Satan's War on the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass
Torch of the Faith
Note: Not an endorsement
Promoting Who?!!!
As the Canadian Vox Cantoris blog
has revealed, Francis has just appointed this sacrilegious
character to be the new auxiliary bishop of Merlo-Moreno in Argentina.
No true Catholic could view this picture of Mass - complete with vast
crumbling loaves, pottery vessels and wine glasses - without
experiencing deep interior distress and sorrow. It is above all else a
grave offence against the Most Blessed Sacrament. As such, and of course
less importantly, it also offends against the sensitivies of genuine
Catholics.
As Vox Cantoris also
demonstrates, this grave scandal is only intensified by the fact that
this sacrilegious priest has spoken in relativistic terms about the life
of human embryos and on the theme of homosexual pairings.
Far
from being promoted, this priest should be having his priestly
faculties suspended by his superiors. I say that for the good of the
Church, for the souls of those promoting him, for the priest's own soul
and for the salvation of the souls who will be forced to suffer his
leadership.
Although
shocked, I must say that I am not at all surprised to learn that Fr.
Oscar Eduardo Minarro has previously been put in charge of the
seminarians in his home diocese.
At
so many levels, this latest news gets to the very heart of the crisis
searing the Catholic Church. What we are witnessing is nothing short of
Satan's war on the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass.
The Warning of St. Alphonsus
The
great St. Alphonsus de Liguori famously warned: ''The devil has always
attempted, by means of heretics, to deprive the world of the Mass,
making them precursors of the Antichrist, who before anything else, will
try to abolish and will actually abolish the Holy Sacrifice of the
Mass, as a punishment for the sins of men, according to the prediction
of Daniel, 'And strength was given him against the continual sacrifice'
(Daniel 8:12).''
The War from Without
Some
years before finding Catholic Truth, our family spent about a year in
the mid-80's attending a ''free-evangelical church'' on Merseyside. The
self-appointed ''pastor'' was very anti-Catholic and frequently used his
weekly platform to rail against the ''ancient whore of Babylon'' and
the ''Antichrist in Rome!''
At
a certain point each week, he would put down his King James Bible and
raise up a bap of bread in one hand. In a bold and scoffing voice, he
would announce that this was only bread and that it would not change its
state. After reading the Last Supper narrative from one of the Gospels,
he would then tear off chunks from this bread and share them out with a
cup of Ribena.
He was right of course.
As
a self-appointed minister with no Catholic priesthood, that bap would
indeed remain a mere bread roll. Without Holy Orders or communion with
Christ's Church, he could only serve people with his own errant
interpretations of Scripture and nourish them with mere earthly food.
Looking back, it is amazing to think that such a strand of real Lutheran
Protestant bigotry had survived so intact into mid-1980's Britain.
Whilst most of the nation grooved into post-modernity to the musical
accompaniment of the Communards and Whitney Houston, here was this
little group bashing its tambourines to ''Let the Fire Fall'' and
babbling in strange tongues...
The
point is, this guy hated the Catholic Church, the Catholic priesthood
and the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass. From the amount of time he dedicated
to this theme, his hatred for the Catholic Church was clearly a
foundational aspect of his entire belief system. As such, he set up his
little ''church'' to reflect that hatred with a circle of chairs
gathered around his chair and a low, unadorned table, on which he stood
the King James Bible, a bap and a mug of fruit juice.
Oh, there was also a buzzing overhead-projector for the words to the praise and worship songs. Well, it was the 80's!
As a true follower of Luther's heresies, this chap waged his personal war against the Catholic Church from beyond its borders.
He was wrong, but he was honest.
That
''pastor'' was right about one thing though: he described Catholic
seminaries as ''cemeteries'' where young men go to die spiritually. When
he said that, I was a 15-year old Protestant. I never dreamed that I
would become a Catholic 6 years later; much less that I would go off to a
Catholic seminary 4 years after that. Neither could I have known what
trials awaited me there...
The War from Within
Far
more sinister than the weekly rantings of that pastor fellow was the
war on the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass that I encountered from within the Catholic Church a whole decade later at Ushaw Seminary.
From 1997-1999, this was the view from my bedroom window at Ushaw on the windswept moors to the west of Durham.
It
was consoling to look down at St. Joseph's chapel in the dead of night
and see the red Sanctuary Lamp; denoting the Real Presence as it
flickered through the stained glass window above the Tabernacle. That
faithful red sentinel acted like a beacon of hope in the midst of so
many of the spiritual storms that my friends and I weathered in that
dark place.
It
was especially consoling to look out at that crimson lantern when
groups of drunken and effeminate ''gin queens'' partied beyond my locked
door, in the early hours, night after night.
As I found out to my cost, complaining only made matters worse...
O Sacrament Most Holy, O Sacrament Divine, All Praise and All Thanksgiving Be Every Moment Thine!
A far more serious cause of sleepless nights in that place though, was the manner in which the Blessed Sacrament was treated.
Upon
arriving at the seminary, I had been greatly shocked to hear students
disparaging Eucharistic Adoration as ''bread worship''. I had also been
greatly troubled to learn that we were not allowed to kneel at Holy
Mass, even for the Consecration and Elevations.
I felt like I'd left the world of 90's Britain for the grim times of Nazi or Soviet oppression.
A
theologically orthodox priest told me not to rock the boat if I wanted
to get ordained. It became an annoying pattern in those days to hear
solid priests telling me to ''keep my head down and get ordained''.
I
remember thinking that I'd either end up with no faith at all, or else
as a totally compromised priest, if I were required to keep my mouth
shut about everything bad that was happening to Jesus, to Catholic
doctrine and to good vocations in that grim place.
Anyway,
that priest recommended that instead of kneeling, I should make a
profound bow towards the altar at the key moments in the Mass. I was not
happy, but there was no other help forthcoming from anywhere else and I
could see no other way to reach ordination.
So much for ''religious liberty'' eh!
Soon
after beginning this practice of bowing, a lady on the staff pulled me
to one side in the cloister. She made a deep bow towards me and said,
''Ah yes, you are the one who did this!'' As she stood back upright, she
narrowed her eyes at me, as if to say, ''I'm on to you young man!''
The
next problem concerned the hosts used for Mass. Although not on the
scale as that pictured above in Argentina, the breads used were also
large, crumbling and powdered. They were circular with triangular
segments marked off for ''fractioning'' prior to distribution. Every
single day, large particles scattered far and wide from these breads.
The hurried ''fractioning'' process carried out by priests and deacons
only made this worse.
Holy Communion was administered standing and in the hand only.
One had to develop a way to surreptitiously consume all the powdery fragments that came away in the palm of the hand.
This
was because some members of staff kept a close scrutiny on students to
see if they checked or licked their hands after Communion to consume all
of the fragments of the Blessed Sacrament. Those caught doing so could
expect to receive accusations of ''scrupulosity'' on their end-of-term
reports.
One
morning, a priest stacked about four crumbling triangles of this bread
onto my palm as I was the last in the line that day. I never made the
mistake of being last in line again...
During
the first days at the seminary, each new student was allocated to a
small team and told to join them for a ''group Mass'' every Monday
evening. Again, I was aghast to discover the nature of these Masses: the
priests wore lay clothes with no vestments at all and used a low and
unadorned coffee table as the ''altar'', the deacon and students would
lounge on bean bags or even lie giggling like schoolgirls across the
floor during Mass, students would ''share personal reflections'' or
''bring along something that helps them to pray'' after the Gospel, and
the paten of hosts was passed around for each person to help themselves
and do their own elevation prior to reception...
We
even had one priest in our group who replaced the words, ''Lord, we are
not worthy to receive you'', with the phrase ''Sisters and brothers...
you are worthy to receive!''
By
the way, that whole ''sisters'' thing referred not only to the female
lay students, who may be reclining on the beanbags among the
seminarians, but to the occasional presence of women who were training
to be Anglican vicars at the nearby Cranmer Hall!
As in the burned heretic, Thomas Cranmer...
Due
to the ''pass the paten'' procedure prior to the elevation, one had to
be careful not to sit next to any of these Protestant lasses, so as to
avoid being required to offer them Holy Communion...
To
have refused to offer them Communion, or even to have complained of the
danger of them trying to receive, would have been one of the fastest
tracks right out of the seminary door. Choosing to miss the weekly
''group Mass'' would also have quickly become a damaging ''formation
issue''.
Check-mate.
During
those Masses I always knelt for the Consecration regardless of the
consequences. Send me home if you like Jim but, whilst I could just
about square bowing toward the altar, lying back on a beanbag was just
not on!
Eventually,
I was made a sacristan and then head sacristan the following year. This
was a brutal crucifixion which included untold difficulties when I
discovered that particles of the powdery Blessed Sacrament were
literally everywhere.
During
that time, I asked the priest in charge of liturgy several times to
change to the regular white hosts used by the Universal Church in order
to avoid the grave problem of large crumbling fragments. He was not
interested because he said I was being ''too scrupulous'' and claimed
that the ''bread used at Mass must look like 'real food' since Vatican
II''.
I
could write a book about the problems that I experienced in that
sacristy. Basically, I experienced many months of bullying and mockery
for trying to gather up the myriad of crumbs of the Blessed Sacrament
after each Holy Mass.
Two
incidents will have to suffice as illustrations in the limited space
here: A non-Consecrated altar bread was once mopped around a paten
containing Consecrated crumbs of the Blessed Sacrament by an aggressive
seminarian who then thrust the results in my face with the snarled
words, ''Get eating!'' Another time a priest on the staff discovered me
and my late friend Fr. Mike Williams checking a corporal cloth for
crumbs in the sacristy after an evening Mass. He came up and scoffed,
''Are you checking for crumbs there? What are you going to do when you
find them? Take them up to your room and worship them?''
Although
it is 17 years since I left Ushaw, I have experienced periods of
intense interior anguish every single day since then, with regards to
the treatment of the Blessed Sacrament in that place.
I
had finally crashed and burned when we were forced to attend a silent
retreat led by liberal priests and nuns. One priest sneered when he
consecrated the Blessed Sacrament, throwing down the Host and crashing
down the Chalice with a sneer each time during his Mass. This fellow,
dressed in lay clothes and without any genuflection, also similarly
crashed down a Monstrance containing the Blessed Sacrament when he was
asked by some of the lads to let us have Adoration during the
''retreat''. Something broke inside me during that guy's Mass and,
although I lasted at Ushaw another 6 months, that was the point at which
I know that I lost my vocation and began to suffer terribly in the
mind. These are very painful things for me to write here, things I have
only shared with my dear wife, family, close friends and spiritual
directors, but I now think the urgency of the times demand it.
Several
years ago, Ushaw College closed its doors as a seminary due to an
unsurprising lack of vocations. I've written elsewhere about orthodox
students being persecuted for their orthodoxy in classes and so-called
spiritual direction sessions; as well as others who were prevented from
even joining the seminary by dissenting liberals who grilled them on
their selection weekends for admitting to their belief in the
hierarchical nature of the Church, expressing their pro-life views or
acknowledging their acceptance of Humanae Vitae.
The
above picture of a Traditional Latin Mass being offered in one of the
small chapels at Ushaw was taken during a Latin Mass training weekend of
the Latin Mass Society, in the year that Ushaw ceased to be a
seminary. Such beautiful events would never have been allowed to happen
when I was there as a seminarian. Indeed, these very chapels used to be
used as store rooms for music stands, mops and buckets. I know, because I
often used to pray silently in them after Mass on Sundays.
Whilst
Masses were regularly offered on coffee tables in bedrooms, lounges and
even in the bar, these splendid chapels stood empty for years.
One
of my good friends was described as being ''dangerous'' by a leftist
nun, when he suggested in her presence that Holy Mass should be offered
on one of these altars instead of on a circular coffee table in a
lounge.
''Animators of Lay Leadership''
In
my first term at Ushaw, the priest-leader came in to our classroom one
day and demanded to know our views about having a ''Mass-free ecumenical
day'' to ''celebrate the Millennium''. Realizing the danger to our
vocations if we crossed swords with him, most of the class remained
silent. He then demanded a response from each of us. One student
attempted to give an academic response, by speaking hypothetically in
the third party. This priest then countered that he was not interested
in such academic opinions, but in how his suggestion made us feel emotionally.
When
we had all had to answer, mainly in defence of the Mass, this
priest-leader gave us an angry lecture about ''sectarianism''. He said
that in ''true ecumenism'' we do not just go off and do our own ''little
Catholic bit''.
He was speaking about the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass...
The
following weekend, this priest used his homily at the main college
Sunday Mass to berate our year group in front of the whole college body
for supposedly holding ''sectarian views''.
We
had given up our whole lives, with good friends, careers and financial
security, for the Holy Mass and here we were being persecuted for that
love by those who were supposed to be forming us to offer the Mass!
In
such an environment, orthodox lads quickly learned to keep their heads
down. In fact, they were told to do so by everyone from orthodox
priests, to prayerful nuns and on to their own friends and families.
This
''keeping your head down'' business has allowed the evil in the Church
to flourish for at least five decades now. It has got to stop.
Even
after several years in the place, vocations could be thwarted at the
very last minute. I know a good lad whose ordination was delayed
6-months just because he wore clerical dress on Sundays and to visit the
sick!
A
few months before diaconate ordination, students could suddenly be
required to join engaged couples on a pre-marriage course, wherein
leaders were speaking against the Church's teachings on contraception.
Other
times, just weeks before priestly ordination, they may be required to
attend a Mass where a priest would share the altar with a woman vicar
''saying'' her eucharist prayers alongside him in a kind of mock
concelebration. In both these cases the student would face a grave moral
dilemma - stand up for the Faith or lose their chance to be ordained
after so many years. This all ties in to my recent article referencing
Hilary White's comments about a purge making it impossible for
seminarians to get ordained unless they compromise with the desecration
of the Holy Eucharist...
You
never knew what was going to happen to you next. I was on two separate
occasions made to consume literally dozens of Consecrated Hosts in the
Sacristy. These experiences have caused me immense psychological trauma
for many years.
The
above-mentioned priest-leader who so publicly scolded us for upholding
the celebration of Mass for the Millennium also took us for a course of
study on Pastores Dabo Vobis, the apostolic exhortation on priestly formation.
Unfortunately,
the content of his course did not include much of the actual content of
the document! Instead, we were told that our future job as priests
would be to act as ''animators'' working to ''empower the laity'' in
taking over the leadership and decision-making in the Church. He
suggested that the hierarchical ''model'' of the Church was to be
replaced by one of lay leadership at the local level.
Again,
I've written elsewhere how various priests and laity, who were
back-then helping to create a vocations shortage, have since gone on to
take on leadership roles in dioceses where they now work to bring on lay
leadership in parishes, due to the supposed lack of priests! Archbishop
Elden F. Curtiss of Omaha, Nebraska, was not wrong when he suggested
that the ''vocations crisis'' was engineered by dissenting liberals...
In
our own area, as in so many others in the devasted vineyard of
post-Conciliar Catholicism, there are many parishes with aging leftist
lay women running things and pushing on with their lay-led ''model of
church''. And this goes on even as parishes continue to shrink and
close.
''Facilitators at the Eucharistic Assembly Meal''
St.
Robert Bellarmine once said: ''When we enter ornate and clean
Basilicas, adorned with crosses, sacred images, altars and burning
lamps, we most easily conceive devotion. But on the other hand, when we
enter the temples of the heretics, where there is nothing except for a
chair for preaching and a table for making a meal, we feel ourselves to
be entering a profane hall and not the House of God.''
The good saint could have been describing that Protestant pastor in 80's Merseyside!
I see that the above picture was taken during the above-mentioned training weekend of the Latin Mass Society at
Ushaw College in 2011. The image shows the majestic High Altar in St.
Cuthbert's chapel being used for the celebration of the Traditional
Latin Mass, as it was originally intended, after years of standing
unloved and neglected.
When
I was at Ushaw, this sanctuary area was actually ''fenced off'' by
ornate black and gold metalwork. On those occasions when there were
sufficient visitors to permit Holy Mass in St. Cuthbert's chapel, the
''fenced-off'' High Altar was never used. In fact priests walked past
the grand Tabernacle without even a single genuflection. Instead, Mass
was celebrated on a low table-style altar standing on the un-raised
chapel floor between the collegiate seating area in the main body of the
church.
More often, the Mass was offered in the small St. Joseph's chapel or on the coffee tables I have described above.
Conclusion
In
all that has been written here, I have tried to convey the reality of a
dynamic that was working to force out students who held that the Holy
Sacrifice of the Mass was just that.
Students
who tried to live from the traditional conception of the Church, the
Holy Mass, the priesthood and Catholic moral teaching, experienced
bullying, mockery, psychological pressure and ultimate exclusion.
On
the other hand, those who viewed the Church as a kind of social-working
NGO, the priesthood as a vehicle for therapeutic counselling and the
Mass as a community meal facilitated by their entertainment skills, were
generally given encouragement towards ordination.
Certainly,
lads who enjoyed lying on a beanbag for Mass, because ''it felt like
the Last Supper with Jesus and His friends'', would have little problem
with the new order of irreverence.
How
ironic that the Lutheran ''free-church'' pastor on Merseyside thought
seminarians became spiritually dead because of their love for the Mass!
How scary that the theology of those leading the seminary seemed closer to his understanding than to that of Catholic Truth.
Indeed,
I would say that he was actually closer to Catholic Truth than them
because he at least believed that Christ was our Divine Saviour, Who
died to save us from our sins. With some of the staff and students, I am
not so sure that they even believed this.
In
all that has been said here, who can fail to discern the horrid words
of the excommunicated heretic Martin Luther echoing down to our times,
''Take away the Mass, destroy the Church''?
Pope
Francis has just appointed the publicly sacrilegious priest Fr. Oscar
Eduardo Minarro to the episcopate. In a few weeks Francis will travel to
Lund to actually celebrate that same excommunicated heretic Martin
Luther.
What we are witnessing seems to be nothing less than the latter stages of Satan's war on the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass.
The most grave warnings of St. Pope Pius X a century ago are now upon us!
St.
Padre Pio, that great priest whose whole existence was mystically
transfigured by the Holy Sacrifice of Calvary, once said that it would
be easier for the world to survive without the sun than to survive
without the Holy Mass.
May he help us to remain with Jesus, Our Lady, the True Faith and the most august Sacrifice of the Mass in the days ahead.
It's worth checking the last book in the Bible - we know that God wins in the end!
Declaration of Fidelity - Please Sign Urgently!
Torch of The Faith News on Tuesday 27 September 2016 - 07:32:47 | by admin
You remember when some 879,451 Catholics from all around the world signed the Filial Appeal to His Holiness Pope Francis on the Future of the Family, asking him to do the papal thing and defend the sacred Deposit of Faith in the area of marriage and family?
Yes,
that's right: the appeal which included in its number around 200
prelates, many priests and a long list of renowned Catholic dignitaries
from all across the globe.
And
you remember how Francis just ignored this vast appeal from the
faithful and went on to similarly ignore similar requests from around
500 British priests and 13 cardinals?
To say nothing of Sacred Scripture and 2,000 years of Sacred Tradition?
And how he just pressed right on with the revolutionary manipulations of Synods '14 and '15 anyway?
And how he next released the hugely problematic Amoris Laetitia?
Oh yes, and
how he then went on to ignore the subsequent requests for clarity from
Bishop Athanasius Schneider, from countless Catholics on-line, and then
from the 45 Catholic scholars, theologians and pastors who took the time
to write him a precisely constructed letter?
Well, now there is a fresh attempt to urgently get Francis' attention.
We strongly encourage all of our readers to please sign up as soon as possible and to spread the word about the Declaration of Fidelity to the Church's Unchangeable Teaching on Marriage and to Her Uninterrupted Discipline. (Please search for this on-line as our blog-page will still not permit working links!).
Even if Francis continues to ignore the real smell of the Catholic
sheep, at least you know that God will not ignore your best efforts to
defend the Faith from the errors which are so widespread today,
particularly after the Extraordinary and Ordinary Synods and the
publication of Amoris Laetitia.
Please sign and make a stand for Christ and 2,000 years of Sacred Scripture and Tradition.
Dies Domini - Keeping the Lord's Day Holy
Torch of The Faith News on Sunday 25 September 2016 - 09:57:25 | by admin
Going to Church Every Sunday
During
one of the early morning Masses at Domus Sanctae Marthae this week,
Pope Francis spoke about people who have the ''face of a saint, but
inside suffer from an osteoporosis of corruption... people who seem
perfect on the outside, going to Church every Sunday and making big
charitable donations.''
Whilst
this does highlight a potential danger for all Catholics, it is easy
enough to see how these words might be taken by sincere Catholics as yet
another of his negative depictions of their best efforts. Again, it is
not hard to see how these words could be used as grist for the mill of
the Church's enemies.
After
all, it is not as if we live in an age when the Sabbath is so honoured
in the wider culture that its upkeep could become merely conventional on
any large scale.
In
much of the Western hemisphere, the churches continue to empty out,
just as the art galleries, department stores and supermarkets continue
to fill up on the Sabbath.
The Bare Minimum
In
these secularized times, it is true that faithful Catholics might be
tempted to pridefully look down their noses at those who do not honour
the Sabbath. We must always remember our own dependence on grace; for by
the grace of God go we.
Perhaps
Pope Francis' words might provide him, and all of us too, with an
opportunity to reflect on the fact that the person who goes to Holy Mass
on a Sunday is not so much being perfect, as merely doing the bare minimum that is required by the Third Commandment of God's Holy Law.
The Catechism of the Catholic Church teaches:
''The Sunday Eucharist is the foundation and confirmation of all
Christian practice. For this reason the faithful are obliged to
participate in the Eucharist on the days of obligation, unless excused
for a serious reason (for example, illness, the care of infants) or
dispensed by their own pastor. Those who deliberately fail in this
obligation commit a grave sin.''
Going
to Sunday Mass is a bit like breathing: you go because you want to go,
but also because you have to go to stay alive spiritually. And that
aspect of having to go keeps one's love for God in the realm of the
objective, more than just in the emotions or the feelings.
In his book This is the Faith,
the great Canon Francis J. Ripley wrote of honouring the Sabbath: ''We
are to keep the Sunday holy by hearing Mass and resting from servile
works... One who merely goes to Mass and forgets about God for the rest
of the day can scarcely be said to keep the Sunday holy, although he may
avoid mortal sin. So it is that the Church urges all to attend the
other services which she provides for them, such as Rosary, Vespers,
Instruction, Benediction, and also to devote some time to pious or
religious reading or other exercises for the sanctification of the
soul.''
Of
course, in these post-modern times, one would be lucky to find such
extra services in many parishes today. In our Archdiocese, it would be
hard enough to find even a Sunday evening Mass in many parishes.
Some
years ago, we were on a coastal walk with a Catholic priest one Sunday
afternoon. Upon passing a local Catholic parish, I asked if we might
stop off there to say a prayer. I was rather taken aback when the
priest, seemingly surprised by my request, replied quickly that the
building would certainly be closed ''because it is Sunday!''
At
least the Traditional communities who offer only the Traditional Latin
Mass also continue to offer liturgies like Sunday Vespers to the laity
in their surrounding areas.
Building a ''Culture'' of Sunday
It
is essential that Catholics develop a ''culture'' of Sunday in their
families through Holy Mass, Rosary, spiritual reading, a family meal,
shared relaxation and the visiting of relatives, or of other orthodox
Catholics.
We
also think that the setting aside of ''Sunday-best'' clothes for
attendance at Church is an important aspect which helps to mark Sunday
as a special day for the glory of the Lord.
A
Post-Modern Scene: Without the holiness of Sunday at the heart of the
week, and without the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass at the heart of the
Sabbath, the Church is eclipsed and the wider culture begins to reflect
the ensuing emptiness.
The Apostolic Letter Dies Domini - Keeping the Lord's Day Holy reminds
us: ''Since Sunday is the weekly Easter, recalling and making present
the day upon which Christ rose from the dead, it is also the day which
reveals the meaning of time. It has nothing in common with the cosmic
cycles according to which natural religion and human culture tend to
impose a structure on time, succumbing perhaps to the myth of eternal
return. The Christian Sunday is wholly other! Springing from the
Resurrection, it cuts through human time, the months, the years, the
centuries, like a directional arrow which points them towards their
target: Christ's Second Coming. Sunday foreshadows the last day, the day
of the Parousia, which in a way is already anticipated by Christ's glory in the event of the Resurrection...
...
In fact, everything that will happen until the end of the world will be
no more than an extension and unfolding of what happened on the day
when the battered body of the Crucified Lord was raised by the power of
the Holy Spirit and became in turn the wellspring of the Spirit for all
humanity. Christians know that there is no need to wait for another time
of salvation, since, however long the world may last, they are already
living in the last times. Not only the Church, but the cosmos
itself and history are ceaselessly ruled and governed by the glorified
Christ. It is this life-force which propels Creation, ''groaning in
birth-pangs until now'' (Rom 8:22), towards the goal of its full
redemption. Mankind can have only a faint intuition of this process, but
Christians have the key and the certainty. Keeping Sunday holy is the
important witness which they are called to bear, so that every stage of
human history will be upheld by hope.''
Each
of us needs the graces of Sunday in order to live, move and have our
being in Christ. May God give us the grace to always Keep the Lord's Day
Holy!
Even if I'm murdered for it, I think I have to speak up - Another fruit of the New Mercy
Torch of The Faith News on Friday 23 September 2016 - 07:25:30 | by admin
We've now had a chance to view parts of the articulate interview which Dr. Josef Seifert has given to Gloria.TV.
The
eminent Austrian professor will be known to many readers as a close
friend of St. Pope John Paul II and a Catholic thinker whose
philosophical work has been greatly influenced by the life and writings
of Dietrich Von Hildebrand.
Various websites like LifeSiteNews have
already provided helpful summaries of the interview, in which Dr.
Seifert explains his recent letter to Pope Francis. That letter is
particularly courageous because Dr. Seifert calls upon Pope Francis to
not only clarify the ''objectively heretical'' statements in Amoris Laetitia, but even to revoke them.
Dr. Seifert insists that this is necessary to avoid the danger of schism, heresy and ''the complete split in the Church.''
Whilst
others have perhaps not yet spoken with such force, Seifert notes that
several thinkers - like Bishop Athanasius Schneider, Pope Benedict XVI's
friend Prof. Robert Spaemann and the Catholic University of America's
Dr. Jude P. Dougherty - have also raised serious concerns relating to
the problematic aspects of Amoris Laetitia.
We
highly recommend that readers take some time to watch the on-line video
coverage of Dr. Seifert's calm and precisely worded commentary during
his interview with Gloria.TV.
There is one point in particular that we wish to highlight.
Towards
the conclusion, Dr. Seifert reflects, albeit with a certain twinkle in
his eye, that he must speak out regardless of the danger to himself.
His
actual words are: ''Whatever happens to me... Even if I am murdered for
it, I think I have to speak up because one cannot remain silent if one
feels that important truths which are also very important for the
eternal salvation of the faithful are obscured... even in the
document.''
However
lightheartedly Dr. Seifert starts to say those words - and in
completing the sentence he does become somewhat more reflective - the
fact that he utters them at all is very suggestive.
At
the very least it reveals that a calm, rational and good humoured man
with such a wealth of experience senses that such a danger may perhaps
exist in the contemporary situation.
It
is not nothing when a renowned philosophy professor and friend of
former popes expresses a fear of being murdered for defending the Faith
in a letter to a reigning Pontiff!
Whether
Dr. Seifert's subjective fear is accurate or not, and where in
particular he locates the perceived source of that danger, it only adds
to the sense of an all-pervading culture of fear which is being felt by
orthodox cardinals, bishops, priests and lay people everywhere in these
times.
And that doesn't much seem like the fruit one would expect from a Year of Mercy to us.
Outnumbered and Outdated: 100 Sexual Revolutionaries Schooled by 500 Catholic Academics!
Torch of The Faith News on Thursday 22 September 2016 - 12:12:06 | by admin
(Fr.)
Johannes Nicolaas Maria Wijngaards will celebrate his 81st birthday
next week. As with big collars, lava lamps and glam rock, the arguments
in the rebellious Wijngaards Statement are just so 1970's.
Antichrists in the Academy
Bl.
Cardinal John Henry Newman once reflected: ''It is a miserable time
when a man's Catholic profession is no voucher for his orthodoxy, and
when a teacher of religion may be within the Church's pale, yet external
to her truth.''
This quote came to mind when I heard that the infamous Wijngaards Institute was
launching another - one hesitates to say ''fresh'' - attack on Catholic
moral teaching. What makes this latest attack particularly troubling is
that it is being done with the support of three powerful United Nations agencies.
Signed by around 100 dissenting ''theologians'' and other non-Catholics (see what I did there!), the release of the Wijngaards Statement is sponsored by the influential and cash-rich UN Population Fund, UN Women and UN Aids.
Welcome to the New World Order folks!
Worse still, the document calls for ''new'' teachings in the Church to be developed democratically by a team of ''experts''.
Perhaps
it should come as no surprise that this proposal for such ''experts''
includes a related call for the Church to change its teachings on
contraception, masturbation, homosexual relationships and IVF.
Diabolical Disorientation
Our Lady of Fatima warned that most souls go to Hell because of the sins of the flesh. The signatories to the Wijngaards Statement need to be reminded of this grave warning. Urgently!
Clearly,
the teachings of Our Lord Jesus Christ, two millennia of Magisterial
authority, the natural moral law and the warnings of Our Lady of Fatima
mean little to this self-appointed team of ''experts''.
The
hubris which makes grown adults think they can convince faithful
Catholics to abandon Christ and the successors of His Apostles for a
''democratic team of experts'' can only be understood in relation to the
problems of pride, sin and spiritual warfare. You might also want to
factor in globalization and high-finance to that equation.
One of the characteristics of the Wijngaards Statement is that it claims to be rooted in reasoned scholarship.
Aside
from the fact that it actually ignores about four decades' worth of
serious scholarship - work that has developed a logically and
theologically consistent defence of the Church's traditional ethical and
moral teachings - the statement itself can be critiqued as a clear
example of the misuse of human reason.
This
is evidenced right from the outset by the fact that it rejects both the
natural moral law and the Magisterial nature of traditional Church
teaching.
Let's consider this for a moment.
Any
orthodox Catholic should be able to tell you that the more one is
converted to God and the life of virtue through grace, then the further
one is able to live freely in, and for, the good, the beautiful and the
true.
Grace
builds on nature and, as nature is restored in Christ, the intellect
receives light, and the will is given strength to grow in holiness.
This is the difficult road to Heaven.
On
the other hand, the further one slides into the acceptance and practice
of sin, then the more one's intellect becomes darkened and the further
one's will is weakened.
As
one's spiritual state declines from venial sin into mortal sin, and
becomes habituated in that dark way of existing, then one's perceptions
of reality become gradually inverted. At a certain point, that which is
good, beautiful and true is no longer recognised as such. Instead that
which is bad, ugly and false becomes normative.
This is the easy slide to Hell.
Anyone
who is really honest with themselves and with God will be able to
recognise these contrasting patterns at work in their own life history.
This discussion of the darkening of the intellect through sin finds an illustrative echo in Joseph Pearce's discussion of Hamlet, in his book Through Shakespeare's Eyes - Seeing the Catholic Presence in the Plays.
During
an exploration of King Claudius' actions in Acts 3 and 4, Pearce
reflects: ''It is a common enough psychological twist to find that one
unwilling to repent begins to justify the sin by believing that it is in
fact not sinful. It is the switch from an uncomfortable objective
reality to a comfortable subjective substitute ''reality''. The King
will not live virtuously, so he makes a virtue out of his vice in an act
of self-justification. He has passed from what is to what seems to be.''
God
gave us the gift of human reason in order to find Him, accept His
revelation and go deeper into the truth. If we reject God and His
revelation, then our intellect becomes dark indeed.
And
so, we have the spectacle of many ''educated'' people using their
''learning'' to attack the very Church which has so often paid for them
to live and study in the first place. Instead of using their learning to
defend God's truth and moral laws, they use it to defend their own
rejection of that truth and morality.
It
is beyond sad that Fr. John Wijngaards ''resigned'' from his priestly
ministry in 1998, in order to protest against the Church's Magisterium
for the supposed cause of women's ordination.
He thus chose to support this theological impossibility rather than offer the most august Sacrifice of the Mass in persona Christi. And so, everyone lost out! Please God, he will have a change of heart during the remainder of his life.
500 Faithful Academics Affirm Traditional Moral Teachings
In light of all that has been expressed above, it was refreshing to read that the 100 signatories to the Wijngaards Statement were outnumbered by a ratio of 5:1, when 500 faithful Catholic academics signed a constrasting document entitled, Affirmation of the Catholic Church's Teaching on the Gift of Sexuality.
Game, Set and Match!
In addition to exposing the outdated theological and anthropological errors at the heart of the Wijngaards Statement,
the orthodox affirmation by the 500 faithful scholars concludes: ''We,
the undersigned Catholic scholars, hold that the Church's teaching on
contraception is true and defencible on the basis of Scripture and
reason. We hold that Catholic teaching respects the true dignity of the
human person and is conducive to happiness.''
A Few Good Men
It
was especially encouraging for us to spot a few names that we knew
among the list of signatories to the faithful affirmation of Church
teaching.
I've
already described here how I was taught at Steubenville, a decade ago,
by Dr. Scott Hahn and Dr. Michael G. Sirilla. It is great to see that
their names are on the list of those defending the true teachings of the
Church.
As
we've also said previously, Dr. Sirilla has already stuck his neck on
the line by being one of ''The 45'' who wrote the letter to Pope Francis
about Amoris Laetitia. May God bless him and his family for his fidelity.
Fr. Dan Pattee TOR
Among other familiar signatories to the Affirmation of the Church's Teaching on the Gift of Sexuality is Fr. Dan Pattee TOR.
Fr. Dan and I outside Steubenville's Christ the King Chapel on the day I graduated with an MA from Franciscan University of Steubenville in
June 2006. I had clearly been having a few too many of the ''Mrs.
Freshley's Honeybuns'' whilst studying for my final comprehensive
exams... Those splendid cinnamon buns are another of the great things I
miss about America!
I
studied St. Thomas Aquinas, St. Bonaventure, the Analogy of Being,
metaphysics and critiques of relativism in Fr. Dan's classes at Franciscan University of Steubenville.
As
I wrote in my end of year review in 2006, ''Fr. Dan is the best teacher
I have ever had. Period.'' Being immersed into the study of St. Thomas
and the Analogy of Being has been one of the most positively influential
experiences of my whole life. It was a key time of healing, ongoing
conversion and growth for my soul.
I
was blessed to meet up again with Fr. Dan during the 2009 Catechetical
Conference in Rome, when I was working for the Maryvale Institute.
Dr. Andrew Beards
When
I was at Ushaw Seminary in the late 1990's, there was a good and
orthodox layman on the daytime staff called Dr. Andrew Beards. Within
the general atmosphere of dissent, sacrilege and the persecution of
orthodox students that prevailed in those dark times, Dr. Beards stood
out as a friendly and sympathetic influence.
To
the orthodox students, he was known simply as ''Beardsie''. He would
often keep us going with his outstanding sense of humour, a word of
encouragement or a jokey note pushed under one's door. It was through
Andrew's influence and invitation that a group of us began to sneak off
on Saturday mornings to the Traditional Latin Mass offered by Fr.
Michael Brown in Newcastle.
Perhaps
Andrew's personality and support can best be summed up by the fact
that, even though he was a married layman and father, he was known to
the students as ''Beardsie... the best priest on the staff!''
I
was very blessed to work with Andrew, and to share the odd pint of
Guinness with him, at the Maryvale Institute in the Midlands several
years ago. With other good folks from there, he is now working at the
excellent School of the Annunciation in Devon as the Academic Director.
As
well as his reliance on grace, one of Andrew's greatest qualities is
his almost Chestertonian love for enemies. It is highly likely that, as
well as signing the affirmation of Church teaching, he will be quietly
praying his Rosary in the chapel for those who have so openly opposed
the Church's true teachings. As Jesus said of Nathanael in John 1:47:
''In him, there is no guile!''
Dr. Petroc Willey
I
first met Petroc around 2002, when I was working as a PR/Education
Officer for a national pro-life charity here in England. He came up to
Merseyside to do a talk for us on the Church's authentic teachings on
contraception.
I
took a huge chance by inviting along a group of women from the local
government who I knew were giving out condoms and so forth to kids in
local schools. I wanted them to hear the truth from someone of Petroc's
calibre. I also invited several religion teachers from ''Catholic''
schools who were very supportive of these women and of the concept of
them giving condoms out in their schools.
I wanted all of these people to have a chance to hear the truth explained calmly and clearly to them.
It
is a measure of Petroc's humility and his ability to articulate the
truth in love that everyone listened to what he had to say. It is also
telling that one of the dissenting teachers came up to me at the end of
the session and said that the style and content of Petroc's presentation
had made him question himself and the ideas he had held up to that day.
That teacher said that he was going to go away and do some serious thinking about his beliefs and approach. Please God, he did!
I
next met Petroc most unexpectedly in America in 2004. I had had to
resign from my pro-life job on conscience because, lamentably, the team
had begun to compromise on the matters of non-directive Rogerian
counselling, condoms, ''safe sex'' and other related issues.
Angie
and I had just arrived in Steubenville to commence my two years of
study there, when Petroc suddenly knocked at the door of our digs! We
did not know it until then, but he was a speaker at the annual
catechetical conference held on the university campus each summer. It
was nice for us to see such a friendly and familiar face when we were
some 4,000 miles from home on the other side of the Atlantic!
Petroc came into our lives again in 2009 when we were working for him at the Maryvale Institute in the British Midlands.
Due
to the unexpected twists and turns of life, Petroc is now himself
living and working at Steubenville as a Professor of Theology.
We give thanks to God that these good people, and all of the 500 souls who signed up to the Affirmation of the Church's Teaching on Human Sexuality, have made such a clear stance in defence of Christ's Truth.
With all the confusion arising from Amoris Laetitia, we pray that they will be given the grace to continue to defend the Faith so clearly and publicly in the times ahead.
Where are the Hierarchy?
As
with the courageous stand being made by Christopher Ferrara, Michael
Matt and John Vennari, this latest initiative has been a largely lay-led
phenomenon.
This
again highlights the strange and continuing silence from the hierarchy
in the face of the widespread subversion of the Church and her moral
teachings.
Being that the Wijngaards Statement has the financial and intellectual support of key UN agencies,
and given the growing awareness of George Soros' influence on Francis'
Vatican, it is to be hoped that the cardinals and bishops will find
their voices soon.
For all our sakes.
In the meantime, and awaiting such clarity from the hierarchy, the dissenters who signed up to the Wijngaards Statement's support
for masturbation, contraception, homosexual activity and IVF, need to
be reminded that they should not approach for Holy Communion until they
have sincerely repented, received sacramental absolution and publicly
recanted their support for these things.
They
need to do this urgently for the good of their immortal souls and to
prevent others from being led into confusion, error and sin.
Ember Days - Wednesday, Friday and Saturday
Torch of The Faith News on Wednesday 21 September 2016 - 05:35:33 | by admin
The September Ember Days by Abel Grimmer (1607).
Anyone
seeking to live more fully from the traditions of the Catholic Church
will want to know that today is Ember Wednesday in the traditional
calendar.
The
Ember days of September are the Wednesday, Friday and Saturday
following the feast of the Exaltation of the Cross. In 2016, that means
today and this coming Friday and Saturday.
Marking
the onset of autumn, these days were originally established to invoke
God's blessing on the harvest through the prayers and fasting of the
faithful. They recall the feast of Tabernacles established by Moses in
the 7th month of the Jewish year, which corresponds with September.
Although
these fasts are no longer binding on the faithful, it is a good and
pious practice to uphold them. The fasts traditionally applied only to
healthy adults between the ages of 21 - 59 who were not engaged in
labour intensive work. They restricted food to 2 small meals and 1
regular meal on these days. In other words: no outsize meals and no
snacking! Fridays, as ever, were meatless. If meat is taken on the
Wednesday or Saturday, this is consumed as part of the regular meal
only.
Our
copy of the Traditional Missal explains that some men were
traditionally ordained to the sacred priesthood on the Ember Saturdays.
On Ember Wednesday, the names of those due to be ordained were read
aloud to the people, so that they might make deposition against any that
they knew to be unworthy to receive Holy Orders.
The
Missal relates that the Church still requires the assistance of the
people - as it is in their interest - to preserve the sanctuary from
unworthy ministers. Hence the importance of fasting and prayers on this
day.
As
the problem of dissenting, heretical and otherwise unworthy ministers
is such a large-scale phenomenon today, the continuance of the practices
of fasting and prayer on these Ember Days is highly recommended.
Perhaps Mr. Kevin Jones said it best at the LMS Wrexham blog
yesterday: ''Unless one does a small amount of penance, Ember Days are
meaningless! Our Lord wants us to follow His example as He fasted in the
Desert before beginning His public life of 3 years. Christ said that
fasting was required to expel some demons. In our own time to combat
evil, always inspired by the devil, prayer and fasting seems like a good
strategy!''
We pray for many graces and blessings for the Church and for our readers during these Ember Days.
The Priority of Grace in the Christian Life
Torch of The Faith News on Monday 19 September 2016 - 11:03:41 | by admin
That
you might know that the Son of man hath power on earth to forgive sins,
Jesus said to the sick man, ''Arise, take up thy bed and go home!''
Grace and the Response to Grace
Yesterday's
readings for the XVIII Sunday After Pentecost in the Traditional Missal
contained a reassuring thread in relation to the Priority of Grace in
the Christian life.
Any
true catechesis worthy of the name will always begin with the mysteries
of God and His grace. It is only upon these solid foundations that the
priest or catechist can go on to call forth responses of acceptance,
belief and ongoing conversion in their hearers.
Even
then, the authentic teacher of the Faith must rely more on God's grace
than on their own abilities. Then they must leave the rest to God: if
they have rooted their teaching in Sacred Scripture and Tradition to the
best of their ability, and saturated the whole endeavour in prayer from
the heart, then they can take refuge in the powerful words of Isaiah
55:11: ''So shall my word be, which shall go forth from my mouth: it
shall not return to me void, but shall do whatsoever I please and shall
prosper in the things for which I sent it.''
Christ and Us - Keeping the Right Perspective
During
times of trial in one's own life, and of intense crisis in the Church
such as we are now experiencing to our chagrin, sincere Catholics can
sometimes be tempted to imagine that more depends on them as individuals
than is truly the case.
Whilst
we each have an important contribution to make, we must never
overestimate ourselves through pride. This kind of thing can frequently
lead to the loss of interior peace and of trust in God. It is important
to recognise this tendency and to know that Satan and his minions will
do all that they can to exacerbate it.
A
good cure for this tendency is to humbly recall the priority of God's
grace. One way to recall this is by remembering how each of us
originally came to know and love Christ and His Holy Church. We will
soon remember that it was all gift!
For,
if we are really honest with ourselves, we will recall that there was
really little that we did to deserve being blessed with the supreme
privilege of knowing Christ. Certainly, that is true in comparison with
what Christ has done for us. He gave more than we did in the exchange of
love!
Remembering
that He has already given us so much more than we ever deserved or
hoped for, should help us to trust that Jesus will not abandon us now.
In dark times like these for the Church, we do well to remember that the
Christian walk is more about Him than about us!
Some Examples
This all puts me in mind of a few further things.
Firstly,
I recall old Fr. Pat Walsh in the confessional at the Blessed Sacrament
Shrine during those long-ago days when I was completing undergraduate
studies in Liverpool. Even after all these years, I can still hear the
late father's Irish lilt reassuring me through the curtained
confessional grille: ''Sure, the very fact that you are kneelin' there
now shows that God's grace is workin' in your life; for it was Him that
prompted you to come here in the first place!''
Another
is the fact that my late Dad used to often utter that phrase about the
''privilege of knowing Christ''. It actually comes from St. Paul in
Philippians 3:8. The Douay-Rheims renders it as the ''excellent
knowledge of Jesus Christ my Lord''. When one stops to think just how
much of an excellent privilege this knowledge really is, especially in
such times as these when so few love God, then one can be moved to deep
gratitude and a renewal of trust. Our Lord would not have given us the
gift of the Faith if He were not Himself going to sustain us in it. We
must trust more to Him than to ourselves.
St.
Augustine of Hippo expressed the orthodox Catholic position thus:
''Indeed we also work, but we are only collaborating with God Who works,
for His mercy has gone before us. It has gone before us so that we may
be healed, and follows us so that once healed, we may be given life; it
goes before us so that we may be called, and follows us so that we may
be glorified; it goes before us so that we may live devoutly, and
follows us so that we may always live with God: for without Him we can
do nothing.''
The Church Bringing Us to Christ
This
came across particularly clearly in yesterday's Gospel - taken from St.
Matthew Chapter 9 - in the Traditional Latin Mass. This Gospel
proclaims the occasion when Jesus healed a man of palsy, in order to
demonstrate His power to both forgive and to heal.
Most of us were brought to Baptism as helpless babies.
In a certain sense, we were like that palsied fellow being carried to Jesus on his bed. This recalls the teaching of the Catechism of the Catholic Church which states: ''The sheer gratuitousness of the grace of salvation is particularly manifest in infant Baptism.''
Even
if we came for Baptism as adults we were still spiritually powerless to
defeat the presence and working of Original and Actual Sin in our
lives. Like babes in arms, we too needed Christ and the Sacraments of
His Holy Church to bring the forgiveness and healing from our sins that
we could not bring for ourselves.
And
again like that man being brought to Christ on a bed by his friends, it
was Christ's grace that preceded us, accompanied us and remains with us
to this day. Thanks be to God!
In addition to this consoling Gospel, yesterday's Traditional Latin Mass also gave related encouragement in the prayers of the Introit and Collect; as well as the first reading from 1 Corinthians 1 on the theme of the grace of Christ at work in the faithful.
May it Please God to Put Us in His Grace
We pray that today's reflections might help some soul somewhere in these times of great trial.
Let
us conclude with a phrase of St. Joan of Arc relating to the theme of
grace: ''If I am not in God's grace, may it please God to put me in it;
if I am in God's grace, may it please God to keep me there.''
Now, we can all say Amen to that!
Fr. Gabriel Amorth - Requiescat in Pace
Torch of The Faith News on Saturday 17 September 2016 - 07:34:29 | by admin
The
news that Fr. Gabriel Amorth has died at the age of 91 invites several
important responses: to pray for the repose of his immortal soul; to buy
a Benedictine Crucifix, have it properly blessed by a good priest and
begin to wear it with devotion; to study his writings; and to reflect on
some of the key things that he said about the present period of
history.
Fr.
Amorth will need no introduction to most readers. Born in the Italian
town of Modena, Fr. Amorth was ordained to the sacred priesthood in 1951
and became the official exorcist for the Diocese of Rome in 1985.
Four years later, responding to the critical shortage of exorcists around the world, he co-founded the International Association of Exorcists.
By 2013, Fr. Amorth is said to have performed anything from 50,000 to
160,000 exorcisms. From all of the people that Fr. Amorth treated, he
suggested that around 100 had been cases of actual demonic possession.
Of the remainder, some were suffering through ''lesser'' cases of
disturbance caused by the Devil, whilst others were simple cases
involving mental health issues.
Anyone who has read Fr. Amorth's books An Exorcist Tells His Story, An Exorcist: More Stories and Memoirs of an Exorcist - My Life Fighting Satan can
recognise that Fr. Amorth was the ''real deal''. His long years of
priestly ministry as an exorcist allowed him deep insights into human
nature, spiritual warfare, the problems in the Church and the moment of
history through which we are all passing.
Here
are some of the key things that Fr. Amorth said which, bearing in mind
the increasingly bad news breaking throughout the Church each day, we
would be wise to heed:-
On the Consecration of Russia:
''The
Consecration has not yet been made. I was there on March 25th in St.
Peter's Square, I was in the front row, practically within touching
distance of the Holy Father. John Paul II wanted to consecrate Russia,
but his entourage did not, fearing that the Orthodox would be
antagonized, and they almost thwarted him. Therefore, when His Holiness
consecrated the world on his knees, he added a sentence not included in
the distributed version that instead said to consecrate ''especially
those nations of which you yourself have asked for their consecration.''
So, indirectly, this included Russia. However, a specific consecration
has not yet been made. You can always do it. Indeed, it will certainly
be done...'' (Faithful Insight magazine, Oct 2015 edition).
On Divine Chastisement
''Without
the Lord, progress too is misused. We see it in laws that go totally
against nature such as divorce, abortion 'gay marriage'... we have
forgotten God! Therefore, God will soon admonish humanity in a very
powerful manner. He knows how to remind us of His presence'' (Ibid).
On Harry Potter and Yoga
''Practicing Yoga is satanic, it leads to evil just like reading Harry Potter'' (The Telegraph, November 2011).
On the Rise in the Need for Exorcisms
''People
have lost the Faith, and superstition, magic, Satanism, or ouija boards
have taken its place, which then open all the doors to the presence of
demons'' (National Catholic Register, October 2016).
On the Post-Vatican II Revision of the Rite of Exorcism
Fr.
Amorth sharply criticised the revisions to the rite of exorcism that
were introduced following the Second Vatican Council. Some sources
suggest that he described the revised rite as a ''blunt weapon''. In one
interview he spoke of ''legions of demons that have taken up residence
in the Vatican''. In that context, he also noted: ''The smoke of
Satan enters everywhere... I have no doubt that the Devil tempts
especially the leaders of the Church, as he tempts all leaders'' (30 Giorni 2001).
Remain in the Peace of Christ
Just
a few weeks before his own death last year, the late Fr. Nicholas
Gruner sent out a letter which contained information of a conversation
he had recently had with Fr. Amorth in Rome. Fr. Gruner wrote: ''Fr.
Amorth told me that unless the consecration of Russia is performed - as
Our Lady asked! - by the end of October, 2015, the dark prophecies of
Fatima may well come to pass any day after that! I have met and spoken
to Fr. Amorth many times over the years. This is the first time he has
ever told me in plain language how much time we have left - exactly -
before the manifest chastisements of the world could begin!''
We at Torch of The Faith think that everyone would do well to heed these grave warnings today.
This
is especially so, given all of the not-so-subtle promotion of sacrilege
and heresy now happening throughout the Church, the fact that October
is almost upon us once again, and the mysterious ongoing silence of
those cardinals and bishops previously thought to be the ''good guys''
in the hierarchy.
Factor in Pope Francis' upcoming October-fest in Lund and there is no mistaking the urgency of this message...
Let us pray for the soul of Fr. Amorth and learn from him by preparing our own hearts, minds and souls for the times ahead. Keep the Faith, Remain in the state of grace and pray the Holy Rosary and Holy Michael Prayer each day!
The worse things get, the closer the Church comes to the promised Triumph of the Immaculate Heart of Mary.
September 15th - Our Lady of Sorrows
Torch of The Faith News on Thursday 15 September 2016 - 05:45:38 | by admin
Lamentations 1:12: O all ye that pass by the way, attend, and see if there be any sorrow like to my sorrow.
Devotion
to the sorrows of Our Lady was fostered during the Middle Ages by the
Fathers of the Servite Order. It was these good priests who first
enumerated the Seven Dolours of Our Lady. Pope Pius VII extended the
celebration of this feast to the Universal Church in 1817, in order to
recall the sufferings which the Church had undergone in the troubled
period following the French Revolution.
Of
course, the forces working through and beyond that revolutionary
ideology are still harrowing the Church in our own present times. The
difference is that those forces and ideologies have now infilitrated to
the very highest levels of the Church and society.
In
our times too, the words of Our Lady of Akita have come to pass: ''The
priests who venerate me will be scorned and opposed by their
confreres.''
One
can only grieve to think how much suffering Our Blessed Lord and Our
Lady of Sorrows must have endured in the Passion when they saw the
organized rebellions, both within and against the Church, in the days
through which we are now living.
During
her life in the 14th-Century, St. Bridget of Sweden received a series
of private revelations. Recorded in nine books, these ''Heavenly
Revelations'' received the decisive approval of Pope Benedict XIV in the
18th-Century as being orthodox.
There
follows an extract of the private revelation that St. Bridget received
from the Mother of Sorrows on the subject of the Crucifixion of Our
Lord.
Because
I was very close to Him during His Passion and did not allow myself to
be separated from Him, for I stood right next to His Cross, and because
the nearer something is to the heart the keener is its stab, so His
suffering was more painful to me than to others. And when He looked down
at me from the Cross, and I looked up at Him, tears streamed from my
eyes like blood from veins. And when He saw me so overwhelmed with
grief, my sorrow made Him suffer so much that all the pains which He
felt from His wounds were surpassed by the sight of the grief in which
He beheld me. Therefore I boldly assert that His suffering became my
suffering, because His heart was mine. And just as Adam and Eve sold the
world for an apple, so in a certain sense my Son and I redeemed the
world with one Heart.''
During
the series of heavenly apparitions at Fatima in 1917, Blessed Francisco
Marto said to Sr. Lucia: ''Didn't you notice how sad Our Lady was that
last month, when she said that people must not offend Our Lord anymore,
for He is already much offended? I would like to console Our Lord, and
after that, convert sinners so that they won't offend Him anymore.''
In
the century that has passed since those innocent words were uttered,
Our Lord has been offended much more than we can possibly imagine.
The
personal sins of each one of us have added to the offences caused by an
epic falling away from the One True Faith, the acceptance of
irreverence and sacrilege at Holy Mass, the destruction of the natural
family, the vast brutalities of the two world wars and countless smaller
wars, the immense scale of abortion, the global corruption of the
young, the widespread persecution of Christians, and the passing of
iniquitous laws approving divorce, ''gay marriage'' and euthanasia in
country after country.
And
now this hideous letter of Pope Francis to the bishops around Buenos
Aires. It must be the worst officially headed and signed letter of a
reigning pontiff in 2,000 years of Church history. But where is the
outcry, or even a fraternal word of correction, from any of the
cardinals and bishops?
Look:
We must stop offending God with our sins, with our indifference and
with our silence in the face of the grave evils and widespread sacrilege
inflicting the Church and world in our times!
We have to stop making the Madonna sad!
Collect Prayer from
today's Traditional Latin Mass: ''O God, in Whose Passion, according to
the prophecy of Simeon, a sword of grief pierced the most sweet soul of
the glorious virgin and mother, Mary; mercifully grant that we who
celebrate with reverence the memory of her dolours may obtain the
blessed effect of Thy Passion. Amen.''
Our Lady of Sorrows - Pray for us!
The Feast of the Exaltation of the Holy Cross!
Torch of The Faith News on Wednesday 14 September 2016 - 05:54:33 | by admin
A Timely Reminder
Today's
feast of the Exaltation of the Holy Cross provides a timely reminder
that the ultimate victory will be that of Our Lord and Saviour Jesus
Christ.
No matter how bad things get for the Church and Her members, we can rely on that great certainty.
During
the last couple of days, I have read comments at other sites about
people who were getting shaky in their Faith because of all that is
happening to the Church: I read of one woman who had decided that Pope
Francis had so contradicted previous Magisterial teaching that she had
given up on the whole thing; I read of a man who had stopped going to
Confession and was now beginning to have doubts about the whole notion
of organized religion; and I read of others who thought their efforts to
be faithful to Christ had all been in vain.
I
feel for people in this situation. I really do. We can make no bones
about the fact that these are extremely grim times for Catholics
everywhere.
However,
it is essential to bear in mind that Christ has promised that He shall
remain with His Church until the end of time; and that the gates of Hell
shall not prevail against Her (Matthew 16:18).
As
we generally remind ourselves and our readers each New Year's Day:
''Jesus Christ is the Lord of the cosmos and of history. In Him, human
history and indeed all Creation are 'set forth' and transcendently
fulfilled'' (Catechism of the Catholic Church: CCC 668).
We
also do well to have a solid grasp of real Catholic doctrine. For
example, the Church teaches that popes are Infallible under certain
clear conditions. The Church has never taught that popes are impeccable.
Awareness of Spiritual Warfare
Because
of our fallen nature, it is a classical trick of Satan to try and get
us to rebel against God, in the manner of our First Parents Adam and
Eve, when things either go wrong, or appear to be going wrong for us.
Also, Satan being the ultimate deceiver can confuse us into thinking that things are much worse than they truly are.
Thoughts
and feelings of despair come from the infernal enemy of our souls.
Inspirations of faith, hope and charity come to us from God's grace;
mediated to us by Our Lady, the Saints and our Guardian Angels.
Unfortunately,
the person who chooses to despair and give up the Faith has at some
deep level made a decision that they know better than God and the
Church. This is a classical example of pride. It is important to grasp
the fact that this final collapse has normally been achieved through
defeats and compromises with incremental attacks from Satan and his
minions.
For
the person that has practiced the Faith, the destruction wrought by
Satan once they leave the protection of the Church would perhaps be
swift.
This
is why it is essential to remain focused on Christ and His promises to
the Church. There is no way that any of us, or even all of us together,
could defeat Satan without Christ and His Church. We are fallen
creatures with a tendency to sin and intellects far below that of Satan.
Without Christ we can do nothing; with Him we can do all things
(Philippians 4:13).
A Personal Experience
I
have shared before that I was tempted to leave the Church back in 2009,
when Modernists seemed to be stitching up the last vestiges of orthodox
hopes here in England. I remember thinking that we had been through so
much at the hands of dissenters, and that things had become so corrupt,
that I was just getting out of the Church.
At
that point, I saw a mental picture of myself standing at the edge of a
ship, about to step off into a black and storm-tossed sea. Thanks be to
God, this helped me to come to my senses and remain lashed to the Barque
of Peter by the Sacraments, Sacred Scripture and Tradition, prayer and
reading key spiritual writers.
God's
grace enabled me to see that I would have been rapidly destroyed if I
had tried to fight corruption by leaving the only supernatural means
available to do this in this world. That is because I, like everyone
else in this world, am also corrupted by my own sins and sinful
tendencies.
Humility and Honesty before God
No, we cannot fight Satan by leaving Christ and His Church.
It
is a good practice, I think, to pray each day for the graces to keep
the Faith and to be given the grace of a holy death in God's friendship.
If
we are tempted to give up resisting sin, going to Confession, or
believing in the Church's doctrines because of the evil in the Church,
we have an opportunity to honestly ask ourselves how much we are truly
converted. These tendencies reveal to us that we still have attachments
to sin and to our own will. If we are honest, we are really saying:
''They are sinning and getting away with it. Why shouldn't I?'' In all
truth, this is hardly a sign of a deep conversion is it? Yet, even
learning this about ourselves ought not cause us to despair, but to go
to Jesus in prayer and the Sacraments and ask Him to give us a deeper
conversion in these areas. In this way, the trials of the Church and of
our own lives may become opportunities for ongoing purification.
Victory from Defeat!
Today's
feast reminds us that our whole religion was built in the midst of the
darkest event in all of human history. In one sense, it could never have
been worse than the hours when man attempted Deicide by killing Christ
on Good Friday. How the Devil must have ''whooped it up'' to think he
had destroyed Christ the Messiah.
And
yet, this truly was the darkest hour before dawn. In that defeat God
was to bring the definitive victory over the powers of Hell.
The Introit from
Galatians 6 in today's Missal for the Traditional Latin Mass proclaims:
''But it behoves us to glory in the Cross of Our Lord Jesus Christ: in
Whom is our salvation, life, and resurrection; by Whom we are saved and
delivered.''
Keep the Faith friends and thanks for reading!