I posted this recently:


In Latin, an important use of the accusative case is with prepositions. Prepositions and the nouns or pronouns they go with show direction toward, time, the means by which something is done, where and when something is done, purpose, and various other kinds of directions.

As an adverb, the word "extra" in Latin is properly translated into English as "outside." However, the same word in the maxim Extra Ecclesiam nulla salus is a preposition which takes the accusative case. It is, therefore, more accurately translated into English as "without."

Consequently, the maxim Extra Ecclesiam nulla salus is more accurately translated into English as "Without the Church there is no salvation."Why is this so important? Because, for the Feeneyites, the maxim means that an individual who is not formally a practicing Catholic cannot be saved. The Church has condemned this interpretation (cf. Denzinger-Schonmetzer, 3870-3873).

As Pope John Paul II explains:"The Council speaks of membership in the Church for Christians and of being related to the Church for non-Christian believers in God, for people of good will (cf. Lumen Gentium 15-16). Both these dimensions are important for salvation, and each one possesses varying levels. People are saved through the Church, they are saved in the Church, but they always are saved by the grace of Christ. Besides formal membership in the Church, the sphere of salvation can also include other forms of relation to the Church. Paul VI expressed this same teaching in his first encyclical, Ecclesiam Suam, when he spoke of the various circles of the dialogue of salvation (cf. Ecclesiam Suam 101-117), which are the same as those indicated by the Council as the spheres of membership in and of relation to the Church.
This is the authentic meaning of the well-known statement 'Outside the Church there is no salvation.'" (Crossing the Threshold of Hope, pp. 140-141).

The cultists at the SBC in Richmond reject this Magisterial teaching of the Church.

Meanwhile, actor Mel Gibson has just sunk another 8 million into his church: http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,291701,00.html

Why abortion is demonic....

Background on Moloch: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moloch

In his exclusive interview with Vittorio Messori in 1985, Pope Benedict XVI (then Cardinal Ratzinger, Prefect for the Sacred Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith) expressed how “Vatican II is in the strictest continuity with both previous councils…Whoever accepts Vatican II…at the same time accepts the whole binding tradition of the Catholic Church.” (Ratzinger Report, pg. 28)

Our beloved Holy Father also explained that it is absolutely incorrect to refer to "Pre-Vatican II" and "Post-Vatican II," as if there were changes in the Church's position in matters of faith and morals. This point is lost on both "liberals" and "conservatives" alike within the Church. Both camps have a skewed understanding of the Magisterial teaching of the Church:
http://www.catholic.net/rcc/Periodicals/Dossier/2000-12/article4.html

By way of example, Mrs. Eleonore Villarrubia, mother of Louis Villarrubia ("Brother" Andre Marie of the Saint Benedict Center in Richmond, New Hampshire), wrote the following words to a Catholic lay woman named Ann Duclos a little while back:

"St. Benedict Center adheres to Catholic dogma as it has been taught for two millenia. Vatican II did not change doctrine. NO ONE can change doctrine. Vatican II was merely a pastoral council, not a doctrinal council. This is history and fact. The changes were brought about by liberal churchmen who undermined the church from within. This, too, is history."

Such an attitude (and many "traditional" Catholics share this view) betrays a profound ignorance of what an Ecumenical Council is and of the Church's gift of infallibility. The gift of infallibility is not restricted to ex cathedra statements and to dogmas explicitly so defined. Rather, it extends as well to the official teaching of the Church regarding all important questions of faith and morals.

Ecumenical Councils are solemn assemblies of the Bishops of the whole world which are called together by the Supreme Pontiff and which meet under his authority as the successor of Peter. As Lumen Gentium, No. 22 teaches: "There never is an ecumenical council which is not confirmed or at least recognized as such by Peter's successor."

As the Catechism of the Catholic Church, No. 891 explains: "...The infallibility promised to the Church is also present in the body of bishops when, together with Peter's successor, they exercise the supreme Magisterium, above all in an Ecumenical Council."

Each Ecumenical Council provides us with a better understanding of the mind of Christ which is always present in the life of the Church and therefore may be viewed as a new element in the development of doctrine as well as another event which consolidates Catholic Tradition. This is why Pope Benedict XVI said that, "Whoever accepts Vatican II...at the same time accepts the whole binding tradition of the Catholic Church."

Of course, there are those within the Church who are often described as "liberal" and who disregard those passages of Vatican II which they are uncomfortable with. For example, the Constitution on the Sacred Liturgy, No. 36, tells us that, "..since the use of the mother tongue, whether in the Mass, the administration of the sacraments or other parts of the liturgy, frequently may be of great advantage to the people, the limits of its employment may be extended.." But this same document tells us (again in No. 36) that: "Particular law remaining in force, the use of the Latin language is to be preserved in the Latin rites." And No. 54 of this same Vatican II document states: "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 sing together in Latin those parts of the ordinary of the Mass which pertain to them."

And hasn't this teaching of Vatican II been largely ignored by those who sought to banish the Latin language altogether?

May we all strive to listen to the voice of Christ as He speaks to us through the Magisterium of His Church. There is no "Pre-Vatican II Church" or "Post-Vatican II Church." These empty slogans are often employed by unhappy individuals who want to promote their own agenda and who often possess a rather distorted idea of what the Church teaches.

Paul.

Stormfront and the SBC in Richmond, New Hampshire...

Mr. Tom Matson, a technology consultant who resides in Cheshire County and who frequently leaves comments at the SBC Watch Blog, has just reported the following: Stormfront, a notorious White Supremacist organization, has initiated a discussion thread at their website: http://www.stormfront.org/, which begins with this lead:

"SPLC stirring up trouble in New Hampshire

A small sect of traditionalist Catholics have lived peacefully in rural Richmond, New Hampshire for more than twenty years. The group, known as the Slaves of the Immaculate Heart of Mary, established a retreat in the quiet town during the 1980's, which they call the Saint Benedict Center, building a convent, a monastery, a church, and a school, raising families, going about their business and committed to leading spiritual lives in the bucolic, out-of-the-way village.

All that is about to change. Morris Dees, the nation's most notorious and successful barrator, has set his sights on the group. Dees may not be the wealthiest ambulance-chaser in the country - that distinction probably belongs to the well-married Democratic presidential hopeful John Kerry - but he is very good at what he does. Like many shysters who sue people for a living, Dees operates a front corporation as a cash repository and tax dodge; Dees calls his the Southern Poverty Law Center, and at last report, the SPLC disposed of more than $175 million in cash. Admittedly, do-gooder Dees salaries himself at a piddling $275 thousand a year. That kind of money wouldn't keep Kerry in cufflinks, but at roughly $750 a day, every day of the year, including shabbot and Halloween, not a bad second income. That's just his base salary - there's lots more to his cut in perks, like his personal bodyguards; and Dees' personal fortune, while not known to us, is no doubt considerable. Remember this operation is 501(c)(3) - tax exempt.http://www.splcenter.org/donate/fina.../financial.jsp

Dees' hostility and contempt for decent people in general and Christians in particular is well established. He and his merry band of licensed legal weasels have filed lawsuit after lawsuit after lawsuit against Christians, hassling Christian organizations, Christian political figures, and Christian projects at every opportunity, always with his hand out to the Jews for "donations" and featuring his latest attacks as his product, and he has a very successful track record, recently unseating an Alabama Supreme Court justice, Roy Moore. In a 2006 version of his perennial fundraising brochure, the Intelligence Report, Dees targeted the traditionalist Catholics, skilfully skewering these particular Christians, their churches, and their clergy as hate criminals and loony cultists.

In the most recent update to his brochure, aimed at the Richmond church, Dees cleverly adds the charge of terrorist. When Dees' lackeys descended on Richmond a few months ago, the brothers and sisters of the Immaculate Heart church were wise enough to have nothing to do with them, but that didn't stop the SPLC hit team from engaging with the local busybodies and stirring up rumors of midnight machine gun practice and martial arts training at the "cultist compound". Dees raises the spectre of Waco and hints that another massacre at the hands of federal gunmen just might be in order for this church, too.

It appears that Dees' longtime hatchet-hag Heidi Beirich has a worthy understudy, one Suzy Buchanan, and Suzy ominously reports that the locals live in fear of the church members, who are "taking over the town". As proof, Suzy reports that three church members have been elected to local posts, and attributes a "hostile church voting bloc" imposed upon the townsfolk. Get a load of Suzy's hit piece right here:http://www.splcenter.org/intel/intel...e.jsp?pid=1384 Kosher to the rotten core. Need I remind anyone that the Jews literally buy into this thinly veiled bushwacking, and they send Dees millions in cash every year, stoked by the SLPC's constant race-baiting drumbeat and stories of nazis under every bed. Dees' operation is in fact essentially a Jew operation, which he co-founded with a Jew, Joe Levin.

The president of his legal front is a Jew, one Richard Cohen; the "Director of Research" Heidi Beirich is a Jewess; his right hand hit-man, Mark Potok, is a Jew; his chief jackal's-bitch-at-law, Rhonda Brownstein, is a Jewess - a rancid bunch of Shylocks indeed, lousy with Jews from top to bottom. Are we surprised? Not at Stormfront we're not. (There is hardly a negro to be found at the Poverty Palace, by the way, excepting the cleaning staff, and of course Julian Bond's hallowed name on the letterhead.)

If the members of the Immaculate Heart community are a bit nervous now, they have good reason to be; as many a Christian can attest, when Dees sics his dogs on you, you have got serious problems. He will never allow them to add on to their school - they can just forget that, but he won't likely stop there. Life as they know it may very well be over. Almost certainly Dees has a team of flinty-eyed Jew lawyers researching legal maneuvers in New Hampshire law libraries right now, and they have the new approach to eminent domain in their arsenal.

We doubt the Immaculate Heart community can afford to defend themselves from Dees in court. The community and their church and school have been in Richmond for over twenty years, and nobody ever heard a peep from there until the SPLC lashed out at them. Now, as Suzy gloats, they find themselves at the center of heated controversy, hysterical allegations, rumors amok, and the glare of the State. It is a given that Dees will file suit if he possibly can. This is too juicy a target. He has a local proxy lined up, the village communist Paul Anthony Melanson, to gain standing in New Hampshire court. That's all he needs - that and a legal excuse, and no one can doubt that Morris Dees can conjure such an excuse in his sleep. The future is bleak for the traditional Catholics of Richmond, New Hampshire. It's entirely possible that their church and school property will be taken from them and plowed over, at Dees' behest - within just a few short years."
Source: http://www.stormfront.org/forum/showthread.php/splc-stirring-up-trouble-new-404930.html

And so now I am "the village communist." An anonymous individual who posted a comment at this Blog would disagree with the bright lights at Stormfront. This individual, who used the name "Summer Dog," accused me of being "an empty capitalist materialist" who is a "traitor to all Christianity...by going to these anti-Christ Jews and joining them in a kvetch session."

Actually, I have been exposing the flawed theology and anti-Semitism of the SBC for years now. If I am a "traitor to all Christianity" for opposing anti-Semitism, then the Roman Catholic Church is also guilty of betraying "all Christianity." For Holy Mother Church condemns anti-Semitism as incompatible with the Gospel.

The hatred is mounting. At SBC Watch, another individual going by the name Sander referred to me as a "Jew-loving sh..bag."

Is this what the SBC means by "Holy Hate?"

Web of hate

Stormfront, a well-known White Supremacist hate group published this anti-Semitic article some time back: http://www4.stormfront.org/posterity/ci/curseofcain.html

Now it would appear that Stormfront is defending the Saint Benedict Center in Richmond, New Hampshire while attacking the Southern Poverty Law Center:http://sbcwatch.blogspot.com/2007/07/stormfrontorg-defends-sbc-attacks-splc.html

Readers of this Blog will recall how Stormfront quoted from Douglas Bersaw ["Brother" Anthony Mary, former SBC "Prefect"] at its website in the past.

Pope Benedict XVI seen as reasserting Tradition

More on the SBC from the Southern Poverty Law Center

The Central challenge of our time


In his book entitled "Truth and Tolerance: Christian Belief and World Religions," Joseph Cardinal Ratzinger had this to say: "Perhaps the finest and most succinct expression of this new Christian synthesis is to be found in a confession in the First Letter of Saint John: ‘we know and believe the love’ (1 Jn 4:16). Christ had become for these people the discovery of creative love; the rational principle of the universe had revealed itself as love - as that greater reason which accepts into itself even darkness and irrationality and heals them...Reason and mystery had met together; the very fact that the whole had been brought together in one person had opened the door for everyone: through the one God, all could become brothers and sisters...Can this evident truth, which at that time struck the ancient world to its depths and transformed it, be reinstated? Or is it irrevocably lost? What is standing in its way? There are many reasons for the current collapse, but I would say that the most important consists of the self-limitation of reason, which is paradoxically resting upon its laurels: the laws of method that brought it success have, through being generalized, become its prison. Natural science, which has built a new world, rests upon a philosophical foundation whose origin must be sought in Plato. Copernicus, Galileo, and even Newton were Platonists. Their basic assumption was that the world is mathematically and rationally structured and that, starting from this assumption, we can decipher it and by experiment can make it equally comprehensible and useful. The innovation consisted in associating Platonism and an empirical approach, ideal and experiment. The experiment is based on an existing interpretative concept, which is then tried out in a practical test, corrected, and opened up to further questions. This mathematical anticipation alone can permit subsequent generalization, the recognition of laws, which then make possible appropriate action. All our ideas about natural science and all practical applications are based on the assumption that the world is ordered according to rational, spiritual laws, is imbued with rationality that can be traced out and copied by our reason. At the same time, however, our perception of it is associated with the test of experience.

Any thinking that goes beyond this connection, that tries to look at reason in itself or to see it as preceding the present world, is contrary to the discipline of scientific method and is therefore utterly rejected as being a prescientific or unscientific way of thinking. The Logos, Wisdom, about which the Greeks spoke, on the one hand, and the Israelites, on the other, has been taken back into the material world and cannot be addressed outside of it. Within the specific path followed by natural science, this limitation is necessary and right. If, however, it is declared to be the absolute and unsurpassable form of human thought, then the basis of science itself becomes contradictory: for it is both proclaiming and denying the power of reason. But above all, a self-limiting reason of that kind is an amputated reason. If man cannot use his reason to ask about the essential things in his life, where he comes from and where he is going, about what he should do and may do, about living and dying, but has to leave these decisive questions to feeling, divorced from reason, then he is not elevating reason but dishonoring it. The disintegration of man, thus brought about, results equally in a pathological form of religion and a pathological form of science. It is quite obvious today that with the detachment of religion from its responsibility to reason, pathological forms of religion are constantly increasing. But when we think of scientific projects that set no real value on man, such as cloning, the production of fetuses - that is, of people - simply in order to use their organs for developing pharmaceutical products, or indeed for any economic exploitation, or if we think of the way science is made use of to produce ever more frightful means for the destruction of men and of the world, then it is obvious that there is such a thing as science that has taken a pathological form: science becomes pathological and a threat to life when it takes leave of the moral order of human life, becomes autonomous, and no longer recognizes any standard but its own capabilities.

That means that the scope of reason must be enlarged once more. We have to come out of the prison we have built for ourselves and recognize other forms of ascertaining things, forms in which the whole of man comes into play. What we need is something like what we find in Socrates: a patient readiness, opened up and looking beyond itself. This readiness to look at things, in its time, brought together the two eyes of reason, Athens and Jerusalem, and made possible a new stage in history. We need a new readiness to seek the truth and also the humility to let ourselves be found. The strict application of methodical discipline should not mean just the pursuit of success; it should mean the pursuit of truth and the readiness to find it." (Truth and Tolerance, pp. 155-159, Ignatius Press, San Francisco, 2004).

This is the central challenge of our time: To restore the older, traditional, and larger notion of reason. We need to return to the simple truth that faith precedes understanding and that understanding is greatly aided by faith, an idea which was expressed so beautifully by the medieval formulas credo ut intelligam (I believe in order that I may understand) and fides quaerens intellectum (faith seeking understanding).

In the words of Pope John Paul II, "What is distinctive in the biblical text is the conviction that there is a profound and indissoluble unity between the knowledge of reason and the knowledge of faith. The world and all that happens within it, including history and the fate of peoples, are realities to be observed, analyzed and assessed with all the resources of reason, but without faith ever being foreign to the process. Faith intervenes not to abolish reason’s autonomy nor to reduce its scope for action, but solely to bring the human being to understand that in these events it is the God of Israel who acts. Thus the world and the events of history cannot be understood in depth without professing faith in the God who is at work in them. Faith sharpens the inner eye, opening the mind to discover in the flux of events the workings of Providence. Here the words of the Book of Proverbs are pertinent: ‘The human mind plans the way, but the Lord directs the steps’ (16:9). This is to say that with the light of reason human beings can know which path to take, but they can follow that path to its end, quickly and unhindered, only if with a rightly tuned spirit they search for it within the horizon of faith. Therefore, reason and faith cannot be separated without diminishing the capacity of men and women to know themselves, the world and God in an appropriate way. There is thus no reason for competition of any kind between reason and faith: each contains the other, and each has its own scope for action.." (Encyclical Letter Fides et Ratio, On the Relationship between Faith and Reason, Nos. 16, 17).


Pope Benedict XVI (then Cardinal Ratzinger) hit the nail on the head when he said that we have to come out of the prison we have built for ourselves and recognize other forms of ascertaining things. Our age is enslaved by the perverse illusion that reason alone is sufficient without faith and that mankind possesses unlimited possibilities of achieving everything and knowing everything through its own strength and through the use of reason alone.
Where will this illusion lead us? Again, in the words of Pope John Paul II: "...the Chosen People understood that, if reason were to be fully true to itself, then it must respect certain basic rules. The first of these is that reason must realize that human knowledge is a journey which allows no rest; the second stems from the awareness that such a path is not for the proud who think that everything is the fruit of personal conquest; a third rule is grounded in the ‘fear of God’ whose transcendent sovereignty and provident love in the governance of the world reason must recognize. In abandoning these rules, the human being runs the risk of failure and ends up in the condition of ‘the fool.’ For the Bible, in this foolishness there lies a threat to life. The fool thinks that he knows many things, but really he is incapable of fixing his gaze on the things that truly matter. Therefore, he can neither order his mind (Prov 1:7) nor assume a correct attitude to himself or to the world around him. And so when he claims that ‘God does not exist’ (cf. Ps 14:1), he shows with absolute clarity just how deficient his knowledge is and just how far he is from the full truth of things, their origin and their destiny." (Fides et Ratio, No. 18).

Already we see the symptoms of a society which has become spiritually sick because it has abandoned these rules. We are witnessing the fruits of suppression of truth as outlined by St. Paul in Romans 1: 18-32:


"The wrath of God is indeed being revealed from heaven against every impiety and wickedness of those who suppress the truth by their wickedness. For what can be known about God is evident to them, because God made it evident to them. Ever since the creation of the world, his invisible attributes of eternal power and divinity have been able to be understood and perceived in what he has made. As a result, they have no excuse; for although they knew God they did not accord him glory as God or give him thanks. Instead, they became vain in their reasoning, and their senseless minds were darkened. While claiming to be wise, they became fools and exchanged the glory of the immortal God for the likeness of an image of mortal man or of birds or of four-legged animals or of snakes. Therefore, God handed them over to impurity through the lusts of their hearts for the mutual degradation of their bodies. They exchanged the truth of God for a lie and revered and worshiped the creature rather than the creator, who is blessed forever. Amen. Therefore, God handed them over to degrading passions. Their females exchanged natural relations for unnatural, and the males likewise gave up natural relations with females and burned with lust for one another. Males did shameful things with males and thus received in their own persons the due penalty for their perversity.
And since they did not see fit to acknowledge God, God handed them over to their undiscerning mind to do what is improper. They are filled with every form of wickedness, evil, greed, and malice; full of envy, murder, rivalry, treachery, and spite. They are gossips and scandalmongers and they hate God. They are insolent, haughty, boastful, ingenious in their wickedness, and rebellious toward their parents. They are senseless, faithless, heartless, ruthless. Although they know the just decree of God that all who practice such things deserve death, they not only do them but give approval to those who practice them."

More vocations from orthodox dioceses

Does this really surprise anyone?

But if anyone is inclined to be argumentative....

"But I want you to know that Christ is the head of every man, and a husband the head of his wife, and God the head of Christ. Any man who prays or prophesies with his head covered brings shame upon his head. But any woman who prays or prophesies with her head unveiled brings shame upon her head, for it is one and the same thing as if she had had her head shaved. For if a woman does not have her head veiled, she may as well have her hair cut off. But if it is shameful for a woman to have her hair cut off or her head shaved, then she should wear a veil....Judge for yourselves: is it proper for a woman to pray to God with her head unveiled? Does not nature itself teach you that if a man wears his hair long it is a disgrace to him, whereas if a woman has long hair it is her glory, because long hair has been given her for a covering? But if anyone is inclined to be argumentative, we do not have such a custom, nor do the churches of God." (1 Corinthians 11: 3-6; 13-16).



Suggested reading:

http://web2.airmail.net/carlsch/MaterDei/Library/the_veil.htm

http://www.lumengentleman.com/content.asp?id=228

http://www.lumengentleman.com/content.asp?id=220

Pope Pius XII of happy memory: Hero of World War II

I was defending His Holiness from the slanderous and unjust attacks against his person in the 1980's. I know the Rev. Albert J. Nevins was doing so during this time as well. At the time, I was ridiculed for doing so. Then a spate of scholarly works began to emerge in the 1990's which decimated the historical revisionism and outright lies of certain unhappy individuals who were determined (because of their own poor scholarship or a perverse agenda) to discredit this great Pontiff.

The truth has a power of its own. In the end, every lie will crumble before the truth. A lie may seem to triumph for a time just as tyrants seem invincible for a time. But in the end, tyrants and lies face the same end. The truth will always prevail....always.

More thoughts on the heel which will crush Satan's head

The heel which will crush Satan's head

Mr. Michael Brown has written a wonderful article on the heel which will crush Satan's head:
http://www.spiritdaily.com/GenesisHeshe.htm.

It was St. Louis Marie de Montfort who explained in his classic work True Devotion to Mary that:

"..Mary's power over the evil spirits will especially shine forth in the latter times, when Satan will lie in wait for her heel, that is, for her humble servants and her poor children whom she will rouse to fight against him...They will be great and exalted before God in holiness. They will be superior to all creatures by their great zeal and so strongly will they be supported by divine assistance that, in union with Mary, they will crush the head of Satan with their heel, that is, their humility, and bring victory to Jesus Christ." (TD, No. 54).

This passage in Mr. Brown's article is most significant: "The Old Testament was written in Hebrew, and the earliest translations of the sentence in question was most widely translated as "it": "And I will put enmity between you and the woman [widely perceived to be the Virgin Mary], and between your offspring and hers; it will crush your head"

According to Montfort, the greatest of the Marian Saints, this "it" is the faithful remnant, consecrated to the Virgin, who will crush the Devil's head (the head representing the intellect and therefore Satan's pride). The heel by contrast represents the lowest part of the body. In other words, those of us who are consecrated to the Immaculata and who are despised by the world because of our lack of wordly "sophistication" and "intelligence." But the wisdom of this world is foolishness (1 Corinthians 1: 18-25). In time, Satan's cohort will come to understand this.

For me it is significant that the Apostle John, in his first vision as described in the book of Revelation, saw "..one like a son of man, wearing an ankle-length robe, with a gold sash around his chest. The hair of his head was as white as white wool or as snow, and his eyes were like a fiery flame. His feet were like burnished bronze refined in a furnace." (Revelation 1: 13-15)

The Catholic Church is the Mystical Body of Christ. That the Apostle John saw Our Lord's feet as burnished bronze seems rather significant to me. Why is this? Because, as the Apostle Paul explains in 1 Corinthians 12: 21-21-25 that, "The eye cannot say to the hand, 'I do not need you,' nor again the head to the feet, 'I do not need you.' Indeed, the parts of the body that seem to be weaker are all the more necessary, and those parts of the body we consider less honorable we surround with greater honor, and our less presentable parts are treated with greater propriety, whereas our more presentable parts do not need this. But God has so constructed the body as to give greater honor to a part that is without it, so that there may be no division in the body, but that the parts may have the same concern for one another.."

The faithful remnant consecrated to the Immaculate Heart of Mary represent, in the thinking of Montfort, the heel which will defeat the Adversary. This burnished bronze which is refined in a furnace (1 Corinthians 3: 10-15) will produce a quality of work which is deserving of a wage. But this only because it was accomplished through the Immaculate Heart of Mary and because it rests on the only foundation which is Christ Jesus.

God love you,
Paul.

Holy Father removes restrictions on Latin Mass while stressing no change to Vatican II.

Full text

Persecution

Reasoned discussion or argument, dialogue or emotion?

In Massachusetts, some homosexual activists have a truly distorted idea of what constitutes authentic dialogue: http://www.massresistance.org/docs/info/know_thy_neighbor.html

"A discussion is an orderly confrontation based on a mutual willingness to learn from one another. It involves the presentation of evidence by each party and then a good-faith attempt of the participants in the discussion to come to agreement. Discussion presupposes some degree of rational disagreement between us or at least a lack of consensus. If I agreed with you already, we would have nothing to discuss. In a discussion, I do not primarily want to disagree: I want to know the truth. If I do not think that what you say is true, then I disagree, stating my reasons as clearly as possible and without animosity. The same is true for you: you present me with your reasons. By sharing our ideas freely, we hope to arrive at a deeper truth. In a discussion, disagreement is for the sake of agreement.....An argument (emotional, not rational) is a disorderly confrontation based on an unwillingness to learn from one another. Desire for victory takes precedence over love of truth, with the result that agreement becomes impossible. Although they may have rational grounds for disagreement in the first place, all arguments include an element of bad faith - we are not, with all honesty, pursuing the truth together. Rather, in an argument I simply want my position to be the right one and you to agree with me. I am, indeed, looking for agreement, but on my terms, not in terms of objective truth. Instead of my following reason and leaving passion aside, passion is primary, and reason (if it has a role) works in the service of passion. Quite often, in order to end an argument, we agree to disagree....

In discussion, we deliberate for the sake of coming to the truth; in an argument, we abandon the mutual pursuit of truth because our purpose is to triumph."

-Dr. Montague Brown, The One-Minute Philosopher, Sophia Institute Press, pp. 32-33.


Meanwhile, the case that is sending shock waves across America:
http://massresistance.org/docs/parker/index.html


In May of 2000, I wrote a piece for the Mother Town News in North Central Massachusetts opposing same-sex "marriage" and based my article on Divine Revelation and Natural Law. At the same time, I cited the teaching of the Catechism of the Catholic Church that homosexual persons are to be accepted with respect and compassion (No. 2358). My father received a phone call from the Clinton Police Department informing him that an individual had told The Mothertown News that he was going kill me with his rifle.

In preparation for the year of St. Paul

We live in fascinating times.

Signs of hope....

Reconciliation of Jews and Gentiles in Christ

Those who have been following the whole controversy surrounding the anti-Semitism of the Saint Benedict Center in Richmond may wish to reflect on the Word of God as given to St. Paul in his letter to the Ephesians:


"Therefore remember that at one time you Gentiles in the flesh, called the uncircumcision by what is called the circumcision, which is made in the flesh by hands - remember that you were at that time separated from Christ, alienated from the commonwealth of Israel, and strangers to the covenants of promise, having no hope and without God in the world. But now in Christ Jesus you who once were far off have been brought near in the blood of Christ. For he is our peace, who has made us both one, and has broken down the dividing wall of hostility, by abolishing in his flesh the law of commandments and ordinances, that he might create in himself one new man in place of the two, so making peace, and might reconcile us both to God in one body through the cross, thereby bringing the hostility to an end..." (Ephesians 2: 11-16).

Wonderful news....

"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." (Pope Benedict XVI, then Cardinal Ratzinger, in his book "Salt of the Earth").

Once again the Diocese of Manchester has spoken....

His Excellency, The Most Rev. John McCormack, has indicated that the faithful should refrain from participating in the spiritual exercises and activities of the Saint Benedict Center in Richmond, New Hampshire.

Lumen Gentium, No. 25:


"Among the more important duties of bishops that of preaching the Gospel has pride of place. For the bishops are heralds of the faith, who draw new disciples to Christ; they are authentic teachers, that is, teachers endowed with the authority of Christ, who preach the faith to the people assigned to them, the faith which is destined to inform their thinking and direct their conduct; and under the light of the Holy Spirit they make that faith shine forth, drawing from the storehouse of revelation new things and old (cf. Mt. 13:52); they make it bear fruit and with watchfulness they ward off whatever errors threaten their flock (cf. 2 Tim. 4-14). Bishops who teach in communion with the Roman Pontiff are to be revered by all as witnesses of divine and Catholic truth; the faithful, for their part, are obliged to submit to their bishops' decision, made in the name of Christ, in matters of faith and morals, and to adhere to it with a ready and respectful allegiance of mind."

Jesus told us that a tree is known by its fruits: http://www.spiritdaily.com/fruits.htm

"Please know that I will continue to pray for you and all those who are affected by difficulties that have been created by the Saint Benedict Center."

- The Rev. Edward J. Arsenault to Mrs. Terri O'Rorke, a New Hampshire resident who has been opposing the Saint Benedict Center in Richmond.

The fruit of the Saint Benedict Center cult is now being made manifest. And what a terrible fruit it is.

Is there anyone who hasn't noticed this?

One of the chief signs of the times.

FAITH AND REASON IN THE SEARCH FOR TRUTH

VATICAN CITY, JUN 23, 2007 (VIS) - Today in the Vatican, Benedict XVI received participants in a meeting of professors and rectors of European universities, who have come together to mark the 50th anniversary of the Treaty of Rome.

"The theme of your meeting - 'A New Humanism for Europe. The Role of the Universities' - invites a disciplined assessment of contemporary culture on the continent," said the Pope in his English-language address. "Europe is presently experiencing a certain social instability and diffidence in the face of traditional values, yet her distinguished history and her established academic institutions have much to contribute to shaping a future of hope."

"Promoting a new humanism, in fact, requires a clear understanding of what this 'newness' actually embodies. ... Europe today is experiencing a massive cultural shift, one in which men and women are increasingly conscious of their call to be actively engaged in shaping their own history. Historically, it was in Europe that humanism developed, thanks to the fruitful interplay between the various cultures of her peoples and the Christian faith."

"The present cultural shift is often seen as a 'challenge' to the culture of the university and Christianity itself, rather than as a 'horizon' against which creative solutions can and must be found."

On the subject of these solutions, the Pope identified three issues to which "men and women of higher education" are called to turn their attention: "The need for a comprehensive study of the crisis of modernity," and of "the problems raised by a 'humanism' that claims to build a 'regnum hominis' detached from its necessary ontological foundation. ... The anthropocentrism which characterizes modernity can never be detached from an acknowledgment of the full truth about man, which includes his transcendent vocation.

"A second issue," he added, "involves the broadening of our understanding of rationality," which "needs instead to be 'broadened' in order to be able to explore and embrace those aspects of reality which go beyond the purely empirical. ... The rise of the European universities was fostered by the conviction that faith and reason are meant to cooperate in the search for truth, each respecting the nature and legitimate autonomy of the other, yet working together harmoniously and creatively to serve the fulfillment of the human person."

The third issue identified by the Pope "concerns the nature of the contribution which Christianity can make to the humanism of the future. The question of man, and thus of modernity, challenges the Church to devise effective ways of proclaiming to contemporary culture the 'realism' of her faith in the saving work of Christ. Christianity must not be relegated to the world of myth and emotion, but respected for its claim to shed light on the truth about man."

"It is," the Pope concluded, "my hope that universities will increasingly become communities committed to the tireless pursuit of truth, 'laboratories of culture' where teachers and students join in exploring issues of particular importance for society, employing interdisciplinary methods and counting on the collaboration of theologians. This can easily be done in Europe, given the presence of so many prestigious Catholic institutions and faculties of theology. I am convinced that greater cooperation ... between the various academic communities will enable Catholic universities to bear witness to the historical fruitfulness of the encounter between faith and reason."

Youth turning to Catholicism....

Should this surprise us? It's not like our morally bankrupt culture has anything to offer. The truth is always far more attractive.

Robin Williams: Anti-Catholic bigot

Perhaps he sat on his head one too many times while filming Mork and Mindy? Yet another example of Tinsel Town's anti-Catholic hatred and hypocrisy.

Vatican reverses a Kennedy annulment....

I opposed this annulment from the very beginning. At the time, I was living within the Diocese of Worcester, Massachusetts and many there were in support of the annulment. There were articles in The Catholic Free Press (official newspaper for the Diocese) which were supportive of the annulment process in general as it is employed throughout the United States. I sided with Pope John Paul II who had spoken of the annulment process as one which was being abused:

"The ethical question has always been asked very pointedly in any kind of judicial proceedings. In fact, individual or collective interests can induce the parties to resort to various kinds of duplicity and even bribery in order to attain a favorable sentence. Nor are canonical proceedings, in which an attempt is made to discover the truth about whether or not a marriage exists, immune from this risk. The unquestionable importance of this for the moral conscience of the parties involved reduces the likelihood of acquiescence to interests alien to the quest for the truth.

Nevertheless, cases can exist in which a similar acquiescence is expressed that jeopardizes the regularity of the proceedings. The firm reaction of canon law to such behavior is well known (cf. CIC, cann. 1389, 1391, 1457, 1488, 1489).

However, in the current circumstances there is also the threat of another risk. In the name of what they claim to be pastoral requirements, some voices have been raised proposing to declare marriages that have totally failed null and void. These persons propose that in order to obtain this result, recourse should be made to the expedient of retaining the substantial features of the proceedings, simulating the existence of an authentic judicial verdict. Such persons have been tempted to provide reasons for nullity and to prove them in comparison with the most elementary principles of the body of norms and of the Church's Magisterium.

The objective juridical and moral gravity of such conduct, which in no way constitutes a pastorally valid solution to the problems posed by matrimonial crises, is obvious. Thanks be to God, there is no lack of faithful people who refuse to let their consciences be deceived. Moreover, many of them, despite being personally involved in a conjugal crisis, are not prepared to solve it except by keeping to the path of truth. In my annual Addresses to the Roman Rota, I have referred several times to the essential relationship that the process has with the search for objective truth.

It is primarily the Bishops, by divine law judges in their own communities, who must be responsible for this. It is on their behalf that the tribunals administer justice. Bishops are therefore called to be personally involved in ensuring the suitability of the members of the tribunals, diocesan or interdiocesan, of which they are the Moderators, and in verifying that the sentences passed conform to right doctrine. Sacred Pastors cannot presume that the activity of their tribunals is merely a "technical" matter from which they can remain detached, entrusting it entirely to their judicial vicars (cf. CIC, cann. 391, 1419, 1423 1).

The criterion that inspires the deontology of the judge is his love for the truth. First and foremost, therefore, he must be convinced that the truth exists. The truth must therefore be sought with a genuine desire to know it, despite all the inconveniences that may derive from such knowledge. It is necessary to resist the fear of the truth that can, at times, stem from the dread of annoying people. The truth, which is Christ himself (cf. John 8:32,36), sets us free from every form of compromise with interested falsehoods.The judge who truly acts as a judge, in other words, with justice, neither lets himself be conditioned by feelings of false compassion for people, nor by false models of thought, however widespread these may be in his milieu. He knows that unjust sentences are never a true pastoral solution, and that God's judgment of his own actions is what counts for eternity.

The judge must then abide by canonical laws, correctly interpreted. Hence, he must never lose sight of the intrinsic connection of juridical norms with Church doctrine. Indeed, people sometimes presume to separate Church law from the Church's magisterial teaching as though they belonged to two separate spheres; they suppose the former alone to have juridically binding force, whereas they value the latter merely as a directive or an exhortation. Such an approach basically reveals a positivist mindset which is in contradiction with the best of the classical and Christian juridical tradition concerning the law.

In fact, the authentic interpretation of God's Word, exercised by the Magisterium of the Church (cf. Second Vatican Council, Dogmatic Constitution on Divine Revelation "Dei Verbum," No. 10), has juridical value to the extent that it concerns the context of law, without requiring any further formal procedure in order to become juridically and morally binding. For a healthy juridical interpretation, it is indispensable to understand the whole body of the Church's teachings, and to place every affirmation systematically in the flow of tradition. It will thus be possible to avoid selective and distorted interpretations and useless criticisms at every step.

Lastly, the preliminary investigation of the case is an important stage in the search for the truth. The very reason for its existence is endangered and degenerates into pure formalism when the outcome of the proceedings is taken for granted. It is true that the entitlement to timely justice is also part of the concrete service to the truth and constitutes a personal right. Yet false speed to the detriment of the truth is even more seriously unjust." (Source: http://www.zenit.org/english/visualizza.phtml?sid=66368)

Paul.

Does religious liberty require a separation of church and state?

We have seen how the First Amendment to the Constitution says absolutely nothing about keeping religion out of government. But there are still those (Catholics included) who insist that religious liberty requires an absolute or strict separation of state and church. Is this the teaching of Vatican II? In a word, no. In its Declaration on Religious Freedom (Dignitatis Humanae) Vatican II said:

"Since the common welfare of society consists in the entirety of those conditions of social life under which men enjoy the possibility of achieving their own perfection in a certain fullness of measure and also with some relative ease, it chiefly consists in the protection of the rights, and in the performance of the duties, of the human person. Therefore the care of the right to religious freedom devolves upon the whole citizenry, upon social groups, upon government, and upon the Church and other religious communities, in virtue of the duty of all toward the common welfare, and in the manner proper to each.

The protection and promotion of the inviolable rights of man ranks among the essential duties of government. Therefore government is to assume the safeguard of the religious freedom of all its citizens, in an effective manner, by just laws and by other appropriate means.
Government is also to help create conditions favorable to the fostering of religious life, in order that the people may be truly enabled to exercise their religious rights and to fulfill their religious duties, and also in order that society itself may profit by the moral qualities of justice and peace which have their origin in men's faithfulness to God and to His holy will.

If, in view of peculiar circumstances obtaining among peoples, special civil recognition is given to one religious community in the constitutional order of society, it is at the same time imperative that the right of all citizens and religious communities to religious freedom should be recognized and made effective in practice.

Finally, government is to see to it that equality of citizens before the law, which is itself an element of the common good, is never violated, whether openly or covertly, for religious reasons. Nor is there to be discrimination among citizens.

It follows that a wrong is done when government imposes upon its people, by force or fear or other means, the profession or repudiation of any religion, or when it hinders men from joining or leaving a religious community. All the more is it a violation of the will of God and of the sacred rights of the person and the family of nations when force is brought to bear in any way in order to destroy or repress religion, either in the whole of mankind or in a particular country or in a definite community." (DH, No. 6).

Separation of church and state: Nothing but dust...

David Carlin is a lifelong Democrat. From 1981 to 1992, he served as a Rhode Island state senator, serving as senate majority leader in 1989 and 1990. In 1992 he was his district's Democratic candidate for the U.S. House of Representatives. For more than twenty years, Mr. Carlin has been a professor of philosophy and sociology at the Community College of Rhode Island.

In his book entitled "Can a Catholic Be a Democrat: How the Party I Loved Became the Enemy of My Religion," he writes:

"..an excuse that appeals to the 'separation of church and state' seems to be among the silliest rationales for a Catholic's support of the secularized Democratic Party. This separation, so we're told, is enshrined in the First Amendment to the Constitution, and it prohibits the intrusion of religion into the affairs of government. Yet the First Amendment says nothing about keeping religion out of government; it's concerned instead with keeping government out of religion. Its two religion 'clauses' say (1) that there will be no 'establishment of religion' and (2) that there will be no interference with the 'free exercise' of religion. That's it: government must keep its hands off religion; nothing about religion keeping its hands off government.

However, it should be considered that in writing the religion section of the First Amendment, the framers were no doubt remembering the history of England and how the government of that nation, from the time of Henry VIII until what was then the present day (the 1780's), established a national religion and interfered with the free exercise of dissenting religions. This was a case of government controlling religion, but at the same time it was a case of religion controlling government. That is to say, government persecuted, or at least discriminated against, all religions other than the Church of England, but one of the main reasons it did so was because the Church of England, both through its bishops and its lay members, had tremendous influence over government (only members of the Church of England could serve in Parliament or government). In other words, in its competition with other churches, not to mention its competition with outright infidelity, the Church of England used government to put down the church's rivals.

This is the kind of thing people, many of them Catholics, have in mind when they say that advocating laws against abortion or same-sex marriage violates the principle of separation of church and state. They fear that an alliance of conservative churches might someday gain enough governmental power to impose religious values on everybody else, non-believers included. This is what they mean when they speak, as they often do, of the looming danger of 'theocracy.' Behind the moral-conservative political activism of Christian churches they see would-be theocrats, or 'dominionists,' who want to take over America, stamp out abortion, subjugate women, drive homosexuals back into the closet, and enact other items allagedly on the agenda of the Religious Right. Yet this would be clearly un-American, violating the philosophical, religious, and moral pluralism that has long been, and should be, characteristic of the United States.

One obvious and oft-given answer is this: few liberals have made similar objections to the modern civil-rights movement, which was in large measure inspired by religion and based on churches. Martin Luther King, Jr. was a Protestant minister - even, it might be said, a Christian martyr. Are the objectors ready to say that the great legislative fruits of this religio-political movement, the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and the Voting Rights Act of 1965, are illegitimate, that they're instances of the imposition of theocratic values? Will they say that the spirit of American 'pluralism' demanded that the pro-segregation values of the KKK and other racists should have been respected? Of course not. And so it appears that what's at stake for these people isn't a matter of principle (separation of church and state) but a matter of policy. Some policies they like )e.g., civil rights legislation), and some they dislike (e.g., laws restricting abortion). A religion-driven politics is okay when it produces laws they like, but it's very naughty when it produces laws they don't like. And so we may conclude (may we not?) that all this talk about the separation of church and state is nothing but dust they throw in people's eyes." (Can a Catholic Be a Democrat: How the Party I Loved Became the Enemy of My Religion, pp. 129-131, Sophia Institute Press, 2006).

Next we will examine the idea of separation of church and state from the standpoint of Vatican II.

Litany of Saint Anthony of Padua

(For Private Use)

Lord, have mercy on us.
Christ, have mercy on us.
Lord, have mercy on us.
Christ, hear us.
Christ, graciously hear us.
God, the Father of Heaven, have mercy on us.
God, the Son, Redeemer of the world, have mercy on us.
God, the Holy Spirit, have mercy on us.
Holy Trinity, one God, have mercy on us.
Holy Mary,
Saint Anthony of Padua,
Saint Anthony, glory of the Friars Minor,
Saint Anthony, ark of the testament,
Saint Anthony, sanctuary of heavenly wisdom,
Saint Anthony, destroyer of worldly vanity,
Saint Anthony, conqueror of impurity,
Saint Anthony, example of humility,
Saint Anthony, lover of the Cross,
Saint Anthony, martyr of desire,
Saint Anthony, generator of charity,
Saint Anthony, zealous for justice,
Saint Anthony, terror of infidels,
Saint Anthony, model of perfection,
Saint Anthony, consoler of the afflicted,
Saint Anthony, restorer of lost things,
Saint Anthony, defender of innocence,
Saint Anthony, liberator of prisoners,
Saint Anthony, guide of pilgrims,
Saint Anthony, restorer of health.
Saint Anthony, performer of miracles,
Saint Anthony, restorer of speech to the mute,
Saint Anthony, restorer of hearing to the deaf,
Saint Anthony, restorer of sight to the blind,
Saint Anthony, disperser of devils,
Saint Anthony, reviver of the dead.
Saint Anthony, tamer of tyrants,
From the snares of the devil, Saint Anthony deliver us.
From thunder, lightning and storms, Saint Anthony deliver us.
From all evil of body and soul, Saint Anthony deliver us.
Through your intercession, Saint Anthony protect us.
Throughout the course of life, Saint Anthony protect us.
Lamb of God, who takes away the sins of the world, spare us, O Lord.
Lamb of God, who takes away the sins of the world, graciously hear us, O Lord.
Lamb of God, who takes away the sins of the world, have mercy on us.

V. Saint Anthony, pray for us.
R. That we may be made worthy of the promises of Christ.

O my God, may the pious commemoration of Saint Anthony, your Confessor and Proctor, give joy to your Church, that she may ever be strengthened with your spiritual assistance and merit to attain everlasting joy. Through Christ our Lord. Amen.

A peace that is ever at war.....

I have said it so many times before, but I'll say it again: In our saccharin society, there are very many individuals (and sadly many Catholics among them) who accuse those of us who defend the Magisterial teaching of the Church as being "negative" or of engaging in negativity. But this childish attitude, which is the result of a sham spirituality, is not the Catholic attitude.

It was Pope John XXIII, beloved Pontiff of happy memory, a true man of peace, who said that:

"...as long as we are journeying in exile over this earth, our peace and happiness will be imperfect. For such peace is not completely untroubled and serene; it is active, not calm and motionless. In short, this is a peace that is ever at war. It wars with every sort of error, including that which falsely wears the face of truth; it struggles against the enticements of vice, against those enemies of the soul, of whatever description, who can weaken, blemish, or destroy our innocence or Catholic faith. This peace combats hatred, fraud, and discord, which can impair and cripple our faith." (Encyclical Letter Ad Petri Cathedram, No. 93).

Was this great Pontiff being "negative" when he insisted that an authentic peace is "ever at war" with every sort of error, including "that which falsely wears the face of truth"?

I would suggest a prayerful read of this Encyclical Letter, especially Nos. 11, 15, 93, 95, 130, 131.

Mature Catholics will find the Encyclical edifying. Immature Catholics infected by the zeitgeist will find it challenging and perhaps even impossible to digest. But then, solid food is for adults and milk is for children.

Paul.

A Nashua Parish honors the Body and Blood of Christ

Yesterday, the Pastor of St. Aloysius of Gonzaga Parish (St. Louis de Gonzague), the Rev. Richard H. Dion, led a Corpus Christi procession through the streets of Nashua, New Hampshire. This charismatic priest is truly a gift to the Church. Upon arriving at the Corpus Christi Adoration Chapel, Rev. Dion gave an excellent talk which was followed by Eucharistic Adoration and Benediction.

The theme of Fr. Dion's talk was the importance of Eucharistic Adoration to the life of the Church and the witness it provides to a culture mired in materialism and enslaved by a hedonistic pursuit of pleasure. To this end, Fr. Dion regularly repeated Our Lord's words, "Amen, I say to you, it will be hard for one who is rich to enter the kingdom of heaven." (Matthew 19:23).

Fr. Dion - and all the faithful who took part in this Corpus Christi procession - are to be commended for their love of Our Eucharistic Jesus and for not being ashamed of standing with (and walking with) Jesus their King. They have already received a blessing.

O Saving Victim opening wide

The gates of heav'n to man below!

Our foes press on from every side;

Thine aid supply, Thy strength bestow.

To Thy great name be endless praise

Immortal Godhead, One in Three;

Oh, grant us endless length of days,

In our true native land with Thee.

Amen.

In Latin, an important use of the accusative case is with prepositions. Prepositions and the nouns or pronouns they go with show direction toward, time, the means by which something is done, where and when something is done, purpose, and various other kinds of directions.

As an adverb, the word "extra" in Latin is properly translated into English as "outside." However, the same word in the maxim Extra Ecclesiam nulla salus is a preposition which takes the accusative case. It is, therefore, more accurately translated into English as "without." Consequently, the maxim Extra Ecclesiam nulla salus is more accurately translated into English as "Without the Church there is no salvation."

Why is this so important? Because, for the Feeneyites, the maxim means that an individual who is not formally a practicing Catholic cannot be saved. The Church has condemned this interpretation (cf. Denzinger-Schonmetzer, 3870-3873).

As Pope John Paul II explains:


"The Council speaks of membership in the Church for Christians and of being related to the Church for non-Christian believers in God, for people of good will (cf. Lumen Gentium 15-16). Both these dimensions are important for salvation, and each one possesses varying levels. People are saved through the Church, they are saved in the Church, but they always are saved by the grace of Christ. Besides formal membership in the Church, the sphere of salvation can also include other forms of relation to the Church. Paul VI expressed this same teaching in his first encyclical, Ecclesiam Suam, when he spoke of the various circles of the dialogue of salvation (cf. Ecclesiam Suam 101-117), which are the same as those indicated by the Council as the spheres of membership in and of relation to the Church. This is the authentic meaning of the well-known statement 'Outside the Church there is no salvation.'" (Crossing the Threshold of Hope, pp. 140-141).

VATICAN CITY, JUN 6, 2007 (VIS) - St. Cyprian, "the first African bishop to achieve the crown of martyrdom," was the subject of Benedict XVI's catechesis during his general audience, held this morning in St. Peter's Square in the presence of 40,000 people.

Cyprian, said the Pope, "was born in Carthage to a rich pagan family" and "converted to Christianity at the age of 35. ... He became a priest and later a bishop. In the brief period of his episcopate, he had to face the first two persecutions authorized by imperial edict, that of Decius (250) and that of Valerian (257-258)," following which many faithful "renounced their faith, or at least failed to comport themselves correctly when under trial. These were the so-called 'lapsi,' that is, the 'lapsed'."

Cyprian was "severe but not inflexible towards the 'lapsi,' giving them the chance of forgiveness after an exemplary penance." The saint also "showed great humanity and was pervaded by the most authentic evangelical spirit in exhorting Christians to offer fraternal help to pagans during the plague." But he was "irremovable in combating the corruption and sins that devastated the moral life, especially that of avarice."

"Cyprian wrote many treatises and letters, all of them associated with his pastoral ministry. Little given to theological speculations, he wrote above all for the edification of the community and to encourage the faithful to good behavior."

In the saint's works, the Holy Father explained, "the Church is by far the topic most dear to him. He distinguishes between the visible hierarchical Church and the invisible mystical Church, at the same time forcefully affirming that the Church is one, founded upon Peter. He never tires of repeating that 'whoever abandons the chair of Peter, upon which the Church is founded, deludes himself if he believes he remains in the Church'."

Hence, "the indispensable characteristic of the Church is unity, as symbolized by the seamless robe of Christ; a unity that finds its foundation in Peter and its perfect realization in the Eucharist," said the Holy Father. He then referred to Cyprian's teaching on prayer "which highlights how in the Our Father Christians are shown the correct way to pray." That prayer refers to "us" and "our" rather than to "me" and "mine," said the Pope, "so that he who prays does not pray only for himself. Ours is a public and community prayer. ... The Christian does not say 'my Father,' but 'our Father,' even when praying in the privacy of a closed room, because he knows that everywhere and in all circumstances, he is a member of the one Body."

"Cyprian, then, lies at the origins of that fruitful theological-spiritual tradition that sees the heart as the privileged place of prayer. ... It is there that God meets and talks to man, ... and man listens to God."

"Let us make our own that 'understanding heart' about which the Bible and the Fathers speak," the Pope concluded. "We have such great need of it."

Pope Benedict XVI to declare year dedicated to St. Paul

I was named after two great preachers: St. Paul of Tarsus and St. Anthony de Padua. This news fills me with joy.

Paul.

Quake rattles the Granite State

"Brother" Andre Marie's mother issues an apologia...

On Friday, April 20, 2007, I wrote a post at this Blog in which I said: "On a related note, 'Brother' Andre Marie of the Saint Benedict Center in Richmond, has been photographed wearing a biretta. As this article explains: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Biretta, the biretta has traditionally been worn by members of the Catholic clergy or in some instances seminarians. Has 'Brother' Andre Marie been passing himself off as a Roman Catholic priest or seminarian? Does this have anything to do with a previous announcement (made in the SBC's newsletter Mancipia) that the SBC intended to have 'Brother' Andre Marie ordained without canonical permission - dimissorial letters?"

This was an entirely legitimate question. Especially since 'Brother' Francis (in the announcement referred to above) had said:

"Since the death of Father Feeney, we have never had a cleric as a religious member of the Slaves of the Immaculate Heart of Mary, circumstances in the Church [read their own disobedience to Church teaching and authority] making it virtually impossible to attain that goal. Regardless of this, it was the intention of our Founder to have priests in our First Order, and we have never abandoned that desire...Years of searching for priests to assist us have turned up no long-term solution.... The demands of serving our community call for a priest convinced of our position and goals. Otherwise, longevity is not likely. The most obvious question is how will it be done? We have long prayed for this goal, and sought to achieve it through proper canonical channels. Knowing how saturated the hierarchy is with modernism - from Rome on down - we have concluded that passage through these channels is impossible without compromising our Crusade. We are forced to take extraordinary measures to procure ordination. To be precise, we would be seeking ordination without dimissorial letters, the canonical permission granted by a diocesan bishop or other prelate for a man to be ordained. Is this action justified? In a word: Yes..."

Just this morning, a Catholic lay woman forwarded me an email which was apparently written by "Brother" Andre Marie's mother, Mrs. Eleonore Villarrubia, in which she wrote in part:

"Dear Ms. Duclos,

I am sorry that you have publicly referred to Brother Andre as a "con man." He may be many things some folks don't like, but he is the most honest and open person I know. You seem to know something about the workings of Chruch procedure. (Most of the ignoramouses who write to this blog [Keene Sentinel Talkback, My Note] criticising St. Benedict Center have no idea what a dismissorial letter is.) Yes, it is true that St. Benedict Center functions without the Bishop's permission. Brother Andre and Brother Francis have seen the Bishop at least once, possibly twice, to present their case. Brother Andre tries to stay in touch with the Bishop to keep him informed of the situation in Richmond. Brother has petitioned the Bishop for regularization and recognition, but he ignores us.

Surely, as a Catholic, you are aware of the terrible crisis in the modern Catholic Church - diminishing vocations, silly music, no reverence, priests who do not believe in the Real Presence of Our Lord in the Eucharist, nuns who have become witches, Catholic Schools who do not teach Catholicism. The list is endless. Many good Catholics are left scratching their heads in the New Church of NICE.

St. Benedict Center adheres to Catholic dogma as it has been taught for two millenia. Vatican II did not change doctrine. NO ONE can change doctrine. Vatican II was merely a pastoral council, not a doctrinal council. This is history and fact. The changes were brought about by liberal churchmen who undermined the church from within. This, too, is history.

The fact is, that St. Benedict Center is Catholic, functioning independently as many Traditional Catholic groups do in this time of trial. Brother Andre is an ordained deacon, not by the local bishop, but ordained nevertheless. I happened to be present at the ordination. In the pictures you see on the website, he is wearing the vestments of a DEACON, not a priest, as some of our detractors have claimed (again, showing their ignorance).... Yes, there is a hate group in Richmond, but it is not St. Benedict Center, Mrs. Duclos; it is our few, but very vocal opponents in this town who are atheists, agnostics, and who knows what else who fear a small, powerless (except for God's grace), poor little independent Catholic monastery.."

"Brother" Andre is an ordained deacon? How so? Once again, Canon 1015 of the Code of Canon Law states that: "Each candidate is to be ordained to the presbyterate or the diaconate by his own bishop or with legitimate dimissorial letters from him." Therefore, it would appear that Mrs. Villarrubia isn't all that familiar with "the workings of Church procedure."

This was also the case, of course, under the previous Code of Canon Law. In his classic work Moral Theology, Fr. Heribert Jone writes that:

"A suspension not reserved is incurred by: (b) One who is maliciously ordained without dimissorials or with falsified ones.." (Canon 2374). (Moral Theology, p. 306).

This is very serious. I fully understand that Mrs. Villarrubia wants to defend her son's actions. But his actions are indefensible. And her email epitomizes that lack of charity and arrogance which has come to define the SBC cult. In her email, Mrs. Villarrubia refers to "chruch procedure" (read Church procedure) and to "ignoramouses" (her plural of the word ignoramus) who have "no idea what a dismissorial (the word is dimissorial) letter is."

But does Mrs. Villarrubia possess an adequate understanding of what a dimissorial letter is? It would seem that she does not.

Bill Maher's anti-Christian bias

I received this email from the Rev. Donald Wildmon of the American Family Association this morning:



Bill Maher Mocks Christianity and Catholics Again

Send an e-mail to HBO Chairman Chris Albrecht and Bill Maher.

Dear Paul,

The anti-Christian bigotry gets more and more sickening. Bill Maher, host of the talk show "Real Time with Bill Maher" on HBO, recently showed the hatred Maher and the other Hollywood types have for Christianity and Christians.Just three days after Rev. Jerry Falwell's death, Maher began his weekly HBO program with a verbal assault on Rev. Falwell and then escalated into a vicious attack on Christianity in general and Catholics in particular.Maher: "We weren’t having sex, officer. I was performing a very private Mass, here in my car. I was letting my rod and staff comfort him. Take this and eat of it, for this is my roommate Barry...and for all those who believe there is a special place for you in Kevin."Please click here for earlier comments of Mr. Maher calling Christians crazy.Time-Warner, owner of HBO, issued no apology for the on-air explicit homosexual mockery of Scripture and Catholic theology. Neither did the mainstream media bring it to the public’s attention as they did with Don Imus. For the mainstream media, Christians are the only religious group in America against whom such bigotry is allowed.

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We Shall Keep the Faith

by Moina Michael,
November 1918

Oh! you who sleep in Flanders Fields,
Sleep sweet - to rise anew!
We caught the torch you threw
And holding high, we keep the Faith With All who died.
We cherish, too, the poppy red
That grows on fields where valor led;
It seems to signal to the skies
That blood of heroes never dies,
But lends a lustre to the red
Of the flower that blooms above the dead
In Flanders Fields.
And now the Torch and Poppy Red
We wear in honor of our dead.
Fear not that ye have died for naught;
We'll teach the lesson that ye wrought
In Flanders Fields.

DUTY HONOR COUNTRY



General Douglas MacArthur's Farewell Speech
Given to the Corps of Cadets at West Point
May 12, 1962


General Westmoreland, General Groves, distinguished guests, and gentlemen of the Corps. As I was leaving the hotel this morning, a doorman asked me, "Where are you bound for, General?" and when I replied, "West Point," he remarked, "Beautiful place, have you ever been there before?"

No human being could fail to be deeply moved by such a tribute as this, coming from a profession I have served so long and a people I have loved so well. It fills me with an emotion I cannot express. But this award is not intended primarily for a personality, but to symbolize a great moral code - the code of conduct and chivalry of those who guard this beloved land of culture and ancient descent. That is the meaning of this medallion. For all eyes and for all time, it is an expression of the ethics of the American soldier. That I should be integrated in this way with so noble an ideal arouses a sense of pride and yet of humility which will be with me always.

"Duty," "Honor," "Country" - those three hallowed words reverently dictate what you want to be, what you can be, what you will be. They are your rallying point to build courage when courage seems to fail, to regain faith when there seems to be little cause for faith, to create hope when hope becomes forlorn. Unhappily, I possess neither that eloquence of diction, that poetry of imagination, nor that brilliance of metaphor to tell you all that they mean.

The unbelievers will say they are but words, but a slogan, but a flamboyant phrase. Every pedant, every demagogue, every cynic, every hypocrite, every troublemaker, and, I am sorry to say, some others of an entirely different character, will try to downgrade them even to the extent of mockery and ridicule.

But these are some of the things they do. They build your basic character. They mold you for your future roles as the custodians of the nation's defense. They make you strong enough to know when you are weak, and brave enough to face yourself when you are afraid.

They teach you to be proud and unbending in honest failure, but humble and gentle in success; not to substitute words for action; not to seek the path of comfort, but to face the stress and spur of difficulty and challenge; to learn to stand up in the storm, but to have compassion on those who fall; to master yourself before you seek to master others; to have a heart that is clean, a goal that is high; to learn to laugh, yet never forget how to weep; to reach into the future, yet never neglect the past; to be serious, yet never take yourself too seriously; to be modest so that you will remember the simplicity of true greatness; the open mind of true wisdom, the meekness of true strength.

They give you a temperate will, a quality of imagination, a vigor of the emotions, a freshness of the deep springs of life, a temperamental predominance of courage over timidity, an appetite for adventure over love of ease. They create in your heart the sense of wonder, the unfailing hope of what next, and the joy and inspiration of life. They teach you in this way to be an officer and a gentleman.

And what sort of soldiers are those you are to lead? Are they reliable? Are they brave? Are they capable of victory?

Their story is known to all of you. It is the story of the American man at arms. My estimate of him was formed on the battlefields many, many years ago, and has never changed. I regarded him then, as I regard him now, as one of the world's noblest figures; not only as one of the finest military characters, but also as one of the most stainless.

His name and fame are the birthright of every American citizen. In his youth and strength, his love and loyalty, he gave all that mortality can give. He needs no eulogy from me, or from any other man. He has written his own history and written it in red on his enemy's breast.
But when I think of his patience under adversity, of his courage under fire, and of his modesty in victory, I am filled with an emotion of admiration I cannot put into words. He belongs to history as furnishing one of the greatest examples of successful patriotism. He belongs to posterity as the instructor of future generations in the principles of liberty and freedom. He belongs to the present, to us, by his virtues and by his achievements.

In twenty campaigns, on a hundred battlefields, around a thousand campfires, I have witnessed that enduring fortitude, that patriotic self-abnegation, and that invincible determination which have carved his statue in the hearts of his people.

From one end of the world to the other, he has drained deep the chalice of courage. As I listened to those songs of the glee club, in memory's eye I could see those staggering columns of the First World War, bending under soggy packs on many a weary march, from dripping dusk to drizzling dawn, slogging ankle deep through mire of shell-pocked roads; to form grimly for the attack, blue-lipped, covered with sludge and mud, chilled by the wind and rain, driving home to their objective, and for many, to the judgment seat of God.

I do not know the dignity of their birth, but I do know the glory of their death. They died unquestioning, uncomplaining, with faith in their hearts, and on their lips the hope that we would go on to victory. Always for them: Duty, Honor, Country. Always their blood, and sweat, and tears, as they saw the way and the light.

And twenty years after, on the other side of the globe, against the filth of dirty foxholes, the stench of ghostly trenches, the slime of dripping dugouts, those boiling suns of the relentless heat, those torrential rains of devastating storms, the loneliness and utter desolation of jungle trails, the bitterness of long separation of those they loved and cherished, the deadly pestilence of tropic disease, the horror of stricken areas of war.

Their resolute and determined defense, their swift and sure attack, their indomitable purpose, their complete and decisive victory - always victory, always through the bloody haze of their last reverberating shot, the vision of gaunt, ghastly men, reverently following your password of Duty, Honor, Country.

The code which those words perpetuate embraces the highest moral laws and will stand the test of any ethics or philosophies ever promulgated for the uplift of mankind. Its requirements are for the things that are right, and its restraints are from the things that are wrong. The soldier, above all other men, is required to practice the greatest act of religious training - sacrifice. In battle and in the face of danger and death, he discloses those divine attributes which his Maker gave when he created man in his own image. No physical courage and no brute instinct can take the place of the Divine help which alone can sustain him. However horrible the incidents of war may be, the soldier who is called upon to offer and to give his life for his country, is the noblest development of mankind.

You now face a new world, a world of change. The thrust into outer space of the satellite, spheres and missiles marked the beginning of another epoch in the long story of mankind - the chapter of the space age. In the five or more billions of years the scientists tell us it has taken to form the earth, in the three or more billion years of development of the human race, there has never been a greater, a more abrupt or staggering evolution. We deal now not with things of this world alone, but with the illimitable distances and as yet unfathomed mysteries of the universe. We are reaching out for a new and boundless frontier. We speak in strange terms: of harnessing the cosmic energy; of making winds and tides work for us; of creating unheard synthetic materials to supplement or even replace our old standard basics; of purifying sea water for our drink; of mining ocean floors for new fields of wealth and food; of disease preventatives to expand life into the hundred of years; of controlling the weather for a more equitable distribution of heat and cold, of rain and shine; of space ships to the moon; of the primary target in war, no longer limited to the armed forces of an enemy, but instead to include his civil populations; of ultimate conflict between a united human race and the sinister forces of some other planetary galaxy; of such dreams and fantasies as to make life the most exciting of all time.

And through all this welter of change and development your mission remains fixed, determined, inviolable. It is to win our wars. Everything else in your professional career is but corollary to this vital dedication. All other public purpose, all other public projects, all other public needs, great or small, will find others for their accomplishments; but you are the ones who are trained to fight.

Yours is the profession of arms, the will to win, the sure knowledge that in war there is no substitute for victory, that if you lose, the Nation will be destroyed, that the very obsession of your public service must be Duty, Honor, Country.

Others will debate the controversial issues, national and international, which divide men's minds. But serene, calm, aloof, you stand as the Nation's war guardians, as its lifeguards from the raging tides of international conflict, as its gladiators in the arena of battle. For a century and a half you have defended, guarded and protected its hallowed traditions of liberty and freedom, of right and justice.

Let civilian voices argue the merits or demerits of our processes of government. Whether our strength is being sapped by deficit financing indulged in too long, by federal paternalism grown too mighty, by power groups grown too arrogant, by politics grown too corrupt, by crime grown too rampant, by morals grown too low, by taxes grown too high, by extremists grown too violent; whether our personal liberties are as firm and complete as they should be.

These great national problems are not for your professional participation or military solution. Your guidepost stands out like a tenfold beacon in the night: Duty, Honor, Country.
You are the leaven which binds together the entire fabric of our national system of defense. From your ranks come the great captains who hold the Nation's destiny in their hands the moment the war tocsin sounds.

The long gray line has never failed us. Were you to do so, a million ghosts in olive drab, in brown khaki, in blue and gray, would rise from their white crosses, thundering those magic words: Duty, Honor, Country.

This does not mean that you are warmongers. On the contrary, the soldier above all other people prays for peace, for he must suffer and bear the deepest wounds and scars of war. But always in our ears ring the ominous words of Plato, that wisest of all philosophers: "Only the dead have seen the end of war."

The shadows are lengthening for me. The twilight is here. My days of old have vanished - tone and tints. They have gone glimmering through the dreams of things that were. Their memory is one of wondrous beauty, watered by tears and coaxed and caressed by the smiles of yesterday. I listen then, but with thirsty ear, for the witching melody of faint bugles blowing reveille, of far drums beating the long roll.

In my dreams I hear again the crash of guns, the rattle of musketry, the strange, mournful mutter of the battlefield. But in the evening of my memory I come back to West Point. Always there echoes and re-echoes: Duty, Honor, Country.

Today marks my final roll call with you. But I want you to know that when I cross the river, my last conscious thoughts will be of the Corps, and the Corps, and the Corps.


I bid you farewell.

41!

Today is my birthday. And I am 41 years young. I share a birthday with St. Padre Pio. And so I would like to share the following prayer:

A Prayer to Padre Pio

Beloved Padre Pio, today I come to add my prayer to the thousands of prayers offered to you every day by those who love and venerate you. They ask for cures and healings, earthly and spiritual blessings, and peace for body and mind. And because of your friendship with the Lord, he heals those you ask to be healed, and forgives those you forgive.

Through your visible wounds of the Cross, which you bore for 50 years, you were chosen in our time to glorify the crucified Jesus. Because the Cross has been replaced by other symbols, please help us to bring it back in our midst, for we acknowledge it is the only true sign of salvation.

As we lovingly recall the wounds that pierced your hands, feet and side, we not only remember the blood you shed in pain, but your smile, and the invisible halo of sweet smelling flowers that surrounded your presence, the perfume of sanctity.

Padre Pio, may the healings of the sick become the testimony that the Lord has invited you to join the holy company of Saints. In your kindness, please help me with my own special request: (mention here your petition, and make the sign of the Cross).

Bless me and my loved ones. In the name of the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit.

Amen.

Pope John Paul II on Extra Ecclesiam nulla salus....

"The Council speaks of membership in the Church for Christians and of being related to the Church for non-Christian believers in God, for people of (cf. Lumen Gentium 15-16). Both these dimensions are important for salvation, and each one possesses varying levels. People are saved through the Church, they are saved in the Church, but they always are saved by the grace of Christ. Besides formal membership in the Church, the sphere of salvation can also include other forms of relation to the Church. Paul VI expressed this same teaching in his first encyclical, Ecclesiam Suam, when he spoke of the various circles of the dialogue of salvation (cf. Ecclesiam Suam 101-117), which are the same as those indicated by the Council as the spheres of membership in and of relation to the Church. This is the authentic meaning of the well-known statement 'Outside the Church there is no salvation.'" (Crossing the Threshold of Hope, pp. 140-141).

Questions or comments:

cleghornboy@juno.com

A Powerful Sacramental

www.catholicfirst.com/thefaith/prayers/simpleexorcism.cfm

Paul.

There is no doubt about it. We are witnessing an increase in disasters: physical, economic, political and religious. We are witnessing sad divisions within the Church and a general corruption of morals, most notably in the areas of sex, marriage and family life. There is a wide-scale increase in drug use, alcoholism, violent crime, disbelief and atheism. These are signs of the times pointing toward chastisement. The world is sick. Men have become weary of striving to be men. In 1926, Oswald Spengler issued a warning to the Western Nations, a warning which was ignored:

"You are dying. I see in you all the characteristic stigma of decay. I can prove that your great wealth and your great poverty, your capitalism and your socialism, your wars and your revolutions, your atheism and your pessimism and your cynicism, your immorality, your broken-down marriages, your birth-control, that is bleeding you from the bottom and killing you off at the top in your brains - can prove to you that these were characteristic marks of the dying ages of ancient states - Alexandria and Greece and neurotic Rome." (Decline of the West, London: Allen & Unwin, 1932).

Watch and pray.