Tradicat

 + JMJ  So there is quite a lot of noise this past month with the publication of Fiducia Supplicans.  Suffice to say that this is the Fruit of Vatican II, but deserved its own category this month. The Spirit of the Second Vatican Council continues to disappoint with the confusion and outright audacity of the Pope and Clergy. I will add commentary and note any updates as time allows. P^3 Persecution of Catholics Update 1: It is not new that persecution follows people who believe what the Catholic Church Teaches - As the Catholic Church Understands the Teachings. Bloody, economic and social persecutions have been going on for thousands of years. So as the Western World moves away from its Christian (i.e. Catholic) foundation, it will turn upon it creating a frenzy.   Were it just the World, it would be one thing, but since the Second Vatican Council, there has been a steady and continuous persecution of Catholics, by Catholics. Why? Simply because we wouldn't give in to the marriag

 + JMJ    Hamas is getting the war that it wanted, but I wonder who is the real opponent. The media is focused on the Gazan civilian's that Hamas is putting or holding in the crossfire, and people are going to die. However, the question becomes who provides the weapons to the terrorist organizations like Hamas, Hezbollah et al?  Who provides the resources of people, equipment, training, and most of funding?  They say to follow the money to get to the root. So far we've heard that Iran is a big supplier as the leaders of Hamas in Qatar or the attack and await the outcry when civilians are killed as a result. Is this really just a war about secular matters, i.e. the erasure of Israel from the map?   ... or ... Is it actually a religious war under the cloak of secularism? Something to consider and watch - even if the Israeli's think of this as a secular war, is that the same for the Muslims? I'm beginning to wonder if this is linked in some fashion to the crisis of the Chu

 + JMJ  Just another collection of articles lovingly scraped from the intergnat by hand.  When time allows to poke around to see if there is anything new and find - sadly - that very little is new.  This means we need to continue to stay the course and remain Catholic by doing what Catholic Dogma, Doctrine and Principles demand.  To depart from this path is to depart from the path to salvation. P^3 SSPX:  Salza and Siscoe  continue their attacks against the SSPX and, to me, are obviously operating under a confirmation bias / cognitive dissonance.  Reading their article below (8.4) we find a caricature of what the SSPX actually states.  First for clarity, the SSPX position on the documents of the Second Vatican Council is that of the theological note provided by the Cardinal Felici (if memory serves): Accept any statement that repeats prior dogma and doctrine, Interpret inline with prior doctrine any ambiguous statement and be very cautious of any novelty.  Their article goes on at len

 + JMJ  So the world continues to spin on its axis and the struggle that is the human condition spins as well. What follows are articles that caught my interest or served as a basis from some of my own work. P^3 Crisis of the Catholic Church and Social Morality Tradicat Commentary: There is a lot of conflict happening both in and outside the Catholic Church. Externally, is it on the moral issues, inside moral, theological and liturgical. Francis Church: Decadence Down to the Last Detail – Gloria.tv US Apostolic Nuncio receives blowback for slamming the cassock, Traditional Latin Mass - LifeSite Zen threatens boycott of HK cardinal’s Mass if Beijing bishop attends EWTN Vatican on X: "🎥VIDEO | At the Mass for deceased cardinals and bishops who passed away in the last year, Pope Francis highlighted the memory of Benedict XVI, from whom he recalled an important teaching: "Faith is not an idea, but a Person, Jesus Christ." https://t.co/MEcIIVTg3p" / X Open L

 + JMJ Today's question is are Traditional Catholics Optimists? For reference, here's some definitions from the Merriam-Webster Dictionary : Optimistic: of, relating to, or characterized by optimism : feeling or showing hope for the future. Pessimistic: : a person who is inclined to expect poor outcomes : someone who is given to pessimism Optimism: a doctrine that this world is the best possible world, an inclination to put the most favorable construction upon actions and events or to anticipate the best possible outcome Pessimism: an inclination to emphasize adverse aspects, conditions, and possibilities or to expect the worst possible outcome;  So a Traditional Catholic who is inclined to expect poor outcomes could be a realist in the near-term, but what about the long-term? The Extreme Sedevacantists that follow their principles to successively de-throning multiple Pontiffs to the absurdity are not optimists.  I think that they may be fatalists or dogmatic pessimists . But t

 + JMJ  One of my kids popped her head into my office as asked if she could ask me a question.  Of course I said yes. She sat down and asked: If a man or woman murdered their current spouse so they could marry another, would that invalidate the following marriage? Suffice to say that I was speechless for a bit. Thinking she may have broken Daddy's brain she hastily added:  Someone said that it would. I wasn't sure so I wanted to ask you! Someone said that it would? The answer is actually clear - even for today.   Canon 1090: §1. Anyone who with a view to entering marriage with a certain person has brought about the death of that person’s spouse or of one’s own spouse invalidly attempts this marriage. §2. Those who have brought about the death of a spouse by mutual physical or moral cooperation also invalidly attempt a marriage together. Nice when things are clear and concise. :-) P^3 References https://www.newadvent.org/ cathen/04489a.htm https://www.vatican.va/ archive/cod-iur

 + JMJ  So ... I noticed on Les Femmes (link), that has been fired resigned from the organization that he founded all those years ago.    At first I had a short "well pot calling kettle black" moment, but then I realised that it must be bad and he does need prayers. Afterall, that is the Catholic thing to do ... pray for the man, it must be humbling and hopefully it will be a time of grace for him.  P^3

 + JMJ   So ... Pope Francis the First has removed Bishop Strickland from his Diocese.   I know the legality of this is being contested on the web, but let's just take a look at what this means in the life of the Catholic Church. First anyone in the 'mainstream' Church who has deviated or given the impression of drifting towards the pre-conciliar doctrine or liturgy is punished - either by the Pope, Church or Civil authorities. When writing this I am obviously thinking about Cardinal Burke. This has happened from Cardinals down to religious (priests, brothers, sisters, nuns, monks).   So there is no 'safe' harbour for those who want to simply 'be' Catholic. That, obviously, leads me to the SSPX.  As long as the Pope, on principle, punishes those who drift towards the SSPX 'position' there will be no peace within the Church. The neo-modernist revolution will continue, the good will be punished, the bad will be promoted. Does this mean that the Pope ca

 + JMJ   The Conflict From my perspective, the Hamas / Israeli conflict is, at its core, a religious conflict that is buried beneath decades of rights, wrongs,  stones, grenades, bullets, missiles, bombs, fighting and death. Lots of death. I've read "Son of Hamas" that provided a good perspective of the situation, specifically that there are "good" and "bad" people on both sides of the conflict.   Let's be clear, the "good" people are not the ones who act from a position of cruelty to kidnap, beat, rape, and kill civilians. The recent events show the Hamas "soldiers" being guilty of these actions.  From the "Son of Hamas" and Wikipedia (link) we have older accounts of Israeli soldiers being guilty of the similar actions. So this is a situation where, from a cultural perspective ( Edgar Schein link ) deep and enduring assumptions have formed. Anything that contradicts or threatens these assumptions will create a stron

Pillar (link)  + JMJ    Rorate-Caeli has reported that Bishop Strickland has been removed from his Diocese. STRICKLAND REMOVED - Francis Peron attacks again: to my enemies not even Justice Removal of bishop of Tyler, U.S.A., and appointment of apostolic administrator The Holy Father has removed Bishop Joseph E. Strickland from the pastoral care of the diocese of Tyler, United States of America, and has appointed Bishop Joe Vásquez of Austin as apostolic administrator of the same diocese, rendering it  sede vacante . [ source ]     If only Bishop Strickland had been a member of Uncle Ted McCarrick's clique of abusers of minors, or used bodily fluids in chalices (Rupnik) after raping sisters, he might have been named a Cardinal by Francis… Courtesy of Rorate-Caeli Here's a link to a BBC article giving a different perspective (link) and the Associated Press (link) , Lifesite (link) , and Pillar (link) , CNA (link) , Crux (link) , Crisis (link) , and Register (link) .

 + JMJ   The following is a round up of news articles accompanied with my thoughts.  Overall, things the trajectory of the Catholic Church is, no surprise, still in a death spiral.  The attempt to pull out of the spiral (Pope Benedict XVI) was short lived.   So now we obviously wait patiently to see what the next pontificate brings. P^3 Pope Francis  A dog's gonna do what a dog does also, remember that you can't medicate stupid.  God will sort this out His way in His time. Pope Francis warns against ideologies in Church and world - Vatican News Pope's big meeting on future of the church wraps up | CTV News How Pope Francis Is Inadvertently Developing the Doctrine of the Papacy - Crisis Magazine The next two are a little bit about the sedes.  I've known some that were very reasonable, logical and polite. Some others just took the idea and ran with it. One believes that there hasn't been a valid Pope since Leo XIII or something like that.  Others go and 'elect&

 + JMJ Introduction Michael Voris gave a thirty minute speech at the Strength and Honor conference ( link to vid )  in August 2023 (Youtube Transcript below).   When shown this video, my first thought was that he repeats himself over and over again.   My second thought was that he made an clear error saying that Pontius Pilate sin was the greatest. Mistake, Our Lord Himself stated that the sin of those who turned Him over to Pilate was greater.  My third thought was they he was espousing Jesuit blind obedience by staying that an order within the jurisdiction of a superior must be obeyed. Going from memory he seemed to imply that an order within the jurisdiction of the superior could not be sinful. Ergo any legitimate command must be obeyed. One thing that Voris got completely right is that the moral character of an individual in the office does not impact the legitimacy of their commands in the execution of that office. I've discussed this elsewhere referring to the Catechism of Tr

 +  JMJ Celebrity Catholics Fr. Altman and Sedevacantistism  So Fr. Altman had fallen into the Sedevacantist pot hole and others will either follow him or use him as an whipping boy for the Traditionalists as a whole.   In light of the scandal caused by the Popes, Cardinals and Bishops, I can understand the desire to pick the easy answer that the Catholic Church is indefectible (or some other excuse) therefore the Pope can't be the Pope etc. Were it that easy.   The sedevacantist 'solution' simply unravels the foundation of Catholic Dogma and Doctrine.  For example, it is a Dogma that there will be successors of St. Peter until the end of time ( see Vatican 1 link ), and if Fr. Altman were to examine the pontificates of Pope John 23, Paul 6, John Paul II in the same light as Pope Francis 1, he will probably find reasons to suspect they also 'lost' the papacy.  I know sedevacantists who take their principle to the logical end and say that the last valid Pope was Pope