Saturday, December 9, 2017

Preach The Gospel With Truth, Not Cutesy Gimmicks And Fads

In the Vortex below, Michael Voris speaks of a loss of Catholic identity and its ramifications on Catholic education.  While he focuses on the problem as it happened in South America during the 1970s (and he states, in a roundabout fashion, that Cardinal Bergoglio started that snowball careening down the hill), it happened in the United States during the mid-1960s, thanks to the so-called "spirit of Vatiican 2".

I was in Catholic parochial school at the time.  I noticed a paradigm shift almost immediately.  Being a child, I couldn't identify the cause or nature.  All I know is that one year we were:
  • learning solid Catholic doctrine
  • were starting our day with prayers coming from the principal's office over the pa system
  • and attending the First Friday Masses.  
The next year:
  • Doctrine went out the window as we "learned" that Martin Luther King was a saint (he had not yet died), made felt banners and listened to Andy Williams sing "Born Free"
  • Morning prayers ceased
  • First Friday Masses were abandoned
  • Listened to a parish "groovy priest" strum his guitar (This priest was later suspended by Cardinal O'Boyle for publicly dissenting against Humanae Vitae)
Only by God's grace do I still have my faith.  Many of my former classmates don't.

Two days ago, Church Militant published the news that Cardinal Burke, International Director of the Marian Catechist Apostolate, directed that the Marian Catechists were to have nothing to do with the protestant-inspired "Alpha In A Catholic Context" program.  Furthermore, the Cardinal warns against "magical formulas" e.g., gimmicks and fads that are used in place of what the Church has always done in her 2000 year history of proclaiming Christ: proclaim the simple truth with no embellishment whatsoever.

The Vortex speaks of several of these gimmicks that plague the Church.  There are others.  Have you ever noticed on social media how priests are becoming seduced by such nonsense?  We have:
How about priests that simply carry on with their priestly ministries without foisting upon us the details of their various hobbies - especially when those hobbies detract from the dignity and decorum incumbent upon them, owing to the indelible mark upon their souls from the Sacrament of Holy Orders?

Now take a look at the "cooking priest" link.  Notice the somewhat subtle pandering to worldly sentiments he (and/or Catholic News Agency) seems to embrace.
  • "offers non-Catholics insights into the human side of a priest's life".  The "human side"?  Why specify some hypothetical "human side"?  What other side would there be?  A priest is not some alien from outer space or some swamp monster.  To concede to the usage of such banal language only validates any silly notions of the priesthood.
  • "There is this impression in our world that priests are always serious, they only do religion. I wanted to break down that [perception], and say ‘hey, we are still real men. We still have interests and excitement in a lot of other ways’"  
    • Again, why the need to prove a priest is "a real man"?  And by what standards?  This statement smacks of trying to justify the existence of the priesthood in the eyes of the world.
    • The perception that priests are "always serious" must be taken in light that those with such perceptions are often those who themselves are silly and superficial.  Should the priest, the "alter Christus", descend to that level?   In a previous post, I spoke of St. Joseph Cafasso and his series of talks on the priesthood.  
    • "Fr. Schnippel expressed hope that his participation in the show would inspire people to face daunting challenges in their own lives."  How about inspiring them to save their souls by turning to Christ in His Church?  See how the embrace of these gimmicks turns the focus to temporal matters instead of one eternal destiny?
Let us pray that these cheap distractions are jettisoned asap so that priests and religious can be about their most solemn duties.



9 comments:

  1. I agree that the change at the time was striking, occurring around 1968/1969 at our Catholic School in the Cleveland area. First, the school had roughly 40-45 children per classroom with 5 or 6 classrooms for each grade, grades 1-8...imagine those numbers alone...those Ursuline Nuns in full habit with a lay teacher here or there educating upwards of 1,600 children, and additionally, there was another Catholic School about 5 miles down the road!

    It was Holy Mass weekly, Baltimore Catechism, and my favorite was once a week for our religion class, one of the 4 Priests of our Parish would come to instruct us.

    Somewhere between grade 6 and grade 7, some of the nuns as well as new nuns coming in reduced their habit to a shortened ayline (sp?) dress, with a small white collar and a shoulder length veil where you saw their edges of their hair! By 7th grade, guitar masses were introduced and we suddenly had a book (not hardbound) with new songs being taught in the classroom, and classroom instruction was really bizarre--dropping catechism to some weird colored workbook having us draw more than learn. Sadly, my older brother and sister left what no longer appeared to be the Faith and still have not returned.

    The damage done to so many souls requires confession by Church authority and repentance and forgiveness sought.

    God bless you.

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  2. Ironically, the daily duty of the priest, and his highest sacrificial calling, is the consecration of UNLEAVENED bread into the Body and Blood of Our Lord...

    I seriously hope that this goofy, embarrassing nonsense is not how Abp. Schnurr fills his Seminary.

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  3. Today, the Second Sunday of Advent, I heard a homily similarly trivializing Saint John the Baptist. Seriously, can you think of a time when he ever "stretched out a helping hand to the lonely and marginalized," because God cares first and foremost about "how we relate to one another"? I can't. I don't remember the guy sending a single, solitary Hallmark card to anybody at all, but instead calling people to moral and religious repentance in anticipation of the salvific ministry of Our Lord.

    In fact, wasn't the heart of the Baptist's message directed straight at the not-lonely-nor-marginalized-in-the-least; namely, straight at Herod and Herodias, the prominent and otherwise untroubled public adulterers of his day? If John was supposed to be all about accompanying them and helping them gradually to discern, he certainly went about things the wrong way. But I guess Father means that, if even John the Baptist would have been cool with Amoris laetitia today, then why shouldn't the rest of us be? If God cares first and foremost about "how we relate to one another," then taking care not to offend the sensibilities of any type of sinner (including the sinners that we are, ourselves) ought to outweigh all other considerations, hands down.

    Unfortunately, we have all gotten used to the Gospel message being watered down somewhat; even abruptly, as you have described above. At this point, however, it needs to be frankly admitted that what is being put forth in the average parish by this time has ceased to be recognizable as Catholicism at all.

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  4. Which priesthood will you be defending before Almighty God and the Holy Apostles Peter and Paul?

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    1. What other priesthoods are there? What is the point of this question?

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  5. Catholic papers have always featured pictures of nuns at the shooting range or playing softball, or the priest with the stamp collection or playing in a jazz band. Pope JPII was photographed skiing. Among the most familiar photos of St. Therese of Lisieux show her costumed as St. Joan of Arc and other characters. St. Ignatius of Loyola treated a despondent Jesuit to one of his native Basque dances. Fr. Groeschel's priests use their many "secular" talents--especially music--to attract people to the gospel.

    Fr. Schnipple is light-years away from the homosexualist Fr. James Martin!

    BTW: If I had to name the most devastating "change" during and after the Council made by those who had decided to stop handing on the Catholic Faith, it was the abandonment of MEMORIZATION of the BALTIMORE CATECHISM.

    Any bishop, diocese, school system, etc., who propose ANY program to transmit the Faith, other than memorization of the Baltimore Catechism, are spinning their wheels.

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    Replies
    1. How many of those other religious engaged in those activities for the sake of being public spectacles? I'd be willing to bet that the late pontiff would have appreciated some recreation without being in the proverbial goldfish bowl.
      As far as some of these singing priests, especially those in rap music, I'll be putting up another post on that shortly.

      I do agree that the trashing of the Baltimore Catechism was a huge blunder.

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  6. DECEMBER 11, 2017
    There is no concrete case, mentioned in Vatican Council II, which could be ' a development' of EENS contradicting Feeneyite EENS.But this is not known to Catholics
    http://eucharistandmission.blogspot.it/2017/12/there-is-no-concrete-case-mentioned-in.html

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  7. I also knew the fallout from V2. I actually had 12 years of Catholic school but my siblings right behind me did not. My high school and all the small Catholic high schools closed and went to a Catholic "Central" from which I graduated. "Back in the day" many parishes had schools, even 12 grades you know. All that fell apart quickly after V2. I was taught by nuns to begin with and then they threw off their habits and then there were none nuns. In grade school we went to Mass daily. In middle school weekly, then to monthly and by the time I graduated, we did not go to a weekday Mass anymore. I recall one teacher who, looking back now, tried to hold on to the traditional faith. He was NOT appreciated! We were all about "updating" and discarding those old things. Yeah, I followed my conscience right into mortal sin: missing Mass, contracepting, and on and on. By the grace of God and Our Lady, I began to find my way back at about age 40. Deo gratias!

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