Image credit: Ben Yanke At one point in Plato’s Republic, Thrasymachus, the nihilistic proponent of might-makes-right, asks his interlocutor Socrates: “Am I to take my argument and pour it into your very own soul?” To which query Socrates replies: “God forbid, don’t do that!”[1] I was thinking about this recently in connection with some truly…
Image courtesy of Marc Salvatore. We have probably all met people who are thinking of attending the traditional Latin Mass on a regular basis and who, when they actually start going, are struck by how much extra effort it costs. Perhaps we ourselves once felt the same way. For starters, you are expected to kneel…
Photo courtesy of Saint Ann’s Church and Shrine in Buffalo, New York. By Peter Kwasniewski & Michael Foley Given that it can often be less convenient for a person or a family to attend the traditional Latin Mass (and I am thinking not only of obvious issues like the place and the time, but also…
I was recently asked by a number of people: “When ought one to point out liturgical abuses and endeavor to correct them?” My interlocutors had been confused by a number of partial truths. Let us, then, exclude several erroneous answers. “To correct an abuse, you need to have perfect charity and disinterested motives.” No man…
Some weeks ago, the Jesuit superior general Fr. Arturo Marcelino Sosa Abascal made international news with his remarks denying the real personal existence of the devil and reducing him to a man-made symbol of evil. Ho-hum, one might say: we expect this kind of heresy from modern liberal Jesuits — even if the Jesuit who holds the…
Some months ago, Maestro Aurelio Porfiri approached me with the idea of authoring a statement in support of genuine sacred music, for the occasion of the fiftieth anniversary of Musicam Sacram. The statement would express in a clear and simple way our conviction of the continuing relevance of the great musical tradition of the Catholic…
The Church has told us countless times to go to St. Thomas for guidance in matters of philosophy and theology. Over the centuries this authoritative counsel has been a source of motivation for countless schools and seminaries, teachers and scholars. But just who was this saint, what were the main lines of his life, and…
Some time ago, a Catholic priest wrote me a wonderful letter about tradition and youth ministry, which turned into a correspondence that struck me as worth sharing with a wider readership. So many of us face the issues discussed therein, week in and week out. I asked the priest his permission to include some of…
Whereas the Son’s own surrender to the love of the Father, on the level of fallen creation, is consummated in his sharing of our death, our reunion in him, in this very death, consummates our ecstasy, our ravishment with the Risen One, our Ascension in his own, in which is celebrated the Marriage of the…
Those who attend the Traditional Mass regularly are deeply familiar with, and deeply appreciative of, the recitation of the Prologue of the Gospel of John at the very end of Mass. It has always struck me, and I have no doubt it strikes many others, as a beautifully appropriate moment of meditation, a long-drawn breath…
Like all ancient liturgical rites of the Church, the traditional Roman rite of Mass—especially if one includes the Asperges me and the Leonine prayer to St. Michael—is full of references and allusions to the holy angels, and more than that, prayers directly addressed to them. To cite all these wonderful texts, let alone comment on…
