Friday 19th April 2024

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Catholic Replies

April 20, 2018 Our Catholic Faith Comments Off on Catholic Replies

Editor’s Note: In a recent reply, we stated that “bishops installed by the Chinese Communists are not true bishops, cannot legitimately ordain priests, and cannot confect the sacraments, including the Holy Eucharist.” However, Fr. E.B.C. of Pennsylvania wrote to say that we are guilty of “if not an error, at least a lack of clarity.” He offered the following comments on our three separate assertions about “bishops installed by the Chinese Communists”: First: “are not true bishops” — The phrase “true bishops” seems to me to imply “invalid bishops,” but it is my understanding that the bishops in the schismatic Patriotic Catholic Church are, indeed, “true bishops” (valid bishops) because they are validly ordained, although they are, as you would…Continue Reading

Raymond Cardinal Burke… Pope Francis Is “Increasing The Confusion”

April 18, 2018 Our Catholic Faith Comments Off on Raymond Cardinal Burke… Pope Francis Is “Increasing The Confusion”

(Editor’s Note: Below is the full text of an April 5 interview Raymond Cardinal Burke granted to an Italian Catholic publication, La Nuova Bussola Quotidiana. LifeSiteNews reprinted that interview with permission of Riccardo Cascioli, La Nuova Bussola Quotidiana’s editor, and we provide it here. All rights reserved. (Diane Montagna did the translation for LifeSiteNews.) + + + ROME (LifeSiteNews) — Pope Francis is “increasing the confusion” in the Church, and the College of Cardinals constitutes a de facto check against papal error, Raymond Cardinal Burke has said in a new interview. Speaking to the Italian Catholic news agency La Nuova Bussola Quotidiana on Thursday, April 5 Cardinal Burke said the previous week’s alleged “interview” on Hell with Pope Francis, reported by his 94-year-old…Continue Reading

The Sheep Of The Lord’s Flock

April 17, 2018 Our Catholic Faith Comments Off on The Sheep Of The Lord’s Flock

By FR. ROBERT ALTIER Fourth Sunday Of Easter (YR B) Readings: Acts 4:8-12 1 John 3:1-2 John 10:11-18 Our faith is one of mystery and what might appear to some as contradictions. Of course, there are no contradictions; paradox would probably be the better word to describe it. Our readings today describe several paradoxes for our consideration. First, we hear that Jesus is the stone rejected by the builders that has become the cornerstone of the living Temple of His Body. Second, we are told that we, human persons who are children of our human parents, are children of God. Then we hear that Jesus is the Good Shepherd who lays down His life for His sheep. This is all…Continue Reading

A Leaven In The World… Confusion, Straw Men Mar Papal Document

April 16, 2018 Our Catholic Faith Comments Off on A Leaven In The World… Confusion, Straw Men Mar Papal Document

By FR. KEVIN M. CUSICK Pope Francis gets high marks in his latest apostolic exhortation on personal holiness, Gaudete et Exsultate (GE), for defending solid teaching on at least one embattled doctrinal truth: “Jesus wanted us to conclude by asking the Father to ‘deliver us from evil.’ That final word does not refer to evil in the abstract; a more exact translation would be ‘the evil one.’ It indicates a personal being who assails us” (GE, n. 160). The Devil is real, he affirms, and he is the “evil one.” If we are to be holy we must steadfastly renounce him, his works, and his empty promises as affirmed at our Baptism. There is also solid material here of a…Continue Reading

The Sacraments Instituted By Christ… Christ Is The Fulfillment Of The Sacrifices Of The Old Law

April 15, 2018 Our Catholic Faith Comments Off on The Sacraments Instituted By Christ… Christ Is The Fulfillment Of The Sacrifices Of The Old Law

By RAYMOND DE SOUZA, KM Part 24 In the two previous articles, we considered the three most important ceremonies of the Old Law, namely, the Sacrifice of the Covenant, the Pasch, and the Day of Atonement. In the New Testament, the Sacrifice of Calvary is closely connected to those three central Jewish sacrifices. In this article, we will see how the Sacrifice of the Covenant, the Passover, and the Day of Atonement were fulfilled in the Sacrifice of the Cross. In turn, we see other realities that were prefigured in the Old Testament but fulfilled in the New: Christ says at the Last Supper, “This cup is the New Covenant in my Blood” (Luke 22:20; 1 Cor. 11:25). Yes, He…Continue Reading

Overview Of The Eight Beatitudes

April 14, 2018 Our Catholic Faith Comments Off on Overview Of The Eight Beatitudes

By DON FIER The dignity of the human person, as we saw last week, “is rooted in his creation in the image and likeness of God” (Catechism of the Catholic Church [CCC], n. 1700). Precisely because he is “endowed with a spiritual soul, with intellect and with free will, the human person is from his very conception ordered to God and destined for eternal beatitude” (CCC, n. 1711). The dignity of man transcends the rest of the material universe because only he is capable of union with God — through knowledge and love — as his last end. So great is the dignity of the human person that the fathers of the Second Vatican Council were able to unequivocally affirm…Continue Reading

Catholic Replies

April 13, 2018 Our Catholic Faith Comments Off on Catholic Replies

Editor’s Note: In agreeing with our advice about not attending an invalid wedding of a family member or friend, D.B. of Pennsylvania sent along a form letter that one might send in response to an invitation to attend such a ceremony. As an aside from the letter, D.B. wondered if John the Baptist would have attended the wedding of King Herod to his brother’s wife — “you know, just to keep the lines of communication open.” Or whether Thomas More would have attended the wedding of “his pal King Henry VIII to Anne Boleyn after leaving his wife Catherine of Aragon” — “you know, just to keep up their relationship and, incidentally, to save his own head.” Here is the…Continue Reading

The Saints Believed In Hell

April 11, 2018 Our Catholic Faith Comments Off on The Saints Believed In Hell

(Editor’s Note: Given that Hell has become a burning issue in the media of late, we thought we would present a few quotations from the saints on the reality of its existence. As St. Paul wrote in 2 Thessalonians: “. . . the Lord Jesus from heaven with his mighty angels, in blazing fire, inflicting punishment on those who do not acknowledge God and on those who do not obey the gospel of our Lord Jesus. These will pay the penalty of eternal ruin, separated from the presence of the Lord and from the glory of his power.” (The quotations below are from various sources, and they represent only a few of the many testimonies from the saints about Hell.)…Continue Reading

We Need A Deeper Conversion

April 10, 2018 Our Catholic Faith Comments Off on We Need A Deeper Conversion

By FR. ROBERT ALTIER Third Sunday Of Easter (YR B) Readings: Acts 3:13-15, 17-19 1 John 2:1-5a Luke 24:35-48 In the first reading we see the kindness and mercy St. Peter extends to the crowd of Jewish people who were listening to him on Pentecost. Just over seven weeks after our Lord had been crucified, we notice there is no anger or judging in Peter’s exhortation. He is very forthright and direct in what he is saying, not trying to sidestep the truth of who had called for the death of Jesus, but he says the people acted in ignorance. We can recognize very quickly the correlation between what Peter is saying to the crowd gathered in Jerusalem and the…Continue Reading

A Leaven In The World Hell Exists: The Risen Lord Is The Way To Avoid It

April 9, 2018 Our Catholic Faith Comments Off on A Leaven In The World Hell Exists: The Risen Lord Is The Way To Avoid It

By FR. KEVIN M. CUSICK Christ is risen, Alleluia! A blessed Easter to all of our readers. We have just celebrated once again the Resurrection of the Lord Jesus Christ, and with it His descent among the dead or, as this mystery of faith is also known, the “harrowing of Hell.” This is one way in which we know Hell exists and we proclaim its reality every time we profess the Creed. All Catholics, if they are practicing their faith, do so every Sunday, the little Resurrection of every week of the year, because the prayer of the Creed is a constitutive part of Holy Mass on the Lord’s Day. This dogma of the faith was cast into doubt after…Continue Reading