How Liberal Trads ushered in the Operation of Error to believe lies

by T. Stanfill Benns | Sep 29, 2023 | New Blog

+St. Michael the Archangel+

The Month of October, Queen of the Most Holy Rosary

Prayer Society Intention

“O Queen of the Most Holy Rosary,…. show unto all men that thou art the queen of peace and forgiveness.” (Raccolta)

As we commented last week, the restoration wars rage on — a repositioning strategy to determine who’s going to acquire paying members. And even a few of those pretending to pray at home are showing their true colors. People are anxious, tired and confused, meaning they are unusually vulnerable. And that always bodes ill for making decisions in matters of faith. But the real problem with Traditionalists hasn’t even been fully realized yet. Many forget that beginning around the time of the French Revolution, three distinct deviations within Catholicism gradually emerged that had not existed before: Liberalism, Americanism and Modernism, all of which were condemned by the popes as heresy. Especially in this country Catholics were at risk, given the so-called liberties touted as democracy. Even certain Novus Ordo Internet commentators admit that all Americans calling themselves Catholic today are infected with these three heresies to some extent.

The Vatican Council condemned the anti-papal heresies related to Liberalism (Gallicanism, Febronianism, Josephism). These heresies advocated limiting papal infallibility considerably and held the bishops equal to — and as a body, even superior to — the popes. But after the council closed, a type of semi-Gallicanist faction emerged that opposed Henry Cardinal Manning’s Ultramontane position, limiting ex cathedra pronouncements to a handful, denying the infallibility of disciplinary decrees and holding the opinion that bishops received their jurisdiction directly from Christ, (then still a free opinion. See the history of this development HERE.) Disciplinary decrees, however, had already been declared infallible by the Vatican Council: “If anyone thus speaks that the Roman Pontiff has… not the full power of jurisdiction over the universal Church, not only in things which pertain to faith and morals but also in those things which pertain to the discipline and government of the Church…Or that this power is not ordinary and immediate…over pastors and faithful altogether and individually; let him be anathema.”

To further shore up the teaching on disciplinary decrees, between 1873-1876 Pope Pius IX issued Quartus Supra, Quae in patriarchatu and Etsi multa, all of these encyclicals dealing with the binding force of papal disciplinary decrees on the faithful. But the Liberal minimalists began to declare that those things laid down for belief in encyclicals were not binding, an error Pope Pius XII later condemned in Humani generis, along with the idea that ex cathedrapronouncements were rare. And in Mystici Corporis Christi, Pope Pius XII settled the question on whether bishops receive their jurisdiction directly from Christ when he taught:

“Bishops must be considered as the more illustrious members of the Universal Church, for they are united by a very special bond to the divine Head of the whole Body and so are rightly called “principal parts of the members of the Lord… Yet in exercising this office they are not altogether independent, but are subordinate to the lawful authority of the Roman Pontiff, although enjoying the ordinary power of jurisdiction which they receive directly from the same Supreme Pontiff.” As you might guess, this did not please those Liberal minimalists hard at work in Pius XII’s day, who had hoped to receive a greater share of power in the Church. Minimalism was fought strenuously by Msgr. Joseph Fenton as we have seen is several past blogs. But in the end, the liberals won out.

Traditionalists are the purveyors of Liberalism

Liberalism was the most insidious among the heresies; it seduced Catholics by degrees and failed to present Catholic teaching as an integral whole. That’s why it rests toward the bottom of the Masonic pyramid. In previous blogs we have illustrated the point that Traditionalists (and closet Traditionalists among those claiming to pray at home) practice liberal charity, but it goes far beyond that. They are Liberals through and through, in varying degrees, and most of their followers are completely unaware of this. In examining the modus operandi used by 19^th century Liberals and adopted by Traditionalists, something else emerges. A pattern establishes itself that fits in quite comfortably with modern propaganda techniques and the dissemination of lies and disinformation.

The judgment of this fact is not our own but is taught by approved and respected Catholic authors writing in the 1800s, when Liberalism first made its ugly appearance. We are only applying their observations to the methods Traditionalists use today. These men witnessed Liberalism at work firsthand, so can hardly be accused of not recognizing it for what it is. We refer to Rev. Felix Sarda y Salvany (Liberalism is a Sin), and Louis Veuillot (The Liberal Illusion), both of them Ultramontanes in the era of the Vatican Council. It is primarily from these two sources that we note the following characteristics of “Liberal Catholics,” an appellation both authors agree is a contradiction in terms.

— The predominating element in Liberalism (also Americanism) is the right to one’s own ability to interpret and judge, to assert their own opinions and theories as authentic, independent of papal authority. (Liberalism teaches that all have individual rights of every kind, many of these issuing from the state, not God-given human rights. Liberals teach that these rights are superior to our belief as Catholics and any religious duties or responsibilities. Liberalism was the earliest stage of Modernism.)

— Liberals teach that: “Individual judgment is the rule of faith… The true sense of revealed doctrine is not always certain and human reason has something to say in the matter” (Sarda). This is nothing more than the Protestant principle of private judgment.

— Liberalism’s negative unity is rooted in denial, for it depends on the varying degrees of the truths it denies in order to maintain its existence.

— This denial can be observed in the Liberals’ failure to draw out the logical conclusions of their own principlesand the opinions held by their advocates, stopping short of the consequences logically flowing from its erroneous premises. (Several instances of this will be demonstrated below.)

— Liberals work to confuse ideas and distort the proper meaning of words. (See below.)

— “They show themselves with some appearance of probity and sound doctrine… but are more dangerous and more baneful than declared enemies” (Pope Pius IX, brief to Circle of St. Ambrose in Milan, 1873). Sedevacantists boast they are staunch upholders of the papacy.

— Liberals apologize, excuse, extenuate, soften and explain away points of faith, practice and discipline. (Soft stance on Canon Law, especially those canons governing jurisdiction and heresy, apostasy and schism; abuse of the principles of epikeia and necessity).

— “They subject God’s authority to the scrutiny of reason,” (Sarda), pretending that they can rightfully interpret and dismiss papal teaching when even approved theologians were forbidden to do this.  Only the lawgiver (the Roman Pontiff) may interpret his own documents.

— They believe that, as Rev. Sarda notes: “The limits of the Church’s infallibility may be determined by human science… The Church is of course infallible but they choose to determine when and what She shall speak infallibly, [placing] the formal motive of faith in human reason.”

— They dismiss dogmatic bulls such as Unam Sanctam and In Coenae Domini, even though “the popes inserted these bulls into Canon Law.”  (Veuillot) And here we must add Pope Paul IV’s 1559 Bull Cum ex Apostolatus Officio, the confirmation of this bull by Pope St. Pius V (Intermultiplices) Pope St. Pius V’s Quo Primum, (which some now hold as non-binding) as well as Pope Pius XII’s papal election Constitution Vacantis Apostolicae Sedis. But the Traditionalists dismissing these bulls and other binding papal decrees are not clerics, are not approved authors nor are they experts of any kind. Henry Cardinal Manning tells us in his The Vatican Decrees and their Bearing on Civil Allegiance (1875) that: “The Vatican Council… definition, by retrospective action makes all Pontifical acts infallible” and here he includes Unam Sanctam, Unigenitus and Auctorum Fidei. Cardinal Manning I believe without hesitation; Traditionalists have no authority.

— In pretending to be Catholic, Liberals demand “…the moderation and charity recommended by the pope(s) to Catholic writers, [which] applies only to Catholic polemics between CATHOLICS on FREE QUESTIONS” (Sarda; see recent series on religious discussion).

— Liberals either discredit their opponents or pass them by in silence. The truth and papal authority being abandoned as the ultimate good, they preach impartiality, tolerance and compromise, but they never practice what they preach. They consistently resort to ad hominem attacks, loaded questions, arguments beside the point or that beg the question, and engage in equivocation. This is no surprise since Liberals and Modernists alike despise the scholastic system of logic. They have never and will never refute an argument point by point.

— “Liberalism is a false Catholicity… It is paganism disguised in Catholic forms and using Catholic language.” In short, Pope Pius IX describes “Catholic” Liberals as “worse than demons” (Sarda).

Distorted meaning of the term Tradition

Not only are Traditionalists Liberals, but they equivocally use the word “Tradition” to describe themselves, when they more accurately match the description of those condemned for Traditionalism in DZ 1649. The advocates for this system taught: “Reason of itself is radically unable to know with certainty any truth or, at least, the fundamental truths of the metaphysical, moral, and religious order. Hence our first act of knowledge must be an act of faith, based on the authority of revelation” and the common consent of society. This is also the teaching of Liberalism as seen above. The very idea that the word Tradition can in anyway be associated with Traditionalists today is preposterous, since furthermore, as Pietro Parente and his fellow authors write in their Dictionary of Dogmatic Theology, the “…organ [of Divine Tradition] is the living magisterium of the Church (the Roman Pontiff and the bishops united with and subordinate to him).”

So from now on, then, these Traditionalist sects will be referred to here as LibTrads, reflecting these two heresies. These errant sects can scarcely claim they are the successors of the Continual Magisterium. They possess no validly consecrated bishops, as infallibly taught by Pope Pius XII in his Vacantis Apostolicae Sedis, far less a canonically elected Roman Pontiff. And in fact, they believe the Church can be governed by bishops alone without a head bishop, meaning they believe the “body of bishops” is superior to the pope as the heretical Gallicanists hold, even when a true pope exists. This heretical principle is also held by some who pray at home, claiming, “there must always be bishops,” without specific inclusion of the pope as head bishop. And the use of this phrase is yet another example of the LibTrad confusion of terms, since it bears the appearance of truth to the less discerning. But in not insisting there must first and foremost be a pope as head of these bishops for the Church to even exist, they deny the teachings of the Vatican Council.

Can LibTrads insist on using their own reason to judge papal teaching and at the same time hold that one is unable to know such truths by way of reason? Yes. Note above that the heresy of Liberalism teaches “the TRUE SENSE of revealed doctrine is not always CERTAIN and human reason has something to say in the matter.”  Here we see the denial that Catholics are able to arrive at certitude, for the heresy of Traditionalism teaches: “Reason of itself is radically unable to know with certainty any truth or, at least, the fundamental truths…” Well this being the case, and the pope being absent, who is able to decide the “true sense” of these  truths? LibTrads consistently refer to the “sensus Catholicus” and their pseudo-clergy’s commission to fulfill the Divine law regarding “the salvation of souls.” This comprises, then, the heresy of Traditionalism’s “an act of faith, [in their validity as successors of the Apostles] based on the authority of revelation,” i.e., the Divine law they say commands them to act. So there must be some directing force, in this case LibTrad pseudo-clergy, deciding for everyone else — those unable to reason for themselves or arrive at certitude — who will speak for the Church in the absence of the Roman Pontiff. They are the ones who “choose to determine when and what She shall speak infallibly.”

This brings us to the remarks in Rev. Sarda’s work regarding, “The dogmatizers of the [Liberal] sect… who teach liberalism in books, in discourses, in articles; by argument or by authority…  Practical liberalists… like a flock of sheep with closed eyes, follow their leaders. They know nothing in truth of principles and systems and did they perceive the perversity of their instructors, they would perhaps detest them. But deceived by a false cry or shibboleth they troop docilely after their false guides. They are nonetheless the hands that act while the theorists are the heads that direct… They are less excusable than those liberals who have never been within the pale of the Church. In short, they sin with their eyes open.” And once again, we have a perfect description of LibTrads.

Individual rights v. duties of priests and faithful

When Pope Pius XII died, those among the faithful infected with Liberalism and Modernism fell prey to these LibTrads after Paul 6 introduced the Novus Ordo Missae. Shell-shocked and vulnerable, with the majority ignorant of their faith, they were ripe for the picking, and their Liberal organizers well knew it. Rather than educate them, which was the first obligation of any lawful clergy (which they were not), LibTrads indiscriminately offered them the Latin Mass and invalid Sacraments. Since the focus of Liberalism is on the inviolability of individual rights versus the absolute obligation to obey the popes and perform one’s Catholic duties, LibTrads appealed to the faithful’s “right” to request the sacraments, excluding the fact that this right applied only if they were not in some way excommunicated (which many were). And they neglected to explain that only lawful pastors, as the Church defined them, were allowed to administer the Sacraments. The entire focus was placed on the Mass and the heretically exclusive idea of a ”community priesthood.” This was no different than the Novus Ordo crowd’s insistence on their “rights” to greater participation in the liturgy and the use of the vernacular.

Negative unity and denial

And here we see demonstrated the negative unity aspect of these LibTrads, a loosely based unity predicated on the denial of various Catholic truths and the failure to draw out logical conclusions — consequences logically flowing from their erroneous premises. If they denied that it could be absolutely determined whether the current holder of the See in Rome was truly vacant (material-formal excuse) they could continue to reign as the hierarchy. If they denied that VAS was an infallible decree that they irrevocably accept, they could continue to claim validity. If they denied VAS applied to them, they could provide the Mass and Sacraments. This in turn would allow them to deny that Paul 6 was Antichrist and the Sacrifice had ceased. All this is assuming that there was no overriding agenda powering the LibTrad movement, and such an assumption would be a huge mistake. For there is every indication that long before Vatican 2 ever occurred, there were preparations to re-channel and misdirect Catholics exiting the Vatican 2 church, and this we have explained in previous articles and blogs.

What else do they deny? The scenario of those believing there will be a restoration of the Church generally goes like this: The papacy would be usurped for a time or the pope would be forced into exile, Antichrist would reign briefly before or after a restoration of the Church, but the Church would be rescued by a great pope (and according to some, a great king) and life would go on. This of course is not what ALL Catholic prophecies, only selected ones, foretold, and there are many variations on this theme. But Church teaching, Canon Law and Catholic commentary on Holy Scripture tell a different story. And there has been no attempt by LibTrads to employ all these resources to arrive at a solution that is fully in accord with Catholic teaching.

Illogical conclusions and false consequences

It is true that some reliable Scripture commentators predict a restoration. But these same commentators did not foresee what happened to us. They did not anticipate a protracted interregnum and the apostasy of all the bishops and cardinals. They wrote before the issuance of the election laws of Pope St. Pius X and Pius XII. Only a few of them wrote after these binding documents were issued and Pope Pius XII handed down his decision on millenarianism. Most importantly, these commentators did not factor in the possibility, in light of Canon Law and Vacantis Apostolicae Sedis, that all the bishops and cardinals would apostatize and none of those who claimed to remain faithful would come forward. They never considered that the Church’s ability to canonically elect a successor to St. Peter would be allowed to expire. And the commentators who do not allow for a restoration see the Church ending sometime after Antichrist’s death, but they do not set a time for how long this period might last.

Earlier this year we explained why a restoration is not possible today, and how the confusion perpetuated by LibTrads came about. As the Vatican Council teaches, “The gates of hell, to overthrow the Church, if this were possible, arise from all sides with ever greater hatred against its divinely established foundation,” (DZ 1821). A house can be swept away yet its foundation remains. Notice that the Council says, “overthrow the Church,” yet this cannot mean the Roman Pontiff. For as Rev. E.S. Berry explains in his The Church of Christ: “The Church as it exists in particular places may fail; even the Church of a whole nation may fall away as history abundantly proves. The Apostolic See of Rome is the only particular Church to which the promise of perpetual indefectibility has been made. (p. 56). The Church without Her head can be diminished, scattered, but never entirely destroyed.

One scholarly work in particular proves that the true teaching of the Vatican Council did NOT support the idea that the hierarchy would exist until the consummation of the world by fire OR support the restoration theory. “The idea that the Church shall have a pope, bishops, seminaries, etc. until the literal last day of the world, until the Lord returns, is widespread and plays a significant role in debates between Catholics about consequences to be drawn in the face of the Great Apostasy that has become visible since the robber council of the 1960s. Looking at original Latin documents and writings of the Magisterium, the Fathers, Doctors and Saints, and the Vulgate as well as other editions of Holy Scripture, a different picture comes to the fore. As a matter of fact, the Vatican Council solemnly teaches that the Lord promised shepherds and teachers until the consummation of the age which, according to Catholic commentary, begins with the revelation of Antichrist who is announced to reign before the return of the Lord. Hence, apostolic succession seems to have come to an end already, and we deal with shepherds of vengeance” (B. E. Strauss, Even to the Consummation of the Age, with impressive documentation from the Fathers and Holy Scripture. This PDF is available on request.)

Cessation of the Continual Sacrifice

From the Vatican Council we read: “In order to restrain impetuous minds… We, renewing the decree [of the Council of Trent], declare that in matters of faith and morals pertaining to the instruction of Christian doctrine, that must be considered as the true sense of Sacred Scripture which Holy Mother Church has held and holds, whose office is to judge concerning the true understanding and interpretation of the Sacred Scriptures. And for that reason, no one is permitted to interpret Sacred Scripture itself contrary to this sense or even contrary to the unanimous agreement of the Fathers” (DZ 1788). Msgr. Joseph C. Fenton comments: “The Council of Trent identified the unanimous teaching of the Fathers with the interpretation of the Church itself as the standard for the correct explanation of Holy Scripture” (The Concept of Sacred Theology, 1941).

And indeed, Henry Cardinal Manning, in hisThe Present Crisis of the Holy See Tested byProphecy wrote: “The Holy Fathers who have written upon the subject of Antichrist and the prophecies of Daniel — all of them unanimously — say that in the latter end of the world, during the reign of Antichrist, the Holy Sacrifice of the altar will cease.” Speaking of the verse in St. Paul, 2 Thess. 2: v. 7-8,  which reads “He who now holdeth do hold until he be taken out of the way, and then that wicked one shall be revealed.” And Manning says that ALL the Fathers also teach Antichrist will be an individual, identifiable person, a member of the Jewish race.

The withholding power and the Great Apostasy

In his The Temporal Power of the Vicar of Jesus Christ, Card. Manning also wrote: “The barrier, or hindrance, to lawlessness will exist until it is taken out of the way.  Now what is the meaning of the words, until it ‘be taken out of the way’? The Son of God shall permit, for a time, the powers of evil to prevail.  That He will permit it for a time stands in the book of prophecy.  When the hindrance is taken away, the man of sin will be revealed. The event may come to pass that as our Divine Lord, after His three years of public ministry were ended, delivered Himself of His own free will into the hands of men, and thereby permitted them to do that which before was impossible, so in His inscrutable wisdom He may deliver over His Vicar upon earth, as He delivered Himself, and that the providential support of the temporal power of the Holy See may be withdrawn when its work is done…

“When the whole number of those whom He hath chosen to eternal life is filled up. It may be that when that is done, and when the times of Antichrist are come, that He will give over His Vicar upon earth, and His Mystical Body at large, [for a time]… The Church would, as in the beginning, again be made up of members voluntarily uniting themselves together throughout the whole world, having indeed a legal recognition here and there, but wandering up and down the earth, without any contact with the nations of the world as such…” And here Manning ends with a warning to the LibTrads: “For as surely as the Son of God reigns on high, and will reign “until He has put all His enemies under His feet,” so surely everyone that lifts a heel or directs a weapon, a tongue, or a pen, against His faith, His Church, or His Vicar upon earth, will share the judgment which is laid up for the Antichrist whom he serves… ‘Whosoever shall fall on this stone shall he broken; but on whomsoever it shall fall, it shall grind him to powder’” (Matt. 21:44). Christ’s Vicars shall not be mocked.

Why would any organization calling itself Catholic, seeing the destruction wrought by John 23 and Paul 6, and the prophecies being fulfilled before their very eyes, interpret what they were seeing any way other than Holy Scripture describes? This teaching of Cardinal Manning on the Holy Sacrifice ceasing was first published in 1970 in a work on prophecy that enjoyed numerous printings! Catholics watched their cardinals betray them in electing Roncalli, their bishops betray them at the council he called and both Roncalli and Montini betray them by destroying their Mass. What kept them from seeing it? The denial orchestrated by the LibTrad pseudo-clergy, “the Liberals’ failure to draw out the logical conclusions prophesied in Holy Scripture, consequences logically flowing from Divine Revelation. Their grand plan to elevate themselves to power and supplant the papacy, to realize the Gallicanist dream while maintaining the appearance of orthodoxy, could be realized only if they made it appear that “Reason of itself is radically unable to know with certainty any truth or, at least, the fundamental truths.” 

 And yet any reasonable person could have drawn the logical conclusions had they been taught or taken the initiative to learn the entire scope of Catholic truth in the first place. Had they followed the sequence of the prophecies that foretell the progression of the Great Apostasy and the coming of Antichrist, found in Daniel, St. Paul, Matthew 24 and the Apocalypse, and prayed for the grace to understand it, the lies of the LibTrads and NO would have fallen apart. Christ orders us to read the book of Daniel, that we might be able to recognize the abomination of desolation, noting, “He that readeth, let him understand” (Matt 24:15). And in his infallible Bull Cum ex Apostolatus Officio, Pope Paul IV, speaking as Christ on earth, defines this phrase as an invalidly elected man usurping the papacy.

St. Paul says that first comes the apostasy (the defection of the cardinals and bishops, which began before Pope Pius XII ever died, leading to Roncalli’s invalid election and Vatican 2. This was succeeded by the defection of the once faithful who remained within the Novus Ordo church). But the appearance of the abomination cannot occur unless “he who withholdeth” (the pope) is first “taken out of the way”; THEN the Man of Sin is revealed, (but how long this takes or in what manner he is revealed is not explained). And only after this, according to the unanimous opinion of the Fathers, does the Sacrifice cease.  As Rev. Sarda wrote, “The seduction of liberalism is not of the kind that blinds by a false light but rather the seduction which, in sullying the heart, obscures the understanding,” and Christ urged us to properly understand his words. Here Rev. Sarda describes yet another prophecy now fulfilled — the LibTrad operation of error, to believe lies.

All the events above we have witnessed with our own eyes. Even LibTrads will admit that Paul 6 officially abrogated the Holy Sacrifice and set up an idol — the heretical monstrosity denying Christ’s own words — on the bare table altar. Yet they fail to follow through with the consequences and admit this man was the Antichrist, the Man of Sin. Holy Scripture does not speak of a blissful time of peace following Antichrist’s death, nor a glorious restoration — that comes from the works of private revelations and commentators writing before Pope Pius XII’s decision om millenarianism. It speaks only of the final judgment and the New Jerusalem. The belief that the 1,000 years in Apoc. 20: 2-3, 7 was the predicator of that peace and restoration was sanctioned as unsafe by Pope Pius XII. Failure of the cardinals and bishops to obey his papal election law Vacantis Apostolicae Sedis forever robbed the Church of the ability to re-establish the papacy, signaling the consummation of the age of the Church.

What Christ has in store for us next is uncertain, but most Scripture commentators predict only His Second Coming following the death of Antichrist and his system. As E. B. Strauss says and Rev. Haydock confirms, “…there is not only no reason to expect true shepherds and teachers during the consummation of the age. On the contrary, biblical prophecy, as expounded by the Fathers and Doctors of the Church, announces false shepherds and teachers as well as Antichrist, sent by the Lord, sitting in the holy place, slaughtering, selling, and devouring the sheep.” This is easily discerned by reviewing Matt. 24, for once Christ announces the coming of the abomination, there is mention only of the danger of false prophets and false Christs, and the need to pray and watch and not grow weary of doing good. This extends even into Matt. Ch. 25. Once the book of Apocalypse commences, there is no relief seen for the faithful, for as Ch. 13: 7 proclaims, “It was given unto him [Antichrist] to make war with the saints and to overcome them.” Daniel says that Antichrist “will crush the saints of the Most High” (Ch. 7:25).

Conclusion

By obscuring these facts, the LibTrads have successfully prevented their followers from arriving at the inevitable conclusion — that there can be no valid hierarchy, hence no Mass and Sacraments today and no restoration. There is nothing they can point to — in Scripture or papal teaching — to support this hypothesis once it is admitted, as Holy Scripture and the  Fathers show, that Antichrist has come and the Sacrifice has ceased. Their organizers and those controlling them behind the scenes have done so for obvious reasons, i.e., the two motives that fuel the ambitions of everyone today: power and money.  The 19^th century Maryland Redemptorist, Fr. Michael Muller, C.s.s.R, includes a poem in his book, The Church and Her Enemies, that tells us where we all stand today. It should convince anyone who believes that what we are now experiencing can be reversed that such is definitely not the case. And we note here that Fr. Muller does not even factor in here the arrival of Antichrist, — his usurpation of the papal See and the cessation of the Continual Sacrifice — which has now occurred. That should put all on notice who truly think this situation is reversible. And it should finally force them to re-examine, then correct, the fatal misdirection of their thinking processes by Liberals parading as the true Catholic Church.

(The following rendition of Fr. Muller’s poem, kindly brought to our attention by a reader, has been somewhat rearranged and adapted, but is faithful to the original meaning.)

• When senators openly buy the seats they occupy, legislators sell bonds for votes, and Christian statesmen pocket leprous notes;
• When brutal ignorance is armed with power and corporations the poor devour;
• When even the pulpit lends its aid to political parties for selfish and unholy ends, and the courts of justice scoundrels tend;
• When the press with great abandon brazenly broadcasts error;
• When luxury and corruption rules and despots seize the land, creating terror;
• When by reckless gamblers great fortunes are made, and swindling bankers ply their thrifty trade;
• When officials plunder savings accounts and rob the poor, who deemed their little pittances secure;
• When funds held for the poor common man are plundered then rationed, by officials who run the city, state and nation;
• When the curs bark at the heels of honesty and worth and every day sees some new monstrous birth of fraud and ingenious con-artistry, of a monstrous and unnatural villainy;
• When lying no longer disgraces even those who hold the highest places but has become a national disease; and when perjuries are thick as leaves on trees;
• When stock investments are fraudulently watered down and forbidden interests in the national treasury are found;
• When a country pays for private transportation and foots the bill for female vanities and shameful disportation;
• When murders and murderers multiply, their perpetrators acquitted and pardoned if it suits party uses and needs;
• When the widow goes unrelieved and the fatherless are wronged by naked greed;
• When devotion sleeps in cinders of contempt and the land with these leprous sins is rent;

WHEN YOU SEE THESE RIVALS OF SODOM AND GOMORRAH THEN REND YOUR GARMENTS, AND LIKE JONAH CRY: REPENT OF YOUR SINS — THE END IS NIGH!!!

Pius XII’s teaching on pain prevention and the Passion of the Church

by T. Stanfill Benns | Sep 15, 2023 | New Blog

+The Seven Sorrows of the Blessed Virgin Mary+

What has reached a fever pitch in our society as the result of the innovations introduced to Catholics via liturgical reform is the desire to avoid pain and discomfort at all costs and at its earliest onset, regardless of how inconsequential it may be. This was referred to by Rev. Kaiser in the series on liturgical reform, concluded last week. As promised, we are writing a separate blog on this issue because it is so widespread and has such far-reaching consequences. But we must also warn below of the deadly rigorist reaction to this attitude of the progressives regarding pain, which is just as harmful as their avoidance of it, if not more so.

In his work, Rev. Kaiser stated: “[Liturgical reform] confused sentimental fear of suffering and psychotic fear of penance with the true role and purpose (both theological and psychological) of the Cross of Christ, as a redeeming principle and the redeeming factor in Christianity… The unreasoning yen for antiquity and simplicity and so-called “objectivity” is opposed not only to orthodoxy but also to sound psychology… It savors of the unrealistic attempt to acquire happiness and glory without earning them. It ignored the power of sin and the consequent need of expiation…. False esthetic preference for the merely ancient and simple was joined to a merely sentimental aversion to pain and suffering.

“The dilettantes wanted to do without the Cross of pain. So they invented a glorified sentiment in place of the victorious and triumphant historical Christ. There is for us no hope of glory except through the Cross and our faith in Him who died that we might live. Man needs Christ on the Cross, both as a Sacrifice and as an inspiration to courage and resignation… The dilettantes, the exclusivists, the Hegelians could merely flatter man’s penchant for ease and self-glorification — not elevate or divinize him, as they pretended.”

This fear of pain and suffering, the very element so essential to Christ’s death on the Cross to achieve our redemption, was symbolized in the appearance of the “Risen Christ” crosses — Christ risen with his arms upraised, not nailed to the Cross, as Kaiser explains. Some Novus Ordo fanatics even added a 15^th “station” of the Resurrection to the traditional 14. This aversion to pain as it appeared in the 1960s was the perfect prelude to the advent, in that same decade, of tranquilizers, pain pills and other palliatives which became a popular refuge for bored housewives and those suffering milder forms of chronic pain. Then of course there was always recourse to illegal drugs, which also began to flourish in that same time-period. So the aversion to pain option cleverly laid the groundwork for future plans of the powers that be to condition Catholics for drug use to avoid or diminish suffering, although few then saw it for what it would later become.

Origin of mind-altering drugs

This would include not only physical but emotional pain, as exhibited in patients suffering from neurosis, obsessive-compulsive disorders, anxiety and depression. Let’s delve a bit into the origin of these drugs. In his Serpent and the Rainbow, researcher Wade Davis explained how a mission into the jungles of Haiti gave rise to the popularity of psychotropic drugs. Davis was dispatched to Haiti by those involved in the development of psycho-pharmaceutical preparations in the 1970s. He found Haiti overrun with secret societies originally introduced via the slave trade. On their arrival in Haiti, these societies eventually allied themselves with tribal chiefs immersed in the occult knowledge of “toxic preparations.” A certain element of these societies terrorized the native Haitian population in much the same way the Holy Vehm had terrorized Germany and Prussia. According to Davis, Haitian secret societies were “the predecessor” of secret societies today, only in the sense that they more closely resembled modern versions of the older model.

Davis journeyed to Haiti to study plant life and return with a drug that would assist anesthesiologists in creating a “zombie-like state” while sedating patients for prolonged surgical procedures. One of his sponsors already had developed the first psychoactive drug used to “cure” insanity: reserpine, derived from the herb snakeroot. Davis found what he was sent to find, but he also discovered a frightening array of toxic plants and preparations used by the secret societies against their enemies; potent drugs that could produce “a body without character, without will.”Despite psychiatry’s disdain as a profession concerning the possibility of possession, Davis is convinced he observed possession firsthand, and feels that the determination as to whether possession exists or not is better left to those who know it best. So now we know the real history behind the term “zombie apocalypse.”

Possession and the “split-mind”

Davis does not seem to address the possibility that his sponsors’ intent could have exceeded their stated professional interest. Yet the subsequent explosion of psychoactive and mind-altering drugs that followed at least suggests that such research paved the way for drug experimentation and the development of succeeding generations of drugs that successfully impede or destroy the memory and the will. And the gurus who would be entrusted to administer them were none other than the students of Sigmund Freud, whose psychoanalytic methods and the theories on which they rested were condemned by the Catholic Church.

Freud defined hysteria, for example, as an organic mental illness distinct from possession, but many theologians believed it to be a state either indicative of possession or preceding it. In the work Soundings on Satanism, by various authors, F.M. Catherinet, writing on the many demoniacs cured by Christ that are recorded in the Gospels, boldly stated that, “All true diabolic possession is accompanied, in fact and by a quasi-necessity, by mental or nervous troubles amplified or produced by the demon.” This also ties into an article written by C. J. Woolen (December 1945 Homiletic and Pastoral Review) entitled “A Schizophrenic Generation.” The article held that already in post-war America a condition existed among Catholics that effectively minimized sin and evil living by attributing its cause to a mental illness which Woolen calls the “split mind,” or schizophrenia, known also today as the dissociative state.

“The Christian, if he is to be faithful, has no choice but to be heroic,” Woolen stated towards the end of his article. The numbing process of denial, psychiatry and psychotropic drugs are modern choices for dulling the pain of living in a materialistic world where true Catholic love of God not tainted by Liberalism would result in loss of earthly goods and the kindly regards of one’s neighbors. Woolen advised in the 1940s that all Catholic priests in every diocese provide the obvious solution — routine exorcism of their parishioners. But the psychotic denial practiced wholesale prior to Vatican 2 gripped the Church with such force that Catholics willingly sacrificed the very things the martyrs gave their lives to preserve rather than appear “out of date.” As the author Fr. Felix Sarda y Salvany’s, in his classic work commended by Pope Leo XIII’s Holy Office, Liberalism is a Sin, rightly notes: “The desire to take and make things easy… obscures the understanding.”

Psychotropic drugs are not specifically addressed in Pope Pius XII’s binding decree below on pain prevention and the administration of pain relief at the hour of death. But the pope does provide answers on how Catholics must view pain and suffering. The specifics of pain relief at the hour of death are an important topic because certain rigorist Traditional sects, some claiming to endorse the pray-at-home position, have convinced their followers that one is not allowed to request pain medications when dying and that taking such medications would be a grave sin. Especially in light of the true teaching of the Church below, this is a cruel and merciless position that must be abhorred, and those who sanction it should be treated as the wretches they truly are for depriving Catholics of the comfort at the end of their life that the Church allows. Yet other Traditionalist sects would permit the complete anesthetization of the dying, depriving them of their reason, so desperately needed to make their peace with God. Both extremes must be avoided, as Pius XII explains below. These heretical sects prey on the ignorance and vulnerability of Catholics even at the end of life because their real mission on this earth is to deprive them of eternal salvation. This is why we continue to warn Catholics that despite their pretenses to uphold papal teaching, these sects do no such thing and are truly a danger to those striving to save their souls.

Morality of Pain Prevention

Pius XII, AAS 27-3-1957 (Feb. 24, 1957  – ACTA, vol. XXIV, n. 3, p. 129)

The Pope Speaks, Vol. IV, 1957-58

Moral obligation to endure physical pain

“… It is evident in certain cases that the acceptance of physical suffering is a matter of serious obligation. Thus a man is bound in conscience to accept suffering every time he is faced with the inescapable alternative of either enduring suffering or acting contrary to a moral obligation by positive action or by omission. The martyrs could not avoid torture or death without denying their faith or evading the serious obligation of bearing witness to it when the occasion was given. But it is unnecessary to go back to the martyrs today there are magnificent examples of Christians who for weeks months and even years have endured suffering and physical violence in order to remain faithful to God and their conscience…

“…[But] man, even after the fall, retains the right to control the forces of nature, to employ them for his own use, and, consequently, to derive benefit from all the resources which nature offers him for the suppression and avoidance of physical pain. But Christian suffering is not something purely negative; on the contrary, it is linked with lofty religious and moral values. Hence it may be desired and sought even if no moral obligation to do so exists in a particular case… The Christian is bound to mortify the flesh and strive after his interior purification, for it is impossible in the long run to avoid sin and fulfill all one’s duties faithfully if this effort at mortification and purification is neglected. Physical suffering becomes necessary and must therefore be accepted insofar as without its aid mastery over the self and its disorderly tendencies is unattainable. But to the extent that it is not required for this purpose it cannot be asserted that there is any strict obligation in the matter.

“The Christian, then, is never obliged to desire suffering for its own sake. He considers it a means more or less adapted according to circumstances to the end which he is pursuing. Although it is beyond dispute that the Christian feels his desire to accept and even to seek physical pain in order to share the more in the passion of Christ, to renounce the world and the pleasures of the senses and to mortify his own flesh, it is important to interpret this tendency correctly. Those who manifest it exteriorly do not necessarily possess genuine Christian heroism. And it would also be erroneous to declare that those who do not manifest this tendency are devoid of heroism. Such heroism can indeed express itself in other ways.

“When a Christian performs day after day, from morning till night all the duties imposed by his state in life, his profession AND THE LAWS OF GOD AND MAN, when he prays with recollection, works wholeheartedly, resists his evil passions, shows his neighbor the charity and service to him and endures bravely, without murmuring, whatever God sends him, he is always living under the standard of Christ’s cross whether physical suffering is present or not; whether he endures it or avoids it by permissible means… The acceptance of physical suffering is only one way among many others of indicating what is the real essential: the will to love God and serve him in all things. It is above all in the perfection of this voluntary disposition that the quality of the Christian life in its heroism consists.”

On the use of analgesics for the dying

“Now growth in the love of God and in abandonment to His will does not come from the sufferings which are accepted, but from a voluntary intention supported by grace. This intention in many of the dying can be strengthened and become more active if their sufferings are eased, for these sufferings aggravate the state of weakness and physical exhaustion, check the ardor of soul, and sap the moral powers instead of sustaining them. On the other hand, the suppression of pain removes physical and mental tension, makes prayer easier, and makes possible a more generous gift of self… The sick person should not, without serious reason, be deprived of consciousness. When this state is produced by natural causes, men must accept it. But it is not for them to bring it about on their own initiative unless they have serious motives for doing so… It is to be remembered that instead of assisting toward expiation and merit, suffering can also furnish occasion for new faults.

“When, in spite of obligations still binding on him, the dying man asks for narcosis for which there exist serious reasons, a conscientious doctor will not countenance it, especially if he is a Christian, without having invited the patient, either personally or, better still, through someone else, to carry out his obligations first. If the sick man refuses obstinately and persists in asking for narcosis, the doctor can consent to it without rendering himself guilty of formal cooperation in the fault committed… But if a dying person has fulfilled all his duties and received the last sacraments, if medical reasons clearly suggest the use of anesthesia, if in determining the dose the permitted amount is not exceeded, if the intensity and duration of this treatment is carefully reckoned, and, finally, if the patient consents to it, then there is no objection: the use of anesthesia is morally permissible.

“If, on the contrary, the administration of narcotics produces two distinct effects, one, the relief of pain and the other, the shortening of life, then the action is lawful; however, it must be determined whether there is a reasonable proportion between these two effects and whether the advantages of the one effect compensate for the disadvantages of the other. To sum up, you ask Us: “Is the removal of pain and consciousness by means of narcotics (when medical reasons demand it) permitted by religion and morality to both doctor and patient even at the approach of death and if one foresees that the use of narcotics will shorten life?” The answer must be: “Yes – provided that no other means exist, and if, in the given circumstances, that action does not prevent the carrying out of other moral and religious duties.” As We have already explained, the ideal of Christian heroism does not require — at least in general — the refusal of narcosis justified on other grounds, even at the approach of death. Everything depends on the particular circumstances. The most perfect and most heroic decision can be present as fully in acceptance as in refusal.” (End of Pope Pius XII excerpts)

Pope Pius XII, then, clarifies our Catholic duty to the dying and sets forth the proper attitude we should have regarding the endurance of pain. This sufficiently and authoritatively counters  the lax and liberal stance of those belonging to the Novus Ordo sects, Latin Mass attendees, “semi-Traditionalists” mainstream Traditionalists and the radical and rigorist sects among them. A recent article published on one popular sedevacantist site claims that Traditionalists are enduring the mystical Passion of Christ. One wonders if they have any clear understanding of the meaning of the word Passion, as related to Christ’s sufferings on the Cross, and as applied to the faithful living in these times. This will be discussed in detail below.

Traditionalists’ bogus interpretation of the Passion of the Church

Above we read from Pope Pius XII that: “It is evident in certain cases that the acceptance of physical suffering is a matter of serious obligation. Thus a man is bound in conscience to accept suffering every time he is faced with the inescapable alternative of either enduring suffering or acting contrary to a moral obligation by positive action or by omission… There are magnificent examples of Christians who for weeks,  months, and even years have endured suffering and physical violence in order to remain faithful to God and their conscience…” This is the pain that cannot be avoided but must be endured by those wishing to be counted as members of Christ’s Mystical Body.

And yet just as Rev. Kaiser describes in his articles, those in the Novus Ordo and Traditionalist sects  resort to heretical exclusivism to avoid enduring this necessary pain. Traditionalists, by denying the necessity of the Roman Pontiff as the head of the Apostolic College of bishops and instead embracing the “community of priests” that would serve those exiting the Vatican 2 Church. And the Novus Ordo counter-church in rejecting both the Church’s true teaching regarding the papacy as well as the Latin Mass. The Gallicanist, Febronian, Gnostic “Traditionalist” faction, which Kaiser rightly credits as the forerunner of this tendency, pretends to save orthodoxy, while rejecting the papacy.

And yet we know from Henry Cardinal Manning and other exegetes commenting on Holy Scripture that this Chair could be overthrown, the shepherd would be struck and the poor flock scattered; and until that fateful day Peter’s Faith did indeed remain unshaken. But this overthrow of the papacy could occur only during the last days of the world and Antichrist’s reign. And whom indeed would bring this about? The Passion of the Church would be orchestrated by the very ones claiming to love Christ the most — once again He would be wounded by those professing to be among His dearest friends, His own race and family. Pope Pius IX stated in his encyclical Nostis et Nobiscum, “Religion itself can never totter and fall while this Chair remains intact, the Chair which rests on the rock which the proud gates of hell cannot overthrow and in which there is the whole and perfect solidity of the Christian religion.” But when that Chair was no longer intact, “religion [WOULD] totter and fall.” Typically, Traditionalists dare to quote these very words of Pope Pius IX above, while ignoring the true import of what he is teaching. They pretend to suffer the Passion of the Church, but how is this possible?

The recent sedevacantist article on the Church’s Passion, answering the “semi-Trads,” defines it as follows: “The true Passion of the Church consists of Catholics, including the Pope, being betrayed, persecuted, humiliated, scourged, calumniated, tortured, and/or killed by the enemies of Christ, His Church, and His Vicar… The sedevacantist does not ‘attempt to eliminate the mystery’ of the Church’s Passion, he tries to understand it correctly.” The horrors of this Great Apostasy is something that all of us have suffered and continue to suffer. This Internet article condemns as false the semi-Trad idea that this Passion is being lived out by the current persecutions aimed at  “Pope Francis” and the Novus Ordo Church, an idea which is, of course, ridiculous. But sedevacantists themselves also entertain a false notion concerning the Passion of the Church, because they have no idea, no proper understanding, of the true meaning of the word “obedience.”

The most perfect worship is to obey God

Our Lord petitioned his Father to be relieved of the Chalice of His Passion in the Garden of Olives. “My Father, if it be possible, let this chalice pass from me… [But] if this chalice may not pass away, but I must drink it, thy will be done” (Matt. 26: vs. 39, 42). We have explained God’s signified will on this site many times; it can be found, St. Francis de Sales tells us, in: “Obedience to the Commandments, both divine and ecclesiastical, is of obligation for all, because there is question here of THE ABSOLUTE WILL OF GOD WHO HAS MADE SUBMISSION TO THESE ORDINANCES A CONDITION OF SALVATION” (“Holy Abandonment,” Rt. Rev. Dom Vital Lehody O.C.R., p. 18, 22). Yet Traditionalists deny that this extends to ecclesiastical law “in these times.” Rev. Aldolphe Tanquerey, that great master of the spiritual life, also wrote:

“Now to conform our wills to that of God is assuredly to cease to do evil, and to learn to do good. Is not this the meaning of that oft repeated text: ‘FOR OBEDIENCE IS BETTER THAN SACRIFICES’ (1 Kings XV, 22; Osee VI, 6; Matt IX, 3 also XII, 7). In the New Law, Our Lord declares from the very moment of His entry into the world that it is with obedience that He will replace the sacrifices of the Ancient Law: ‘Holocausts for sin did not please Thee. Then I said: Behold I come … that I should do Thy will, O God.’ (Hebrews X, 6-7; Phil 11, 8; Phil, IV, 3). And in truth, it is by obedience unto the immolation of self that He has redeemed us: ‘He was made obedient unto death, even the death of the Cross.’ (John 4, 34) In the same way, it is through obedience and through the acceptance of God-ordained trials in union with Christ that we shall atone for our sins and cleanse our soul.” (The Spiritual Life,pages 240-241). But Traditionalists must have their sacrifices at all costs, even the cost of their eternal salvation.

And in his Our Greatest Treasure (1942), Rev. John Kearney wrote: “Obedience is not merely doing what you are told but being cheerfully willing to be told what to do…To obey the Church, therefore, is to obey God, for She commands in His name. And to obey God, to submit to God’s Will, is to offer Him the most perfect worship.” Sedevacantists, as explained in previous blogs, did all they could do to avoid this obedience to ALL the popes teach regarding the primacy, the divine law that is jurisdiction, and the infallible decrees of the Council of Trent and the Vatican Council. They cherry-pick what teachings of the popes they choose to quote and even then, they entirely obscure the full meaning of what they are quoting. They violate every Canon Law pertaining to their operations and pretend that these laws do not issue directly from the Popes and the Councils. This has been demonstrated on this site in numerous articles, so does not bear repeating here.

ALL Traditionalists refuse obedience to the full range of binding teachings issuing from the Continual Magisterium. They deny the integral nature of the Church’s dogmatic teaching, practice heretical exclusivism and steadfastly ignore doctrinal development. They insist on enjoying the emoluments of the Catholic religion despite the prohibitions and condemnations of Her Pontiffs, and the infallible command of Pope Pius XII that this cannot be done during an interregnum. So what are they suffering? What obedience are they offering to Our Lord as a sacrifice, in imitation of His acceptance of His Father’s will in the Garden of Gethsemane? Our Blessed Mother and St. Joseph endured a perilous several-day journey over mountain passes and deserts, in the cold of winter, to obey a civil law, and they are suffering a renewal of Christ’s Passion? To obey WHAT?! Only their own will.

Today is the feast of Our Lady of Sorrows, and one of her deepest sorrows today is the refusal of those entrusted to her sorrowful heart to obey the laws and teachings of her Divine Son and His Vicars. We pray for their conversion daily. If we truly wish to suffer with Our Lady and her beloved Son, that we too may fill up some of what is “wanting” to Christ’s Passion, Mother Mary Potter has this advice to offer:

“The Church appears to have entered upon the time when she mystically represents the Passion of Our Lord, and her members are unusually afflicted and tried; therefore the thought cannot be too often in your mind of the priceless value of suffering, of the short time the severest suffering can last, if it lasted without intermission through your whole life which it does not. Meditate again and again, in union with the Mother of Sorrows, upon the value (we might almost say infinite value) of suffering, since it will procure an infinite reward. It will be well to remember, likewise, that suffering not only procures a closer union with God, and therefore greater happiness in Heaven, but it likewise begets a greater happiness even on earth. You will taste a joy — you who suffer till your soul seems sorrowful even unto death — not conceived by those who pass through life with but its ordinary cares. Suffering is the one thing we may glory in. Suffering borne patiently, borne as God wills, is a present we may offer in some way back to God, and be sure it will be a gift most pleasing to Him. All that we suffer we of course, in our fallen state, deserve; but if God sees that in our hearts we are willing to suffer even undeserved suffering to please Him, to save our souls, He accepts that will, and our suffering is beautified to some resemblance to Our Lady’s” (Path of Mary, 1878, p. 85).

“O let us with the Church unceasingly ask Jesus that He raise sinners from their spiritual death, enlighten those in error, so that all recognize the truth, find, and walk the path which leads to life” (Rev. Leonard Goffine’s Explanation of the Epistles and Gospels, 1874, 15^th Sunday after Pentecost).

Liturgical Reform, Pt. 2, and new insights on the odious heresy of Leonard Feeney

by T. Stanfill Benns | Sep 7, 2023 | New Blog

+Novena to the Sorrowful and Immaculate Heart of Mary+

(See novena below following this bog post)

Please accept my apologies for the long delay in posting the second part of this series. Unfortunately I was waylaid by yet another Leonard Feeney supporter and this prompted a review of the Feeney error, which strangely enough ties into the methods used to reform the liturgy. I have now completed a new three-part series which provides some long-overdue deep insights into the origins of Leonard Feeney’s heresy and more clearly exposes the errors of those supporting him. For while Feeneyites claim to strictly uphold papal teaching they instead distort it, misrepresent it and even at times falsify it. It is a travesty that has been going on for many decades and successfully continues to seduce the unwary. This by attempting to garner sympathy for one they portray as a champion of pre-Vatican 2 Catholicism, but in truth was a condemned heretic who most likely played a clandestine part in dismantling the Church. I provide the link here knowing that many will not wish to spend time reading this series but do so for those who may have friends or relatives entangled in this troublesome heresy. It can be accessed HERE.

Before presenting Part 2 of Rev. Kaiser’s article on Mediator Dei, a brief history of the liturgical movement is provided below.

The emergence of the liturgical movement

A reader has provided the following information from two Novus Ordo sites on the liturgy (http://journalworship.org/About/VatII and https://www.biola.edu/talbot/ce20/database/virgil-michel#biography): “The liturgical movement had its origins in 1832 at the Benedictine Abbey of Solesmes in France. It was there that Dom Prosper Guéranger endeavored to recover authentic Gregorian chant. His work and the work of other monks at the center for liturgy spurred new interest in all aspects of liturgical life (Weiss 1998, 61). In 1903, Pius X issued a motu proprio on church music and by 1909 a conference focusing on liturgy was held in Malines, Belgium. Dom Lambert Beauduin led the conference that underscored full participation in the liturgy as a way of instructing the faithful and deepening their faith. These ideas were pastoral in nature and pointed to the catechetical potential of the Mass. In an article on liturgy and catechesis, Joseph Weiss quotes Virgil Funk,

Beauduin held that an understanding of the nature of the Church as the body of Christ would enable the development of a deeper sense of community in both worship and life. Worship, Beauduin stressed, was the common action of the people of the Church, an action that involved them all in a sharing in the saving work of Christ in and for the world. . . . The “active participation” of the people, a phrase first used officially by Pope Pius X, was promoted through early and frequent communion, the restoration of community singing, and the translation of the Roman Missal as a devotional manual for the people. (Funk 1991, 699)… It was Dom Beauduin who was the inspirational force behind Michel’s desire to revive the liturgical worship of the Catholic Church in the United States. From the elder monk, Michel grew to see the theology of The Mystical Body of Christ as a key element in understanding the nature of the liturgy and its ability to touch the whole person, individually and collectively.”

Virgil Michel, O.S.B. (1890-1938), a Benedictine monk of Saint John’s Abbey in Collegeville, Minnesota, was the leader of the Roman Catholic Liturgical Movement in the United States. It was the Collegeville Press that first printed the Our Parish Prays and Sings missalettes in 1959, translating the Latin pro multis as “for all men,” a topic which has been discussed in previous blogs. His life’s work was broadly centered on “bringing about a more Christian society through education for a greater understanding of and participation in the worship of the Church.” A trip to Europe in 1924 brought Michel into contact with courses in liturgy being taught by a monk from Mont César in Belgium named Lambert Beauduin, who believed that the work of saving souls, to be truly effective, must be rooted in the liturgy (Marx 1957, 28). Michel’s biographer writes: “’Virgil Michel was deeply influenced by the scholarly and energetic Dom Lambert who wrote of their meeting: ‘Religious education of the laity was at the heart of his desire to effect liturgical reform. Michel believed that a deeper understanding of the liturgy would in turn lead participants to lead more vibrant Christian lives and, consequently, bring about a more just society. He stressed the inherent link between the liturgy of the Church and action for social justice.’”

Michel later worked with several Protestants to develop his liturgical theology notions. His biographer states that Michel believed that “the laity as well as the clergy made up the Church and each member of the Body of Christ was given special gifts in order to help build up the Church. For Michel, the laity must be at the heart of the liturgy as the ‘work of the people.’ Participation in the Mass and an active Catholic laity were central to Michel’s thought.” And yet the Mystical Body was not defined by the Church until Pope Pius XII wrote Mystici Corporis Christi in 1943, and by that time Michel had already passed away. So what were Beauduin and his student really teaching? Rev. Kaiser will explain some of this below.

Early inklings of reform

The Liturgical Movement was first established in the late 1800s to FIGHT the abuses related to liturgical reform, although it was swiftly overtaken by the Modernists and put to work to promote ecumenism. It was seen as dangerous even in its infancy, long before Pope Pius XII’s death. Many of the reforms that would later be introduced were already being promoted in a work in 1879 entitled History of the Mass, by Rev. John O’Brien where the author writes regarding the consecration of the wine:

“According to the best authorities and Pope Benedict XIV among others, and the Enchiridion, page 72, the word “many” is here to be taken as meaning ‘all,’ a mode of expression by no means uncommon in the Holy Scripture. St. Thomas Aquinas also interprets it in this way.” Patrick Henry Omlor, in his The Robber Church comments: “This TOTALLY erroneous paragraph penned by Father John O’Brien is disturbing enough. Even MORE DISTURBING is the fact that the book wherein it appears was published in [1879] and BEARS THE IMPRIMATUR of John Cardinal McCloskey. Now, in the first place, Father O’Brien’s claim would make a mockery of Saint Pius V and his CATECHISM BY DECREE OF THE HOLY COUNCIL OF TRENT. The reader will recall that earlier in this monograph we quoted a passage from this CATECHISM which begins thus: “With reason, therefore, were the words FOR ALL not used.”(!)  Or wasn’t this saintly Pope aware that the word “MANY “…is here to be taken as meaning “ALL“??

“That Father O’Brien would actually use Benedict XIV and St. Thomas as authorities to prove his point is INCREDIBLE!Because they both held EXACTLY THE OPPOSITE of what Father O’Brien is trying to ‘prove.’  This quotation of St. Alphonsus… needs repeating here: “The words PRO VOBIS ET PRO MULTIS (`For you and for many’) are used to distinguish the virtue of the blood of Christ from its fruits; for the blood of our Savior is of sufficient value to save all men, but its fruits are applicable only to a certain number and not to all, and this is their own fault.  … THIS IS THE EXPLANATION OF ST. THOMAS, AS QUOTED BY BENEDICT XIV.”  (Emphasis added)  And this disingenuous misinterpretation of crucial texts is a tactic repeatedly employed by Traditionalists and the Feeneyites among them.

Fr. O’Brien also notes that: “As far back as the year 1815 when devotion to St. Joseph, the spouse of the Blessed Virgin and foster father of our divine Lord was making rapid headway, the Sacred Congregation of Rites was earnestly besought to grant permission to add the name of this venerable patriarch to [the Canon of the Mass], one of the reasons assigned for making the request being that many persons had a particular devotion to him. The request was not granted, the reply to the question being ‘Negative,’ and this was denominated a response urbis at orbis that is, binding in Rome and everywhere else.” So as can be seen here, the liturgical reform advocates were already at work and it is interesting that in the same volume, two of the later innovations appear that would actually be implemented under Angelo Roncalli. Now to Rev. Kaisers Part 2 on “The Background of Mediator Dei.”

Kaiser opens his article with these words: “In Mediator Dei Pius XII not only refutes the errors of Borgman and Doerner, [writers who helped popularize radical liturgical reform], but also corrects the vagaries of both the indifferent and the enthusiasts. But he does much more. He presents in summary form a beautiful and significant synthesis of Catholic teaching and worship — an integrated philosophy and theology of liturgy. Here we find a truly Catholic and doctrinal integration — one that the enthusiasts might very well use to correct their false sacramentalism and one that heretics might admire and copy in their return to historical and dogmatic values.”

T. Benns comment: And here we ask, why is it that certain “credentialed” individuals antagonistic to Pope Pius XII prefer to write articles condemning him for changes in the Holy Week liturgy and the Breviary; also for failing to deliver the good in Mediator Dei? Such unjust criticism of Pope Pius XII is placed in its proper perspective by the following:“Nor can we pass over in silence the audacity of those who, not enduring sound doctrine, contend that “without sin and without any sacrifice of the Catholic profession assent and obedience may be refused to those judgments and decrees of the Apostolic See, whose object is declared to concern the Church’s general good and her rights and discipline, so only it does not touch the dogmata of faith and morals.” But no one can be found not clearly and distinctly to see and understand how grievously this is opposed to the Catholic dogma of the full power given from God by Christ our Lord Himself to the Roman Pontiff of feeding, ruling and guiding the Universal Church” (Pope Pius IX, Quanta Cura, 1864). Would it not have been much better to simply do a little research and present Rev. Kaiser’s analysis of the topic, along with those of other approved theologians, who were so much closer to the issues of the day?

Kaiser: “…The liturgy has a divine and unchangeable element as well as a human or merely ecclesiastical element, as Pius XII says: ‘The human components admit of various modifications, as the needs of the age, circumstances and the good of souls require, and as the Ecclesiastical Hierarchy under the guidance of the Holy Spirit may have authorized. . . .’ The Pope goes on to give the causes of this development as due, among other things, to a more explicit formulation of doctrine. As doctrine came to be determined with greater certitude and clarity, new ritual forms came to reflect and express the new light shed on the truths of faith.” Pius XII writes in Mediator Dei: “The Church is without question a living organism, and as an organism… she grows, matures, develops, adapts and accommodates herself to temporal needs and circumstances, provided only that the integrity of her doctrine be safeguarded.”

T. Benns comment: Critics of the liturgy changes instituted by Pope Pius XII do not believe that he was inspired by the Holy Ghost to male them? That he could err in a matter of faith? We may not know the exact reasons for these changes but we have no right to question the pope’s ability to make them, as long as they do not touch the substance of the Sacraments. Doctrine develops, and the pope did his best to ensure in this encyclical that it developed in a manner that safeguarded the integrity of Catholic doctrine.

Kaiser: “A perfect harmony is realized between divine faith in the mind and the divine life in the soul, brought about by the integration of Scripture, dogma, moral, and ascetics in liturgy… However, liturgy does not exclude the value and need of other forms of worship and other means of sanctification. It presupposes and requires private worship and private devotion.

T. Benns comment: Here we see the “heretical exclusivism” Rev. Kaiser spoke of in Part 1 of his article, as explained in our last blog. I can’t think of a better way to describe how Traditionalists make the liturgy out to be the “end all, be all” of Catholic faith and belief, excluding all other forms of sanctification such as prayers, devotions, the Perfect Act of Contrition and Spiritual Communion. This teaching of Pope Pius XII in his ordinary magisterium condemns their disparagement and rejection of praying at home. We also must note that this rejection of all other forms of sanctification is also the rejection of an integral Catholicism, and as Msgr. Joseph C. Fenton explained in a previous blog, that rejection is a clear indication of Modernist teaching.

Kaiser: “(Social supper hypothesis) “The Pope adds: ‘They therefore err from the path of truth who do not want to have Masses celebrated unless the faithful communicate… This social supper hypothesis flows from the heretical concept of the community of priesthood as well as from an exaggerated view of Communion as a communal act.”

T. Benns comment: This “community priesthood” — perpetuated by Traditionalists who rely solely on their “precious priests” and “bishops at large,” minus their head bishop, the pope — flourishes precisely because Traditionalists make the Mass and Sacraments the sole focus of Catholic belief and practice, stripping the Church of Her ability to rule infallibly in Jesus’ name. This again is heretical exclusivism, separating the Church, the Mass and the Sacraments, from the direction of Her Vicar.

Kaiser: Pius XII writes: “’It is false, insidious and pernicious to conclude that all Christian piety must be centered in the mystery of the Mystical Body of Christ — with no regard for what is personal or subjective.’ … The supremacy of the Mass and Communion is to be maintained without denying or underestimating the value and need of the other sacraments and rites and likewise without prejudice to all the other non-sacramental means of holiness. Liturgy is indeed the master key but not the only key to the heavenly treasures… Surely the people should have understood the pernicious results of a teaching that tried to separate liturgy from private prayer and devotions and all regard for personal, individual holiness.”

T. Benns comment: So here is proof positive that Traditionalists err in a matter of faith when they condemn those praying at home and tell their followers that it is not possible for them to receive the graces necessary for salvation unless they attend Mass and receive the Sacraments from them. And no, prior to Vatican 2, the people obviously did NOT understand the dire effects of this heretical exclusivism that now has pervaded everything ever once thought to be Catholic. Clearly Traditionalist errors, especially those of the Feeneyites, center wholly around the manner in which grace is distributed. And this is precisely what Mediator Dei condemned. Kaiser sums up his articles as follows.

Kaiser: The author explains that without naming them personally, Pope Pius XII condemned the teachings of Doerner and Borgman, which Kaiser describes as  “Nestorian ideas [issuing] indirectly through liberal Protestantism [and] through Febronianism (German Gallicanism), which culminated in Josephinism and its secular ideas of religion and religious government. The pretense at giving all bishops equal power and denying supreme papal jurisdiction was a cover up for so-called nationalistic and “Los vom Rom” [free from Rome] delusions of Febronianism…” He terms their confusion regarding the operation of grace to “to a monistic conception of identity of the soul in grace with Christ the Author of grace… Whilst Christ is really and substantially present in the Eucharist, Holy Communion is not a substantial union with Christ but rather a spiritual and moral union with the real and substantial presence of Christ in the soul. That may be the reason why some pictured the Eucharistic presence as such as abiding even after the species is dissolved. Here is where Hegelianism and Quietism led to a kind of pantheism. How else explain the term “numerically one and the same grace” of Christ if they merely meant to identify sanctifying grace with the Eucharistic presence? It is therefore an error insofar as it identifies the sacramental Christ with a mere member of His Mystical Body.

“In short, the new doctrine confused the natural and sacramental priesthood of Christ as well as the lay-priesthood with clerical and ordained human priesthood. It confused the sacramental and Mystical Body of Christ. It confused the hypostatic union of the divine and human in Christ with the merely moral and spiritual union of the soul with Christ in Holy Communion. It confused the temporary Eucharistic presence of Christ’s humanity in the soul of the communicant with the longer-lasting presence of sanctifying and sacramental grace in the souls of the just. It mistook antiquarianism and simplicity for true historical and scientific research into the backgrounds of doctrine, liturgy and theology.

“It confused sentimental fear of suffering and psychotic fear of penance with the true role and purpose (both theological and psychological) of the Cross of Christ, as a redeeming principle and the redeeming factor in Christianity. It confused objective and subjective holiness or at least failed to integrate the two in any realistic or even spiritual orientation. It confused Hegelian monism and the unity of truth. It confused scientific scholasticism and mere arbitrary and perfunctory nominalism, or in other words real thinking and mere labeling. And it mistook Quietism for mysticism; syncretism for integration, humanism for divine faith. And finally its socialistic community worship led to community of priest, community of Christ, community of God. Not evolution, but revolution and devolution.

T. Benns comment: Whew! Here we have in a nutshell not only the errors of the Novus Ordo reformers but the Traditionalists as well. It is backhanded proof that they were working both ends to meet in the middle. Errors regarding the necessity of maintaining an integral faith, of the true nature of sanctifying grace, the condemned notion of equality of the bishops with the pope and the heretical exclusivism that separated the liturgy from the papacy — all of these are present in what Kaiser wrote. What is most startling is his assessment that this community priest idea, which Traditionalists have cultivated for decades, is actually a manifestation of socialism, the people running and directing the clergy, in reverse order to the Vicar of Christ reigning over all the faithful, including bishops and priests.

Further thoughts on the liturgy and the Church

As Pope Pius XII explained in Mediator Dei, after reminding the faithful that the Credo is a key part of the liturgy,  “The entire liturgy has the Catholic Faith for its content…it bears public witness to the faith of the Church. For this reason whenever there was a question of defining a truth revealed by God, the Sovereign Pontiff and the Councils, in their recourse to ‘theological sources,’ as they are called, have not seldom drawn many an argument from this sacred science of the Liturgy…’The rule for prayer determines the rule for belief.’ The Sacred Liturgy does not decide or determine independently and of itself what is of Catholic Faith… If one desires to differentiate and described the relationship between faith and the Sacred Liturgy in absolute and general terms, it is perfectly correct to say…’let the rule of belief determine the rule of prayer.’”

And so Catholic doctrine stands outside and above the liturgy. Here we see that Pope Pius XII deliberately reversed the “Lex orandi, lex credendi” touted by the liturgists to prove a point. And he did so because people like Roncalli and his associates were already using this rule to advocate and facilitate actual changes. And yet even Traditionalists reject this clear teaching of the ordinary magisterium as false and injurious to the Church today. This is proven by the many “opinions” concerning the validity of the Novus Ordo Missae (NOM), the lawfulness of attending an NOM, of using priests ordained in Novus Ordo rites and other matters. It also is seen in the constant criticism aimed at Pope Pius XII for allowing even those changes he was permitted to make in the liturgy. This even though the pope taught in this same encyclical that:

“The Sacred Liturgy does include Divine as well as human elements. The former, instituted as they have been by God, cannot be changed in any way by men…The Sovereign Pontiff alone enjoys the right to recognize and establish any practice touching the worship of God, to introduce and approve new rites, as also to modify those he judges to require modification…No private person has any authority to regulate external practices of this kind, which are intimately bound up with Church discipline and with the order, unity and concord of the Mystical Body, and frequently even with the integrity of Catholic faith itself.”

Rev. Ernest Graf summarized Mediator Dei for the Homiletic and Pastoral Review in July, 1948. It is a most enlightening article. One of the first things Graf addresses is Pope Pius XII’s condemnation of a false interpretation of lex orandi, lex credendi, “…which would make of the Liturgy a touchstone of orthodoxy and the content of faith…Though the Liturgy does not absolutely and authoritatively constitute or designate the Catholic faith, valuable arguments may be drawn from it in support of particular points of Christian doctrine.” Thus idolatry of the liturgy as the primary focal point for the practice of the Catholic faith was long ago condemned as dangerous to that faith.

Graf continues: “Changes may be introduced and new forms of devotion approved by the Supreme Pontiff alone…The Pope…sternly rebukes those who, on their own new rites and customs, or to revive others that have become obsolete…Individual priests must not use their churches for liturgical experiments. With a view to preventing abuses, the liturgical movement should be watched and directed by a special committee to be set up in each diocese…Above all, let the laws of the Church be obeyed.”

Pope Pius XII relied on the bishops to obey him and exercise vigilance. They did not. This is far from allowing anything. Pope Pius XII made a very important decision in reserving liturgical change to the Pope. He proved that the Pope is the center of the Catholic faith not the liturgy, or at least not the liturgy without the Pope. Reintroducing or not reintroducing the Tridentine rite is not the gold standard. As Adrian Fortescue explained in the Catholic Encyclopedia under the Mass, the center of unity in belief in the Catholic Church is the papacy, but the Holy Sacrifice is the expression of that unity. Catholics pray according to what they believe, (lex orandi, lex credendi). When the  Church’s teachings are overturned, this invariably results in a disintegration of the liturgy.

Therefore the destruction of the symbol of unity, inextricably bound up with the doctrine of the papacy was mistaken for the thing itself. This is an echo of the manner in which the Modernists intended to represent the faith: external symbols of doctrines themselves were all that was needed to satisfy the superficial Catholic. Heretical exclusivism separates dogmatic integrity from liturgical practice. It makes the Mass and Sacraments the sole means of obtaining grace by excluding other means. It disrupts integral belief in the Church as an unchangeable, undivided whole. It destroys the Apostolic College by decapitating its head, excluding the necessity of perpetual succession and pretending that it can operate without the Vicar Christ established as the sole source of all unity and infallibility. But the most tragic consequence of all these heresies is that they exclude those wishing to be truly Catholic from membership in the Mystical Body of Christ and rob them of their eternal salvation.

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Novena to the Sorrowful Mother

(Can be started at any time before the actual feast on Sept. 15)

MOST BLESSED and afflicted Virgin, Queen of Martyrs, who didst stand generously beneath the cross, beholding the agony of thy dying Son; by the sword of sorrow which then pierced thy soul, by the sufferings of thy sorrowful life, by the unutterable joy which now more than repays thee for them; look down with a mother’s pity and tenderness, as I kneel before thee to compassionate thy sorrows, and to lay my petition with childlike confidence in thy wounded heart.

I beg of thee, O my Mother, to plead continually for me with thy Son, since He can refuse thee nothing, and through the merits of His most sacred Passion and Death, together with thy own sufferings at the foot of the Cross, so to touch His Sacred Heart, that I may obtain my request.

(Here pause and name the favors which you are asking Our Sorrowful Mother to obtain for you through this Novena. Let your secondary intention be to pray for the intentions of all the people making this Novena anywhere in the world, and especially for the prayer associates on this site. Thus a great mass prayer for all Novena intentions will arise to Our Blessed Mother.)

For to whom shall I fly in my wants and miseries, if not to thee, O Mother of mercy, who, having so deeply drunk the chalice of thy Son, canst most pity us poor exiles, still doomed to sigh in this vale of tears? Offer to Jesus but one drop of His Precious Blood, but one pang of His adorable Heart; remind Him that thou art our life, our sweetness, and our hope, and thou wilt obtain what I ask, through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

Hail Mary, Virgin Most Sorrowful, pray for us. (Seven times)