Restoring the Sacred
Tuesday, October 10, 2017
Fr. Schall: On Hatred
From The Catholic Thing Blog, October 9, 2017:
Where did this “hate language” business come from anyhow? Its origin was in the now largely successful endeavor to overturn the moral structure of civil society. Generally speaking, this transformation was accomplished through the deft usage of “rights talk.” What was once called, on rational grounds, a disorder or vice became first tolerated, then finally a “right.” Once it became a “right,” then for anyone to call it a sin or evil became a slander, an attack on transformed human dignity and pride.
https://www.thecatholicthing.org/2017/10/09/on-hatred/
Monday, October 9, 2017
Sunday, October 8, 2017
Saturday, October 7, 2017
Fr. Nix: Mary: God's First Love
From the Blog of Fr. Nix today:
http://www.padreperegrino.org/2017/10/07/mary-first-love/
One last time, St. Bonaventure’s quote: “God could make a bigger world or a wider sky, but He could not raise a pure creature higher than Mary.” This means that Mary’s soul was planned before the creation of earth to be so beautiful that it would outdo the combined beauty of the souls of all the saints, all the heroic acts of the martyrs, all the beauty of a newly born baby, all the beauty of uncharted planets with their own unknown Grand Canyons and even more glorious than the invisible world of angels. Such is the soul of Mary.
Fr. Rutler's Weekly Column October 8, 2017
Father Rutler's Weekly Column
October 8th, 2017
October 8th, 2017
When a mathematical problem stumped Professor Einstein, he played Mozart on his violin to put him “in touch with the harmony of the cosmos,” and often the solution followed. It does not require genius to sense that all relations in the creation are harmonious. Only because of celestial harmony is there a human intuition that wrong is wrong and right is right.
“Music” first meant being charmed by what Greeks like Hesiod called the Muses. To climb up to their mount, Helicon or Olympus, was to be “amused,” and to return from that peak was to bring happy harmony to a dissonant world. Wanting to be amused is a desire to become part of the cosmic harmony. In physics six centuries before the Incarnation, Pythagoras discovered how harmonies issue from the ratios of vibrating strings, concluding that music, based on ratios of numbers, is the definitive principle ordering the world. Two centuries later, Aristotle figured out that the planets and stars, arranged in harmonic ratios, produce the “music of the spheres.”
The Eternal Ratio, or Logos, is Christ, and the noisy darkness, to paraphrase St. John, has never overcome him. Union with Christ is, in reality and not myth, like climbing the mount to meet the Muses: “But you are come to Mount Sion and to the city of the living God, the heavenly Jerusalem” (Hebrews 12:22).
Although Plato did not think in terms of evil, he did think of ignorance and confusion as the opposites of harmony. In the sixth century after the Resurrection, Boethius said in Platonic terms that morality is harmony with the music of the spheres. In the Eucharist, as the Second Vatican Council taught, the song of the Heavenly Jerusalem is brought to our earthly altars, like the singing angels ascending and descending Jacob’s ladder (Sulam Yaakov). Pope Benedict XVI wrote: “Liturgy presupposes . . . that the heavens have been opened . . . If the heavens are not open, then whatever liturgy was is reduced to role playing and, in the end, to a trivial pursuit of congregational self-fulfillment in which nothing really happens.”
Last week as we celebrated the feast of our patron, Saint Michael the Archangel, in the Hammerstein Ballroom just a two-minute walk east of our church, a “Heavy Metal Anti-Christ Superstar” who calls himself a “Priest of the Church of Satan,” screamed noise, for which the audience paid up to four hundred dollars to be amused. Now a bit long in the tooth, he said in 1996: “Hopefully, I’ll be remembered as the person who brought an end to Christianity.” A collapsing stage set ended his performance by knocking him unconscious.
I do not play the violin as well as Einstein, but as a priest, in contrast to the “Honorary Priest of Satan,” even my faltering voice can bring the song of the Heavenly Jerusalem to our altar in Hell’s Kitchen.
“Music” first meant being charmed by what Greeks like Hesiod called the Muses. To climb up to their mount, Helicon or Olympus, was to be “amused,” and to return from that peak was to bring happy harmony to a dissonant world. Wanting to be amused is a desire to become part of the cosmic harmony. In physics six centuries before the Incarnation, Pythagoras discovered how harmonies issue from the ratios of vibrating strings, concluding that music, based on ratios of numbers, is the definitive principle ordering the world. Two centuries later, Aristotle figured out that the planets and stars, arranged in harmonic ratios, produce the “music of the spheres.”
The Eternal Ratio, or Logos, is Christ, and the noisy darkness, to paraphrase St. John, has never overcome him. Union with Christ is, in reality and not myth, like climbing the mount to meet the Muses: “But you are come to Mount Sion and to the city of the living God, the heavenly Jerusalem” (Hebrews 12:22).
Although Plato did not think in terms of evil, he did think of ignorance and confusion as the opposites of harmony. In the sixth century after the Resurrection, Boethius said in Platonic terms that morality is harmony with the music of the spheres. In the Eucharist, as the Second Vatican Council taught, the song of the Heavenly Jerusalem is brought to our earthly altars, like the singing angels ascending and descending Jacob’s ladder (Sulam Yaakov). Pope Benedict XVI wrote: “Liturgy presupposes . . . that the heavens have been opened . . . If the heavens are not open, then whatever liturgy was is reduced to role playing and, in the end, to a trivial pursuit of congregational self-fulfillment in which nothing really happens.”
Last week as we celebrated the feast of our patron, Saint Michael the Archangel, in the Hammerstein Ballroom just a two-minute walk east of our church, a “Heavy Metal Anti-Christ Superstar” who calls himself a “Priest of the Church of Satan,” screamed noise, for which the audience paid up to four hundred dollars to be amused. Now a bit long in the tooth, he said in 1996: “Hopefully, I’ll be remembered as the person who brought an end to Christianity.” A collapsing stage set ended his performance by knocking him unconscious.
I do not play the violin as well as Einstein, but as a priest, in contrast to the “Honorary Priest of Satan,” even my faltering voice can bring the song of the Heavenly Jerusalem to our altar in Hell’s Kitchen.
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E-Mail from Fr. Maximilian Mary of Jesus Crucified Oct 7, 2017
A photo from my Temporary Profession as a Diocesan Hermit on Sept. 12th. I'm lying prostrate as the Nuns sing the Te Deum in thanksgiving to God for the grace of my Profession. Bishop Ronald Gainer is to the left with Fr. John Szada (Chaplain to the Nuns), 2 altar servers from the Academy of St. Louis De Montfort, and Mr. Byron Whitcraft (one of the 2 witnesses to sign my Profession of Vows).
Ave Maria!
Feast of Our Lady of the Most Holy Rosary
Dear Novena Family,
Thank you to all who have enrolled in the All Souls Latin Mass Novena and to the many who made donations. May God and His Holy Mother reward you!
Those who have not enrolled yet, but would like to, can go to www.novenamasses.org or click on the link below. I will send out a final alert towards the end of October.
In Corde Matris,
Fr. Maximilian Mary of Jesus Crucified
P.S. I've included some spiritual commentary on the Las Vegas massacre below for those who might be interested.
ALL SOULS
LATIN MASS NOVENA
Click HERE to Enroll now
A photo from my Temporary Profession as a Diocesan Hermit on Sept. 12th. I'm lying prostrate as the Nuns sing the Te Deum in thanksgiving to God for the grace of my Profession. Bishop Ronald Gainer is to the left with Fr. John Szada (Chaplain to the Nuns), 2 altar servers from the Academy of St. Louis De Montfort, and Mr. Byron Whitcraft (one of the 2 witnesses to sign my Profession of Vows).
Be assured of my poor prayers and please pray for me...
What I am about to share, and admittedly I was hesitant to do this, is not primarily about the Las Vegas shooter or the victims or myself; rather, I recount this because I think it illustrates how God gently, but concretely calls upon us to pray and do penance for the conversion of poor sinners in simple, concrete ways.
On Sunday, Oct. 1st, after praying Compline, I went to sleep peacefully in my hermitage cell. Slightly after 1am (E.T.) I woke up with heartburn. I offered it up for the triumph of Mary's Immaculate Heart and got up to take an antacid. Since I clearly was not going to be able to go back to sleep right away I went to the Chapel, greeted Jesus in the Blessed Sacrament, and took my Breviary back to my cell. I propped my pillow against the wall and sat up in my bed. I glanced at the clock; it was 1:08am. Then I began Matins and Lauds for Oct. 2nd, Feast of the Guardian Angels.
Regem Angelorum Dominum, Venite, adoremus was the Invitatory Antiphon: "Come, let us adore the King and Lord of the Angels."
Little did I know that as I was offering up this minor discomfort and saying my Divine Office there were over 20,000 souls under attack by a shooter in Las Vegas. Around 10:15, only 10 minutes after the shooting had begun - and it's obvious that killer intended to keep shooting - the terrorizing bullets stopped. Apparently things didn't unfold the way the gunman had thought they would; in fact a security guard named Jesus Campos had come to his door. That would have happened when I was praying this Antiphon:
Deus meus misit Angelum suum, et conclusit ora leonum, et non nocuerunt mihi - "My God sent His Angel, and He closed the lions' mouths, and they did not harm me."
For me, there was nothing extraordinary about what I was doing - I was just a useless servant fulfilling his priestly duty; but the next morning when a priest told me what had happened in Las Vegas and when I saw the timeline of events, I couldn't help but marvel. To be sure, I wasn't the only one led to pray and offer sacrifices at that fatal hour; but Our Lord allowed me to see the correlation of my own prayers and sacrifices with what was happening in Las Vegas.
Lesson: fulfilling our daily Christian duties has impact on the fate of the world.
Another lesson: God wants our love, prayers and sacrifices; these give Him glory and unleash graces for poor sinners.
As we finish this year, 100th anniversary of the apparitions at Fatima, Our Lady seems to be inviting us now - as she did the little shepherd children then - "Sacrifice yourselves for sinners, and say many times, especially when you make some sacrifice: 'O Jesus, it is for love of You, for the conversion of sinners, and in reparation for the sins committed against the Immaculate Heart of Mary.' " Sr. Lucia explains, "Many persons, feeling that the word penance implies great austerities, and not feeling that they have the strength for great sacrifices, become discouraged and continue a life of lukewarmness and sin." But Our Lord explained to her that "the sacrifice required of every person is the fulfillment of his duties in life and the observance of My law. This is the penance that I now seek and require."
Let me quote the sobering words I myself uttered after Sept.11th, 2001, in an article printed by the National Catholic Register: "If life is not safe in its mother's womb - which, naturally speaking, should be the safest place for human life in the entire universe - then it is not safe anywhere." Or, to quote St. Teresa of Calcutta speaking to President Clinton and company at the National Prayer Breakfast in Washington, D.C., in 1997: "What is taking place in America is a war against the child. And if we accept that the mother can kill her own child, how can we tell other people not to kill one another?" That is our situation and without conversion of mind and heart what happened in Las Vegas can and will repeat itself with horrifying variations. The victims of abortion are not only the unborn child and its mother, but the whole of society.
In conclusion, events like this are never without hope. In reflecting upon the tragedy I couldn't help but think of the words of St. Maximilian Mary Kolbe, "Love is stronger than hatred." He used to repeat this to his confreres before he was arrested and sent to the concentration camp in Auschwitz. Indeed, the love of Christ Crucified and Risen from the dead endures; His light shatters the darkness; His victory over sin, Satan and eternal death is definitive. Let us enter into His victory of light, love and life and do our part to usher in the triumph and reign of the Immaculate Heart of Mary.
"In the end, my Immaculate Heart will triumph!"
Our Lady of Fatima (July 13, 1917)
Friday, October 6, 2017
Thursday, October 5, 2017
Anthony Esolen: The Pleasures of Virtue
From The Catholic Thing today:
https://www.thecatholicthing.org/2017/10/05/the-pleasures-of-virtue/
Virtue, as the perpetual adolescent known as modern man will not understand, is not a restraint upon freedom but a liberating power. If you abuse your knees you will not enjoy an alternative form of walking. You will be a cripple. If you abuse your moral powers, you will be a moral cripple.
Wednesday, October 4, 2017
THE ROSARY: Spiritual Sword of Our Lady (Trailer)
From Fr. Heilman today:
This was filmed in my parish – St. Mary of Pine Bluff – before nearly 500 people on September 8, 2017 – The Nativity of Mary.
I’ve tried to describe the evening to many … it was the weight of the Holy Spirit as I have rarely seen in my life. Fr. Donald Calloway’s talk went almost two hours, and nobody moved. They were riveted and filled with the power of God’s grace.
This video, set to appear in February of 2018, is going to be a game changer.
Sunday, October 1, 2017
Fr. Nix Sermon Today: The Rosary Will Triumph Over Abortion
Podcasts, Sermons, TalksThe Rosary Will Triumph Over Abortion
In the TLM calendar, today is the external feast of Our Lady of the Rosary. Although this sermon deals with abortion, I tried to avoid extremely graphic descriptions of the violence. In fact, the families with whom I inquired after Mass had no problem with my vocabulary in preaching. Nevertheless, I would highly encourage parents to preview this sermon in order to first determine the level of age-appropriate listening in your family.
Nota Bene: Future sermons will probably be released on Mondays, blog posts on Thursdays.
Saturday, September 30, 2017
Bishop Gracida: Election of Pope Francis Pursuant to Universi Dominici Gregis
Bishop Rene H. Garcia, retired Bishop of Corpus Christi, is adamant that the election of Pope Francis was not valid, and in this post explains why it is important for that to be established.
https://abyssum.org/2017/09/29/even-distinguished-canonists-can-get-it-wrong-when-they-comment-on-papal-legislation-governing-conclaves/
Friday, September 29, 2017
Thursday, September 28, 2017
George Weigel vs Remnant TV vs George Weigel
George Weigel, who like our current Pontiff is dismissive of Traditional Catholicism, recently took to the pages of First Things to further disparage not only Traditionalists, but also their favorite publication: The Remnant. Chris Ferrara, president of the American Catholic Lawyers Association, and a regular columnist of The Remnant, struck back:
http://remnantnewspaper.com/web/index.php/articles/item/3444-george-weigel-scolds-remnant-tv-catholic-identity-conference
