CAPG's Blog 

Saint Catherine of Siena, Wake Forest NC ©VP

"The United States of America is a thoroughly secularized society which canonizes radical individualism and relativism, even before the natural moral law. The application, therefore, is more necessary than ever, lest the faithful, led astray by the strong cultural trends of relativism, be deceived concerning the supreme good of the Holy Eucharist and the gravity of supporting publicly the commission of intrinsically evil acts. Catholics in public office bear an especially heavy burden of responsibility to uphold the moral law in the exercise of their office which is exercised for the common good, especially the good of the innocent and defenseless. When they fail, they lead others, Catholics and non-Catholics alike, to be deceived regarding the evils of procured abortion and other attacks on innocent and defenseless human life, on the integrity of human procreation, and on the family.

As Pope John Paul II reminded us, referring to the teaching of the Second Vatican Ecumenical Council, the Holy Eucharist contains the entire good of our salvation [91]. There is no responsibility of the Church's shepherds which is greater than that of teaching the truth about the Holy Eucharist, celebrating worthily the Holy Eucharist, and directing the flock in the worship and care of the Most Blessed Sacrament. Can. 915 of the Code of Canon Law and can. 712 of the Code of Canons of the Eastern Churches articulate an essential element of the shepherds' responsibility, namely, the perennial discipline of the Church by which the minister of Holy Communion is to deny the Sacrament to those who obstinately persevere in manifest grave sin."

Source: The Discipline Regarding the Denial of Holy Communion to Those Obstinately Persevering in Manifest Grave Sin by Most Rev. Raymond L. Burke, 2007 EWTN

What medium is to be observed by a priest between a severe and a lax morality?

There have been priests in every age who have decided this question according to their own fancy and inclination, and priests will continue to do so in the future. There will always be doctors and preachers and directors of souls who, yielding to the prejudices and tastes of the age, or desirous of gaining the good will of individuals, or ambitious to make a name, will change the teachings of the Church, making easy or burdensome the yoke of the Lord; as if it were their right to broaden or make narrow the way to heaven; as if it were their privilege to substitute the changing and fallible opinions of men for the infallible and changeless law of the Gospel of Christ.

(...)

A good priest is certainly not a man who follows the mode of the world and its fashions; he is a man who is loyal to truth and loves order. The truth, then, is this, that laxity and severity are two extremes, both equally bad and dangerous and both skirting along the edge of the precipice.

And first laxity. It is condemned in every page of Holy Writ. Did not our Lord say: Narrow is the gate and strait is the way that leads to life? and again: I came not to send peace upon earth, but the sword? And does not He command what is hard and a trial to flesh and blood? To cleanse the heart of whatever is a snare to it and defiles it, to submit to humiliations, to deny oneself in all things, to return good for evil, to carry the Cross daily- this, in short, is the morality taught by Jesus Christ. This is but saying that the life of a Christian is a life of mortification and self-denial, and that to be a Christian in any true sense one must be generous and courageous, ready to struggle and willing to make war upon oneself and conquer. For this reason the Holy Council of Trent warns ministers of the Sanctuary against that excessive indulgence which causes sinners to slumber on in their sins and against becoming accomplices in disorders which they should combat and correct.

To wish to adjust the teachings of the Gospel to the solicitations of human passion, instead of subjecting human passion to the teaching of the Gospel; to set up principles from which deductions can be drawn indulgent to human nature, ever averse to mortification and self-sacrifice, is to open wide the door to laxity, to create false consciences and to cause the loss of souls under pretext of tranquilizing them. Woe to you who deceive the people, scatter lies and call them oracles; Woe to you who lead them astray and allow them to slumber on in false security! My hand shall be heavy upon you; the corruption of your false maxims shall be visited upon your heads, and in the end you shall know that I am the Lord. ( Ezechiel vi. 13.)

Next, severity. Faith and a decent respect for one-self will be enough to restrain one from disseminating in public or teaching privately a lax morality which is clearly in opposition to the spirit of the Gospel. But this is not true in regard to severity. An excessive severity flatters vanity and gains a reputation for sanctity. A priest who openly parades himself as one of austere life is reputed mortified and a man of irreproachable morals. This was the artifice made use of by the Scribes and Pharisees to lead the people astray and poison their minds with error. A stately walk, and imperious tone of voice, a cold and mortified exterior, long prayers, ceaseless censure of the most innocent actions, a haughty scorn of publicans and sinners, all this but served as a mask for their hypocrisy and was a fitting expression of the severe maxims which they disseminated. Their teaching were an additional burden, and made almost unbearable the already weighty and galling yoke of the Hebrew law. They laid upon others burdens which they themselves were unwilling to bear, and which they would not so much as touch with a finger's tip.

This is why the Lamb of God, who was so gentle and tender to others, who pardoned the woman taken in adultery, who had not even a harsh word for Judas who betrayed Him, nor for the executioners who crucified Him, had for the Scribes and Pharisees only words of scorn and anathema: WOE TO YOU!

And why was our Lord so severe upon them? because God is essentially loving and the Father of mercy, and nothing is so injurious to Him as to represent Him as a gloomy and terrible Master, ever armed with thunderbolts to annihilate us. It is, therefore, beyond all question that nothing is more detrimental to souls than to exaggerate the difficulty of being saved, and to put on grace a higher estimate than that put upon it by our Savior Himself. And after all, His ministers are but the interpreters of His law. If, on the one had, they are forbidden to conceal or disguise its true import and meaning or make it ineffective by unwarranted indulgence, they are, on the other, equally forbidden to render it odious and intolerable by culpable exaggeration.

(...)

It is necessary to keep a middle course between these two rocks and while avoiding one not get wrecked on the other. But to do this an exact and precise knowledge of the doctrine of Jesus Christ is necessary, in order to transmit it to the people just as He brought it from heaven, and just as the Church transmits it to us, without adding to it or taking from it a single iota.

Source: Jesus living in the priest : considerations on the greatness and holiness of the priesthood, by Rev. Millet S.J. 1901

What father, if his son asks him for bread, will give him a stone? (Mt 7:9)

Dear Brothers and Sisters in Christ,

It is with great sadness that we learned of Pope Francis’ decision to abrogate the main provisions of the Motu Proprio Summorum Pontificum, promulgated by Pope Benedict XVI on July 7, 2007. After decades of divisions and quarrels, that Motu Proprio was, for all the Catholic faithful, a work of peace and reconciliation.

Rome violates the word given by Pope Benedict XVI with brutality and intransigence, far from the much vaunted fraternal welcoming.

The explicit will of Pope Francis, stated in the Motu Proprio Traditionis Custodes, of July 16, 2021, is to see the celebration of the Mass of the Tradition of the Church disappear. This decision drives us to great dismay. How can we understand this rupture with the traditional Missal, a “venerable and ancient” actualization of the “law of faith,” which has bore fruit through so many nations, so many missionaries, and so many saints? What harm is done by the faithful who simply want to pray as their ancestors had done for centuries? Can we be unaware that the Tridentine Mass converts many souls, that it attracts young and fervent assemblies, that it arouses many vocations, that it has given rise to seminaries, religious communities, monasteries, that it is the backbone of many schools, youth groups, catechism activities, spiritual retreats, and pilgrimages?

Many of you, Catholic brothers and sisters, priests, and bishops, have shared with us your failure to understand this and your deep sorrow: thank you for your many testimonies of support.

To promote peace within the Church, in order to build unity in charity, and also to lead Catholics to reconnect with their own heritage by making as many people as possible discover the riches of liturgical tradition, the treasure of the Church: those were the goals pursued by Summorum Pontificum. Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI witnesses his work for reconciliation destroyed during his own lifetime.

In a time steeped in materialism and torn by social and cultural divisions, liturgical peace appears to us as an absolute necessity for the Faith and for the spiritual life of Catholics in a world that is dying of thirst. The drastic restriction of the authorization to celebrate Mass in its traditional form will bring back mistrust, doubt, and it heralds the return of an agonizing liturgical war for the Christian people.

We solemnly affirm, before God and before men: 

We will not let anyone deprive the faithful of this treasure which is first of all that of the Church. 

We will not remain inactive in the face of the spiritual suffocation of vocations laid forth in the Motu proprio Traditionis Custodes. 

We will not deprive our children of this privileged means of transmitting the faith which is faithfulness to the traditional liturgy.

As children to their father, we request Pope Francis to reverse his decision, by abrogating Traditionis Custodes and restoring full freedom to celebrate the Tridentine Mass, for the glory of God and the good of the faithful. 

Bread rather than stones.

 September 8, 2021, 

on the feast of the Nativity of the Blessed Virgin Mary

Signatories:

Bernard Antony, Président de l' AGRIF
Xavier Arnaud, Forum catholique
Victor Aubert, Président d'Academia Christiana
Moh-Christophe Bilek, Notre Dame de Kabylie
François Billot de Lochner, Président Fondation de Service politique
Benjamin Blanchard, Délégué général de SOS Chrétiens d'Orient
Anne Brassié, Journaliste et écrivain
Jacques Charles-Gaffiot, Historien d'art
Thibaud Collin, Professeur agrégé de philosophie
Laurent Dandrieu, Journaliste
Yves Daoudal, Journaliste - Directeur de Blog
Marie-Pauline Deswarte, Docteur en Droit
Stéphane Deswarte, Docteur en Chimie
Cyrille Dounot, Docteur en droit, licencié en droit canonique
Alvino-Mario Fantini, The European Conservative
Claude Goyard, Professeur des universités
Max Guazzini, Avocat
Michael Hageböck, Summorum Pontificum Freiburg
Maike Hickson, Docteur en Littérature, écrivain
Robert Hickson, Professeur, écrivain
Michel De Jaeghere, Journaliste et essayiste
Marek Jurek, Ancien pdt de la Diète de Pologne
Peter Kwasnieswki Ecrivain
Philippe Lauvaux, ULB Paris Assas
Pierre de Lauzun, Haut fonctionnaire Ecrivain
Massimo de Leonardis, President International Commission of Military History
Anne le Pape, Journaliste
Christian Marquant, Président de Paix Liturgique
Michael Matt, The Remnant
Roberto de Mattei, Ancien président du CNR (CNRS italien)
Jean-Pierre Maugendre, Renaissance Catholique
Philippe Maxence, Rédacteur en Chef de L'Homme Nouveau
Charles de Meyer, Président de SOS Chrétiens d'Orient
Paweł Milcarek, Christianitas
Jean-Marie Molitor, Journaliste
Martin Mosebach, Ecrivain
Hugues Petit, Docteur en Droit
Philippe Pichot-Bravard, Docteur en Droit
Jean-Baptiste Pierchon, Docteur en Droit
Hervé Rolland, Vice-Président de ND de Chrétienté
Reynald Secher, Historien
Jean Sévillia, Journaliste, Historien, Ecrivain
Henri Sire, Ecrivain, compositeur, chercheur
Jeanne Smits, Journaliste - Directrice de Blog
Jean de Tauriers, Président de Notre Dame de Chrétienté
Guillaume de Thieulloy, Editeur de presse
Jérôme Triomphe, Avocat
Philippe de Villiers, Ancien ministre, écrivain

Source: Rorate Caeli , Liturgy Guy et Forum Catholique

"This glorious title of Co-Redemptress, and that of Mediatrix of all graces ,which it implies, have been given her by the latest popes. On February 2nd, 1904, Pius X wrote in the encyclical Ad Diem: "In virtue of the communion of sorrows and of will which attached her to Christ, Mary wanted to become the worthy Reparatrix of the fallen world, an din consequence the Dispenser of all the graces Jesus acquired for us by His bloody death...Because she surpasses all other creatures by her sanctity and by her union with Christ, and because she was called by Christ to participate in the work of our salvation, she merits for us de congruo, as the expression is, what Christ has merited for us de condigno, and she is the first steward in the dispensing of graces."

Benedict XV writes similarly, March 22nd, 1918:"When her Son suffered and died, she so to say suffered and died with Him, renouncing for the salvation of men and the appeasement of the justice of God her maternal rights over he Son - and immolating her Son, as much as in her lay, so that we are entitled to say that she, with Christ, has redeemed the human race."

And Pius XI writes, February 2nd, 1923:" The Virgin of Sorrows participated with Christ in the work of the Redemption." The actual word Co-Redemptrix appears in two decrees of the Holy Office, dated June 26th, 1913, and January 22nd, 1914."

The consent Our Lady gave to the mystery of the Cross was already contained in the Fiat she had uttered to the angel.

 Speaking of this totally free acceptance Leo XIII quotes the great sentence of St. Thomas Aquinas according to which at the instant of the Annunciation, God waited for the Virgin to utter the consent of the human race in its entirety; "and he adds that in consequence none of that immense treasure of grace and truth which the Lord has brought us is communicated to us apart from Mary. He calls her our Mediatrix with the Mediator."

As we may see, the mystery of the Redemption stands in the Church like as great tree of doctrine which never ceases to flower.

Source: Our Lady of Sorrows, by Fr. Journet, Sheed, SJ 1939