Tridentine Masses coming this week to metro Detroit and east Michigan

Tridentine Masses This Coming Week


Sunday

• Sun. 10/02 7:30 AM and 10:00 AM: Low Mass (Confessions 45 minutes before and after Masses) at St. Joseph's Church, Ray Township [NB: See note at bottom of this post about SSPX sites.]* (20th Sunday after Pentecost - 2nd class, or External Solemnity of Our Lady of the Rosary - 2nd class)
• Sun. 10/02 8:00 and 10:30AM Low Mass (Confessions 1/2 hour before Mass: call beforehand) at St. Ann's Church, Livonia [NB: See note at bottom of this post about SSPX sites.]* (20th Sunday after Pentecost - 2nd class, or External Solemnity of Our Lady of the Rosary - 2nd class)
• Sun. 10/02 8:00 AM: High Mass at St. Joseph's Church, Detroit (20th Sunday after Pentecost - 2nd class, or External Solemnity of Our Lady of the Rosary - 2nd class)
• Sun. 10/02 9:30 AM: High Mass at St. Josaphat, Detroit (20th Sunday after Pentecost - 2nd class, or External Solemnity of Our Lady of the Rosary - 2nd class)
• Sun. 10/02 9:30 AM: High Mass at Assumption Grotto, Detroit (20th Sunday after Pentecost - 2nd class, or External Solemnity of Our Lady of the Rosary - 2nd class)
• Sun. 10/02 9:45 AM: High Mass at OCLMA/Academy of the Sacred Heart, Bloomfield Hills (20th Sunday after Pentecost - 2nd class, or External Solemnity of Our Lady of the Rosary - 2nd class)
• Sun. 10/02 [occasional Tridentine Masses: contact parish] at Our Lady of the Scapular Parish (20th Sunday after Pentecost - 2nd class, or External Solemnity of Our Lady of the Rosary - 2nd class)
• Sun. 10/02 2:00 PM: High Mass at St. Alphonsus Church, Windsor, Canada (20th Sunday after Pentecost - 2nd class, or External Solemnity of Our Lady of the Rosary - 2nd class)
• Sun. 10/02 3:00 PM High Mass St. Matthew Catholic Church, Flint (20th Sunday after Pentecost - 2nd class, or External Solemnity of Our Lady of the Rosary - 2nd class)

Monday

• Mon. 10/03 7:30 AM: Low Mass at Assumption Grotto, Detroit (St. Theresa of the Infant Jesus - 3rd class)
• Mon. 10/03 8:00 AM: Low Mass (Confessions 8:30 AM to 9:30 AM) at St. Joseph's Church, Ray Township [NB: See note at bottom of this post about SSPX sites.]* (St. Theresa of the Infant Jesus - 3rd class)
• Mon. 10/03 12:00 Noon: High Tridentine Mass at Assumption Grotto, Detroit (St. Theresa of the Infant Jesus - 3rd class)
• Mon. 10/03 7:00 PM: Low Mass at St. Josaphat, Detroit (St. Theresa of the Infant Jesus - 3rd class)
• Mon. 10/03 7:00 PM: Low Mass at Assumption Grotto, Detroit (St. Theresa of the Infant Jesus - 3rd class)
• Mon. 10/03 7:00 PM: Low Mass at St. Joseph's Church, Detroit (St. Theresa of the Infant Jesus - 3rd class)

Tuesday

• Tue. 10/04 7:00 AM Low Mass at Assumption Grotto, Detroit (St. Francis of Assisi - 3rd class)
• Tue. 10/04 8:00 AM: Low Mass (call for Confession schedule) at St. Joseph's Church, Ray Township [NB: See note at bottom of this post about SSPX sites.]* (St. Francis of Assisi - 3rd class)
• Tue. 10/04 7:00 PM: Low Mass at Holy Name of Mary, Canada (St. Francis of Assisi - 3rd class)
• Tue. 10/04 7:00 PM: Low Mass at Assumption Grotto, Detroit (St. Francis of Assisi - 3rd class)

Wednesday

• Wed. 10/05 7:30 AM: Low Mass at Assumption Grotto, Detroit (Feria - 4th class, or St. Placid & Companions - 4th class)
• Wed. 10/05 8:00 AM: Low Mass (Confessions 8:30 AM to 9:30 AM) at St. Joseph's Church, Ray Township [NB: See note at bottom of this post about SSPX sites.]* (Feria - 4th class, or St. Placid & Companions - 4th class)
• Wed. 10/05 7:00 PM: Low Mass at Assumption Grotto, Detroit (Feria - 4th class, or St. Placid & Companions - 4th class)

Thursday

• Thu. 10/06 7:30 AM: Low Mass at Assumption Grotto, Detroit (St. Bruno - 3rd class, or Jesus Christ the High Priest - 3rd class)
• Thu. 10/06 8:00 AM: Low Mass (Confessions 8:30 AM to 9:30 AM) at St. Joseph's Church, Ray Township [NB: See note at bottom of this post about SSPX sites.]* (St. Bruno - 3rd class, or Jesus Christ the High Priest - 3rd class)
• Thu. 10/06 7:00 PM: Low Mass at Assumption Grotto, Detroit (St. Bruno - 3rd class, or Jesus Christ the High Priest - 3rd class)

Friday

• Fri. 10/07 7:30 AM: Low Mass at Assumption Grotto, Detroit (Our Lady of the Rosary - 2nd class)
• Fri. 10/07 8:00 AM: Low Mass (Confessions 8:30 AM to 9:30 AM) at a href="http://www.sspxmichigan.com/#!schedule/c24jx">St. Joseph's Church, Ray Township [NB: See note at bottom of this post about SSPX sites.]* (Our Lady of the Rosary - 2nd class)
• Fri. 10/07 7:00 PM: Low Mass at St. Josaphat, Detroit (Our Lady of the Rosary - 2nd class)
• Fri. 10/07 7:00 PM: Low Mass (usually) at Assumption Grotto, Detroit (Our Lady of the Rosary - 2nd class)
• Fri. 10/07 7:00 PM: High Mass (periodically) at St. Joseph's Church, Detroit (Our Lady of the Rosary - 2nd class)
• Fri. 10/07 7:00 PM: High Mass at Old St. Mary's, Greektown, Detroit (Our Lady of the Rosary - 2nd class) [First Friday]
Windsor's St. Benedict Choir will be there!

Saturday

• Sat. 10/08 7:30 AM: Low Mass at Assumption Grotto, Detroit (St. Bridget of Sweden - 3rd class)
• Sat. 10/08 8:00 AM: Low Mass (Confessions 1/2 hour before Mass: call beforehand) at St. Ann's Church, Livonia [NB: See note at bottom of this post about SSPX sites.]* (St. Bridget of Sweden - 3rd class)
• Sat. 10/08 8:00 AM: Low Mass (Confessions 8:30 AM to 9:30 AM) at St. Joseph's Church, Ray Township [NB: See note at bottom of this post about SSPX sites.]* (St. Bridget of Sweden - 3rd class)
• Sat. 10/08 8:30 AM: Low Mass at Miles Christi, South Lyon, MI (St. Bridget of Sweden - 3rd class)
• Sat. 10/08 6:00 PM Tridentine Mass at SS. Cyril & Methodius Slovak Catholic Church, Sterling Heights (St. Bridget of Sweden - 3rd class)

Sunday

• Sun. 10/09 7:30 AM and 10:00 AM: Low Mass (Confessions 45 minutes before and after Masses) at St. Joseph's Church, Ray Township [NB: See note at bottom of this post about SSPX sites.]* (21st Sunday after Pentecost - 2nd class)
• Sun. 10/09 8:00 and 10:30AM Low Mass (Confessions 1/2 hour before Mass: call beforehand) at St. Ann's Church, Livonia [NB: See note at bottom of this post about SSPX sites.]* (21st Sunday after Pentecost - 2nd class)
• Sun. 10/09 8:00 AM: High Mass at St. Joseph's Church, Detroit (21st Sunday after Pentecost - 2nd class)
• Sun. 10/09 9:30 AM: High Mass at St. Josaphat, Detroit (21st Sunday after Pentecost - 2nd class)
• Sun. 10/09 9:30 AM: High Mass at Assumption Grotto, Detroit (21st Sunday after Pentecost - 2nd class)
• Sun. 10/09 9:45 AM: High Mass at OCLMA/Academy of the Sacred Heart, Bloomfield Hills (21st Sunday after Pentecost - 2nd class)
• Sun. 10/09 [occasional Tridentine Masses: contact parish] at Our Lady of the Scapular Parish (21st Sunday after Pentecost - 2nd class)
• Sun. 10/09 12:30 PM: Old St. Patrick's, Ann Arbor (21st Sunday after Pentecost - 2nd class)
• Tue. 10/09 2:00 PM: High Mass at Holy Name of Mary, Canada (21st Sunday after Pentecost - 2nd class)
• Sun. 10/09 3:00 PM: Low Mass (call ahead for Confession times, 989-892-5936) at Infant of Prague, Bay City [NB: See note at bottom of this post about SSPX sites.]* (21st Sunday after Pentecost - 2nd class)
• Sun. 10/09 3:00 PM High Mass St. Matthew Catholic Church, Flint (21st Sunday after Pentecost - 2nd class)

* NB: The SSPX chapels among those Mass sites listed above are posted here because the Holy Father has announced that "those who during the Holy Year of Mercy approach these priests of the Fraternity of St Pius X to celebrate the Sacrament of Reconciliation shall validly and licitly receive the absolution of their sins." These chapels are not listed among the approved parishes and worship sites on archdiocesan websites. Also please note that St. Joseph's SSPX Chapel in Richmond has moved to Ray Township, at 57575 Romeo Plank Rd., Ray Twp., MI 48096.

Michael Matt: it's not 'the Donald,' stupid; it's his 13 conservative Catholic advisors

Amy Welborn on Nashville sex ed skirmish

Amy Welborn, "4th Period is SexyTime Today" (Charlotte was Both, September 22, 2016)

[Parental advisory: the article contains explicit language]

Really? Is this what children need to be hearing in school?

As Guy Noir says: "Eye-opening and surprising, even as it is completely unsurprising ... And one more time I'll opine that Theology of the Body is as much a bloated and dubious project as any sort of gift, much like Vatican II."

Very cool: the “Ley Line”

Check out what this is all about at Fr. Z's blog: HERE. It's very cool.

Upshot: Catholics have more fun! Just like Hobbits journeying from the Shire!

George Carlin: The Language of Politics (To whom do you think this most readily applies?!)

Via Fr. Z:

St. Paul Albanian Church (Rochester Hills) to host major Tridentine Mass with Windor's St. Benedict Choir Oct. 2nd

The Binding force of Tradition ~ Fr Ripperger

Advisory: This is a substantial lecture with considerable philosophical & theological detail:


[Hat tip to J.E.]

Liturgy: Look to the East at sunrise for my coming ...

Ad orientem ... Overcoming the hurdle of 'priest as performer' ... Relearning what was once habit ....


[Hat tip to J.E.]

"Profound hypocrisy of ACC, NCAA and others making business decisions desguised as moral outrage"

The following is taken from a PDF of a letter from Franklin Graham from Boone, NC, to Commissioner John D. Swofford of Atlantic Coast Conference in Greensboro, NC, dated September 15, 2016:

As a lifelong resident of North Carolina and current CEO and president of two organizations employing nearly 1,500 North Carolinians, I am saddened -- even outraged -- by the vote of the ACC Council of Presidents to move conference championships from our state in protest of legislation requiring people to use public bathrooms that correspond with their birth gender.

While I recognize this legislation -- and legislation like it in other states -- is complicated by society's continued blurring of the lines of gender and sexual identity, I also recognize the profound hypocrisy of the ACC, the NCAA and other companies and organizations who are making calculated business decisions disguised as moral outrage.

For example, the football championship game your conference voted to move from Charlotte in December is called the "Dr. Pepper ACC Football Championship." Dr. Pepper and its parent company, Cadbury Schweppes and Carlyle Group, proundly sell their products in countries where homosexuality is illegal. Will ACC drop its title sponsor? And why isn't the LGBT community demanding you sever ties with such a "bigoted" corporate sponsor?

Currently, LGBT relationships are illegal in more than 70 countries -- including 10 where homosexuality is punishable by death. Dr. Pepper is often bottled under contract by Coca-Cola bottlers -- yet Coca-Cola conducts business in virtually every nation on earth, including nearly every country where homosexuality is currently criminalized. Can your conference continue to tolerate that?

The ACC website proudly features Toyota as an "Official Corporate Champion," yet Toyota maintains factories and distribution centers in several of these discriminatory countries, including Pakistan, Sri Lanka and Egypt. Where is the moral outrage of the presidents of Boston College, Clemson, Duke, Florida State, Georgia Tech, Louisville, Miami, UNC, North Carolina State, Notre Dame, Pittsburgh, Syracuse, Virginia, Virginia Tech and Wake Forest?

Indeed, the ACC's member schools compete in 25 sports divided by gender -- 12 men's sports and 13 women's. Though gender issues may be becoming more complicated in higher education and other parts of society, the athletic conference you serve as commissioner doesn't seem to have any problem distinguishing between the two genders -- male and female. Yet, when a state like the one I live in seeks to make the same distinction with regard to use of public bathrooms in an effort to protect its citizens from those who would use the men's room today and th women's room tomorrow, the academic elites who comprise your conference fake a moral outrage that is frankly shameful.

Ironically, the NCAA is more discriminatory towards transgender people than the public policy they apparently wish to see as law in America. For example, opponents to legislation like NC House Bill 2 support permitting people to use the bathroom which corresponds to the sex they identify with on a given day -- meaning someone might feel like a man today and a woman tomorrow, switching bathrooms at will.

Yet even the NCAA doesn't allow such casual gender identity for participation in collegiate athletics. The NCAA Policy on Transgender Student-Athlete Participation states, "Any transgender student-athlete who is not taking hormone treatment related to gender transition may participate in sex-separated sports activities in accordance with his or her assigned birth gender."

I think I represent the views of millions who would rather preserve gender-specific public bathrooms -- a mainstay for generations -- than to attend a football game in my state to determine the champion of a conference governed by politically-correct, morally hypocritical academics.

Commissioner, in your statement today you said, "the ACC Council of Presidents made it clear that the core values of this league are of the utmost importance, and wthe opposition to any form of discrimination is paramount. Today's decision is one of principle." Will this same paramount "opposition to any form of discriminatin" have you now sever ties with Toyota and Dr. Pepper?

I am a big sports fan. My only daughter married a college football star that went on to play in the NFL. But I would rather defend the biological definition of the two genders as created by the Creator of the universe than attend -- or even watch on TV -- a football or basketball game to determine the AC champion.

Commissionar Swofford, you maintain your conference's decision is "one of principle" and that "core values ... are of utmost importance." Well, millions of us who oppose your decision do so as a matter of principle and core values -- values of privacy, safety and protection of our sons and daughters in public restooms, and the principle that God created just two genders and assigned them at birth.

Please don't make political pawns of student-athletes who just want to play football or basketball in North Carolina, and don't continue to offend millions of Americans who endorse thousands of years of gender-specific bathrooms while you continue to accept corporate sponsorship money from companies proudly conducting their business in countries that discriminate against homosexuals to the point of death.

Sincerely,

Franklin Graham President & CEO of Samaritan's Purse President & CEO of the Billy Graham Evangelistic Association

cc. Presidents of the 15 member schools.

[Hat tip to J.S.]

Two money quotes from Henry Sire on the Mass of Paul VI and Annibale Bugnini

Pope Paul VI with Secretary of the Commission on the reform of the liturgy, Annibale Bugnini
Henry J.A. Sire, Phoenix from the Ashes: The Making, Unmaking, and Restoration of Catholic Tradition(Angelico Press, 2015):

The story of how the liturgical revolution was put through is one that hampers the historian by its very enormity; he would wish, for his own sake, to have a less unbelievable tale to tell. The partisanship in choice of agents, the contempt for law and consultation, the blind support given by Paul VI despite every abuse, the silencing of the Church's official organisms for the liturgy, the spirit of conflict in which the reform of the most sacred possession of the faithful was carried out, the advance of irreverence and impiety, the prompt discarding of principles that had been declared essential only a few years before, the discrediting and sudden departure of both the men to whom Paul VI had entrusted the reform of the liturgy, all these challenge belief. Moderation seems to demand rejection of such a story; but moderation is the wrong lens through which to judge immoderate events. That the reform of the Church's liturgical life should have been bound up with such violations seems too hard to accept, but it can be explained by two facts: the first is the initial decision of Paul VI to hand over the reform to the most extreme wing of liturgical iconoclasts, and the second is the background of Modernist clamour that existed at the time. However they chose to act, the pope and his nominees needed never to fear criticism for actions that made for change, but only for laggardness in promoting it. This noisy chorus, claiming to be the voice of the faithful, represented a milieu filled with arrogance towards the sacred and towards Christian tradition. At their demand the religious treasure house of centuries was destroyed, while the ordinary laity, under the flood of innovation, lapsed from the Church in their millions. One day it will be necessary for the Church to study with honesty the way in which its liturgical heritage was done away with and to pass the judgment that it has pronounced in the past on grave deviations from its true nature and duty. (p. 251-2)

We need to be clear that in attempting to stamp out the traditional liturgy of the Church, Pope Paul VI and the hierarchies of the world after him were following a policy of complete illegality. This assertion is not a legal quibble; it does not rest on a benign oversight in the constitution Missale Romanum. Paul VI did indeed want to consign the traditional rite to oblivion, but he knew that he was not entitled to do so. Yet even the legitimate intentions of legislation need to be expressed in legally valid form, and where the intention is legitimate there is never any difficulty in ensuring that. The failure of Pope Paul VI to abrogate the old liturgy is the consequence of the fact that it was a wholly illegitimate intention. This is merely part of a wider truth, that the entire liturgical reform is steeped in illegitimacy and illegality from beginning to end: the assumption by Bugnini and his associates of a mission beyond what the Council had authorized, the disregard that they showed for the Congregation of Rites, the ignoring of due process in the introduction of reforms, the overriding of the Synod of Bishops when it opposed the new Mass, the forcing of the new rite on the Consilium by Bugnini on the plea that it was the pope's personal will, his disobedience of the pope's direction to submit the General Instruction to the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith. When the new rite was brought in, the attempt to accompany its introduction with the abolition of the old was part of the same course of illegality. Hence we ought to recognize what the genuine law of the Church is at present: there is no need juridically for the restoration of the traditional rite. The only thing needed for its recovery is that the Church should return to legality. As a matter of law, there is no obligation on any priest to use the Missal of Paul VI for any celebration, and the only liturgy that has universal right in the Latin Church is the one decreed by Pope St. Pius V in the bull Quo Primum. (p. 286)

[Hat tip to Sir A.S.]

'Ruling Class' author explains the Trump phenomena

Neal B. Freeman of the National Review has an interesting article by the above title over at WorldTribune.com (September 13, 2016). The interview is with Angelo Codevilla, "the longtime professor of international relations at Boston University and, before that, a powerful voice in Washington deliberations on national security. The author of 13 books, he is perhaps best known for an essay later turned into a book, The Ruling Class, which called out the coastal elites that have dominated, and in Codevilla’s view misdirected, our political culture for several decades past."

Excerpts:

In every group of 1,000 Trump voters, there is one made-for-TV skinhead. With remarkable efficiency, the designated nut-job is identified and packaged for tele-journalists who in other circumstances might be expected to deplore the conflation of anecdote with datum.

... Caricaturing Trump’s supporters as skinheads is yet another instance of the ruling class’s longstanding attitude toward America. To wit: America was born tainted by racism, sexism, greed, genocide against natives — a critique that is wrapped in both religious obscurantism and hypocritical promises of equality. This refrain from government, its clients in the media, the educational establishment, and major corporations has convinced millions to support whomever and whatever might disempower that class. Even Donald Trump. Rejection of these caricatures is a unifying sentiment among his supporters. The accused’s natural tendency is to think, “That’s not who I am.” And then, “Who the Hell do they think they are to say that of me?” Humans live by the sense of who they are and of what the world around them is. In short, by common sense. They rebel reflexively when confronted by assertions that run counter to it.

[Hat tip to Sir A.S.]

Argument of the Month Club debates Amoris Laetitia

Well, 'debated' would be more accurate: this happened back on May 10th. But the video is still worth a watch:

Fr. John Eckert vs. Dr. David Pence, "Amoris Laetitia (Joy of Love): 'Ambiguous and Scandalous' or 'Clear and Inspiring'?" (AOTM, May 10, 2016) [VIDEO]

[Hat tip to Sir A.S.]

An update from Norcia

Via Rorate:

Rare Merton observations on the liturgical reform

Kenneth J. Wolfe, "Thomas Merton on post-Vatican II liturgy" (Rorate Caeli, September 20, 2016):

For Father Louis (his religious name that appears on his tombstone, above), his liturgical sensibilities began in quite the traditional manner. In his 1948 autobiography "The Seven Storey Mountain", he wrote of his love of "the warmth of Gregorian chant" and noted his first attendance at Mass (before converting) was an August 1938 Low Mass at Corpus Christi church in New York, where he was impressed by even a music-free liturgy.

... In the 1960s, Father Louis would get caught up in the spirit of Vatican II, but he also showed some misgiving. A recent article by Gregory K. Hillis, an associate professor of theology at Bellarmine University in Louisville, Kentucky, highlighted some of these quotes in the context of embracing "really groovy" Mass insanity in 1967, while writing numerous letters in the same decade opposing the reforms that led to the novus ordo (which he did not live to see). From the article:

...Merton knew that liturgical reform was risky, and in a letter to Dom Denys Rackley, a Carthusian at La Grande Chartreuse written five days after the constitution's promulgation, he expresses his reservations about the liturgical doors opened up by the council:

"Our great danger is to throw away things that are excellent, which we do not understand, and replace them with mediocre forms which seem to us to be more meaningful and which in fact are only trite. I am very much afraid that when all the dust clears we will be left with no better than we deserve, a rather silly, flashy, seemingly up-to-date series of liturgical forms that have lost the dignity and the meaning of the old ones."

"The monks cannot understand the treasure they possess, and they throw it out to look for something else ...."

... But Merton also frequently expresses frustration with the willingness with which progressives were willing to rid the liturgy of that which had timeless value. Merton's frustrations come through clearly in a 1965 letter to an Anglican:

"As I tell all my Anglican friends, 'I hope you will have the sense to maintain traditions that we are now eagerly throwing overboard'."

He is particularly concerned about the ease with which Latin and Gregorian chant were being abandoned, even in the monastery: "The monks cannot understand the treasure they possess, and they throw it out to look for something else, when seculars, who for the most part are not even Christians, are able to love this incomparable art."

Free fall

Elliot Milco, "Francis's Argentine Letter and the Proper Response" (First Things, September 14, 2016).

[Hat tip to JM]

Two demurrals from Mirus

Edward Peters, "My I demur re Mirus this once?" (In the Light of the Law, September 13, 2016):

Pretty much everything Dr. Jeff Mirus writes is worth reading, but his latest column, correctly defending Pope Francis against charges of heresy based on his endorsement of the Buenos Aires Directive, overstates the argument in one small, technical regard and, I think, misses a larger, more important point in another. I basically agree with everything Mirus wrote, except as follows. Read more >>

Dr. John Lamont, "Dr. Jeffrey Mirus on marriage and the Eucharist" - via "Op-Ed: 'Adultery as a venial sin' -- and other absurdities of trying to defend the indefensible Francis Doctrine" (Rorate Caeli, September 15, 2016):

Dr. Jeffrey Mirus has recently published an article entitled ‘Not heretical: Pope Francis’ approval of the Argentine bishops’ policy on invalid marriages’ [available here]. The object of this article is to argue that Pope Francis has not asserted or endorsed heresy in approving of a recent document issued by some Argentinian bishops concerning the apostolic exhortation Amoris Laetitia. To justify this conclusion, Dr. Mirus makes a number of claims about moral behaviour and the discipline of the sacraments.

These claims urgently need to be addressed. Read more >>

Related: And now a response from Dr. Jeff Mirus, "Papal governance by sleight-of-hand strains my grasp of culpability and Canon Law" (CatholicCulture.org, September 16, 2016).

Canonis Ed Peters on "the Buenos Aires directive"

Ed Peters, "On the Buenos Aires directive" (In the Light of the Law, September 13, 2016). As always, superlatively clear, eminently edifying, and right on the money.

Robert Royal: "So now we know"

Robert Royal,"A Bizarre Papal Move" (The Catholic Thing, September 14, 2016):

So now we know. We knew before, really, but didn’t have explicit confirmation. The long, agonizing slog, however, is finally over: from Pope Francis’ invitation to Cardinal Kasper to address the bishops in Rome in February of 2014 to the pope’s letter last week to some Argentinean bishops affirming guidelines they had developed in a joint document that, in “exceptional cases,” people divorced and remarried (living in an “adulterous” relationship as we believed for 2000 years in Western Christianity), may receive Holy Communion. This whole affair is bizarre. No other word will do....

....Indeed, Catholics have a new teaching now, not only on divorce and remarriage. We have a new vision of the Eucharist. It’s worth recalling that in January the pope, coyly, not ruling it out, suggested to a group of Lutherans in Rome that they, too, should “talk with the Lord” and “go forward.” Indeed, they later took Communion at Mass in the Vatican. In a way, that was even more significant. A Catholic couple, divorced and remarried, are sinners, but – at least in principle – still Catholic. Has intercommunion with non-Catholic Christians also been decided now without any consultation – almost as if such a momentous step in understanding the Sacrament of Unity hardly matters?

I say this in sorrow, but I’m afraid that the rest of this papacy is now going to be rent by bands of dissenters, charges of papal heresy, threats of – and perhaps outright –schism. Lord, have mercy.

Spiritual vitality of today's youth vs. encultured sterility of older generations? A false dichotomy

Guy Noir, again, commenting this time on "Rah Rah T(eam) G(ospel) C(oalition)" (Old Life, September 13, 2016).

Noir writes:

SO the overheated rhetoric of "new" evangelization and new forms of discipleship is not just a postconciliar Catholic phenomenon. This critique seems not so much curmudgeonly as correct.

Let's have impassioned preaching (do we Catholics though have that?), but let's also have talk about faithful living that sounds adult in its tenor, and not like what sounds closer to either what Knox called Enthusiam or what I'd call very bad European ad campaigning.

Excerpts from the Old Life article:

[The so often] repeated contrast between the spiritual vitality of today’s young people and the enculturated sterility of the older generation is naive.... [...I]f spiritual renewal is to be a sustaining presence in the church at large, it must certainly go beyond what theologians, preachers, [...]officials, and other professional Christian workers do for a living. It must even go beyond what lay people do in devotion, worship, witness, and Christian social involvement.

Francis Schaeffer listened to Pink Floyd? Timothy Leary, Eric Clapton, and Keith Richards read or studied with him??

A terrific article in many, many ways. Please do yourself a favor if you are the least bit interested in Christian intellectual culture, and read Jake Meador's "Francis Schaeffer and Christian Intellectualism" (Mere Orthodoxy, August 18, 2016).

The piece sets the stage by tolling the death knell of public Christian intellectual culture round about 1960. Like this:

In his recent essay on Christian intellectualism, Alan Jacobs dates the high point of the public Christian intellectual in America as being in the late 1940s. Citing the influence of thinkers like CS Lewis, WH Auden, and Reinhold Niebuhr, Jacobs argues that the movement began to fade in the 1950s and, by the 1960s, was largely a spent force. By that time Lewis, Auden, and Niebuhr were no longer as relevant in contemporary debates and the next generation had not yet emerged. By the time that generation of leaders did, Jacobs argues, the culture had moved past them and they had become more conversant in the intramural discussions happening in conservative religious circles rather than the broader cultural conversation.

... In dating the decline of the Christian intellectual, Jacobs cites, amongst other things, the evidence offered by major media coverage of prominent public Christians. He notes that both Lewis and Niebuhr made the cover of Time in the late 1940s with Lewis appearing on it in 1947 and Niebuhr doing the same in 1948. What’s funny about this is that Francis Schaeffer, who has been hailed by some as Lewis’s only equal amongst orthodox Christian apologists in the 20th century, also makes a prominent appearance in Time ... but in 1960....

Time‘s description of Schaeffer, however, tells us something about how things had changed during the 12 years between Niebuhr’s cover and Schaeffer’s. In 1960, Time presents Schaeffer as a missionary to the intellectuals, which he no doubt was. But this assumes that Christianity needs missionaries to the intellectuals because the intellectuals are no longer Christian. What had been conflict within the intellectual community 13 years before when they reported on CS Lewis has become an attempt to witness to the intellectual community by 1960. This suggests, in one sense, that Jacobs is right—the Christian public intellectual is dead by 1960, which is why Schaeffer was needed.

But it also raises a separate question: If that intellectual is dead, why is Schaeffer being covered by Time in the first place?Further, why does he have well-known figures from the various counter-cultures as well as popular icons of the era beating down his door to study with him at L’Abri? Timothy Leary, Eric Clapton, and Keith Richards are just three examples of prominent 1960s figures who read or studied with Schaeffer. There are others....

Read more >>

[Hat tip to JM]

Papal letter approving sacraments for the re-married

• "Discernimento e carità pastorale: ​Papa Francesco sulla lettera di vescovi argentini dedicata all’«Amoris laetitia»" (L'Osservatore Romano, September 12, 2016).
• John-Henry Westen, "Vatican Radio confirms Pope's leaked letter on Amoris Laetitia as authentic" (LifeSiteNews, September 12, 2016).
• "For the record. Pope Frances confirms Amoris Laetitia allows communion for adulterers" (Rorate Caeli, September 10, 2016)
• "Pope: 'No other interpretation' of Amoris Laetitia than allowing communion for divorced and remarried 'in some cases'" (LifeSiteNews, September 9, 2016)
• Spanish original of the letter from the Pope [PDF]
• Spanish original of the bishops' directives [PDF]
• LifeSiteNews' translation of the Pope's letter [PDF]
• LifeSiteNews' translation of the bishops' directive
• Steve Skojec, "Papal Signature, Crest, on Original Letter Approving Sacraments for REmarried" (1P5, September 12, 2016).
• "Francisco aprecia el documento de los obispos argentinos sobre Amoris Laetitia" (ZENIT, September 13, 2016).
• "Los obispos de Buenos Aires están elaborando unos «Criterios básicos para la aplicación del capítulo VIII de Amoris laetitia»" (infoCatolica, September 8, 2016).

Related: Lianne Laurence, "Another plea to Pope to correct 'heretical' statements in 'Amoris Laetitia'" (LifeSiteNews, August 10, 2016) - Professor Josef Seifert.

Us and Them and Cultural Resistance

This just in from Guy Noir:

Amy Welborn on the home schooling movement ...

I hope readers of my blog over the last few years have picked this up from what I have written. Much of what moved me to homeschool in the first place was a dissatisfaction with the lifestyle school forces on a family. We have so little freedom in the way we lead our daily lives anyway: work limits our families, as do economic concerns. School – with its daily, weekly and yearly schedules, with its homework and projects, with its fundraisers – slams one more constraint on. As I have written over and over again, the reason we accept this is that we accept that what school gives is worth what we must give over to it. The tipping point for many of us comes when we realize that what the school gives is not worth it and what it demands is counterproductive to our children’s flourishing and our family lives and that the resources available to us, our own schools, and our childrens’ not-yet-deadened curiosity means that we can do the same thing at home just as well or even better, and have a lot more fun doing it.

Guy Noir again:

I found this doubly interesting since a teaching colleague, someone who tilts liberal, told me she moved her family inland to get it away from the materialistic encroachments of the urban center where they were. And she came in on Monday very pumped by the movie "Captain Fantastic." There is very real counter-cultural emphasis in the Faith that should appeal across political lines, as Alexi Sargeant gets, at "First Thoughts":

I recently saw the film Captain Fantastic, and enjoyed it immensely. The film stars Viggo Mortensen as Ben Cash, a man raising and schooling his six children off-the-grid in a remote corner of Washington State forest. The family are Leftist, slightly pagan hippies (the eldest son informs his father that being a Trotskyist was just a phase, “I'm a Maoist now”), and yet their homeschooling experience absolutely reminded me of my own. Sure, I wasn't learning to hunt animals with a bow and arrow or celebrating “Noam Chomsky Day” in my heavily Christian homeschool community, but I totally recognize these characters’ family solidarity, their quirky erudition, and their combination of regimented learning with an anti-authoritarian streak.

The film’s plot is kicked off when Ben hears from the parents of his wife, who left the forest to be treated in a hospital for bipolar disorder. She has committed suicide. Ben’s father-in-law, who blames his daughter’s mental illness on the family’s unconventional lifestyle, orders him not to come to the funeral. But the children insist on paying respects, so the whole family climbs into a battered bus named “Steve”—and set out on a collision course with contemporary America.

While there are immensely satisfying scenes of Ben’s young children demonstrating how real their education has been to skeptical aunts, uncles, and cousins, the movie is also committed to questioning Ben’s model of homeschooling. His motivation for raising his kids the way he has is twofold: both a great love of learning, and a fear of the corrupting influence of modern mediocrity. The movie’s conclusion sees Ben and his kids try to reach some sort of compromise with society—so it’s finally a film about the Benedict Option as well, asking how we can stay part of the wider world while modeling a more humane culture.

Mercy? Charity? Peter Claver, the Slave Lover!

Amy Wellborn, "7 Quick Takes" (Charlotte Was Both, September 9, 2016):

Feastdays!

Contemporary Churchy rhetoric might lead you to believe that before the last couple of years, Catholics didn’t know that charity and mercy were at the heart of the Gospel. Surprise! They did! Take a look at our saints for today:
St. Peter Claver

“No life, except the life of Christ, has so moved me as that of St. Peter Claver.”

–Pope Leo XIII

 

A statue of Peter Claver and a slave in Cartagena.  

This is a very good introduction, from a Cartagena page. 
From Crisis:

Claver’s heroism in dealing with the diseased and sick is astounding. Even so, it was an everyday occurrence. Claver would wipe the sweat from the faces of the slaves with his own handkerchief. Moreover, he would often clothe the sick and diseased in his own cloak. As some of his interpreters witnessed, the cloak had to be washed up to seven times a day from the stink and filth which it had accumulated. It was routine for Claver to console his fellow man by joyfully undertaking practices which were considered extremely repugnant to most. As one eye-witness notes, “Most admirable was that he not only cleansed these plague-ridden ulcers with the two handkerchiefs he kept for that, but did not hesitate to press his lips to them.” He plainly saw Christ “in the least of these brethren.”

The chief problem in the evangelization of the slaves lay in the numerous languages used by the many “races” of Africans. Although Claver himself never mastered the African languages, he did have some facility with Angolese, the most common of them. On account of these linguistic difficulties, he continually worked with a team of interpreters, black slaves who had a fine ear and tongue for languages. It is important to note that Claver empowered these slave interpreters to become true leaders, diligently training them in the Christian faith. Treating them as his equals, close friends, and true collaborators in the work of evangelization, he always carefully looked after their food, clothing, and medicines. If they were seriously sick, he gave up his bed to them, and slept on the floor.

As images are the books of the illiterate, Claver was liberal in his use of pictures in catechizing the new converts. In his instructions, he taught them the rudiments of the faith. He especially enjoyed teaching them about the life, passion, and death of Christ through illustrations and the crucifix. At times, he even used the monitory pictures of hell to inspire in them a true sense of contrition for their own sins. At the same time, he also gave them hope, teaching them about the glories of heaven. It was not an easy task. The slaves had to be patiently drilled in such simple matters as the sign of the cross. At all times, however, he reminded them of their own dignity and worth, teaching them that Christ had redeemed them at a great price with his blood.

Every spring, Claver would set out on rural missions to plantations surrounding Cartagena. Here he would check up on the lives of his charges as much as he was able. Refusing the hospitality of the plantation owners, he dwelt in the Negro slave quarters. On many occasions, he was ill-received by the plantation owners and their wives. They looked at his spiritual ministrations among their slaves as a waste of their time. Throughout his life, he was never a revolutionary, a “hater of the rich and embittered protector of the poor.” Although he had a special predilection for the poor black slaves, he did not ignore the rich; rather, he exhorted the wealthy to carry out their social duties and he promoted cooperation between the classes.

 Guy Noir comments:

I'll add that I  second her point. When I researched Sheed & Ward, it was evident that strongly orthodox Catholics were also very active in "social justice." The modern idea that there is a tension there is simply absurd. Arnold Lunn was a fairly staunch apologist. So much so her and Frank Sheed had disagreements over how much vigor to apply to arguments. Yet he also wrote a bio of St. Peter Claver (with the somewhat startling cover pictured. I can't imagine any publisher having the gumption to market such a great jacket today!) 

Fierce

Reading Peter Wehner's "George Orwell's Fierce Modesty" (First Things, September 7, 2016), our underground correspondent we keep on retainer, Guy Noir - Private Eye, comments:

OK, and I have thought similar thoughts. A needed word.

And Orwell actually wrote a very appreciative review of Frank Sheed's Communism and Man.

But "fierce" modesty? Where on earth did that word come from, and how does it fit at all? "Sober," maybe, "measured," "admirable," "honest," "consistent." But "fierce" ? Sounds like a Bro Country album title.

You know what we really need? A fierce resistance to defaulting to intense words to try pump up our relevance and vitality. I saw a sign for "The Surge Church." We need "robust interior lives." We have to be "Gospel centered," there is the "New" evangelization, and Orwell was "fiercely" modest. It is exhausting enough to make you want to yawn. I know every age has its phrases, but have we peaked and overshot, in an era when new books routinely come out with a page of seven to nine book blurbs hyping a little known author, and even article titles have to have so.... much ... zing!

Fr. Perrone on how acedia can lead you to hell, and a proper 'self-hate' and 'violence to oneself' can save your soul

Fr. Eduard Perrone, "A Pastor's Descant" (Assumption Grotto News, September 11, 2016):

Our Lady's birthday was observed this past week with fitting liturgical ceremonial here while I was in far away Ohio offering Mass for a bus load or two of pilgrims visiting a Marian Shrine. In the Archdiocese of Detroit our parish is the equivalent of a local Marian shrine, having a long history of Marian devotion, especially at our outdoor Grotto.

My thoughts today turn to the consideration of a topic I treated once before, but with a slightly different twist. I had written then about acedia, a spiritual malignancy that afflicts many people who have a spiritual bent alright, but who lack the motivation to carry-through on any lasting course of spiritual resolve.

The condition I write about today is the want of spiritual get-up-and-go, an indifference to things of faith, not in theory or doctrinal acquiescence, but in carry-through in effective action. It's a listlessness which can't get one going to be zealous in religious observances. For those thus afflicted, everything suffers: the moral life (commandments are not kept), prayer (just can't get motivated to do it), spiritual reading and engagement in spiritual conversation, retreat making, holy hours with the Blessed Sacrament, the daily rosary, Mass attentiveness ... the list could be extended. I want to say from the outset that this is a condition that results from sensuality. The readiness to jump in eagerly to sensual delights -- eating, drinking, socializing, recreational activities, movies, music, sports, etc., let alone outright sinful and perverse pleasures -- these things paralyze the spiritual faculties, rendering them incapable of deriving satisfaction of a non-sensual kind from religious things. One does not get into such a state of lethargy innocently. Rather it's the product of sensual indulgence. As such, it is utterly distinct from that form of aridity experienced by those who have achieved a certain level of spiritual proficiency, the so-called "dark night." No, this is a much more basic level of torpidity which turns away from religious activities because they don't give the 'buzz' of excitement that sensual things do -- I might add: "of necessity!"

As a result of this unfortunate state, sufferers of this malady get into moral ruts and never make spiritual progress. The devil keeps them firmly held in a position where their half-hearted attempts of freedom from this misery become impossible. Such a one, held in a deadlock, becomes sad, depressed, grumpy and ashamed of himself ... until something sensually exciting comes along to distract him from feeling the sting of his spiritual wretchedness. The pleasure having passed, the cycle repeats, over and over again. The end of the line for such a person is despair and final impenitence -- the assured prelude to hell.

If what I have written about here applies to you, it's not because I have been spying on you particularly. This affliction is rampant, in varying degrees, for people of this time in western countries. We have lost our "early love" (as the Book of Revelation calls our love and loyalty for Christ) and are left to our own devices, living joylessly apart from God who is the final end of the spiritual life.

We have come to expect in our day easy fixes for our pains: a tablet, a therapy, a quick exit from spiritual tensions and physical pains. For this disorder, however, I know of only one effective remedy. It will shock you. Violence to oneself. (How utterly impolitic and incorrect!) Christianity's strength has always been its asceticism, its strictness, the austerity which is part and parcel of the Gospel of Christ. Our Lord said quite plainly that we must hate ourselves. This is a recognizition that the most formidable enemy we have to eternal life is dear Self. I know of no other way to subdue the intemperate demands of self-love than the aforementioned 'violence' to oneself. I know this must sound to modern ears schooled in the tenets of modern psychology which justifies all self-indulgence, as an exhortation to masochism. But that's because we've grown overly much fond of self-esteem and entirely intolerant and indignant of anything smacking of self-discipline and self-restraint. Read the lives of the saints and search -- in vain -- for any one of them who has not inflicted on himself this said violence against himself. Such a saint has never existed.

Wonder no longer about backsliding, inertia, repeated sins, and unhappiness. Unless the cause be manifestly otherwise (and there surely are other reasons possible for emotional disorders) you are likely victim of your own doing. How supremely ironic it is that to be happy one must practice penances. Our Lord's manner of speaking the same: "he who loves his life will lose it, whereas he who hates his life in this world preserves it for life eternal."

Fr. Perrone

Pre-announcement. The celebrated author Joseph Pearce will be here Sunday, September 25 from 2:00 to 4:00 p.m. to speak on The Hobbit and the Lord of the Rings. The noon Mass that day will be the Latin Tridentine Mass. (Another reminder of this will follow next week.)

Tridentine Masses coming this week to metro Detroit and east Michigan

Tridentine Masses This Coming Week
Sunday

• Sun. 09/11 7:30 AM and 10:00 AM: Low Mass (Confessions 45 minutes before and after Masses) at St. Joseph's Church, Ray Township [NB: See note at bottom of this post about SSPX sites.]* (17th Sunday after Pentecost - 2nd class)
• Sun. 09/11 8:00 and 10:30AM Low Mass (Confessions 1/2 hour before Mass: call beforehand) at St. Ann's Church, Livonia [NB: See note at bottom of this post about SSPX sites.]* (17th Sunday after Pentecost - 2nd class)
• Sun. 09/11 8:00 AM: High Mass at St. Joseph's Church, Detroit (17th Sunday after Pentecost - 2nd class)
• Sun. 09/11 9:30 AM: High Mass at St. Josaphat, Detroit (17th Sunday after Pentecost - 2nd class)
• Sun. 09/11 9:30 AM: High Mass at Assumption Grotto, Detroit (17th Sunday after Pentecost - 2nd class)
• Sun. 09/04 9:45 AM: High Mass at OCLMA/Academy of the Sacred Heart, Bloomfield Hills (17th Sunday after Pentecost - 2nd class)
• Sun. 09/11 [occasional Tridentine Masses: contact parish] at Our Lady of the Scapular Parish (17th Sunday after Pentecost - 2nd class)
• Tue. 09/11 2:00 PM: High Mass at Holy Name of Mary, Canada (17th Sunday after Pentecost - 2nd class)
• Sun. 09/11 3:00 PM: Low Mass (call ahead for Confession times, 989-892-5936) at Infant of Prague, Bay City [NB: See note at bottom of this post about SSPX sites.]* (17th Sunday after Pentecost - 2nd class)
• Sun. 09/11 3:00 PM High Mass St. Matthew Catholic Church, Flint (17th Sunday after Pentecost - 2nd class)

Monday

• Mon. 09/12 7:30 AM: High or Low Mass (varies) at Assumption Grotto, Detroit (Most Holy Name of Mary - 3rd class)
• Mon. 09/12 8:00 AM: Low Mass (Confessions 8:30 AM to 9:30 AM) at St. Joseph's Church, Ray Township [NB: See note at bottom of this post about SSPX sites.]* (Most Holy Name of Mary - 3rd class)
• Mon. 09/12 12:00 Noon: High Tridentine Mass at Assumption Grotto, Detroit (Most Holy Name of Mary - 3rd class)
• Mon. 09/12 7:00 PM: Low Mass at St. Josaphat, Detroit (Most Holy Name of Mary - 3rd class)
• Mon. 09/12 7:00 PM: Ad ordientem Novus Ordo Mass celebrated by Archbishop Allen Vigneron at Assumption Grotto, Detroit, followed by Eucharistic procession (Most Holy Name of Mary - 3rd class)
• Mon. 09/12 7:00 PM: Low Mass at St. Joseph's Church, Detroit (Most Holy Name of Mary - 3rd class)

Tuesday

• Tue. 09/13 7:00 AM High or Low Mass (varies) at Assumption Grotto, Detroit (Feria - 4th class)
• Tue. 09/13 8:00 AM: Low Mass (call for Confession schedule) at St. Joseph's Church, Ray Township [NB: See note at bottom of this post about SSPX sites.]* (Feria - 4th class)
• Tue. 09/13 7:00 PM: Low Mass at Holy Name of Mary, Canada (Feria - 4th class)
• Tue. 09/13 7:00 PM: Low Mass (usually) at Assumption Grotto, Detroit (Feria - 4th class)

Wednesday

• Wed. 09/14 7:30 AM: High or Low Mass (varies) at Assumption Grotto, Detroit (Exaltation of the Holy Cross - 2nd class)
• Wed. 09/14 8:00 AM: Low Mass (Confessions 8:30 AM to 9:30 AM) at St. Joseph's Church, Ray Township [NB: See note at bottom of this post about SSPX sites.]* (Exaltation of the Holy Cross - 2nd class)
• Wed. 09/14 7:00 PM: Low Mass (usually) at Assumption Grotto, Detroit (Exaltation of the Holy Cross - 2nd class)

Thursday

• Thu. 09/15 7:30 AM: High or Low Mass (varies) at Assumption Grotto, Detroit (Seven Sorrows of the Blessed Virgin Mary - 2nd class)
• Thu. 09/15 8:00 AM: Low Mass (Confessions 8:30 AM to 9:30 AM) at St. Joseph's Church, Ray Township [NB: See note at bottom of this post about SSPX sites.]* (Seven Sorrows of the Blessed Virgin Mary - 2nd class)
• Thu. 09/15 7:00 PM: Low Mass (usually) at Assumption Grotto, Detroit (Seven Sorrows of the Blessed Virgin Mary - 2nd class)

Friday

• Fri. 09/16 7:30 AM: High or Low Mass (varies) at Assumption Grotto, Detroit (Sts. Cornelius & Cyprian - 3rd class)
• Fri. 09/16 8:00 AM: Low Mass (Confessions 8:30 AM to 9:30 AM) at a href="http://www.sspxmichigan.com/#!schedule/c24jx">St. Joseph's Church, Ray Township [NB: See note at bottom of this post about SSPX sites.]* (Sts. Cornelius & Cyprian - 3rd class)
• Fri. 09/16 7:00 PM: Low Mass at St. Josaphat, Detroit (Sts. Cornelius & Cyprian - 3rd class)
• Fri. 09/16 7:00 PM: Low Mass (usually) at Assumption Grotto, Detroit (Sts. Cornelius & Cyprian - 3rd class)
• Fri. 09/16 7:00 PM: High Mass (periodically) at St. Joseph's Church, Detroit (Sts. Cornelius & Cyprian - 3rd class)

Saturday

• Sat. 09/17 7:30 AM: High or Low Mass (varies) at Assumption Grotto, Detroit (Saturday of Our Lady - 4th class, or Stigmata of St. Francis - 4th class)
• Sat. 09/17 8:00 AM: Low Mass (Confessions 1/2 hour before Mass: call beforehand) at St. Ann's Church, Livonia [NB: See note at bottom of this post about SSPX sites.]* (St. Pius X - 3rd class, or Immaculate Heart of Mary - 3rd class)
• Sat. 09/17 8:00 AM: Low Mass (Confessions 8:30 AM to 9:30 AM) at St. Joseph's Church, Ray Township [NB: See note at bottom of this post about SSPX sites.]* (St. Pius X - 3rd class, or Immaculate Heart of Mary - 3rd class)
• Sat. 09/17 8:30 AM: Low Mass at Miles Christi, South Lyon, MI (St. Pius X - 3rd class, or Immaculate Heart of Mary - 3rd class)
• Sat. 09/17 6:00 PM Tridentine Mass at SS. Cyril & Methodius Slovak Catholic Church, Sterling Heights (St. Pius X - 3rd class, or Immaculate Heart of Mary - 3rd class)

Sunday

• Sun. 09/18 7:30 AM and 10:00 AM: Low Mass (Confessions 45 minutes before and after Masses) at St. Joseph's Church, Ray Township [NB: See note at bottom of this post about SSPX sites.]* (18th Sunday after Pentecost - 2nd class)
• Sun. 09/18 8:00 and 10:30AM Low Mass (Confessions 1/2 hour before Mass: call beforehand) at St. Ann's Church, Livonia [NB: See note at bottom of this post about SSPX sites.]* (18th Sunday after Pentecost - 2nd class)
• Sun. 09/18 8:00 AM: High Mass at St. Joseph's Church, Detroit (18th Sunday after Pentecost - 2nd class)
• Sun. 09/18 9:30 AM: High Mass at St. Josaphat, Detroit (18th Sunday after Pentecost - 2nd class)
• Sun. 09/18 9:30 AM: High Mass at Assumption Grotto, Detroit (18th Sunday after Pentecost - 2nd class)
• Sun. 09/08 9:45 AM: High Mass at OCLMA/Academy of the Sacred Heart, Bloomfield Hills (18th Sunday after Pentecost - 2nd class)
• Sun. 09/18 [occasional Tridentine Masses: contact parish] at Our Lady of the Scapular Parish (18th Sunday after Pentecost - 2nd class)
• Tue. 09/18 2:00 PM: High Mass at Holy Name of Mary, Canada (18th Sunday after Pentecost - 2nd class)
• Sun. 09/18 3:00 PM High Mass St. Matthew Catholic Church, Flint (18th Sunday after Pentecost - 2nd class)

* NB: The SSPX chapels among those Mass sites listed above are posted here because the Holy Father has announced that "those who during the Holy Year of Mercy approach these priests of the Fraternity of St Pius X to celebrate the Sacrament of Reconciliation shall validly and licitly receive the absolution of their sins." These chapels are not listed among the approved parishes and worship sites on archdiocesan websites. Also please note that St. Joseph's SSPX Chapel in Richmond has moved to Ray Township, at 57575 Romeo Plank Rd., Ray Twp., MI 48096.

Tridentine Community News - The Priest's Vesting Prayers; TLM Mass schedule

"I will go in unto the Altar of God
To God, Who giveth joy to my youth"
Tridentine Community News by Alex Begin (September 11, 2016):

September 11, 2016 - Seventeenth Sunday After Pentecost

The Extraordinary Form of Holy Mass incorporates rubrics and practices that display reverence towards holy objects and things destined for a sacred purpose. For example, any object handed to the priest during Holy Mass is to be kissed before being handed over. When an object is taken from the priest, it is kissed as soon as it is taken.

Likewise, before Mass, the celebrant kisses each of the vestments as he puts them on, often while reciting a set of Vesting Prayers.

The 1962 Roman Missal contains one chapter of Preparatory Prayers to be said before Mass, and another chapter of Prayers of Thanksgiving to be said after Mass. The Vesting Prayers comprise one section of the chapter of Preparatory Prayers. All of the prayers in these two chapters are optional. Several had been enriched with indulgences according to the pre-1968 list of indulgences. Many older sacristies, including those at St. Florian in Hamtramck and at the National Shrine of the Little Flower in Royal Oak, have cards containing these prayers mounted on their sacristy walls. Since the pious custom of a priest’s preparation for Mass is not well-known, below we present the Vesting Prayers. For those who may not be familiar with them, these vestments were described in our June 25, 2006 column, available on our web site.

Washing Hands

Da, Dómine, virtútem mánibus meis ad abstergéndam omnem máculam; ut sine pollutióne mentis et córporis váleam tibi servíre.


Give virtue to my hands, O Lord, that being cleansed from all stain I might serve Thee with purity of mind and body.

Amice

Impóne, Dómine, cápiti meo gáleam salútis, ad expugnándos diabólicos incúrsus.

Place upon me, O Lord, the helmet of salvation, that I may overcome the assaults of the devil.

Alb

Deálba me, Dómine, et munda cor meum; ut, in sánguine Agni dealbátus, gáudiis pérfruar sempitérnis.


Purify me, O Lord, and cleanse my heart, so that, washed in the Blood of the Lamb, I may enjoy eternal bliss.

Cincture

Præcínge me, Dómine, cíngulo puritátis, et exstíngue in lumbis meis humórem libídinis; ut maneat in me virtus continéntiæ et castitátis.

Gird me, O Lord, with the cincture of purity, and quench in my heart the fire of concupiscence, that the virtue of continence and chastity may abide in me.

Maniple

Mérear, Dómine, portáre manípulum fletus et dolóris; ut cum exsultatióne recípiam mercédem labóris.


May I deserve, O Lord, to bear the maniple of weeping and sorrow, that I may receive the reward for my labors with rejoicing.

Stole

Redde mihi, Dómine, stolam immortalitátis, quam pérdidi in prævaricatióne primi paréntis: et, quamvis indígnus accédo ad tuum sacrum mystérium, mérear tamen gáudium sempitérnum.


Restore unto me, O Lord, the stole of immortality, which was lost through the guilt of our first parents: and, although I am unworthy to approach Thy sacred Mysteries, nevertheless grant unto me eternal joy.

Dalmatic (Deacons and Bishops)

Índue me, Dómine, induménto salútis et vestiménto lætítiæ; et dalmática justítiæ circúmda me simper.

Lord, endow me with the garment of salvation, the vestment of joy; and with the dalmatic of justice ever encompass me.

Chasuble

Dómine, qui dixísti: Jugum meam suáve est et onus meum leve: fac, ut istud portáre sic váleam, quod cónsequar tuam grátiam. Amen.

O Lord, Who said, “My yoke is easy and My burden light”: grant that I may bear it well and follow after Thee with thanksgiving. Amen.

Tridentine Masses This Coming Week

• Mon. 09/12 7:00 PM: Low Mass at St. Josaphat (Most Holy Name of Mary)
• Tue. 09/13 7:00 PM: Low Mass at Holy Name of Mary, Windsor (Votive Mass for the Propagation of the Faith)
• Sat. 09/17 8:30 AM: Low Mass at Miles Christi (Stigmata of St. Francis)

[Comments? Please e-mail tridnews@detroitlatinmass.org. Previous columns are available at http://www.detroitlatinmass.org. This edition of Tridentine Community News, with minor editions, is from the St. Albertus (Detroit), Academy of the Sacred Heart (Bloomfield Hills), and St. Alphonsus and Holy Name of Mary Churches (Windsor) bulletin inserts for September 11, 2016. Hat tip to Alex Begin, author of the column.]

Ferrara: apostolic constitution Vultum Dei Quaerere bodes ill for future of cloistered convents

[Disclaimer: Rules ##7-9]

In Part III of what he calls "Ominous Power Grabs," Christopher A. Ferrara, "Francis Attacks the Cloistered Convents" (CFN, July 26, 2016), outlines the implications of the apostolic constitution Vultum Dei Quaerere for cloisters, given that the document mandates they immediately join 'federations' to be governed by Presidents and Councils, requiring the adoptation of new constitutions and 'forms of cloister' to be approved by the Vatican's centralizing control over all religious orders. Repealing all prior papal legislation mandating the strictness of major and minor 'papal enclosures' of nuns (e.g., by Pius XII and John Paul II), Francis' apostolic constitution mandates that even papal enclosures of nuns be opened to the public for Eucharistic adoration and permit the routine coming and going of nuns from their enclosures for such things as "specific courses on formation outside their monastery," including the recommended use of the Internet for their 'formation' and 'cooperation' with other convents.

Part I of the series is devoted to the new means of forcing the 'retirement' of bishops by motu proprio, especially troublesome when they seem in some cases ideologically motivated and to focus on prelates perceived as doctrinally and liturgically conservative, such as Bishops Tebartz-van Elstm of Limburg, Germany; Livieres Plano of Ciudad del Este, Paraguay; Oliveri of Albenga, Italy; Finn of Cansas City/St. Joseph, Missouri; and Nienstedt of Minneapolis. Whatever the accusations against them, they seem to dwindle in the presence of the notorious homosexual predator, Mgsr Battista Ricca, whom Francis appointed head of his papal household.

Part II reports on a rescript from the Congregation for the Institutes of Consecrated Life and Societies of Apostolic Life that would in essence "block the formation of any new traditionally-oriented society of diocesan right by local bishops sympathetic to Tradition unless the Vatican was satisfied with the 'originality' of it's 'charism,' failing which any attempt to erect the society would be void and without effect."

Suicide vs. Crapshoot election?

Increasing numbers of conservatives, at least, seem to be seeing it that way. A writer under the moniker of Publius Decius Mus, in "The Flight 93 Election" in the Clairmont Institute's online Review (CRB, September 5, 2016), writes:

2016 is the Flight 93 election: charge the cockpit or you die. You may die anyway. You—or the leader of your party—may make it into the cockpit and not know how to fly or land the plane. There are no guarantees.

Except one: if you don’t try, death is certain. To compound the metaphor: a Hillary Clinton presidency is Russian Roulette with a semi-auto. With Trump, at least you can spin the cylinder and take your chances.

The author then goes on to address the apparent lack of sense of crisis and urgency among fellow conservatives and to argue, compellingly at points, that -- essentially -- the jig is up.

Pro-life hero: Phyllis Stewart Schlafly (1924-2016) RIP

Ann Coulter, "Phyllis Stewart Schlafly, 1924-2016" (Human Events, September 5, 2016):

Phyllis Schlafly, the St. Louis-born American intellectual who grew from a shy and beautiful girl to become one of the most influential political activists of the 20th and 21st century, died today, Monday, September 5, 2016 according to Eagle Forum.

Schlafly has written or co-written more than 20 books, on military policy, education, legal and social issues. Her first book, “A Choice, Not an Echo,” is credited with winning Barry Goldwater the Republican nomination for president and inspiring the conservative movement that eventually led to Ronald Reagan’s presidency. Her military work was a major factor in Reagan's’ decision to proceed with High Frontier technology.

Since 1967, Schlafly has published the Phyllis Schlafly Report and in 1972, Schlafly founded The Eagle Forum, which grew to nearly 100,000 members. Her syndicated column appeared in 100 newspapers, her radio commentaries were broadcast on more than 400 stations, and her radio talk show, "Eagle Forum Live," was broadcast on 45 stations and the Internet. Throughout her career, Schlafly gave college speeches – including in January 2009, in her still-spry 80’s, when, at a Berkeley speech, she fell and broke a hip.

She was appointed by President Reagan to serve on the Commission on the Bicentennial of the U.S. Constitution from 1985-1991. For years, Schlafly was the National Defense Chairman of the Daughters of the American Revolution.

Over the years, Schlafly testified before more than 50 congressional and state legislative committees on constitutional, national defense, and family issues. She has been a delegate at every Republican National Convention since 1956. The Ladies' Home Journal named Schlafly one of the 100 most important women of the 20th century.

Read more >>

'Profiling' is wrong because ...?

• In 732 A.D. a Muslim Army, which was moving on Paris, was defeated and turned back at Tours, France, by Charles Martell.
• In 1571 A.D. a Muslim Army/Navy was defeated by the Italians and Austrians as they tried to cross the Mediterranean to attack southern Europe in the Battle of Lepanto.
• In 1683 A.D. a Turkish Muslim Army, attacking Eastern Europe, was finally defeated in the Battle of Vienna by German and Polish Christian Armies.
• In 1968, Bobby Kennedy was shot and killed by a Muslim male.
• In 1972, at the Munich Olympics, Israeli athletes were kidnapped and massacred by Muslim males.
• In 1972, a Pan Am 747 was hijacked and eventually diverted to Cairo where a fuse was lit on final approach. Shortly after landing it was blown up by Muslim males.
• In 1973, a Pan Am 707 was destroyed in Rome, with 33 people killed, when it was attacked with grenades by Muslim males.
• In 1979, the US embassy in Iran was taken over by Muslim males.
• During the 1980's a number of Americans were kidnapped in Lebanon by Muslim males.
• In 1983, the US Marine barracks in Beirut was blown up by Muslim males.
• In 1985, the cruise ship Achille Lauro was hijacked and a 70-year old American passenger was murdered and thrown overboard in his wheelchair by Muslim males.
• In 1985, TWA flight 847 was hijacked at Athens , and a US Navy diver trying to rescue passengers was murdered by Muslim males.
• In 1988, Pan Am Flight 103 was bombed by Muslim males.
• In 1993, the World Trade Center was bombed the first time by Muslim males.
• In 1998, the US embassies in Kenya and Tanzania were bombed by Muslim males.
• On 9/11/01, four airliners were hijacked; two were used as missiles to take down the World Trade Centers and of the remaining two, one crashed into the US Pentagon and the other was diverted and crashed by the passengers. Thousands of people were killed by Muslim males.
• In 2002, the United States fought a war in Afghanistan against Muslim males.
• In 2002, reporter Daniel Pearl was kidnapped and beheaded by - you guessed it - a Muslim male. (Plus two other American journalists who were just recently beheaded).
• In 2013, the Boston Marathon bombing resulted in 4 Innocent people, (including a child) being killed and 264 people injured by Muslim males.

The vast majority of Muslims, of course, are not terrorists but perfectly decent law-abiding and respectful citizens; regrettably, the vast majority of terrorists just happen to be professed Muslims.

And yet our TSA officers continue to conduct body cavity searches on little old nuns and grand mothers in wheelchairs in American airports, because we wouldn't dream of anyone thinking we were profiling minorities? Why? Because we are 'morally superior' to those like the Israeli's, who do profile and haven't had a single plane hijacked since 1968 (or before), the year of the infamous El Al Flight 426 hijacking in 1968, which doubled their resolve ("Never again!")?

The Marxist Infiltration of the Latinamerican Catholic Church: sources in Gustavo Gutiérrez

Carlos A. Casanova, "The Marxist Infiltration of the Latinamerican Catholic Church: sources in Gustavo Gutiérrez" (September 8, 2016):

I think it relevant that you know that the Church in Spanish America has been systematically infiltrated at least since the 1960s. Krushev coined the expression “theology of liberation” (cfr. http://www.acidigital.com/noticias/ex-espiao-da-uniao-sovietica-nos-criamos-a-teologia-da-libertacao-28919/, seen Sept. 9th 2016) before Gutiérrez used it and China followed Krushev’s footsteps. In 1974 Carlos Sacheri, an important Argentinian philosopher, was killed for having denounced and documented the infiltration of the Argentinian Church (La iglesia clandestina, available online). I want to show you only a handful of texts by Gutiérrez in which this is admitted openly. The translation from the Spanish edition is mine:

In pp. 29-30[1] Gutiérrez says that a Theocentric Church would be a power structure and not a structure of service. He states this manipulating texts drawn from the Second Vatican Council, underlining not the proclamation of the Revealed Truth as the Council did, but the “Signs of the times.”

P. 100: “In the past the church used the world for its own ends; today, many Christians –and non Christians– are asking themselves if they should, for example, use the social weight of the church in order to accelerate the process of transformation of the social structures”.

Pp. 141-142: “A better perception of the tragic reality of the continent, the clear positionings which the political polarization creates […] have caused that the priestly (and religious) wing of the church is today one of the most dynamic and restless of the Latinamerican church. Priests and religious […] intend above all that this [the church] may break her solidarities with an unjust order and that, in a renewed fidelity to the Lord who gathers her [the church] and to the gospel which she [the church] preaches, she may join its destiny to that of those who suffer misery and dispossession.// In many countries one can see the creation of priestly groups (with traces not allowed by the Canon Law!)". [My note: in one of my books (El republicanismo español en América, una evaluación, available online) and in one of my papers (published in English by Logos, in Minnessota) I show that injustice in Latinamerica was mostly the work of the liberals by the dissolution of the communities of land which the Law of the Indies had created in the 16th century. Very much like poverty rose in England with the expoliation of the monasteries; or in Italy with the extinction of the old property system which Paolo Grossi has documented. So, to blame the Churh in Spanish America for the injustice which we had before the current onslaught of Marxism is very unjust. Moreover, there was not so much injustice (in Venezuela, for example, which is my Fatherland) in 1998 as there is now, when the Marxist are just committing an aseptic genocide by sterilization of women and also by indebting the country to the international Bank system.]

P. 144, note 18: Accorging to Gutiérrez, the meaning of Catholic priesthood has to be radically reformulated until it can be found “[…] in commitment to the oppressed parts of society in their fight for liberation”. [“Liberation” means here the abolition of private property through revolutionary action. This is to say, priesthood exists to serve Marxism.] Gutiérrez adds, approvingly quoting another priest: “Our essential goal is not [as for some Dutch priests who left the priesthood] ‘to put an end to our situation as clergymen’ but to committ ourselves in a priestly way to the Latinamerican revolutionary process. […] Hence, even if our deeds and words will bring us –as they already have– frictions and suspicions from the greatest part of the ‘official’ church, our ocupation is not to appear as marginalized by her, because this would subtract efficacy to our action. We think that the church has an enormous power to create conscience in the people… We think that many sociological and historical reasons make us Latinamerican feel the clerical state in a way different from your [of the above said Dutch priests] way of feeling it […]”.

[1] I am using Gustavo Gutiérrez’ Teología de la liberación. Perspectivas (Ediciones Sígueme. Salamanca, 1972) The 1988 and 1990 editions only added a new introduction and some notes besides changes in chapter 12 (I have no quotations here from that chapter). In 2006 Gutiérrez gave an interview in which he stated that he would not take back anything of what he wrote in the first edition of Theology of Liberation. (See a 2008 interview in the same line: http://blog.pucp.edu.pe/blog/manuelpiqueras/2008/08/05/gustavo-gutierrez-la-teologia-como-carta-de-amor/) Thus, with these brief lines the reader can think by himself whether Gutiérrez is a Catholic author or not.This is very relevant nowadays, among other reasons, because the current Prefect of the Congregation of Faith has gained fame as a champion of orthodoxy. But, actually, he has supported Gutiérrez. Moreover, he has taken sides against the Archbishop of Lima in the quarrel between the Archbishop and the elected Rector of the Pontifical Catholic University of Peru, a quarrell which might be seen as part of Gutiérrez’ legacy. Perhaps the former Secretary of the Congregation for Education, Brugues, was removed as a consequence of this conflict and the Congregation of Faith’s position on the matter.

Was that a Catholic Mass or Protestant Service? Hilarious.

Of course, humour, like alcohol (in vino veritas), always conveys some truth:


"No One At Mass Sure Whether They At Catholic Or Protestant Service" (Eye of the Tiber, September 7, 2016):

Despite efforts to figure whether they were in a Catholic or Protestant service, local parishioners were left baffled after an “animated” man wearing vestments put on a head mic and began pacing back and forth as he delivered his sermon.

“The man looked like a priest and I was quite certain I was in a Catholic Church,” said longtime parishioner Joyce Parlin who had no clue as to what the hell was going on. “But he kept pacing back and forth, ending each statement with a ‘can I get an amen?’ No one was exactly sure what he was asking for. I overheard one gentleman respond, ‘yes, I suppose,’ but the priest or pastor or whatever he was kept desperately asking if he could get more amens.”

Parlin went on to add that the priest or pastor or whatever the heck he was continually used words like “fellowship” and “ministry” during his sermon, words, Parlin admitted, she had never heard before.

“He also used the phrase ‘saved by the Blood of the Lamb,’ which I suppose is some sort of Christian take on the TV show ‘Saved by the Bell.’ Hell, I don’t know.”

At press time, the band has begun singing praise a worship as beach balls are being thrown to and fro, confirming that the event is a Life Teen Mass.

[Hat tip to Fr. Z]

Tridentine Community News - Institute of Christ the King to Take Over Detroit’s St. Joseph Church; New Monthly Tridentine Mass at Detroit’s Our Lady Queen of Angels Church; TLM Mass schedule

"I will go in unto the Altar of God
To God, Who giveth joy to my youth"
Tridentine Community News by Alex Begin (September 4, 2016):

September 4, 2016 – Sixteenth Sunday After Pentecost

The Institute of Christ the King to Take Over Detroit’s St. Joseph Church

There is a big change coming to our local Tridentine Mass scene: Detroit Archbishop Allen Vigneron has invited the Institute of Christ the King to take over Detroit’s St. Joseph Church, effective October 15. In 2013, St. Joseph, St. Josaphat, and Sweetest Heart of Mary Parishes were merged into Mother of Divine Mercy Parish; now St. Joseph will be un-merged into the new “St. Joseph Oratory” personal parish, the first fully-Tridentine parish in the Archdiocese of Detroit.

Founded in 1990, the Institute is the second-largest community of priests in the world devoted to the Extraordinary Form, the largest being the Fraternity of St. Peter. The Archbishop decided to invite them because Mother of Divine Mercy Parish is in need of over $1,400,000 to restore St. Joseph, and it became questionable whether the parish could raise that level of funding given the needs of the other two churches. The sobering numbers and the correspondence between the parish and the Archdiocese on the subject of restoration is posted for all to see in the Archive section of the Parish Council Minutes page of the parish web site: http://www.motherofdivinemercy.org/minutes.html

In its early years the Institute was able to restore many historic churches – albeit with the assistance of a wealthy donor who is no longer around – and thus acquired the reputation of being able to fix such things. The Archbishop likely chose the Institute over the Fraternity and the Canons of St. John Cantius because of this reputation and because of his previous experience with them at St. Margaret Mary Church in Oakland, California. More recent experience, such as at their apostolate in Chicago, indicates they are no longer assured of being able to save the churches entrusted to them quite so quickly.

The Institute’s arrival will necessitate some juggling among the three current churches of Mother of Divine Mercy. Surprisingly, Tridentine Masses are planned to continue at St. Josaphat. Conversely, an Ordinary Form English Mass will be held at St. Joseph on Saturday afternoons, celebrated by an outside priest. The idea is not to jar those who have an attachment to those churches. Such arrangements may very well change as demand is assessed over time. Think of the Institute as a global franchise, with recognizably unique characteristics not unlike the Dominicans or Norbertines. Early on in its existence, the Institute hired a professional marketing director and crafted a high-gloss image, with a monthly newsletter, a fancy web site, and strong branding in its parishes. Just as we now have the Westin Book Cadillac Hotel, so you’ll see the Institute’s name prominently displayed alongside the parish’s own publications. The Institute even has its own vocabulary, not unlike Starbucks. Most of us now know that “grande” means medium. At the Institute, a parish is an “oratory” [a proper canonical term for a non-territorial parish], a priest is called “Canon” and not “Father”, and a brother is called “Abbé”. They even have their own version of the Juventútem young adults group, called Sursum Corda.

The Institute encourages the faithful to follow the spirituality of St. Francis de Sales and is known for revitalizing parish life. We will likely see daily Mass in the Extraordinary Form, alongside offerings for families, invitations to join national Institute retreats, and a catechism program. All that costs money, of course, so expect some fundraising initiatives, both for the restoration of St. Joseph Church and for operating these new activities. Indeed, the new parish will start with little if any money at all, so even paying the salaries of the priest(s) who will be assigned there will be a challenge.

Mass goers will notice several differences at an Institute Mass, some rather controversial: Altar servers wear elaborate light blue vestments, seemingly from another century. Ceremonial rubrics differ from the 1962 standard that Masses in the Extraordinary Form are supposed to follow: for example, this writer was once chided for ringing the Sanctus bells at an Institute Mass ... at the Sanctus. While this can annoy those who strive to be faithful to Vatican regulations, it may not matter to most of the faithful.

One of the beautiful things about the flourishing of the Extraordinary Form in Detroit and Windsor is that there is an ever-increasing spectrum of options. One location may offer more parish activities, another may offer a superior music program, another may enjoy more camaraderie among its faithful. Proximity to one’s home is also a factor. Hopefully the Institute’s arrival, along with the new Mass at Our Lady Queen of Angels mentioned below and the forthcoming Masses at St. Paul Albanian Church in Rochester Hills, will result in an ever-increasing number of Catholics being exposed to, and developing affection for, the Church’s liturgical traditions.

New Monthly Tridentine Mass at Detroit’s Our Lady Queen of Angels Church


Starting today, September 4, Sacred Heart Seminary Assistant Professor of Theology Fr. Clint McDonell will offer a monthly First Sunday Tridentine Mass at 2:00 PM at Our Lady Queen of Angels Church [pictured], located at 4200 Martin St. in southwest Detroit. [Photo by Mark Nemecek]

Tridentine Masses This Coming Week

• Mon. 09/05 7:00 PM: Low Mass at St. Josaphat (St. Lawrence Justinian, Bishop & Confessor)
• Tue. 09/06 7:00 PM: Low Requiem Mass at Holy Name of Mary, Windsor (Daily Mass for the Dead)
• Sat. 09/10 8:30 AM: Low Mass at Miles Christi (St. Nicholas of Tolentino, Confessor)

[Comments? Please e-mail tridnews@detroitlatinmass.org. Previous columns are available at http://www.detroitlatinmass.org. This edition of Tridentine Community News, with minor editions, is from the St. Albertus (Detroit), Academy of the Sacred Heart (Bloomfield Hills), and St. Alphonsus and Holy Name of Mary Churches (Windsor) bulletin inserts for September 4, 2016. Hat tip to Alex Begin, author of the column.]