Lumen ad Revelationem Gentium

The Feast of Candlemas, which derives its origin from the local observance of Jerusalem, marks the end of the Feasts included in the Christmas cycle of the liturgy. It is perhaps the most ancient festival of Our Lady. It commemorates, however, not only the obedience of the Blessed Virgin to the Mosaic Law in going to Jerusalem forty days after the birth of her Child and making the accustomed offerings, but also the Presentation of Our Lord in the Temple, and the meeting of the Infant Jesus with the old man Simeon– the Occursus Domini, as the Feast was anciently termed. This is the principal theme of the liturgy on this day: Jesus is taken to the Temple “to present Him to the Lord.” So the Lord comes to His Temple, and is met by the aged Simeon with joy and recognition.

The procession on this day is one of the most picturesque features of the Western liturgy. The blessing and distribution of candles, to be carried lighted in procession, preceded the Mass today– a symbolic presentation of the truth proclaimed in the Canticle of Simeon: Our Lord is the “Light for the revelation of the Gentiles.” The anthems sung during this procession, eastern in origin, well express the joy and gladness of this happy festival, and the honor and praise we give to our Blessed Lady and her Divine Son by this devout observance.

Entry for the Feast of the Purification of the Blessed Virgin Mary in the New Marian Missal

Wishing you and yours one last, heartfelt Merry Christmas! this season. May the beauty, hope, and joy of Our Savior’s glorious incarnation and birth arm us for the dreadful fight ahead. Septuagesima is coming this Sunday, of course, and I need not remind you of the evil of our times.

May we all beg Our Incarnate Lord and His Blessed Mother for the gift of final perseverance and a happy death, and then face the daily battle with confidence in the help of heaven.

Masses at St. Francis de Sales Oratory today: Low Masses at 8am and 12:15pm; Solemn High Mass preceded by blessing of candles and procession, 6:30pm

Man Up

This is a good time to repost the quote of St. Athanasius at the bottom of this blog. The Mass is the hill we die on. It cannot be abrogated and any attempt must be resisted:

YOU ARE THE ONES WHO ARE HAPPY; YOU WHO REMAIN WITHIN THE CHURCH BY YOUR FAITH, WHO HOLD FIRMLY TO THE FOUNDATIONS OF THE FAITH WHICH HAS COME DOWN TO YOU FROM APOSTOLIC TRADITION. AND IF AN EXECRABLE JEALOUSY HAS TRIED TO SHAKE IT ON A NUMBER OF OCCASIONS, IT HAS NOT SUCCEEDED. THEY ARE THE ONES WHO HAVE BROKEN AWAY FROM IT IN THE PRESENT CRISIS. NO ONE, EVER, WILL PREVAIL AGAINST YOUR FAITH, BELOVED BROTHERS. AND WE BELIEVE THAT GOD WILL GIVE US OUR CHURCHES BACK SOME DAY.

Forward with Faith, Hope, and Charity

I was prompted to write today after stumbling upon a twitter post that states: “Retweet if you think Pope Benedict XVI should be declared a Doctor of the Church.” That pretty much sums up where we are today.

For all the good that he did, for whatever faults he may have had, becoming a Doctor of the Church is not the product of an internet influence campaign. Or, if it become so these days, we are so far gone from any spirit of Catholicity that the mind reels at the unlikeliness of getting that spirit back. Neither is the question of which (if either)of any two persons is Pope subject to any internet influence campaign.

The gloating in some quarters over those who think that Pope Benedict XVI did not effectively resign the papal office as “sedevacantists”, or as facing a crisis of faith, or as being definitively proven wrong, betrays how little they understand of the Church, the papacy, and the duties of a Catholic. I don’t know some of the more famous internet gloaters personally, but it doesn’t speak well either for their intelligence or their honesty. One of two things happened in February 2013: Pope Benedict abdicated the papacy or he did not abdicate the papacy. That’s it. There can be at any time one pope, or none. Not two.

If he did abdicate, there is nothing in the death of Pope Benedict that changes it; if he did not, likewise, there is nothing in his death that changes that. Bergoglio, if he be not pope, does not inherit it with the passing of the pope. Nor does Bergoglio’s mere survival over his rival work to prove his claim like some trial by ordeal.

So, if the issue is not soluble, as a friend noted to me today, until a future date and/or event, do not ever abandon the Church. She is the ark of salvation, and will not fail. God loves us, and does not seek to mislead us. He has this. And Mary is on the job– she will crush the serpent’s head. And maybe cut people a break for being confused in a truly wretched time.

No matter what or when or how, the Church is the One, Holy, Catholic and Apostolic Church. It is the only true Church, founded by Christ, and outside of which there is no salvation.

And this may be a good time to state again publicly what I have said many times, and that informs any mere statement of opinion or question I ever address or have addressed concerning “the two popes” question: I accept Unam Sanctam. I willingly submit to the true Roman Pontiff, even if it is Bergoglio. If instead the seat is temporarily vacant until further events, I willingly await God’s foreordained plan and trust in His providence. This doesn’t unsay any of my opinions or questions or beliefs– not at all. It just means that as a human being who can err on all kinds of things, I could be wrong on any particular belief that is not part of the deposit of faith guaranteed by the Church. That’s it. That’s the last this unimportant layman has to say on it, unless such an event or future date makes things clear.

Therefore, keep the Faith. Have Hope. Live in Charity. This has all been foreseen by an All-loving, All-powerful God.

Our Lady of Fatima, pray for us.

Sic Transit Gloria Mundi

It is reported that Pope Benedict XVI died this morning, December 31, 2022, on the Feast of Pope Saint Sylvester.

Réquiem ætérnam dona ei Dómine; et lux perpétua lúceat ei. Requiéscat in pace. Amen.

You may recall that Sylvester is the papal name taken by the last-ever Pope in the novel Lord of the World, by Robert Hugh Benson; this Pope celebrates Mass as Our Lord returns to slay the antichrist.

I find the coincidence chilling indeed.

Who knows when the next conclave may be held? Short of the Triumph of the Immaculate Heart, I don’t know how this situation has a chance of resolution until a post-death-of-Bergoglio conclave. God have mercy on Pope Benedict, and on us.

Whatever happened that has yet to come to light, Summorum Pontificum was a great act of justice and charity. We should not forget this.

Our Lady of Fatima, pray for us!

St. joseph, pray for us!

St. Peter, pray for us!

Orémus.

Gregem tuum, Pastor ætérne, placátus inténde: et per beátum Silvéstrum Summum Pontíficem perpétua protectióne custódi; quem totíus Ecclésiæ præstitísti esse pastórem.

Per Dóminum nostrum Jesum Christum, Fílium tuum: qui tecum vivit et regnat in unitáte Spíritus Sancti, Deus, per ómnia sǽcula sæculórum.
℟. Amen.

Saying More Than He Intends?

Or perhaps he is saying what he intends to say exactly.

All Catholics should be praying for Pope Benedict XVI amid reports of his failing health, and the tremendous weight of the office of which he will one day have to render an account to the Savior Whose Vicar he is.

The great mystery of his actions nearly ten years ago, and to this day, will one day be revealed to all, at least on the Last Day. Abdication effectively made? Substantial error? Coercion? Stratagem to protect the deposit of faith? Acting on Heavenly orders? Cowardice? God knows the answer to these questions, of course. Not that we cannot observe what we see and use our brains where necessary, but these topics are well-hashed out and can be covered another day.

What I wanted to highlight are the words of Bergoglio today regarding Pope Benedict. To do that, I want to share with you the scripture passage I immediately thought of when I read it:

47The chief priests therefore, and the Pharisees, gathered a council, and said: What do we, for this man doth many miracles? 48If we let him alone so, all will believe in him; and the Romans will come, and take away our place and nation. 49But one of them, named Caiphas, being the high priest that year, said to them: You know nothing. 50Neither do you consider that it is expedient for you that one man should die for the people, and that the whole nation perish not. 51And this he spoke not of himself: but being the high priest of that year, he prophesied that Jesus should die for the nation. 52And not only for the nation, but to gather together in one the children of God, that were dispersed. 53From that day therefore they devised to put him to death.

John 11: 47-53

Now to today’s quote:

I want to ask you all for a special prayer for Pope Emeritus Benedict who sustains the Church in his silence. He is very sick.

Today’s general audience

Again, asking for prayers for Pope Benedict XVI “who sustains the Church in his silence.”

I think it highly likely that Pope Benedict has indeed sustained the Church, and yet sustains it while he lives, in his silence.

I think the prayer request of Bergoglio is awfully reminiscent of the prophecy of Caiphas in John 11. And to continue our theme I note the recent, remarkable post by Ann Barnhardt about Caiphas being one of “two” High Priests, along with Annas, when he uttered those words.

While one certainly can be accused of being Captain Obvious by noting we are in dangerous times, I think they’re about to get a lot more dangerous. After all, Fatima is still on our dance card.

Pray for the pope, the Church, and each other. Our Lady of Fatima, pray for us!

Hang Tough

Jesus Christ and His spotless bride, the Church, are the only things that matter. God is sovereign and loves us. He is the Way to Eternal Life.

Don’t fret. Trust in God’s providence and be ready.

Feast of the Immaculate Conception

At length, on the distant horizon, rises, with a soft and radiant light, the aurora of the Sun which has been so long desired. The happy Mother of the Messias was to be born before the Messias himself; and this is the day of the Conception of Mary. The earth already possesses a first pledge of the divine mercy; the Son of Man is near at hand. Two true Israelites, Joachim and Anne, noble branches of the family of David, find their union, after a long barrenness, made fruitful by the divine omnipotence. Glory be to God, who has been mindful of his promises, and who deigns to announce, from the high heavens, the end of the deluge of iniquity, by sending upon the earth the sweet white Dove that bears the tidings of peace!

The Eternal Father would not do less for the Second Eve that he had done for the First; yet she was created, as was also the first Adam, in the state of original justice, which she afterwards forfeited by sin. The Son of God would not permit that the Woman, from whom he was to take the nature of Man, should be deprived of that gift which he had given even to her who was the mother of sin. The Holy Ghost, who was to overshadow Mary and produce Jesus within her by his divine operation, would not permit that foul stain, in which we are all conceived, to rest, even for an instant, on this his Spouse. All men were to contract the sin of Adam; the sentence was universal; but God’s own Mother is not included. God, who is the author of that law; God, who was free to make it as he willed; had power to exclude from it Her whom he had predestined to be his Own in so many ways; he could exempt her, and it was just that he should exempt her; therefore, he did it.

Was it not this grand exemption which God himself foretold, when the guilty pair, whose children we all are, appeared before him in the garden of Eden? In the anathema which fell upon the serpent, there was included a promise of mercy to us. I will put enmities, said the Lord, between thee and the Woman, and thy seed and her seed: she shall crush thy head. (Genesis 3:15) Thus was salvation promised the human race under the form of a victory over Satan; and this victory is to be gained by the Woman, and she will gain it for us also. Even granting, as some read this text, that it is the Son of the Woman that is alone to gain this victory, the enmity between the Woman and the Serpent is clearly expressed, and she, the Woman, with her own foot, is to crush the head of the hated Serpent. The Second Eve is to be worthy of the Second Adam, conquering and not to be conquered. The human race is one day to be avenged, not only by God made Man, but also by the Woman miraculously exempted from every stain of sin, in whom the primæval creation, which was in justice and holiness, (Ephesians 4:24) will thus reappear in her, just as though the original sin had never been committed.

Raise up your heads, then, ye children of Adam, and shake off your chains! This day, the humiliation, which weighed you down, is annihilated. Behold! Mary, she who is of the same flesh and blood as yourselves, has seen the torrent of sin, which swept along all the generations of mankind, she has seen it flow back at her presence and not touch her; the infernal dragon has turned away his head, daring not to breathe his venom upon her; the dignity of your origin is given to her in all its primitive grandeur. This happy day, then, on which the original purity of your race is renewed, must be a Feast to you. The Second Eve is created, and from her own blood (which, with the exception of the element of sin, is the same as that which makes you to be the children of Adam), she is shortly to give you the God-Man, who proceeds from her according to the flesh, as he proceeds from the Father according to the eternal generation.

From The Liturgical Year, by Dom Gueranger

Blessed Feast Day, dear readers! Masses on this Holy Day of Obligation at St. Francis de Sales Oratory are at 8am, 12:15pm, and 6:30pm.

Vigil of the Immaculate Conception

O God, who didst wondrously preserve the Mother of Thine only-begotten Son from original sin in her Conception: grant, we beseech Thee: that strengthened by her intercession we may be ready with clean hearts to take part in her festival. Through the same Lord Jesus Christ Thy Son, who liveth and reigneth with Thee in the unity of the Holy Ghost, God, world without end. Amen. (Collect of the Mass)

O Most Holy Virgin who wast pleasing to God and didst become His Mother. Immaculate in your body, in your soul, in your faith and in your love, we beseech thee to look graciously upon the wretched who implore thy powerful protection. The wicked serpent, against whom the primal curse was hurled, continues nonetheless to wage war and to lay snares for the unhappy children of Eve. Ah, do thou, our blessed Mother, our Queen and Advocate, who from the first instant of thy conception didst crush the head of our enemy, receive the prayers that we unite single-heartedly to thine and conjure thee to offer at the throne of God, that we may never fall into the snares that are laid for us, in such wise that we may all come to the haven of salvation; and in the midst of so many dangers may holy Church and the fellowship of Christians everywhere sing once more the hymn of deliverance, victory and peace. Amen.

–Novena prayer

Presentation of the Blessed Virgin Mary

“Congratulate me, all ye that love the Lord, because when I was a little one I pleased the Most High.” Such is the invitation thou addressest to us, O Mary, in the Office chanted in thy honor; and on what feast couldst thou do so more appropriately?

When, even more little in thy humility than by thy tender age, thou didst mount, in thy sweet purity, the steps of the temple, all heaven must have owned that it was henceforth just for the Most High to take his delight in our earth. Having hitherto lived in retirement with thy blessed parents, this was thy first public act; it showed thee for a moment to the eyes of men, only to withdraw thee immediately into deeper obscurity. But, as thou wast officially offered and presented to the Lord, he himself doubtless surrounded by the princes of his court, presented thee not less solemnly to those noble spirits as their Queen. In the fullness of the new light that then burst upon them, they understood at once thy incomparable greatness, the majesty of the temple where Jehovah was receiving an homage superior to that of their nine choirs, and the august prerogative of the Old Testament to have thee for its daughter, and to perfect, by its teachings and guidance during those twelve years, the formation of the Mother of God.

Holy Church, however, declares that we can imitate thee, (Ambrose, de Virginibus, 2) O Mary, in this mystery of thy Presentation, as in all others. Deign to bless especially those privileged souls who, by the grace of their vocation, are even here below dwellers in the house of the Lord: may they be like that fruitful olive enriched by the Holy Spirit, to which St. John Damascene compares thee. (Damascene. de Fide oxthodoxa, 4) But is not every Christian, by reason of his Baptism, an indweller and a member of the Church, God’s true sanctuary, prefigured by that of Moriah? May we, through thy intercession, follow thee so closely in thy Presentation, even here in the land of shadows, that we may deserve to be presented after thee to the Most High in the temple of his glory.

–from The Liturgical Year by Dom Gueranger

A November Reminder, for No Reason at All

In light of world events, and in light of the fact that there are two bishops out there wearing white, pre- and post- Labor Day for that matter, I repost the words of Fatima visionary Sr. Lucia in the part of the Third Secret that has been released so far:

“J.M.J.

The third part of the secret revealed at the Cova da Iria-Fatima, on 13 July 1917.

I write in obedience to you, my God, who command me to do so through his Excellency the Bishop of Leiria and through your Most Holy Mother and mine.

After the two parts which I have already explained, at the left of Our Lady and a little above, we saw an Angel with a flaming sword in his left hand; flashing, it gave out flames that looked as though they would set the world on fire; but they died out in contact with the splendour that Our Lady radiated towards him from her right hand: pointing to the earth with his right hand, the Angel cried out in a loud voice: ‘Penance, Penance, Penance!’. And we saw in an immense light that is God: ‘something similar to how people appear in a mirror when they pass in front of it’ a Bishop dressed in White ‘we had the impression that it was the Holy Father’. Other Bishops, Priests, men and women Religious going up a steep mountain, at the top of which there was a big Cross of rough-hewn trunks as of a cork-tree with the bark; before reaching there the Holy Father passed through a big city half in ruins and half trembling with halting step, afflicted with pain and sorrow, he prayed for the souls of the corpses he met on his way; having reached the top of the mountain, on his knees at the foot of the big Cross he was killed by a group of soldiers who fired bullets and arrows at him, and in the same way there died one after another the other Bishops, Priests, men and women Religious, and various lay people of different ranks and positions. Beneath the two arms of the Cross there were two Angels each with a crystal aspersorium in his hand, in which they gathered up the blood of the Martyrs and with it sprinkled the souls that were making their way to God.

Tuy-3-1-1944″.