Too many people today are without good, strong preaching, to the detriment of all. Share the good stuff.
Was there a GOOD point made in the sermon you heard at the Masses for the 1st Sunday of Lent?
Tell about attendance especially for the Traditional Latin Mass. I hear that it is growing. Of COURSE.
Any local changes or (hopefully good) news?
Those of you who regularly viewed my live-streamed daily Masses – with their fervorini – for over a year, you might drop me a line.
I have some written remarks about the TLM Mass for this Sunday – HERE
Loading ...
Fr. Z, I couldn’t tell you what the sermon was about today, because it was all in Ukrainian. But such a beautiful, devout Mass! And it is the Sunday of the Veneration of the Cross in the Eastern Rite: “We bow down to Your Cross and we glorify Your Resurrection.” Singing that at the beginning, in the middle, and at the end of Mass is a sermon in itself.
My pastor is a good man, and a good priest: during the depths of COVID, he insisted on making mass and confession (readily) available when he could have taken an easier path. But his sermons: he still wears a mask during mass, and (with my bad hearing) I cannot make out what he says. I hope other people can hear him. I won’t fault him for this – I don’t know the details behind his choice. But I hope it changes soon.
At Latin Mass…as usual…wonderful homily promoting Tradition while being sensitive to the watered down teaching the last 50 years…..onward Christian soldiers !!!!!
Well, it wasn’t part of the sermon, but I’ve always found Luke 11:21-26 to be confusing. It appears to either suggest that maybe you’re better off living with one demon than angering him so that he comes back with seven of his friends, or that attempting to combat demons is useless, because they’ll retaliate. Of course, neither of these can be the correct interpretation. Haydock’s commentary quotes St. Cyril (“ex divo Thoma”) who says that this refers to the Jews who were cleansed through the blood of the lambs during the original Passover, but then (here Haydock quotes St. John Chrysostom) they became worse than they had been in Egypt, so more demons were able to enter. So, Jesus was not speaking in generalities, but referring to a specific event. Although, there is also a general application (Haydock quotes the Venerable Bede), which is that we must not rest on our laurels but always be vigilant. And also, be aware that demons will retaliate, there are specific prayers against this.
As for TLM attendance, anecdotally of course it does seem to be increasing or at least holding steady. “Thou openest thy hand, and fillest with blessing every living creature.”
It was a very practical sermon. Father connected Covid with the Church…in a good way. He stated that when people contracted the virus they went to the doctor or hospital to get medicine or treatment to heal their bodies.
The way he connected it to the Church was by saying when people sin, they need to come to church to get the medicine of the sacraments (Confession, Holy Eucharist) to heal their souls.
There was much more to it than that, but that’s the gist of it
At our NO mass Father spoke about how like the gardener with the fig tree, God gives us opportunities to cultivate and bear good fruit. The importance of getting right with God while we still have the chance in this life. If we haven’t been to confession in a while, we need to avail ourselves of this gift.
Saturday morning we had our weekly TLM which happened to be the feast of St. Joseph. When St. Joseph heard that Mary was with child his first reaction was a worldly one to divorce her quietly. But God had other plans and Joseph instead listened to God and chose His path to marry Mary and be the foster father of the Savior. An important lesson that we need to be like Joseph and discern what God’s will is for us and follow it.
Wow. at the 630p Latin ad orientem OF we got a strong memento mori, ending with a shortened version of this story, which pertains quite vividly to the Gospel of the day: https://onesmallrose.com/2021/07/22/the-conversion-of-father-steven-scheier/
Adoration, Vespers, Benediction before Mass and confessions went for 90 minutes before Mass until at least the offertory. for most of that time there were two priests available.
due to my aversion to driving after dark, i hadn’t been to 630 since October. it’s very well-attended, particularly by single young adults
while i am not a fan of disposable missals, this new one is a cut above those i’ve seen (the advisory board includes the illustrious Anthony Esolen fwiw)
https://www.sourceandsummit.com/missal
For the first time, my family and I visited the local Syro-Malankara Catholic parish. They are if the West Syrian Rite, as the Maronite Catholics are, but they have not compromised their Sacred Liturgy with modern Latinizations as many Maronite Catholic parishes have. The Holy Qurbono was truly heaven and Earth, and the young priest have a great homily on the gospel reading of the woman asking our Lord Jesus for the table scraps. Fr. said that he must always persevere in prayer, that our Lord will reward our great faith. Even when it seems like we are in impossible times, and our prayers are not heard the way that we want them to be carried out, if we persevere in that prayer we will be able to experience great joy.
The church was fairly full, as people are just starting to emerge more from COVID, but it’s the only Syro-Malankara Catholic parish around, so people drive great distances. If you are near such a parish, I highly recommend going. Such a beautiful, beautiful sacred liturgy, and they have not modernized hardly anything. I definitely plan to study this form of liturgy more, and participate in it more in the future.
Byzantine church so also Holy Cross. I don’t recall a word of the homily, but of 34 including 2 priests because one of our Jesuits was in town for a few days, we had 9 visitors, some local, others from out of state.
We learned in homily pt 2, aka announcements that Ukraine isn’t far away and affects us. Frs vestments are from Ukraine and he wonders how the maker is doing, does she have food and shelter. He doesn’t think that reliquaries like one he saw recently will ever be made in Ukraine again.
The Cantor at the Ukrainian Catholic church a mile and a half from us went to Ukraine last week as his mother is sick. He planned to return this week but may have to stay and fight.
The Ukrainian Orthodox church across the street behind that church is having a borscht dinner and fundraiser on Sunday and Fr told us to go. He doesn’t care if we like borscht. The 3 churches I mentioned and the Russian Orthodox church were founded by people from the Carpathian mountains; our ancestral Byzantine eparchy is in Ukraine.
The seminary of our Eparchy is near the Slovak border and has closed so they can teach children. Churches, restores, schools and any space they can house people are open to refugees.