Council as a recovery of the original form but was, in fact, a historical and liturgical forgery. By these examples, I wish to highlight that well before Vatican II there were revolutionary forces infiltrating the Church that were ready to make definitive those innovations that were introduced ad experimentum and had become the practice, especially in countries historically less inclined to adapt to romanitas.
Once we understand that the liturgy is the expression of a specific doctrinal approach — which with the Novus Ordo also became ideological — and that the liturgists who conceived it were imbued with this approach, we must analyze the conciliar corpus liturgicum to find confirmation of its revolutionary nature. Beyond the texts and ceremonial rubrics, what makes the reformed rite unequivocally revolutionary is that it was made malleable to the celebrant and the community, on the basis of an adaptability completely unknown to the Roman mens liturgica. The arbitrariness of the innovations is an integral part of the reformed liturgy, whose liturgical books — beginning with Paul VI’s Missale Romanum — are thought of as a rough draft, a canvas at the mercy of more or less talented actors seeking public acclaim. The applause of the faithful, introduced albeit abusively with the Novus Ordo, is the expression of a consensus that is an essential part of a rite that has become a spectacle. On the other hand, in ancient societies theater has always had a liturgical connotation, and it is significant that the conciliar church wanted to exhume this pagan vision by inverting it, that is, by giving a theatrical connotation to the liturgical rite.
Anyone who thinks that the Editio typica in Latin corresponds to the rite that should have been celebrated after the Council sins in naivety as well as in ignorance: nothing in that liturgical book was really intended for daily use by priests, beginning with the pitiful graphic layout, which was clearly neglected precisely because of the awareness that practically no one would ever celebrate the Novus Ordo in Latin. The same papal ceremonies in which the Missale Romanum of Paul VI was used derogated from the rubrics by introducing readings in the vernacular, ceremonies not foreseen, and roles reserved to clerics carried out by laymen and even women. This, in my view, confirms the revolutionary soul of the Council and of the rite inspired by it.
Father Claude Barthe: The liturgical reform, which began in 1964 and produced a new missal in 1969, may seem more radical than its programmatic document, the Second Vatican Council’s Constitution on the Sacred Liturgy, Sacrosanctum Concilium. Do you think that Archbishop Bugnini’s Consilium betrayed Vatican II, as some say, or that it developed it, as others suggest?
Archbishop Carlo Maria Viganò: Archbishop Annibale Bugnini was one of the collaborators in the drafting of the Ordo Hebdomadae Sanctae instauratus promulgated during the pontificate of Pius XII. The serious deformations of the new Missal are in nuce [essentially] contained in the rite of Holy Week, demonstrating that the demolition plan had already begun. There is therefore no betrayal of the Council, so much so that none of its architects ever considered the liturgical reform inconsistent with the mens of Sacrosanctum Concilium. A careful study of the genesis of the Ordo Hebdomadae Sanctae instauratus allows us to understand that the innovators’ demands were only partially accepted but were re-proposed with Montini’s Novus Ordo.
However, it must be clearly said that, unlike all the other Ecumenical Councils, this Council deliberately used its authority to sanction a systematic betrayal of faith and morals, pursued through pastoral, disciplinary and liturgical means. The transitional Missals between the 1962 rubrics and the 1970 Editio typica, and the one that immediately followed — the Editio typica altera of 1975 — show how the process was carried out in small steps, accustoming clergy and faithful to the provisional nature of the rite, to continuous innovation, and to the progressive loss of many elements that initially made the Novus Ordo closer to the last Missale Romanum of John XXIII. I am thinking, for example, of the recitation submissa voce of the Roman Canon in Latin, with its sacrificial Offertory and the Veni Sanctificator, which in the course of adaptation led to the recitation of the Roman Canon aloud, with its Talmudic Offertory and the suppression of the invocation of the Holy Spirit.
Those who prepared the conciliar documents to have them approved by the Council Fathers acted with the same malice that the drafters of the liturgical reform adopted, knowing that they would interpret ambiguous texts in a Catholic way, while those who were to disseminate and utilize them would interpret them in every sense except that.
In fact, this concept is confirmed in everyday practice. Have you ever seen a priest who celebrates the Novus Ordo with the altar facing East, entirely in Latin, wearing the fiddleback (Roman) chasuble and distributing Communion at the Communion rail, without this arousing the ire of his Ordinary and confreres, even though, strictly speaking, this way of celebrating would be perfectly legitimate? Those who have tried — certainly in good faith — have been treated worse than those who habitually celebrate the Tridentine Mass. This demonstrates that the continuity hoped for in the Council’s hermeneutic does not exist, and that the break with the pre-conciliar Church is the norm to which one must conform, to the satisfaction of conservatives.
Lastly, I would like to point out that this awareness of the doctrinal incompatibility of the ancient rite with the ideology of Vatican II is claimed by self-styled theologians and progressive intellectuals, for whom the “Extraordinary Form” of the rite can be tolerated as long as the entire theological framework that it implies is not adopted. This is why the liturgy of the Summorum Pontificum communities is tolerated, provided that in preaching and catechesis one is careful not to criticize Vatican II or the new Mass.
Father Claude Barthe: Among the criticisms often made of the new Ordo Missæ, which do you consider to be the most important?
Archbishop Carlo Maria Viganò: The most well-founded criticism lies in having wanted to invent a liturgy for one’s own use and consumption, abandoning the bi-millennial rite that began with the Apostles and harmoniously developed through the centuries. The reformed liturgy — as any competent scholar knows — is the result of an ideological compromise between the Catholic lex orandi and the heretical demands of Protestants and Lutherans. Since the Church’s faith is expressed in public worship, it was essential that the liturgy adapt to the new way of believing, weakening or denying those truths that were considered “uncomfortable” for the pursuit of ecumenical dialogue.
A reform that simply wanted to prune certain rites that modern sensibilities could no longer understand could easily have avoided the slavish repetition of what Luther did at the time of the pseudo-reformation and Cranmer did after the Anglican schism: the mere fact of having adopted the innovations with which the heretics rejected certain points of Catholic dogma is an unquestionable demonstration of the Pastors’ subordination to the consensus of those outside the Church, to the detriment of the flock the Lord entrusted to them. Imagine what one of the martyrs of Calvinism, or of the fury of King James, would have thought in seeing popes, cardinals and bishops using a table in place of the altar that cost them their lives; and what respect a heretic might have for the hated Roman Babylon, which is all caught up in awkwardly mimicking what the “reformers” had done four centuries earlier, although perhaps in a more dignified manner. Let us not forget that Luther’s liturgical heresies were conveyed by Bach chorales, while the celebrations of the conciliar Church are accompanied by compositions of unprecedented ugliness. The liturgical breakdown has revealed a doctrinal breakdown, humiliating the Holy Church out of a mere eagerness to please the mentality of the world.
Father Claude Barthe: How can we explain the failure of Benedict XVI, Cardinal Sarah, and others who have advocated a gradual “liturgical revival” by (e.g.) celebrating the Mass towards the Lord, reintroducing the Offertory prayers, and distributing Holy Communion on the tongue?
Archbishop Carlo Maria Viganò: If a Vatican official were to give orders to decorate the Sala Nervi in the Paul VI Audience Hall with stucco and frescoes, replacing the hideous sculpture of the Resurrection with a baroque perspective, he would be considered an eccentric, especially when St Peter’s Basilica is just a stone’s throw away. The same thing applies, in my opinion, to attempts to make the reformed liturgy presentable by means of objectively useless window-dressing: what is the point of celebrating the Novus Ordo towards the East, changing the Offertory and distributing Communion on the tongue, when the Tridentine Mass has always provided for this?
This “liturgical revival” starts from the same erroneous presuppositions that animated the conciliar reform: modifying the liturgy at will, now distorting the venerable ancient rite to modernize it, now dressing up the reformed rite to make it look like what it is not and does not want to be. In the first case, we would be forcing a queen to wear clogs and dress in rags, in the second we would have the commoner wearing a royal tiara over ruffled hair or sitting on a throne in a straw hat.
I believe that behind these attempts, which seem to be motivated by pious intentions, lies a fact that none of these prelates dare confess: the failure of the Council and even more so of its liturgy. Returning to the ancient rite and definitively archiving the squalor of the Novus Ordo would require great humility, because those who would like to save it from shipwreck today were yesterday among the most enthusiastic supporters of the liturgical reform, and of Vatican II with it.
I ask myself: if Paul VI had no problem recklessly abolishing the Tridentine liturgy between one day and the next, replacing it with cobbled-together excerpts from the [Anglican] Book of Common Prayer, and imposing this new rite despite the protests of clergy and laity, why exactly should we today use any more consideration in restoring the ancient Roman Rite to its place of honor, by prohibiting the celebration of the Novus Ordo? Why such delicacy of mind today, and such ruthless iconoclastic fury yesterday? And why this cosmetic surgery, if not to hold together the last conciliatory frill by giving it the appearance of what it did not intend to be?
The next Pope will have to restore all the liturgical books previous to the conciliar reform and banish from Catholic churches its unseemly parody, in whose realization notorious modernists and heretics collaborated.
Father Claude Barthe: In a 2013 interview with the Jesuit magazines, Pope Francis cited the liturgical reform as an exemplary fruit of the Council (“Vatican II was a reinterpretation of the Gospel in the light of contemporary culture”), and yet Bergoglio does favors for the Society of St Pius X. Is he interested in the liturgical question?
Archbishop Carlo Maria Viganò: I do not believe that Bergoglio has any interest in the liturgy tout court, and a fortiori in the Tridentine liturgy, which is as alien to him and disliked as anything remotely reminiscent of Catholicism. His approach is political: he tolerates the Ecclesia Dei communities because they keep the conservatives out of the parishes, and at the same time he maintains control over them, forcing them to limit their dissent solely to the liturgical level, while ensuring their fidelity to the conciliar ideology.
With regard to the Society of St. Pius X, we are witnessing a more subtle maneuver: Bergoglio maintains “good neighborly” relations, and while recognizing certain prerogatives of its Superiors — thus demonstrating that he considers them living members of the Church — on the other hand he may want to barter their complete canonical regularization for an acceptance of the “conciliar magisterium.” [See Bishop Fellay's Doctrinal Declaration, which effectively accepts Vatican II, the New Mass, the New Code of Canon Law, etc. - in essence, the SSPX has already done this, it just hasn't been formally accepted or approved. - The Catacombs] It is clear that this is an insidious trap: once an agreement is signed with the Holy See, the independence which the Society enjoys in virtue of its position of not being completely regular would be lost, and with it, its economic independence. Let us not forget that the Society has assets and resources that guarantee sustenance and security for its members. At a time when the Vatican is experiencing a serious financial crisis, those assets are certainly enticing to many, as we have seen in other cases, starting with the Franciscans of the Immaculate, and the persecution of Father Mannelli.
Father Claude Barthe: Do you think that the protective status (dependence on the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith and not on the Congregation for Religious) desired by Joseph Ratzinger before and after his accession to the papacy for societies of apostolic life which practice the traditional Mass is in danger today?
Archbishop Carlo Maria Viganò: The canonical position of the Ecclesia Dei communities has always been at risk. Their survival is linked to their at least implicit acceptance of the conciliar doctrine and liturgical reform. [This is also what Archbishop Lefebvre and the old SSPX consistently taught- see here, here, here, and here. - The Catacombs] Those who do not conform, by criticizing Vatican II or refusing to celebrate or attend the reformed rite, ipso facto put themselves in a position of being expelled. The superiors of these societies of apostolic life themselves end up being the overseers of their clerics, who are strongly advised to refrain from criticism and to give tangible signs of alignment from time to time, for example, by taking part in celebrations in the “Ordinary Form.” Paradoxically, a diocesan parish priest has greater freedom of speech in doctrinal matters than a member of one of these institutes.
It should be said that, according to the mindset of those in power in the Vatican today, the liturgical eccentricities of some communities, far from encouraging the rediscovery of the traditional rite, give it an elitist aspect and confine it to the “small ancient world” to which the proponents of the Bergoglian church have every interest in relegating it. Making the celebration of the Catholic Mass “normal”—according to the dictates of the motu proprio Summorum Pontificum — without “liturgical reservations” and dedicated spaces, would give the impression that it is really possible for any faithful to attend Mass without any other title of belonging than being a Catholic. On the contrary, this Kafkaesque bureaucratic castle forces all conservatives into an enclosure, obliging them to follow the rules of confinement and to demand nothing more than what the sovereign grace deigns to grant them, almost always with the ill-concealed opposition of the diocesan bishop. [See Fr. Hewko's similar words here from 2014. - The Catacombs]
Bergoglio’s actions are now clearly exposed: his latest encyclical theorizes about heterodox doctrines and a scandalous subservience to the dominant ideology, which is profoundly anti-Catholic and anti-human. From this perspective, questions about the liturgical sensitivity of this or that institute seem to me frankly negligible: not because the liturgy is not important, but because once one is willing to remain silent on the doctrinal front, the complex ceremonies of the Pontifical end up being reduced to a manifestation of aestheticism that poses no real danger to the magic circle of Santa Marta.
Father Claude Barthe: Do the ban on individual Masses in St. Peter’s, the three-day inspection of the Congregation for Divine Worship by Archbishop Maniago, and the fact that the Constitution on the reform of the Curia, Prædicate Evangelium, is said to strengthen the powers of oversight for the Congregation for Divine Worship, give rise to fears of a new virulence of the reform? Or does Francis have little interest in this liturgical problem?
Archbishop Carlo Maria Viganò: The ban on celebrating private Masses in St. Peter’s, despite the choral protest of many faithful and some prelates against a real abuse by the Secretariat of State, continues in force and is as an unprecedented scandal. It is a trial balloon to test the ground and study the reactions of prelates, clergy and laity who, for the moment, are limited to the mere, very composed and in some cases embarrassing verbal lamentation. As I have already had occasion to state, I believe that this ban is nothing more than an attempt to give legal semblance to a practice that is now consolidated and universal, which also confirms the doctrinal error that underlies it; namely, the primacy of the community dimension of the “Eucharist” understood as a convivial banquet, to the detriment of the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass celebrated privately. But here we are touching on Vatican II, which none of the Cardinals who spoke out on the ban on Masses in St. Peter’s dares to question in the slightest, even though it is clearly at the origin of the Secretariat of State’s illegitimate prohibition.
As far as the supervisory powers of the Congregation for Divine Worship are concerned, in themselves they could also be considered in a positive sense, since liturgical matters are strictly within the competence of the Holy See. However, we would be sinning in naivety and lack of foresight if we did not take into account the fact that any norm promulgated by the innovators will be used by them to obtain unconfessed aims, often opposite to those stated.
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| Biden Administration Asks Americans to Report ‘Potentially’ Radicalized Friends and Family |
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Posted by: Stone - 06-16-2021, 05:46 AM - Forum: Socialism & Communism
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Biden Administration Asks Americans to Report ‘Potentially’ Radicalized Friends and Family
![[Image: GettyImages-1233463531-e1623782716860-640x480.jpg]](https://media.breitbart.com/media/2021/06/GettyImages-1233463531-e1623782716860-640x480.jpg)
US President Joe Biden attends a EU - US summit at the European Union headquarters in Brussels on June 15, 2021.
Breitbart | 15 Jun 20210
President Joe Biden’s administration announced their plans to create ways for Americans to report radicalized friends and family to the government, in an effort to fight domestic terrorism.
In a conversation with reporters, one senior administration official explained the importance of stopping politically fueled violence before it started.
“We will work to improve public awareness of federal resources to address concerning or threatening behavior before violence occurs,” the official said.
The official cited the Department of Homeland Security’s “If you see something say something” campaign to help stop radical Islamic terror as a domestic possibility.
“This involves creating contexts in which those who are family members or friends or co-workers know that there are pathways and avenues to raise concerns and seek help for those who they have perceived to be radicalizing and potentially radicalizing towards violence,” the official said.
Biden began his presidency with a stark warning in his inauguration speech about the “rise in political extremism, white supremacy, domestic terrorism that we must confront and we will defeat.” On June 1, Biden described the threat from “white supremacy” as the “most lethal threat to the homeland today.”
The Biden administration said it would also work with large technology companies on “increased information sharing” to help combat radicalization.
“Any particular tech company often knows its own platform very well,” the official noted. “But the government sees things — actually, threats of violence — across platforms. They see the relationship between online recruitment, radicalization, and violence in the physical world.”
The Department of Homeland Security also plans to deploy “digital literacy” and “digital fitness” programs to help combat “malicious content online that bad actors deliberately try to disseminate.”
The official reassured reporters that the administration’s new strategies would remain “laser-focused” on stopping violent acts.
“This is a strategy that is agnostic as to political ideology or off the spectrum,” the official said. “What matters is when individuals take their political or other grievances and turn that — unacceptably, unlawfully — into violent action.”
The official added the Biden administration was taking the threat of domestic terrorism seriously and would redirect the focus of intelligence agencies on internal threats.
“We are investing many agencies of the government and resourcing them appropriately and asking our citizens to participate,” the official said. “Because, ultimately, this is really about homeland security being a responsibility of each citizen of our country to help us achieve.”
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| Homeschool Curriculum |
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Posted by: Ruthy - 06-15-2021, 10:35 AM - Forum: General Commentary
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It is that time of year, when you are looking for your homeschool curriculum for the upcoming school year. I would like to recommend Angelic Doctor Academy. It is a traditional homeschool academy, that is owned by a traditional catholic in our area. In the 25 years that I have been homeschooling, the history book and exercise book from ADA was the best book I have ever used. Looking at the biology book sample, it looks like it will be a great book also. ADA also offers grading and other subjects. Here is the website: Angelic Doctor Academy
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