A prophecy being fulfilled before our very eyes

 Time and again, motivated by a spirit of evil, Francis has attacked the universal language of the Church.   

As noted here:

Francis lamented on the feast of Epiphany about those whose religion he said was self-referential and encased in a “suit of armour”, “Have we been stuck all too long, nestled inside a conventional, external and formal religiosity that no longer warms our hearts and changes our lives?”

And, “Do our words and our liturgies ignite in people's hearts a desire to move towards God, or are they a 'dead language' that speaks only of itself and to itself?”

Talking about his self-referential Synod on Synods, he said that the task is “to journey together, to listen to one another, so that the Spirit can suggest to us new ways and paths to bring the Gospel to hearts of those who indifferent, distant, and without hope.”

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Have you ever encountered a priest, Bishop or layman who impugned the Latin Mass? Is such an attitude even Catholic? In a word, no. In his Apostolic Letter Ecclesia Dei, Pope John Paul II said that, "Respect must everywhere be shown for the feelings of all those who are attached to the Latin liturgical tradition...for the use of the Roman Missal according to the 1962 edition."

And, in his book "Salt of the Earth," Joseph Cardinal Ratzinger said, "I am of the opinion, to be sure, that the old rite should be granted much more generously to all those who desire it. It's impossible to see what could be dangerous or unacceptable about that. A community is calling its very being into question when it suddenly declares that what until now was its holiest and highest possession is strictly forbidden and when it makes the longing for it seem downright indecent."

To be sure, Vatican II called for an extended use of the vernacular. But nowhere did Vatican II call for the Latin language to be abolished from the liturgy. And anyone who claims otherwise is either ignorant of the facts or a liar. The Constitution on the Sacred Liturgy (Sacrosanctum Concilium) No. 36 states clearly that, "Particular law remaining in force, the use of the Latin language is to be preserved in the Latin rites."

Number 54 of this same Vatican II document teaches that, "In Masses which are celebrated with the people, a suitable place may be allotted to their mother tongue. This is to apply in the first place to the readings and "the common prayer," but also, as local conditions may warrant, to those parts which pertain to the people, according to the norm laid down in Art. 36 of this Constitution.

Nevertheless steps should be taken so that the faithful may also be able to say or to sing together in Latin those parts of the Ordinary of the Mass which pertain to them."

This is the teaching of Vatican II and the mind of the Church on the use of Latin and the attitude Catholics should have toward those who are attached to the Latin liturgical tradition.

A prophecy given by Pope Pius XII is being fulfilled before our very eyes.  The Reign of Antichrist approaches. 

"Then the Church shall be scattered, driven into the wilderness, and shall be for a time, as it was in the beginning, invisible; hidden in catacombs.."

“The apostasy of the city of Rome from the vicar of Christ and its destruction by Antichrist may be thoughts very new to many Catholics, that I think it well to recite the text of theologians of greatest repute. First Malvenda, who writes expressly on the subject, states as the opinion of Ribera, Gaspar Melus, Biegas, Suarrez, Bellarmine and Bosius that Rome shall apostatize from the Faith, drive away the Vicar of Christ and return to its ancient paganism. ...Then the Church shall be scattered, driven into the wilderness, and shall be for a time, as it was in the beginning, invisible; hidden in catacombs, in dens, in mountains, in lurking places; for a time it shall be swept, as it were from the face of the earth. Such is the universal testimony of the Fathers of the early Church.”- Henry Edward Cardinal Manning, The Present Crisis of the Holy See, 1861, London: Burns and Lambert, pp. 88-90)

Protect the Pope is reporting that, "In his address to the plenary session of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith Pope Benedict has warned that the Faith is in danger of being snuffed out in vast areas of the world due to a loss of the religious sense:


‘As we know, in vast areas of the world the Faith is in danger of being snuffed out like a flame that no longer has any sustenance. We are at a profound crisis of faith,at a loss of a religious sense that constitutes the greatest challenge for the Church of today.

The renewal of the faith must therefore be the priority in the undertaking of the whole Church in our times. I hope that the Year of Faith can contribute,with the cordial collaboration of all the members of the People of God, to bring God back anew to this world and to open to men an access to the faith,to a reliance on the God who loved us to the end (cf John 13,1), in Christ Jesus,crucified and risen.’

The Year of Faith is an ’opportune moment to point out to all the gift of faith in the Risen Christ,the clear teaching of the Second Vatican Council and the invaluable doctrinal synthesis offered by the Catechism of the Catholic Church’."  See here.

Everywhere we look today, signs of persecution against the Church are emerging. Our Lady told Father Gobbi of the Marian Movement of Priests that, "My Adversary will one day think that he is celebrating a complete victory: over the world, over the Church, over souls. It will be only then that I will intervene - terrible and victorious - that his defeat may be all the greater when he is certain in his conviction that he has conquered once for all...You, my sons, have been called to live through these events. It is now the time for you to know this, that you may be consciously prepared for the battle. This is now the time for me to begin disclosing part of my plan. First of all, it is necessary that my Enemy have the impression of having conquered everything, of having everything now in his hands. This is why he will be permitted to penetrate even into the interior of my Church, and he will succeed in plunging the sanctuary of God into darkness. He will reap the greatest number of victims from among the ministers of the sanctuary. This will in fact be a time of great falls on the part of my beloved sons, my priests. Satan will seduce some of them by pride, others by love of the flesh, others by doubts, others by unbelief, and still others by discouragement and loneliness.." (October 18, 1975).


Our Lady, speaking to Barbara Reuss on April 25, 1946 at Marienfried, said that, "There are dark incomprehensible events. In the place where the greatest confidence is found and where the people are taught I can do everything, I will make preparations for peace. I am the sign of the living God. I place my sign on the foreheads of my children. The star (Lucifer) will persecute the sign. But my sign will conquer the star."

While Our Lady is placing her sign on the foreheads of her children [those who are consecrated to her and who live out a true devotion to her], the Devil is also placing his mark on the foreheads of his children. Our Lady explained to Father Gobbi that, "These are the times when the followers of him who opposes himself to Christ are being signed with his mark on the forehead and on the hand. The mark on the forehead and on the hand is an expression of a total dependency on the part of those who are designated by this sign. The sign indicates him who is an enemy of Christ, that is to say, the sign of the Antichrist. And this mark, which is stamped, signifies the complete belonging of the person thus marked to the army of him who is opposed to Christ and who fights against his divine and royal dominion. The mark is imprinted on the forehead and on the hand. The forehead indicates the intellect, because the mind is the seat of the human reason. The hand expresses human activity, because it is with his hands that man acts and works. Nevertheless, it is the person who is marked by the mark of the Antichrist in his intellect and in his will. He who allows himself to be signed with the mark on his forehead is led to accept the doctrine of the denial of God, of the rejection of his Law, and of atheism which, in these times, is more and more diffused and advertised. And thus he is driven to follow the ideologies in mode today and to make of himself a propagator of all the errors..."

I'm not a pessimist.  I will respond - as I have been for many years - to the Holy Father's call for working to renew the faith.  But all of us have to understand, as the prophetic Stefan Cardinal Wyszynski once said, "Certain events are willed by the Lord of history, and they shall take place."

Related reading here.

Recommended reading: Catechism of the Catholic Church, 675.