Author Archives: Harvey Millican

A few days ago – four to be exact – a man known to all in the trad world by a few different aliases sent me a picture and suggested I might like the product contained therein.

I am already a huge fan of the company Tradflags.com so I couldn’t resist. I clicked the link and found myself pulling out the old debit card.

Here we are four days later and I proudly present to you all…

The TEXAS SACRED HEART flag! Talk about rapid delivery!

The astute observer will note that I have replaced my previous Sacred Heart flag with this Lone Star variant. He will also note the fraying edges of the Immaculate Heart flag that hangs just below. That fraying is entirely my fault. I did not heed the warning of the Tradflags folks a year ago and so I did not properly Scotchgard the flag. Texas, as you may have heard, gets pretty durn hot during the summer months and pretty durn tornadic the rest of the year. Perhaps one of my loving sisters can fix this problem for me or perhaps I’ll just have to buy more flags.

With that in mind, before raising this standard I did a couple of things that I highly recommend.

First, go to their website and buy a flag or two. You will not regret it!

Second, Scotchgard that flag. See above about regrets and the lack thereof.

Finally, this…

I busted out the Epiphany water at this step. Sprinkle the flag, the pole, and the ground with the Epiphany water. Say a prayer. I simply asked Our Lord to bless the flag, the home and land, and this great state of Texas and to keep us always mindful of His infinite love for us. I asked Him to protect us from storms and to bless all who lovingly look upon these flags. Finally, I asked Him to accept my devotion to His Sacred Heart and to the Immaculate Heart of His Mother and to bless me and my family.

Then I sat down on my porch with my gin and tonic to admire this work of art. It is still Texas after all and it’s already 100° in early June.

Most Sacred Heart of Jesus, have mercy on us!

Perhaps maybe possibly one tiny thing they didn’t bungle horrendously when they randomly chopped up the ancient calendar was this one little detail which the Novus Ordo church does today. In the current Roman calendar this is the feast of the Immaculate Heart of Mary. In the Traditional calendar that feast is sometime in August. However, I do not mind at all celebrating a sort of “twinning” of the two hearts that are so united in love as to almost be one. And the August feast could still stand. That is the beauty of the old calendar. There is no restriction on celebrating multiple times throughout the year (and the a votive Mass) or on doubling up feasts on the same day.

As always, here’s your monthly reminder for the First Friday devotion.

With an additional video because this is the feast of the Sacred Heart in the month of the Sacred Heart and because First Friday’s are all about the Sacred Heart.

I read this earlier and agreed with it so much so that I wanted to make sure everyone gets to read it. Especially in this “election” season, I am reminded of all the times we were told “you have to vote for X because Y is far worse” or similar. Read a bit below and then click over for the rest.

“As my wife crystallized many years ago– in the Indian Summer of pre-scamdemic, post-Summorum Pontificum, conservative-N.O.-ers-and-Trads-living-together, let’s-vote-harder-for-freedom time, she had one, chief complaint:

“I’m tired of being lied to 100% of the time.”

I’m not saying that this was not true at an earlier time or that other persons came to that conclusion without her help. What I am saying is that her particular way of phrasing what many felt and now all non-Matirx people know for a fact struck me quite forcibly, and I have never forgotten it.”

https://stlouiscatholic.wordpress.com/2024/06/05/100-of-the-time/

Yesterday I wrote of my experience as a visitor at the TLM in the cathedral church in Raleigh, NC.

Happily, I received an email from one of the regulars at that Mass. As I told her in my reply, I am always tickled to hear that anyone reads my blog. I am happy to have been able to share what a wonderful experience it was visiting.

But there is one other thing that I shared with her that I would like to share with you now. So often those of us in TLM communities tend to hear from others who do not attend the ancient Mass that our parishes and communities are insular and closed off and somehow offputting to outsiders or those beginning to trad. I often times tend to dismiss this criticism as a red herring tossed out by those who do not understand the Latin Mass or those who hold it in contempt. And yet I still give the benefit of the doubt to a person who makes such a claim. Let’s face it, there would be valid reasons for parishioners in a Latin Mass community to be suspicious of “outsiders”. To be honest, those of us who attend the ancient rites have been labeled as everything from weirdos to rigid by everyone from immediate family members to prelates of the Church. And it isn’t as if federal agents haven’t admitted to openly trying to infiltrate our communities.

But if such a sentiment existed in the past, I have not seen it in many years. I certainly did not experience that when I tradded five years ago. And I absolutely did not experience that in Raleigh. The members of this particular community were edifying in their reverence and in their palpable desire to welcome new members to the “ beauty ever ancient, ever new.”

As I stated, in my last post, none of us desire the situation we find ourselves in. We long for a day when the venerable and august rites of the Catholic Church can be celebrated openly, everywhere, and by all priests. I personally, as one who travels frequently, long for a day when I can find the Latin Mass easily and everywhere.

So when I find a community such as that in Raleigh, I am most grateful to Almighty God and I thank the members of the TLM community in North Carolina for their dignified grace in welcoming me and my family.

Yesterday the family and I started making our way home from the Atlantic coast all the way back to Texas. We had a blessed time visiting with our friends – four families in all with a total of about 50 people. It’s our yearly tradition and we’ve even managed to get a priest in on the act with us – an enhancement that only brought us to a whole new level. To have a daily TLM before going out onto the beach each day is, well, there’s nothing quite like it.

On our drive, thanks to bishops who either fear the man the presume to be their boss or who genuinely despise their flocks (perhaps both but I’ll be kind and go with the former) we managed to find exactly one TLM for Sunday Mass. Keep in mind this diocese covers half of the state of North Carolina. One Mass for everyone. And it was held in the cathedral and it was a high Mass. The choir was magnificent. The acoustics are grand. The building itself isn’t bad for a new construction. So thank you, Bishop, for that. Truly. I am grateful. I know things aren’t what any of us would like right now but God provided for me as He does for the five hundred or so faithful of this particular TLM community. By the way, group, your priest is a rock star. Thank God for him.

So now we just drive another thirteen hundred miles or so and back to the safety of the parish.

Deo Gratias and thanks to all of you who kept us in your prayers. The more substantive daily posts will resume tomorrow.

Check them out. I’ve had two of theirs for a while now. I went away to the Atlantic coast from Texas two weeks ago and left my “land” under the watchful emblems of both the Sacred Heart and the Immaculate Heart flags. Texas has been slammed with destructive storms. Guess whose house is still fine. Coincidence? You be the judge.