What is happening to you, Cebu?

In the Archdiocese of Cebu, the following are no longer allowed.

1. The Benedictine Altar Arrangement with the crucifix facing the people, not the priest, and with 6 candles for priests, and 7 candles for bishops.
2. New Churches must not have their Tabernacles anywhere near the Sanctuary, but only at the side.
3. Tabernacle veil

Has the long arm of Jennifer finally reached you? Paniwalang-paniwala naman kayo sa world-renowned kuno liturgist na yun?

WHAT IS HAPPENING TO YOU, QUEEN OF THE SOUTH?

GULP ALERT

Isang malaking GULP ang naganap sa Davao. Susme, sa mismong Archdiocese pa ng tinuturing ng ilan na 'conservative' daw na Archbishop Romulo Valles.

Can you guess what the GULP is? 

Ang pasimuno, following the footsteps of his master (small m), seen in the background.

Salamat, Master Chiriko sa pictures!

Brainwashing

Ano naman kaya ang tinuturo nila sa mga server?

Pwede mag-uwi ng hostiya para sa personal adoration!
Pwede mag-sayaw sa sanctuary kasi dapat lively ang Misa!
Pwede mag-kamisa de tsino kasi yan ang suot ni San Lorenzo Ruiz at San Pedro Calungsod!

We shall see the results in the coming months. Abangan!

Ad orientem worship

This is not a Traditional Latin Mass.

This is the Ordinary Form of the Mass, done ad orientem.

It can be done and it is LEGAL!

Why am I for this orientation of the Mass?  Is it because I go to a Traditional Latin Mass?  Probably or should I say, definitely so!

You know dear friends, I came to appreciate the supernatural character of the Mass when I saw the ad orientem orientation of the TLM.  I asked myself why this kind of thing is not done in the Mass of Paul VI?  Why can't we not face the same direction to worship just like when the priest leads us during Holy Hour?  Why not?

Someone asks me, "Is it better?"

Oh sure it does!

If supporters of the versus populum orientation think that th

That is why I beg to VEHEMENTLY disagree with the statements posted on Facebook by Fr. Abe Arganiosa who said that the Novus Ordo is:

"THE PAULINE MASS IS EVEN MORE ANTI-PROTESTANT THAN THE TLM."

How will it be more anti-Protestant than the Traditional Latin Mass which was codified by the Council of Trent as a RESPONSE to the Protestant / Lutheran attacks on the sacrificial nature of the Mass.  Remember that the Protestants pounced on the notion that the Mass is a mere meal and not a sacrifice, thus they turned the priest to face the congregation and changed the altar, sans the retable, relics, flowers and candles on it, and called it from Altar to........drum roll............Table of the Lord.  Sounds familiar?

The Holy Sacrifice of the Mass right after Vatican II was popularly called.....drum roll...

Feast of His Love
Banquet of the Lord
Breaking of Bread
and my all time favorite punching bag of a quote...
MEAL OF LOVE.

Is there something wrong with it?  Not completely.  St. Paul refers to the Mass as Breaking of Bread.  But what happened to more than a thousand year of romance of the Lord and His Bride, the Church?  Hasn't the Church Militant reflected and meditated upon this great meal of love and found the way to call this meal the Sacrifice of Calvary if did not realize that this is the same sacrifice, made present again and again in every Catholic altar around the world to fulfill the prophecy made by the prophet Malachi and beautifully included in the Third Eucharistic Prayer, "For from the rising of the sun even unto the going down of the same my name shall be great among the Gentiles; and in every place incense shall be offered unto my name, and a pure offering: for my name shall be great among the heathen, saith the LORD of hosts"

Understandably, I personally believe and Cardinal Ratzinger wrote about this too, that the sacrificial nature of the Mass, has been watered down, if not, lost when the priest was made to face the congregation.  There upon the temptation to be narcissistic cast its ugly shadow unto the priest.  So what have you now?

Fr. Archie Guiriba
Fr. Mario Sobrejuanite
Fr. Glenn Paul Gomez
Fr. Anton Pascual

and the list goes on and on and on...

And what follows?

Tons of liturgical innovations and abuses.

Liturgical dance, drama, flag waving and all sort of stuff called "Creativity" which does not actually create but destroys.

Personally, if the Mass of Paul VI would have the ad orientem orientation, then we could all teach Catholics everywhere the sacrificial nature of the Mass and priests would be reminded of their role as priests, and not as program hosts or animators.

And that the Mass is the same sacrifice on Calvary, and not just a mere re-enactment of the Last Supper.

I sure hope and pray that whatever Cardinal Ratzinger was writing before, and what Pope Benedict XVI is doing today, he implements throughout the Catholic world.

Isn't this what mutual enrichment of the Old and New Mass was all about when he wrote about this in Summorum Pontificum?

Pray, hope and don't worry.

Traditionalist or not traditionalist?

Was THAT bishop a sede vacantist and less of a traditionalist too for being too attached to the Traditional Mass?

Duh!

He is sitting on the SEDE.



***


I just had to comment.

My email was flooded because of this.

TPC readers wanted me to react on this one.

Nothing personal.

***

Those faithful who are inclined with the Extraordinary Form of the Mass, also known as Tridentine Rite, are few of the members of the Roman Church [there was an actual head count?  Or is it few just because only the few knows about the Extraordinary Form?] that our Holy Mother, the Mystical Body of Christ, embraces. However not all of them respect and obey the Holy Father.  [Huh?]

It is widely rampant that some of these faithful, especially those who are active, secretly deny the validity and sanctity of the Second Vatican Council (Vatican II). [He must know some of them.  But I personally heard one who thinks he is more Catholic than the Pope.  Yup, more like a Williamson type.]  I heard, and I was well informed by those who knew them, that they still go against the teachings of the Sacred Council and calls the Ordinary Form of the Roman Rite invalid. [most likely sede vacantists!] Who are they to call the Mass invalid? It is very clear that the Holy Father, in his motu propio “Summorum Pontificum,” highlighted that the two forms of the Eucharistic Celebration are valid and are equal of dignity – that these two forms of the Roman Rite are rooted in the Tradition (with a capital letter “T”) of the Church. We have only one rite in two forms, and I myself highly appreciate the richness of both forms of one Roman Rite.  [I would be more discreet in using the adjective richness for the Novus Ordo.]

The Pope, on the accompanying letter for the said motu propio, already clarified the confusions made by so-called traditionalists (with small letter “t”) that Vatican II never abrogated the Extraordinary Form (notice that I use the official term given by the Holy Father). [The traditionalists are claiming that Vatican II never abrogated the Extraordinary Form?  Or was it Cardinal Ratzinger and the other cardinals with him who advised John Paul II that it was so.]

Efforts to reconcile the Society of Saint Pius X are being made. [Whoa!  Quick jump here!] As a vibrant sign of their desire to unite with the Holy See, they recently expelled Bishop Richard Williamson from the fraternity because of his disobedience and disrespect toward his superiors. Some breakaway groups from the said society are building means to unite themselves to Rome and, as like the Father in the parable of the prodigal son, they are received with love and affection, with respect and care. We need to pray more for reconciliation within the Roman Catholic Church.  [This I agree.  This is the true essence of ecumenism, not like how some liturgist, like the famous one, would make the Mass, the Ordinary Form, look more like a Protestant Mass with too much INCULTURATION.]

For those who call themselves ‘traditionalist’ Catholics, when will they reconcile their thoughts, words, actions and feelings to the Roman Church? [Are all traditionalists like this?  I don't think so.]  How come they go against the Church’s teachings and the Holy Father’s move towards unity and reconciliation? [Huh?] We are celebrating the Year of Faith to commemorate the 50th anniversary of the opening of Vatican II. Yet they disregard to grab the blessed moment to open their hearts and minds to know the teachings – the REAL TEACHINGS - and to enrich their faith. [Wasn't it because of the confusion made my those who made their own interpretation of the so-called Spirit of Vatican II that the Year of Faith was called in the first place?  Wasn't it because of the confusion in how the liturgical reform should have been done that the Holy Father has called on the Synod and to discuss other confusions for that matter?] Isn’t it that by doing such acts and holding on to such biased principles, in a sense, being ‘Protestant’ or “Schismatic” - denying the Pope and the Church teachings?

I wish to re-echo the words of Pope Benedict XVI, which he sent to bishops about the motu propio, which I now address to the ‘traditionalist’ Catholics:

“It is true that there have been exaggerations and at times social aspects unduly linked to the attitude of the faithful attached to the ancient Latin liturgical tradition. Your charity and pastoral prudence will be an incentive and guide for improving these.” (Emphasis added)  [I think this reminder of the Holy Father is more applicable to those who think traditionalists are automatically denying the validity of the Mass of Paul VI and think they are schismatics too.]

Dear friends, “traditionalism” is not measured on how you worship and what you personally believe. Rather, true traditionalism is measured on how you show fidelity and love to God, through Christ in His Church through His Vicar here on earth, and with your unity in faith with the One, Holy, Catholic and Apostolic Church.

***

Uhm... if that were the definition of traditionalism....then those looney Wiccan dancers of St. Vincent School of Theology, Maryhill School of Theology and Euntes of Zamboanga are......uhm....traditionalists?!?  Isn't traditionalism a way to describe those who are particularly attached to the TRADITIONAL practices of the Church which disastrously were almost lost to oblivion thanks to the interpretation of Vatican II of those who "show fidelity and love to [sic] God, through Christ in His Church through His Vicar here on earth, and with your unity in faith with the One, Holy, Catholic and Apostolic Church."

Even those who do the most tragic things during the Mass, dancing, clowns, powerpoints, wise crack jokes...they all show fidelity and love of God.  But does it make them traditional?

Will you call Cardinal Mahony and his dissent fest Religious Education Humbug a traditionalist just because they love God?

I consider myself a traditionalist.  But I do not consider the Novus Ordo or the Ordinary Form invalid.   In fact, I love the Novus Ordo especially if it were celebrated in Latin and Ad orientem.  Yes, a priest regularly celebrates it and I ATTEND IT.

Traditionalism is measured in how you love the Church, all about Her...past, present and future.

Take that Mad Man from Davao!

I love the Novus Ordo just as I love the TLM.  I have said this many times before.  Does that make me less of a traditionalist or not a traditionalist anymore?

To the wackos who parade around wearing their made up cassocks or habits or clerical tabs, or what I call "Knights of Williamson", just associating yourself with the Novus Ordo makes you a heretic.

To the self-proclaimed and self-ordained, just-had-a-seminar-with-Fr. Anscar Chupungco, they think they are more qualified about the liturgy and about Vatican II than even the Pope himself...they think others don't have the right to comment about the liturgy.

Quite frankly, academic degrees mean nothing in the Church except about Canon Law and Licentiate in Theology.

Holy Orders do.

So to the dean of San Beda School of Liturgy, you can brag about your doctorate woman!  But you still are not ordained.

So shut up!

The return of the Papal Fanon

Yup.

Someone is throwing a nutty fit again.

Oh well.

He and his minions would just think.

"The Pope can do whatever he wants, just as long as it is not done in Manila or in the entire Philippines."

Yup.  That is the plan all along.

Pope Benedict can display all the old liturgical vestments he wants for as long as he does not use his "papal powers" to impose it on all dioceses in the world, including Imperial Archdiocese of Manila who so blatantly and arrogantly issued a directive against a Papal Motu Propio, Summorum Pontificum.  Who wrote it?  Who else?!?!?

Fr. Anscar Chupungco.

But who signed it?

The former archbishop, Cardinal Gaudencio Rosales, benefactor and protector of Fr. Chupungco's Paul VI Institute for Liturgy in Malaybalay, Bukidnon.

But what these liturgical rebels think is just plain liturgical fancy of an old man, is actually a deeper expression of faith and the bringing forth of a worship worth the Lord and Creator of the Universe.

So mass vestments and other devotionals are not just mere externals.  They are an expression of what you feel inside.

So when you over simplify, you get the point.

So when you emphasize more on inculturation of the liturgy, you put more weight on the culture.  Surprising to note that for a liturgical expert to just trash away all the traditional elements of liturgy to tell you that your pious expression is WRONG and that his research on liturgy is right.

Yeah.......for the sake of selling books.

Ugh!

You can read a wonderful article about the Papal Fanon by Fr. Z.

Liturgy experts becoming Experts in Liturgical Abuse!

What the Holy Mass should look like

Vatican City, Oct 3, 2012 / 09:42 am (CNA/EWTN News).- Pope Benedict XVI has reminded Catholics that the liturgy belongs to Jesus Christ and his Church, and should not be changed according to individual whims.  [Especially those who parade their diplomas in Liturgy!  Ha!  Benedict drives....SLAM DUNK!  For the Win! Boom!  Pak! Ouch!]

“It is not the individual – priest or layman – or the group that celebrates the liturgy, but it is primarily God’s action through the Church, which has its own history, its rich tradition and creativity,” the Pope said during his Oct. 3 general audience in Rome.  [take that parish liturgical commission!  Stay away Angry Manang!]

“This universality and fundamental openness, which is characteristic of the entire liturgy is one of the reasons why it cannot be created or amended by the individual community or by experts, but must be faithful to the forms of the universal Church,” he stated.  [UNIVERSAL!!!  Take that Inculturation!!!]

With over 20,000 pilgrims gathered in St. Peter’s Square, the Pope explained how the Church is made most visible in the liturgy where “God enters into our reality and we can meet him, we can touch him.” The liturgy is where “he comes to us, and we are enlightened by him.”  [We do not come to Mass to meet the Powerpint priest aka Fr. Glenn...the modulated SM Megamall shopping dance-patron priest aka Fr. Mario....or......]

The primary importance of Jesus Christ within the liturgy has been a constant theme of Pope Benedict’s teaching during his seven-year pontificate. He has often expressed concern that bad teaching can lead some Catholics to view the liturgy “horizontally” as the creation of a parish or group in which the community celebrates itself. “The liturgy is not a kind of ‘self-manifestation’ of a community,” he told pilgrims.  [Have you noticed how people treat the Mass today....as if it were just your ordinary thing?  How people dressed up?  Because they see it in their priests!!!  Some even say Mass wearing slippers!  And where do the laity go to to report this?  NOWHERE!  Except turn to GULP where these Liturgical Abusers get called out.  CYBERCRIME THIS DUDE!!!]

Pope Benedict noted that when priests or parishioners reflect on how to make the liturgy “attractive, interesting and beautiful,” they can “risk forgetting the essential: That is the liturgy is celebrated for God and not for ourselves.”  [Whether they admit it or not, these liturgical dancers are all on it for themselves.  If they really want to praise God using their bodies....then they do it like King David in the Psalms!....he did it after the sacrifice in the Temple!  And he did it while no one was watching.  Let's see if these so called liturgical dancers would do it all for God without anyone watching or clapping at them.  Ha!]

To help counter such erroneous concepts, Pope Benedict XVI’s papal liturgies are always celebrated with a prominent crucifix placed centrally upon the altar.  [Only narcissistic priests don't want anything especially the image of the crucified Christ covering their well-Belofied face.  Ha!]

The liturgy is God’s work and he is the subject, the Pope said, adding that this means when it comes to the liturgy we must “open ourselves to him and be guided by him and his body which is the Church.”  [And you don't have to go to Malaybalay or Mendiola to learn that!  Ha!]

“If the centrality of Christ does not emerge in the celebration, then it is not a Christian liturgy, totally dependent on the Lord and sustained by his creative presence,” he said.  [When the priest's main attention is to draw everything towards him, then you know he is not doing God's work.  As I have challenged Fr. Mario, will he still say Mass at Megamall if the Mass weren't televised?  I guess NOT!]

“God acts through Christ, and we can only act through him and in him.”

This conviction must grow in the hearts and minds of Catholics each day because “the liturgy is not our, my, ‘action,’ but the action of God in us and with us.”

“Let us ask the Lord to learn every day to live the sacred liturgy, especially the Eucharistic celebration, praying in the ‘we’ of the Church, that directs its gaze not in on itself, but to God, and feeling part of the living Church of all places and of all time,” Pope Benedict said in conclusion.


***

We go to Mass for the Lord, to worship Him, to thank Him, to ask forgiveness to Him, to ask for His Graces....THAT'S IT!

We do not go to Mass to be entertained...

We do not go to Mass because of the priest, because one priest is boring while the other one is entertaining...

We do not go to Mass to have a fellowship!

We do not go to Mass to say "Hi", "Good morning!"  or "Batiin mo ang katabi mo!".  You do not need the Mass to do that!

We do not go to Mass to look at a powerpoint presentation of a priest trying hard to be Stephen Covey!

We do not go to Mass to listen to recycled jokes!

We do not go to Mass to be entertained!!!

‎"When we assist at the Mass we are not just individuals of the earth or solitary units, but living parts of a great spiritual order in which the Infinite penetrates and enfolds the finite, the Eternal breaks into the temporal, and the Spiritual clothes itself in the garments of materiality. Nothing more solemn exists on the face of God's earth than the awe-inspiring moment of Consecration; FOR THE MASS IS NOT A PRAYER, NOR A HYMN, NOR SOMETHING SAID – IT IS A DIVINE ACT WITH WHICH WE COME IN CONTACT AT A GIVEN MOMENT OF TIME."

- Archbishop Fulton J. Sheen

***

What the EXPERTS or those educated by the EXPERTS at Mendiola and Bukidnon have done...

The Male Vestal Virgins???

The Mumbaki Censing Dance Troupe!

The "Sunday Dance Troupe"  of Channel Mass.  Look!  There's Fr. Glenn!

The Swswswswshhhh Ballet Company...

The Trip to Jerusalem Mass of Euntes Zamboanga

The "trying-hard-to-be-a-priest" EMHC of SM MegaMall

The "intimate" hotel room Mass

The Excursion Mass of the Groovy Reverend BayWatch!

Yes, that is the Mass they want.

Yes!  Because their Mass is all about THEM!

Not about HIM who is crucified!

***

PS:  Here is the Vatican's prohibition against Liturgical Dance and other Creativity Nonsense.

Print a copy and give it to your parish priest!

And if you can find anything in the General Instruction for the Romal Missal, or in Redemptionis Sacramentum OOOOOR in any Vatican II documents about having these kinds of shenanigans at Mass that permits this... I DARE YOU!

OF and EF Mass: Mutual enrichment

I am for both as I have blogged many times before!

BUT!

If given a choice.

I'd go to the ones that my great grandparents and ancestors loved.

Nuff said.

Let the discussion....begin!

No blog posts for today!

Except this one!

from a good friend and brother Knight from California.

What my fave cardinal says here, says everything what I hold dearly in my heart:



The cardinal mentions resistance from some corners...

Aside from our usual suspects, well evidently, not suspects anymore, like Frs. Chupungco, Diwa, Malicdem, Aranda, Sobrejuanite, etc.

Anymore priests and liturgists you could name are against the liturgical reforms of Pope Benedict XVI?

Liturgical Reform ok? Not just against Summorum Pontificum, ok?

When you see a liturgical abuse...

 Do you need a college degree before you can even notice something wrong in this?

And this?

And this....

Or this...

And this...

And this...

And this...

Bwahahahah!!!

Poor guys who got a degree from You-Know-Who...

They need to trumpet their diplomas to get their license and to shut you up.

And what I think is surprising is that these very individuals who trumpet their association with the "world-renowned liturgist" and their "degree in Liturgy" or their "certificate of attending a seminar in Liturgy or Congress in Liturgy," conducted by You-Know-Who or his diminutive padawan or his associate nun, or some who claims such ludicrous titles like "Pontifical Masters of Ceremonies" when they are not even assisting in a Papal Mass or have not been given that title by the Holy Father....

CAN'T EVEN SPOT WHAT IS A LITURGICAL NO-NO OR ABUSE!

In fact, they are the very ones who either tolerate it or encourage it or are the very architects of the abuse!

They tell you, that you do not have the right to say anything against the abuse that you have seen or even shout..."Broken faucet!".  (if you are on my Facebook list of friends, you'll know what this corny joke is all about. Ha!)

So, if someone tells you to shut up if you cannot show your degree or certificate in Liturgy, give him a copy of the Instruction Redemptionis Sacramentum, which obviously they would not and have never read, along with the Motu Propio Summorum Pontificum:


Here is what Redemptionis Sacramentum, advises us in the even we witness a liturgical abuse:

6. Complaints Regarding Abuses in Liturgical Matters

[183.] In an altogether particular manner, let everyone do all that is in their power to ensure that the Most Holy Sacrament of the Eucharist will be protected from any and every irreverence or distortion and that all abuses be thoroughly corrected. This is a most serious duty incumbent upon each and every one, and all are bound to carry it out without any favouritism.

[184.] Any Catholic, whether Priest or Deacon or lay member of Christ’s faithful, has the right to lodge a complaint regarding a liturgical abuse to the diocesan Bishop or the competent Ordinary equivalent to him in law, or to the Apostolic See on account of the primacy of the Roman Pontiff.[290] It is fitting, however, insofar as possible, that the report or complaint be submitted first to the diocesan Bishop. This is naturally to be done in truth and charity.

***

I bolden the letters to put emphasis.

It all takes a brave soul to lodge a complaint against Fr. Sobre and his dancing tambourined go-go dancers...

I cannot do it myself.  I'll lose whatever I have as a senior Knight, being a past Grand Knight, former District Deputy and a Faithful Navigator.

Some of you laity can do it.

But do it in TRUTH and CHARITY.

Submit a photo of the abuse, cite what provision of the liturgical law was violated and submit either to the superior or bishop of the priest or deacon in question.

Yup.  You do not need to attach a resume or a photocopy of a degree in Liturgy to lodge the complaint.

Redemptionis Sacramentum nor the Code of Canon Law require it.

THE PINOY CATHOLIC's LITURGICAL MANIFESTO

This is courtesy of the great Fr. Z's blog, What does the Prayer Really Say?

This was posted after the Notre Shame debacle of honoring that POTUS with an honorary doctorate in law when he hasn't done anything.  Oh yeah, I forgot.  He said a LOT.

So for the record, let this be my liturgical manifesto from this day forward!

***

On Sunday we heard resound from Notre Dame well-crafted speeches well-delivered.

They were designed to shift the present controversies from the basis of reason to that of emotion and they succeeded.

The backdrop was perfect.

Controversy insured high reportage. Thousands of cheering young fans, products of the education they just received, blithely drank up their obviously deserved praise. Gray-haired veteran liberals whose skills were honed by a real education and decades of progressivist trench warfare provided the spear-carriers of a more authentic ecclesiastical establishment, a Church establishment as it truly ought to be if we lived in a more just world. A few pathetic court-jesters shouted incoherently during the President’s speech. They provided the students with some entertainment and gave the Doctoratus in Chief his chance to reveal his patient benevolence by means of a prepared one liner.

Who needs The Tudors? This was like watching Henry suborn the English Church away from the interference of Rome.

Neither President, Jenkins nor Obama, needed to say much of substance. And they didn’t. All they had to do to vindicate the inevitable rightness of their agendas was to sound reasonable.

Fr. Jenkins, throbbing with emotion after these weeks of persecution, cuddled the students and their adorers, inviting them into his sufferings.

President Obama, wise realist, offered astonishing insight. For example, you surely noted his stunning admission that the two sides in the abortion debate – wait for it – have irreconcilable differences!

In the final analysis we heard various expressions of "can’t we all just get along" even as we were being told to "shut up".

A great goal has been held up for us. Gaze with wonder upon the new calf. Our new goal is dialogue. Common ground is our promised land. There we will find healing from divisions and lots more talk. Endless dialogue and then more dialogue. Our side might not be able to say very much, but that is neither here nor there. It’s the goal of dialogue which is important.

But this dialogue must not be allowed to become mean-spirited. Forefend! We must not "demonize" – a favorite new word – anyone with their past records or the Church’s clear principles about the sanctity of human life.

In an era when emotion trumps reason, facts are just plain mean.

The progressivist side knows they will not win by arguments. They win by projecting the image of deep-caring, of brow-furrowed nuance, of struggling with those hard decisions.

Remember: If you will have first "struggled" you are thereafter justified in anything you chose.

So, Sunday was pretty black for Catholics who are waking up to a clearer Catholic identity in continuity with our Tradition. It was a great day for adherents of Catholic-lite, especially in the many long-subverted institutions of higher learning. They are sure to be revitalized.

It is hard to imagine, they will surely assume, that Ex corde Ecclesiae will ever be implemented now.

Frankly, I agree.

After all, who would implement it?

Unless we see, soon, some concrete gesture on the part of either the local bishop where Notre Dame is (and other bishops where there are other universities) or the Congregation for Catholic Education in Rome, then a battle will have been lost and won in this ever more closely joined culture war over the Church’s role in the modern world.

Among the reactions I gathered from the smart people I talk with about pivotal events – and we witnessed something pivotal on Sunday – I heard grim assessments and forecasts.

One person said, "America has a new pope".

Therefore, after pondering this for a day, my response is finally to return to a basic premise of this blog.

More than ever, we must have what the Church really says, what Holy Church really has to offer.

We are not getting the fullness of the Church’s teachings from Notre Dame or other, now lesser, water carriers of the secularist agenda. We are not getting it from very many of our leaders in the Church.

And so…

I urge all priests and bishops who read this blog with any slight quaver of resonance or benevolence, to consider this with care:

If you sense that something quite serious and important is going on right now, for the love of God rethink your approach to how you foster Holy Church’s proper public worship.

Do all in your power and through your influence to foster a worship of God which conforms not to worldly goals – as praiseworthy as they may be in a world still dominated by its dire prince – but rather to the real point of religion: an encounter with mystery.

Our worship must become more and more focused on the one who is Other. Seek what is truly above in your rites and raise people to encounter mystery.

You will be challenged and reviled, blocked and attacked as you do. You will be worn down and afraid under the weight of resistance.

But I think that to save the world we must save the liturgy.

Sunday reaffirmed this for me.

They can’t compete with the fullness of Catholic liturgy and sound preaching.

Reforming the liturgy along the lines Pope Benedict has proposed may be the most loving and effective option we have in these ever hotter times.

People will have to keep working very much in the sphere of the secular. Of course! Our inward Catholic Christian identity must find outward expression and bring concrete fruits.

But I think the real work now – where we will make some effective headway – must be done at the level of our public worship.

In the present circumstances, we are not going to argue most people out of danger or error. But together we can draw them in and along and back through worship.

So long as we remain doctrinally faithful and active in works of mercy both spiritual and especially temporal, if we get our public worship together we will have a strong bastion against error.

Holy Catholic worship will be an attractive force for conversion.

We need to foster worship which stuns, which leaves the newcomer, long-time practicing Catholic, above all the fallen-away simply thunder stuck. Worship must at some point leave people speechless in awe. We need language and music and gesture which in its beauty floods the mind with light even while it swells the heart to bursting.

The more people encounter mystery through liturgy, the more hollow will clang the false or incomplete messages of those who have strayed from the good path, either to the left or to the right.

Our goal must be that which is good and beautiful because it is true, that which reflects what is of God, not man’s image merely. Give us mystery, not fabrications smacking of the world, fallen and transitory.

Fathers, and you Reverend Bishops, if anything of alarm has sounded in your hearts and minds of late, rethink your approach to our worship. Examine your approach with an eye on the signs of the times. Take a new approach.

The approach we have had least last few decades isn’t getting it done. Really … it isn’t

Going neither left nor right along the road toward the Lord, even as He comes to us, take the flock now deeper, now higher on that path, but always to encounter the mystery which distinguishes truly Catholic liturgy… and therefore true Catholics.

Lines are being drawn, sides taken, choices made.

More than ever we need what Christ, the true Actor of our liturgy, desires to offer us through Holy Church’s worship.