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In 1933, sixteen years after Our Lady’s apparitions at Fatim
a, the future Pope Ven. Pius XII, then Cardinal Eugenio Pacelli, Secretary of State to Pope Pius XI, made prophetic remarks in confidence to his friend Count Enrico Pietro Galeazzi. Cardinal Pacelli stated that Our Lady of Fatima’s confidences to Sr. Lucia were a warning against the “suicide” of destruction of the liturgy and other dangers of altering the Faith. Pacelli made similar prophetic warnings in a subsequent conversation with a fellow curial cardinal.
While these Pacellian remarks have appeared in truncated form in various traditional Catholic publications over the years, in honor of the 100th anniversary of Fatima, the entirety of Pius XII’s prophetic remarks are printed here in a fresh English translation, as they appear in Pie XII devant l’Histoire [Pius XII Before History] (1972) by Msgr. Georges Roche & Philippe Saint Germain (See appendix for the full context):
Suppose, dear friend, that Communism is the most visible among the organs of subversion against the Church and the Tradition of Divine Revelation. Thus, we will witness the invasion of everything that is spiritual: philosophy, science, law, teaching, the arts, the media, literature, theater, and religion.
I am concerned about the confidences of the Virgin to the little Lucia of Fatima. This persistence of the Good Lady in face of the danger that threatens the Church is a divine warning against the suicide that the alteration of the Faith, in its liturgy, its theology, and its soul, would represent.
I hear around me innovators who wish to dismantle the Sacred Chapel, destroy the universal flame of the Church, reject her ornaments, and make her remorseful for her historical past. Well, my dear friend, I am convinced that the Church of Peter must affirm her past, or else she will dig her own grave.
I will fight this battle with the greatest energy on the inside of the Church, just as outside of it, even if the forces of evil may one day take advantage of my person, my actions, or my writings, as they try today to deform the history of the Church. All human heresies which alter the word of God are so that a greater light might appear.”
[…]
These underdeveloped peoples will save the Church, Eminence. A day will come when the civilized world will deny its God, when the Church will doubt as Peter doubted. She will be tempted to believe that man has become God, that His Son is only a symbol, a philosophy like so many others. And in churches, Christians will search for the red lamp where Jesus awaits them, like the sinful woman crying out before the empty tomb: ‘Where have they taken Him?’
Then, priests will rise up from Africa, from Asia, from America, formed here in this seminary of the Missions, who will say and who will proclaim that the ‘bread of life’ is not ordinary bread, that the mother of the God-man is not a mother like others. And they will be cut to pieces to testify that Christianity is not a religion like others, since her head is the Son of God, and the Church is His Church.
Cardinal Pacelli’s Prophesies Coming True Today:
Cardinal Pacelli’s remarks are stunning prophesies of the current state of affairs in the Church, 84 years later. We are witnessing today that:
- Russia spreads her errors of communism and secularization throughout the world as Our Lady of Fatima warned. This happens even in the Church through doctrinal, moral, and liturgical relativism and secularization. The smoke of Satan has entered the sanctuary.
- The imposition of Paul VI’s “New Mass” after Vatican II has brought about widespread destruction of the Church’s sacred liturgy and beauty in church architecture. There is widespread grave liturgical irreverence, sometimes even causing the sacraments, including the Eucharist, to be invalid from certain priests using the new rites.
- There is mass apostasy in the Church and her bishops – “She will doubt as Peter doubted.”
- She doubts exclusivity of salvation through the Catholic Church and the social kingship of Christ. This is evidenced by harmful ambiguities, compromise formulas, and omissions in the very texts of Vatican II (ex. Nostra Aetate, Lumen Gentium, and Dignitatis Humanae). She doubts that all peoples and nations must become subject to Christ’s rule or ought to convert to the Catholic faith, and favors secular governments and practices. Scandalous practices of ecumenism have led to a virtual abandonment of the Divine Commission in favor of a vacuous, open-ended “dialogue”.
- She doubts even the universal validity of the Divine Law as seen in the double synod on the family and Pope Francis’ justifications for adultery and of a false notion of conscience in Amoris Laetitia. Numerous bishops conferences are openly violating the Divine law by allowing the divorced and civilly remarried persons living more uxorio to receive Holy Communion.
- She doubts the eternity and reality of Hell, by devoting her energies to progressive terrestrial utopias under the guise of environmentalism, one-world-government, mass immigration, and wealth redistribution, rather than to the salvation of souls.
- The Church in Africa flourishes and holds fast to the Catholic Faith, especially on sexual ethics, while the Western Catholic Church is losing the faith and dying out.
- Faithful Catholics suffer at the hands of fellow Catholics (white martyrdom) and non-Catholics (sometimes red martyrdom) because they refuse to give in to the prevailing moral relativism and religious syncretism.
Implications for Fatima
Cardinal Pacelli’s words about Fatima are especially revealing. Pacelli states his belief that the warnings of Our Lady at Fatima are about primarily internal threats to the Church rather than external ones; namely, through the “suicide” of the “alteration of the Faith in its in its liturgy, its theology, and its soul.” This runs contrary to the narrative of those who argue that message of Fatima only speaks of individual conversion, and not warning of the crisis in the Church we are experiencing today since Vatican II.
As to the Third Secret and its possible unrevealed part about apostasy in the Church even touching the pope, it should be noted that Pius XII did not likely ever read Sr. Lucia’s letter containing the Third Secret. According to the testimonies of Cardinal Ottaviani and Monsignor Capovilla, Secretary of Pope John XXIII, the envelope containing the secret, which arrived in Rome on April 16, 1957, was still sealed when John XXIII opened it in 1959, one year after Pius XII’s death. However, having been made Secretary of State to Pius XI just twelve years after the Fatima apparitions, Pacelli was apparently informed and even gravely concerned by the yet unwritten “confidences of the Virgin to Sister Lucia”, which presumably warned of a crisis of faith in the Church.
Regarding the authenticity and reliability of Cardinal Pacelli’s comments
Private comments like Cardinal Pacelli’s, that are later revealed can only be rejected as inauthentic on two bases: if the comments conflict with known truth, or if the one who reveals them is untrustworthy.
On both counts, these Pacelli quotations stand up to scrutiny. They not only do not conflict with the truth, but rather, in fact, prophetically predict the state of the Church today. The credentials of Count Galeazzi, the source, and Msgr. Roche, the author of Pie XII devant l’histoire, moreover, are sound.
If the quotes were fabricated, surely Count Galeazzi (who died in 1986, 14 years after Pie XII devant l’histoire was first published) would have challenged the veracity of Msgr Roche’s account, and surely Msgr. Roche wouldn’t have dared to publish this account, in consultation with Galeazzi in the first place, if the passage were blatantly false, knowing that Galeazzi was alive and could easily debunk it. Both men were men of learning, reputation and proximity to the time, the events, the people, and the Pontiff Pius XII himself.
Msgr. Roche, moreover, was secretary and confidant for thirty years to the French Cardinal Eugène Tisserant (who himself was archivist and pro-prefect of the Vatican Library from 1930 to 1936), and whose archives are cited as the primary source of the book. It was reported upon Tisserant’s death that he bequeathed his personal files to Msgr Roche. Tisserant himself was consecrated by Cardinal Pacelli (Pius XII) and was respected so much that he was the first person after Pope Paul VI to sign each of the acts of the Vatican II.
It should be noted that Pie XII devant l’histoire was given a scathing review by liberal laicized ex-priest Emile Poulat at the time of its publication in “Archives des sciences sociales des religions” (1972, vol. 33, no. 33, p. 292-293). Poulat called the work as a whole “improbable, bearing little resemblance to the truth.” He criticized the authors for poor citations, bibliographies, and various errors, “all from the same fanciful ink.” Poulat, however, had suspect motives for criticizing the book. Poulat was a Modernist priest who renounced the priesthood following Pius XII’s 1954 condemnation of the modernist worker-priest movement, of which Poulat was a member. It is more than reasonable to disregard Poulat’s critiques as that of a disgruntled ex-cleric with a modernist agenda, irrelevant to the question of the veracity of these particular quotes from Pacelli, which Poulat does not even address in his critique of the book.
Msgr. Roche’s Pie XII devant l’histoire is also cited by several historical biographies about the life of Pius XII, such as in Jacques Kornberg’s The Pope’s Dilemma, Neal Pease’s Rome’s Most Faithful Daughter, and Philippe Chenaux’s Paul VI: Le souverain éclairé.
The skeptical critic, therefore, must prove a documentary fraud on the part of close collaborators of Pius XII (with no clear motive), involving the invention of an entire conversation that never happened, and he must show how it is that an allegedly fabricated conversation turned out to be so full of accurate prophecies.
Conclusion
While some may rightly point out the Pope Pius XII’s controversial reforms of the Holy Week liturgy in 1955 and 1956, devised by the modernist Annibale Bugnini, began this process of the destruction of the liturgy that culminated in the New Mass, nevertheless, Cardinal Pacelli’s warnings about the “suicide” of altering the faith “in its liturgy” are chilling warnings for our time. Indeed, we have witnessed Pacelli’s warnings of an anthroprocentric Church come true through the harmful dealings of bishops and even popes in living memory and today, from Pope John XXIII and Paul VI to Pope Francis. Pacelli’s image of Mary Magdalene at the tomb is a powerful one for the sufferings of faithful Catholics in our own time in watching the events warned by Our Lady of Fatima unfold: “Christians will search for the red lamp where Jesus awaits them, like the sinful woman crying out before the empty tomb: ‘Where have they taken Him?”
Cardinal Pacelli’s remarks, however, have two optimistic prophesies for traditional Catholics to take courage in, of how Christ will save His Church. The first is that, “All human heresies which alter the word of God are so that a greater light might appear.” Indeed, many have noted that the acute crisis in the Church, especially manifest in the papacy of Pope Francis, have unmasked many of the wolves in sheep’s clothing among bishops, priests, and career Catholic lay commentators. The current crisis has also effectively rendered the ultamontanism of Catholic neo-conservatism untenable, at last opening up a frank discussion of the sources of the crisis in what went wrong at Vatican II and the Pauline liturgical reforms. We may hope that “greater light” may appear for future successors of Pope Francis who will be tasked with the duty of restoring the Church from damage done not only by the papacy of Pope Francis but by Vatican II itself.
The second hopeful prophesy is that the “underdeveloped peoples” in Africa, Asia, etc “will save the Church.” Pacelli’s prediction brings to mind recent remarks by Cardinal Robert Sarah speaking of Africa’s strong stance in favor of the family at the synod on the family: “I have a conviction: It will be Africa, and therefore the Church, who will save the family… In this deep anthropological crisis, Africa, despite her poverty, and indeed because of this poverty, which is the poverty of Christ in the Gospel, can give to the Church her most precious treasure: fidelity to God and to the Gospel, her love of life and the family.” Soon Africa and other nations who were once the mission territory of Christianity may re-evangelize the post-Christian Western world that first brought them the Faith.
To conclude, we have no reason to doubt the authenticity of the prophetic confidences of Cardinal Pacelli in 1933. Indeed, they are worthy of prayerful meditation and widest dissemination by faithful Catholics during this, the 100th Anniversary of Our Lady of Fatima, so that we too can help end the suicidal crisis that the Church is undergoing today.
Appendix:
For the benefit of OnePeterFive readers, below are reprinted Cardinal Pacelli’s remarks in the full narrative context in which they occur in Pie XII devant l’Histoire. Thanks is due to Dr. Maike Hickson, who so kindly reviewed this English translation from the original French.
Click here for a scan of the original French text.
Msgr. Georges Roche & Philippe Saint Germain, Pie XII devant l’Histoire [Pius XII Before History], Paris: Robert Laffont, 1972.
Preface
In order to understand Pius XII’s thought and to reconstitute the overall vision that was his, the authors of this dossier consulted the archives of the diplomatic missions to the Holy See, the personal documents of Cardinal Spellman, the documents received by the Secretary of State, in The Acts and Documents of the Holy See Related to the Second World War. They were guided in their research by Fr. Pierre Blet who was the archivist of the acts of Pius XII, together with three of his confreres of the Society of Jesus. The collaboration and advice of the relatives of the Holy Father gave this narrative warmth of life, among whom the authors are particularly grateful to Mother Pascalina, Count Galeazzi, and the late Prince Carlo Pacelli.
[pg. 52-54]
[…] Msgr. Pacelli is fifty-seven years old and has a capacity for work that exhausts his entourage. “Everything rose in him like a flame,” said Mother Pascalina, remembering this time. She often finds him in his office, kneeling on his prie-dieu, where he begs the Most High to enlighten him. This diplomat, who is so perfectly aware of events, of the men who make them, and of the reasons which guide them in detail, is first of all a mystic at the service of the City of St. Augustine.
The building of a “universal juridical order,” a real force of moral persuasion, which the Holy See tries to build on the basis of the Lateran Accords, would be only a diplomatic artifice if the modernist tendencies which manifest themselves came to compromise Christian doctrine. The jurist Pacelli, who carried out the codification of canon law, is aware of the necessity for reform, but he is not one of those who act lightly.
To believe in men is first of all not to hide the truth from them by celebrating virtue, liberty, progress, science, while the age comes to give birth to atomic bombs, concentration camps, materialism of the State, and moral nihilism. To believe in men is to warn them against “a social providence” which would regulate for them the eternal conflict between good and evil, truth and error, and would assure them a conditioned happiness in their termite mound.
[In 1933] to Count Enrico Pietro Galeazzi (fn. blood-brother of Prof. Riccardo Galeazzi; the medical oculist of the pope after 1930; architect of the sacred palaces; general counselor of the state; secret Camerlengo of the Cape and Sword; privy counselor), who will become one of his [Mgsr. Pacelli’s] most intimate collaborators and who is visiting him to settle the details of his sojourn in America, he [Mgsr. Pacelli] made a confidence that sheds light on the providential man who assisted Pius XI:
— “Suppose, dear friend, that Communism is the most visible among the organs of subversion against the Church and the Tradition of Divine Revelation. Thus, we will witness the invasion of everything that is spiritual: philosophy, science, law, teaching, the arts, the media, literature, theater, and religion.
I am concerned about the confidences of the Virgin to the little Lucia of Fatima. This persistence of the Good Lady in face of the danger that threatens the Church is a divine warning against the suicide that the alteration of the Faith, in its liturgy, its theology, and its soul, would represent.”
Pius XII paused for a moment.
“I hear around me innovators who wish to dismantle the Sacred Chapel, destroy the universal flame of the Church, reject her ornaments, and make her remorseful for her historical past. Well, my dear friend, I am convinced that the Church of Peter must affirm her past, or else she will dig her own grave.
I will fight this battle with the greatest energy on the inside of the Church, just as outside of it, even if the forces of evil may one day take advantage of my person, my actions, or my writings, as they try today to deform the history of the Church. All human heresies which alter the word of God are so that a greater light might appear.”
At this moment, Count Galeazzi adds, the gaze of the pope, veiled by the glasses of his spectacles, has become supernatural, and an irresistible mystical force emanates from his long and fragile body.
Msgr. Pacelli became aware of the state in which he placed his interlocutors, and apologized for a trivial word, which returned the conversation to its terrestrial orbit. This is the mystical fervor that brings Pius XI to be more close to his Secretary of State than any minister of the Church has ever been attached to his chief (fn. Msgr. Pacelli wished to be appointed to an apostolic position. The affection that Pius XI bore for him made him a cardinal on December 16, 1929 with the title of St. John and Paul of Mount Callius. The action of the Holy Spirit urged Pius XI to make him his Camerlengo on April 1, 1935.) They are seen everywhere together on the pilgrimage of the J.O.C [Young Christian Workers] in 1931, during which the Secretary of State gave communion to an eighteen-year-old metal worker, while twelve thousand “jocists” sang under the cupola of St. Peter’s: “We will meet again, Christians, our brothers,” during the Jubilee commemorating the 19th Centenary of the Redemption, during which the Vicar of Christ will honor the Institution of the Holy Last Supper, which raised the Apostles to the priestly order, the Passion of Christ, His resurrection, and the preaching of the Apostles. As Prefect of the Council, Secretary of State Pacelli himself presided over “the Holy Hour,” which brought together all of Christendom into the smallest chapels of the Church of the Vatican.
A witness to the Soviet persecution, Msgr. Slozkaz, who escaped from the “Red Hell”, attends this ceremony as the first victim of this crucifixion, which has been the mark of Christians since the establishment of the Church of Peter.
Already, Msgr. Pacelli is fond of symbolic locations, those that strike the spirit and permeate the soul. He built this seminary of the Missions, drawn from the will of Pius XI, on the promontory of the Janiculum overlooking Saint Peter’s Square. It is the Church of tomorrow, the one that will include all peoples of color in the government of the Church. For its construction, Msgr. Pacelli obtained a credit that the “high administration” of the Vatican almost refused him.
“You see too much greatness in the underdeveloped peoples,” a curial cardinal criticizes.
— “These underdeveloped peoples will save the Church, Eminence. A day will come when the civilized world will deny its God, when the Church will doubt as Peter doubted. She will be tempted to believe that man has become God, that His Son is only a symbol, a philosophy like so many others. And in churches, Christians will search for the red lamp where Jesus awaits them, like the sinful woman crying out before the empty tomb: ‘Where have they taken Him?’
Then, priests will rise up from Africa, from Asia, from America, formed here in this seminary of the Missions, who will say and who will proclaim that the ‘bread of life’ is not ordinary bread, that the mother of the God-man is not a mother like others. And they will be cut to pieces to testify that Christianity is not a religion like others, since her head is the Son of God, and the Church is His Church.”
The Church, Pacelli carries her within him. Each time that he becomes animated, that he speaks, he does not recite his speeches, he delivers them. Pius XI was impressed by the force of this speech, and once he said to Bishop Tardini: “Ah! What a beautiful pope he will make. So that the world may know him, and so that he may know the world, he will be my legate” (fn. Pacelli Family Documents).
So it’s only “certain” priests using the “new rites” who have invalid sacraments? That would be certainly be grave liturgical abuse indeed, with either bread and wine not being used or the words of institution not being used. Is that to what the author refers?
Otherwise, I’ve always been taught ex opere operato. The most wicked priest could, in a state of mortal sin, confect the Blessed Sacrament, though we would commit a grave sacrilege in so doing. Then again, if the new rites are invalid, then the priest, no matter how holy, saintly he might does not confect the Blessed Sacrament no matter how reverently he may offer the Mass, and such reverence becomes instead idolatry.
But there’s no middle ground. The new Rite is either valid or invalid. Which one is it?
The point I was trying to make was that in some cases, priests of a malformed training using the new rites might so deviate from the words of consecration and of the intention to do as the Church does, that they may be an invalidate the Eucharist. This admittedly could have been stated more clearly. I am and was not trying to argue that the Novus Ordo is invalid… but simply that its very chaotic and novel structure lends itself towards such grave abuses that may cause invalidity.
The NO isn’t invalid but the FM:. Bugnini engineered it so slyly that it might easily become invalid when used by fanciful and “innovators” priests.
It is a shame and utterly incomprehensible that Paul VI didn’t cancel the new Rite when Mgr Bugnini’s belonging to the FM was blatantly exposed.
So how do you tell one priest’s intention from another?
The answer is that the surrounding rite itself manifests the correct intention, according to Leo XIII.
Since the novus rite suppresses the most essential nature of the Mass as the renewal of the Sacrifice of Calvary, then any Priest using it manifests a doubtful intention.
It is the same as if he used the Anglican Lord’s Supper / Holy Communion rite. The Anglican rite has proper form and matter, which would be valid in a Catholic rite, but the surrounding protestant ceremony does not profess the Catholic Faith. It is a memorial meal.
This makes the intention to do what the Church does defective in the Anglican rite, and the Anglican rite is thus invalid, even if a Catholic Priest were to dare use it.
I figured that’s what you were getting at but I wanted to make sure. I’ve been to some pretty wacky NO Masses but I’ve never wondered if the Eucharist was validly consecrated at them. Closest was the priest who changed the word “many” to “all”
“For you and for all ” is almost certainly an invalid form.
Oh…crap
I know, it’s pretty bad isn’t it?
Means I’ve attended a few invalid Masses. More worried bout my parents cuz they are still members of that parish
I have been to invalid masses years ago while still working my way out of the Novus Ordo. I told my family not to go to communion and stay in the pew. I also have family members in the same predicament. The crisis is not their fault. They want to be in the Catholic Church. They believe in and desire the Sacraments.
God can give souls who are properly disposed and desire to receive the sacraments the grace of those sacraments if there is something lacking through no fault of their own. This desire does not make an invalid sacrament valid though. Of course the far better way is to receive the Sacraments themselves.
I have read ALL of the posts on this subject and all I got out of them was a raging headache. I just want to be a good Catholic and do what is required by and is pleasing to God. I will go to TLM when I find one I can get to because the disintegration of the NO is driving me crazy … even though it is the only Mass I have ever known (I converted in 1970). Lord help me! Lord have mercy on us all!
Hello Katherine, that’s the place to start. I’m just some guy on the internet who has looked hard at the crisis. You don’t have to take any advice from me at all. But if I may make a recommendation, it is this. Find a local SSPX chapel, go and make a general confession and practice the Faith by attending the traditional mass and receiving regular sacraments from there exclusively.
Thank you. But the nearest SSPX is more than a three hour round trip and I am 70 years old. A bit hard for me to drive. I will give it some serious thought, though.
Maybe another TLM closer?
Yes, could be one in Dunn, about as long but an easier drive. One person says the LM will still go on there after the diocesan priest reassignments, another is not so sure. Trying to find out before I drive all that way.
Oh good!
(Not that I have the faintest idea where you are…)
I know it is very difficult. We have been robbed of basic Catholicism in its itegrity. It is hard to do these days. If you can get there to at least make a good confession and go to a Mass and receive the Sacrament, that would be a good place to start.
The new Rite cannot be invalid but only if the words of Consecration are altered. Otherwise, this would mean that the catholic faithfuls aren’t eating the Blood and the Body of Christ since the Novus Ordo was enforced.
We know for certain that Padre Pio had the mystical gift to know at a glance if the species were or were not consecrated. If the NO Rite was invalid certainly he would have noticed this.
Did Padre Pio use the NO rite?
NO (pun intended). He wrote to Pope Paul VI begging him to permit him to offer the TLM for the rest of his life.
There were changes made to the TLM after 1962, but the full-blown NO was decreed in 1970 (AFTER the death of St. Padre Pio).
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So he couldn’t really have warned against it? Other than to know in advance that he never wanted any part of it and beg for exemption? I always wonder how Holy men like Padre Pio and Bishop Sheen watched us go over this cliff without a shout of warning. Especially Padre Pio, who had such spectacular charisma. If the Lord wanted us anything but totally confused He had good men in place to warn us.
See how Sr Lucia was silenced by the Vatican about the 3rd Secret and the Consecration of Russia under her duty of strict obedience (see: “The whole truth about Fatima” by Br François de Marie des Anges http://www.catholicrevelations.org/PR/twtf%20book%204.htm)
One may be certain that Padre Pio would have been silenced in the same way, should he have uttered one word about the issue.
Don’t forget that Padre Pio was suspended (for other unfair reasons) by his bishop for a time.
But if he did know at a glance that the species was not consecrated surely he would have raised alarm. Do you think he ever saw a New Order rite?
I posted a comment above about this. Here it is again.
We don’t look for what a holy mystic says or doesn’t say to determine the facts regarding the validity or otherwise of a sacrament.
We know if a sacrament is valid or not by what the Church teaches.
Something strange happened to Bishop Sheen. He wrote to a lady in the 70’s, who was concerned about the Novus Ordo, telling her that it is exactly the same mass but in the vernacular. This is completely false.
I think that he could have been the Catholics’ Mr. Rogers. Placed or allowed by the bad guys, so that they could point to him and say, “Hey kids, look at how much Mr. Rogers is enjoying his Soylent Green. No problems here.????”
…same goes for warnings from Our Lady.
Bingo ol’ boy ; )
We know if a sacrament is valid or not by what the Church teaches us. We don’t look for what a holy mystic says or doesn’t say to determine the facts.
“holy mystic”?…I think you mean Saint ; )
Either way, we learn from the Church.
Do you use the Novus Ordo Missae?
No brother Mike, at St. Mary’s we use the Latin. But if Holy Mother Church says the Novus Ordo Mass is a sacrifice and the words of consecration from Sacred Scripture are used then by God’s grace the bread and wine become the Living God Christ Himself : ) The Novus Ordo while valid and licit, is on borrowed time. God’s Will be done. PAX
Is it the Catholic Church who issued the mistranslated “for you and for all” in the consecration of the Chalice from 1967 to 2011, intrioducing a grave doubt regarding the validity of the mass?
Who prays on Good Friday in the novus ordo prayer that the Jews continue in faithfulness to their covenant?
Who allows the Sacraments to be given to heretics and schismatics in Canon 844.3 and 844.4?
Who creates a synthetic rite of Mass from scratch by a committee of heretics – with the aim of pleasing heretics – which denies that it is the renewal of Calvary?
Who deletes the Offertory and replaces it with an offering of bread and wine by the people, with no explicit reference to the Ministerial Priesthood?
All these things have caused the greatest loss of Faith and the greatest apostasy in history. Is this the work of the Church?
I don’t think that just assuming that the Catholic Church does these things is safe.
Mmm, yes..I see what you mean Mike. This might not be the most PC thing to say but I have the sneaking suspicion that most lay Catholics don’t even pay attention to these things outside the bubble of neo-traditionalism, perhaps even before Vatican II, and that much of what you’re referencing was done for their (clergy) own sake. Complicit negligence is rampant in the Church. Without it you couldn’t have possibly done to Catholic parishes what they did after Vatican II. If anyone thinks it was a simple poor language translation from 67 to ’11 then they are as we say St. Mary’s…retar…I mean..naive.
Patrick Henry Omlor was probably the first layman in the world to raise the alarm. He broke onto the scene back in 1968. He published the first traditionalist critique of the “for you and for all men” consecration of the Chalice. His landmark book “Questioning the validity of the Masses using the new, all English Canon” has to my knowledge, never been refuted.
…well on the bright side it’s been valid since 2011, lol. …it’s a start ; )
Ha ha! There’s always a bright side.
But the priest has to manifest the intention to do what the Church does. My sticking point that I can’t get over is this: The Novus Ordo appears to cause a defect of intention, because it suppresses the Catholic Faith, and replaces it with a protestantised idea. This is primarily through the absence of an Offertory, but the whole thing is laced with the denial and suppression of the essential notion of propitiatory sacrifice.
If a Priest uses Cranmer’s Anglican Lord’s Supper rite, even though it has proper matter and form, he does not manifest the intentionto do what the Church does, because this rite does not profess the Catholic Faith. Thus there is no transubstiantion in an Anglican service, even if a validly ordained Priest were to use it.
How is everyone so certain that the novus ordo is valid? Where does this adamant certainty come from?
Well brother Mike, to answer your questions without also ‘defending’ the Novus Ordo as a rite of equal value to the TLM, I would say this. All speculative and bloviated arguments aside, I believe what has happened in practice is that the INTENT of the Novus Ordo (again, all Freemason conspiracies aside), (and I’m basing some of this on the podcast recently posted to OnePeterFive), was to keep the theological sacrificial nature of the Mass in teaching…in mind, but at face-value, be more ecumenical externally…visually and audibly. I believe those who wanted the liturgical change actually believed a more simplified, hippie back to earth, can’t we all just hold hands in the ‘age of Aquarius’ ecumenical Mass might perhaps actually bring all the mainline protestants back into the fold of Rome and that that was a noble effort and worth the try..especially during the decades of war the world was reeling from. I’m not saying that was OK, I’m just proposing this as a well-intended but severely flawed rational for the Novus Ordo. I don’t think the great majority of those who wanted change hated the Catholic faith and so on. There’s no substantive way to prove that Freemasons and Communists within the Church had any effect in doctrine or liturgical corruption. Too many checks and balances. I do believe perhaps that Bugnini played the game of lying to both Pope Paul VI and the Bishops as is also suggested in the podcast..that he lied on behalf of both parties to craft the liturgy he wanted…with both sides thinking the other wanted and condoned the changes..and when Pope Paul discovered this deception, that’s when Bugnini was shipped off to Iran. But rather stopping everything, Pope Paul owned the changes and went forth with them even while seemingly criticizing them publicly. So just as we lay Our Lord’s Crucifixion at the feet of Pontius Pilate..so too must we lay the Novus Ordo at the feet of Pope Paul VI, regardless of who really orchestrated the liturgical changes.
I think most priests still believe and hold the proper theological intent while saying Mass and that while vague somewhat in its wording for reasons stated above, the CHURCH still formally teaches everything that the TLM professes…thus making the Novus Ordo valid. We also have to at some point have to consider, include, trust in the divine authority given to both the Church and more precisely the Chair and Office of St. Peter.
However, these days, Pope Francis is further challenging us faithful by operating within the grey waters of Vatican II thinking where dogma and doctrine are not explicitly violated (depending on who you ask), but Sacred Tradition is certainly being tested, and at what threshold can the Church bind and loosen with its own authority without violating its own Sacred Tradition and Sacred Scripture itself? This is perhaps a disease of the modern mind introduced by the Church itself by and since Vatican II and subsequently the new Catechism.
I hate nothing more than having to defend the Church’s authority against protestants in debate, and then lament the abuse of such authority by our very own Supreme Pontiff.
But I myself cannot in good faith condemn millions of Catholics to have never received valid sacraments or ordinations. And I say this only because I myself have received so many graces from God by His holy sacraments, especially reconciliation, and true healing. And if those healings didn’t really happen by virtue of truly efficacious sacraments, then what good are those sacraments if I can seemingly experience that grace and/or healing as a placebo effect in my own mind?
All with Peter to Jesus through Mary, Amen.
Lord have mercy on us and grant us a new vicar.
…P.S. If as it has been proposed that Pope Benedict XVI’s abdication is invalid because a pope can never abdicate what God has ordained, then what ever previous popes who resigned? Would that make all the popes since Benedict IX or Gregory VI invalid? Would such a scandal reaffirm Benedict’s abdication as valid? Or can both Benedict’s abdication and the manner of Francis’ election be invalid? Thoughts?
This is a really thoughtful and well-balanced response. While I personally tend to believe there was more malice at work when liturgical reform transmogrified into liturgical revolt, you’ve offered a lot of sensible insights here. Thank you.
Wow..thank you Steve, that really means a lot. I like to think as both a convert to Catholicism and now to ‘traditionalism’ I have many questions that can often receive twice as many answers even within a forum like this. I’m just a Catholic dad and husband trying to understand all of this. Your podcast on Vatican II was fantastic. The specter of Vatican II looms over every convert to the faith and there’s really just two roads to take on that and usually converts go the Novus ordo route because that’s the mainstream route many to most new Catholics come into the faith, and that’s what I want older trads to understand. If anyone needs “accompanying” it’s us Novus Ordo converts who want to explore and enter into traditionalism so to speak. And it’s scary! Freemasonry, Communism, gay agendas, invalid Masses, invalid popes, heresy, Fatima secrets, etc, etc..it can really overwhelm a soul who just wants to love Jesus, love the Church, love Our Lady, go to Mass, and fight the good fight : ) Thank you for all the good work you do Steve! …and may the bells of St. Mary’s continue to ring and lead the faithful home to the TLM ; )
I couldn’t agree more.
I get where you are coming from.
However, it doesn’t matter whether the fabricators of the novus meant well or evil. It doesn’t matter whether The Bug was or wasn’t a mason. It doesn’t matter whether they thought they would “help” the Church, or they wanted to destroy it. The Church does not judge internals, and neither do Catholics if we want to think with the Church.
The Church is a visible society, so at the end of the day, we make judgements on what’s visible and external.
The Novus Ordo is, objectively and visibly, a “striking departure from the theology of the Mass as defined by Session XXII of the Council of Trent” (Cardinal Ottaviani). That’s all that matters in the final analysis. That’s objective and visible reality.
I don’t condemn anyone, especially the faithful who have been deceived and robbed. The good disposition of the soul towards God can cause it to receive the grace of a sacrament even by the desire for it, even though it is far better to receive the sacrament itself.
Again we don’t judge internals. That’s God’s business, not ours. The command to “judge not, lest ye be judged” cuts both ways. If we judge the internals of the malefactors in a positive way, you know, to be “nice” to them, we could then approve and tolerate the evil they introduced. If we judge their interior in a bad way, we could be wrong and condemn ourselves. Either way, whether in a positive judgement of anothers inner forum or a negative one, we put ourselves in danger. That’s why the Church only concerns herself in judging the external forum, and so should we.
So whatever the cause of this evil turns out to be, there is something defective about the novus ordo as a rite, and something defective about the way it was introduced and foisted upon the faithful. Therefore the safety or validity cannot be absolutely guaranteed. The Catholic Church cannot produce a thing such as novus ordo. She is ever fruitful and ever faithful to her Spouse, and cannot force, or even offer, poison to her children. The new mass is the main engine which has caused the greatest apostasy in history. It must be avoided.
The outcome may be the same regardless of motive, but it’s a lot easier, I think, to get wrapped around the axle if you think you’re fighting a genuine villain than a misguided soul with good intentions.
Yes, I know what the road to Hell is paved with. (The floor, too.)
Something that always gets me in trouble is when I start talking about tone. But it’s an important part of rhetoric. If you make people feel like they’re being attacked, they get defensive. Make them feel like you’re trying to sell them wild conspiracy theories, and they’re going to be suspicious of what you’re selling. Etc.
To concede that some of the people involved in the project of “reform” in the Church were sincerely mistaken, to my mind at least, makes the problems they created easier to address. “Well, obviously THAT didn’t work, so now that we know, let’s go back and course correct.” It’s a lot easier than having to convince people that they’ve bought into a centuries-old freemasonic plot augmented by Satanic rituals held in key churches of Christendom.
Even though some of that probably happened, too.
So again, in terms of redressing the errors, is it more effective to say, “Well, this was a big mistake, and we see that now, so let’s work on fixing it” or to tell everyone we meet that they’re modernist pawns (or modernists themselves) and that the Mass the Church has given to them for their whole lives is probably invalid and that it’s all a sinister plot and there’s no real hope of fixing it because the modernists control the Church, too and in fact the pope may very well not even be the pope and they should go hang out somewhere they’ve also been told their whole lives is schismatic or heretical until this all blows over and Christ comes down from the heavens and fries all these jerkfaces with divine lazer beams from his eyes and….you get the point.
Sometimes, why a thing happened matters less than the fact that it happened and making a reasonable case that it can be fixed. I have no doubt we’re dealing with principalities and powers and their minions and that unspeakable evils have been perpetrated in this molecular-level demolition of Catholicism that’s gone on since longer than any of us have been alive. And the origin story should be told for those who want the whole deal. But if a guy comes along who says, “You know, I’m not sure I buy the whole Illuminati space aliens connection to Eucharistic Prayer #2 but it’s pretty clear to me that the reformers got way off track,” maybe we don’t need to beat him over the head with what we’re never going to definitively prove.
Maybe, we just need to say, “Well, I’m glad you see the problem. Would you like to work with us on setting it right?”
Thanks Steve. That’s great!
I think the most important thing we sheep can do is to simply remember what ( and who) the Catholic Church is. We have to be sure of this, and recognise what she is and is not capable of. This includes making mistakes. The Church cannot make a mistake. The things she is not capable of producing must be avoided.
“The Church cannot make a mistake. ”
Pretty sure that’s manifestly false. You need to do a better job defining your terms. Not to beat a dead horse, but again, this sounds just like the standard sede arguments.
The Church cannot lead the faithful astray in her official capacity, or else she defects. The Novus has done just that, so I don’t think the Church has given it to us. She can’t correct this and say, oops, sorry.
I am sorry if this sounds like a sede argument. It is not meant to be. Whatever the cause of the defect, we recognise that it is something the Church can’t do and get to safety. This is the simple response to the crisis, and the way through. “Hold fast to tradition”.
The Church can err in discipline and governance. Look at all the awful popes who’ve been elected, just for an obvious example.
Changes to the liturgy, while they affect the faith of those in attendance, are neither doctrinal nor dogmatic. You’re attributing a level of authority to these things that does not pertain.
I’m not here to argue that it isn’t significant or doesn’t matter. I’m here to argue that there’s a lot more latitude for human error in the Church than you’re giving credit for, and that leads to very different conclusions.
I am loathe to go against you, especially here, but with all respect Steve, that is not correct.
“Credo in unam, sanctam, catholicam et apostolican ecclesiam”.
The “oneness” of the Church is a unity of faith, worship, and government.
If this unity can fail, the gates of hell have prevailed.
If a rite of Mass can lead the faithful astray, then it is not a rite approved by the Church.
“If anyone says that the ceremonies, vestments, and outward signs which the Catholic Church uses in the celebration of masses, are incentives to impiety rather than stimulants to piety, let him be anathema.” Canon 7 On The Sacrifice Of The Mass, The Council Of Trent.
http://www.catholicliturgy.com/index.cfm/FuseAction/DocumentContents/Index/2/SubIndex/37/DocumentIndex/502
If you can lose the Faith and end up in hell by following the church, then this “church” is not the Catholic Church, but a spectacularly diabolical and masterful counterfeit.
Well, the oneness of worship is fairly subjective. Ever walked into a Ruthenian rite Church? Looked up an Ambrosian liturgy? Visited the Melkites? There’s quite a bit of diversity in the Church’s rites.
Certainly, these rites are all unified in their essentials, but I’ve yet to see a persuasive case that the NO omits what is essential. Minimizes? Yes. Distracts from? Sure. But there’s a range there, too, so you’d have to make the argument that the NO essentially differs from the essentials of other liturgies.
On my way to the TLM, I used to attend a Latin Novus Ordo, ad orientem, with sacred music and all the bells and smells. It was still the NO — lipstick on that particular pig, you might say — but as a matter of praxis it was an exposure to the implicit pedagogy of authentic Catholic worship.
Now, we all know the prayers are deficient and the omissions are glaring but the fact is that this liturgy didn’t, properly speaking, lead me astray. It led me to the fullness of the TLM. I might never have gotten there without that bridge.
But that’s a Novus Ordo, said totally within the rules.
I don’t think I can overstate how much I dislike the NO. I avoid it — even this “TLMified” version of the NO — like the plague. I’m too aware of its shortcomings, and it grates at my nerves rather than nourishing my soul. But for people who come to it without that knowledge and the correct disposition, they can not only survive, but thrive. Is it in spite of the Mass? Probably, although the graces of the sacrament are also there. It’s a weird thing. It’s the reason why nobody has ever created the silver bullet to kill the NO. Because in some cases — in enough that it’s not just an anomaly — people are spiritually profiting from it.
Would they profit more from a TLM? I have no doubt. But that’s not enough to win the argument. It’s not leading them to lose their faith and end up in hell. This is where the reform-of-the-reformer’s arguments take on a bit more weight. They say the Masses that do lead people astray are littered with abuses. And technically, they’re probably also right. Practically, though, we know it was engineered to allow for improv and accretion alike, and that the loopholes are big enough to drive a bus through.
Trent was right, by the way, when it said that. But it was talking about the TLM. The fathers of Trent could never have seen what was coming. Lucky them.
Pre Novus Ordo, Catholics were taught (yes, the Church used to teach!) that to fulfil the Sunday Obligation, one had to be at Mass at the minimum, for the Offertory, the Consecration and the Priest’s Communion. These three elements constitute the renewal of the Sacrifice of Calvary.
De Defectibus instructs a Priest, e.g. that should he find there is no wine in the chalice when he comes to the consecration, he has to put the wine in, go back and re-offer, at least in his heart, the chalice, because it was not done in the Offertory. Becasue of organic development, the Offertory is now an essential part of the Mass.
So the Novus Ordo omits the Offertory, and replaces it with an offering of bread and wine, not by the priest, but by the gathered assembly. It is not offered with any propitiatory intention.
The Novus Ordo suppresses something essential.
I find that remembering that it all ultimately boils down to the Evil One to be invaluable in dealing with, and even understanding, all of this.
“However, it doesn’t matter whether the fabricators of the novus meant well or evil. It doesn’t matter whether The Bug was or wasn’t a mason. It doesn’t matter whether they thought they would “help” the Church, or they wanted to destroy it. The Church does not judge internals, and neither do Catholics if we want to think with the Church.”
“The Church is a visible society, so at the end of the day, we make judgements on what’s visible and external.”
…and yet my dear brother Mike much of the point of the New Testament and indeed the efficacious nature of the sacraments rests on intent.
There may have been malice in the Novus Ordo undertaking at the deceptive hands of Bugnini, but his reasoning was based on a false precept of dubious liturgical history as suggested in the podcast and not necessarily evil. Whatever they were trying to do in the 60’s didn’t work even though the missal and Mass remain. I don’t know any Novus Ordo Catholics who believe anything about the Mass other than it being a sacrifice. Novus Ordo Catholics are still taught and still believe the same as TLM Catholics, because Church teaching doesn’t change from one form to another. I can vouch personally to this because as soon as I became a Catholic I began helping and eventually running the RCIA program at my parish. And I didn’t teach anything dubious. Are there some liberal-minded Catholics at the Novus Ordo who have lost faith in the Real Presence? Perhaps..most likely they just stopped going to Mass period at that point though. Are there similar Catholics who attend the TLM? No. Because at this particular time, the TLM has become a small remnant of devout faithful and doesn’t broadly encompass the entirety of the Church.
In regards to externals further more..I could fall from airplane into a satanic temple as an un-baptized soul and upon my dying ask their high-priest to baptize me accordingly to the Catholic faith in proper form and matter and it’s fully accomplished and valid at the hands of a satanic priest in his very own satanic temple is it not?
Yes it is. The form for the sacrament of Baptism is bulletproof. It manifests the correct intention by the form and matter by itself.
The intention to do what the Church does in the other Sacraments however is made manifest by the rite surrounding it because of the context given to them. The Anglicans use what would be considered proper form and matter by the Church, but it does not produce a valid sacrament in their Lords Supper service, even if the minister is validly ordained, because the rite gives the context of a memorial meal, not a propitiatory Sacrifice. What’s the Novus Ordo – a meal or a sacrifice?
I recommend reading Apostolicae Curae by Leo XIII.
Catholic *Churchmen* did these things.
So, you are saying that the Catholic Church did not do these things, but instead it was the evil work of some “churchmen”?
That’s great!
We can only trust what comes from the Catholic Church, and not “churchmen”.
In the practical order, I agree. That’s why we should avoid the new mass and sacraments, investigate them, scrutinise them, treat them as suspicious, dangerous, alien and of doubtful validity. Do you agree? That’s the result of your argument. These same “churchmen” tell you to stay away from the SSPX, for example, but why should we care about that?
The New Rite, as any rite, can also be invalid if the priest lacks the proper intention. The lack of proper education for Novus Ordo priests, coupled with the changes to the Rite itself, which obscure the sacrificial aspect of the liturgy, can raise legitimate questions about whether a priest has the proper intention (although that is not uniformly the case).
Pope Leo XIII said that if the proper form and matter are used in a Catholic rite, then the Church presumes the minister has the intention to do what the Church does.
The Offertory, the Consecration and the Priest’s Communinon all form the essential part of the Mass. If you miss any one of these three elements, you miss Mass.
The problem with this Novus Ordo thing is that it does not have an Offertory. So in the Novus Ordo, how do we know the priest has the intention to do what the Church does, when the rite does not manifest the faith of the Church regarding the Mass – in it’s most central and essential parts?
The FORM of the consecration of the Chalice has been altered in the new mass. It has been made into a narrative mode, not a consecratory formula. That’s why they took the words Mysterium Fidei (The Mystery of Faith) out of the consecration of the chalice and put it after the consecration. Sacramental theology says that the priest has to recite the words of consecration a sacramental formula, not a narrative, or the sacrament is not confected.
Again, how do we know the Priest has the intention to do what the Church does? According to Leo XIII in Apostolicae Curae, we don’t.
Ha ha, that’s funny. Padre Pio died in 1968 – a year before the Novus Ordo came out.
If a defect of intention to do what the Church does is manifest in the minister, the sacrament is invalid.
By the time the Novus Odour Mess had been handed down, St. Padre Pio was dead
This is a popular notion, but this picture says different (unfortunately). It’s not the Novus Ordo Mass in its finalized form, but one of the developments of the 65 Missal.
http://tinyurl.com/y77tfxqb
Isn’t the NovusOrdo ‘table’ behind Father? He seems to be elevating at the correct altar for the tridentine rite.
No, just the opposite. The High Altar is behind him.
Poop. However, knowing how insistent he was regarding being obedient to his ‘superiors’ including some highly immoral ones, I’ll go with that explanation. Still question of which liturgy, Canon etc. Padre Pio said.
Thanks. I do now recall seeing some photographs of this kind at one time, but they have long been obscured in my memory, like many other things after the imposition of fifty years of mediocrity.
Valid, when said by a validly ordained priest and when form, matter, and intention are present.
Never licit however. Quo Primum is the law of the Church.
John, how would you know if he has the intention to do what the Church does when he says the Novus Ordo, which is devoid of an Offertory? The new rite does not say that it is renewing the Sacrifice of Calvary anywhere at all, but steers away from what the Church believes.
Leo XIII taught in Apostolicae Curae that the intention to do what the Church does is made manifest by the Catholic rite surrounding the matter and form. Since the Novus Ordo suppresses what it ought to manifest, then it is doubtful that it is a Catholic rite, and therefore the intention is also doubtful.
I was under the impression that these were not mere remarks from Pacelli, but were taken from an extant letter which he wrote to a prominent lay Catholic nobleman, either Italian or French from memory. If that’s correct, their authenticity cannot be in doubt.
Thanks Andrew. Hopefully there are still a few good Cardinals and Bishops who believe as Pius XII. It is a mystery why more Cardinals and Bishops can’t see the damage caused by Modernism.
Either they can’t see it, which means they don’t have the Faith, or they don’t know anything about it; or they can see it, and don’t do anything about it. In the second case they actually continue to promote and preside over the very changes which have driven millions of souls into apostasy and heresy which came in after Vatican II, with perfect peace. Such men could not possibly be considered Catholics, according to Pius XII, Mystici Corporis.
The smoke and smote of Satan has engulfed the Church. Let us pray for strength in our faith, courage in our actions and hope for Divine intervention.
It’s pretty bad, but God has put us here to see what we will do when the wolves tear the flock apart.
It’s happening now. Prayer and penance, please.
“Well, my dear friend, I am convinced that the Church of Peter must affirm her past, or else she will dig her own grave.” P. Pius XII
And yet he had Bugnini alter Holy Week. Why?
Something doesn’t add up.
The changes I believe were mostly fine, i.e. Changes in time so the rites correspond to their meaning.
LOL, absurd, the changes were profound and by a character of Bugnini’s ilk.
Well, Aidan Nichols says otherwise…aside from the Renewal of Baptismal Promises on Holy Thursday, most of the changes were organic ones…
I have no doubt Aidan (does he go by Fr?) an apologist for the Vatican II, “reforms” would say otherwise.
Unfortunately for him and for all Catholics, you can go to just about any diocese today and see the rotten fruits everywhere.
The late Canon Hesse knew more about the council that Aidan will know in his lifetime.
I spoke with Fr. Nichols back in the 80’s. Pure academic. Clueless as to what was going on at the pastoral level. I told him then that “praxis” leads theology and that there was a Revolution underway. He just kinda gave me a blank stare.
Interesting. Thanks!
…
I don’t see your comments here though I have an email copy in my inbox. I suggest you adopt a more civil tone if you want to continue being the mouthpiece of “sacramental theology”.
I misread your comment and I deleted mine after reading it again. There’s a lot of misunderstanding out there. People have given up listening to ( what they think is) the Church. I listen to the pre vatican II teaching and apply it as best as I can to today. Sorry about the deleted comment.
No worries! I share your frustration, to be sure.
Pius XII’s changes did not suppress essential Catholic theology regarding the Mass. The Novus Ordo is a completely distorted and defective rite from beginning to end. They are apples and oranges.
They’re not apples and oranges, one led to the other. If he were so concerned about the “innovators everywhere”, why would he assign a known freemason to kick off the “aggiornamento” by CHANGING Holy Week? They didn’t change the mass first overnight or who knows, maybe they would have been met with pitchforks and torches instead they started by changing Holy Week.
Either the quotes supposedly from Pius XII are BS (he never said them), he was greatly naive and deceived, or..he knew full well what he was doing.
Even if The Bug was a mason, and he probably was, the evidence shows that he joined the lodge in 1963 and no earlier.
It’s a secret society and from what I have researched there is no direct proof of him even being being a member but I’m sure he didn’t reach his high level of the Church and then decide in 63, decide to join the lodge.
His rotten fruits are everywhere today with his “reform of the liturgy”. That part we can know, the evidence is there for all to see.
The frustrating part is those that would canonize Pius XII can never explain why he enabled Bugnini to demolish Holy Week. This has to be sufficiently answered before any canonization can proceed.
I agree with all you say here. My point is that it is not because The Bug might have been as the reason why the novus ordo should be avoided, but the novus ordo as it is.
Do you consider Pius XII to be a false Pope then ? Because if you believe that then the next question begs……. who is the Real Pope ? And does that contradict Christ’s Promise that his Church will never fall ? Where do we draw the line ?
No Vocations ? Archdiocese of Denver has like almost 100 Seminarians…….. plus a few Exchange Students from Vietnam. In Vietnam, there was a jump from 45 Priests to 200 Priests in 7 Years in one of the Dioceses……..
About Buiguini ? Ask him. Oh wait…. he’s dead. Now I don’t know why…. Pope Pius XII would do it…..
According to Mr. Shakespeare, via Hamlet, Bugnini’s mentor “hath the power to assume a pleasing shape.”
Maybe Pius XII was duped.
I appreciate Andrew Guernsey’s work wherever it appears, and am very glad that he is writing here at 1P5.
I have also read somewhere, I can’t remember now, that the sun danced for Pope Pius XII which he saw from his balcony.
I am reminded that the Africans in whom we are so fond of placing great hope, almost exclusively know nothing of any Mass but the Novus Ordo. Indeed, a couple of our FSSP parishes seminarians are now visiting an area in Nigeria where there is a small Traditional movement. One Nigerian will be ordained soon in the Traditional form.
I am concerned about the reality that the Traditional Mass is so thinly distributed on the continent. For African culture lends itself to self-expression and the NO Mass encourages that very thing, and we have seen where that leads. I fear that over time we will, rather than see a purification of the whole Church by the input of staunchly orthodox Africans, rather see the poisoning of orthodox Africa thru the same troublesome temptations common to every other area where the Novus Ordo holds sway.
Pray for the voice of orthodox Africa.
People say “the Church is dying in Europe and America, but Oh! it’s thriving in Asia and Africa!”
Umm, no it’s not. Both continents are nothing but Novus Ordo disasters from top to bottom. A quick youtube search will tell you everything you need to know. Sure, someone will pull up an exception to the rule no doubt.
I’m not being a mean Mr Grinch (as someone called me the other day!). It’s not the laity’s fault. Where are the clergy? Why are they promoting a so-called mass with no Offertory? What’s going on?
I think Cardinal Sarah is very much aware of the danger you mention happening in Africa and in his most recent book “The power of silence” does his best to counter it. There are others such as Cardinal Arinze of the same view.
Dear Rod, you and I both have experience of Africa. The Old Mass is perfect for them because the Communion of the Saints chimes so well with reverence for the ancestors.
But the Novus Ordo will lead them straight to Pentecostalism; indeed, it already has. Ten different sects on every street.
If Mgr Roche had invented all this then it seems to me very unlikely that his invention would have turned out to be so accurate in what it foretold.
The things that the authors of this site say, if they truly believe what they are saying, then the only alternative is to renounce the Catholic faith, as currently constituted, because to refuse to do so is to descend into apostasy. So here’s a suggestion: Orthodoxy. I know, I know, it just doesn’t have the prestige, or, dare I say, the DRAMA of the flamboyant Catholic Church. Is the Orthodox Church even relevant? But while you were complaining about the Third Secret, Russia has become more Christian than the USA. It wasn’t Russia that reduced the Christians of Iraq from 1.5million to less than 150,000, or decimated those in Syria and Libya. It was the good ol USA. All by unfortunate accident of course. Maybe it’s okay because they aren’t really Christian, despite having apostolic traditions equal to that of Rome.
You will have to swallow some bitter pills, however, if you are to convert. You will have to stop saying the Filioque, which was never approved by any ecumenical council, and which is, in the words of Kallistos Ware, “theologically inexact and spiritually harmful.” Ask yourself, how much of the problems of the Roman Church are due to the degradation of the Holy Spirit? Why is your Novus Ordo so sterile, why does the Church to this day tolerate, if not encourage, frenzied Evangelical worship? It is because the Spirit has been relegated to Trinitarian Sidekick, and Charismatics are the desperate but futile attempts to elevate the Spirit?
You will also have to renounce the doctrine of the Immaculate Conception, which is the belief that God the Father had to intervene twice to produce one Son. For 1800+ years, this doctrine was not necessary for belief, and then all of a sudden, KaPOW! One must believe in the blood guilt of every born human being. How could Mary, stained by Original Sin, produce a Son without Original Sin? A Quandary! Somehow Mary herself must go through the unstaining process first. And the Catholics are the ones who tell us it is the Protestants who believe human nature is inherently sinful. Already, some of your most logical theologians have seen the consequences of the Immaculate Conception doctrine, and have called for Mary to be elevated to Co-Redemptrix status.
Oh, and Papal infallibility, you’ll have to drop that one too. Which may be hard until you realize that 90% of your complaints stem from the fact that this doctrine even exists.
Vacant seats, New Masses, Churches that are uglier than anything Corbusier could have ever designed (have you noticed they all look like spaceships?), and the Paul VI Audience Center, which, I mean, I can’t even, google image that thing and tell me what you find most Christian about it. But this is not new. It has been going on since well before the Borgia Pope. When I was young, my Catholic priest told me that a ship, if it goes off course even by 1 degree, over time, go farther and farther off course., until it may even seem to be going in an opposite direction. How is this not applicable to a church whose Pontifex Maximus could not even be bothered to attend the Council of Nicaea in person?
Orthodoxy came close to destruction, first by Islam and then by the Bolsheviks. The Coptics have been under siege for centuries, as have the non-Chalcedonians. It is possible that these Christian faiths may die out within our lifetimes, but they will have died of old age or been murdered, but in their account before God they will never have to explain a suicide.
At this point, what do you have to lose? go to your Saturday night Mass, fulfill your obligation and then Sunday morning witness the Liturgy of St. John Chrysostom or St. Basil the Great and see if anything (or Any One) speaks to you.
Quitting is for quitters.
Also: https://www.ewtn.com/library/PAPALDOC/B7UNAM.HTM
????????????
(#11 thou shalt not quit)!! ????
It wouldn’t help us, because the Orthodox position on marriage and divorce is ludicrous.
Thank you. I was going to mention that too but you beat me to it. ????
Not to mention even above this is the Primacy of the Chair of St Peter.
Your post was not charitable.
In the first place, to suggest that one should renounce the Catholic Faith because of the actions of Churchmen is like throwing the baby out with the bath water.
Second, the Immaculate Conception is inextricably linked to the Incarnation and the Redemption. God created Eve immaculate, so why would He not do the same for the woman who was to bear His Only-begotten Son? Besides Gen. 3: 15 (the first reading for the First Friday of the Great Fast), Scripture also says that “Wisdom will not dwell in a body subject to sin.” (Sorry, I don’t have the chapter and verse but it’s in there.) The Fathers and Doctors of the Church say that “Wisdom” applies to Our Lord, God and Savior Jesus Christ. Since He is the Eternal Wisdom, therefore He will not dwell in a body subject to sin. Therefore the Theotokos MUST be immaculate. As noted here:
http://www.papalencyclicals.net/Pius09/p9ineff.htm
God redeemed Her in advance so that She would be worthy of bearing the Eternal Son of God.
Everything that the Catholic Church has taught in re to the Theotokos – Her Immaculate Conception, Her Perpetual Virginity (Tone 7 Theotokion if you don’t believe me), Her Dormition and Assumption into Heaven – is in preparation for and/or a consequence of Her Divine Maternity.
In re to the term Co-Redemptrix: Without the free consent of the Ever-Virgin Mary, there would have been NO Incarnation, NO Crucifixion, NO Resurrection, NO Ascension, NO Descent of the Holy Ghost and establishment of the Catholic Church as we know it.
Re Papal Infallibility: The Pope is ONLY infallible when ALL the conditions laid down by Vatican I (1869-70) are met. Not everything the pope says meets these criteria.
Re the Council of Nicea: Which one? If Nicea I, then you should know that the Pope was very frail and could not make the trip. That’s why he sent 2 legates.
Nicea II – I don’t know. I have to research that one.
Re Orthodoxy: It came into being when Cardinal Humberto and Patriarch Michael Cerularius mutually hurled excommunications in 1054. Before that, there was One, Holy, Catholic and Apostolic Church breathing with both lungs (c.f. PJPII). Check out the decrees of Nicea I.
Btw, I go to Divine Liturgy Saturday and Sunday. 😉
thnx for all that Margaret
You’re welcome. 🙂
You rock! ????
Thank you. (Actually, I think that’s the first time anyone ever said that to me online.) 🙂
’bout time! 😉
“The skeptical critic, therefore, must prove a documentary fraud on the part of close collaborators of Pius XII (with no clear motive), involving the invention of an entire conversation that never happened, and he must show how it is that an allegedly fabricated conversation turned out to be so full of accurate prophecies.”
Why must they prove that?
It’s not hard to predict the damage done by modernism in 1972. There’s nothing prophetic about that at all. Pius Xth warned of the dangers of modernism at the turn of the century so all an orthodox Catholic would have to do is lick their finger and stick it in the air to feel the prevailing wind and by 1972, to an educated Catholic insider, that was obvious. After all, in 1968 Archbishop Lefebvre resigned from the Holy Ghost Fathers (in protest of their modernism) and in 1970 he founded the Society of Saint Pius X (SSPX) as a small community of seminarians in the village of Écône, Switzerland, specifically to resist the modernist trend. So by 1972 it was already obvious.
We have to also take into consideration the writings of the Saints. Marie Julie Jahenny was visited by Pope Pius XII during his pilgrimage to Rome. She stated in 1902 that a “New Mass” containing words “Odious ” to Our Lord Jesus’s ears, would be created by “His enemies, not of HIS Gospel”
November 27, 1902 and May 10, 1904
Our Lord and Our Lady announced the conspiracy to invent the “New Mass”:
“I give you a WARNING. The disciples who are not of My Gospel are now working hard to remake according to their ideas and under the influence of the enemy of Souls a MASS that contains words that are ODIOUS in my sight. When the fatal hour arrives when the faith of my priests is put to the test, it will be (these texts) that will be celebrated in this second period.
The First period is the one of my priesthood which exists since Me. The second is the one of the persecution when the enemies of the Faith and of Holy Religion will impose their formulas in the book of the second celebration. These infamous spirits are those who crucified Me and are awaiting the kingdom of the NEW MESSIAH!”
May 10, 1904
On 10th of May 1904, Our Lady denotes the new clergy and its Mass:
“They will not stop at this hateful and sacrilegious road. They will go further to compromise all at once and in one go, the Holy Church, the clergy and the Faith of my children.” She announces the, “Dispersion of the pastors by the Church itself; real pastors who will be replaced by others formed by hell, initiated in all vices, all iniquities, perfidious, who will cover souls with filth. New preachers of new sacraments, new temples, new baptisms, new confraternities.”
As well as the overthrowing of the Papal Bull “Quo Primum” of Pope Saint Pius V the prophecies above (and the many others she gave) give clear indication that the Novus Ordo is definitely NOT instigated by Our Lord. Yes, i appreciate that those celebrating it in “Invincible Innocence” will receive His Mercy as they have not been willfully disobediant, Our Lord is MERCIFUL. In the truest sense of the word. However, words such as the prophecies above, made by a mystic who showed the signs of supernatural gifts that has resulted to her being praised by not only St Padre Pio, but by many, many Bishops and Priests, should not be treated with contempt.
Dubbed “The greatest Mystic of Modern Times”, she prophecised two world wars, became supernaturally light/heavy, fasted on the Most Holy Eucharist for many years, she even spend time in a Hospital undergoing a barrage of tests to ascertain that she truly WAS eating NOTHING whatsoever by one consecrated Eucharist a day.
Pope’s do not just “visit” Mystics. Pope Pius XII clearly was influenced by her warnings of the threats to the Church from the enemies who sought to destroy Her from within. She remains un-beatified, but Blessed Anne Emmerich has only recently been Beatified, if a cause for Canonisation is subsequently introduced, it would only further draw investigation by the unknowing of the prophecies. The enemies intent on subverting the True Church FEAR that more than anything.