Topics: Catholic Bamberg: The Church of St. Getreu....Thomas A'Kempis 1; Thoreau 0: Submitted By James Spencer...."The Mother": Cardinal Jozsef Mindszenty....Heretic Repellant: Fun Pic....Latin Never Abrogated: Repeat, Rinse, Repeat....Cardinal Llovera: On The Motu Proprio....Eight Habits of Highly Effective Bishops: Episcopal Qualities and the Syntax of Liberals (Kansas Catholic.blogspot View)....Sola Scriptura: The Luther Invention....You Build With Peace, Not With War: By Robert Moynihan, Inside the Vatican
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Catholic Bamberg: The Church of St. Getreu
The New Liturgical Movement
http://www.newliturgicalmovement.org/2009/05/catholic-bamberg-church-of-st-getreu.html
Blogger's note: Please go to the New Liturgical Movement website to see all these beautiful pictures.
Starting off our series about Catholic Bamberg (cf. introductory post here) is the church of St. Getreu. This, like so many other things, is a foundation of St. Otto. Since he is such a determining figure for Bamberg, and we will encounter him quite often.
The name "Getreu" is a literal translation of "Fides", and refers to St. Fides (Foy) of Agen, whose relics are kept in the Abbey of Ste. Foy in Conques-en-Rouergue. St. Otto's foundation thus, like other churches and chapels he founded, represents an important station on the pilgrimage route to Santiago de Compostela. St. Getreu was a priory of nearby St. Michael's Abbey (which we will visit in one of the next posts of the series). Its present form dates from the 1730s.
Here is an impression of the interior in its entirety:
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Thomas A'Kempis 1; Thoreau 0
submitted by James Spencer
When I took American Romanticism at Creighton University back about the time Caesar was crossing the Rubicon, I especially enjoyed Henry David Thoreau's wit and wisdom. However, without the Faith, even his immense talent falls woefully short. Here's an example:Thomas A'Kempis: "If you carry your cross willingly, it will carry you . . . if you carry it unwillingly, it will burden you the more and nevertheless you must carry it. . . . If you throw off one cross, you will undoubtedly find another, and perhaps a heavier."
H.D. Thoreau: "Most people live in a state of quiet desperation." Both describe the universally-shared "human condition" (pardon the exhausted cliche), but what a difference in the perspectives!
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"The Mother"
by Cardinal Jozsef Mindszenty
submitted by Larry Bethel
“The most important person on earth is a mother.
She cannot claim the honor of having built Notre Dame Cathedral.
She need not.
“She has built something more
magnificent than any cathedral—
a dwelling for an immortal soul,
the tiny perfection of her baby's body…
“The angels have not been blessed with such a grace.
They cannot share in God's creative miracle to
bring new saints to Heaven. Only a human mother can.
Mothers are closer to God the Creator than any other creature;
God joins forces with mothers in performing this act of creation…
“What on God's good earth is more glorious than this; to be a mother?”
—Cardinal Mindszenty
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Just in at Angelus Press — "The Mother" by Cardinal Mindszenty. Cardinal Mindszenty's respect for Mothers was deep and abiding. He wrote one book on a Mother and had planned two more; however, his imprisonment by the Nazis and then the Communists prevented the completion of his work.
Now reprinted in beautiful hardcover w/ dust-jacket.
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Heretic Repellant
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Latin Has Never Been Abrogated as the Language of the Church
If you repeat it enough...somethings bound to stick!
Blogger's note: Most of us who read this blog are well aware of Latin as the sacred language of the Church. Amazingly, a lot of my Catholic friends are just not aware that a sacred language exists for Catholics. So, in the interest of teaching through repetition, here it is again in the official writings. Footnote: I took this from someone else and the comments following are not mine. However, I cannot find the original source to credit the writer.
Some points about Latin and the Catholic Church:
-- Latin Has Never Been Abrogated as the Language of the Church. Latin is still the language of the Church, even though Vatican II extended, in limited cases, the use of vernacular tongues. Some points from the documents of Vatican II illustrate how far we have strayed from the true teachings of the Council:
Sacrosanctum Concilium
(Constitution on the Sacred Liturgy),
36.1: Particular law remaining in force, the use of the Latin language is to be preserved in the Latin rites.
Id. at 54:....steps should be taken so that the faithful may also be able to say or to sing together in Latin those parts of the Ordinary of the Mass which pertain to them.
Id. at 101.1: In accordance with the centuries-old tradition of the Latin rite, the Latin language is to be retained by clerics in the divine office. But in individual cases the ordinary has the power of granting the use of a vernacular translation to those clerics for whom the use of Latin constitutes a grave obstacle to their praying the office properly. The vernacular version, however, must be one that is drawn up according to the provision of Art. 36.
Optatum Totius (Decree On Priestly Training), 13: Before beginning specifically ecclesiastical subjects, seminarians should be equipped with that humanistic and scientific training which young men in their own countries are wont to have as a foundation for higher studies. Moreover they are to acquire a knowledge of Latin which will enable them to understand and make use of the sources of so many sciences and of the documents of the Church.
-- Latin Makes it Harder to Tinker with the Liturgy. It is altogether possible to commit liturgical abuses in Latin, but it cannot be possible to do it to the extent it has been done in vernacular liturgies.
-- Latin Preserves the Integrity of the Faith. The safest way to preserve Catholic doctrine intact is by preserving it in a language that is no longer a vernacular tongue, and therefore no longer subject to the vicissitudes of change and evolution.
-- Latin Is a Mark of Universality. The Mass in Latin was recognizable to any Catholic. A Catholic could travel anywhere and be perfectly at home at Mass, even though he could not understand the language of the homily. Those who hold that Latin left the majority of Catholics ignorant of what truly happens in the Mass bear the burden of proving their assertion. The existence of children's books explaining the preconciliar Mass (I happen to own one from the 1940s), boys who served the Mass, Latin classes in Catholic schools, and the existence of Missals providing the Latin text side-by-side with the vernacular translation, all serve to give the lie to the idea that people did not understand the Mass before the changes. On the other hand, the marked decline in reverence on the part of many of us at Mass is a strong indication that fewer people than ever truly understand what is happening at Mass, even though it is now seldom offered in Latin.
-- Latin Is a Mark of Unity. All Catholics could participate in a Latin Mass, even though they were from different countries and spoke different languages. Setting aside Latin as the language of the liturgy -- which was never permitted by Vatican II, let alone mandated -- has led to the balkanization of parishes. Now parishes are divided into ethnic enclaves that rarely intermingle, even for worship. Efforts to divide one Mass up into several vernacular languages serves rather to accentuate disunity than to overcome it; they can never substitute adequately for the loss of a universal language.
Besides being unlawful, the discarding of Latin, and the fostering of hostility toward Latin among the faithful, was downright foolish. Hopefully, the damage will soon be undone.
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Cardinal Antonio Cañizares Llovera on the Motu Proprio
Prefect of the Congregation for Divine Worship and the Discipline of the Sacraments
---- Introduction of Father Nicola Bux’s book, The Reform of Benedict XVI ----
submitted by Larry Bethel
Courtesy NCRegister
“If we truly believe that the Eucharist is really the ‘source and summit of Christian life’ – as the Second Vatican Council reminds us — we cannot admit that it is celebrated in an unworthy manner. For many, accepting the conciliar reform has meant celebrating a Mass which in one way or another had to be ‘desacralized.’ How many priests have been called ‘backward’ or ‘anticonciliar’ because of the mere fact of celebrating in a solemn or pious manner or simply for fully obeying the rubrics! It is imperative to get out of this dialectic.”
These are the words of Cardinal Antonio Cañizares Llovera, prefect of the Congregation for Divine Worship and the Discipline of the Sacraments, in an introduction he wrote for a new edition of Father Nicola Bux’s book, The Reform of Benedict XVI.
The New Liturgical Movement website has posted a translation of the introduction.
Cardinal Cañizares offers his comments in the context of discussing Pope Benedict XVI’s 2007 motu proprio Summorum Pontificum, which encourages more widespread celebration of the extraordinary form of the Mass in Latin.
The cardinal credits Benedict’s motu proprio with helping to heal divisions in the Church caused by conflicting views about the liturgical reform initiated by the Second Vatican Council, and with highlighting that the Council never intended that the reform should injure the Church’s liturgical patrimony.
Writes Cardinal Cañizares,
The reform has been implemented and it has mainly been experienced as an absolute change, as if an abyss should be created between the “before” and the “after” the Council, in a context where the term “preconciliar” was used like an insult. Here also the phenomenon occurred which the Pope notes in his recent letter to the bishops of 10 March 2009: “Sometimes one has the impression that our society needs at least one group for which there need not be any tolerance; which one can unperturbedly set upon with hatred.” For years this was the case in good measure with the priests and faithful attached to the form of Mass inherited throughout the centuries, who were often treated “like lepers,” as the then Cardinal Ratzinger bluntly put it.
Today, thanks to the Motu Proprio, this situation is changing notably. And it is doing so in large part because the intention of the Pope has not only been to satisfy the followers of Monsignor Lefevbre, nor to confine himself to respond to the just wishes of the faithful who feel attached, for various reasons, to the liturgical heritage represented by the Roman rite, but also, and in a special way, to open the liturgical richness of the Church to all the faithful, thus making possible the discovery of the treasures of the liturgical patrimony of the Church to those who still do not know it. How many times is the attitude of those who disdain them not due to anything other than this ignorance! Therefore, considered from this last aspect, the Motu Proprio makes sense beyond the presence or absence of conflicts: even if there were not a single “traditionalist” whom to satisfy, this “discovery” would have been enough to justify the provisions of the Pope.
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Episcopal Qualities and the Syntax of Liberals
Courtesy of Kansas Catholic
Blogger's note: While Kansas Catholic offers a more "street level" view of this article I urge you, good readers, to read the original article at inside Catholic.com as well. It is much too long to post here. Here is the link.
If you read the article, you will see the author's intent is to promote orthodoxy among Catholic bishops in the U.S. After reading the article, I thought I would provide likely liberal translations of the named habits by using their abundant buzzwords and their even more abundant ability to obfuscate (i.e. change the meaning of the listed habits while saying something that appears completely inoffensive).
1. A bishop must be personally holy.
Liberal translation: A bishop must be pastoral.
2. A bishop must promote and defend the authentic Catholic faith.
Liberal translation: A bishop must creatively apply Catholic social doctrine to the evolving challenges of our modern age.
3. A bishop must be committed to Catholic education.
Liberal translation: A bishop must educate Catholics of their obligations to those that the church has marginalized.
4. A bishop must work to strengthen the Catholic family.
Liberal translation: A bishop must work to make the Catholic family inclusive.
5. A bishop must foster vocations.
Liberal translation: A bishop must work to remove barriers to vocations for all of the People of God.
6. A bishop must love the Mass.
Liberal translation: A bishop must make the Mass welcoming and accessible to all.
7. A bishop must be willing to start from scratch.
Liberal translation: A bishop must build upon the liberating spirit that infused the Second Vatican Council.
8. A bishop must be vocal in the public square.
Liberal translation: A bishop must listen to the "signs of the times" while engaging other faith traditions in such a way as to promote interfaith understanding.
See how just a little tweaking can change the whole meaning of what a bishop should be?
Most of us have lived through a period of transition in the Church, one where tradition was abandoned in search of a new way. As that new way begins to finally fall by the wayside (having born such little fruit), many of us are left with its vapid lexicon still wandering between our ears--like a lost tribe.
The new way, like all things that strive for relevancy, never really found it. How could it? Tradition, like nature itself, defines relevancy, and cannot be put aside. The resurgence of tradition, those fundamentals of the faith as practiced for centuries, cannot be done in by simple word play, at least not for long. And Lord knows they've tried--and will try still. Luckily, the educated and informed laity, the one that was to bring forth the new way to its triumph, can see through the word play at last.
Of course, as Holy Mother Church is comprised of dioceses, parishes are the building blocks of those same dioceses. So what is said here about bishops also applies to parish priests. Pray for our bishops and priests.
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Sola Scriptura
The Luther Invention
Blogger's note: Again I do not have the author of this writing but it came form a Catholic forum somewhere. It deals with a poster's question about the legitimacy of the protestant idea of Sola Scriptura. I thought it was a great answer so here it is...
"The reality is that it never occurred to any christian to take the position that the Bible is the sole rule of faith and contains EVERY legitimate element of divine revelation until Martin Luther dreamt that idea up in the 1500's. Prior to that time, the Church operated on the model shown in the Acts of the Apostles: apostles established new churches in new towns and ordained/annointed a bishop to hold authority there when the apostle left (or died). The bishops (and apostles) gathered together to discuss controversies and determine the authentic christian response to them. When controversies got REALLY bad, Peter (and later his successors) decided the issue with divine assisstance. Catholics believe that this is not "development by man using the bible as a guide" (the bible didn't even exist for the first few hundred years of this) but rather God's design for the function and preservation of the Church.
The major reason the NT writings were considered authoritative was because the authors held apostolic office. It took a few hundred years before there was general agreement on which books were inspired revelation and became the new testament. By that time, ALL the major elements of catholicism were in place and not controversial (sacraments, communion of saints, apostolic succession, Marian devotion, etc). Curiously enough for the protestants, Scripture does not ever contain a statement that the model of church operation described above was supposed to end at a certain point and Scripture to take over as the sole source of authority. How careless of God to forget an important detail like that..."
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"You Build With Peace, Not With War"
By Robert Moynihan
Courtesy Inside the Vatican
submitted by Michael O'Neill
On the eve of Pope Benedict's trip to the Holy Land, Inside the Vatican spoke with Archbishop Jean Benjamin Sleiman (photo), Latin-rite archbishop of Baghdad, Iraq, on the hopes for the region and the world from this trip...
By Robert Moynihan
Pope Benedict is scheduled to leave Rome today for his historic pastoral trip to the Holy Land (May 8-15). The trip has six main purposes which may be summarized in a phrase: to build peace through speaking truth. We will publish a regular commentary on the events of the Pope's trip.
The way for Israel to secure its future lies not through making war, but through building a just peace, the Archbishop of the Catholic Church in Baghdad, Iraq, Jean Benjamin Sleiman, told Inside the Vatican magazine on the eve of Pope's departure for the Holy Land.
"This trip is very dear to Pope's heart," the archbishop said. "But it is also very important for Israel. The Pope in his addresses will layout the principles by which the Israelis and Palestinians in coming months and years can develop a lasting peace. The question is whether this message will be heard and acted upon. I think it is a historically dramatic occasion when one man will speak words which will, if they are listened to, change history."
Sleiman, 63, a native of Lebanon, has been Latin-rite bishop of Baghdad for eight years, since 2001. He is considered one of the leading spokesman among Catholics in the Middle East for the continued presence of the Christian community of that part of the world. He spoke to Inside the Vatican (Photo below: Archbishop Sleiman with the author meeting in Washington D.C.) in Washington DC, where he was meeting with US Senators and Congressmen to discuss the life of the Christian community in Iraq and its prospects for a secure future.
The Archbishop is persuaded that, despite the difficulty facing the Christians of Iraq, there are profound reasons to stay there and, if they have left, to return.
"We have had a tremendous flight of Christians from Iraq," he said. "This is what I told the Pope on my last visit with him.
"I explained that many of the young people who seek a better life in places like London and Paris and Stockholm end up losing their faith. Iraq society puts tremendous value on a close-knit family. When the young people leave Iraq and get off on their own, away from their parents and grandparents, they often lose their way.
"So from a pastoral perspective, I feel compelled as a bishop to encourage the Christians to stay in Iraq, even thought I understand their desire to seek a better life elsewhere. I know that the 'better life' for them would be to keep their faith."
When the archbishop spoke of his talks with Pope Benedict, he became animated. "Pope Benedict is a holy man, a intelligent man, and a humble man," he said. "He is kind and he listens attentively to those to whom he speaks."
Sleiman was born in Lebanon, near Byblos. He is one of five children and grew up speaking French and Arabic (he also speaks excellent English and Italian).
He felt the first promptings of a religious vocation in the admiration he felt for several of the priest who were his teachers. But later his vocation entered a deeper phase.
"I no longer simply wanted to imitate the life and character of the men I admired," he said. "I wanted to commit myself totally to something higher — to the highest thing I could find. And that highest was the priesthood, conforming my life to the life of Christ."
"The Muslims of the world are very confident that they will be the planet's future," he continued. "But I believe the future is in Christ. The Pope will proclaim this hope throughout his trip, to everyone in the Middle East, and to the whole world watching."
Sleiman said he would have been in Jordan to greet the Pope upon his arrival, but the need to explain the situation of the Christians in Iraq to U.S. officials was so urgent that he decided to take more than a week in the United States to make his case.
The man who discovered and promoted Sleiman for the position in Baghdad was the Italian Cardinal Achille Silvestrini, in 2001 the head of the Vatican's Congregation of Oriental Churches, under Pope John Paul II. Silvestrini, a career Vatican diplomat who has since retired, visited Saddam Hussein personally to try to persuade him to come to a compromise with the Western powers before the 2003 war began.
Both Silverstrini and Pope John Paul II found in Sleiman a man with the diplomatic tact to work well in the explosive atmosphere of Baghdad and with the deep faith needed to be an effective pastor to the diverse Latin-rite community in the Iraqi capital (some 30,000 Poles, 6,000 Brazilians and many other nationalities).
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