WobLog

Although England has had permission, in the wake of the Second Vatican Council, to celebrate the Traditional Latin Mass since 1971 (vs. 1984 or 1988 for the rest of the world), it's been very difficult to find a Latin Mass in the Old Rite. It turns out that one of the few churches in Southern England that offers the Traditional Latin Mass on a weekly basis is in a town that I visit regularly: Reading, which is in the county of Berkshire and in the Diocese of Portsmouth.

The second irony is that the Church is called Christ the King. The Latin Mass in our home parish is offered by the Institute of Christ the King. Small world.

Posted by Don Roberts at 2:31 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

White House press secretary Tony Snow, who's been battling a return of cancer will return to work on April 30. This is a hopeful sign, but Tony Snow still needs our prayers.

H/T National Review Online.

Posted by Don Roberts at 11:48 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

Awhile ago I urged any Californians reading this blog to contact Assembly members to advise them to vote against AB 16, the bill that would add the new HPV vaccine to the list of vaccines required for school entry.

AB 16 has been completely restructured. After resistance to the initial version, the bill has been rewritten to remove the responsibility for determining which vaccines to require from the legislature to state public health officials. This means, basically, that the CDC (Centers for Disease Control) would essentially mandate the vaccines required in our state, and voters would no longer have any leverage through the legislature to influence the process. Voters would be "written out" of the process by the referral of vaccine issues to faceless "officials" who have no accountability to the people.

And it gets worse. The typical language allowing for Religious, Medical, or Philosophical exemptions to vaccinations is being replaced by parental "belief," a vague term with no constitutional standing. This could easily be overturned if challenged later, essentially removing a parent's right to refuse a vaccine.

Removal of the medical exemption also implies there are no medical reasons to exempt and makes doctors the enforcers of government policy. They are left with no legal responsibility for preventing vaccine injuries and deaths. Removal of the religious exemption tramples deeply held religious beliefs opposing vaccination or the use of certain vaccines, and it denies the right to religious freedom. The exemption for philosophical or conscientiously held beliefs has greater legal standing than undefined parental "beliefs."

This is very bad legislation that makes it seem like the legislature has either decided they aren't brave enough to tangle with the issue so they'll pass it on to bureaucrats, or it makes it seem that they don't think they can pass the bills they wish to (a la the HPV vaccine) so they'll get their agenda passed by force.

So if you are a Californian, please contact your Assembly member and voice your opposition to AB 16.

Posted by Lisa Roberts at 2:51 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

The widespread rumors of a Vatican document that will be released on the Pope's personal initiative (a so-called Motu Proprio) liberalizing the use of the classical Roman Rite has led to interest in the Tridentine Rite both in the Catholic blogosphere and in the general press. I'll have more to say about the Motu Proprio when it's released, but the growing attention being paid to Catholics attached to the traditional liturgy is interesting in itself.

Shawn Tribe notes that traditional Catholics have typically been considered part of a fringe movement that is too hot to handle when organizing conferences, but that this is changing. The Prior of the Benedictine Monastery of Clear Creek in Oklahoma will be one of two keynote speakers at a Notre Dame conference on Pope Benedict XVI's encyclical Deus Caritas Est.

While I've known about the Clear Creek monks for some time, I hadn't realized that their liturgical life is primarly based on the classical liturgical books. It's very heartening to see the growing presence in the U.S. of traditional, orthodox orders like the Clear Creek monks and the priests of the Institute of Christ the King.

Posted by Don Roberts at 8:35 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

The California State Assembly is at it again, offering us another bill we need to oppose. This one will be debated on April 25th, and it goes under the name, "Compulsory School Attendance; Kindergarten Readiness Program." Proposed, essentially, by the California Teacher's Association, the bill reduces the age of compulsory education from 6 to 5, requiring kindergarten, which is not currently mandatory.

However, as commented on by universalpreschool.com, which is against this bill, 94 percent of California's five year olds are voluntarily sent to private or public kindergarten by their parents, with others being enrolled in charter school home study programs. The other 6% are kept at home and/or are homeschooled by their parents. Therefore, mandating kindergarten won't result in vastly greater numbers of children attending conventional public school. There is no need for unnecessary legislation and associated costs to mandate Kindergarten. Ah, but that's not the entire thrust of this bill. It gets worse.

The state says "all of California's children should have a full-school-day-kindergarten experience." So, it isn't just that all children must attend, now it is that they must attend for a full school day. The costs for this are more than just monetary. Basically, the government, which distrusts parents, wants to pull children away at younger and younger ages for longer periods of time.

This becomes even more evident with the "Kindergarden Readiness Program," which would start the push for universal preschool.

We need to resist this bill. Young children should preferably be with a parent, not a government nanny who can mold the child into the "perfect citizen." It is always through the children that regimes try to grasp and maintain power. To protect our children and our country, we need the freedom to make our own choices about education and to keep our children with us during their most formative years.

Posted by Lisa Roberts at 9:19 PM | Permalink | Comments (5)

Pat Buckley, wife of National Review founder William F. Buckley, Jr., died Sunday morning after a long illness. National Review Online has collected reminiscences from many in the NR family who knew Pat over the years. It is a fitting tribute to a great lady who was more than just the wife of a great man.

Requiem aeternam dona ei, Domine, et lux perpetua luceat ei. Requiescat in pace. Amen. (Eternal rest grant unto him, O Lord, and let perpetual light shine upon him. Rest in peace. Amen.)

Posted by Don Roberts at 12:50 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Some of you will remember my earlier post, Giving Up on the Future?, where I posted about the difficulty I had accepting that we probably wouldn't have any more children. Well, it's time for the truth to come out. Unbeknownst to me, I was actually pregnant when I wrote that post. Yes, despite all the odds, God decided He wanted us to conceive another little one. I am currently at 13 weeks, and you can see a picture of the little bambino/bambina from today's office visit. To the right side of the picture is the baby's head, with the left arm just above it. The body goes toward the left, and the feet are eclipsed by the body. The baby moved around during the ultrasound and seemed fairly animated, which reassured us since we had first tried to hear the heartbeat and were unable to find it. Prayers are appreciated since pregnancy and labor are not without their own difficulties.

Posted by Lisa Roberts at 6:28 PM | Permalink | Comments (7)

Cambridge scholar David Instone-Brewer writes about the unusual level of support among Evangelicals for (twice) divorced GOP candidate Rudolph Guliani. Dr. Instone-Brewer writes that this is probably in part attributable to divorce rates among Evangelicals mirroring those in the population at large. However, current Biblical scholarship among Evangelicals is causing many to confront the notion that Jesus' proscription of divorce (Mt 19:3), while not as sweeping as Catholic Tradition teaches, would clearly prohibit "no-fault" divorce.

The article is written from a Protestant Evangelical point of view, and so it does not address the Sacramental character of marriage. However, the idea discussed at the end of the piece of "covenant marriage" is a close approximation:

Some leaders advocate a "covenant marriage" in which spouses agree not to divorce unless there is abuse, a felony conviction or adultery. Conservative Christian Mike Huckabee (former Arkansas governor and presidential hopeful) calls this "a positive pre-nup," and James Dobson of Focus on the Family promotes it as a way to oppose no-fault divorces.

This would be very similar to the Catholic Church's teaching that divorce must be "for cause." (This teaching says nothing to suggest that the original marriage was not a valid Sacrament. It assumes that it was, and that therefore even a justifiable divorce would not allow the aggrieved spouse to remarry, since the couple is still sacramentally, if not legally, married).

Such a "pre-nup" would restore the contractual nature of legal marriage. No longer would spouses be able to divorce because they had "grown apart" or felt "unfulfilled." Sounds like the first idea for a pre-nup that I can get behind.

Posted by Don Roberts at 6:23 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Here's a video of a very modern altar being re-fitted for use in a traditional liturgy. All of the work is reversible, since the church is shared between both the new and the old rite. (The captions in the video are all in French, but you can get the idea even if your French isn't all that good).

It's heartening to see what can be done in a modern church to make the Sanctuary suitable for the Sacrifice of the Mass according to the classical rite.

Posted by Don Roberts at 9:29 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Hæc dies, quam fecit Dominus; exsultemus, et lætemur in ea.

This is the day that the Lord has made, let us rejoice and be glad in it.

Posted by Don Roberts at 4:35 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

We receive a weekly e-mail newsletter with information about the Traditional Latin Mass at our parish. The Holy Week edition opened with the following:

When asked about Palm Sunday in the young Catechism class today, 4-year-old Alex correctly answered that Our Lord Jesus Christ was entering the city of Jerusalem.  Then the question was posed: ‘And how did Our Lord enter Jerusalem?’ Young Alex enthusiastically replied, ‘He took the bottom of the cross and knocked on the door!’

You see – Alex attended Mass here at St. Margaret Mary on Palm Sunday, and saw the knocking on the church door! Palm Sunday certainly made a deeper impression on me this year. Last year I thought the blessing of the palms was awesome. This year the added procession and the prayer and knocking at the Church door were truly moving.

Then imagine reading about this exact portion of our Sunday liturgy in the Holy Father’s Palm Sunday homily! In it he referred to this knocking at the door:

In the old liturgy of Palm Sunday, the priest, having arrived in front of the Church, knocked forcefully with the bar of the processional cross on the still closed door, which, following this knocking, was opened. It was a beautiful image for the mystery of the same Jesus Christ who, with the wood of his cross, with the force of his love that he gives to us, has knocked from the side of the world on the door of God; from the side of a world that was not able to find access to God. By the cross Jesus has thrown open the door to God, the door between God and man. Now it is open. But, even from the other side the Lord knocks with his cross: he knocks on the door of the world, on the door of our hearts that so often and in so many ways are closed for God. And he speaks to us more or less like this: if the trials that God gives you in creation don’t succeed in opening you up for Him, if the words of Scripture and the message of the Church leave you indifferent – then, look at me, your Lord and your God.

The entire homily (with photographs of the Pope) can be read here.

If you hadn't already guessed it, the young fellow who made the same Palm Sunday connection that the Holy Father preached on was our little boy!

Posted by Don Roberts at 10:41 PM | Permalink | Comments (3)

Jennifer Graham recounts her family's experience at their new parish church following a recent move to New England:

I am a ruthless church shopper, not because my family spends so much time in a sanctuary, but because we spend so little. I figure if we are going to spend only an hour or two each week in formal worship of the Almighty, it better be a quality hour, one with a challenging sermon, soaring music and no Game Boys in the next pew.

Her article reminds me of our own experience a few years ago when we decided that we couldn't take our local parish any longer and had to make a switch. Unlike Mrs. Graham, we found ourselves very reluctant "church shoppers." It wasn't the ugly architecture, the banal music, or the shabby (and sometimes scandalous) attire of some of the faithful – though to be sure, we experienced all of the above – that drove us away. Instead, the blatant heterodoxy of both the preaching and the liturgy forced us to make the painful decision to leave. We decided we just couldn't deal with having to "de-program" our kids from what they'd be learning (either by preaching, catechesis, or observation) at church.

In retrospect, our decision to find a new parish was a Godsend. We've found a faithful, orthodox and welcoming community. We've made new friends with fellow homeschoolers. Our spiritual lives, and the spiritual development of our kids, have deepened tremendously. If you're in the East Bay (San Francisco Bay area) and find yourself similarly frustrated, come join us.

Posted by Don Roberts at 2:05 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Although many Catholics have never seen them, black vestments are still appropriate for several liturgical uses throughout the year, including Good Friday. Check out Shawn Tribe's 2005 post on the use of black vestments over at the New Liturgical Movement.

Posted by Don Roberts at 9:17 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Over at National Review Online, you can find a repost of Kathryn Jean Lopez's 2006 interview with Fr. George Rutler on the seven last words of Christ (including some recommended Scripture reading for today).

A very good Good Friday to all.

Posted by Don Roberts at 8:06 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Fox TV's prime-time medical drama "House, MD" just ran an episode with a strong pro-life message, doubly amazing since Dr. House (Hugh Laurie) forcefully defends the pro-abortion view throughout most of the episode.

Details here, here, and here.

Posted by Don Roberts at 8:15 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

On a recent trip to Washington, DC for work, I was able to see the National Cherry Blossom festival. The weather was perfect, and it was a bizarre experience to walk through a "snowstorm" of cherry blossoms in near-80-degree weather (when the blossoms fall around you, it even sounds a little bit like snow falling).

Because of the fine weather, there was quite a huge crowd walking around the Tidal Basin, which meant walking at a slow pace. However, since I've been getting over a bum knee for the last few months, the slow pace was probably for the best.

For all the trips I made to DC when I was in grad school, this was the first time I was there when the cherry blossoms were in bloom. It was quite a treat!

Posted by Don Roberts at 7:02 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)