STUNNING RESTORATION OF NOTRE DAME; NEW ALTAR AMBO AND CATHEDRA, NOT SO MUCH…

 Old high altar beautifully restored:

New altar is blah and out of place, but so was the old new altar, new ambo and cathedra non descript:

WHAT’S UP WITH THE VATICAN NEWS WEBSITE—ITS BEEN HACKED BY RUSSIANS?????

 Since early this morning and as I type this at 9:35 AM EST, I can’t access the Vatican News website.

Thank God for Silere non Possum website as they explain it with searing critical thinking:

This is a rough English translation, provided by the their site, of their Italian commentary:

Dicastery for communication: to cover up incompetence, Russian hackers are uncomfortable

For years Silere non possum has been collecting the complaints of clerics and lay people who realize, unlike someone in Santa Marta, that the work of Paolo Ruffini, Andrea Tornielli and Andrea Monda makes water on all sides. The religion professor in an article even wrote that Bethlehem was in Israel. The situation is really critical and in recent days the site of the Holy See (Vatican.va) remains inaccessible to millions of Catholics in the world who would like to consult the words of the Pontiff.

«There is still an abnormally high number of interactions with the .va domain. The countermeasures are still in progress and for this reason it could still be difficult to access," Matteo Bruni told journalists. What astonishment, a site that should be visited by millions of people is subject to heavy traffic. Once again it is confirmation that these people are not suitable for these roles. After all, what to expect from characters who spend their days "making tubs" for Borgo Pio with their cell phones in their ears and bringing subjects to lunch to interview, "cump" and "convince"? Did anyone really think they were capable of running a Dicastery with such a great responsibility? In the past, when management was quite different, these things didn't happen. Who knows why? This is the management, then on the lower floors there are those who don't even know how to layout a bulletin correctly. What do we expect? We only give them tens of thousands of euros a month, we won't expect them to work.

To cover the incompetence, therefore, we have now moved on to inconvenience the maximum systems. The site doesn't work? Ah, it's the Russian hackers. The all-rounder and conspiracy theogist Maria Antonietta Calabrò, another of those journalists who know everything and are only interested in power and secret services, makes a voice of swebies that are passed through the Way of Conciliation and accuses Russia of having attacked the Vatican sites. There are journalists, and also someone who is not but braints titles and acquaintances despite being taken by a pedal, who report the news without even verifying the reliability. If it were Russian hackers, however, the site would certainly not be "inaccessible" but at most they would write about everything above it.

This morning, precisely because hackers act in watertight compartments, even the propaganda situation (Vatican news) is inaccessible. Not many have noticed it because it is something that is not visited by anyone but still it is the object for which they have spent a lot of money and does not offer any serious service. At the same time it serves to make Tornielli and his pupils eat.

What can I say? Not only in this pontificate do we have documents that are not published and kept hidden (fortunately there are those who publish them here) but now it is impossible to access even the ordinary magisterium of which the Pope also talks so much this morning.

I THINK THAT EVEN MARTIN LUTHER WOULD BE SHOCKED AND APPALLED BY THIS RENOVATION!

St. Hedwig Cathedral, Berlin, Germany, before the wreckovation:

This is Saint Hedwig’s Cathedral in Berlin, Germany, newly remodeled by way of wreckovation:

How shall we describe it? Post Catholic? Neo-Protestant? Purely Puritanical? Presbyterian? Baptist? Iconoclastic? Sterile? An abomination?

What adjectives would you use?

Please note, not a statue in sight except for the corpus on the Processional Crucifix.

This is from the Facebook page where I found thee photos:

With a solemn service, the Saint Hedwig Cathedral in Berlin was reopened on today's Christ the King Festival after six years of extensive reconstruction and renovation work! ⛪️✨

Many thanks to Erzbistum Berlin for the impressive pictures and a moving opening! 🙏

👉 More info on reopening:

🔗https://ow.ly/aCzB50UesLW

🔗https://ow.ly/hNYn50UesLX

#Berlin #SanktHedwig #Kathedrale #ErzbistumBerlin #Kirche #Wiedereröffnung

PLEASE NOTE THE POST CATHOLIC CHALICES OR ARE THEY CYLINDERS? IS ALL OF THIS A PERVERSE JOKE AND SACRILEGE AND THE HERSY OF ICONOCLASM?

THE SILLINESS OF CURRENT HOLY DAY OF OBLIGATION NONSENSE! LET’S RETURN TO SOUND TRADITION!

FROM THE DIOCESE OF SAVANNAH:

With the approval of Holy Mother Church, or, as some call it, the Vatican Regime, the American bishops many decades ago came up with a solution to reduce the number of Holy Days of Obligation in the United States.

Prior to Vatican II, in the USA the Holy Days of Obligation were Christmas Day (not Eve), The Circumsision of the Lord, January 1, Ascension Thursday, Assumption of the BVM, August 15, All Saints, November 1st, and Immaculate Conception, December 8th.

Well, the American bishops buying into the snowflake culture developing in the Church in the post-Vatican II period decided that it was just too hard for priests and laity to have to be obligated to attend Mass on Holy Days if the Holy Day fell too close to a Sunday. Thus the obligation to attend a Holy Day of Obligation was removed if the Holy Day fell on a Saturday or Monday. Such nonsense, no?

And in addition to that, the American bishops thought it was too hard for Catholics to attend Mass on Ascension Thursday so 40 days after Easter Sunday was made into the non-biblical 42 or 43 days after Easter as it was transferred to the following Sunday Vigil or Sunday Mass for the 7th Sunday of Easter! You can’t make this stuff up!

Recently, though, one of the Vatican’s dicasteries, the one least in chaos at this moment in Pope Francis’ papacy, decided to contradict the American bishops and say that if a Holy Day falls on a Saturday or Monday that if it is an obligation, it retains its obligatory character! Good for them.

However, uniquely this year, since December 8th is the 2nd Sunday of Advent, the Immcaulate Conception is transferred to Monday, December 9th and thus in the USA, of course there was no obligation attached to it, but the Vatican dicastery disagreed.

By the way, Cardinal Cupich fingered the Vatican dicastery’s decision and has removed the obligatory nature of December 9th, really the 8th, since it falls on a day that isn’t the 8th and is a Monday. So much for synodality as I don’t think the good Cardinal consulted with the people in Chicago in a democratic manner or the rest of the Church in the USA or the Vatican Dicastery which clarified the obligation. 

But pre-Vatican II Tradition and its exquisite logic has the solution.

On Sunday December 8th, yours truly will be the celebrant for a Solemn Sung High Mass at Sacred Heart Church in Savannah. It will be for the Feast of the Immcaulate Conception and will satisfy the obligation to attend this feast day on the day it is meant to be celebrated. But in addition to that, the proper prayers for the Second Sunday of Advent will be prayed as well, thus killing two birds with one stone, a holy stone at that!

If only this could be done in the post-Vatican II debacle of obligations! 

I CAN LIVE WITH THESE RULES, ESPECIALLY NUMBER FIVE

 I hate cleaning up Doritos after Mass and American Fruit loops with red dye number five!

IT MAKES PERFECT SENSE WHEN YOU HAVE A PERFECTLY BEAUTIFUL ALTAR TO ADD AN ADDITIONAL ONE, THAT IS QUITE UGLEY, IN FRONT OF THE OLDER ONE, BUT ONLY IN AN ALTERNATE CHURCH!

 Bishop Marini, what’s going on here and no crucifix facing you! Oh, the agony of it all:

This afternoon the Bishop of Tortona, Mons. Guido Marini went to the Sanctuary of Our Lady of Tortona Guardia where he presided over the Eucharistic Celebration in which he consecrated the Crypt and the Altar

ELECTRIC ALTAR CANDLES IN THE 1950’S? YOU MIGHT FIND THIS SHOCKING, BUT YES! DON’T BLOW A FUSE!

 This is a low Mass thus only two candles are lighted. But look closely at the six tall candles.

Low Mass at Baclaran Shrine during the 1950's

MY MONTHLY TLM AT SAVANNAH’S SACRED HEART ❤️ CHURCH

 Please note the sunbeam directed at yours truly:

And these other miracles of the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass:

Please note the perfect height to lift the chasuble!!!

GOOD SUGGESTIONS FROM CARDINAL ARINZE ON HOMILIES, BUT 10 MINUTES IS WAY TOO LONG; I RECOMMEND 6 MINUTES AT THE MOST!

Since I entered into so-called retirement, I have cut my Sunday homilies in half from about 12 minutes to about six minutes.

People now love my homilies, not so much because they are good, but because my homilies are short. 

If you are a priest or deacon and want compliments about your homilies after Mass, keep them to six minutes!

Here is what the good Cardinal Arinze has to say, press the title:

Cardinal Arinze Cautions Priests Against Lengthy Homilies

WHO KNEW THAT CARDINAL CUPICH WAS SO HILARIOUSLY FUNNY!

 I can’t stop laughing!

Cardinal Cupich says that young Catholics will look back at the synod on synodality as ‘one of the most historic moments in their lives, for it has redirected the focus of where the church is going.”

WILL THE NEXT POPE DEAL WITH THE CATHOLIC CHURCH’S MAJOR PROBLEM FOR THE PAST 60 YEARS, HER OWN CANCEL CULTURE?!

What the American elections can show the current leadership of the Church from the top down is that the cancel culture of the last many years has been a dismal failure and is rejected by a landslide of those with any common sense. The Catholic Church has had its own virulent cancel Culture since 1964 propmoted by clericalism and a lust for power over rank file Catholics. That needs to be addressed in the future papacy.

Let’s face it, the major problem with the implementation of Vatican II, in particular its fluid and failed “spirit”, is that this implementation canceled so much of what constituted Catholic identity for the clergy, the religious and the laity of the pre-Vatican II era.

A small clericalism caste and cadre of bishops and theologians from their on-high position and by manipulating the work of the Holy Spirit for their own narcissistic privileges, were able to cancel the manner in which the Church had existed since the major reforms of the Council of Trent. 

The spirit of Vatican II clericalists, canceled the manner in which the Mass had been celebrated for over 1,500 years, but codified or standardized by the Council of Trent. They canceled the manner of living religious life and tried to cancel the sacramental aspect of the clergy turning them from worship and prayer to being social workers for the poor, something proper for religious who are not clergy and certainly for the laity.

The spirit of Vatican II tried to cancel the hierarchical nature of the Church and authority of the college of bishops in union with the pope.

What Vatican II’s poor implementation did was to cancel what had previously been understood as constituent to Catholic identity and proposed and then dictatorially imposed it on laity who accepted this imposition solely on the pre-Vatican II appreciation they had for Church authority, especially the pope and bishops. They didn’t like it but they were obedient pray, pay and obey Catholics.

St. Pope John Paul II and especially Pope Benedict XVI tried heroically to end the cancel culture of the Church in the post-Vatican II era. They did it slowly with non-dictatorial edicts. They proposed and enabled the ending of the cancel culture but they did not impose it on all. 

The apex of the genius of Pope Benedict XVI was and is Summorum Pontificum, that enabled a return to liturgical tradition of the pre-Vatican II era while encouraging the reforms of the Liturgies but now within continuity with the past not in a breach of the past or worse yet, canceling that past.

With the dismal and unfortunate abdication of Pope Benedict, a 1970’s ideologue was elected to the See of Peter as the new pope. We have seen since 2013 a return to the spirit of Vatican II’s cancel culture, the one most blatant was and is the canceling of the two papacies of St. Pope John Paul II and Pope Benedict. The apex of this cancelation was the dictatorial canceling of Pope Benedict’s centerpiece of his papacy, Summorum Pontificum and the resulting resentment of the current papacy and its 1970’s agenda. 

The next pope will have to be a redeemed Donald Trump who will restore the papacies of the previous two popes but in continuity. Pope Benedict’s reform in continuity is the way forward and that must be revived! 

THE NATIONAL NOT CATHOLIC REPORTER THINKS THAT THIS INTERVIEW IS JUST HORRIBLE, HORRIBLE I SAY, THUS WE KNOW THAT IT IS A GREAT INTERVIEW

 The Democrat operatives masquerading  under the guise of the National Not Catholic Reporter just can’t believe how our Catholic people voted President Trump back into office. Crocodile tears there are, let me say that again, crocodile tears, tears I say. Your can read the Democrat’s meltdown over this intereview HERE.

To view this video, do not press the center arrow but go to the bottom left corner and press “watch on you-tube”:

ANOTHER WAY TO LOOK AT PRESIDENT TRUMP’S AND VICE PRESIDENT VANCE’S LANDSLIDE VICTORY AND BY COUNTY

 This graphic really shows how deep in do-do the Democrat Party is. And this a party that once upheld political and religious values of our Judeo Christian nation and refused to cater to atheists and agnostics and immoral, amoral ideologies. It is sad indeed, but it is the rise and fall of a once great political party:

And over at the National Not Catholic Reporter, Sean Michael Winters and all his cohorts and wailing and grinding their teeth. This is in part what he has to write today:

The Democratic Party has a choice. It can change or it can find a different country. When you can't beat a convicted felon, lose really excellent public servants like Senators Bob Casey and Jon Tester, and watch your margins shrink in virtually every demographic, you need to do some serious soul-searching.

Currently, the Democrats are engaged in a round of finger-pointing and counterfactuals. What if Joe Biden had not dropped out? Can't know for sure, but my bet is the country would have tired of the anxiety that swept the nation every time he went to a microphone. What if he had dropped out earlier and the Dems had found a different candidate? Looking at the losses in down-ballot races, it is hard not to conclude that the problem is the brand.

Read the whole dang thing there by pressing HERE!

HOW DO YOU SPELL A LANDSLIDE VICTORY? A PICTURE HAS ALL THE LETTERS…

Boy was I wrong! To be honest with you, I never thought an Electoral College landslide victory would ever be possible again. But the Democrat Party of abortion and anti-science, anti-DNA far left ideology when it comes to boys/men becoming girls/women and frequenting girl and women’s bathrooms and locker rooms and competing on their teams, MADE IT POSSIBLE!

WELL, I’LL GIVE THEM AN “E” FOR “EFFORT” BUT, TO BE FRANK, IT MAKES ME DIZZY AND SEASICK! IT’S JUST TOO MUCH AND TOO BUSY AND EYE DISORIENTING!

 To be honest with you the “before” plain look isn’t that bad. I don’t think the church needed to be duded up as much as it is. It is too much and too eye-disorienting. The “after” ceiling approach should have been the approach to the walls.

And then you have that busy red carpet runner adding to the seasickness! 

While I like the attached altar, it should have had the ability for the Mass to be celebrated toward the nave too. The reason I say this is because that diocese might get a bishop who will demand that the Mass be celebrated toward the nave. Then they’ll have to put another altar out in front of the current one and you once again have the two back to back altars that so many places have and even with new construction. It makes no sense to me!

Before and After: St. Ann's Catholic Church in Plattsburg, Missouri

Before:

After:

(Mystery question): If you look above, there is a door to the sacristy, where the Sacred Heart statute is in the first photo below. How does one access the sacristy now, as there appears to be no door to it behind the altar? 

THE sYNODAL cHURCH RATHER THAN THE ONE, HOLY, CATHOLIC AND APOSTOLIC CHURCH UNDERMINES A BISHOP’S AUHORITY ONCE AGAIN, UNDERMINES APOSTOLIC SUCESSION…

BISHOP ABROGATES DECREE ON SACRED MUSIC IN JEFFERSON CITY

November 7th, 2024|Categories: Liturgy, Music|Tags: Bishop Shawn McKnight, Jefferson City

This is an extraordinary move from Bishop Shawn McKnight, following the uproar surrounding the banning music in his diocese:  

Read More

My comments: Recently, the Bishop of Jefferson, issued a very good, direct and much needed censoring of songs at Mass that contain lyrics that are less than Catholic in their theology. 

Then, after the uproar of a number of progressive liturgists and their fans, he rescinded his decree to a certain extent and has decided to approach his mission as the primary liturgists of his diocese through a synodal process. 

Let me say that I endorse consultation with clergy and laity in a diocese. Under Bishop Raymond Lessard, a very Vatican II prelate, in terms of its proper implementation, he modeled what he expected pastors to do in their parishes. We had/have pastoral councils and various committees as well as canonically required finance councils. Stewardship Councils were encouraged. 

Priests need to consult with the their parishioners before making major decisions that change something and have a large expenditure of monies. Autocratic decisions that have nothing to do with doctrines and dogmas of our Faith or go against canon law, should be tempered through consultation. 

Bishop Lessard had a Diocesan Pastoral Council consisting of two lay Catholics from each deanery in our diocese. He met with them at least twice a year although it might have been quarterly.

But when it comes to the liturgy, we need experts in liturgy and theology to make decisions as well as in Canon Law and the rubrics of the Mass.

Music is a major problem for the Reformed Mass and it has been so since 1964 and the first minor revision of the 1962 Roman Missal. Junk is and was allowed and by junk, not just that sacred words are set to secular notes and genres of music, but that the words of many songs are heterodox.

We need dogmatic theologians to critique the words of hymns and what is or isn’t appropriate for the Mass. We don’t need those who base their statements only on opinion and what they like making those decisions.

Hopefully, Bishop McKnight’s synodal approach will not dumb down the Church or her liturgy, but shore it up with those making decisions based upon sound doctrine and liturgy. 

Bishops are the primary liturgists for their diocese. However, they must follow the Doctrines and dogmas of the Church. They must follow Canon Law and they must make decisions in line with the rubrics of the Mass and the General Instruction of the Roman Missal. 

They can make unilateral decisions that upholds the Catholic Faith, its doctrines and morals and how the liturgy is to be celebrated without consulting with those who know very little to nothing about these teachings and canon laws. 

POLITICAL ELITISM AND SECULAR CLERICALISM

A CNN commentator called out Democrat elitists by saying,  they have become “smarty pants, tea and crumpets elitist college educated progressives looking down their nose at everyone else especially blue collar, non college educated people.” Political clericalism anyone?

These smarty pants Democrats have betrayed Catholics and the Catholic Church in general. They pandered more to the “nones” that those engaged in their Catholic Faith and have made abortion their sacrament.

Vice President Harris has a track record of anti-Catholic sentiments. I bet she now regrets not going to the New York Catholic Gala and sent a stupid, insulting to Catholics video! I bet she regrets telling a Christian who shouted “Jesus is Lord” at one of her rallies, that he was at the wrong rally!

The elitists of the smarty pants cabal of leaders in the Democrat party are:

1. Celebrities who think people love their ideas and political opinions, Oprah being the biggest problem

2. Aging democrats from another era, like the two Obamas, Pelosi, the Clintons. Did I say Pelosi? Talk about someone who is out of touch and did more in the last two days of the Harris’ campaign to do her in.

3. And their rhetoric, by calling supporters of President Trump and Trump himself, fascists, Nazis, trash, baskets of deplorables,  threats to democracy, unfit, and so on and so on. 

4. Taking jobs away from blue collar workers and expecting them to do dainty jobs that require educational and personal skills they do not have, thus leaving them in danger of going homeless and not able to support their families

5. Thinking that solar panels, windmills and only electric cars will change the climate.

6. Democrats call practicing pro-life Catholics who are pro-life, abortion phobic. They continue to call everyone out as being phobic on every stupid ideology they support, from LGBTQ+++++ stupidity to masculinity, which they call toxic and pro-life people who they call backwards and a threat to women’s freedom! They want men in girl’s bathrooms, locker rooms and on their teams.

One Democrat commenters on my blog is a prime example of Democrat condescension. This is what he wrote: “ The pope did not frame the election as you suggest. Your reading skills, as you often exhibit, are poor and tend to be self-serving. 2. "Half the nation" would be 165 million. Only 138 million voted, so "half the nation" is more than a slight exaggeration. 21% of the nation voted Trump. Poor math skills to go with the reading problems...” That commenter departed America before the election for an exotic vacation, not realizing that the America he will soon return to has completely changed and his party is in complete meltdown because of themselves. There is no one else to blame!

Tea and crumpet democrats who look down their noses at those who disagree with them both in their own party and those who are of other parties, especially those who support President Trump. 

God and what He has created will not be mocked and Divine retribution is always a possibility especially at the Final Consummation of the world and the Last Judgement which climate change may well be a harbinger! 

President Trump’s landslide victory over Democrat stupidity and clericalism can be seen as a sign of God’s Divine Retribution, no?

POST ELECTION PRAYER FOR THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA! 🇺🇸

Post Election Prayer for our Nation:

God of all nations, Father of the human family,

we give you thanks for the freedom we exercise

and the many blessings of democracy we enjoy

in these United States of America.

We ask for your protection and guidance

for all who devote themselves to the common good,

working for justice and peace at home and around the world.

We lift up all our duly elected leaders and public servants, in particular President Elect Donald Trump and Vice President Elect JD Vance and those who will serve us as legislators and judges, those in the military and law enforcement.

Heal us from our differences and unite us, O Lord, with a common purpose, dedication, and commitment to achieve liberty and justice in the years ahead for all people, and especially those who are most vulnerable in our midst. 

Through Christ our Lord. Amen.

THANK YOU POPE FRANCIS FOR FRAMING THE AMERICAN ELECTION AS A CHOICE BETWEEN THE LESSER OF TWO EVILS!

History is repeating itself from 2016 and 2024. This morning at 1:50 am Fox News declared President Trump the winner. CNN at this same time, is trying to show how Vice President Harris could win. The same thing happened at both networks in 2016. Pope Francis framed the American election as choosing the lesser of two evils. When it comes to the foundational pro-life issue, the right to life of the unborn, President Trump is clearly the lesser of two evils compared to Vice President Harris. Pope Francis, at the same time, called abortion murder and hiring a hit man to carry it out. God willing, both Republicans and Democrats will move back to a truly pro-life ethos with the right to life of the unborn foundational.

IS SYNODALITY AND THE RHETORIC OF TODAS, TODAS, TODAS, I.E. INCLUSION, THE MEANS TO BRING ABOUT A CHURCH DIFFERENT FROM THE CATHOLIC CHURCH, A WOKE SYNODAL CHURCH ?

 Bishop Baron’s critique of the movie “Conclave”? I am sure Pope Francis Jesuit pal, Fr. James Martin, gives all of this a 👍’s up!