If you’ve been paying attention to coverage of the Catholic Church lately, you might have noticed a spike in the appearance of terminology borrowed from the bellicose arts, with words like “conflict,” “battle” and even “war” being used to describe the goings-on in and around the Vatican these days. While such talk is pretty standard fare for faithful Catholic publications, it has recently spread beyond the narrow borders of Catholic blogdom and entered the mainstream of polite society: Tess Livingstone of The Australian, Tim Stanley of The Telegraph, Ross Douthat of The New York Times and now Damian Thompson ofThe Spectator have all come to the same conclusion: we are on the brink of civil war.
Just more media spin? A bit of hyperbole to increase revenue? Some would like you to think so. Cardinal Donald Wuerl recently appeared onWorld Over Live with Raymond Arroyo in part to assure viewers that there exists “no division on the core teachings of the faith” among the bishops. We are, I suppose, to ignore voices such as that of Polish Archbishop Henryk Hoser, who recently stated that “some bishops […] do not even accept the official teachings of the Church.” And if we don’t ignore them – if we reject the “Sunshine, Lollipops and Rainbows”narrative – and instead view events within the framework of a “politically partisan narrative,” then we deserve to be silenced, as Ross Douthat found out after his commentary provoked the ire of a gaggle of progressive Catholic intellectuals and university professors.
That is, if it weren’t for the fact that such talk of war is not limited to the authors of newspaper editorials. Just yesterday, Cardinal Maradiaga informed reporters that Pope Francis is “prepared to battle” his own Curia in order to push through his desired reforms. And in this morning’s homily, the Pope himself trained his sights yet again upon the “Doctors of the Law” and fired off a characteristically veiled yet effective warning shot:
God has included us all in salvation! All! This is the beginning. We with our weaknesses, with our sins, with our envy, jealousies, we all have this attitude of excluding which – as I said – can end in wars.
While I congratulate Douthat, Thompson and the rest for refusing to go along with the official narrative and calling it like it is, I have to ask: Where the hell have you guys been for the last 50 years?
For the record: civil war is already upon us. Anyone paying attention knows that the walls have been scaled, the gates have been breached, and the enemy has set up camp in our own court. All that’s left is the castle keep, surrounded on all sides by men brandishing torches. And now you think we are on the brink of civil war? Tell that to the three generations of Catholics who have been fighting tooth and nail to preserve every scrap of Sacred Tradition they can get their hands on from the corruption of the grand Aggiornamento. Tell that to those who were reduced to tears as sanctuaries were being desecrated, statues removed, altars broken, and communion rails torn out. Tell that to the scores of good men who were turned away from the priesthood because they objected to the rampant homosexualism of the seminaries. Tell that to the faithful who were cast out of the Church for having the gall to demand that she remain loyal to Christ’s teachings 30 years ago.
The only thing new about the 2015 Synod was the brazenness with which the heretics and apostates pushed their revolutionary agenda. They’re not even trying to prop up a ‘Hermeneutic of Continuity’ anymore. It’s a rupture, a break – in other words, a schism – from Catholic Tradition. They know it, we know it, and it’s time you guys start reporting on it.
Welcome to the war. It’s about time you showed up.
This post originally appeared at the author’s blog, The Radical Catholic.
Matthew Karmel is the nom de plume of a teacher, freelance writer and translator living in Zurich, Switzerland with his wife and four children. A lifelong Catholic, he is also the author of the blog The Radical Catholic.
Bam-o!
Meanwhile, our Catholic chattering class is made up disproportionately of people who converted in the last 20-30 years. It’s cute these converts expect me to take their chatter seriously, and really cute that the Church machinery is apparently paying them not to shut up. cha ching. Don’t know about you, but this cradle really enjoys being lectured on what it takes to be a good Catholic by formerly atheist 24 year olds hired by Lizzie Scalia.
Ha, rkat! I could not agree more. How many cradle Catholics think we on the verge of a schism/war? Not many. Converts are so short-sighted.
But it’s also “everything is peachy so shut up, trads!”
Um, thanks? Some of us converts have been calmly (and in hindsight, accurately) pointing out exactly where this is headed since the spring of 2013, while comboxes filled with distraught cradle Catholics berated us for not trusting in the Holy Spirit, and for doubting the manifest awesomeness and sagacity of whoever happens to be pope this year.
To be certain, the convert side features such nonpareil Mottramists as Shea, Akin, Longenecker, and Armstrong, but it also includes guys like 1P5 contributors Bougis and Williams, Hunwicke, Tantum (of A Blog for Dallas Area Catholics) and–with increasing forthrightness–Zuhlsdorf.
And it’s not as if cradle Catholics have covered themselves in glory: there’s Scalia, Mirus, Keating, and Thomas L. McDonald, for instance. Plus, we shouldn’t forget that all the revolutionaries in the Church hierarchy are cradle Catholics. My own IRL cradle-Catholic friends and acquaintances are, almost to a man, firmly in the Everything is Awesome camp, as are most of the cradle-Catholic priests I know.
While I have nothing against generalizations–I am a firm believer that stereotyping saves time–this turkey just won’t fly. There are too many counterexamples on each side.
I think there’s some truth the idea that many Protestant converts who crossed the Tiber in the post-conciliar era didn’t convert to Catholicism, they converted to sacramental Protestantism with a pope. They often bring a Protestant-mega-minster style ethos to their work, which plays well in the media age and sells lots of books. I suspect a number of them wouldn’t have set foot in a Catholic Church in 1930.
But you’re right – this brush paints too broadly. And I’m grateful for the contrary examples you’ve mentioned.
Speaking of the Catholic Church in the 1930s, I think we know how the converts Waugh and Chesterton would view current events.
More to the point , would Waugh and Chesterton set foot in a Catholic Church now?
This may possibly be the best comment you have ever written, Steve. You have hit the nail on the head. THIS. IS. IT. EXACTLY!!!
You could probably develop this into a separate post. I have never seen it written anywhere else on the Catholic blogosphere.
I thought the same.
Hilary White’s statement, “Novusordoism isn’t Catholicism” has stuck with me since I first happened upon it.
“Many Protestant converts who crossed the Tiber in the post-conciliar era didn’t convert to Catholicism”.
That is a most uncomfortable but entirely true assessment. Very, very disturbing. Fight this war wherever you can.
“I suspect a number of them wouldn’t have set foot in a Catholic Church in 1930.”
But Steve, surely this is an imponderable question, right? Perhaps I am a sacramental Protestant who has a pope. From the bottom of my heart, I don’t believe I am. But, as Jeremias teaches us, “The heart is deceptive above all things.” Those of us who were not fortunate enough to be born into the True Faith often have to leave all our family and friends behind. My own father would not allow me to be present at his deathbed. It’s hard enough being shunned and cut off by one’s family. Being resented by one’s new — and only — family is nearly unbearable. As I said above, where have all the cradle Catholic apologists been for the last 50 years? And, by the way, why do so many of us Trade — yes, I am one — talk about converts the way the current pope talks about his own priests? (The Pope really seems to despise parish priests. Have you noticed?) I really enjoy your blog! Our Lord has blessed you with such a good mind, and with a clever, cheerful and upbeat wit. It’s good to be in the trenches with men like you!
Well, this is the problem. It’s a short rhetorical leap from Grrr. These ex-protestant apologists really get my goat to Converts should sit in the back of the Church and learn from their betters. After all, if professional ex-protestants should clam up, how much more so the rest of us? But hey! I’m an ex-heathen, so maybe the same rules don’t apply to me!
Contrary to some of the projections elsewhere in this thread, I know better than to take offense at someone bloviating in a combox. I do enough combox bloviating myself, after all. But it is discouraging to other converts to see their erstwhile allies sniping at them for no apparent reason.
I’m relatively active in my (perhaps soon to be ex-) parish, and all the normalists I know are cradle Catholics. In fact, I’m the only non-normalist I can think of off the top of my head. But this is to be expected: the vast majority of human beings want nothing more than to be accepted by their peer group, and instinctively seek to adapt their beliefs and expectations to match those around them. I suspect that those of us who comment in places like this are highly abnormal: perhaps lower in basic sociability or conventionality, meaning we don’t care too much what other people think. Or perhaps we have a dogged determination to follow a line of argument through to the bitter end, regardless of the cost. Whatever’s behind it, it’s ridiculously counterproductive to start plinking rhetorical pebbles off the foreheads of those who are willing to stand side by side with you in the battle.
Please see my comment about Plato’s Allegory of the Cave. The cradle Catholics have been told for 50 years (by those in authority over them) that this is what is good, this is what is Catholicism, there are no other alternatives. It takes some work to escape that cave.
Right. As wonderful as it is to see 1P5 getting hundreds of comments on its articles, we’re still a tiny minority. Almost all modern Catholics–cradle, revert, or convert–are normalists, and the majority of them either have no experience of pre-Vatican II Catholicism or no desire whatsoever to return to those days. They’re perfectly happy to continue singing Bread of Life at their a la carte Novus Ordo Masses every Sunday for the rest of their lives, cheerfully send their kids to feeble “Catholic” schools (read: atheist incubators), and cheer on the Pontificate of Mercy as it’s presented in their diocesan newspapers and the mainstream media. We might think they’re mistaken–and they are certainly mistaken–but they’re the overwhelming bulk of Catholics out there. (And a great many of them are still much better Catholics than me.)
So it’s simply not true that there’s a vast pool of well-informed, critically thinking cradle Catholics out there. We happy few counter-revolutionaries simply don’t have the numbers to start turning up our noses at fellow travelers who haven’t yet achieved our own sophisticated, highly refined palates.
Well said Murray.
Jeff Cavins comes to mind, and t hose god-awful “Amazing Parish” and “Forming Intentional Disciples” movements.
You’re being really sensitive. Do you think you have nothing to learn from cradles?! Get over the “I’m just as Catholic as you” grudge . Looking to your co-religionists for validation is itself very, non-Catholic. …And I never said converts were less Catholic than me anyway …
Hahaha. My dear fellow/lady, I am the very opposite of sensitive. I am a happy warrior, but I do know cant when I see it.
Really? Then quote it to me.
Still no quote? Crickets…
It’s also important to remember that a lot of those cradle Catholics who are berating you, were purposely kept ignorant by the clergy. We have been living Plato’s Allegory of the Cave, and only some of us have been lucky enough to be the prisoner that escapes.
Yes, papalotry sunk pretty deep roots into the JPII generation.
I don’t know anything about L Scalia, but you need to be careful here. The phenomenon of excellent converts who can teach us all a great deal about our faith is not new. In the 19th century, just to name two stellar examples, we were blessed with the conversion of John H Newman and Ronald Knox (the latter belonging most fully to the 20th cent.). And a bit further back we have the rather important conversion of St. Paul. Today there are many Catholics who have converted and brought with them both a sound knowledge of the Old Testament and that fire in the belly lacking to many cradles now.
The exception does not prove the rule. The vast majority of converts who never experienced pre-Vatican II Catholic culture are patently useless right now … and that’s probably why they get so much air time.
There are plenty “cradle” Catholics who didn’t experience pre VII culture either. I was born in the early 60’s. I was running around in diapers when the Bride of Christ was being raped by the liberal modernists. By the time I became aware it was all gone; a stolen away patrimony hidden from us. Tough for me to forgive that. In the meantime it’s incumbent upon me to fight the infestation responsible.
It’s not just converts who lack a perspective through no fault of their own, but also cradle Catholics of my generation and later. Unless they have sought the true Faith all they know is the garbage novus ordo.
I’m not older than you. But we did experience a family life totally based on Catholicism, with older relatives teaching us by example, which is lot more educational than websites and blogs purporting to be Catholic. We know what was lost better than converts do.
Good for you. Most folks didn’t have that is my point.
You’re going out of your way to split ranks which is self defeating. Try to recognize when someone is essentially agreeing with you.
Wow, are you a man???? If your feelings get hurt on a comment thread bc someone mentioned converts, you don’t have what it takes, convert or not. Wow!
Ad hom! Not surprising. Go away. The adults have work to do.
For the love, RK. Lay off the coffee today. We’re among friends here. Save it for the people in the commboxes who are spouting heresy or sedevacantism or something. Use your superpowers for good, mmmkay?
Sorry but I don’t react well to people indignantly rebutting arguments I didn’t make in the first place.
Hey, Steve, just wanted to bring to your attention, if you didn’t already know, the bug in your About > Contributors section.
Yes, thanks. I fixed a different problem in the author template yesterday and now suddenly it looks as though I’m very full of myself. Haven’t had time to troubleshoot this yet.
JT, I think rkat is having a bad day. May be best to just say a prayer for the cat that tomorrow will be more agreeable and just disengage for today.
Rash. It’s never a good idea to throw over “being careful”, especially when dealing with something as crucial as you religion. Subtract converts from Catholic history and you subtract its lifeblood: Robert Hugh Benson, Bernard Nathanson, Roy Campbell, G.K. Chesterton, Mortimer Adler, Sheldon Vanauken, Evelyn Waugh, Thomas Woods, John C. Wright, Malcolm Muggeridge, Dwight Longenecker, Russell Kirk, Louis Bouyer, and an army of others, some of whom converted rather recently, within the parameter you identify. As an aside, I think you do not understand the expression “the exception that proves the rule.” “Proves” here means “tests”, something exceptions like Newman and Knox most certainly do with your rule concerning “patently useless” converts.
Yeah, when I think of Chesteron or Muggeridge, Ithe word that comes to mind is “careful”. Dont be a scold. It’s boring.
OK, you agree not to be rash and I’ll give up scolding.
If you think commenting on a website can ever be rash, you must have a very delicate sensibility. Maybe you should man up .
Hey Johnny, Chacun à son gout.
D’accord, mais il y en a de bon et de mauvais, n’est-ce pas? Moi, je préfére celui-là toujours.
somebody parle francais!
Ps And thanks for the grammar lesson. Just what we need.
You mean semantics.
Zzzzz
I see what you did, there.
I agree with *nearly* all of that, Johnny. Enough to merit an up vote, at least.
At the age of reason, we all need to make a conscious decision (renewable) to believe the Faith.
PS I’m done “being careful”. When the Pope is careful, I’ll be careful.
Don’t take your cues from the current Pope!
This jury of one has returned a “caution” verdict for Newman. Do you think it coincidental he is credited with being the inspiration for V2?
Ooooh *sucks through teeth*….
I don’t think the term is “inspiration” of VII (correct me if I’m wrong but I’m sure I’m not). Darn it I cannot find the correct term which I know is quoted somewhere in this here newsletter I have open before me. Ah… “a hidden Father of Vatican II”… Now, +Lefebvre was a visible Father of same, so let’s be careful here. If Newman had been alive at the time there is no doubt in my mind that his reading of the situation would have been to stand against the heretics, he would certainly have recognised and resisted liberalism as he did in life.
*Sigh* If only VI had completed its work.
Have you read Sire’s account of Vatican II? If so, you know that what happened there was most certainly NOT what John XXIII envisioned when he announced the convoking of a council. He tells us, “[John] thought of the council as ‘a new Pentecost,’ meaning…that the bishops of the world should come together to be bathed in the Holy Spirit and return personally inspired to carry out their pastoral tasks.” The Modernist twist eventually given the council and allowed by Paul VI was not John’s idea at all. So, while I don’t know if Newman can be “credited with being the inspiration for V2”, he cannot be “credited” with the abuses tolerated by Paul VI nor the direction of it that pope wanly let others assume.
Please be silent and join us at the Lord’s Supper for praise and worship with Brother Nick and his band Glory Glories.
rkat, I understand your frustration with some of the high profile converts but suggest prudence regarding painting converts with too broad a brush. My wife and I are converts (9 years in now) and have been increasingly drawn to the traditionalist point of view. I’ve become a pest to my local Bishop with pressing him to uphold orthodoxy. You are no more Catholic than one who came into the Church yesterday – you are just more fortunate that you were brought up with the faith. Would that I had been so blessed but the Lord brought my family into the fold in His time. Not all converts are wet behind the ears either. For what it’s worth . . . I’m 51. How about we take up arms alongside each other rather than having a circular firing squad?
I didn’t “paint converts with a broad brush”, I *specifically* talked about paid commentators who are converts. Read more carefully. The firing squad is in your head.
Yes, rkat, you did specifically refer to paid commentators, fair enough. Didn’t seem to be a big leap however to extrapolate to converts in general given the tone of your post. But if that was not your intent, so be it.
I have tons to learn from cradles. I’m quite ignorant actually and don’t mind saying so. That’s why I’m reading on sites like this.
I ask you again. Can we not fight together as comrades in arms even if some of us are still learning?
I just told you, you’re the only one who is fighting. Stop putting words into my mouth
As a convert, am I welcome into the traditionalist fold or is it a closed society. Just asking.
Do you want an engraved invitation????? Cuz I didn’t get one either.
Rkat, I think I share your uncompromising zeal and readiness for war, but please do take care to direct it towards the real enemy. It takes time in this dark age to work one’s way to the heart of the Faith, which is the traditional understanding of Catholicism. HRpuffinstuff is a convert who probably battled his way through the RCIA and Novus Ordo façade, and is now seeing the truth of what has been happening since the Council. That means he is willing to fight this out to the end. Go easy on him. I know it took time for me when I returned to the Church. In the beginning I was all CAF and EWTN, Novus Ordo, JPII-we-luv-you and anti SSPX etc, but I eventually went deeper in to things in God’s good time and by His divine assistance.
Everyone has to go through that grade school period. Unfortunately, many Catholics never leave it. I know Catholics who think the EWTN/CA crowd are the greatest things since sliced bread. It’s all about their next paid talk or book signing at a parish near them.
What can be done about it?
You can try to throw some more traditional resources their way and invite them to attend the TLM. It’s pretty rare to find one who is willing to step outside the comfort zone. So my husband and I are really focusing on educating our children to understand the difference.
That is exactly what I am doing, along with prayer and penance, but it is a hard sell and a tough slog.
LOL I feel like I’m through the looking glass. I have nothing against converts: my only point in this entire thread is that there IS a difference between cradle and converts. That a bunch of ostensible adults can’t hear that without getting hysterical amazes me.
I understood EXACTLY what you were saying.
People are bristling for nothing.
THANK YOU! ay caramba! From one Catholic female to another, I thank you for your chivalry and cool headedness, historically male traits which are so regrettably rare in the Church today.
Wow, thanks! I’m flattered!
But the post from Rkat wasn’t about all converts. It was about the ones who are touted as “experts” by the Patheos crowd.
Agreed. As I willingly conceded quite some time ago in this comment thread.
Patheos? What? are they lousy too??
Yes
I remember many years ago seeing Netmilsmom on the CAF boards. Is that you? Another escapee? I got sick of that whole thing years ago.
Yes that’s me. I got tossed in the “Great trad cleanout” of 2007.
Nice to see you again!
Congratulations! I have a look inside that CAF thing every now and then. They helped me out a fair bit while I was de-programming myself from a decade of heresy in the protestant error, but once I was back squarely in the Church, and could look out beyond my own errors that needed fixing, I began to smell the rat. A large, smelly rat. Eventually, I grew wary of all the positive spin on everything – including all the same things that contributed to me losing my Catholic Faith a decade prior. About the same time, I went to my first Traditional Mass, and the rest is history. I called myself Captain Coog back in the CAF days. (a variation on a nickname for one of my children, just in case you were wondering) I was around the traps here and there, but remember seeing you on there very well!
I remember you!!!
Yeah, CAF detests trads like us. I was the expert on how the Orans for the laity and handholding was not liturgically correct. I’d get pinged everytime that was debated. Powerful people didn’t like it.
They started the “Traditional Catholicism” forum and within a month a whole bunch of us were tossed from there. We were rounded up and picked off.
But honestly, it was good for me. The whole forum was slipping more and more Modernist. I had less of a need of Confession after I was banned!
At first I thought that liturgical correctness was so important, and that if only the “abuses” of the liturgy could be corrected, everything else would turn out ok. That was then. Now, I don’t care if you have a Novus Ordo clown mass with puppets, rock band and stupid dancing, or you have six candlesticks and reverence, incense and good hymns. It doesn’t matter. I think the best thing is to leave the Novus Ordo alone and let it be however they want it to be. It is not the received and approved Roman Rite of Mass, and is open to a huge variety of “legitimate” interpretations provided for by Sacrosanctum Concilium, the GIRM and actual new Rite itself. Leave it alone and it will die of it’s own natural deficiency. Too slowly and too painfully for me, but there is no point in trying to keep it on life support, by trying to make it look like it comes from Tradition. We already have a Traditional Rite that worked just fine for innumerable centuries, and will continue to do so.
You are truly a rare breed if you are fighting the Orans. I salute you – may your tribe increase! Many’s the time when surrounded by Orans at the Our Father I would try to hold the line by putting my hands together the traditional Catholic way.
Is Orans that thing where people awkwardly hold their hands half way up during the Our Father?
Yes. It seems to have made its way into Catholicism from Protestantism via the charismatic door.
Stay strong. You can do it.
Yes, that exact path!
Ignore him.
They’re a cantankerous bunch, but they mean well.
You are most definitely welcome. Please read my comment above to see where we are coming from. My husband is a convert, and he loves our TLM parish (especially after spending his first eight years as a Catholic in the Novus Ordo).
You are welcome here.
I’m a pre-Vatican II cradle Catholic, and in my lifetime I have known some very stalwart converts, some of whom ended up as lifetime supporters of Archbishop Lefebvre.
In fact, I know of few modern bishops who would want to meet some of my convert friends in a dark alley, particularly those of the female persuasion.
Talk about war? The bishops wouldn’t make it out alive.
Reread your post and make correction.
What needs to be corrected?
wouldn’t
Read it again. “I know OF few… who would…” It’s correct as is.
Many people have seen the Faith, in its explanation and its practice, especially in the Liturgy, become completely vandalized and destroyed, and they are on the offensive. It is certainly a war. In maintenance of that zeal, it can accidentally cause come collateral friendly fire, because the trigger is permanently squeezed. You will come across people like this who, as Murray said, mean well. To take a few unintentional hits here and there is unfortunately par for the course. It shouldn’t be that way, but it is. So yes, you are very welcome. And it’s not like I am on some self appointed welcoming committee. It is not a secret club or masonic order. Keep pressing for the truth, no matter how uncomfortable it may become for you.
He said “Paid”, he is talking about Patheos. Unless you’re a paid Patheos writer, you shouldn’t personalize a post which is not about you.
I think we need to include most of the EWTN and CA crowd as well.
God bless you HR
indeed, friend. “the last shall be first and the first shall be last.” along with steve’s excellent and level-headed commentary, can i make a recommendation? the prayer of st ephrem. http://www.catholic.org/prayers/prayer.php?p=3084 maybe we all should say it before we comment, myself included. one more thing that is helpful. i have spent over a dozen years of my time as a catholic breathing with my other lung, so you are also honoring Holy Tradition in a Byzantine Catholic parish delighting in the Divine Liturgy of St John Chrysostom. Also I recommend the Anglo-Catholic Ordinariate churches, which will give you the old sarum English Mass – in English.
Ps if you think you have nothing to learn from cradles, think again.
Nice mannikin you got there. Is that you, Francis?
” I’ve become a pest to my local Bishop with pressing him to uphold orthodoxy.”
I like you already 🙂
“You are no more Catholic than one who came into the Church yesterday –
you are just more fortunate that you were brought up with the faith.”
Matthew 20:1-16 Parable of the Laborers in the Vineyard
Keep in touch, some of my friends are doing something about this.
Too often the converts are showing up late to the game and failing to appreciate all the fighting that has come before them. It reminds me of “Band of Brothers,” when the replacement troops would show up. They had no understanding of what the soldiers before them had experienced. You think it’s hard converting to Catholicism? Guess how hard it is to stay Catholic when you find out that the parish priest was trying to get your mother to sleep with him, and a member of your immediate family was molested (attempted rape) by a homosexual priest who was, of course, moved to another Church. The converts expect me to put the pope on a pedestal? Sorry, that ship sailed long ago. My faith does not depend on the virtue of the pope. Popes come, and popes go.
I’ve got Mark Shea saying that every Mass is a gift. Well, I don’t think Mark had to sit through the Mass designed by the lesbian SJW ex-nun who made us all listen to Jesus Christ Superstar. Dave Armstrong thinks that Catholics who desire an all-male altar crew are afraid our boys will get cooties, and that something is wrong with having all-male or all-female schools. Well, you’re the expert here, Dave. Let’s ignore the centuries that came before Mr. Armstrong. The cradle Catholics have been through decades of the war, and only by the Grace of God are we still hanging in there.
Thank you for what you’ve gone through, paving the way for those who are following. Amazing you’ve kept your faith through it all. Your service is appreciated. Keep up the fight.
I am a convert, and a priest. One of the things I will never understand is lifelong Catholics who, except in comboxes especially (like yourself), have probably never done a single damn thing to stand up for the Faith. It’s almost like you resent former Protestants finding and believing the Truth. Does it make you angry that we found the truth and are willing to defend it? Where were you, my friend? Why didn’t you have a blog. Why weren’t you writing books? Why weren’t you doing podcasts? In the meantime, my fellow converts and I are going out into the fields. My little congregation of 600 souls has 21 people in RCIA and 2 seminarians. Are you under the impression — as so many RadTrads are — that you are a precious snowflake Victim Soul? Sure sounds like it. BTW, I offer the Spotless Sacrifice according to the 1962 Missal daily.
You do realize that for centuries Catholics were a tad busy–just being Catholics. We’ve been here, going to Mass (even after they stripped everything beautiful away from us), saying the Rosary, abiding by the teachings of the Church, and raising our families. Meanwhile, do you think that the Catholic lite publishers were going to print any of this? It was the “new springtime.” Everything was wonderful. Defend? Why, there was no need to defend, because the whole world was practically banging at our door trying to get in, so attractive was our new liturgy, our new openness. It was irresistible. Everything was booming. (Ignore all those people in your family that are falling away. They’ll be back. They always come back.) You think you’ve seen clergy in denial now? You missed the matinee.
Internet has really only been mainstream for twenty years, blogs far less than that. Podcasts? Gee, I think I had about five children that I was raising in the Faith by the time podcasts came along. How did we stand up for the Faith? WE LIVED IT. WE FOUGHT FOR IT. Even when it was unpopular, even when the news was day after day of another priest scandal. Even when we lost friends and family members because of our “radical” positions on things like abortion, contraception, or divorce. We marched for life, we endured crappy homilies, heretical directors of religious education, and dissenting guest speakers at our parishes. Oh, and by the way, WE PAID FOR ALL OF IT. While letters to the bishop went unanswered. Or maybe you think that those buildings and vestments and and seminaries just appeared, “poof.” You have your Church, your position, and your congregation precisely because we didn’t jump ship when the going got tough. THAT”S WHERE WE WERE.
You’re welcome.
Would you be happier, Jude, if more people noticed and praised you for what you’ve suffered? I know the suffering was and *continues* to be real. Still, true victim souls seldom make a point of identifying themselves as Victim Souls — as you have, whether you realize it or not.
By the way,
“You have your Church, your position, and your congregation precisely because we didn’t jump ship when the going got tough. THAT”S WHERE WE WERE.
You’re welcome.”
No. Not at all. The only reason I was able to be ordained or have a congregation at all (2 parishes, actually) is because people like you said “No” when the Lord invited them to the priesthood and/or religious life. You know it’s true, Jude. I’m nobody special. I was accepted simply because I asked “May I?”
This isn’t about asking for praise. This is a direct reply to your insinuation that those of us born into the Faith have simply been twiddling our thumbs, letting it all slip away.
No, I was actually never invited to the priesthood or religious life. A) I am female. B) While I seriously considered religious life, I absolutely, positively knew that God was calling me to marriage and motherhood.
Clearly, most of us *have* been twiddling our thumbs for the last 50 years, though, thank God, apparently not you. Live long and prosper! Nevertheless, 2/3 of American Catholics are fallen away, and of those “practicing” many if not most wouldn’t know the difference between a sacramental and a sack o’ taters. My cradle Catholic predecessor had a “separate but equal” communion station every Sunday for divorced and remarried Catholics, but with unconsecrated hosts and wine so no one would feel excluded. Don’t tell me about battles, Jude. And don’t be a smart aleck telling me you’ve spent your life with the family rosary and going to Mass. Those two things add up to about an hour and fifteen minutes per week. Your mileage may vary. Shall I tell you all about being reported to my bishop for stopping the fake communion station my first week as pastor; or about all the lifelong Catholics I minister to who sincerely seem to believe that *Jesus* and I are meanies, since the only valid test for whether one is a good priest or not is whether one gets exactly what he wants when he wants it? (N.B.: This holds equally true for both the Modernist heretics and the Traditionalists.) Meanwhile, my Traditionalists are having a food fight over the second Confiteor at the Tridentine Mass.
“Don’t tell me about battles, Jude. And don’t be a smart aleck telling me you’ve spent your life with the family rosary and going to Mass. Those two things add up to about an hour and fifteen minutes per week.”
If you think being a good Catholic (homeschooling) parent to a large family takes up about one hour and fifteen minutes per week, then you must not get out much. Do you not talk to the families in your parish? As a parent, every minute of your day you are modeling the Faith, explaining the Faith, making sure your children get the right resources, and finding time to have conversations about things like why we couldn’t stay in BSA or why the movies and books that are fine for the general public are not coming into your house. You’re teaching the three year old how to do the sign of the cross (millionth time) reading Bible stories at different age levels, quizzing one kid on sacrament preparation, and trying to make sure that your older kids are not neglecting their prayer life and moving forward in religious studies. (I have one that wants to be a priest.) And you get to do all this while preparing three meals and a snack each day, wiping noses, changing diapers, nursing babies, paying bills, cleaning the house, teaching algebra, teaching Latin, teaching multiple levels of history from a Catholic perspective, and doing mountains of laundry. The fathers might like to relax when they get home, but they need to get the boys to altar boy practice, work on the Columbian Squires fundraiser, volunteer for Church events, teach the boys what it means to be a Catholic gentleman, make sure their daughters feel loved, help out the elderly and financially strapped neighbors with their needs, and get to the Planned Parenthood prayer vigil on the weekend.
We are ALL pretty darn busy trying to build up the Church, Father. Clergy and laity alike. Maybe the difference is that I’m not dismissive of the sacrifices you make or questioning how you spend your time.
Actually, you *are* dismissive — and pretty snotty to boot.
LOL!!!!
Man, I *really* hope you are a troll.
No — I assure you, I’m for real. It’s just that we Trads have gotten so used to being butthurt that we seriously risk the inability to have true contrition for our own pride and arrogance. The Devil loves to convince us that that we are the only ones holding on to the virtue of Hope.
My advice: go to the zoo and look at God’s surprising creatures, Father. Get out of your head. Nature is a great way to remind us that hope is everywhere and comes in crazy forms we couldn’t begin to invent ourselves.
Jude is a fabulous Catholic mother. You, sir, are a without a clue.
Please, Father. That’s really not fair You’re baiting her, then criticizing her responses. See my most recent comment. This is not helpful.
Wow your behavior, especially for a priest, is disturbing to say the least.
Hmmm. “snotty” “smart aleck” “never done a single damn thing”
Yeah, I don’t think I’m the one needing the attitude adjustment, Fr. Bass. You might want to be careful about your lack of charity. Your bitterness is showing, while your love for your spiritual children is most definitely not. I think it’s time for you to take a break from the com boxes and reassess if you love your vocation. I know I love mine.
Hey Jude, are we having fun yet? ; )
Good Lord, Fr please, in charity, think again about this tone you are taking. I don’t think you realise how you are coming across, or how you are applying the most uncharitable interpretation of Jude’s words possible. Please Father, I implore you, think again.
Any relation to Nino Scalia ?
Bring it!
Some of us who have been fighting are tired too.
I’m so glad to see someone else taking the ball. I’ll be in adoration if anyone needs me.
“And in doing good, let us not fail. For in due time we shall reap, not failing.” Galatians 6:9
This veiled woman is brandishing her own torch alongside the men protecting the castle keep!
(I’m not criticizing your image, simply adding to it.)
Nice one! but grab a sword like Isabella of Spain. Torches aren’t enough.
“After John was arrested, Jesus came into Galilee, preaching the gospel of God, and saying, ‘The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God is at hand; repent, and believe in the gospel.’ ” (Mark 1:14-15)
I guess, to them, the only sin that one must repent from is having any notion of sin.
Deliver us, O Lord!
One feels torn between a passive stance of “waiting this out” and confusion over just how to actively resist this and scourge it out of the Temple. In many ways, it has to be both.
Deliver us, O Lord, AND give success to the work of our hands!
Yes, the hermeneutic of continuity was always a farce, unless continuity is defined as continuing down the path of Aggiornamento.
I am really amazed on how the Pontiff was to so easily use his teaching of “Jesus” in light of a progressive, socialist ideal and not on the true teaching. So easy to detect falsity that even I, can see it a mile away! Pretty funny considering that simpletons like myself only need read the Bible, to see Francis’ version of ” exclusion” just isn’t so. And to the detriment of our faith, just to go along to get along. Great article.
He’s been doing this pretty much since Day One. On several occasions, the Holy Father has described the Feeding of the Five Thousand as a “miracle of sharing”. He turned Our Lord’s criticism of the Pharisees traversing “land and sea to make a proselyte” into a condemnation of proselytism simpliciter. He interpreted Romans 8’s “creation groaning in travail” as a metaphor for pollution, and transformed the Father’s feeding of the birds into enviromentalist agitprop. And that’s before we consider the ceaseless Pharisaical railing against Pharisees and “doctors of the law”. It’s not at all uncommon for Scripture to get thoroughly mashed up after going through the Bergoglian wringer.
On the Cardinal Weurl interview with Raymond Arroyo, Weurl sounded like Bagdad Bob. Reports from other than the fawning Catholic media painted an entirely different. If the Synod was as harmonious as Weurl recounts, would the Pope and Synod organizers have demanded that AB Hoser cease his blog?
Or would it have been necessary for the Pope to deliver one of his scathing speeches against the orthodox doctors of the law, etc?
I’m just happy they’re on board.
Yes. Better late than never. Once they feel the joy of having the fox hole dirt on their skin they will wish they had entered the fight sooner. But that’s ok.
Schism is an offense against the unity of the Church.
However, unless I’m wrong, which may well be, there seems to be a distinction that users of this term miss. The distinction is this:
(1.) of one’s own volition, fomenting or initiating schism (bad), and
(2.) desiring, ‘lo, actively and publicly seeking, that the very contumacious opposition (the Kasperites, the American Kasperites such as Cupich, the socially liberal professors in “Catholic” academe) will of their own volition engage in schism, i.e. go their own way and join the ranks of the low-church Anglicans, or the tens of thousands of Protestant denominations. After all, the Church’s history is one of “shedding”.
This distinction has to do with identifying the **agents** of schism. One should not be a direct agent of schism, but should one encourage others to act on their de facto schism and make it a fait accompli? But in doing so, is one indirectly promoting schism? (Maybe double effect doctrine obtains here!–in suggesting that others make good on their schismatic attitudes, one does not intend schism, but foresees it as an unintended consequence. (??))
Anyhow, what is the greater offense to unity: overlooking the fact that the Church is now in a radical de facto state of disunity, *or* desiring that those who pretend to be within the tradition no longer perpetuate their dishonesty?
In brief, can encouragement of “shedding” be a *good* thing if the alternative is the status quo of sheer dishonesty, now going on decades? Should we all encourage others to go their merry way and, in doing so, are we, or are we not, offending against the unity of the Church?
My reply to your second request addressed to Steve elsewhere in these comments is more directed towards your questions here.
Thanks
Gonna fight it on my knees with my rosary in my hand and often before the Blessed Sacrament. Take that, you heretics!
Superb comment!
SACERDOS
“They have abandoned the Fort, those
who should have defended it.” (St. John Fisher)
Who held the Fort
Till the Calvary came
Fighting for all
In His Holy Name?
Who fed the sheep
As the pastures burned dry?
A few Good Shepherds
Heeding their cry.
Who led the charge
‘Gainst heresy’s Huns
Defending the degreed
To His lowliest ones?
Who battened down
The hatch of the barque
To warm cold souls
From shivering-seas dark?
“Who?” mocks Satan
Delighting in doubt
Fills you with questions,
Never lets you find out.
“Hoc est enum
Corpus meum…
and for many…” who kept
The dead words – Te Deum!
What I want to say to the new recruits is, “Welcome to the battefield. Glad you’re here. Now grab a weapon and get in line!”
In other words, take some time to learn the art of war from those that have been engaged in it for longer than some of you have been alive before you start telling us how to fight it. No need to name names, but some of the new recruits come in thinking they’ve got the snazziest weapon, or unbeatable media strategy, not realizing they’ve already been tried and found wanting. But I guess that’s the genius of our Enemy, they’ve left us without leaders (bishops) to rally behind.
Keep up the great work on 1P5.
“some of the new recruits come in thinking they’ve got the snazziest weapon, or unbeatable media strategy, not realizing they’ve already been tried and found wanting”
Oh my gosh. I know one of these recruits. He seems to be all over Catholic media the last few years, milking his “trad” credentials.
(This is NOT Steve Skojec. This is someone whose site trumpets his books, his speaking engagements, complete with an “As Seen On” banner that includes The Huffington Post.)
Well, c’mon, don’t hide your light under a bushel basket. No fear of lawsuits here.
No way. Just wanted to assure Newman Noggs that he is not the only one who has witnessed this occurrence.
So you don’t want me to put up the “As Seen On” banner I was working on or start selling books? Gotta make a living somehow…
Definitely get a picture of yourself in a deep-thinky pose, finger or pen on chin, looking earnestly into the camera or middle-distance.
All the best auto-didactic polymaths have one of those.
Like this?
https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/b6f8c03c73693f029704f4adb5e6ac400c96e8f540e1c1486412b83bade98bad.jpg
Perfect!
Thanks for that, I really needed a good loud belly laugh, and that absolutely hit the spot.
Yes. We can always photoshop in the pen later.
“The Very Hungry Caterpillar” in the background is a nice change from everyone who puts the Summa Theologica and their own published works there.
I like to keep things young and fresh.
Never become a “celebrity Catholic”. They seem to have a habit of selling out to maintain their access to the hierarchy.
There is a War. Its the offspring of Satan vs. the offspring of Mary. For anyone including Bishops and Cardinals promoting the Mortal Sins of Adultery and Sodomy in the name of Jesus Christ are servants of Satan. There is no Mercy in promoting Adultery and Sodomy but a false mercy, the mercy of darkness which leads souls to Hell. Even Bishops and Cardinals.
Don’t forget their sins of omission for the past 40+ years of ignoring these sins and letting them fester.
I am a convert. I am 52 and came to the Church 3 years ago after a lifetime of study of the Scriptures and the various Protestant ecclesial group doctrines. I have a Masters degree from a Protestant theological seminary. As mentioned, thru the years I studied the various positions. I simply could not reconcile Protestant teaching from any of the denominations with the full teaching of Scripture itself. It was the Bible that drove me to the Catholic faith. Indeed, how can a group claim to affirm the inerrancy of Scripture if it rejects portions thereof?
I never gave the Catholic position a chance until I was teaching Lutherans and obtained a copy of the CCC to prove the Catholics wrong, and…wound up converting to Catholicism. Since then I have spent pretty much every minute I can studying the various Catechisms, Patristic Fathers, Denzinger, etc.
However, since converting, I can only describe my situation {and my wife’s and adult children who have followed me} as being adopted into a dysfunctional family with an abusive father who derides and beats his kids while he sings the praises of the next door neighbor’s drunk and disorderly clan who break his windows and then he invites them over, not to sober them up but to poor rotgut down their gullets. Frankly, I am disgusted.
Just FINDING a parish where guaranteed, consistent Catholic doctrine is taught has been a tremendous challenge, and finally I have found that in an FSSP parish about a couple hours away. It is worth the drive.
So now I am learning a bit of Latin. I marvel as how folks in the novus ordo culture hate Latin. Indeed, why is it folks all over the world are willing to learn other dialects and languages simply to shop at a market while we Catholics cannot even stomach learning a language of faith that can help us with eternal and not just temporal benefits? Beats me.
As for converts at-large , I can’t speak. Only for myself and mine. Deo gratias!
Remember that the cradle Catholics had clergy telling them for decades how awful and archaic Latin was, a total waste of their time. Much, much too hard for them to ever figure out. We were advised to learn French or Spanish instead. And the teachers in the schools were given those same lines to repeat. You don’t want to learn Latin. You don’t want to read a Catechism. Let’s sit around in a circle on cushions and discuss things. (This is after years of elementary education spent coloring rainbows and butterflies.) Year after year of brainwashing that the old ways were cruel and this what we had now was so much better. And they conveniently removed every trace of what came before, so there would be no comparisons made by anyone born after about 1963.
Stick with the FSSP. It has been a blessed haven for my family.
“Latin is a language, dead as it can be. First it killed the Romans, now it’s killing me” was a line from my father. Of course my father was a Methodist minister so I can forgive him for deriding it, but even he back in the day had to learn it and Methodists really didn’t use it at all! He died as a Methodist, but I remember his struggles with that liberal denomination and in his last years he told me he would absolutely not go with them again if he had it to do all over again. He was the best man I have ever met. He knew little about the Catholic faith but he did seek truth, and I am glad for that. What I see in the Catholic Church today smacks of the same-old crap we heard in the UMC 35 years ago. Catholics are late to the party of eco-religion, sodomy-support and “find your soulmate” marriage/divorce. May God keep the wolves at bay until we get the Sword of the Word sharpened, cuz in the RCC it is rusted and dull except for a few old ones laying about…most of them with Latin inscriptions etched in their blades…
Yes, it is the same Great Apostasy, predicted in Holy Write and preached on by Rev John Henry Newman at St Mary the Virgin, Oxford in the 1830s. It issued (spewed) out of Tubingen University, eventually invaded all of Europe, Cambridge and Oxford, then Harvard, Yale and Princeton fell like dominos in the days of Greshem Machen who tried to fight it tooth and nail. First fell the Reformed, the the Lutheran, then the Anglican and now has made its entrance in the Catholic and Orthodox Churches – didn’t know even the venerable Orthodox now have their Modernist heretics? Oh yes! ANd from this Great Apostasy the Bible and Newman in his sermons made absolutely clear – shall come forth Antichrist. Still, Christ promises His Holy protection to all who are true, for He’s coming to steal away His true bride before He lets His full fire and brimstone flow out of heaven on the Devils’ own….
Hmmm. What you said near the end of your post set me to thinking about Philip Larkin’s Annus Mirabilis. The Church wasn’t the only victim of that despicable, miserable time, just the most important.
Rod,
All I can tell you my dear Brother is to be REAL careful about the “Latin Mass People”! Some of them can walk you right out the back door of the One True Church. I served at MANY Latin Masses growing up, I’m 65, I can absolutely guarantee you there was GREAT abuse! When and if someone says to you that Vatican II wasn’t valid or the NO is not valid, ETC, RUN for your spiritual life!!! Some “Traditionalist” are insidious in their attempt to destroy the Catholic Church. Welcome to the WAR, ain’t nothing new since the book of acts.
When I search more thoroughly I find that the ancient liturgy is rather a kind of fashion. And if it is a fashion, therefore it is a matter that does not need that much attention.
He likes to think he has his finger on the pulse!
What the heck are you talking about?
It’s what Pope Francis said about the Extraordinary Form of the Mass and those who prefer it.
It is absurd that the Mass of All Ages is called “extraordinary” whilst a banal, theologically false, concocted, radically new and protestantised rite overnight is deemed “ordinary”.
Lynda, I suggest you read Pope Benedict XVI’s “Summorum Pontificum.”
I’ve read it many times.
here here lynda! “Lex orandi, lex credendi!”
The more I studied the difference between the Received and Approved Roman Rite, aka the “Extraordinary form” and the New Order of Mass, aka the “Ordinary form”, I eventually made the seismic shift in my thinking:
What was formerly a matter of *preference* for the Traditional Mass, became a matter of *principle*.
that’s aunty pope bergoglio round here…
If you paid as much attention to our Holy Father, Pope Francis as those Latin Mass People did, you would recognise the source of this quote immediately.
One of your neo-protestant friends, Lynda, posted (right above your post): “It is absurd that the Mass of All Ages is called “extraordinary” whilst a banal, theologically false, concocted, radically new and protestantised rite overnight is deemed “ordinary”. I’m quite sure both of you are younger than I am. Your both good “Either Or” Neo-protestants. AND THEN says: “You’re warning against the wrong people. It’s the heretics and apostates and promoters of offences against God that are to be avoided” Holy SMOKES!!!!
I am the product of the Novus Ordo era and modern Catholic School system. I.e. I have already lost my Faith and left the Church once. I am not doing it again. This time I am grounding my self in traditional liturgy, sacraments, catechism and spiritual life. I will fight this dog of modernism at every opportunity. You have your own race to run, and may God bless you and your undertakings, but you are the product of the era that threw away the family heirlooms, and I am from the generation after that. Each of us has to work out his salvation. I will accept absolutely no compromise. The modernist reforms are just that, so I reject them. I will continue to practice and demand the faith of my fathers.
It seems we have travelled parallel paths. I give thanks daily for God opening my eyes and bringing me back to the traditional Faith and not the NO religion I left.
I did receive all of my grace of conversion through the new mass, but that was through the ministry of devout priests who celebrate ad orientem, never use EP2, and truly believe. Because they offer the TLM regularly I was exposed to it ‘ by accident’ as it were, and now I’m exclusively that unless being away from the parish for good reason absolutely forces me to attend NO (though I try to make it to my parish for NO offered later in the day if I have to miss the TLM high mass in the morning and cannot find a TLM where I’m visiting).
Somehow, early on (and following a bit of a mystical revelation) I started to learn about the modernist crisis, VII and whatnot, and after a period of real inner turmoil I knew what I had to do. Pascendi was a massive moment for me (coming from Freudo-Marxism I recognised the Hegelian reading of Christianity it was refuting), and I immediately fell to my knees and privately affirmed the oath against modernism as soon as I found out about it.
The real beauty now is that my friend is converting from Anglicanism, getting a good formation, attending mass with me and loving it. We talked about St Athanasius the other day and he said “I would have been in the desert”. Deo Gratias!
Amen. Well said!
Smoke what you like but you’re as wrong as Curly, Larry & Moe.
It’s a paraphrase, if not a quote, of what the Pope actually said sometime ago.
A paraphrase which captures what our Holy Father, Pope Francis actually said.
You.
All I can tell you my dear Brother is to be REAL careful about the “Novus Ordo People”! Some of them can walk you right into hell with their unwillingness to call a sin a sin. I assisted at four decades of Novus Ordo Masses. I can absolutely guarantee you there was GREAT abuse. When and if someone says to you that all paths lead to Christ, and the real miracle of the fishes and loaves was that they learned to share, and doctrine can be separated from practice, etc… RUN for your spiritual life!!! Some NovusOrdinarians are insidious in their attempt to destroy the Catholic Church. Welcome to the WAR, ain’t nothing new since the book of Acts.
You are exactly right. I’m just not “either or”. Hey Jude, are you a clown mass catholic or a Neo-protestant.
Goodbye, John. This is a place for grownups to talk. The schoolyard mockery isn’t welcome.
The Novus Ordo rite is presents a definite ambiguity in it’s intentions, especially in the “Liturgy of the Eucharist”. Thus, it is correct to say that the Novus Ordo *can* be valid, but due to the ambiguity of the intention within the text of the Rite itself, “it ain’t necessarily so”. The Received and Approved rite, aka the “Latin Mass”, is completely the opposite. Pope St Pius V said the Roman Missal (the one he codified as a means of application of the dogmas of Council of Trent) is “absolutely free from error” and “a safeguard against heresy”.
You’re warning against the wrong people. It’s the heretics and apostates and promoters of offences against God that are to be avoided.
Bull shit! Priests followed the rubrics back in the day. Where were you an Altar Boy and what were the abuses you witnessed and who were the priests?
Hmmm, there were “problems” (in scary scare quotes). I say this merely for clarity, not really as a counterpoint (and certainly not to support John’s contentions). By and large they did follow the rubrics as you say, but…
http://www.lmschairman.org/2015/10/can-traditional-mass-preserve-orthodoxy.html
With all respect, I think you should edit your language. It is simply not necessary. Temperance and prudence. We are all in a war and that produces certain emotions, but please do try to express yourself in a manner befitting your state in life. Also, it looks bad to people passing by this site, whom perhaps are, for the first time, investigating the whole “tradition” thing. And the enemy is watching.
Dear Ad Orientem. IANS was using language equal to his state in life but owing to the reality that not all were born and raised in the Piemonte region of Vermont, where such an expression is a perfectly acceptable idiom for both men and women, IANS decided to hear and respond favorably to a new voice.
Of course, that means IANS has had to repudiate the traditions of his culture, but because the Irish-Algonquin culture is so tiny as regards the totality of Catholicism, IANS is ok with excising it and not pleading for minority rights.
But, if you think this means IANS will not spend Saint Paddy’s Day getting drunk and scalping protestants, you’ve got another thing coming….
Maybe it’s my Irish ancestry (well seven-eights Irish and one eighth English as a bit of built in penance), but I thought we should petition the Author to re-name this article Welcome to the Bar.
I agree Ad. As an ex-soldier ( well actually National Serviceman not a real soldier ), I can swear with the best, and probably better than most.
But one thing I did learn was to identify and mark your target, and shoot to kill. Shouting upsets the breathing – and the aim!
And we are now in a deadly war and every shot counts.
Welcome, Rod. I am happy to see that you study Latin; I agree that it is a shame so many Catholics ignore it (and did even when they heard it every Sunday!). I also think we see eye to eye concerning Papa Francisco. From what you write, though, I have every confidence you can sort out the matter and know how to put in perspective the man, the office, and the Church. I commented somewhere else today on this site that converts are a special gift sent us “cradles” by God. Their knowledge of Scripture and their “fire in the belly” is much needed for the “the war” we find ourselves in at the moment.
Welcome to the jungle, Rod, Don’t get too close to the university chimps in the trees on the far left; they are mostly Howler Monkeys who will pelt you with feces as they scream Balthasar, Balthasar, Balthasar ceaselessly.
You do not know what you are talking about.
Querite Primum Regnum Dei!
Pax Vobiscum!
Great job, Mr. Karmel! I might extend the timeframe of the war back even further: Pope St. Pius X clearly knew we are already at war during his pontificate, and engaged the enemy in battle very forcefully, though ultimately they were driven underground to emerge again. Or should we go back even further, to 1717, when Freemasonry publicly appeared? A.D. 33, when Our Lord founded the Church? At any rate, I hope your column enlists more soldiers in “the Devil’s Final Battle.”
Speaking of Denzinger…
A pretty quick study exposes the fact that heresy condemned by past Popes does not have to be crystal clear, but may be as in the case of the Auctorem fidei 1794 condemnation of the Synod of Pistoia be a condemnation of statements “if taken as”, etc. There is certainly precedent for the Pope to define the Synod documents and state clearly what Catholic doctrine is. That he does not is one more indication of where he stands as if we need any more clarity of that. For quite some time now he has not been confusing at all. He is only confusing if you try to read him from an orthodox perspective. Taking his words as they come make what he is saying and doing abundantly clear. The lines in the current conflict are clearly drawn. That the Pope is not on the side of those of us who are proclaiming and affirming the consistent teaching of the Church makes this a rather interesting conflict. Someone is wrong. Both cannot be right.
What was especially shocking to me was that Bishop Cupich of Chicago had the hutzpah to suggest – right at the Vatican during the synod – that gay men in a homosexual union would have the right in good conscience to receive Holy Communion. He said that such a conscience exception would extend to them because they cannot be “pigeon-holed.” He needs to repent for misusing his teaching office and causing scandal.
I was going to respond to a specific comment, but after reading the rest, I think I’ll make a general response.
Everyone here has a story. Everyone has made sacrifices. Everyone has suffered to live their faith. You don’t get to be a Catholic in the 21st century without having run the gauntlet. At least, not a Catholic commenting on a website like this.
Almost everyone in the discussion on this post today is ON THE SAME TEAM. I read all your comments, I see the subtle sniping going on between a few people, and I find myself feeling really frustrated.
If I was able to host a big barbeque instead of a website, I think most of you would get along. You’d feel solidarity. You’d talk about shared difficulties and sufferings. It’s been hard as hell to be a faithful Catholic for the just about the entire lifetime of almost anyone still alive today.
I’d like to place here a reminder of something I warned about almost two months ago. A spiritual insight that I believe was given to me so that I could share it with those who come here.
“I have seen in recent weeks a growing spirit of division among those who should be united under Christ’s banner. Like tendrils of smoke, the enemy sows doubt and discord, delicately enough that we do not notice. We distract ourselves with arguments that do not pertain to the evil before us. We find that the faults of others with whom we are aligned have become sufficiently exaggerated that we are agitated. And some of our fellows, with whom we should be standing against the coming charge, have even turned and set upon the members of our ranks.
I have become convinced that these sorts of events, which I see growing in frequency, are in fact the fruit of a campaign of spiritual warfare — intentional distractions and provocations — designed to blunt our effectiveness, to dull our awareness, and to drain our energy. Beware the Divider, already in our midst, who seduces us into thinking that our cause is more just, our judgments more correct, our methods more praiseworthy. Look for the signs of this deception in your own life during these troubled times. Be on guard against the conflict and bitterness and gossip and futile arguments and judgments made on those who agree with you on the important things – judgments that they are not worthy enough, not Catholic enough, not committed enough to the cause. Root them out. Pray more. Plead with God for wisdom and guidance. Do not do work in the service of the cause without first making supplication that the Holy Spirit work through you, committing all things to Our Lord through prayer.
Already, we find ourselves in combat with principalities and powers, who are more fiercely intelligent and capable than we. They know how to deceive, how to provoke, how to manipulate according to the frailties of our humanity. Are we better, somehow, than those who have already fallen to the seductions of the enemy? Have we not all seen leaders in the fight whom we have respected and trusted be turned by the forces of darkness and thus lost from the battle? We will win not a single victory if God is not on our side. We must remember to always humble ourselves, asking only to be His instruments for His glory, not to use Him — and the work we believe we’re doing for Him — as a means to our own aggrandizement. It can happen to any of us. If the enemy has his way, it will happen to all of us.
Fight it as though your soul depends on it, for surely it does.”
You can read the rest here: https://onepeterfive.wpengine.com/beware-the-divider-already-in-our-midst/
We traffic in volatile ideas on this website. I’m not afraid of conflict. But I hate seeing infighting among our own. Please be aware of this, and if you’re reading this now, say a prayer for the others in this comment box. A memorare would do.
We’re in this together. Let’s not forget.
I’ve heard a joke in the past two weeks that goes like this, more or less: “How do traditional Catholics form a battle line? They stand in a circle.”
The exercise of Saint Ignatius of Loyola (I still don’t understand how he is not a Doctor of the Church) on the “two standards” should give us spiritual fodder. There are TWO sides, as ultimately there will be, in the end of all things, Heaven and Hell, the blessed and the damned. In getting in petty fights, we ought to first ask ourselves: “Am *I* under the standard of Christ right now? But is this person *also* under the banner of Christ also with me?” If the answer to both is ‘yes’, then we might just need to let what is truly petty fall by the wayside.
Thankyou for your words Father, Steve! God bless you both!
May I add, ‘But I say to you, Love your enemies: do good to them that hate you: and pray for them that persecute and calumniate you’ Matthew 5:44
and ‘But before all things have a constant mutual charity among yourselves: for charity covereth a multitude of sins. ‘ 1 Peter 4:8
If we have no charity, if we have no great and burning love for ALL the souls around us, we will be snuffed out by the devil one by one.
Dare we complain of our wounds? Look to Christ on the Cross!
Saints will win the battle by the power of Christ, so let us be saints!
God bless you all!
Steve, if you come across anything that responds to my rather turgidly stated question about schism in this com box, please let me know. I’m looking for theological discussions of this issue and the distinction the posting mentions, as well as my rather facile invocation of double effect. Open minded on this. But one recalls Matthew 10 and 14. The biblical language is pretty stark. Not settled my views on this, pending finding out if arguments of this kind were bandied around, e.g. in the late scholastic literature at the time of the Reformation/Counter-Reformation.
Start here with the Catholic encyclopedia: http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/13529a.htm
and follow the embedded links to the Church Fathers.
Happy reading.
Yes it’s always great to go to the Church Fathers. Thanks for this. Trying to get my views settled on this but it will be a long process.
Thank you for saying this, Mr. Skojec. I am a convert. I came to the Church after many years of wandering in the wilderness, searching for the real Truth. I believe with all my heart and mind that the Holy Spirit protected me and led me, step by step, using Bible study, a powerful spiritual experience, and many years of prayer and reading, including lives of the saints. During all those years, I was not aided in my search by any personal help from a living “cradle” Catholic, although I knew many Catholics. I do not say this because I expected the personal help, nor am I bitter. God did things His way.
Although I knew the Church had experienced problems since Vatican II, I did not fully understand the depth of the hurt and damage. But I most certainly was not looking for any “sacramental Protestantism with a Pope” version of Catholicism. I had tried about eight different Protestant denominations already. I was fortunate to have received excellent RCIA training with an orthodox priest who used the CCC. The days of my First Communion and Confirmation were about the happiest days of my life. I felt like a bride and like Mary Magdalene at the same time.
Reading the comments here today, at this excellent website, have just made me literally sick to my stomach. I’m sorry to disagree with one point you made — this is not “subtle” sniping. It just confirms to me what I have experienced in my interactions with other Catholics since my Confirmation. I learned early on what “the look” meant, when I naively and happily enthused about coming into the Church. I learned that it was best to just be quiet, after I was the recipient of a few of the exquisitely well-tuned one-liners, accompanied with the condescending “look”.
I think it’s just incredibly sad. I came to the Church and gave myself over to walking that narrow path, with the hope of making it to Heaven. Just getting to Confirmation entailed many years of purification and suffering, which only intensified after. My children have walked away from the Faith and both are in dangerous situations. My Catholic in-laws are “modern” and think I’m crazy for praying the Liturgy of the Hours, wearing the Brown Scapular and believing in Purgatory. My Protestant relatives and friends think the same. Catholic friends? I have one, a convert like me, who lives far away. I hesitate to talk to a priest, when I don’t know what kind of “priest” he is. I asked our former parish priest to bless our house because the previous owners were occult and had left pagan stuff there. He did it but made me feel like a fool.
I am not happy with the Novus Ordo Mass, but my husband and I now live in a rural area with one parish and we have no choice if we want to receive the Eucharist. We are too many hours away from any other option. We support the FSSP and are members of their Confraternity, even though we have never been able to attend one of their masses. We watch the FL mass on TV. I thank God for my husband, a revert who came back when I came in. As far as living, breathing human-body personal contact brothers and sisters in the faith go, we basically have each other. We are newly retired, in a new parish, and maybe that will change. But based on my past two parishes, I won’t count on it. Since I am almost completely house-bound with physical problems, I am not able to “participate” in the usual ways.
I did not comment here looking for any sort of sympathy or approval. I am actually breaking a sort of rule I set for myself to make no comments, although I read many Catholic blogs. I see too much of faithful Catholics, who I believe love the Lord, picking at and correcting each other, seemingly ever-vigilant for the slightest “mistake” someone might make. I totally get it that people have to stand firm against error. The abuse and heresy and all the “isms” I have learned about are horrible. I want no part of them. My husband and I have put our lives completely into God’s hands, trusting that He will keep our feet on the right path, begging His will be done in our lives every day. I just had no idea that we would feel quite so alone, so hesitant to share with other Catholics.
Thank you, Mary. Please know that you are welcome here. And for bringing to light what I know that others can’t see.
There’s a hundred and some odd comments here, but this post has been viewed 2,537 times since it went up yesterday. For every comment, there are 10-20 times as many people reading.
I’d like the people who look quietly at these things to see the truth of what we believe, the good that we’re capable of, and the work that we’re doing.
There’s a joke I share with some of my fellow website publishers: “Comment boxes are where the truth goes to die.”
I don’t mind honest debate. But bickering and personal attacks are just obnoxious and exhausting. I try not to moderate with a heavy hand because people need to work out what’s going on some place where they can talk about it with others. Still, it’s clear that at times, that is being taken advantage of.
Being angry about what’s wrong doesn’t preclude charity.
Well, please accept my apologies for my part in the sniping, Steve.
Thanks. But you did (and have always. at least around these parts) manage to keep your disagreements civil.
I’m not interested in pointing out specific bad behavior. There’s a general tenor, and it’s getting worse. I really believe that those of us standing up to what’s happening in the Church are getting spiritually HAMMERED right now. If we go anywhere without the armor of God (for me, that’s the prayers of the Auxilium, etc.) then we wind up getting manhandled by the enemy. I include the infighting as a symptom of that.
I should also note my own guilt, here. I’m not just pointing fingers.
I’ve said it elsewhere here and I repeat: converts were, are now, and I believe in the future will continue to be God’s special gift to us ”cradles.” No other writer I ever read concerning religious matters has ever given me so much as Fr. Ronald Knox….the son of an Anglican bishop.
Yes, in my experience there is a tremendous amount of longstanding internecine quarreling and invective among orthodox RC’s. (Would that one would not have to use the qualifier orthodox.) Maybe it is a result of being under siege, comparable to the frayed nerves of persons sitting in trenches in WWI and constantly under artillery fire.
The remedy in my view is for everyone to take a really deep breath before posting and ask: am I going to advance the discussion, or persuade others, with my words? Am I going to pose questions or make comments that illuminate how to behave, ‘lo survive, the unfolding mess?
My own attitude toward the synod, and this papacy, has been to really jumpstart my study (in good Dominican fashion) of Church history, theology, and pretty much anything of substance that is Catholic.
We all need a really really deep base base of knowledge about the tradition, both to foster unity among the faithful Catholics but also to challenge–in respectful and civil ways–those who are now trying to undermine longstanding doctrines of the Church. Nothing is gained through “gotcha” rhetoric and mean-spiritedness, either with respect to people we generally agree with, or with respect to the now very aggressive opposition, which goes all the way to the top of the hierarchy.
I would recommend that someone start a manifesto, along the lines of the Manhattan Declaration. Call it, say, the Manifesto of the Faithful. Signees would commit themselves to the project of: learning as much as they can about the tradition; keeping discourse respectful and civil; all the while doing whatever is necessary to consolidate and entrench the stance of faithful Catholics vis-a-vis the opposition. And commit not to lowering oneself to the sorts of ad hominem attacks so prevalent among the opposition, as exemplified (just for example) recently in the statement by the signees to the letter assailing Douthat’s credentials. And committing to prayer for cool-headedness, self-control, and sobriety under fire. And a sense of humor. And a perspective that a study of the long history of the Church provides. It’s a history of tumult.
Thanks for the reminder Steve. The devil wants us to fight each other. He will do everything he can to reduce our effectiveness. As an example look at the Michael Voris vs. Remnant fight. Simply ridiculous. It is time for a united front and the need to overlook minor differences.
but, it can also be true that monsieur voris is simply wrong. we must watch the tendency nowadays to equalize all…traditionalists who know their stuff have suffered from the attitude voris displays for decades now…simply because he is pope, to voris he can do no wrong. that is not catholic doctrine, but idolatry.
Cannonkat. You got that right! Good judgement and prudence must always apply.
Call me paranoid, but i think we have to allow for the likelihood that there are actual people — not just principalities and powers — who work to destroy online communities via false identities. I don’t think we can put the quarreling on any of Catholic sites down to *just* spiritual warfare. There are those who want to tamp down inconvenient communities.
I certainly wouldn’t put it past them.
Let’s see if we can change the focus a bit here. VISnews sends along this gem this morning. I won’t presume to add commentary I am sure will immediately come to your mind upon reading it:
****Interviewer: Holy Father, is it possible to imagine a world without the poor?
*****Pope Francis: “I would like a world without the poor. We must fight for this. But I am a believer and I know that sin is always within us. And there is always human greed, the lack of solidarity, the selfishness that creates poverty. Therefore, would seem difficult to me to imagine a world without the poor. If you think about children exploited for slave labour, or sexually abused children. And another form of exploitation: children killed for the trafficking of organs. Killing children to remove their organs is greed. Therefore, I do not know if we will be able to make a world without poverty, because sin is always there and leads to selfishness. But we must always fight, always …”.
I have just won a war against a schismatic “Old Catholic” element infecting our Traditional Latin Mass. It’s not over. There’s still plenty of debris to clean up.
You guys go and fight the modernists while I fight in the battlefront at the other end of the heresy spectrum. God bless.
we’re here and we hear you, demanding an indicting of this antipope, his trial for heresy and uncanonical, indeed conspiratorial election, his deposition, and excommunication. of course we need athanasius, burke and gadecki to implement it. when francis laughs in our face, then we, in consultation with Pope Benedict and determining if he be still the holy father, have him decide if he would like to no longer be prisoner of bergaglio anymore and if he still wants to bail out, then we have to have our own synod in which we pronounce anathema on berger king and all his german sausages….and elect our own GENUINE Pope!!!
“Tell that to the three generations of Catholics …”
Just three generations?
The progressives comprehensively won on economic liberalism in the 1700’s and 1800’s, officially papering over doctrine (not to mention a sound understanding of property and finance) with ‘pastoral solutions’ issued under Papal authority. Tradition and the Church’s moral doctrine were trounced by ‘pastoral’ concerns before the outbreak of the American Civil War, to such a comprehensive extent that most of what used to be understood by everyone about usury has been forgotten and replaced by financially and morally ignorant lies.
I agree with the basic sentiment of the article, other than its unwarranted optimism. Commenters (a general statement, not about the author or anyone in particular) heading in the sedevacantist direction looking for an anti-pope can start with the ‘pastoral’ rulings on usury:
https://zippycatholic.wordpress.com/2015/01/21/the-grand-inquisitor-shows-pastoral-mercy-to-usurers/
If the Holy See is empty because of (an ultramontane understanding of) Francis and his sin-nod, it has been empty since Pius VIII declared that unrepentant usurers were not to be ‘disturbed’ in confession, and thus should be admitted to Holy Communion.
The first rule in a war is to really understand what we are up against. And I am afraid that many of the ‘standard’ traditionalist positions are entirely too optimistic.
Dear Zippy. More and more men are starting to see your wisdom in seeing other aspects of morality in light of the pastoral exceptions extended in opposition to the still existing Doctrine of Vix Prevenit and that is prolly one reason Mr. Hoffman believes the One True Holy Roman Catholic and Apostolic Church is now in heresy re that Doctrine.
And were we to allow distribution of Holy Communion to Adulterers while insisting we had not changed Doctrine, like what we have done vis a vis usury, we would be, similarly, making unjustified claims of continuity.
Pastoralism can be a leech that drains the lifeblood of doctrine until it collapses into an empty hulk.
The talk of war is to be welcomed. It is a refreshing breath of reality. The Catholic Church not for the first time in its history is at war, both within and from without.
The quicker we all wake up to this somewhat uncomfortable fact the better.
War in religious terms is interchangeable with Reformation. The earliest reference I have
found to Reformation in the Catholic Church was Malcolm Muggeridge in about 1970 ?
We are also at war with Secularism and with Islam but those are separate discussions
The difference this time is that the latest heresies from within such as Kasperism, are
not being condemned by the current Pope. That is a new factor.
But we are at war and all good Catholic Men (and of course women and there are certainly
female members of this family in the military), will have to face up to this.
Funny the author mentions what many have known for decades–that this indeed is a war and it has been open war since the end of Vatican II. It was a covert war prior to those days.
Quite a number of months ago (I don’t recall the exact number or for which article) I entered a comment to Mr. Skojec to the effect that I was ‘welcoming him to the party’ because the tenor of his article seemed to indicate that he was starting to understand the gravity of our situation.
SO, to all of you who weren’t around in the early days, OR who didn’t want to see the gravity of our situation for all these years, “WELCOME TO THE PARTY, PAL!”