This was a recent, very recent, Holy Hour at St. Anne Church in Richmond Hill. There was Solemn Exposition of the Most Blessed Sacrament and Benediction.
This is a renewal of the posture for adoration for those laity who chose to do so. It is the declericcalization of this posture of piety.
St. Anne Church celebrates all of its Masses, except for one Sunday Mass, ad orientem and the laity receive Holy Communion at the brand spanking new Communion Rail kneeling or standing.
IT IS JESUS CHRIST, CRUCIFIED AND RISEN, TRULY AND TRANSUBTANTIALLY PRESENT IN THE MOST HOLY EUCHARIST OFFERED DURING THE GLORIFIED AND UNBLOODY HOLY SACRIFICE OF THE MASS IN WHATEVER VALID FORM THAT MASS OR DIVINE LITURGY TAKES! ENOUGH SAID!
Here is a portion of an Our Sunday Visitor article that makes that point brilliantly as it concerns the now completed Eucharistic Congress in Indianapolis:
The recent National Eucharistic Congress in Indianapolis was nothing short of a monumental success for the Church in the United States. It was a historic gathering that shattered barriers and brought together diverse segments of our Catholic community in an unprecedented way.
For too long, the Church in the United States has struggled with ideological echo chambers that have fostered division and misunderstanding. Often those ideologies are presented under the guise of liturgical preference. The National Eucharistic Congress, however, proved to be a powerful antidote to this fragmentation. The gathering drew a wide spectrum of Catholics, from Traditional Latin Mass devotees and members of Eastern Catholic churches to charismatics and more. This was not just a meeting of minds but a communion of hearts, united in love for the Eucharist and the Catholic Church.
The article states that there were Eastern Rite Catholics present with Eastern Rite Liturgies celebrated. Of particular note was the Syro-Malabar Liturgy that was celebrated for 25,000 Catholics and celebrated ad orientem as Pope Francis demands that it be celebrated, warning priests who don’t that they may be excommunicated.
Also allowed, thanks be to God and His glory, was the Ancient Traditional Latin Mass in a church filled to capacity with and overflow outside.
There were Novus Ordo Masses with a variety of musical styles, Gospel music being quite notable, as well as, charismatic Catholics with their style of liturgy and liturgical expression.
And all who were there, over 50,000 Catholic Faithful of the East and the West were united not by the form of the Liturgy but by Jesus Christ present, truly present, as well as His one glorified Sacrifice on the Cross. He unites us, not the form of the Liturgy. But the liturgy must be valid and it must be licit! It must be reverent, not banal and pedestrian.
The Vatican needs to wake up to this truth. May I be as bold to say that the Most Holy Spirit was speaking to all Catholics about what I just wrote and especially to a tone deaf Vatican where many in high places, to include the pope, think the Novus Ordo is the uniting liturgy for the entire Church. How ridiculous!
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One of my former parishioners in Richmond Hill sent me this photo and explanation of it. She says that this is the end of the Procession the Blessed Sacrament was in Exposition on the terrace of the war memorial in Indianapolis ….. very moving….. tens of thousands of people on their knees on the plaza and in the park.
The voices of thousands singing o salutaris hostia and the Tantum ergo.
We saw Bishop Stephen Parkes walking in the procession 😊
Some of the restorations I have seen in the last few years see to me like the pendulum swinging from the extreme of austere, puritanical wreckovations to way to ornate and fussy recoveries of what the decorators thought was the case in pre-Vatican II times. Very often it is way too much and distracting to me, at least.
Other decorations in modern churches seem to impose an incongruent design on a modern structure thus creating quite a clash of styles, very distracting to say the least.
This is Sacred Heart Church, one of the Canons Regular of St. John Cantius’ parishes Springfield, Illinois. I am sure you will agree with me that it is very tastefully decorated:
This Sacred Heart Church in Springfield, Illinois is very similar to Sacred Heart Church in Savannah, Georgia where the TLM is celebrated each Sunday at 1 pm. Unfortunately, Savannah’s Sacred Heart underwent a horrible wreckovation shortly after Vatican II. This is what it looked like prior to that wreckovation:
This is how it looks today:
Although, Savannah’s Sacred Heart doesn’t have stained glass windows above the altar and never did, like Sacred Heart in Springfield, but Sacred Heart in Springfield is a good template for the restoration of Sacred Heart in Savannah one day, when a benefactor pays for it!
And miracles of miracles! Blogspot seems to have fixed how photos are posted! They now appear in the proper order in which I inputted them! In the past, I would input fotos in the order I wanted them and then when I went to publish the post, the photos were all out of order. Praise be Jesus Christ for this fix!
This photo was taken after Sunday’s Traditional Latin Mass at Sacred Heart Church in Savannah for the 9th Sunday after Pentecost. On the left is Fr. Kevin O’Keefe, pastor of Sacred Heart and on the right, is Abbe Michael Dirksen, a seminarian in his last year of studies for the priesthood. He is a member of Institute of Christ the King, Sovereign Priest which specializes in the traditional Latin Liturgies of the Church. The youngest of the three, who is in the center, is Fr. Allan J. McDonald.
So call me the Catholic “n” word. I am a pre-Vatican II Catholic as I was born into the pre-Vatican II Church in January of 1954 when I was baptized in Naples, Italy. I made my First Confession and Holy Communion in the pre-Vatican II Church in Augusta, Georgia in 1961 and I was Confirmed there when I was in the 4th grade in 1962.
Yes, you read that correctly! I was completely initiated into the Pre-Vatican II Church through Baptism, Confirmation and Holy Eucharist.
BUT HERE IS THE POINT OF MY PRE-VATICAN II IDENTITY
The other night I spoke on the phone to a young Catholic in his early 20’s. He drives to Jacksonville, Florida from the Savannah area to attend the SSPX Sunday Mass there because he can’t stand any Novus Ordo Mass.
He asked me what I thought about that and I told him my mind as a pre-Vatican II Catholic.
I said I would never step foot into that Church when there are Catholic Masses within my parish boundaries that I can attend, Masses that are valid, regardless of how well or how poorly these are celebrated. If it is valid, I will attend only those Masses that are under the jurisdiction of the local bishop in union with the pope.
I would only attend an SSPX Mass if there were no choices under the jurisdiction of the local bishop in union with the pope.
Being Catholic means being in full communion with the Supreme Pontiff and the local bishop of the area in where I am geographically.
When I was a child in my pre-Vatican II Church, I told my dad that I had looked into the Episcopal Church down the road from our Catholic parish and where we lived. I told him it looked like our parish church, with the six tall candlesticks on the altar and a crucifix over the altar.
He was livid. He said to me that I should not even have looked inside that church through its glass doors, similar to the doors of my parish church.
And thus you see where I am coming from as a pre-Vatican II Catholic. I would never go to a “valid” but “illicit” Mass that is not under the full communion of the Catholic Church and her pope and bishops.
Enough said!
With a population around 300 million people, many are asking can't we don't better and with a better slate of candidates?
But who wants to run? Only those extroverted enough to cater to the big bucks donors they need to run a campaign. Money speaks, not mom and pop from bread and butter America, but special interest groups that have mega bucks. These monied groups have enough clout to overrule a primary process not to mention a fair and free election!
Wouldn't it better to allot certain bucks from the government for legitimate candidates to run for office during the primary and then the lead up to the actual election so that there isn't reliance on special interest groups and their ability to buy political candidates?
Let me speak of President Biden first. He is the Democrat presidential candidate as determined by the primary season and more than likely, if he doesn't give into those trying to pressure him to get out of the race, he will be confirmed as the Democrat presidential candidate at the Democrat's National Convention in August.
But therein lies the corruption. Leading Democrats and they money-backed supporters are trying to pressure the sitting President to get out of the race. Why? Because polls say he can't win. It isn't because he has dementia and maybe other health issues related to age, it is because the big money backers are pulling their money and polls show he can't win, this late in the game.
It's as though we are experiencing a coup in real time in order to thwart the electors, meaning the country and the electoral college from determining who will be the next president. It is clearly election interference calling into question our election process.
And now former President Trump. Say what you want about him, he is where he is because of the primary process, and if President Biden prevents a "coup" against him, Trump may well win the presidential election fair and square.
But look at how impeachment was weaponized against Trump during his first term to get him out of an office he won fair and square, a political coup with the cover of the constitution. It didn't work.
Or look at the weaponization of the legal system to convict Trump and put him into prison or manipulate voters to vote for someone else. That is a legal coup!
Big money and political elitists don't trust our election process, neither the actual voters or the electoral process.
Whether you are a Biden supporter or Trump supporter, all of this must be of concern for us as Americans.
Now for the Catholic prospective on the two main candidates we have for the presidency: both are loved by God and both are showered with God's love. For Trump, who has no real religious affiliation or communal worship, Catholics believe that Our Lady of Fatima could have guided the bullet or the head of President Trump to avoid a gunshot leading to his death. Why would God do this or allow our Blessed Mother to do it? Because God is Missionary and an Evangelist. His grace His freely given to the deserving and undeserving, to all people, regardless of their religion or lack thereof.
The same is for President Biden. Maybe God can bring good out of what he is experiencing by God's grace and our Blessed Mother's assistance. Maybe President Biden will repent of his rabid pro-choice politics that has enabled the murder of so many more babies than perhaps would have not take place if Biden were a witness to his Catholic Faith, which he practices by going to Mass each weekend.
And of course, we know as Catholics, that when much is given to us, in terms of the Catholic Faith we say we practice, much is expected and culpability for failing in the practice of our faith is greater than for those who are not Catholic. Just saying.
I was thrilled to see that at the Eucharistic Congress in Indianapolis, that the TLM was allowed to be celebrated in a large church that was too small to accommodate all the young Catholic who wanted to attend. There was an overflow outside the Church with the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass live-streamed to those outside.
The key words are that the Mass was overflowing with young people. For the pope and the Vatican disasteries to suppress something that is attracting a certain kind of young person looking to the Church and Jesus for direction and security in their lives within the context of their generation of Catholics leaving the Church for something else or nothing, it is breath taking and so opposed to the missionary and evangelizing nature of the Church.
The pope and the Vatican must stop it and stop it now!
My recommendation is to return to Summorum Pontificum but emphasize the local bishop’s role in protecting the full communion of the Church within his diocese although there will be liturgical diversity. But make sure bishops in the Church are as zealous at supervising errant celebrations of the Novus Ordo that verges on schism as they are at micro managing the TLM. Is that too much to ask?
Scheduled to be released November 1, the movie follows the fictional Cardinal Lawrence (played by Ralph Fiennes) as he arranges the election of a new pope after the mysterious death of the pervious one, who kept a dark secret. In theaters only…
What kind of spirituality and devotion would you call it?
