Short Histories – Nothing is certain in a country where the past is constantly rewritten, says Owen Matthews. The Russian enigma (The Spectator)
Papal Infallibility – “A pope speaks ex cathedra when he presents some teaching in a formal and definitive manner that is intended infallibly to settle debate about it once and for all.” Aquinas on St. Paul’s correction of St. Peter (Edward Feser Blogspot)
Alphabet Soup of Agencies – The first amendment is a simple, powerful thing. and the message is clear: “congress shall make no law.” bending the first amendment past breaking (bad cattitude)
Anti-religious liberals and Post-liberals vs. Classical liberalism – “Subverting the liberal backbone of Western civilization invites Tocqueville’s dystopias.” The Baby and the Bathwater (Law & Liberty)
Gang of Rulers – The Democratic Party is “throwing out all settled principles of fiscal responsibility … all in the pursuit of some wild ideological vision that they share but overwhelming numbers of the rest of the thinking public reject.” The Destructionist Phase of American History (The Epoch Times)
A Queer Theory – Sacramento City Unified School District instructs teachers to “normalize gender exploration” and promotes such identities as “genderqueer,” “polysexual,” and “two-spirit.” How Gender Radicalism Conquered Sacramento Schools (City Journal)
Health of the Soul – It is important for the leaders and faithful of the Church to take this time to examine the impact of the pandemic on Catholic life. Eucharistic Revival Depends on Learning From Mistakes We Made During COVID-19 (National Catholic Register)
Receive His Presence – In contemplative prayer one does not so much approach God, but is approached by God. Contemplative Prayer And Receptivity (SpiritualDirection.com)
Asian Catholic Woman – Here I was, a Catholic for about a decade, and this was my first time reading detailed stories about Korean saints. Sharing the Stories of Asian Saints (Catholic News Service)
The Space Trilogy – Taken as a whole, Out of the Silent Planet, Perelandra, and That Hideous Strength serve to guide those of good will through the perils and temptations of modernism. Out of the Silent Planet: A Guidebook Against the “New Normal” (Crisis Magazine)
Transgender Athletes – Transgender teen athletes will be able to compete against girls in Utah after a court stunningly reversed a previously implemented ban. Transgender kids will be allowed to compete against biological girls after court reverses ban (Washington Examiner)
The Rosary and Guns – The Atlantic got some blowback for obvious reasons and then attempted to “modify” the headline on the fly. Watch The Atlantic Hilariously Flee from their Own Rosary Story. (Creative Minority Report)
(*The posting of any particular news item or essay is not an endorsement of the content and perspective of said news item or essay.)
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(Health of Soul, #7) Or, maybe the larger thing that the Eucharistic Revival should learn from COVID, is how to not lapse into word substitution?
How is the “revival” (“coherence” renamed) any different from the revivalist Great Awakening of the 1730s and 1740s? Eucharistic Coherence had to do with consistency between our moral life (especially if notorious) and access to the Eucharist. A “revival” toward the Real Presence (CCC 1374) is well overdue, but by itself is it still too oblique and tangential from personal coherence between the Faith and action?
On this point of coherence, the manipulators within synodality (Marx, Batzing, Hollerich & Co.) would have the innate natural law and the Catechism lobotomized, by a “paradigm shift” in pastoral discernment, surely not mainstreaming abortion, but kowtowing to the LGBTQ subculture.
The central enigma—to be perennially leavened by Jesus Christ—is the progressive displacement of a sacral and discovered universe by a substituted and radically diminished universe of our own (de)construction. The exploratory Vatican II sought to engage what’s best in the modern world (aggiornamento) with a deepening and healing rediscovery of Scripture and the Church Fathers (ressourcement). The calling is how to render “progress” itself open and accountable to the Eucharistic center of human history, to Someone other than ourselves, and is not a rolling modus vivendi simplistically rendering the Church ever more progressive.
The Real Presence and our sacredness together, each person without exception and the solidarity of all generations—this witnessing “coherence” beckons well beyond the necessary step of “awakening.”
Receive His Presence and Contemplative Prayer.
Fr Shryock correctly counsels we omit words, thoughts and even one’s own sentiments [that] become obstacles to receiving God [except for a nuance of sentiment as explained below]. Where there is discrepancy is an overly passive understanding in which Shryock counsels contemplation is not achieved through the medium of one’s own mind and heart.
Whereas the authoritative [those with acknowledged experience and credentials] Pope St Clement, St Augustine, St John of the Cross counsel otherwise. Clement in his ‘letter’ encourages us to remain focused on Our Lord in silent prayer. St Augustine in The Confessions teaches we take the initiative to ‘enter’ into God’s presence. The austere St John of the Cross in The Living Flame of Love says we remain silent, while maintaining a peaceful, warm interior composure [a form of intellectual recognition or cognition].
The point here is that the intellect is not [entirely] suppressed, rather it remains active in it’s receptivity by a reverent, actively ‘sensual’ [meaning an interior sense of love] composure. Otherwise, we become disposed to Quietism, where the intellect acquires an unreceptive brute composure. This is the fine line between quietism and true contemplative prayer.
Potentially handy feature.
re: the image accompanying this piece
Does anyone remember when one could step out to the local pub/eatery/cafe, order a cup of coffee and read a paper without being harangued by “social justice warriors,” “mask Karens,” vaccine enforcers and other demons? Back when the only threats to one’s peace and liberty were an occasional ne’er-do-well, a loud drunk, or waitress in a bad mood? I never thought I would long for the day when the proprietor of the Square Cafe would glower at me as I scribbled on a pad in a tiny booth in the corner.
I must be getting old. Pardon me.