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A Call for the Re-Discovery of Traditional Liturgical Piety

Mass is not a lesson or a class, or a primary form for the exchange of information. The primary point (of Mass) is not to understand it for the information conveyed. The primary point is to be present with your heart and soul just as Our Lady, St. Mary and St. John were present at the foot of the cross.

-Fr. Calvin Goodwin, FSSP

The “participatio actuosa” is free, conscious and fruitful, but it does not mean to always participate and intervene, and even silence (which is a sign of adoration and respect) is 'active' participation. The source of participation is prayer which is the conversation between us and even more with God, it means to act cum Ecclesia: participation, then does not mean movement; silence is not empty. Connected to participation is devotion, which cannot and must never be banal, superficial, mundane, something which obliges. No, indeed, it is free from those defects.

-Antonio Cardinal Canizarez Llovera,
Prefect of the Congregation of Divine Worship

Introduction: Why Is This So Important?

According to the 1962 hand missal, The Holy Mass: Short Instructions:

Of all the practices recommended by our holy religion: Morning and Evening Prayers, Prayers before and after Meals, Visit to the Most Holy Sacrament, Rosary, Way of the Cross, etc.--the august Sacrifice of the Mass is infinitely greater. It is the most precious, the most holy of practices, as well as the most conducive to man's salvation.

Mass is the re-presentation, in an unbloody manner, of the sacrifice of Calvary in which Jesus offered his life to atone for the sins of all humanity. It is the pinnacle of man's encounter with God on this earth.

Thus, the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass is first and foremost the most precious practice of our holy religion, and the most conducive to salvation for all men. The Catholic Church has always placed the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass at the center of Catholic life. The reason for this is the nature of the Sacrament that is confected at the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass. The Eucharist is truly the Body, Blood, Soul and Divinity of Jesus Christ. However, it is more than simply a static presence of Our Blessed Lord. The Eucharist is the Living Bread that came down from heaven.

Then Jesus said to them: Amen, amen I say unto you: Except you eat the flesh of the Son of man, and drink his blood, you shall not have life in you. He that eateth my flesh, and drinketh my blood, hath everlasting life: and I will raise him up in the last day. (Jn 6. 54-55.)

For this reason the Eucharist is the end and consummation of all the sacraments (St. Thomas Aquinas, ST, III, Q63, Art 6). In Baptism is contained a necessary and implicit desire to receive the Eucharist, and all the other sacraments are ordered toward the Eucharist. It is, indeed, the consummation of our holy religion on this earth. This is the reason why the Mass is the most precious practice of our religion. It circumscribes the highest manifestation of the Divine on earth, and as a consequence it reveals all that is the highest in man.

The Catholic Mass in consequence of its place as the consummation of religion can not be an isolated exercise in the spiritual life, but must be the center and focal point of the whole spiritual life of man while he endeavors upon this earthly sojourn. As the other six sacraments are ordered by and toward the Eucharist, so must be the devotional practices of the spiritual life, and, indeed, the whole of human life.

This important facet of our liturgical worship was hinted at by Pope Benedict XVI when he wrote in his book, Spirit of the Liturgy:

It becomes clear that "cult", seen in its true breadth and depth, goes beyond the action of the liturgy. Ultimately, it embraces the ordering of the whole of human life in Irenaeus' sense. Man becomes glory for God, puts God, so to speak, into the light (and that is what worship is), when he lives by looking toward God. (20)

The Mass, by virtue of the Eucharist, directs the life of man toward God. In it, God provides the means by which man can direct his life toward God. The Catholic Mass is not fabricated by man. The Mass was Divinely instituted at the Last Supper by Jesus Christ, and it has been perfected by God through its organic development throughout the years by the aegis of Holy Mother Church. The Mass is something that is received from God.

However, not all generations have been attentive to the Mass, or have safeguarded a fitting manner of offering it. At present, the manner of offering the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass is suffering. In fact, many bishops have allowed the Mass to be offered in such a way that it rivals the repulsive rites of the Borborites. Most traditional Catholics rightly point the finger of blame at the ideologies that produced the novus ordo Mass and other innovations of the post-Vatican II Church. While these innovations are clear examples of a break with Tradition, especially the received ritual of the Mass, they did not suddenly spring out of nowhere. Their origins lay in evolution of the 20th Century Liturgical Movement, which subtly spun, strand by strand, a formidable web of errors that eventually entangled the children of Holy Mother Church.

Spinning the Web of Liturgical Clericalism: The 20th Century Liturgical Movement

The history of the Liturgical Movement of the 20th Century is a very complex subject. Many consider its roots to lie in the writings of Dom Gueranger or the motu propio of Pope St. Pius X, Tra le solectudini (on the restoration of ecclesiastical music). The later includes the now famous quote, "it being our ardent desire to see... the active participation [of all the faithful] in the holy mysteries and in the public and solemn prayer of the Church." Others trace its roots even further back, to St. Giuseppe Tommasi and Ludovico Antonio Muratori of the late 17th century, or the work of the 19th century scholar, Antonio Rosmini. Practically speaking, however, the beginning of the 20th Century Liturgical Movement was the work of Dom Lambert Beauduin, O.S.B.

From the beginning, Beauduin sought to reform the liturgy of the Church in light of his "pastoral" experiences, and in light of fostering a "liturgical piety". His notion of liturgical piety, however innocent in appearance at first, was, nonetheless, entirely wrong. Beauduin is given a favorable review by many modern liturgists, such as Dom Alcuin Reid, O.S.B., who see nothing, at least in Beauduin's early work, to cause alarm. However, Reid like all other liturgists, especially clerical liturgists, don't see cause for alarm because they are blinded by their priestly and scholarly perspective that sheds light only on the words and rubrics and their historical development. What Reid sees in Beauduin's early work is an entirely acceptable respect for the "organic development" of the liturgy. Indeed, Beauduin attempted to achieve what Pope St. Pius X called for, that is an active participation. Reid writes in The Organic Development of the Liturgy:

Thus, the Liturgical Movement was founded, not in order to create oases of medieval liturgical splendour [more's the pity, eh?] or archaeological delight, but to nourish everyday Christian life by participation in the Liturgy celebrated in local churches and chapels. In its origins it sought to awaken people's consciousness, including, and primarily, that of the clergy, to the Church's traditional spiritual treasury that was widely ignored. (p. 81, emphasis added.)

This seems perfectly acceptable, doesn't it? Even noble! However, it's wrong headed because it is steeped in a kind of subtle clericalism. Priests such Beauduin, Botte, and many a modern priest, looked out from where they stood during Mass and witnessed a congregation fingering their beads, reading from a devotional manual, or kneeling with their eyes shut tight, and those priests assumed that the laity hadn't a proper "liturgical piety". Thus, they concluded that in order for there to be "active participation", the same congregation must have translations in their hands and must follow every word and action of the priest. They must keep their rosaries at home, and instead loudly intone the words of the altar server. Thus the evolution of that hideous thing called a dialogue Mass wherein a congregation dreadfully slaughters the Latin language. The more the people slavishly follow the words and actions of the priest, the more they are like the priest, and thus the better their "liturgical piety." Have you ever noticed, dear reader, that when congregations started to bury their eyes in hand missals instead of allowing them flow over the church's furnishings during the course of the sacred Mysteries, church architecture and art started its downward spiral, by degrees, into what we have today: cold, sterile boxes that lack even the charm of a Wal-mart?

It is interesting to read through the work of the principle movers of the 20th century liturgical movement--not just Beauduin, but also Romano Guardini, Dom Theodore Wesseling, Dom Virgil Michel--and discover that so little of them mention on extremely rare occasion the fourfold intention of assisting at the Mass (adoration, praise and thanksgiving, reparation and impetration). Roger Schoenbechler's principles of liturgical reform that appeared in the journal, Orate Fratres (see Reid, 101), never mentions them, either. Nor do any of them mention that at the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass, the faithful are present at the mystical re-presentation of Our Blessed Lord's one Sacrifice on Calvary Hill. It's not that these things were unknown to the movers of the liturgical movement; its that they were below them.

For the liturgists of the 20th century liturgical movement, the "spiritual treasures" of the Church's liturgy, which Dom Alcuin Reid mentioned, did not really include the fact that the principle actor of the Church's public worship is Jesus Christ, nor that the Mass is the re-presentation of Christ's one Sacrifice on Calvary Hill. For the liturgists of the 20th century liturgical movement, and many modern priests today (who often pose as liturgically traditional or conservative), the spiritual treasures of the Church's liturgies are nothing more than the "organic development" of poetic words and rubrics.

And the poor, poor laity--those poor people uniting themselves to the Sacrifice of the Mass by praying the sorrowful mysteries of the rosary, or reading a devotional manual that helped them to meditate on how the various parts of the Mass represented the episodes in Our Blessed Lord's Passion--those poor slobs hadn't any "liturgical piety" at all! The priests of the movement would give it to them, no matter the cost. Such was the felicitous "pastoral" liberality of Annibale Bugnini, and so we ended up with the novus ordo Mass. It was not an organic development of the liturgy, so Dom Reid laments, but it was an organic development, nonetheless. It organically developed out of the sterile notion of "liturgical piety" that scholarly priests conceived in the early years of the 20th century.

The Web of Liturgical Clericalism Today

Thus came about the clericalism at the heart of all our liturgical difficulties today. This clericalism was firmly embedded in the thinking of those who fabricated the novus ordo Mass, but it is also commonly found among neo-conservative, and even some traditionalists.

The Church has struggled with a post-Vatican II clericalism that has been fostered throughout the course of the 20th century by a liturgical movement that concerned itself only with making the laity act like priests. This clericalism posits the sad falsehood that only the ordained can foster an authentically Catholic spirituality and piety, and the laity share in this only to the extent that they can resemble the priest, by saying his prayers and tramping about in the sanctuary as lectors, extraordinary ministers of Holy Communion, etc., etc., etc...

Even traditional Catholics have been influenced by this deviant ideology, as is apparent from some otherwise laudable conservative Internet priests. One of these otherwise laudable Internet priests has given the impression that only priests benefit primarily from Summorum Pontificum, the landmark motu proprio by Pope Benedict XVI that declares the Traditional Latin Mass never abrogated, and, therefore, by association, only the priest primarily benefits from the Traditional Latin Mass. What rubbish is that?

The very history of the Church bears this attitude false.

Look to the example of Saints Thomas Moore, King Louis IX, Maria Goretti, and, of course, Blesseds Louis and Zelie Martin, our very special examples of saintly parenthood. The Mass for these saints was not an exercise in slavishly following the actions or words of the priest, nor was it a spectacle that they passively witnessed, all along wishing to be something they were not. Nor for them was the Mass a matter of priestly etiquette, for their religion was more than the learned opinions of the ordained. The piety and spirituality of these lay saints was, simply, a life centered on the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass, and directed, in consequence thereof, in toto toward God.

Likewise, the beauty that Holy Mother Church has been adorned throughout her history was provided by laymen artisans, architects, and musicians, financially supported by laymen of means, and born upon backs of layman laborers, and all done for the love the Traditional Latin Mass. Aside from a few rare exceptions, the masterpieces that adorn our great cathedrals and churches, aside from a few rare exceptions designed and built by laymen, were sculpted and painted, not by priests, but by laymen, while over the centuries they were washed in melodies crafted by, for the most part, laymen. It was the sweat and tears, not to mention the financial backing, of the laymen that adorned and filled out our churches, basilicas and cathedrals. These works were not done begrudgingly, or in compliance with the dictates of the priests. How could anyone think this who has gazed up a the arched ceiling of Notre Dame de Paris, or the brilliant hues of Guido Reni's Trinity above the main altar at Rome's Santissima Trinita dei Pellegrini, or listened in rapture to Byrd's Circumspice Jerusalem? Are these not works of love? Are these not the works of those whose lives and endeavors were profoundly influenced by the fruits of the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass? How bereft the Church would be if there were only ordained priests and no one else.

Lest I be accused of anti-clericalism, let it be known that I fully agree with Saint John Vianney who wrote:

Saint Bernard tells us that everything has come to us through Mary; and we may also say that everything has come to us through the priest; yes, all happiness, all graces, all heavenly gifts. If we had not the Sacrament of Orders, we should not have Our Lord. Who placed Him there, in that tabernacle? It was the priest. Who was it that received your soul, on its entrance into life? The priest. Who nourishes it, to give it strength to make its pilgrimage? The priest. Who will prepare it to appear before God, by washing that soul, for the last time, in the blood of Jesus Christ? The priest -- always the priest. And if that soul comes to the point of death, who will raise it up, who will restore it to calmness and peace? Again the priest. You cannot recall one single blessing from God without finding, side by side with this recollection, the image of the priest.

I would gladly kiss the hands of the most sinful priest, for by his hand Our Blessed Lord visits us, and by his word are my sins forgiven, and by his ministry my soul is prepared for the final journey of this life. What dignity has the fingers of the priest that are set upon the very Flesh of Our Blessed Lord! Certainly, I have known wonderful priests, caring priests, men who feared God. When we see a priest, any priest, our thoughts must certainly go to Our Blessed Lord, Jesus Christ. But, certainly, that is, indeed, where one's thoughts must go, for the entire existence of the priest and the nature of his ordination resides in the ministry of Jesus Christ's one Priesthood. We are all given our proper place and office, and the office of the priest, by its very nature, is higher in dignity than that of the laymen, for he performs the greatest of all acts: the priest offers the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass. Nor do I wish to belittle the cultural and artistic gifts that have been left by those of the cloth. However, at the same time, this dignity of the priest can not cancel out the profound dignity of, nor the vast treasury of artistic and cultural gifts left by, all the others who benefit from the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass. If this were so, then there would be no dignity of the priest, either, for it is for and on behalf of the rest of the Church that the priest offers the Mass.

The Antidote to Liturgical Clericalism: The Dignity of the Laity's Participation in the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass

Rather than anti-clericalism, what I propose is an antidote to the clericalism that arose in the 20th century, which was a unique product of the liturgical movement. The key to this antidote is re-discovering the unique means by which the laity participate in the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass, and by highlighting the dignity of this participation.

At the height of the 20th century liturgical movement the Church ended up with the novus ordo Mass, wherein the faithful are constantly busy with various responses, recited carelessly from rote, singing folk music so loudly that they drown each other out, and are embarrassed by a priest who attempts to entertain with his personality. Completely absent, however, are those "private" devotions so lamented by the intelligentsia of the liturgical movement. Now there is no more fingering of beads, no more devotional manuals, no more pesky meditations on the Passion of Christ that distracted the laity from the most important thing of all, the creativity of the liturgists.

Fr. Chad Ripperger wrote in an article, The Spirituality of the Ancient Mass:

The last aspect is ascendence in prayer. We have already mentioned the silence that is necessary to ascend the heights of prayer. While it is not required for vocal prayer, it is required for mental prayer and the other seven levels of prayer. St. Augustine said that no person can save his soul if he does not pray. Now it is a fact that mental prayer and prayer in general have collapsed among the laity (and the clergy, for that matter) in the past thirty years. It is my own impression that this development actually has to do with the ritual of the Mass. Now in the new rite, everything centers around vocal prayer, and the communal aspects of the prayer are heavily emphasized. This has led people to believe that only those forms of prayer that are vocal and communal have any real value.

The absence of meditative prayer at Mass is the result of the sterility of the movement's "liturgical piety" for the laity. The fruit of the liturgical movement was rotten, not because the movement was hijacked at some point in its history, but because the movement was flawed from the very outset. It had at its heart a clericalism that was used to interpret "active participation" in a way that the liturgists wanted, not what it really was intended by the original author, St. Pius X. The liturgists of the movement provided their own, clerical, meaning for the term. However, active participation isn't an external game of keeping up with the priest at the altar, and the spiritual treasures of the Mass aren't limited to words or rubrics. There is a vast treasure that has, indeed, been lost because the 20th century liturgical movement forgot a simple sentence from the Catechism: "The best manner of hearing Mass is to offer it to God with the priest for the same purpose for which it is said, to meditate on Christ's sufferings and death, and to go to Holy Communion."

Attempting to unpack the meaning of that single sentence is the purpose of this blog. This is an attempt to show another kind of liturgical piety that is the property, not of the priest at the altar, but for all those who are brought to the one Sacrifice of Christ in a mystical manner at the Holy Mass. Ars Orandi, the art of prayer, is the work and the joy of the faithful who assist at the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass. It is the part that they play, namely opening themselves up to the primary actor, Jesus Christ, who will affect in them, in measure of His good pleasure, unity with God. Those prayers and meditations and contemplation that opens the human heart to this work of God is nothing to belittle. It must once again take center stage in our understanding of Catholic liturgy if we are to again achieve authentic Catholic liturgy in the ruins left by the 20th century liturgical movement.

The primary aspect of the laity's participation at Mass is to be present with all their hearts with Our Lady, St. Mary Magdalen and St. John, the beloved disciple, at the foot of the cross. This presence requires that man allow God's grace to lead him there, to meditate upon the Passion of Christ, the same that is re-presented on the altar, the goal being God's gracious gift of contemplation. Within the Church various methods have been discovered that help those present at Mass become present at Calvary. These are called methods of hearing Mass.

The many methods of hearing the Mass are immeasurable helps to the laity, religious, and even priests. They facilitate a worthy means of assisting at Mass. They are a means to meditation and contemplation upon the principle actor of the Mass, Jesus Christ. By these methods of hearing the Mass the faithful are given access to a universe that has all but been lost to average Catholics in the last century. By these methods the Mass becomes more than a closed circle of people acting out the lines and blocking of a rigid, unchanging game. By these methods the faithful are brought to Calvary, to the foot of the Cross with Mary the Mother of Jesus, Mary Magdalen, and Saint John. They witness the raising of the Cross at the elevation of the Host, Our Blessed Lord's last words, His death at the breaking of the Host, and the shaking of the world at the moment of that history shattering event in the silence before the second Confiteor. They weep with the Blessed Virgin Mary as Our Saviour is taken down and placed in her trembling arms. The faithful follow in mournful procession as Our Lord is laid in the tomb, and at the Communion, they rest their heads against the stone of that tomb in sadness for their sins that necessitated His suffering, but in hopeful expectation for the Resurrection that comes at the "Dominus vobiscum". Each part of the Mass carries with it a meditation according to the various methods.

This traditional liturgical piety is that piety that gave us the flourishing beauty of the Catholic Church. The fruits of these meditations can be seen in the brilliant colors and flowering art of the great Baroque churches, but also in the sober and graceful lines of the Gothic, the simplicity of the ancient monasteries, the quiet of Solemnes Chant, and the majestic grandeur of Mozart's Masses. These are the achievements of a liturgical piety that looks toward God.

It is my hope that this blog can help the faithful, especially the lay faithful who are in the trenches, to experience the art and beauty of the Traditional Latin Mass and its commensurate spirituality.

Challenging the Old Liturgical Movement at the New Liturgical Movement

I'm engaged in an interesting and respectful debate over at NLM, at this link. Please feel free to go there and chime in with your thoughts. Also, watch the video on that post. Very interesting.

TradNews Roundup

*Clarification document in regards to Summorum Pontificum coming soon? And other rumors are starting to circulate in the Italian press. Will the pope offer the TLM this Holy Week? Will he revoke the indult for communion in the hand?

*EWTN interview with FSSP priest and deacon. This interview is spot on in regards to how the meditative participation of the laity in the TLM has inspired the holiness of the saints and the beauty that has adorned the Church through out Her history. Father's apology for the novus ordo is a bit strange, though. Why does the novus ordo need the TLM to find its way? We already had a Mass received from God through the hands of Holy Mother Church. Why do we need the TLM to be corrective for something the Church doesn't need? The Church needs to work to eventually reverse the novus ordo rebellion by a gradual return to the TLM. At any rate, you really have to take the time to watch and listen.

*Our Lady of the Annunciation Monastery in Clear Creek, Oklahoma is elevated to the status of Abbey.

*The Jesuits promoting the Traditional Latin Mass!? I have to admit, I never thought I would live to see the day.

*Interview with Fr. Schmidberger, District Superior of the SSPX in Germany.

*Pope Benedict XVI: Lent is a time for spiritual combat.

*What a cowardly, dastardly bishop! Diarmuid Martin has the audacity to suggest that the whole Church in Dublin must do penance for what is clearly the perversion and malfeasance of religious, priests and bishops. Allow me to suggest to Archbishop Martin that it ought to be him, and him alone, from the Church in Dublin who should be barefoot in the snow. Martin: "Its your fault too!" With bishops like this, it's no wonder we have to keep our children away from them and their priests.

*Patriarch of Constantinople defends real ecumenism.

*Good news: Diocese of Green Bay, Wisconsin to withhold 2010 funds for the USCCB's CCHD. Keep the pressure up!

*The logical evolution of the novus ordo. Fr. Kenny packs them in by confirming that the Mass shouldn't get in the way of more important things. So what was that old liberal criticism of the TLM that required such a radical overhaul? Oh yeah, that horrible thing the liberals called the "fifteen minute Mass." While it is a fable in regards to the TLM, apparently with the novus ordo it's more than possible.

*We brought this on ourselves.

*You won't see this on ABC, CBS, NBC, CNN or even Fox. No reason to ask why.

*Obama shows his true face at Health "Care" Summit.

*Horrific Death Camp in Philadelphia. Joseph Mengela had nothing on this guy.

*CNN Poll: Majority of Americans think the US Government is too big and powerful and an immediate threat to citizens' rights. Given the laws that have been enacted regarding homosexuality, is there any doubt that the US Government is an immediate threat to religious liberty?

Consider making this Lenten season a giving one.

The Society of St. Vincent de Paul.

The Traditional Latin Mass in South Philadelphia

Solemn Traditional Latin Mass in South Philadelphia's Our Lady of Lourdes Parish. The Solemn Mass was offered upon the parish's feast day of Our Lady's Apparitions in Lourdes. See more wonderful images at In Caritate Non Ficta.

Another excellent blog added to the blog list

I came across another great blog for the blog list through a connection at FaceBook. Please check out Splendor Veritatis Missio. There are posts here for English speakers, but also Spanish, Portuguese, and Italian. Enjoy.

New blog on the blog list

I'm pleased to add Cleveland Friends of the TLM to my blog list. Please check it out.

Jesus the Consolator

And whithersoever He entered, into towns or into villages or cities, they laid the sick in the streets and besought Him that they might touch but the hem of His garment, and as many as touched Him were made whole.
(-St. Mark, 6. 56)

Jesus the Consolator by Carl Bloch

Dear Lord, grant that our sacramental and spiritual Communions in this Lenten Season might heal our troubled bodies, minds and hearts.

TradNews Roundup

*Pat Kennedy to exit public disservice in the wake of row with bishop over public support of abortion.

*Cardinal Claudio Hummes vows to rid Church of perverted, child abusing priests. (Warning, sarcasm ensuing.) Should be easy since there are so few of them. I wonder why nobody thought of this before? Why, Cardinal Hummes is a regular genius.

*U. of Notre Dame president determined to see pro-lifers jailed like Dr. King was. Jenkins is a bizarre person.

*Abuse victims are the Irish bishops' first priority. Good! That means the promotion of modernism and liberalism has dropped down to second on that priority list.

*The Knights of Columbus think it's promising that 20% of young Catholics don't even believe in God. It's nice to know the Knights are so optimistic about mainstream Catholicism.

*Australia Forward in Faith's response to Apostolic Constitution Anglicanorum Coetibus.

*PCED reaffirms that one may not mix and match the two forms of the Roman Rite (see #4). Stable group is not required for priest offer the TLM publicly if he wants.

*More fruits of Vatican II: "We've sold to Muslims, we've sold to Buddhists."

*Canon Lawyer on the Vatican/SSPX talks.

*Opus Dei in Washington sells out?

*The confusion that reigns in the post-VCII Church. Where is the leadership we so desperately need?

*Fisichella under fire from those he purports to lead. They claim his leadership of the Pontifical Academy for Life is "absurd". Couldn't agree more.

*Chin up! This is a veil of tears. We knew that from the start. However, don't forget that there has been tremendous progress, and the gates of hell will not prevail.

*Crossing the desert. That's something traditional Catholics are familiar with.

Several Excellent Methods: Thirteen

Several Excellent Methods of Hearing Mass
By Lady Lucy Herbert

A Manner of assisting at Holy Mass, and preparing ourselves for Death, by considering our Death as a Sacrifice of Propitiation for our Sins, and Impetration of eternal Happiness.

Motives.

The prayer Christ made for us, tho’ of such force, and the sacrifices of himself offered for us, though of an infinite value, will avail us nothing, if they are not applied to us. Now they are only applied to us by our prayers of sacrifices offered to him. The best sacrifice we can offer, is certainly our lives, which we may offer as a propitiatory sacrifice for our sins, because that all things, and all the satisfactions which we might severally in sacrifice to God, are all victims of this sacrifice: Therefore, if we sincerely, with a humble ad contrite heart offer our lives, that offering will effect the full pardon of our sins, and by an entire atonement blot them out. God is pleased to give us an example of this in the third book of Kings, in the person of the prophet sent to Jeroboam, who, for punishment of his sin, was killed by a lion; but bet because he accepted the punishment with submission, and willing offered his life to atone for sin, death thus accepted of by him made him again a just man, and acceptable to God.

We cannot have a true contrition, unless we are willing to destroy our past sins by such a sacrifice as offers in satisfaction for them, whatever proved an unjust satisfaction to us, and was cause of our offending God. By death we do this; therefore, who really, willingly, and actually receive and offer their death as such, have certainly the true contrition that blots out all sins.

At the Beginning of Mass.

Consideration.

Reflect, how Adam having sinned, God, in punishment of it, ordained that he and all his posterity should die. This is due to us on account of that sin; but how much more have we deserved that punishment on account of our own sins?

Affections.

Since death, my God, is the punishment you ordain for sin, it is with a humble and submissive heart to the decree of your justice that I accept of it; and in the spirit of penance I accept of all the pains, humiliations, and privations, which accompany it, in satisfaction for all the sins I have committed, which I am truly sorry for: O pardon me, my God, I beseech you!

How great is my ingratitude to your Divine Majesty, who drew me out of nothing, and gave me all I have; and I have disowned your sovereignty over me, by refusing to subject myself to your law. You could at each moment have punished me, and I slighted your justice, and offended you with so little fear and so great liberty: I have dishonored your sanctity by the impiety of my sins, and your goodness which adopted me for your child, by refusing to obey and hour you as my Father. You proffered me a share in you happiness, in your glory; nay, in yourself, if I would be faithful to you, and the least difficulty has made other ways.

Had I but once offended you, it were still too much, but I have multiplied my sins above the hairs of my head. My iniquities and offences are so many, that I cannot look through the numberless multitude of them.

In every place, surrounded with your gifts, have I sinned. No moment of my life which has not been stained with different sins, ad this, after pardons so frequently obtained. Besides, how many have caused to sin by my ill example?

Pardon, my god, these crimes, for I am truly sorry for them, and detest them with my whole heart. I wish I were capable of an infinite sorrow to blot out the guilt of them. Accept, Lord, in lieu of the grief that is wanting in me, that which my Saviour had in the garden of Olives and upon the Cross for the sins of the whole world, and of mine in particular. Purify me from my sec ret sins, and pardon those I have committed by others. Despise not, my God, a contrite heart, which only hopes for pardon from your infinite mercy, and the promise you made, that when a sinner is sorry for his sins you will no longer remember his iniquities.

If, dear Lord, I have ceased to be your dutiful child, you have not ceased to be my loving Father. All that I can offer you in satisfaction for my sins and ingratitude, is but my life, which I offer you with a very good will, as a propitiatory victim; ad with it I offer the privation of all I have loved, liked, and r enjoyed when I offended you. At this very instant, if you please, deprive me of all, and of my life. I resign ti to you with my whole heart, and would think myself most happy if you did it by violence of the grief you give me for having offended you: But if you defer taking the whole sacrifice, take at least what part you please, I resign it to you, ad only beg you will give me the grace to sanctified by it.

At the Offertory.

Consideration.

Reflect that Christ, your model and example, offers himself to his eternal Father to die for satisfaction of your sins, well may you offer yourself to do the same.

Affections.

O eternal Father, behold your dear Son, who, out of his abundant charity for me, offers himself to die, for to satisfy for my sins and offences, it is but just that I do the same; I offer you, then, my liberty and my life, my heart and my soul, but united with his, that so it may be grateful in your sight. I accept of death with all submission; and I offer it to your Divine Majesty for expiation of my sins; and that as a criminal, guilty of treason, whom you have justly condemned to die. I am glad that my body will be reduced to earth, to punish my proud mind, and all the faults I have committed for its sake; but grant that my soul may return to your hands from whence it came.

I resign myself to all the bitterness, pains, and anguishes; to all temptations (sin excepted) is all the satisfaction I can make your Divine majesty; having nothing more of my own to offer, I bet you will please to accept of this all that I can give; and remember not my sins and iniquities, but remember that I am the work of your hands, the price of your blood, the conquest of your Cross, the pledge of your death, and the effect of your love. It is is to your love that I join mine, with this protestation, that I will admit of no other sentiments but those conformable to what faith teaches; and that I will be moved with no other thoughts than those of hope in your mercies and love of your goodness; if any thing pass in me contrary to these, I disown, extract, and detest them.

I recommend my soul into your hands, it is what you have bought with the price of your blood. Be mindful, dear Lord, of all you have done for it, and forget all it has done against you. You were pleased to declare, that you will not the death of a sinner, to wit, eternal death; but that he be converted and live for ever. I bet for the sake of your most precious passion and death; and since you have said it, I hope that the sentence which will decide my eternity, will be such as to procure my eternal happiness.

It is true, my God, that notwithstanding all this, I am very full of fears, my sins being so grat and your jugments so terrible; but yet my hopes are still greater, because your mercy is great, and you forgive all that confide in you. I cast myself into the abyss of your mercies, full o repentance for having so often offended you, and had I but this moment left, I would employ it in loving you. The greater my sins are, the more glorious it is for you to pardon me, on which account I beg it.

From the Preface till the Elevation.

Reflect that the victim must necessarily die before we can enter our happy inheritance. A good Christian cannot enjoy that supreme Good who ahs not first ardently desired it: For not to desire it is a contempt of it; and that is such a fault that will not be repaired but by the ardent desire of the said happiness. It is contempt not ot desire eternal bliss for more than the reserving human life, so as to be content to sacrifice our temporal life to obtain eternal. We ought to also to desire to make the exchange soon; for what we really desire we are eager to possess.

Affections.

My god, I firmly believe each point of faith. I am ready to sign any of them with my blood; in particular, all you have revealed of that blissful eternity; where your servants enter ino your joy; become like to you, because they see you as you are; dwell in you as you dwell in them, and possess that kingdom prepared for them before the creation of the world. I ardently desire to be dissolved here by death, that I may be with you, my God. And having nothing but my life to purchase it, with all I might have enjoyed by it, I here offer you the sacrifice of both, accept it, dear Lord, and let a speedy death complete the Holocaust. Hasten that day, when joyful tidings will be brought me that I must go into the house of our Lord, where God dwells, and I shall possess the freedom and liberty of his children. Send my deliverer a happy death; I expect it, and will embrace it with open arms, hoping by its means to get into yours. I fear it not, under the covert of your mercies, insured to me by the blood of your Divine Son, which he shed for me, and is this very moment going to offer the same for me on this altar.

At the Elevation.

Consideration.

With all imaginable respect adore Jesus Christ elevated on high. Reflect that it is through the sac red merits of his death, that you can only hope, and lay claim to eternal life. Look on him in that state in which he negotiates your salvation. Beg him to form your death my the model of his; for you cannot die well unless he makes you partaker of his interior dispositions.

Affections.

Eternal Father, behold here you dear Son, who is pleased to offer himself and his merits for me; it is by them that I have a just title to an eternal possession of your Divine Majesty, and of all in you. Your Son, Christ Jesus, has lain down the full price of it for me. I have no other title to it, nor do I desire any other. His death for me, is my security for eternal life; and with full confidence I challenge it in his name by his merits, which has bequeathed to me as an inheritance. It is what I ardently desire, and will firmly hope for, because your unerring word assures me of it; for they that hope in you shall not be confounded.

My dear Saivour, who not only would die for me, but also suffer a most a cruel agony, I adore each of your interior motions, even to the last moment of your life. I adore your last thoughts, words, and sufferings. I adore the last sentiments of your sacred humanity, and last applications of the powers of your soul. I offer you my death, and the last moment of my life, in honour of your most holy death, and last moment of your sacred life.

Dear Jesus, bless my death and sanctify it by yours. Unite it, Lord, with yours. Make me partaker of those divine dispositions with which you rendered your soul into the hands of your eternal Father. Grant that the last sigh of breath I take, may be consecrated to you. And be a perfect act of love.

As you accepted of death from the first moment of your incarnation, and remained in the same acceptance all the days of your life; in like manner I, from this moment, accept of whatever death you have ordained for me, and will, with your grace, remain in a constant resolution of dying for you according your will, in the spirit of obedience; heartily desiring that the last use of my liberty may be an act of obedience to your divine will in honour of that last act you produced on the Cross, when, bowing down your sacred head in obedience to the divine decree, you rendered up your blessed soul. I also accept of death in the spirit of love. As your death was the most pregnant testimony of your love for my soul, so I desire to give my life (which according to nature, is most dear to me) as the greatest proof I can give that I truly love you, and have a sincere desire to be where I shall ever love you, and never more offend you.

At the Agnus Dei.

Consideration.

Behold Christ in the Blessed Sacrament as your strength, your hope, your support, as the pledge of your salvation, and of a happy eternity.

Affections.

Come, sweet Saviour, come and take possession of my heart, it is yours by so many titles; sustain, comfort, and assure it against all the terrors of death and apprehensions of my salvation. Say to my soul, especially at the hour of my death, as you did to your Apostles, “it is I, fear not, peace be with you”, no attempt of the enemy shall hurt you. Say but these comfortable words, and my soul shall be saved.

Who am I, great God, that you should vouchsafe to visit me? You truly verify what you once said, that you come to save those in danger to be lost. I have reason to fear, when I think what I have deserved for offending you; but yet much more to hope, when I reflect what you have done to merit my salvation. I acknowledge you for my God and my Saviour, and as such I confide in you. It is in your merits that I place all my hopes of salvation, fortify me in my passage out of this world to eternity.

Since you have been pleased to visit me, I beg you will leave me some tokens of your presence, giving me victory over all my enemies, sins, and passions; especially that from which I may fear the worst consequences at my death. Do not refuse me this, since it is for your glory I beg it. I am sensible that my continued offences deserve that you should let me die in them, but the blood which you have shed for me, cries out to you, and demands its price and salary; since it was shed for no other end than to cleanse me from my sins, and merit eternal bliss for me, which I confide you will grant through its merits.

What shall I render you, my dear Saviour, for all you have done for me? But what shall I return you for yourself which you have been pleased to give? I will return you my life, because that includes all in my power to give. I really desire then to die, if such be your will. Please to unite my death with yours, and say to my soul before she quits her earthly habitation, as you did to Magdalene, “many sins are forgiven you”; and if you cannot say, “Because she has loved much”; say at least, “because you have loved her much.”

Eternal Father, your Son has given himself to me, that I may offer him and his merits to you to pay my debts, and purchase what I stand in need of. I then present him to you, with all the merits of his life and death; and bet by them to be discharged of the heavy load of my sins, and enriched with all I want to render my death precious in your sight.; and that I may receive all the last Sacraments, with a disposition necessary to receive the grace and virtue they bring with them. With joy I receive death from your hands, because it gives me to you, and alone can bestow you upon me by a happy exchange.

Death being the greatest concern, and it being uncertain what deaths we shall die, and whether our last sickness will permit us to think of God; and though it should, whether we shall be capable of strengthening ourselves then by those interior acts of virtue requisite to prepare for so dangerous a passage; let us, with God’s grace, every week, for the remainder of our lives, hear one Mass according to the method here set down to prepare for death, endeavoring to perform the acts therein mentioned, as if we were presently to depart out of the world; and beseeching Almighty God to grant that they may supply for those which probably we may not be in a capacity of making in our last sickness; for if we can, at that time, make any, we must expect to make them with difficulty and less perfection.

"Not all valid Councils are fruitful"

Fr. Z quotes Ratzinger.

Can't disagree in the least. Is the great experiment coming to an end?

TradNews Roundup

*The anti-Catholic Der Spiegel is loving this! More scandal that promises to be as big if not bigger than the Irish scandal.

*If you are asking yourself why this won't go away you aren't approaching the problem from the right perspective. The Church's enemies are stronger than ever because the Church's enemies are so entrenched in the Church, Herself. And they call SSPXers schismatic!

*Oh, and its not going away here in the United States, either. By their fruits you will know them.

*Really folks, is this frivolity, and this frivolity, posted in the midst of the second European wave of priest sex abuse scandals, the degree of excellence to be expected from the "internet pastor"? Does he even have a bishop to whom we may complain?

*Philippine Archbishop calls out the United Nations and the United States for promoting population control in the Philippines. From Russia to the United States and then to the rest of the world. Still think the consecration was done?

*Factionalism in the traditional Catholic movement highlights the need for episcopal leadership. Tom Woods goes off the deep end.

*The Prefect of the Congregation for Institutes of Consecrated Life and Societies of Apostolic Life, Cardinal Rode, states that religious institutes are in a state of crisis due the adoption of a secularist mentality and the abandonment of traditional practices. That's exactly what traditional Catholics have been saying for decades.

*Tebow Superbowl ad a work of genius. No one would have known this was about abortion if it hadn't been for Planned Parenthood's visceral reaction to a "pro-life" commercial during the Superbowl. Focus on the Family handed Planned Parenthood the rope, and they hung themselves.

*Challenging the mush.

*Kasper is up to his old tricks. This time he suggests a catechism shorn of anything Catholic. How helpful for the new world church.

*USCCB makes false accusations of calumny and avoids taking responsibility for mismanagement of funding and clerical malfeasance. Sound familiar?

*It's time to listen to the victims. But the liberals only want to listen to themselves and their tired out ideologies.

*Anne Hathaway: "I'm nothing." She said it, not me.

*Pro-lifers, public enemy number one.

Post War Guilt and the Second Vatican Council

This in a Catholic New Agency article about George Weigel giving a pre-prepared lecture at Paris:

Pointing out that the last century was one of the the bloodiest in Europe's history, Weigel quoted Cardinal Jean Marie Lustiger to say that a collective post-war “guilt” still hangs over Europe.

“Here, Lustiger had in mind 'the proclamation of freedom [which] became the will to dominate…the pursuit of equality [which] produced slavery,' and 'the affirmation of brotherhood [which] became the origin of bloody struggles and of hopeless divisions,'” the American scholar said.

Accoring to Weigel, Cardinal Lustiger described that guilt in a 1981 address to the diplomatic corps in Bonn, saying, “as if exhausted by violence, Europe is hardly capable of transmitting life to new generations; poor, wounded Europe is causing the springs of life to run dry. The fruitfulness of love is under attack and the fruits of love are being aborted.”

Here we have a glimpse of the rational George Weigel, a guy who is able to diagnosis the root cause of Europe (and the West's) cultural collapse. His use of Cardinal Lustiger is spot on. Few prelates in the late twentieth century have been able to so clearly point out the cultural problems that arose in the wake of World War II. The images of starving and dieing concentration camp inmates defined a whole generation of Europeans.

However, Weigel for some reason can not draw the obvious connection between this post-war guilt and the events that took place in Rome in the early 1960s. If this post-war guilt so shaped in such a significant way the cultural collapse of Europe, how can we for a moment dismiss the fact that this post-war guilt also had a significant role to play in the Second Vatican Council? The principal influences that shaped the course of the Council came from the Rhineland, an area from whence one would expect the most guilt.

There was a false optimism that arose in post-war Europe, but at the heart of this humanistic optimism was a denial and hatred for the cultures that were unfairly blamed for the rise of Nazism and the atrocities of the war. Is this false optimism the real spirit of Vatican II? Does the hatred and denial of traditional Catholicism have its roots in this humanism that unfairly blamed the traditional Church for the rise of Nazism and the atrocities of the war?

It has always been my position that the Second Vatican Council and the ensuing "spirit" that infested the Church was at least in part a result of European self-loathing in the wake in the Second World War. There's a reason why the younger generations of Catholics are more traditional than the baby-boomer generation. The new generation of Catholics are further removed from this post-war guilt and this humanism of hate.

Online Petition for the Reform of the USCCB's CCHD

Please take a moment to read through and consider signing the Reform CCHD Now's online petition that asks the United States bishops to take action to reform this branch of the United States Catholic Conference. (The petition is embedded below if you are ready to sign.) The CCHD's bureaucracy has friends and connections with political advocacy and community organization groups that are pro-abortion, pro-same-sex-marriage and support other positions diametrically opposed to the teachings of the Catholic Church.

Over the past few weeks a number of bishops have attempted to divert attention away from the real issue of the bishop's conference keeping this sinful company by making criticism of the CCHD and USCCB out to be personal attacks against individuals in the conference's bureaucracy. This, however, has never been the case as is readily apparent by looking at the reports that have been released.

The persistent question raised by these reports is "why are individuals and groups committed to the homosexual and radical feminist agendas, and individuals and groups that openly dissent from the Church's teachings, involved so heavily with the USCCB's organs and conferences?" This question is not being answered by the nation's bishops. Instead certain bishops have willfully mischaracterized the criticisms in order to avoid this persistent question.

The fact that bishops (bishops!) have willfully mischaracterized the criticisms of the USCCB and its bureaucracy should give us all pause. Has the climate of corruption and cronyism among our American Church leaders, the same corruption and cronyism that was at the heart of the priest sex abuse scandal, been eradicated in the American Church, or is it still alive and well?

German theologian Manfred Hauke on Medjugorje

Fr. Tim Finigan has this at The Hermeneutic of Continuity. German theologian Manfred Hauke says in an interview:

If a drink is mixed with rat poison, it's not sufficient to point out that it contains only two percent strychnine with 98 percent water: the whole drink has to be poured out. If the Church does not, herself, finally lance the boil that is connected with Medjugorje, then anti-Catholic groups will do the job and with pleasure. And then the patience extended to the enthusiasm of Medjugorje could become a boomerang that attacks the Church from inside, if the groups previously connected with the Bosnian "place of pilgrimage", finally disillusioned, should turn against the Faith and the Church.

Please visit Fr. Finigan's blog to read more.

The Medjugorje phenomenon, fraught as it is with all manner of difficulties, presents a unique and extremely severe problem for the Church. There are hordes of influential neo-conservative clerics and laymen who favor the continuation of these pilgrimages despite the fact that these pilgrimages have been discouraged by the local ordinaries and the Vatican. The promotion of the Medjugorje phenomenon is a decidedly neo-conservative endeavor, demonstrating that the neo-conservative criticism of traditional Catholics as disobedient is a hypocritical canard.

However, the whole situation holds even greater significance for the future of the Catholic Church. Hauke makes an important point that the bad fruits of Medjugorje could evolve into a full scale attack on the Church from within. This attack would necessarily originate from disillusioned neo-conservatives, individuals and groups that have been given, by consequence of an allegiance between them and powers in the highest magisterial offices of the Church, a wide and powerful influence on mainstream Catholics everywhere. Because of this far ranging influence of neo-conservatives, if the attack mentioned by Hauke should materialize from Medjugorje the new divisions it would cause in the modern Church could prove devastating.

However, the phenomenon has already been allowed to grow unabated in the years following Bishop Zanic's troubles. Pilgrimages are still sponsored far and wide in thousands, if not millions, of Catholic parishes around the world. The numbers of pilgrims have not decreased since the Vatican started to discourage pilgrimages, but they have rather increased. Disobedience in this matter has grown unabated in neo-conservative Catholic circles. If the Church should "lance this boil" now, I'm afraid it will already be too late to avoid the disillusion that will foment into an attack on the Church from within.

The Gamaliel approach has been tried and found lacking. The modern Magisterium must stop abrogating its responsibilities.

Several Excellent Methods: Twelve

Several Excellent Methods of Hearing Mass
By Lady Lucy Herbert

A Manner of Assisting at Holy Mass, considering our Death as a Holocaust and Sacrifice of Thanksgiving. It is to prepare us for Death, Mass being the most proper Time for that Preparation, since it is a Commemoration of Christ’s Death, in which his Merits are applied to us.

Consider your death as a Holocaust our Sacrifice of Praise, to adore and worship the greatness of God. Endeavour to render it so by acts conformable, and therein employ yourself from the beginning of Mass till the Sanctus.

At the Beginning of Mass.

Consideration.

Reflect that sacrifices were ordained to honour God, who is infinite in all kinds, containing in himself all greatness and excellency; which to honour worthily, it ought to be with the destruction and sacrifice of our lives; life being the greatest thing we have our ourselves to offer.

Affections

My God, though my death is inevitable, yet in acknowledgment of your sovereign dominion over me, and for love of you, I am resolved, as much as in me lies, to make it voluntary; and, therefore, I now freely offer myself to it: So that could I avoid dying, I would not, that by my death I may make restitution of all I am to your Divine Majesty who gave it me. I rejoice that by death I shall be no more in a condition to resist your will and dominion over me as Lord and Maker. I accept of death in punishment for my having so often done it.

My god, I acknowledge and confess before heaven and earth, that you only are him that is, and I rejoice at it with my whole heart; and I, poor creature, am her that is not. I embrace, with humble submission, the destruction of my body, which by death is to return to dust or nothing from whence you drew it. I humbly adore the decrees of your providence, and submit to whatever you have been pleased, from all eternity, to ordain concerning my death. And because I know not what will then be the sentiments of my soul, I desire not to perform that which I wish then to do, and beg you will be pleased to accept it now for that time.

I adore you, Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, one in essence and three in persons, and I love you with my whole heart. I acknowledge you as Author and Principal of my life, both of nature and grace. I firmly believe all you have said, and as firmly hope all you have promised, because you are truth itself, and can neither deceive nor be deceived. You are an infinite Good, containing in yourself whatsoever is good; therefore I love you above all things, and that purely for yourself.

It is for your sake alone, my God, who are infinitely amiable, and can never be sufficiently loved, that I detest all my sins, because contrary to your sanctity. I detest them for the same motive that Christ our Lord detested them in the garden of Gethsemani; and for the same motive that my detest them, I offer you, in reparation of the affronts you have received by them, the love with which your only Son, and blessed Mother loved you, and the love with which all the Just upon earth, and Saints and Angels in heaven love you, and with which you love yourself.

I desire that the last motion of my heart may be an act of adoration to pay you due homage for my being, and an act of love whereby loving you for yourself, and in the last moment of my time, I may continue to love you for eternity.

I adore your power which created me, your goodness which redeemed me, your providence which has care of me, and your mercy which has pardoned me so many offenses. I adore also your justice, and abandon myself to it, but with this confidence, that your goodness and mercy will never forsake me, but plead for me before your justice; and obtain that I may for all eternity sing forth your mercies. Full of this sweet and amorous confidence, I hope to see and enjoy your blessings in the land of the living, of which you are the resurrection and the life.

At the Offertory.

Consideration.

Reflect that Christ not only offered his life and merits upon Mount Calvary for your salvation, and to purchase for you all yo shall want for that effect, but he is also pleased to do the same upon our altars: Now what is more necessary for salvation than a happy death? Confide therefore, since he will obtain it for you.

Affections.

Innumerable are the thanks I owe you, my dear Redeemer, for thus sacrificing yourself for me; all I can offer in return, is my life, which I offer as a victim to honour you; and that it may be worthy of your acceptance, I unite it with yours, which you offered for me on the Cross, and are now going to offer for me here. Let the fire of your love consume this victim, that so it may be grateful to you.

O infinite Goodness! You are all love. Loving me, though so unworthy, with an infinite love. I give you my heart, fit it for yourself, and fill it with your love, that so from this instant it may of sinful become holy. I offer myself a Holocaust, that is, my life with all the objects of it. All I have or could love in it, all the satisfactions I could draw from it, all which I freely offer to you; destroy both them and me by death; so that if it please you to take my life this moment, I readily submit to it, and truly desire to die now, that I may enjoy you, and be no more in danger of offending you.

But if it be your will and pleasure to leave me yet some time in this dark prison of my body, grant me the grace from this instant to love nothing but you, whose love has redeemed me, and bought me with no less a price than you precious blood, as a condemned criminal begged from the gallows for experience: but what experience, dear Lord? To try if, after such preventions, I could come to love you. O work that love in me, ad steroy all that opposes it. Let is take up all my thoughts, actions, and affections, and in a word my whole heart.

From the Sanctus till the Agnus Dei, consider your Death as a Sacrifice of Thanksgiving.

Motives to accept and offer it as such.

God requires Sacrifices of Thanksgiving, under pain of withdrawing his affection and favours from us. St. Bernard speaking of ingratitude, says, that it dries up the fountain of goodness, the dew of mercy, and the current of God’s graces. If you desire not to be guilty of it, offer to God the sacrifice of your life, and with it all that might be a pleasure and contentment in it, as a Sacrifice of Thanksgiving. Rejoice that you have that to offer in return for what God has bestowed upon you, and desire that you may soon offer it.

Affections.

O my god! How great are your benefits to me, both in number and worth, and how kind your way of bestowing them on me. If I should spend every moment of my life in thanksgiving, yet I should not be able to return due thanks for one single benefit; for, besides those favours common to all your creatures, your particular providence has been most liberal to me; in my education, my vocation, the innumerable and powerful helps you have given me for my salvation continued by you, though neglected by me. The many dangers, both of soul and body, which you have secured me from, preserving me from death, when in the state of sin, etc., add one more to these, I beseech you, which is a happy death.

Accept, in thanksgiving, the sacrifice of my life, and all I am and have, which by death I sacrifice to you. And I desire now actually to offer it, if such be your divine will and pleasure; if not now, whenever you please. In the mean-time I offer the sacrifice and myself to be sacrificed; and I wish I could every moment offer the same, and had I a million of lives, I would offer each of them a Sacrifice of Thanksgiving. Accept, my god, this free and willing oblation I make you of my life, and with it all earthly enjoyments; for were it in my power to avoid death, yet I would die in return of thanks for all you favours and mercies to me; and especially for your having died for me: for whatever else I offer it is still but part of your gifts, but by death I sacrifice all.

At the Elevation.

Consideration.

Having adored jesus lifted up by the hands of the priest, as he was on the Cross, call to mind that when he was upon earth he said these words: “No man can shew a greater love than to give his life him he loves.” This Christ has done for you; love and gratitude obliges you to do the same for him.

Affections.

O my God, since love has made you died for me, it is by just that with a good will I accept of death for love you. Had I thousand lives, I would give them all to acknowledge this your love to me. I embrace death in return; and rejoice that this body of sin will be by it destroyed in punishment for my having offended your goodness. Let earth return to earth, but grant that my soul created to your image, and redeemed with your Blood, may return to you. This is what I earnestly beg, recommending it now for then into your sacred hands.

I do most humbly thank you for all your benefits, as I desire to do at the last moment of my life; in which possibly I may be deprived of both speech and reason: and therefore not able to speak, or even think of you. Therefore be pleased now to receive my thanksgiving for all your benefits to me, general and particular, known and unknown; but above all for that Blood and life you offered for me on Mount Calvary, and daily offer on our altars, allowing me to the happiness to be present, and applying to my soul the merits thereof, through means of the Sacraments. For all which I offer all the adorations, praises, and thanksgiving, which the humanity of my Saviour and his blessed Mother rendered to you, O Eternal Father! And those which all the Saints and Angels have, and will render you for all eternity. And all the Sacrifices of Mass, which have been, are, or shall be offered you till the day of judgment.

And when in my Agony I shall not be able to adore, praise, and thank you my god, I desire still to be united to all those that do it both in heaven and on earth. And I offer now and then my agony, my seat, and dolorous sufferings of my dying Saviour, for the remission of my sins, and for the eternal glory of the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost: whose name be fore ever praised, and will for ever be done, in me, and by me, for all eternity.

O my God! I abandon myself to your Divine will; and to the judgment you shall pronounce on my soul: and I submit to it with my whole heart, confiding in your goodness that you will safe a soul, you have loved so much as to send your only Son for its redemption and salvation.

For Communion

Consideration.

Reflect how the same Jesus Christ, present on the altar, as said: that he who shall eat his flesh shall live for eternity, and shall not die for ever. Beg that this may be fulfilled in you; and confide it will be so, since you have his word for it.

Affections.

How coms this happiness to me, that my God should vouchsafe to visit me! Lord I am not worthy that you should enter my soul, speak only the word, and my soul shall be saved. I firmly believe whatever you have said, and therefore, unworthy as I am, I desire to receive you, that so I may be made worthy to live for ever with you. Grant that this heavenly food may be to me a preservative against all my enemies at the hour of my death, and that I may receive it with the disposiitions most pleasing to you. And since you are pleased to promise that those who eat your flesh, and drink your Blood, shall not die for ever; I confide in your mercy, that I shall not die that eternal death: and I beg that whilst I live I may never die by sin, which I dread more than temporal death.

My Saviour and redeemer, the Sovereign object of my heart! Take possession of its affections. Sanctify my soul, and replenish it with your grace; to the end that all the remain moments of my life may be entirely spent in your love.

I desire now to die, having received my God and Saviour; that separated from all earthly things, and from this my body; I may for ever be united to you with unchangeable affection. Jesus, my Jesus, be to me a Jesus especially in my last hour; and fortify me in my passage out of this world, against all your enemies and mine.

[Further Considerations.]

Then take, as it were, an oath of allegiance; renew your vows, and promised made for you at Baptism. Beg your Sovereign Lord never to leave you. Say to him, with the Disciples of Emmaus: Stay with me Lord, for it si late, the best part of my life being spent, and the evening of it now approaches. Or else with holy Simeon: let your servant depart now in peace, for not only my eyes have seen, but my Heart has received the Author of my Salvation. And with the Royal Prophet: although I walk in the shadow of death, I will fear no evil, because you, my Lord, are with me.

[Further Affections.]

Put yourself, dear Lord, as a seal upon my heart, that nothing but you may find entrance there; I unite this Communion with that I shall make at my death; and both with that you made before your death: and also with the Communions of our blessed Lady, and all your Saints during their lives, that those may supply for all the faults I have, or ever shall commit in receiving you.

I beg, dear Saviour, that you will make me partaker of those Sacred dispositions which your Divine Soul had at the last moment of your life, to the which, I with my whole heart unite mine; that they may supply for all my defects at my death. Dear jesus be to me a Jesus, especially at the hour of my death. I abandon myself entirely to you, to suffer for your sake the pangs of death. And I renounce and disavow all impatience, or any evil I may be tempted to commit.

At the Benediction say,

O most Blessed and undivided Trinity, Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, I adore you, and consecrate to you my heart and all its affections. Bless me now and at the hour of my death, as you bless those that are yours and bring with them to that everlasting glory which you have designed for me; that I may for ever bless and praise your mercies. Amen.

Get the word out about USCCB corruption

Septuagesima Sunday in Kinkora, Ontario

Here are some photos from Saint Patrick Catholic Church in Kinkora, Ontario, Canada. The priest is Father Paul Nicholson, a diocesan priest for the London diocese.


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Thanks to Mr. Carl Vanderwouden for providing these wonderful photographs.

Bishop Fellay's recent comments on the talks

Rorate Caeli reports on recent comments made by Bishop Fellay regarding the Vatican/SSPX talks, here.

And, therefore, even if we face a difficult and contradictory reality, we know that events are in God's hands, He who has the means to put things in order. It would be proper to recall that to talk and to debate is necessary, but it is not enough: when one talks about saving souls, when one considers how God rescued the Church from other crises it faced through the centuries, we see that holiness is that with which He renews and heals the Church.

There is more at DICI (English), here.

For us, we must really see this opportunity for the discussions with Rome as truly a disposition of Divine Providence, as truly an amazing grace to be able to present to the highest authorities in the Church what that Church has always said and which, thanks be to God, we have kept; thus, to make it resound at the very top of the Church. To bear witness to the Faith is a great grace. And even at Rome, a certain number [of prelates] are expecting from these discussions—and it’s a direct quote— “very much good for the Church"...

...We cannot say that the pope has only to do this or that. It is every member of the Church who must, once again, at his place, according to his powers, according to the grace of the good Lord, do everything he can for the Church’s restoration. Everybody must contribute his efforts—everybody. So let us make this effort precisely by our prayers, by our sacrifices, by all the means that truly give life to the Church. The means that the good Lord commonly uses to restore and uplift the Church is called holiness.

Bishop Fellay's remarks are solid. They may be sobering for some, especially those who would like to see the SSPX simply bow down to liberal and neo-conservative conceptions of the post-Vatican II Church. However, if the truth is spoken, then there is nothing to fear, there is nothing to compromise.

TradNews Roundup

*More details at Rorate Coeli about the CDF/SSPX talks.

*After man-made climate change, the biggest hoax of our young century is economic recovery.

*Ethically and doctrinally Nancy Pelosi has more in common with an an atheistic burlesque dancer than a Catholic, but, at least, she drinks like one.

*The inspiring Fr. Jenkins of Notre Dame University has left an indelible cultural mark on our society.

*US immigration judge rules that Germany's persecution of a homeschooling family violated basic human rights. As a result, German homeschooling family is granted political asylum in the United States.

*Widespread support for Scott Brown by pro-life voters may cause no pro-life candidates for POTUS in 2012.

*British "Catholic" politician commands that the Vatican submit to EU law. The liberal notion of separation of Church and State works in only one direction. Incredibly, non-Catholics in England have more respect for the Catholic pope.

*Pope to British Bishops: dissent is not mature debate.

*It's not so much an outright policy position of the CCHD. It's the company they keep.

*New study highlights the crisis in "Catholic" higher education.

*Cardinal Castrillon Hoyos to offer the Traditional Latin Mass at the high altar in the National Shrine of the Immaculate Conception in Washington, D.C.

*Anti-Catholic rhetoric continues from President Barack Obama’s Advisory Council on Faith-Based and Neighborhood Partnerships. Meanwhile, Obama strives to staff White House with other anti-Catholics.