Topics: Pope Benedict : Kneel For Communion....ICEL Backs Plainchant: Trendy Composers Wail...Half a Million Vietnamese: Protest Against Police’s Brutality
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The Necessaries
We here at Venite Missa Est! are aware of the increasing readership, email and RSS feed subscribers to our little corner of the blogosphere. Thank you! For you folks who recieve us through email or RSS feeds please note that the blog does at times contain pictures and video that you may not be seeing...so at your convenience...navigate over to http://venite-missa-est.blogspot.com/ for complete contents.
That being said let us be clear that this blogs intention is to the greater glory of God and will at times feature local stories, parishioners, guest writers and artists from within Wichita, the Latin Mass (EFLR) community of Kansas at large as well as national and international news stories. Occasionally there may be some articles that some may find controversial. It is not our intention to cause harm or insult to any fellow Catholics, ordained or lay but to present information that pertains to the Catholic world at large.
And now the neccesary housework: Please note: St. Anthony Catholic Church is the only local church celebrating the Traditional Latin Mass (EFLR) in the Wichita area. Though this blog is loosely centered around this parish and it's members, Venite Missa Est! is by no means, in any way an official voice of, or for, St. Anthony Parish or the Diocese of Wichita. Venite Missa Est is strictly a private layman's endeavor. Enjoy this weeks post. We are always looking for contributers.
Feel free to contribute thoughts, articles, poems, artwork or anything else for that matter to bumpy187@gmail.com for consideration for next weeks post.
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Bloggers Note: This summer was suppose to be dedicated to reading and writing original articles for the blog. My intention was to cover more history of St. Anthony Parish (Wichita), take more pictures, write more articles....alas the summer is ending.
This week is sparse in content and contains no original work...but the articles within are worth reading. Enjoy and, as always, send me your original thoughts, stories, pictures pertaining to Catholicism and how you have experienced it in life. I would love to post your contributions!
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Pope Benedict to Catholics: Kneel For Communion
8/1/2009 8:22:00 AM By David Martin -www.newsblaze.com
Catholic Citizens of Illinois
Submitted by Larry Bethel
"Whosoever shall eat this bread, or drink the chalice of the Lord unworthily, shall be guilty of the Body and of the Blood of the Lord... For he that eateth and drinketh unworthily, eateth and drinketh judgment to himself, not discerning the Body of the Lord" - 1 Corinthians 11:27,28
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Pope Benedict XVI does not want the faithful receiving Communion in their hand nor does he want them standing to receive Christ in the Blessed Sacrament. According to Vatican liturgist, Monsignor Guido Marini, the pope is trying to set the stage for the whole church as to the proper norm for receiving Communion for which reason communicants at his papal Masses are now asked to kneel and receive on the tongue.
The Holy Father's reasoning is simple: "We Christians kneel before the Blessed Sacrament because, therein, we know and believe to be the presence of the One True God." (May 22, 2008)
According to the pope the entire Church should kneel in adoration before God in the Eucharist. "Kneeling in adoration before the Eucharist is the most valid and radical remedy against the idolatries of yesterday and today" (May 22, 2008)
The pope's action is in accord with the Church's 2000 year tradition and is being done in order to foster a renewed love and respect for the Eucharist which presently is being mocked and treated with contempt. The various trends and innovations of our time (guitar liturgy, altar girls, lay ministers, Communion in the hand) have worked together to destroy our regard for the Eucharist, thus advancing the spiritual death of the church. After all, the Eucharist is the very life and heartbeat of the Mystical Body around which the entire Church must revolve.
Kneeling also coincides with the Church's centuries old ordinance that only the consecrated hands of a priest touch the Body of Christ in Holy Communion. "To priests alone has been given power to consecrate and administer to the faithful, the Holy Eucharist." (Council of Trent) This teaching is beautifully expressed by St. Thomas Aquinas in his Summa Theologica: "Because out of reverence towards this sacrament, nothing touches it, but what is consecrated; hence the corporal and the chalice are consecrated, and likewise the priest's hands, for touching this sacrament."
It is for reason that Pope Paul VI in his May 1969 pastoral letter to the world's bishops reaffirmed the Church's teaching on the reception of Communion, stating that: "This method on the tongue must be retained." (Memoriale Domini) This came in response to the bishops of Holland who started Communion in the hand in defiance of the centuries old decree from the Council of Rouen (650 A.D.) where this practice was condemned as sacrilegious. "Do not put the Eucharist in the hands of any layperson, but only in their mouths." To date this prohibition has never been overturned legally.
Today Communion in the hand is carried on illegally and has become a major tool of the enemy to destory the Faith throughout the world. For this practice serves no other purpose than to warp our conception of Jesus Christ and nourish a contempt for the sacred mysteries. It's no wonder St. Basil referred to Communion in the hand as "a grave fault."
That is to say, Communion in the hand is not tied with Catholic tradition. This practice was first introduced to the Church by the heretical Arians of the 4th century as a means of expressing their belief that Christ was not divine. Unfortunately, it has served to express the same in our time and has been at the very heart of the present heresy and desecration that is rampant throughout the universal Church. If we have 'abuse' problems today it is because we're abusing the Sacrament - it's backfiring on us!
Thanks to Communion in the hand, members of satanic cults are now given easy access to come into the Church and take the Host so that they bring it back to their covens where it is abused and brutalized in the ritualistic Black Mass to Satan. They crush the Host under their shoes as a mockery to the living God, and we assist it with our casual practice? Amongst themselves the satanists declare that Communion in the hand is the greatest thing that ever happened to them, and we do nothing to stop it?
Hence, the Holy Father is doing his part to try to purge the Church of abuse and we as members of Christ are called upon to assist him. For your encouragement we include the following quotation from Cardinal Llovera, the new prefect for the Vatican's Congregation for Divine Worship and Discipline of the Sacraments speaking to Life Site News on July 22, 2009: "It is the mission of the Congregation for Divine Worship and Sacraments to work to promote Pope Benedict's emphasis on the traditional practices of liturgy, such as reception of Communion on the tongue while kneeling."
Also worth considering is the recent decree from Cardinal Caffarra, the Archbishop of Bologna Italy, forbidding the practice of Communion in the hand: "Many cases of profanation of the Eucharist have occurred, profiting by the possibility to receive the consecrated Bread on one's palm of the hand... Considering the frequency in which cases of irreverent behavior in the act of receiving the Eucharist have been reported, we dispose that starting from today in the Metropolitan Church of St. Peter, in the Basilica of St. Petronius and in the Shrine of the Holy Virgin of St. Luke in Bologna the faithful are to receive the consecrated Bread only from the hands of the Minister directly on the tongue." (from his decree on the reception of the Eucharist, issued April 27, 2009)
Technically all bishops and clergy are bound to follow the Holy Father's directive on this issue, but in the meantime the faithful are not obliged to wait for the approval of their bishop in order to kneel for God. The directives of the Holy Father are not subject to the veto or scrutiny of the bishops and therefore all pastors and laity have a right and duty to put these directives into practice for the edification of their communities.
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Trendy Composers Wail as ICEL Backs Plainchant for New English Mass
By Damian Thompson
Telegraph.co.uk
The publisher of those toe-curling classics, the “Israeli Mass” and the “Clap-Hands Gloria”, is one of many “liturgists” worried by ICEL’s suggestion that the new (better) English Mass should be accompanied by vernacular chant based on plainsong.
As the Tablet reports, clucking sympathetically:
UK music publisher Kevin Mayhew said his firm would be commissioning many new Masses, but said worshippers would take months to learn new settings, and felt sure that favourites such as the “Clap-Hands Gloria” and the “Israeli Mass” would remain in use.
Not so fast, Kevin. First, those two works are not “favourites”. They are LOATHED, especially by young people. Second, the Congregation for Divine Worship and ICEL will now have a policy of zero tolerance for liturgical settings that monkey around with the Ordinary of the Mass (as I seem to remember the “Israeli” excrescence does).
I don’t know what the new secretary of ICEL, Fr Andrew Wadsworth, thinks of the greedy cartel of guitar-strumming copyright hawks who’ve had Catholic music sewn up for so long. But he is a classically trained musician who specialises in the celebration of the Extraordinary Form of the Roman Rite. So it’s not looking good, boys.
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Half a Million Vietnamese Catholics of Vinh Diocese
Protest Against Police’s Brutality
VietCatholic News
Blogger's note: St Anthony parish, in Wichita, has many Vietnamese parishioners which is why this story is pertinent to this blog. Please pray for our fellow Catholics in this troubled part of our world.
In unprecedented event after the communist takeover of Vietnam, half million Vietnamese Catholics joined in huge protests demanding the justice for victims who were assaulted brutally by police in central costal province of Vinh as they were trying to rebuild their worship place.
Police in provinces of Nghe An, Ha Tinh, and Quang Binh had been put on high alert in the wake of huge protests joined by half million Catholics. At 7 am local time on Sunday morning, 170 priests and 420 women religious led 500,000 Catholics of Vinh Diocese and neighboring dioceses in peaceful protests being held throughout 19 deaneries. The event is reportedly observed as the most crowded religious protest in Vietnam history.
Across the entrance of the Bishop’s Office and on the façade of every church in the diocese hung big banners which stated the reasons why people were protesting, a testimonial evidence of severe conflict between the increasingly dictatorial regime and a normally peace loving, law abiding citizens and Catholics. The banners asserted Catholics had no choice but holding these protest as it was the only way the world could hear their indignant voice on police's brutality and the injustice that parishioners of Tam Toa have been suffering almost since the beginning of communism in Vietnam.
In more details, Catholic protestors demanded the immediate release of their brothers and sisters who were beaten cruelly in a violent police raid on Monday and have since then been detained indefinitely. During the said incident, police fired teargas at parishioners, who were erecting a Cross and patios on the grounded of the bombed Tam Toa church, before kicking and beating them brutally with stun guns, and batons. 18 were thrown into police trucks. 7 of them are still behind the bar and risk being prosecuted.
Police have charged Catholic activists of “counter-revolutionary crimes, violating state policies on Americans’ War Crimes Memorial Sites, disturbing public order, and attacking officials-on-duty,” state-run media outlets reported.Right after the incident, Nhan Dan (People), a mouthpiece of the Politburo – the supreme leading body of Vietnamese Communist Party – initiated a media campaign calling for severe punishments against Catholics of Tam Toa. The article in the Nhan Dan has seen as a strong signal from the Party for extreme actions against efforts of Catholics to regain Church properties.
The start shot of the highest power newspaper has been followed by most state-own media outlets including television channels.
Facing the wake of fierce attacks from state media, on July 24, 2009, the Bishopric of Vinh Diocese issued a statement rebuffing accusations from Vietnam government.
“Parishioners of Tam Toa did not violate the laws when they build patios on the ground of Tam Toa church. Up till now, Tam Toa church premise, and its bell tower still remain in the ownership of Tam Toa parish of the diocese of Vinh,” said the statement, demanding the government to “stop immediately the distortion of truth, the defamation of religion, and the instigation of hatred between Catholics and non-Catholics.”
News relating to the Vatican visit of communist leader Nguyen Minh Triet on November and a potential pastoral Vietnam visit of Pope Benedict XVI at un-specified time have been also exploited to their wildest extends. Citing them as an evident of a significant improvement on religious freedom, state media have attacked Catholic leaders and faithful who have actively involved in struggles for the requisition of Church properties as “bad Catholics” who blatantly disregard the laws and continually disrupt public order. In particular, the parishioners of Tam Toa have been accused as “a group of gang rivals” who challenged the laws by attacking officials-on-duty.
In its response, the Bishop’s Office of Vinh Diocese was determined to set the record straight: “We have enough evidence to state that the police of Quang Binh had beaten our faithful before arresting them illegally. Police seized our Cross and confiscated other Church properties as well as our faithful's ones,” the statement said.
On July 22, 2009, the People’s Committee of Quang Binh province sent summoning orders to representatives of the Bishop’s Office and the College of Priests of Vinh Diocese to ask them come to the Committee to discuss on the “the situation of Catholic activities on the area”. The orders were rejected. “While our Cross – a great, sacred symbol of our faith is still being profaned by the police of Quang Binh, and while our faithful are still being jailed unjustly, we cannot come to talk with the Provincial Committee,” explained Fr. Anthony Pham Dinh Phung, Chief Secretary of Bishop’s Office in a response letter to the Committee.
Bishop’s Office of Vinh Diocese also sent a letter to the local authorities of Quang Binh demanding that the local government:
1) Release immediately and completely all Catholics who have been beaten, arrested and jailed.
2) Provide medical care for wounded Catholics beaten by police.
3) Make compensation for the patios of Tam Toa parish.
4) Return the Cross and other Church properties as well as our faithful's ones.
5) Stop immediately the distortion of truth, the defamation of religion, and the instigation of hatred between Catholics and non-Catholics.
On Sunday, Vietnamese Catholic Communities in large cities around the world spent a minute of silence to pray for victims of police violent raid at Tam Toa, and for the Church in Vietnam which has recently continually suffered persecutions by the atheist government.
From the diocese of Vinh, organizers of the protests have reported a couple of incidents in which Catholics had clashed with police who tried to turn them back to their villages when they tried to join in protests. Especially, at Tam Toa, at least 20 women and children were beaten badly by plain-clothed police when they were on their way to the church.
Latest reports stated that after the protest at Tam Toa, on Sunday night police raid parishioners’ houses and arrested at least a women and a male university student.
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