My friend who runs the wonderful site St. Luke’s Gallery has just posted an excellent piece on the Archangel Gabriel.
As you know, I am a big fan of sacred art. I try to include a picture in every post – a sort of artistic freebie, if you will, as a way of giving readers a glimpse into not only the patrimony of the Church but also of the beauty of God reflected in the handiwork of man.
Tonight, St. Luke’s Gallery has a magnificent presentation about 7:00 in length that tells the story of the Archangel Raphael, drawing from the paintings of Andrea Vaccaro. I love the commentary that Vaccaro depicts Raphael, the heavenly guide-hero of Tobit, as youthful and manly. Watch the piece and you’ll know what I mean.
Tonight in a special way, I had recourse to pray to this patron of travelers. I drove four friends of my teenage daughter to the airport for their flight home. We experienced some significant weather here in Texas today and their flight was slightly delayed. I just received word that they landed safely. They were on Southwest but it could have easily been – as Fulton Sheen quipped – “TWA: Travel with Angels”.
And please continue to submit pictures of sacred art and architecture as you are able. A reader sent me some lovely shots of a church over the weekend that I will post in my next blog.
I invite you to check it out. I have friends in Denver. Perhaps if he reads this blog, he might reach out to me. I’d love to meet him and discuss things.
All is quiet on the southern front tonight. But just like the polar vortex that has caused my thermometer to have a stroke over the past two days, there is definitely a strange wind blowing…
I have had many occasions of late to write about the things I believe regarding the unfortunate state of the One, Holy, Catholic, and Apostolic Church today. Regular readers are not lost to the fact that I believe Jorge Mario Bergoglio to be an antipope. I have laid out the case before. I believe that Pope Benedict Ratzinger is still, thanks to an invalid resignation, the one and only living Vicar of Jesus Christ, “whether he likes it or not”, as the incredible Ann Barnhardt says.
This is not something foreign to the history of a two-thousand year-old institution. We have had somewhere in the neighborhood of three and a half dozen antipopes before. So what if it hasn’t been for a while? What makes these current days somewhat frustrating is the suspension of rational thought on the part of men who ought to know better.
Take for instance a man like Michael Matt. I will preface this by stating up front how much I respect Mr. Matt’s work over the years. Without The Remnant or even The Wanderer, would many of us know which end is up right now? And yet, from Matt we have the image campaign called “Recognize and Resist”. If I understand this correctly it means that The Remnant’s official position is that Bergoglio is “definitely pope” but that this Vicar of Christ must be resisted at every step because he’s evil. Think about it. He’s definitely pope but doesn’t do things a Catholic pope should do, so resist him. Something doesn’t seem right here. Again, he’s not Catholic but we still think he’s the pope.
If he actually was the pope then he is definitely the Vicar of Jesus Christ on earth. One would expect Christ’s vicar to not be, you know, in open defiance of everything that Christ’s Church has taught for two millenia. I could be wrong. But I’m not. I would like to know if there is anything Bergoglio says or does for which we should not resist him? At this point, he could state that the sun is a mass of incandescent gas and I would need a fact check.
St. Kateri, mural, Shrine of Ste. Anne de Beaupre, Beaupre, Quebec (unrelated to post)
But let’s take a look at those who lack the prominence of a Catholic publisher yet still hold the reigns of power where it really counts – the day to day lives of everyday Catholics like you and me.
Over the past few months I have had opportunities to speak with members of the clergy who have sway over important things in our lives. These things pertain to the preservation of the Latin Mass. I will not mention any more about the priests in question. It would not be helpful to any purpose. But in every one of my conversations I have heard, essentially, the following. “We get that he probably isn’t pope but what can we do? He’ll be dead soon anyway and things can get back to normal.”
Really? That’s your game plan? Oh boy, are we screwed…
But this brings us to a bigger question. We all know that the trad world is a very small world indeed. One might say that we are already “a remnant Church”. Anecdotally, I can attest that a majority of my fellow trad Catholics, including the priests, do not really believe in the validity of Bergoglio’s claim to the throne of Peter. It gets really shocking when we factor in the Novus Ordo priests who are starting to wake up as well. And believe me, there are not a few of them. We criticize the bishops of the Church for not speaking out and rightly so. We wonder if they aren’t simply afraid of losing their sees by making a public declaration. But what have we to lose? Are we worried about losing the friendship of the odd parishioner sitting next to us in the pew? Do we fear losing the respect of family members? Are we just like those who say “Yes, we know he’s a fraud but we cannot do anything more than wait for him to die”?
Isn’t it time we recognized the reality publicly and resisted the narrative vocally? I speak here more for myself than for anyone else. I will admit it is easy to write an anonymous blog. Yet, when it comes to speaking up face to face, there are still some people to whom I would rather not mention my true thoughts. And I know that time has come where I must be a man about it. We serve no good when we cling to truth yet fail to expose it. Because waiting for the problem to go away is not a plan so much as wishful thinking.
Pray for the Church, as Frank Walker says.
St. Joseph, guardian of the Holy Church, pray for us!
Blogger and author Adam Piggot from Pushing Rubber Downhillpenned the following in reference to the piece I wrote last week about male altar servers. It is definitely worth a read and I thank him profoundly for his kind words and keen insight. Also I’m not sure the verb “penned” works when referring to something that was typed but we’ll go with it and see if anyone cares. Finally, Mr. Piggot receives Harvey’s gold star of the week for the alliterative line: “Weekends away in the wintry wilds of Western Australia.” Nice. ⭐️
I once told a friend that the servers at Latin Mass, in particular, evoke a great sense of both pride and humility in me. Here we have – in some …
I saw a headline today on Canon212. “Yahoo says: More Babies Need to be Aborted to Solve America’s Diaper Shortage”
My wife and I would have loved an army of offspring. I hear it’s a very Catholic thing to do. He gave us two and they are the joy of my life. But long before I “tradded” I knew this was what God asks of couples entering marriage – to lovingly accept ALL the children He gives them. Being the 14th in my own family might have tinted my worldview here but who’s to say?
Stations of the Cross, Sacred Heart Catholic Church, OKC (unrelated to topic)
Reading that particular headline made me shudder. I say this with absolute conviction. I would lovingly take the children that others don’t want. In a world where a shortage of disposable plastic waste collection systems prompt men to suggest child murder as the solution, perhaps this petition should go into my novena to St. Rita.
Folks, I got off all that social media nonsense a while ago. Sorry but I'm not on Twitbook, Facepalm, YouHu, WingWang or any of the others. Maybe an event will happen to make me change my mind like Peter and Paul coming down with flaming swords and commanding it be so. Until then, read the blog and if you feel a comment is in order or you feel like sharing a tip or suggestion for a topic, email me at harvey@harveymillican.com.
Harvey Millican's Blog: Musings of a Trad Dad 