by
Thomas A Droleskey
There was a time eight years ago when I asked the editor of a conservative journal in whose pages my articles were carried, although at a very reduced rate by that point, if he planned on addressing the apostasy contained in the Joint Declaration on Justification that had been reached by Joseph Ratzinger, then the Prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the [Conciliar] Faith and representatives of the Lutheran "ecclesial community." The editor said, "No, some things are best left unreported." In other words, news that would make the Vatican look bad was not going to see the light of day. (By the way, a good treatment of that "Joint Declaration on Justification" has been written by His Excellency Bishop Donald Sanborn. See:
Critical Analysis of the Joint Declaration on the Doctrine of Justification .)
Sadly, the issuance of Summorum Pontificum has resulted in the same phenomenon in the Motu world. Matters that once would have been highlighted and discussed in great deal are being ignored as though they are of no relevance whatsoever. Joseph Ratzinger has silenced large numbers of people into believing that it is no longer necessary to defend the honor and glory of God and the integrity of the Catholic Faith if that means jeopardizing the "era of good feelings" generated by the supposedly greater access that Catholics in the structures of the counterfeit church of conciliarism are going to have to the modernized version of the Mass of Tradition. The mentality that led the editor of the conservative journal to "spike" any mention, no less critical mention, of the Joint Declaration on Justification eight years ago is now the same mentality of those who used to be in the vanguard of pointing out sacrileges and of calling for public acts of reparation to be made by faithful Catholics.
This positivistic mentality, which is of the essence of the naturalist farce that is the Judeo-Masonic view of civil governance and popular culture, has not appeared overnight in the the wake of Summorum Pontificum. Oh, no. This positivistic mentality had matured very well as a result of Karol Wojtyla's issuance of the Ecclesia Dei motu proprio in 1988. The situation in what used to be called the "indult" world is so bad that a "priest" in the Priestly Fraternity of Saint Peter told us when we saw him outside of a funeral home earlier this year that he had no responsibility to oppose error. This is an amazing abandonment of the sensus Catholicus. No responsibility to oppose error? One might as well admit that he belongs to a conciliar version of the High Anglican "Church" and be done with it than to say that such a cowardly rationalization has anything to do with the patrimony of the Catholic Church.
Nothing seems to outrage those who have permitted themselves to be put under Joseph Ratzinger's Hegelian spell. Taking off shoes in that mosque in Turkey and turning in the direction of Mecca while assuming the Mohammedan prayer posture? No big deal. Ratzinger just "had" to do it. Calling the heretical and schismatic "patriarch" of Constantinople a "pastor" in the Church of Christ? What's a few differences among equals, eh? Permitting the conciliar Vatican to hold the world premiere of a motion picture, Nativity Story, that mocked the effects of Our Lady's Immaculate Conception, which is the reason that her body did not had to suffer decay after death and was Assumed into Heaven on this very day, which include the perfect integrity of her human nature, making it a portrayal of her as "moody" and "sulky" and "disobedient" to be completely blasphemous? Oh, well, it was only a movie, right? What, I ask you, will wake Ratzinger's sycophants out of the fog of delusion in which they find themselves to realize that no amount of Catholic-sounding allocutions can redeem even one of these outrages?
Like so much else in the past twenty-eight months, however, it appears, at least at the present moment, that the outrage manifested in Joseph Ratzinger/Benedict XVI's statement to the Religious Summit Meeting on Mount Hiei, Japan, will go without anyone in the Motu world defending the honor and glory of God. Although I have commented on this a few days ago in Enemies of Souls Universally, this matter is so serious and strikes at the heart of the apostasy that courses through the veins of Joseph Ratzinger that the statement, which is pasted below, must be discussed, if ever so briefly, once again:
I am glad to greet you and all the religious leaders gathered on the occasion of the Twentieth Anniversary of the Religious Summit Meeting on Mount Hiei. I wish also to convey my best wishes to Venerable Eshin Watanabe, and to recall your distinguished predecessor as Supreme Head of the Tendai Buddhist Denomination, Venerable Etai Yamada. It was he who, having participated in the Day of Prayer for Peace in Assisi on that memorable day of 27 October 1986, initiated the “Religious Summit Meeting” on Mount Hiei in Kyoto in order to keep the flame of the spirit of Assisi burning. I am also happy that Cardinal Paul Poupard, President of the Pontifical Council for Interreligious Dialogue, is able to take part in this meeting.
From the supernatural perspective we come to understand that peace is both a gift from God and an obligation for every individual. Indeed the world’s cry for peace, echoed by families and communities throughout the globe, is at once both a prayer to God and an appeal to every brother and sister of our human family. As you assemble on the sacred Mount Hiei, representing different religions, I assure you of my spiritual closeness. May your prayers and cooperation fill you with God’s peace and strengthen your resolve to witness to the reason of peace which overcomes the irrationality of violence!
Upon you all I invoke an abundance of divine blessings of inspiration, harmony and joy.” Benedict XVI sends message to interreligious meeting in Japan
This statement stands on its own regardless of how much those in the Motu world want to ignore it. The man who believes himself to be the Vicar of Christ called a mountain upon which sits a temple dedicated to devil worship "sacred." There is no such thing as a small sacrilege. This is an offense against the First Commandment. There is nothing sacred in Buddhism. Neither peace in the soul or in the world can be produced by Buddhism, whose "meditation" requires a person to empty himself, which is an open invitation to the devil to come into his soul for a rather lengthy visit. Our souls are to be filled with Sanctifying Grace, which I can assure you is not made present by the Tendei sect of Buddhism on Mount Hiei. No one who can call a place of devil worship sacred is a friend of the Blessed Trinity or of the Catholic Faith.
Words matter. Correction. Words matter only if you attach precise meaning to them, which is the great protection that Scholasticism provides in the service of the teaching of the Catholic Faith. Ambiguity, paradox, imprecision and contradiction and direct sacrileges have nothing to do with the Deposit of Faith that Our Blessed Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ entrusted exclusively to the Church He founded upon the Rock of Saint Peter, the Pope. Is there anyone out in the Motu world who would want to contend for a single moment that Pope Saint Pius X would have called a mountain upon which is offered worship to false gods, which is devil worship, sacred? Why must the "Cone of Silence" from Get Smart descend upon Catholics in order to get them to respond like Sergeant Hans Schultz from Hogan's Heroes (I know nooooooooooooothing!!!) when such a blasphemous statement is uttered that offends the majesty of God and places a false, diabolical religion on a level of equality with Him and His true Faith?
Although the conciliarists insist time and time again that they are not indifferentists or syncretists, their words show them to be liars. Perhaps they do not recognize this, steeped in a world of Hegelian contradiction and paradox and synthesis. The truth is what it is: calling Mount Hiei "sacred" sends the clear signal that Buddhism is pleasing to God and helpful to souls and to the cause of world peace. This is blasphemous and helps to reaffirm in the minds of Catholics the very indifferentism that they say they are not promoting.
A simple review of the words of Pope Pius IX, contained in his first encyclical letter, Qui Pluribus, November 9, 1846, reveals any impression of indifferentism is a grave matter and must be opposed most vigorously:
Also perverse is the shocking theory that it makes no difference to which religion one belongs, a theory which is greatly at variance even with reason. By means of this theory, those crafty men remove all distinction between virtue and vice, truth and error, honorable and vile action. They pretend that men can gain eternal salvation by the practice of any religion, as if there could ever be any sharing between justice and iniquity, any collaboration between light and darkness, or any agreement between Christ and Belial.
Pope Saint Pius X explained this as well in Pascendi Dominci Gregis, September 8, 1907:
How far this position is removed from that of Catholic teaching! We have already seen how its fallacies have been condemned by the Vatican Council. Later on, we shall see how these errors, combined with those which we have already mentioned, open wide the way to Atheism. Here it is well to note at once that, given this doctrine of experience united with that of symbolism, every religion, even that of paganism, must be held to be true. What is to prevent such experiences from being found in any religion? In fact, that they are so is maintained by not a few. On what grounds can Modernists deny the truth of an experience affirmed by a follower of Islam? Will they claim a monopoly of true experiences for Catholics alone? Indeed, Modernists do not deny, but actually maintain, some confusedly, others frankly, that all religions are true. That they cannot feel otherwise is obvious. For on what ground, according to their theories, could falsity be predicated of any religion whatsoever? Certainly it would be either on account of the falsity of the religious .sense or on account of the falsity of the formula pronounced by the mind. Now the religious sense, although it maybe more perfect or less perfect, is always one and the same; and the intellectual formula, in order to be true, has but to respond to the religious sense and to the believer, whatever be the intellectual capacity of the latter. In the conflict between different religions, the most that Modernists can maintain is that the Catholic has more truth because it is more vivid, and that it deserves with more reason the name of Christian because it corresponds more fully with the origins of Christianity. No one will find it unreasonable that these consequences flow from the premises. But what is most amazing is that there are Catholics and priests, who, We would fain believe, abhor such enormities, and yet act as if they fully approved of them. For they lavish such praise and bestow such public honor on the teachers of these errors as to convey the belief that their admiration is not meant merely for the persons, who are perhaps not devoid of a certain merit, but rather for the sake of the errors which these persons openly profess and which they do all in their power to propagate.
How can anyone with a modicum of the sensus Catholicus say that this is not a perfect description of the mind of Joseph Ratzinger?
Pope Pius IX also warned in Qui Pluribus against the wiles of those, identified sixty-one years later by Pope Saint Pius X in Pascendi as Modernists, who would like to convince Catholics that our understanding of truth can be adapted to the "modern" age:
It is with no less deceit, venerable brothers, that other enemies of divine revelation, with reckless and sacrilegious effrontery, want to import the doctrine of human progress into the Catholic religion.
Pope Pius IX furthermore identified the method by which the champions of Judeo-Masonic Modernity in the civil world, those cousins of theological Modernists, were seeking to insinuate their errors into the bosom of the Church:
To this end also tend the most dark designs of men in the clothing of sheep, while inwardly ravening wolves. They humbly recommend themselves by means of a feigned and deceitful appearance of a purer piety, a stricter virtue and discipline; after taking their captives gently, they mildly bind them, and then kill them in secret. They make men fly in terror from all practice of religion, and they cut down and dismember the sheep of the Lord. To this end, finally -- to omit other dangers which are too well known to you -- tends the widespread disgusting infection from books and pamphlets which teach the lessons of sinning. These works, well-written and filled with deceit and cunning, are scattered at immense cost through every region for the destruction of the Christian people. They spread pestilential doctrines everywhere and deprave the minds especially of the imprudent, occasioning great losses for religion.
My friends, what is more pestilential than calling a mountain upon which is offered worship to the devil sacred? And while it is undoubtedly that case that most Catholics across the ecclesiastical divide will never learn of Joseph Ratzinger's offense to God in this regard, the offense is grave and it is merely representative of the larger apostasy of conciliarism itself, which involves, among many other things, an abandonment of the rights of Christ the King in civil society in order to adopt the inter-denominationalism of the Sillon, condemned by Pope Saint Pius X in Notre Charge Apostolique, August 15, 1910, and the "integral humanism" of Jacques Maritain.
It is on this latter point that the principal focus of Joseph Ratzinger's message to the meeting on Mount Hiei hinges: that "peace" in the world is not dependent upon the conversion of all men and all nations to the Catholic Faith. There is no point in the entire fifty-six year priesthood of Joseph Ratzinger that he has spoken of peace in the terms spoken of by Pope Pius XI in Ubi Arcano Dei Consilio, December 23, 1922:
Since the Church is the safe and sure guide to conscience, for to her safe-keeping alone there has been confided the doctrines and the promise of the assistance of Christ, she is able not only to bring about at the present hour a peace that is truly the peace of Christ, but can, better than any other agency which We know of, contribute greatly to the securing of the same peace for the future, to the making impossible of war in the future. For the Church teaches (she alone has been given by God the mandate and the right to teach with authority) that not only our acts as individuals but also as groups and as nations must conform to the eternal law of God. In fact, it is much more important that the acts of a nation follow God's law, since on the nation rests a much greater responsibility for the consequences of its acts than on the individual.
When, therefore, governments and nations follow in all their activities, whether they be national or international, the dictates of conscience grounded in the teachings, precepts, and example of Jesus Christ, and which are binding on each and every individual, then only can we have faith in one another's word and trust in the peaceful solution of the difficulties and controversies which may grow out of differences in point of view or from clash of interests. An attempt in this direction has already and is now being made; its results, however, are almost negligible and, especially so, as far as they can be said to affect those major questions which divide seriously and serve to arouse nations one against the other. No merely human institution of today can be as successful in devising a set of international laws which will be in harmony with world conditions as the Middle Ages were in the possession of that true League of Nations, Christianity. It cannot be denied that in the Middle Ages this law was often violated; still it always existed as an ideal, according to which one might judge the acts of nations, and a beacon light calling those who had lost their way back to the safe road.
There exists an institution able to safeguard the sanctity of the law of nations. This institution is a part of every nation; at the same time it is above all nations. She enjoys, too, the highest authority, the fullness of the teaching power of the Apostles. Such an institution is the Church of Christ. She alone is adapted to do this great work, for she is not only divinely commissioned to lead mankind, but moreover, because of her very make-up and the constitution which she possesses, by reason of her age-old traditions and her great prestige, which has not been lessened but has been greatly increased since the close of the War, cannot but succeed in such a venture where others assuredly will fail.
It is apparent from these considerations that true peace, the peace of Christ, is impossible unless we are willing and ready to accept the fundamental principles of Christianity, unless we are willing to observe the teachings and obey the law of Christ, both in public and private life. If this were done, then society being placed at last on a sound foundation, the Church would be able, in the exercise of its divinely given ministry and by means of the teaching authority which results therefrom, to protect all the rights of God over men and nations.
It is possible to sum up all We have said in one word, "the Kingdom of Christ." For Jesus Christ reigns over the minds of individuals by His teachings, in their hearts by His love, in each one's life by the living according to His law and the imitating of His example. Jesus reigns over the family when it, modeled after the holy ideals of the sacrament of matrimony instituted by Christ, maintains unspotted its true character of sanctuary. In such a sanctuary of love, parental authority is fashioned after the authority of God, the Father, from Whom, as a matter of fact, it originates and after which even it is named. (Ephesians iii, 15) The obedience of the children imitates that of the Divine Child of Nazareth, and the whole family life is inspired by the sacred ideals of the Holy Family. Finally, Jesus Christ reigns over society when men recognize and reverence the sovereignty of Christ, when they accept the divine origin and control over all social forces, a recognition which is the basis of the right to command for those in authority and of the duty to obey for those who are subjects, a duty which cannot but ennoble all who live up to its demands. Christ reigns where the position in society which He Himself has assigned to His Church is recognized, for He bestowed on the Church the status and the constitution of a society which, by reason of the perfect ends which it is called upon to attain, must be held to be supreme in its own sphere; He also made her the depository and interpreter of His divine teachings, and, by consequence, the teacher and guide of every other society whatsoever, not of course in the sense that she should abstract in the least from their authority, each in its own sphere supreme, but that she should really perfect their authority, just as divine grace perfects human nature, and should give to them the assistance necessary for men to attain their true final end, eternal happiness, and by that very fact make them the more deserving and certain promoters of their happiness here below.
It is, therefore, a fact which cannot be questioned that the true peace of Christ can only exist in the Kingdom of Christ -- "the peace of Christ in the Kingdom of Christ." It is no less unquestionable that, in doing all we can to bring about the re-establishment of Christ's kingdom, we will be working most effectively toward a lasting world peace.
As Pope Leo XIII used this quote, provided in Satis Cognitum, June 29, 1896, to explain that one falls from the Faith in its entirety if he falls from in if one matter, if he drops bits of poison into the well of the Holy Faith:
"There can be nothing more dangerous than those heretics who admit nearly the whole cycle of doctrine, and yet by one word, as with a drop of poison, infect the real and simple faith taught by our Lord and handed down by Apostolic tradition."
(Auctor Tract. de Fide Orthodoxa contra Arianos).
Joseph Ratzinger dropped the poison calling Mount Hiei "sacred" into the message he sent to the "interreligious prayer meeting" in Japan, which met on the Feast of Saint Dominic, August 4, 2007, the great saint who used the weapon given him by Our Lady herself, the Most Holy Rosary, to fight the heresy of his day, the Albigenses heresy. Joseph Ratzinger/Benedict XVI also dropped the poisonous belief that "peace" can be had without the conversion of all men and all nations to the true Faith, daring even to refuse any mention of the Holy Name of the Divine Redeemer, Our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ, into that message. Does none of this matter because one chooses not report it or comment about it? Is God any the less offended by it because the poison is ignored and the offense given to Him permitted to stand without any opposition and firm, clear, manly defense of His greater honor and glory?
Oh, I know, there are some who believe that one remains Catholic as long as he holds onto a "minimal" number of articles contained in the Deposit of Faith, a proposition that is without any Patristic support and, indeed, contradicts these words of Pope Leo XIII in Satis Cognitum:
The practice of the Church has always been the same, as is shown by the unanimous teaching of the Fathers, who were wont to hold as outside Catholic communion, and alien to the Church, whoever would recede in the least degree from any point of doctrine proposed by her authoritative Magisterium. Epiphanius, Augustine, Theodore :, drew up a long list of the heresies of their times. St. Augustine notes that other heresies may spring up, to a single one of which, should any one give his assent, he is by the very fact cut off from Catholic unity. "No one who merely disbelieves in all (these heresies) can for that reason regard himself as a Catholic or call himself one. For there may be or may arise some other heresies, which are not set out in this work of ours, and, if any one holds to one single one of these he is not a Catholic" (S. Augustinus, De Haeresibus, n. 88).
Referring to a place of devil worship as "sacred" is hideous, communicating to others that Joseph Ratzinger agrees with Father Raniero Cantalamessa's 2002 Good Friday sermon in the Basilica of Saint Peter in which he said that "other" religions are "positively willed" by God to exist. Those who believe in such a thing have fallen from the Catholic Faith, having stated their private beliefs most publicly for all to hear.
There are others who will try to point out, sometimes in a breathless, emotional manner, that there are many times when Joseph Ratzinger is said to make good Catholic points. That does not redeem his Modernism, whose internal mixture of truth and error was dissected in a penetrating manner by Pope Saint Pius X in Pascendi Dominci Gregis, September 8, 1907:
This will appear more clearly to anybody who studies the conduct of Modernists, which is in perfect harmony with their teachings. In their writings and addresses they seem not unfrequently to advocate doctrines which are contrary one to the other, so that one would be disposed to regard their attitude as double and doubtful. But this is done deliberately and advisedly, and the reason of it is to be found in their opinion as to the mutual separation of science and faith. Thus in their books one finds some things which might well be approved by a Catholic, but on turning over the page one is confronted by other things which might well have been dictated by a rationalist. When they write history they make no mention of the divinity of Christ, but when they are in the pulpit they profess it clearly; again, when they are dealing with history they take no account of the Fathers and the Councils, but when they catechize the people, they cite them respectfully. In the same way they draw their distinctions between exegesis which is theological and pastoral and exegesis which is scientific and historical. So, too, when they treat of philosophy, history, and criticism, acting on the principle that science in no way depends upon faith, they feel no especial horror in treading in the footsteps of Luther and are wont to display a manifold contempt for Catholic doctrines, for the Holy Fathers, for the Ecumenical Councils, for the ecclesiastical magisterium; and should they be taken to task for this, they complain that they are being deprived of their liberty. Lastly, maintaining the theory that faith must be subject to science, they continuously and openly rebuke the Church on the ground that she resolutely refuses to submit and accommodate her dogmas to the opinions of philosophy; while they, on their side, having for this purpose blotted out the old theology, endeavor to introduce a new theology which shall support the aberrations of philosophers.
This is once again, a perfect description of Joseph Ratzinger, who calls a mountain of devil worship "sacred" on August 4 and then, ten days later, gives an allocution on the Four Last Things. Support for "theistic evolution" one day an opposition to perverted "marriages" on the next. Manifest error and Catholicism found in the same mind, which rejects the sure defense of Scholasticism in favor of the murkiness of Modernism's step-child, the "new theology." Modernism is the admixture of truth and error. Why is it so difficult for so many to recognize this fact, to admit that it is opposed to the Catholic Faith to offend God and to call the place of worship of a false religion "sacred," to contend that "peace" can be attained by any other means than by the conversion of men and nations to the Catholic Faith?
The following passages from Pascendi Dominci Gregis, whose centenary is fast approaching, also apply very much to the conciliarists and their apostate ethos:
Would that they had but displayed less zeal and energy in propagating it! But such is their activity and such their unwearying labor on behalf of their cause, that one cannot but be pained to see them waste such energy in endeavoring to ruin the Church when they might have been of such service to her had their efforts been better directed. Their artifices to delude men's minds are of two kinds, the first to remove obstacles from their path, the second to devise and apply actively and patiently every resource that can serve their purpose. They recognize that the three chief difficulties which stand in their way are the scholastic method of philosophy, the authority and tradition of the Fathers, and the magisterium of the Church, and on these they wage unrelenting war. Against scholastic philosophy and theology they use the weapons of ridicule and contempt. Whether it is ignorance or fear, or both, that inspires this conduct in them, certain it is that the passion for novelty is always united in them with hatred of scholasticism, and there is no surer sign that a man is tending to Modernism than when he begins to show his dislike for the scholastic method. Let the Modernists and their admirers remember the proposition condemned by Pius IX: "The method and principles which have served the ancient doctors of scholasticism when treating of theology no longer correspond with the exigencies of our time or the progress of science. "They exercise all their ingenuity in an effort to weaken the force and falsify the character of tradition, so as to rob it of all its weight and authority. But for Catholics nothing will remove the authority of the second Council of Nicea, where it condemns those "who dare, after the impious fashion of heretics, to deride the ecclesiastical traditions, to invent novelties of some kind...or endeavor by malice or craft to overthrow any one of the legitimate traditions of the Catholic Church"; nor that of the declaration of the fourth Council of Constantinople: "We therefore profess to preserve and guard the rules bequeathed to the Holy Catholic and Apostolic Church, by the Holy and most illustrious Apostles, by the orthodox Councils, both general and local, and by everyone of those divine interpreters, the Fathers and Doctors of the Church." Wherefore the Roman Pontiffs, Pius IV and Pius IX, ordered the insertion in the profession of faith of the following declaration: "I most firmly admit and embrace the apostolic and ecclesiastical traditions and other observances and constitutions of the Church.''
The Modernists pass judgment on the holy Fathers of the Church even as they do upon tradition. With consummate temerity they assure the public that the Fathers, while personally most worthy of all veneration, were entirely ignorant of history and criticism, for which they are only excusable on account of the time in which they lived. Finally, the Modernists try in every way to diminish and weaken the authority of the ecclesiastical magisterium itself by sacrilegiously falsifying its origin, character, and rights, and by freely repeating the calumnies of its adversaries. To the entire band of Modernists may be applied those words which Our predecessor sorrowfully wrote: "To bring contempt and odium on the mystic Spouse of Christ, who is the true light, the children of darkness have been wont to cast in her face before the world a stupid calumny, and perverting the meaning and force of things and words, to depict her as the friend of darkness and ignorance, and the enemy of light, science, and progress.'' This being so, Venerable Brethren, there is little reason to wonder that the Modernists vent all their bitterness and hatred on Catholics who zealously fight the battles of the Church. There is no species of insult which they do not heap upon them, but their usual course is to charge them with ignorance or obstinacy. When an adversary rises up against them with an erudition and force that renders them redoubtable, they seek to make a conspiracy of silence around him to nullify the effects of his attack. This policy towards Catholics is the more invidious in that they belaud with admiration which knows no bounds the writers who range themselves on their side, hailing their works, exuding novelty in every page, with a chorus of applause. For them the scholarship of a writer is in direct proportion to the recklessness of his attacks on antiquity, and of his efforts to undermine tradition and the ecclesiastical magisterium. When one of their number falls under the condemnations of the Church the rest of them, to the disgust of good Catholics, gather round him, loudly and publicly applaud him, and hold him up in veneration as almost a martyr for truth. The young, excited and confused by all this clamor of praise and abuse, some of them afraid of being branded as ignorant, others ambitious to rank among the learned, and both classes goaded internally by curiosity and pride, not infrequently surrender and give themselves up to Modernism.
Have we forgotten that Joseph Ratzinger himself expressed contempt for the reiteration of Catholic teaching by the popes of the Nineteenth and early-Twentieth Centuries, demonstrating that he wanted "to weaken the force and falsify the character of tradition, so as to rob it of all its weight and authority?"
The text [of the Second Vatican Council] also presents the various forms of bonds that rise from the different degrees of magisterial teaching. It affirms -- perhaps for the first time with this clarity -- that there are decisions of the Magisterium that cannot be a last word on the matter as such, but are, in a substantial fixation of the problem, above all an expression of pastoral prudence, a kind of provisional disposition. Its nucleus remains valid, but the particulars, which the circumstances of the times have influenced, may need further ramifications.
“In this regard, one may think of the declarations of Popes in the last century about religious liberty, as well as the anti-Modernist decisions at the beginning of this century, above all, the decisions of the Biblical Commission of the time. As a cry of alarm in the face of hasty and superficial adaptations, they will remain fully justified. A personage such as Johann Baptist Metz said, for example, that the Church's anti-Modernist decisions render the great service of preserving her from immersion in the liberal-bourgeois world. But in the details of the determinations they contain, they become obsolete after having fulfilled their pastoral mission at the proper moment.” (Joseph Ratzinger, L'Osservatore Romano, July 2, 1990)
One who believes he can rob the perennial teaching of the Catholic Church of "all its weight and authority" is an enemy of souls. One who can call a mountain dedicated to the devil religion of Buddhism is in league with Baal and his friends:
“‘Nevertheless send now, and gather unto me all Israel, unto Mount Carmel, and the prophets of Baal four hundred and fifty, and the prophets of the groves four hundred, who eat at Jezebel’s table.’
“Achab sent to all the children of Israel, and gathered together the prophets unto Mount Carmel.
“And Elias coming to all the people, said: ‘How long do you halt between two sides? If the Lord be God, follow Him: but if Baal, follow him.’ And the people did not answer him a word.
“And Elias said again to the people: ‘I only remain a prophet of the Lord: but the prophets of Baal are four hundred and fifty men. Let two bullocks be given us, and let them choose one bullock and cut it in pieces and lay it upon wood, but put no fire under: and I will dress the other bullock, and lay it on wood, and put no fire under it. Call ye the names of your gods, and I will call on the name of my Lord; and the God that shall answer by fire, let him be God.’ And all of the people answering said: ‘A very good proposal.’
“Then Elias said to the prophets of Baal: ‘Choose you one bullock and dress it first, because you are many; and call on the names of your gods, but put no fire under.’
“And they took the bullock which he gave them, and dressed it; and they called on the name of Baal from morning even till noon, saying: ‘O Baal, hear us.’ But there was no voice, nor any that answered: and they leaped over the altar that they had made.
“And when it was now noon, Elias jested at them, saying: ‘Cry with a louder voice: for he is a God, and perhaps he is talking, or he is in an inn, or on a journey, or perhaps he is asleep, and must be awaked.’
“So they cried with a loud voice, and cut themselves after their manner with knives and lancets, till they were covered with blood. And after midday was past, and while they were prophesying, the time was come of offering sacrifice, and there was no voice heard, nor did any one answer, nor regard them as they prayed: Elias said to the people: ‘Come ye unto me.’ And the people coming near unto him, he repaired the altar of the Lord, that was broken down:
“And he took twelve stones according to the number of the tribes of the sons of Jacob, to whom the word of the Lord came, saying: ‘Israel shall be thy name.’ And he built with the stones an altar to the name of the Lord: and he made a trench for water, of the breadth of two furrows round about the altar. And he laid the wood in order, and cut the bullock in pieces, and laid it upon the wood.
“And he said: “Fill four buckets with water, and pour it upon the burnt offering, and upon the wood.’ And again he said: ‘Do the same the second time.’ And when they had done it the second time, he said: ‘Do the same also the third time.’ And they did so the third time. And the water run about the altar, and the trench was filled with water.
“And when it was now time to offer the holocaust, Elias the prophet came near and said: ‘O Lord God of Abraham and Isaac, and Israel, show this day that thou art the God of Israel, and I thy servant, and that according to they commandment I have done all these things. Hear me, O Lord, hear me: that this people may learn, that thou art the Lord God, and that thou hast turned their heart again.’
“Then the fire of the Lord fell, and consumed the holocaust, and the wood, and the stones, and the dust, and licked up the water that was in the trench. And when all the people saw this, they fell on their faces, and they said: ‘The Lord he is God, the Lord he is God.’ And Elias said to them: ‘Take the prophets of Baal, and let not one of them escape.’ And when they had taken them, Elias brought them down to the torrent Cison, and killed them there” (3 Kings: 18:19-40)
Mount Carmel, which was desecrated by false worship and claimed for God by Elias the prophet, is a truly blessed mountain. Our Lady herself has identified herself with Mount Carmel, not Mount Hiei, giving us the garment of her Brown Scapular to be worn as a symbol of her Heavenly care for us. Yes Heavenly care, especially at the moment of our death. Our Lady of Mount Carmel appeared in the Thirteenth Century from the place to which she was Assumed on this day, Heaven, to give us a special garment to clothe us with her motherly protection.
It is by keeping close to the ever sinless Blessed Virgin Mary, especially through her Most Holy Rosary, that we can obtain the graces necessary to reject conciliarism and to denounce the apostasies of the moment. Our Lady will help us to be ever ready to defend the honor and the glory of the Blessed Trinity to Whom she is Daughter, Mother, and Spouse. She will lead us to be ever mindful of making reparation for our own many sins by offering our daily penances to the Most Sacred Heart of Jesus through her own Sorrowful and Immaculate Heart, ever desirous of spending time with her at Holy Mass and in front of her Divine Son's Real Presence in the Most Blessed Sacrament as a foretaste of the Heavenly glories that will await us if we die in a state of Sanctifying Grace as members of the Catholic Church.
There is no such thing as a small sacrilege or a small blasphemy. May we use the glories of this great feast day of the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary into Heaven body and soul to thank God for the great gift of His ever sinless Mother and to resolve to beg her intercession to help us to be vigilant and courageous in denouncing blasphemies and more and more generous to make reparation for them as we flee from false shepherds and seek out the protection the true shepherds in the catacombs where no attempts are made to justify the apostasies of the moment.
Our Lady, Assumed into Heaven, pray for us.
Immaculate Heart of Mary, pray for us now and the hour of our death Amen
Vivat Christus Rex!
Our Lady of Fatima, pray for us
Saint Joseph, pray for us
Saints Peter and Paul, pray for us
Saint John the Baptist, pray for us
Saint Michael the Archangel, pray for us
Saint Gabriel the Archangel, pray for us
Saint Raphael the Archangel, pray for us
Saint Eusebius, pray for us.
Saint Philomena, pray for us.
Saints Tiburtius and Susanna, pray for us.
Saint Clare of Assisi, pray for us.
Saint Lawrence the Deacon, pray for us.
Saint Cajetan, pray for us.
Saint Donatus, pray for us.
Saint Dominic de Guzman, pray for us
Saint Alphonsus de Liguori, pray for us
Pope Saint Stephen I, pray for us
Saint Stephen the Protomartyr, pray for us
Saint Christopher, pray for us
Saint James the Greater, pray for us
Simon Stock, pray for us
Saint John of the Cross, pray for us
Saint Teresa of Avila, pray for us
Saint Therese Lisieux, pray for us
Saint Bonaventure, pray for us
Saint Athanasius, pray for us
Saint Irenaeus, pray for us
Saints Monica, pray for us
Saint Jude, pray for us
Saint John the Beloved, pray for us
Saint Francis Solano, pray for us
Saint John Bosco, pray for us
Saint Dominic Savio, pray for us
Saint Scholastica, pray for us
Saint Benedict, pray for us
Saint Joan of Arc, pray for us
Saint Antony of the Desert, pray for us
Saint Francis of Assisi, pray for us
Saint Thomas Aquinas, pray for us
Saint Bonaventure, pray for us
Saint Augustine, pray for us
Saint Bernard of Clairvaux, pray for us
Saint Francis Xavier, pray for us
Saint Peter Damian, pray for us
Saint Frances Xavier Cabrini, pray for us
Saint Lucy, pray for us
Saint Monica, pray for us
Saint Agatha, pray for us
Saint Anthony of Padua, pray for us
Saint Basil the Great, pray for us
Saint Philomena, pray for us
Saint Cecilia, pray for us
Saint John Mary Vianney, pray for us
Saint Vincent de Paul, pray for us
Saint Vincent Ferrer, pray for us
Saint Athanasius, pray for us
Saint Margaret Mary Alacoque, pray for us
Saint Isaac Jogues, pray for us
Saint Rene Goupil, pray for us
Saint John Lalonde, pray for us
Saint Gabriel Lalemont, pray for us
Saint Noel Chabanel, pray for us
Saint Charles Garnier, pray for us
Saint Anthony Daniel, pray for us
Saint John DeBrebeuf, pray for us
Saint Alphonsus de Liguori, pray for us
Saint Hyacinth, pray for us
Saint Basil, pray for us
Saint Vincent Ferrer, pray for us
Saint Sebastian, pray for us
Saint Tarcisius, pray for us
Saint Bridget of Sweden, pray for us
Saint Gerard Majella, pray for us
Saint Bernadette Soubirous, pray for us
Saint Genevieve, pray for us
Saint Vincent de Paul, pray for us
Pope Saint Pius X, pray for us
Pope Saint Pius V, pray for us
Saint Rita of Cascia, pray for us
Saint Louis de Montfort, pray for us
Venerable Anne Catherine Emmerich, pray for us
Venerable Pauline Jaricot, pray for us
Father Miguel Augustin Pro, pray for us
Francisco Marto, pray for us
Jacinta Marto, pray for us
Juan Diego, pray for us
Sister Teresa Benedicta, pray for us
The Longer Version of the Saint Michael the Archangel Prayer, composed by Pope Leo XIII, 1888
O glorious Archangel Saint Michael, Prince of the heavenly host, be our defense in the terrible warfare which we carry on against principalities and powers, against the rulers of this world of darkness, spirits of evil Come to the aid of man, whom God created immortal, made in His own image and likeness, and redeemed at a great price from the tyranny of the devil Fight this day the battle of our Lord, together with the holy angels, as already thou hast fought the leader of the proud angels, Lucifer, and his apostate host, who were powerless to resist thee, nor was there place for them any longer in heaven That cruel, that ancient serpent, who is called the devil or Satan who seduces the whole world, was cast into the abyss with his angels Behold this primeval enemy and slayer of men has taken courage Transformed into an angel of light, he wanders about with all the multitude of wicked spirits, invading the earth in order to blot out the Name of God and of His Christ, to seize upon, slay, and cast into eternal perdition, souls destined for the crown of eternal glory That wicked dragon pours out as a most impure flood, the venom of his malice on men of depraved mind and corrupt heart, the spirit of lying, of impiety, of blasphemy, and the pestilent breath of impurity, and of every vice and iniquity These most crafty enemies have filled and inebriated with gall and bitterness the Church, the spouse of the Immaculate Lamb, and have laid impious hands on Her most sacred possessions In the Holy Place itself, where has been set up the See of the most holy Peter and the Chair of Truth for the light of the world, they have raised the throne of their abominable impiety with the iniquitous design that when the Pastor has been struck the sheep may be scattered Arise then, O invincible Prince, bring help against the attacks of the lost spirits to the people of God, and give them the victory They venerate thee as their protector and patron; in thee holy Church glories as her defense against the malicious powers of hell; to thee has God entrusted the souls of men to be established in heavenly beatitude Oh, pray to the God of peace that He may put Satan under our feet, so far conquered that he may no longer be able to hold men in captivity and harm the Church Offer our prayers in the sight of the Most High, so that they may quickly conciliate the mercies of the Lord; and beating down the dragon, the ancient serpent, who is the devil and Satan, do thou again make him captive in the abyss, that he may no longer seduce the nations Amen
Verse: Behold the Cross of the Lord; be scattered ye hostile powers
Response: The Lion of the Tribe of Juda has conquered the root of David
Verse: Let Thy mercies be upon us, O Lord
Response: As we have hoped in Thee
Verse: O Lord hear my prayer
Response: And let my cry come unto Thee
Verse: Let us pray O God, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, we call upon Thy holy Name, and as suppliants, we implore Thy clemency, that by the intercession of Mary, ever Virgin, immaculate and our Mother, and of the glorious Archangel Saint Michael, Thou wouldst deign to help us against Satan and all other unclean spirits, who wander about the world for the injury of the human race and the ruin of our souls
Response: Amen
