Blog
January, 21st 2024
Feast of St. Agnes and the anniversary of the execution of King Louis XVI on 21st January 1793
Confronting the Crisis that is Modernity.
Modernity – One big “head trip”.
In 1848, the French sociologist and liberal Catholic, Alexis De Tocqueville, said that “We are sleeping on a volcano… a wind of revolution blows, the storm is on the horizon.” [1]The irony is that today the volcano has long since exploded, the storm continues to rage and yet people are still sleeping in a lethargy of unreality. At the heart of the crisis of modernity is the denial of reality. Financial markets are held together by usurious financial products that only exist in the mind of brokers. Language is being distorted and definitions forcibly expanded to include things that have no basis in reality e.g. same sex marriage.
Ever since the fourteenth century when William of Ockham denied the common natures of things (e.g. human nature) he set in motion modern philosophy, Protestantism, the Enlightenment, and the French Revolution by turning the mind in on itself and away from external reality. This is the denial of the mind’s adequation with reality. For these people reality becomes what their mind makes it to be not what reality says to their mind about what it is. Consequently, if reality is what your mind makes it to be then you must impose it on the world, see it take shape, determine, and control it. Effectively, thinking and rationality becomes one big “head trip” and absolute freedom to determine the “head trip” becomes everything, hence the bloodbaths of 1789, 1848 and future events which De Tocqueville foresees.
Today’s corruption in thinking and today’s bloodbaths manifest themselves in disguised, seemingly neutral but violent ways. Abortion is dressed up as the unreality of bodily autonomy, mass immigration is pushed as humanitarian and economic benevolence, euthanasia as mercy and the denial of pre-existing social and cultural norms, like the family, as progress.The volcano has blown yet people still sleep and as the lava flows around and over them, they are oblivious because they are lost to the unreality and distorted ideas created and formed in the minds of revolutionaries.
Modernity - The Proposed Options
Modernity is created to destroy society, the village, the Family, and the Catholic Church because they are custodians of reality. Modernity only accepts Individualism and liberalism. Both are destructive and both are demonic. Over the last number of years Catholics have been presented with various “options” to deal with the ferocity of modernity - the Benedict option, the Jeremiah option and even a “Brendan Option!” To be honest none of them are fit for purpose as none of these saints confronted anything as malign as modernity. Although St. Benedict had to contend with barbarians - the tattooed uncivilised types wielding axes - at least he could tell who the bad guys were, he wasn’t dealing with ideologies pretending to be neutral like gender theory. No, modernity is a different animal altogether and Ireland is at the vanguard of promoting it as recent referenda results clearly show. This is ironic considering that from this island missionaries went forth and in a very small way were harbingers for benedictine monasteries across Europe which in turn led to the reign of Charlemagne and the eventual unification faith and reason in the thirteenth century with St Thomas Aquinas’ writings. What this island once helped to build, in a minuscule way, with western civilisation it now leads to destroy.
Modernity – Crushing its Head.
But what can be done to turn the tide if anything? Indeed, many of the best Catholic philosophers and theologians today do not hold out any hope. For them we have gone passed the point of no return because Catholicism is being eviscerated from within and without, it no longer has the social presence to attract new converts. However, even they would admit that there is a reality that is best situated to confront modernity because it is the greatest of all realities and it represents an event that occurred in the fullness of time and when history reached a climax of reality. This is a reality that destroyed both sin and death. If modernity is based on what is most unreal than what is needed to vanquish it, or at least confront it, is to avail of what is most real – The Traditional Latin Mass. The Traditional Latin Mass is Jesus Christ, it is the greatest act of love. Before it there is nothing you can say or do except remain silent and give thanks. Not only is it most real in providing a superabundance of grace, which heals, perfects, and elevates the reality of nature, but it also passes on something pre-existing like a gift given to us from previous generations of Catholics. Love, silence and attempting to receiving something pre-existing from previous generations are all abhorrent to modernity.
Of course, at Calvary the superabundance of gifts that pours forth does so through the conduit that is Our Lady suffering while offering up her son to God and acting as co-redeemer. There she is given to her children as Mother as she gives birth to them in agony. She is the nemesis of modernity, and She will crush its head. St Louis Marie de Monfort in his great work said: “The children of Belial, the salves of Satan, the friends of the world – for they are all one and the same – have always persecuted and will persecute more than ever in the future those who belong to the Blessed Virgin, just as Cain of old persecuted his brother Abel, and Esau his brother Jacob. These are the types of the wicked and the just. But the humble Mary will always triumph over Satan, the proud one, and so great will be her victory that she will crush his head, the very seat of pride…... Satan will lie in wait for her heel, that is, for her humble servants and her poor children whom she will rouse to fight against him.” [2]
What is most needed in an age of unreality is to withdraw, every now and again, for a short time and be reminded of the reality of the Traditional Latin Mass and the co-redeeming work of Our Lady. This is what is happening in Galway City on February 10th 2024 with the Roundtower Association conference on Our Lady, The Liturgy, the Family, and the crisis of Modernity. For more details see www.roundtower.org/conference-24
Re- emerging afterwards to confront modernity’s insidious ideologies is the objective. That may take many forms or shapes - small surprise attacks, a skirmish here or there, or full-scale spiritual battles, but confrontation there must be otherwise modernity will have succeeded, with its pretend neutral ideologies, to render Catholics inactive once again before the exploding volcano. Again, confrontation there must be for as Otto Von Habsburg, the eldest son of Blessed Karl, the last Austrian Emperor, once said “When you die and stand before Christ, at your personal judgement, He will not ask you how successful you were in life but on which side you fought on and how hard did you fight?”
[1] Speech Made before the Constituent Assembly during the Discussion of the New Constitution on the Right to Work. Session of September 12, 1848
[2] True Devotion to the Blessed Virgin Part 1, chapter 1, section 4
October 23 2023
A brave new world for Life and calling out Pro - Life liberalism.
The introduction, in Ireland, of the euphemistically entitled "Health (Termination of Pregnancy) services - safe access zones Bill 2023" sees the removal of freedoms for Catholics to pray publicly in front of abortion mills. Liberalism in Ireland over the last fifty years now manifests itself in explicit totalitarianism. The right to abortion has been elevated to the most fundamental right far exceeding the right to life or freedom of association or the duty to help manipulated women and those in mortal danger - the unborn.
Even now, backed into a corner, victory is still possible against abortion and against the culture of death but we have to take the Gospel of Christ seriously, we have to take the teachings of the Catholic Church seriously and recognise the role of Our Lady has in this war. Make no mistake - this is war.
" .. .....be strong in the Lord and in his mighty power. Put on the full armor of God, so that you can take your stand against the devil’s schemes. For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the powers of this dark world and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms.. Therefore put on the full armor of God, so that when the day of evil comes, you may be able to stand your ground, and after you have done everything, to stand. Stand firm then, with the belt of truth buckled around your waist, with the breastplate of righteousness in place, and with your feet fitted with the readiness that comes from the gospel of peace. In addition to all this, take up the shield of faith, with which you can extinguish all the flaming arrows of the evil one. Take the helmet of salvation and the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God." Eph 6:10-17
This means hitting the streets with effective and coordinated public prayer and public witness outside abortion clinics or at the edge of buffer zones. Groups like 40 Days for Life and the Helpers of God's precious infants are doing remarkable things by simply taking Christ and the Catholic Church at their word.
However, no time should be given to groups purporting to be on the side of the culture of life but who actually detest public prayer or the public proclamation of the Gospel. They prefer to talk, to debate, to reason, to march to parliaments showing they willingly conform to secular expectations in how they demonstrate their grievances. On the contrary, they make no plans to hold outdoor Eucharistic Adoration or a public Rosary rally in reparation to God for the sin of abortion and the plebiscite that introduced it . Prayer for them is a private matter and should be kept private. They follow a slight type of liberalism which can easily escalate into radical liberalism . In 2017, i remember being on a bus, organised by one of these groups, to their own pro life rally in Dublin, and being shocked at almost having to beg to have the Rosary recited on the bus. They wanted to control so much - the flags or statues you brought to the rally. Public Rosary was a taboo. Though the pro aborts were the clear enemy that day, little did we know that among our ranks and throughout the pro life high command lurked another enemy - those who follow an implicit liberalism that despoils the Catholic Church of her nature as the greatest pro life organisation in the world.
Blessed Cardinal John Henry Newman had such liberalism in his crosshairs.(See poem below). He recognised these so called "Catholics" as only accepting half the truth of the Gospel. Justice and peace are the limits of the Gospel for them. If they believe in grace at all it is a "cheap grace" - meaning a contraceptive free marriage is impossible for them. Those accepting only half the truth of the Gospel are in no position to turn things around. That's why they are now like rabbits caught in the highlights of the juggernaut of secularism. They don't know what to do. The truth is that they need to be converted to the other half of the Gospel of Life as much as the pro aborts need to be converted to the whole Gospel.
"YE cannot halve the Gospel of God’s grace;
Men of presumptuous heart! I know you well.
Ye are of those who plan that we should dwell,
Each in his tranquil home and holy place;
Seeing the Word refines all natures rude,
And tames the stirrings of the multitude.And ye have caught some echoes of its lore,
As heralded amid the joyous choirs;
Ye mark’d it spoke of peace, chastised desires,
Good-will and mercy,—and ye heard no more;
But, as for zeal and quick-eyed sanctity,
And the dread depths of grace, ye pass’d them by.And so ye halve the Truth; for ye in heart,
At best, are doubters whether it be true,
The theme discarding, as unmeet for you,
Statesmen or Sages. O new-compass’d art
Of the ancient Foe!—but what, if it extends
O’er our own camp, and rules amid our friends?"
– John Henry Newman, Palermo. June 5, 1833
11th July 2023
St. Thomas Acquinas, the new Mass and "where Aughrim was lost "
On this day 1691, the eve of the bloodiest battle ever in Ireland, Jacobite and Williamite forces were gathering in Aughrim, East Galway. If the Battle of the Boyne, a year earlier, was just a skirmish Aughrim was a massive engagement. A Catholic victory would have driven the Williamites back to Dublin and advanced the cause of James II - perhaps the future of Europe could have been completely different - but it was not to be.
Disagreement has raged for centuries as to the cause of the Catholic defeat especially after such a promissing start to the battle. Was the defeat due to Sarsfield's dismissal to the reserves? was it due to the Marquis de St.Ruth's decapitation and subsequent confusion in the Catholic ranks? Was Aughrim lost due to lack of ammunition and low morale? The debate continues.
Throughout her history the Church has stressed the importance of studying the works of St.Thomas Aquinas particularly the Summa. At Trent it was the Holy Bible and the Summa that was placed on the Altar before the Bishops during the sessions. Despite this it is eye opening to listen to modern theologians wax on about how their ideas are in line with St.Thomas Aquinas when they are clearly not. Even the dubious private theological speculations of recent Popes have claimed their work to be in line with St. Thomas. This has impacted Soteriology, Ecclesiology and the Liturgy - for these modern theologians key terms like "Sacrifice" no longer mean "death" or "change" but rather "surrender" and more strangely "absorption." In the end if further reductionism continues and Liturgical and theological wars are lost there can be no debate as to why.
Further thoughts of the Liturgy here.
April 15th 2023. Octave of Easter.
Pope Leo XIII's Libertas in action - 40 Days for Life
As if it were needed, evidence of Ireland's further decline into radical liberalism emerged over the last three days . The US president and geo- political leader of the abortion loving West was lauded at every turn here. Visits to Knock Shrine and an address outside St. Muredach's Cathedral in Ballina ensured that the cult of man and meritocracy surpasses the authority and honour of God. It proved that here in Ireland man is subject to nobody but himself , that the only authority recognised is that of the State and that the demonic cry "I will not serve" is heard loud and clear. Liberalism in all its forms , social, political, economic and theological, reigns supreme in this land.
The symbolic centre of social liberalism is abortion on demand. Abortion is the antithesis of the dominion of God over life and death. It is the antithesis of the dominion of God over man and it is a rejection of the duty owed by man to God and his neighbour. Abortion is the much extolled and glorified real freedom of liberalism yet as the fruits of abortion prove it is but a false freedom.
True freedom, as Pope Leo XIII's encyclical of 135 years ago, Libertas, beautifully shows, is obedience to God's authority written into natural and divine law. True liberty is virtuously recognising the right order of things. "The nature of human liberty, however it is to be considered. whether in individuals or in society, whether in those who command or in those who obey, supposes the necessity of obedience to some supreme and eternal law, which is no other than the authority of God, commanding good and forbidding evil." Libertas 11
Nowhere do these alternative views of freedom collide more than at a prayer vigil in front of an abortion site or at a 40 days for Life campaign. Here, Christendom and liberalism clash, here the ancient battle between the city of God and the city of the world engage. Here, when prayers are offered to God the visceral offence it gives to liberals takes little time to come to the fore. Ironically, the offended who demand freedom for everyone one and everything, now want to restrict the freedom of those who pray. It is ironic too that in a time when so few Catholics know about Pope Leo XIII's social encyclicals that the essence of Libertas is being preached at these vigils and campaigns "that man, by a necessity of his nature, is wholly subject to the most faithful and ever -enduring power of God and that as a consequence, any liberty, except that which consists in submission to His will , is unintelligible". Libertas 36
It is at these vigils and campaigns that those who pray and witness to life say their faith intensifies and grows. They sense their own liberty being perfected and that the claims of liberalism, that submission to the authority of God only destroys freedom, are erroreous. Which of these two forms of liberty will we choose ? That is a question we have to engage in every day. As Otto Von Habsburg said once, it is a question Our Lord will ask us at our personal judgement - " on which side did you stand and how hard did you fight?"
January 1st 2022.
A prayer for every new year and every new day.
GK Chesterton on how the spiritual sword helps the temperal one.
"O God of earth and altar,
bow down and hear our cry,
our earthly rulers falter,
our people drift and die;
the walls of gold entomb us,
the swords of scorn divide,
take not thy thunder from us,
but take away our pride.
From all that terror teaches,
from lies of tongue and pen,
from all the easy speeches
that comfort cruel men,
from sale and profanation
of honour and the sword,
from sleep and from damnation,
deliver us, good Lord!
Tie in a living tether
the prince and priest and thrall,
bind all our lives together,
smite us and save us all;
in ire and exultation
aflame with faith, and free,
lift up a living nation,
a single sword to thee".
December 17 2021
"The Breakout"
Througout the history of miltary conflict what armies have feared the most is simultaneous attacks from both its flanks resulting in complete encirclement and often eventual utter destruction. From Alexander the Great to Hannibal to the Soviet Generals at Stalingrad they have all proven the effectiveness of such princer movements.The only option for the encircled (or almost encircled) army is to concentrate their forces, aim at a weak point in the encirclement, and make an attempt at an immediate "breakout" before the noose tightens.
St. John Bosco gave us a naval analogy in the Spiritual realm where he had a vision of the Church almost encircled by Her enemies but providentially was breaking out through the twin pillars of the Eucharist and Our Lady. It will always be by these means that grace breaksout into the world and why the gates of hell will never prevail against the Church.
Yet today, the Church faces not just another secular lockdown attack from one flank - which leads poorly formed Bishops to unjustly lock out people from receiving the Sacraments that are being celebrated like Holy Mass, Weddings, Baptisms etc - but from the other flank (and from within the visible Church Herself) comes an attack more akin to a Liturgical lockdown where the Traditional Latin rite Sacraments are not to be celebrated at all and utimately subpressed. The breakout is needed immediately and like before we need the Eucharist (even if to receive it we need to go underground) and Our Lady but in particular we need to know and love the doctrine of the social Kingship of Christ expressed in the social encyclicals of Pope Leo XIII. These teaching not only enable a breakout but will utterly destroy the attacks from the flanks by re-ordering the source from which they come.
May 13 2021
The Ascension, Fatima and returning to Public Mass
The Liturgy for today's feast, the Ascension, is full of joy after all it is the glorious Ascension of Our Lord who, now with Human nature, is seated at the right of the Father interceding for us. Yet, there is also a hint of sadness because the disciples have lost His physical presence. How much greater their sadness would have been had they not possessed the sacramental presence of Christ.
To have returned to Holy Mass today, for the first time since Christmas day, intensifies the joy of the Feast. However, the hint of sadness is sharper also as the shadow of being excluded from the full sacramental presence of Our Lord in the future grows darker and looms large still. When looking at the whys and hows of the current situation it is foolish to ignore the apparitions and private revelations at Fatima over a hundred years ago.
Archbishop Vigano commenting, last April, on Fatima and in specific the current situation said:
What I limit myself to doing is repeating the words of Our Lord, the eternal Word of the Father: “Behold, I am with you every day, until the consummation of the ages.” We feel isolated, of course: but didn’t the Apostles and all Christians feel this way as well? Did not Our Lord even feel abandoned in Gethsemane? These are the times of trial, perhaps of the final trial; we must drink the bitter cup, and even if it is human to implore the Lord to let it pass from us, we must repeat confidently: “Not my will, but Yours,” remembering His comforting words: “In the world you will have tribulations, but have courage, for I have conquered the world!” After the trial, no matter how hard and painful, the eternal prize is prepared for us, which no one can take away from us.The Church will shine again with the glory of her Lord after this terrible and prolonged Easter Triduum.
But if prayer is certainly indispensable, we must also not fail to fight the good fight, making ourselves the witnesses to a courageous militancy under the banner of the Cross of Christ.Let us not find ourselves being pointed out as the handmaiden did with Saint Peter in the high priest’s courtyard: “You too were one of his followers,” only to then deny Christ.Let us not be intimidated! Let us not allow the gag of tolerance to be placed on those who want to proclaim the Truth!Let us ask the Blessed Virgin Mary that our tongue may proclaim with courage the Kingdom of God and His Justice.
May She also give voice to us, Her children, who for too long have been mute.
Our Lady of Fatima, Queen of Victories, Ora pro nobis.
April 2 2021 Good Friday
"Because they have not known the Father nor me" John 16:3
To have been excluded from the Easter Tridiuum last year was difficult to take but to be prohibited, by our Bishops, from attending again this year is really shocking. After five months of public prayer in front of cathedrals and after thousands of petitions sent to their Lordships, underlining that it is their responsibility, not the civil order's, to restore public Mass, it all has fallen on deaf ears. This should not really be surprising for in the last discourse or the farewell discourse of the Last Supper Our Lord did say to his disciples "They will put you out of the synagogues... and they will do this because they have not known the Father nor me. But I have said these things to you that when the hour comes that you may remember that I told you of them." Catholic churchs are definitely not synagogues but is not the cause of the explusion the same?
February 15 2021
Coincidence or direct assults on the Social Kingship of Christ?
Ireland today can hardly be described as a bastion for the Kingship of Christ. Twice in her history she may have well been but today the majority of her people truely reside in the "City of the World". Though the true Catholic Faith remains here in small pockets the Evil one wants to crush these remnants and drag Irish society into deep darkness. Public Mass has not been granted for 33 Sundays of the last year - nearly 65% of the time. A local undertaker was asked if business had increased sharply over the last year with the "virus" and his reply was "not with the virus but with suicides".
The principles for the restoration of the Kingship of Christ will be threefold. All Catholics recognising that Christ is a divine person who took on huamn nature. All Catholics returning to the Holy Rosary. Formation in the teachings of the Angelic Doctor.
It is eye opening to note when each of the three prohibitions of Public Mass commenced here. March 8th 2020 - Day after the traditional feast of St. Thomas Aquinas. October 7th 2020 - The Feast of Our Lady of the Rosary ( or the Victory at Lepanto) and 26th December 2020 the day after the birth of Our Lord.
October 7 2020.
Why have we forgotten the victory at Lepanto?
On this day in 1571 victory over the Turks at the naval battle of Lepanto was gained through the intercession of the Mother of God. The power of the rosary ensured the freedom of Catholics in most of europe to live their Catholic faith. Fastforward to the same date in 2020 and that freedom has been taken away today in Ireland but not by marauding Turks finally penetrating europe and sweeping to its most westerly shores but by its secular government. Public Masses have been cancelled by stage 3 lockdown restrictions. Has secularism achieved what the Turks could not in this western part of europe and if so how would a Pope Pius 5th or a Don John of Austria deal with such an adversary? Surely the answer is that they would insist on something that was second nature to european catholics in the sixteenth century and realised by them upto the Peace of Augsburg in 1555 - the social kingship of Christ. They would insist that the temporal authority be ordered to the spiritual authority and that no worldly power could forbid Public Mass.
" I have said this so often that I am almost tired of saying it again, but I must continue to say it. People who cannot see the value of Lepanto are half dead. Let them so remain." Hilaire Belloc.
June 27 2020.
The Temple of God and returning from Exile after Lockdown.
Returning to Holy Mass after twelve or so weeks of Corona Lockdown seems like returning from exile. Perhaps there is an analogy that can be made between our own experiences and those of the Hebrews in exile at the hands of Nebuchadnezzar and not just at the spiritual level because modernity often seems like a Babylonian captivity. This Old Testament event was a punishment for idolatry, adultery, unfruitfulness and unfaithfulness so the question has to be asked whether our own recent exile was a punishment for similar reasons? It was in Babylon where the elite of Judah hung up their harps and wept - mourning at the memory of Sion and the destruction of their Temple.
Recently we celebrated the feast of the birth of St. John the Baptist and it brought to mind that day - three months prior to his birth - when he prophesized and danced in the womb of his mother before Our Lord in the womb of the blessed Virgin. The Old Testament pointed to this scene when King David danced with joyful anticipation before the Ark of the Covenant on its way to restore the glory of God in the Temple. (2 Samuel 6)
Ultimately Jesus became the true temple and the true sacrifice so receiving the Eucharistic Lord allows us access to the Temple, However, mere access to the temple is not all that happens as St. Thomas Aquinas says the purpose of Gospel of John is to point out that "the faithful become the temple of God and become filled with the majesty of God". In other words, this, therefore, is true life. "I have come that they may have life and have it to the full". (John 10:10)
Notwithstanding plentiful spiritual communions over the last few months participation in this temple may well have waned for many of the faithful because of not being able to particpate in the Eucharistic sacrifice. So if they feel now as if they occupy some position in Ezekiel's valley of dry bones how great it will be to be restored fully once again to the temple of God. Life, restoration , recreation, rest, indeed everything is from the Father including Christ's body and His blood which flowed from his pierced side giving life as the waters flowed from Ezekiel's vision of the temple. "Below waters were issuing from the threshold of the Temple towards the east... and where the river flows every living creature which swams will live". (Ezekiel 47).
