The Resurrection of the Church
On Palm Sunday, a donor and friend texted me an excerpt from The Familiar Explanation of Christian Doctrine written by Rev. Michael Müller, C.SS.R in 1876. I know we all have a tendency to skip long "copy-and-pastes" on blogs we visit, but I really hope you read this Question/Answer on the indefectibility of the Catholic Church, for you will see: As Christ raised Himself by His Divine Power, so also, Jesus Christ will raise us out of this Church crisis. Familiar Explanation of Christian Doctrine” by Rev. Michael Müller, C.SS.R., 1876 Lesson VII.—The Roman Catholic Church Cannot Be Destroyed Q. What is the world in which we live? A. It [...]
Slavery to Sin Becomes Broken Bonds in Tradition
When your son asks you in time to come, "What is the meaning of the testimonies and the statutes and the rules that the Lord our God has commanded you?" then you shall say to your son, "We were Pharaoh's slaves in Egypt. And the Lord brought us out of Egypt with a mighty hand. And the Lord showed signs and wonders, great and grievous, against Egypt and against Pharaoh and all his household, before our eyes. And He brought us out from there, that He might bring us in and give us the land that He swore to give to our fathers. And the Lord commanded us to do [...]
Are Irreverent Masses Binding On Sundays?
The most common question I receive from my readers is: "Do I have to attend a Novus Ordo Mass on a Sunday when there is no Traditional Latin Mass nearby?" I was going to title this article that very question, but then I realized that question is only sixty years old. Then I thought to title this article: "Is it a mortal sin to skip an irreverent Mass on Sunday if I can't get to a reverent Mass?" but that was too long. I then realized the entire topic of the Third Commandment was at stake. What does Church history tell us before 1960? Dr. Peter Kwasniewski emailed me the [...]
The Red Guard of Tradition
Who controls the past controls the future. Who controls the present controls the past.—George Orwell, 1984. Tucker Carlson recently interviewed a Chinese woman named Xi Van Fleet. After Mao's culture revolution, Xi sought and received asylum in the United States in the 1970s. She soon came to love and defend America. This became especially evident when, in 2020, she realized the United States was undergoing a communist revolution, fabricated not upon a conflict of class, but rather that of race. (Fabricated is the operative word in the last sentence.) Although Xi never wanted to be involved in politics in the United States, she spoke at a Loudon Co. (VA) school [...]
Don’t Be Afraid of the Natural Sciences
I frequently hear traditional Catholics say something like, "The natural sciences are inferior and subject to the theological sciences." While this is true, many traditional Catholics often imply there is a contradiction between science and Divine Revelation. Or some believe if there ever were to be found to be a contradiction between biology and religion, religion trumps science. This also is true, but the contradiction is often framed by traditional Catholics as if there really could be a contradiction between our Catholic faith and the natural sciences. (By natural sciences, I mean biology, chemistry, astronomy, geology, meteorology, genetics, etc.) The fear of leftists treating science as a religion is well-founded [...]
Mr. Morrow’s Near-Death Experience of Hell
Mr. Dominic Morrow was a Chicago gangster who was shot twice in the stomach. He died and went to experience an antechamber to hell, but Our Lord gave him another chance as his soul returned to his body in the hospital where he had arrested. Dominic was not a Christian before his near-death experience (NDE.) Now, he is a Christian, but still not Catholic. Nevertheless, his account of what he saw in hell conforms to what I have read in the Church Fathers and St. Thomas Aquinas. It even supports what the mystics of the Catholic Church have stated in their visions of hell. One small example is that he [...]
Relevance, Compromise and Conversion
The Bad News: The above picture is a French Catholic priest recently snapped. According to the caption I read online, his Mass vestments reflect the uniform of the French soccer (football) team. There are not many young people around him as you can see. Clergy seeking "relevance" among peers in modern culture has made very few converts. "We're the exact same as you, so please join our club!" Why? Why would I join a club of old people trying to act young? Below are graphs on the Catholic Church in the United States from Index of Leading Catholic Indicators, a book written in 2003 by Kenneth Jones, a graduate of [...]
Is the Eucharist a “Prize For the Perfect”?
Many modernist-heretics since the 1970s have purposefully conflated the requirement to receive Holy Communion in a state of grace with the notion of receiving Holy Communion in a state of perfection. This is purposeful and diabolical ambiguity. The Bible and the Catholic Church have always taught that one must receive Holy Communion in "a state of grace." One need not be in a "state of perfection" (normally seen as the unitive stage of prayer, or the religious state or the state of being a bishop) to receive Holy Communion. In light of the above purposeful-conflation, modernist heretics since the 1970s have often said things like "The Eucharist is not a [...]
Who Gave Priests the Right To Defend Traditional Catholicism?
Anyone who tries to phone me knows that my device is in "airplane mode" about ¾ of the day and then in "moon mode" the other ¼ of the day. This isn't to be rude, but because a traditional priest has several hours of prayer a day. Due to this (and not having a community with whom to share various duties) my only time for "reading" is while washing dishes or cleaning my hermitage or running to the hospital for extreme unction. Thus, I listen to pre-downloaded audio-books or podcasts or Rosaries on airplane-mode much of the day while not in prayer or writing. My goal is to then turn [...]
The Scarcity Principal on the Deposit of the Faith
Knowing that you were ransomed from the futile ways inherited from your forefathers, not with perishable things such as silver or gold, but with the Precious Blood of Christ, like that of a lamb without blemish or spot.—1 Pt 1:18-19. The above quote from Sacred Scripture shows that the Most Precious Blood of Jesus Christ is objectively of infinite value to our salvation from sin, death, hell and demons. But many Catholics today subjectively take the shed-blood of Jesus for granted. As I have written before, a diocesan bishop once admitted to me that 80% of the Catholics in his Archdiocese received Holy Communion in a state of mortal sin [...]