On 6 August 2026 Card. Burke graciously recorded this video message for my readers during the annual Speculum Iustitiae conference held at the Shrine of Our Lady of Guadalupe near La Crosse, WI.
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“This blog is like a fusion of the Baroque ‘salon’ with its well-tuned harpsichord around which polite society gathered for entertainment and edification and, on the other hand, a Wild West “saloon” with its out-of-tune piano and swinging doors, where everyone has a gun and something to say. Nevertheless, we try to point our discussions back to what it is to be Catholic in this increasingly difficult age, to love God, and how to get to heaven.” – Fr. Z
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We are having a son, due in December. We are naming him Raymond Nazareth in honour of his Eminence and his defence of the family!
Off topic (with apologies to our reverend host, who should have been at least a monsignor by now), a link to an obviously heartfelt open letter to the Holy Father by Bishop Mutsaers, auxiliary bishop of ‘s-Hertogenbosch, The Netherlands. I think he says what needs to be said, and I think it is of interest to my fellow readers of this blog.
https://vitaminexp.blogspot.com/2026/08/open-letter-to-his-holiness-pope-leo-xiv.html
@EAW – Thank you so very much for posting this link to such an extraordinarily clear and precise exposition by a Catholic Bishop.
Some of ’em can and do speak plainly.
From the open letter (link above) from Bishop Mutsaers:
And [after Christ reveals himself at Emmaus], the disciples do not remain gathered endlessly in Emmaus to evaluate their walking experience. They get up. They return to Jerusalem. They go out to preach. The synodal process got stuck in Emmaus, and the question is whether they can still get out of there.
Oh, man, Francis wouldn’t have liked that comment. We’ll see how Leo responds (if at all), but since he is already publicly invested in synodality, it seems unlikely he’ll react positively.
Tactically, I think the good bishop made a mistake in referring to “traditional Catholics” as a locus of sound, reliable Catholicism to be upheld: the prelate-powers that moved Francis and Leo to the top don’t view that expression in that way. It is improbable that Leo will be different from those who advanced him.
Other than that, his letter is phenomenal.
Cardinal Burke: he sounds extremely old and/or quite ill and in need of oxygen. He’s a great man and a great bishop, but his time here is limited. We should pray for him.
Regarding the modern Church and one of the go-to’s of its modern agenda, an issue pushed as the very essence of the Church: evangelization. I have a question: how is it that with all the talk about “evangelization”, the Church in the West has pointedly ignored, marginalized, and LOST the largest readily evangelizable people, the children of Catholics. In America at least, for the 1st half of the 20th century, Catholic churches and schools had no real trouble making new, reliable, even fervent Catholics out of the children of Catholics. Since 196o, the Church has lost by the wayside fully 1/2 of all childred born to 2 Catholic parents, or even more than that. Why must we talk of evangelization outside of the family when we fail even the basic, ordinary task of evangelization INSIDE the family? A Church that cannot sustain ordinary Catholic schools is failing at evangelization, and a Church that cannot promise (and fulfill) that their schools actually teach Catholicism has no reason for existing (hence why so many good Catholics homeschool). Catholic colleges are even worse, all but about 10 of them subvert the faith of their Catholic students. Can someone hold bishops’ feet to the fire and tell them “we’ll believe you mean it on ‘evangelization’ when you make Catholic schools and universities Catholic again”?