Catholics! Will We Fill Charlie's Shoes?

Regarding the murder of Charlie Kirk and the ramifications on our nation, I came across this excellent article entitled "The End Of Illusion: On The Assassination of Charlie Kirk And The Way Forward".  It was written by Richard Y. Rodgers and David F.X. Army and published by the Harvard Salient.   It appears here, but for the sake of discussion, I will copy and paste the article now.  Below the article will appear some thoughts on what this portends for faithful Catholics.  Now the article.

Charlie Kirk’s murder is first and last a private calamity: a wife now without her husband, children without their father, a circle of friends and kin bereft of a steady presence. That grief is immediate, awful, and beyond any contestation. We owe the dead our sorrow and the bereaved our silence and our service. But grief has its civic logic too. The taking of a life for some desperate, ill-conceived political conviction—in the courtyard of a university, in front of young witnesses—forces a public diagnosis: we are at war, and too many of us still pretend otherwise.

Those who knew Charlie will tell you what the cameras too often obscured. He could be theatrical, florid, and exasperating in the delightfully modern register of political showmanship. He could also be unexpectedly, almost annoyingly, moderate: a man who prized argument over obliteration, outreach over insularity, whose modus operandi was to cross campus thresholds and address anyone curious enough to ask a question. He exhorted a generation, plainly and insistently, to love God, love their family, and love their country. That was enough to get him killed.

Let us be unsentimental about the nature of the enemy. Leftism is not merely a rival policy set or an alternate party program. Leftism is a mental illness. There is no risk in naming the condition plainly when the symptoms are so evident: systematic hatred for inherited institutions, a taste for moral monstrosity, and a bloodlust that sanctifies obliteration—of traditions, of customs, of human life—as signs of progress. If you are on the Right and have been told this language is excessive, look instead at the evidence of behavior: celebration when opponents are deplatformed, undone—or worse—killed. They hate you. They want you dead. To say it this way is necessary, for it is in the flowery meadows of euphemism that rot truly spreads.

This is not a rhetorical flourish. It is a warning. To those who treat conservative life on campus or in civic society as an agreeable pastime—“a club,” “a journal,” “a debating society”—recognize that there is no safe neutral. The adjective “just” in front of any conservative endeavor is an attempt to be dismissed as harmless, but it is precisely the seemingly harmless that activists of the other persuasion seek to erase first. If you wear your conviction visibly, if you sign your name to a cause, if you instruct others in the habits that sustain a free and ordered society, you place yourself on the line, and, if the Left wins, they will place you on the gallows. That is not martyr rhetoric; that is realism.

For those of conservative disposition who wish only to lead a private life, cloistered away from the political fray, I am sorry. That is not possible. They won’t allow it. The logic of our hour is simple: if our institutions and formative practices fall, the private life you cherish will be the first to go. To wish for quiet while our enemies reconfigure the moral architecture of the nation is to wish for exile in place.

And yet, despair is not an option. Charlie’s death must not be allowed to calcify into a paralyzing fatalism. It must harden into a militant diligence. Reverence must be translated into work.

First, we must outlast personalities. Charisma withers; institutions endure. Do not treat conservative talent as an end in itself but as the seedbed of durable structures: parish schools that catechize the young, neighborhood reading groups that form habits of mind, free associations that forge the brave and the learned, scholarship funds that free talent from petit politics. Endowments, curricula, and local cells of study should be built now, not as ephemeral projects but as a conservative infrastructure: slow, networked, and resilient against the fashions and fury of the moment. Make the long game irreversible.

Second, cultivate an education of courage. The modern university offers an education in the art of dissent. We must answer with an alternative catechesis: rhetoric, logic, history, theology, liturgy, and philosophy of civic friendship, whatever remains of it. Courage is an acquired disposition: to speak the truth as you see it, to stand when others flee, to accept cost without cynicism. We should produce men and women who can withstand slander, who can retain composure under siege, and who can outlast the moral fashions of an age.

Third, refuse the counterfeit civility that is merely cowardice. There was a civic civility that governed honest bargaining and, insofar as it still exists, that ethic is worth preserving. Too often, the best case scenario is that “civility” is deployed as a plea to disappear, to shrink one’s claims until the public square is emptied of all meaningful assertion. The worst case scenario is that any attempt at discourse, even of the most reasonable, accommodating kind, will be met, Left on Right, with violence. If it can happen to a lion of free speech and civil discourse like Charlie, it can happen to anyone. Regardless of whether or not the age of reasons debate ended two days ago, the counterfeit civility imposed upon the Right must be exposed. Practice a measured politeness toward persons while being implacable in defense of public truth and the institutions that sustain it.

Finally, be precise and uncompromising in your politics: the stakes are metaphysical as well as administrative. Elections are only punctuation marks in the politics of man. Family, church, law, education, and public memory are the true battlegrounds. If we cede the formative structures, policy wins will be temporary because the habits that sustain a free people will have been hollowed out. Organize, staff, fund, and harden those institutions now so that when the hour grows harder we answer with political intelligence and moral readiness, not surprise.

Charlie Kirk’s life was a mixture of exuberance and seriousness; his death should compel us to the latter without surrendering the former. To grieve is human; to pick up the mantle and persevere is a fitting tribute. We have been offered a summons by the worst of circumstances. Let us answer with the best of ourselves: with learning sharpened into resolve, with institutions of habit and formation, and with a courage that understands the cost of action—and inaction. The hour is harsh. The work is hard. The loss is great. The choice, however, is ours.

END OF ARTICLE

This article, for many faithful Catholics and pro-lifers, particularly those who consider themselves "retired from the fray", provides a much-needed kick in the pants, as it were.  Too many think that if they just concentrate on their families and churches - to the exclusion of society at large - that God will protect them and theirs.  That pipe dream needs to end yesterday!   That is why I high-lighted that paragraph in red.

This blog, as do the others on the right side bar, give information as to how to become aware of the threats to the Church and all our families, and what we can - and must - do about it.

Importance Of Latin Mass And Why Satan's Minions In The Catholic Hierarchy Hate It

Last week, Raymond Arroyo interviewed Cardinal Raymond Burke on the importance of the Traditional Latin Mass and why attempts to suppress it are gravely misguided and most likely engineered by demons themselves.  LifeSiteNews summarized some highlights of that conversation.  The entire exchange can be viewed in the clip below.

He commented, too, on the number of young people who are coming to the Traditional Latin Mass in great numbers.  They are coming because they see the emphasis on Jesus Christ, and Him alone.  They see it in the solemnity and the transcendence embodied in the liturgical form and language used.  By the way, that draws many of us older types, too.

Later on, as you'll read in the article, His Eminence stated that the contact with God in the most sacred liturgy gives us the strength to overcome evil and do good in our lives.  When I read those words, I thought of the Latin maxim "lex orandi, lex credendi, lex vivendi".

Now I will go out on a limb here and state some personal theories.  Despite the best efforts of progressive bishops and even popes who seem hell-bent on deconstructing authentic Catholic faith, the Latin Mass continues to grow and attract Catholics.  Might it be the ever-increasing grace, brought down by authentic worship, that has enabled people, particularly in those areas that have relative freedoms of speech, assembly and worship, to score victories against de facto tyrants in their civil leadership?  Witness the election of Donald Trump in 2024.  Witness those areas of the world that are standing up to the plague of illegal immigrants crashing through their borders.  Was this mass border-crashing, largely by young Muslim men, a planned invasion designed to implement the Cloward-Piven strategy?

Why else would the progressive bishops, in the pockets of their liberal sugar-daddies, be waxing tyranical against the Tradtional Latin Mass?  They understand its spiritual significance.

So if the liberal de facto apostates understand its significance, why do so many otherwise decent Catholics refuse to acknowledge the truth?  I suppose some could be unaware of the Latin Mass, but these days, with information available at a few clicks of a mouse, I find that increasingly difficult to accept.  Perhaps if they do, then they might realize that they can no longer sit on the fence and remain noncommittal about these matters.  

I will now link to a piece written a while ago, just when Traditionis Custodes and all its spiritual poison was foisted on the Catholics in the pew.  The author is quite correct when he states that not only are we permitted to resist the attempts to destroy the Mass of the Ages, but we have a solemn duty to do so.  Not being a moral theologian, I cannot say whether or not such duty binds on pain of sin, but I wouldn't be a bit surprised to learn that it does.   

Follow also the plight of faithful Catholics in the Diocese of Charlotte.  Not only is the local bishop attacking the Latin Mass like a ravenous wolf, but he is also attacking piety during the Novus Ordo Masses.  Altar rails and kneelers are being removed.  In Catholic high schools, students will be compelled to "share" during Mass.  I sure hope home-schooling increases there.  These bishops hate the faith and any semblance of adherence to it.  Are we awake yet?

Cardinal McElroy Is Now Canceling A Faithful Priest For Calling Out The Moral Depravity Of Current And Recent Prelates

Today I became aware that yet another priest of the Archdiocese of Washington is being canceled.  Father Michael Briese, stationed at St. John the Evangelist in Silver Spring MD is getting the axe.  To wit:

This letter from McElroy is dated less than two weeks ago.  McElroy announced his intention to reduce Fr. Briese to the lay state.  Could this post, as reproduced by Complicit Clergy, have aroused McElroy's ire?  If so, Father Briese wouldn't be the first one to ruffle the feathers of the gay cartel within the DC chancery now, would he?   He's not the first faithful priest to prick McElroy's conscience, either.  When McElroy was Bishop of San Diego, he lashed out at Father Richard Perozich when the latter reminded his parish that it is a mortal sin to vote for pro-abortion Democrats.

At the same time that Father Briese published his piece, I reposted an article by my blogging colleague An Archdiocese of Washington Catholic, detailing how Cardinal Gregory reinstated a priest, Father Adam Clark, credibly accused of homosexual abuse.  Of course, who can forget the debacle caused by Cardinal Wuerl and his lapdog, Bishop Knestout, when they expelled Father Guarnizo when the latter denied Holy Communion to a flaming lesbian.  You can go to my posts between Feb-April 2012.  One odd thing: there was no mention of this in either the Catholic Standard or Our Parish Times, although the incident literally made international news.

So now Father Briese is getting the axe.  I suppose Father now knows he has nothing to lose by spilling all the beans that he has in his substack post today, alleging that both Cardinals Gregory and McElroy were involved in their own perverted dalliances.  I say "alleging" because I have not yet seen solid evidence that these crimes occurred.  They are entirely believable.  Recall that very soon after Gregory assumed his position in Washington, he sang the praises of Fortunate Families in his first "theology on tap" talk that he gave. (Note: the video has been taken down, but see this)  He also had nothing to say about the "gay pride Mass" that occurred at Holy Trinity Church in Georgetown two years ago.  I wager a bet that the Holy Trinity pastor is still a priest in good standing.  Here is more on McElroy - and that's just from this humble blog.  I'm sure more exists elsewhere.

In his post today, Father Briese states that it's up to the laity to call them out.  He's right.

Mike McCormick On The Anchor Team

Today's Anchor Team featured Michael McCormick, a former stenographer of the Biden administration.  McCormick relates how he often saw ex-cardinal Theodore McCarrick in the White House, and why he believes that McCarrick was instrumental in the selection of Francis as Pope..  He in turn relates how the "deep church" helped tilt the 2020 election to Biden.

From his vantage point, he stated that the election of Trump upended the plans that progressives had for the United States and ultimately western civilization.  However, I am not going to rehash all the video's contents here.  Suffice it to say that he puts forth a very optimistic view of the current trajectory of this nation.  Please watch this.

I guardedly share this optimism, although caution is needed.  I believe God has blessed us with the election of Trump.  He certainly saved us from the unmitigated disaster that would have ensued, had Kackle-lot Harris won the White House.  Many people, an ever-increasing amount of people have been praying their daily Rosaries as requested by Our Lady of Fatima.  They have also been assisting at the Traditional Latin Mass.  Lex orandi, lex crdendi, lex vivandi (forgive any misspellings of the Latin).  

This is no time to grow complacent or to relax in our intercession for this world.  Much sin, particularly against life, family, sexuality, still is prominent.  There is overt hostility towards God and disregard for Our Lord's crucifixion and the salvation that He offers us.  Keep up the prayer, keep up the momentum, keep up the work.

Pro-Abortion Assailant Gets Slap On The Wrist In Baltimore

In May of 2023 outside the Planned Parenthood on Howard Street in Baltimore, two elderly sidewalk counselors were brutally beaten by one Patrick Brice.  Coverage of the trial was published in the Defend Life newsletter's most recent issue.  Today Brice was sentenced for the attack.  This sentence amounted to not much more than a slap on the wrist.

The prosecution requested ten years imprisonment.  Instead he received one year of home detention; he can still go to work and keep medical appointments.  After that he will be on a three-year probation; during that time, he cannot go anywhere near an abortuary or a pro-life pregnancy center.

Such is justice in liberal Baltimore.  The ruling, while profoundly disappointing, is by no means surprising.  I don't know if any civil suits are in the making; I hope they are.

Catholic Standard Articles Reveal True Thrust Of The Current Pope.

Today I picked up the July 17th issue of the Catholic Standard (the official mouthpiece for the Archdiocese of Washington).  While disappointed at the amount of bilge that was contained therein, I was not surprised.

Let's go in order as the stuff appeared in the print edition.  On page 3 was the account of Cardinal McElroy receiving a pallium from Pope Leo XIV.  The online article is here.  Most of the article was a rehash of a homily that Leo gave on the occasion.  Some bloopers popped up.  He spoke of moving "beyond a tired and stagnant faith".  If he truly is serious about such movement, one key thing he could do is stop the insidious attempts to quash the Traditional Latin Mass.  I attend these regularly on Sundays.  The faith there can in no way be called "tired and stagnant".  Then towards the end, he spoke of the beatitudes as being equivalent to the goals of today's "social justice warriors".  No where did he mention that the beatitudes spoke of the repentance from sin and pursuit of personal holiness.

We then turn a few pages and see two articles that are basically screeds that shill for those border-crashers euphemistically called "undocumented immigrants".  They are found here and here.  The first is an interview with Cardinal McElroy while the second is penned by Auxiliary Bishop Menjivar.  Both articles share the same flaw, and I think this flaw has been repeated so often that, owing to its repetition, is actually a blatant sin against honesty.  I am talking, of course of the disingenuous refusal to differentiate immigrants who come here in accordance with our immigration laws versus those who deliberately violate our laws by sneaking across the border, coming under false pretenses, overstaying visas, etc.  All of us welcome those who arrive in accordance with our laws.  Decent people object to those who flout our laws, and lately, with the complicity of progressives, including those in the US Catholic hierarchy, are coming in by the thousands.  Hitherto, Catholic Charities have received millions in federal grants to "process" thousands of these people, many of whom are being sex-trafficked across the border.

I noticed towards the end of the interview article, McElroy couldn't help but put in a plug for one of his pet divergences from Sacred Tradition.  He of course shilled for "women deacons".  Bishop Menjivar, on the other hand, actually stated our case for us, albeit unwittingly.  The whole article is lacking in wit, but I digress.  Here is what he said, and you can read it for yourselves in the link provided.

"That’s right. From the very beginning of the United States, this country was pro-immigration; and one of the main complaints of the Founders was the English government forbidding the colonies from passing laws promoting migration and naturalization of people from countries other than England."

England disregarded our right to pass laws regarding immigration, rendering existing ones moot in practice.  Those crashing our borders are doing the exact same thing in disregarding our laws and our right to regulate immigration.  I might add that the moral guilt lies not only with the border-crashers,  but with people such as McElroy and Menjivar who hold our laws, and our law-keepers, in contempt.

But enough with immigration, for social justice has many facets.  In this same issue, we read that Pope Leo is praying for the "conversion" of certain people.  Who might be these people?  Are they those who embrace homosexuality and other perversions?  Are they those who facilitate the baby-slaughter known as abortion?  Nope!  Well then, just who are these depraved degenerates who stand in need of all this "conversion"?  Why, these are dastardly fiends who (I can scarcely bring myself to mention these horrid, scandalous words!) resist climate action!  Read it here!  

On Monday July 9, Leo celebrated a Mass "for the care of creation".  Yes, it is a new Mass that has been added to the Roman Missal.  Of course natural disasters are lamented for they supposedly "are in part created by the excesses of human beings with their lifestyle".  In other words, people are the big meanies who need to undergo the requisite guilt trips.  Most troubling, though, is this echo from Laudato Si: "we listen to the cry of the earth, we listen to the cry of the poor".  In other words, the planet is being made equal to human beings.  That is heresy.  We cannot assent to that under any circumstance.  We cannot say "amen" to any prayer containing that error, even if a pope were to put forth that prayer.  I did several posts in the past regarding the problem in which this pope seeks to embroil us.  Please read.   When Francis died and Leo was elected, I had hopes that there would be fidelity to Tradition again.  Those hopes are growing dim and once again, we must resist papal errors.

Drat! There Goes That Excuse!

How many times over these past few decades have we sought the Church's assistance in speaking out against Catholic-in-name-only politicians who use their powerful positions to promote evils such as abortion, homosexual perversions and other moral evils?  We have seen, time after time, the hierarchy stonewalling our attempts to hold petition drives in Churches to combat gay marriage and other degradations of public morality.  Invariably they always held as an excuse the canard that the Johnson Amendment prohibited political activity on the part of 501(c)3 charities.  In reality, it only prohibited engagement in partisan politics, not ballot initiatives.

It was announced this week that this gag order has been lifted, and churches are now free to endorse political candidates.  The naive individual might think that Catholic clergy would now jump at the chance of endorsing pro-life candidates and those in favor of curtailing the gay agenda.  Alas, I have long been disavowed of such illusions, as I have come to understand that many clergy, including some in the highest echelons of power and influence, are actually just as much pro-abortion and pro-gay as are Joe Biden and Nancy Pelosi.  Although a few still insist on hiding behind the "social justice" facade, a good number of them no longer make a secret of their heresies.  Hitherto they could hide behind the Johnson Amendment so as not to have to take pro-life positions to save face.  Now, however, the thought encapsulated in this post's title is the thought in many of their minds.

However, the US Conference of Catholic Bishops has risen to the occasion. They have said that the Church will remain mum on all political races.  So if pro-life candidate is running against pro-abort, they will simply zip their lips.  Of course, in that article, they give "reasons" that sound so..so..pastoral!  In other words, it's a lot of sanctimonious mumbo-jumbo.

So now we watch and see how consistent they are with their "mum's the word" script.  My guess is that they won't be, and we know how the Cupich-McElroy-Tobin et al crowd will try to run with it.  Pro-life candidates will continue to be treated as personae non grata at Catholic churches and there will be no campaigning for them on church property.  It's worth noting that one of the two times that I was threatened with arrest happened on a church parking lot for leafletting cars during an election cycle.  That will still happen, I surmise.

The good news is that other types of pro-life "C3s" now have the gags removed from their mouths.  Let's run with that.

On This Independence Day

Let us consider the condition of the United States of America through the eyes of God.  Once a God-fearing nation, at least on the lips if not hearts of most people, the US has largely degraded into a hedonistic cabal of intellectually and spiritually stunted people.  Yet a few embers of decency remain, as evidenced by the last presidential election.

Our Lord's promise, as stated in 2 Chronicles 7:14, state And my people, upon whom my name is called, being converted, shall make supplication to me, and seek out my face, and do penance for their most wicked ways: then will I hear from heaven, and will forgive their sins and will heal their land.  

That promise is clear and unambiguous.  So what do we do?  Firstly, go to Mass today, even if that means skipping the fireworks.  What better place to pray for our beleaguered nation?  Besides, today is First Friday.  Honor our Lord and His Sacred Heart, wounded for us, as individuals and nations.

FACE Going Down

Today the US House Judiciary Committee advanced a bill authored by Chip Roy (R-TX) to repeal the FACE Act.  It is simply called the FACE Act Repeal Act.  The vote was largely along party lines.  I believe it will now advance to the House floor.  In the Senate chamber, Mike Lee, (R-UT) has introduced the Senate companion bill.  We will need to keep an eye on this and be prepared to lobby for this, as the pro-abortion crowd are already throwing snits.

Recall last year that the activists known as the Garland Nine were imprisoned on account of "violation" of this insidious attack on pro-lifers and the babies.  They would still be languishing in prison today, had not Donald Trump retaken the White House.  Shortly after he was inaugurated, January 23 to be precise, he signed pardons for them and several other pro-life activists and set them free.  Several of them attended the March for Life a few days later.

Now the first real steps have been taken to overturn FACE.  Planned Parenthood, while not completely defunded yet, has had its governmental spigot crimped.  Other positive developments are here.  Two takeaways:

1. Keep praying, particularly the Rosary.  Then keep active and watchful.  Trump's election affords us a window of opportunity that we dare not blow.  
2. Elections have consequences.  While many have finally awakened from the "never-Trump" stupor, some still arrogantly persist in it.  We must work with what we have.  Had enough of us stayed home on election day because we had no canonized saint running for office, the Garland Nine and others would still be in jail and Planned Parenthood would still be siphoning our tax dollars to slaughter babies.  Let's not blow the opportunity that God, in His mercy, has given us.

Update On The Charlotte Situation

Today I saw this announcement on Facebook

In a word, cockroaches hate the light.  Anyone who tells you to be quiet about these matters and "just pray" is most likely being a mouthpiece of the devil, even if unwittingly.

We will keep on shining the light on them and exposing them.  Of course we must always be praying for our Church, particularly by being faithful to the Sacraments and the daily Rosary.

Resume