All Catholics who are able to attend should do so. Traditional-minded Catholics are the Church: our right of Catholic citizenship can never be taken away, much less by unjust rules and regulations.
Quadragesima Sunday: “INVOCABIT,” First Sunday in Lent
Rev. Fr. Leonard Goffine’s
The Church’s Year, (This book is available from Angelus Press)
This Sunday is called Invocabit, because the Introit of the Mass begins with this word, which is taken from the ninetieth psalm, wherein we are urged to confidence in God, who willingly hears the prayer of the penitent:
INTROIT He shall call upon me, and I will hear him; I will deliver him, and glorify him; I will fill him with length of days. (Ps. XC. 15-16.) He that dwelleth in the aid of the Most high shall abide under the protection of the God of heaven. (Ps. XC. 1.) Glory be to the Father, etc.
COLLECT O God who dost purify Thy Church by the yearly fast of Lent; grant to Thy household that what we strive to obtain from Thee by abstinence, by good works we may secure. Through our Lord, etc.
EPISTLE (II. Cor. VI. 1-10) Brethren, we exhort you that you receive not the grace of God in vain. For he saith: In an acceptable time have I heard thee, and in the day of salvation have I helped thee. Behold, now is the acceptable time; behold, now, is the day of salvation. Giving no offence to any man, that our ministry be not blamed: but in all things let us exhibit ourselves as the ministers of God; in much patience, in tribulations, in necessities, in distresses, in stripes, in prisons, in seditions, in labors, in watchings, in fastings, in chastity, in knowledge, in long-suffering, in sweetness, in the Holy Ghost, in charity unfeigned, in the word of truth, in the power of God, by the armor of justice on the right hand, and on the left, by honor and dishonor, by evil report, and good report; as deceivers, and yet true; as unknown, and yet known; as dying, and behold we live; as chastised, and not killed; as sorrowful, yet always rejoicing; as needy, yet enriching many; as having nothing, and possessing all things.
EXPLANATION The Church very appropriately reads on this day this epistle of St. Paul, in which he exhorts the Christians to make use of the time of grace. A special time of grace is Lent, in which everything invites to conversion and penance, a time, therefore, in which God is ready to make rich bestowal of His graces. St. Anselm says, those do not use the grace who do not cooperate. Let us, therefore, follow St. Paul’s exhortation, and earnestly practise those virtues he places before us, and especially those of temperance, patience, chastity, liberality, love of God and of our neighbor. Let us arm ourselves with the arms of justice at the right and the left, that is, let us strive to be humble in prosperity and in adversity, confident of God’s help. Let us never be led from the path of virtue, by mockery, contempt, nor by persecution, torments, or death.
ASPIRATION Grant, O Jesus, that we may always faithfully cooperate with Thy graces, and employ well the time Thou hast again given for our salvation.
GOSPEL (Matt. IV. 1-11.) At that time, Jesus was led by the Spirit into the desert, to be tempted by the devil. And when he had fasted forty days and forty nights, afterwards he was hungry. And the tempter coming, said to him: If thou be the Son of God, command that these stones be made bread. Who answered and said: It is written: Not in bread alone doth man live, but in every word that proceedeth from the mouth of God. Then the devil took him up into the holy city, and set him upon the pinnacle of the temple, and said to him: If thou be the Son of God, cast thyself down; for it is written: He hath given his angels charge over thee, and in their hands shall they bear thee up, lest perhaps thou dash thy foot against a stone. Jesus said to him: It is written again: Thou shaft not tempt the Lord thy ‘God. Again the devil took him up into a very high mountain, and showed him all the kingdoms of the world, and the glory of them; and said to him: All these will I give thee, if, falling down, thou wilt adore me. Then Jesus said to him: Begone, Satan, for it is written, The Lord thy God shaft thou adore, and him only shaft thou serve. Then the devil left him; and behold, angels came, and ministered to him.
INSTRUCTION
I. Christ went into the desert by the inspiration of the Holy Ghost to prepare by fasting and prayer, for His mission, and to endure the temptations of Satan, that, as St. Paul says, He might be one tempted in all things such as we are, without sin, and so become for us a High-priest who knew how to have compassion on our infirmities, (Heb. IV. 15.) and to show us by His own example, how we should, armed with the word of God, as with a sword, overcome the tempter. (Eph. VI. 17.) – Let us, therefore, courageously follow Christ to the combat against all temptations, with His assistance it will not be hard to conquer them. He has certainly taught us to overcome the hardest ones: the lust of the eyes, of the flesh, and the pride of life, and if we overcome these, it will be easy to conquer the rest.
II. If Christ, the only Son of God, permitted Himself to be tempted by Satan, even to be taken up on a high mountain, and to the pinnacle of the temple, it should not appear strange to us, that we are assailed by many temptations, or that we should find in the lives of so many saints that the evil spirit tormented them by various images of terror and vexation. This we find in the history of the pious Job, where we also find at the same time, that the evil spirit cannot harm a hair of our head without God’s permission.
III. From the coming of the angels to minister to Christ, after He had conquered Satan, we see that all who bravely resist temptations, will enjoy the assistance and consolations of the heavenly spirits.
INSTRUCTION ON TEMPTATION
To be tempted by the devil. , (Matt. IV. I.)
What is a temptation?
A temptation is either a trial for instruction and exercise in virtue, or a deception and incitement to sin. In the first sense, God tempts man; in the second, he is tempted by the devil, the world or bad people, and the flesh, by evil thoughts, feelings, words, or work.
By what are we principally tempted?
By our own evil concupiscence and inclination to sin which adhere to us through original sin, (Fam. I. 14.) on account of which it is said, that the flesh lusteth against the spirit. (Gal. V. 17.)
Does the devil also tempt us?
He does, and is therefore called, in this day’s gospel, the tempter. St. Peter teaches us this, having himself experienced it: Be sober and watch: because your adversary the devil, as a roaring-lion, goeth about, seeking whom he may devour. (I Peter V. 8.) Not all temptations are to be ascribed to the devil, however, they often come from our own corrupt nature, our own incautiousness, or looseness of our senses, by which we expose ourselves to the danger of falling into sin.
How does the devil tempt us to sin?
In a twofold manner: He incites the concupiscence of man to those sins to which he sees him inclined, and then seeks to blind and confuse his imagination, so that he neither reflects, nor properly sees the temporal injury, disgrace, and derision, nor the shamefulness of sin and its eternal punishment. Thus the devil seduced Eve, our first mother, and thus he tempted Christ, with whom he could not, of course, succeed, for He was incapable of sin. He tempts bad people to persecute us, or to try us by their wicked vanities, as he did by the friends of Job.
Can the devil force us to evil?
He cannot; “for as a chained dog,†says St. Augustine, “can bite none but those who go near him, so the devil cannot harm with his temptations those who do not consent to them. Like the dog he can bark at you, but cannot bite you against your will.†Not by force but by persuasion Satan strives to injure, he does not force our consent, but entreats it. Seek, therefore, to subdue your passions and your senses, especially your eyes, and you will either remain free from all temptations, or easily overcome them.
Does God also tempt us?
God does indeed tempt us, but not to sin, as St. James expressly teaches. (Fam. I. 13.) God either Himself proves us by sufferings and adversities, or He permits the temptations of the devil or evil-minded people to give us opportunity to practise the virtues of love, patience, obedience, etc. Thus He said to the Jews through Moses: The Lord your God trieth you, that it may appear whether you love him with all your heart, and with all your soul, or no. (Deut. XIII. 3.)
Does God permit us to be tempted by man also?
He does, and for the same reasons. Thus He permitted the chaste Joseph to be tempted by Putiphar’s wife; (Gen.XXXIX. 7.) Job by his wife and his friends. (Job II. 9.) But He never permits us to be tempted beyond our strength, but gives us always sufficient grace to overcome and even to derive benefit from the temptation. (I Cor. X. 13.)
Are temptations pernicious and bad?
No; they are useful and necessary, rather. “Hard is the fight,†St. Bernard writes, “but meritorious, for although it is accompanied by suffering, it is followed by the crown;â€
(Apoc. III. 12.) and Origen says. (Libr. Num.) “As meat becomes corrupt without salt, so does the soul without temptations.†Temptations, then, are only injurious when consent is given, and we suffer ourselves to be overcome by them.
When do we consent to temptations?
When we knowingly and willingly decide to do the evil to which we are tempted; as long as we resist we commit no sin.
What are the best means of overcoming temptations?
Humility; for thus answered St. Anthony, when he saw the whole earth covered with snares, and was asked “Who will escape?” “The humble;” he who knows his own frailty, distrusts himself, and relies only on God who resists the proud and gives His grace to the humble; (Dam. IV. 6.) the fervent invocation of the Mother of God, of our holy guardian angels and patron saints; the pronouncing of the holy name of Jesus, making the sign of the cross, sprinkling holy water; the remembrance of the presence of God who knows our most secret thoughts, and before whom we are indeed ashamed to think or do that which would cause us shame in the presence of an honorable person; frequent meditation on death, hell, and eternal joys; fleeing from all those persons by whom, and places in which we are generally tempted; fervent prayers, especially ejaculations, as:
“Lord, save me, lest I perish! Lord, hasten to help me!” finally, the sincere acknowledgment of our temptations at the tribunal of penance, which is a remedy especially recommended by pious spiritual teachers.
PRAYER O Lord Jesus! who spent forty days in the desert without food or drink, and didst permit Thy self to be tempted by the evil spirit, give me, I beseech Thee by that holy fast, the grace to combat, during this holy season of Lent, under Thy protection, against intemperance, and to resist the suggestions of Satan that I may win the crown of eternal life. Amen.
February 25, 2023 No Comments
Fourth Sunday after Epiphany
Rev. Fr. Leonard Goffine’s
The Church’s Year, (Angelus Press)
[The Introit of the Mass as on the preceding Sunday.]
COLLECT O God, who knowest us to be set in the midst of so great perils, that because of the frailty of our nature we cannot stand; grant to us health of mind and body, that those things which we suffer for our sins, we may by Thy aid overcome. Through the same Jesus Christ, our Lord &c.
EPISTLE (Romans XIII. 8-10.) Brethren, owe no man anything, but to love one another; for he that loveth his neighbor hath fulfilled the law. For thou shaft not commit adultery; thou shaft not kill; thou shaft not steal; thou shaft not bear false witness; thou shaft not covet; and if there be any other commandment, it is comprised in this word: Thou shaft love thy neighbor as thyself. The love of our neighbor worketh no evil. Love, therefore, is the fulfilling of the law.
What is meant by St Paul’s words: He that loveth his neighbor, hath fulfilled the law?
St. Augustine in reference to these words says: that he who loves his neighbor, fulfils as well the precepts of the first as of the second tablet of the law. The reason is, that the love of our neighbor contains and presupposes the love of God as its fountain and foundation. The neighbor must be loved on account of God; for the neighbor cannot be loved with true love, if we do not first love God. On this account, the holy Evangelist St. John in his old age, always gave the exhortation: Little children, love one another. And when asked why, he answered: Because it is the command of the Lord, and it is enough to fulfill it. Therefore in this love of the neighbor which comes from the love of God and is contained in it, consists the fulfillment of the whole law. (Matt. XXII. 40.)
GOSPEL (Matt. VIII 23-27) At that time, when Jesus entered into the boat, his disciples followed him. And behold, a great tempest arose in the sea, so that the boat was covered with waves; but he was asleep. And they came to him and awaked him, saying: Lord, save us, we perish. And Jesus saith to them Why are ye fearful, O ye of little faith? Then rising up, he commanded the winds and the sea, and there came a great calm. But the men wondered, saying: What manner of man is this, for the winds and the sea obey him?
Why did Christ sleep in the boat?
To test the faith and confidence of His disciples; to exercise them in enduring the persecutions which they were afterwards to endure; to teach us that we should not waver in the storms of temptations. St. Augustine writes: “Christ slept, and because of the danger the disciples were confused. Why? Because Christ slept. In like manner thy heart becomes confused, thy ship unquiet, when the waves of temptation break over it. Why? Because thy faith sleeps. Then thou shouldst awaken Christ in thy heart; then thy faith should be awakened, thy conscience quieted, thy ship calmed.”
Why did Christ reproach His disciples when they awaked Him and asked for help?
Because of their little faith and trust; for if they firmly believed Him to be true God, they would necessarily believe He could aid them sleeping as well as waking.
Nothing so displeases God as to doubt His powerful assistance. Cursed be the man that trusteth in man, and maketh flesh (mortal man) his arm (aid), and whose heart departeth from the Lord. Blessed be the man that trusteth in the Lord, and the Lord shall be his confidence. (Jerem. XVII. 5. 7.) God sometimes permits storms to assail us, such as poverty, persecution, sickness, so that we may have occasion to put our confidence in Him alone. Of this St. Bernard very beautifully says: “When the world rages, when the wicked become furious, when the flesh turns against the spirit, I will hope in Him. Who ever trusted in Him, and was put to shame?” We should therefore trust in God only, and take refuge to Him, invoking Him as did the disciples: Lord, save us, we perish; or cry out with David: Arise, why sleepest thou, O Lord? Arise, and cast us not off to the end. (Ps. XLIII. 23.)
Why did Jesus stand up and command the sea to be still?
To show His readiness to aid us, and His omnipotence to which all things are subject. His disciples who saw this miracle, wondered and said: What manner of man is this, for the winds and the sea obey Him?
We see daily in all creatures the wonders of the Omnipotence, the wisdom, and the goodness of God, and yet we are not touched; we continue cold and indifferent. The reason is, that we look upon all with the eyes of the body and not with the eyes of the soul; that is, we do not seek to ascend by meditation to the Creator, and to judge from the manifold beauty and usefulness of created things the goodness and the wisdom of God. The saints rejoiced in all the works of the Lord; a flower, a little worm of the earth would move the heart of St. Francis of Sales, and St. Francis the Seraph, to wonderment and to the love of God; they ascended, as on a ladder, from the contemplation of creatures to Him who gives to every thing life, motion, and existence. If we were to follow their example, we would certainly love God more, and more ardently desire Him; if we do not, we live like irrational men, we who were created only to know and to love God.
ASPIRATION Grant us, O good Jesus! in all our needs, a great confidence in Thy divine assistance, and do not allow us to become faint-hearted; let Thy assistance come to us in the many dangers to which we are exposed; command the turbulent winds and waves of persecution to be still, and give peace and calmness to Thy Church, which Thou hast redeemed with Thy precious blood, that we may serve Thee in sanctity and justice, and arrive safely at the desired haven of eternal happiness. Amen.
ON THE PROVIDENCE OF GOD
But he was asleep. (Matt VIII. 24.)
It is an article of faith in the holy Catholic Church that God has not only created the world, but that He sustains and governs it; this preservation and ruling of the whole world and of each individual creature is called Providence. There are people who think that God is too great a Lord to busy Himself about the care of this world, that to do so is beneath His majesty; it was enough for Him to create the world, for the rest, He leaves it to itself or to fate, enjoys His own happiness, and, as it were, sleeps in regard to us. Thus think some, but only the ignorant and impious. Were He as these imagine Him, He would not or could not have aught to do with creation. If He could not, then He is neither all-wise nor almighty, if He would not, then He is not good; and if He knows nothing of the world, then He is not omniscient.
If we once believe that God created the world, (and what rational man can doubt it?) then we must also believe He rules and sustains it. Can any work of art, however well constructed and arranged, subsist without some one to take charge of and watch aver the same? Would not the greatest of all master-pieces, the world, therefore come to the greatest confusion and fall back into its original nothingness, if God, who created it from nothing, did not take care of its further order and existence? It is indeed true that the method of Divine Providence with which God controls all things is so mysterious that, when considering some events, one is persuaded to admit a necessary fate, an accident, the course of nature, the ill will of the devil or man, as the fundamental cause. Yet in all this the providence of God is not denied, for nothing does or can happen accidentally, not the smallest thing occurs without the knowledge, permission, or direction of God. Not one sparrow shall fall on the ground without your Father. But the very hairs of your head are all numbered. (Matt. X. 29. 30.) Chance, fate, and luck are but the ideas of insane or wicked men, which even the more rational heathens have rejected, and the course of nature is but the constant, uninterrupted, all-wise and bountiful preservation and government of creation through God. The perverted will of men or of the devil is but the instrument which God in His all-wise intention, uses to effect the good, for He knows how to produce good from evil, and, therefore, as St. Augustine says, “permits the evil that the good may not be left undone.” If we peruse the history of our first parents, of Abraham, of Joseph in Egypt, of Moses, of the people of Israel, of Job, Ruth, David, Tobias, Esther, Judith and others, we will easily see everywhere the plainest signs of the wisest Providence, the best and most careful, absolute power, by virtue of which God knows how to direct all things according to His desire, and for the good of His chosen ones. The gospel of this day furnishes us an instance of this? Why did Christ go into the boat? Why did a storm arise? Why was He asleep? Did all this occur by accident? No, it came about designedly by the ordinance of Christ that His omnipotence might be seen, and the faith and confidence of His disciples be strengthened.
Thus it is certain that God foresees, directs, and governs all; as Scripture, reason, and daily experience prove. Would we but pay more attention to many events of our lives, we would certainly notice the providence of God, and give ourselves up to His guidance and dispensations. The Lord ruleth me, and I shall want nothing, says David. (Ps. XXII. 1.) And we also, we shall want nothing if we resign ourselves to God’s will, and are contented with His dispensations in our regard; while, on the contrary, if we oppose His will, we shall fall into misfortune and error. God must rule over us with goodness, or with sternness, He is no slumbering God. Behold! He shall neither slumber nor sleep, that keepeth Israel. (Ps. CXX. 4.)
January 28, 2023 No Comments
Third Sunday after Epiphany
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Rev. Fr. Leonard Goffine THIRD SUNDAY AFTER EPIPHANYINTROIT Adore God, all ye His angels: Sion heard, and was glad; and the daughters of Juda rejoiced. The Lord hath reigned; let the earth rejoice; let the many islands be glad. (Ps. XCVI. 1.) Glory be to the Father, etc. COLLECT Almighty everlasting God, mercifully look upon our infirmity, and stretch forth the right hand of Thy majesty for our protection. Through etc. EPISTLE (Rom. XII. 16-21.) Brethren, be not wise in your own conceits. To no man rendering evil for evil: providing good things not only in the sight of God, but also in the sight of all men. If it be possible, as much as is in you, having peace with all men; not revenging yourselves, my dearly beloved but give place unto wrath; for it is written: Revenge is mine; I will repay, saith the Lord. But if thy enemy be hungry, give him to eat; if he thirst, give him to drink; for doing this, thou shalt heap coals of fire upon his head. Be not overcome by evil, but overcome evil by good. When are we overcome by evil? When we wish to take revenge. “Revenge is no sign of courage,” says St. Ambrose, “but rather of weakness and cowardice. As it is the sign of a very weak stomach to be unable to digest food, so it is the mark of a very weak mind to be unable to bear a harsh word.” “Are you impatient,” says the same saint, “you are overcome; are you patient, you have overcome.” What should we do if our reputation is injured? We should leave its revenge, or its defence and protection to God, who has retained that for Himself. “But as a good name,” says St. Francis de Sales, “is the main support of human society, and as without it we could not be useful to that society, but even hurtful to it on account of scandal, we should feel bound, for love of our neighbor, to aim after a good reputation, and to preserve it.” We should not be too sensitive about this, however, for too great a sensitiveness makes one obstinate, eccentric, and intolerable, and only tends to excite and increase the malice of the detractors. The silence and contempt with which we meet a slander or an injustice, is generally a more efficacious antidote than sensitiveness, anger, or revenge. The contempt of a slander at once disperses it, but anger shows a weakness, and gives the accusation an appearance of probability. If this does not suffice, and the slander continues, let us persevere in humility and lay our honor and our soul into the hands of God, according to the admonitions of the Apostle. How do we “heap coals of fire on the head of our enemy?” When we return him good for evil, for seeing our well meaning towards him, the flush of shame reddens his face for the wrongs he has done us. St. Augustine explains these words thus: “By giving food and drink or doing other kindnesses to your enemy, you will heap coals, not of anger, but of love, upon his head, which will inflame him to return love for love.” Learn therefore, from the example of Christ and His saints, not to allow yourself to be overcome by evil, but do good to those that hate and persecute you. ASPIRATION Ah, that I might, according to the words of St. Paul, so live that I may be a child of the Heavenly Father, who lets His sun shine on the just and the unjust! GOSPEL (Matt. VIII. 1-13.) At that time, when Jesus was come down from the mountain, great multitudes followed him; and behold, a leper came and adored him, saying: Lord, if thou wilt, thou canst make me clean. And Jesus, stretching forth his hand, touched him, saying: I will, be thou made clean. And forthwith his leprosy was cleansed. And Jesus saith to him, See thou tell no man: but go, show thyself to the priest, and offer the gift which Moses commanded for a testimony unto them. And when he had entered into Capharnaum, there came to him a centurion, beseeching him, and saying: Lord, my servant lieth at home sick of the palsy, and is grievously tormented. And Jesus saith to him: I will come and heal him. And the centurion making answer, said: Lord, I am not worthy that thou shouldst enter under my roof; but only say the word, and my servant shall be healed. For I also am a man subject to authority, having under me soldiers; and I say to this man: Go, and he goeth; and to another: Come, and he cometh; and to my servant: Do this, and he doeth it. And Jesus hearing this, marvelled; and said to them that followed him: Amen I say to you, I have not found so great faith in Israel. And I sad to you that many shall come from the east and the west, and shall sit down with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob in the kingdom of heaven; but the children of the kingdom shall be cast into the exterior darkness: there shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth. And Jesus said to the centurion: Go, and as thou hast believed, so be it done to thee; and the servant was healed at the same hour. Why did the leper say: “Lord, if Thou wilt, Thou canst make me clean”?He believed Christ to be the promised Messiah, who as true God had the power to heal him. From this we learn to have confidence in the omnipotence of God, who is a helper in all need, (Ps. CVI. 6. 73. 19.) and to leave all to the will of God, saying: Lord, if it be pleasing to Thee, and well for me, grant my petition. Why did Jesus stretch forth His hand and touch the leper?To show that He was not subject to the law which forbade the touching of a leper through fear of infection, which could not affect Jesus; to reveal the health-giving, curative power of His flesh, which dispelled leprosy by the simple touch of His hand; to give us an example of humility and of love for the poor sick, that we may learn from Him to have no aversion to the infirm, but lovingly to assist the unfortunate sick for the sake of Jesus who took upon Himself the leprosy of our sins. The saints have faithfully imitated Him in their tender care for those suffering from the most disgusting diseases. Oh, how hard it will be for those to stand before the Tribunal of God at the Last Day, who cannot even bear to look at the poor and sick! Why did Christ command the leper to tell no man?To instruct us that we should not make known our good works in order to obtain frivolous praise, (Matt. VI 1.) which deprives us of our heavenly reward. Why did Christ send the healed leper to the Priest?That he might observe the law which required all the healed lepers to show themselves to the priests, to offer a sacrifice, to be examined and pronounced clean: that the priest if he beheld the miracle of the sudden cure of the leper, might know Him who had wrought the cure, to be the Messiah; and finally, to teach us that we must honor the priests because of their high position, even when they do not live in a manner worthy of their dignity, as was the case with the Jewish priests. What it taught by the centurion’s solicitude for his servant?That masters should take care of their sick servants, see that they are attended to in their illness, and above all that they are provided with the Sacraments. It is unchristian, even cruel and barbarous, to drive from the house a poor, sick servant, or to leave him lying in his distress without assistance or care. Why did Christ say: I will come and heal him?Because of His humility, by which He, although God and Lord of lords, did not hesitate to visit a sick servant. Here Christ’s humility puts to shame many persons of position who think themselves too exalted to attend the wants of a poor servant. Why did the centurion say: Lord, I am not worthy that Thou shouldst enter under my roof? Because he recognised Christ’s divinity and his own nothingness, and therefore regarded himself as unworthy to receive Christ into his house. From this we learn to humble ourselves, especially when we receive Christ into our hearts, hence the priest in giving holy Communion uses the centurion’s words, exhorting those to humility who are about to receive. Why did he add: But only say the word, and my servant shall be healed?By this he publicly manifested his faith in Christ’s divinity and omnipotence, because he believed that Christ, though absent, could heal the servant by a word. If a Gentile centurion had such faith in Christ, and such confidence in His power, should not we Christians be ashamed that we have so little faith, and confidence in God? What is meant by: Many shall come from the east and the west, and shall sit down with Abraham, and Isaac, and Jacob in the kingdom of heaven; but the children of the kingdom shall be cast into the exterior darkness? This was said by Christ in reference to the obdurate Jews who would not believe in Him. Many pagans who receive the gospel, and live in accordance with it, will enjoy heavenly bliss with the patriarchs Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, who were the most faithful friends of God, while the Jews, God’s chosen people, who as such, possessed the first claim to heaven, will, because of their unbelief and other sins, be cast into outer darkness, that is, into the deepest abyss of hell, where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth. Thus it will be with those Christians who do not live in accordance with their faith. Therefore, fear lest you, for want of cooperation with God’s grace, be eternally rejected, while others who have faithfully corresponded to the divine inspirations will enter into your place in the kingdom of heaven. ASPIRATION O Jesus, rich in consolations! grant me the leper’s faith and confidence, that in all things I may rely upon Thy omnipotence, and may resign myself to Thy divine will, and may ever honor Thy priests. Grant me, also, O most humble Jesus! the centurion’s humility, that for Thy sake, I may compassionately assist my neighbor, and by doing so render myself worthy of Thy grace and mercy. ON RESIGNATION TO THE WILL OF GOD Lord, if thou wilt. (Matt. VIII. 2.) Those who in adversity as well as in prosperity, perfectly resign themselves to the will of God, and accept whatever He sends them with joy and thanks, possess heaven, as St. Chrysostom says, while yet upon earth. Those who have attained this resignation, are saddened by no adversity, because they are satisfied with all that God, their best Father, sends them, be it honor or disgrace, wealth or poverty, life or death. All happens as they wish, because they know no will but God’s, they desire nothing but that which He does and wills. God does the will of them that fear Him. (Ps. CXLIV. 10.) In the lives of the ancient Fathers we find the following: The fields and vineyards belonging to one farmer were much more fertile and yielding than were his neighbors’. They asked how it happened and he said: they should not wonder at it, because he always had the weather he wished. At this they wondered more than ever: How could that be? “I never desire other weather,” he replied, “than God wills; and because my desires are conformable to His, He gives me the fruits I wish.” This submission to the divine will is also the cause of that constant peace and undimmed joy of the saints of God, with which their hearts have overflowed here below, even in the midst of the greatest sufferings and afflictions. Who would not aspire to so happy a state? We will attain it if we believe that nothing in this world can happen to us except by the will and through the direction of God, sin and guilt excepted, for God can never be the cause of them. This the Holy Ghost inculcates by the mouth of the wise man: Good things and evil, life and death, poverty and riches, are from God, (Eccles. XI. 14.) that is, are permitted or sent by God; all that which comes from God, is for the best, for God doeth all things well. (Mark VII. 37.) Whoever keeps these two truths always in mind, will certainly be ever contented with the will of God, and always consoled; he will taste while yet on earth the undisturbed peace of mind and foretaste of happiness which the saints had while here, and which they now eternally enjoy in heaven, because of the union of their will with the divine will. INSTRUCTION FOR MASTERS AND SERVANTS The master of a house should be careful to have not only obedient, faithful, willing, and industrious servants in his home, as had the centurion in the gospel, but still more, pious and God-fearing ones, for God richly blesses the master because of pious servants. Thus God blessed Laban on account of the pious Jacob, (Gen. XXX. 30.) and the house of Putiphar because of the just Joseph. (Gen. XXXIX. 5.) The master should look to the morals and Christian conduct of his servants, and not suffer irreligious subjects in his house, for he must, after this life, give an account before the tribunal of God, and he makes himself unworthy of the blessing of God, often liable to the most terrible punishment by retaining such. Will not God punish those masters and mistresses who suffer those under them to seek the dangerous occasions of sin, keep sinful company, go about at night, and lead scandalous lives? Will not God, one day, demand the souls of servants from their masters? The same punishment which will befall those who deny their faith, will rest upon careless masters and mistresses, for St. Paul the Apostle writes: But if any man have not care of his own, and especially of those of his house, he hath denied the faith, and is worse than an infidel. (I. Tim. V. 8.) Subjects should learn from the centurion’s servants who obeyed his only word, that they also should willingly, faithfully, and quickly do every thing ordered by their masters, unless it be something contrary to the law of God. They should recollect that whatever they do in obedience to their superiors, is done for God Himself. Servants, obey in all things your masters according to the flesh, not serving to the eye, as pleasing men, but in simplicity of heart, fearing God. Whatsoever you do, do it from the heart as to the Lord, and not to men: knowing that you shall receive of the Lord the reward of inheritance. Serve ye the Lord Christ. (Col. III. 22-24.) |
January 21, 2023 No Comments
Twenty-Fourth Sunday After Pentecost
Rev. Fr. Leonard Goffine’s
The Church’s Year
| REMARK The Mass of this Sunday is always the last, even if there are more than twenty-four Sundays after Pentecost; in that case, the Sundays remaining after Epiphany, which are noticed in the calendar are inserted between the twenty-third and the Mass of the twenty-fourth Sunday.
The Introit of the Mass is the same as that said on the twenty-third Sunday after Pentecost. COLLECT Quicken, we beseech Thee, 0 Lord, the wills of Thy faithful: that they, more earnestly seeking after the fruit of divine grace, may more abundantly receive the healing gifts of Thy mercy. Thro’. EPISTLE (Col. I. 9—14.) Brethren, We cease not to pray for you, and to beg that you may be filled with the knowledge of the will of God, in all wisdom and spiritual understanding: that you may walk worthy of God, in all things pleasing, being fruitful in every good work, and increasing in the knowledge of God: strengthened with all might according to the power of his glory, in all patience and long-suffering with joy, giving thanks to God the Father, who hath made us worthy to be partakers of the lot of the saints in light; who hath delivered us from the power of darkness, and hath translated us into the kingdom of the Son of his love, in whom we have redemption through his blood, the remission of sins. EXPLANATION In this epistle St. Paul teaches us to pray for our neighbor, and to thank God especially for the light of the true, only saving faith. Let us endeavor to imitate St. Paul in his love and zeal for the salvation of souls, then we shall also one day partake of his glorious reward in heaven.
EXPLANATION When you shall see the abomination of desolation. The abomination of desolation of which Daniel (IX. 27.) and Christ here speak, is the desecration of the temple and the city of Jerusalem by the rebellious Jews by perpetrating the most abominable vices, injustices and robberies, &c., but principally by the pagan Romans by putting up their idols. This destruction which was accomplished in the most fearful manner about forty years after the death of Christ, was foretold by Him according to the testimony of St. Luke. (XXI. 20.) At the same time He speaks of the end of the world and of His coming to judgment, of which the desolation of Jerusalem was a figure. Pray that your flight be not in the winter or on the Sabbath. Because, as St. Jerome says, the severe cold which reigns in the deserts and mountains would preÂvent the people from going thither to seek security, and because it was forbidden by the law for the Jews to travel on the Sabbath. There shall rise false Christs and false prophets. According to the testimony of the Jewish historian Josephus, who was an eyewitness of the destruction of Jerusalem, Eleazar, John, Simon, &c., were such false prophets who under the pretence of helping the Jews, brought them into still greater misfortunes; before the end of the world it will be Antichrist with his followers, whom St. Paul calls the man of sin and the son of perdition, (II Thess. II. 3.) on account of his diabolical malice and cruelty. He will rise up, sit in the temple, proclaim himself God, and kill all who will not recognize him as such. His splendor, his promises and his false miracles will be such that even the holy and just will be in danger of being seduced, but for their sake God will shorten these days of persecution. Wheresoever the body shall be, there shall the eagles also be gathered together. That is, where the wicked are, who have aimed at spiritual corruption, there punishment will overtake and destroy them. This generation shall not pass till all these things be done. By these words Christ defines the time of the destruction of Jerusalem, and says that many of His hearers would live to see it, which also happened. But when the end of the world will come, He says, not even the angels in heaven know. (Matt. XXIV. 36.) Let us endeavor to be always ready by leading a holy life, for the coming of the divine Judge, and meditate often on the words of our diÂvine Lord: Heaven and earth shall pass, but my words shall not pass. (See the account of the Destruction of Jerusalem on the Ninth Sunday after Pentecost.) PRAYER Remove from us, O Lord, all that is calculated to rob us of Thy love. Break the bonds with which we are tied to the world, that we may not be lost with it. Give us the wings of eagles that we may soar above all worldly things by the contemplation of Thy sufferings, life and death, that we may hasten towards Thee now, and gather about Thee, that we may not become a prey to the rapacious enemy on the day of judgment. Amen. INSTRUCTION CONCERNING PERJURY The Son of God here, and elsewhere in the gospel, conÂfirms His word by an oath, as it were, for swearing is nothing else than to call upon God, His divine veracity, His justice, or upon His creatures in the name of God, as witness of the truth of our words. Is swearing, then, lawful, and when? It is lawful when justice or necessity or an important advantage requires it, and the cause is true and equitable. (Jer. IV. 2.) Those sin grievously, therefore, who swear to that which is false and unjust, because they call upon God as witness of falsehood and injustice, by which His eternal truthfulness and justice is desecrated; those sin who swear in a truthful cause without necessity and sufficient reason, because it is disrespectful to call upon God as witness for every trivial thing. In like manner, those sin grievously and constantly who are so accustomed to swearing as to break out into oaths, without knowing or considering whether the thing is true or false, whether they will keep their promise or not, or even if they will be able to keep it; such expose themselves to the danger of swearing falsely. “There is no one,” says St. Chrysostom, “who swears often, who does not sometimes swear falsely, just as he who speaks much, sometimes says unbecoming and false things.” Therefore Christ tells those who seek perfection, not to swear at all, (Matt. V. 34.) that they might not fall into the habit of swearing and from that into perjury. He who has the habit of swearing should, therefore, take the greatest pains to eradicate it; to accomplish which it will be very useful to reflect that if we have to render an account for every idle word we speak, (Matt. XII. 36.) how much more strictly will we be judged for unnecessary false oaths! God’s curse accompanies him who commits perjury, in all his ways, as proved by daily experience. He who commits perjury in court, robs himself of the merits of Christ’s death and will be consumed in the fire of hell, which is represented by the crucifix and burning tapers, in presence of which the oath (in some places) is taken. If you have had the misfortune to be guilty of perjury, at once be truly sorry, weep for this terrible sin which you have committed, frankly confess it, repair the injury you may have caused by it, and chastise yourself for it by rigorous penance. |
November 19, 2022 No Comments
“The Church Is in Ruins” – Bishop Athanasius Schneider
The aim of the synod on synodality is to undermine the faith and adapt it to a [supposed] “fashion of the day”, Bishop Athanasius Schneider told EWTN (20 October).
He denounced the diocesan synodal processes as non-transparent, manipulative and a way of hearing only those who want to change the faith, while Catholics “are despised or not heard”.
Catholic people and priests told Schneider that their input into the synod has been ignored and “many” bishops fear the synod is a cover for a pre-determined agenda in Rome. He agrees with Cardinal Müller that there is a “hostile takeover of the Church” by enemies of the faith.
The [feigned] “hearing process” is a problem for Schneider in principle, because the Church is not a parliament with “democratic” methods, because it has to teach the faith handed down by the apostles, not to listen to opinions.
“Jesus Christ did not say: go and listen to the pagans, the Gnostics, the Buddhists. That is a perversion of the nature of the Catholic Church.”
Schneider criticizes Francis for making statements that confuse and dilute the faith. His Traditionis Custodes aims to destroy the Mass. This, he said, is made even clearer by the restrictions and is “a great injustice”, “a persecution” and “discrimination against Catholics, while pagans and the cult of Pachamama are introduced into Rome.”
For Schneider, the texts of Vatican II are open to “different interpretations” and Francis adopts “the extremely liberal [= anti-Catholic] interpretation and application of some expressions of Vatican II.”
Result, “The Church is in ruins, her life a chaos.”
October 24, 2022 No Comments
“Traditionalism: Fidelity, Resistance, Work of the Church”: Jean-Pierre Maugendre
On Saturday, September 24, 2022, a symposium on the future of the traditional Mass was held in Paris, bringing together nearly 500 participants. The great success of this event, co-organized in particular by the associations Oremus-Paix Liturgique and Renaissance Catholique, was due to the quality of the interventions and in particular that of Jean-Pierre Maugendre, President of Renaissance Catholique, a translation of which appears below.
The Council that has just opened is like a resplendent dawn that is rising over the Church, and already the first rays of the rising sun are filling our hearts with sweetness. Everything here breathes holiness and brings joy. We see stars shining in the majesty of this temple, and these stars, as the Apostle John testifies (Rev 1:20), are you!
So said good Pope John in his opening address to the Council on 11 October 1962! The proposed program was biblically simple:
The Church has never ceased to oppose errors. She has even often condemned them, and very severely. But today, the Bride of Christ prefers to use the remedy of mercy, rather than brandishing the weapons of severity, she responds better to the needs of our time by emphasizing the riches of her doctrine.
The method proposed was perfectly clear:
It is necessary for [the Church] to turn to the present times, which bring with them new situations, new forms of life and open up new paths for the Catholic apostolate. It is for this reason that the Church has not remained indifferent before the admirable inventions of human genius and the progress of science, which we enjoy today, and that she has not failed to appreciate them at their true value.
These intentions, which were undoubtedly very praiseworthy in substance, led in reality to what Jacques Maritain—who was not very suspected of traditionalism, and even, if I may say so, was the “hidden imam” of the Vatican Council—called in the Peasant of the Garonne: “Kneeling before the world.”
In a few years, a heritage of many centuries was thrown down; thousand-year-old habits were forgotten, cursed, castigated, and condemned. Mrs. Michu [*the average homemaker], who had not read the Acts of the Council and had no intention of devoting ten seconds to it, observed with astonishment, in her parish:
• The abolition of the choir, that was all well and good but…
• The elimination of Latin; well, she didn’t understand anything of it, but the objective was for God to understand.
• The appearance of a table in front of the altar—it was her neighbor who had provided it!
• The celebration of the Mass facing the people, which made the celebrant turn his back to the tabernacle, which seemed incongruous to Mrs. Michu, but not to the celebrant.
• The distribution of Communion in the hand; Mrs. Michu had seen children put the host in their pocket.
• The upheaval of the calendar and the suppression of the patron saint of the parish. She learned that even St. Philomena, the favorite saint of the Curé d’Ars, had disappeared in the turmoil.
• The destruction of confessionals.
• The prohibition of kneeling.
• The suppression of Corpus Christi processions.
• The abandonment of the recitation of the Rosary.
And so on and so forth… Mrs. Michu did as another neighbor did; she decided not to go to church again, except for weddings and funerals. Her religion had been changed.
As Patrick Buisson reports in his important book La fin d’un monde, quoting a good mother, wife of a mechanic: “Religion should not change, since what we are looking for is to be sure of something.” For his part, Guillaume Cuchet notes, in conclusion of his valuable work How our world ceased to be Christian:
This rupture within Catholic preaching created a profound discontinuity in the preached and lived contents of religion on both sides of the 1960s. It is so manifest that an outside observer could legitimately wonder whether, beyond the continuity of a name and the theoretical apparatus of dogmas, it is still the same religion.
All this was imposed with an unheard-of brutality. This brutality was certainly in opposition to the official discourse on “listening, openness, dialogue, respect for others, and the acceptance of differences,” but it was necessary because all these upheavals did not in any way respond to the demands of the Catholic faithful themselves.
A survey of August 13, 1976, in the heart of the “hot summer” (so named because of the heat wave of that year but also in reference to the traditional Mass celebrated by Archbishop Lefebvre, in front of thousands of faithful, in Lille), published by the IFOP and the Progrès de Lyon, revealed the extent of the malaise. While 40% of regular churchgoers felt that the reforms initiated by Vatican II should be continued, 48% felt that the Church had gone too far in its reforms. To this figure, we must undoubtedly add the vast majority of those who had simply stopped practicing between 1965 and 1976. Even today, all the surveys conducted by the association “Paix Liturgique” confirm these opinions. Overall, today 30% of regular churchgoers would attend the traditional Mass if it were celebrated in their parish.
While it is fashionable to denounce clericalism, the years following the Council were primarily those of unbridled clericalism in keeping with what Bishop Schneider analyzed in his indispensable work Christus Vincit: “The ‘Vatican II’ phenomenon appears to be an enormous spectacle of clerical triumphalism.” The departure of Madame Michu from her parish did not upset her parish priest; certainly it was upsetting for the collection basket, but he had well assimilated the postulate “a thousand times repeated, that the evangelization of those who were far away could be done only after the eviction of all those who were falsely close,” according to the luminous synopsis of Patrick Buisson. As a bishop quoted in Jean Madiran’s review Itinéraires wrote: “The Church is moving from a sociological Christianity to an authentic Christianity.”
Traditionalism is first of all that: a fidelity to beliefs, habits, behaviors on which the post-conciliar years claimed to sound the death-knell. For centuries, the life of the French countryside had been punctuated by the Church: think of the Angelus of Miletus, the processions of the Rogations, public prayers to attract God’s blessings to the earth. The world had changed. Let us quote Bishop Paul-Joseph Schmitt, then bishop of Metz: “The transformation of civilization through which we are living entails changes not only in our external behavior but in the very conception we have of creation as well as of the Salvation brought by Jesus Christ” (L’hérésie du XXème siècle, Jean Madiran, p. 130). This is manifested in the words of a 1969 episcopal report: “To the scandal or laughter of modern man, a part (actually more and more reduced) of our liturgy continues to ask of God what the peasant asks of fertilizer: a cosmic Salvation which makes God the substitute for our insufficiencies” (quoted by Rémi Fontaine in Présent 7726, November 10, 2012). Is this not confusing and opposing the first cause and the secondary causes?
The Church was no longer the unique ark of Salvation; it was only a means “for man to become fully man,” “an expert in humanity,” in the words of Paul VI. The “tragedy” was that this turn to man did not seem to arouse the enthusiasm of political decision-makers.
Quite logically, this revolution against tradition aroused resistance. Some priests refused to celebrate the new Ordo Missae, arguing that the bull Quo Primum of Saint Pius V and its perpetual permission were the basis for their theological doubts, in line with the Brief Critical Study of the New Ordo Missae by Cardinals Ottaviani and Bacci. All over France, lay people gathered, supporting the priests who continued to celebrate Mass according to the “usus antiquior.” Let us mention, in my native Brittany, Doctor Pacreau in Brest, Professor Lozachmeur in Rennes. Salons, auditoriums, sports halls, the Wagram hall in Paris, welcomed a growing number of disoriented, bruised, wounded faithful, eager to remain faithful to the liturgy that had sanctified their fathers. Some priests remained faithful to the Mass of their ordination or returned to it after a few years of reformed practice. Let us mention Monseigneur Ducaud-Bourget, Father Reynaud, Father Calmel (O.P.), Father Marziac, Father Réveilhac, Father Montgomery, Father Sulmont, Canon Porta, Canon Roussel, etc.
An intellectual resistance arose: let us mention the articles of Father Bruckberger (O.P.) in L’Aurore, those of Louis Salleron in Carrefour and his book La Nouvelle Messe. Overlooking everything, the review Itinéraires, founded in 1956, recalls, in the sparkling and precise style of Jean Madiran, the reasons for this resistance:
Christian children are no longer educated but degraded by the methods, practices, and ideologies that now prevail most often in ecclesiastical society. The innovations which are imposed in this society, rightly or wrongly claiming to be based on the last Council, and which consist in delaying and diminishing the instruction of revealed truths, and in advancing and increasing the revelation of sexuality and its spells, are creating a generation of apostates and savages throughout the world, each day better prepared to kill each other blindly. (“Fundamental Declaration of the Magazine Itinéraires”)
These lines have not aged a bit. They underlie a reclaiming that is still relevant today, as it was written in the book of the same name:
It is clear that the Christian people as a whole and the Catholic clergy can hardly spontaneously have the courage or the discernment to keep Sacred Scripture, the Roman Catechism, and the Catholic Mass; they cannot have the courage or the discernment to keep them at all costs at the center of the education of children. For them to have this discernment and courage, they must be positively and sufficiently encouraged by the spiritual authority that God has established for this purpose. That is why, turning to the leaders of the ecclesiastical hierarchy, we make an uninterrupted complaint: Give us back the Scriptures, the Catechism, and the Mass! We are on our knees before the Successors of the Apostles, kneeling as free men (as Péguy said), begging them and calling on them for the salvation of their souls and for the salvation of their people. Let them give back to the Christian people the Word of God, the Roman Catechism and the Catholic Mass. Until they do so, they are as good as dead. We ask them for our daily bread and they keep throwing stones at us. But these very stones cry out against them to heaven: Give us back the Holy Scriptures, the Roman Catechism, and the Catholic Mass! When the men of the Church do not want to hear it, we cry out our reclamation to earth and heaven, to the angels and to God!
While this claim, first made in 1972, was not fully acted upon, it is undeniable that little by little what must be called the ban on the celebration of the Mass was lifted—until the publication of the ill-fated motu proprio Traditionis Custodes on July 16, 2021.
However, traditionalist resistance quickly crystallized around a prestigious prelate, Archbishop Marcel Lefebvre, former Archbishop of Dakar, Apostolic Delegate for French Africa, Superior General of the Fathers of the Holy Spirit, founder in 1970 of the Priestly Fraternity of St. Pius X, and of the International Seminary of Ecône. At a time when no priest was being trained to celebrate the traditional Mass, except for the seminary of Monsignor de Castro Mayer in Campos, Brazil, Monsignor Lefebvre carried the hopes and expectations of the traditional world. He was thus, for years, the only bishop to train and ordain priests for the traditional Mass, which quickly got him in trouble with the Roman authorities, from the declaration of November 21, 1974, to the consecrations without a pontifical mandate of 1988, passing through the “suspens a divinis” of 1976.
This declaration of 1974 is one of the founding acts of the traditionalist resistance:
We adhere with all our heart and soul to Catholic Rome, guardian of the Catholic faith and of the traditions necessary for the maintenance of this faith, to eternal Rome, teacher of wisdom and truth. On the other hand, we refuse and have always refused to follow the Rome of neo-modernist and neo-Protestant tendencies, which was clearly manifested in the Second Vatican Council and after the Council in all the reforms that followed. All these reforms, in fact, have contributed and still contribute to the demolition of the Church, to the ruin of the priesthood, to the annihilation of the sacrifice and the sacraments, to the disappearance of religious life, to a naturalist and Teilhardian teaching in universities, seminaries, catechesis, teachings stemming from liberalism and Protestantism, condemned many times by the solemn magisterium of the Church. No authority, not even the highest in the hierarchy, can compel us to abandon or diminish our Catholic faith, clearly expressed and professed by the Church’s magisterium for nineteen centuries.
Archbishop Lefebvre was not a party man: he responded to requests for priests made to him by the laity; he supported religious communities whose founders or foundresses refused, in conscience, the new liturgy, the new catechism, and the “refoundation” of the constitutions of their community in the conciliar sense desired by the decree Perfectae Caritatis. Let us mention here Dom Gérard Calvet, founder of the Benedictine abbey of Le Barroux; Father Eugène de Villeurbanne, founder of the Capuchins of Strict Observance, whose mother house is today in Morgon; Mother Hélène Jamet, who with the help of Father Calmel maintains the traditions of the Dominican Sisters of the Holy Name of Jesus in Brignoles; Mother Anne-Marie Simoulin, who came from the same congregation and settled in Fanjeaux; Mother Elisabeth de La Londe, founder of the Benedictine abbey of Le Barroux; Mother Gertrude de Maissin, founder of the Benedictine abbey located today in Perdechat, and so forth.
In this context, an apostolic movement emerged, the MJCF (Mouvement de la Jeunesse Catholique de France), a true nursery of leaders and a school for the executives of the Tradition from which were born multiple Christian homes, a bishop, several abbots or superiors of religious communities (Le Barroux, Lagrasse, Morgon, the Missionaries of Divine Mercy), several Mother Abbesses or superiors of female religious communities (Le Barroux, Perdechat…). New religious communities emerged: the Fraternity of the Transfiguration in Mérigny, under the aegis of Father Bernard Lecareux; two Dominican communities: the Fraternity of Saint Dominique in Avrillé, originally made up of members of the MJCF, and the Fraternity of Saint Vincent Ferrier in Chéméré-Le-Roi with Father de Blignières and Father Guérard des Lauriers (O.P.).
From 1983, on the initiative of the Henri and André Charlier Center, a pilgrimage drew ever larger crowds at Pentecost from Notre-Dame de Paris to Notre-Dame de Chartres, in the footsteps of Charles Péguy. The message around which all are united could be summarized as follows: “Let us practice the religion of our fathers. Let us experience Tradition. Moreover, wherever it is allowed to flourish, this experience proves conclusive.”
Guillaume Cuchet, who is not to be suspected of traditionalism since he is a member of the editorial board of the Jesuit review Etudes, honestly observes:
This departure from the culture of duty and obligation—a path on which the Church has preceded, in many respects, the civil world, especially the school and educational world—is a fundamental event on which it would be appropriate to ponder. In families and environments where this culture has been both maintained and modernized, transmission rates [of the Faith] have often been better.
Today, traditional communities represent 12–15% of priestly ordinations in France, well beyond the numerical weight of “trads” in the Catholic demographics in France. The traditional world as a whole is young and missionary. Young because of the large families that are formed there—“these Catholic families with their blond children,” nicely mocked by Fabrice Luchini in the film Alceste à bicyclette. Young, because conversions are numerous, attracted by the triptych: “Transcendence, excellence, coherence.”
Why does the ecclesiastical hierarchy persist in such a blatant denial of reality in the face of such facts? A mystery! A mystery that we can, however, force ourselves to illuminate in the light of two particularly penetrating analyses. As Paul Vigneron wrote in Les crises du clergé français contemporain, as early as 1976:
It is not a question of being content to say, like an emperor appalled by four years of atrocious war: “We did not want this!” We must have the courage to ask ourselves the inevitable question: Here are 30 years during which we have been making “experiments,” apostolic or otherwise; in which we have gone, without ever managing to find them, in search of new methods of prayer and discipline. After so many attempts, will we dare, at last, to risk one last one? Simply and loyally to try those methods of apostolate and spirituality that we had rejected, perhaps with temerity, some thirty years before? And if, by chance, these methods, which have proved their worth, were to succeed—who knows!—in giving us back the joy of heart that we have lost, if they filled our seminaries again, which have become almost deserted, if they gave back to our preaching and to our life that strength that only consecrated witnesses possess—would we dare to admit at last that we were mistaken?
But here, precisely, is the hardest word to pronounce! After Christ’s arrest, some of the apostles denied Him because they feared for their own lives. Today, it is much more than their lives that are at risk for those who have adhered—sometimes enthusiastically and without necessarily seeing the pernicious character thereof—to the innovative tendencies that appeared around 1945. They have now reached the age of influence and, sometimes, of high responsibility. It is their self-esteem that should be sacrificed by saying humbly: “Yes, perhaps we have been wrong for a long time!” Courageous men can, like the first apostles after their falling-away, finally sacrifice their lives to God… but can self-love?
Pierre Chaunu, the famous Protestant historian, wrote, for his part, in the conclusion of his work, published in 1975, De l’histoire à la prospective:
Before the quantitative drying up of recruitment, it is an intellectual and spiritual drying up of vocations that has affected the Church in France since roughly 1930. The intellectual and spiritual mediocrity of the leaders in place in the Western churches at the beginning of the 1970s is distressing. An important part of the clergy of France constitutes today a social, intellectual, moral, and spiritual sub-proletariat; of the great tradition of the Church this fraction has often kept only its clericalism, intolerance, and fanaticism. These men reject a heritage that crushes them, because they are intellectually incapable of understanding it and spiritually incapable of living it.
This reference to the ecclesiastical hierarchy is one of the major characteristics of the traditionalist movement. The consecrations of 1988 divided this world into two components united by the same faith, the practice of the same sacraments, the same will not to break from the hierarchical structure of divine right of the Church, the same concern for the social Kingship of Our Lord Jesus Christ.
A traditionalist “ecosystem” has been built, with its places of worship, its publications, its gatherings, its schools, its pilgrimages, etc. The risk would then be to sink into a communitarianism turned in on itself, oblivious to the issues of the universal Church. To make Tradition a dead star, similar to what Russian Orthodoxy has become, of which Father Martin Jugie wrote in his work on Joseph de Maistre and the Greek-Russian Church: “For many centuries, the East has become accustomed to considering revealed doctrine as a treasure to be guarded, not as a treasure to be exploited; as a collection of immutable formulas, not as a living and infinitely rich truth that the spirit of the believer seeks to understand and assimilate ever better.” Joseph de Maistre, in his work On the Pope, observed: “All these churches separated from the Holy See, at the time of the twelfth century, can be compared to frozen corpses whose forms the cold has preserved.”
A fertile warning for those who might forget that the fight for Tradition is first and foremost a work of the Church. If the Church does not begin with Vatican II, neither does it take refuge, from Vatican II onwards, in structures that would be foreign to the visible and God-willed organization of the Church: the pope and the bishops. It is a great mystery, with sometimes terrible dilemmas! It is a call to allow ourselves to be guided by St. Gregory of Nyssa: “The right way is the way of the mountains.” Reminder that according to Emile Poulat: “The history of the Church is not a resting place of Corpus Christi.” If churchmen today appear occupied by a worldliness that is foreign to the Church, there is nevertheless only one Church whose seat is in Rome and whose head is the pope. The major drama of our time is that the same Church distributes to us, through the same channels and sometimes at the same time, not only the means and the words of Salvation but also insipid and insignificant words, sentimental and philanthropic, without vigor for good nor vigor against evil. Disfigured, sometimes too human or worldly, neither frankly Catholic and anti-modernist nor frankly modernist and anti-Catholic, the Church remains the Church, the only Ark of Salvation.
The difficulties of the present time should not be a reason for discouragement, quite the contrary. If our elders might once have feared that the thread of our liturgical and doctrinal tradition would be broken altogether, our situation is no longer that one. We know that the future belongs to us because, through Tradition, we are linked to the Apostles themselves and thus to Christ. Fashions come and go. The Cross of Christ continues to protect us and enlighten us with its outstretched arms.
Finally, in this struggle, for it is a struggle—indeed, all of Christian life is a struggle—we will keep in mind the precious advice of Father Calmel, intrepid defender of the traditional Mass: “Let us be witnesses to the faith, as were our brothers, the martyrs of the first centuries in the midst of violent persecution. They showed themselves to be not only strong and courageous, but also gentle and patient, and this because their souls were ardent with charity.”
Translated from Paix Liturgique, letter 889, October 11, 2022.
October 13, 2022 No Comments
We WILL NEVER GIVE UP THE TRADITIONAL LATIN MASS
No matter how difficult it becomes to attend the Traditional Latin Mass, which is our right as Catholics, despite its attempted suppression by the Pope and Bishops, we will endure this persecution as many of our Fathers in the Faith have done before us, even if we must worship underground as they did. We are not swayed or discouraged by the Modernism that has a grip upon the Church at the present time. We are only more determined than ever to fight for the Mass of the Ages. We know that all the maneuvers, decrees, and other means used to suppress the Mass are all in vain, as they were when used in the past. Summorum Pontificum proved that we have a right to this Mass, despite its apparent abrogation by the current authorities in Rome. (This opinion was submitted by one of our readers).
September 23, 2022 No Comments
The Freshmen Seminarians of Fall 2022 in France: They’re Choosing the Traditional Mass
The Freshmen Seminarians of Fall 2022: The Seminarians are Choosing the Traditional Mass
Jean-Pierre Maugendre
Rennaissance catholique
September 15, 2022
For the past year three Roman documents have led to converging and complementary attacks on the freedom to celebrate the traditional Roman Mass. These included, on July 16, 2021, Pope Francis’ motu proprio Traditionis custodes; the August 4 response of Archbishop Roche, Prefect of the Congregation for Divine Worship and the Discipline of the Sacraments, to questions posed by Cardinal Nichols, Archbishop of Westminster; and, finally, on June 29, 2022, the apostolic letter Desidero desideravi on the liturgical formation of the people of God.
A developing traditional world
In France, these documents have had an important media impact but a modest influence on the number of traditional Masses celebrated with the approval of the bishop. The Ad majorem dei gloriam website notes, however, the suppression of 14 places of worship out of an initial total of 241, a decrease of 6%.
While this is not a large number, it is the first time that a decrease in the number of traditional Masses celebrated under Summorum Pontificum has been observed. What is the impact of these documents on the number of priests entering seminaries, and thus, in the long run, on the evolution of the number of priests in France and their liturgical practices? Let us first note that, in 2022, according to the website of the French Bishops’ Conference, 77 French secular priests were ordained, i.e., destined to be diocesan priests, to which must be added 12 other French priests: 3 for the Institute of Christ the King Sovereign Priest (ICRSP), 3 for the Fraternity of St. Peter (FSSP), and 6 for the Fraternity of St. Pius X (FSSPX). These 12 French priests ordained for the traditional Mass thus represent 14% of the total number of ordinations of French secular priests. Without taking into account the 4 ordinations planned for the diocese of Toulon and postponed sine die, it should be noted that these ordinations are essentially concentrated in a few dioceses and communities: Saint Martin community: 14, Paris: 10, Vannes: 5, Versailles: 3. These figures are to be compared with a median age of priests of 75 years and an yearly death toll of between 600 and 800.
Reality versus ideology
In this month of September 2022, what has been the impact of the Roman decisions on entries into the seminaries? The numbers speak for themselves. The communities where the traditional Mass is celebrated (ICRSP, FSSP, FSSPX, IBP – Institute of the Good Shepherd- and MMD – Missionaries of Divine Mercy) have benefited from 95 entries compared to 69 in 2021, including 38 Frenchmen. This progression is general and important for all the communities. A double movement, which could be described politically as rightward-leaning, seems to be taking place, starting from the fact that many seminarians, even diocesan ones, have in fact been more or less familiar with the traditional Mass in their families or during their personal itinerary for years (cf. the testimony of Dom Geoffroy Kemlin, the new abbot of Solesmes in La Nef No. 350).
With the motu proprio Traditionis custodes, Pope Francis has made it almost impossible for a new diocesan priest to celebrate the traditional liturgy. It is necessary to ask permission from Rome, which is always refused! Faced with this situation, a certain number of young people aspiring to the priesthood, who hoped to be able to live a form of spirituality in the dioceses, seem to have chosen the former Ecclesia Dei communities to prepare themselves for the priesthood. On the other hand, it is certain that the former Ecclesia Dei communities are under the threat of canonical visitations whose purpose would be to impose on them the “benefits” of the liturgical reform and “all that goes with it”. Joining the SSPX seminaries is a radical way to protect oneself from such threats. Finally, vocations being a mystery, perhaps this is simply the divine response to the pontifical will to cut the Roman Church off from its liturgical tradition.
In view of this encouraging situation in communities attached to the traditional Mass, the situation of the Church that Cardinal Benelli described as “conciliar” appears pathetic. In 2019 the seminaries of Bordeaux and Lille closed for lack of personnel. The French Bishops’ Conference has not yet officially made public the number of students entering the first year program in 2022, but the figures will certainly not be good, with one bishop declaring modestly a few days ago: “The number of students entering the seminary is stagnating. Only the most traditional communities are doing well, even if they have adopted the conciliar reforms. Let us mention the Saint Martin community with 24 ordinations in 2021 and 14 in 2022, 24 entries in propaedeutics in 2022 and 19 in 2021. The Thomist and conservative Dominicans of Toulouse, who are religious, have 11 entrants in 2022, while there is only one, in first year, at the seminary of the rose city [Toulouse] where Abp. de Kérimel made himself conspicuous by castigating the seminarians who wore cassocks. As for the diocese of Toulon, renowned for the number of its ordinations, the only candidate in first year is sent to Aix and this year the seminary of La Castille is closed. Moreover, it is not enough to enter, one must persevere. Of the 6 students entering the first year program at the Paris seminary in 2021, only 2 will go on to the first year of philosophy, the others having taken another path, tired of having “communion” imposed on them.
Asking the right questions
Faced with this situation, very few bishops seem to be asking themselves the question, “Perhaps we have been on the wrong track for a long time” and its corollary, “Why don’t we try these traditional methods that seem to have proven themselves and that always prove effective?” On the contrary, the solution, for many, would be the advent of a Church without priests, with married deacons more or less acting as such, waiting the ordination of married men, or even women. A few months ago, a bishop recently appointed to head a diocese in the south of France announced to his presbyterate: “There are still 50% too many priests in this diocese.” But would a Church without priests still be the Catholic Church?
September 16, 2022 No Comments
Solemn High Traditional Latin Mass for the Feast of the Assumption
August 14, 2021 No Comments
INSTRUCTION ON THE SIXTH SUNDAY AFTER EASTER
| Rev. Fr. Leonard Goffine’s The Church’s YearThis Sunday and the whole week should serve as a preparation for the festival of Pentecost, that we may be enabled by good works and pious devotional exercises, to receive the gifts of the Holy Ghost. At the Introit the Church sings:
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May 12, 2021 No Comments