Fr. Z's Blog | Catholic commentary by Fr. John Zuhlsdorf

Your Sunday Sermon Notes

Posted on 9 February 2014 by Fr. John Zuhlsdorf

Was there a GOOD point in the sermon you heard for your Sunday Mass of obligation?

Let us know the good stuff, please.

Also, be sure to check out Your Urgent Prayer Requests.

Posted in SESSIUNCULA |
42 Comments

Legatus: Day 2

Posted on 8 February 2014 by Fr. John Zuhlsdorf

The theme of pretty much the whole day yesterday was: courage. We have to be courageous now and stand up for what we believe, for the Enemy is not going to relent.

Last night Archbp. Chaput was the celebrant for Mass. He contrasted the figures of King David and King Herod.

This is what the members of Legatus recite after Mass.

I had a good chat with Sen. Santorum, who was the speaker last night.

After supper I was pleased to meet up with one of the favorites of the Fishwrap, Michael Novak.

Many of the people who were on the Legatus pilgrimage last October are here.

Michael Coren is here this morning.

He’s amusing and the Canada jokes are coming in a steady stream.

He has taken well-deserved shots at Bob Newhart.

I also enjoyed the line, “Some people call me the Bill O’Reilly of Canada, but that’s not true. I’m Catholic.”

UPDATE

There are some good exhibits, as you might expect. Wyoming Catholic College still has my favorite item.

UPDATE

I have been chewing the rag with quite a few people this morning.

For example I got to catch up with Fr Frank Pavone and hear what Priests For Life is up to.

UPDATE

John Smeaton of SPUC is on fire.

He said the more bishops should imitate the bishops if Nigeria in their strong opposition to the homosexualist agenda.

Now he is on Ireland passing anti-life legislation.

“Barbarians”

Posted in On the road, SESSIUNCULA, What Fr. Z is up to | Tagged Legatus
56 Comments

Cookoo for Cocoa Popes!

Posted on 6 February 2014 by Fr. John Zuhlsdorf

Someone went ahead and carved a life-size Pope Francis out of chocolate.

No, really.

Yes, people in their zeal to honor the Holy Father sometimes do odd things.

“But Father! But Father!”, some of you are saying, “That chocolate should have been melted down and given to the poor!”

Who wants to bet on where this chocolate will eventually wind up.

Distributed to children on the periphery of Roma? To street people? Auctioned off? Given to heads of state when they visit? Perhaps some could be sent to the LCWR nuns, to sweeten them up a bit.

Posted in Francis, Lighter fare, SESSIUNCULA | Tagged chocolate
31 Comments

QUAERITUR: Why not Sacrament of Anointing before execution?

Posted on 6 February 2014 by Fr. John Zuhlsdorf

From a reader…

QUAERITUR:

In my Religion book by Fr. Laux, “Mass and the Sacraments”, he says without any explanation that soldiers going into battle and criminals before execution cannot receive Extreme Unction. I get the soldiers part, but why can’t the criminals receive Extreme Unction? I also read somewhere that they receive it AFTER death… This sounds weird to me and I’m really confused now.

The law is pretty clear.

Can. 1004 §1. The anointing of the sick can be administered to a member of the faithful who, having reached the use of reason, begins to be in danger due to sickness or old age.

This doesn’t say execution or about to engage in battle or some other activity like driving in a NASCAR race.

And there is the Catechism of the Catholic Church:

1514 “The anointing of the sick is not a sacrament for those only who are at the point of death. Hence, as soon as anyone of the faithful begins to be in danger of deathfrom sickness or old age, the fitting time for him to receive this sacrament has certainly already arrived.”

Common points? Danger of death… sick and old age.

One can be in danger of death for many reasons. For example, someone who is about to undergo surgery requiring a general anesthesia could be in danger of death. People about to be executed or go into battle are in danger of death. Those are not occasions for the sacrament because they are external to the person. Once damage is inflicted through a wound and danger of death is obvious, that’s another matter.

Soldiers and those to be executed ought to be given the opportunity to make their confession, receive Viaticum, hear the commendation of the soul, and so forth.

Some of you might be saying “But Father! But Father! You must really hate Vatican II! Vatican II did away with rules. Pope Francis said so! All sacraments should be given to everyone all the time. You make me cry. I need to be anointed now.”

Look. Bending law on the level of wearing blue vestments on a Marian feast is one thing. Administration of sacraments is another.

Posted in "How To..." - Practical Notes, ASK FATHER Question Box, Liturgy Science Theatre 3000, Our Catholic Identity | Tagged anointing of the sick, execution, Extreme Unction, Sacrament of Anointing
38 Comments

Are the aging-hippies burying Benedict’s legacy?

Posted on 6 February 2014 by Fr. John Zuhlsdorf

I have written a few times about the priest in the Diocese of Brentwood, UK, a man of a certain age who – inexplicably – was in charge of the diocesan liturgy office, who sent a letter to The Tablet (aka RU-486) and the priests of his diocese claiming that they could set aside the current ICEL English translation of the Roman Missal and go back to the 1973 version. His arguments were risible. The letter was imprudent, defiant, crass. HERE

I also posted Fr. John Hunwick’s good comments. HERE

Fr. Hunwicke has another go at poor Brentwood Butler and raises some questions about the legacy of Benedict XVI. HERE

Inter alia, Father H reminds us of those people who proposed to wait Benedict out, wait for a new dawn and new pontificate, and then trash-can everything Benedict did.

Plausible?

Sure. But unlikely.

The enemies of Benedict’s vision at at their end. They might think they have the big mo right now. They may be emboldened. What they will try, they will attempt in vain.

They may try to roll back what Benedict set in motion, or the good things he ratified from his predecessor. They will fail.

There is a new generation rising up who have no time for their bitter retrograde agenda.

Now is not the time to be discouraged or to back down or to lose vigor. Press forward. The Biological Solution (which works on all of us) is at work on the aging-hippies. In finem citius! Yes, they are still influential, but they see the dusk closing around them.

Posted in SESSIUNCULA | Tagged Benedict XVI, Biological Solution, Fr. John Hunwicke, translation
18 Comments

Mr. President? REALLY?

Posted on 6 February 2014 by Fr. John Zuhlsdorf

This morning The First Gay President addressed the National Prayer Breakfast. [UPDATE: Text HERE.]

Two take away lines:

“[T]he killing of innocents is never fulfilling God’s will.”

“[F]reedom of religion matters to our national security.”

Really?

To paraphrase Mary McCarthy, but only slightly:

Every word he says is a lie, including “and” and “the”.

Posted in Emanations from Penumbras, Liberals, Self-absorbed Promethean Neopelagians, The Drill, The future and our choices, The Last Acceptable Prejudice, What are they REALLY saying?, You must be joking! | Tagged abortion, contraception, HHS mandate, National Prayer Breakfast, Pres. Obama, religious freedom, The First Gay President
22 Comments

Yucking it up in church. Wherein Fr. Z rants.

Posted on 6 February 2014 by Fr. John Zuhlsdorf

Most of our churches are consecrated. They are holy places. Their walls are anointed with chrism. They have been given a name. They are sacred places. Within their walls we participate in the most sacred act we little humans can be privileged to witness, which God Himself gave us to renew, before which the angels themselves bow and worship: the Holy Mass which is the Sacrifice of the Cross.

In Washington DC you find the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier. An elite corps, the Old Guard, maintain watch at the Tomb. They preserve the decorum of the place. They correct people who do not maintain proper decorum.

Here is a video of one of the sentinels silencing people who are talking loudly and laughing near the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier, crossing over the chains and boundaries, remaining seated when they can stand.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1mzTsCN7mNs&feature=player_embedded

Remember this video, you … you… church-blabbers… when you yuk-it-up or shoot-the-breeze in your parish church, when you slap each other on the backs at the “sign of peace”or refuse to kneel when able, when you troop up into the sanctuary itself as if it were a Dunkin’ Donuts shop.

Sorry… am I not being fluffy enough for you? “Time’s have changed!”, you say?

I don’t think so.

If this level of decorum is expected at an outdoor secular tomb, how much more should we expect decorum within the hallowed walls of the place where Mass is offered?

Reason #75 for Summorum Pontificum.

Posted in Hard-Identity Catholicism, Our Catholic Identity, SUMMORUM PONTIFICUM, The future and our choices, Wherein Fr. Z Rants | Tagged consecrated ground, SUMMORUM PONTIFICUM, talking in church, The Old Guard, Tomb of the Unknown Soldier
66 Comments

Irony abounds

Posted on 5 February 2014 by Fr. John Zuhlsdorf

I saw an e-cigarette for the first time the other day. At least I saw one close up and knew what it was. A little strange. Apparently they help people stop smoking. That’s good, right?

Lo and behold, today I had a message that CVS drugstores has decided to take a principled stand and not sell them.

Fine. They can sell or not sell whatever they choose. If I don’t like that (and I don’t care), I can go to a different store.

What I found ironic in the story is that The First Gay President, Pres. Obama, praised the decision. See the TIME article, HERE.

CVS announced Wednesday that the pharmacy will stop selling cigarettes and other tobacco products in its 7,600 stores by October, a decision that could cost the drug retailer as much as $2 billion in annual sales. The move was cheered by public health advocates and federal officials, including President Barack Obama, a former smoker, who called CVS’s decision a “powerful example.”

Read the whole statement HERE. Obama is chuffed that CVS agrees with him.

So, let’s get this straight. CVS has values that it wants to uphold: don’t sell anything like cigarettes, because they can hurt people and we don’t want to cooperate in hurting people. Buy them from someone else! CVS is praised by the President for taking a principled stand according to what they believe in. After all, nicotine is bad for you, right? “Isn’t CVS wonderful?”

BUT… the Little Sister of the Poor and Hobby Lobby and other Christian groups believe in something too. They have taken a principled stand for what they believe in. They don’t want to sell things that might hurt babies, right? Buy them from someone else! Obama (whose values include voting in favor of infanticide before he moved to the White House) and his HHS machine threaten them with fines, force them into courts, saying “You can’t force your values on other people! You MUST provide things you object to!”

Posted in Liberals | Tagged e-cigarettes, HHS mandate, irony, Obama Administration, White House
16 Comments

Will the Holy See ever wake up about the United Nations?

Posted on 5 February 2014 by Fr. John Zuhlsdorf

Let me get this straight.

While berating the Catholic Church for sexual abuse of children, the United Nations criticized the Church for opposing legalization of abortion… the ultimate child abuse… and wants the Church to change her teachings.

I had an email from C-FAM with these two items:

Vatican Blasts UN Committee That Asks Church To Change Teaching on Abortion and Homosexuality

[…]

UNESCO Report Promotes Abortion and Same-Sex Narrative

[…]

What I wouldn’t give to see the Holy See stop panting with its tongue lolling out after the UN as the world’s forum for “justice and peace”.

Will the Holy See ever wake up and see that the UN is Planned Parenthood on a global scale?

Posted in SESSIUNCULA | Tagged abortion, sexual abuse of children, United Nations
54 Comments

Overlord State put us in FEMA camps? Nahhh… it’ll never happen. Well… maybe never…

Posted on 5 February 2014 by Fr. John Zuhlsdorf

From ABC:

Scalia Says Internment Ruling Could Happen Again

U.S. Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia told law students at the University of Hawaii on Monday that the nation’s highest court was wrong to uphold the internment of Japanese-Americans during World War II, but he wouldn’t be surprised if the court issued a similar ruling during a future conflict.

Scalia was responding to a question about the court’s 1944 decision in Korematsu v. United States, which upheld the convictions of Gordon Hirabayashi and Fred Korematsu for violating an order to report to an internment camp.

“Well of course Korematsu was wrong. And I think we have repudiated in a later case. But you are kidding yourself if you think the same thing will not happen again,” Scalia told students and faculty during a lunchtime Q-and-A session.

Scalia cited a Latin expression meaning, “In times of war, the laws fall silent.” [“Silent enim leges inter arma.” Cicero, Pro Milone. Scalia referred to this in 2004 in Hamdi v. Rumsfeld about detention of US citzen without charge or suspension of habeas corpus. All some administration has to do is claim that there is a need. But first they have to disarm you.]

“That’s what was going on — the panic about the war and the invasion of the Pacific and whatnot. That’s what happens. It was wrong, but I would not be surprised to see it happen again, in time of war. It’s no justification, but it is the reality,” he said.

[…]