Abbey-Roads2

Just thinkin’ about nothin’.

#1)  Not all devout Catholics were always devout - some were great big sinners - even anti-Catholic - before they became devout.

#2)  Not all cradle Catholics practiced their faith their entire lives.

#3)  The rule that women should cover their heads  for Mass was never changed.

#4)  Many Catholics do not like the Stewardship Campaigns conducted by their parishes because it seems too much like the Protestant ethic of tithing - and even Protestants don’t like that idea.

#5)  The Pope looked very papal  at the consistory this weekend.

#6)  Oprah is going to teach  “A Course In Miracles”  based upon the book with the same title by Marianne Williamson which is based on a nonsensical New Age cult/belief system.  As the Irish might say - it’s a bunch of malarkey.

#7)  Nuns who wear traditional habits do not, as a rule, shave their heads, they simply cut their hair short.

#8)  The 6:30am Sunday Mass at St. Agnes in St. Paul is not as crowded as it was when Fr. Altier had the Mass, which concerns me because they could cancel that Mass at anytime.  (It also suggests to me that Fr. Altier did have groupies.)

#9)  I think I quit smoking, it has been 4 weeks since I had a cigarette.  I was happier as a smoker.

#10)  This is odd and useless:  It’s the story about the woman who had an abortion and sterilization  to save the planet from over-population.  It’s that old “Was man made for the sabbath or the sabbath made for man?” debate, only this question seems more transparent, “Was the planet made for man, or man made for the planet?”  With this woman’s logic, we should begin to exterminate children when the schools begin to get over-crowded.

#11)  Secularists do not believe in Divine Providence.

#12)  When the vernacular began to be introduced into the Mass, and the Novus Ordo came along, most average Catholics in the pew thought the only changes to the Mass had been the language and the novelty of the priest facing the people.  Few of the laity understood the rite was no longer extraordinary.

#13)  Marilyn Manson seems dangerous.  I don’t like him.

Their meaning and purpose…

21. That these blessings may be abundant and lasting in Christian society, it is necessary that the kingship of our Savior should be as widely as possible recognized and understood, and to the end nothing would serve better than the institution of a special feast in honor of the Kingship of Christ. For people are instructed in the truths of faith, and brought to appreciate the inner joys of religion far more effectually by the annual celebration of our sacred mysteries than by any official pronouncement of the teaching of the Church. Such pronouncements usually reach only a few and the more learned among the faithful; feasts reach them all; the former speak but once, the latter speak every year - in fact, forever. The church’s teaching affects the mind primarily; her feasts affect both mind and heart, and have a salutary effect upon the whole of man’s nature. Man is composed of body and soul, and he needs these external festivities so that the sacred rites, in all their beauty and variety, may stimulate him to drink more deeply of the fountain of God’s teaching, that he may make it a part of himself, and use it with profit for his spiritual life.

22. History, in fact, tells us that in the course of ages these festivals have been instituted one after another according as the needs or the advantage of the people of Christ seemed to demand: as when they needed strength to face a common danger, when they were attacked by insidious heresies, when they needed to be urged to the pious consideration of some mystery of faith or of some divine blessing. Thus in the earliest days of the Christian era, when the people of Christ were suffering cruel persecution, the cult of the martyrs was begun in order, says St. Augustine, “that the feasts of the martyrs might incite men to martyrdom.”[34] The liturgical honors paid to confessors, virgins and widows produced wonderful results in an increased zest for virtue, necessary even in times of peace. But more fruitful still were the feasts instituted in honor of the Blessed Virgin. As a result of these men grew not only in their devotion to the Mother of God as an ever-present advocate, but also in their love of her as a mother bequeathed to them by their Redeemer. Not least among the blessings which have resulted from the public and legitimate honor paid to the Blessed Virgin and the saints is the perfect and perpetual immunity of the Church from error and heresy. We may well admire in this the admirable wisdom of the Providence of God, who, ever bringing good out of evil, has from time to time suffered the faith and piety of men to grow weak, and allowed Catholic truth to be attacked by false doctrines, but always with the result that truth has afterwards shone out with greater splendor, and that men’s faith, aroused from its lethargy, has shown itself more vigorous than before.

23. The festivals that have been introduced into the liturgy in more recent years have had a similar origin, and have been attended with similar results. When reverence and devotion to the Blessed Sacrament had grown cold, the feast of Corpus Christi was instituted, so that by means of solemn processions and prayer of eight days’ duration, men might be brought once more to render public homage to Christ. So, too, the feast of the Sacred Heart of Jesus was instituted at a time when men were oppressed by the sad and gloomy severity of Jansenism, which had made their hearts grow cold, and shut them out from the love of God and the hope of salvation.

24. If We ordain that the whole Catholic world shall revere Christ as King, We shall minister to the need of the present day, and at the same time provide an excellent remedy for the plague which now infects society. We refer to the plague of anti-clericalism, its errors and impious activities. This evil spirit, as you are well aware, Venerable Brethren, has not come into being in one day; it has long lurked beneath the surface. The empire of Christ over all nations was rejected. The right which the Church has from Christ himself, to teach mankind, to make laws, to govern peoples in all that pertains to their eternal salvation, that right was denied. Then gradually the religion of Christ came to be likened to false religions and to be placed ignominiously on the same level with them. It was then put under the power of the state and tolerated more or less at the whim of princes and rulers. Some men went even further, and wished to set up in the place of God’s religion a natural religion consisting in some instinctive affection of the heart. There were even some nations who thought they could dispense with God, and that their religion should consist in impiety and the neglect of God. The rebellion of individuals and states against the authority of Christ has produced deplorable consequences. - QUAS PRIMAS -
ENCYCLICAL OF POPE PIUS XI - ON THE FEAST OF CHRIST THE KING