We enjoy this year a goodly stretch of verdant Epiphanytide. Some years it is very short indeed, depending on when Easter falls. This year we get through the 3rd, 4th, and 5th Sundays after Epiphany, though not the 6th, which gives way to Septuagesima Sunday. Take note that the opening chant for Holy Mass in…
We arrived last night at around 1:00am and crashed for a few hours after a 12 hours bus trip. This morning we heard Mass at St. Mary, Mother of God parish in Washington, DC. The beautiful church was built by our German forbears in the 19th century and – thank God – seems to have…
I have been reading the Traditionalist classic, Tito Cassini’s The Torn Tunic, first published (in Italian, La Tunica Stracciata) in 1967, reprinted by Angelico Press. It is an impassioned, indeed ferocious, statement of the case for liturgical traditionalism, written and published before the Novus Ordo Missae was promulgated. Casini, like most Catholics of the time,…
The bishops who came home from Vatican II (or the “liturgist” wolves they failed to stop) initiated acts of violent destruction and iconoclasm in the name of the Council. The zeal for change disparaged the Church’s heritage and liturgical tradition and naturally influenced its architecture and design. This ended up destroying the monuments that our…
Author’s Preface: The following article pertains to the ongoing campaign against traditional contemplative life unleashed by Pope Francis. I had drafted my article in full prior to the fortuitous appearance of two other articles on Madre Maravillas, namely, Mary Cuff’s “The Beauty of Austerity” (Crisis Magazine, January 8, 2022) and Sr. Gabriela Hick’s “St. Maravillas:…
I never did get my father to see his two grandsons serve the old Mass – I’d harbored a vague notion that seeing them up there amidst the “smells and bells” might help bring him back into the fold. When they assisted at his requiem this past October, it was the first time they were…
In an article entitled: “Does the SSPX Have an Extraordinary Mission?”, Mr. John Salza argues that the ministries of the Society of St. Pius X are illegitimate and, although he does not state it explicitly, should be avoided. He concludes: Neither Archbishop Lefebvre nor any of his bishops and priests have produced a single miracle…
Recently, Mr. Joe Bocca wrote a reply to my articles against the SSPX (see here and here). In my article, I demonstrate that the ministry of the Society is illegitimate due to its lack of a juridical (or extraordinary) mission, according to divine law and the teaching of the Church. In short, the SSPX is…
Read chapter I here. *** Malthus my boy, I have received the dossier on your specimens, and although it was tardy and should have been handed in sooner—do not let that happen again—it is informative enough for now. Alas, the father does not as of yet have a habit of utilizing sexualized imagery for…
It appears that the prologue to my series on sedevacantism caused quite a stir, rankling and even riling up a boatload of belligerent BadTrads. A bunch of sour grapes if you ask me, and they failed on multiple fronts, not least of which was their fantastical lack of foresight – not to mention their apparent…
We made a firm move into Epiphanytide, the few weeks before pre-Lent’s Septuagesima Sunday. There is a strong magnetic attraction back to Epiphany on this 2nd Sunday after that great feast. Epiphany, really always on 6 January, was once endowed with its own Octave, regrettably abolished in 1955. The former Octave Day, always 13 January…
