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Home ... the One, True, Holy, Catholic Church
“That
understanding of its sacred dogmas must be
perpetually retained,
which Holy Mother Church once declared; and there must
never be a recession from that meaning under the specious
name of a deeper understanding”
(Blessed Pope Pius IX, 1st Vatican
Council, S.3, C.2 on Revelation, 1870 ex cathedra)
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“We
are not worthy of persecution. We are Christians not
worth killing.”
Matthew Walsh
Philadelphia as Boston:
A Shameful
and Deadly Remix
“We remain
shamed by these egregious failures to protect children and
those who are vulnerable and affirm our commitment that
these failures will never be repeated.”
(Cardinal O’Malley of Boston — 16 August 2018)
“Failures”? … I really bristled at this.
What
Hypocrisy! What Hogwash!
Who can believe that? Who in Boston? In Brighton? On Planet
Earth?
He came here, to Boston, in 2003 — 15 years ago — to
“correct” the criminal behavior, the homosexual deviancy
that infested the priesthood and raped our children — and
especially festered at Saint John’s Seminary where, if you
could not pass the Color Pink, you would never see Holy
Orders. Why? Because it was the seedbed of the homosexual
culture that infiltrated, dominated, shamed, and broke the
Church in Boston — and then the rest of the world.
Where do you first look when attempting to uncover
widespread crime? How about a Criminal Organization? If it
is theft, a gang of thieves! If it is political corruption,
the State House and the Legislature!
If it is perversion in the priesthood — how about the
seminary? “Elementary, my dear Watson.”
Never again?
He came. He saw. He “conquered” — and left Saint John’s
Seminary as filthy as it was when he arrived as the
Vatican’s “White Knight” in 2003. And now he wishes
to “affirm our commitment
that these failures will never be repeated.”
Did he not say something of that nature 15 years ago?
He is, reportedly, putting together yet ANOTHER
... “PANEL”
... to
investigate what was already “investigated”
long before. According to
NECN,
“Cardinal
Sean O’Malley from the Archdiocese of Boston says he’s not
able to verify or disprove these allegations,
but wants the investigation to start as soon as possible
… Cardinal O’Malley said in a statement,
“The allegations made
this week are a source of serious concern to me as
Archbishop of Boston.”
He must be scratching his
head: “Haven’t I heard something like this before?” As we
see, O’Malley is STILL only tentatively
scandalized by homosexual predators in the Episcopacy and
the priesthood!
He is yet — some 15 years after the loathsome
scandal broke in Boston — simply “unable
to verify or disprove these allegations”,
you understand.
No, you are not in some parallel dimension. Fifteen
years after this nauseating and pandemic putrescence in
the Church burst like a vesicle ... a boil ... from a
diseased Body — O'Malley is not yet ready (as
Francis famously was not in Chile) to give credence to the
such ... “allegations”
... however many, and however grave the scandal to the
Faithful.
Perhaps he misunderstood Christ:
“But
he that shall scandalize one of these little ones that
believe in Me, it were
better for
him that a millstone should be hanged about his neck, and
that he should be drowned in the depth of the sea.”
(Saint Matthew 18.6)
Let us offer our clueless
Cardinal in absentia … a few clues obvious to most
Catholics, but apparently opaque to most cardinals:
Doesn’t a cardinal or bishop
have to be a priest first? And do not priests first
have to be seminarians? And do not seminarians attend
places like Saint John’s Seminary? “Elementary, my
dear Watson”.
How about “starting that the
beginning”, O’Malley? You know, like the people responsible
for admitting candidates to the seminary? And the
teachers who instruct them? The bishops who
consecrate them?
You MUST have been there
before. It is on Lake Street in Brighton. Of course we know
that you share the habits of Francis — who is enamored of
you — by living in a simple residence, and maybe you cook
your own meals, too? But how about the weightier matters?
The Faith? The Flock? Remember them? “The Little Ones” … you
remember them, too?
Ask yourself: when was the
last time you saw O’Malley? At a photo-op with
Francis? You have listened to his “sermons” — mostly
monetary appeals — ON RECORDINGS in your parish — in place
of a homily embodied in a physical presence?
Did you ever write him about
an abuse in your parish? If you did, you never heard from
him. You heard from his “secretary” who told you that Father
so-and-so was held in O’Malley’s “highest esteem”. In other
words, GFY! This is a Catholic Journal so I will not spell
it out for you.
“Insincerity”
is too good a word
O’Malley is the poster boy
of all the insincerity we now find in the Church. He
talks the talk. He kind of looks the part. But
face it, by now it is apparent that he is most likely one of
the Old-Boy boys from the 60’s culture that devastated the
Church and has no real intention of correcting a vicious
crime.
That would mean gathering
the criminals and clapping them in irons! But then … who
would “man” the emptying churches which, since Vatican II,
have been largely emptied of meaning anyway. Salus
animarum? The Salvation of souls? That is last on the
list of O’Malley, just as it is last on the list of Francis.
The Beatle’s song “Imagine” invokes two things
indispensable to both men from that hallucinogenic era of
the 60s: imagine a world of “the brotherhood of man” and “no
religion too?” This is the “Post-Conciliar” Church. This is
Vatican II. This is Francis — and, apparently, O’Malley.
God? Heaven? Hell?
Salvation? All such silliness was stamped out by Vatican II
— and both men are eminent products of that “Council” that
became the ecclesiastical equivalent of Dresden. Once again
O’Malley comes, not as a shepherd, but to collect the ashes
of faith, mix them with the tears of the sodomized, and somehow
to mold a monument to this crushing horror with the
promise, yet again, that “these failures
will never be repeated.”
“Failures”? You call them mere “failures”?
The rest of us— your “Eminence”, call them our “Children”.
Vae vobis!
Editor
Boston Catholic Journal
August 19, 2018
Printable
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Vatican II:
The Model of the Failed Corporation
Imagine
a corporation that is very large; indeed, has many thousands
of managers and employees, and what is more, more than a billion
customers. The corporation has prospered for 2000 years
with the business model it had developed and which had been
rigorously maintained by a succession of over 200 presidents
and many more board members. The customers have been satisfied
and in no way found the business wanting in the way of customer
service and business policy.
A new president is elected
— and without any compelling warrant or reason decides to change
the business model dramatically. The managers and the employees
are told — despite any evidence — that the business is wanting
and could prosper more, even though it is at the apex of any
competing businesses by several magnitudes of order. Business
had been good, the customers happy, and the employees as well,
but he and a handful of likeminded board members wished to change
not only the model, but the erstwhile universally admired architecture
of its thousands of stores throughout the world, as well as
dramatically simplifying the interiors to more accord with its
less successful competitors — and what is more, totally changed
the business language itself — so that these formerly unifying
features were to be discarded in favor of disunity. Once again,
it must be emphasized, there was no compelling reason to
make such drastic changes to a remarkably successful corporation.
The model is changed according
these new principles that differ greatly from the former.
Decline Hailed as Growth
Within a few years, this once
monolithic business, viewed as a paradigm of success in its
area of competence, then loses tens of thousands of employees
and managers and — most importantly — the customer base,
once in the area of 75% repeat business became 40%, and in a
few more years less than 25%.
Remarkably, the new president
— and his successors — hail the change as a success,
despite metrics in every area that show it in decline —
almost in receivership! The stores close by the thousands, or
are consolidated in an effort to stop the hemorrhaging of customers.
Then, in the middle of this
disastrous downward spiral, the corporation is hit, in successive
years, with over $3 Billion dollars of loss in the way of lawsuits
due to negligent hiring practices resulting in employees’
large-scale and sordid misconduct of the most vile sort — and
the incessant litigation that followed. To pay for their negligence
— or rather, to pay the lawyers and the victims
for the negligence of the managers — the corporation must sell
off large portions of its portfolio and close many, many of
its stores. The customers are fewer and fewer, and what is more,
there are no new employees to be had as a result of the
magnitude of the scandal. The schools of management (Seminaries)
must, of course, close also, for there are no more candidates
(seminarians) for the positions which themselves are fewer and
fewer.
Despite all this, the Chairman
(in the case of the Catholic Church, Pope Francis) and the Board
(the bishops and cardinals) are determined more than ever
— not to return to the successful and prosperous
method of the last 2000 years (the Tridentine or Latin
Mass that preceded Vatican II for two millennia) — but to
continue in its new business model which
is crumbling daily with still further departures from the past,
and is itself becoming increasingly arthritic — together with
its remaining customers.
What do you see in all this?
What is your assessment of its management and its future as
a viable business? The question, of course, is rhetorical, except
for a doctrinaire few who maintain that — despite all appearances
and metrics — it is actually prospering in its
manifest decline.
This is a vignette of the
state of the “modern” Catholic Church subsequent to Vatican
II. It is the state of the Church today. And many increasingly
wonder if it is the same Church at all — given the changes that
followed — and still follow — that ill-fated Council that
effectively defected from the Faith and went the Way of the
World.
Counterfeit: another religion altogether
The profanity euphemized as
“The Church of Vatican II” and “The Post-Conciliar
Church” or the “Novus Ordo (New Order) Church” is,
in fact — and increasingly clearly, given the vast network
of homosexual perversion that pervades it at all
levels — an imposter, a meretricious simulacrum;
in fact, it is another religion altogether : that
is to say, distinct from, and not identical to, nor in continuity
with, the Holy Catholic Church that preceded it for 2000
years.
In a Word — Vatican II was a Schism
“The Schismatics” are not — as the liberal
media and the godless homosexual priests, bishops, and apparatus
would have us believe — those who return
to the Most Holy Sacrifice of the Mass as it was celebrated
for generations going back to Christ — and who faithfully adhere
to the Teachings and Magisterium of the Church,
and to the Sacred Deposit of Faith entrusted to it by
Christ Himself — who are .
It is the Post-Conciliar
Church of Vatican II itself that is Schismatic!
Children’s parents and grandparents
tell them of something which once was unspeakably beautiful
— and manifestly holy. They pray it will be again.
So do we.
Editor
Boston Catholic Journal
August 18, 2018
Printable
PDF Version
Francis
— the Great Divider
in the “Post-Modern” Catholic Church
The
Two Faces of Pope Francis
Will the Pride and Arrogance
of Francis dare even defy God Himself?
Much depends upon
which side of a Radically Liberal Agenda you Stand
Francis
is a man of inversions.
If you
stand on the right side of him you are well-treated and
heard; if you stand on the wrong side of him (as, say, Cardinal
Burke) you are dispatched to the Ultima Thule. But
the “right” side of Francis is on the Left; and the wrong
side of Francis is on the Right. For all his putative
benignity, Francis can be ruthless. It is a side of Francis
that receives little attention from the media. He autocratically
tolerates no disagreement and is quick to punish or exile.
He is not “the man-made-by-the-media”. In an irreconcilable
juxtaposition he is ostentatiously humble, trumpeting the
humility he tries to equate with himself while failing to
exercise that “humility and gentleness” among his own courtiers.
That “an atmosphere of fear” pervades the halls of the Vatican
is no surprise.
His disdain for, and antagonism toward, traditional
Catholics and the those who adhere to the Tridentine Mass
is well known. But there is no such disdain for openly dissident
Catholics such as Kasper and Danneels, both cardinals, who
enjoy his favor and to whom he is keen to listen. Indeed,
they are part of the inner circle of his closest advisors.
Unlike
his immediate predecessor, Francis is openly antagonistic
and condescending toward those who do not align themselves
with his unquestionably revolutionary — many would
say destructive — liberal agenda that would not only “decentralize”
the 2000 year old teaching authority of Rome, but
effectively abdicate the papacy itself , leaving all
matters ecclesiological in the hands of broadly dispersed
Synods (a 1965 creation of Vatican II), Episcopal Conferences
(another creation of Vatican II in 1966), local Ordinaries
(bishops), and even in parishes themselves, free to articulate
the Faith as a “praxis” unique to each local parish’s “creative”
expression of the Faith — which may differ entirely from
a neighboring parish’s creative impulse and expression of
the Faith. The two needn’t be uniform in either teaching
or “praxis”. If there is contradiction in the teaching of
each — and, eo ipso no unity among them —
then that is the most genuine expression of the Church for
those particular parishioners, priests, and Parish Council
(yet another 1965 creation emerging from Vatican II that
deprived the pastor of his authority in the parish. While
it is ostensibly an “advisory” group — often comprised of
disaffected Catholics — it often works to undermine the
unique pastoral responsibility of the priest. Here you find
the feminists, the liberal Catholics, the “progressives”,
the people who really run the Church). That contradiction
exists and flies in the face of reason and logic (specifically
the Principle of Non-Contradiction) is beside the point.
After all, according to Francis, we must be open to “God
surprising us”.
Let
us put it bluntly: Francis is not a particularly bright
man. This is not to say that being
intelligent, coherent, and articulate is indispensable to
being holy — but it certainly helps in every other aspect,
especially as it pertains to the Vicar of Jesus Christ on
Earth.
Understanding
what Francis is saying concerning extremely important issues
should not be an exercise in verbal Sudoku, an effort
to make sense of what he is attempting to say — presuming
that he himself “knows” rather than solipsistically intuits
what he is saying, leaving the rest of us to guess.
He is a
man of tremendous ambiguity despite his vaunted simplicity.
There is a distinct lack of clarity often couched in awkward
phrases — often neologisms — doubtlessly written for
him by others, and the tone, the phraseology, is
one often encountered in the lexicon of distinctly liberal
circles and among “New Age” thinkers. What are we
to make of such statements as:
“If we, each doing our own part, if we do
good to others, if we meet there, doing good,
and we go slowly, gently, little by little, we will make
that culture of encounter: We need that so much.
We must meet one another doing good.
'But I don't believe, Father, I am an atheist!'
But do good: We will meet one another there.”
Q: Where is “there”?
And how is it different from “here” if one is talking
with an atheist? Will the atheist no longer be an atheist
in that nebulous “there”? Will the Pope no longer be a Catholic
when he reaches “there”? If “there” is “in the doing of
good”, what is the outcome he suggests will result? That
we will find that “we are both doing good and that is good
— and it really does not matter if we believe in Christ
or not … as long as we are doing good? As long as we are
being nice to each other we both will find
that Christ is really beside the point and quite unnecessary.
We can trade places and our ultimate destiny will be unaffected
… as long as we “meet each other there”. In Whom we believe
or do not believe is really unimportant (despite
what that Person in Whom we believe or do not believe has
said concerning belief in Him in very clear
and unequivocal terms.)
On the
other hand, however insipid and incoherent the statement,
it is the logical and inevitable result of an emerging
policy in Francis’s papacy that discourages, even forbids,
any attempt by a Catholic to convert another
to Christ (and through Christ to come to salvation,
and ultimately to Heaven (the best possible will
we can have toward another: their ultimate, ontological
and eternal good — for which we were created in the first
place — at least according to authentic Catholic doctrine).
He is also
an accomplished showman. His repudiation of the emblems
of his office, his refusal to live where his predecessors
lived, to deliberately be chauffeured in sub-compacts, to
make his own meals — ostensibly to reveal his simplicity
— appears not so much an example to the faithful
for their own edification — as it does a reproach
to his predecessors who chose to accept the historical
tradition accorded their ecclesiastical office. A cynic
may say that it is a carefully and publicly orchestrated
slap in the face to his predecessors — which hardly accords
with humility. In fact, the press, the media, are
invited to witness and to broadly publicize this exaggerated
“humility”. There is something troubling in this ostentation
of “humility” which immediately invokes Jesus’ parable in
Matthew 6.5:
“Do not be like the hypocrites, for they love to pray standing
in the synagogues and on the street corners to be seen by
others. Truly I tell you, they have received their reward
in full.”
If that
is not confusing enough, let us look at another bewildering
statement by Francis, invoking one of his “blessed” predecessors:
“Blessed
Paul VI expressed this eloquently: “We can imagine,
then, that each of our sins, our attempts
to turn our back on God, kindles in him a more
intense flame of love, a desire to bring us
back to himself and to his saving plan …”
In light
of what precisely that “plan” is, and “Who” is putatively
involved as quite necessary to it, Francis is not clear,
given his rapprochement with the straw atheist. This is
a decidedly queer notion with no clear Scriptural or theological
credentials, for we had been taught (note the past tense)
that sin is an offense to God, an evil so
great that it required the very Son of God to die in expiation
for it. Following this logic, then, if I wish to be more
loved by God then I should sin more often … and the
graver the sin, the more intense God’s love, yes?
But that
ability to confuse, to render indistinct, is precisely the
sine qua non of the agenda of those who boasted
of putting him in office (Cardinal Danneels of the infamous
“Vatican Mafia” who openly declared that Francis was “their
man”, that is to say, the candidate favored by the notorious
“St. Gallen Club” who regularly met for years to undermine
Pope Benedict’s election, and ultimately his papacy, in
order to replace him with “their man”. And who was
“their man”? Bergoglio! Surprise!
And now, as Francis, the devolution
of the Church has been inaugurated. He is merely “the Bishop
of Rome” as he fondly refers to himself, and concomitantly
diminishes and undermines the universal authority
of the papacy itself). This is to say nothing of:
-
Danneels cover up of the pedophile
Bishop
of Bruges, Roger Vangheluwe, despite the insistence
of the bishop’s own nephew who was sexually victimized
by him for 14 years and demanded that Danneels bring
it to the attention of the pope — which he refused to
do.
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This same Cardinal Danneels
also vigorously attempted to convince King Baudouin
of Belgium to legislate an abortion bill
despite the king’s moral reluctance as a matter of conscience
(The king stepped down for 36 hours rather than associate
his name with the bill that was subsequently passed)
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His
approval of and his lobbying for same-sex “unions” which
he considered, in his own words, and as a Catholic Cardinal,
“a positive development”.
-
This same Cardinal Danneels
was the number two appointee
to the Synod on the Family! (of all things)
— despite being disgraced … and did we mention that
he is retired? Why was he given this position
of such prominence? It is simple: Quid pro quo:
something for something. In other words, Francis’s personal
invitation and appointment of Danneels
was a blatant “thank you!” for Danneels part in having
engineered his ascent to the Throne of Peter (the Holy
Ghost, of course, is parenthetical to all this). Did
we mention that the extremely liberal Cardinal Walter
Kasper of Germany — also a member of the
same “St. Gallen Club” — was number one
on the list? Quid pro quo x 2.
Let us
put this into clearer perspective that, unfortunately, requires
less imagination. Let us assume that a presidential nominee
is elected to office. It is later found that a powerful
coterie of conspirators had done everything legal and illegal
to place him in office to further their own interests (which
may in fact coincide with the president’s). One of the conspirators
is found to be deeply involved in criminal activity of the
most loathsome sort and the media, seizing upon it, expose
him to public outrage. However, the statute of limitations
required by law expires before he can be convicted. He then
goes on to publicly boast of how instrumental he was in
getting the current president elected, and had, in fact,
engineered it. Soon after the president assumes office,
he assembles a group of advisors. The number one appointee
is someone openly disaffected with the Constitution of the
United States and makes every effort to undermine it. We
are astounded. But that was just the jab. The real blow
comes when the number two appointee is the very man who
had engaged in unscrupulous and criminal activity — and
who had publicly boasted to the news outlets that he was
the kingpin in getting the president elected. He is not
simply a personal, but a public disgrace!
Would a politician really make so blatant, so egregious,
so open a payback as to place this man in his inner circle
of advisors — and as the second in the position of influencing
the president? Would not the president, rather, distance
himself from that figure at all costs as a liability to
his own credibility? Of course he would! Obama even distanced
himself from his “friend” and “pastor” the “reverend” Jeremiah
Wright after preaching “God damn America” … three times
in one homily … among many other incendiary remarks? It
was political poison to the president.
But it is not a theological and moral outrage that Francis
appoints Danneels and Kasper to his own inner circle? It
is not just theology and morality — it is stupidity … or
worse yet, utter arrogance: “If I can get away with this,
I can get away with anything.” And he has. And, to the detriment
of the Church, likely will continue to.
Very Proud of His Humility ... an
Oxymoron
Of course this
assessment goes against the prevailing narrative of a man
“renowned for his humility” in the secular press. Indeed,
he completely agrees with and personally endorses this narrative.
In discussing the dismal results of Vatican II we find the
following:
“He said the Second Vatican Council, the
1962-65 meetings that brought the church into the modern
world, had promised such an opening to people of other faiths
and non-believers, but that the church hadn't made progress
since then.”
“I have the
humility and ambition to do so,” he said.”
1
What
does this say of his predecessors?
That all of them lacked the requisite personal
attributes (humility and ambition) to fulfill the revolutionary
vision of Vatican II— while Francis unflinchingly
asserts that he possesses what they
lacked — and flatly tells us so. Because he
possesses the … unique … combination of (self-acclaimed)
humility and ambition lacking in his predecessors,
he can achieve what they failed to.
Even the most casual Catholic recognizes an inherent conflict
in this perplexing and troubling statement. Self-ascribed
humility strikes us the wrong way — think
of Christ’s parable of the Pharisee and the Publican praying
before God), especially when it is coupled with ambition.
Are self-acclaimed humility and ambition really
exemplary or even complementary virtues in any remotely
Catholic discourse? The hubris less-than-implicit
in this remarkable statement is given clearer, bolder relief
in the following story we find quite revealing and not a
little unsettling:
Bankrupt
Benevolence: “And I
am the pope; I do not need
to give reasons.”
This is
what Pope Francis unceremoniously told Cardinal Müller of
the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith —
who dared to disagree with Francis on issues
within Amoris Laetitia — when Francis effectively
fired him. Technically what he stated is true. It is true
of any corporation or business: one can be called in at
the end of the day of twenty years of faithful service and
be summarily dismissed
“for
no reason”
— but is rarely exercised because of the odor of autocracy
that surrounds it together with the blatant exercise of
pitiless power uncommon even in business and industry. Certainly
we found no such crude exercise of power within other pontificates
of recent memory. Human dignity demands reasons for
such curt dismissals — and so do human beings. It is callous
and stinks of supercilious authority, prepotency and crude
superiority. In other words, earmarks that have characterized
the authoritarian papacy of Francis. It is no more than
a slap-down: “I am the Pope ... dammit! ... just do as your
told, man!”
So much for the much vaunted mercy, tolerance, gentility,
and good-will of this deeply confused and even more confusing
pope.
According to
Lifesite News,
“In
an interview with the German newspaper Passauer Neue
Presse, Cardinal Müller revealed details of the meeting
in which he learned of the Pope’s refusal to renew his 5-year
mandate as prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine
of the Faith (CDF).”
Pope Francis, Cardinal Müller said, “communicated
his decision” not to renew his term “within
one minute” on the last work day of his five-year-term,
and did not give any reasons for it.
The same Cardinal Müller found his own peremptory dismissal
reminiscent of Pope Francis’s summary and inexplicable dismissal
of three extremely worthy priests from his office at the
Congregation of the Doctrine of the Faith; priests that
Cardinal Müller found indispensible just before Christmas
last year. On that occasion Cardinal Müller politely inquired
about their abrupt dismissal as follows:
“Your Holiness, I have
received these letters (demanding their
dismissal), but I did not do anything
because these persons are among the
best of my dicastery… what did they
do?”
The answer was, as follows:
“And I am the pope,
I do not need to give reasons for any
of my decisions.
I have decided that they have to leave
and they have to leave.”
He got up and stretched out his hand
in order to indicate that the audience
was at an end.” (if you wish to read
more of this dramatic episode, see:
“Before
Dismissal of Cardinal Müller,
Pope Asked Five Pointed Questions”.
Note particularly the following:
“The pope wants to speak to you.”
“Did you tell him I am celebrating
Mass?” asked Müller. “Yes,” said
the
secretary, “but he says he does not
mind—he wants to talk to you all the
same.” The cardinal went to the sacristy.
The pope, in a very bad mood, gave him
some orders and a dossier
concerning one of his friends, a cardinal.”).
HYPOCRISY
This is the same author of
Laudato Si who literally pontificated about “the
immense dignity of each person, who is not just something,
but someone.” (65) and that “In our time, the Church does
not simply state that other creatures ... have no worth
in themselves and can be treated as we wish. The German
bishops have taught that, where other creatures are concerned,
“we can speak of the priority of being over that of being
useful” (69)
Why
do we even bring this up? Is it character-assassination?
Malice? No. It is simply relevant. Let us be clear.
We wish Pope Francis every good and no evil. This is the
correct understanding of loving anyone. We love Pope Francis
as Christ commands us to love everyone.
Is this
assessment lacking in charity? I think not. Saint Paul rebuked
Saint Peter himself
“when
[he] saw that they walked not uprightly unto the truth of
the Gospel”
but that Peter,
"fearing them
who were of the circumcision" had acquiesced to what
may be considered the first attempt at "ecumenism" (Gal
2.11-14). Did Saint Paul not love Saint Peter? And because
he loved him — and because he loved Christ more
— he reproached him.
Rarely,
in the history of the Church, has a Catholic had to choose
with whom to side: Christ or the pope? To side with the
pope was to side with Christ! This is no longer so
clear, and it is puzzling to many faithful Catholics when
Francis advocates that which Christ opposes, or opposes
that which Christ mandates. How is a Catholic to accept
two contrary counsels ... even commands?
Christ:
“Going
therefore, teach ye all nations; baptizing them in the
name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy
Ghost. Teaching them to observe all things whatsoever
I have commanded you.”
(St. Matthew 28.19)
Francis:
“Proselytism is solemn nonsense.”
How
do we reconcile such completely contradictory
exhortations? Have we come to such a state of affairs
that Catholics are confronted with choosing between
what our Blessed Lord commanded and what Pope
Francis disdains as nonsense? This is not simply
scandalous ... it verges on — and is a broad and deep
current toward — nothing less than heresy: the rejection
of what Christ Himself unquestionably taught.
There is no other plausible explanation for this contradiction.
Such contrariety cannot co-exist in the Church.
It is a violent breach of 2000 years of Catholic teaching
and doctrine. The heresy of Indifferentism
2 was not repealed by the Second Vatican
Council, nor can it ever be, for Christ simply and forcefully
stated:
“I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No man
cometh to the Father, but by me.”
(St. John 14.6)
“Who are we to Judge?”
Is Francis dismantling the Barque of Peter
— plank by plank — or simply following the prevailing
winds and steering it into the rocks? Cardinal Burke
aptly used the analogy of a ship without a rudder in
reference to Pope Francis's apparent lack of reference.
Look at the confusion about you and tell us. If the
ship is heading toward Lesbos driven by a furious and
feckless wind, what are we to do? Reproach the
pilot to avert disaster? But to reproach — however pressing
— is to judge, and in in Francis's own words,
who are we to do so... ?
Amoris Laetitia — the First
Apostolic Exhortation to Sin!
And
this ... this is to utter nothing of the horrific
scandal and heresy inherent in Francis’s troubled
Amoris Laetitia, an Apostolic Exhortation — to
sin! Perhaps the first ever: against Christ's
own teaching on the indissolubility of marriage,
the sin of adultery, His unequivocal injunction
against divorce, and Saint Paul’s stern admonition
against receiving Holy Communion unworthily (1
Corinthians 11.27) — the very Body and Blood
of Christ — while in a state of mortal sin (adultery)!
And
Francis presumes to abrogate what Christ Himself
established?
Indeed, all
4?
Two
days ago (August 2, 2018) Francis had the audacity to
change the Catechism of the Catholic Church,
abolishing the more than 2000 year old Church Teaching
that the State has the right to impose the death penalty
on individuals for certain heinous crimes (Luther and
Calvin agreed with this as do Muslims and many
Atheists). The point to consider, however, is the
precedent Francis is establishing in no longer
preserving and protecting 2000
years of Church teaching, which is his primary duty
as the Vicar of Jesus Christ on Earth, but in fact
abolishing it! This is to say nothing
of the egregious implication that what the Church has
taught from the beginning has been corrupt, and up until
now (that is to say, up until Francis) immoral!
He is the first to have done so.
Does
Francis’s defection from Church teaching constitute
formal heresy? We cannot answer that, although the odor
is distinct. That is the competency of the College of
Cardinals which, up until now, has been habitually
and remarkably silent and — dare we say — pusillanimous.
Courage and careerism seldom coincide
— as we have repeatedly witnessed in today’s ... “delicate”
... Episcopacy. As G.K. Chesterton appositely noted,
“only live fish go against the current.”
This much is vital:
we must ask, perforce, how many more
“corrections,
“deletions”,
and “amendments”
to Catholic Teaching found in the Catechism of the Catholic
Church and in violation of the Sacred Deposit of the
Faith are now open — by Francis’s precedent? This is
an extremely serious question.
Did
not someone speak of the reek of sulfur in the Vatican?
How prescient!
Archbishop
Tomash Peta who sat on the Synod that produced this
document observed that: “Blessed Paul VI in 1972: 'From
some crack the smoke of Satan has entered the temple
of God.' I am convinced that these were prophetical
words...”
https://www.cnsnews.com/blog/michael-w-chapman/bishop-vatican-synod-one-can-still-perceive-smell-smoke-satan-synod-document
So
are we.
_______________________________________
1
http://www.oregonlive.com/today/index.ssf/2013/10/pope_francis_urges_reform_want.html
2 “Indifferentism” is the belief
that it does not matter what religion a man professes;
he can attain to salvation by any religion. The Church
has roundly condemned this notion as a heresy in very
strong language, holding it to be a denial of extra
ecclesiam nulla salus (outside the Church there is no
salvation). Here, we feature a brief passage
from Mirari Vos, by the last great monk-pope,
Gregory XVI (August 15, 1832). All emphasis (bold and
italics), are ours; paragraph numbers, and reference
numbers appear as in the original:
"13. Now We consider another abundant source of
the evils with which the Church is afflicted at
present: indifferentism. This perverse opinion
is spread on all sides by the fraud of the wicked
who claim that it is possible to obtain the eternal
salvation of the soul by the profession of any kind
of religion, as long as morality is maintained.
Surely, in so clear a matter, you will drive this
deadly error far from the people committed to your
care. With the admonition of the apostle that “there
is one God, one faith, one baptism”[16] may those
fear who contrive the notion that the safe harbor
of salvation is open to persons of any religion
whatever. They should consider the testimony
of Christ Himself that “those who are not with Christ
are against Him,”[17] and that they disperse unhappily
who do not gather with Him. Therefore “without a
doubt, they will perish forever, unless they hold
the Catholic faith whole and inviolate.”[18] Let
them hear Jerome who, while the Church was torn
into three parts by schism, tells us that whenever
someone tried to persuade him to join his group
he always exclaimed: “He who is for the See of Peter
is for me.”[19] A schismatic flatters himself falsely
if he asserts that he, too, has been washed in the
waters of regeneration. Indeed Augustine would reply
to such a man: “The branch has the same form when
it has been cut off from the vine; but of what profit
for it is the form, if it does not live from the
root?”[20]
14. This shameful font of indifferentism gives rise
to that absurd and erroneous proposition which claims
that liberty of conscience must be maintained for
everyone. It spreads ruin in sacred and civil affairs,
though some repeat over and over again with the
greatest impudence that some advantage accrues to
religion from it. “But the death of the soul is
worse than freedom of error,” as Augustine was wont
to say.[21] When all restraints are removed by which
men are kept on the narrow path of truth, their
nature, which is already inclined to evil, propels
them to ruin. Then truly “the bottomless pit”[22]
is open from which John saw smoke ascending which
obscured the sun, and out of which locusts flew
forth to devastate the earth. Thence comes transformation
of minds, corruption of youths, contempt of sacred
things and holy laws — in other words, a pestilence
more deadly to the state than any other. Experience
shows, even from earliest times, that cities renowned
for wealth, dominion, and glory perished as a result
of this single evil, namely immoderate freedom of
opinion, license of free speech, and desire for
novelty."
— Pope Gregory XVI, Mirari Vos
http://catholicism.org/indifferentism-is-a-condemned-heresy-gregory-xvis-mirari-vos.html
Editor
Boston Catholic Journal
Friday August 3, 2018
Printable
PDF Version
Comments? Write us:
editor@boston-catholic-journal.com
Further Reading on the
Papacy of Francis:
Francis as
“the Prince”
and the
Logical Conclusion
of Vatican II
Francis
is the logical conclusion of the Second Vatican Council understood
as the Assisted Suicide of the Church. He is the logical consequent
of nearly every flawed statement, every questionable postulate,
and every sophistical premise either substantive or implicit,
within Vatican II as so many antecedents to a catastrophically
spurious argument. As he himself stated as early as 2013
— but not before a rude slap in the face to all
his predecessors (one still alive: Pope “Emeritus” Benedict):
“In the interview, Francis denounced the
“Vatican-centric” nature of the Holy See administration
and acknowledged that popes past had been infatuated
with the pomp of the
Vatican and its “courtesans.”
and then:
“He said the Second Vatican
Council, the 1962-65 meetings that brought the
church into the modern world, had promised such
an opening to people of other faiths and non-believers,
but that the church hadn’t made progress since
then.”
1
He then went
further, to make the paradoxical claim that:
“I have the
humility and ambition to do so,” he said.”
1
In other words,
“I, Francis the celebrated, acclaimed,
and famously humble and unpretentious — propose to fully
actualize all the nonsense embodied in the equally celebrated
(albeit spurious) ‘Spirit of Vatican II’ because
I alone among
all my predecessors have the real
humility — and ambition — that
they lacked — and the iron will to do so!
Bet on it.”
Let us
ponder that for a moment, for it is fraught with significance.
Does a humble
man boast of his humility? Of course not, for he sees
the contradiction inherent in such a question.
More troubling
still is the question: is ambition consonant with
humility in a pope?
At the apex of power (at which Francis now sits)
ambition can dangerously verge on Machiavellian. As Niccolo
observed in his famous work, The Prince,
“Ambition is so powerful a passion in the heart, that however
high we reach we are never satisfied.” 1
How Far?
Machiavelli
was a vehement atheist. Francis is an unbridled progressivist
(radical liberal). In both cases, however otherwise divergent,
the pressing question appears identical: “How far can
I go? What can I get away with? To what extent can I push
the limits of this power vested in me? To the point where power
prevails over truth?”
These are serious questions, especially as they pertain
to the Vicar of Jesus Christ on Earth.
Has the Church, as Francis insists, really been stagnant
for 50 years — until the epiphany of Francis who alone
can achieve what Vatican II proposed — because he alone
has the humility to accomplish this, coupled with an
unbending determination? Is there something disconcerting
about this statement? Even contradictory?
What is more, we need only look at the anemic state of the Church
following Vatican II: the dearth of clergy, religious,
seminarians — the aging and emptying pews … to see that no such
“stagnation” in the Church occurred. To the contrary,
prior to Vatican II it was a Church full of vitality
in every conceivable metric — and growing exponentially!
To understand how Francis arrives at this spurious conclusion
we must first understand that Francis is the quintessential
product of a unique generation. He is among the last of
that now dwindling generation (thank God) who themselves were
products of the psychotropic culture of the 1960’s — which,
in our rear-view mirror — is a now barely visible, and from
which we cannot speed away fast enough. It has long begun
to fade to fatuity. Most of us have, by now, come to our senses
and recognize this.
A Deadly Age
It was a deadly
age, a noxious age whose poison still leeches into Western society.
At a given stratum it will be percolated through reason,
eventually strained of its poison, and become the historical
nonsense it was — even if it contaminated so much and so many
lives before it was bleached out of our consciousness and finally
became innocuous , together with the psychedelic caricature
of a reality it had never known. Timothy Leary, et alia, “Turned
on, tuned in, dropped out” and in alignment with his not-so-famous
literary micropiece “Design for Dying — Dying? Throw a House
Party! ” — dropped dead.
The Age of Aquarius and the Psilocybin
mushroom are dead and what is left of that sad crop are dying
leaves on a withering tree, fretted by songs still strummed
by the arthritic hands of the elderly on guitars three times
the age of the audience. They are pathetic figures clinging
to a youth that betrayed them to an old age that wasn’t supposed
to happen in the euphoric Flower Days.
In truth it was a miserable age that opiated America; an age that filled
the valleys and made the mountains low — for the coming of
the Flower Child who littered it with filth. It was Woodstock
after the rain and the music stopped: a wasteland of plastic
trash, condoms and roach clips.
The Segue into
Vatican II
Same time, same culture, same euphoria, same mantra against inhibition, same
contempt for authority, same disdain for absolutes. It was the
time to experiment with society, with minds, and — most
sadly — with souls. While students occupied the chancellor’s
office at the university, “liberated” Catholic theologians,
together with Avant-guard bishops and their ecumenically requisite
Protestant advisors occupied the Vatican.
“The Establishment” was shut out — in academic, ecclesiastic
and civil society. “Old school” was out. “New school” was in:
a new and radical school of theology and spirituality; new interpretation,
“exegesis”, “hermeneutics”, and now “discernment”. “Dogma”
became “anathema” and “anathema” was finally scrubbed from the
Catholic lexicon altogether: both became something pejorative:
nothing was incontrovertibly true (itself a reflexive contradiction).
Latin as an Ecclesiastical Marker or Identifier was out. Banality was in.
Priests spoke the vernacular and finally realized that they
had nothing to say. Homily became comedy. Comedy became skit.
The Guitar is King! — no longer Christ Jesus.
And the only Choir we know is not of Angels: they ceased their
accompaniment with us when “Liturgists” discarded Gregorian
Chant in favor of the insipid ditties of Marty Haugen who is
Lutheran or the “Saint
Louis Jesuits (not all of whom remain Jesuits, or priests, or
even Christians.”1)
No going back: DNR and the
Church as a Hospice
New vestments, new language(s), new Mass, new spirituality that emphasized
man through a unilateral (Catholics gave up virtually
everything. Protestants relinquished nothing) effort at a newly-reformulated
notion of “ecumenism” instead of salvation. Nun’s and
Sister’s Habits were shortened, then abbreviated, then thrown
out. The new “cool” was the collarless priest, the unidentifiable
Sister. The various “Conferences of Catholic Bishops” (which
have no binding authority) became social, then political. The
Church effectively became the
“field hospital” envisioned by Francis — but it was also the only patient —
mortally wounded, and strapped to it was the purple rescript
DNR (“Do Not Resuscitate or Revive”) upon the inauguration
of Francis as pope with a ready hand on the plug. Vatican II,
it turns out, was really an act of Assisted Suicide as
Francis has more than amply demonstrated and the Church has
become less a “field hospital” than a hospice. “Better that
the one true Church die than acknowledge our mistakes and return
to the business of saving souls as we had done for the
2000 years preceding Vatican II.”
But even the model of a hospice is inadequate, for after the
last Catholic dies, the hospice itself altogether ceases to
be. This is nihilism — not Catholicism — and it has been for
some time.
The Birth of
Theo-Politics
Theo-politics
was born. Peace, Poverty, Immigration, Inclusiveness, Equality,
Linguistic Neuterization in the Liturgy, Feminism, and “Ministries”
without meaning or number became the New Evangel.
“The salvation
of souls”?
Not a chance. That outdated mandate belonged to the 2000 years
prior to the Second Vatican Council — and is something of an
embarrassment to contemporary Catholic priests, theologians,
scholars, and … yes … laymen. Ask yourself: when was the last
time you so much as even heard that phrase at Church?
Modernism — that
“synthesis of all heresies” — replaced every
vestige of the theological concept of Tradition
that is inseparable from the identity of the Church especially
as it is articulated through infallible Church Teaching and
Dogma.
The Kingdom of God became the Polity of Man. Language
was purged of “salvation”, “soul”, “Hell”, “Penance”,
“repentance”, “Mary”, woman, virgin, man, he, she, her, hers,
his, gender, evil, the devil, conversion, sin,
suffering, chastity, mortification — anything that stifled
the desires of men and the ambitions of women. Heaven now has
Open Borders — and they are coterminous with earth.
A Replica or
a Counterfeit?
We built a simulacrum, a meretricious and largely plastic replica of the Kingdom
of Heaven and placed in on earth — complete with electric votive
candles. And yet, for all its semblance we secretly fear
it is counterfeit. It is little wonder that we fear dying
and leaving our Kingdom … for, perhaps, another
and fabled Kingdom of which we heard long ago where Someone
else ruled and in which the totality of man did not abide,
given his sin, selfishness, cruelty, malice and indifference
to God — a place of ceaseless Light and no fire divided from
a chasm of ceaseless fire with no Light.
But we know that Vatican II — or at least it’s true “spirit” abolished
all that 50 years ago. “Everyone and everything goes
to “Heaven” — despite the explicit teaching of
Christ to the contrary (Saint Matthew 7.13-14).
Does this
appalling vision offend you? Have I injured your “sensibilities”?
Reality is like
that — much like the “Reality TV Shows” that you probably watch.
Not every episode has a good ending. Many do not even have a
good beginning — much like Vatican II — and even more apropos
of the spectacle that is Francis as its culmination.
__________________________________________
1
Associated
Press
http://www.oregonlive.com/today/index.ssf/2013/10/pope_francis_urges_reform_want.html
2
https://www.catholicculture.org/commentary/otr.cfm?id=3844
3
Niccolo
Machiavelli — The Prince
Geoffrey K. Mondello
for the Boston Catholic Journal
April 19, 2018
Printable PDF Version
Comments? Write us:
editor@boston-catholic-journal.com
ROMAN MARTYROLOGY
Tuesday August 21st
in the Year of Grace 2018
Time after Pentecost
This Day, the Twenty-First Day of August
At Annecy, in Savoy, the festival of St. Jane
Frances Fremiot de Chantal, foundress of the Order of Nuns of
the Visitation of St. Mary, who is commemorated on the 13th of December.
At Rome, in the Veran field, St. Cyriaca, widow
and martyr. In the persecution of Valerian, after devoting herself
and all her goods in the service of the saints, she gave up her life
by suffering martyrdom for Christ.
At Salona, St. Anastasius, a law officer,
who was converted to the faith by seeing the fortitude with which blessed
Agapitus bore his torments, and being put to death by order of the emperor
Aurelian, for confessing the name of Christ, went to Our Lord.
In Sardinia, the birthday of the holy martyrs
Luxorius, Cisellus, and Camerinus, who were put to the sword
in the persecution of Diocletian, under the governor Delphius.
In Gevaudan, St. Privatus, bishop and martyr,
who suffered in the persecution of Valerian and Gallienus.
The same day, the holy martyrs Bonosus and Maximian.
At Fundi, in Campania, St. Paternus, a martyr,
who came from Alexandria to Rome to visit the tomb of the Apostles.
Thence he retired to the neighborhood of Fundi, where, being seized
by the tribune whilst he was burying the bodies of the martyrs, he died
in captivity.
At Edessa, in Syria, during the persecution of Maximian,
the holy martyrs Bassa, and her sons Theogonius,
Agapius, and Fidelis, whom their pious mother exhorted to martyrdom
and sent before her bearing their crowns. Being herself beheaded, she
joyfully followed them and shared their victory.
At Verona, St. Euprepius, bishop and confessor.
Also St. Quadratus, bishop.
At Siena, in Tuscany, blessed Bernard Ptolemy,
abbot and founder of the Congregation of Olivetans.
And elsewhere in divers places, many other holy martyrs, confessors,
and holy virgins.
Omnes sancti Mártyres,
oráte pro nobis. ("All ye Holy Martyrs, pray for us", from the
Litaniae Sanctorum, the Litany of the Saints)
Response: Thanks be to God.
|
Roman Martyrology
by Month
Why the
Martyrs Matter
Each day we
bring you a calendar, a list really,
of the holy Martyrs who had suffered
and died for Christ, for His Bride the
Church, and for our holy Catholic Faith;
men and women for whom — and well they
knew — their Profession of Faith would
cost them their lives.
They could have repudiated all three
(Christ, Church, and Catholic Faith)
and kept their lives for a short time
longer (even the lapsi only postponed
their death — and at so great a cost!).1
What would motivate men, women, even
children and entire families to willingly
undergo the most evil and painfully
devised tortures; to suffer death rather
than denial?
Why did they not renounce their Catholic
Faith when the first flame licked at
their feet, after the first eye was
plucked out, or after they were “baptized”
in mockery by boiling water or molten
lead poured over their heads? Why did
they not flee to offer incense to the
pagan gods since such a ritual concession
would be merely perfunctory, having
been done, after all, under duress,
exacted by the compulsion of the state?
What is a little burned incense and
a few words uttered without conviction,
compared to your own life and the lives
of those you love? Surely God knows
that you are merely placating the state
with empty gestures …
Did they love their wives, husbands,
children — their mothers, fathers and
friends less than we do? Did they value
their own lives less? Were they less
sensitive to pain than we are? In a
word, what did they possess that we
do not?
Nothing. They possessed what we ourselves
are given in the Sacrament of Confirmation
— but cleaved to it in far greater measure
than we do: Faith and faithfulness;
fortitude and valor, uncompromising
belief in the invincible reality of
God, of life eternal in Him for the
faithful, of damnation everlasting apart
from Him for the unfaithful; of the
ephemerality of this passing world and
all within it, and lives lived in total
accord with that adamant belief.
We are the Martyrs to come. What made
them so will make us so. What they suffered
we will suffer. What they died for,
we will die for. If only we will! For
most us, life will be a bloodless martyrdom,
a suffering for Christ, for the sake
of Christ, for the sake of the Church
in a thousand ways outside the arena.
The road to Heaven is lined on both
sides with Crosses, and upon the Crosses
people, people who suffered unknown
to the world, but known to God. Catholics
living in partibus infidelium, under
the scourge of Islam. Loveless marriages.
Injustices on all sides. Poverty. Illness.
Old age. Dependency. They are the cruciform!
Those whose lives became Crosses because
they would not flee God, the Church,
the call to, the demand for, holiness
in the most ordinary things of life
made extraordinary through the grace
of God. The Martyrology we celebrate
each day is just a vignette, a small,
immeasurably small, sampling of the
martyrdom that has been the lives of
countless men and women whom Christ
and the Angels know, but whom the world
does not know.
“Exemplum enim
dedi vobis”, Christ said to His
Apostles: “I have given you an example.”
And His Martyrs give one to us — and
that is why the Martyrs matter.
Geoffrey K. Mondello
Contributing Editor
Boston Catholic Journal
Note: We suggest that you explore
our newly edited and revised
“De SS. Martyrum Cruciatibus — The Torments
and Tortures of the Christian Martyrs”
for an in-depth historical account of
the sufferings of the Martyrs.
|
INTRODUCTION TO THE ROMAN
MARTYROLOGY
By
J. Cardinal
Gibbons, Archbishop Baltimore
THE ROMAN MARTYROLOGY is an official
and accredited record, on the pages of which are
set forth in simple and brief, but impressive words,
the glorious deeds of the Soldiers of Christ
in all ages of the Church; of the illustrious Heroes
and Heroines of the Cross, whom her solemn verdict
has beatified or canonized. In making up this long
roll of honor, the Church has been actuated by that
instinctive wisdom with which the Spirit of God,
who abides in her and teaches her all truth, has
endowed her, and which permeates through and guides
all her actions. She is the Spouse of Christ, without
spot or wrinkle or blemish, wholly glorious and
undefiled, whom He loved, for whom He died, and
to whom He promised the Spirit of Truth, to comfort
her in her dreary pilgrimage through this valley
of tears, and to abide with her forever. She is
one with Him in Spirit and in love, she is subject
to Him in all things; she loves what He loves, she
teaches and practices what He commands.
If the world has
its
“Legions
of Honor”,
why should not also the Church of the Living God,
the pillar and the ground of the truth? If men who
have been stained with blood, and women who have
been tainted with vice, have had their memory consecrated
in prose and in verse, and monuments erected to
their memory, because they exhibited extraordinary
talents, achieved great success, or were, to a greater
or less extent, benefactors of their race in the
temporal order, which passeth away, why should not
the true Heroes and Heroines of Jesus, who, imitating
His example, have overcome themselves, risen superior
to and trampled upon the world, have aspired, in
all their thoughts, words, and actions, to a heavenly
crown, and have moreover labored with disinterested
zeal and self-forgetting love for the good of their
fellow-men, have their memories likewise consecrated
and embalmed in the minds and hearts of the people
of God? If time have its heroes, why should not
eternity; if man, why should not God?
“Thy
friends, O Lord, are exceedingly honored; their
principality is exceedingly exalted.”
Whom
His Father so dearly loved, the world crucified;
whom the world neglects, despises, and crucifies,
God, through His Church, exceedingly honors and
exalts. Their praises are sung forth, with jubilation
of heart, in the Church of God for ages on ages.
The wisdom of the
Church of God in honoring her Saints is equaled
only by the great utility of the practice thus consecrated.
The Saints are not merely heroes; they are models.
Christ lived in them, and Christ yet speaks through
them. They were the living temples of the Holy Ghost,
in whose mortal bodies dwelt all the riches of His
wisdom and grace. They were in life consecrated
human exemplars of divine excellence and perfection.
Their example still appeals to our minds and to
our hearts, more eloquently even than did their
words to the men of their own generation, while
they were in the tabernacle of the flesh. Though
dead, they still speak. Their relics are instinct
with sanctity, and through them they continue to
breathe forth the sweet odor of Christ. The immortality
into which they have entered still lingers in their
bones, and seems to breathe in their mortal remains.
As many an ardent, spirit has been induced to rush
to the cannon's mouth by reading the exploits of
earthly heroes, so many a generous Christian soul
has been fired with heavenly ardor, and been impelled
to rush to the crown of martyrdom, by reading the
lives and heroic achievements of the Saints and
Martyrs of Christ. Example, in its silent appeal,
is more potent in its influence on the human heart
and conduct than are words in their most eloquent
utterances.
The Church knows
and feels all this, in the Spirit of God with whom
she is replenished ; and hence she sets forth, with
holy joy and exultant hope, her bright and ever-increasing
Calendar of Sanctity of just men and women made
perfect and rendered glorious, under her unearthly
and sublime teachings. In reading this roll of consecrated
holiness, our instinctive conclusion is, precisely
that which the great soul of St. Augustine reached
at the very crisis of his life, the moment of his
conversion
“If
other men like me have attained to such sanctity,
why not I? Shall the poor, the afflicted, the despised
of the World, bear away the palm of victory, the
crown of immortality, while I lie buried in my sloth
and dead in my sins, and thus lose the brilliant
and glorious mansion already prepared for me in
heaven? Shall all the gifts, which God has lavished
upon me, be ingloriously spent and foolishly wasted,
in the petty contest for this world's evanescent
honors and riches, while the poor and contemned
lay up treasures in heaven, and secure the prize
of immortal glory? Shall others be the friends of
God, whom He delights to honor, while I alone remain
His enemy, and an alien from His blessed Kingdom?”
It is a consoling
evidence of progress in the spiritual life in this
country to find the Martyrology here published,
for the first time, in English, and thereby made
accessible, in its rich treasures of Sanctity, to
all classes of our population. It will prove highly
edifying and useful, not only to the members of
our numerous religious Communities of both sexes,
but also to the laity generally. Every day has here
its record of Sanctity; and there is scarcely a
Christian, no matter how lowly or how much occupied,
who may not be able to daily peruse, with faith
and with great profit, the brief page of each day's
models of Holiness. These belong to all classes
and callings of life; from the throne to the hovel,
from the Pontiff to the lowest cleric, from the
philosopher to the peasant, from the busy walks
of life to the dreary wastes of the desert.
Let all, then, procure
and read daily the appropriate portions of this
Martyrology. Its daily and pious perusal will console
us in affliction, will animate us in despondency,
will make our souls glow with the love of God in
coldness, and will lift up our minds and hearts
from this dull and ever-changing earth to the bright
and everlasting mansions prepared for us in Heaven!
Imprimatur,
J. Cardinal Gibbons, Archbishop Baltimore, Maryland
1916
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THE APOSTOLIC CONSTITUTION
“QUO
PRIMUM
”
(and what
“Forever”
really means)
“From
the very first,
upon Our elevation to the chief Apostleship,
We gladly turned our mind and energies
and directed all out thoughts to those
matters which concerned the preservation
of a pure liturgy, and We strove with
God's help, by every means in our power,
to accomplish this purpose. For, besides
other decrees of the sacred Council
of Trent, there were stipulations for
Us to revise and re-edit the sacred
books: the Catechism, the Missal and
the Breviary. With the Catechism published
for the instruction of the faithful,
by God's help, and the Breviary thoroughly
revised for the worthy praise of God,
in order that the Missal and Breviary
may be in perfect harmony, as fitting
and proper —
for it is most
becoming that there be in the Church
only one appropriate manner of reciting
the Psalms and
only one rite for the
celebration of Mass
— We deemed
it necessary to give our immediate attention
to what still remained to be done,
viz, the re-editing of the Missal
as soon as possible.
Hence, We decided to entrust this work
to learned men of our selection. They
very carefully collated all their work
with the ancient codices in Our Vatican
Library and with reliable, preserved
or emended codices from elsewhere. Besides
this, these men consulted the works
of ancient and approved authors concerning
the same sacred rites; and thus
they have restored the Missal itself
to the original form and rite of the
holy Fathers. When this work
has been gone over numerous times and
further emended, after serious study
and reflection, We commanded that the
finished product be printed and published
as soon as possible, so that all might
enjoy the fruits of this labor; and
thus, priests would know which prayers
to use and which rites and ceremonies
they were required to observe from now
on in the celebration of Masses.
Let all everywhere adopt and observe
what has been handed down by the Holy
Roman Church, the Mother and Teacher
of the other churches, and let
Masses not be sung or read according
to any other formula than that
of this Missal published by Us.
This ordinance applies
henceforth, now, and
forever,
throughout all the provinces of the
Christian world, to all patriarchs,
cathedral churches, collegiate and parish
churches, be they secular or religious,
both of men and of women — even of military
orders — and of churches or chapels
without a specific congregation in which
conventual Masses are sung aloud in
choir or read privately in accord with
the rites and customs of the Roman Church.
This Missal is to be used by all churches,
even by those which in their authorization
are made exempt, whether by Apostolic
indult, custom, or privilege, or even
if by oath or official confirmation
of the Holy See, or have their rights
and faculties guaranteed to them by
any other manner whatsoever.
This new rite alone is to be used
unless approval of the practice of saying
Mass differently was given at the very
time of the institution and confirmation
of the church by Apostolic See at least
200 years ago, or unless there has prevailed
a custom of a similar kind which has
been continuously followed for a period
of not less than 200 years, in which
most cases We in no wise rescind their
above-mentioned prerogative or custom.
However, if this Missal, which we have
seen fit to publish, be more agreeable
to these latter, We grant them permission
to celebrate Mass according to its rite,
provided they have the consent of their
bishop or prelate or of their whole
Chapter, everything else to the contrary
notwithstanding.
All other of the churches referred to
above, however, are hereby denied the
use of other missals, which are to be
discontinued entirely and absolutely;
whereas, by
this present Constitution,
which will be valid henceforth, now,
and
forever,
We order and enjoin that nothing must
be added to Our recently published Missal,
nothing omitted from it, nor anything
whatsoever be changed within it under
the penalty of Our displeasure.
We specifically command each and every
patriarch, administrator, and all other
persons or whatever ecclesiastical dignity
they may be, be they even cardinals
of the Holy Roman Church, or possessed
of any other rank or pre-eminence, and
We order them in virtue of holy
obedience to chant or to read the Mass
according to the rite and manner and
norm herewith laid down by Us
and, hereafter, to discontinue and completely
discard all other rubrics and rites
of other missals, however ancient, which
they have customarily followed; and
they must not in celebrating Mass presume
to introduce any ceremonies or recite
any prayers other than those contained
in this Missal.
Furthermore, by these presents [this
law], in virtue of Our Apostolic authority,
We grant and concede in perpetuity that,
for the chanting or reading of the Mass
in any church whatsoever,
this Missal is hereafter to be followed
absolutely, without any scruple of conscience
or fear of incurring any penalty, judgment,
or censure, and may freely and lawfully
be used. Nor are superiors,
administrators, canons, chaplains, and
other secular priests, or religious,
of whatever title designated, obliged
to celebrate the Mass otherwise than
as enjoined by Us. We likewise declare
and ordain that no one whosoever is
forced or coerced to alter this Missal,
and that
this present document
cannot be revoked or modified,
but remains always valid and retain
its full force
notwithstanding
the previous constitutions and decrees
of the Holy See, as well as any general
or special constitutions or edicts of
provincial or synodal councils, and
notwithstanding the practice and custom
of the aforesaid churches, established
by long and immemorial prescription
— except, however, if more than two
hundred years' standing.
It is Our will, therefore, and by the
same authority, We decree that, after
We publish this constitution and the
edition of the Missal, the priests of
the Roman Curia are, after thirty days,
obliged to chant or read the Mass according
to it; all others south of the Alps,
after three months; and those beyond
the Alps either within six months or
whenever the Missal is available for
sale. Wherefore, in order that
the Missal be preserved incorrupt throughout
the whole world and kept free of flaws
and errors, the penalty for
nonobservance for printers, whether
mediately or immediately subject to
Our dominion, and that of the Holy Roman
Church, will be the forfeiting of their
books and a fine of one hundred gold
ducats, payable ipso facto to the Apostolic
Treasury. Further, as for those located
in other parts of the world, the penalty
is excommunication latae sententiae,
and such other penalties as may in Our
judgment be imposed; and We decree by
this law that they must not dare or
presume either to print or to publish
or to sell, or in any way to accept
books of this nature without Our approval
and consent, or without the express
consent of the Apostolic Commissaries
of those places, who will be appointed
by Us. Said printer must receive a standard
Missal and agree faithfully with it
and in no wise vary from the Roman Missal
of the large type (secundum magnum
impressionem).
Accordingly, since it would be difficult
for this present pronouncement to be
sent to all parts of the Christian world
and simultaneously come to light everywhere,
We direct that it be, as usual, posted
and published at the doors of the Basilica
of the Prince of the Apostles, also
at the Apostolic Chancery, and on the
street at Campo Flora; furthermore,
We direct that printed copies of this
same edict signed by a notary public
and made official by an ecclesiastical
dignitary possess the same indubitable
validity everywhere and in every nation,
as if Our manuscript were shown there.
Therefore, no one whosoever
is permitted to alter this notice of
Our permission, statute, ordinance,
command, precept, grant, indult, declaration,
will, decree, and prohibition. Should
anyone dare to contravene it, know that
he will incur the wrath of Almighty
God and of the Blessed Apostles Peter
and Paul.”
Given at St. Peter’s
in the year of the Lord's Incarnation,
1570, on the 14th of July of the Fifth
year of Our Pontificate.
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