The media—and particularly Catholic media—highlighted October 11’s commemorations of the opening of the Second Vatican Council’s 60th anniversary. Illustrative photos show the massive procession of bishops entering Saint Peter’s Basilica for the Catholic Church’s twenty-first ecumenical council in 1962. However, one might ask whether there is a real cause for celebration. Our … Read more
There has been some confused notions about the ultramontane movement of the nineteenth century among traditional-minded Catholics. The American Society for the Defense of Tradition, Family and Property (TFP) is publishing two articles putting the movement in context and showing its orthodoxy. The author is the French TFP’s Jose Antonio Ureta who … Read more
Is the Pope always infallible in everything he says or does? What are the conditions and limits provided by the First Vatican Council for the Pope to exercise the charisma of infallibility? Can Catholic faithful with sufficient doctrinal formation resist documents that clearly contradict Catholic tradition? These are some of the urgent … Read more
Symbolic acts and gestures often have a greater persuasive power than words and reasoning, though one completes the other. This is why the Divine Savior constantly used both symbolic gestures and employed metaphors and parables. This is also why the Church has always surrounded herself with symbols to make visible the beauty … Read more
On February 11, feast day of Our Lady of Lourdes, Pope Benedict XVI announced to the Consistory of Cardinals and to the whole world his decision to resign from the Papacy. The announcement was received by the Cardinals, “almost in disbelief,” “with a sense of loss,” and “like a lightning bolt out … Read more
An abyss separates the world (understood here not in its cosmological but moral sense) from the Church founded by Our Lord Jesus Christ. The world neither accepts being guided by, nor comprehends the Light that came to illuminate it. The world does not live for God or for life eternal, but for … Read more
With all the discussions about tax rates and the prodigious amount of municipal deficits, our politicians and media tell us that we must increase tax rates to survive. One is left with the hollow feeling that there are no options and we must raise taxes regardless of the effects to stave off … Read more
An estimated 190,000 to 2 million Chinese are incarcerated for various reasons. The prisoners include religious and political dissidents, unregistered Christians and counter-revolutionaries. They are victims of trumped-up charges brought against them by local police, who then place them in horrible “re-education camps” with sentences of up to four years without a … Read more
“And many false prophets shall rise, and shall seduce many. And because iniquity hath abounded, the charity of many shall grow cold. But he that shall persevere to the end, he shall be saved.” These words by the Savior, in the Gospel of St. Matthew, telling the Apostles about the signs of … Read more
The Nineteenth Century: Ravished by Modernism and Rationalism It is not easy for someone today to have a clear idea of the devastation which rationalism and modernism wrought on European and American society throughout the nineteenth century. At that time, the human soul had been profoundly worked over by materialists and revolutionaries … Read more