For the record: Local Bishop confirms Medjugorje is a hoax'This really is not Our Lady from the Gospel'

The bishop of Mostar-Duvno, His Excellency Ratko Peric, has once again strongly stated the obvious -- the apparitions of Medjugorje are a hoax. In fact, he goes even further, saying they were a form of manipulation from the fake visionaries and priests who benefit from the duped throngs of Catholics who visit the site. His predecessaor, His Excellency Pavao Žanic, also condemned the financial boondoggle of Medjugorje as false.

According to Jutarnji Vijesti, and translated by Total Croatia News, Bishop Peric said: "Considering everything that this diocesan chancery has so far researched and studied, including the first seven days of alleged apparitions, we can say: there have been no apparitions of Our Lady in Medjugorje."

In describing the woman who the fake visionaries say appears, Bishop Peric says:  "She often does not speak first, she has a strange laugh, she disappears after certain questions and then returns; she obeys the 'visionaries' and priests to come down from the hill to the church, although reluctantly. She is not sure how much time she will be visible, allows some of the visionaries to stand on her veil which is on the ground, allows others to touch her clothes and body. This really is not Our Lady from the Gospel."

The pontificate summarized

Conservative and traditional-minded Catholics were heavily criticized for the anonymous posters spread around Rome a few weeks ago with not a single mistake: both content and image were rigorously correct, not an unjust criticism of the Pope.

Naturally, no one ever proved that any conservative Catholic was behind the posters.

Because the fact that this Pope, Jorge Mario Bergoglio, is a Socialist and a strong-armed politician is a common conclusion throughout Italy -- as was seen this weekend in the Carnival parades of Viareggio, coastal Tuscany.

Behold the Che GuePapa:

"Francis received in audience this morning...

... - H. E. Abp. Guido Pozzo, Titular Archbishop of Bagnoregio, Secretary of the Pontifical Commission 'Ecclesia Dei';..." (Bollettino)

Sin is Virtue

The freaking creeps running the Church today:

Why bother getting married, right? Then, why bother being Catholic at all?...

Fr. Spadaro, SJ, runs the once-great Civiltà Cattolica founded by none other than the magnificent Pio Nono (Bl. Pius IX). He is one of the two or three closest advisors of Pope Francis...

A tale of Mass murder and homicide

On February 18, 1916, a Catholic priest was executed by the state of New York at the Sing Sing prison -- the only priest in America to receive the death penalty for a crime. The New York Daily News today did a look back at the story from a century ago.

Father Hans Schmidt was convicted of murder, following an affair he had with a woman. Before he killed her, he also paid for their baby to be aborted.

What was especially interesting was this passage from today's article:

Shameful and Repulsive: 1970s-style Francis unsurprisingly soft on pedophiles

From the excellent AP reporter in Rome Nicole Winfield:

Pope quietly trims sanctions for sex abusers seeking mercy

By NICOLE WINFIELD

VATICAN CITY (AP) — Pope Francis has quietly reduced sanctions against a handful of pedophile priests, applying his vision of a merciful church even to its worst offenders in ways that survivors of abuse and the pope's own advisers question.

Ecce ascendimus Ierosolymam: Lent Is coming...

Ecce ascendimus Ierosolymam, et consummabuntur omnia quæ scripta sunt per prophetas de Filio hominis. (From the Gospel for the Sunday in Quinquagesima, Luke xviii, 31: Behold, we go up to Jerusalem, and all things shall be accomplished which were written by the prophets concerning the Son of Man.)

Christianity is as old as the world; for it consists, essentially, in the idea of a God -- Creator, Legislator, and Savior -- and in a life conformable to that idea. Now, God manifested himself to the human race from the beginning under the threefold relation of Creator, Legislator, and Savior, and from the beginning, from Adam to Noah, from Noah to Abraham, from Abraham to Moses, from Moses to Jesus Christ, there have been men who lived conformably with this idea of God.

Three times before Jesus Christ, God manifested himself to men in this threefold character: by Adam, the first father of the human race; by Noah, the second father of the human race; and by Moses, the lawgiver of a People whose influence and existence have mixed them up with all the destinies of mankind.

There exists, however, a fact not less remarkable, namely, that Christianity only started its reign in the world eighteen hundred years ago, with Jesus Christ. Jesus Christ appears to have been the first who brought light into the world. Before him, as Saint John said, "it shined in darkness". But what is the cause of this? How is it that Christianity, vanquished in the world before Jesus Christ, has been victorious in it since his coming? How is it that Christianity, before Jesus Christ, "did not hinder the nations from following their ways", and that Jesus Christ, on the contrary, was able to pronounce that sentence of eternal victory, "In mundo pressuram habebitits, sed confidite, ego vici mundum"?

What new thing is it then that Jesus Christ has accomplished? Is it the sacrifice on Calvary? The Lamb of God that takes aways the sins of the world "was slain from the beginning of the world". ... Is it the Gospel? The Gospel, after all, is but the Word of God, and that word, after many trials, did not change the world. Is it the sacraments? The sacraments are only the channels of grace, and the grace of God, although less abundant, without doubt had not ceased continually to flow to men before Jesus Christ. What new thing, then, did Jesus Christ accomplish? By what means did he secure the eternal duration of the victory obtained on Calvary?

Listen to his own words, he will say them to you: "Thou art Peter, and upon this rock I will build my Church, and the gates of hell shall not prevail against her". This is the work which was to subjugate forever hell and the world, which would everyday renew the Sacrifice of the Savior, maintain and diffuse his doctrines, distribute his grace! ... this Church, "the pillar and ground of the truth"...[is] destined to the universal and perpetual instruction of the human race.

Henri-Dominique Lacordaire
Conférences à Notre-Dame de Paris (1835)

Lent is coming: Time to prepareAudio mission on death, judgement, Heaven & Hell

Lent is coming next week. We're running out of time to prepare.

In the past, you could find a traditional Lenten Mission at many parishes. Now, unless you are near a traditional parish, they are nearly extinct -- or worthless.

Fortunately, we are not meant to live in the past, we are meant to live in the now. And, now, we have the Internet. And there is an abundance of good on the Internet, along with the bad.

As we do every year, we bring to your attention this wonderful, traditional, five-part Lenten Mission by the holy and learned Fr. Isaac Mary Relyea. While it is not short, it does go by very quickly, and is easy to follow and understand. It's clear, concise and bold.

As the season nears, you would do well to listen to this, to pray on it and to use it to prepare for a fruitful Lent -- and be ready for it to change you for the better.

Click on each of the five themes of the mission: Prelude to the Mission * On Death * On Judgment * On Hell * On Heaven

Please consider helping Fr. Isaac. If these sermons end up meaning as much to you as they do to us, please consider giving whatever you can to cover Father's expenses.

To donate, please send your contribution to the address below. You can reference Rorate when you write. No donation is considered too small.

Father Isaac Mary Relyea
369 County Road 546
Hanceville, Alabama 35077

Lent is coming: Time to prepare Printable Lent worksheet

Lent is coming and it's now that we should be preparing.

Today, we once again post the worksheet below, which was made years ago for us to use by a wonderful traditional priest (click for larger view and printing). It's a good tool to make our plans, to refer to throughout Lent and to evaluate our progress when Lent ends.

Planning for Lent should be no different than planning for other things in life: Plan, prepare, execute and evaluate. Today we give you a tool to use. Tomorrow, we'll give you some inspiration. 

New book on the Church and the New Age

Buy it here: Amazon.co.uk; Amazon.com

Roger Buck's Cor Jesu Sacratissimum: From Secularism and the New Age to Christendom Renewed is a substantial volume investigating the New Age, its roots and its implications, and the path to the restoration of Christendom.

I've written more about the New Age over on my blog here; a position paper on the New Age and the Traditional Mass is in preparation.

I was asked to provide a comment for the back cover, and I wrote:

'Roger Buck has done a great service to the Church by his careful and well-informed examination of the New Age, which is both truly charitable and unflinching, and his discussion of wider issues in the Church from the perspective of a former New Age initiate.

'Buck shows that the New Age is an attempt, however flawed, to escape the materialism of modernity, and that it is Catholicism in its traditional forms, with its mystery and ritual, its sacramantals, art, and pious practices, which can best reveal the immense reality of the suffering and love for all mankind of Christ's Sacred Heart, to those trapped in the false mysteries of the New Age.'

Francis: the gift that keeps on giving

"There are those who say 'I am very Catholic, I always go to Mass, I belong to this and that association'," the head of the 1.2 billion-member Roman Catholic Church said, according to a Vatican Radio transcript.

He said that some of these people should also say "'my life is not Christian, I don't pay my employees proper salaries, I exploit people, I do dirty business, I launder money, (I lead) a double life'."

"There are many Catholics who are like this and they cause scandal," he said. "How many times have we all heard people say 'if that person is a Catholic, it is better to be an atheist'." [Homily at Santa Marta, translated by Reuters]

No, no: it's always better to be a baptized person, cleansed by the Holy Ghost in baptism -- it always objectively allows the baptized soul to open itself up more easily than the non-baptized to the calls of the Holy Trinity to penance and conversion. That is the whole point of the yearly exercise of Lent to start next week: it is to recognize our many failures, and join the darkness of our souls to be washed away by the Supreme redeeming Action of God-Incarnate who died on the Cross.

Parce nobis, Domine! - You know why you inflicted Francis upon your Church: parce nobis!

En attendant GodotTagle to replace Müller as CDF Prefect?

 

Tagle singing at a concert, 2012. 

To the recent reports from other sources that Cardinal Müller has already offered his resignation from CDF, Rorate can now add, from its own very well-placed sources, that there is a plan at the highest levels to replace Müller as Prefect of CDF with no less than the Asian "Pope Francis", the man seen by many as Francis' dauphin, Luis Antonio Cardinal Tagle. 

Müller, appointed Prefect in July 2012, has been effectively marginalized in the past years over the Family Synods and most importantly over Amoris Laetitia. Questions about his future in the Roman Curia have been persistent through the years. It remains to be seen whether he will eventually be sent back to Germany to take the still-vacant see of Mainz (traditionally a red-hat see), or be tossed to a ceremonial position, or whether, like Stanisław Cardinal Ryłko last year, he will simply be retired long before turning 75.

Tagle's own theological oeuvre is very thin and his academic reputation rests mainly on the essays he wrote as part of the Bologna School's History of Vatican II. It is his slick promotion by the mainstream Catholic media, his reliably progressivist views (couched in "moderate" language) coupled with his stint at the International Theological Commission and the patronage he received from Joseph Ratzinger, first as CDF Prefect then as Pope, that have combined to give him an aura of learning far beyond what is supported by his real output. His election as President of both the Catholic Biblical Federation (in 2014) and Caritas International (in 2015) and his designation as one of three Delegate Presidents of the Extraordinary Synod of 2014 further guaranteed his prominence in the universal Church. 

Should this latest plan come to pass, Cardinal Tagle, who will turn 60 in June, will have an enviable "CV" for a conclave frontrunner: a long stint (more than 15 years and counting) as diocesan bishop then archbishop, followed by a stint as head of a Curial dicastery.

In the two previous Februaries Don Pio Pace wrote for Rorate long articles on the growing Tagle candidacy for the next conclave, articles worth reading now more than ever: 

"THE SUCCESSOR" - Rome in Pre-Conclave mood: What will come after the Bergoglio Papacy? (February 2015)

Exclusive Op-Ed: Pio Pace: "Conclave Preparations: Watch Out - Great Editorial Manoeuvres Signal Cardinal Tagle" (Feb. 2016)

Appeal: Help Keep the Roman Forum going

For most of our readers, you already know the critical work Dr. John Rao, and The Roman Forum, do every year on behalf of the Church and traditional Catholics everywhere. Last year, we helped raise over $10,000 to keep the Forum going. This year, for obvious reasons, it is more important than ever. Please read below, and please click here to donate whatever you can.

The Roman Forum

11 Carmine St., Apt. 2C

New York, New York 10014

www.romanforum.org

drjcrao@aol.com

Dear Friends,

          The Roman Forum is still in need of at least $25,000 in tax-deductible donations in support of its Twenty-Fifth Annual Summer Symposium. This program will be held from July 3^rd through July 14^th, 2017 (11 nights) on the topic: Setting Right a World Turned Upside Down---Transformation in Christ Versus a Sickness Unto Death.

          We need this sum to provide travel, room, and board for our international faculty and musical staff: fourteen participants at the moment, though still growing in number and potentially to include some further and rather significant clerical additions. No speaker receives remuneration for his participation. Funds are also used to aid the many priests, seminarians, college students, and others from across the globe---especially from Africa---who would be unable to attend without some help. I cannot tell you how significant this quarter of a century Symposium has become in creating a permanent, worldwide, fraternal union of clergy and laity, as well as providing an annual academic and activist strategy planning session on behalf of the Traditionalist Movement across the globe. Those wishing to attend Gardone, 2017 can contact us through the email address given above.

De Mattei: When public correction of a pope is urgent and necessary

Roberto de Mattei

Corrispondenza Romana

February 22, 2017

May a Pope be publicly corrected for his reprehensible behaviour? Or should the attitude of the faithful be that of unconditional obedience, until the point of justifying anything the Pope’s says and does, even if  openly scandalous? According to some, like the Vatican journalist Andrea Tornielli, it is possible to express “tète a tète” one’s dissent to the Pope, without, however, manifesting it publicly. This thesis nonetheless, contains an important admission. The Pope is not infallible, unless he speaks ex cathedra. Otherwise it would not be licit to dissent even privately and the path to follow would only be that of religious silence.  On the other hand, the Pope, who is not Christ, but only his representative on earth, can sin and make mistakes. Yet, is it true that he may only be corrected privately and never publicly?

The Wall Street Journal visits Clear Creek Abbey

The three-day American holiday weekend edition of the Wall Street Journal featured an article on the front page of its "Review" section looking at "a burgeoning movement among traditional Christians" to create "their own small communities".

It could have said "community", as the piece focused almost entirely on the work of the Benedictines at Clear Creek Abbey.  The article began:

Announcing the 2017 Summer Theology Program in Norcia -- Aquinas on the Sacraments

Agriturismo Casale - the base of our operations

The Albertus Magnus Center for Scholastic Studies is happy to announce that registration is now open for the July 2017 summer theology program in the town of Norcia. This will be our sixth summer program since 2011. We are especially excited to be studying the sacraments, with a close look at baptism and the Holy Eucharist, through the lens of Book IV of the Commentary on the Sentences of Peter Lombard by St. Thomas Aquinas, which has some of the Angelic Doctor's most extensive and intriguing discussions of sacramental theology from his entire career. The program directors will be Fr. Thomas Crean, O.P., Christopher Owens, and Peter Kwasniewski. Fr. Cassian Folsom, O.S.B., the founding prior of Norcia, will join us for a lecture and conversation.

Conference on the Canonical Problem of the Deposition of Popes to be Held in Paris

For some reason, a certain provision of Gratian’s Decretals, an early collection of canon law, has been the subject of renewed interest in recent times. The relevant text runs: “No mortal shall presume to rebuke [the pope’s] faults, for he who is to judge all is to be judged by no one, unless he is found straying from the faith” (Dist. 40 c.6). The last condition “unless he is found straying from the faith” has sometimes been interpreted to mean that a pope who strayed into heresy could be deposed. At the end of March a scholarly conference on the canonical and theological problem of the deposition of heretical popes is to be held at the Center for Law and Religious Societies of the Legal Faculty Jean-Monnet of the University Paris-Sud, in the Parisian suburb of Sceaux. The conference will be considering a recently published book on the subject by legal scholar Laurent Fonbaustier: La déposition du pape hérétique : Une origine du constitutionnalisme ? [The Deposition of an Heretical Pope: An Origin of Constitutionalism?]. Fonbaustier traces the influence of Gratian’s decretal on political theories of limited government. 

Support the FSSP Saint Francis Xavier Mission Trip

        

Rorate has always been a proud supporter of these mission trips. Below, please see a short write-up, provided by a reader:

It is easy to get discouraged by all the maddening news that seems to come out about the Church on a daily basis. Especially for orthodox, conservative, traditional-minded Catholics it can be extremely frustrating when we get characterized as rigid, sick, or elitist. If you are not already aware of it, I want to draw your attention to an apostolate that both destroys these stereotypes and hopefully represents a real sign of hope for the future of the Church.

For five years now the Saint Francis Xavier Mission Trip of the Priestly Fraternity of St. Peter has been organizing missions for youth and families. On the one hand we could emphasize that these missions are rooted in the Traditional Latin Mass, but it may be better to simply say that these missions are grounded in the Catholic Faith, which has always had at its heart the Traditional Latin Mass. 

I'M TIRED OF FRANCIS

That's it. That's all we have to say.

On the other hand, we should never get tired of Saint Paul. He, like the good Jesuits of the 16th century (Xavier first of all, but so many others), suffered immensely, out of love for Christ and His Church and her true, everlasting, and unwavering Doctrine.

Is there a more beautiful epistle than this Sunday's in the Church year? Hardly any: the Autobiography of Saint Paul is a testament of love. If you heard it and read it thoughtlessly in Mass today, read it again. Thank you, Doctor Gentium!

Saint Paul's shipwreck in Malta

"You gladly put up with fools, because you are wise yourselves! For you suffer it if a man enslaves you, if a man devours you, if a man takes from you, if a man is arrogant, if a man slaps your face! I speak to my own shame, as though we had been weak. But wherein any man is bold - I am speaking foolishly - I also am bold. Are they Hebrews? So am I! Are they Israelites? So am I! Are they offspring of Abraham? So am I! Are they ministers of Christ? I - to speak as a fool - am more: in many more labors, in prisons more frequently, in lashes above measure, often exposed to death. From the Jews five times I received forty lashes less one. Thrice I was scourged, once I was stoned, thrice I suffered shipwreck, a night and a day I was adrift on the sea; in journeyings often, in perils from floods, in perils from robbers, in perils from my own nation, in perils from the Gentiles, in perils in the city, in perils in the wilderness, in perils in the sea, in perils from false brethren; in labor and hardships, in many sleepless nights, in hunger and thirst, in fastings often, in cold and nakedness. Besides those outer things, there is my daily pressing anxiety, the care of all the churches! Who is weak, and I am not weak? Who is made to stumble, and I am not inflamed? If I must boast, I will boast of the things that concern my weakness. The God and Father of the Lord Jesus, Who is blessed forevermore, knows that I do not lie. In Damascus the governor under King Aretas was guarding the city of the Damascenes in order to arrest me, but I was lowered in a basket through a window in the wall, and escaped his hands. If I must boast - it is not indeed expedient to do so - but I will come to visions and revelations of the Lord. I know a man in Christ who fourteen years ago - whether in the body I do not know, or out of the body I do not know, God knows - such a one was caught up to the third heaven. And I know such a man - whether in the body or out of the body I do not know, God knows that he was caught up into paradise and heard secret words that man may not repeat. Of such a man I will boast; but of myself I will glory in nothing save in my infirmities. For if I do wish to boast, I shall not be foolish; for I shall be speaking the truth. But I forbear, lest any man should reckon me beyond what he sees in me or hears from me. And lest the greatness of the revelations should puff me up, there was given me a thorn for the flesh, a messenger of Satan, to buffet me. Concerning this I thrice besought the Lord that it might leave me. And He has said to me, My grace is sufficient for you, for strength is made perfect in weakness. Gladly therefore I will glory in my infirmities, that the strength of Christ may dwell in me." (2 Cor. 11:19-33; 12:1-9)

Guest Op-Ed - Waiting for the Bridegroom: The Nuptial Character of the Usus Antiquior

By Veronica A. Arntz

The parable of the ten virgins awaiting the bridegroom reveals a significant key for understanding our relationship with Christ: We are meant to be watchful, waiting for the hour of His coming with anticipation. Five virgins were wise, and five were foolish. Five had a sufficient amount of oil to meet the delayed bridegroom, while five did not. Some of us await the second coming of Christ with an awakened spirit, while others live our lives as if He does not exist. If we consider this parable within the context of sacred liturgy, we could say the following: The wise virgins are the ones who listen for the voice of the Lord within the texts; they are the ones who are prepared to meet the Bridegroom by listening to His words. In a particular way, the Extraordinary Form of the Roman Rite can foster what Dietrich von Hildebrand calls the “spirit of awakenedness,” which he considers to be the spirit necessary to “conform to the sursum corda.”

This parable about the wise and foolish virgins appropriately sets the tone for discussing the spirit of waiting in the Extraordinary Form, because this form of the Roman Rite possesses a manifestly nuptial character. The words of the rite reveal both the love of the Bridegroom for us, but also, the love that we ought to give Him through praise and thanksgiving. While much has been said to men about the Extraordinary Form being the natural place to cultivate a priestly or religious vocation, it seems that women can relate very well to this nuptial character of the Mass. In a special way, women can discover the means and the grace for anticipating the Bridegroom, like the five wise virgins, through the sacred texts and form of the usus antiquior. 

NEW: Bishop Athanasius Schneider video interviewSSPX regularization, priests refusing Communion in the hand, heretic Martin Luther and Amoris Laetitia discussed

Today, along with our Spanish-language partners "Adelante la Fe," we release a video interview with His Excellency Athanasius Schneider, Auxiliary Bishop of the Archdiocese of Saint Mary in Astana. The interview, conducted by Mauricio Ponce, goes into many of the hot-button issues facing the Church today. This coincided with the Summorum Pontificum conference hosted by the FSSP in Guadalajara. The FSSP will post more of his conferences, Masses and interviews soon at www.fsspmexico.mx 

Please see the video below. And, as always, we ask everyone to post this on their blogs and social media sites: 

A Sign of Hope

The newly completed chevet of Clear Creek Abbey Church

The monks of the traditionalist Benedictine abbey of Clear Creek recently sent out the following e-mail:

Op-Ed: "SSPX: the Personal Prelature will outlive the various succeeding Pontiffs"

SSPX : The Personal Prelature will outlive the various succeeding Pontiffs

A special Op-Ed by

Côme de Prévigny

Should the Personal Prelature presented by Rome to the Society of Saint Pius X be accepted? Some present their negative opinion, based on the circumstances, but that is a badly formulated quetion. What should be asked instead is this: Can a canonical recognition be rejected when no unacceptable condition is attached to this concession? Abp. Lefebvre never refused a canonical structure by itself, when he was alive. He refused solely the demands conditioning the structure that he had originally sought and obtained, and that was unjustly removed from him.

He never wanted to break, of his own will, the canonical liaison that linked him officially with Rome, and even to this Rome infested with Modernists. Quite the contrary, he refused it: he challenged the publication of the break of this link, and appealed the decisions of the ecclesiastical authorities. Consequently, Abp. Lefebvre never faced the situation in which we find ourselves: the Society is offered a canonical structure unconditionally. Incidentally, on what basis can it be refused if no condition is imposed (and even if the conditions were neutral), and if one considers that the Pope, due to the divine mandate granted by Our Lord to Peter and his successors, continues to possess the supernatural power of binding and unbinding, despite all his woes? Would the current crisis make the primacy of Peter and the power of the keys of Catholic truths which are embarrassing, optional, and superfluous?

Article: "On the Formal Correction of Pope Francis"

[Editor's note: rumors gave been circulating about a supposed "private" correction of the Pope. These rumors are almost certainly false, and this article had already been written long before those false rumors appeared, and is completely unrelated to said rumors.]

***

On the formal correction of Pope Francis

John R. T. Lamont, DPhil

St.Catherine pleads with Pope Gregory XI in Avignon ( Sebastiano Conca)

It is more than four months since the dubia concerning the teaching of the apostolic exhortation Amoris Laetitia were sent to Pope Francis by Cardinals Brandmüller, Burke, Caffarra and Meisner. As is well known, the dubia requested the Pope to dispel doubts about the content of Amoris Laetitia by authoritatively confirming that the document did not make five claims that contradicted Catholic tradition and divine revelation. After these dubia were made public, Cardinal Burke stated that 'if there is no response to these questions, then I would say that it would be a question of taking a formal act of correction of a serious error.'

Penance! Penance! Penance!

In a society which is barely conscious of the ills which assail it, which conceals its miseries and injustices beneath a prosperous, glittering, and trouble-free exterior, the Immaculate Virgin, whom sin has never touched, manifests herself to an innocent child. With a mother's compassion she looks upon this world redeemed by her Son's blood, where sin accomplishes so much ruin daily, and three times makes her urgent appeal: "Penance, penance, penance!" She even appeals for outward expressions: "Go kiss the earth in penance for sinners." And to this gesture must be added a prayer: "Pray to God for sinners."

As in the days of John the Baptist, as at the start of Jesus' ministry, this command, strong and rigorous, shows men the way which leads back to God: "Repent!" Who would dare to say that this appeal for the conversion of hearts is untimely today?

Pius XII

Le pèlerinage de Lourdes

July 2, 1957

Saint Joan of Arc, Intercede for the Catholic Faithful

Saint Joan of Arc,

Condemned by Evil Prelates,

Burned by Evil Powers,

Pray for the Church of God,

Intercede for the Catholic Faithful!

More on St. Joan of Arc's persecution by evil Church authorities in our series for her 600th anniversary:

Joan of Arc (I) : A Saint in armor 

Joan of Arc (II) : A Saint in isolation

Joan of Arc (III) : A Saint under excommunication

Opinion: Despite all problems, the SSPX still should reach an agreement with the Vatican

Some readers have asked us if we agree with these words in the last piece by dear Professor Roberto de Mattei published by Rorate last Sunday:

The wish of Bp. Bernard Fellay to regularize the canonical position of the Society of St. Pius X with an agreement that nothing will undermine the identity of his institute is certainly commendable, but the question arises: Is it opportune to be placed under the legal umbrella of Rome in the very moment when the law is being ignored, or worse yet, being used as a means to crack down on those who want to remain faithful to Catholic faith and morals?

Now, Rorate is second to none in its realistic view of Pope Francis and the Bergoglian Pontificate. Minutes after his name was announced, literally as he appeared on the loggia on that fateful March 13, 2013, we were the first in the world to warn about his Pontificate -- and we suffered great criticism and even persecution for it.

It has been bad for the Church, but good for our credibility, to slowly see all Traditional-leaning Catholics first, then almost all serious Catholics, reach the conclusion we had reached on the first instant of the papacy. We have worked to inform our readers realistically since then.

However, viewing this pontificate as it is does not mean being against an eventual agreement which recognizes the full regularity of the Society of Saint Pius X.

Sermon for the Fifth Sunday after the Epiphany: Be Patient

Father Richard G. Cipolla

From the Epistle, Paul to the Colossians:  Brethren: Put on, as God’s chosen ones, holy and beloved, a heart of mercy, kindness, humility, meekness, patience.

The last in St. Paul’s list in today’s epistle, describing what the Christian should take on, become,  is patience.  It may be last but it is not least.  Patience can be trivialized.  Someone is doing a job that requires time and meticulousness.  This needs patience, in the sense that things have to go slowly and what is needed is attention to detail and the time it takes to make that detail perfect.  But St Paul is not talking about that kind of patience.  He is talking about that patience whose etymology comes from the Latin verb, patior, whose first meaning is to suffer.  

Op-Ed: "A Violent Pope" - by Roberto de Mattei

A Violent Pope?

Roberto de Mattei
Corrispondenza Romana
February 3, 2017

Against the evidence there is little to argue. The outstretched hand of Pope Bergoglio to the Society of St. Pius X is the sam,e which has recently dealt blows to the Order of Malta and the Franciscans of the Immaculate.

Unheard-of since the Papal States fell: Rome covered in posters critical of the Pope

Rome woke up this Saturday with something quite new, and very old, in its streets: posters throughout the City (in the style of the old "pasquinate") critical of the Pope.

In English, from the Romanesco-inspired Italian:

ICR Pilgrimage to Holy Lands in April

Rorate on the Road: Honolulu

The 50th of the United States is perhaps the most beautiful. On Oahu, the island in Hawaii containing the capital city Honolulu, Blessed Sacrament parish is the home of a traditional Latin Mass offered every Sunday at 10 a.m.

Rorate recently attended Mass there -- a sanctuary within paradise on earth -- and met numerous members of the congregation afterward. The diocese was not always friendly toward the TLM, as infamously demonstrated decades ago. But times have changed, and the TLM community there is quite strong, with several happy families and friendly young adults in the pews of the diocesan church.

Sunday Mass at Blessed Sacrament church in Honolulu

SSPX-Vatican: "Two dates are mentioned in Rome: May 13 or July 7"

French conservative daily Le Figaro's religious correspondent Jean-Marie Guénois mentions in an article today the current status of negotiations between the Society of Saint Pius X and the Holy See (both of which we have covered: SSPX's Superior-General Fellay's interview and Pontifical Commission Ecclesia Dei's Secretary Pozzo's comments).

In the end, through, he adds the following new information:

Liturgy as the Court Ritual of the Heavenly Kingdom

(cross-posted from New Liturgical Movement)

Fr. Anthony Ruff, O.S.B., regnant spirit of PrayTell and heir to Collegeville’s long line of liturgical iconoclasts and modernizers, has this to say about the “paradigm shifts” inaugurated by the Second Vatican Council:

The Council fathers didn’t get into all the specifics of the reform of the liturgy. They left most of that to a future commission under the pope. The fathers approved a major paradigm shift — from liturgy as Carolingian clerical drama to liturgy as act of all the people — and then left open what the implications of that shift would be. No doubt some or many of the fathers didn’t yet have in mind all the possible implications of the paradigm shift. Nor did they need to.

Reminder: Rorate Caeli Purgatorial Society

This is our monthly reminder to please enroll Souls of the Rorate Caeli Purgatorial Society. We now stand at 78 priests saying weekly or monthly traditional Latin Masses for the Souls. 

** Click here to download a "fillable" PDF Mass Card to give to the loved ones of the Souls you enroll. It's free for anyone to use. **

Priests: The Souls still need more of you saying Mass for them! Please email me to offer your services. There's nothing special involved -- all you need to do is offer a weekly or monthly TLM with the intention: "For the Souls enrolled in the Rorate Caeli Purgatorial Society." And we will always keep you completely anonymous unless you request otherwise. 

How to enroll souls: please email me at athanasiuscatholic@yahoo.com and submit as follows: "Name, State, Country." If you want to enroll entire families, simply write in the email: "The Jones family, Ohio, USA". Individual names are preferred. Be greedy -- send in as many as you wish and forward this posting to friends as well.

Don Barsotti: The soul that leans on God alone, experiences a peace that transcends all suffering

“We have to remember that man lives in a triple dimension: physical, psychological and spiritual. The dimension of a purely physical life makes us slaves to nature and all its demands:  cold, heat, illness, instincts and death. The psychological dimension makes us subject to the highs and lows of feelings and sensations. We are never entirely free. Nevertheless, if we live in the spiritual dimension, the soul transcends itself and reaches God. This is the life of pure faith, which leans on nothing other than God Himself. It is the life of infallible hope, which seeks no other support than in Him.  It is a life of boundless charity, which doesn’t capitulate when faced with evil. In this dimension, no trial can disturb the soul and take away its innermost peace. It may be a “black” peace as the mystics call it, given that on the physical and psychological levels the soul may experience abandonment and trials, but it doesn’t capitulate. It experiences a peace that transcends all suffering”. 

- Don Divo Barsotti 

Translation: Contributor Francesca Romana

[H/T Antonio Socci]