#ASonnetADay – Sonnet 141. “In faith, I do not love thee with mine eyes…”

Posted on 11 April 2021 by Fr. John Zuhlsdorf

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Man who identifies as a woman wants to be admitted to a convent of Poor Clares. Good idea?

Posted on 10 April 2021 by Fr. John Zuhlsdorf

I picked up from Elizabeth Johnston that, according to media in Belgium, a man who identifies as a woman wants to be admitted to a convent of Poor Clares.

Great idea, right?  What could go wrong?

Actually, now that I think about it, the Jesuits and a lot of other religious orders… heck… and dioceses have been admitting effeminate men to the ranks and absolutely nothing has gone wrong with that right?

As an now retired bishop once told me, warning me about a few priests of the diocese waaaay back in the day,

“There are old women of both sexes.”

The other day I saw a good piece at Crisis penned by women who want men to be men.   Good idea.  As a matter of fact, there’s no way out of the spiral of disaster we are in until that happens.

 

Posted in The Coming Storm, The future and our choices | Tagged ,
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#ASonnetADay – SONNET 140. “Be wise as thou art cruel; do not press…”

Posted on 9 April 2021 by Fr. John Zuhlsdorf

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Is there ice on Mars? It seems that, yes, there is.

Posted on 9 April 2021 by Fr. John Zuhlsdorf

Is there ice on Mars?

It seems that, yes, there is.

The European Space Agency has released a photo of what they say is water ice in an unnamed crater in Vastitas Borealis near the pole of Mars.  (I love Martian names … Vastitas Borealis … rather like my first seminary).

Perhaps one should inaugurate a new cocktail in honor of this Martian Water…. L’Esprit de Mars!

Posted in Just Too Cool, Look! Up in the sky! | Tagged
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10-13 June – Guadalajara – Summorum Pontificum Conference

Posted on 9 April 2021 by Fr. John Zuhlsdorf

The FSSP will have a great event in Guadalajara.  10-13 June.

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Daily Rome Shot 126

Posted on 9 April 2021 by Fr. John Zuhlsdorf

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#ASonnetADay – SONNET 139. “O call not me to justify the wrong…”

Posted on 8 April 2021 by Fr. John Zuhlsdorf

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Daily Rome Shot 125

Posted on 8 April 2021 by Fr. John Zuhlsdorf

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ASK FATHER: Can we eat meat on Friday in the Octave of Easter?

Posted on 8 April 2021 by Fr. John Zuhlsdorf

We are now in the Easter Octave – Happy Easter! Let’s get out in front of this before the calendar clicks over to Friday

From a reader…

QUAERITUR:

My wife and I recently returned to the traditional Friday abstinence from meat year round.

Traditionally, would the Friday abstinence from meat also apply during Fridays of the whole Easter season?

What about just the octave?

Congratulations for wanting to adhere to the traditional practices.  Kudos.

You’ve asked a good question.

Here is canon 1251:

Can. 1251 Abstinence from meat, or from some other food as determined by the Episcopal Conference, is to be observed on all Fridays, unless a solemnity should fall on a Friday. Abstinence and fasting are to be observed on Ash Wednesday and Good Friday.

The days of the Octave of Easter are celebrated as Solemnities (in the Novus Ordo calendar).    Therefore, there is no obligation for Catholics for the Friday abstinence on this coming Friday.

Note well that the other Fridays of Eastertide are not Solemnities.  The relief from abstinence applies only to the Friday in the Octave of Easter.

BTW… this does not apply to the Octave of Christmas, for those days of that Octave are not counted as “Solemnities” as are those of the Easter Octave.

This is how the 1983 Code of Canon Law handles Friday in the Octave of Easter, and this applies also to those who prefer the Extraordinary Form (which did not have “Solemnities”).

As far as other Fridays are concerned, outside the Octave of Easter or some other Solemnity, you can ask your parish priest to dispense you or commute your act of penance.

Can. 1245 Without prejudice to the right of diocesan bishops mentioned in can. 87, for a just cause and according to the prescripts of the diocesan bishop, a pastor [parish priest] can grant in individual cases a dispensation from the obligation of observing a feast day or a day of penance or can grant a commutation of the obligation into other pious works. A superior of a religious institute or society of apostolic life, if they are clerical and of pontifical right, can also do this in regard to his own subjects and others living in the house day and night.

Abstinence from meat has good reasoning behind it. For some, however, abstinence from other things can be of great spiritual effect.

Certainly you would never abstain from reading this blog… or from ordering…

 

Posted in "How To..." - Practical Notes, 1983 CIC can. 915, ASK FATHER Question Box, Our Catholic Identity | Tagged , , ,
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BOOK: Mysteries of the Lord’s Prayer

Posted on 8 April 2021 by Fr. John Zuhlsdorf

Lo those many years ago in Rome, I was in school studying the Fathers of the Church (Patristics) with one of the fine young Jesuits who are rising up in many places.

I just received a new book by this good Jesuit.

Mysteries of the Lord’s Prayer: Wisdom from the Early Church by John Gavin, SJ.

US HERE – UK HERE

The writer, Fr. Gavin, offers a “new way of reflecting on the Lord’s Prayer” which is actually ancient.

Fr. Gavin digs into ancient, Patristic commentaries on the Our Father, which are amazing.  He looks at the different petitions of the Prayer and approaches each one from the point of view on an aporia, or “problems”.  For example, recently we heard about how in Italy the liturgical version of the Lord’s Prayer was changed so as to deal with the aporia about the petition “lead us not into temptation”.  Does God lead us into temptation?  What does that mean?

Another… if God is God, ultimately transcendent, beyond all imagining, how is it that we can call God “Father”?

I’ve just received this and I’ve done some spot reading here and there.  This is really an exciting book.

One reason I like it is because Fr. Gavin is doing something that Pope Benedict XVI said needed to be done in his introduction to his first volume of Jesus of Nazareth.   For a long time in Biblical scholarship, “technicians” (my word) have been interpreting scripture.   You cannot simply apply tools of modern scholarship, such as the historical-critical method, form criticism, etc., to Scripture without also concerning yourself with the who behind each word.  Papa Ratzinger asks us, in his preface, to reconnect with Scripture in a way closer to that the of early Fathers of the Church.  Put another way, the Fathers are important now especially because they reconnect us with a way of reading Scripture.  They teach us how to read the Bible anew.

Therefore, Fr. Gavin’s book is a great contribution.  He brings in the primary sources of the Fathers to help us gain more from our own praying of Christ’s prayer, which we say so often.

Get a copy for yourself and your parish priest.  Then pay attention to see if it affects his preaching!

Posted in Patristiblogging, REVIEWS | Tagged , , ,
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