23 December 2024
The Ten Martyrs of Crete
From Fr Alban Butler's Lives of the Saints:
UPON the publication of the edict for persecuting the Christians under Decius, by the activity of a barbarous governor in seeing it rigorously executed, the isle of Crete, now called Candia, soon became one large field of blood. Among the martyrs who there triumphed over the world, the devil, and sin, none were more conspicuous than Theodulus, Saturninus, Euporus, Gelasius, Eunicianus, Zoticus, Cleomenes, Agathopus, Basilides, and Evarestus, commonly called the Ten Martyrs of Crete. The first three were citizens of Gortyna, the metropolis, where they had probably been grounded in the faith by St. Cyril, bishop of that city, who was beheaded for the faith in the same persecution, and is honored in the Roman Martyrology on the 9th of July. The rest were brought from other towns of the same island; Zoticus (called by some Zeticus) from Gnossus, Pontius from Epinium, Agathopus from Panormus, Basilides from Cydonia, and Evarestus from Heracleum. Their zeal had united them in their confession of Christ; they were apprehended, insulted, dragged on the ground, beaten, stoned, covered with phlegm and spittle, and at length presented to the governor of the island at Gortyna, and the 23d of December was appointed for their trial. As soon as they appeared in court, they were ordered to sacrifice to Jupiter, who was particularly worshipped in Crete, and on that very day their countrymen celebrated a festival in his honor with all manner of pleasures, diversions, and sacrifices. The martyrs answered, they could never offer sacrifice to idols.
Collect of the Ten Martyrs of Crete ~ Indulgenced on the Saints' Feast (See Note)
According to the Apostolic Penitentiary, a partial indulgence is granted to those who on the feast of any Saint recite in his honour the oration of the Missal or any other approved by legitimate Authority.
V. O Lord, hear my prayer.
R. And let my cry come unto thee.
Let us pray.
Let us pray.
O God, who dost permit us to celebrate the anniversary of the death of Thine holy Theodulus, Saturninus, Euporus, Gelasius, Eunicianus, Zoticus, Cleomenes, Agathopus, Basilides, & Evarestus, grant that we mayest enjoy their companionship in everlasting happiness.
Through Jesus Christ, Thy Son our Lord, Who liveth and reigneth with Thee, in the unity of the Holy Ghost, God, world without end.
R. Amen.
Top 5 Queens of the Middle Ages
A documentary video looking at the greatest queens of the medieval world.
The Christian Origins of Christmas: December 25th & Paganism
Was the December 25th date for the nativity celebrated because of pagan influence? Where does this theory come from, and is it rooted in history anti-Catholic sentiment?
00:00 Setting the Stage
00:49 The Two Groups
02:42 Protestant Origins
06:23 Syncretism & Catholicism
10:28 So…is Usener right?
11:21 The Calculations Theory
15:43 Counter-points & Contemporary Scholarship
19:26 Final Thoughts
The Life of Father Christmas | Beyond Arda
To go with the previous post.
From 1920-1943, the children of JRR Tolkien received letters from Father Christmas, detailing his adventurous (and comedic) life at the North Pole. In addition to Polar Bear hijinks and Christmas preparations, Father Christmas would reveal the dangers of the North Pole - particularly attacks by Goblins!
What Happened When Father Christmas Met J. R. R. Tolkien?
The Letters From Father Christmas have been collected and edited by Baillie Tolkien, JRRT's daughter-in-law, Christopher Tolkien's wife.
From Aleteia
By Joseph Pearce
Beginning in 1920, each year at this time the children of J.R.R. Tolkien received a letter from Father Christmas about his adventures at the North Pole...
Long before J. R. R. Tolkien told stories about hobbits, elves and orcs in Middle-earth, he was telling stories about snow-elves, gnomes and goblins in the North Pole. He told these stories to his own children as he told stories about hobbits to his own children, long before they were told to the public after his books were published.
A lifelong practising and devout Catholic, Tolkien and his wife Edith had four children: three sons and a daughter. In his role as paterfamilias, father of the family, Tolkien amused himself and his children every year with stories of the adventures of Father Christmas. As a talented artist and gifted storyteller, he wrote illustrated letters to his children which were purportedly sent to them personally from the North Pole every December by Father Christmas himself.
Father Christmas's first letter
The first letter was written by Father Christmas in 1920 from his home address (Christmas House, North Pole), when Tolkien’s eldest son was three years old:
Dear John,
I heard you ask daddy what I was like and where I lived. I have drawn ME and My House for you. Take care of the picture. I am just off now for Oxford with my bundle of toys – some for you. Hope I will arrive in time: the snow is very thick at the NORTH POLE tonight.
Each subsequent Christmas, as John grew older and other children were born, the letters from Father Christmas became ever more elaborate and imaginative. New characters were introduced to the children as Father Christmas recounted his adventures.
There was the Polar Bear, Father Christmas’s helper who was, more often than not, more of a hindrance than a help; there was the Snow Man, Father Christmas’s gardener; Ilbereth the elf, his secretary, as well as snow-elves, gnomes and evil goblins.
News from the North Pole
Disaster struck in 1925 when the Polar Bear climbed to the top of the North Pole to retrieve Father Christmas’s hood. The North Pole broke in the middle and landed on the roof of Father Christmas’s house with catastrophic results. The hapless Polar Bear was also to blame the following year when he turned on the Northern Lights for two years in one go. As one can imagine, this shook all the stars out of place and caused the Man in the Moon to fall into Father Christmas’s back garden.
One letter arrived “by gnome-carrier” in an envelope with a hand-painted North Pole postage stamp. One letter had evidently been left personally by Father Christmas because he had left a muddy footprint on the carpet. In other years, it was delivered by the postman himself. Sometimes the letters were written in Father Christmas’s characteristic shaky handwriting; sometimes in the Polar Bear’s rune-like capitals; and sometimes in IIbereth’s gracefully flowing script.
Lessons from two fathers
Letters from Father Christmas would be published in 1976, three years after Tolkien’s death and half a century after they were written. Their considerable charm is accentuated by the fact that they were composed solely by a father for his children and were never intended for publication. They also offer a cosey fireside foreshadowing of the familiar homeliness of hobbits and hobbit-holes.
As for the moral which we can glean from this charming friendship between Tolkien and Father Christmas, we can see it in the connection between fatherhood and Christmas. As a Catholic called to the married life, Tolkien was, first and foremost, the paterfamilias. His primary vocation, ahead of his calling as a scholar or as a storyteller, was to fatherhood. As a good husband to his wife and a good father to his children, he sought to emulate the life and love of the Holy Family in the life and love of his own family.
In this, as in so much else, the author of The Lord of the Rings is an inspiration to us all.
The Media Launches Vile Attacks Against Jesus and Mary Just In Time For Christmas
Public trust in the secular media is at an all time low.
No, Christmas Was Never Saturnalia (Lies Debunked)
Join the Counter-Revolution lest you find yourself before the judgment seat of God justifying your inaction.
The enemies of the Church will never stop lying about the traditions of the faith. Be vigilant and know the lies: Christmas was never pagan!
There Are NO Exceptions
The Hippocratic Oath, before it was "edited" said, "I will not give to a woman a pessary to cause abortion." Now, doctors do the killing of the unborn.
From Mundabor's Blog
Today I’d like to say three words about these famous “exceptions” that should, in the view of some people, justify abortion even even if one is “pro-life”. This is rubbish. Let us see why.
Incest
The idea that if a baby is born of incest he should not be born has always been considered utterly bonkers. At no time has the Church ever said that this is allowed. The reason is very simple: the innocent child is not at fault for the behaviour of his parents. An innocent life is an innocent life, and must be protected irrespective of how this life was born.
It’s not rocket science. It’s common sense. There should be no discussion whatever on this. It’s a discussion that starts from a faulty logical position, actually from no logic at all. It is an emotional approach to a simple, actually elementary issue.
Rape
Rape is, again, an emotional issue. The same considerations made above apply here right off the bat.
However, in the case of rape another issue must be considered: it’s very easy to cry “rape”, and such an “exception” would make such claims extremely frequent.
“I was raped by a guy I met at the bar, and who got me drunk, and whose identity I don’t know, and whom I could not identify, on the evening of the 26th September” would suffice. Hey, she says it’s rape. Off with the baby’s life. You can immediately realise that every demand to have this rape made objectively verifiable or in any way investigated would be met with the inordinate screaming of the feminist troops. Heck, in the US people are allowed to cry “rape” decades after the alleged fact. Go figure. We would see an epidemic of rape claims, and the press would even pretend to believe them. Oh, that “toxic masculinity” rearing its ugly head again!
Life of the mother
This is the most insidious of them all and believe you me, it would make every restriction useless (see below). Let us explain first that, if the baby dies because a surgical intervention is necessary to save the life of the mother, this is no abortion at all. It is a surgical operation with a double effect. As the operation is, in itself, good and legitimate, and was not carried out in order to kill the baby, there is no abortion. The operation was successful. The patient will survive. Sadly, her child did not.
This is an extremely obvious, as clear as the sun, application of the traditional Catholic doctrine of the “double effect”. This case does, therefore, not need to enter the discussion.
However, the one of the “life of the mother” is an extremely broad field. “The mother is now distressed and clearly suicidal. You are k-k-k-killing her!!!”. This would be abused very hard from day one. How do I know? This was how abortion was introduced in Italy as an allegedly very rare measure to be adopted only in extreme cases.
Screw that.
There’s a bridge down the road, ma’am. Your body, your choice.
——-
We can, therefore, see that there is no way an abortion can be seen as legitimate. If it’s an abortion, it must be made illegal. There is no middle way, and there is no logical way to say to a baby, “I am sorry, little one, but you will now have to die, because both your mother and the legislator do not like the way your innocent life was conceived”.
You would think this is straightforward thinking, easy to grasp.
Sadly, neither DJT nor RFK seem to.
Feria in Advent
Today's Holy Mass from Sacred Heart Church, Tynong AUS. You may follow the Mass at Divinum Officium.
The Great Antiphons: O Emmanuel
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The Church sings this Antiphon in today’s Lauds:
ANT. Lo! all things are accomplished that were said by the Angel, of the Virgin Mary.
SEVENTH ANTIPHON
(Listen to the Chant)
O Emmanuel, our King and Lawgiver, the Expectation and Savior of the nations! come and save us, O Lord our God!
O Emmanuel! King of Peace! thou enterest today the city of thy predilection, the city in which thou hast placed thy Temple—Jerusalem. A few years hence, and the same city will give thee thy Cross and thy Sepulcher: nay, the day will come, on which thou wilt set up thy Judgment-seat within sight of her walls. But today, thou enterest the city of David and Solomon unnoticed and unknown. It lies on thy road to Bethlehem. Thy Blessed Mother and Joseph, her Spouse, would not lose the opportunity of visiting the Temple, there to offer to the Lord their prayers and adoration. They enter; and then, for the first time, is accomplished the prophecy of Aggeus, that great shall be the glory of this last House more than of the first; (Haggai 2:10) for this second Temple has now standing within it an Ark of the Covenant more precious than was that which Moses built; and within this Ark, which is Mary, there is contained the God whose presence makes her the holiest of sanctuaries. The Lawgiver himself is in this blessed Ark, and not merely, as in that of old, the tablet of stone on which the Law was graven. The visit paid, our living Ark descends the steps of the Temple, and sets out once more for Bethlehem, where other prophecies are to be fulfilled. We adore thee, O Emmanuel! in this thy journey, and we reverence the fidelity wherewith thou fulfillest all that the prophets have written of thee, for thou wouldst give to thy people the certainty of thy being the Messias, by showing them that all the marks whereby he was to be known, are to be found in thee. And now, the hour is near; all is ready for thy Birth; come, then, and save us; come, that thou mayest not only be called our Emmanuel, but our Jesus, that is, He that saves us.
THE GREAT ANTIPHON TO JERUSALEM
O Jerusalem! city of the great God! lift up thine eyes round about, and see thy Lord, for he is coming to loose thee from thy chains.
It Is a Far Greater Miracle to Repent than to Raise the Dead
A sermon for today. Please remember to say 3 Hail Marys for the Priest.
Day 5 – Novena of Christmas: Jesus Offered Himself for Our Salvation From the Beginning
Meditations for every day of Advent by St Alphonsus Liguori.
St Servulus, Confessor
From Fr Alban Butler's Lives of the Saints:
From St. Gregory, Hom. 15, in Evangel, and Dia1.1. 4, c. 14.
A. D. 590.
IN this saint was exemplified what our divine Redeemer has taught us of Lazarus, the poor man full of sores, who lay before the gate of the rich man’s house. Servulus was a beggar, and had been afflicted with the palsy from his infancy; so that he was never able to stand, sit upright, lift his hand to his mouth, or turn himself from one side to another. His mother and brother carried him into the porch of St. Clement’s church at Rome, where he lived on the alms of those that passed by. Whatever he could spare from his own subsistence he distributed among other needy persons. The sufferings and humiliation of his condition were a means of which he made the most excellent use for the sanctification of his own soul, by the constant exercise of humility, patience, meekness, resignation, and penance. He used to entreat devout persons to read the holy scriptures, and he heard them with such attention, as to learn them by heart. His time he consecrated by assiduously singing hymns of praise and thanksgiving to God, and his continual pains were so far from dejecting or distracting him, that they proved a most pressing motive for raising his mind to God with greater ardor. After several years thus spent, his distemper having seized his vitals, he perceived his end to draw near. In his last moments he desired the poor and pilgrims, who had often shared in his charity, to sing sacred hymns and psalms by him. While he joined his voice with theirs, he on a sudden cried out; “Silence; do you not hear the sweet melody and praises which resound in the heavens!” Soon after he had spoken those words he expired, and his soul was carried by angels into everlasting bliss, about the year 590. The body of St. Servulus was buried in St. Clement’s church, and honored with miracles, according to the Roman Martyrology.
St. Gregory the Great concludes the account he gives of him in a sermon to his people, by observing that the whole behavior of this poor sick beggar loudly condemns those who, when blessed with good health and a plentiful fortune, neither do good works, nor suffer the least cross with tolerable patience.
St Victoria, Virgin & Martyr
From Fr Alban Butler's Lives of the Saints:
VICTORIA was a young, noble, Roman lady, who being a Christian, desired to live to her heavenly spouse alone in a state of virginity. Eugenius, who sought her in marriage, was provoked at meeting with a repulse, and accused her to the judge, by whose order, after many fruitless attempts to extort her consent to many, or to sacrifice to idols, she was stabbed in the breast by an executioner: of which wound she speedily died in 250, when the persecution of Decius was hottest at Rome See her Acts abridged by St. Aldhelm, and by Ado.
Collect of St Servulus of Rome, Confessor ~ Indulgenced on the Saint's Feast (See Note)
According to the Apostolic Penitentiary, a partial indulgence is granted to those who on the feast of any Saint recite in his honour the oration of the Missal or any other approved by legitimate authority.
V. O Lord, hear my prayer.
R. And let my cry come unto thee.
Let us pray.
Attend, O Lord, upon our supplications, which we offer to Thee on the solemnity of Blessed Servulus, Thy Confessor, that we who put no trust in our own righteousness, may be holpen by the prayers of him who was well pleasing unto Thee.
Let us pray.
Attend, O Lord, upon our supplications, which we offer to Thee on the solemnity of Blessed Servulus, Thy Confessor, that we who put no trust in our own righteousness, may be holpen by the prayers of him who was well pleasing unto Thee.
Through Jesus Christ, Thy Son our Lord, Who liveth and reigneth with Thee, in the unity of the Holy Ghost, God, world without end.
R. Amen.
Collect of St Victoria of Tivoli, Virgin & Martyr ~ Indulgenced on the Saint's Feast (See Note)
According to the Apostolic Penitentiary, a partial indulgence is granted to those who on the feast of any Saint recite in his honour the oration of the Missal or any other approved by legitimate Authority.
V. O Lord, hear my prayer.
R. And let my cry come unto thee.
Let us pray.
We beseech Thee, O Lord, that Blessed Victoria, Thy Virgin & Martyr, may implore for us pardon, who was ever pleasing unto Thee both by virtue of her chastity and by her manifestation of Thy power.
Let us pray.
We beseech Thee, O Lord, that Blessed Victoria, Thy Virgin & Martyr, may implore for us pardon, who was ever pleasing unto Thee both by virtue of her chastity and by her manifestation of Thy power.
Through Jesus Christ, Thy Son our Lord, Who liveth and reigneth with Thee, in the unity of the Holy Ghost, God, world without end.
R. Amen.
22 December 2024
Why I Am Not a Protestant
"Joining a church should not be dependent upon consumerist preferences based upon how well any given Christian community aligns with individual opinions. What matters, most essentially, is which Church is the one Christ founded?"
From Crisis
By Casey Chalk, MA(Theol)
To argue that one cannot become Catholic because Pope Francis may share certain traits in common with liberal Protestants is to engage in a form of individualistic consumerism.
The conservative Presbyterian academic Carl R. Trueman is one of the most important and interesting voices in contemporary Protestantism. His top-selling 2020 book, The Rise and Triumph of the Modern Self: Cultural Amnesia, Expressive Individualism, and the Road to Sexual Revolution, was such an impressive scholarly tour de force it was celebrated by Protestants and Catholics alike (including myself). He regularly speaks at Catholic events, such as the Leonine Forum, where I had the great pleasure of meeting him a couple of years ago. He even writes for Catholic publications such as The Catholic World Report.
So, when the good Dr. Trueman offers his opinions on Catholicism—as he recently did at First Things—one can’t help but pay attention. In a December 12 piece titled “Why I Am Not Catholic,” Trueman begins by noting that “many issues are important in my commitment to Reformed Protestantism: authority, salvation, the nature of the ministry, and the significance of sacraments are just a few of the more obvious.” He adds that the Catholic Church has given Mary “significance that is well beyond anything the Bible would countenance.” But his preeminent concern, he tells us, is with one thing—or rather, one person. Can you guess?
If you said Pope Francis, you win the luxury, all-expenses-paid trip to the well-trod land of anti-Franciscan Protestant polemics. Francis, claims Trueman, is “a liberal Protestant in a white papal robe.” The latest evidence? The December 2023 Fiducia Supplicans, which permits blessings for individuals in same-sex relationships; and, more recently, Francis’ alleged decision to support a pilgrimage for the LGBTQ+ community in the 2025 Jubilee Year titled “Church: Home for All, LGBT+ Christians and Other Existential Frontiers.” This pilgrimage includes a September 2025 prayer vigil for LGBTQ+ Catholics at a church in Rome.
For starters, as The Pillar—which is no unwavering apologist for all Francis says and does—has reported, a spokesperson for the Vatican’s Dicastery for Evangelization told Reuters that the activities of the pilgrimage “are not sponsored activities.” Nor does the pilgrimage appear on the Jubilee website’s “calendar of major events.” Does Pope Francis support such a pilgrimage? It’s unclear; and it is certainly complicated by the fact that as much as he has presented an image of welcoming to LGBTQ+ persons, he has also expressed his opposition to the presence of gay men in the priesthood and even, multiple times, allegedly used a gay slur.
But, frankly, none of that really matters. For one, whatever the nature of Pope Francis’ opinions on LGBTQ+ persons and their behavior—and I am in no position to divine the mind of a man I’ve never met and whose comments can be confusing and are also often misinterpreted and manipulatively spun by liberal corporate media—the Catholic Church quite demonstrably teaches that our current pontiff is incapable of altering magisterial teaching on sexuality. According to Catholic teaching, Pope Francis could be the most pro-LGBTQ+ bishop of Rome in the history of the Church and he still could not magisterially declare that homosexual acts or transgenderism are moral goods to be celebrated. The magisterium has spoken and cannot be overturned.
Secondly, and far more importantly, there is the problem of what Trueman’s argument actually amounts to. If I were to carefully dissect it, it would appear to be thus: Trueman has read his Bible and come to the personal opinion that the Catholic Church is wrong on various theological issues important to Trueman and that the current pope is taking the Church in what he estimates to be the wrong direction. Thus, Trueman cannot become a Catholic.
This is what my friend and Catholic philosopher Bryan Cross calls “ecclesial consumerism.” By this, Cross is describing a philosophical and theological paradigm in which one chooses a church based on personal opinions related to any number of subjective criteria. Perhaps your redline is a Christian community’s (or leader’s) position on LGBTQ+ issues. Perhaps it’s on the denomination’s conformity to certain Reformation-era teachings on salvation, the sacraments, or Mary. Whatever that redline, its basis is one’s subjective opinions and preferences regarding what is most important, and even decisive, in choosing a church to join.
However important are doctrines related to soteriology, sacramentology, or Mariology, they must all, ultimately, be peripheral to the central decision of the individual seeking to identify “the church” as such. Joining a church should not be dependent upon consumerist preferences based upon how well any given Christian community aligns with individual opinions on such various theological or moral subjects. What matters, most essentially, is which Church is the one Christ founded?
For, whichever institution is the Church Christ founded, our opinions about the behavior and ideas of any given pope, cardinal, or bishop become, in at least one sense, inconsequential. This is true for the same reason that the opinions of individuals encountering Christ or His apostles were, at least as it related to divine revelation, irrelevant. If Jesus is the Son of God, and the apostles have been designated with authority to teach infallible Christian doctrine on His behalf, our disagreement or dislike of those teachings or the behavior of those promulgating them is irrelevant to the reality of that authority.
If apostolic succession is a verifiable reality, our opinion regarding the magisterium’s (quite narrowly defined) infallible teachings is also irrelevant. And what an individual bishop or pope does in guiding the Church in one direction or another, while it may be wrong and even sinful, cannot undermine that divinely-instituted magisterial authority. That’s true whether the bishop in question is Pope John XII, Pope Alexander VI, or the “no kneeling while receiving Communion” Cardinal Blase Cupich.
Thus, to argue, as Trueman does, that he cannot become Catholic because Pope Francis may share certain traits in common with liberal Protestants is to engage in a form of individualistic consumerism, which, ironically enough, is the very thing he condemns in his best-selling 2020 book. No one should make his decision about the Catholic Church based on the behavior or opinions of a particular pope. One should make a decision about Catholicism based on a conviction that it is (or is not) the very Church instituted by Christ and miraculously preserved by the Holy Spirit through the centuries. Almost fifteen years ago, when I was a Presbyterian seminary student, I came to the conclusion that only one such institution had a credible, historical claim to that distinction. We should pray that Dr. Trueman, who has otherwise done so much good in the war against the evils of secular, anti-God modernity, soon does the same.
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