From Crux: In a surprise move, Pope Francis on Holy Thursday celebrated the Mass of the Lord’s Supper – one
Again, Praytell gives voice to a post-Catholic theologian who does not believe that God’s Holy Spirit in the now of whatever age guides the Magisterium of the Church. They give voice to a theologian who doesn’t believe in the Catholic Church and he makes it into a purely sociological phenomenon like some kind of political party.
IT IS SICK, TO SAY THE LEAST AND IT FOMENTS MORE POST CATHOLICS LEAVING THE CHURCH OR GOING INTO SCHISM WITH THE GERMANIC BISHOPS’ MOVEMENT.
Here’s the money byte:
The statements contained in the letter from Cardinal Sarah with regard to the “individual Mass” must be read in the light of an age-old question. Ever since the Roman Church has given itself a centralized bureaucracy, this organization has begun to assume the role of a “corporation” within of the Roman Church, shaping traditions from a unique and very one-sided notion of ecclesial life. All this started already in the Middle Ages and became even more accentuated after the Council of Trent. Hence it is not possible to understand the words of Sarah’s letter except by placing them within the context of the “form of life” that the Roman curia has imposed on its members for many centuries.
You can read the rest of this babble here. I can’t comment on the whole thing as sick as it is but think about what I highlight in red:
“Ever since the Roman Church has given itself a centralized bureaucracy...” What the hell? Read that again. This theologian has to be kidding.
And I suspect he worships Vatican II, ecclesiology, lay participation, the prospect of same sex and LGBTQ etc, marriage, doing away with Humanae vitae, enabling LBGTQetc ordination, and you name any other aberration and it is worshiped.
Where is Jesus Christ? Where is the Most Holy Trinity? Where is the Blessed Mother.
And the worst thing for Grillo? That a priest might say Mass by himself. What a joke!
Let me make a disclaimer. My preference is to say Mass with my parish. But occasionally I say a private Mass. I prefer at least an altar server, but that doesn’t always happen. Private Masses when I am not in my parish is the One Sacrifice of the Mass and always has an intention.
It is about Jesus, not just my private Mass and it is about my relationship to Jesus, not my relationship to a community. I don’t worship a community, I worship God. I hope you do too.
At US’ lone top Chrism with laity, Chicago’s Card Blase drew from Pope’s teaching on St Alphonsus (
bit.ly/3ccPce5), to blast “the CDF. I think Rocco was dreaming or read to much into the good Cardinal’s homily. If that is true than it would appear, as unlikely as this would be, that the Chicago Cardinal is aligning himself with progressive cardinals and bishop in the Germanic countries and striving to get bishops here to join him in the German schism. Just saying.And Rocco, during Holy Week, still has on his blog Pope Francis’ Christmas Mass at Night! What’s up with that whispered the loggia!
Yes, my new bishop, Bishop Stephen Parkes gave a far better homily than the good Cardinal in Chicago or any archbishop showcased in Palma’s tweets. No brag, just fact! And yes, our cathedral on Tuesday at 11 AM had just about has many laity as Chicago’s cathedral and we didn’t have to harass them about wearing their masks throughout the entire liturgy as they did in Chicago!
This is Chicago’s Cathedral:
This is Savannah’s Cathedral:
This is a still photo of the Requiem Mass video for Officer Talley. It was celebrated at the Cathedral Basilica of the Immaculate Conception in Denver. This photo captures the so-called “pre-Vatican II Mass” celebrated in a Cathedral designed according to pre-Vatican II norms for the high theology of this Mass:
Praytell is complaining about Robert Cardinal Sarah’s missive to Pope Francis, a brilliant piece of apologetic for private Masses, because Praytell sees Cardinal Sarah’s missive as having a foundation on the true worship of God, God’s personal relationship with each of us individually and collectively and the grace that enables us to have a personal relationship with God as individuals and collectively, through Jesus Christ.
You can read the Praytell missive that quotes others who prefer to worship Vatican II, Ecclesiology and Active Participation—all of which support my thesis that Praytell and like minded progressives are the problem for the Church’s proper worship, not the solution.
You can read Praytell going down the rabbit hole (fortunately it also links to Sarah’s brilliant letter heads and above Grillo and Faggioli (Beans), but I digress:
Cardinal Sarah Asks the Pope to Lift the Ban on “Individual” Masses at St. Peter’s
Here is Fr. Antony’s downfall into idolatry, money quote:
This article from the Wall Street Journal tries to link apostate, schismatic German bishops, priests and laity to the opposite spectrum in the USA which is not at all opposite. What is happening in the USA as described in this article isn’t apostasy, isn’t schismatic and isn’t post-Catholic. This article is absurd except for the reporting on the German schism and apostasy:
VATICAN CITY (VATICAN CITY)
Wall Street Journal [New York NY]
March 20, 2021
By Francis X. Rocca and Ian Lovett
March 26, 2021
A livestream will be available for anyone interested in viewing the Catholic funeral Mass for Officer Eric Talley on Monday, March 29, 2021 at 12:00 pm.
The Catholic Mass will be celebrated at the Cathedral Basilica of the Immaculate Conception in downtown Denver.
The holy Mass has restricted seating and the family has requested that they not be shown during the livestream of the Mass.
Officer Eric Talley, 51, a member of the Boulder Police Department, was killed on Monday, March 22, 2021, when he responded to an active shooter situation at a grocery store in Boulder, CO. Nine other people were also killed during the shooting.
Officer Talley has been described as a man of strong faith with a great trust in the Lord and a strong devotion to Mary. He was a loving husband and father of seven children, and a great servant to his community.
The Catholic funeral Mass will be a Solemn High Requiem Mass celebrated by Fr. Dan Nolan, FSSP. Other priests of the Priestly Fraternity of St. Peter, along with Archbishop Samuel J. Aquila (Archbishop of Denver) will be in attendance.
A Solemn High Requiem Mass is a Funeral Mass celebrated in the Extraordinary Form (i.e., the Traditional Latin Mass) of the Roman Catholic Church. The funeral liturgy specifies that the Church “confidently proclaims that God has created each person for eternal life.” Moreover, “Christians celebrate the funeral rites to offer worship, praise, and thanksgiving to God for the life which has now been returned to God,” and to offer prayers for the deceased and the consolation and hope of the living.
While a vast improvement, the new altar and reredos simply don't fit this building. The building would be best used for something else.
Hopefully, that is the plan, to build a new church with architecture that will compliment the new reredos altar. In the meantime, the current church is a great storage facility creating excitement and anticipation of the day it will be placed in a new magnificent church building.
Our Lady of Grace in South Houston, Texas:
Before:
After:
I am disappointed the papal high altar is still not be used, especially after the packed papal Masses in Iraq:
Is Synodal Path in Germany a road to schism?
Crux has a very good article on the actual schism in Germany which makes Lefebrev’s movement look like child’s play. In Germany or the Germanic nations, we have cardinals and bishops, many priests and a goodly number of laity who are spinning off into schism.
But this caught my eye in the Crux article:
If you’re seeking power and influence, the last standing institution (in Germany) that is interesting for the people, it’s the Catholic Church,” Schnabel said. “Less than one percent of Protestants go to church in Germany. Being a Catholic is more attractive. What they dream about already exists, but they don’t want to join a sinking ship; they would rather try to change the course of a ship that is doing quite well in comparison.”
Father Nikodemus Schnabel, from the German Benedictine Monastery Dormitio in Jerusalem, said he is not truly afraid of schism, though he sees many in his country adopting an “I’m Catholic but” attitude.
He claimed that it’s often forbidden to argue that these “forward looking” ideas haven’t worked in other churches, despite this fact being an unavoidable elephant in the room: “We have the Protestant church, and it’s more catastrophic.”
You read that correctly! Only 1% of German Protestants go to church. Yet the schismatic Germans don’t want to be Lutheran which is the dead faith of progressives and the faith that is dead, they want to make what success the Catholic Church has with Mass attendance just like the dead progressive Lutheran Church.
IT IS ABSOLUTELY ABSURD!
Then, I was on a tweet by Rocco Palma reporting what the Cardinal Papal preacher said at the Lenten Retreat for Pope Francis and the Curia:
"Tradition is the living faith of the dead; traditionalism is the dead faith of the living.
Who is Cardinal Cantelemessa speaking of? Which nation in the world is so traditional that it is a dead nation? Or is he speaking of the growing SSPX? Or the growing FSSP or traditional Masses which are seeing increasing numbers especially with young people and young married couples with many, many children.
Just who is the Cardinal speaking about and why did he not say one negative word about the dead church in Europe which is far from tradition and traditionalism. Why did he not call out the German Church and how progressivism since Vatican II has destroyed religious orders, caused a decline in vocations to the priesthood and left Europe decimated? Why not a word of praise for the USA, especially in more traditional dioceses, seeing growth and in conservative Africa, Asia and South America?
IT IS ABSURD!
The problem in progressive Rome and progressive Catholic media is they suffer from some kind of mental illness. Theology can’t help that, only Sigmund Freud!
In a word, YES! As I have mused over the years on this blog, the recovery of the ecclesial mindset of progressives from the 1960's and 70's under this pontificate is showing us now as this papacy will soon come to its conclusion, what a failure that mindset was in the 1960's and 70's and what a failure it is now. This is especially true now, that there are processes being set loose in the Germanic countries where Cardinals and other bishops may well lead an actual schism, similar to the Great Schism or the Protestant Reformation which will make the SSPX movement and its founder attempt at true reform look like peanuts. This will not reflect well at all on Pope Francis' legacy in Church history.
What is good about this, as I have mused over the years, is that a whole new generation of Catholics, completely clueless about the schismatic tendencies of "spirit of Vatican II elitist progressives" now know exactly what happened then as it is happening again. That's the formula and the formula produces the same results.
Pope Francis' papacy has been very much like Pope Paul VI's papacy, except Pope Paul VI while trying to put the toothpaste back in the tube had become very depressed, visibly shaken and aged by the events in the Church and very weak toward the end of his papacy. Pope Francis, producing and fomenting many of the same results that alarmed Pope Paul seems immune from experiencing psychological, physical and spiritual symptoms. In fact, he seems to relish the chaos.
It will take a charismatic figure who is a combination of Pope John Paul II and Pope Benedict, to recover the sanity that both popes heroics attempted.
Who will that figure be? Right now, only God knows.
And these manipulators in Germany have the temerity, the audacity and the hutzpah to declare that their neo-fascist, neo-synodal path will create a “new springtime” for the Church in Germany. It is to laugh if not so very, very, very tragic. Mental illness describes it best!
But here are the two most important paragraphs, read the rest at crux:
As what’s come to be called the German “Synodal Path” begins forwarding its mid-term conclusions to Rome, many lay activists and bishops are describing the process as an historic and inspiring moment, a potential springtime of sweeping reform and renewal in Catholic life.
However, some believe that the Synodal Path is a wolf in sheep’s clothing. In reality, they charge, the purpose of the Synodal Path is not to bring the sexual abuse crisis to a close, but to use the actual crisis to justify profound changes in the Church, concerning Catholic teaching, identity, and tradition.
Many parts of the Church in South America, Germany and the Philippines are allowed blue vestments for Marian feasts. Why not in the USA?
I have also in the past advocated dark, very dark, blue vestments for the season of Advent. In my former parish in Augusta, I had a lovely set. The next pastor tossed them because of a rigid liturgical color attitude, so unloving to dark blue loving priests and laity, so unloving!
New Archbishop of Manila, Cardinal Jose Advincula:
Of course people can be blessed. What isn’t blessed is their sin. Sin and evil are often exorcized as a foundation of a blessing. Just think of the exorcism even in the revised rite of Baptism, that takes place before the actual baptism.
Just think of Catechumens who are exorcised during the Scrutinies of the Lenten Season. People are blessed not sin.
This push to bless same sex unions isn’t about that, blessing people. It is about blessing sexual acts that these unions entail that are sterile with no possibility of procreation.
If a person goes to confession and confesses masturbation, or fornication (regardless of the sexual orientation of the act) or adultery or even impure thoughts, they are absolved and blessed, not their sins.
The current controversy is about changing the Church and making LBGTQetc unions, no matter who and how many people are involved, a sacrament of the Church on an equal footing with heterosexual marriage. It is also about changing the sacramental system of the Church to include the ordination of any gender of person, even those contrived genders.
And what is the basis of all this? Love. But it is not only the love of persons, but an infatuation and love of their sin. In fact it is a love of sin that eclipses the love of God.
And the love meme as a form of the enablement of sin and making sin a virtue is a grotesque form of manipulation by these clerics and laity doing it. It is truly sickening. It is also cowardice.
First vaccine three weeks ago:
Second vaccine on Annunciation. Prior to this I had eyes dilated for eye procedure related to a detachment near retina but not a retina detachment, thus the celebrity sunglasses. May need laser procedure in three weeks or maybe not. I hope not.
And Massimo Faggioli as well as the NCR think the celebration of the Extraordinary form of the Mass is an assault on their favorite false god, the spirit of Vatican II. Press title for the NCR article fomenting Catholic schism and apostacy:
One of the ten victims of the mass shooting in Colorado was a Boulder Police Officer, Eric Talley, 11 year vet, 51 years old, husband, father of 7. He responded to the incident and he was killed.
Officer Talley and family belong to Our Lady of Mount Carmel in Littleton, staffed by priests of the FSSP, which celebrates the Traditional Latin Mass
A Solemn Requiem Mass for Officer Eric Talley is on Monday.
