Fr. Z's Blog | Formerly entitled: "What Does The Prayer Really Say?" – Clear, straight commentary on Catholic issues, liturgy and life by Fr. John Zuhlsdorf o{]:¬)

A new “manifesto” in Rome urging prayers for the Pope

Posted on 4 December 2017 by Fr. John Zuhlsdorf

Do you remember that, no too long ago, some wags in Rome clandestinely slapped up some posters “manifesti” on the walls of Rome addressing themselves – in the Roman way – to Pope Francis? The posters were hurriedly removed.

Now I read from Marco Tosatti that there are new “manifesti”, small in format, with various petitions.

The manifesto features a smiling Francis surrounded by a Rosary and these petitions (my translations and comments):

perché Roma torni alla fede [That Rome return to the faith]
perché la Madonna venga prima di Lutero [That Mary come before Luther – a reference surely to the horrid stamp from the Vatican Post featuring Luther and Melanchthon beneath the Cross]
perché la fede venga prima della politica [that faith come before politics]
perché Pannella e Bonino non siano più additati come esempi [that Pannella and Bonino not be taken as exemplary – The former is the architect of divorce laws, the later infamously pro-abortion.]
perché il papa torni a parlare con i cardinali prima che con i giornalisti [that the Pope starts again to speak with cardinals before journalists – surely a reference to the Four Dubia Cardinals v. superannuated Communist editor Eugenio Scarfari.]
perché il papa non perseguiti sacerdoti e ordini religiosi che non gli piacciono [that the Pope not persecute priests and religious orders that he doesn’t like – perhaps referring to the 3 CDF officials that were sacked and also to the Franciscan Friars of the Immaculate – today I read at Rorate that their sisters are forbidden now to accept postulants. HERE]
perché il papa non taccia davanti a chi combatte famiglia e vita. [that the Pope not remain silent towards those who fight for the family and for life – If I recall, the March for Life in Rome got a cool reception from His Holiness]

The essential message is clear: pray for the Rosary for Pope Francis.

There’s nothing wrong with that.

Put this together with the posters of last February and also with TODAY’s release of the sharply critical book, in Italian and now in English, by the pseudoanonymous “Marcantonio Colonna”, The Dictator Pope (more about that HERE and buy today in English US HERE – UK HERE), and you see that resistance is rising towards, at least, those who surround the Pope and towards the Pope himself.

And wasn’t there an incident in Rome recently involving a truck with a billboard about the late Card. Caffara, which was shushed away from the area around Vatican City?

REMEMBER: As I wrote the other day,

Most of you do not have to read this stuff. Some of us do. Most do not. Be wary, in yourself, of the vice of curiositas. Yes, there is a kind of “curiosity” which leads to sin.

This manifesto, however, frames the problems in prayers. Is it critical of the Pope? The petitions are clearly also statements of discontent with the present state of affairs.

It is always good to pray for the Pope.

Posted in Francis, The Coming Storm, The Drill, The future and our choices, What are they REALLY saying? | Tagged manifesto, Marco Tosatti, Pope Francis
8 Comments

Just Too Cool! Voyager fires its thrusters for the first time in 37 years.

Posted on 3 December 2017 by Fr. John Zuhlsdorf

Recently I re-watched the movie The Martian, which is also a novel. [US HERE – UK HERE I understand that the author has a new book out.] I find it inspiring.

We encounter challenges. We work the problems. We face our greatest challenge, our salvation, alone.

We can get advice from others, but we really are alone in working out our salvation with fear and trembling, close to but distant from others. The character in the movie faces a lot of challenges alone.

We all, on the other hand, for our spiritual lives have the help of angels and saints and of actual graces!

In a sense, in this life, we are all in this together and we have to help each other out, for the love of God and neighbor. But when it comes down to responsibility for our actions, when it comes to our Judgment… we face those things by ourselves and stand alone before the Just Judge.

Speaking of being alone, I spotted this nifty story at Space.com. “The Martian”, in the movie and book, uses old technology (a couple of different kinds) to overcome his challenges. So, too, those who handle Voyager.

Voyager 1 Just Fired Up its Backup Thrusters for the 1st Time in 37 Years

NASA’s far-flung Voyager 1 spacecraft has taken its backup thrusters out of mothballs.

Voyager 1 hadn’t used its four “trajectory correction maneuver” (TCM) thrusters since November 1980, during the spacecraft’s last planetary flyby — an epic encounter with Saturn. But mission team members fired them up again Tuesday (Nov. 28), to see whether the TCM thrusters were still ready for primetime.

The little engines passed the test with flying colors, NASA officials said.

“The Voyager team got more excited each time with each milestone in the thruster test,” Todd Barber, a propulsion engineer at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) in Pasadena, California, said in a statement. “The mood was one of relief, joy and incredulity after witnessing these well-rested thrusters pick up the baton as if no time had passed at all.”

[…]

“The Voyager flight team dug up decades-old data and examined the software that was coded in an outdated assembler language, to make sure we could safely test the thrusters,” Chris Jones, chief engineer at JPL, said in the same statement.

[…]

Interesting.

How about an analogy.

The hotshots who handle Voyager dug up stuff from way back in the probes past and used it creatively to give new live to the spacecraft.

Even as we see now that the Catholic Church is, demographically dying in these wealthy USA, and she is being shoved farther and farther to the periphery, some bishops and priests are injecting new life into their flocks through the rediscovery of tradition.

We can benefit a great deal from the past. We must be careful not to rush to scrap things that some claim are obsolete.

Also…

GO TO CONFESSION!

Posted in Four Last Things, Just Too Cool, Look! Up in the sky! | Tagged The Martian, Voyager
10 Comments

ASK FATHER: How can I approach my Bishop about getting a Traditional Latin Mass?

Posted on 2 December 2017 by Fr. John Zuhlsdorf

From a reader…

QUAERITUR:

How can I approach my Bishop about getting us a Traditional Latin Mass because I keep running from one parish to another looking for Holy Mass?

It has been some 10 years now since Summorum Pontificum, Benedict XVI’s “Emancipation Proclamation”. In that juridical document, Benedict said that the Roman Rite is in two forms. If priests have faculties to say Mass, they can choose either form without any additional permissions. Furthermore, Benedict said that pastors of parishes can, on their own, implement the Traditional Latin Mass (Extraordinary Form) in their parishes without any additional permissions from the bishop.

It has been 10 years since this is the law, and people still ask about getting the bishop to do something.

Getting the bishop to do something is only a concern when your parish priests are uncooperative.

You, first, go to your parish priests and work with them.

Make sure that you have a group of people who want this and are – this is important – willing and able to do all the work it takes to organize and train servers, buy and care for vestments, books, altar cards, etc.

Be willing to spend the money to send a priest to get some training if he cannot get it locally.

Keep in mind that priests who don’t know Latin and who don’t have experience of the older, traditional form can be really intimidated by the prospect of learning it. Also, some priests of a certain age have an irrational, knee-jerk hostility toward it.

You have to learn to be diplomats.

Think ahead. Think strategically. Keep your goals in mind and then find ways to achieve them without working against yourselves. Always consider: “What’s the best way to accomplish X?”, and then avoid what will undermine your objective.

Step up and be involved in the life of the parish all around. Be visible, active, helpful, and cheerful.

Do NOT give the priest the impression that you are trying to create a division in the parish.

Remember that priests have a lot to do. If you come at them with something that sounds hard and complicated and time consuming, and if you are pushy or arrogant about it, you might not achieve your goal.

The bottom line is get organized and work with the priest.

If the priest – over time – is uncooperative then you can have recourse to the bishop and the Pontifical Commission Ecclesia Dei.

It might be helpful here were some of the readers to share their success stories (underscoring what worked) and also the defeat stories (underscoring where they may have put their foot wrong).

And if you get what you want, please, please, please don’t lord it over anyone else or run down the Novus Ordo or put on airs.

I know one parish where a small group who prefer the TLM are starting to be jerks about it. So the pastor tells me.

KNOCK IT OFF.

Posted in "How To..." - Practical Notes, ASK FATHER Question Box, Liturgy Science Theatre 3000, SUMMORUM PONTIFICUM | Tagged SUMMORUM PONTIFICUM
9 Comments

“Perhaps we have arrived at the End Times.”

Posted on 1 December 2017 by Fr. John Zuhlsdorf

At the UK’s best Catholic weekly, the Catholic Herald, there is an interview with His Eminence, Raymond Leo Card. Burke.

‘Perhaps we have arrived at the End Times’: an interview with Cardinal Burke

[…]

CARDINAL RAYMOND BURKE In the present moment there is confusion and error about the most fundamental teachings of the Church, for example with regard to marriage and the family. For instance, the idea that people who are living in an irregular union could receive the sacraments is a violation of the truth with regard both to the indissolubility of marriage and to the sanctity of the Eucharist.

St Paul tells us in his First Letter to the Corinthians that before we approach to receive the Body of Christ, we have to examine ourselves, or we eat our condemnation by receiving the Eucharist in an unworthy way. Now the confusion in the Church is going even further than that, because there is today confusion as to whether there are acts which are intrinsically evil and this, of course, is the foundation of the moral law. When this foundation begins to be questioned within the Church, then the whole order of human life and the order of the Church itself are endangered.

So there is a feeling that in today’s world that is based on secularism with a completely anthropocentric approach, by which we think we can create our own meaning of life and meaning of the family and so on, the Church itself seems to be confused. In that sense one may have the feeling that the Church gives the appearance of being unwilling to obey the mandates of Our Lord. Then perhaps we have arrived at the End Times.

[…]

He is also asked about the “formal correction” in regard to the Dubia. He explains his present appointments. He opines about the first thing that any new Pope should do.

Card. Burke has called our times “realistically apocalyptic”.

Our Lord explained signs that would precede the End and His Second Coming (which we look for when we say Holy Mass ad orientem. He describes those harrowing times. We heard the Gospel reading in the EF last Sunday. Also, the Lord said:

When it is evening, you say, It will be fair weather, for the sky is red. And in the morning: Today there will be a storm, for the sky is red and lowering. You know then how to discern the face of the sky: and can you not know the signs of the times?

Paul wrote to Timothy:

For there shall be a time, when they will not endure sound doctrine; but, according to their own desires, they will heap to themselves teachers, having itching ears: And will indeed turn away their hearing from the truth, but will be turned unto fables.

Since the Ascension of the Lord, Christians have known and deeply felt that we are in the “end times”. Sometimes that feeling is stronger than others. It is almost as if it rushes towards us and then – something happens to hold it off just a little longer.

Once there were Masses and Acts of Reparation. People offered their pains. Convents of religious did penance and adored the Blessed Sacrament in silence. Our Lady appeared with dire warnings but also with descriptions of what we were to do.

Now there are many many fewer of all these things, and Our Lady was not heeded.

Who knows how these factors, back in the day, held us back from the apocalyptic tipping point.

Who knows how the blasphemies and sacrileges, the indifference, is escatologically hurtling us to the end.

Here I will track back to what I have written before, long ago now, as a kind of manifesto.

Save The Liturgy – Save The World (2007)

The Eucharist, its celebration and itself as the extraordinary Sacrament, is the “source and summit of Christian life”.

If we really believe that, then we must also hold that what we do in church, what we believe happens in a church, makes an enormous difference.

Do we believe the consecration really does something? Or, do we believe what is said and how, what the gestures are and the attitude in which they made are entirely indifferent? For example, will a choice not to kneel before Christ the King and Judge truly present in each sacred Host, produce a wider effect?

If you throw a stone, even a pebble, into a pool it produces ripples which expand to its edge. The way we celebrate Mass must create spiritual ripples in the Church and the world.

So does our good or bad reception of Holy Communion.

So must violations of rubrics and irreverence.

Mass is not merely a “teaching moment” or a “celebration of unity” or a “tedious obligation”. Our choice of music, architecture, ceremonies and language affect more than one small congregation in one building. We are interconnected in both our common human nature and in baptism. When we sin we hurt the whole Body of Christ the Church.

If that is true for sin, it must also be true for our liturgical choices. They must also have personal and corporate impact. Any Mass can be offered for the intentions of the living or the dead.

Not even death is an obstacle to the efficacy of Holy Mass.

Celebrate Mass well, participate properly – affect the whole world. Celebrate poorly – affect the whole world.

In each age since Christ’s Ascension, people have felt they were in the End Times. They were right. In any moment, when the conditions are right, the Lord could return.

Considering what is happening in the world now, I am pushed to think about the way Mass is being celebrated, even the number of Masses being celebrated. Once there were many communities of contemplatives, spending time before the Blessed Sacrament or in contemplation, in collective and in private prayer. There were many more Masses.

Many more people went to confession.

Who can know how they all lifted burdens from the world and turned large and small tides by their prayers to God for mercy and in reparation for sin?

A single droplet of Christ’s Precious Blood consecrated at Holy Mass is the price of every soul ever created in God’s unfathomable plan.

So I repeat:

Posted in Four Last Things, Hard-Identity Catholicism, Our Catholic Identity, The Coming Storm, The future and our choices, Turn Towards The Lord | Tagged Apocalypse, End Times, Raymond Card. Burke, Save The Liturgy Save The World
10 Comments

ACTION ITEM! Help a true contributor to TLM causes after horrible vandalism

Posted on 1 December 2017 by Fr. John Zuhlsdorf

This HORRIBLE news just arrived.

SPORCH needs you now. HERE

Keep in mind that this nice lady, Mary, whom I’ve met, has through her efforts made it possible for many priests to have beautiful materials for Holy Mass in the Extraordinary Form.

In her own way, her business is as helpful for the promotion of the Extraordinary Form as those who, say, teach priests how to say it. Beauty attracts people. Beauty helps the priest.

Read this. GRRRRRR!!!!

Last Saturday night, vandals smashed their way into the offices of SPORCH (Society for Preserving Our Roman Catholic Heritage). [Among other things, she makes the super useful “travel” altar cards for the TLM. For example HERE] The police have little sign of attempted theft or any apparent rationale for the crime – all evidence points simply to a malicious intent to inflict damage. To add insult to injury, the vandals ruptured the plumbing to flood the building after wreaking havoc on its contents. Here’s a photo of two statues that had been knocked to the ground and desecrated – your readers will note it was the faces of the rare and historic matching set of century-old statues Our Lord and Our Lady below that were attacked: [below]

On your blog you have displayed beautiful examples of the work done by my friend Mary, the founder and operator of SPORCH. [Many times. Beautiful things.] For years, as a non-profit labor of love, Mary has created reproductions of altar cards and travel altar cards for the traditional Latin mass. She also restores traditional Catholic art, with the intent of getting it back into circulation. Altarpieces, statues, and all manner of pieces she has salvaged from demolished churches have been returned to use around the nation. Many priests and seminarians around the globe have been the beneficiaries of Mary’s generosity, including Cardinal Burke, who has publicly praised her work.
This vandalism was very costly, and Mary is now struggling to rebuild. I happen to know she relies almost entirely on donations (including her own contributions from her unrelated “day job” earnings) to keep the non-profit SPORCH viable. [Did you get that?]
Would you please ask your readers to pray for the conversion of the vandals, who have as of yet not been apprehended, and that Mary will have all necessary help in repairing and replacing her equipment and inventory, including care of the statues pictured? Below is a link to her donation page – I hope and pray that your readers will be very generous in assisting. Perhaps we can turn this sacrilege, which so saddens our hearts, into something positive. Donations are tax-deductible. Thank you and God bless you and all of your readers!

Everyone, in your charity, please send a donation, even if it must be small.

Many small donations will have a considerable impact and there are many of you.

Look at this and weep.

It’s hard to look at, knowing that it was done in malice.

Random? Part of The Coming Storm?

It feels like a microcosm of so much that is going on in the world and… in the Church.

Fight back.

Let’s help her get things going again. Young priests and seminarians are going to need what she makes. Please please please.

Donations are tax-deductible

>>HERE<<

Posted in ACTION ITEM!, Cri de Coeur, The Coming Storm, The Drill, The Last Acceptable Prejudice | Tagged SPORCH, vandalism
9 Comments

FOLLOW UP: Traditional Confirmations in Madison

Posted on 29 November 2017 by Fr. John Zuhlsdorf

On Tuesday 28 November in Madison, the Extraordinary Ordinary confirmed using the traditional Roman Rite. There were quite a few confirmands. We had people from Kansas, Minnesota, Maryland and North Carolina along with folks from area.

We started with a Solemn Mass, a Votive of the Holy Spirit.

After which His Excellency came in and confirmed.

He was in good humor after. It is a cheering moment, to tell the truth. How wonderful and encouraging it is to see all these good people receive the great sacrament of Confirmation.

Posted in "How To..." - Practical Notes, Just Too Cool, Liturgy Science Theatre 3000, What Fr. Z is up to | Tagged Bp. Morlino, D. Madison, The Extraordinary Ordinary
5 Comments

Previous unknown letter of Sr. Lucia to Pope Paul VI: “diabolical revolt”

Posted on 28 November 2017 by Fr. John Zuhlsdorf

I just read at CWR a fascinating piece about a newly revealed letter of the last seer of Fatime, Sr. Lucia, to Pope Paul VI predicting dire things for the Church.

It is in interview with the author Kevin Symonds who has a new book called: On the Third Part of the Secret of Fatima – US HERE – UK HERE

Now CWR article:

The Third Secret of Fatima and the “Hermeneutic of Conspiracy”

“I am convinced that we are entering into a new phase of Fatima’s history,” says the author of a new book on the controversial Third Secret of Fatima.

Kevin J. Symonds (kevinsymonds.com) is the author of the recently published On the Third Part of the Secret of Fatima (En Route Books and Media, 2017), which offers a scholarly challenge to those who claim the existence of a yet-unrevealed text of the third part of the secret of Fatima, given to Sr. Lucia de Jesus dos Santos by the Blessed Virgin Mary in 1917. In response to the publication of his book, Symonds was invited by Angelus Press to debate Fatima controversialist Christopher Ferrara at the traditionalist publisher’s annual conference in October.

In the following interview with CWR’s Matthew Cullinan Hoffman, Symonds discusses his research on key issues of controversy in the debate over the text of the Third Secret, and his recent debate with Ferrara. He also reveals the existence of a heretofore unknown letter from Sr. Lucia to Pope Paul VI regarding a “diabolical revolt” against the Church that seems to refer to themes from both the second and third parts of the secret.

[…]

Symonds: In June, I visited the Sr. Lucia museum in Coimbra, which is overseen by the Carmelites of Coimbra, Sr. Lucia’s convent. On display was the first page of an unpublished and undated letter of Sr. Lucia to Pope Paul VI. She wrote him a beautiful, encouraging letter that was similar to one that St. Pio [of Pietrelcina] wrote to the Holy Father in September 1968.

In her letter, Sr. Lucia spoke about a “diabolical revolt” that was being “promoted by the powers of darkness” with “errors” being made against God, his Church, her doctrines and dogmas. She said the Church was going through an “agony in Gethsemane” and that there was a “worldwide disorientation that is martyring the Church.” She wrote to encourage Paul VI as the Vicar of Christ on earth and to tell him of her and others’ steadfastness to him, to Christ and his Church, in the midst of the revolt. Perhaps I am biased, having studied the third part of the secret, but I was struck by how similar Sr. Lucia’s discourse appeared to the second and third parts.

[…]

There’s a lot more.

There’s also a roundup at LifeSite.

Posted in Our Solitary Boast, The Drill | Tagged Fatima, Kevin Symonds, Paul VI, Sr. Lucia
8 Comments

Division in Catholic identity of young people and @MassimoFaggioli shows his true colors

Posted on 28 November 2017 by Fr. John Zuhlsdorf

This is sad. This fellow really needs prayers.

First….

Today at the UK’s best Catholic weekly, the Catholic Herald, we find a piece about

Study: young Catholics divided between traditionalists and modernists

Some want to ‘draw the Church back’ while others want it to follow social trends, a report says [In other news, water is still wet.]

There are two groups of young Catholics: those who want to “draw the Church back” to a previous era, and those who think the Church should conform to social trends, according to a report from the bishops of England and Wales.

The bishops surveyed around 3,000 young Catholic Britons ahead of next October’s synod of bishops, whose theme is “Youth, Faith and Vocational Discernment”. [Now the surveys from various parts of the world will be sent to Rome, where they will be found in conform to a pre-determined agenda.]

Describing the two main groups, the report said the first is “a small but vocal group who want to draw the Church back into an era which they have been told was far better than it is today”. [Notice the language. “back” … NO! Consider what a reasonable person does when she finds that, instead of heading to the store, she instead went in the other direction. Does she simply keep going in the wrong direction? No, she retraces her steps and get’s back to the proper course. One doesn’t go “back” for the sake of going “back”. That’s just nostalgia. That’s not what young people have. They don’t have “nostalgia”. They want a future. Look at the numbers of people who self-identity as Catholics, at the numbers of priests and religious, and what the trends are. If we keep heading in the wrong direction, those numbers are going to get real ugly, real fast.]

The other group, which the report describes as “much larger, though less evident”, [Note the language again. “less evident”…. why? Because they… don’t go to church?] adheres to the “predominant narratives in society, wanting the Church to follow suit”.

“The first group asks for clarity, the second for authenticity,” the report claims. [We do not accept the premise that the one is somehow opposed to the other.]

“If we’re brave enough not to dismiss either of them, it’s possible to hear their yearning for a compelling narrative of how to live as Christians both faithfully and authentically.” [Okay. They got to a good place. “not to dismiss either of them“…]

[…]

That’s enough to get the sense. Read the rest there.

Speaking of acrimony… the Catholic Herald tweeted its story:

Study: young Catholics divided between traditionalists and modernists https://t.co/RKWZIpUKB9

— Catholic Herald (@CatholicHerald) November 28, 2017

Here is how Beans responded.

Study: young Catholics divided between good guys and bad guys https://t.co/EJjabHZwe2

— Massimo Faggioli (@MassimoFaggioli) November 28, 2017

Traditionalists are “bad”.

This is a perfect example of the catholic Left, the same sorts who made disparaging remarks about converts last summer. HERE and HERE and HERE and HERE

It’s not only that they hate the ideas that traditional people in the Church hold.

They hate the people, who hold them. They hate the people.

Posted in Liberals, The Coming Storm, The Drill, The future and our choices | Tagged Massimo Faggioli, Synod
19 Comments

“The Continuing Vocation Crisis in the United States”

Posted on 28 November 2017 by Fr. John Zuhlsdorf

Recently, I posted

I just read a piece by Fr. Mark Pilon at The Catholic Thing about the vocations crisis. He compares the small numbers of ordinations in large dioceses in metro areas such as New York City and Los Angeles, with the relatively large numbers in small dioceses such as Wichita. He tries to get a handle on what the differences are.

Inter alia, he wrote (my emphases and comments):

At the same time, it’s highly questionable just how truly committed to Catholic education most of the schools are in large archdioceses and even in smaller dioceses. How many of these local churches effectively oversee the hiring of faculty to assure that the Catholic educators are themselves practicing and faithful Catholics? Students being educated in a school where there is a pro forma, watered-down religion curriculum, and who are also well aware that some or many of their other teachers either disagree with Church teaching or don’t practice their faith at all, are surely less likely to be the kind of committed Catholics from whom vocations will emerge. So, the study might just look at how many dioceses are insisting that to teach in a Catholic school, the faculty member must be a faithful Catholic who actually practices the faith. [And what to say about their families?]

Another datum from these two small dioceses is that they have had a succession of bishops who themselves were firmly committed to building a strong and affordable Catholic education system and who were personally involved to one degree or another in the vocation program itself. Of course, that involvement is easier in smaller dioceses, [I’m not so sure that’s true. Priorities must be set.] but given the small number of candidates today in large archdioceses, certainly some involvement will be more possible today than in previous times. The first bishop of my own diocese, Thomas Welsh, was very much involved in strengthening the religious curriculum of the schools he inherited, and he was very directly involved in the vocations program. He had been the rector of the major seminary in Philadelphia and understood well the needs of young men studying for the priesthood – including some regular personal contact and support from their bishop. That’s one reason why the Arlington Diocese does not have a priest shortage.

Read the rest there.

The crisis of priestly vocations is largely artificial. It has, in some cases, been manufactured.

Tradition is the counter-measure to the crisis. It works where it is tried.

Also, we need to pray explicitly for vocations and keep the sound of that prayer ringing constantly in the ears of parents and their sons. Again, I propose that every parish adopt the following prayer, to be prayed while kneeling by the entire congregation at every Sunday Mass immediately after the Gospel.

Use it exactly as it is. Do not change a word, except to substitute “diocese” for “archdiocese”.

LEADER: Please kneel for our prayer for vocations. Let us ask God to give worthy priests, brothers and sisters to His Holy Church.

ALL: O God, we earnestly beseech Thee to bless this (arch)diocese with many priests, brothers and sisters, who will gladly spend their entire lives to serve Thy Church and to make Thee known and loved.

LEADER: Bless our families. Bless our children.

ALL: Choose from our homes those who are needed for Thy work.

LEADER: Mary, Queen of the Clergy!

ALL: Pray for us. Pray for our priests and religious. Obtain for us many more.

It works.

A friend back home – whom I miss rather a lot – sent me one of the original holy cards, which I prize.