Thursday, December 26, 2019
Wednesday, December 25, 2019
What to do when you’re watching TV with your kids and an unexpected sex scene appears?
Turn it off! What are you doing with the TV on in the first place? Throw it out and read your child a book instead. No sex scenes there!
Aleteia doesn’t get it:
Their solution? Sex education: sex talk plus sex scenes!
Aleteia doesn’t get it:
Their solution? Sex education: sex talk plus sex scenes!
Tuesday, December 24, 2019
Our Lady “mestizo” but not co-redemptrix?
Professor De Mattei informs us about the latest theological novelty being thrown at the wall to see if it will stick:
https://www.patreon.com/posts/32561111
This, after excluding the possibility that Mary is co-redemptrix in cooperation with her Divine Son, in accord with the centuries of testimony from saints, scholars and doctors.
This is all about rebranding, about promoting personalities and personal wills in preference to the good of the Faith and the Church for the sake of the salvation of souls in accord with Tradition, without which we cannot be Catholic, or saved.
Merry Christmas Eve to you all!
https://www.patreon.com/posts/32561111
This, after excluding the possibility that Mary is co-redemptrix in cooperation with her Divine Son, in accord with the centuries of testimony from saints, scholars and doctors.
This is all about rebranding, about promoting personalities and personal wills in preference to the good of the Faith and the Church for the sake of the salvation of souls in accord with Tradition, without which we cannot be Catholic, or saved.
Merry Christmas Eve to you all!
Tuesday, December 17, 2019
How to cancel Netflix
Why cancel? Netflix is blaspheming with airing of “The First Temptation of Christ”. Bishop Strickland and over 1 million others are doing so.
Here’s how:
Here’s how:
Monday, December 16, 2019
My latest column: “Fulton Sheen a Needed Patron for Bishops”
Shock: While McCarrick goes unexamined by leadership and comfortably ensconced in a Kansas friary, some Catholics initially feared that unspecified prelates, in an anonymous attack upon Archbishop Sheen’s reputation, indefinitely stalled his beatification. Peoria Bishop Daniel Jenky and his people are now deeply saddened.
Archbishop Fulton Sheen, credited with at least one miracle to support his beatification, is a badly needed heavenly patron for bishops today. Which makes the fact that one or more of our bishops convinced Rome to delay his planned December 21 beatification in Peoria all the more difficult to comprehend.
When we need good news about the Church, why are those in charge likely the first in this case to quash it? And why would Rome call into question its own much-lauded strict beatification vetting procedures by such action?
Read the rest:
https://thewandererpress.com/catholic/news/our-catholic-faith/a-leaven-in-the-world-sheen-a-needed-patron-for-bishops/
Archbishop Fulton Sheen, credited with at least one miracle to support his beatification, is a badly needed heavenly patron for bishops today. Which makes the fact that one or more of our bishops convinced Rome to delay his planned December 21 beatification in Peoria all the more difficult to comprehend.
When we need good news about the Church, why are those in charge likely the first in this case to quash it? And why would Rome call into question its own much-lauded strict beatification vetting procedures by such action?
Read the rest:
https://thewandererpress.com/catholic/news/our-catholic-faith/a-leaven-in-the-world-sheen-a-needed-patron-for-bishops/
Friday, December 13, 2019
This happens only once every thousand years for everyone on earth
Try this: add your age to your birth year.
Everyone on earth comes up with the same number: the current year of Our Lord, 2019.
Nobody can explain why.
Everyone on earth comes up with the same number: the current year of Our Lord, 2019.
Nobody can explain why.
Tuesday, December 10, 2019
Looks like the German Church has given Pope Francis an early Christmas gift
Let’s see how well silence works with this one:
“German bishops proclaim homosexuality ‘normal,’ adultery ‘not grave’“
Will Pope Francis make an effort to stop the Church in Germany from joining those already in Protestant schism by their rejection of these non-negotiables of Catholic faith and morals?
Sunday, December 8, 2019
Friday, December 6, 2019
Ireland, Catholic Faith and reconversion: John Waters and E Michael Jones
Great video; E Michael Jones interviews John Waters on us new book
“My YouTube channel has just been un-frozen, and tonight at 7pm EST, I will be joined by renowned Irish journalist and author of “Give Us Back The Bad Roads” John Waters, to discuss Ireland and the #CultureWars! #Censorship #Ireland”
https://youtu.be/_8BCK-23Spc
“My YouTube channel has just been un-frozen, and tonight at 7pm EST, I will be joined by renowned Irish journalist and author of “Give Us Back The Bad Roads” John Waters, to discuss Ireland and the #CultureWars! #Censorship #Ireland”
https://youtu.be/_8BCK-23Spc
Thursday, December 5, 2019
If Nancy Pelosi doesn’t hate anyone why does she support legalized child murder?
Recently Nancy Pelosi cited the Catholic faith in which she was baptized as the evidence to prove that she doesn’t hate anyone. She says she was taught never to hate anyone only to love others. Well if the definition of hating somebody is wishing their murder, then by that reason Nancy Pelosi hates unborn children because she supports legalized child murder of preborn boys and girls, also known as abortion.
Nancy, cloaking yourself in the Catholic Faith is hypocritical as long as you support abortion because it’s no different than hatred.
Nancy, cloaking yourself in the Catholic Faith is hypocritical as long as you support abortion because it’s no different than hatred.
Tuesday, December 3, 2019
Traditional Latin Requiem Mass with horse drawn hearse and procession on foot to graveside in southern Maryland
At Saint Joseph’s Church in Morganza, Md. MC, servers and schola provided by Saint Francis de
Sales in Benedict, Md.
Monday, December 2, 2019
Archbishop Vigano Condemns Vienna Cathedral Pro-LGBT Concert as Blasphemous
In response to a pro-LGBT concert last night in St. Stephen’s Cathedral in Vienna, Archbishop Carlo Vigano has said the event was a sacrilege and a consequence of idolatry that “darkens the mind and perverts judgement.”
In a message to Alexander Tschugguel, one of the founders of the St. Boniface Institute who led a rosary outside the cathedral while the event was taking place, Archbishop Vigano noted that “once again” Vienna suffers from “yet another homoerotic and blasphemous provocation.”
https://edwardpentin.co.uk/archbishop-vigano-condemns-vienna-cathedral-pro-lgbt-concert-as-blasphemous/
Sunday, December 1, 2019
December 6: Join my parish and others offering prayers of reparation for idolatry by Catholics and in Catholic Churches
I support Father Illo’s message and recommend it be shared on Facebook and Twitter. My parish will join others in offering prayers of reparation for idolatry and heresy in Rome and other places on December 6.
From Father Illo:
https://cal-catholic.com/father-illo-asks-prayers-of-exorcism-dec-6/
From Father Illo:
https://cal-catholic.com/father-illo-asks-prayers-of-exorcism-dec-6/
Saturday, November 30, 2019
Equipping a priest to serve underground in Hong Kong
Our parish has befriended a priest from Hong Kong who plans to return to his home county someday and faces the real possibility that he may have to go underground to remain faithful as a Catholic priest. A parishioner is building a portable altar, in progress as seen in the accompanying photos, the priest has requested to aid him in his mission there. Please keep faithful Catholics in China and the priests who serve them in your prayers.
Friday, November 29, 2019
Our many prayers were answered
Mom was released from the hospital yesterday and feasted with the family for Thanksgiving dinner.
She came home with a couple new prescriptions and is doing fine. We spent some time together today offering prayers of thanks at the parish church and had lunch together.
Thank you for the many prayers,
She came home with a couple new prescriptions and is doing fine. We spent some time together today offering prayers of thanks at the parish church and had lunch together.
Thank you for the many prayers,
Thursday, November 28, 2019
Thanksgiving Day: “Let all Your works give you thanks, O Lord”
“... and let your faithful ones bless you. Let them discourse of the glory of your Kingdom and speak of your might.
-- Ps 145
http://mcitl.blogspot.com/2010/11/thanksgiving-day-let-all-your-works.html
Prayers and best wishes for a blessed Thanksgiving to you and yours.
http://mcitl.blogspot.com/2010/11/thanksgiving-day-let-all-your-works.html
Prayers and best wishes for a blessed Thanksgiving to you and yours.
Wednesday, November 27, 2019
Please pray for my mother Mary
She’s suffering from Alzheimer’s and had a small stroke today. May be staying overnight in hospital.
If you’d like to join me I’ll be praying the following novena prayer for the intercession of the Immaculate Conception through December 8.
Thank you for your kindness.
If you’d like to join me I’ll be praying the following novena prayer for the intercession of the Immaculate Conception through December 8.
Thank you for your kindness.
Tuesday, November 26, 2019
Tradition and Inculturation
Our Catholic tradition has always inculturated elements of various cultures compatible with the truths to be handed down. There are, however, some aspects of cultures to be evangelized that may never be inculturated.
https://thewandererpress.com/catholic/news/our-catholic-faith/a-leaven-in-the-world-inculturation-and-tradition/
https://thewandererpress.com/catholic/news/our-catholic-faith/a-leaven-in-the-world-inculturation-and-tradition/
Sunday, November 24, 2019
James Grein back to Mass today
James Grein came forward with great courage to reveal himself as a victim of Theodore McCarrick. His willingness to do so resulted in exposing the great crimes of the former Cardinal and his expulsion from the priesthood. James has struggled for years to practice the Catholic Faith after suffering the scandal and pain of his experience and as a result has been away from attendance at Mass. One of our parishioners invited him to join us at Saint Francis de Sales Sunday traditional Latin Mass and he did so today. We were overjoyed to welcome him into our parish family for the Mass and communal lunch at the church hall following. We hope and pray he will continue on the path of persevering in the Faith and thank him for his courageous witness.
Grein is pictured here with Father Cusick and members of the Scarlata family.
Wednesday, September 18, 2019
Father Ratzinger Predicts the Future of the Church
“The future of the Church can and will issue from those whose roots are deep and who live from the pure fullness of their faith. It will not issue from those who accommodate themselves merely to the passing moment or from those who merely criticize others and assume that they themselves are infallible measuring rods; nor will it issue from those who take the easier road, who sidestep the passion of faith, declaring false and obsolete, tyrannous and legalistic, all that makes demands upon men, that hurts them and compels them to sacrifice themselves.
To put this more positively: The future of the Church, once again as always, will be reshaped by saints, by men, that is, whose minds probe deeper than the slogans of the day, who see more than others see, because their lives embrace a wider reality. Unselfishness, which makes men free, is attained only through the patience of small daily acts of self-denial. By this daily passion, which alone reveals to a man in how many ways he is enslaved by his own ego, by this daily passion and by it alone, a man’s eyes are slowly opened. He sees only to the extent that he has lived and suffered.
If today we are scarcely able any longer to become aware of God, that is because we find it so easy to evade ourselves, to flee from the depths of our being by means of the narcotic of some pleasure or other. Thus our own interior depths remain closed to us. If it is true that a man can see only with his heart, then how blind we are!
“How does all this affect the problem we are examining? It means that the big talk of those who prophesy a Church without God and without faith is all empty chatter. We have no need of a Church that celebrates the cult of action in political prayers. It is utterly superfluous. Therefore, it will destroy itself. What will remain is the Church of Jesus Christ, the Church that believes in the God who has become man and promises us life beyond death. The kind of priest who is no more than a social worker can be replaced by the psychotherapist and other specialists; but the priest who is no specialist, who does not stand on the [sidelines], watching the game, giving official advice, but in the name of God places himself at the disposal of man, who is beside them in their sorrows, in their joys, in their hope and in their fear, such a priest will certainly be needed in the future.
“Let us go a step farther. From the crisis of today the Church of tomorrow will emerge — a Church that has lost much. She will become small and will have to start afresh more or less from the beginning. She will no longer be able to inhabit many of the edifices she built in prosperity. As the number of her adherents diminishes, so it will lose many of her social privileges. In contrast to an earlier age, it will be seen much more as a voluntary society, entered only by free decision. As a small society, it will make much bigger demands on the initiative of her individual members. Undoubtedly it will discover new forms of ministry and will ordain to the priesthood approved Christians who pursue some profession. In many smaller congregations or in self-contained social groups, pastoral care will normally be provided in this fashion. Along-side this, the full-time ministry of the priesthood will be indispensable as formerly. But in all of the changes at which one might guess, the Church will find her essence afresh and with full conviction in that which was always at her center: faith in the triune God, in Jesus Christ, the Son of God made man, in the presence of the Spirit until the end of the world. In faith and prayer she will again recognize the sacraments as the worship of God and not as a subject for liturgical scholarship.
“The Church will be a more spiritual Church, not presuming upon a political mandate, flirting as little with the Left as with the Right. It will be hard going for the Church, for the process of crystallization and clarification will cost her much valuable energy. It will make her poor and cause her to become the Church of the meek. The process will be all the more arduous, for sectarian narrow-mindedness as well as pompous self-will will have to be shed. One may predict that all of this will take time. The process will be long and wearisome as was the road from the false progressivism on the eve of the French Revolution — when a bishop might be thought smart if he made fun of dogmas and even insinuated that the existence of God was by no means certain — to the renewal of the nineteenth century.
“But when the trial of this sifting is past, a great power will flow from a more spiritualized and simplified Church. Men in a totally planned world will find themselves unspeakably lonely. If they have completely lost sight of God, they will feel the whole horror of their poverty. Then they will discover the little flock of believers as something wholly new. They will discover it as a hope that is meant for them, an answer for which they have always been searching in secret.
“And so it seems certain to me that the Church is facing very hard times. The real crisis has scarcely begun. We will have to count on terrific upheavals. But I am equally certain about what will remain at the end: not the Church of the political cult, which is dead already, but the Church of faith. It may well no longer be the dominant social power to the extent that she was until recently; but it will enjoy a fresh blossoming and be seen as man’s home, where he will find life and hope beyond death.”Father Ratzinger, 1969
Transubstantiation: The CCC quotes the Council of Trent
“And his servants went out into the roads, and gathered all whom they found, both good and bad; and the marriage feast was filled with guests. Now the king went in to see the guests, and he saw there a man who had not on a wedding garment. And he said to him, ‘Friend, how did you come in here without a wedding garment?’ But he was speechless. Then the king said to the attendants, ‘Bind his hands and feet and cast him forth into the darkness outside, where there will be the weeping and the gnashing of teeth.’ For many are called, but few are chosen.” Matthew 22
“The Council of Trent summarizes the Catholic faith by declaring: "Because Christ our Redeemer said that it was truly his body that he was offering under the species of bread, it has always been the conviction of the Church of God, and this holy Council now declares again, that by the consecration of the bread and wine there takes place a change of the whole substance of the bread into the substance of the body of Christ our Lord and of the whole substance of the wine into the substance of his blood. This change the holy Catholic Church has fittingly and properly called transubstantiation."206
The CCC section on the Eucharist begins with number 1326. This teaching is given in number 1376, implying a secondary importance to this aspect of the Sacrament.
Every other teaching on the Eucharist follows from the dogma of transubstantiation, including the fact that a person not in a state of grace could not benefit from receive Our Lord truly present.
We are baptized and confirmed in a state of grace to remove the stain of original sin and to be fed with the Lord’s Body and Blood so as to grow in grace, “a fountain welling up to eternal life”.
“The Council of Trent summarizes the Catholic faith by declaring: "Because Christ our Redeemer said that it was truly his body that he was offering under the species of bread, it has always been the conviction of the Church of God, and this holy Council now declares again, that by the consecration of the bread and wine there takes place a change of the whole substance of the bread into the substance of the body of Christ our Lord and of the whole substance of the wine into the substance of his blood. This change the holy Catholic Church has fittingly and properly called transubstantiation."206
The CCC section on the Eucharist begins with number 1326. This teaching is given in number 1376, implying a secondary importance to this aspect of the Sacrament.
Every other teaching on the Eucharist follows from the dogma of transubstantiation, including the fact that a person not in a state of grace could not benefit from receive Our Lord truly present.
We are baptized and confirmed in a state of grace to remove the stain of original sin and to be fed with the Lord’s Body and Blood so as to grow in grace, “a fountain welling up to eternal life”.
Thursday, September 5, 2019
Thursday, August 29, 2019
"The great thing about being a Catholic is you can take Sundays off."
Leading Souls Astray at a Funeral Mass
By Father
Kevin M. Cusick
“You need to
smile more.”
It’s a sure
sign a fellow Catholic has lost immunity to error afforded by firm assent to
truth when he says this after you’ve together just witnessed a chapel full of
souls misled by heresy.
I recently
attended a funeral in a neighboring diocese. My decision to remain seated in the
pews was rewarded: I didn’t have to struggle to keep a poker face in the sanctuary
while innocent souls were lied to and their salvation was put in serious
jeopardy by a heretic in a chasuble.
Many stand-up
comedians lost out on their true calling when they were ordained priests in the
70’s. Some of them will even stoop to joking about a deceased person wandering
off before the funeral because they successfully escaped from their unit in the
nursing home a number of times while alive. But that’s not the worst of it. The
desire to keep things light and avoid the issue of sadness in death extends to
actually deceiving souls starving for truth about the possibility of eternal
damnation.
How many already
benighted by error are told every week in the US that they are assured of salvation
by an official representative of the Catholic Church? That is the logical conclusion
when everyone who dies is proclaimed to be in heaven. Last I checked some
people are still attempting to use their God-given logic.
Why does an otherwise
rational grown man get up in front of a group of people and tell them he knows the
deceased is in heaven? Then he proceeds to offer Mass for the deceased and the living
present as if such is any longer needed if he speaks the truth. In the fallout from
such error the whole concept of a crucified God, His image hanging in carved
wood on the wall behind the altar, becomes a countersign.
Prayer itself
becomes useless when there is no longer anything that we could possibly do that
would prevent us from going anywhere other than heaven when we die. That could be
the reason why so many people talk in church and so few pray. This could be a
significant contribution to the collapsing numbers of practicing Catholics.
The “presider”,
an ordained priest, invited family and guests seated in the chapel in anticipation
of the Mass to “wander around and chat” while waiting for the musician to
arrive.
The chapel
itself was dedicated to universal salvation, many of the kneelers ripped out, except
in the side aisles for those few who might still be “tempted” to pray.
The signature
symbol of Vatican II abuses and the denial of God was also enshrined: Our Lord
Himself, sacramentally present in the Blessed Sacrament was relegated to the corner
pocket.
The few Catholics
still possessing some vestigial awareness of the sacred knelt after the praying
of the Sanctus despite the priest’s invitation to be seated. It’s a brutal irony
when the prayer and posture of the few still cleaving to the signs of universal
Catholic worship are reduced to a kind of protest.
The deceased
was a good Catholic woman, but like many Catholics of her time she went to Mass
every day except Sunday. For many years Catholics were led to believe that
Saturday evening Mass was the same as Sunday. They weren’t properly informed
that if you can go on Sunday you’re supposed to go on Sunday.
The priest
in summary gave us the line of the day: “That’s the great thing about being
Catholic: you can take Sundays off”. Just what the non-practicing family members
needed to hear: affirmation of the fact that they’re already taking Sundays off
because they never attend obligatory worship on the Lord’s Day to begin with.
The deceased
practiced her faith as best she could in the circumstances afforded her. I have
few worries for her soul and fervently pray she rest in peace. Many lay people today
patiently and quietly suffer the predations visited upon the sacred liturgy by unfaithful
priests. It is a relief for priests blessed to share the holy aspects of the
life of the deceased. These are helps toward the hope of salvation. But the
homily is not to take the form of a hagiographical canonization as the Catechism
makes clear:
“The liturgy of the Word during funerals demands very careful
preparation because the assembly present for the funeral may include some
faithful who rarely attend the liturgy, and friends of the deceased who are not
Christians. The homily in particular must "avoid the literary genre of
funeral eulogy"189 and illumine the mystery of Christian
death in the light of the risen Christ.” (CCC 1688)
Weddings and
funerals are the occasions in which the vast majority of mankind intersects with
the Catholic Church. It is for this reason that many perhaps mistakenly believe
that there are only three songs in the entire Catholic repertoire: “Be Not Afraid”,
“On Eagle’s Wings” and “Amazing Grace”. It is true that more people tend to
sing when they have the words memorized.
One question
occurs: why are we still cautioning people to “Be Not Afraid” while we are
telling them in funeral homilies that everyone goes to heaven?
The role of
the priest is to do what the Church does, commending all souls to the mercy of God:
“The Eucharistic Sacrifice. When the celebration takes place in church the Eucharist is the
heart of the Paschal reality of Christian death.190 In the
Eucharist, the Church expresses her efficacious communion with the departed:
offering to the Father in the Holy Spirit the sacrifice of the death and
resurrection of Christ, she asks to purify his child of his sins and their
consequences, and to admit him to the Paschal fullness of the table of the
Kingdom.191 It is by the Eucharist thus celebrated that the
community of the faithful, especially the family of the deceased, learn to live
in communion with the one who "has fallen asleep in the Lord," by
communicating in the Body of Christ of which he is a living member and, then,
by praying for him and with him.” (CCC 1689)
Note that priest on behalf of
the deceased and the people asks God “to admit” the deceased into heaven.
I received
good news in conversation following the liturgy. An acquaintance asked me for
prayer, informing me that a young man was taking a high school equivalency test
that day for mathematics as he had dropped out of a Catholic school. He was
seeking admission to the seminary for a traditional order of priests. This
after a priest on the staff had behaved inappropriately with him in the confessional,
precipitating his departure from the school. This is just one of many miracles
keeping the faith and sacramental grace alive in our time.
As many age
out, the biological solution will bring some improvement to the quality of the
life of prayer for our people. Many young candidates today are seeking ordination
despite great scandal and many reasons for discouragement. Pray for them.
Thank you
for reading and praised be Jesus Christ, now and forever.
My 90-day Twitter
fast ends soon. See you see @IntroiboAdAltar!
Monday, August 26, 2019
My 90-Day Twitter Fast
My fast from tweeting is almost over. What will I give up by getting back into the verbal scrum of social media?
Doctors studying Alzheimer’s patients in the search for a cure have landed on fasting as a possible answer to eliminating the disease. It’s another case of Church tradition proved right for more than spiritual reasons.
It turns out that if one skips a morning collation, waiting 12 hours before breaking one’s fast each day, the body uses more of the stored fat that aids in brain function, to include accessing memories which begins to fail in persons with the disease.
The traditional Catholic fast from midnight, it turns out, is beneficial for physical as well as spiritual reasons.
For years Catholics, obedient as they were to Church discipline surrounding reception of the Holy Eucharist only after a lengthy fast, ensured that the Body of Christ was the first meal of the day. Often this would be closer to noon on Sundays, resulting in a fast sometimes of more than 12 hours. What was a purely religious discipline fed the mind through bodily denial, as well as the life of the spirit, working together as they do in the life of faith.
The mind must be deployed in grasping the truths proposed to the understanding of the believer. The more powerful operation of the mind enabled by bodily fasting from other food enables a more effective encounter with Our Lord upon reception of Him as the Food of the Eucharist. The mind as well as body and soul are to be fed by grace through faith.
The Eucharistic fast in fact enables the body to use what was previously consumed in a more efficient manner.
My nearly concluded 90-day break from posting on the Twitter social network has similarly brought spiritual benefits.
Some may remember I came under attack by thousands of persons on Twitter in early June in a shouting match over the choice of words I employed about a dress code incident at Mass.
After I emptied my “verbal magazines”, going down fighting under the barrage of tens of thousands of tweeted assaults, the result was an excessive number of posts over a 24-hour period. I happened to be on a day off away from the parish when it happened, but nothing in the life of a priest is free of examination by others, living as a public person as he must. That rate of posting could lead to questions over prudence and detachment.
My period of three months away from the social media platform resulted.
Distance always provides objectivity. The same ability to see the speck on someone else, or to provide very convincing advice to others that we may be struggling to follow, demonstrates the ease with which we can see the truth about others more clearly and easily than we sometimes do for ourselves. It is emotion-free distance that makes such clear vision possible.
For those who engage in verbal sparring on Twitter it is a deep investment of self in a conversation at times about very personal issues. The lack of authentic conversation so often witnessed on Twitter is a reflection of the high degree of personal investment bringing out concomitant emotions with an attendant lack of objectivity.
Quick access to a brief, public expression of thought at the wrong moment for ourselves can result in perceived injury to others with highly toxic results.
On Twitter, as well as in every other human interaction, reflection and often also prayer are necessary before reacting if one is to offer the emotion-free objectivity that truly benefits others in more effective communication.
Filters that are employed before Tweeting which can enable inspection for and elimination of emotion-laden ambiguities open to misinterpretation are helpful. Tweet yourself before you treat others to your thoughts.
Looking in on the platform as I did while fasting from actual participation gave me the strengthened ability to see the truth about so many conversations that take place there. I observed that people were processing their emotions through successive tweets, thereby avoiding conversation invited by others in a given thread.
Recently a beloved and respected pro-life warrior, wife and mother, jumped into a thread started by another exemplary Catholic woman, resulting in a stunted exchange hampered by emotion.
One tweeted a teaching from the Roman catechism on the laudable and necessary role of the mother in the home. The other, who often goes on the road for her work, evidently felt slighted in some way and responded several times as if wounded. Some name-calling further muddied the waters as the first individual tried innocently though unsuccessfully to engage with the truths presented in the teaching.
This is just one unfortunate example of many occasions in which Catholics, who agree on essentials, talk past each other because effective aids to objectivity, such as getting off the social network and talking face to face, are lacking.
Such individuals could agree to meet or phone at a future date, afterward publishing an edifying piece on the encounter for the benefit of all.
Non-verbal signals made possible by personal encounter often derail avoidable conversational flash points and help both parties involved to focus on the real issues at hand.
Texting a friend and asking for advice, waiting before tweeting to test the importance of speaking out sooner rather than later and on one issue rather than another, and taking breaks from social media all can help aid in a more edifying use of Twitter for its undeniable benefits to Catholic interaction and evangelization.
Working one's thoughts out in blog format and then linking via a tweet to draw traffic and conversation can also prevent disedifying train wrecks.
Working one's thoughts out in blog format and then linking via a tweet to draw traffic and conversation can also prevent disedifying train wrecks.
Even Twitter admits its own limitations by advising that more than 20 Tweets per day results in decreasing benefits to the user.
Thank you for reading and praised be Jesus Christ, now and forever.
Friday, August 16, 2019
The problem with Catholics ...
... when they want to be liked more than Jesus was.
So they tinker with the message. Change something here or there.
And then what they have is no longer truly Christian but an attempt to be liked.
Christianity is not about being liked; it’s about dying to self for the sake of the Father’s will so as to live with Him.
“Greater love no man hath than to lay down his life for his friends.” Laying down one’s life in authentic love for friends means sharing the truth in a disinterested manner.
If you want to be a true Christian stop trying to turn the Faith into a popularity contest.
So they tinker with the message. Change something here or there.
And then what they have is no longer truly Christian but an attempt to be liked.
Christianity is not about being liked; it’s about dying to self for the sake of the Father’s will so as to live with Him.
“Greater love no man hath than to lay down his life for his friends.” Laying down one’s life in authentic love for friends means sharing the truth in a disinterested manner.
If you want to be a true Christian stop trying to turn the Faith into a popularity contest.
Tuesday, August 13, 2019
Coming soon: Father Cusick’s “First Tweet” after 90 day Twitter fast
Vote for your choice for my first tweet after my 90-day Twitter fast @IntroiboAdAltar.
1. Hello
2. Everyone is doing just fine, attending Mass as before and there was no pastoral crisis after all.
3. Of course men have self control just like women do. It’s an insult to anyone’s intelligence to suggest they didn’t know that. (Thanks for the compliment, Twitter mob).
4. Your suggestions
1. Hello
2. Everyone is doing just fine, attending Mass as before and there was no pastoral crisis after all.
3. Of course men have self control just like women do. It’s an insult to anyone’s intelligence to suggest they didn’t know that. (Thanks for the compliment, Twitter mob).
4. Your suggestions
Sunday, August 11, 2019
Traditional priestly ordination at Harrisburg Cathedral with Cardinal Burke
On the occasion of the ordination in the traditional rite of a Carmelite hermit in Pennsylvania.
Cardinal Burle blessing the faithful.Pilgrims from New York and Maryland.
First blessings from the new priest.
Cardinal Burke blesses a priesthood discerner.
Monday, July 22, 2019
Holy Mass on the road for feast of Saint Mary Magdalene: “It is the truth that the backbone of a good work is perseverance.“
From the Sermons of Pope St. Gregory the Great.
25th on the Gospels.
Mary Magdalen, a woman in the city, which was a sinner, through love of the truth, washed away in her tears the defilement of her sins, and the words of the Truth are fulfilled which He spake Her sins, which are many, are forgiven; for she loved much. She who had remained chilly in sin, became fiery through love. When even His disciples went away again unto their own home, Mary still stood without at the sepulchre of Christ, weeping. She sought Him Whom her soul loved, but she found Him not. She searched for Him with tears; she yearned with strong desire for Him Who, she believed, had been taken away. And thus it befell her, that being the only one who had remained to seek Him, she was the only one that saw Him. It is the truth that the backbone of a good work is perseverance.
25th on the Gospels.
Mary Magdalen, a woman in the city, which was a sinner, through love of the truth, washed away in her tears the defilement of her sins, and the words of the Truth are fulfilled which He spake Her sins, which are many, are forgiven; for she loved much. She who had remained chilly in sin, became fiery through love. When even His disciples went away again unto their own home, Mary still stood without at the sepulchre of Christ, weeping. She sought Him Whom her soul loved, but she found Him not. She searched for Him with tears; she yearned with strong desire for Him Who, she believed, had been taken away. And thus it befell her, that being the only one who had remained to seek Him, she was the only one that saw Him. It is the truth that the backbone of a good work is perseverance.
Friday, July 19, 2019
Father James Martin launches attack against Catholic Church with false equivalency between ethnicity and repeated choice to engage in sodomy
Father James Martin, with a straight face and with the presumption of his own intelligence, leads off his attack on the Church, which he claims to represent officially as a priest, with a false equivalency between ethnic blood, with which a person is born despite their own free choice, and the repeated free choice to knowingly engage in acts of sodomy.
As an operative of the transgressive he continues to baptize such a lifestyle as a political movement under the mantle "LGBT", insisting that other persons must be forced to submit to the agenda under the threat that they otherwise might no longer deserve be called "Christian".
The only way to remain Christian, in fact, is to be honest with regard to the truth about sin, the act of sodomy being one such if engaged in with sufficient reflection and full consent of the will. No personal opinion can change this fact. Neither Father Martin's opinion nor that of anyone else can do so.
Here is the video in which, once again, Father Martin panders to the mob while pretending he doesn't know the difference between one's birth in a particular ethnic group, which is never subject to a person’s free choice, and the responsibility inherent in the free choice always necessary for engaging in sex acts which are mortally sinful when done with sufficient reflection and full consent of the will:
https://youtu.be/2V1xO8Yswkk
As well, Father Martin continues to push the false notion that a qualifier can be placed before the word "Christian", such as "LGBT", while claiming that one can continue in the true faith as such.
One is either fully Christian, and thus deserving of the name, or one is not. Using a qualifier like "LGBT", which approves of and promotes the mortally sinful embrace of sodomy, is not only never a label like any other to be used with Christian, but in fact an agenda that opposes Christianity and cannot coexist with it.
As an operative of the transgressive he continues to baptize such a lifestyle as a political movement under the mantle "LGBT", insisting that other persons must be forced to submit to the agenda under the threat that they otherwise might no longer deserve be called "Christian".
The only way to remain Christian, in fact, is to be honest with regard to the truth about sin, the act of sodomy being one such if engaged in with sufficient reflection and full consent of the will. No personal opinion can change this fact. Neither Father Martin's opinion nor that of anyone else can do so.
Here is the video in which, once again, Father Martin panders to the mob while pretending he doesn't know the difference between one's birth in a particular ethnic group, which is never subject to a person’s free choice, and the responsibility inherent in the free choice always necessary for engaging in sex acts which are mortally sinful when done with sufficient reflection and full consent of the will:
https://youtu.be/2V1xO8Yswkk
As well, Father Martin continues to push the false notion that a qualifier can be placed before the word "Christian", such as "LGBT", while claiming that one can continue in the true faith as such.
One is either fully Christian, and thus deserving of the name, or one is not. Using a qualifier like "LGBT", which approves of and promotes the mortally sinful embrace of sodomy, is not only never a label like any other to be used with Christian, but in fact an agenda that opposes Christianity and cannot coexist with it.
Monday, July 15, 2019
Help a traditional Catholic seminarian pay his tuition
Joseph Falciano comes from a good Catholic family and I know him to be of the highest moral caliber and of firm and devoted Catholic Faith. He has been accepted to enter the FSSP seminary in Nebraska this Fall.
I recommend him most highly to you for your sacrificial support as a future priest who will serve well the faith of your children and grandchildren after those many of you who are now in a position to support him financially have gone to your rest in the Lord.
Please visit his GoFundMe site and make a pledge: https://www.gofundme.com/f/help-a-catholic-seminarian-pay-tuition
Thank you,
Fr Cusick
I recommend him most highly to you for your sacrificial support as a future priest who will serve well the faith of your children and grandchildren after those many of you who are now in a position to support him financially have gone to your rest in the Lord.
Please visit his GoFundMe site and make a pledge: https://www.gofundme.com/f/help-a-catholic-seminarian-pay-tuition
Thank you,
Fr Cusick
Sunday, July 14, 2019
Thursday, July 11, 2019
Thursday, July 4, 2019
There are no genders among humans
Among human beings there are two sexes only: male and female.
There are genders in language only: male, female and neuter.
“So God created man in his own image … male and female he created them” (Gen. 1:27).
There are genders in language only: male, female and neuter.
“So God created man in his own image … male and female he created them” (Gen. 1:27).
Wednesday, July 3, 2019
Tuesday, July 2, 2019
Sunday, June 30, 2019
Dominica III post Pentecosten: "... true righteousness is merciful, and false righteousness is contemptuous..."
From the Holy Gospel according to Luke
Luke 15:1-5
At that time: the publicans and sinners drew near unto him to hear him. And so on.
Luke 15:1-5
At that time: the publicans and sinners drew near unto him to hear him. And so on.
Homily by Pope St. Gregory (the Great)
34th on the Gospels
Ye have heard, my brethren, from the Gospel which hath but now been read, how that the publicans and sinners drew near unto our Redeemer, and how that He received them, not only to converse, but also to eat with Him. And when the Pharisees and Scribes saw it, they murmured. From this learn ye, that true righteousness is merciful, and false righteousness is contemptuous, albeit that the righteous also oft-times feel moved with just indignation at sinners. But it is one thing to feel thus indignant through pride, and another to feel so through love of law.
34th on the Gospels
Ye have heard, my brethren, from the Gospel which hath but now been read, how that the publicans and sinners drew near unto our Redeemer, and how that He received them, not only to converse, but also to eat with Him. And when the Pharisees and Scribes saw it, they murmured. From this learn ye, that true righteousness is merciful, and false righteousness is contemptuous, albeit that the righteous also oft-times feel moved with just indignation at sinners. But it is one thing to feel thus indignant through pride, and another to feel so through love of law.
The righteous indeed look down upon sinners, and yet, as not
despising them; they abandon them, and yet, as not without hope; they fight
against them, and yet, as loving them all the while; for if they be behoven to
chasten them grievously as touching the outer man, yet is it through charity
which offereth sweetness to their inner man. In their hearts they prefer before
themselves them whom they are correcting; they hold as better than themselves
them whom they judge. And thus doing, they watch by carefulness over them,
which are committed unto their charge, and, by lowly-mindedness, over themselves.
On the other hand, they whose exaltation cometh of a false
righteousness, look down upon their neighbour, but are softened by no mercy
toward his misery, and are all the more sinful, because they perceive not that
they themselves are sinners. Of such were those Pharisees who judged the Lord
because He received sinners, and, in the dryness of their own heart, rebuked
the very Fountain of mercy. They were sick of so desperate a sickness that they
knew not of themselves that they were sick; but, that they might know that they
were so, the Heavenly Physician applied to them His tender ointments, and, by
means of a gracious parable, lanced the boil of their pride of heart.