Fr. Z's Blog

Here is ADVENTCAzT 14, for Saturday of the 2nd Week of Advent. These 5 minute offerings, to help you prepare for the upcoming feast as well as for your own, personal, meeting with the Lord, are a token of gratitude for my benefactors who donate and send items from my wishlist.  Thank you! Make some Mystic Monk Coffee and have a listen! Some serious Advent music : US HERE – UK HERE Please chime in if you listened.  I read and need the feedback. PS: These podcasts should also be available through my iTunes feed, though in years past I have had problems with it. Let me know how you are listening.  Through the plug in on this post? Through iTunes? Downloading? Share/Bookmark

Today we are going to hear St. Pope Pius X’s encyclical letter of 1905 on Catechetics, On Teaching Christian Doctrine, Acerbo nimis.  This could have been offered to us today. As you listen, tune your ear for how Pius talks about the wretched state of souls of both the simple and the cultured and the grave spiritual danger they in. Their danger comes from ignorance of religion. The woes of society stem principally from ignorance of religion. Therefore religious instruction is important not only for the church bur all of society. Listen to how he described the special role of catechists. Fancy and erudite sermons are one thing, but the simple consistent explanation of faith and morals is even more fundamental. Catechetics are like food for children, whereas refined sermons are like food for adults: you have to have the one before the other. Pius places a great deal of importance on the preparation of the priest for teaching and preaching. Given the fact that today we are in far sorrier shape than things were in the pontificate of Pius X, the saintly Pope’s admonishments and solutions provide great wisdom as we look to our present duties and the care of souls. I’ll give you some historical context so you can get into the swing of things. Share/Bookmark

For this 15oth PODCAzT I offer Pope Leo XIII’s 1888 Encyclical Exuente iam anno, On Right Christian Conduct. Despite the claims of many, the Church began neither with the Second Vatican Council nor the Pontificate of Francis.   There are inestimable treasures available to us in the magisterial documents of Popes stretching back through the centuries. Today let us hear, in its entirety, this wonderful encyclical which could be addressed – and is – to us in this troubling age. I’ll give you some pointers about Leo XIII, talk about the 1880’s and specifically 1888 and then give you the whole text.  If you can imagine such a thing, encyclicals were used to be brief and clear. They didn’t make you scratch your head as you turned to the Roman Catechism or the documents of the Council of Trent to make sure that what you just read was really what you just read.  But I digress. US HERE – UK HERE Leo paints a bleak picture, but he also offers consolations and counsel for how can can get out of this mess we are in with God’s help.  He makes a powerful plea to clergy, to priests, for learning and for virtue and for detachment. Leo makes a strong case for the only thing that is going to help turn society around and avert the disaster that awaited every state and empire in history when it turned away from virtue. And Leo points to the fact that the pursuit of true virtues can only be rooted in faith in Christ. Listen for the what he calls the “bent of our age”, meaning the overriding direction. Tune your ears for this paragraph: “Nor is there any power mighty enough to bridle the passions, for it follows that the power of law is broken, and that all authority is loosened, if the belief in an ever-living God, Who commands what is right and forbids what is wrong is rejected. Hence the bonds of civil society will be utterly shattered when every man is driven by an unappeasable covetousness to a perpetual struggle, some striving to keep their possessions, others to obtain what they desire. This is well nigh the bent of our age.” Share/Bookmark

In this PODCAzT we hear the the second, shorter, of two parts of an interview I did with Fr. Richard Heilman, pastor of St. Mary’s Church in Pine Bluff, WI a few minutes to the west of Madison.  I’ve written about Fr. Heilman may times.  I help out at that parish on weekends.  I’ve seen some great things going on there.  It occurred to me that what Fr. Heilman is doing there could provide some encouragement, especially in the wake of Card. Sarah’s appeal to priests to start saying Mass ad orientem. In the first part, Father spoke about an unusual situation he faced at the beginning of his pastorate, about moving his parish to ad orientem worship for all Masses and the influence learning the Traditional Latin Mass has had on him.  He also talks about working with groups of men. In this part Father talks about confessions and confessionals (face to face or behind the screen), his Combat Rosaries and the Swiss Guard (I wrote on that HERE), and about his Scapular Crucifix. Fr. Heilman’s blog is HERE. In this PODCAzT we switch musical gears.  You might hear along the way something in honor of Pope Francis, whose favorite music is tango. UK HERE 148 16-07-09 Interview with Fr. Richard Heilman – Part 1 Share/Bookmark

In this PODCAzT we hear the the first of two parts of an interview I did with Fr. Richard Heilman, pastor of St. Mary’s Church in Pine Bluff, WI a few minutes to the west of Madison.  I’ve written about Fr. Heilman may times.  I help out at that parish on weekends.  I’ve seen some great things going on there.  It occurred to me that what Fr. Heilman is doing there could provide some encouragement, especially in the wake of Card. Sarah’s appeal to priests to start saying Mass ad orientem. In this first part, Father talks about a rather unusual situation he faced at the beginning of his pastorate.  We speak about moving his parish to ad orientem worship for all Masses.   He speaks about the influence learning the Traditional Latin Mass has had on him.  He also talks about working with groups of men. Fr. Heilman is the maker of the Combat Rosary which was recently in the world’s view with the Commandant of the Swiss Guard help one up and referred to it in his speech during this year’s Oath Taking Ceremony in May.  I wrote on that HERE. Fr. Heilman’s blog HERE. Along the way you hear some music by Zipoli.  UK HERE 149 16-07-18 Interview with Fr. Richard Heilman – Part 2 Share/Bookmark

At The Catholic Thing I saw excerpts of a piece by Fulton Sheen on Patriotism. As I have done in the past, I’ll read the whole thing for  you.  Recently, I read for you his essay on how we have to be intolerant (yes, you read that right).  HERE Sheen spoke out this essay on his radio program the The Catholic Hour on 20 February 1938. My interest today, on this Independence Day 2016, the 4th of July, is to  hear Sheen’s thoughts on Patriotism and to see how they impact us today, in our present circumstances.  I think there are some parallels. Furthermore, today we are revving up for the true battle against the major threat of our day (other than the stupidity deepening with the help of public education and other than the twisting of morals with social “gender” re-engineering, which is from Hell), that is, Islamic Terror Jihad.  I am reading Sebastian Gorka’s book right now.  Sheen’s essay was in interesting counterpoise (a little ham radio jargon for you there). How do we fight this threat?   We need to take pages from our past. As usual I try to give some historic context (with audio cues), and I prime you for what to listen for.  I rant a little, too. BTW… years later Sheen would talk about “Patriotism” on his TV show in an episode called “Quo Vadis, America?” Quo vadis, indeed. And also… The Glory of Being an American Happy Independence Day 2016! UPDATE: As part of my own Independence Day observance (quiet… at home), I watched a couple movies. First, I saw Coming Home, a Chinese movie directed by a favorite of mine Zhang Yimou with the incomparable Gong Li. This epitomizes poignant.  If there was ever a movie about charity, sacrifice, in the context of MARRIAGE, it is this.  It is beautifully upliftingly sad. What better way to celebrate our hard won freedom than to watch something about the breaking of a woman’s mind because the Cultural Revolution (et al.), and the decades long diligence of the man who loves her. Next, on this We are Not Canada Day, I saw Patriot with Mel Gibson.  Here you find some great scenes that capture the era… in spite of a few historical infelicities.   For my friends across the water, think… BREXIT. And I am following JUNO! UPDATE: Don’t forget this car magnet and/or sticker: Share/Bookmark

It is nice to have as your Patron the great Baptist, for I get two feasts a year, his Nativity and his Beheading. For the Vigil of St. John (today, as I write) in the old Roman Ritual the priest would once bless bonfires! And in Bavaria, witches are burned!  A priest friend who shares my feast sent me a spiffing photo (below – a little hard to see at this size, but I assure you, there is a witch in there). If you have any unwanted witches (and don’t we all?), send them to Bavaria next year for a nice vacation. In other places, cast-off or unneeded things are burned… in a way parallel, I suppose, to throwing things away at the other end of the year after the Winter Solstice. In any event, the evening is about as long as the year can offer, so a great party could be had well into the night with much cooking in the open and revelry.  Have a nice bonfire! The blessing for the bonfire is beautiful.  After the usual introduction, the priest blesses the fire saying: Lord God, almighty Father, the light that never fails and the source of all light, sanctify ? this new fire, and grant that after the darkness of this life we may come unsullied to you who are light eternal; through Christ our Lord. All: Amen. At this point the fire is sprinkled with holy water and everyone sings the hymn Ut quaent laxis which is also the Vespers hymn. It is almost as if the fire, and our celebration, is baptized. The reference to light and darkness surely harks to the fact of the Solstice, which was just observed. At this point the days get shorter in the Northern Hemisphere.  I looked at that HERE and HERE. For the feast of St. John in June for centuries the Church has sung at Vespers the hymn beginning Ut queant laxis.  If you want to hear Ut queant laxis sung “in the wild”, as it were, check out the Benedictines at Norcia, a fine group of men, really living the Benedictine life in the place where Benedict is said to have been born.  HERE (they don’t update consistently – but buy their new chant album HERE).  Also, check the monks at Le Barroux.  Hard core.  Fantastic chant. HERE Those of you who are lovers of the movie The Sound of Music will instantly recognize this hymn as the source of the syllables used in solfège or solmization (the use of syllables instead of letters to denote the degrees of a musical scale). Both the ancient Chinese and Greeks had such a system. The Benedictine monk Guido d’Arezzo (c. 990-1050) introduced the now familiar syllables ut re mi fa sol la for the tones of the hexachord c to a… or, more modally, the tonic, supertonic, mediant, etc. of a major scale. The Guidonian syllables derive from the hymn for the feast of St. John the Baptist: UT queant laxis REsonare fibris MIra gestorum FAmuli tuorum, SOLve polluti LAbii reatum, Sancte Ioannes (SI). After the medieval period (when music became less modal and more tonal) to complete the octave of the scale the other syllable was introduced (si – taken from S-ancte I-oannes, becomes “ti”) and the awkward ut was replaced sometime in the mid 17th c. with do (or also doh – not to be confused in any way with the Homeric Simpsonic epithet so adored by today’s youth, derived as it is from the 21st century’s new liturgical focal point – TV) and do came to be more or less fixed with C though in some cases do remains movable. So, now you know where Doh, Re, Mi comes from!  Check out this oldie PODCAzT from 2007: It is also good to gather St. John’s Wort (Hypericum perforatum) on the feast.  “Wort” is from Old English wyrt (German Würze), which means “plant”, but is used mostly in compounds.  Since ancient times “singent’s wort” was known to relieve melancholy or depression, as does borage… which every garden should have.  It would be hung above doors, windows and sacred images (hence the hyper-icum “above image”) to keep [...]

Here is an oldie PODCAzT made back in 2009.  How time flies. ___ I started this one thinking that I could make a fast audio project and then move on.  Ha! In this PODCAzT I dissect the Pentecost Sequence, Veni Sancte Spiritus, also used during the Octave of Pentecost in the traditional Roman calendar. I give you some background on what a sequence is, what an octave is and then we start drilling. First we hear the Latin text and a good translation.   Then see start looking at the structure of the prayer. That is when things get interesting.  I found a few things I had never noticed. This is a profound glimpse at mystery, folks. This is the Roman Rite at her finest. Share/Bookmark

Click! I direct the readership’s attention to a piece at Crisis about Amoris laetitia, the controversial and ambiguous Post-Synodal Apostolic Exhortation… that is, if any of you still care to read about it. Or listen to it!  Hopefully busy priests and seminarians will benefit from being able to hear it as well as read it.   Richard A. Spinello, Associate Research Professor at Boston College and a member of the adjunct faculty at St. John’s Seminary in Boston. asks: Does Amoris Laetitia Retreat from Absolute Moral Norms? He sets the stage: We can begin to better appreciate the potential problems with Amoris Laetitia if we recall why Pope John Paul II felt it necessary to devote a whole encyclical [Veritatis splendor – which is not cited in AL] to the theme of moral theology and natural law. Many encyclicals written by John Paul II’s predecessors dealt with specific moral issues, but John Paul II was more concerned about the proper foundation of moral theology. After Vatican II,  dissent on moral issues was rampant in the Catholic Church. [After what?  After Vatican II?  I’m shocked.] Moral theologians proposed novel theories such as the “fundamental option,” which claimed that a single evil act need not reverse one’s “option” for God and therefore could not be classified as a mortal sin. They promoted proportionalism—making moral choices based on whatever option yields the optimal proportion of benefits to harms. Reflecting the postmodern flight from truth and certitude, they discarded the doctrine of specific moral absolutes in favor of formal norms such as “Love your neighbor.” [All you need is love, love… love is all you need!] John Paul II witnessed the confusion spread by the revisionists and decided to intervene by writing this encyclical in 1993. The philosopher-pope dissected the shallow arguments underlying these new theories with exquisite care. Most U.S. Catholic seminaries have been faithful to the traditional doctrines reinforced by Veritatis Splendor. Of course, there has been residual discord at a number of Catholic universities. Some moral theologians continued to teach and defend these revisionist creeds such as the fundamental option. That helps to put AL in a context.   Going on… [QUAERITUR…] But what will happen to moral theology in the wake of Amoris Laetitia, which seems to disregard and perhaps even oppose the highly principled reasoning of Veritatis Splendor? Will more moral theologians and clergy come to see that encyclical as an irrelevant relic of the John Paul II papacy? [I think that it was part of the agenda of the managers of the last two Synods to frame John Paul’s magisterium as something that belongs to the past and as no longer relevant.] Supporters of Pope Francis’s approach to moral theology might contend that Amoris Laetitia does not rebuke the work of his predecessor. This may be true, but the language of this exhortation, especially in Chapter Eight, seems to suggest that Pope Francis is distancing himself from St. John Paul II.  It seems likely that some theologians will perceive Francis’s exhortation as a vindication of the revisionist moral theologyVeritatis Splendor sought to dismantle. In an article called “In Good Conscience,” one moral theologian has already proclaimed that Pope Francis “clearly believes there are few, if any, ‘one-size-fits-all’ concrete absolute norms.” He also applauds the expansive role for conscience presented in the exhortation.  [It’s in Jesuit-run Amerika Magazine.  Are you surprised?] The writer goes on to show how the use of Aquinas in AL doesn’t hold up very well. Be sure to tune your ears for his explanation of the fundamental  option (which is wrong), proportionalism (which is wrong). Also, listen for his explanation of absolute moral norms. Finally, follow carefully his own exposition of Thomas Aquinas which show the flaw in how Aquinas is employed in AL. Amoris Laetitia fails to p[...]

In this PODCAzT I read for you the open letter by Bishop Athanasius Schneider, Auxiliary Bishop of the Archdiocese of St Mary in Astana, Kazakhstan. It seems that it was originally released in Italian, but it was subsequently translated into English. The English appeared on the blog of the Voice of the Family. However, everyone involved, including His Excellency Bishop Schneider, would like it to be widely diffused. Here’s my contribution. It maybe that you won’t sit and read it – it’s longish, some 6500 words in English – but maybe you can listen to it while doing other things. That’s where I come in. Bp. Schneider tackles some of the difficult and confusing, seemingly contrary to the Church’s teachings, in the infamous Chapter 8 of Amoris laetitia and points out the possible bad effects. Therefore, he – and I guess we – would like greater clarity about them. Along the way you hear a cut from Robert Shaw’s O Magnum Mysterium, “If ye love me” by Thomas Tallis. And… “Love” by Paul Simon. Share/Bookmark

UPDATE: I fixed the glitch at 24:02-24-22. Sorry about that. It was a lot of reading – with interruptions – and editing together.  If you had an “overlap” in that time range, you can download again or listen again and it should now be okay. There has been a lot of controversy about the Post-Synodal Apostolic Exhortation Amoris laetitia, the Joy of Love, as it is being called in English. Most of the controversy surrounds the 8th Chapter. And yet many have pointed out that the Exhortation has some great strengths, among them Chapter 4, entitled “Love in marriage”. So that you do not know only the controversies, and so that you have really heard what the Holy Father says in Chapter 4 … here it is. The text I read, as carefully as I can, is as it appears on the Vatican’s website. They may alter or amend it in the future, but here is the text as it stands now. For the purpose of a smooth reading, a first experience of the chapter, I don’t read footnotes. That would be too ponderous. Also, I won’t quote the inline chapter and verse references to Scripture. You can see both of those when you read the text, which, at the time of this writing, you can download as a PDF from the Vatican’s website HERE. I hope this will be helpful to you, in whole or in part. I can tell you that it was extremely useful to me. I had read it when it came out – before it came out, but silently, Reading it aloud, and trying to give sense to the black on the white, turned out to be, among other things, an examination of conscience for me. Therefore, I urge you, not only to listen to this, but to go back and read the document – especially so you can get the notes and references which I left out – but also to use it as a mirror in which you see yourself. Remember: Amoris laetitia is an exhortation – an urging -an encouraging – from Peter. We must allow ourselves to grasp what he is saying and then work with it with honesty.   Share/Bookmark

Click With a biretta tip to my friend Fr. Heilman at Roman Catholic Man, this PODCAzT welcomes today’s guest Ven. Fulton J. Sheen.  We will hear his Plea for Intolerance … yes, you read that right. It seems appropriate to read this in the wake of Amoris laetitia. Sheen’s text is in a book given its imprimatur in 1931!  They had a lot of the same problems we have, because the Devil is always at work, but that was a different time, I’ll tell ya’.  Pius XI was gloriously reigning…. You can immediately tell that what Sheen is addressing was already a problem in 1931, at least 85 years ago.  I would submit that, though Sheen concerns himself with “America”, his comments reach far beyond America now. In the PODCAzT I have bits and pieces of popular hits from 1931 as well as a clip from Stravinsky’s Violin Concerto which came to us in … guess which year.  Also, to get you into the mood and the era, salted through are clips of voices and moments from 1931 (except for the brief intro to Sheen’s radio show The Catholic Hour which is actually from 1943). (There is a super bit – among many – starting about 15:00!) Below is a taste of a deeply edited version of Sheen’s original piece with my emphases and comments.  I, on the other hand, read the whole thing in the PODCAzT unedited, so it has some references that folks in 1931 would have found current but which some of you might not grasp.  Here’s the edited version… America, it is said, is suffering from intolerance. It is not. It is suffering from tolerance: tolerance of right and wrong, truth and error, virtue and evil, Christ and chaos. Our country is not nearly so much overrun with the bigoted as it is overrun with the broad-minded. The man who can make up his mind in an orderly way, as a man might make up his bed, is called a bigot; [Sound familiar?  Watch the nightly news!] but a man who cannot make up his mind, any more than he can make up for lost time, is called tolerant and broad-minded. [Indeed… “nuanced… thoughtful…”.] A bigoted man is one who refuses to accept a reason for anything; a broad-minded man is one who will accept anything for a reason—providing it is not a good reason. It is true that there is a demand for precision, exactness, and definiteness, but it is only for precision in scientific measurement, not in logic. The breakdown that has produced this natural broad-mindedness is mental, not moral.  [That’s 1931.  Today, I think it’s both mental and moral.  We are in serious trouble now, after decades of the dumbed-down education at least two generations have received. On top of that habitual sin, especially of the carnal variety, makes you stupid.  Add dumb to stupid and we wind up with a real problem.] The evidence for this statement is threefold: the tendency to settle issues not by arguments but by words, the unqualified willingness to accept the authority of anyone on the subject of religion, and lastly the love of novelty. [Fulton J. Sheen… prophet.] The science of religion has a right to be heard scientifically through its qualified spokesmen, [God, save us.] just as the science of physics or astronomy has a right to be heard through its qualified spokesmen. Religion is a science despite the fact the some would make it only a sentiment. Religion has its principles, natural and revealed, which are more exacting in their logic than mathematics. [!] But the false notion of tolerance has obscured this fact from the eyes of many who are as intolerant about the smallest details of life as they are tolerant about their relations to God.  [Sound familiar?] Another evidence of the breakdown of reason that has produced this weird fungus of broad-mindedness is the passion of novelty, as opposed to the love of truth. Truth is sacrificed for an epigram, the Divinity of Christ for a headline in the Monday morning newspaper. Man[...]

The Lamentations of Fr. Z include verses on the loss of the singing of Tenebrae, whole and entire in its proper language. The ordering of the psalms is not particularly profound, but the antiphons and responsories are simply incomparable in the liturgical year. To give you a sample, here is a snippet of Matins for Holy Saturday sung by the monks of Le Barroux. You are hearing the 3rd Lesson, Lamentation, from the Prophet Jeremiah followed by the Responsory.  The Lamentation is sung in a special tone, not the usual prophecy tone.  In the Responsory, tune your ears for the word “uluate“,  howl. The text in English Reading 3 Lam 5:1-11 1 Remember, O Lord, what is come upon us: consider and behold our reproach. 2 Our inheritance is turned to aliens: our houses to strangers. 3 We are become orphans without a father: our mothers are as widows. 4 We have drunk our water for money: we have bought our wood. 5 We were dragged by the necks, we were weary and no rest was given us. 6 We have given our hand to Egypt, and to the Assyrians, that we might be satisfied with bread. 7 Our fathers have sinned, and are not: and we have borne their iniquities. 8 Servants have ruled over us: there was none to redeem us out of their hand. 9 We fetched our bread at the peril of our lives, because of the sword in the desert. 10 Our skin was burnt as an oven, by reason of the violence of the famine. 11 They oppressed the women in Sion, and the virgins in the cities of Juda. Jerusalem! Jerusalem! Return unto the Lord thy God. R. O my people! lament, like a virgin girded with sack-cloth for the husband of her youth, howl, ye shepherds, in sack-cloth and ashes * For the day of the Lord is at hand, and it is great and very terrible. V. Gird yourselves, ye Priests, and howl, ye ministers of the altar: cast up ashes upon you. R. For the day of the Lord is at hand, and it is great and very terrible. Gloria omittitur R. O my people! lament, like a virgin, girded with sack-cloth for the husband of her youth, howl, ye shepherds, in sack-cloth and ashes * For the day of the Lord is at hand, and it is great and very terrible. A chant for our times and for our nation and for our Church. Lectio 3 Incipit Oratio Ieremíæ Prophetæ Lam 5:1-11 1 Recordare, Domine, quid acciderit nobis; intuere et respice opprobrium nostrum. 2 Hereditas nostra versa est ad alienos, domus nostrae ad extraneos. 3 Pupilli facti sumus absque patre, matres nostrae quasi viduae. 4 Aquam nostram pecunia bibimus; ligna nostra pretio comparavimus. 5 Cervicibus nostris minabamur, lassis non dabatur requies. 6 Ægypto dedimus manum et Assyriis, ut saturaremur pane. 7 Patres nostri peccaverunt, et non sunt: et nos iniquitates eorum portavimus. 8 Servi dominati sunt nostri: non fuit qui redimeret de manu eorum. 9 In animabus nostris afferebamus panem nobis, a facie gladii in deserto. 10 Pellis nostra quasi clibanus exusta est, a facie tempestatum famis. 11 Mulieres in Sion humiliaverunt, et virgines in civitatibus Iuda. Ierusalem, Ierusalem, convertere ad Dominum Deum tuum. R. Plange quasi virgo plebs mea: ululate pastores in cinere et cilicio: * Quia venit dies Domini magna, et amara valde. V. Accingite vos sacerdotes, et plangite ministri altaris, aspergite vos cinere. R. Quia venit dies Domini magna, et amara valde. Gloria omittitur R. Plange quasi virgo plebs mea: ululate pastores in cinere et cilicio: * Quia venit dies Domini magna, et amara valde. Share/Bookmark

It is Holy Saturday in the Sacred Triduum. We are dead with Christ in the tomb awaiting the spark in the darkness. These 5 minute podcasts are intended to give you a daily boost in your discipline during this holy season.  http://www.wdtprs.com/lentcazt16/46_lentcazt16.mp3 Yesterday’s LENTCAzT HERE Share/Bookmark

It is Good Friday in the Sacred Triduum. Coincidentally, it is the Feast of St. Dismas, the Good Thief. These 5 minute podcasts are intended to give you a daily boost in your discipline during this holy season.  http://www.wdtprs.com/lentcazt16/45_lentcazt16.mp3 I provide these podcasts again this year in gratitude to benefactors who help me and this blog through their donations, both monthly and ad hoc. Music is from Liturgy for Holy Week by the Choeur Gregorien De Paris.  Some of the best recorded Gregorian chant I have ever heard. These 5 minute podcasts are intended to give you a daily boost in your discipline during this holy season, Lent. One of the pieces used in this podcast is from the magnificent album from St. John Cantius in Chicago, Miserere: Music for Holy Week.  Haunting. In this podcast I mention Evelyn Waugh’s novel Helena. Click! USA HERE UK HERE Yesterday’s LENTCAzT HERE Share/Bookmark