Event: Seventh Annual Sacred Liturgy Conference, May 28-31, 2019, in Spokane, Washington

Registration is now open for the 7th annual Sacred Liturgy Conference, hosted this year by the Diocese of Spokane.

Schola Cantus Angelorum is pleased to announce the seventh annual Sacred Liturgy Conference, to be held in Spokane Washington from May 28 to 31, 2019. It will take place at the state-of-the-art Hemmingson Center on the campus of Gonzaga University. The liturgies will be held at the beautiful nearby Churches of St Aloysius and the Cathedral of Our Lady of Lourdes. 

St Aloysius

A new, friendly bishop in Virginia -- and a loss of influence for Cardinal Wuerl?

For over a year, our readers in the Diocese of Arlington, Virginia, where the traditional Latin Mass has flourished under Summorum Pontificum, have anxiously awaited the replacement of their current ordinary, Bishop Paul Loverde. Loverde is no lover of tradition, but he did, after 2007, finally get with the program, facing an onslaught of young, traditional-minded priests who were taking matters into their own hands. 

The anxiety came from the pervasive conventional wisdom that Cardinal Donald Wuerl would handpick the next bishop in the diocese that neighbors the Archdiocese of Washington. But with the announcement this morning that the bishop of Raleigh, North Carolina, Bishop Michael F. Burbidge will be installed in Arlington, the question is: Has Wuerl lost his influence? 

Our readers may know that Bishop Burbidge has, by most standards, embraced Summorum Pontificum in his diocese. 

Bishop Burbidge confirms youth in the traditional Latin rite.

Event: English-Language Summer School in France, accompanied by the Traditional Latin Mass

We have received the following announcement from the Fraternity of St. Joseph the Guardian. (We have slightly edited it for this posting). 

Last year, at the initiative of Bp. Dominique Rey of Fréjus-Toulon, the the Fraternity of St. Joseph the Guardian hosted an English-language Summer School (Pro Civitate Dei, aimed at the renewal of Catholic culture) for young Catholics in the south of France.  

The Summer School consisted of lectures, discussions, informal conversations, times of conviviality and acts of piety. Every day we had sung Lauds, Vespers and Compline, as well as a High Mass, all in the Extraordinary Form. In the course of the Summer School, one of the participants, a former Protestant, was received into the Catholic Church. 

In 2016 we will repeat this same programme, from May 30 until June 5. You can read more on the Pro Civitate Dei blog. 

More pictures of this year's Summer School can be found in an album at the Fraternity's Facebook page: Pro Civitate Dei Summer School.

The Fraternity of St. Joseph the Guardian (Fraternidad de San José Custodio - FSJC) is a Public Association of the Faithful that was founded in 2010 by Bishop Dominique Rey of Frejus-Toulon. It got its own seminary last year, with the mandate to form priests from North and South America in order to serve as missionaries in Europe. While it is theoretically "bi-formal" with the seminarians being taught both forms of the Roman Rite, it has a clear predilection for the Vetus Ordo. We have previously posted about the work of this seminary (see The New World Steps Forth to the Rescue and Liberation of the Old: A Seminary in Europe and for Europe with Vocations from the Americas and Report and Events of the Fraternity of St. Joseph the Guardian: - the New World evangelizing the Old.)

Abp Luigi Negri: Western Civilization is at an end

Among the bishops of Italy currently serving as Ordinaries, Archbishop Luigi Negri stands out for his trenchant commentary and prolific writings (including a multitude of articles and around 30 books) on a wide variety of topics, always with the object of defending a conservative Catholic world view and its presence in the public square and the world of culture. A close student and collaborator of Msgr. Luigi Giussani, founder of Comunione e Liberazione, he was appointed Bishop of the small diocese of San Marino - Montefeltro in 2005 and then Archbishop of the small Archdiocese of Ferrara-Comacchio in 2012. He is already well-known to Traditional Catholics for his interventions in favor of the Traditional Latin Mass: his telegram to Pope Benedict XVI thanking him for Summorum Pontificum, his denunciation of episcopal opposition to the same, and his 2013 homily to Traditional Catholics with its precious words of encouragement and praise. 

A friend and reader of Rorate has kindly presented us with this translation of an article written last month by the Archbishop and published by La Nuova Bussola Quotidiana. This is a bishop who knows how to fight, who knows how to denounce the French Revolution (and its Catholic apologists) in the same breath as the Islamist menace that he does not fear to name either. 

The End of Western Civilization is in the Museum of Mosul

By Luigi Negri, Archbishop of Ferrara-Comacchio

02/28/2015

Ancient Statues and bas-reliefs were toppled down by bearded men who then proceeded to destroy them by using jackhammers. This is the latest video released by ISIS in Mosul.  It is the continuation of a campaign against remnants of the past. Islamic State militants have been blowing up places of worship, feeding flames with books taken from libraries, and destroying a part of Nineveh’s city walls, the ancient Assyrian capital in the outskirts of present-day Mosul. These images, spread by a Twitter account used by the Caliphate, show the methodical destruction perpetrated in the rooms of what looks like a museum in Mosul. During the five-minute long video, we notice museum labels in Arabic and English describing exhibited artefacts. It is because of this that we have recorded the comments of Mons. Luigi Negri, the Archbishop of Ferrara-Comacchio.

I hope that the technological means which our society uses – and oftentimes abuses – can vividly preserve for future generations the images of such terrible scenes of barbarism which we have been able to see “live” in different parts of the world. This is rage, much more demented than barbaric, against the artistic expressions of one of the greatest ages of world culture, which have been handed down with devotion and respect from one generation to another, from one culture to another, from one civilization to another. And so culture and civilization are not exclusive, unlike the case of this horrendous ideology, even if it is religious. Culture and Civilization are inclusive and even know how to incorporate cultural and historical realities not born from the limitations of their proper milieu; thereby becoming all the more enriched. 

Bishop Athanasius Schneider visits SSPX USA seminary

From DICI:

On February 11, 2015, Bishop Athanasius Schneider, auxiliary bishop of Astana in Kazakhstan, met with Bishop Bernard Fellay, SSPX Superior General, and also with several priests of the Society, at St. Thomas Aquinas Seminary in Winona (United States).

This was the second visit by Bishop Schneider to one of our seminaries. On January 16, 2015, he had visited the St. Cure d’Ars Seminary in Flavigny (France). Both meetings pertained to the question of the liturgical reform of Paul VI and the doctrinal presuppositions of the Novus Ordo Missae.

On December 5, 2014, Cardinal Walter Brandmuller, President Emeritus of the Pontifical Committee for Historical Sciences, had visited Sacred Heart Seminary in Zaitzkofen (Germany), where the discussion focused on the magisterial authority of Vatican Council II.

These meetings are a way of continuing the doctrinal discussions between the Society of St. Pius X and the Roman authorities « in a larger and less formal context than that of the preceding meetings », according to the decision made during the meeting of Bishop Fellay with Cardinal Gerhard Muller, Prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith on September 23, 2014.

These meetings are also an opportunity for the visitors to become better acquainted with the Society of St. Pius X, and also to learn more about what has been accomplished by the works of Tradition.

The visit in Winona coincided with the annual meeting of priests, during which 80 priests of the United States District met at the seminary for a week of studies.

RORATE EXCLUSIVE: Open letter by Archbishop on the crisis in the Church'It is difficult to believe that Pope Benedict XVI freely renounced his ministry as successor of Peter.''I am forced to resort to this public means of expression because I fear that any other method would be greeted by a brick wall of silence and disregard.''... increasingly evident that the Vatican through the Secretariat of State has taken the course of political correctness.'

Rorate Caeli has obtained an exclusive copy of the English version of a rare open letter from an Archbishop on the crisis of the Church. 

The letter, written by His Excellency Archbishop Jan Pawel Lenga, bishop emeritus of the Diocese of Karaganda, Kazakhstan, hopefully will serve as a much-needed wake-up call to Catholics who have buried their heads in the sand for far too long.

Let us pray more of his brother bishops will have the faith -- and the backbone -- to stand up and be heard before there's nothing left to defend.

***

Reflections on some current problems of the crisis of the Catholic Church

I had the experience of living with priests who were in Stalinist prisons and camps and who nevertheless remained faithful to the Church. During the time of persecution they fulfilled with love their priestly duty in preaching Catholic doctrine thereby leading a dignified life in the imitation of Christ, their heavenly Master.

I completed my priestly studies in an underground Seminary in the Soviet Union. I was ordained a priest secretly during the night by a pious bishop who himself suffered for the sake of the faith. In the first year of my priesthood I had the experience of being expelled from Tadzhikistan by the KGB.

Subsequently, during my thirty-year stay in Kazakhstan, I served 10 years as priest, caring for faithful people in 81 localities. Then I served 20 years as bishop, initially as bishop of five states in Central Asia with a total area of around four million square kilometers.

In my ministry as a bishop I had contact with Pope Saint John Paul II, with many bishops, priests and faithful in different countries and under different circumstances. I was member of some assemblies of the Synod of Bishops in the Vatican which covered themes such as “Asia” and “The Eucharist”.

This experience as well as others give me the basis to express my opinion on the current crisis of the Catholic Church. These are my convictions and they are dictated by my love of the Church and by the desire for her authentic renewal in Christ. I am forced to resort to this public means of expression because I fear that any other method would be greeted by a brick wall of silence and disregard. 

I am aware of possible reactions to my open letter. But at the same time the voice of my conscience will not allow me to remain silent, while the work of God is being slandered. Jesus Christ founded the Catholic Church and showed us in word and deed how one should fulfill the will of God. The apostles to whom He bestowed authority in the Church, fulfilled with zeal the duty entrusted to them, suffering for the sake of the truth which had to be preached, since they “obeyed God rather than men”.

The Unstoppable Summorum PontificumThree bishops, three countries, three Traditional liturgies

1. Bogotá, Colombia

For the first time since the liturgical reforms of the early 1970's, the Sacrament of Confirmation was conferred in Colombia by a member of that country's hierarchy. The Confirmations took place on October 4 at the Espíritu Santo church in Bogotá and were conferred by Bishop Medardo de Jesús Henao del Río (born 1967 and consecrated to the episcopate only this year), who is the Vicar Apostolic of Mitú. The Confirmations were followed by Benediction of the Blessed Sacrament. 

The Facebook page of the Institute of the Good Shepherd in Colombia has published photos of the event. 

New Archbishop of Liverpool: "How on earth can you say no [to the Traditional Mass]?"

Liverpool is the largest diocese in the whole island of Great Britain by number of nominal Catholics - at least according to the Annuario Pontificio (source) - so it certainly is a source of great joy that its new archbishop, Abp. Malcolm Patrick McMahon, O.P., appointed today by the Pope, is so open to the Traditional Mass. He is not only the first ordinary who celebrated a pontifical mass openly in England after the advent of the Mass of Paul VI (source), he is also very open to it in general:

Press Conference, March 21, 2014

I had the pleasure, today, of interviewing His Lordship at the Metropolitan Cathedral of Christ the King, Liverpool. I discussed only the matter of the Extraordinary Form of Mass. I faithfully reproduce here verbatim the Archbishop-elect’s quotes, which are illuminating, although I stress that it was necessary for him to speak while walking and needing to attend to passing and ongoing briefings whilst developing his responses.

Although conscious that, due to circumstances, he couldn’t devote full concentration to the subject, the Archbishop-elect said he was nonetheless happy for me to convey his thoughts publicly. Please, therefore, feel completely free to disseminate these quotes with confidence.

+Malcolm on whether those attached to the Extraordinary Form of Mass in the Archdiocese of Liverpool need have any concerns:

"There is no need [for anyone] to feel nervous.”

+Malcolm on how much he foresees that the Extraordinary Form may in time become a general and unremarkable part of the liturgical life of the archdiocese

"I think it’s hard to predict. I will certainly be open to any requests that come my way. I’ve always listened to what people have wanted, and tried to do my utmost to satisfy their needs – and that applies to liturgy, forms of liturgy, as well as other aspects of my ministry.”

+Malcolm on whether he foresees himself personally celebrating the Extraordinary Form:

"It depends how it is used. I mean, I’ve celebrated Mass in the Extraordinary Form when required and when I’ve been asked to. But the Mass always has to be a source of unity in the Church, and I certainly wouldn’t want to be used, and the Extraordinary Form to be used, to divide the Church. That would be my [only] concern. But there are plenty of pictures of me on the Internet [celebrating the Extraordinary Form] with [laughing] mitres that don’t fit me and all that!

"But yes, of course I would be agreeable. How can you not be when the Mass has been such a … well some like to call it the ‘Traditional Rite’ … but (when) the Extraordinary Form has been a source of holiness to people for hundreds of years. So how on earth can you say no?” [Source: Telegraph Blogs]

Pope Francis appoints a Tradition-friendly Bishop in Italy

It cannot be said that the appointment of bishops has gotten worse in the new Pontificate: as in the past ones, one finds great names favorable to Tradition along with mediocre liberals and liberal careerists. Not any different from what used to happen in the Benedictine years, which did not give us, alas, and contrariwise to what had been expected, a continuous parade of solid episcopal appointments.

The appointment on January 25 by Pope Francis of the rector of the seminary of the diocese of Albenga-Imperia (Liguria), Msgr. Antonio Suetta, as new bishop of the neighboring diocese of Ventimiglia-San Remo, on the border with France, was widely welcomed by Tradition-minded Catholics throughout Italy. As we have often reported here, the bishop of Albenga-Imperia, Mario Oliveri, has made his diocese an "oasis for the 1962 Missal in Italy". In contrast the diocese of Ventimiglia-San Remo has not been as welcoming. Bishop-elect Suetta has been a faithful follower of Bp. Oliveri, and will hopefully proceed with at least being open to Traditional practices in the diocese he will now head.

(Tip and image source: Cordialiter)