Benedict XVI: Beauty, Claudel, and the traditional Mass

Cardinal Suhard celebrates a Pontifical Midnight Mass at his 
Cathedral of Our Lady of Paris (Notre-Dame de Paris), Christmas 1948

[First televised Mass - Source: Institut national de l'audiovisuel, France]

The work of art is the fruit of human creativity, which questions the visible reality, trying to discover its deep meaning and to communicate it through the language of shapes, colours, sounds. ...

At the end of August

At the end of the first month of the Great War:

August 29, 1914: an agonizing French Catholic soldier, in an infirmary bombarded by the Germans in the war front, asks a military chaplain, whom he believes to be a priest in a cassock, for a Crucifix. The chaplain was Chief Rabbi Abraham Bloch, who brings and presents to him the image of the Crucified Lord: moments later, both would be killed by an exploding shell. [For those who asked... the main eye-witness of the incident was Father Jamin, S.J., in whose arms Bloch finally expired. See, for instance, Maurice Barrès, Les diverses familles spirituelles de la France - published in English as The faith of France.]

Silent recess

Be ye not many masters, my brethren, knowing that you receive the greater judgment. For in many things we all offend. If any man offend not in word, the same is a perfect man. He is able also with a bridle to lead about the whole body. For if we put bits into the mouths of horses, that they may obey us, and we turn about their whole body. Behold also ships, whereas they are great, and are driven by strong winds, yet are they turned about with a small helm, whithersoever the force of the governor willeth. Even so the tongue is indeed a little member, and boasteth great things. Behold how small a fire kindleth a great wood.

And the tongue is a fire, a world of iniquity. The tongue is placed among our members, which defileth the whole body, and inflameth the wheel of our nativity, being set on fire by hell. For every nature of beasts, and of birds, and of serpents, and of the rest, is tamed, and hath been tamed, by the nature of man: but the tongue no man can tame, an unquiet evil, full of deadly poison. By it we bless God and the Father: and by it we curse men, who are made after the likeness of God. Out of the same mouth proceedeth blessing and cursing. My brethren, these things ought not so to be.

Doth a fountain send forth, out of the same hole, sweet and bitter water? Can the fig tree, my brethren, bear grapes; or the vine, figs? So neither can the salt water yield sweet. Who is a wise man, and endued with knowledge among you? Let him shew, by a good conversation, his work in the meekness of wisdom. But if you have bitter zeal, and there be contentions in your hearts; glory not, and be not liars against the truth. For this is not wisdom, descending from above: but earthly, sensual, devilish.

For where envying and contention is, there is inconstancy, and every evil work. But the wisdom, that is from above, first indeed is chaste, then peaceable, modest, easy to be persuaded, consenting to the good, full of mercy and good fruits, without judging, without dissimulation. And the fruit of justice is sown in peace, to them that make peace. [Epistle of Saint James, iii]

Traditional Benedictine Compline

Plus ça change...

Ah, those "Romans"!

Tradidi quod et accepi: First to Cephas, then to the others

"Fratres, notum vobis facio Evangelium, quod prædicavi vobis, quod et accepistis ... Tradidi enim vobis, in primis quod et accepi: quoniam Christus mortuus est pro peccatis nostris secundum Scripturas: et quia sepultus est, et quia resurrexit tertia die secundum Scripturas: et quia visus est Cephæ, et post hoc undecim..."

May he rest in peace

Officium defunctorum, in mat., resp. ad lec. IX ["Libera me Domine"]

Thomas Ludovicus de Victoria, Sac.

(† 27 Aug. MDCXI)

Requiescat in pace

The control of holy things belongs to the clergy, under Peter and his successors

To Peter the Prince of the Apostles, the divine Founder of the Church allotted the gifts of inerrancy in matters of faith and of union with God. This relationship is similar to that of a "Choir Director of the Choir of the Apostles." He is the common teacher and rector of all, so that he might feed the flock of Him who established His Church on the authority of Peter himself and his successors. And on this mystical rock the foundation of the entire ecclesiastical structure stands firm as on a hinge. From it rises the unity of Christian charity as well as our Christian faith. ...

The ancient Fathers, especially those who held the more illustrious chairs of the East, since they accepted these privileges as proper to the pontifical authority, took refuge in the Apostolic See whenever heresy or internal strife troubled them. For it alone promised safety in extreme crises. Basil the Great did so, as did the renowned defender of the Nicene Creed, Athanasius, as well as John Chrysostom. For these inspired Fathers of the orthodox faith appealed from the councils of bishops to the supreme judgement of the Roman Pontiffs according to the prescriptions of the ecclesiastical Canons. Who can say that they were wanting in conformity to the command which they had from Christ? Indeed, lest they should prove faithless in their duty, some went fearlessly into exile, as did Liberius and Silverius and Martinus. ...

However We, who embrace the Eastern Church with no less solicitude and charity than our predecessors, truly rejoice, now that the frightful war is ended. We rejoice that many in the Eastern community have achieved liberty and wrested their holy things from the control of the laity.

Benedict XV

Principi Apostolorum Petro

October 5, 1920

Visit the Royal Chapel of Versailles

New extremely detailed images of the building, including religious masterpieces specially lent by the Franciscan Custody of the Holy Land - just in time to celebrate Saint Louis, King of France, main patron of the Chapel. [Tip: FC]

...propterea exaltabit caput.

The deciding issue concerning the position of the priest at the altar is, as we have said, the nature of the Mass as a sacrificial offering. The person who is doing the offering is facing the one who is receiving the offering; thus, he stands before the altar, positioned ad Dominum, facing the Lord.

If, nowadays, the aim is to emphasize the aspect of the communal meal during the "Eucharistic Feast" by celebrating versus populum, this aim is not being met, at least not in the way some might have hoped. The new arrangement has the "meal  leader" positioned at the table, by himself. The other "meal participants" are situated in the nave, or in the "auditorium," not directly connected to the "meal table." ...

The focus must forever be on God, not man. This has always meant that everyone turn towards Him in prayer, rather than that the priest face the people. From this insight, we must draw the necessary conclusion and admit that the celebration versus populum is, in fact, an error. In the final analysis, celebration versus populum is a turning towards man, and away from God.

Klaus Gamber

Die Reform der römischen Liturgie

[Image source: Mysterium Fidei - announcing the monthly Mass at the Basilica of the Most Precious Blood, in Bruges - next one on Aug. 28.]

Refiner's fire -1

Yesterday's and today's daily thoughts of the French District of the Priestly Fraternity of Saint Pius X (FSSPX / SSPX) - their website, La Porte Latine, publishes a different saying of their Founder, Abp. M. Lefebvre, every day:

"Let me be well understood, I do not say that the Fraternity is the Church, but [that] we are of the Church, as the Sulpicians, the Lazarists, the Foreign Missions, and so many others were."

"There is but one Church, of which we are a powerful branch, filled with sap, approved by the Church exactly as other societies were in the past, and that now are, alas, in their great majority dying of natural death."

The Mass of the Council * The Mass of the "good Pope"

Pope Blessed John XXIII

December 1962