"Human Diginity" in the light of the Incarnation

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JMJ


Feast of St. John the Evangelist

While all things were in quiet silence and the night was in the midst of her course, Thine almighty Word, O Lord, leaped down from heaven from Thy royal throne. And the Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us, (and we saw His glory, the glory as it were of the only begotten of the Father,) full of grace and truth… (Wisdom 18.14-15; St. John 1.14, DRV).


It was promised of Old that God Himself will come and will save you (Isaias 35.4). God Himself comes as man, but He comes first as a poor babe born in a manger carrying the name Jesus (Emmanuel, God-is-with-us). This was God’s “first leap,” as St. Gregory the Great expresses it, “the first leap of the Infinite into human finiteness, the first step in God’s self-humiliation” (Fr. Joseph Holzner, SJ, Paul of Tarsus, p.458).

The first Adam, through the suggestion of the first Eve at the subtle instigation of the devil, thought that he could pluck out “being-like-God” from the forbidden tree. Concurring with the devil, he intended to steal divine honors: that he should sit at the throne of God as the supreme judge of what is true and false, of what is good and evil – the same great sin of the modern man: he is the standard and measure of truth, “For me…,” he quips [and this is the same breath that comes out of the mouth of many “Catholics” attached to the New “Catholic Order” (the Novus Ordo) after all the boast that they now better understand more than ever their encounter with God in the New Liturgy thanks to the revolutionary Vatican II that gave them first a revised Mass in their vulgar tongue].

But the Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, the God-man, thought it not robbery to be equal with God (St. Paul to the Philippians, 2.6). This was His rightful possession because of His eternal generation from the Father: Glorify Thou me, O Father, with Thyself, with the glory which I had, before the world was, with Thee (St. John 17.5). Nevertheless, as the second Adam to undo the injustice of the first Adam, He freely divested Himself of all external glory, and He hid his divine origin, emptied Himself, taking the form of a servant, being made in the likeness of men, and in habit found as a man (St. Paul to the Philippians, 2.7).

For God to become man is not absolutely necessary, however. In His almighty power, He could have just forgiven man and accepted penance according to man’s utmost capacity. But no, God deemed it that man must be redeemed in a most noble, effective, and admirable manner according to the measure of God’s generosity; for true love overcomes every obstacle, accepts every situation, and makes any sacrifice in order to unite us with Him Who has loved us with an everlasting love (Jeremias 31.3).

If we are to be united to God, we must do exactly what the Word did to become united to human nature; He followed the path of prodigious self-abasement, of infinite humility. Here there opens before us the path of “nada” of St. John of the Cross – the path of “nothing,” of total abnegation: “In order to possess everything, desire to possess nothing” (Ascent of Mt. Carmel, I. 13,14). We desire naturally supreme truth and supreme goodness as the final goal of all our rational strivings; and, according to St. Thomas Aquinas, because this is inborn, it cannot be vain or aimless. However, the modern godless “rationalist” man, faced with incontrovertible evidence and realizing his embarrassing folly in thinking, on one hand, that by declaring the material-physical world – in which he moves as a lesser lord and master – to be the only reality affording him a firm and solid ground on which to proclaim the non-existence of a superior Intelligence and Will, now, on the extreme, refusing to yield to the superiority of the "Middle-Ages"-Catholic-Thomistic genius which concludes that “we shall reach our ultimate end [the possession of the Supreme Truth and Supreme Goodness] only if an agent higher than our natural faculties [Who is God] actualises our intellect and fills to repletion our natural desire for knowledge,” proclaims with Vatican II the bottom line of Ecumenism: “There is no absolute truth” [except his statement which is an absolute one?]. This modern godless “rationalist” man now asks: “How do we know?” [Only plants, among the living bodily beings, do not know and so from the Catholic-Thomistic viewpoint the vegetative life is the lowest grade of life. A man who refuses to know simply because he will inevitably face the reality of God can retreat to the level of a vegetable?] He that findeth his life, shall lose it: and he that shall lose his life for Me, shall find it (the Eternal Word made flesh in St. Matthew 10.39, cf. 16.25).

Compared to the infinite humiliations of the Eternal Word made flesh, this path should not seem to us to be austere and exacting. What He asks is that we return generous love for generous love by striping ourselves everything that is not Him and hinders our union with Him: sin and our voluntary faults and imperfections; above all, let us divest ourselves of self-love, pride, vanity, all our righteous pretensions. What a striking contrast between these vain pretenses of our “ego” and the touching humility of the Incarnate Word! Sic nos amantem, quis non redamaret? Who would not love Him Who loves us so much? (Adeste Fideles). Out of love for us, Jesus Christ not only stripped Himself during His earthly life of all His greatness and majesty, but from the very first moment He embraced every possible privation. Let us consider how the Holy Child Jesus lived: rough straw, insufficient coverings, a stable for His house, and a manger for His cradle. Let us strive to strip ourselves of our love of riches, of our attachment to our material well-being, our comforts, and everything that is superfluous.

If Christ had thought and lived as we do, He would have insisted on His divine rights, he would have avenged Himself during His earthly life on everyone that offended Him, He would have legions of angels to fight for Him, He would have rained fire and brimstone from heaven, and He would have sold his life for the highest price. The Lord and Savior Jesus Christ did none of these things and we are too eager to insist on our rights, we are stubborn, and we will not yield to God and His Church and to others. God adapted Himself to us when He became man; let us learn from the Child Jesus how to come down from the little pedestal of our personality to adapt ourselves to the mentalities, preferences, and needs of our brethren. Certainly, we cannot conform to the desires of our brethren when there is question, however slight, of something in opposition to the honor and glory of God, the observance of His laws and commandments and the constant teachings and precepts of His Church, or simply because we cannot really do them, and that these would prevent us from fulfilling our duties. To do so in such cases would be culpable weakness. But there are many other ocassions when it is simply a matter of not insisting upon our personal feelings, our point of view, our own tastes, but of effacing ourselves, and considering the mentality and tastes of others. Then condescension is a solid Christian virtue, and far from being weakness, it is a beautiful proof of moral strength, of that strength which knows how to overcome self and sacrifice its ego for the sake of the Beloved. For Christian Charity does not make use of its sensitiveness to defend its own rights, to protest against the ingratitude of others [considering that God already foresaw all the ingratitude for and even mockery of His condescension], or to demand some degree of justice; rather, Christian Charity is not easily offended when it meets with a lack of refinement or consideration, and in spite of the coldness and hostility which it may encounter, it continues its one work: to give itself, and to give itself always, for the love of God and for the benefit of those who caused its suffering.

When Mary Comes… (III): Defense of Catholic Dogma & the Failed Papal 'Consecration' of Russia

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JMJ

Feast of St. Peter of Alcantara

… She upholds the Truth: The Roman Catholic Church is the one true Church of Christ and everyone must be subject to the sovereign dominion of Christ the King only through conversion to it and submission to the supreme and full primacy of jurisdiction of the Chair of St. Peter.

1. The Consecration of Russia and the Crucial Year of 1929

In the Message of July 13, 1917, the Blessed Mother had promised to Sr.Lucia that “I shall come to ask for the Consecration of Russia to My Immaculate Heart and the Communion of Reparation on the first Saturdays.” And true to her word, our Blessed Mother appeared again to Sr. Lucia dos Santos on June 13, 1929 (Sr. Lucia was still a Dorothean nun during that time, she would not become a Discalced Nun of the Order of the Blessed Virgin Mary of Mt. Carmel until 1948) where she was praying in the convent chapel during the Holy Hour of Adoration and Reparation.

We will let Sr. Lucia recount the apparition – an apparition that the Church, including Pope John Paul II, has pronounced as worthy of belief – unprecedented even among the annals of recognized heavenly apparitions to the saints of the Holy Church:

“I had requested and obtained permission from my superiors and confessor to make the Holy Hour from 11:00 pm until midnight from Thursday to Friday. Being alone one night, I knelt down before the Communion rail in the middle of the chapel to say the prayers of the Angel, lying prostrate, Feeling tired, I got up and knelt, and continued to say them with my arms in the form of a cross.

The only light came from the sanctuary lamp. Suddenly a supernatural light illumined the whole chapel and on the altar appeared a cross of light which reached to the ceiling. In a brighter part could be seen, on the upper part of the Cross, the face of a Man and His body on the waist. On His breast was an equally luminous dove, and nailed on the Cross, the body of another Man.

A little below the waist, suspended in mid-air, was to be seen a Chalice and a large Host onto Which fell some drops of Blood from the face of the Crucified and from a wound in His breast. These drops ran down over the Host and fell into the Chalice. Under the right arm of the Cross was Our Lady (Our Lady of Fatima with Her Immaculate Heart in her hand)… Under the left arm (of the Cross), some big letters, as it were of crystal-clear water running down over the altar, formed these words: ‘Grace and Mercy’.

I understood that it was the mystery of the Most Holy Trinity that was shown to me…”

From the above details, God Himself signifies the great importance of what Our Lady was about to tell Sr. Lucia:

“The moment has come when God asks the Holy Father to make, in union with all the bishops of the world, the consecration of Russia to my Immaculate Heart, promising to save it by this means.” [emphases added]

Sr. Lucy, who had been in the presence not merely of the Mother of God, but the Most Holy Trinity, immediately conveyed the divine request to her confessor, Fr. Gonçalves, as evidenced in her published correspondence with him (in Frère Michel de la Sainte Trinit é [a Fatima expert], The Whole Truth About Fatima, Vol. II: The Secret and the Church, 462-465. Sister Lucia, Memorias e Cartas da Irma Lucia, 1973, 463-465).

2. What, precisely, this Consecration of Russia to the Immaculate Heart of the Blessed Mother would entail for that country?

Father Joaquin Alonso, a Claretian priest, appointed official Fatima archivist by Bishop John Venancio of Fatima in 1966 to establish a complete critical history of the revelations states: “… We should affirm that Lucia always thought that the ‘conversion’ of Russia is not to be limited to the return of the Russian people to the Orthodox Christian religions, rejecting the Marxist atheism of the Soviets, but rather, it refers purely, plainly and simply to the total, integral conversion of Russia to the one true Church of Christ, the Catholic Church.” ( La Verdad sobre el Secreto de Fatima, Fatima sin mitos, “… conversion total e integral de un retorno a la unica y verdadera Iglesia, la catolica-romana .”). This testimony is not the private theological musing of Fr. Alonso. The conversion referred to is unequivocally understood in its singular orthodox Catholic sense as is consistently taught by the Chair of Peter (cf. Satis Cognitum and Testem Benevolentiae Nostrae of Pope Leo XIII, Mortalium Animos of Pope Pius XI, and the Dec. 20, 1949 Instruction of the Holy Office on Ecumenism issued by Pope Pius XII). Clearly, Our Blessed Mother came to Fatima, Portugal to uphold the Catholic dogma that only the Roman Catholic Church is the one true Church of Christ – to be attacked, 45 years later, when the other Apocalyptic portent, Satan, symbolized by the great red dragon (Apoc 12.3) which appeared in November 1917, would have finally “entered the temple of God” (Pope Paul VI, June 29, 1972 speech to the Lombard Seminary in Rome) through the “churchmen”-dummies of the Synagogue of Satan (Apoc 2.9) overturning the Second Vatican Council and imposing the doctrine of “Ecumenism” of no return!

3. a. Sr. Lucia’s consistent testimony: “Consecration of THAT country”

However, the divine appeal for the Consecration of Russia was delayed. Sr. Lucia, C.D., wrote in August 1931 that Our Lord appeared with this message: “Make it known to My ministers given that they follow the example of the King of France in delaying the execution of My command, like him they will follow him into misfortune [Our Lord alludes to the mysterious failure of the kings of France to honor Our Lord's request in 1689 for the Consecration of France to His Sacred Heart so that the ruinous consequences of the REVOLUTION, orchestrated by Freemasonry - the "philosophical-religious" front of attack by the Synagogue against the Catholic Church; Communism, the former's militant front - befell the country].” In October 3 and December 8, 1942, Pope Pius XII, acting alone, consecrated the world, but not Russia, to the Immaculate Heart. In the Spring of 1943, Our Lord appeared again to Sr. Lucia and told her that world peace would not result from this consecration, although the war would be shortened.

Professor Thomas Walsh, a prominent historian, educator and author who wrote the classic biography of the great reformer of the Carmelite Order, St. Teresa of Jesus, interviewed Sr. Lucia on July 15, 1946, which is recounted on his work, Our Lady of Fatima, and asked her questions about the correct procedure for the Collegial Consecration: “Finally we came to the important subject of the second July secret, of which so many different and conflicting versions have been published. Lucia made it plain that Our Lady did not ask for the consecration of the world to her Immaculate Heart. What she demanded specifically was the consecration of Russia. She did not comment, of course, on the fact that Pope Pius XII had consecrated the world, not Russia, to the Immaculate Heart in 1942. But she said more than once, and with deliberate emphasis: ‘What Our Lady wants is that the Pope and all the bishops in the world shall consecrate Russia to her Immaculate Heart on one special day. If this is done, She will convert Russia and there will be peace. If it is not done, the errors of Russia will spread through every country in the world.’” (p. 221) [emphases supplied].

In a little-known revelation of our Blessed Mother to Sr. Lucia, C.D. in the early 1950s, which appeared in Il Pellegrinaggio Pella Meraviglie, published under the auspices of the Italian episcopate, Our Lady said: “Make it known to the Holy Father that I am always AWAITING [emphasis added] the Consecration of Russia to My Immaculate Heart. Without the Consecration, Russia will not be able to convert, nor will the world have peace.” July 7, 1952, Pope Pius XII consecrated Russia specifically, but he was not joined by all the Catholic bishops of the world because he did not ask them to participate.

Thirty years later, in 1982, Sr. Lucia’s testimony remains consistent. On May 12, 1982, the day before Pope John Paul II’s consecration, L’Osservatore Romano published an interview of Sr. Lucia by Fr. Umberto Ma. Pascuale, SDB: “Sister, I should like to ask you a question…. Has Our Lady ever spoken to you about the Consecration of the world to her Immaculate Heart?” to which Sr. Lucia replied: ” No, Fr. Umberto! Never! At the Cova da Iria in 1917 Our Lady had promised: I shall come to ask for the Consecration of Russia… In 1929, at Tuy, as She promised, Our Lady came back to tell me that the moment had come to ask the Holy Father for the Consecration of that country.”

On March 19, 1983, at the request of the Holy Father, Sr. Lucia met with the Papal Nuncio, Abp. Portalupi, Dr. Lacerda, and Fr. Messias Coelho. Sr. Lucia, C.D., confirmed: “In the act of offering of May 13, 1982, Russia did not appear as being the object of the consecration. And each bishop did not organize in his own diocese a public and solemn ceremony of reparation and Consecration of Russia . Pope John Paul II simply renewed the consecration of the world executed by Pius XII on October 31, 1942. From this consecration we can expect some benefits, but not the conversion of Russia.” (in Frère François de Marie des Agnes [a principal Fatima scholar], Fatima: Tragedy and Triumph, p. 165).

On March 25, 1984, Pope John Paul II, in his last offering, consecrated again “the world”, not Russia. And as with the 1982 Consecration, “each bishop did not organize in his own diocese a public and solemn ceremony of reparation and consecration of Russia”. Concerning this ceremony Frère François writes: “In the months which followed the act of offering of March 25, 1984, which was only a renewal of the act of 1982, the principal scholars of Fatima agreed in saying that the consecration of Russia had not yet been done as Heaven wished it.” ( Fatima: Tragedy and Triumph, p. 172)

In a September 1985 interview in Sol de Fatima, Sr. Lucia was asked if the Pope fulfilled the request of the Blessed Mother when he consecrated the world in 1984, the Discalced Carmelite Nun replied: “There was no participation of all the bishops, and there was no mention of Russia.” She was then asked, “So the consecration was not done as requested by Our Lady?” to which she replied: “No. Many bishops attached no importance to this act” [emphasis added].

b. Testimony of one of the Synagogue’s dummy-'priests'

Even Fr. Rene Laurentin, an associate of the openly Modernist (and therefore apostate) priest-theologians, admitted in 1987 that “Sr. Lucia remains unsatisfied… Lucia seems to think that the Consecration has ‘not been made’ as Our Lady wanted it.” (in Fatima: Tragedy and Triumph, p. 189)

4. The Last Papal “Consecration”

Finally, Pope John Paul II himself sealed the consistent testimony of Sr. Lucia that the request of the Blessed Mother for the Consecration of Russia to Her Immaculate Heart has not been granted when he made a departure from his own prepared text of consecration during the 1984 ceremony. After performing the consecration word proper, the late Pontiff added this spontaneous prayer quoted in L’Osservatore Romano of March 26, 1984: “Enlighten especially the peoples of which You Yourself are AWAITING our consecration and confiding.” (“Illumina specialmente I populi di cui tu ASPETTI la nostra consacrazione e il nostro affidamento.” ). This flatly belies that Vatican anonymous order (actually issued by then Secretary of State Cardinal Sodano) in 1988 “obliging everyone to say and think: ‘The Consecration is done. The Pope having done all that he can, Heaven has deigned to agree to this gesture.’” (Fr. Caillon, a devotee who reversed his contrary testimony in “obedience” to this “anonymous” Vatican order, in Fatima: Tragedy and Triumph, 189-190)

5. Vatican’s “Consecration” Version vis-a-vis St. Thomas Aquinas: “Ens et verum convertunter” (Truth is Convertible to Reality)

a. Russia after the last Papal 'Consecration'

The state of affairs in Russia after the 1984 Consecration would give the Consecration its “decisive character“ (Sr. Lucia, C.D. in Fatima: Tragedy and Triumph, 167-168): conversion. However, in April 1993, nine years after the 1984 Consecration, Boris Yeltsin had allowed homosexuality to be de-criminalized. Homosexuality is now legal in Russia. Dmitry Chepchugov, head of the Russian Interior Ministry’s department for high technology crimes told reporters in Moscow that “unfortunately, Russia has turned into a world trash bin of child pornography.” (“Activist Says Child Porn Prosecutions Will be Difficult in Indonesia, Russia”, Associated Press, Aug. 9, 2001) In February 2002, the Vatican announced that its “apostolic administrations” in Russia would be designated as dioceses “making up a new ecclesiastical province of Moscow.” Following the Pope’s action, Patriarch Alexy II of Moscow cancelled Cardinal Kasper’s visit to Moscow saying that “we have nothing to say to each other.” The Orthodox charged that “it betokens a Vatican strategy to ‘proselytize’ or seek converts, in Russia.” ( National Catholic Reporter, 22 February 2002). Zenit News of December 22, 2000 quoted The Economist noting that “Russia is suffering a crisis of faith… 94% of Russians aged 18-29 do not go to church.” In 2001, Fr. Stanislaw Opiela, the Secretary of the Catholic Bishops’ Conference in Russia, was denied an entry visa three times without explanation. April 2002, that same fate befell Bishop Jerzy Masur, assigned by the Vatican to administer to the vast region of Siberia. He was expelled from Russia, his entry visa confiscated without explanation and he was to learn that he had been added to a secret list of those who are considered “undesirables” and will no longer be allowed to enter Russian territory. Abp. Kondrusiewicz issued a formal protest in behalf of the Conference of Catholic Bishops in Russia, entitled “Religious Liberty in Russia Is In Serious Danger”: “… With grave worry, we express our decisive protest in respect to violation of the constitutional rights of Catholics.” [Russia's 1997 law on "freedom of conscience" continues to grant special legal status to the Russian Orthodoxy, Judaism, Islam and Buddhism, while forbidding Catholic "proselytism" and requiring registration of Catholic churches with local bureaucrats].

b. The Miracles in Portugal after Consecration (from "Heaven's Peace Plan in Microcosm" in Fr. P. Kramer, ed., The Devil's Final Battle, Good Counsel Publications, 2002, pp. 23-24)

This Russian state of affairs was a far cry from the case of Portugal which has proved to be heaven’s “demonstration project” of the efficacy of the Consecration the Blessed Mother has long been requesting and “AWAITING“. In 1931, two years after the Blessed Mother had requested for the Consecration of Russia, the bishops of Portugal, in a solemn public ceremony, consecrated their country to the Immaculate Heart of the Blessed Mother to preserve it from the Communist contagion that was sweeping through Europe, and especially Spain. As a result of this consecration, Portugal experienced a three-fold miracle. First of all, the country experienced a great Catholic Renaissance, a magnificent rebirth of Catholic life. There had been a drastic upsurge in priestly and religious vocations. There was an unprecedented vast renewal of Catholic life including the development of a Catholic press, Catholic radio, pilgrimages, spiritual retreats, and a robust movement of Catholic Action that was integrated into the framework of diocesan and parish life. There was also a miracle of political and social reform, in accordance with the traditional Catholic social principles. The Masonic Regime collapsed and a Catholic leader, Antonio Salazar, ascended to power. He inaugurated a Catholic counter-revolutionary program through which he strove to create, as much as possible, a Catholic social order wherein the laws of government and social institutions harmonize with the law of Christ, His Gospel and His Church. President Salazar did not simply talk a good line; for one, he enacted legislation to protect the family, including laws that frowned upon divorce. In addition to these religious and political changes, there was the two-fold miracle of peace. Portugal was preserved from the Communist plague and especially from the Spanish Civil War which was raging next door. The country was also spared from the devastations of World War II.

Regarding the Spanish Civil War, the good bishops had vowed in 1936 that if Our Blessed Mother protected Portugal, they would express their gratitude by renewing the National Consecration to the Immaculate Heart of Mary. True to their word, on May 13, 1938, the Portuguese bishops renewed the Consecration of Portugal to the Immaculate Heart in thanksgiving for Our Lady’s protection. Cardinal Cerejeira acknowledged publicly: “… If we review the two years which have gone since our vow, one cannot fail to recognize that the invisible hand of God has protected Portugal, sparing it the scourge of war and the leprosy of atheistic communism.” Even Pope Pius XII expressed astonishment that Portugal emerged unscathed from this scourge. In an address to the Portuguese people, the Pope spoke of “the Red Peril, so menacing and so close to you, and yet avoided in such an unexpected way.”

Portugal passed the first danger safe and sound, but there was a second staring them in the face. World War II was about to break out. On February 6, 1939, seven months before the declaration of war, Sr. Lucia wrote to her bishop, Msgr. Da Silva: “… In this horrible war, Portugal would be spared because of the national consecration to the Immaculate Heart of Mary made by the bishops.” (in The Whole Truth About Fatima, Vol. II, p.428). And Portugal was indeed spared the horrors of the War. In a letter to Pope Pius XII on December 2, 1940, Sr. Lucia wrote: “Most Holy Father, Our Lord promised a special protection to our country in this war, due to the consecration of the nation, by the Portuguese prelates, to the Immaculate Heart of Mary; as proof of the graces that would have been granted to other nations, had they also consecrated themselves to Her.” (in ibid.) And Cardinal Cerejeira, in his homily of May 13, 1942 said it very well: “What has taken place in Portugal proclaims the miracle. And it foreshadows what the Immaculate Heart of Mary has prepared for the world.”

13 October 2010

Anniversary of the Last Apparition of Our Lady of Fatima

Divine Intimacy

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JMJ

Feast of St. Joseph of Coppertino of the Order of Friars Minor

“Not really understanding my life and how it’s been going…?
I’m 23 with dreams and determined. I’m big on God and church! I love praising God and making him proud of me and my doings. One thing i can’t say is that i’m not blessed. I WILL NOT sit here and say i’m not blessed and have alot of good things going for myself. I have my own car, nice place, my bills get paid, can get SOME things i want, pretty good health, a part time job, in school fulltime with everything paid for and my gas daily to school paid for…i can go on and on with my blessings. But I am missing some things. I’ve never really had a close relationship with anybody. The closest in my family is my grandma, and outside of my family was my ex, but we have been broken up for years, and i’ve just been so lonely and empty feeling since. Due to issues from when i was younger, i have always been moreso a reserved, quiet, not so outgoing person. That’s not the way i want to be, but it’s just how it is. I don’t want God to think i don’t appreciate my blessings, because i do, i just have things i don’t quite understand that is causing me deep, long-term pain. Not having friends or people to date is hard. I continue to live and hang in there, although i’d rather have those things. Any good advice?” – ‘nextkobe1986′ @ Yahoo!Answers

It’s far a greater blessing for God to penetrate more and more fully into your life, into your heart. When the Spirit of Light and Truth came upon the disciples of Our Lord on Pentecost day, He filled the whole house where they were sitting (Ac 2.2). It’s common for us to live in compartmentalized dwellings where we have a room and space of our own and the same, sadly, happens even in that life which we claim to be “new” in, with, for, and by Christ – the Christian Spiritual Life. But the Christian Spiritual Life is not where God remains at the periphery of our whole self and being – the mastery of which we try to keep in our hands. We “try to keep” because our self is broken (if not shattered) and it comes with the more poignant realization of our powerlessness in dealing with it followed, in one extreme, by a debilitating resignation to our helplessness. The effect: the doors of our heart shut us in in gloom, preoccupied with our self – which preoccupation is always the starting point of our disordered relationship, first, with God; second, with others.

However, the Crucified teaches us that there’s a kind of resignation that does not debilitate and degenerate us – but this from the viewpoint of God, not according as we would judge the “Scandal” of the Cross: compressing the whole point of the Cross of Calvary into a single point of sensation or emotion or intellect which is all but a very limited department of our being. His is that childlike resignation in the arms of His most tender loving Father Who, in the depth of the richness of His mercy and benevolence, works not only in consideration of our good and happiness but even of those who surround us, those who have become part of us – especially even those who dealt us pains and hurts, and those who will still become part of us.

The vacuum in our heart can never be filled in by our self. Neither can other passing creatures (material or persons – broken like we are and seeking comfort and consolation as we do) do so. Deep calleth on deep (Ps 41.8, DRV). Our heart is restless unless God’s excessive love – pouring forth from the Crucified – penetrates and fills it. As this excessive love of God on the Cross of Calvary saturates our heart and burns brightly in it, it supplies us the impulse to return love to Him with that love the Crucified returned to Him. And as this excessive love of God on the Cross of Calvary enriches and expands our poor heart, then it begins to see, not those whom it desires to draw to itself to seek from them their poor love, but those whom it may embrace rather with the love of the Crucified – which Divine Love is enough for it to have found as its reward and consolation. Seek the solution of God in Calvary: intimacy with Our Crucified Lord.

The Crucified and the Christian

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JMJ


Feast of the Exaltation of the Holy Cross

Traditional Latin Mass

Let this mind be in you, which was also in Christ Jesus: Who being in the form of God, thought it not robbery to be equal with God: But emptied Himself, taking the form of a servant… He humbled Himself, becoming obedient unto death, even to the death of the cross.
For which cause God also hath exalted Him, and hath given Him a name which is above all names: that in the name of Jesus every knee should bow, of those that are in heaven, on earth, and under the earth (Phil 2.5-10, DRV).

To comprehend the mystery of God’s love on the Cross, insofar as it is possible to our limitations, is the summit of the Spiritual Life. Christianity is all Divine Love: we are Christians in the measure that we live in Christ’s love, in the measure that we understand God’s love on the Cross of Christ, in the measure that we love as Christ has loved  on the Cross. “Love is only repaid by love” (St. John of the Cross).

On this Feast, the Crucified exhorts us to be rooted in charity and in humility. To be rooted in Divine Charity, we must not fall into two aberrations: the aberration of one who pretends to love God while paying attention solely to his own interests, without any thought for the needs of others; and, the aberration of one who pretends to love his neighbor while paying attention only to the demands of secular “humanism”, without any thought for what is due to God. To be rooted in Divine Charity, we must also be rooted then in true Christian humility which inclines us to truth (cf. our post on “True Humility”), keeping us in our own proper place in relation to God and others – of which the Beatitude of the poor in spirit (Mt 5.3) is its hallmark.

In the face of all that life can offer us in the way of honors, satisfactions, affections of creatures, comforts and pleasures, and riches – the same offer of Satan to Our Lord in his attempt to make the Savior pursue rather His mission in an easier, popular, “sensibly” comprehensible fashion and less painful and gruesome manner – the Crucified repeats in the depths of our hearts His words: If thou wilt be perfect, go sell what thou hast… and come, follow Me (Mt 19.21). This means not only to desire nothing more than what one has, but to give up even this; not to be eager for riches, pleasures and comforts, consolations, fame, nor earthly affections, but to sacrifice all these things which fill our heart with our self and with the world, and prevent it from being filled by God Who Is Charity.

The Crucified also spurs us on to material poverty, teaching us to be content with little, curbing our desires for the necessities of life, but He urges us even more to poverty of spirit, for without this, the former is of no worth. “The lack of things,” says St. John of the Cross, “implies no detachment on the part of the soul if it retains a desire for them, that is, if it is still attached to them… The things of this world neither occupy the soul nor cause it harm, since they enter it not, but rather the will and the desire for them, for it is these that dwell within it.”

This poverty of spirit, the hallmark of Christian humility, includes detachment not only from material goods, but also from moral and even spiritual goods. Whoever tries to assert his own personality, seeking the esteem and regard of creatures, who remains attached to his own will and ideas, or is too fond of his independence, is not poor in spirit, but is rich in himself, in his self-love and his pride. “If thou wilt be perfect,” says St. John of the Cross, “sell thy will… come to Christ through meekness and humility; and follow Him to Calvary and the grave.”

In like manner, one who still seeks the affection of creatures, and the joy and satisfactions which they can give him, is not poor in spirit; neither is he who goes in search of consolations and spiritual delights in his devotions and relations with God. Poverty of spirit consists in being entirely stripped and empty of all these pretensions, so that the soul seeks and desires only one thing: to possess God, and to be thus content, even when God lets Himself be found only in darkness, aridity, anguish, and suffering. Here is that perfect poverty of spirit which frees the soul from all that is not God; this very freedom constitutes the reason for our happiness, because, explains St. John of the Cross, “the soul that strips itself of its desires, delights, and affections that are not of God, will be clothed by God with His purity, joy, and will.” The Beatitude promised to the poor in spirit is the possession of God, a possession which will clothe them with His infinite riches. This is the goal to which the Holy Spirit desires to lead us; let us second His action by responding with docility to His invitation to detachment and total despoliation of the Crucified. The more generously we renounce all that is not God, the more we shall enjoy the beatitude promised to the humble soul who is poor in spirit.

When Mary Comes... (II)

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JMJ

Feast of the Holy Name of Mary

She fights against and conquers the visible enemies of Christ and His Church

The Holy Roman Catholic and Apostolic Church celebrates today this glorious feast which Pope Innnocent XI made obligatory throughout the whole Church in commemoration of the victory over and deliverance of the Christian Europe, led by the Catholic King of Poland, John Solieski, from the Moslems who were routed under the walls of Vienna, Austria in 1683 - in the name of and through the intercession of the Blessed Virgin Mary.

"[This] is the hour for Mary's power, mercy and watchful protection. She, beautiful, loving and splendid, can be as terrible as an army in battle array (Canticle of Canticles 6.3), and among Her names She bears that of 'Our Lady of Victories', reminding us of Lepanto and Vienna. In her is our hope and peace." - Pope Pius XII, Allocution to the Pilgrims of Genoa, April 21, 1940

The above statement made by Pope Pius XII could be said to have been the last reiteration of what the previous occupants of the Chair of St. Peter had consistently maintained:

1. that the Church has invisible and visible enemies of diabolical order to fight with; and,

2. in the face of this battle against diabolical forces:

"From our post, as helmsman of St. Peter's bark, when we hear the storm raging and see spuming before our eyes the furious surge that would fain submerge our vessel, calmly and confidently we look to the Virgin of Mount Carmel and beseech Her not to desert us. Although hell unceasingly renews its attacks, and the violence, audacity and fury of evil forces are ever increasing, as long as we rely on Her powerful 

patronage we never may doubt the victory." - Pope Pius XII, Radio Message to the National Marian Congress of Colombia, July 19, 1946

"Victory." The Holy Roman Catholic and Apostolic Church here on earth, the Church Militant, shall triumph in this enmity which God has irrevocably fixed between the Woman and Her seed, and Satan and his seed (Gen 3.15). But this Catholic triumph is assured only under the banner of the Crucified and the visible badge of the Immaculate Heart of Mary - the Brown Scapular of Our Lady of Mt. Carmel. And this triumph of the Immaculate Heart of Mary, our Catholic triumph, is still far from the offing as long as:

1. the present occupant of the Chair of St. Peter still walks disorderly and not according to the tradition which they have received of us (2 Thess 3.6), halting between two sides (3 Kings 18.21) of the Traditional Roman Catholic Order surmounted by the Crucified (cf. "Our Great Reversal" posted at this site) and the Counterfeit "Catholic" Order allied with the New World Order organized by the Synagogue of Satan (Apoc 3.9) - futilely pursuing Vatican II's double-sided Ecumenical program, an inter-religious "dialogue" on the surface but within, according to the principles that govern it, an attempt to reconcile Catholicism with or adjust it to:

a. the religious and philosophical errors the Synagogue of Satan spewed: (i) out of France (the principles of the French Revolution through Freemasonry) and of Russia (Materialism through its militant front against the Catholic Church, Atheistic-Communist Revolution), and (ii) those widespread "spiritual" fronts that it inspired (Islam, Protestantism) - all of which already supplanted* the Faith (Our Lord Jesus Christ authored, cf. Heb 12.2) in those nations which once prided themselves as Catholic bastions: But yet the Son of Man, when He cometh, shall He find, think you, faith on earth? (Lk 18.8);  

* Islam is fast overturning Catholic nations which turned themselves over to Protestantism

b. the Greek schism; and,

c. paganism in general.

This Ecumenical "dialogue" of the Second Vatican Council is a subtle program calculated to weaken the Church from within, making her appear to relinquish her position as the pillar and ground of the truth (1 Tim 3.15) by forcing her to stand on equal footing with the sects of perdition (2 Pet 2.1) - that she is just like the rest who worship the same "god". But God and Satan are and can never be of equal footing; there is no reconciliation or any middle ground or meeting point between them and the same must be firmly and unequivocally held, as the Chair of St. Peter had constantly done so throughout the ages past, between the Church of Christ and the sects of Satan. Bear not the yoke with unbelievers. For what participation hath justice with injustice? Or what fellowship hath light with darkness? And what concord hath Christ with Belial? Or what part the faithful hath with the unbeliever? (2 Cor 6.14)

And does not the Rite of Exorcism forbid dialogue with the devil? Those who profess and propagate these errors are in the hands of Satan. And if he will not hear the Church, let him be to thee as the heathen... [whose] gods are devils... (Ps 95.5) and the publican (Mt 18.17). They need the liberation of the Crucified and deliverance into His Kingdom - the Catholic Church.

2. the occupant of the Chair of St. Peter does not meet yet the demands of the Woman clothed with the sun (Apoc 12.1) - the heavenly portent which finally appeared in 1917 at Fatima, Portugal: the consecration of Russia to Her Immaculate Heart. A consecration which the de facto authorities in the Vatican spoke of as something already accomplished but which pronouncement plainly contradicts the spontaneous prayer of Pope Benedict XVI's predecessor in his last act of consecration. Pope John Paul II, in his act of consecration of March 25, 1984: "Enlighten especially the peoples of which You Yourself  are awaiting our consecration and confiding" ("Illumina specialmente i populi di Cui Tu aspetti la nostra consacrazione e il nostro affidamento," L'Osservatore Romano, March 26, 1984).

True Humility

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JMJ

Feast of St. Nicholas of Tolentino of the Order of St. Augustine

“Where can one find true humbleness of heart? Is it as simple as opening a door for someone else?” – 'Bilbo Baggins' @ Yahoo! Answers

If you were to aspire to reach the summit of the entire edifice of Christian Perfection – the Cross of Calvary which alone eloquently speaks of true charity (to love as God loves) – it is only then that you can find true humility of heart for this is its ultimate foundation: the preliminary and indispensable work, the condition “sine qua non”. And just as digging is no simple task, digging one’s heart could not only be arduous but could rather prove to be a disquieting and agonizing ordeal: for at the end of the pitch-black tunnel is our self – crushed and hurting terribly, and that through all those years we have lived “independently” we even bungled (read: we were wrong!) in nursing it (most often than not, with the varied illusions and delusions of how excellent we are, exaggerating our own worth, as a result making us demanding and pretentious to ourselves and to others). What a terrible “vacuum” one would create in excavating and displacing all of it - crowned with the fact that we have stood wrong even after all our effort to heal and reconstruct our shattered selves - into the hands of God Whose ways we could not even comprehend! But this is the only way the depths of our hearts could be filled, not by any passing creature utterly powerless to do so, but only by that Divine Person Who on the Cross shows us that true “humility keeps us in our own place; that humility is truth: it tends to establish in truth both our intellect – by making us know ourselves as we really are – and so our life, by inclining us to take, in relation to God and to men, our proper place and no other” (Fr. Gabriel of St. Mary Magdalen, C.D., ‘Divine Intimacy,’ 107.1).

True humility does not make us preoccupied with our wounded heart and does not insist upon our brokenness and misery (and of our "broken" view as well of how perfect and happy we could and should have been) as the standard of what is truth and therefore how God and others should deal with, nay more revolve around us. As the Crucified convinces us of this and makes us bow down before Him Who alone understands us and can turn everything into good just at the right time, He, at the same time, provides us the best of opportunities and His own strength to repair and renew us from within - not forgetting that He did not lie lifeless and powerless in the tomb. By letting the Crucified to be God as He Is, He will not fail to make us see, in one way or another, sooner or later, how things in our life turn and go to their proper place. As His face, His love, and His peace find room and shine upon us, then the doors of our heart are thrown open for others who could be more crushed and broken than we had been. And since it is the Crucified Himself reposing in our hearts Who would take care of those who are drawn to Him through us, we shall not delude ourselves and others. 

Learn of Me, for I am meek and humble of heart (Mt 11.29).

When Mary Comes... (I)

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JMJ

Feast of the Nativity of the Blessed Virgin Mary

            She shall crush thy head (Gen 3.15, the Catholic Douay-Rheims Version). Thus God speaks of Our Blessed Mother's role in His plan of Redemption: She is the one to crush Satan and his forces through Her Divine Son, Our Lord Jesus Christ. Since it was by a woman that led us into the dominion of Satan, it was fitting then that God elected also another Woman to undo and repair the injustice of the first; to bring us back to God's dominion; and, even to crush Satan and his forces in their pride and rebellion by her humility and submission, and in their guile by her perfect purity and innocence. And just as Eve became the accomplice of Satan in the mockery of God thereby bearing the firsfruits of it and projecting upon the whole of creation the darkness of Satan’s dominion, so it was fitting also that another Woman should rise as the partner of God par excellence - that is, that she must had never been under the dominion of Satan since her conception.  

           The birth of Mary is the dawn of our redemption; her appearance projects a new light over all the human race: a light of innocence, of purity, of grace, a resplendent presage of the great light which will inundate the world when Christ, lux mundi, the Light of the World, appears. Therefore the Church, in her sacred traditional Liturgy, sings: “Thy nativity, O Virgin Mother of God, brings joy to the whole world, because from you came forth the Sun of Justice, Christ, our God.” (Magnificat Antiphon). Mary's birth is a prelude to the birth of Jesus because it is the initial point of the realization of the great mystery of the Incarnation of the Son of God for the salvation of mankind. The Mother proclaims the Son, making it known that He is about to come, that the divine promises made centuries before, are to be fulfilled. Mary, therefore preserved from sin in anticipation of Christ’s merits, not only announces that the Redemption is at hand, but she bears the firstfruits of it within herself: She is the first one redeemed by Her Divine Son.

Our "Great Reversal"

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JMJ

Feast of the Immaculate Heart of the Blessed Virgin Mary

Life in a Traditional Catholic Seminary: "The Clerical Tonsure"

[A general view of the essential difference between the Traditional Roman Catholic Clergy and the New "Catholic" Clergy of the New “Catholic" Order (the Novus Ordo) - inaugurated at the Second Vatican Council (1962-1965) - of which the Crucified is the crucial test and point of departure. The reason for our "great reversal". Excerpted from a letter of our confrere who received this sacred rite.]  

Tonsure, from the Latin "tonsura", denotes the cutting of the hair as well as the shaven crown worn by religious clerics as a distinctive mark of their state( cf. Numbers 8.5-22). By this traditional sacred rite – which is the prerequisite for the reception of Orders – a layman, a monk, or a friar who aspires to the Eternal Priesthood of Our Lord, according to the order of Melchisedech, is received into the clerical state.  

The word cleric is derived from the Greek "kleros" which means “portion” or “inheritance”. The choice of the term is suggested by the words of God addressed to the tribe of Levi, by which the clerics were typified: You shall possess nothing in their land, neither shall you have any portion among them. I am your portion and inheritance in the midst of the children of Israel (Numbers 18.20, DRV). St. Jerome, commenting on the passage, thus interprets the word cleric: “They are called clerics, because they are the portion of the Lord and because the Lord is their portion” (Ep. ad Nep.). The Ritual comments: “The Lord has chosen the clerics for His special service, and they have freely accepted the choice. In order to give themselves with wholehearted and undivided attention to the service of God, they renounce the pursuit of secular vocations.”  

As the choice portion of the Lord set apart for His divine service, clerics ought to be manifestly marked, like all things devoted solely for the service of God, to make known before all their sacred consecration and their inviolability. And it seems to me that there is no better way to do this than by the shedding of their hair, for this reason: just as the lamb was shed of its hair before it was offered as oblation and finally immolated on the altar of Old, so the clerics of the Holy Roman Catholic Church are marked, and have always been marked, thus since their lot is none other than the fate of the Lamb of God who was offered and immolated on the Cross in Calvary and to Whom they freely choose to dedicate their whole life. By the sacred rite of tonsure, the Holy Church, under the infallible guidance of the Spirit of Truth Who teaches her all things (Jn 14.26), deeply impresses on the young Levite – as he shall ascend later as priest, though not anymore the steps leading to the altar of Old but now leading to what this OT altar only prefigured: the altar of the Eternal High Priest and Victim – his most blessed portion which is that of the Crucified. The life of a Roman Catholic cleric is the life of the Eternal High Priest the summit of which is His oblation and immolation on the Cross, the Cross which in turn is the sure mark and seal of his very identity with Whom he shall be commissioned to preach: Christ Crucified (1 Cor 1.23). 

At this point, it is well to remark that he who passes through this door of the traditional Roman Catholic Rite of Clerical Tonsure to the summit of the Cross of the Eternal Priesthood of Our Lord recognizes clearly that his life can never be identified with or likened to that life according to the doctrine and ministry of the Protestant clergy and also of those who enter the New “Catholic Priesthood” as it was conceived in the Second Vatican Council. And this difference is our conformity to Christ Crucified (cf., 2 Cor 3.18), Who alone is explicitly professed by the Church in the Traditional Latin Mass, and our future divine mission of forming the Crucified in souls (cf., Gal 4.19).  

It might be objected that this truth is not totally repudiated in the New “Catholic Order”, and that it is still affirmed. But this is the trick. We are not deceived by something that is evidently or manifestly evil which of course requires no more proof or demonstration of it. We are deceived because as the Word of God warns us: Satan himself transformeth himself into an angel of light (2 Cor 11.14). Yes, Christ Crucified is still affirmed and preached but no longer by all, always, and everywhere; only by a few of good will. However even this good will of the rare few in the Novus Ordo is not enough since the most pleasing acceptability of the ministry of a Roman Catholic priest before God does not depend on his good will but on the merits of Jesus Christ Crucified Whom he must resemble and Whose ancient priesthood he must partake. These Novus Ordo priests of good will still miss the standard set by Our Lord of which we learn from the Book of the Apocalypse in His rebukes and warnings to the higher authorities of His Church tolerating within the ranks of the clergy evil doers and open heretics, schismatics, and apostates: I know thy works, and thy labour, and thy patience, and how thou canst bear them that are evil, and thou hast tried them, who say they are apostles, and are not, and hast found them liars... I know thou holdest fast my name, and hast not denied my faith... But I have against thee a few things: because thou hast left thy first charity... because thou hast there them that hold the doctrine of Balaam... also them that hold the doctrine of the Nicolaites (2.2,4,13,14,15). The suppression of this sacred rite of clerical tonsure, together with the traditional minor orders and even the major order of the subdiaconate, in the New "Catholic" Order only clearly points to the huge discrepancy or rather inconsistency between the reality of what the institution formally (that is, in principle) denies in its New Rite and what it projects to the faithful. Those then who struggle to hold to the truth yet at the same time tries to stick to this New "Order" of "Catholic" Life - in which the same truth is actually denied or rather passed over in silence and never formally affirmed - for the sake of 'official' "legitimacy", they are either not really true to the fundamental Roman Catholic principles they claim to steadfastly profess or to the diametrically opposed principles which constitute the foundation of the New "Catholic" Order.      

The modern ministry commissioned to those who enter the New “Catholic” priesthood is to preach Vatican II’s New “Catholic” Orientation that will make the flock accept and enter, without any shocking disturbance to their Catholic conscience, into a New “Catholic Order” which is aligned with the New World Order (allergic to the traditional Catholic program of sovereign dominion of Christ as King not only of hearts, of families, but also of nations as prophesied in the Book of Psalms, 21.29; 144.13), in which the Crucified is not to hold anymore its sole dominating and therefore most prominent place of primacy at the sanctuary – for the fad is to see rather a Resurrected Christ on the Cross (the case in the chapel of our OCD Novitiate House). Satan’s dealings with us is not so much as to induce us to exclude God totally from our lives as to allot to God a place not due Him: a place other than that of primacy of His complete and total dominion which the Crucified returns to His Father and which He gives us for our example. Pope John Paul II affirmed, though not in a solemn manner as to engage papal infallibility, this new salvific horizon for the Novus Ordo surmounted by a resurrected Christ other than what the Roman Catholic world had known throughout the ages past until the Second Vatican Council (1962-1965): “The fact that Christ ‘was raised the third day’ constitutes the final sign of the messianic mission, a sign that perfects the entire revelation of merciful love... In fact, Christ... has revealed in His resurrection the fullness of the love that the Father has for Him and, in Him, for all people” ('Dives in Misericordia,' Nov. 30, 1980, n.8). In the New “Catholic Order”, the Cross of Christ in Calvary is no longer "the final sign of the messianic mission;" It has ceased to be the revelation of “the fullness” of God’s “merciful love.” The Traditional Roman Catholic clergy thunders with St. Paul: But we preach Christ Crucified! (1 Cor 1.23)  But though we, or an angel from heaven, preach a gospel to you  besides that which we have preached to you, let him be anathema (Gal 1.8).  

This New Image of the “Catholic Cross” is explained unequivocally by the New “Catholic” Orientation which Pope Paul VI revealingly told the Novus Ordo seminarians of the Lombard College in Rome on June 29, 1972: “We preach ecumenism*.” And what this Vatican II "Ecumenism" entails? The dominating Cross of Christ in Calvary is not relevant to the modern world since it speaks of an imposed absolute one-way road that leads to the Truth and the Good, aside from the fact that it speaks of a “cruel” God Who passes or allows to pass on to an innocent enormous sufferings and torments and Who threatens with eternal damnation those who would refuse to embrace the Crucified and His Cross [cf., our post "The Ultimate Delusion of Vatican II 'Catholicism'"]. To meet this mentality of a world which chooses to put itself under the sway of a spirit other than the Spirit of the Crucified, it is incumbent then for this New “Catholic Order ” with its New Orientation to “re-create” a new image more agreeable to the enemies of the Cross yet less shocking for the Catholic conscience: a cross, yes though still there (for to take it away completely would reveal the true color of the innovators) but on which a victorious resurrected “Christ” surmounts it; yet, even then this must not dominate the New world-wide religious horizon: it is only one of the legitimate signs of salvation since everybody, anyways, calls on, adores, and worships one and the same “god”. It is only understandable why the Traditional Latin Mass (also the other Traditional Sacraments) and the whole of the ancient Roman Catholic Order founded on it had to be illegally suppressed and, even after the Summorum Pontificum of our Holy Father, must be opposed still.  

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* Vatican is preaching "ecumenism" as if it were a Catholic doctrine that must be held by all the faithful under pain of eternal damnation. Pope John Paul II, in his Encyclical Ut Unum Sint, revealed what this projected doctrine of "ecumenism" is: "[a] movement [which] really began within the Churches and Ecclesial Communities of the Reform" (65). Ecumenism is not a Catholic doctrine but a Protestant movement with this devastating effect: Pope John Paul II even called the Protestant sects as "Churches" as if Our Lord built on Peter "churches"; no, the Catholic Church can never be of equal footing with the "Bible-only" sectarians.

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At a Traditional Roman Catholic Seminary (non-Sedevacantist, cf. our posts "On the Sedevacantist Position: A Reply (I) & (II), and non-'Conservatist' - that is, those under the Ecclesia Dei Commission), one is safe from any of the inevitable illusions sooner or later will confront those who place themselves in the service and ministry of Vatican II’s New “Catholic Order”. For here, the Ritual and all the Liturgical Books; the High Altar in the Sanctuary; and, the Catholic dogmatic teachings and spiritual doctrines being professed- based on the Sacred Scriptures, the constant teachings of the Chair of St. Peter, and on the doctrines of the Doctors of the Church especially of St. Thomas Aquinas - all consistently and precisely speak of and point to the Crucified Christ as the only one reality Who must figure in His Holy, Roman, Catholic, and Apostolic Church and in the world through His Mystical Body, which, like its Head, Jesus Christ Crucified, is the same, yesterday, today, and forever. Deo gratias!