Reminiscences of Pre-Vatican II Life and How It Came to Ruin

Philosophy Notes

Catholic Candle note: Below are the charming recollections we received from one of our senior readers.  Her account speaks from her heart and shows her love of what is truly Catholic and normal.  This is an edifying memoire of a faithful Catholic, rather than a work of meticulously-researched history.  So, we have left her words intact without footnotes or qualifications.

Catholic Candle encourages other readers to submit articles for the glory of God and the salvation of souls.

Chicago neighborhoods in the fifties and several decades before, were a clean, orderly, quiet patchwork of cottages, bungalows, and modest apartment buildings populated by nuclear families.  The fathers, even in the Depression of the ‘30s, went to work early in the mornings, freeing the mothers to maintain the home and nurture the children, who walked with their friends to school and then home again for lunch.  At 2:45, the children again walked home—the boys to play games like “cops and robbers”, “war”, “Cowboys and Indians”, etc., the girls to ride their bikes, or roller skate, or perhaps to walk their beloved dolls in their “doll buggies”.

In the morning the mothers could leisurely comb the girls’ hair into “long curls” (unseen, of course, since pre-1940s).  A 1939 survey found the main complaint of Chicago Public High Schools to be “gum-chewing”.

Among the hundreds of large parish churches in Pre-Vatican II Chicago, some seated a thousand or more congregants.  Sunday Mass times were 6:00, 7:00, 8:00, 9:00 (Children’s Mass), 10:00 High Mass, 11:00, and 12:00 p.m.  The parishioners, suitably attired, would walk in silent contemplation to the parish church (few had cars until the fifties), filling the pews for the 9:00, 10:00, 11:00, and 12:00 Masses – the noon Mass stretching to standing room only, to accommodate the young Saturday night revelers, who stood and knelt as appropriate throughout the forty-five-minute service.

My husband has told me that in the earlier days of the Vietnam War—on the battlefields, when a priest could get through – the Catholic soldiers would race to the Mass site.  I’ve never seen anyone race to a novus ordo mass.  The rallying cry of the fifteenth century English Catholic martyrs was, “It’s the Mass that matters”, (as opposed to the Protestant Novus Ordo, which finally at Vatican II, took down almost all of the rest of the Catholic world, leaving fewer than ever Traditional Catholics, who now await the proper Consecration of Russia and its effects).

The Schools

Educators came from around the country to study the Chicago Public Schools –  staffed mainly by teachers educated, as I was, by the Catholic Religious.  The many Catholic public-school teachers in Chicago founded the Aquin Guild, with a monthly Mass (Tridentine, of course), and conference.  The students paid the remarkable low price of $1.00 per month for their tuition.

At my typical pre-Vatican II Catholic elementary school, staffed by Adrian Dominican Sisters, we prayed at the beginning of the day, and again to begin afternoon classes.  After morning prayers, the Sister would call the children alphabetically – who would reply, “Present, Sister”.  (For whatever reason the total number of children in my classroom always seemed to be 42).   Next came, as necessary, Catechism class in which the Sister called on the children individually to respond from memory to the Baltimore Catechism questions from their homework.  Math, reading, spelling, history/geography, English grammar, and sometimes art or music, completed the school day.

In all eight years of grammar school, I can remember only one instance of “discipline”.   In fourth grade, the Sister left the room for a few minutes, and a few boys began to chat.  When she returned she directed the boys to hit their hands several times with their rulers. 

The girls had their playground and the boys had theirs.  Inside the school building and out, the atmosphere was peaceful – playful on the playground, but peaceful. 

In the earlier days of the SSPX, priests commented that in a classroom, children without a T.V. at home stood out as self-controlled and “normal.”


Subversion of Curriculum

The pre-Vatican II period was also, until the late 1940s, pre-television; in general, the population thought more clearly than now – but of “Liberty & Freedom”; not so much.  Misguided patriotism seems to have blinded the people.  Here is an example of the contradictory messages taught in Catholic schools:

In the morning, we learned, substantially, that the purpose of free will, enabled by grace, was to choose the good.  In the afternoon history class, we would learn – for example, from Lincoln’s Gettysburg address, that “Our Fathers brought forth on this Continent, a new-nation, conceived in liberty” – as indeed the revolutionaries had done, as they immediately removed the cross from the flag –  (which, by the way, the Confederates from the next century, did not remove).

Indeed, the Catholic French and Spanish spiritual forefathers of those American Catholic children had already brought forth on this Continent, (as originally mapped by the devout Catholic Americus Vespucci) – thriving Catholic civilizations, from the university level down, before Lincoln’s forefathers even got here.

The (Traditional) Catholic Church of the Middle Ages conceived and executed the very idea of a “university,” – at Paris, Cambridge, Oxford, Bologna, Salamanca, the Sorbonne, Louvain, etc.  The French and Spanish governments made strenuous efforts to continue the process of establishing and encouraging education, sending ten thousand consecrated religious at a time to civilize, assimilate, educate the Indians of North, South, and Central America.  (This was in contrast to the Puritan forefathers who liked to shoot Indians for sport, while their [Puritan] cousins martyred the starving Catholics of Ireland by trampling them under the hooves of horses).

Before Vatican II, graces available in the Church somewhat elevated and permeated U.S. society at large.  Women’s skirt lengths generally extended below the knee, with special occasions requiring hat and gloves. (Hats and silence, of course, were mandatory for women in the presence of the Blessed Sacrament.)  Before John F. Kennedy, men wore hats often and not just for special occasions.

From the beginning of Vatican II until I discovered Archbishop Lefebvre’s Society of St. Pius X (unfortunately liberalized after his death), I forced myself to attend the Novus Ordo Mass, at which I never saw the pews filled.

About women’s skirt lengths: I read in my post-graduate research, an 1820s extract from The Masonic Journal – I think that was its title – that though it seems absurd, the first step in the necessary corruption of women was to raise skirts from the floor.  I read this piece in the early heyday of the miniskirt. 

Researching further to account for the apparently sudden collapse in the 1960s of the remnants of Christian civilization, I learned that in the 1920s the Vatican had forbidden women to make spectacles of themselves by performing athletics in public. 

As readers know, in 1917, Our Lady of Fatima (correctly) predicted, “Fashions which offend My Son very much will be introduced”.  I read that Our Lady’s words compelled the Vatican, in 1931, to finally explain for the first time that, among other obvious requirements – skirts should extend several inches below the knee.  (Padre Pio required of his penitents’ skirts and dresses to be at least eight inches below the knee.) 

As far as I have learned, no U.S. bishop disseminated either of the Vatican’s directives (viz., about women as public spectacles and concerning skirt-length).

Speaking of women’s decorum in public – I once saw a picture in a magazine of mobs of men filling the streets of Sicily, in celebration of the allied World War II victory in 1945.  There were no women in the streets.  (In Chicago, men and women indiscriminately mobbed State Street for the same occasion.) 

All this doesn’t begin to address the massive semi-nudity on the beaches and streets.  Such semi-nudity was directly caused by Vatican II serving its demonic purpose of virtually annihilating the Tridentine Holy Sacrifice of the Mass, that had acted as the chief restraint against the forces of hell. 

A major demonic preliminary to Vatican II and major offense against Our Lord, was the destruction which Robert Oppenheimer demanded of the only two Catholic enclaves in Japan: Hiroshima and Nagasaki.

Popular consensus, which was giddy with the Atom bomb and the unconditional surrender of the Axis side in World War II, celebrated with a new swim suit style of enhanced public semi-nudity, unseen since the Church civilized the barbaric hordes of Europe in the early Middle Ages.  Their new fashion icon “Bikini,” was named after an unpopulated Pacific atoll Bikini, which was destroyed by a then-experimental atomic bomb.  Indeed “Bikini” has become, over the decades, a catchword joke for women’s beachwear which covers almost nothing.  The U.S. bomber nuking Hiroshima sported on its fuselage, a large graphic of a voluptuous woman in a pre-Bikini, World War II vintage swim suit.

Eight German Jesuit missionary priests lived near the small Hiroshima Cathedral, probably in the immediate area of the nuclear blast in Hiroshima – which Robert Oppenheimer demanded, and which the Freemason Truman readily authorized.  (He earned his honorary 33rd Masonic degree by his consent.)  The priests could see the flash as they cut their breakfast grapefruit, but felt no personal pain.  Medical examinations cleared all of these priests.  One of them (I think Father Schiffer was his name) traveled the world for decades, explaining that the Jesuit missionaries were merely living the Jesuit rule, incorporating the daily Rosary, as Our Lady of Fatima requested of everyone, and that they specifically had devotion to the Fatima message.  They were known as the “Amazing Hiroshima Eight”.  They not only survived the bombing, but also survived the radiation poisoning aftermath.

U.S. Hierarchy and Laity Refuse to Resist

Before Vatican II, people generally lived at home with their families – each girl building her “hope chest” of accessories for her future home; and the boys saving their money to support their future families.  In the ordinary middle-class standards of the era, I never encountered the various four letter-words now seemingly heard everywhere but which, before Vatican II, were not in common use.

The Vatican II blitzkrieg of the mid-sixties took no prisoners.  Women wore mini-skirts or trousers almost everywhere; crucifixes disappeared from school walls; consecrated altars and statuary appeared in second-hand stores.  I read that one of Pope Paul VI’s tiaras turned up in a resale shop.  Religious Sisters abandoned their sacred habit for uniforms reminiscent of the blue jumpers of the postulancy; college administrators crumbled before girl-terrorists demanding Get Out of Vietnam Now or Else.  I read that the year Vatican II ended, the Vatican granted sixty-five annulments worldwide and, not many years afterwards, they granted sixty-five thousand worldwide.

B’nai B’rith required that the Second Vatican Council repudiate its doctrine of “no salvation outside the Church”, and so it was.  The “Council Fathers” set in motion the request that nine Protestant ministers would help to gut the Tridentine Sacrifice and this happened, replacing it (of course) with their own Luther/Cranmer Novus Ordo of the 1500s. 

The religion itself having been thrown out, the Church buildings came to resemble semi-empty railroad stations with disheveled, slouching congregants in the pews.  I once saw a college-level guy sitting in pew – eating an apple, in the otherwise-empty Holy Name Cathedral in Chicago.  I’ve seen twenty-something Marquette students squatting on the floor, attending, (or not) to the novus ordo mass at the Jesu Church in Milwaukee.

Vatican II: The French Revolution within the Church
(As Arch. Lefebvre used to say.)

Having completed my many history-related courses in the best immediately Pre-Vatican II schools, I never encountered there, as far as I can recall, the words “Talmud”, “goyim”, “mason”, or “Free-mason.”  In general, the early English-speaking U.S. Bishops folded themselves and their compliant sheep eagerly into the Masonic pantheon of thirty-six thousand-plus sects of all religions, or no religion(s). 

The Catholic school history books even today, for example, largely mirror the books of the “public” schools.  Had the early U.S. Bishops alerted the Catholic immigrants of the Luciferian-Talmudic-“Enlightenment” and its determination to eradicate the Traditional Catholic Church from the earth, perhaps the human element of the U.S. Catholic Church of the 1960s would not have almost-totally collapsed as it did at Vatican II.

Indeed, Vatican II continued on a trajectory that began before the Masonic U.S. existed.  The century before the American and French revolutions, Our Lord, to defend against the coming onslaught, directed King Louis XIV to inscribe on the French flag, the image of the Sacred Heart of Jesus.  However, Louis XIV, Louis XV, and Louis XVI demurred; and then one hundred years later – to the day – after Our Lord gave this command to King Louis XIV, the French Assembly deposed Louis XVI from his throne.  In a street of Paris, the Masonic mob assassinated Louis XVI and his always-libeled wife, Queen Marie Antoinette. 

Phi Beta Kappa researcher Solange Hertz reports that in her study of the French journalistic output of the era, nowhere does “Let them eat cake” appear.  Queen Marie Antoinette had ordered the expulsion of the spectacularly libertarian publishers, Franklin and Jefferson.  Perhaps this indignity provoked them to concoct and spread the “Let them eat cake” libel, which continues to this day.

Jefferson and Madison, in their journal Citizen’s Gazette, had egged on their French Masonic brethren to the “Mother of all revolutions,” viz., the French Revolution.  The Masonic mob, after relieving the Bastille of its fourteen never-do-wells, enthroned a prostitute as “goddess of reason” on the desecrated main altar of Notre Dame (Our Lady) Cathedral in Paris. 

This prostitute – the “goddess of reason” is the precursor of the eventually-created “Statue of Liberty”, which holds aloft the classic “light” of Luciferian/illuminist iconography.  This abomination is a gift of the Masonic French government to their brethren in the Masonic U.S. government, for unflagging support for the genocidal massacre totaling hundreds of thousands: of Bishops, priests, consecrated nuns and other religious; fathers, mothers, children, infants – and even farm animals and pets as occurred in the Vendee region of northern France.

From the beginning, it was Franklin who brought Voltaire into Masonry, and not the reverse.  Voltaire was and is most admired for proclaiming, “I don’t agree with a word you say, but I defend to the death your right to say it” – except, of course, for the truths taught by the Catholic Church, which he was determined to annihilate. 

Voltaire died a screaming madman, gulping down the contents of his chamber pot, with brother Masons, including Franklin in attendance. (Franklin, at the U.S. Constitutional Convention, warned his brethren that in their obsession to obliterate the Church of Rome, they were overlooking “the Jews,” “who” if admitted to the U.S. would usurp all the power in the U.S. within two hundred years.)

This emphasis on the destruction of Catholic France sprang from the unpleasant reality that France was the leading Catholic power and the dominant political power of Europe.  Jefferson’s desire on his deathbed was that other nations follow the U.S./French lead in the destruction of “monkish ignorance and superstition”, as he put it.  This goal of destroying what is Catholic has been largely achieved in the Church’s human element, up to and including in the citadel of the Vatican, by Vatican II and its implementation, including the Vatican pressuring the few remaining Catholic nations to succumb.

In addition to his four legitimate children, Jefferson fathered at least six illegitimate children by a slave he inherited from his father-in-law.  The affluent Jefferson rages in his writings against “monkish ignorance and superstition.”  The Protestant William Cobbett, an English contemporary who published his own book at about the time Jefferson died, wrote that since the 1500s, English children had been imbued from their mothers’ knees with gratitude for having been freed from “monkish ignorance and superstition.”  Cobbett himself had enjoyed no such freedom, having spent his Dickensonian childhood as a rabbit chaser, and probably a weed-picker, on the estate (previously part of the public patrimony of the monasteries) of an Anglican Bishop and his family as well as his entourage.  The word “pauper” entered the English language under Henry VIII and his illegitimate daughter Elizabeth, the original plunderers of the public patrimony of the monasteries.  The descendants of some of those who were kicked off the stolen monastic lands, migrated to London where, years later, Charles Dickens described their plight.

From his youth, Cobbett researched the phrase “monkish ignorance and superstition”; eventually publishing a one hundred-sixty-page book, the Protestant Reformation in England and Ireland – concluding that it was monkish knowledge and wisdom (rooted in the means of grace), which throughout the Middle Ages elevated the barbarous European hordes into Christian civilization.

One of the six causi belli (“causes of war”) of the U. S. revolution was the non-Mason King George’s permission to the citizens of Quebec to freely practice their Traditional Catholic Faith, in land adjacent to the New England colonies.  The Archbishop of Quebec excommunicated John Carroll, S.J., one of the rebel legates vainly pressuring Quebec to join the revolt – which was generously financed by wealthy Masons, according to the debriefings of General Howe.

The Catholic establishment in the U.S., obsequious from the first to their Masonic masters, submitted to – in fact originally suggested – the Masonic requirement that for citizenship, all must first accept the objective legitimacy and equality of all “religions” – thus gutting the core of the Catholic Faith.  

Our Lord, having established His Church at the price of His atrocious sufferings, mandates His Church as essential to salvation.  Obviously what Our Lord has established is true and anything “protesting” this is false.  The ten million Catholic martyrs of the first three centuries of the Christian era, under the popes of this period – almost all of them martyrs also – refused the absurdity of the then–pantheon of false gods of the self-proclaimed 30,000 “religions” at the time.

Had the U.S. founding fathers crafted a First Amendment of Mutual Tolerance to Prevent Violence, as had been forged at the Treaty of Westphalia, for example, or as warring nations have forged a truce to stop bloodshed, all “religions” and “nonreligions” could at least maintain a semblance of intellectual honesty.  The Traditional Catholic Church condemns Protestantism for its determination to supplant the Church.  The Protestants condemn the Church for claiming to be infallible in Faith and Morals – especially morals.  

Again, Jefferson desired to obliterate Catholicism and this was the goal of the Luciferian/Talmudic/Masonic/“Enlightenment” establishment.  Perhaps this goal would not have been so well fulfilled at Vatican II (as to the Church’s human element), if the early U.S. Catholic Bishops had warned the early Catholic immigrants about this plot.

At this point, the only solution to obtain world peace remains: the Pope and Bishops together must consecrate Russia to the Sacred Heart of Jesus and the Immaculate Heart of Mary as Our Lord directed through Our Lady, and Sister Lucia and her superiors in 1929.

In 1931, Our Lord expressed His exasperation to Sister Lucia that virtually nothing had been done to accomplish the Consecration.  The intransigent refusal of the Popes and Bishops since 1929, to consecrate Russia precisely and simply, as Our Lord directed, has of course provoked the magnitude of the world’s horrors since then.  Our Lord told Sister Lucia that the Consecration would be done, but it would be “late”.  When the Consecration is performed, she then said that the resulting blessings would last “for a time.” 

Sister Lucia, in her memoirs of 1957, wrote that Our Lady had revealed that in response to the escalating corruption engulfing the world from the Papacy down (including Vatican II), Our Lord was making the rosary – which is accessible to all – more efficacious than ever.  Our Lady told Sister Lucia, “There is no problem which cannot be solved” by seriously praying the daily rosary, the “rosary” being a chronological series of meditations on redemptive events in the lives of Our Lord and Our Lady.  Our Lord told Sister Lucia that the Consecration would be done when a sufficient number of souls were praying the daily rosary for this intention.

Photographs of Sister Lucia before 1957 bear no resemblance to “photographs” of her after then.

About the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass, as codified at Trent: the Papal decree enforcing the Tridentine Sacrifice of all time admonishes the world that anyone attempting to alter this Sacrifice of all time, would “incur the wrath of the holy apostles Peter and Paul.”

Among the scores of caskets of canonized saints in St. Peter’s Basilica in Rome, only two caskets remain open: those of the incorrupt bodies of Pope St. Pius V, who implemented the Council of Trent and the Tridentine Sacrifice; and of Pope St. Pius X, who more than four hundred years later, would advise Theodore Herzl that the unrepentant descendants of the Talmudic Jews who engineered the crucifixion of Our Lord, should never exercise authority in the Holy Land.  (The perennial Talmudic/Islamic chaos in the Holy Land since 1947, of course, speaks for itself).

The French Revolutionary Army General Francois Westermann wrote the following:

There is no Vendee ….  According to the orders that you gave me, I crushed the children under the hooves of the horses, massacred the women who at least for these will not give birth to any more brigands.  I do not have a prisoner to reproach me.  I have exterminated all, including farm animal and family pets.

Quoted from a letter to the French Committee of Public Safety, 1794.

In delighted response to the final Masonic victory, Jefferson wrote:

The liberty of the whole earth was depending on the issue of this contest (the French Revolution) and was ever a prize (hundreds of thousands of guillotined Catholics) won with so little innocent [Masonic] blood?  I have expressed to you my sentiments, because they are really those of 99 of a hundred of our citizens.  The universal feasts and rejoicings which have lately been had on account of the successes of the French showed the genuine effusions of their hearts.

Quoted from http/founders. archives.gov/document/Jefferson01-25-02-001

Thomas Jefferson wrote this concerning Our Lord Jesus Christ:

If we could believe that he (Jesus) really countenanced the follies, the falsehoods, and the charlatanism which his biographers (Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John) claim he taught, and (if we could) admit the misconstructions, interpretations, and theorizations of the fathers of the early ages (St. Augustine, St. Jerome, etc.) and fanatics of the latter ages, the conclusion would be irresistible by every sound mind that he (Jesus) was an imposter.

Jefferson, Memoirs, Correspondence and Private Papers of Thomas Jefferson, 1829, p. 333.

Meanwhile, the image of Our Lady of Guadalupe continues to reign in humility, modesty, and dignity, at the geographic center of the Americas, as it has since 1531 A.D., as we see so many North, South, and Central Americans continue to pervert their reason and free will and repudiate Our Lady and her Divine Son Whom she brings us in His Traditional Catholic Church.

May God help us and them!

Frequent Crosses Needed to Help Us to Turn From Sin

For earthly happiness and eternal happiness, live your life as prescribed for us by the Creator, Who is all-wise and loving.  He knows what is best for us and gives us everything we need.  We may not always see the wisdom of God’s gifts to us, but be assured they are for the best.

Let us never then attribute our losses, our disappointments, our afflictions, our humiliations to the devil or to men, but to God as their real source.  ‘To act otherwise,” says St. Dorothy, ‘would be to do the same as a dog who vents his anger on the stone instead of putting the blame on the hand that threw it at him.’  So let us be careful not to say, ‘So-and-so is the cause of my misfortune.’

Your misfortunes are the work not of this or that person but of God.  And what should give you reassurance is that God, the sovereign Good, is guided in all His actions by His most profound wisdom for holy and supernatural purposes.”[1]

Here is an admirable Prayer When Receiving Your Daily Cross:

Do with me and mine as Thou please.  I ask and desire only three things: Thy love, final perseverance, and the grace always to do Thy holy will.  And if to love Thee thus, I must endure persecution and suffering, I am perfectly satisfied.

Let us then conclude with St. Augustine:

All that happens to us in this world against our will (whether due to men or to other causes) happens to us only by the will of God, by the disposal of Providence, by His orders and under His guidance; and if by the frailty of our understanding we cannot grasp the reason for some event, let us attribute it to Divine Providence, show Him some respect by accepting it from His hand, believe firmly that He does not send it to us without cause.[2]

 

Some find it hard to believe one has to suffer to avoid sin.  But consider this: If you were very, very successful (e.g., in business), it is easier to see that salvation is likely not your top priority, not if you are constantly seeking more awards and honors and even world-wide recognition. 

Now contrast that with how the Saints wanted to leave the world and live and seek salvation in the desert or in the wilderness.  Thus, they earned Heaven. 

Remember, you have to earn Heaven.

Here are some reflections on earning Heaven and the part suffering plays in that:

Suffering is thought by many to be the great evil of life.  Oh, if they could only avoid it!  The truth is that if they did find a way of avoiding it, that would be the greatest evil of their lives.

All about suffering.  Our Lord has given us a most perfect redemption.  He could have dispensed the law of suffering if He so willed.  Why does God, being of infinite goodness and mercy, ask us to suffer?

He does so for the simple reason that suffering is a very great grace.  

Our suffering is a share, a small but most valuable share, in the Passion of our dear Lord.

It is priceless in value – if we only accept it and offer it in union with Christ’s Passion.

He has suffered unspeakable agonies for each of us.  Are we such arrant cowards as to refuse to suffer a little for Him?

How little gratitude we show for all that He has done for us!  The easiest and best way of thanking Him is to offer our daily crosses and trials for love of Him.

The one big trouble about suffering is that we do not know how to suffer.  We have no idea of its merits.

The secret is to suffer with patience and serenity.  Then suffering loses all its sting, all its bitterness.

We need only remember that it is our sweet Lord Himself Who asks us to bear these daily trials for love of Him, suffering loses its horrors.

God gives us abundant strength and grace to bear our crosses, if we ask Him.

Many good and pious Christians never think of asking God to help them to bear their crosses!  Therefore, their crosses weigh heavily on them.

Our sufferings are the purest gold in our lives.  Five minutes’ suffering is of greater worth than twenty years of pleasure and happiness.

One fact well worth remembering is that our daily sufferings, the least as well as the greatest, if borne well, merit for us a crown of martyrdom.       

Suffering, well borne, makes us saints.[3]

In closing, this might be a thought to bear in mind:

If a little suffering makes you impatient now, what will hell fire do?  In truth, you cannot have two joys: you cannot taste the pleasures of this world and afterward reign with Christ.[4]



[1]           Trustful Surrender to Divine Providence, Father Jean Baptiste Saint Jure, S.J., & Saint Claude De La Colombiere, S.J., Tan Books and Publishers, Inc., Rockford, IL, 1983, pp. 25-26.

[2]               Trustful Surrender to Divine Providence, Father Jean Baptiste Saint Jure, S.J., & Saint Claude De La Colombiere, S.J., Tan Books and Publishers, Inc., Rockford, IL, 1983, pp. 17-18.

[3]               An Easy Way to Become a Saint, Fr. Paul O’Sullivan, O.P.,(E.D.M.)  Tan Books and Publishers, Inc., Rockford, IL, 1990, pp. 68-70.

[4]               Imitation of Christ, Thomas à Kempis; Book I, Ch. 25.

The Awe-inspiring Providence of How God Teaches Humility to His Friends.

Catholic Candle note: The following is a letter from a Catholic Candle reader.  We invite our readers to send their own letters and articles.

Dear fellow Catholic Candle readers,

While reciting the Joyful Mysteries I found myself pondering the reason why God allowed the angels to fall.  Would it not have been better to have all the created angels to be in heaven adoring God?  For that matter, would it not have been better if Adam had not sinned and to have all humans obtain heaven and be with God? 

Then I could almost hear what I have heard people say so many times before, “If there is a God and He is so good, then how can there be suffering, sickness, and death in the world?”  I am sure, you, dear fellow-readers, have heard similar things.

How would I refute such questions?

Then, I remembered that the Candle had an article about how men are not created equal and how the fall of the angels and men showed God’s glory more than if these events had not occurred.  The bitter questions of those who do not understand how Providence works make it sound like God is somehow unfair or unjust in His ways.

Then my thoughts went a bit deeper to ponder how God is so provident and He works on all levels from top to bottom, as it were.  How marvelous it truly is that God chose to become Man in the form of a little Baby!  In a cave used as a stable!  For all those people who think that God is unfair, have they ever thought about how He chose such humiliations for Himself?  How is it unfair that He gives us something to suffer and we are sinners and deserve suffering, when He, Who is perfect, showed us such loving examples of how to offer things up out of love for the Heavenly Father?  He didn’t stop there; He suffered so many attacks, humiliations, and such an ignominious death on the Cross!

I couldn’t help contrasting the Blessed Virgin Mary to whom He gave so much, with so many souls to whom God chose to give little.  It is almost overwhelming to contrast the most ignorant and weak savage pagan, to the immaculately conceived Mother of God.  What a remarkable difference between two human creatures of God!  Our Lady is God’s masterpiece.  She had the use of reason from her conception and always served God perfectly. 

God chose to do this and He is not unfair or unjust.  He planned from all eternity to create man and He planned the means He would use to redeem man.  He planned to create a perfect virgin to be the Mother of Wisdom Incarnate.  He also planned that He would give her to us to be our Mother to help us miserable sinners work out our salvation.   He planned that she would be more powerful than all hell put together. 

The most astounding thought of all my contrasting back and forth was that God did all of what He did as a means to foster humility in us.  Whether we think of all of the blessings He has given us from the Faith on down, or whether we see how low we are compared to Mary, the highest of all the saints, we are humbled by these thoughts.  This all made me think how He wants our humility and how He allows all things to help us discover humility, see its beauty, and desire to have this most necessary virtue.  Our Lord told us we cannot enter the kingdom of heaven without humility.  I could not help but be struck how He works out all things in His creation and in particular, in the human race, in order to teach men this foundation of all virtue – humility.   Mary and Blessed Christ Mass, fellow Catholic Candle readers!

Life’s Spiritual Road Without a Priest

Catholic Candle Note: The article below is one man’s account of his fight for Catholic Tradition throughout the decades, as this fight was punctuated by periods (including the present) when he had no priest because of his refusal to compromise.

My family and I have carried the cross of having no priest on multiple occasions throughout the decades as we strive for salvation. 

We were without a priest the first time after the Second Vatican Council in the 1960s.  Mercifully, it didn’t last too long as we found a few uncompromising “independent” priests and then, later, the Society of St. Pius X came to America. 

Before Archbishop Lefebvre brought his fledgling Society, we had what we called family “meetings” with our children, to explain why we didn’t attend the local church but why we still dressed in our Sunday best to read the Mass prayers at home.  It was all part of training them to know and retain traditional Catholic morals and virtue. 

However, many others accepted the Liberalism and Modernism and said Our Lord will understand if they went along to get along.  (No, Our Lord will not understand!)  He expects us to cherish our Faith and do our best to keep it perfect as Our Lord intended.  He knows what we need and will always provide it.  But we have to understand and use what He provides for happiness on earth, and greater happiness in Heaven.

But sadly, after the Archbishop died, the SSPX gradually became more and more liberal and we had to leave the “new” SSPX in September of 2015.  We were still able to find uncompromised Masses for another three years, although not every Sunday.  Thus, we have been without a priest for the past five years. 

The question is how are we managing to stay on track and profit in the spiritual life for our salvation?  Well, I’ll tell you.

As you know, only saints go to heaven.  So, we must become saints to go there.  We must love God and not sin.  Plus, we must live our life preparing for our personal judgment by Christ, during which every one of our thoughts and actions will be judged.  We must develop such a great love of God that any sacrifice we must endure is a joy, and to sin is unthinkable.

To increase our love for God, we should study the life of Christ and increase our understanding of what He has done for us.  He created us.  He keeps us in existence.  He came to earth and suffered and died for us.  He now gives us both actual grace and sanctifying grace in order to make us happy on earth, and after death, happy with Him in Heaven forever.  Wow!  What a gift!

So, we must not sin – not even a venial sin.  This is not as hard as it sounds when a person loves God greatly.  We feel the responsibility for our salvation much more keenly now.  We wouldn’t even want to fall back on our previous sluggish practice of our Faith, such as misusing the old “Saturday afternoon Confessions.”  My impression living back then, is that the Saturday Confession was taken advantage of – many “Sunday Catholics” had a “good time” amidst the voluntary occasions of sin, thinking that they would just go to Confession Saturday, and that “would take care of” what they chose to do the evening before.  “No problem”, they thought.

But now we begin to understand that this newer, closer relationship with God cannot depend upon going through a priest and receiving the Sacraments.  We now understand better that our salvation hinges about us and what we do.   

This is not the first time that large numbers of souls have been without a priest and the Sacraments.  Japanese Catholics suffered through 300 years of spiritual aridity, without the sacraments. 

We are being tested to prepare for Eternity.  We must refuse to accept Liberalism and Modernism although “everyone else” accepts them. 

The longer I live, the more I realize that the “misfortune” God sends us turns out to be a “life saver” toward our goal of salvation.  He knows best. 

We must use Advent and Lent for the spiritual strength we need in the fight against evil. 

Hang a picture of Our Lord in your home and foster devotion to His Sacred Heart in order to obtain the promises of Our Lord.  (Although these Promises were published in Catholic Candle recently, they are so important that we should remind ourselves about them again now)

The Promises of Our Lord
To St. Margaret Mary for Souls Devoted to His Sacred Heart

1.    I will give them all the graces necessary for their state of life.

 

2.    I will establish peace in their families.

3.    I will console them in all their difficulties.

4.    I will be their secure refuge during life, and more especially at the hour of death.

5.    I will shower down abundant blessings on all their undertakings.

6.    Sinners shall find in My Heart a Source and boundless ocean of Mercy.

7.    Tepid souls shall become fervent.

8.    Fervent souls shall rise speedily to great perfection.

 

9.    I will bless every place in which the picture of My Sacred Heart shall be exposed and honored.

10. I will give to priests the power of touching the most hardened hearts.

11. Persons who propagate this devotion shall have their names written in My Heart, and they shall never be effaced therefrom.

 

12. I will grant the grace of final repentance to all those who shall communicate on the first Friday nine months consecutively.  They shall not die in mortal sin, nor without having received the last Sacraments, for My Divine Heart will become their secure refuge at that last moment.

What else should we do?  Start reading each night a religious book such as Lives of the Saints, or Trustful Surrender to Divine Providence, etc.  

Of course, praying the 15 decades of the Rosary daily is a great way of becoming closer to Our Lord and His Blessed Mother. 

You will learn to talk to Jesus many times during the day as you would with a good friend Who always has the wise answer to your daily problems.  You should seek uncompromising Traditional Catholic friends when possible. 

Don’t forget our Guardian Angels who are given to us by God to preserve us from the many serious dangers in life.  We should converse with our angels; ask for their help.  They want to help us to fulfill God’s plan for us. 

Finally, we can receive great strength by frequently and devoutly reciting three prayers: 1) the Our Father; 2) the Apostles Creed; and 3) the Spiritual Communion.  St. Augustine stated that praying devoutly the Our Father will gain forgiveness for venial sins.

A final word: Be Patient.  The Sacraments will be provided when God wills it.  Meanwhile, we must stay strong and fight for Christ the King!

                                                                                                                         

Recollections of the Earliest Days of the “Changes”

Catholic Candle Note: The article below is one wife’s account of the early days of her family’s fight for Catholic Tradition after Vatican II.

When We First Began to Suspect Big Trouble Was Brewing in the Human Element of the Church (Early ‘60s)

Early in our marriage and “babies” stage, my husband and I used to take turns going to Mass every weekday.  With five children under the age of six, one of us had to stay home, of course.  We were in St. Edward’s parish on the southside of Racine, Wisconsin, and we began to find that the church was not always open when we arrived for early Mass.  Or sometimes the correct side door was still locked.  Or one of the young priests was late, not exactly conducive to encouraging Mass attendance.   Eventually, the early Mass was canceled “due to poor attendance,” they explained. 

Meanwhile, minor, and seemingly unimportant changes were creeping into the Mass, e.g., St. Joseph was now mentioned in the immemorial Canon of the Mass.  But it was said: “who could object to good St. Joseph being honored like that?”  I distinctly remember thinking, “Well, I don’t like [this or that], but if that’s the way it has to be, I’d better get used to it.”  (However, we soon learned to be more vigilant and not so ready to accept changes.)

At this time, we had a venerable monsignor for our pastor, with two young assistant priests, who were the same ones who dragged their feet providing the early Mass.  The old monsignor was to celebrate his silver jubilee, and the parish was giving him the gift of a trip to Hawaii.  The way it worked was that while he was gone on his trip, a certain cabal of parish liberals went to the bishop and convinced him to retire the monsignor.  Thus, one of the younger priests replaced him.

We invited this new pastor to dinner to get an idea in what direction he would be leading the parish, and it became very clear, he wouldn’t be. He was planning to let the newly-installed nuns run things.  And this was in the day when radical nuns were first leveraging their power in order to take control.

So, we had to leave St. Edward’s, where innovations to the Mass started increasing, and it was announced that a new mass would be coming.  It was evident that this new mass would not be Catholic but that it would be an implementation of the modernism that had been implanted at Vatican II.  Therefore, we saw that we could have nothing to do with this new mass. 

The new mass was promulgated for use beginning the First Sunday of Advent, 1969.  In late November 1969, the parish priest at St. Edward’s announced that the following Sunday, he would begin using the new mass, instead of the Traditional Latin Mass. 

That was Providence’s sign for our family to make its move.  When we returned home after this announcement, my husband called a “family meeting” and explained to our children that there was a protestantized service which was going to be used at St. Edward’s starting the following Sunday.  He explained that, for the love of God and in order to keep the true Catholic Faith, we would not be attending it nor would the family return again to St. Edward’s.

We learned somehow that a small ethnic parish near downtown Racine was still allowing the Latin Mass, so we began the next Sunday to attend St. Casimir’s regularly.  Before too long, there were a few dozen other new faces in the congregation, as word got around that this parish had the Traditional Mass.   

St. Casimir’s was a Lithuanian parish in an older part of town.  This is the church that my husband had discovered to be the place to which we could “flee”.  It was a beautiful old structure, with towering dark woodwork making up a large altar backdrop.  In this woodwork there were little niches in which were placed about a dozen statues of saints.

At St. Casimir’s, the parish priest saw that the new mass was a bad thing and he resisted its implementation.   For the moment, things were good.

Probably “too good”.  St. Casimir’s pastor was not as “strong as steel”, although for a while he made excuses for not using the new mass.  The months went by.  But it became evident that the pastor of St. Casimir’s was not strong enough to continue withstanding the pressure of the bishop to use the new mass.

The tiny parish was suddenly being visited by younger priests, to “help out”, at the bishop’s direction, one of whom sticks in my mind.  On a feast of our Blessed Mother, he gave a sermon comparing her in a worldly way to a popular actress(!), Raquel Welch, and I remember we were sitting there outraged at this insult to Our Lady, and very nearly walked out of church.  Well, that was the beginning of the end for St. Casimir’s. 

Very soon, the unwanted attention from the archbishop of our diocese spelled the end of the Latin Mass at this small Lithuanian hold-out parish.  We tried talking the little Lithuanian priest into hanging on to it, and though he surely agreed silently, he must have been pressed hard by the diocese to give it up.

Then on Passion Sunday 1970, he announced that the following Sunday the parish would start using the new mass. 

Because St. Casimir’s was apparently wavering in the weeks before that, my husband and I planned where our family would have to “flee” next.  On Palm Sunday 1970, we did not return to St. Casimir’s but drove to Milwaukee and attended St. Michael’s, which was a Byzantine (Eastern Catholic rite) Catholic church.  We, especially our children, found the Byzantine Mass surprising and strange.  Although it was Palm Sunday, there were no palms.  Instead, the Mass included the blessing of pussy willow branches, which had no leaves but only the grey fuzzy oblong “balls” at the tips. 

Also, strange to our children, the priest distributed Holy Communion under both Species.  The Blessed Sacrament which the priest took from his ciborium was leavened cube Hosts, soaked in the Precious Blood.  The priest used a little gold spoon to carefully pour the precious Species into the uplifted mouth of each communicant.

Our children trusted us, their parents, and “took it all in” as something strange but which was part of our life now.  Ever after this day – even decades later – our children refer to this Palm Sunday as “Pussy Willow Sunday”.

After Mass, we were talking with the parishioners of St. Michael’s.  My husband was discussing with the men of the parish what was going on at the Roman rite parishes.  The men from St. Michael’s seemed uninterested in the on-going conciliar revolution.  If the positions had been reversed, and if these men had come to our original parish (St. Edward’s) telling my husband about the on-going revolution coming to our parish, he would have “hung on every word” they said.  But no.  These men were as uninterested and as unalarmed as the average parishioner at St. Edward’s had been. 

In any event, one of them remarked that a few miles away there was a Roman rite parish, St. Lawrence’s, with a conservative pastor who continued to offer the Traditional Mass every Sunday.  My husband got directions and we went there beginning the following Sunday.

The good Lord had provided us with this wonderful next step.

When we were at St. Lawrence’s, we did “have it all”: the true Mass, a beautiful church, magnificent organ, wonderful choir, and strong sermons.  Sigh!  This fortuitous situation continued for some years, enough time that we were able to see all of our five children make their First Communions. 

However, at some point, my husband began to have a nagging doubt whether it was the right thing to do to attend the Mass of a priest who said the (sacrilegious) novus ordo mass once a month because the bishop insisted.  No amount of wishing could rationalize away that compromise.  And so, in 1976, we left St. Lawrence and all of our traditional friends, for the love of God and His Holy Faith. 

In the following years, we found ourselves tracking down the good Traditional Masses whenever and wherever we could find them without compromise: a hotel ballroom, a priest’s basement, an empty dancehall, a country church, a veterans’ home, a priest’s lakeside cottage, a nursing home, etc.  We reminded ourselves when we were hearing Mass in humble surroundings, that the setting wasn’t the most important consideration; the Mass itself was.  

In those periods, sometimes we had no Mass to go to, and our family read the Mass prayers at home, all of us dressed in our Sunday best to train the children to dress as traditional Catholics should.  My husband fulfilled the father’s duty of giving a short talk in lieu of a sermon.  While sanctifying the Sunday in this way seemed less satisfactory to us, it was clearly God’s Will for us.

Eventually, after having been without Mass for about 3-4 months, we heard that the priest who had been at St. Lawrence (Fr. Hugh Wish) had left that parish and was now offering exclusively the Tradition Mass, at various other venues.   This is when Fr. Wish began offering Mass in the large room of a dancehall near Oconomowoc, WI, more than an hour’s drive from our home.  But we were happy to travel so that we could again attend Mass! 

Shortly after that, we heard that Fr. Wish had become pastor of St. Pius V’s church at Mukwonago, a town west of Milwaukee.  This church had been owned by the diocese and was for sale.  The diocese refused to sell it to Catholics for fear that it would be used for the Old Mass.  So, some Traditional Catholics, guided by Fr. Wish, paid a black protestant minister to buy the church building and then transfer title to them.  It was so good to have a parish again!

But, as we were learning, earthly things are transitory, and Father Wish’s death in 1979 eventually brought the Mukwonago chapel under the auspices of the Society of St. Pius X.  Archbishop Marcel Lefebvre had begun this priestly society in Switzerland in 1970, and it eventually came to the United States.  It was a godsend, and we were so fortunate to benefit from the Archbishop’s good work. 

Under his wary eye, the SSPX fought the good fight opposing modernist Rome, which was trying to gain control of the Society.  He was a magnificent non-compromiser and kept the SSPX firmly on the right track.  That is, until he died.

Before his death, however, Archbishop Lefebvre consecrated four bishops in 1988.  They made no abrupt, jarring changes, and life went on.

It wasn’t, probably, until we were in the new century that an occasional SSPX news release or action began to raise a few eyebrows.  However, midway through the second decade we began to notice troublesome statements from the Society coming more frequently and getting harder to explain.  By 2015 we could no longer remain with the Society and were forced to leave.

We now have no Mass or priest, out of love for Our Dear Lord.  This will not change until He wills it to change.  We wait patiently, dear Lord, content with Thy Holy Will.

Let Us Undergo the Trials that God Sends Us!

Catholic Candle note: The article below is a reminder of the benefit we receive from the trials that God sends us. 

This article is a “companion piece” to Catholic Candle’s prior article, Strategies for Lightening the Crosses You Now Have, which can be found here: https://catholiccandle.org/2020/04/01/77/

St. John Chrysostom gives five reasons why God permits us to undergo trials and tribulations, even very severe ones.  Here are his words:

Whoever thou art then that after thy baptism sufferest grievous trials, be not troubled thereat; for this thou receivest arms, to fight, not to sit idle.  God does not hold all trial from us:

·         firstly, that we may feel that we are become stronger;

·         secondly, that we may not be puffed up by the greatness of the gifts we have received;

 

·         thirdly, that the Devil may have experience that we have entirely renounced him;

 

·         fourthly, that by it we may be made stronger; and

 

·         fifthly, that we may receive a sign of the treasure entrusted to us; for the Devil would not come upon us to tempt us, did he not see us advanced to greater honors.[1]

Let us examine each of these reasons why God permits us to suffer trials.

1.   God permits us to undergo trials that we might feel that we become stronger.

We need encouragement and (reasonable) confidence in spiritual battles.  If we never fight spiritual battles, we will be afraid to do so.  We would wonder “how would I do?”  Because of this insecurity, we would shrink back like cowards from future spiritual battles that God wishes us to fight, for His glory and for our reward.

An army’s general values his battle-tested and battle-hardened soldiers because they know from experience that they can succeed and they know what they must do in order to succeed.  Those veteran soldiers gain in courage and confidence by fighting battles, so that they feel ready to fight future battles.

Similarly, Christ, our “General” in the Church Militant, gives us trials to help us Soldiers of Christ to be battle-tested and battle-hardened spiritual warriors.  Through trials, we test our spiritual armaments, our (spiritual) combat skills, and our strength in the spiritual battles of this life.  We learn by experience that the devil cannot conquer us provided that we do not let him do so (by consenting to sin).  We know that, with God’s help and if we do our part, we will conquer all demons. 

For this reason, God sends us trials so that we might gain courage and (reasonable) confidence that we are able to fight life’s spiritual battles for God’s glory and for the salvation of souls.

2.   God permits us to undergo trials that we may not be puffed up by the greatness of the gifts we have received.

When we are inside our home while a wild storm rages outside, we feel secure, like a sailor looking out from the security of a safe harbor at a storm raging at sea.[2]  By contrast, when a sailor is caught out at sea, with his ship almost capsizing, fighting for survival amidst the buffeting waves, then he remembers that he needs God and that his own efforts are very weak and small.

Let us apply that principle to the spiritual life:

The angelic spirits are truly awesome – greatly exceeding our comprehension:

  The angelic nature is so great that it would be a greater thing for us to understand the nature of the lowest angel than it would be for us to know everything about all material creation combined.

  The lowest angel is so powerful that he could very easily destroy all of material creation, if God permitted him to do so.

The devils have such very high angelic natures.  Their rebellion against God did not change the greatness of their natures.

Suppose we found all trials to be easy.  Suppose that, for us, avoiding temptation was “child’s play” and that when the devil tempted us, we could simply “snap our fingers in the devil’s face” (as it were) and that we could prevail against his temptations without need to make any serious effort to resist him.

If all trials were so easy for us, our pride would grow exceedingly.  Thus, God lovingly sends us the precious gift of trials in order to deflate our pride by forcing us to fight hard for the life of our souls, in the spiritual storms that rage in this world.

It is during spiritual trials that we best know that we need God’s help.  At such times, we best remember that we are small and weak and that we are not the great spiritual champions that we would otherwise imagine ourselves to be.  We remember then that we would be deluding ourselves to think that we can terrorize all devils and put them to flight because of our great holiness and spiritual power.

For this reason, God sends us trials – including severe trials – in order that these trials would remind us of our weakness so that we do not get puffed up by the magnificent spiritual gifts that God gives to us Catholics who follow the full traditions of the Church.

3.   God permits us to undergo trials in order that the Devil may have experience that we have entirely renounced him.

It is appropriate that the devil should have discernable evidence that we belong to God and are soldiers in His army.  It is fitting that the devil sees that the soldiers of Christ fight for Him and that the devil sees that we fulfill our baptismal vows to “renounce Satan and all of his works and pomps”.

It befits the Divine honor that we, who are Our Lord’s servants and friends, do not render Him service which is so indiscernible that the devil is able to mock Our Lord that he can’t even tell that we are serving the Divine Majesty.

God must not only triumph in us but must also be seen to triumph in us.  This is good and fitting just as it is good and fitting that, at the end of the world, not only will justice be done at the General Judgment but also that it will be seen to have been done.

Thus, God sends us trials to make manifest that we belong to Him and not to the devil.

4.   God sends us grievous trials in order that, by this spiritual combat, we can be made stronger.

A soldier is given weapons in order that he can fight.  If he were not supposed to fight, he would not have been given weapons.  If he were supposed to remain idle, he would have been given pillows instead of weapons.

Similarly, St. John Chrysostom teaches us that we Soldiers of Christ receive spiritual weapons for the very purpose of we fighting God’s battles in the trials He sends us.  St. John Chrysostom teaches us that God wants us “to fight, not sit idle”.  Id.

Just as hard physical exercise causes our bodily muscles to gain strength, likewise grievous spiritual trials and tribulations strengthen our “spiritual muscles”.  That is, our wills gain strength in virtue through hard spiritual work. 

We should welcome the trials that God sends.  We should generously enter into the penitential times (e.g., Lent, Ember Days, vigils of high feasts, Advent), valuing them as opportunities and as blessings, not as misfortunes which we must endure.  We should not approach such times with a stingy heart, doing the minimum required, and making as little change in ourselves as possible. 

We should look upon penitential times as occasions of great liberty, freeing ourselves from the burden of our lower nature which pulls us downward.  We should also view the Great Apostasy in which we live as a blessing and as a trial meant for our good.[3]  For we know that such trials “work together unto the good, for those who love God”.  Romans, 8:28.

Thus, God sends us trials in order to make us stronger in His service.

5.   God permits us to undergo trials that we may receive a sign of the treasure entrusted to us; for the Devil would not come upon us to tempt us, did he not see us advanced to greater honors.

Suppose we inherited an old painting of little apparent value from a distant relative.  As we receive it, suppose we also receive an offer from a rich art collector to purchase it for $25 million.  That offer would cause us to regard this painting much differently.  We would keep it safe and not throw it away or otherwise disregard it.

Suppose we learned that an art thief planned to steal that painting.  We would take great care to not allow this valuable possession to be stolen.

Analogously, we possess a far greater treasure: sanctifying grace (which is always accompanied by Charity and the indwelling of the Holy Ghost).  That grace is infinitely valuable, although it can seem to people that it is like that old worthless-seeming painting we inherited. 

However, when we know that the devil is trying to “steal” this priceless treasure from our souls, it helps us to remember the incomparable value of grace.  Just as the art thief’s desire to steal our painting warns us of the value of that painting and reminds us to protect it from theft, likewise, the devil’s desire to “steal” the grace in our soul reminds us to take all precautions to protect the life of grace.

Thus, we see that God permits the devil to tempt us through trials to remind us of the infinite value of the grace we have in our souls.

Conclusion

Let us appreciate the trials and tribulations that our Dear Lord generously gives us! 

Let us value them more than all material goods and more than a life of ease, since those trials are a crucial means for our salvation. 

Let us thank God for those trials and use them for God’s greater honor and glory and for maximum merit!

 

 



[1]           Catena Aurea on St. Matthew ch.4, v.1.  St. Thomas Aquinas, greatest Doctor of the Catholic Church, chooses and quotes these words of St. John Chrysostom, Doctor and Father of the Church, from St. John’s sermon #13 on St. Matthew’s Gospel

[2]           Here is how the Roman philosopher Lucretius explained the comfortable security that a person has when he sees others, but not himself, undergoing great tribulations:

Pleasant it is, when on the great sea, the winds trouble the waters, to gaze from shore upon another’s great tribulation: Not because any man’s troubles are a delectable joy, but because to perceive what ills you are free from yourself is pleasant.

Lucretius, De Rerum Natura, Book II, line 1.

[3]           This time of Great Apostasy is a glorious time to be Catholic and to live for Christ the King!  https://catholiccandle.neocities.org/faith/it-is-a-blessing-to-live-during-this-great-apostasy.html

God is Just and Will Not Be Mocked

Catholic Candle note:  The article below pertains to Our Lord’s command that the pope together with the bishops of the world consecrate Russia to the Immaculate Heart of Mary.  In 2022, Pope Francis performed a consecration to the Immaculate Heart of Mary, naming Russia.  However, this consecration did not fulfill the necessary requirements as Our Lord commanded.  For an explanation and analysis of this, read this article: https://catholiccandle.org/2022/04/20/did-the-popes-consecration-fulfill-heavens-command-no/

So far, a just God has punished mankind, which has been steeped in sin over the centuries, thereby sending a message He will not be held up to scorn.  One of the first great punishments was the Deluge.  We read in Genesis:

God seeing that the wickedness of men was great on the earth, and that all the thought of their heart was bent upon evil at all times, It repented him that he had made man on the earth.  And being touched inwardly with sorrow of heart, He said: I will destroy man, whom I have created, from the face of the earth, from man even to beasts, from the creeping thing even to the fowls of the air, for it repenteth me that I have made them.  But Noe found grace before the Lord.[1]


Warning of the Flood

These are the generations of Noe: Noe was a just and perfect man in his generations, he walked with God.  And he begot three sons, Sem, Cham, and Japheth.  And the earth was corrupted before God, and was filled with iniquity.  And when God had seen that the earth was corrupted (for all flesh had corrupted its way upon the earth,)  He said to Noe: The end of all flesh is come before me, the earth is filled with iniquity through them, and I will destroy them with the earth.[2]

Another early, great punishment was the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrha. 

For the sins of their inhabitants Sodom, Gomorrha, Adama, and Seboin were destroyed by “brimstone and fire from the Lord out of heaven.”[3]

Much more recently, came World Wars I and II, with a great loss of life.  The Blessed Mother at Fatima revealed that they were punishments for sin.  Also at Fatima, Our Lady revealed that God wills that Russia would be consecrated to her Immaculate Heart.  In 1929, she appeared to Sister Lucy and told her:

The moment has come when God asks the Holy Father to make, in union with all the bishops of the world, the consecration of Russia to my Immaculate Heart, promising to save it by this means ….[4] 

Earlier (viz., in 1917), Our Lady of Fatima revealed that the pope definitely will consecrate Russia to her Immaculate Heart and through this means God will grant peace.  Here are her words:

The Holy Father will consecrate Russia to me, and she [viz., Russia] shall be converted, and a period of peace will be granted to the world.[5]

However, Our Lady of Fatima warned in 1917 that, when she came in the future, (viz., in 1929) to ask for the consecration, if the pope delayed this consecration, his delay would cause great harm throughout the world.  Here are Our Lady’s words

I shall come [viz., in 1929] to ask for the consecration of Russia to my Immaculate Heart, by the Holy Father and all the bishops of the world.  If my request is heeded, Russia will be converted and there will be peace.  If not, she will spread her errors throughout the world, provoking wars and persecution against the Church.[6]

In 1931, Our Lord assured Sister Lucy that the pope and bishops will perform this consecration – but He revealed that there will first be a long delay.  Here are Sister Lucy’s words describing Our Lord’s revelation to her:

Later on, by means of an interior communication, Our Lord said to me, complaining: “They [viz., Pope Pius XI and the bishops of the world] did not want to heed My request!  …  Make it known to My ministers, seeing that they follow the example of the King of France in delaying the execution of My demand, they will also have to follow him into misfortune.  Like the King of France, they will repent and do it, but it will be late.[7]

Because the world is becoming continually worse, it is reasonable to suppose that another chastisement is coming.  We can ponder what this new chastisement will be.  But when and how it will occur, I don’t know.

Readers of the Catholic Candle are aware, and so I needn’t recount just how depraved and steeped in sin this world has become today.  However, one evil  which must be addressed is this: Rome and, perhaps, 99.5% of Catholics in the world said good-bye to the Catholic faith in the 1960s and 1970s (and afterwards) to join the anti-Catholic Conciliar church, catastrophically adding to the mockery of God which sin always is.  Christ established a perfect religion, and we must do our part, the best we can, to promote and practice this religion: the uncompromising Traditional Catholic Religion.

Just how does the world avoid another chastisement?  By doing as Our Lord said: the pope and all the Catholic bishops[8] must consecrate Russia to the Immaculate Heart of Mary in the way He directed that it be done.  Then, and only then, will peace follow. 

Considering the words and actions of our current pope, Francis, and most of the Catholic bishops[9] of the world, I don’t see that consecration happening any time soon.  What we can and should do now is to use the Blessed Virgin Mary’s “sword against evil” – viz., the rosary – in our fight for peace in the world.  Since my visit to Fatima in the 1980s, I’ve always felt that Our Lady’s request for us to pray the rosary every day meant all 15 decades.  They are all part of the rosary, and she didn’t say “at least part of a rosary.”  In this way, you’d say seven complete rosaries a week, as compared to two and a third partials.  Which do you think she prefers?  (You are no doubt busy, so it’s acceptable to say each mystery at a different time of the day, morning, noon, or night but we should all do our best to pray the entire rosary – 15 decades – every day.)

What do you think?  Did I make my case? 



[1]           Holy Bible, Genesis, Ch.6, vv. 5-13.

[2]           Holy Bible, Genesis, Ch.6, vv. 5-13.

[3]           The Catholic Encyclopedia, article: Sodom & Gomorrha, 1913.

[4]           The Whole Truth About Fatima, Frere Michel de la Sainte Trinite, translator John Collorafi, vol. II, Immaculate Heart Publications, Buffalo, NY, copyright 1989 for English translation, p.464 (emphasis added)

[5]           This is a portion of Our Lady’s message during the Third Apparition of Fatima, July 13, 1917 (emphasis and bracketed words added), quoted from The Whole Truth About Fatima, Frere Michel de la Sainte Trinite, translator John Collorafi, vol. II, Immaculate Heart Publications, Buffalo, NY, copyright 1989 for English translation, pp. 281-282.

[6]           This is a portion of Our Lady’s message during the Third Apparition of Fatima, July 13, 1917 (emphasis and bracketed words added), quoted from The Whole Truth About Fatima, Frere Michel de la Sainte Trinite, translator John Collorafi, vol. II, Immaculate Heart Publications, Buffalo, NY, copyright 1989 for English translation, pp. 281-282.

[7]           The Whole Truth About Fatima, Frere Michel de la Sainte Trinite, translator John Collorafi, vol. II, Immaculate Heart Publications, Buffalo, NY, copyright 1989 for English translation, p. 464, (emphasis added; bracketed words added for clarity).

[8]           This consecration of Russia which Heaven commanded to be performed, pertains to the bishops wielding jurisdictional power to govern the Church throughout the world.  As such, it can be performed by those Ordinaries who govern the Church, despite the doubtfulness that their conciliar consecrations give them the sacramental power of a bishop.  For an explanation of this, please read chapters 10 and 11 of this book: https://catholiccandle.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/08/sedevacantism-material-or-formal-schism.pdf

Catholic Candle holds that a bishop consecrated under normal conditions, by the Church in normal times, properly receives the presumption of the validity of his Episcopal consecration.  In other words, the fact that he was consecrated under the Church’s normal conditions, in normal times, causes an appropriate presumption that he is a valid bishop.

However, this presumption (of the validity of such a bishop’s consecration) could be rebutted even in normal times, by a positive doubt – even a small positive doubt – concerning the validity of his particular consecration.  Read more about this principle here: https://catholiccandle.neocities.org/faith/new-ordination-doubtful.html

We hold that the consecrations performed outside these normal conditions and not during normal times, do not deserve such presumption of validity because the Church does not vouch for those consecrations.  Those consecrations should not be taken as valid unless they are proven valid.

We hold that the consecrations (as of the present date – February 2023) consecrating the bishops of the N-SSPX and of Bishop Williamson’s group have been proven to be valid, even though those groups are compromising Faith and morals in other aspects.

We assess that the Thuc line, Mendez line, William Moran line and other supposed lines are, at a minimum, unproven and, on occasion, range into the obviously invalid.

For further information about the doubtfulness of the conciliar “consecration” rite, read this analysis: https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B49oPuI54eEGZVF5cmFvMGdZM0U/view

For more about the principle that it is our duty to treat doubtful consecrations and ordinations as invalid, read this article here: https://catholiccandle.neocities.org/faith/new-ordination-doubtful.html

[9]           Here is a repetition of the previous footnote, for those readers who did not read it: This consecration of Russia which Heaven commanded to be performed, pertains to the bishops wielding jurisdictional power to govern the Church throughout the world.  As such, it can be performed by those Ordinaries who govern the Church, despite the doubtfulness that their conciliar consecrations give them the sacramental power of a bishop.  For an explanation of this, please read chapters 10 and 11 of this book: https://catholiccandle.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/08/sedevacantism-material-or-formal-schism.pdf

Catholic Candle holds that a bishop consecrated under normal conditions, by the Church in normal times, properly receives the presumption of the validity of his Episcopal consecration.  In other words, the fact that he was consecrated under the Church’s normal conditions, in normal times, causes an appropriate presumption that he is a valid bishop.

However, this presumption (of the validity of such a bishop’s consecration) could be rebutted even in normal times, by a positive doubt – even a small positive doubt – concerning the validity of his particular consecration.  Read more about this principle here: https://catholiccandle.neocities.org/faith/new-ordination-doubtful.html

We hold that the consecrations performed outside these normal conditions and not during normal times, do not deserve such presumption of validity because the Church does not vouch for those consecrations.  Those consecrations should not be taken as valid unless they are proven valid.

We hold that the consecrations (as of the present date – February 2023) consecrating the bishops of the N-SSPX and of Bishop Williamson’s group have been proven to be valid, even though those groups are compromising Faith and morals in other aspects.

We assess that the Thuc line, Mendez line, William Moran line and other supposed lines are, at a minimum, unproven and, on occasion, range into the obviously invalid.

For further information about the doubtfulness of the conciliar “consecration” rite, read this analysis: https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B49oPuI54eEGZVF5cmFvMGdZM0U/view

For more about the principle that it is our duty to treat doubtful consecrations and ordinations as invalid, read this article here: https://catholiccandle.neocities.org/faith/new-ordination-doubtful.html

Want to Make Only Your Best Decisions – And No Mistakes?

For a happy life – with no stress – make your many daily decisions by asking God what He wants you to do.

Whatever be the affair, enter with Moses into the tabernacle to ask advice of the Lord, (and) return instructed in many things present and to come.[1]

Further, we should gladly place ourselves entirely in God’s Hands:

Lord, I willingly commit all things to You, for my anxiety can profit me little.  But I would that I were not so concerned about the future, and instead offered myself without hesitation to Your good pleasure.[2]

God knows what is best for you.  How do you know what God wants?  Well, you know He loves you very much.  He suffered and died for you.  Each time you ask Him what to do, remember that He knows all things and wants you to do His Will. 

Of course, you must study the traditional Faith to better understand that God created you to be happy on earth and to be perfectly happy with Him in heaven.  He knows the best way for you to attain this happiness.

He will tell you if only you will listen.  That’s the crux of the problem: most people don’t listen because they want to follow their own will, not God’s.  They know deep down that God is right yet they refuse to listen when His Will conflicts with their own.  They will be sorry and unhappy for their prideful mistake.  It seems they never learn.

So, start out with a deep love for God and with a firm determination that you will follow His all-knowing answer to your question (viz., what you should do).  With this frame of mind, and following your strong resolution not to commit even the smallest sin, all your actions will be the right ones – for the greater honor and glory of God.

Listen here to the voice of Christ:

My Child, I am the Lord Who gives strength in the day of trouble.  Come to Me when all is not well with you.  Your tardiness in turning to prayer is the greatest obstacle to heavenly consolation, for before you pray earnestly to Me you first seek many comforts and take pleasure in outward things.  Thus, all things are of little profit to you until you realize that I am the one Who saves those who trust in Me, and that outside of Me there is no worthwhile help, or any useful counsel or lasting remedy.[3]

Amen, amen, I say to you that if you ask the Father anything in My name, He will give it to you.[4]

Do not concern yourself about the best way to approach a loving God.  Remember, talk to Him like a friend you trust, and ask “What should I do?” in this or that situation.  As noted above, listen closely and follow through on what He tells you even if it is hard to do, since you know deep down that He is right.

 

 

 



[1]              My Imitation of Christ by Thomas à Kempis, Book 3, ch.38.

[2]              My Imitation of Christ by Thomas à Kempis, Book 3, ch.39.

[3]              My Imitation of Christ by Thomas à Kempis, Book 3, ch.30.

[4]               St. John’s Gospel, Chapter 16.

The Crisis in the Church Affects Members in Different Ways

 

First:  There are the low-information Catholics who accept and obey any changes as good and worthwhile.  They fail to realize their perceived faith is meaningless, with little or no value for what counts in their hope of salvation.  It is based on the

feeling that you pray or go to Mass only if you really want to.  (If it’s “meaningful”.)  They also have a misguided understanding of obedience.

 

Second:  Members who go-along-to-get-along.  They are willing to compromise their principles and their faith, as well as to accept a liberal pastor in order to obtain the Sacraments and the Mass, no matter what the cost.  Their plan is to avoid conflict, overlook gradualism, and to be highly thought of.  They don’t want to give up friendships or family ties.  They refuse to believe their compromises will greatly weaken their faith.  They (mistakenly) believe God will understand.  They take comfort in numbers for there are a great many with them on the wide, smooth path to perdition that they travel.  They fail to do any research on the crisis for fear they will find they are wrong and therefore must re-think the direction they are headed.   

 

Third: Members who are uncompromising and are devastated by the very disastrous changes caused by Vatican II and post-VC II additional and even more harmful changes.  These members realize just how destructive the changes have been to a point that it seems there is no longer a recognizable Catholic Church.  The conciliar hierarchy has taken the lead in seeking to destroy all worthwhile Catholic attributes and religious communities.  It seems that the Catholic Church has evolved into an anti-Catholic Conciliar church.  They have also eliminated the traditional Catholic Sacraments and the Tridentine Mass, founded by Christ, and replaced them with the conciliar (anti-Catholic) “sacraments” and the Novus Ordo “Mass”, which fail to give grace.  It’s easy to see that the Masons’ Vatican II plan is working.

 

Our Blessed Mother at Fatima stated that there would be a time when we will have only her Immaculate Heart and the Rosary.  It’s surely beginning to look like today is the time she was referring to.  We in the true Resistance know how hard it already is to find an uncompromising Catholic priest or parish, and I can assure you it will be almost impossible to find them in the future.

 

It is hard to believe that, in the human element of the Church, the traditional uncompromising Catholic Faith could fall so fast and so far in such a relatively short time.  Actually, it is understandable when we consider that the Conciliar church “sacraments” and “mass” fail to give grace.  I attribute that to little concern regarding the manifest liberal gradualism that has been promoted by the human element in Rome and local dioceses.  This liberalism started with John XXIII, the weak pope responsible for calling VC II.  It also proves God will not take away one’s free will, even if it is against His Mystical Body, the Catholic Church.

 

The conciliar corruption spread beyond the visible Catholic Church.  It has also adversely affected Culture throughout the world, education, Catholic influence, music, entertainment, the family, health, etc., etc.  Yes, every aspect of life.  And that’s all to be expected, considering the strong Masonic influence in Vatican II, and the implementation of their plan that followed.

 

Don’t despair.  God is still in charge, with the correction coming in His own good time.  Meanwhile, we in the real Resistance must pray every day for the consecration of Russia to Mary’s Immaculate Heart, and to stand strong and uncompromising for Christ the King.  I’m sure we will receive extra graces to help us to remain confident and to succeed.