 “Salus animarum supremus
lex esto” — “The
salvation of souls must be the supreme law in the Church.” (Canon
Law 1752) |
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Mary, Conceived without Sin, pray for us who have recourse to Thee
Going Once and Leaving
Twice:
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| “I-believe-in-God-the-Father-Almighty-Creator-of-Heaven-and-earth- and-in-Jesus Christ-His-only-Son-Our Lord-Who-was-conceived-by- the-Holy-Spirit-born-of the-Virgin-Mary-suffered-under-Pontius-Pilate -was-crucified-died-and-was-buried-He-descended-into-Hell-the-third- day-He-rose-again-from-the-dead-He-ascended-into-Heaven-and-sitteth -at-the-righ-hand-of-God-the-Father-almighty-from-thence-He-shall- come-to-judge-the-living-and-the-dead-I-believe-in-the-Holy-Spirit-the- holy-Catholic-Church-the-Communion-of-Saints-the-forgiveness-of- sins-the-resurrection-of-the-body-and-life-everlasting-Amen.” |
All spoken as one sentence as quickly as possible — to
get through it.
Worse still is the prayer to the very Mother of God, Mary Most
Holy, ESPECIALLY as it is “recited” — rather than “prayed” in
that beautiful prayer called the Angelic Salutation,
but better known simply as the Hail Mary:
| “HailMaryfullofgracetheLordiswiththeeblessedartthouamongstwomen andblessedisthefruitofthywombJesusHolyMaryMotherofGodprayforus sinnersnowandatthehourofourdeathAmen.” |
Within 14 seconds flat! … and
ten times between each
sacred Mystery!
REALLY?
“It is written: I will strike the shepherd, and the sheep of the flock shall be scattered.” (Saint Matthew 26.31)
“I will strike
the shepherd, and
the sheep of the flock shall be scattered.”1
We have often heard this. It pertains to the imminent Passion
of Jesus Christ on the very night before He was betrayed into
the hands of sinful men. He, the Good Shepherd, would be struck
(in fact, repeatedly ...) and the Apostles, the Disciples, and
the Faithful would be scattered — they would abandon Him, flee
for their lives, and their unity in Him would be broken. Their
Shepherd, in Whose fold they were one flock, had been struck!
What the will become of the sheep? How much anxiety rends them!
But now, in some incomprehensible and
ghastly apocalyptic narrative unfolding before our very eyes,
the shepherd himself
strikes the sheep —
and they are scattered! Unfaithful to his trust and careless
of the sheep entrusted to him, the shepherd not only abandons
them to the wolves who have prowled the fences for 500 years
… but he himself strikes them so that they are forced
to leave the sheepfold; with his staff he strikes the necks
and the backs of the defenseless sheep — not even sparing the
Little Lambs — who cry out in their pain as they flee, seeking
a fold where they will find pasture and protection. They are
confused and frightened, and no other shepherd seems to have
the courage to gather the lost and the scattered — not
one other shepherd! Homeless and shelterless they are prey
to wolves — wolves even more remorseless than the wolves who
drove them from the sheepfold.
The
REAL
Goal
of the LGBT Movement is DIABOLICAL:
Why?
Just as Satan cannot create, but only mimic, imitate, in the LGBT Movement we find his (Satan’s) effort to contrive a spurious — a completely counterfeit and totally perverse mockery — of the genuine family. It is a diabolical attempt to pass off what is a fiction for what is real — with the willing collaboration of a profoundly sexually and militantly perverse community.
But there is an impediment to this epic exploit in Western culture as it devolves into de-civilization and debauchery: the family.
As long as the nuclear family of husband, wife and children still remains intact, it is an indictment of the sterile sexual perversity that the LGBT fascists embrace and promote. It stands as an unassailable reproach to the counterfeit, for it is genuinely procreative and naturally perpetuates itself — as every other species has from the dawn of creation.
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Look
carefully at this emblematic vision of Vatican
II in the Pope Paul VI Audience Hall. It is, for want of any other aesthetic description, demonic and blasphemous, hideous and frightening — a sign of times to come — that are now here. |
Hideous — is it not?
It has not changed much — apart from its growing defection from what the Holy Catholic Church taught for 2000 years before that most pernicious council.
It is increasingly elderly, gray, and disheveled.
Its children — fewer and fewer every year — are largely the children
of the world, checking off the boxes branded on their young minds
by a perverse generation that has lost its Catholic Faith and Identity:
for Abortion (yes), Homosexuality (yes), Lesbianism (yes), Transgenderism
(yes), Gender Identity Choices (yes), Gender Re-assignment (yes),
Euthanasia (yes), Cremation (yes), Pre-Marital Sex (yes), Co-Habitation
(yes), “Social Justice” Issues (yes!) — the proper formation
of a Catholic Conscience (NO!), Chastity (NO!) Virginity until Marriage
(NO!) Sanctity (NO), learning the most fundamental aspects of the
Catholic Religion into which they were summarily Baptized (NO!)
the Priesthood (NO!), Religious Life (NO!) — Missionary zeal and
the conversion of sinners and those who do not know Christ — which
Francis (perhaps heretically) calls “solemn nonsense.” (NO!) When
they look about them at their fellow “Catholics” and” Priests”,
“Nuns” and “Religious” — even the papacy of Francis and the current
Episcopacy (bishops and cardinals) — who can blame them? The Faith
is not even authentically lived out by the highest prelates
— and sadly enough by Francis himself who gives scandal on a routine
basis.
ROMAN MARTYROLOGY
Monday November 23rd in the Year of Grace 2020
Time
after Pentecost
Response: Thanks be to God.
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PV2 = Enrolled prior to Vatican II and deleted after Vatican II
| January | February | March | April | May | June |
| July | August | September | October | November | December |
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
Editor
editor@boston-catholic-journal.com
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.
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
Printable PDF Version
(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.
Printable PDF Version
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