Happy New Year

Bob knows. He always knows.

This Must Simply Be Defied

Cardinal Cupich in Chicago has issued a diktat that purports to prohibit the Traditional Mass throughout the Archdiocese of Chicago on the first Sunday of the Month, during Triduum, and at Christmas. He demands a scad of other restrictions on the Mass, sacraments, priests and faithful. Actual document here. Fr. Z analyzes it in a good post at his blog.

To all the dear readers out there who used to like to say that I am too likely to jump the gun on things that may never happen, can I assume that you see that, now, THIS IS IT. THIS IS HAPPENING. ONE OF THE WORST OF THE MANY HORRIBLE BISHOPS INFESTING THE CHURCH IS TRYING TO ELIMINATE THE CELEBRATION OF THE TRADITIONAL MASS FOR ABOUT 1/4 OF THE YEAR,, AND ALSO ON OUR HIGHEST HOLY DAYS. NOT TO MENTION AXING THE OTHER TRADITIONAL SACRAMENTAL FORMS.

There is only one Catholic way to respond to this anti-Catholic, anti-Christ, invalid and illegal “policy”.

DEFY THIS POLICY AT EVERY STEP AND RESIST HIM TO HIS FACE.

Let us reiterate our premises, so that one can clearly see the consequences of letting these people get away with outrage after outrage, hoping it will somehow all work out:

1. Pope St. Pius V in Quo Primum guaranteed the right of every priest in the Roman Rite to celebrate the TLM; he stated that nobody could force a priest to do otherwise. He guaranteed the faithful, therefore, the right to assist at this Mass, which he prohibited anyone from attempting to abrogate. Ever. He made Quo Primum perpetual.
2. The TLM cannot be abrogated due to its antiquity alone which, aside from more theological considerations best left to theologians, gives the priests and faithful the right to it by force of law.
3. The non-abrogation of the TLM was confirmed by Pope Benedict XVI in Summorum Pontificum and its accompanying instruction letter. Note he did not exercise any act of power to “resurrect” the TLM, he merely confirmed a preexisting fact.
4. If no Pope can abrogate the TLM, then no antipope can abrogate it, and no bishop or cardinal can do so either.
5. Moreover, even if a real pope could abrogate the TLM, no bishop or cardinal on his own could do it.
6. Furthermore, even if a real pope could abrogate the TLM, and even if a real pope issued Traditionis Custodes, the hate-ball that is Traditionis Custodes did not abrogate the TLM because of the incompetence of its writers, who failed to use the type of specific legal language necessary under canon law in order to take the extraordinary step of abrogating laws established via immemorial custom.

All of the above leads to the following conclusion regarding Cardinal Cupich’s new policy: IT IS COMPLETELY INVALID AND ILLEGAL. IT DOESN’T BIND. IT DOESN’T MATTER. IT MUST BE DEFIED.

There is no indication in the policy that it does not apply to Societies of Apostolic Life or other groups whose charter grants them the right to the TLM. In the policy document itself, it states that priests who request permission to celebrate the TLM in the Archdiocese of Chicago must include “a statement of agreement to abide by the norms set forth in this document” and also states that “in the churches oratories, or chapels” in which there are already groups celebrating the TLM, the priest ministering to these groups can request to continue this practice “except for the days noted”.

Oh, and by the way, all other traditional sacraments are out. Case-by-case exceptions can be requested, but not for ordinations or confirmations.

It is no coincidence that Bergoglio’s favorite toady in the U.S. is issuing this, and it is no coincidence that the U.S. headquarters of the Institute of Christ the King Sovereign Priest is located in Chicago. How will they respond to this outrage to Christ the King? People have speculated for years about what would happen when the Ecclesia Dei communities were pushed over a line that could not be crossed, consistent with their charisms. We may soon find out.

As an aside, I don’t see how, without pointing to Quo Primum, the Canons Regular of St. John Cantius (which celebrates both the TLM and N.O. in their beautiful church in Chicago) can celebrate the TLM on the proscribed days. Their reaction will be most interesting. I am not hopeful, but would be glad to post how wrong I was should they hold the line.

Finally, and this is only my opinion, but I believe this attack on the TLM and the Sacraments is an existential crisis for the TLM communities. A present crisis. Here, now, taking place in Chicago but affecting the whole, long before any Bergoglio thug comes to “visit”. If the faithful who desire the ancient Mass aren’t given it by one group, they will go elsewhere as long as there is an “elsewhere”. If there is no “elsewhere”, those who would be willing to assist at the N.O. would likely go to the closest halfway-decent parish near them. If these groups will not ordain their priests according to the traditional forms, then their vocations will likely also dry up. To put it mildly, it may be hard for a group without charism, priests, faithful, or money to exist.

Yes, Bergoglio and his cabal know this very well. If he is not stopped, these groups will cease to exist. Whether this occurs by unjust discipline and censures, or by the abandonment of their charism hardly matters.

Cardinal Burke has splendidly led by example in the wake of Traditionis Custodes by publicly celebrating the TLM. It sends a visible message that people will rally around. I pray His Eminence will continue to lead by ordaining priests in the traditional ritual. I think it only takes one Cardinal, or perhaps a few bishops, to render this attack a dead letter.

If any of the former Ecclesia Dei communities simply ignores the invalid orders of this anti-Catholic cabal and just– simply, resolutely– celebrates the Mass of the Ages as before, it would render this attack a dead letter.

Please, dear Catholic priests and bishops, stand!

Our Lady of Fatima, pray for us!

“As every natural support falls away, let us fix our eyes on Him.”

A beautiful Christmas essay by John Zmirak at The Stream:

A Weary World Rejoices
By JOHN ZMIRAK Published on December 24, 2021

I suppose it’s a kind of privilege, of the kind one never asks for:

We now live in times of an uncanny similitude to the very first Christmas in history. We’re ex-citizens, now subjects, of a once-great and free republic. Wealth, corruption, and luxury bloated it into an empire. We are ruled by a senile reprobate no better than Tiberius, whose lucid intervals yield tyrannical mandates for local Herods to enforce on various innocents. Those who defy his dictates face a winter of “severe illness and death.”

Our religious leaders, mostly, ape the Sadducees of the Temple, who truncated the Law, denied the afterlife, and carefully flattered Caesar. The ruler of my own church, Pope Francis, has taught that every Catholic is obliged to profit from abortion by taking the COVID vaccine. “It was Caiaphas who had given counsel to the Jews that it was expedient that one man should die for the people.” (John 18: 14)

Like Fake Doubloons on Mardi Gras

Meanwhile our fellow citizens throw away their liberties with both hands, tossing their ancestors’ birth-right, hard won in rebellion and war, like fake doubloons on Mardi Gras. The same judges who rule that our Constitution so protects our privacy that it licenses abortion … would have the hostess at TGI Fridays demand our vaccine passports. Germany, which my father helped General George Patton to liberate, now locks down its citizens and flouts the Nuremburg Code.

So does the rest of the West, where governments force experimental treatments into our bodies without our free consent. Our unhinged medical establishment embraces Dr. Mengele’s medical ethics, demanding hundreds more organs from unborn babies for COVID research. Meanwhile, our hospitals deny cheap, safe life-saving treatments, obedient not to Hippocrates but to Fauci, Pfizer, and China. Our elites won’t let us rest until we’re lining up to beg Leviathan for fresh injections every three months, whipped up to eye-rolling panic by sanitized, centralized media.

Can We Still Listen to the Hymn?

To look at all this without flinching and write the truth each day takes its toll, my friends. This Advent in particular I have stumbled like Frodo through Mordor. Remember the scene in The Return of the King where he looks up at Sam and says:

I can’t recall the taste of food, nor the sound of water, nor the touch of grass. I’m naked in the dark. There’s nothing — no veil between me and the wheel of fire. I can see him with my waking eyes.
It’s especially hard to hear my favorite Christmas hymns. For instance, “O Holy Night.” There’s no other song so poignant, heartfelt, and true about what Our Savior has meant to mankind.

How Weary the World

But this year? As soon as the singer reaches “the weary world rejoices” I break down sobbing, and have to stop listening. Never before have I realized just how weary the world can leave us. I’m huddled with Jeremiah as he watches Jerusalem crumble.

That infant King in the manger sleeps at the very eye of this storm. His coming in the flesh is the only proof that human life is sacred — not cheap as it seems to the pagans, who piled high their unwanted babes all along the walls of Rome. His pierced hand, outreached to our hearts, is what licenses our freedom. If He would be our friend, then each of us must have dignity, beyond and above the Collective. (“He appeared and the soul felt its worth.”) Christ never called termites “friends.”

Faith Needs Hope

In the darkest times, like these, the tenderness and delicacy, the very beauty and goodness that blaze forth from the Virgin and Child can sear your soul, not console it. They remind us of what is threatened, warn us what might be lost: a civilization, and laws, and art, and a whole mode of living built around the truths that Jesus revealed to us. All tottering, it seems, on the brink of a vast abyss of lies spoken through dirty masks, enforced by bayonets and bullhorns. (“Chains shall He break for the slave is our brother; / And in His name all oppression shall cease.”)

If God has led us this far, to find the manger in Bethlehem, will He not grant us the strength to trust that Herod can’t hunt it down? I wonder sometimes. What a dubious privilege it would be, to have the Faith to love Jerusalem and mourn her, but lack the Hope that promises her renewal and restoration.

Only He can give us that, the child who sleeps in the Virgin’s arms. Let’s pray that He does, each night and each day, as each of us staggers under the weight of his cross, his Ring. As every natural support falls away, let us fix our eyes on Him.

Beautiful Christmas Message from Archbishop Viganó

Thanks to Lifesite News, I post this in full. It should be read in full. Christ has conquered. Be steadfast! Rejoice! Endure and Triumph with Him!

——————————

“Come, O Wisdom, who orders earthly events; come to teach the way of prudence and of glory.” 

These words are taken from a very ancient hymn for Advent which dates to the eighth century. In them the Christian soul invokes the coming of Our Lord Jesus Christ, the Wisdom of the Father, so that he may show us how to pass through this valley of tears unharmed – the via prudentiæ – and attain eternal beatitude in heaven – la via gloriæ. 

I address all of you, dear brothers and sisters, who during these twenty-one months of medical madness have courageously resisted the blackmails of a civil authority everywhere enslaved to globalist power, in the betrayal of the natural law and of God, and in the violation of the laws of nations. A planetary coup d’etat that seeks to make possible the Great Reset which will be used to establish the hateful tyranny of the New World Order. 

I address first of all you who are mothers and fathers of families, who in this hour of resurgence of the absurd repressions of fundamental liberties find yourselves having to pay for your decision not to subject yourselves to the so-called vaccination with the segregation and discrimination of you and your children. Their fragile psycho-physical equilibrium has already been crudely compromised by months of distance-learning, the imposition of masks, and hammering from their teachers.

The authorization of the gene serum for children, which today is presented as an indispensable and safe method for containing a virus that does not represent even a minimal threat to them and which instead puts their immune system and their health at irreversible risk, is the latest wicked decision made by people who are corrupt in soul and misguided in mind, for whom the innocent life of a child can be sacrificed on the altar of the health Moloch.

Be intrepid defenders of your little ones, for whom you are responsible before God both for their physical health and for the salvation of their souls. Place them under the protective mantle of the Most Holy Virgin, consecrating them to the one who along with Saint Joseph succeeded in stealing away from the fury of Herod “the threatened life of the little baby Jesus,” fleeing to Egypt. Do not forget, dear parents, that the Lord looks at children with a special love, and he will not fail to assure them and you of His Holy protection.

To you employees and workers, who have been suspended from work and deprived of pay because you did not want to yield to vaccine blackmail; to you artisans and shopkeepers, restaurant operators and small business owners, on whom the State has imposed unjustified closures that have served no purpose other than to impoverish you; to you military and law enforcement personnel who have been forced to choose between hierarchical obedience and your oath of fidelity to the Constitution; to you doctors and paramedics, expelled from hospitals, clinics, and nursing homes for not allowing yourself to be inoculated with the gene serum – to all of you I say: resist!

Those who would like to force you by means of extortion to put your health at risk fear your determination and know that it can be a comfort and an example for your colleagues and friends. Resist because you have the sacrosanct right to refuse a health treatment that has demonstrated itself to be ineffective and harmful, which constitutes gene therapy and which is not aimed at guaranteeing you health and protection, but rather intends to make you chronically ill or to exterminate you. Resist because it is not by yielding to blackmail that you will reconquer the freedoms that have been stolen from you. Resist because as children of God you know that you have the Lord of Time and History on your side, and not an acolyte of the corrupt in the service of the Evil One.

To you, the elderly and sick, forced to remain inside retirement homes or hospital wards; to you who have been segregated from your families and your loved ones, treated as outcasts by doctors and nurses, I say: do not allow yourselves to be disheartened by your loneliness; do not fall into despair and desperation!

You have the possibility of putting your sufferings to good use, offering them to the Lord in union with His suffering on the Cross for the remission of your sins, in reparation for offenses against God, and in suffrage for the souls in Purgatory. Pray! Pray to the Most Holy Virgin, asking her to help you and protect you. Recite the Holy Rosary, asking the Blessed Mother to save our beloved Italy and the whole world from this infernal scourge. Pray to the Saints, asking them to be your friends and to be near you in the hours of silence and abandonment. Pray to the Angels, asking them to protect others who are sick, so that they can receive the Sacraments and have the grace of going to Confession and having a holy death, with the comfort of the presence of a priest. 

Offer your sufferings, your anguish, and your tears to Our Lord, and in return, He will give you the gift of His peace and of holy abandonment to His will. And do not neglect to keep yourself in the grace of God, because you are not given to know either the day or the hour. 

To all of you, ready to fight the good fight for the Truth and for the end of this dystopian nightmare; to you who face derision and insults from those who consider you socially dangerous only because you do not surrender yourselves to mass experimentation, I say: courage! do not give in now!

This criminal farce, made up of lies and deceptions, will not last long, because it is only the Truth that makes us free. Your battle for the Truth, if waged for the glory of God, will defeat the darkness of fraud, will unveil the evil intentions of the elite, and will dispel those who are corrupt and traitors. And do not allow yourselves to be seduced by those who, in the imminence of the collapse of this castle of criminal falsehoods, will try to convince you that is useless to struggle, useless to fight. They are telling you that you are just a few thousand people, that you represent a minority, they will come to “track you down” door to door, that you are deserters.

Yet, it is enough to look at the people in line outside of pharmacies, or the job vacancies in businesses, schools, public offices and hospitals in order to understand that you are, that we are, many more than they would like us to believe. And even if we were few, our strength does not lie in numbers but in having made the right choice and in wanting to defend it courageously. 

When this crime is denounced and condemned, history will thank you and only you for your coherence and your fidelity to the Good. It will not thank those who have segregated you and discriminated against you, calling you infectors. It will not thank those who have blackmailed you and deprived you of work and of legitimate pay. It will not thank those who have deceived you, calling an experimental serum “safe” that is in fact ineffective, dangerous and even lethal. It will not thank those who have taken advantage of the faith placed in them by simple people, who will find themselves betrayed and stricken with health problems.

May you know how to resist, with your gaze turned toward God, whom we call “Our Father” precisely because he loves us and protects us as a loving Father and never abandons us. 

And if these trials seem painful and unsustainable to you, think of how they represent an anticipation of that infernal world of the New World Order, from which Jesus Christ and every sign of the Catholic faith must be banished. Return to God! Understand that peace, concord, and prosperity are not obtained by breaking God’s Commandments, nor by blaspheming His Name, legitimizing sin, and celebrating vice. True peace, which is the stability of order and the mirror of Divine Justice, is obtained only where Christ the King reigns, where the laws are conformed to the Good, and where every discipline and art is aimed at the greater glory of God.

Dear brothers and sisters, I invite all of you, I exhort all of you to celebrate this Holy Christmas in its true spiritual dimension. Let the Infant King be born in your heart, beginning with a good Confession and receiving Holy Communion with devotion. Think of your soul, and the Lord will take care of the rest. Turn your thoughts to the Holy Family, turned away from the inn and forced to find shelter in a cave. May their blessed poverty and their apparent segregation be a consolation for all of you.

In the midst of the social distancing and ostracization that has been imposed on those who are the weakest and the most in need, the magnificence of God does not fail to shine forth powerfully, with the choirs of Angels above the manger, the simple gifts of the shepherds, and the adoration of the Magi. Let us all place ourselves in a corner of that cave, contemplating the infinite Love that moved the Second Person of the Most Holy Trinity to become Incarnate, being born amid sufferings and being prepared even from the cradle for His Redemptive Sacrifice. 

I extend to all of you my most sincere wishes for a Holy Christmas. A Christmas that will be truly holy, if you know how to celebrate it by remaining close to the Infant Jesus. A Christmas that will not be spent in solitude and anguish, but in the blessed company of the Holy Family and in the joy of the Birth of the Savior of the world. With all my heart I bless you.

+ Carlo Maria Viganò, Archbishop 

19 December 2021

In Vigilia Nativitatis Domini

Translation of extract from today’s Martyrology:

December 25th 2021, the 21st day of the Moon, 

In the year 5199th from the creation of the world, when in the beginning God created the heavens and the earth, in the year 2957th from the flood, in the year 2015th from the birth of Abraham, in the year 1510th from the going forth of the people of Israel out of Egypt under Moses, in the year 1032th from the anointing of David as King, in the 65th week according to the prophecy of Daniel, in the 194th Olympiad, in the 752nd from the foundation of the city of Rome, in the 42nd year of the reign of the Emperor Octavian Augustus, in the 6th age of the world, while the whole earth was at peace, Jesus Christ, Himself Eternal God and Son of the Eternal Father, being pleased to hallow the world by His most gracious coming, having been conceived of the Holy Ghost, and when nine months were passed after His conception, (all kneel down) was born of the Virgin Mary at Bethlehem of Juda made Man, Our Lord Jesus Christ was born according to the flesh.

Miserando

Man thinks ’cause he rules the earth he can do with it as he please
And if things don’t change soon, he will
Oh, man has invented his doom
First step was touching the moon

Now, there’s a woman on my block
She just sit there as the night grows still
She say who gonna take away his license to kill?

Now, they take him and they teach him and they groom him for life
And they set him on a path where he’s bound to get ill
Then they bury him with stars
Sell his body like they do used cars

Now, there’s a woman on my block
She just sit there facin’ the hill
She say who gonna take away his license to kill?

Now, he’s hell-bent for destruction, he’s afraid and confused
And his brain has been mismanaged with great skill
All he believes are his eyes
And his eyes, they just tell him lies

But there’s a woman on my block
Sitting there in a cold chill
She say who gonna take away his license to kill?

Ya may be a noisemaker, spirit maker
Heartbreaker, backbreaker
Leave no stone unturned
May be an actor in a plot
That might be all that you got
’Til your error you clearly learn

Now he worships at an altar of a stagnant pool
And when he sees his reflection, he’s fulfilled
Oh, man is opposed to fair play
He wants it all and he wants it his way

Now, there’s a woman on my block
She just sit there as the night grows still
She say who gonna take away his license to kill?

—Bob Dylan

Better Watch Out

Judas Was an Apostle. He Has His Successors, Too

Diocese of Quebec cancels Mass for Christmas and Epiphany. Appalling.

What should the Catholics of Quebec do? Go to Mass, God deserves our worship, and we need His Sacraments. Go to brave priests who love God more than they fear persecution from hirelings.

Support these brave men. Don’t just sit there and let the Church’s enemies abolish the Mass!

Bishops denied their flocks all over the world Easter Mass last year. At that time, we didn’t know what we know now. I thought it was outrageous then, but in charity one might have been able to chalk their decisions up to a good faith mistake in judgement, or possibly a greater mistake in overvaluing physical health over the health of souls.

Not now. The Scam has been exposed. No Bishop has an excuse to deny Christmas and Epiphany Mass to their flock in fear of an eminently proven-to-be-treatable bad cold. You have people afraid to come? Make it so they are excused from their obligation.

But to deny Mass to those who are willing to assume whatever risk there might be to their health— to deny them access to Sacraments to which they have a right— is in my view a DENIAL OF CHRIST.

So, Quebec today. Readers, will it be your diocese tomorrow? What are you prepared to do?

GO TO MASS.

True Grit

A comment on Ann B’s latest post:

Stand and Fight or Break and Run

I’m gonna walk across the desert ’til I’m in my right mind.
I won’t even think about what I left behind
Nothing back there anyway that I can call my own
Go back home, leave me alone
It’s a long road, it’s a long and narrow way
If I can’t work up to you, you’ll surely have to work down to me someday

Ever since the British burned the White House down
There’s a bleeding wound in the heart of town
I saw you drinking from an empty cup
I saw you buried and I saw you dug up
It’s a long road, it’s a long and narrow way
If I can’t work up to you, you’ll surely have to work down to me someday

Look down angel from the skies
Help my weary soul to rise
I kissed your cheek, I dragged your plow
You broke my heart, I was your friend ’til now.
It’s a long road, it’s a long and narrow way
If I can’t work up to you, you’ll surely have to work down to me someday

In the courtyard of the golden sun
You stand and fight or you break and run
You went and lost your lovely head
For a drink of wine and a crust of bread
It’s a long road, it’s a long and narrow way
If I can’t work up to you, you’ll surely have to work down to me someday

We looted and we plundered on distant shores
Why is my share not equal to yours?
Your father left you, your mother too
Even death has washed it’s hands of you
It’s a long road, it’s a long and narrow way
If I can’t work up to you, you’ll surely have to work down to me someday

This is a hard country to stay alive in
Blades are everywhere, and they’re breaking my skin
I’m armed to the hilt and I’m struggling hard
You won’t get out of here unscarred.
It’s a long road, it’s a long and narrow way
If I can’t work up to you, you’ll surely have to work down to me someday

You got too many lovers waiting at the wall
If I had a thousand tongues I couldn’t count them all
Yesterday I could’ve thrown them all in the sea
Today even one may be too much for me
It’s a long road, it’s a long and narrow way
If I can’t work up to you, you’ll surely have to work down to me someday

Cake walking baby, you could do no wrong
Put your arms around me where they belong
I wanna take you on a roller coaster ride
Lay my hands all over you, tie you to my side
It’s a long road, it’s a long and narrow way
If I can’t work up to you, you’ll surely have to work down to me someday

I’ve got a heavy stacked woman with a smile on her face
And she has crowned my soul with grace
I’m still hurting from an arrow that pierced my chest
I’m gonna have to take my head and bury it between your breasts
It’s a long road, it’s a long and narrow way
If I can’t work up to you, you’ll surely have to work down to me someday

Been dark all night but now it’s dawn
The moving finger is moving on
You can guard me while I sleep
Kiss away the tears I weep
It’s a long road, it’s a long and narrow way
If I can’t work up to you, you’ll surely have to work down to me someday

I love women, and she loves men
We’ve been to the west and we’re going back again
I heard a voice at the dusk of day
Saying, “Be gentle brother, be gentle and pray.”
It’s a long road, it’s a long and narrow way
If I can’t work up to you, you’ll surely have to work down to me someday

Narrow Way, by Bob Dylan