Tradition

Contamination

Contamination on February 5, 2011

If liberalism in its broadest sense be defined as the liberation of man from God (see last week’s “Eleison Comments”), then the liberal Catholicism of the 19th century arising out of the French Revolution (1789) was, broadly, the successful liberating of politics from God, while the liberal Modernism of the early 20th century was the unsuccessful attempt to liberate the Catholic Church from God, attempt scotched by St. Pius X. However, that attempt succeeded half a century later way beyond even most liberals’ dreams, at the Second Vatican Council. Here below is another recent testimony I received, from Italy, observing how liberal Traditionalism is now at work to liberate Catholic Tradition from God (if only we had half the Devil’s perseverance!):—

“After the unchaining of the Tridentine Mass by Benedict XVI’s Motu Proprio of 2007, a great quantity of Catholics came closer to Tradition, but their quality varied widely. As was inevitable, the increase in numbers brought towards Tradition many Catholics who had never been convinced of its importance, and whose idea of Tradition was still basically subjective, meaning it is optional for Catholics and not obligatory. In this respect even if Benedict did say some useful things in his charter speech of December 22, 2005, its effect was disastrous.

“Confidence in the Pope then made any critical thinking about the modern liturgy, catechesis or doctrine take second place. To draw distinctions or to clear up confusion made one widely unpopular. However, the announcement of Assisi III dealt a sharp blow to this broad and very fluffy spectrum of Tradition, and Catholics had to make up their minds. Contrasts came out into the open, and the first divisions emerged.

“Benedict XVI has succeeded in infecting the promising potential of young Catholics connected or close to Tradition, and he has succeeded in creating divisions. Much of that potential is now ruined, even if one may put one’s hope in God that many other youngsters will come to talk and behave in a properly Catholic way. So just how many Catholics will embrace whole-heartedly the Church’s just cause? We shall have to wait for the dust to settle, and for men of good will and fresh vigour to make their appearance.

“Witnessing to Tradition calls more than ever for clear and firm statements. Hesitating or vacillating only does damage. Meanwhile let us fight on, sharpening the tone wherever called for, and openly pointing out the evils of Benedict XVI’s Conciliar Newchurch. Public opinion in Italy is far from concerning itself with the Church’s true problems. Catholics here have learned for centuries to believe that what the Pope says is Gospel. They are children of our age.”

Surely this testimony suggests that the marginalization of Econe by the mainstream Church in 1975, and its outright condemnation with the “excommunications” of 1988, each helped to save Catholic Tradition from contamination. Will the Lord God for the same purpose need to permit another such division and marginalization? We devoutly hope not!

Kyrie eleison.

Traditional Infection

Traditional Infection on January 29, 2011

Liberalism is an unbelievable disease, capable of rotting out the best hearts and minds. If we define it, most briefly, as the liberation of man from God, it is as old as the hills, but never has it been so deep or widespread or seemingly normal, as it is today. Now religious liberty is at the heart of liberalism – what use is it to be free from everything else and everybody else if I am not free from God? So if Benedict XVI lamented three weeks ago that “religious freedom is threatened all over the world,” he is certainly infected. Nor let even followers of Catholic Tradition be confident that they have immunity from the disease. Here is an e-mail I received a few days ago from a layman in Continental Europe:—

“For the longest time, about 20 years, I was moulded by liberalism. It is through the grace of God that I underwent a conversion with the Society of St Pius X. To my shock I have found liberal behaviour even in the ranks of Tradition. People are still saying that one should not exaggerate how bad things are at present. Freemasonry is hardly mentioned as being an enemy of the Church, because to do so might damage one’s personal interests, so people go on reacting as though, overall, the world is still in good shape.

“Some Traditionalists even recommend psycho-drugs to deal with the stress that goes with being a Traditional Catholic, and if you are looking for happiness, they say, you should go to a medical doctor to make life easier.

“The consequence of such behaviour is an indifferentism which is the seed-bed of liberalism. All of a sudden it is no longer so bad to attend the Novus Ordo Mass, to make common cause with modernists, to change one’s principles from one day to the next, to give up showing one’s faith in public, to study at a State university, to trust the State, and to act on the assumption that everybody does after all mean well.

“Our Lord has harsh words for this sort of indifferentism: the lukewarm he will “begin to spit out of his mouth” (Rev. III, 16). It may sound paradoxical, but the greatest enemies of the Church are liberal Catholics. There is even a liberal Traditionalism!!!” (end of layman’s quote).

What then is the antidote for this poison that threatens every one of us? Sanctifying grace, no doubt (Rom.VII, 25), which can clear the mind of confusion, and strengthen the will to do what the mind sees to be right. And how do I make sure of sanctifying grace? That is a little like asking, how can I guarantee my final perseverance? The Church teaches that one cannot guarantee it, because it is a gift – or the gift – of God. But what I can always do is pray the Holy Rosary, an average of five Mysteries a day – better, if reasonably possible, fifteen. Whosoever does that is doing what the Mother of God asks all of us to do, and she has a virtually unlimited maternal power over her Son, Our Lord and God, Jesus Christ.

Kyrie eleison.

Dangerous Dreamland

Dangerous Dreamland on January 15, 2011

Somebody just sent me a few sentences of Fr. Denis Fahey (1883–1954), which prove that before Vatican II not every Catholic was “asleep at the switch.” Is that to say that many Catholics were? There can be no doubt of it. Moreover many still are, including a number of so-called Traditional Catholics, because the same causes produce the same effects, and the causes that gave rise to Catholics’ blindness in the mid-20th century are stronger than ever in this early 21st century.

Here is the brief extract from Fr. Fahey’s “Kingship of Christ and Organized Naturalism” (1943). (the sentences are numbered for purposes of commentary afterwards):— 1/ “Catholics are succumbing to the machinations of the enemies of Our Lord because they are not being trained for the real combat of this world. 2/ They leave school without an adequate knowledge of the organized opposition which they will be sure to encounter, and with only hazy notions on the points of the social order which they must defend . . . 3/ and Catholics who really fight for a true Christian order are always sure to find Catholics in the opposite camp.”

1/ Since the mass of people in today’s world no longer believe that the truly good life is to be led in Heaven with God, thanks to salvation through faith in Our Lord Jesus Christ and in his Church, then they trust in men to provide the good life on this earth, and so politics become in effect their religion, and their governments take the place of God’s Providence. It becomes then more and more difficult for people to believe that their governments and way of life are virtually controlled by the very real enemies of Our Lord – for instance, how could our governments possibly be lying to us about 9/11? Yet such trust in modern governments betrays a woeful grasp of reality, and however widespread it may be, if Catholics let themselves slip into sharing it (without toppling over into becoming revolutionaries), they will inevitably be “not trained for the real combat” of the Faith in this world. Moreover, buying into the dreamland here below, they will have serious difficulty reaching the real Heaven of the real God above.

2/ It may be difficult to teach schoolchildren and seminarians that Our Lord has bitter enemies, because their organized opposition is skilfully disguised. But the youngsters are “certain to encounter” that opposition, so unless that disguise is ripped off by the teachers preparing them for life or for the priesthood, the Catholic youngsters will be going into combat with blinkers, or with one hand tied behind their back. And since individualistic liberalism is heavily promoted by the enemies of Our Lord in order to dissolve what remains of Christian order, then the youngsters need in particular to learn well what Mother Church teaches on “the points of the social order that they must defend” and on the social nature of man.

3/ Alas, as that great Pope of the 19th century, Pius IX said, even the bitter enemies of Our Lord outside the Church are less to be feared than liberal Catholics within the Church. The latter will ridicule the idea that anybody could be “machinating” against Our Lord. After all, “Ithn’t evewybody nithe?” (“Isn’t everybody nice?,” said with an effeminate lisp.) No, they are not!

Fr. Fahey, pray for us!

Kyrie eleison.

Assisi-Ism – No!

Assisi-Ism – No! on January 8, 2011

Some people are still afraid that Archbishop Lefebvre’s Society of St Pius X is on the way to a bad agreement with Benedict XVI’s Rome, but by the Pope’s Assisi-ism amongst other things, one might say that Benedict XVI himself is doing his best to prevent any such occurrence.

Six days ago he argued in theory that the world’s “great religions” can constitute “an important factor of the peace and unity of mankind.” Five days ago he announced in practice that in October of this year he will go “as a pilgrim” to Assisi to commemorate the 25th anniversary of the Prayer Meeting of World Religions held there by Pope John-Paul II in 1986. But the theory of all “great world religions” contributing to world peace was absolutely rejected by Archbishop Lefebvre, and the practice of the 1986 Prayer Meeting in Assisi he condemned as a flagrant violation of the First Commandment, which, coming from the Vicar of Christ, constituted a scandal unheard of in all the history of the Church. Only the fear of too much repetition being counter-productive might have stopped him from castigating this latest piece of Assisi-ism.

However, the Archbishop did recognize that all too few Catholics then grasped the enormity of the scandal. This is because the whole modern world marginalizes God, brackets out the divinity of Our Lord Jesus Christ, makes religion a matter of free choice and turns Catholic Tradition into a mere question of sensibility or feeling. Infecting even the Popes, this way of thinking has become so normal all around us that every one of us is threatened. Let us get back to basics:—

All being requires a First Cause. That Cause, to be the First, must be Being Itself, which must be all-perfect being, because any second god, to differ from the First, would have to have some perfection lacking to the First. So the true God can only be one. This one true God took human nature once, and only once, in the divine Person of Our Lord Jesus Christ, who proved his divinity by a quantity and quality of miracles that have accompanied no other man ever, but have accompanied his Church ever since: the Roman Catholic Church. Membership of that Church is by faith and is open to all men. If they believe, that is the indispensable start of their eternal salvation. If they refuse to believe, they are on their way to eternal damnation (Mk. XVI, 16).

Therefore if by their past and future Assisi events, Popes John-Paul II and Benedict XVI have encouraged souls to think that Catholicism is not the one and only way to a happy eternity, but merely one amongst many other promoters (even if it is the best) of mankind’s “peace and unity” in this life, it follows that both Popes have facilitated the dreadful damnation of countless souls in the next life. Rather than have any part in such a betrayal, Archbishop Lefebvre preferred to be scorned, rejected, despised, marginalized, silenced, “excommunicated,” you name it.

There is a price to be paid for holding to the Truth. How many Catholics are ready to pay it?

Kyrie eleison.

Truth Liberates

Truth Liberates on December 11, 2010

The argument of the last three numbers of “Eleison Comments” (175–177), has been merely provoked by the French painter Paul Gauguin (1848–1903), because he is by no means the worst of modern artists. That argument has not been that God exists, so modern art is “bosh” (see Evelyn Waugh’s “Brideshead Revisited,” I, 6). Rather it has been, modern art is bosh, so God exists. There is an important difference here between descending from the cause to the effect and climbing from the effect to the cause.

If I start from the existence of God as a given, and reason downwards to the wrongness of, for instance, modern art, modern music, modern opera productions, etc., firstly God and his existence are not thereby proved, and secondly his religion can seem to come down on us like a wheel-clamp upon our liberty. Now I am me, and whatever it is that is me wants to be free to choose what art I like. But here comes a Traffic Warden supposedly from Heaven to clamp that freedom? No thank you!

If on the other hand I start out from my own experience of modern art, I am firstly starting out from what I directly know. And if my experience of it is, honestly, dissatisfactory – that is not necessarily the case, but if it is – then I can begin to wonder why I feel such unease in front of highly praised modern artists. I listen again to the praises. I am still not convinced. Why not? Because modern art is ugly. What is wrong with ugliness? It lacks beauty. And if I continue to climb through the beauty of, for instance, landscapes or women as portrayed in art, to their beauty in Nature, to a harmony of parts running through all creation, my thoughts have climbed from my personal experience a considerable way towards the Creator.

In this latter case he no longer resembles a traffic warden with wheel-clamps. On the contrary, far from clamping down on our freedom, he seems to be leaving us human beings with free-will and with freedom to proclaim ugliness through the land and to create a world of chaos. Maybe he is hoping that the ugliness will become horrible enough to turn our thoughts towards the True and the Good. At this point his religion resembles no longer any clamp from outside on our liberty within, but rather a help and liberator of all that is best in me from all that is worst, because unless I am proud, I am bound to admit that not everything inside myself is ordered and harmonious.

At which point supernatural grace is no longer conceived of as a kind of policeman landing on the back of my nature to control by force whatever it does. Rather it is a very good friend that will, if I wish, enable the best in me to liberate itself from the worst, or at least strive to do so.

Was not, and is not still, one driving force behind Vatican II and the Conciliar religion, the widely shared sense of Catholic Tradition being a sort of unbearable policeman, as though all natural impulses are bad? Yes, the impulses of my fallen nature are bad, but there is good in our nature underneath that bad, and this good must be allowed to breathe, because from inside us it synchronizes perfectly with the true religion of God coming from outside. Otherwise I fabricate a false religion out of my bad impulses – like Vatican II.

Kyrie eleison.

Doctrine Indispensable

Doctrine Indispensable on October 9, 2010

I can remember Archbishop Lefebvre in 1986 being surprised at how few followers of Catholic Tradition seemed to grasp the enormity of the all-religion love-fest at Assisi, but such is the corruption of our times: ideas and truth are of no consequence, because “All you need is love.” In truth, all of us need, absolutely, both doctrine and love.

Doctrine is not just formulas of words. Those of us that have the inestimable gift of the Faith know that upon our short life in this world hangs an eternity of unimaginable bliss or horror in the next life, and we know that this is the destiny of all men, whether they believe it or not, Limbo for unbaptized innocents being the one exception. It then stands to reason that unless God is cruel – vain wish of many a poor soul seeking to justify its revolt against Him! – He is offering to all souls at all times the light and strength they need to gain Heaven and avoid Hell, if they wish. But when a soul does not have the Faith, what form can that light and strength take?

Let two non-Catholics point towards the answer. Dr. Samuel Johnson, 18th century giant of English common sense, said “When a man is tired of London he is tired of life.” In other words, behind the hurly-burly of daily living in all its daily details, a man is forging day by day a general attitude towards life. And Count Leo Tolstoy in his epic novel, War and Peace, says, “To love life means to love God.” In other words, a man’s general attitude towards life is in fact an attitude towards God.

Of course many a modern soul will deny vigorously that his attitude to life can have anything to do with a “non-existent” God, but God is not the less sustaining in existence both him and all the objects daily surrounding him, and God is giving to him all the time the free-will with which to love or hate God within and behind them all. Thus Communists are meant to be atheists, yet Lenin once said, “God is my personal enemy.” Communists, as such, hate life and hate God.

Then what is the right attitude to life and to God? The First Commandment lays it down: to love Him with all one’s heart and mind and soul. But how can I love anybody without first having some knowledge of him? The right attitude to life and to God presupposes at least some faith or trust in the goodness of life and/or of God. Thus when unlettered souls come to Our Lord in the Gospels to ask for a miracle, frequently he tests their “faith,” or praises it and rewards it, when he grants the miracle. What faith? Faith in him. But who exactly is he?

That is for lettered souls to formulate, in doctrine. This doctrine of God may be polished down the ages, but it cannot be changed, any more than God can be changed. It is the on-going corrector of our attitude to life and to God, for as long as we wish to be unimaginably happy and not unhappy for all eternity. Catholic doctrine is truth. God is Truth. Truth is indispensable.

Kyrie eleison.