Self-Induced Blindness
by
Thomas A. Droleskey
The revolutionaries who have gutted the Catholic Faith, principally by means of the destruction of the Roman Rite of Tradition as offered according to the Missale Romanum of Pope Saint Pius V, are nothing if not self-delusional. That is, the men responsible for the introduction of novelties that have offended the majesty of God and attacked the truths He has deposited exclusively in the Catholic Church are unwilling to look objectively at the wreckage they have wrought, unwilling to see that they are responsible for the devastation of souls and thus for adding more and more disorder to the world-at-large.
The examples of this self-induced blindness are myriad. One could do little else with his life than review these examples and have enough fodder for an infinite number of commentaries. Too much commentary on these matters becomes tedious and redundant, to be sure. Every once in a while, especially when the Vatican is seeking to neutralize any and all opposition from traditional Catholics by offering them the Trojan Horse of a "regularized" status in exchange for agreeing to view the Second Vatican Council in "light of Tradition," it is important to note a few examples of how the self-induced blindness of the doctrinal and liturgical revolutionaries still persists.
One example of the blindness that persists yet in conciliarist circles is the following story, posted on CWNews.com, about the laughable proposition that "order" can be established in the ever-fungible concoction known as the Novus Ordo Missae. The entirety of G.I.R.M. Warfare is devoted to demonstrating the absurdity of this proposition. I guess, however, that the officials in the Vatican have not yet read their copies (my tongue is planted firmly in my cheek as this is written) and thus continue to persist in the delusional expectation that a synthetic concoction that makes war against the Catholic Faith can be "reformed."
Jul. 13 (CWNews.com) - The Vatican is planning to restore some disciplinary control of the liturgy, according the secretary of the Congregation for Divine Worship, in response to widespread abuses.
Speaking to the I Media news agency in Rome, Archbishop Albert Malcom Ranjith Patabendige Don will soon take steps to indicate the importance of following the Church's liturgical guidelines. Asked whether Pope Benedict XVI (bio - news) is preparing a document on the liturgy, Archbishop Ranjith answered indirectly, noting that the Holy Father has written and spoken extensively on liturgical issues in past years. Pope Benedict is keenly aware of today's challenges, he said, and determined to restore a proper sense of reverence to the liturgy. The Sri Lankan prelate said that some of his thoughts had been taken out of context after a previous interview with the French newspaper La Croix. He had not intended to suggest that the liturgical reforms of Vatican II had failed, he stressed; rather, he meant that some liturgical changes had produced an overreaction, and a loss of appreciation for Church traditions. As a result, he said, "the reforms of the Council did not bear the expected fruit, because of the way in which they were interpreted and put into practice." Now, he continued, the great challenge for the Church is to promote a deeper understanding of the liturgical reforms: one in keeping with the constant traditions of Catholicism.
Archbishop Ranjith said that two extremes must be avoided: a liturgical free-for-all in which "every priest of bishop does what he wants, which creates confusion;" or a complete abandonment of liturgical reforms, leading to a vision that is "closed up in the past." Today, he said, those two extremes are becoming more prominent, and the Church needs to establish a middle ground.
Every day, the archbishop disclosed, the Congregation for Divine Worship receives new complaints about serious liturgical abuses, and complaints that local bishops have failed to correct them. If the Church fails to curb these abuses, he said, "people will attend the Tridentine Mass, and our churches will be empty." Liturgical guidelines are set forth clearly, he observed, in the Roman Missal and in Church documents. Now "some discipline is necessary regarding what we do at the altar."
Archbishop Ranjith spoke to I Media after returning from Kumasi, Ghana, where he participated in a workshop about the liturgy in Africa. He reported that Church officials from 23 different African countries took part in the discussions, which centered on questions of translation and inculturation.
Well, here is a newsflash for Archbishop Ranjith: Catholic churches have been emptied as a result of the Novus Ordo Missae and its own internal logic of decay and degeneration that has scandalized and demoralized so many Catholics around the world. Catholic church buildings are being closed and sold by the scores in this country alone as a signal manifestation of the sterility of the conciliarist religion, which has made war against everything authentically Catholic. Benedict XVI himself said, as Joseph Cardinal Ratzinger, that he was unconcerned about Catholics who attended Mass only occasionally. Well, if a curial cardinal is unconcerned about the Mass attendance of ordinary Catholics, why should ordinary Catholics be concerned? Alas, one who is possessed of the Hegelian mindset that truth can contradict itself is as incapable today as seeing the internal logic dismissing the importance of regular Mass attendance as Martin Luther was incapable in his own day of seeing that his belief that we are "saved by faith alone" would lead to Antinomianism, the belief that one could do anything one wanted and still be saved after making his "profession of faith" in his heart and on his lips.
Catholic churches have been emptied precisely because of the profanity of prayers that have eliminated references to the miracles performed by the saints and do not convey the need for exterior penance and the fact that we could lose our salvation for all eternity by dying in a state of Mortal Sin. The General Instruction to the Roman Missal's bias in this regard is very clear, stated in Paragraph 15 of its wretched text:
"The same awareness of the present state of the world also influenced the use of texts from very ancient tradition. It seemed that this cherished treasure would not be harmed if some phrases were changed so that the style of language would be more in accord with the language of modern theology and would faithfully reflect the actual state of the Church's discipline. Thus there have been changes of some expressions bearing on the evaluation and use of the good things of the earth and of allusions to a particular form of outward penance belonging to another age in the history of the Church."
Who says that acts of outward penance belong to "another age in the history of the Church"? Who says this? Revolutionaries who do not want to do penance for their own sins and those of the whole world, that's who. Revolutionaries who do not take seriously the words of the Mother of God, who has exhorted men to do penance for their own sins and for those of the whole world, who wants us to live penitentially so as to bring about the conversion of poor sinners, starting with ourselves on a daily basis, that's who. Revolutionaries who must believe that Francisco Marto was daft to spend his days after Our Lady's final apparition in Fatima on October 13, 1917, praying one Rosary after another for sinners, that's who. Revolutionaries who believe that there is no need for the Collects and Offertories and Secrets and Communions and Postcommunions in the Mass to express man's need for penance and the fact that he will face a God Who judges Him, that's who.
Our fallen human nature inclines us to self-indulgence. We seek excuses not to do penance for our sins. We want to believe that the path to salvation is relatively easy, that we do not have do acts of penance and live penitentially in order to try to undo the damage we have inflicted on our souls by means of our sins. The Novus Ordo Missae is made-to-order for this self-indulgence.
Want to eat meat on Friday? No problem. Substitute some "other" penance?
Want to wear casual clothing for Sunday Mass? No problem. After all, God accepts us as we are, right?
Want to wear objectively immodest, if not indecent, attire? Who is anyone to judge what you want to do?
A woman who doesn't want to show her submissive to Our Lord by wearing a head covering? Oh, that "sexist" custom has been thrown out.
The Novus Ordo Missae encourages self-indulgence, if not the Lutheran ethos of presuming our own salvation. Heard any "homilies" or "eulogies" (which, yes, strictly speaking, are forbidden in the Novus Ordo Missae but are "permitted" in most instances nevertheless) at a Novus Ordo funeral Mass? No need to have Masses offered or to make sure prayers are said for the deceased. They're in Heaven, after all.
How in the world is "order" going to be "restored" in a Mass that is premised upon the disorder of Modernity and Protestantism? Are altar rails going to make a comeback? Are the wreckovated churches going to be restored to the way they were before the liturgical revolutionaries began to get hold of them in the 1960s and 1970s? Are Catholics going to be allowed to kneel for Holy Communion? Will the sacrilege of Communion in the hand be abolished? Are the egregious preconciliar liturgical changes that were meant to lead into the Novus Ordo--and have been enshrined therein--to be done away with in favor of the restoration of the second and third Collects, in favor of the rich panoply of octaves of various feast days, in favor of the ancient Holy Week rites, in favor of the feast days of the saints, including Saint Philomena herself, that were suppressed by jolly old Angelo Roncalli? Are folk Masses and charismatic Masses and Cursillo Masses and World Youth Day Masses to give way in favor of Gregorian Chant? Are efforts at "inculturation of the Gospel in the liturgy" to give way in favor of the Immemorial Mass of Tradition, which gives voice universally to the immutability of the essence of God and of man's unchanging need for Him and His eternal truths?
As has been pointed out ad infinitum by any number of observers far more astute than this one, the Novus Ordo Missae of its own defective nature has busied Catholics with enterprises that detract from their personal sanctification. Believing Catholics who truly do love God and want to see Him given the honor and glory that are His due in the context of the offering of the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass have been scandalized and angered by the improvisations engendered by the Novus Ordo Missae. Other believing Catholics have spent endless amounts of time trying to get translations into the vernacular "correct," oblivious to the fact that the imprecise nature of the vernacular languages gives rise to one argument after another. We should be spending our time sanctifying our souls in the glories of the fullness of Tradition, not spending time and energy on trying to "get right" that which is un-Catholic and is offensive God and thus hurtful to souls.
Archbishop Ranjith is said to be a friend of Tradition. That may very well be as true as it can be for a conciliarist living in the world of serving as an apologist for conciliarism. Unfortunately, his commitment to defend the tenets of the liturgical revolution, which he does not accept as such, leads him to "warn" his interviewer that more and more people would go over to the Immemorial Mass of Tradition. Well, Your Excellency, what is wrong with that? What is wrong with all Roman Rite Catholics assisting at the Mass that was taught in all of its essential elements to the Apostles by Our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ Himself in the forty days between Easter Sunday and Ascension Thursday?
What is wrong with all Roman Rite Catholics assisting at the Mass that helped to produce the glories of Christendom, that is, the world where Christ reigned as the King of men and nations.
What is wrong with all Roman Rite Catholics assisting at the Mass that produced most of the Church's canonized saints?
What is wrong with all Roman Rite Catholics assisting at the Mass where the priest is seen clearly as the alter Christus, where the priest begins Mass addressing God, not us, where the Mass ends on most days of the year with the Gospel of the Incarnation so as to remind us that the Mass itself is incarnational and that we are to make Him incarnate in every aspect of our lives?
What is wrong with all of that, Your Excellency? Why are the sons of the Second Vatican Council so afraid to admit that the council was a disaster and that we should, as Bishop Bernard Tissier de Mallerais of the Society of Saint Pius X noted in his interview with Stephen Heiner of www.TrueRestoration.com, speak of this council no more? The Church needs to restore Tradition, not rearrange the deck chairs on the Titanic that is the bad ship called conciliarism.
Efforts to square conciliarism with Catholicism lead to insanity, produced by the mental energy that it takes to suspend rational thought in order to make sense of absurdities that contradict the entire patrimony of the Catholic Church. When did the normative Mass of the Roman Rite of the Catholic Church ever undergo such extensive changes as took place in the years between 1955 and 1969? When did the entire language of the Church change so radically and completely as has happened from 1958 to our present day? When has any Mass of any rite of the Catholic Church differed so substantially from one place to the next and been subject to so much ceaseless change from one year to the next, from one priest to the next?? When has it ever been the case prior to conciliarism that false religions are said to have a fundamental "human right" to propagate their diabolically-inspired beliefs in the midst of civil society?
The Self-Induced Blindness Caused by the Apostasy of Religious Liberty
No one who is authentically Catholic can call "religious liberty" anything other than apostasy. Our Lord did not become Incarnate in Our Lady's virginal and immaculate womb by the power of the Holy Ghost to make it possible for the non-existent "rights" of false religions to be propagated in civil society. He wants false religions to be eradicated from the face of the earth by the work He entrusted to the Apostles to preach His Gospel until the end of the world. He has sanctioned military campaigns against the false religion of Mohammedanism. He sent His own Blessed Mother to eradicate the vestiges of barbaric superstition in the Americas shortly after Hernando Cortez dealt a fatal blow to Montezuma and his false, barbaric religion that committed wholesale atrocities against the people of the Americas. He sent the North American Martyrs to try to eradicate similar practices in parts of what are now upstate New York and Canada. He sent Father Pierre Jean De Smet and other "black robes" of the Society of Jesus to evangelize the Indians of the Western part of the United States. The belief that God wants false religions to be honored in civil society and to be able to propagate their false beliefs therein is opposed to the First Commandment: "I am the Lord, Thy God; thou shalt have no strange gods before Me."
Well, go tell that to the Masonically-inspired indifferentists of conciliarism who advocate this heresy publicly, doing so in that den of Masonry known as the United Nations. Archbishop Silvano Tomasi, the Holy See's Permanent Observer at the United Nations offices in Geneva, Switzerland, said the following on Thursday, June 29, 2006 (the Feast of Saints Peter and Paul),as reported by Zenit on July 14, 2006:
GENEVA, JULY 14, 2006 (Zenit.org).- Reciprocity between states is needed to prevent and resolve situations of violation of religious freedom, stressed Archbishop Silvano Tomasi.
The prelate, who is the Holy See's permanent observer to the United Nations office in Geneva, addressed the first session, second part of the United Nations Human Rights Council on June 29.
Among other points in his address, Archbishop Tomasi paid special attention to the "public role of religions," underlining earlier to the new council that "respect for human dignity" which provides equal value for both individuals -- born or conceived," is the "common ground and the necessary component on which the human family can engage in a successful human rights education, promotion and protection."
And although in fact "religion is often considered as a factor of division and social tension," it is "the manipulation and defamation of religion which threatens human dignity, rights, peace and security," he emphasized.
Religion, "as history shows, has spread positive values, revealed the dignity of human beings and of creation" and "contributes to human development," clarified Archbishop Tomasi.
According to international law and "reason and common sense," "the right to freedom of religion or belief must be balanced, but never denied in the name of other fundamental rights and freedoms, including the freedom of expression, which is neither absolute nor includes the right to offend," he specified.
The prelate said that "all human rights and fundamental freedoms should be exercised with responsibility and respect for others."
Beyond the fact that "freedom of religion" "must be counted among the highest expressions of the human spirit," international legislation establishes it among human rights, he underlined.
However, at present "the international community faces widespread religious intolerance and violence against individuals and communities of different religious beliefs, whose basic rights and freedoms are violated in more or less sophisticated ways," he said.
The archbishop gave examples, including "believers imprisoned or killed for their practice or choice of religion, places of worship confiscated or destroyed, cemeteries desecrated, religions ridiculed or stereotyped by the media."
"In addition, some legal and judicial systems" "have not yet developed adequate mechanisms to protect religious minorities and their members," he noted.
"A determined political will as well as cooperation among states, in a spirit of mutual respect and reciprocity, are needed to prevent and resolve such situations," he stressed.
In this connection, for Archbishop Tomasi the Human Rights Council "represents a new opportunity for states and international institutions to review their human rights policy and jointly engage in their implementation together with civil society, NGOs, human rights defenders, and other stakeholders."
Thus, he concluded, the "expectations of millions of victims of daily discrimination and violation of the most elementary human rights will not be disappointed."
These remarks could be given by the grand master of a Masonic lodge.This is what some traditional Catholics who are not as yet neutralized by Vatican "recognition" are eagerly awaiting full and perfect communion with? These remarks are not innocuous. They are not "silly." They are blasphemous. They offend not only pious ears. They offend God Himself as they constitute a fundamental denial of the fact that He has founded but one Church and that He wants everyone on the face of this earth to belong to it in order to get home to Him in Heaven by persisting in a state of Sanctifying Grace. Archbishop Tomasi does not seem to recognize this simple fact: religion is not about spreading "values." The true religion, Catholicism, is about spreading the truth Who is Jesus Christ and providing people with the supernatural helps to get to Heaven. Archbishop Tomasi does not realize that the only foundation for order within and among nations is the order produced in individual souls by the working of the Holy Ghost in the sacraments administered by the Catholic Church, namely, the peace of the Divine Redeemer Himself.
Although oft-quoted on this site, Pope Pius XI's words in Ubi Arcano Dei Consilio, December 23, 1922, are once again worth reviewing:
"When, therefore, governments and nations follow in all their activities, whether they be national or international, the dictates of conscience grounded in the teachings, precepts, and example of Jesus Christ, and which are binding on each and every individual, then only can we have faith in one another's word and trust in the peaceful solution of the difficulties and controversies which may grow out of differences in point of view or from clash of interests. An attempt in this direction has already and is now being made; its results, however, are almost negligible and, especially so, as far as they can be said to affect those major questions which divide seriously and serve to arouse nations one against the other. No merely human institution of today can be as successful in devising a set of international laws which will be in harmony with world conditions as the Middle Ages were in the possession of that true League of Nations, Christianity. It cannot be denied that in the Middle Ages this law was often violated; still it always existed as an ideal, according to which one might judge the acts of nations, and a beacon light calling those who had lost their way back to the safe road.
"There exists an institution able to safeguard the sanctity of the law of nations. This institution is a part of every nation; at the same time it is above all nations. She enjoys, too, the highest authority, the fullness of the teaching power of the Apostles. Such an institution is the Church of Christ. She alone is adapted to do this great work, for she is not only divinely commissioned to lead mankind, but moreover, because of her very make-up and the constitution which she possesses, by reason of her age-old traditions and her great prestige, which has not been lessened but has been greatly increased since the close of the War, cannot but succeed in such a venture where others assuredly will fail.
"It is apparent from these considerations that true peace, the peace of Christ, is impossible unless we are willing and ready to accept the fundamental principles of Christianity, unless we are willing to observe the teachings and obey the law of Christ, both in public and private life. If this were done, then society being placed at last on a sound foundation, the Church would be able, in the exercise of its divinely given ministry and by means of the teaching authority which results therefrom, to protect all the rights of God over men and nations.
"It is possible to sum up all We have said in one word, 'the Kingdom of Christ.' For Jesus Christ reigns over the minds of individuals by His teachings, in their hearts by His love, in each one's life by the living according to His law and the imitating of His example. Jesus reigns over the family when it, modeled after the holy ideals of the sacrament of matrimony instituted by Christ, maintains unspotted its true character of sanctuary. In such a sanctuary of love, parental authority is fashioned after the authority of God, the Father, from Whom, as a matter of fact, it originates and after which even it is named. (Ephesians iii, 15) The obedience of the children imitates that of the Divine Child of Nazareth, and the whole family life is inspired by the sacred ideals of the Holy Family. Finally, Jesus Christ reigns over society when men recognize and reverence the sovereignty of Christ, when they accept the divine origin and control over all social forces, a recognition which is the basis of the right to command for those in authority and of the duty to obey for those who are subjects, a duty which cannot but ennoble all who live up to its demands. Christ reigns where the position in society which He Himself has assigned to His Church is recognized, for He bestowed on the Church the status and the constitution of a society which, by reason of the perfect ends which it is called upon to attain, must be held to be supreme in its own sphere; He also made her the depository and interpreter of His divine teachings, and, by consequence, the teacher and guide of every other society whatsoever, not of course in the sense that she should abstract in the least from their authority, each in its own sphere supreme, but that she should really perfect their authority, just as divine grace perfects human nature, and should give to them the assistance necessary for men to attain their true final end, eternal happiness, and by that very fact make them the more deserving and certain promoters of their happiness here below."
Can anyone assert with a straight face that conciliarists believe a word of this? That's right, a single, solitary word? Pope Pius XI was reiterating basic truths of Catholicism, not asserting a "pastoral approach" that has grown outdated and can be replaced by a mere pontifical or conciliar fiat. The words contained in Ubi Arcano Dei Consilio represent the unchanging truths of the Catholic Faith. Indeed, Pope Pius XI declared that anyone who dissented from the reiteration of Catholic truths contained in the encyclical letters of some of his immediate predecessors was a Modernist:
Many believe in or claim that they believe in and hold fast to Catholic doctrine on such questions as social authority, the right of owning private property, on the relations between capital and labor, on the rights of the laboring man, on the relations between Church and State, religion and country, on the relations between the different social classes, on international relations, on the rights of the Holy See and the prerogatives of the Roman Pontiff and the Episcopate, on the social rights of Jesus Christ, Who is the Creator, Redeemer, and Lord not only of individuals but of nations. In spite of these protestations, they speak, write, and, what is more, act as if it were not necessary any longer to follow, or that they did not remain still in full force, the teachings and solemn pronouncements which may be found in so many documents of the Holy See, and particularly in those written by Leo XIII, Pius X, and Benedict XV.
There is a species of moral, legal, and social modernism which We condemn, no less decidedly than We condemn theological modernism.
A Modernist is one who believes in propositions condemned by the Church. It was not without good reason that the late Archbishop Marcel Lefebvre used the term "Modernist Rome" or the term "the Rome of the Antichrist" in his talks in the 1970s and 1980s. It is not without good reason today that some Catholics who dearly love the Church are raising questions as to how it is possible for men who hold ecclesiastical positions to do and say things contrary to the Catholic Faith for a period of over forty years and yet remain Catholics in good standing, no less exercise legitimately the ecclesiastical power they appear to hold.
There is absolutely no room for ambiguity. God does not want false religions propagated in civil society. Conciliarism says this is a fundamental human right. Conciliarists are at odds with God Himself, violating the First Commandment as they countenance the worship of the Golden Calf and Baal and a thousand other false gods and beliefs and practices. Modernists must, therefore, coopt the word "tradition" to justify things that are repugnant to God and injurious to souls, which is exactly what Benedict XVI does in his efforts to square the novelties of conciliarism with the authentic patrimony of the Catholic Church.
Pope Saint Pius X put the matter very bluntly in Pascendi Dominici Gregis, September 8, 1907:
Thus far, Venerable Brethren, We have considered the Modernist as a philosopher. Now if We proceed to consider him as a believer, and seek to know how the believer, according to Modernism, is marked off from the philosopher, it must be observed that, although the philosopher recognizes the reality of the divine as the object of faith, still this reality is not to be found by him but in the heart of the believer, as an object of feeling and affirmation, and therefore confined within the sphere of phenomena; but the question as to whether in itself it exists outside that feeling and affirmation is one which the philosopher passes over and neglects. For the Modernist believer, on the contrary, it is an established and certain fact that the reality of the divine does really exist in itself and quite independently of the person who believes in it. If you ask on what foundation this assertion of the believer rests, he answers: In the personal experience of the individual. On this head the Modernists differ from the Rationalists only to fall into the views of the Protestants and pseudo-mystics. The following is their manner of stating the question: In the religious sense one must recognize a kind of intuition of the heart which puts man in immediate contact with the reality of God, and infuses such a persuasion of God's existence and His action both within and without man as far to exceed any scientific conviction. They assert, therefore, the existence of a real experience, and one of a kind that surpasses all rational experience. If this experience is denied by some, like the Rationalists, they say that this arises from the fact that such persons are unwilling to put themselves in the moral state necessary to produce it. It is this experience which makes the person who acquires it to be properly and truly a believer.
How far this position is removed from that of Catholic teaching! We have already seen how its fallacies have been condemned by the Vatican Council. Later on, we shall see how these errors, combined with those which we have already mentioned, open wide the way to Atheism. Here it is well to note at once that, given this doctrine of experience united with that of symbolism, every religion, even that of paganism, must be held to be true. What is to prevent such experiences from being found in any religion? In fact, that they are so is maintained by not a few. On what grounds can Modernists deny the truth of an experience affirmed by a follower of Islam? Will they claim a monopoly of true experiences for Catholics alone? Indeed, Modernists do not deny, but actually maintain, some confusedly, others frankly, that all religions are true. That they cannot feel otherwise is obvious. For on what ground, according to their theories, could falsity be predicated of any religion whatsoever? Certainly it would be either on account of the falsity of the religious .sense or on account of the falsity of the formula pronounced by the mind. Now the religious sense, although it maybe more perfect or less perfect, is always one and the same; and the intellectual formula, in order to be true, has but to respond to the religious sense and to the believer, whatever be the intellectual capacity of the latter. In the conflict between different religions, the most that Modernists can maintain is that the Catholic has more truth because it is more vivid, and that it deserves with more reason the name of Christian because it corresponds more fully with the origins of Christianity. No one will find it unreasonable that these consequences flow from the premises. But what is most amazing is that there are Catholics and priests, who, We would fain believe, abhor such enormities, and yet act as if they fully approved of them. For they lavish such praise and bestow such public honor on the teachers of these errors as to convey the belief that their admiration is not meant merely for the persons, who are perhaps not devoid of a certain merit, but rather for the sake of the errors which these persons openly profess and which they do all in their power to propagate.
There is yet another element in this part of their teaching which is absolutely contrary to Catholic truth. For what is laid down as to experience is also applied with destructive effect to tradition, which has always been maintained by the Catholic Church. Tradition, as understood by the Modernists, is a communication with others of an original experience, through preaching by means of the intellectual formula. To this formula, in addition to its representative value they attribute a species of suggestive efficacy which acts firstly in the believer by stimulating the religious sense, should it happen to have grown sluggish, and by renewing the experience once acquired, and secondly, in those who do not yet believe by awakening in them for the first time the religious sense and producing the experience. In this way is religious experience spread abroad among the nations; and not merely among contemporaries by preaching, but among future generations both by books and by oral transmission from one to another. Sometimes this communication of religious experience takes root and thrives, at other times it withers at once and dies. For the Modernists, to live is a proof of truth, since for them life and truth are one and the same thing. Thus we are once more led to infer that all existing religions are equally true, for otherwise they would not survive.
The last two sentences quoted from Pope Saint Pius X's Pascendi Dominici Gregis above are quite telling: they put the lie to the assertion made by numerous conciliarists, including the Preacher to the Papal Household, Father Raniero Cantalamessa, that Protestant "churches" exist by the ordinance of God merely by the fact that they exist. After all, God would crush them from the face of the earth if He wanted them not to exist, they reason? Thus, these "churches" must be pleasing to God, affording their adherents a means of salvation that is just as efficacious as that provided by the Catholic Church. Pope Saint Pius X had dissected with precision the Modernist mind concerning the "diversity" of religions in the world. He would condemn as Modernist the conciliarspeak of Archbishop Tomasi and of his boss, Benedict XVI.
Although the heresy of religious liberty was condemned numerous times by popes in the Nineteenth and early Twentieth Centuries, its essential tenets were condemned as erroneous in The Syllabus of Errors, 1864:
77. In the present day it is no longer expedient that the Catholic religion should be held as the only religion of the State, to the exclusion of all other forms of worship. -- Allocution "Nemo vestrum," July 26, 1855.
78. Hence it has been wisely decided by law, in some Catholic countries, that persons coming to reside therein shall enjoy the public exercise of their own peculiar worship. -- Allocution "Acerbissimum," Sept. 27, 1852.
79. Moreover, it is false that the civil liberty of every form of worship, and the full power, given to all, of overtly and publicly manifesting any opinions whatsoever and thoughts, conduce more easily to corrupt the morals and minds of the people, and to propagate the pest of indifferentism. -- Allocution "Nunquam fore," Dec. 15, 1856.
80. The Roman Pontiff can, and ought to, reconcile himself, and come to terms with progress, liberalism and modern civilization.- -Allocution "Jamdudum cernimus," March 18, 1861
Pretty stark, is it not? The very things condemned as erroneous in 1864 received conciliarism's stamp of approval one century later. How can this be? I do not know. I have no answers, other than to point out the conflict between conciliarism and Catholicism. No one in my acquaintance who is thus far unwilling to broach the issue of the legitimacy of the conciliar popes can explain the numerous and frequent contradictions between the ethos of conciliarism and the authentic patrimony of the Church. No one can explain how this situation of no-fault apostasy can go on ad infinitum for over four decades.
As one who has broached the issue of the legitimacy of the conciliar popes but who has not made any "declaration" concerning the matter, I am interested in the perspectives of those who have concluded that no Catholic can believe what the conciliarists profess and remain a Catholic in good standing. Thus, I have accepted an invitation from His Lordship Bishop Mark Pivarunas of the Congregation of Mary Immaculate Queen (CMRI) to speak at the congregation's annual Fatima Conference at Mount Saint Michael's Academy in Mead, Washington, which is located near the City of Spokane. I will speak on my particular subject of expertise, the Social Kingship of Our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ on Thursday, October 12, 2006. I will also listen intently to the talks of others concerning the state of the Church. A debate on the subject of sedevacantism will also take place after the conference, which includes a Fatima Rosary Procession on the evening of October 13, 2006. I might not know anything more after the conference than I do now. All I know for certain at the present time is that there is indeed a conflict between the authentic patrimony of the Church and the words and deeds of the conciliarists, a conflict that has enshrined itself in the very ethos of the Novus Ordo Missae and in the conciliarist approach to the role of the Church in the world. I thank Bishop Pivarunas for his most kind invitation. (That sound you just heard was the thud of many doors just being slammed in my face! All to you, Blessed Mother. All to your Sorrowful and Immaculate Heart. Jesus, Mary, and Joseph, we love you. Save souls.)
Our Lady of Mount Carmel and the Garment of Grace: The Brown Scapular
Yesterday was the feast of Our Lady of Mount Carmel. Benedict XVI devoted his Angelus talk in his mountain retreat in the Aosta Mountains to the subject of Our Lady of Mount Carmel. The exhortation, which included some very fine passages while omitting any reference to the Brown Scapular whatsoever, concluded with the following plea for peace in the Middle East:
Let us pray to Mary, Queen of Peace, to implore from God the fundamental gift of concord, bringing political leaders back to the path of reason, and opening new possibilities of dialogue and agreement. In this perspective I invite the local Churches to raise special prayers for peace in the Holy Land and in the whole of the Middle East.
Our Lady does not want new possibilities of "dialogue and agreement." She wants conversion to Catholicism, the only foundation of peace in the souls of men and thus in the world. Our Lady told Saint Simon Stock, to whom she gave the Garment of Grace that is the Brown Scapular, to move the Carmelites out of harm's way from the Saracens in the very land that is under siege as a result of the fury and rage of men, Talmudic Jews an Mohammedans, steeped in their captivity to the devil by means of Original Sin. Dom Prosper Gueranger, O.S.B., noted the The Liturgical Year:
Our Lady had taken the cause of the friars into her own hands, and had obtained from Honorious III the decree of confirmation, which originated to-day's feast. This was neither the first nor the last favor bestowed by the sweet Virgin upon the family that had lived so long under the shadow, as it were, of her mysterious cloud, and shrouded like her in humility., with no other bond, no other pretension than the imitation of her hidden works and contemplation of her glory. She herself had wishes them to go forth from the midst of a faithless people; just, as before the close of that same thirteenth century, she would command her angels to carry into a Catholic land her blessed house of Nazareth. Whether or not the men of those days, or the short-sighted historians of our own time, ever thought of it, the one translation called for the other, just as each completes and explains the other, and each was to be, for our own Europe, the signal for wonderful favours heaven.
In these times of apostasy and betrayal, times in which the truth is mixed in with error, albeit subtle and thus sometimes hard to detect, we must continue to cleave as never before to Our Lady. We must take our own enrollment in the Brown Scapular seriously, fulfilling on a daily basis all of the obligations attached to its wearing. Saint Simon Stock was privileged to be an instrument of Our Lady at a time when Catholics were under siege by the Saracens. May we, who are under siege by the the descendants of the Saracens and by the Saracens in shepherds' clothing within the conciliarist structures, invoke the protection and intercession of Our Lady of Mount Carmel and of Saint Simon Stock that we never waver in our intentions to do penance for our sins and those of the whole world, hoping and praying that our sacrifices and prayers may plant a few seeds for the restoration of Tradition in the Church and of Christendom in the world.
It was as Our Lady of Mount Carmel that the Mother of God appeared to Lucia dos Santos on October 13, 1917, in the last of four images she had seen with her cousins, who had seen the first three images (the first being Our Lady's last Fatima apparition in which she announced herself to be the Lady of the Rosary, the second being her apparition with Saint Joseph and the Child Jesus, the third being Our Lord and Our Lady with the Seven Swords or Sorrow, the Dolors, piercing her Immaculate Heart). We must beseech Our Lady of Mount Carmel, the very mount when Elias destroyed the false worship of Baal, that the false notions of the Novus Ordo Missae and religious liberty, among others, will be banished from our midst and spoken of no more. We must beseech Our Lady of Mount Carmel that we might be kept as safe from the Saracens in shepherds' clothing as she kept the House of Loretto safe from the Saracens in the Thirteenth Century, that she will keep as safe as wearers of the Garment of Grace that is the Brown Scapular now and at the hour of our deaths.
Vivat Christus Rex!
Our Lady of Mount Carmel, pray for us.
Saint Joseph, pray for us.
Saints Peter and Paul, pray for us.
Saint John the Baptist, pray for us.
Saint Michael the Archangel, pray for us.
Saint Gabriel the Archangel, pray for us.
Saint Raphael the Archangel, pray for us.
Saint Simon Stock, pray for us.
Saint Alexius, pray for us.
Saint Augustine, pray for us.
Saint Thomas Aquinas, pray for us.
Saint Vincent Ferrer, pray for us.
Saint Sebastian, pray for us.
Saint Tarcisius, pray for us.
Saint Lucy, pray for us.
Saint Agnes, pray for us.
Saint Agatha, pray for us.
Saint Bridget of Sweden, pray for us.
Saint Catherine of Sweden, pray for us.
Saint Philomena, pray for us.
Saint John of the Cross, pray for us.
Saint John Bosco, pray for us.
Saint John Mary Vianney, pray for us.
Saint Teresa of Avila, pray for us.
Saint Therese Lisieux, pray for us.
Saint Bernadette Soubirous, pray for us.
Blessed Anne Catherine Emmerich, pray for us.
Blessed Pauline Jaricot, pray for us.
Blessed Francisco, pray for us.
Blessed Jacinta, pray for us.
Sister Lucia, pray for us.
The Longer Version of the Saint Michael the Archangel Prayer, composed by Pope Leo XIII, 1888
O glorious Archangel Saint Michael, Prince of the heavenly host, be our defense in the terrible warfare which we carry on against principalities and powers, against the rulers of this world of darkness, spirits of evil. Come to the aid of man, whom God created immortal, made in His own image and likeness, and redeemed at a great price from the tyranny of the devil. Fight this day the battle of our Lord, together with the holy angels, as already thou hast fought the leader of the proud angels, Lucifer, and his apostate host, who were powerless to resist thee, nor was there place for them any longer in heaven. That cruel, that ancient serpent, who is called the devil or Satan who seduces the whole world, was cast into the abyss with his angels. Behold this primeval enemy and slayer of men has taken courage. Transformed into an angel of light, he wanders about with all the multitude of wicked spirits, invading the earth in order to blot out the Name of God and of His Christ, to seize upon, slay, and cast into eternal perdition, souls destined for the crown of eternal glory. That wicked dragon pours out. as a most impure flood, the venom of his malice on men of depraved mind and corrupt heart, the spirit of lying, of impiety, of blasphemy, and the pestilent breath of impurity, and of every vice and iniquity. These most crafty enemies have filled and inebriated with gall and bitterness the Church, the spouse of the Immaculate Lamb, and have laid impious hands on Her most sacred possessions. In the Holy Place itself, where has been set up the See of the most holy Peter and the Chair of Truth for the light of the world, they have raised the throne of their abominable impiety with the iniquitous design that when the Pastor has been struck the sheep may be scattered. Arise then, O invincible Prince, bring help against the attacks of the lost spirits to the people of God, and give them the victory. They venerate thee as their protector and patron; in thee holy Church glories as her defense against the malicious powers of hell; to thee has God entrusted the souls of men to be established in heavenly beatitude. Oh, pray to the God of peace that He may put Satan under our feet, so far conquered that he may no longer be able to hold men in captivity and harm the Church. Offer our prayers in the sight of the Most High, so that they may quickly conciliate the mercies of the Lord; and beating down the dragon, the ancient serpent, who is the devil and Satan, do thou again make him captive in the abyss, that he may no longer seduce the nations. Amen.
Verse: Behold the Cross of the Lord; be scattered ye hostile powers.
Response: The Lion of the Tribe of Juda has conquered the root of David.
Verse: Let Thy mercies be upon us, O Lord.
Response: As we have hoped in Thee.
Verse: O Lord hear my prayer.
Response: And let my cry come unto Thee.
Verse: Let us pray. O God, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, we call upon Thy holy Name, and as suppliants, we implore Thy clemency, that by the intercession of Mary, ever Virgin, immaculate and our Mother, and of the glorious Archangel Saint Michael, Thou wouldst deign to help us against Satan and all other unclean spirits, who wander about the world for the injury of the human race and the ruin of our souls.
Response: Amen.
