V. Adjutorium nostrum in nomine Domini R. Qui fecit caelum et terram
V. Dominus Vobiscum R. Et cum spiritu tuo
Oremus;Domine, Jesu Christe, panis Angelorum, panis vivus, et aeternae vitae: benedicere +dignare panem istum, sicut benedixisti quinque panes in deserto: ut omnes ex eo digne gustantes, inde corporis et animae desiderabilem percipiant sanitatem: Qui vivis et regnas in saecula saecolorum. R: Amen
Holy Water is then sprinkled.
The Litany of Saint Joseph may be added or the oration at the end of the Litany of St. Joseph
Oremus:Deus, qui ineffabili providentia beatum Joseph sanctissimae Genetricis tuae sponsum eligere dignatus es: praesta quaesumus; ut, quem protectorem veneramur in terris, intercessorem habere mereamur in caelis: Qui vivis et regnas in saecula saecolorum.
Good Friday 2008 in the Conventual Chapel of Saint John of Jerusalem. More photoshere.
The Latin Mass Society of England and Wales has informed Rorate Caeli that the cycle of ceremonies for Palm Sunday, the Sacred Triduum and Easter Sunday will be celebrated in 8 locations for this year’s Holy Week. These are as follows:
London Masses
Corpus Christi, Maiden Lane, WC2
Monday 29 March 6.30pm Sung Mass
Tuesday 30 March 6.30pm Sung Mass
Wednesday 31 March 7.00pm Tenebrae
Sacred Triduum
Holy Thursday 1 April 6.30pm Sung Mass and Procession to the Altar of Repose
Good Friday 2 April 3.00pm Good Friday Liturgy
Holy Saturday 3 April 7.00pm Vigil and High Mass
St Thomas Aquinas, Ham Common, Ham
Palm Sunday 28 March 6.00pm Blessing of Palms and Sung Mass
Partial Sacred Triduum
Good Friday 2 April 5.00pm Good Friday Liturgy
Easter Sunday 4 April 6.00pm Low Mass
St Bede’s ThorntonRoadClaphamParkLondon SW12
Palm Sunday 28 March 10.30am Blessing of Palms Procession and Mass (in the Chapel La Retraite School Atkins Rd Clapham, SW12)
Sacred Triduum
Holy Thursday 1 April 6.00pm High Mass and Procession to Altar of Repose
Good Friday 2 April 3.00pm Good Friday Liturgy(in the Chapel La Retraite School Atkins Rd Clapham, SW12)
Holy Saturday 3 April 7.00pm Vigil and Solemn Mass
Easter Sunday 4 April10.45am High Mass 5.00pm Solemn Vespers and Benediction
Chapel of the Hospital of St John and St Elizabeth 60 Grove End Rd St John’s WoodPlease see the blog of the Conventual Church of Saint John of Jerusalem for details ofHoly Week Services . An initial post can be found here. A more complete listing is in the works.
Palm Sunday-Sacred Triduum-Easter Sunday Ceremonies in other Dioceses
Brentwood
St Antony, St Antony’s Rd, Forest Gate, London E7
Palm Sunday 28 March 6.30pmSung Mass
Sacred Triduum
Holy Thursday 1 April 6.30pm Sung Mass & Procession
Good Friday 2 April 12.30pm Good Friday Liturgy
Holy Saturday 3 April 5.00pm Vigil and First Mass of Easter (in the St Nicholas Gladding Rd ManorParkLondon E12)
Easter Sunday 6.30pmSung Mass
Plymouth
Lanherne Convent St Mawgan Nr Newquay Cornwall
Palm Sunday 28 March 10.00am Sung Mass
Sacred Triduum
Holy Thursday 1 April 7.00pm Mass and Procession to Altar of Repose; Adoration to 12 Midnight
Good Friday 2 April 3.00pm Good Friday Liturgy
7.00pm Stations of the Cross (outdoors weather permitting)
Holy Saturday 3 April 8.30pm Easter Vigil and Sung Mass
Easter Sunday 4 April 10.00am Sung Mass
Portsmouth
St William of York, Upper Redlands Rd, ReadingTimes to be confirmed Tel 0118 9875819 for information
Palm Sunday 28 March 11.00am Procession & Mass
Sacred Triduum
Holy Thursday 1 April 7.00 pm Mass & Adoration
Good Friday 2April 1.30pm Stations of the Cross
3.00pm Good Friday Liturgy
Holy Saturday 3 April 10.00pm Vigil & Mass
Easter Sunday 4 April11.00am Sung Mass
Shrewsbury
Sacred HeartChurch, The Cross, Moreton, Wirral CH46 9QB
Palm Sunday 28 March 11.30am Low Mass
Sacred Triduum
Holy Thursday 1 April 5.00 pm Mass & Procession
Good Friday 2 April 5.00pm Good Friday Liturgy
Holy Saturday 3 April 5.00pm Vigil & Mass
Easter Sunday 4 April 11.30am Low Mass
In addition, Palm Sunday and Easter Sunday Masses are to be held in those churches and chapels where Sunday Masses are scheduled. A complete list of Holy Week services throughout England and Wales can be foundhere.
Our readers are invited to post information on their own Holy Week liturgical services in the combox
March 5, 2010. Benedict XVI has formed a commission to investigate if Our Lady truly appeared in Medjugorje, a small town in Bosnia.
The commission is part of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith and Cardinal Camillo Ruini will preside over the commission. Ruini is the pope’s former vicar of Rome’s diocese. Ruini goal will be to explain to the pope what’s happening at the sanctuary which has become the third most visited in Europe.
Allegedly, at least 6 people have witnessed the Virgins apparitions there since 1981. Aside from the large crowds of pilgrims who visit the sanctuary, the Vatican has not commented on the alleged apparitions, but in 1991 the local bishops said they were not aware of any supernatural apparitions.
This investigation will put an end to any doubts and it’ll be critical for the millions of pilgrims who visit this shrine every year
ESTABLISHMENT OF INTERNATIONAL COMMISSION ON MEDJUGORJE
VATICAN CITY, 17 MAR 2010 (VIS) - The Holy See Press Office today published the following communique:
"An international investigative commission on Medjugorje has been constituted, under the presidency of Cardinal Camillo Ruini and dependent upon the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith. Said commission - made up of cardinals, bishops, specialists and experts - will work privately, submitting the results of its work to the authority of the dicastery."
Following the Quiet Revolution of the 1960s , a movement of massive secularisation emptied the churches in Quebec. Religious weddings, however, remained common practice until recent times. But even this sacrament has suffered a huge diminution in the Belle Province, as the recent statistics published by the diocese of Valleyfield, South-West of Montreal, attest. In the diocesan newsletter Cœur et âme for January 2010, it is claimed that religious weddings have diminished by 30% in barely six years, despite the fact that nearly 80% of the population call themselves Catholics. In 2003, 344 religious weddings were celebrated; six years later, there were only 242. From year to year the trend continues: last year, in twenty-five out of the fifty-nine dioceses in Quebec, no religious weddings were recorded at all. (Source : apic – DICI n°211 du 06/03/10) (CAP note: I think there is a mistake in this statistic, and I'm still checking various articles for the more accurate figures.)
Benedict XVI gave thanks for the fact that "we are gathered here on this Sunday, singing together, listening to the Word of God, listening to one another and looking towards the One Christ, bearing witness to the One Christ".
Continuing his homily, delivered off-the-cuff in German, the Holy Father noted how "we hear many complaints about the fact that there are no longer any new developments in ecumenism. Yet", he insisted, "we can say with gratitude that there are many elements that unite us".
"We must not content ourselves with the successes of ecumenism over recent years, because we still cannot drink from the same chalice or gather together around the same altar", he said.
"This", he went on, "cannot but make us sad because it is a situation of sin; and yet unity cannot be achieved by men. We must entrust ourselves to the Lord, because He is the only one Who can give us unity. Let us hope that He brings us to that goal".
Recalling words used by Pastor Kruse in his homily, the Holy Father agreed that the main common ground between Lutherans and Catholics "must be the joy and hope we are already experiencing, and the hope that our current unity may become even deeper".
"We have destroyed the us of the Christian community, we have divided the only way into many ways, and now we experience the sin that does not allow us to drink from the same chalice or be together around the altar. However, today we are here praying together to the Lord, the only One who can grant us unity."
This reminds me of the wise words that are to be found in the Third Sermon of St. Maximus of Turin, a Church Father of the late 4th and early 5th centuries. These words do not directly deal with Holy Communion but are nevertheless appropriate to it, and also make for fine Lenten reading.
"...It is a strong and far-reaching punishment at the disposal of the priests not to entrust to whoever is unworthy the sacraments of the heavenly scriptures nor, as the Lord says, to give what is holy to dogs or to cast pearls before the feet of swine so that they are trampled upon (Mt. 7:6). For whoever tries to set the grace of the heavenly pearl upon a vile sinner squanders it. A jewel, as you yourselves know, demands a setting of gold, and a pearl should only be placed in precious necklaces. Be then, the finest sort of gold! Be a precious necklace, so that the spiritual pearl can be set in you! For Christ the Lord is the pearl which that rich merchant in the Gospel hastened to buy after having sold all his property; he chose to get rid of all the worldly jewels that he had just so that he might buy the one pearl of Christ.
Hence, brethren, on account of the enormity of the transgression that you have committed, I have been unwilling to open to you the words of Gospel refreshment. Instead I indignantly press upon you your wrongdoing, first correcting you with spiritual blows and then enriching you with gifts of the pearl. I have chosen, I say, to lay blame on your sin with bitter accusation rather than to foster it with kindly dissimulation. For whoever does not reprove his brother when he sins is encouraging him, in a certain way, to sin. But I do not wish you to think that in striking you frequently I have no love for you; for the son who is worthy of chastisement is loved the more, as Scripture says: Whom the Lord loves He corrects; He chastises every son whom He accepts.(Heb 12:6)
The New Liturgical Movement's post on Opus Mariae Matris Ecclesiae reminded me that, in 2009, Rorate had received information (via Enrico Spitali of Messa in Latino) from the same community about itself and its founder, Fr. Pietro Cantoni. However, I was not able to post the community's letter due to time constraints and I soon forgot about it. Permit me therefore to share it, albeit belatedly.
Fr. Pietro Cantoni was born in Piacenza in 1950. After his doctorate in Philosophy (1975) at the Catholic University of the Sacred Heart in Milan, he experienced a strong calling to priesthood through the Spiritual Exercises of St. Ignatius of Loyola. Due to the confused atmosphere that followed Vatican II, he entered the Econe seminary in Switzerland, where Monsignor Lefebvre intended to give seminarians a traditional formation. He was ordained a priest in 1978 and invited to teach Ecclesiology in Econe (Switzerland). In time he realized the risk of schism of the Society of St. Pius X and- having received no answer from Mons. Lefebvre to his letters - he chose to leave. Some seminarians from Econe followed him and they were accepted by Mons. Aldo Forzoni, diocesan bishop of Apuania (now Massa Carrara - Pontremoli), a small diocese in northern Tuscany, in 1981.
This small group had the desire to pursue many good things they learned in time, especially the Spiritual Exercises of St. Ignatius of Loyola and the Vetus Ordo Missae but encountered many problems; only in 1991 the small fraternity had its first approval as "private association of clerics" and in 2002 Opus Mariae Matris Ecclesiae had its approval as "public clerical association" from Mons. Eugenio Binini (as you can read in this section of our website http://www.opusmariae.it/chisiamo.htm). We look forward with much hope to the approval as "Society of Apostolic Life" as expressed in our Constitutions (http://www.opusmariae.it/CostituzioniOMME.pdf).
Opus Mariae Matris Ecclesiae is a Marian priestly fraternity commited to the sanctification of priests and the people we minister. With a strong Marian characteristic, we dedicate ourselves to the preaching of the Spiritual Exercises of St. Ignatius of Loyola & other spititual retreats, trying to serve the Holy Church for that great spiritual work that John Paul II called "the New Evangelization", in unity with the Holy Father. For this purpose our bishop entrusted us a big house for our home and apostolate. We also minister 16 parishes, we assist spiritually various catholic associations, some of us teach in the local seminary and other schools in the area. Some of us are engaged in the formation of future priests as recently we were allowed to form our seminarians internally.
Today (2009) the fraternity is composed of 8 priests and 2 seminarians. Since the beginnings we always considered Liturgy (in both forms of the Roman Rite) as the basis for our spiritual life; much before the Motu Proprio Summorum Pontificum, we often celebrated the Holy Mass according to the extraordinary form of the Roman Rite with the generous permission of our diocesan bishop. We always found in this practice a great nourishment for that "hermeneutics of continuity" indicated by the Holy FatherBenedict XVI as a strong remedy to many problems within the Church.
Fr. Pietro Cantoni is the Founder and Moderator of Opus Mariae Matris Ecclesiae. He teaches Metaphysics, Ecclesiology and Mariology to the Studio Teologico Interdiocesano based in Camaiore (Lucca province - Italy), where the seminarians of 6 dioceses from northern Tuscany and south-western Liguria study. After his Doctorate in Philosophy and the Licenciate in Theology he is working at a thesis on the role of the doctrinal authority in the Church. Fr. Cantoni is a founding member of Alleanza Cattolica for which he wrote many articles on Cristianità; he writes regularly on various italian magazines of apologetics & priestly formation as Il Timone and Sacerdos. He spoke at many conferences in Italy and abroad. Many of his writings and speeches can be found on our website www.opusmariae.it"
"At the end of a week in which a large part of the attention of the European media has been focused on the question of sexual abuses committed by people in institutions of the Catholic Church, we would like to make three observations:
"Firstly, the line being taken by the German Episcopal Conference has shown itself to be the right way to face the problem in its various aspects. The declarations of the president of that conference, Archbishop Zollitsch, following his meeting with the Holy Father, recap the strategy laid down in the conference's recent assembly and reiterate its essential operational aspects: recognition of the truth and help for victims, reinforcement of preventative measures and constructive collaboration with the authorities (including the judicial authorities of State) for the common good of society. Archbishop Zollitsch also unequivocally reiterated the opinion of experts according to whom the question of celibacy should in no way be confused with that of paedophilia. The Holy Father has encouraged the line being followed by the German bishops which - even taking account of the specific context of their own county - may be considered as a useful and inspiring model for other episcopal conferences that find themselves facing similar problems.
"Furthermore, an important and wide-ranging interview given by Msgr. Charles J. Scicluna, promoter of justice of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, gives a detailed explanation of the significance of the specific canonical norms established by the Church over the years to judge the heinous crimes of sexual abuse of minors by members of the clergy. It is absolutely clear that these norms did not seek, and have not favoured, any kind of cover-up of such crimes; quite the contrary, they initiated intense activities to confront, judge and adequately punish the crimes in the context of ecclesiastical legislation. And it must be remembered that all this was planned and set in motion when Cardinal Ratzinger was prefect of the Congregation. The line he followed was always one of rigour and coherence in dealing with even the most difficult situations.
"Finally, the archdiocese of Munich has replied, with a long and detailed communique, to questions concerning the case of a priest who moved from Essen to Munich at the time in which Cardinal Ratzinger was archbishop of that city, a priest who subsequently committed abuses. The communique highlights how the then archbishop was completely unconnected with the decisions in the wake of which the abuses took place. Rather, it is evident that over recent days some people have sought - with considerable persistence, in Regensburg and Munich - elements that could personally involve the Holy Father in questions of abuse. To any objective observer, it is clear that these efforts have failed.
"Despite the storm, the Church clearly sees the route she must follow, under the sure and rigorous guidance of the Holy Father. As we have already had occasion to observe, it is our hope that this torment may, in the end, help society as a whole to show ever greater concern for the protection and formation of children and adolescents."
... it is important to overcome dangerous reductionism that, in past decades, using categories that were more functional than ontological, has presented the priest almost as a "social agent," running the risk of betraying the priesthood of Christ itself. Just as the hermeneutic of continuity is increasingly revealed as urgent to understand in an appropriate way the texts of the Second Vatican Council, similarly an hermeneutic seems necessary that we could describe "of priestly continuity," which, starting from Jesus of Nazareth, Lord and Christ, and going through the 2,000 years of the history of grandeur and holiness, of culture and piety, which the priesthood has written in the world, arrives at our days.
Dear brother priests, at this time in which we live it is especially important that the call to participate in the one priesthood of Christ in the ordained ministry flower in the "charism of prophecy": There is a great need of priests that speak of God to the world and that present God to the world; men not subject to ephemeral cultural ways, but capable of living in an authentic way that liberty that only the certainty of belonging to God is in conditions to give. As your Congress has pointed out well, today the most necessary prophecy is that of fidelity, which, starting from the fidelity of Christ to humanity, will lead through the Church and the ministerial priesthood to live one's priesthood in total adherence to Christ and to the Church. In fact, the priest no longer belongs to himself but, because of the sacramental seal received (cf. Catechism of the Catholic Church, Nos. 1563;1582), is "property" of God. This "being of Another" must be made recognizable by all, through a clear witness.
In the way of thinking, of speaking, of judging the events of the world, of serving and loving, in relating to persons, also in the habit, the priest must draw prophetic strength from his sacramental belonging, from his profound being. Consequently, he must have every care to subtract himself from the prevailing mentality, which tends to associate the value of the minister not to his being, but only to his function, thus not appreciating the work of God, who influences the profound identity of the person of the priest, configuring him to himself in a definitive way (cf. Ibid., No. 1583).
The horizon of the ontological belonging to God constitutes, moreover, the appropriate framework to understand and reaffirm, also in our days, the value of sacred celibacy, which in the Latin Church is a charism required for Holy Orders (cf. "Presbyterorum Ordinis," 16) and is held in very great consideration in the Eastern Churches (cf. CCEO, can. 373). That is authentic prophecy of the Kingdom, sign of consecration to the Lord and to the "things of the Lord" with an undivided heart (1 Corinthians 7:32), expression of the gift of self to God and to others (cf. Catechism of the Catholic Church, No. 1579).
(I wonder if Fr. Touze was being prophetic about Rome's eventual extension of celibacy to the Eastern Churches, now that the Pope is speaking of "ontological belonging to God" as the proper framework for the understanding of clerical celibacy...CAP)
That which seems to Us not only the greatest evil but the root of all evil is this: often the lie is substituted for the truth, and is then used as an instrument of dispute. On the part of not a few religion is passed by as a thing of no importance, and elsewhere absolutely prohibited in family and social life as a remnant of ancient superstitions; public and private atheism is exalted in such a way that God and His law are being abolished, and morals no longer have any foundation. The Press also too often vulgarly reviles religious feeling, while it does not hesitate to spread the most shameful obscenities, agitating and with incalculable harm leading into vice tender childhood and betrayed youth.
By means of false promises a people is deceived and provoked to hatred, rivalry and rebellion, especially when the hereditary faith, the only relief in this earthly exile, is successfully torn from its heart. Disturbances, riots and revolts are organized and fomented in continuing series, which prepare for the ruin of the economy and cause irreparable harm to the common good.
We must above all deplore with overwhelming sadness that in not a few nations the rights of God, Church and human nature itself are outraged and trampled upon. Sacred ministers, even those invested with high dignities, are either driven from their proper Sees, exiled and imprisoned, or impeded in a manner preventing them from exercising their ministry. In the field of education, whether of lower or of university level, as well as in publications and the Press, permission to explain and defend the doctrine of the Church either is not given or is so restricted and subjected to such surveillance by official censorship that the arbitrary proposition that truth, liberty and religion must submissively serve only the civil authority seems to be the established principle.
Since these innumerable evils spring, as We have said, from one source only, the repudiation of God and contempt for His law, it is necessary, Venerable Brethren, to offer to God fervent prayers and recall all to those principles whence alone can come enlightenment for minds, peace and concord for souls and well ordered justice between the various social classes.
As you know, once religion is taken away there cannot be a well ordered, well regulated society...
If the Masonic and Liberal influenced Kingdom of Italy had not completed its conquest of the peninsula by finally swallowing the City of the Popes in 1870, then the Lutheran church in Rome which Pope Benedict will soon honor with his presence would not exist. While the Popes still governed Rome, Lutheran worship was confined to a chapel in the Prussian embassy. Both public immorality and public heresy were banned in the Eternal City as the Popes guarded the souls of their local diocesan flock. Blessed Pope Pius IX lamented the change since 1870 in his Consistorial Allocution of March 12, 1877: “Even those who boast of our liberty would be unable to deny the manifold, constant and grave occasions that are prepared for the demoralisation and corruption of incautious youth, and for uprooting Catholic faith from their minds. And if they walked through the streets of this City, which, as being the See of Blessed Peter, is the seat and center of religion, they could easily judge whether the temples of heretical worship, the schools of error everywhere established, the houses of ill-fame set up in many places, and the obscene and loathsome sights presented to the eyes of the people, constitute a state of things which is tolerable for him whose duty and wish it is, by reason of his Apostolic office, to destroy these many evils, but who is unable to apply a remedy to even one of them, or to help the souls that are perishing.”
The charity of Pius IX toward the souls of those who maintained the temples of heretical worship had been expressed in the Apostolic Letter Iam Vos Omnes of September 13, 1868, issued on occasion of the upcoming Vatican Council to which he invited them to send observers: “Sustained therefore by this hope, solicitous and urged by the charity of Our Lord Jesus Christ, who offered His life for the salvation of all the race of men, it is not possible for us to pass by the occasion of the future Council without turning Our paternal and Apostolic word again to all those who, even if they acknowledge Jesus Christ the Redeemer and boast of the name of Christian, do not profess the totality of the true faith of Christ and are not in the communion of the Catholic Church. This being the case, we propose with all zeal and Charity to admonish, exhort, and beseech them for this reason to seriously consider and reflect whether the way in which they continue is that which is indicated by that same Christ the Lord: which is the way that leads to eternal life. ......
It is therefore by force of the right of Our supreme Apostolic ministry, entrusted to us by the same Christ the Lord, which [must] carry out . . . the duties of the good Shepherd and to follow and embrace with paternal love all the men of the world, we send this Letter of Ours to all the Christians from whom We are separated, with which we exhort them warmly and beseech them with insistence to hasten to return to the one fold of Christ; we desire in fact from the depths of the heart their salvation in Christ Jesus, and we fear having to render an account one day to Him, Our Judge, if, through some possibility, we have not pointed out and prepared the way for them to attain eternal salvation. In all Our prayers and supplications, with thankfulness, day and night we never omit to ask for them, with humble insistence, from the eternal Shepherd of souls the abundance of goods and heavenly graces. And since, if also, we fulfill in the earth the office of vicar, with all our heart we await with open arms the return of the wayward sons to the Catholic Church, in order to receive them with infinite fondness into the house of the Heavenly Father and to enrich them with its inexhaustible treasures.”
Blessed Pius IX was greatly admired by Blessed John XXIII, who mentioned in In Petri Cathedram that the Second Vatican Council would also be for the return of the separated brethren. And Pope John showed himself remarkably like Pius IX in his own diocesan Synod of Rome which was linked in his mind with the Ecumenical Council: as he wrote in the Apostolic Constitution Sollicitudo Omnium (June 29, 1960), bringing present-day errors and dangers to light and taking precautions was one of the goals of the synod, together with the renewal of discipline, the promotion of the apostolates and of participation in the liturgy, and the accommodation of pastoral methods to present-day needs. Pope John prescribed prayer for the unity of all Christians even as he legislated for the protection of the Catholic faithful in the meantime:
“228, 2: Let Catholics pour forth earnest prayers that all may be gathered into one sheepfold, under the guidance of one shepherd. 240, 1: And laypeople, using legitimate means, and even though it may cause some inconvenience, must resist non-Catholics who would dare to disseminate among the people what they think against Catholic doctrine and try to suggest their own endeavors to the souls of others. 2: Catholics are prohibited from entering the halls and temples of non-Catholics and from being present at their rites (cfr. Can. 1258, 1 and 2), . . . nor is it licit for Catholics to read or spread or have in their homes the things which non-Catholics have published treating ex professo about religion (cfr. Can. 1399). 241, 1: If dealings must be had with those who are far from the Church, let it always be done with respect and at the same time with prudence and charity. 2: Let parents assiduously avoid welcoming into the home those who could harm faith and morals, and even less should they treat them on intimate terms.”
One of the statutes of the synod has this to say about its own laws, and therefore about the ones just quoted: “5, 2: All declarations of the Synod, including exhortations, are to be received with reverence and with full and sincere docility of mind.”
The Apostolic Constitution describes in warm terms the entire process of the synod, the prayers for its success, and the Pope’s own attention and participation. At the end he promulgates its laws: “Having implored the help of God, and trusting in the patronage of the holy apostles Peter and Paul, whose feast we celebrate today, with certain knowledge, from the plenitude of our power, as Supreme Pontiff and bishop of the Roman diocese, with this our constitution, we promulgate these laws of the first Roman Synod . . . ordering and prescribing that from the first of November of this year they begin to have binding power . . .”
50 years later: Pope Benedict’s Cardinal-Prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith said last Saturday in Canada that the goal of ecumenism is unity with the Catholic Church. Pope Benedict undoubtedly believes that he is serving that long-term goal by preaching in Rome’s Lutheran church next Sunday. However in the meantime, as a previous post by Bonetus pointed out (Feb. 19), the German Lutheran church in Rome probably attracts some Italians out of the true Church—they have some services in Italian--and has an ex-Catholic Italian as a parish councillor, theologian and preacher. And because of the Italian Lutheran website, divorced Italians wanting to marry a Lutheran will know that Rome’s lovely Lutheran church will give them the church wedding denied them by the Catholic Church which does not accept divorce. These sorts of things were foreseen by the anguished paternal charity of Blessed Pope Pius IX and concretely guarded against by the Roman Synod of Blessed John XXIII.
On March 6th in the Year of Our Lord 2010, The Most Reverend Arthur Saratelli, Bishop of Paterson, New Jersey, ordained 4 seminarians of the Priestly Fraternity of Saint Peter and 2 of the Carmel of the Immaculate Heart of Mary in Wyoming to the Diaconate. The ordination took place in the newly finished Chapel of Sts. Peter and Paul in Denton, Nebraska This marked the first ordinations conferred in the new chapel at Our Lady of Guadalupe Seminary. Please keep the seminarians in your prayers as they continue their ascent to the altar of our Lord.
Those ordained to the Diaconate:
Rev. Mr. Matthew McCarthy, F.S.S.P.
Rev. Mr. David Kemna, F.S.S.P.
Rev. Mr. Damonn Sypher, F.S.S.P.
Rev. Mr. Christopher Pelster, F.S.S.P.
Br. Michael Mary of the Trinity, M. Carm.
Br. Joseph Marie of Jesus, M. Carm.
In the last picture, one can see a member of the F.SS.R at the right.
Saint Bonaventure au concile de Lyon. Ecole flamande. XIVe.
At this point perhaps it is useful to say that also today there are views according to which the whole history of the Church in the second millennium is a permanent decline; some see the decline already immediately after the New Testament. In reality, "opera Christi non deficiunt, sed proficiunt," the works of Christ do not go backward, but progress. What would the Church be without the new spirituality of the Cistercians, of the Franciscans and Dominicans, of the spirituality of St. Teresa of Avila and St. John of the Cross, and so on? This affirmation is also valid today: "Opera Christi non deficiunt, sed proficiunt," they go forward.
St. Bonaventure teaches us the whole of the necessary discernment, even severe, of the sober realism and of openness to new charisms given by Christ, in the Holy Spirit, to his Church. And while this idea of decline is repeated, there is also the other idea, this "spiritualistic utopianism," which is repeated. We know, in fact, how after the Second Vatican Council, some were convinced that everything should be new, that there should be another Church, that the pre-conciliar Church was finished and that we would have another, totally "other" Church. An anarchic utopianism! And thanks be to God, the wise helmsmen of Peter's Barque, Pope Paul VI and Pope John Paul II, on one hand defended the novelty of the council ("la novità del Concilio") and on the other, at the same time, defended the uniqueness and continuity of the Church, which is always a Church of sinners and always a place of grace.
