Saturday, November 30, 2013

Jack Shaugnessey, RIP


A good and generous faithful Boston Catholic and lover of our Beloved and His Church has finished the race.

He will be sorely missed.

There is little doubt that on this day, the angels will be leading him into Paradise.

Pray for us Jack!

HereticThomas Groome on Celibacy



It's hard to fathom the negligence of the Catholic Bishops who permit Thomas Groome to remain Chair of Religious Education at Boston College.

Spiritually, as a father charged with the vocation of educating Catholics so they have the tools to make choices for the rest of their lives, leaving Thomas Groome in place is more insidious than leaving a pedophile in place for decades.

I would love to get on board Pope Francis idea of 'decentralizing' authority over these matters to local bishops, but the writing is on the wall. They don't have the backbone to do their jobs, even if it means generations of Catholics will be misled into spiritual folly, possibly costing them their salvation.

Here's Groome pontificating about how dangerous and hazardous he was when he was forced to be celibate.

What does that even mean?

Did he have thoughts about raping children because he didn't have a handy repository?

It is disturbing. In so many ways.

This man has in the public square for decades making it painfully obvious that he is misguiding the souls of Catholic children.

What is he doing as Chair of Religious Education at Boston College?

There is no excuse for this.







Priest resigns in Ireland over abortions at Catholic Hospitals



It only takes a few.

The few have always been enough.

Let's always remember, this started with twelve of us. LOL.

Cardinal O'Malley Fracturing the Latin Rite Community?

Boston Catholic Insider has an eloquent recitation of facts on another "pastoral" kick in the pants to faithful Catholic families who have escaped the madness and sought refuge in our Latin Rite.

I had to calm down before I wrote about it.

I wouldn't say my disgust has been tempered but this is as calm as I'm going to get about this subject matter.

When you read the story, pay close attention to how Fr. Higgins was treated by the Cardinal's...I was about to say henchmen... but executioners is a better word for it.

This is a parish with a unique character,just like the parishes the Cardinal has built around the nationality of a particular community. The Cardinal takes great pains to preserve the inculturation of parish communities--except when it comes to whitey fleeing from the heresy and sophomoric antics in the Sacred Liturgy in suburbia.

Imagine a pastor pleading to retain the culture of Cape Verdian community intact being treated this way?

The Cardinal would be too afraid the thoughtless dissolution and crude treatment would be exposed in the Boston Globe as bigotry.

Cardinal O'Malley's treatment of TLM community has been a consistent pattern of obfuscation and fracturing.

Clapping fornication liturgies are in vogue in his administration. Those reminding him of the ramifications to souls - taking their families and fleeing from it are not in good favor.

I think I've finally figured out why.

TLM community are completely focused on being pleasing to God and not the wizards in a Chancery. The wizards are not accustomed to being snubbed, even for God. They don't like it.

They have the pins for people who make judgment calls that inform consciences what's being doesn't rise to the level of the worthiness of God.

It then becomes obvious and public that their fruit has been tested and found an unworthy offering to the Divinity of God.

To boost self-esteem, they rob God of the comfort of His elect.

Might want to check the Laws from Moses. I think there is a Commandment about that.

Get over yourselves and leave these people intact with their pastor.

Pope Francis Apostolic Exhortation


Reading media reports about what Pope Francis said has become quite entertaining. Almost as entertaining as the hysteria that follows the media reports.

Here's what I read on the exhortation in a nutshell:


  • Pope Francis said a free society of hard working successful people who employ and give money to the poor leaves the poor empty handed.
  • Unfaithful and uncatechized women should be helping the Pope, bishops and priests formulate doctrine.
  • Pope Francis is a pure Marxist



Here's an excellent analysis of The Joy of the Gospel.

Unfettered consumerism is good food for thought, especially during Christmas.

I've been struggling with purchasing Christmas gifts this year. The hype and exploitation of merchants who want us to spend money in their stores but won't say Merry Christmas to us has been bothering me for a long time. Each year I cut back. This year, with more merchants opening on Thanksgiving forcing employees to lose their family time on this precious day and the "Black Friday" insanity really has me wanting to cut it completely out and just celebrate it as the religious holiday it is.

That all being said, writings about pooling resources that can be taken out of context to imply we should move towards communism, at this time in history, is a dangerous practice.

It's probably also a good practice for us to wait until rational folks correctly interpret what Pope Francis says and does. Fr. Z has it going on. Before jumping off of the cliff, tune in.





Sunday, November 24, 2013

Absolutely Magnificent



Pope Francis holding relics of St. Peter.

Credo.

The greatest of these is love.



It is not what happens to you in life, it's what you do with it.

Christians martyred in the streets of England.



A sordid tale, but a victim of an 'honor killing' in the streets of England where they are feeding the sharks with bigotry against Christians.

Another Course Correction

"..it strikes me that Pope Francis is making some course corrections" ~ Fr. Z

Since the 450th anniversary of the day on which the Council of Trent drew to its favorable end, it is fitting that the Church recall with readier and more attentive eagerness the most rich doctrine which came out of that Council held in the Tyrol. It is certainly not without good reason that the Church has for a long time given such great care to that Council’s decrees and canons which are to be recalled and heeded, seeing that, since extremely grave matters and questions sprang up in that period, the Council Fathers employed all their diligence so that the Catholic faith should come into clearer view and be better understood. Without a doubt as the Holy Spirit inspired and prompted them, it was the Fathers’ greatest concern not only that the sacred deposit of Christian doctrine be defended, but also that mankind be more brightly illuminated, in order that the saving work of the Lord could be diffused throughout the entire globe and the Gospel be spread through the whole world.

Harking closely to the same Spirit, Holy Church in this age renews and meditates on the most abundant doctrine of the Council of Trent. In fact, the “hermeneutic of renewal” [interpretatio renovationis] which Our Predecessor Benedict XVI explained in 2005 before the Roman Curia, refers in no way less to the Council of Trent than to the Vatican Council. To be sure, this mode of interpretation places under a brighter light a beautiful characteristic of the Church which is taught by the Lord Himself: “She is a ‘subject’ which increases in time and develops, yet always remaining the same, the one subject of the journeying People of God”


That's the way it strikes me too.

I continue to pray that separated souls continue to be drawn to his shining example of love.

Relics of St. Peter Venerated at the Vatican


Today, and for the first time.

I don't get the feeling this is random.

O glorious Saint Peter, who, in return for thy strong and generous faith, thy profound and sincere humility, and they burning love, wast rewarded by Jesus Christ with singular privileges, and, in particular, with the leadership of the other Apostles and the primacy of the whole Church, of which thou wast made the foundation stone, do thou obtain for us the grace of a lively faith, that shall not fear to profess itself openly, in its entirety and in all of its manifestations, even to the shedding of blood, if occasion should demand it, and to sacrifice of life itself rather than surrender. Obtain for us likewise, a sincere loyalty to our holy mother, the Church; grant that we may ever remain most closely and sincerely united to the Roman Pontiff, who is the heir of thy faith and of thy authority, the one, true, visible Head of the Catholic Church, that mystic ark outside of which there is no salvation. Grant, moreover, that we may follow, in all humility and meekness, her teaching and her advice, and may be obedient to all her precepts, in order to be able here on earth to enjoy a peace that is sure and undisturbed, and to attain one day in heaven to everlasting happiness. Amen

Seven Thousand To Attend Eucharistic Procession



More of this please.

Everywhere and often.

Saturday, November 23, 2013

Interesting Article on Removal of Scalfari Interview

"It was removed," Fr. Lombardi explained, "to clarify the nature of that text. There were some misunderstandings and disagreements about its value."


You said it brother.

Speaking to Marchetto:

You have demonstrated this love [of the Church] in many ways, including by correcting an error or imprecision on my part - and for this I thank you from my heart - but above all it has been manifested in all its purity in your studies of Vatican Council II. I have said this to you once, dear Archbishop Marchetto, and I want to repeat it today, that I consider you the best hermeneut of the Vatican Council II."

Sandro points out another troubling citation from the interview that are worthy of noting:

But if one rereads the succinct passage that Francis dedicates to Vatican II in the interview with "La Civiltà Cattolica," one gets a different impression. "Yes, there are hermeneutical lines of continuity and of discontinuity," the pope concedes. "Nonetheless," he adds, "one thing is clear”: Vatican II was "a service to the people" consisting in "a reinterpretation of the Gospel in the light of contemporary culture."

Again, the Pope's vocabulary and syntax leaves one to conclude that the Pope thinks that the Church's service to the people is to reinterpret the Gospel to adopt the tenets of the culture of sin and death to create the homey feeling of affirming their transgressions against God.

But this is not how a family works. The role of the father (and mother) gives their children the tools to discern the difference between right actions and wrong actions, when to feel remorse over their actions and when to be pleased.

When a parent or a priest or a bishop or a Pope reinterprets the Gospel to train their children to be pleased or take pride in their sinful nature - they subvert sanctifying grace by reprogramming the intellect to conflate right actions from wrong actions. Depending upon the genetics, IQ, maturity, formation of emotions - the consequences of that training can be spiritually and physically lethal to themselves and others.

This is not the mission of the Church. Those who carry out this 'service' are doing the work of the father of lies.

Consequently, when we hear the Pope choosing syntax and words from the Woodstock generation thesaurus, we raise concern because we are experiencing the consequences of this exact distortion of the mission of the Church. We have requested relief from this distortion for 50 years. We've had enough of it. His job is to teach, sanctify and govern the Church in accordance with Her mission and to remove and obstruct the work of the devil.

My guess is that he was trying to say, sometimes the culture has such a grip on the intellects of the masses that one must reduce teaching to pablum. Christ often reduced something to a ditty, hoping to get His point across to some lost soul. The Apostles were dumbfounded and expressed their frustration and confusion. Christ told them that in some situations, the people are incapable of processing a teaching.

The drugs and immorality of the 60s created such a culture and the dumbing down of Church teaching was a service to the people.

But the intentions of Vatican II have been perverted. Those of us who somehow managed to survive intact are not going to feed at the trough. We are not bringing our children and grandchildren to feed at that trough. He best be getting a new thesaurus or the fractures of Christ's elite army will pick up the pace.

Leaving the Mystical Body of Christ is impossible for me. My instincts are exactly the opposite. The more It is bruised and battered, the closer I get. But I am not foolish enough to sit in the pews of a priest that is misleading the flock. When something is said that is inconsistent with Christ's Mystical Body, I have the duty to my children and grandchildren, my friends, family, people I love, to explain to them how and why they need to reject what is said and done. Even in the sad situation when a Pope says something that contradicts Church teaching - or it's public interpretation does.

I really love this Pope's love. I love his witness of Christ's love. I love his humility. His in and trospection.

We have a father who wants to lead and unify his family.

Please. The 60s are over and they're not coming back. The Romans have a lot wrong but their syntax, vocabulary and respect for what is Holy is right on the money. You are not a Jesuit. You are not simply the Bishop of Rome. You are now the Pope. Our traditions do are not yours to ridicule and abolish. You are the custodian of what belongs to the heirs of Christ. Preserve and evangelize our teachings. Do not add or subtract from them. At the end of your reign you hand them off to you successor. Tighten up the antics in the Liturgy. Your conduct should be consistent with standing in the Praetorium and Golgotha because you are. No beach balls and balloons in our Sanctuary. Bend your knee at Transubstantiation. Worthy is the Lamb.

This is what we're talking about!.





Thursday, November 21, 2013

Pope Francis. Kicking off his shoes update.


Very interesting developments over the last few weeks.

First, Pope Francis prayed the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass Ad Orientum.


I know. Fr. Z wasn't all that impressed. But there's a bit more.

This rocked.

I still cry when I see the pictures.

Love it.

And how about this homily on progressives.

Like!

Ductus Exemplo

And then there was the leaked letter on the old hippies who instituted the bologna school.

Then...the kooky interview came down. And, he reported he was afraid his interview would be misinterpreted.

He's on a roll!

But, this was my favorite and I'll tell you why in a minute.

And, he made clear the criticism from Catholics faithful to the Magisterium is important to him on more than one occasion

Why do I think this is so important?

First and foremost, he is living his vocation as a Father of our family and he is a witness to the dynamic that families communicate what is going awry to their father and mother - and when we've prayerfully discerned we have made a mistake, we make changes accordingly.

Sometimes, maybe even most times, we are unaware of our good faith creative attempts to tend to the needs of one person in the family, is backfiring in other ways. As a parent, I always encourage my children, my family, my friends, my colleagues, my neighbors -- to articulate these things to me.

The cult mentality of the Mark Sheas of this world are on notice. The Pope has let the air out of their balloons.

It is duly noted that over the course of the past few weeks, the homilies and off the cuff remarks of the Pope have not generated a farcical trajectory of our Magisterium.,
The Ship is just sailing peacefully on Its course and there is much love. Everywhere.

I know so many Catholics struggling with Church teaching who have been hurt and alienated by the mischaracterizations of our religion who love this Pope. It brings great joy when they tell me they like or are attracted to Pope Francis. I am still praying and watching how I can assist on their journey back to Christ's Church and Sacraments.

Always raise your voice in the public square when you know that somebody's foolishness is or will drag too many souls into the abyss.

People whose mission is the same as ours will always know exactly what we are doing and why, and will respond accordingly.



Back in the saddle!



What an annoying problem that was (hopefully in the past!)

In the meantime, I am working on a few projects. I'm going to be a grandmother!

I hope all of you are well.