St. John Paul II and the Future of Ukraine

See http://www.crisismagazine.com/2014/st-john-paul-ii-and-the-future-of-ukraine

An Open Letter to Pope Francis

Translated from http://lacomunidad.elpais.com/lplanas/2013/9/26/perplejidad-carta-al-papa-francisco

Huixquilucan, Mexico, on September 23, 2013

Dearest Papa Francesco, I am so pleased to have the opportunity to greet you. Surely you will not remember me, seeing so many new people every day must be hard to remember everyone, even those with whom you talked and lived during the long course of your life.

Over the past 12 years, you and I, many times have found ourselves in several meetings, church meetings and conferences that took place in the cities of Central and South America on various topics (communication, catechesis, education). During these pastoral meetings I had the opportunity to live with you for so many days, sleeping under the same roof, sharing the same table and also the same desk. Then you were the Archbishop of Buenos Aires and I was the director of a leading Catholic media.

Now you are the Holy Father and I ... only a mother, a Christian, married to a good husband and nine children, who teaches mathematics at the University and seeks to cooperate as best as I can with the Church, the place where God has put it.

In these meetings several years ago, I remember more than one brought you to me and said: - "Girl, tell Jorge Mario, we're friends", I replied, startled: "Absolutely not, Mr. Cardinal! God forbid you from giving of one of his princes on earth. "

Now, however, I beg to call you, because you are no longer the card. Bergoglio, but the Pope, my Pope, the sweet Christ on earth, to which I have the confidence to address as my father.

I decided to write to you because I suffer and I need you to comfort me. I'll explain what is happening to me, trying to be as short as possible. I know you like to comfort those who suffer, and now I'm one of them.

When I first met you during these retreats, when you were still Cardinal Bergoglio, I was struck and puzzled that you never acted like the other cardinals and bishops. To give some examples: you were the only one there that did not genuflect before the tabernacle or during the Consecration, if all the bishops presented themselves with their cassocks and their clerical garb, because that was required by the necessary rules for the meeting, you will presented yourself in suit and clerical collar. If all of you were sitting on the seats reserved for the bishops and cardinals, you left empty the place of Cardinal Bergoglio and you sat in back, saying "I'm fine here, so I feel more at ease."If others came with a vehicle that corresponds to the dignity of a bishop, you had arrived after the others, busy and in a hurry, telling aloud your encounters in public transport in order to come to the meeting. Seeing these things - I am ashamed in telling this - I said to myself: - "Phew ... who wants to attract attention! Because, if you want to be truly humble and simple, is it not better to behave like the other bishops to go unnoticed? ". Even some of my Argentine friends who attended these meetings, somehow noticed my confusion, and I said - "No, you're not the only one. We all were always puzzled, but we know that clear criteria, and in speeches show convictions and certainties always faithful to the Magisterium and the Tradition of the Church, it is a brave loyal defender of right doctrine ... Apparently, however, loves to be loved by all and please everyone. In this sense could one day make a speech on TV against abortion and the next day, in the same TV show, bless the pro-abortion feminists in the Plaza de Mayo, could make a wonderful speech against masons and, hours later, eat and drink with them at the Club Rotary Club. "

My dear Papa Francesco, it is true, this was the card. Bergoglio I knew closely. One day, intent on chatting animatedly with Bishop Duarte Aguer in the defense of life and of the liturgy and the same day, at dinner, chatting animatedly with always Ysern Bishop and Bishop Rosa Chavez on base communities and the terrible obstacles that represent "the dogmatic teachings "of the Church. One day a friend of the Cardinal Cipriani and Cardinal Rodriguez Maradiaga to talk about business ethics and against the ideologies of the New Age and a little later a friend of Casaldáliga and Boff to talk about class struggle and the "wealth" that the techniques could donate to the Eastern Church.

With this in mind, you will understand that I with greatly widened his eyes when I heard your name after the '"We Have a Pope" and from that moment (before you ask) I have prayed for you and for my beloved Church. And I have not stopped doing it for a single day since then. When I saw you on the balcony, without miter, without cape, breaking the protocol of greeting and the reading of the Latin text, with this trying to differentiate yourself from the rest of the Popes in history, smiling, worried, I said to myself: "Yes, without a doubt. This is the Cardinal Bergoglio. " In the days following your election, you gave me a number of occasions to confirm that you are the same person I had known closely, always looking for a diversity: you asked for different shoes, a different ring, a different Cross , a different chair and even room and home different from the rest of Popes that always had been content humbly with those things provided, without the need of "special" things, especially for them. In those days I was trying to recover from the immense pain felt by the resignation of my beloved and much admired Pope Benedict XVI, in which I identified from the beginning to the clarity in his teachings (the best teacher in the world), for his loyalty the Liturgy, for his courage in defending the right doctrine among the enemies of the Church and a thousand things that will not be listed here. With him at the helm of Peter I felt like I had stepped on land. And with his resignation, I felt the ground disappear beneath my feet, but I understand it, the winds were really stormy and the papacy was something too rough for his strength, now diminished by age, in the terrible and violent culture war being waged.

At that moment I felt abandoned in the midst of war, the earthquake, in the increasingly fierce hurricane, and suddenly you came to replace him at the helm. We have a new captain, we give thanks to God! I confided in full (without any doubt) that, with the assistance of the Holy Spirit, with the prayer of the faithful, with the weight of responsibility, with the assistance of the working group in the Vatican and with the awareness of being observed throughout the world , Papa Francesco leave behind the special things and ambivalences of the card. Bergoglio and would immediately take command of the army, and with renewed vigor continuing the path of struggle that his predecessor had set.

Unfortunately, to my surprise and dismay, my new general, rather than take up arms once arrived, he began his tenure using the time as the Pope to call his barber, to his dentist, his milkman and his newsagent, attracting attention to his person and not on the relevant issues of the Papacy.

Six months have passed since then and I recognize, with love and emotion, you've done thousands of good things. I really like (very much) your formal speeches (to politicians, gynecologists, communicators, the World Day of Peace, etc..) And your homilies on feast days, because in them we see a thorough preparation and a deep meditation of each word used. Your words, in these discourses and homilies have been a real food for my spirit. I really like that people love you and applaud you. You are my Papa, the Supreme Head of my Church, the Church of Christ. However - and this is the reason for my letter - I must say that I also suffered (and suffer), from many of your words, because you say things that feel like stabs in the lower abdomen during my repeated attempts to a sincere loyalty to the Pope and the Magisterium .

I feel sad, yes, but the best word to express my current feelings is: perplexity. I do not know what to say and what not to say, I do not know where to go on and let it go. I need you to orient me, dear Papa Francesco. I'm really suffering, and much, for this concerns me still. My biggest problem is that I have devoted much of my life to the study of Sacred Scripture, Tradition, and the Magisterium, in order to have strong reasons to defend my faith. And now, many of these solid foundations are in contradiction with what my beloved Pope says and does. I am shocked and I need you to tell me what to do.

I'll explain myself better, with a few examples. I can not applaud a Pope who does not kneel before the tabernacle or during the Consecration as taught by the rite of the Mass, but I can not criticize it, because it is the Pope! Benedict XVI asked us in the Redemptoris Sacramentum that we are to inform the bishop of the unfaithfulness and liturgical abuses we are witnessing. Ma .. Who should I inform if the Pope himself does not respect the liturgy? I do not know what to do. I disobey the instructions of our Pope Emeritus? I can not feel happy to have eliminated the use of the paten and kneeling for Holy Communion, and even that you never give communion to the faithful, who do not call yourself "the Pope", but only "Bishop of Rome "or you do not use the fisherman's ring. But I can not even complain, because you are the Pope! I do not feel proud that you have washed the feet of a Muslim woman on Holy Thursday, since it is a violation of liturgical law, but I can not issue a peep, because You are the Pope, to whom I owe respect and to whom I must be faithful! I was hurt terribly when you have punished the Franciscan Friars of the Immaculate, because they were celebrating the Mass in the ancient rite with the explicit permission of your predecessor in Summorum Pontificum. And punish them, is to go against the teachings of previous popes. But who do I communicate my pain, you're the Pope! I did not know what to think or say when you have mocked publicly a group that had sent you a Spiritual Bouquet of rosaries, calling them "those who count the prayers." Such Spiritual Bouquets are a wonderful tradition in the Church, what am I to think and I do not like it if my Papa derides those who offer them to him? I have many friends who are "pro-life" who a few days ago were very saddened by your calling them "obsessed and obsessive." What should I do? Console, softening falsely your words or hurt them even more, repeating what you said to them, seeking to be faithful to the Pope and his teachings? WYD you asked young people to "make some noise in the streets." The word "casino", as far as I know, is synonymous with "disorder", "chaos", "confusion." Really this is what you want them to do the young Christians in the streets? There are already enough confusion and disorder in the world? I know of many single and older women (spinsters), which are very cheerful, funny and generous and really felt badly when you said that the nuns were not to have a face like a spinster. I was very sick at heart for my friends and me, it hurt me in my soul for them, because there is nothing wrong with being alone and to dedicate one's life to good works (in fact, loneliness is specified as a vocation in the Catechism). What should I tell my friends who are "spinsters"? That the Pope was serious (which I can not do a Pope), or that I support the Pope in the fact that all the old maids have a face like a bitter religious?

A couple of weeks ago you said that "what we are experiencing is one of the best moments of the Church." How can you say that as Pope when we all know that there are millions of young Catholics who live in concubinage and many millions of Catholic marriages where they use contraceptives, when the divorce is "our daily bread" and millions of Catholic mothers kill their children not born with the help of Catholic doctors, when there are millions of Catholic businessmen who are not guided by the social doctrine of the Church, but by ambition and avarice; when there are thousands of priests who commit liturgical abuses, and when there are hundreds of millions of Catholics who have never had an encounter with Christ and do not know the essence of the doctrine, when education and governments are in the hands of the Freemasons and the world economy in the hands of Zionism? This is the best time of the Church? When you said it, beloved Pope, I panicked. If the captain is not seeing the iceberg before us, it is very likely that we smash against it. Do You really believe that or is it just a way of saying dear Pope? Many great preachers have felt devastated to know that you said that now no longer have to talk about the themes of which the Church has already spoken and which are written in the Catechism.

Tell me, dear Papa Francesco, what must we Christians who want to be faithful to the Pope and also to the Magisterium and Tradition do? Let's stop preaching even though St. Paul has told us that we must do so at every opportunity in season and out of season? What with the courageous preachers, we force them to silence, while truly spoil sinners and gently tell them that if they can and want to, should read the Catechism to know what the Church says? Whenever you speak of the "shepherds smelling of their sheep," I think of all those priests who allowed themselves to be contaminated by the things of the world and have lost their scent of priesthood to acquire a certain smell of decomposition. I do not want the smell of shepherds with sheep, but sheep that do not smell of dung, because their pastor care and always keep clean. A few days ago you talked about the vocation of Matthew with these words:  "I am impressed by the gesture of Matthew.He clings to his money, as saying: 'No, not me! No, this money is mine " .  could not help but compare your words with the Gospel (Mt 9, 9), contrary to what Matthew himself says of his vocation: "And Jesus went forth from thence, he saw a man who was sitting at the tax office, whose name was Matthew, and said unto him, Follow me. And he rose and followed him. " 

I can not see where the grasping of money (not what I see in the painting by Caravaggio). I see two different narratives and wrong exegesis. Who should I believe, the Gospel or the Pope, if you want (as I really want to) be faithful to the Gospel and the Pope?

When you talked about the woman who lives in concubinage after a divorce and an abortion, you said  she "now lives in peace." I wonder: can someone live in peace, a lady who is voluntarily removed from the grace of God? The previous Popes, from St. Peter to Benedict XVI, said that it is not possible to find peace away from God, but Pope Francis said so. What should I support, the teachers always or this news? Should I say, starting today, to be faithful to the Pope, that peace can be found in a life of sin? Then you tossed the question without answer on how a confessor should behave, as if to open the Pandora's box knowing that there are hundreds of priests who mistakenly recommend continuing in concubinage. Why does my Papa, my dear Papa, not tell us in a few words what should be advised in cases like this, instead of opening doubts in sincere hearts?

I met Cardinal Bergoglio in almost a family environment and I am a faithful witness to that you are intelligent, friendly, spontaneous, very witty and very clever. But I do not like that the press is publishing all your sayings and quips, because are not a village priest, nor the Archbishop of Buenos Aires, now you're the Pope! and every word you say as Pope, acquires ordinary magisterial value for many of who read and hear you.

Anyway, I wrote taking too much of your time, my good Papa. With the examples I have given you (although there are many others) I think I made clear the pain of uncertainty and perplexity I'm living.

Only you can help. I need a guide that illuminates my steps based on what the Church has always said, speak boldly and clearly, does not offend those who work to be faithful to Jesus' command, to call "the bread, bread and wine wine"," to call sin " sin" virtue " virtue", although this risks his popularity. I need your wisdom, your firmness and clarity. I ask for help, please, because I am in agony.

 I know that God has equipped you with a very acute intelligence, so that, trying to comfort me alone, I could imagine that everything you do and say is part of a strategy to disconcert the enemy, by introducing yourself in front of him with the white flag and so letting your guard down.

But I'd like you to share it with those who are fighting this strategy at your side, because, in addition to disconcerting the enemy, you are disconcerting us, we do not know where he is and where our headquarters is located in front of the enemy. Thank you once again for all the good you have done and what you said during the feast, when you uttered beautiful homilies and speeches because there really are served a lot. Your words inspired and gave us the impulse to love more, to love, to love in the best way, to show the world the loving face of Jesus

I send you a hug branch very loving, my dear Papa, with the assurance of my prayers. I also ask for yours, for me and for my family, of which I enclose a photo, so that you can pray for us, knowing our face. Your daughter loves you and pray for you every day, 

Your daughter loves you and pray for you every day,

Lucrecia Rego de Planas

Holy war rocks Harvard as the Catholic Church fights back against Satanic mass

From http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2014/may/10/holy-war-rocks-harvard-catholic-church-fights-back/

Church officials say they will “combat evil” by hosting a positive worship service to counter a Harvard group’s Satanic mass planned for Monday evening.

The Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Boston will host a Eucharistic procession from MIT to a nearby church for an hour of prayer, The Boston Globe reports.

The religious procession will end up at St. Paul’s Parish in Harvard Square, just a 10-minutes walk from the Queen’s Head Pub in Memorial Hall the Harvard Extension Cultural Studies Club is set to hold a “black mass.”

A black mass is a ritual performed as a parody of the Roman Catholic Mass.

In an official statement, the Archdiocese said it fears that people who partake in the ceremony are “underestimating the power of Satan.”

Club members say that they are holding the service for educational purposes, but church officials say that the service is offensive.

“The university is allowing this under the guise that it is educational,” said the Rev. Michael Drea, pastor of St. Paul’s Church. “But anything rooted in hatred is not something that should be put in the same category as academic freedom and academic expression.”

Club leaders insist that the black mass is meant to be a historical reenactment and an exploration of other cultures.

“Clearly people are insulted, and I believe that is due to them having no contact with, or understanding of Satanism,” an unidentified club representative said via email Friday.

The newspaper reported that members of the club would not identify themselves and preferred to speak over email.

The club’s representative told reporters that Satanists are often misunderstood: These people are not evil; they just don’t fit in with mainstream culture and choose to “actively embrace their outsider status.”

“Many whom I have met are vegetarians, artists, animal-rights activists, and have a strong sense of community,” the representative said.

Mr. Drea disagreed and said the practice was inherently evil.

“There is no way to misunderstand a Satanic act that degrades the Catholic liturgy,” he said. “There is no misunderstanding; it is just a fact.”

Archdiocesan spokesman Terrence Donilon said in a statement that the black mass is “contrary to charity and goodness, and it places participants dangerously close to destructive works of evil.”

RTE Abortion Bias

Ireland appoints a woman as its new resident ambassador to the Holy See

From http://vaticaninsider.lastampa.it/en/world-news/detail/articolo/33939/

The Irish Government has appointed Ms. Emma Madigan, a career diplomat as its new resident ambassador to the Holy See. 

The decision was taken today at the Cabinet meeting in Dublin, May 6, and confirmed by the Department of Foreign Affairs (DFA), which said the new Ambassador will have a particular mandate to ‘follow the activities of the Holy See on the development and human rights front’.  The DFA, in a statement, said that Pope Francis, since his election in March 2013, has “become a leading global advocate for action to address hunger and poverty and for the respect of human rights”.

Ms. Madigan, at the time of her appointment was assistant-chief of protocol at the Department of Foreign Affairs. She has served in the Irish diplomatic service for the past 14 years, including as Vice Consul in New York, Private Secretary to the Secretary General and Deputy Director of Europe and United Nations Coordination Section. Recently she played a key role in organizing the first ever State visit to Britain by an Irish Head of State when President Michael D. Higgins met Queen Elizabeth II.

She has a degree in History and Italian as well as a Masters in European Studies from UCD, all of which will serve her well in her new mission.  It is her first appointment as Head of Mission, and she will be the first resident Irish ambassador since November 2011 when the Government closed the Irish Embassy to the Holy See. The last resident ambassador was Noel Fahey, who retired from the post and the diplomatic service in the summer of 2011.

Ms. Madigan takes over from David Cooney, who served as non-resident ambassador in these past years, while also acting as Secretary General at the Department for Foreign Affairs.  Cooney played an important role in the reopening of the Embassy and the restoration of a resident ambassador. 

The new Ambassador’s appointment comes just over a week after the Irish Taoiseach (Prime Minister) Enda Kenny came to the Vatican for the canonization of John XXIII and John Paul II.  At the end of that ceremony on April 27, the Taoiseach met Pope Francis and invited him to visit Ireland.  

Kenny’s visit opened a new chapter in Ireland’s relations with the Holy See because as head of the Irish Government, he had harshly attacked the Vatican in the Irish parliament, July 2011, for its handling of numerous cases of abuse of children by priests and religious in the country, and for not cooperating with State investigations into these.  In November of that same year the Government closed its embassy to the Holy See as a cost-saving move, it said.

 In January of this year, however, the Government reversed that decision and announced that the Embassy would be reopened, though downsized, with a resident ambassador.  The DFA then said the re-opened Embassy will “enable Ireland to engage directly with the leadership of Pope Francis on the issues of poverty eradication, hunger and human rights”.

It has not yet been announced where the new embassy will be housed since the former Embassy to the Holy See on Rome’s Janiculum Hill now serves as Ireland’s Embassy to Italy. The Department for Foreign Affairs said the new Embassy will be a “modest”, one-person operation, and will re-open this summer.

Popes John Paul II, John XXIII officially declared saints

Vatican City, Apr 27, 2014 (CNA/EWTN News).

In a packed St. Peter's Square at the Vatican on Divine Mercy Sunday, Pope Francis officially declared former pontiffs John Paul II and John XXIII as Saints.

“For the honor of the Blessed Trinity, the exaltation of the Catholic faith and the increase of the Christian life, by the authority of our Lord Jesus Christ and of the Holy Apostles Peter and Paul and having sought the council of many of our brother Bishops, we declare and define Blessed John XXIII and John Paul II be Saints,” Pope Francis exclaimed April 27 as the crowds cheered.

“We enroll them among the Saints, decreeing that they are to be venerated as such by the whole Church. In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit.”

Throngs of pilgrims flooded the Vatican on Divine Mercy Sunday to celebrate the highly anticipated canonizations of now-Saints John Paul II and John XXIII.
    
Pope John XXIII was born in Sotto il Monte, a diocese and province of Bergamo, Italy, Nov. 25, 1881 as fourth of 13 children. He was elected Roman Pontiff Oct. 28, 1958.

Known as “Good Pope John,” he is most remembered for his historic encyclical “Pacem in Terris,” and for his calling of the Second Vatican Council.

He was declared Blessed by Pope John Paul II Sept. 3, 2000, during celebration of the Great Jubilee Year in 2000, and was approved for canonization by Pope Francis last July.

Saint John Paul II is perhaps one of the most well-known pontiffs in recent history, and is most remembered for his charismatic nature, his love of youth and his world travels, along with his role in the fall of communism in Europe during his 27-year papacy.

The cherished Polish Pope died in 2005, marking his 2011 beatification as one of the quickest in recent Church history, and is the first Pope to be beatified by his immediate successor.

In an April 24 message sent to both the Church in Poland and the diocese of Bergamo, Italy, Pope Francis thanked each for the great “gift” of the Saints for the Church and for the world, saying of John Paul II that he is grateful, “as all the members of the people of God, for his untiring service, his spiritual guidance, and for his extraordinary testimony of holiness.”

Speaking of Saint John XXIII’s historic calling of the Second Vatican Council in order to address a pastoral response to the presence of the Church in the modern world, the Roman Pontiff explained that “the renewal desired from the Second Vatican Council has opened the road.”

It is “a special joy that the canonization of Pope Roncalli takes place together with that of Bl. John Paul II,” he continued, adding that “this renewal has brought forward in his long pontificate.”

Seated alongside the cardinals in attendance for the canonization is retired pontiff Benedict XVI, making this the first Mass in history concelebrated by a Pope and his predecessor.

Divine Mercy Sunday

Canonisation of Pope John XXIII & Pope John Paul II

10 Advantages of Celebrating the Mass Ad Orientem

St. Peter's List March 1, 2014:

Fr. Mark Kirby offers an excellent reflection on ad orientem.1 On his blog, Vultus Christi, Father Kirby reflects on five years of saying the Holy Mass ad orientem. He states, “after five years of offering Holy Mass ad orientem, I can say that I never want to have to return to the versus populum position.”

Ad Orientem is Latin for to the east and refers to the direction the priest faces during the mass. Catholic churches are traditionally built facing the East, because, as Cardinal Ratzinger taught, this direction reflects the “cosmic sign of the rising sun which symbolizes the universality of God.”2 The priest facing the altar is also referred to as Ad Deum, which is Latin for to God. First, this phrase sidesteps so-called problems that arise if the priest is facing the altar in a Church that has not been built facing the East. Second, it provides a strong contrast to the phrase Versus Populum, which is Latin for facing the people. While the ancient liturgies did speak of the priest turning and “facing the people” during certain parts of the mass, the concept of celebrating the entire mass versus populum is arguably an invention of the 1970′s, an invention that stands in direct contradistinction to the Church’s ancient traditions.

In celebrating five years of switching to ad orientem/ad deum from versus populum, Father Kirby submits “10 Advantages” to celebrating the mass facing the East.

10 Advantages of Ad Orientem

1. The Holy Sacrifice of the Mass is experienced as having a theocentric direction and focus.

2. The faithful are spared the tiresome clerocentrism that has so overtaken the celebration of Holy Mass in the past forty years.

3. It has once again become evident that the Canon of the Mass (Prex Eucharistica) is addressed to the Father, by the priest, in the name of all.

4. The sacrificial character of the Mass is wonderfully expressed and affirmed.

5. Almost imperceptibly one discovers the rightness of praying silently at certain moments, of reciting certain parts of the Mass softly, and of cantillating others.

6. It affords the priest celebrant the boon of a holy modesty.

7. I find myself more and more identified with Christ, Eternal High Priest and Hostia perpetua, in the liturgy of the heavenly sanctuary, beyond the veil, before the Face of the Father.

8. During the Canon of the Mass I am graced with a profound recollection.

9. The people have become more reverent in their demeanour.

10. The entire celebration of Holy Mass has gained in reverence, attention, and devotion.

In contrast, he also speaks of the disadvantage of occasionally having to celebrate versus populum. He laments, “I suffer from what I can only describe as a lack of sacred pudeur, or modesty in the face of the Holy Mysteries. When obliged to celebrate versus populum, I feel viscerally, as it were, that there is something very wrong — theologically, spiritually, and anthropologically — with offering the Holy Sacrifice turned toward the congregation.”3 Father Kirby is not the only advocate of ad orientem in the Tulsa Diocese. His Excellency Bishop Slattery celebrates mass ad Deum and has been a vocal critic of versus populum. In his own words, he states, “it was a serious rupture with the Church’s ancient tradition. Secondly, it can give the appearance that the priest and the people were engaged in a conversation about God, rather than the worship of God. Thirdly, it places an inordinate importance on the personality of the celebrant by placing him on a kind of liturgical stage.”4

**************

1. Fr. Kirby: At the time of his blog post, Fr. Kirby was the Prior of the Diocesan Benedictine Monastery of Our Lady of the Cenacle in Tulsa, Oklahoma. He is now at the Silverstream Priory.
2. Cardinal Ratzinger on the East: The Spirit of the Liturgy, Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, Ad Solem, 2006 p. 64
3. Father Kirby: The good priest wrote this reflection in 2010 in a blog entitled, Five Years of Ad Orientem, h/t to the Rorate Caeli post Fr. Mark Kirby on Ad Orientem and the TLM for pointing us toward Father Kirby’s reflection.
4. Bishop Slattery: The quote is taken from Oklahoma bishop explains return to ad orientem worshipCatholic Culture, August 18, 2009. His Excellency has also penned an article for his diocesan news paper on Ad Orientem – PDF. He also written an article for the National Catholic Register on the liturgy, in which he proclaims “nothing was broken” in the pre-Vatican II liturgy.

An Easter meditation

 from The Liturgical Year by Abbot Dom Guéranger, O.S.B.

He is risen: He is not here! The Corpse, laid by the hands of them that loved their Lord, on the slab that lies in that cave, is risen; and, without removing the stone that closed the entrance, has gone forth, quickened with a life which can never die. No man has helped Him. No prophet has stood over the dead Body, bidding it return to life. It is Jesus Himself, and by His own power, that has risen. He suffered death, not from necessity, but because He so willed; and again, because He willed, He has delivered Himself from its bondage. O Jesus! Thou, that thus mockest death, art the Lord our God! We reverently bend our knees before this empty tomb, which is now forever sacred, because, for a few hours, it was the place of Thy abode. Behold the place where they laid Him! Behold the winding-sheet and bands, which remain to tell the mystery of Thy having once been dead! The angel says to the women: Ye seek Jesus of Nazareth, who was crucified! The recollection makes us weep. Yes, it was but the day before yesterday that His Body was carried hither, mangled, wounded, bleeding. Here, in this cave, from which the angel has now rolled back the stone--in this cave, which His presence fills with a more than mid-day brightness--stood the afflicted Mother.  It echoed with the sobs of them that were at the burial, John and the two disciples, Magdalen and her companions. The sun sank beneath the horizon, and the first day of Jesus' burial began. But the prophet has said: 'In the evening weeping shall have place; and in the morning gladness' (Psalm 29:6). This glorious, happy morning has come, O Jesus! and great indeed is our gladness at seeing that this same sepulchre, whither we followed Thee with aching hearts, is now but the trophy of Thy victory! Thy precious wounds are healed! It was we that caused them; permit us to kiss them. Thou art now living, more glorious than ever, and immortal. And because we are resolved to die to our sins, when Thou wast dying in order to expiate them, Thou willest that we, too, should live eternally with Thee; that Thy victory over death should be ours; that death should be for us, as it were for Thee, a mere passage to immortality, and should one day give back, uninjured and glorified, these bodies which are to be lent for a while to the tomb. Glory, then, and honor and love, be to Thee, O Jesus! who didst deign not only to die, but to rise again for us!