Plinio Corrêa de Oliveira on the Carmelites

There are certain religious orders that have a perennial role in the Catholic Church. They irradiate a certain spirit that is indispensable to the Church. It is a perfume that God wants His Church to have since it is a part of her very physiognomy. So God conserves those religious orders that maintain these characteristics. Other religious orders, however, which God judges as not indispensable to the Church, decline and disappear.

Among the orders in the first category, none has so wonderful a continuity as the Order of Carmel. According to a very respectable tradition, it was founded by Elias the Prophet, that is to say, long before the birth of Our Lord. It passed through trials and sufferings, brilliant successes and great failures until the coming of St. John the Baptist, who would be a member of this spiritual family and the greatest successor of Elias. Our Lord Himself would have been close to those religious, who for a certain period would be part of the movement of the Essenes.

Then, with the New Covenant and the dispersion of the Hebrew people, the Order took the name it has today and remained at Mount Carmel until the Muslim persecutions obliged it to flee to the West. In Europe it was at the point of closure when Our Lady appeared to St. Simon Stock – who was the General of the Order – and gave him the scapular devotion. With this, a torrent of graces came to the Order.

Later, St. Teresa of Ávila and St. John of the Cross reformed a part of the Carmelite Order. This branch of reform influenced the whole trunk, and it continued to shine until it produced one of its most beautiful flowers, which was St. Therese of Lisieux. Afterward, a phenomenon of general decay set in until it experienced the tornado of bad consequences coming from Vatican, which we know.

You see that Divine Providence wants to conserve the Order of Carmel. According to private prophecies, this Order will never disappear. It will continue – from one glory to another and one trial to another – until the moment that its founder, Elias the Prophet, will return and be present in the last days of History to fight against the Antichrist, who will kill Elias. Then he will be resurrected, and see the return of Our Lord Jesus Christ for the Final Judgment.

There is, therefore, a mystery of predilection of Our Lady for this spiritual family. For this reason, it has greater longevity than other orders.

Important anniversary - 1700th anniversary of the Council of Nicea

The year 2025 marks the 1700th anniversary of the world’s first Ecumenical Council, the Council of Nicea of 325, a key moment in the history of Christianity. To mark the anniversary, Pro Tridentina (Malta) is planning a year of activities that will include seminars, lectures and other activities. 

The first Ecumenical Council in 325 was a gathering of Christian bishops in Nicea (present-day Türkiye), as the first attempt to reach consensus in the church through an assembly representing all of Christendom, and to affirm the Christian faith in the triune God. It was held under the patronage of the Emperor Constantine the Great, to affirm the faith and witness to the society around the Empire. 

This anniversary offers an opportunity to celebrate and reflect on the affirmation of faith in the Nicene Creed, as well as ponder the current situation where traditional Catholics are de facto being thrown out of the Church's structures. Further information will be posted in due course on this website. You can also contact us at:

• pro.tridentina.malta@gmail.com
• Facebook Group Pro Tridentina (Malta)
  

Abuses in the Novus Ordo Mass - sacrifice needed?

A member of Pro Tridentina (Malta) wanted to share a correspondence he had with Bro. John-Paul Ignatius Mary, OMSM several years ago. Although Brother Ignatius passed away 5 years ago (this Friday), we thought fitting to publish said correspondence to honour his memory. Obviously some information is now outdated.

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Dear Bro. Ignatius Mary, In Malta, in recent years, the Ordinary Rite of Mass is being abused in various ways, such as: priests behaving irreverently during Mass or cracking jokes, indecent attire (both males and females), no respect for Jesus in the Tabernacle, and awful music (a case in point is a parish that uses erotic music from the Eurovision Song Contest).

In the past, I've spoken to the Archbishop and other priests about this situation but the reaction was from lukewarm to outright derision.

I've stopped attending Mass since last year because it's so irreverent and I feel guilty if I attend as I would be an accomplice in all this. At least, that is how I feel.

What can I do to help in having reverent masses (whether Ordinary or eventually Extraordinary Rite if it will available). I feel at a loss and guilty.

Thank you for your patience.

Konrad (surname withheld for privacy)

Answer below

Dear Konrad,

No matter how irreverent the Mass may be said, there is no justification to stop going to Mass. You are risking your soul to hell by avoiding Mass like this.

You need to get to the Sacrament of Confession to confess your sin and return to the Mass this next weekend. There is no excuse.

These things do not invalidate the Mass. As long as the Mass is valid, Jesus is there. Why do you leave Jesus alone with the abusers?

You need to mortify your pride and instead accept the suffering of having to endure priests who abuse the liturgy and offer that suffering up to God for the conversion of those priests and for your Archbishop.

You are not an accomplice to the abuse for attending Mass. You are not the priest, you are not an altar server, you are a man sitting in the pew who has expressed his concern to the authorities. There is no complicity.

But, you disobey God to stop going to Mass over this and it is grave sin.

In terms of what to do about this situation, you need to offer up your suffering, pray, write a letter (not verbal communications) to the bishop, and if no response or inadequate response then you can write the Congregation on the Discipline of the Sacraments. In doing these things your responsibility is finished, There is nothing else you can do except to continue to offer up your suffering and to pray.

You do have a right under Canon Law to address these issues with them (Canon 212.2). In that regard Canon Law 214 says that you have a right to participate in the liturgy in accordance with legitimate norms.

When you write the bishop be business-like and factual. Detail the specific things that you believe are in violation of liturgical law and ask that these things be resolved.

If there is no resolution, if you wish, write (sending a copy of letters to and from the Bishop):

Antonio Cañizares Llovera, Cardinal, Prefect
Congregatio de Cultu Divino et Disciplina Sacramentorum
Palazzo delle Congregazioni
Piazza Pio XII, 10
00120 CITTÀ DEL VATICANO
(Vatican City)

• Bro. John-Paul Ignatius Mary

Brief biography: Bro. Ignatius Mary, OMSM(r)+ DALC, LTh, DD, CDCP. was born  in October 1955. He was a writer, poet, Deliverance Counselor, Nouthetic Counselor, Catholic Apologist, Theologian, Professor, and Spiritual Director. He held the posts of:

• Dean and Senior Professor, St. Michael Academy for Spiritual Warfare and Deliverance Counseling;
• Provost and Superior, Oblates and Missioners of St. Michael;
• Director, St. Padre Pio Center for Deliverance Counseling;
• Lord Knight of the Cross, Military Fraternity of the Legionnaires of St. Michael.

He lived a monastic life in a hermitage. Brother Ignatius Mary passed peacefully from this life to his eternal reward on 13 December 2019.

On the Number of Sins Beyond Which God Pardons No More

 

by St. Alphonsus de Liguori

"Thou shalt not tempt the Lord thy God" - Matt., 4:7

In this day's Gospel we read that having gone into the desert, Jesus Christ permitted the Devil to set Him on the pinnacle of the temple and say to Him: "If Thou be the Son of God, cast thyself down"; for the angels shall preserve Thee from all injury. But the Lord answered that in the Sacred Scriptures it is written: Thou shalt not tempt the Lord thy God. The sinner who abandons himself to sin without striving to resist temptations, or without at least asking God's help to conquer them, and hopes that the Lord will one day draw him from the precipice, tempts God to work miracles, or rather to show to him an extraordinary mercy not extended to the generality of Christians.

God, as the Apostle says, "will have all men to be saved" (1 Tim. 2:4); but He also wishes us all to labour for our own salvation, at least by adopting the means of overcoming our enemies, and of obeying Him when He calls us to repentance. Sinners hear the calls of God, but they forget them, and continue to offend Him. But God does not forget them. He numbers the graces which He dispenses, as well as the sins which (we) commit. Hence, when the time which He has fixed arrives, God deprives us of His graces, and begins to inflict chastisement. I intend to show in this discourse that when sins reach a certain number, God pardons no more. Be attentive.

St. Basil, St. Jerome, St. John Chrysostom, St. Augustine and other fathers, teach, that as God according to the words of Scripture, "Thou hast ordered all things in measure, and number, and weight" (Wis. 11:21) has fixed for each person the number of the days of his life, and the degrees of health and talent which He will give him, so He has also determined for each the number of sins which He will pardon; and when this number is completed, He will pardon no more.

"The Lord hath sent me to heal the contrite of heart" (Isa. 61:1) God is ready to heal those who sincerely wish to amend their lives, but cannot take pity on the obstinate sinner. The Lord pardons sins, but He cannot pardon those who are determined to offend Him. Nor can we demand from god a reason why He pardons one a hundred sins, and takes others out of life and sends them to Hell, after three or four sins. By His Prophet Amos, God has said: "For three crimes of Damascus, and for four, I will not convert it" (1:3). In this we must adore the judgments of God, and say with the Apostle: "O the depth of the riches, of the wisdom, and of the knowledge of God! How incomprehensible are His judgments" (Rom. 11:33). He who receives pardon, says St. Augustine, is pardoned through the pure mercy of God; and they who are chastised, are justly punished. 

How many has God sent to Hell for the first offense? St. Gregory relates, that a child of five years, who had arrived at the use of reason, for having uttered a blasphemy, was seized by the Devil and carried to Hell. The divine Mother revealed to that great servant of God, Benedicta of Florence, that a boy of twelve years was damned after the first sin. Another boy of eight years died after his first sin, and was lost. You say: I am young; there are many who have committed more sins than I have. But is God on that account obliged to wait for your repentance if you offend Him? In the Gospel of St. Matthew (21:19), we read that the Saviour cursed a fig tree the first time He saw it without fruit. "May no fruit grow on thee henceforward forever. An immediately the fig tree withered away." You must, then tremble at the thought of committing a single mortal sin, particularly if you have already been guilty of mortal sins.

"Be not without fear about sin forgiven, and add not sin to sin" (Eccl. 5:5). Say not then, O sinner: "As God has forgiven me other sins, so He will pardon me this one if I commit it." Say not this; for, if to the sin which has been forgiven you add another, you have reason to fear that this new sin shall be united to your former guilt, and that thus the number will be completed, and that you shall be abandoned. Behold how the Scripture unfolds this truth more clearly in another place. "The Lord patiently expecteth, that when the day of judgment shall come, He may punish them in the fullness of sins" (II. Mac. 6:14). God waits with patience until a certain number of sins is committed but, when the measure of guilt is filled up, He waits no longer, but chastises the sinner. "Thou hast sealed up my offenses as it were in a bag" (Job 14:17). Sinners multiply their sins without keeping any account of them; but God numbers them, that, when the harvest is ripe, that is, when the number of sins is completed, He may take vengeance on them. "Put ye in the sickles, for the harvest is ripe" (Joel 3:13).

Of this there are many examples in the Scriptures. Speaking of the Hebrews, the Lord in one place says: "All the men that have tempted Me now ten times. . . .shall not see the land" (Num. 14:22, 23). In another place, He says, that He restrained His vengeance against the Amorrhites, because the number of their sins was not completed. "For as yet the iniquities of the Amorrhites are not at the full" (Gen. 15:16). We have again the example of Saul who, after having disobeyed God a second time, was abandoned. He entreated Samuel to interpose before the Lord in his behalf. "Bear, I beseech thee, my sin, and return with me, that I may adore the Lord" (I Kings 15:25). But, knowing that God had abandoned Saul, Samuel answered: "I will not return with thee, because thou hast rejected the word of the Lord, and the Lord hath rejected thee," etc. (5:26). Saul, you have abandoned God, and He has abandoned you. 

We have another example in Balthassar, who, after having profaned the vessels of the Temple, saw a hand writing on the wall, Mane, Thecel, Phares. Daniel was requested to expound the meaning of these words. In explaining the word Thecel, he said to the king: "Thou art weighed in the balance, and art found wanting" (Dan. 5:27). By this explanation, he gave the king to understand that the weight of his sins in the balance of divine justice, had made the scale descend. "The same night Balthassar, the Chaldean king, was killed" (Dan. 5:30). Oh! how many sinners have met with a similar fate! Continuing to offend God till their sins amounted to a certain number, they have been struck dead and sent to Hell! "They spend their days in wealth, and in a moment they go down to Hell" (Job 21:13). Tremble, brethren, lest if you commit another mortal sin, God should cast you into Hell.

If God chastised sinners the moment they insult Him, we should not see Him so much despised. But, because He does not instantly punish their transgressions, and because through mercy He restrains His anger and waits for their return, they are encouraged to continue to offend Him. "For, because sentence is not speedily pronounced against the evil, the children of men commit evil without any fear" (Eccles. 8:11). But it is necessary to be persuaded, that though God bears with us, He does not wait, nor bear with us forever. Expecting, as on former occasions, to escape from the snares of the Philistines, Samson continued to allow himself to be deluded by Delilah. "I will go out as I did before, and shake myself" (Judges 16:20). But "the Lord departed from him." Samson was at length taken by his enemies, and lost his life. The Lord warns you not to say: I have committed so many sins, and God has not chastised me. "Say not: I have sinned, and what harm hath befallen me; for the Most High is a patient rewarder" (Eccl. 5:4). God has patience for a certain term, after which He punishes the first and last sins. And the greater has been His patience, the more severe His vengeance.

Hence, according to St. Chrysostom, God is more to be feared when He bears with sinners, than when He instantly punishes their sin. And why? Because, says St. Gregory, they to whom God has shown most mercy shall, if they do not cease to offend Him, be chastised with the greatest rigor. The saint adds that God often punishes such sinners with a sudden death, and does not allow them time for repentance. And the greater the light which God gives to certain sinners for their correction, the greater is their blindness and obstinacy in sin. "For it had been better for them not to have known the way of justice, than, after they had known it, to turn back" (II Pet. 2:21). Miserable the sinners, who, after having been enlightened, return to the vomit. St. Paul says, that it is morally impossible for them to be again converted. "For it is impossible for those who were once illuminated-have tasted also the Heavenly gifts... and are fallen away, to be renewed again to penance" (Heb. 6:4, 6).

Listen, then, O sinner, to the admonition of the Lord: "My son, hast thou sinned? Do so no more, but for thy former sins pray that they may be forgiven thee" (Eccl. 21:1). Son, add not sins to those which you have already committed, but be careful to pray for the pardon of your past transgressions; otherwise, if you commit another mortal sin, the gates of divine mercy may be closed against you, and your soul may be lost forever. When then, beloved brethren, the devil tempts you again to yield to sin, say to yourself: If God pardons me no more, what shall become of me for all eternity? Should the Devil in reply, say: fear not, God is merciful; answer him by saying: What certainty or what probability have I that, if I return again to sin, God will show me mercy or grant me pardon? Behold the threat of the Lord against all who despise His calls: "Because I have called and you refused,.....I also will laugh in your destruction, and will mock when that shall come to you which you feared" (Prov. 1:24, 26). Mark the words "I also"; they mean that, as you have mocked the Lord by betraying Him again after your confession and promises of amendment, so He will mock you at the hour of death. I will laugh and will mock. But, "God is not mocked" (Gal. 6:7). "As a dog," says the Wise Man, "that returneth to his vomit, so is the fool that repeateth his folly" (Prov. 26:11). Bl. Denis the Carthusian gives an excellent exposition of this text. He says that, as a dog that eats what he has just vomited, is an object of disgust and abomination, so the sinner who returns to the sins which he has detested and confessed, becomes hateful in the sight of God.

O folly of sinners! If you purchase a house, you spare no pains to get all the securities necessary to guard against the loss of your money; if you take medicine, you are careful to assure yourself that it cannot injure you; if you pass over a river, you cautiously avoid all danger of falling into it: and for a transitory enjoyment, for the gratification of revenge, for a beastly pleasure, which lasts but a moment, you risk your eternal salvation, saying: I will go to confession after I commit this sin. And when, I ask, are you to go to confession? You say: On tomorrow. But who promises you tomorrow? Who assures you that you shall have time for confession, and that God will not deprive you of life as He has deprived so many others, in the act of sin? "Diem tenes" says St. Augustine, "qui horam non tenes." You cannot be certain of living for another hour, and you say: I will go to confession tomorrow. Listen to the words of St. Gregory: "He who has promised pardon to penitents, has not promised tomorrow to sinners" (Hom. 12 in Evan). God has promised pardon to all who repent; but He has not promised to wait until tomorrow for those who insult Him. Perhaps God will give you time for repentance, perhaps He will not. But, should He not give it, what shall become of your soul? In the meantime, for the sake of a miserable pleasure, you lose the grace of God and expose yourself to the danger of being lost forever.

Would you, for such transient enjoyments, risk your money, your honour, your possessions, your liberty, and your life? No, you would not. How then does it happen that, for a miserable gratification, you lose your soul, Heaven, and God? Tell me: do you believe that Heaven, Hell, eternity, are truths of faith? Do you believe that, if you die in sin, you are lost forever? Oh! what temerity, what folly is it, to condemn yourself voluntarily to an eternity of torments with the hope of afterwards reversing the sentence of your condemnation! "Nemo," says St. Augustine, "sub spe salutis vult aegrotare." No one can be found so foolish as to take poison with the hope of preventing its deadly effects by adopting the ordinary remedies. And you will condemn yourself to Hell, saying that you expect to be afterwards preserved from it. O folly! which, in conformity with the divine threats, has brought, and brings every day, so many to Hell. "Thou hast trusted in thy wickedness, and evil shall come upon thee, and thou shalt not know the rising thereof" (Isa. 47:10, 11). You have sinned, trusting rashly in the divine mercy: the punishment of your guilt shall fall suddenly upon you, and you shall not know from whence it comes. What do you say? What resolution do you make? If, after this sermon, you do not firmly resolve to give yourself to God, I weep over you and regard you as lost.

Plinio Corrêa de Oliveira on the Benedictines

 

To consider only one aspect of the matter, there are certain religious orders that have a perennial role in the Catholic Church. They irradiate a certain spirit that is indispensable to the Church. It is a perfume that God wants His Church to have since it is a part of her very physiognomy. So God conserves those religious orders that maintain these characteristics. Other religious orders, however, which God judges as not indispensable to the Church, decline and disappear.

One finds a similar action of Divine Providence with regard to the oldest Western order, the Benedictine Order. St. Benedict is the Patriarch of the Western monks. All of Western monasticism was born from him. He founded a religious order that spread throughout Europe and worked the conversion of the barbarians in one of the worst moments of the Church’s History.

Paradoxically, the Church at this time was contaminated by the germs of corruption of the pagan world that she had helped to destroy. On one hand, the spirit of softness and sensuality of Paganism survived in many ecclesiastics and lay faithful. On the other hand, the Church had to face the barbarian invasions. For the most part, the barbarians were heretics; they were partisans of Arianism. That is to say, the Church had enemies both inside and outside.

In this crucial situation, the Benedictine monks entered the scenario and worked for the conversion of the barbarians. The conversion of England, Ireland, Germany, Sweden, Norway, Denmark, Bohemia, Austria, and Hungary was due in great part to the work of the Benedictine Order. Its monks worked in a way that brought them much prestige.

What did they do? The modern missionary runs after the unfaithful and tries to convert him. The Benedictine missionary did not do this. He would go to an area without the Faith and found an abbey there. The abbey would begin its monastic life of praying and chanting the Divine Office and, at the same time, it would give alms to the poor, systematically work the lands, drain the swamps, and civilize the land surrounding the abbey. Because of the good example of the Benedictines in these different spheres, the Order exerted an enormous influence on souls. The surrounding villages would start to depend on the abbey. Sometimes populations would build towns and even cities around the abbeys.

So, the apostolate of the Order was to attract by its way of being. The people used to come to the Benedictine, and not the Benedictine to the people. I think it is a beautiful way to attract souls – they lived their own life, radiating their particular lustre and diffusing the perfume of the lives they led.

While some branches of the Benedictine Order were converting the barbarians, others were preparing the ground for the Middle Ages. All the spiritual, cultural, artistic, political and military development of the Middle Ages relied in great part on the Benedictines. Some historians sustain that the Spanish Reconquista relied on the Benedictines of Cluny, others present good arguments that the Holy Roman-German Empire would not even have been possible without Cluny. Cluny was not, properly speaking, a new branch. It was a movement inside the Order that gave new life to it. After some time, the Benedictines of Cluny also fell into decay.

Then, Divine Providence called on an English noble, who entered a declining Benedictine abbey and met two other saints who were fighting against the decadence. They left that abbey and founded another branch with a stricter discipline. It was so small and lacking in vocations that even St. Stephen had a doubt whether its foundation was really the will of God. He asked for a sign from Heaven.

Smiling, Our Lady, Mother of all the good initiatives in the Church, gave him a most beautiful sign. It was the arrival of a knight, the future St. Bernard of Clairvaux, who was accompanied by 30 companions. They came and asked to enter the new abbey.

The arrival of St. Bernard was no small thing. He is one of the suns of the Benedictine Order, one of the greatest devotees of Our Lady called the Doctor Mellifluus – the doctor who speaks on Our Lady with the sweetness of honey (from the Latin mel = honey). He was a man of penance and mortification, a polemicist and a fighter who faced hard combats against all the enemies of the Church at his time. One of them was Peter Abelard, a very bad man who I consider to be a precursor of Progressivism.

With his 30 knights St. Bernard gave splendor to the new branch of the Benedictine Order, which in its turn brought new life and vigor to the ensemble. It was a new aspect of the same vocation. What did this branch do? Complete silence, manual work, study, cloister. The life of cloister was only broken when the monks had to travel to preach a mission. They differed from the old Benedictine in this way of preaching missions. They also had a different habit. The Cistercians have a white habit with a black scapular, while the Benedictines have a black habit. The Cistercians practiced greater poverty than the Benedictines, their churches were simpler and more austere with simple stain glass. That poverty was necessary to correct the abuses produced by the former richness.

Step by step many branches of the Benedictine family recovered their fervor. The branch of Cluny, however, did not recover. It continued to decay until the French Revolution when the abbey of Cluny itself was destroyed. Almost nothing of the main building remained. The wrath of God fell over that institution and it was razed. Some buildings of the complex still exist, the relics of the founders remain in the city of Cluny, but the main part of the enormous abbey disappeared.

...

Inside the Benedictine family, we saw how the Cistercians became a new branch that brought fresh life to the ensemble.

These quotes by Prof. Corrêa de Oliveira were posted to commemorate the anniversary of the visit by the Founder to Subiaco's Sacro Speco Sanctuary (photo above), a place close to Saint Benedict's heart.

Remember the Fatima message!

The message of Our Lady of Fatima can be summed up in the following:

1. Our Lady came to warn the world that if people do not stop offending God another, worse war than the First World War (fighting was still going on in 1917, the year of the apparitions) will start. It did, the Second World War took place between 1939 and 1945. And it seems likely that we're on the eve of a more devastating World War (see further in points 6 and 8).

2. She asked for repentance and praying of the Rosary. 

3. Our Lady showed Lucia, Francisco and Jacinta hell when she outstretched the palms of her hands downwards. She said that most people go to hell because of the sins of the flesh which should be totally understandable given what godless age we live in where flesh dominates the actions of men. 

4. She indicated that God wishes to save sinners by consecration to Her Immaculate Heart.

(In later years Sister Lucia emphasized to Father Fuentes that Satan is engaged in a great battle with the Holy Virgin where one side will be victorious and other defeated. Everyone must choose sides, either with God or with Satan. Remember Revelation 12 which speaks of the great red dragon i.e. Satan waging war with the woman i.e. Our Lady).

5. She came to warn that Satan will succeed to reach up to the top of the Catholic Church's hierarchy.

6. She asked for consecration of Russia to Her Immaculate Heart to prevent Russia spreading atheistic communism throughout the world, fomenting wars and causing persecutions including within the Church and annihilating nations. The consecration was not done as required so Russia did spread her errors throughout the world. She also said that God will use Russia as an instrument of punishment for the sins of mankind. She said that Russia will be a scourge of the world.

7. She asked for reparation to Her Immaculate Heart to be done on the first 5 Saturdays for the ingratitude of men. What ingratitude is she speaking of? Towards her as Our Heavenly Mother who intercedes on our behalf to mitigate punishments and to appease God’s wrath. Reparation also for the blasphemies against her. 

(In later years, Lucia specifically asked the Lord Jesus why was His Mother with 7 thorns around Her Immaculate Heart. He replied that these represent the 7 blasphemies against Her as a person including Her Immaculate Conception, Her perpetual virginity and all the dogmas concerning Her person).

8. She said that in the end Her Immaculate Heart will triumph. After all the cataclysm, Her Immaculate Heart will triumph, the Era of Peace will begin and as many Catholic Saints have prophesied Russia will be converted, i.e. the Russian Orthodox Church will submit itself to the Roman Catholic Church. 

9. She also asked that we should always be willing to perform acts of sacrifice in reparation for sins. That constitutes crosses and sufferings that God would send our way. When we accept them, we mitigate the effects of sins upon the world. It should be done in the spirit of humility and self-denial.

May all be given the grace to see Fatima in its true light which it deserves to be seen in and understood.

Quotes to reflect upon (24)

From the encyclical Mediator Dei of Pope Pius XII (1947). 

23. The worship rendered by the Church to God must be, in its entirety, interior as well as exterior. It is exterior because the nature of man as a composite of body and soul requires it to be so. Likewise, because divine Providence has disposed that “while we recognize God visibly, we may be drawn by Him to love of things unseen.”[26 – Roman Missal, Preface for Christmas.] Every impulse of the human heart, besides, expresses itself naturally through the senses; and the worship of God, being the concern not merely of individuals but of the whole community of mankind, must therefore be social as well. This obviously it cannot be unless religious activity is also organized and manifested outwardly. Exterior worship, finally, reveals and emphasizes the unity of the mystical Body, feeds new fuel to its holy zeal, fortifies its energy, intensifies its action day by day: “for although the ceremonies themselves can claim no perfection or sanctity in their won right, they are, nevertheless, the outward acts of religion, designed to rouse the heart, like signals of a sort, to veneration of the sacred realities, and to raise the mind to meditation on the supernatural. They serve to foster piety, to kindle the flame of charity, to increase our faith and deepen our devotion. They provide instruction for simple folk, decoration for divine worship, continuity of religious practice. They make it possible to tell genuine Christians from their false or heretical counterparts.”[27]

24. But the chief element of divine worship must be interior. For we must always live in Christ and give ourselves to Him completely, so that in Him, with Him and through Him the heavenly Father may be duly glorified. The sacred liturgy requires, however, that both of these elements be intimately linked with each another. This recommendation the liturgy itself is careful to repeat, as often as it prescribes an exterior act of worship. Thus we are urged, when there is question of fasting, for example, “to give interior effect to our outward observance.”[28 – Roman Missal, Secret for Thursday after the Second Sunday of Lent.] Otherwise religion clearly amounts to mere formalism, without meaning and without content.  You recall, Venerable Brethren, how the divine Master expels from the sacred temple, as unworthily to worship there, people who pretend to honor God with nothing but neat and well-turned phrases, like actors in a theater, and think themselves perfectly capable of working out their eternal salvation without plucking their inveterate vices from their hearts.[29]  It is, therefore, the keen desire of the Church that all of the faithful kneel at the feet of the Redeemer to tell Him how much they venerate and love Him. She wants them present in crowds – like the children whose joyous cries accompanied His entry into Jerusalem – to sing their hymns and chant their song of praise and thanksgiving to Him who is King of Kings and Source of every blessing. She would have them move their lips in prayer, sometimes in petition, sometimes in joy and gratitude, and in this way experience His merciful aid and power like the apostles at the lakeside of Tiberias, or abandon themselves totally, like Peter on Mount Tabor, to mystic union with the eternal God in contemplation.

25. It is an error, consequently, and a mistake to think of the sacred liturgy as merely the outward or visible part of divine worship or as an ornamental ceremonial. No less erroneous is the notion that it consists solely in a list of laws and prescriptions according to which the ecclesiastical hierarchy orders the sacred rites to be performed.  

26. It should be clear to all, then, that God cannot be honoured worthily unless the mind and heart turn to Him in quest of the perfect life, and that the worship rendered to God by the Church in union with her divine Head is the most efficacious means of achieving sanctity.

10 Reasons to be a Traditional Catholic and 10 Ways to Stay a Traditional Catholic

BY FATHER CAROTA

One of the dangers of being a traditional Catholic is getting stuck on the superficial (exterior) elements of our Catholic faith and worship.  Another danger is getting caught up in the polemic battles with those who are out to destroy us.  For this reason, each one of us needs to have a life centered on God through prayer.  We love and fight for everything traditional because it protects the divine presence of God in our souls, our families and in our Church.

Here are 10 reminders why to be a traditional Catholics, (lest we forget);

1) To adore, love and serve God in the most dignified way possible in this life on earth.  The primary reason we were created was to adore, love and serve God, in this life and in the life to come in heaven.  This is what gives meaning to this life and our eternal life.

2) To defend and preserve the Catholic faith in its Ancient Liturgy and Teachings.  Lex Orandi (How we pray.) protects Lex credendi (What we believe), that leads to Lex Vivendi (How we live our lives).  And this is why we are giving our lives to defend and preserve what was passed on to us from before our time.

3) To obtain a personal union with God through the practice of this ancient Catholic faith.  In living a orthodox life and praying in a manner that pleases God, graces are given to us to obtain our final goal, a loving union with God in this life and in the one to come.

4) To grow in holiness in our ordinary daily lives.  No matter what we may believe and know about our Catholic faith, what is of paramount importance, is that it will effect our daily lives and how we live it in union with God.

5) To obtaining the graces necessary to fight the devil and our daily temptations.  We live in a constant spiritual battle for our own souls, and those around us, against the forces of evil.  God has given us the graces necessary through the traditional Latin Mass, Rites and prayers to avail ourselves with great power against the devil and his minions.  The devil hates Latin and all that is sacred.

6) To defend Catholic Dogma against heresies and false worship.  From the beginning of Christianity there has always been error introduced into the Church.  St. Paul writes about the false apostles and those who are against truth in his epistles.  And this has been part of the Church’s struggle down to today.  We need to realize that heresy will have to be fought up to the last second before Jesus’ return in Glory.

7) To obtain the graces given by God that we need for the salvation of our eternal souls.  At every Holy Mass, every Holy Communion, every confession, every time we go to adore Jesus in the Blessed Sacrament, we receive divine graces.   Every time we read the Bible, pray the Holy Rosary, we receive more graces (supernatural help from God) to not fall in sin and loose our souls forever in hell.

8) To avoid separation from God, which means eternal damnation and all of its horror.  The greatest horror is to be eternally separated from our loving union with God.  In living the traditional Catholic life there are many aids to help us on our way to avoid the pits of damnation and to find the spiritual ladders to climb out of the well, if for some terrible reason we may fall into the well of sin.

9) To help as many persons a possible to be saved through Jesus’ redeeming sacrifice.  We love God, and we love our neighbor.  Out of love, we want to share the tools that God has given to His Church, for salvation of souls.  So by preserving and sharing traditional faith, we love our neighbors as ourselves and help them get to heaven.

10) To make it easy to be holy through the natural grandeur and beauty of the Latin Mass, churches, altars and art.  The Holy Latin Mass is the “Most Beautiful Thing This Side of Heaven”.  When the solemn High Mass is offered, in its beauty, it speaks beyond what human words can express.  All over Europe, people from all over the world are awe struck at the grandeur and beauty of the Catholic churches and art. Millions of people wait hours in line just to be able to visit the traditional Sistine Chapel at the Vatican in Rome.  Divine liturgy, art and music speak on their own.

There are many more reasons why to choose to be traditional Catholics. But these are some of the essential ones. So, this being stated, the next question is how do we live this traditional Catholic life every day.

1) Love God and Neighbor.  Love of God helps us avoid what offends Him.  Love of neighbor helps us grow in virtue and is indispensable. Every day we need to work on loving God and asking Him to help us love our family, our friends, strangers and our enemies.

2) Put God first in our personal lives, our family and our work.  Priorities, priorities, priorities.  Great people always know how to prioritize.  We too need to be reminded every day to put God first.  With God in the first place, the rest seems to fit together naturally.

3) Put prayer as the most important activity in your daily routine. Living in this fast pace life, we get caught up in the stream of rushing.  We try to keep up with everything that needs to be done everyday.  Prayer, then gets put off because it takes discipline and does not come naturally. It is much easier to just go along with the flow, than to put prayer first in our day and our lives.  A day that is not started with prayer does not go that well.  We always want to put prayer as the most important activity we can do every day.  Fight the temptation to put it off till later.  Later usually never comes.

4) Be around holy people who support, challenge us and council us on how to be holy.  As we see in the Bible, Jesus gathered the apostles, disciples and friends around Him.  It is wonderful to know that Jesus knows we need Him, and other holy people, to grow spiritually.  We were not meant to be lone rangers.  Let us be humbly open to other’s suggestions and constructive criticism, especially from holy priests and religious.

5) Read the Bible and other spiritual classics written by the saints. We have a great guide to help us on our way to heaven, called the Bible. All we have to do is sit down and open it and read it.  We have thousands of older brothers and sisters (the saints) who have gone before us and cleared the path to heaven for us.  We can walk in their foot prints or try to clear the path on our own.  It is a lot safer and easier to follow their path than to re invent the wheel and highway over again.  But it will take discipline to read their writings.

6) Attend the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass as often as possible during the week.  Graces and encouragement is available at the Holy Mass everyday.  If we can only organize our day so that we can make time for this great help, we will be happier and holier for it.

7) Be attentive to the action of God in our ordinary lives as priests, religious and laity.  Most of us are just ordinary people trying to be good. The daily life of St. Joseph and Mary in Nazareth was ordinary like ours. We learn from them that the ordinary life is the ordinary way to heaven. So we want to be extraordinary saints through the ordinary life God has given us.

8) Ask God for more faith and a deeper love for Him.  Faith and love are supernatural virtues that comes from God that need to be developed. We all need more faith and love.  When we have more faith and love, we are able to put our lives (with all its difficulties) in the hands of Our Loving God.  So to grow in the virtue of faith, we need to exercise blind believing that God is behind everything that is happening to us (other than sinful actions).  To grow in Love we daily ask for the grace to do things out of love and to put love into even the tiniest event and action of our daily routine.

9) Have gratitude for the graces already present in our lives.  “The Attitude of Gratitude” is so important to keep us cheerful and steadfast on the way to holiness.  Taking time to reflect on what God has done, is doing and will continue to do in the future, helps us in the dry times of our spiritual lives.

10) Have a hatred for sin and anything that would in the slightest way offend God. Loving what God loves and hating what God hates, is a help to stay close to Him.  It is very salutary to meditate on the terrible consequences of sin in our past and in the world around us right now.  Sin is poison, a virus that kills the body and the soul.   

God has been so good to help us live holy, happy and healthy lives.  We are so blessed to have these divine treasures in the traditional Catholic Church.  Let us protect them and share them with all those who have good will.

We traditionalists know who is in charge after all; God.  And for that reason we can relax about all that is going on in the Church and in the world.  So, we enjoy each day, loving, adoring, praising and thanking God for His love, protection and goodness.

The original author of this blog passed away in July of 2016. RIP Father Carota.