Did Hans Urs von Balthasar teach that everyone will certainly be saved? by Mark Brumley
Whatever Balthasar’s position is, and whether or not it is correct, it isn’t universalism.

Music for Great Lent

Fr. Patrick Henry Reardon on Atonement

CWR: Pope Francis believes in hell—and he needs to stop talking to Eugenio Scalfari by Christopher R. Altieri

Our Lord also told His disciples, “Behold I send you as sheep in the midst of wolves. Be ye therefore wise as serpents and simple...

That He Said This... Believe It or Not?

Pope Francis: 'There Is No Hell' by Michael W. Chapman

Rorate Caeli

Reaction from Pat Buchanan

Why the Cross?

Thomistic Institute: Liberalism and Christianity Conference

audio (via MoJ)

Priest Stephen Freeman: Running on Empty in the Abundant Life (English)

Acquired Mental Handicaps

If overuse of the internet and other electronic media leads to some sort of mental impairment with respect to attention and focus and other acts of the mind, then might it be the case there will be consequences on a person's ability to participate in liturgical prayer? How many of our young people can sit through the praying of a Psalm, or the Anaphora/Roman Canon, without being distracted? Has modern technology exacerbated our natural weaknesses or deficits?

With a Psalm least one can prayer/sing the Psalm and that will help one regain focus. But with an anaphora? One should be listening attentively, and not praying. Though perhaps repeating the words silently might be permissible.

GREAT DOC: American Orthodox Christians and Their Connection with Russia Through Music - PATRAM

Articulation entre théologie et anthropologie dansl’œuvre liturgique de Louis Bouyer: Une introduction à la question by Laurent Penot

More on the Viganò Affair

Settimo Cielo: Far From Continuity, Here There Is a Chasm. The True Story of the Eleven Booklets

Priest Stephen Freeman: Becoming Human in a Secular World

I Have Believed: Christ and the Psalms

For those Orthodox scandalized by the Pauline reform of the Roman rite, are they scandalized that the patriarchate of Rome is planning to canonize Paul VI? Do they see this act as something more than approval of that reform?

Fr. Bouyer and the Pauline Reform

Sacred Music 141.4: "Louis Bouyer and the Pauline Reform: Great Expectations Dashed" by John Pepino

Settimo Cielo: The Devil in the Convent. An Original Memoir of the Catholic '68

But Will a Robe Be Associated with Masculinity?

Or will the cassock fall into disrepute because of negative associations with unmanly clerics?

A Reset of Sorts

NCReg: Youth Leader: Traditional Latin Mass is 'Progressive' by Edward Pentin
Bertalan Kiss says the extraordinary form of the Roman rite is not stuck in the past but rather draws on the treasures of the Church’s heritage and attracts young people because it ‘challenges them.’

Should Be: "Patriarchate of Rome, Where Are You Going?"

Settimo Cielo: "Catholic Church, Where Are You Going?" A Conference. That It Not Lose Its Way

Finally

CNA/EWTN via NCReg: Top Vatican Communications Officer Resigns After ‘Lettergate’ Fiasco
On Wednesday Pope Francis accepted the resignation of Msgr. Dario Edoardo Viganò.

Related:
More on the Letter of Benedict XVI. There's Another Paragraph, in Which He Writes…
Like getting blood out of a stone

The Devil and Father Amorth

‘The Devil and Father Amorth’ Trailer: Witness ‘Exorcist’ Director William Friedkin Filming a Live Exorcism by Zack Sharf
What happens when the director of “The Exorcist” shoots an actual exorcism? Let's find out.

The Dictator Pope Now in Print

Author of “The Dictator Pope” revealed (officially) and book format now available

Related: Pope Francis' modus operandi

"Old-school Jesuit"? Doesn't seem like it.

CNA: The theological formation of Pope Francis

More from Fr. Hunwicke on Canonization

CANONISATION (2)

The rites of Canonisation have tended ... this will not surprise you ... to vary in the last seventy years. The most recent changes before this (PF) pontificate, which took place under Benedict XVI, seemed designed to impose on the rites a theological meaning which they previously had not so explicitly expressed. As Pope Benedict left the rite, before the singing of Veni Creator Spiritus the Pontiff asked for prayer that Christ the Lord would not permit His Church to err in so great a matter. And, in the Third Petition the Cardinal Prefect for the Causes of Saints informed the Pontiff that the Holy Spirit "in every time renders the supreme Magisterium immune from error (omni tempore supremum Magisterium erroris expertem reddit)".

These phrases, added by Pope Benedict, were in formulae cut out by PF when he canonised a number of beati in 2014; and subsequently.

It looks to me as though Pope Benedict's additions were intended to confirm the view that acts of canonisation are infallible and require acceptance de fide. I wish now to point out that, if the formulae introduced by Benedict XVI did affect this debated theological question, then, surely, so does the action of this Pontificate in removing them. In the gradual accumulation of evidences and precedents which gradually build up an established judgement of the Magisterium, surely phrases which were introduced into rites by one Pontiff and, very soon afterwards, removed by the next, have less auctoritas than established and immemorial formulae which have been used by successive pontiffs for centuries.

See also this blog entry at ccwatershed.

A Reform of the Reform?

The version of Fr. Peter M.J. Stravinskas: Liturgical Vision vs. Liturgical Visions: Vatican II, Pope Benedict XVI, Cardinal Sarah
Why I believe that the loss of the sense of the sacred is the primary reason why we have lost millions of Catholics to faithful worship.

Much of it a Latin traditionalist could agree with.

Over and above that, for a universal Church (in an age of high mobility), the ability to worship in a common language is most important. How many of you have gone on a business trip to Tokyo, for example, finding yourself attending Sunday Mass in Japanese (which I presume most of you do not know)?

So why should the Japanese have to suffer through Latin just so that a few tourists and legal residents can benefit from hearing something familiar?

Also, the patriarchate of Rome is not the Universal Church. And there is no reason why the patriarchate of Rome should have just one language, when it has jurisdiction over such a disparate group of ethnic groups and cultures. Latin could be a lingua franca for clerics, or bishops, but all of the faithful?

There should have been a greater move towards inculturation for peoples who did not speak Latin or Latin-derived language/Romance language, and this should have been part of the initial missionary effort. (To the Germanic tribes, for example.) Even if the project to develop a native hieratic language took some time as the local Churches discerned for those gifted with the intellectual ability and calling to undertake such a task, it still should have been a priority prominent in the minds of missionary bishops.

What is the significance of kneeling? It is at one and the same time the posture of humility and adoration. Benedict was fond of quoting St. Augustine who declared: “Let no one receive who has not first adored.” The external sign of kneeling helps to safeguard the sacrality of the action of receiving. Admittedly, the Churches of the East (both Catholic and Orthodox) receive standing, however, so much else in their liturgies emphasizes the transcendent that there is little danger of obscuring that dimension.

One can ask whether in the Latin psyche adoration has been separated from liturgical worship due to the rise of Latin "Eucharistic devotion."

Interesting Marketing?

Ignatius Press: Confessiosn of a Traditional Catholic by Matthew Arnold

The book features an oil lamp (or candle holder) that is typically used in Byzantine temples or homes, especially hanging in front of an icon, but not in Latin temples. Roman Catholics, even traditionalists, prefer their bleached candles, which generally go with their statues. Rarely will they put candles in front of a religious paintings. Though perhaps I may have seen this in Rome, but was the candle for the painting or the altar? So why was this particular image used for book? It was probably the decision of the publisher and not the author. To add a greater sense of ritual or piety or mystique that would be missing with a candle?

Ivan Moody on His Setting of the Akathist Hymn

"A conference on ‘Thomas Byzantinus’: Hope for increased dialogue between East and West"

L'Osservatore Romano

"Liturgy, Orality, and Rubricism"

Luther and the Natural Law

Law, Liberalism, and Luther: Beyond the Myths by Korey D. Maas

Contrary to the popular, tidy narrative repeated by Robert Reilly and others, neither Luther nor his colleagues and heirs “abandoned” natural law. Nor did they recast it in a voluntarist mold. They embraced and defended it along entirely traditional lines.

Eastern Catholic Bishops Meet in St. Louis

Romanian Catholic (via Byz TX)

Educating in Christ

First Things: Is There a Saving Truth? by Gerhard Cardinal Müller
Does our eternal salvation depend on the concrete acceptance of the truths of faith?

CWR Dispatch: What to make of Benedict XVI’s letter about Pope Francis’ theological thought?

The brief and perfunctorily courteous note from the Pope emeritus was just that, and there’s no reason to try and make the letter say what it does not say.

Related: The Double "Foolish Prejudice." The Complete Text of the Letter by Benedict XVI

R.J. Snell Reviews MacIntyre's Latest

Power, Preference, and Morality: On Alasdair MacIntyre’s Latest by R.J. Snell

Despite the frustrating sense that much of its argument is asserted rather than demonstrated, there can be no doubt that those involved in the cultural disputes of our day ought to know Alasdair MacIntyre’s new book.

Canonization and Papal Infallibility

Fr. Hunwicke

Again the question needs to be asked as to whether the bishop of Rome canonizes as the first bishop of the Universal Church or as the patriarch of Rome. Was his authority to canonize on behalf of the Universal Church ever been recognized in the first millenium? I would think the answer is no.

A Premature Defense?

Has evolution really been proven as fact?

In Defense of Thomistic Evolution: A Response to Chaberek by Nicanor Austriaco, O.P.

Why did God choose to work via an evolutionary process rather than will a special creation? Because it better reveals His glory and His power. Because it reveals better that He is God.

Ryan T. Anderson on Sex Change

Sex Change: Physically Impossible, Psychosocially Unhelpful, and Philosophically Misguided by Ryan T. Anderson

Modern medicine can’t reassign sex physically, and attempting to do so doesn’t produce good outcomes psychosocially. Here is the evidence.

The Sacred Divine Liturgy

(via Byz, TX)

She Has Her Fans

Catholic Theology by Tracey Rowland


Fr. Z is one. BOOKS RECEIVED and a strong recommendation and a new liturgical rites manual

Fr. Gerald Murray and Robert Royal on Pope Francis

full episode

L'Ivresque: Louis Bouyer – Le sens de la vie sacerdotale

The Forty Martyrs of Sebaste

Another Chant...

Stile Antico's Latest

Ivan Moody with Cappella Romana

Karol Wojtyla and Humanae Vitae by Pawel Galuska

Sandro Magister: "Humanae Vitae" Under Siege. Two New Assaults and a Counterattack

Related: Analysis: Overturning Humanae Vitae's teaching, a 'crime against the Church'

Psalm 103

Doesn't the Patriarchate of Rome Have More Pressing Issues?

One would think that the various explanations given by scholars and theologians about the validity of current translations would have been sufficient to give this a rest.

"Pater Noster," No Peace. The Battle Begins Among the Translations

Crisis: Holding Moral Theory Accountable by Msgr. Robert Batule

The New Memorial in the Roman Rite

Sacred Art in Secular Terms

Something on Icons

CWR: Critics misrepresent Cardinal Sarah’s call for reverence in receiving Holy Communion by Conor Dugan

Why are so many avoiding the key question: Why has belief in Christ’s Real Presence in the Eucharist diminished in recent decades?

EF Tenebrae

The introversion/extroversion distinction or spectrum has its roots in Jungian psychology. What to make of this sort of personality analysis?

Cardinal Müller on The World Over

Sandro Magister: Bergoglio Disclosed. Tell Me How You Speak and I Will Tell You Who You Are

Byz, TX: Pan-Orthodox Vespers in London

Archdiocese of Thyateira and Great Britain
London Greek Community
Diocese of Sourozh
London ROCA

Related:
Orthodox London
Greek Orthodox Cathedral of the Divine Wisdom
ROCOR Great Britain and Ireland
SPC London

Against Marriage by Clare Chambers

OUP

MoJ: "Against Marriage: An Egalitarian Defence of the Marriage-Free State" by Rick Garnett

What's the Catch?

Fr. Z: Pope Francis decrees Memorial of Mary, Mother of the Church

Eastern Christian Books: Eastern Orthodoxy and Human Rights

Eastern Christian Books: Eastern Orthodoxy and Human Rights

Philip Lawler on The World Over

Phil Lawler on EWTN Bookmark

Eastern Christian Books: Fr. Paul Tarazi on Scripture, Theology, and Mysticism: An Interview

Eastern Christian Books: Fr. Paul Tarazi on Scripture, Theology, and Mysticism: An Interview

Lost Shepherd

CWR: A Papacy of Contradictions by Dr. Samuel Gregg

Veteran journalist Phil Lawler asks hard questions in Lost Shepherd about where Pope Francis is—or isn’t—leading the Catholic Church.

Fr. Alessio Ulisse, SJ

Rorate Caeli: De Mattei: Opponents of Ostpolitik – Part 2: Father Alessio Ulisse (1920-1986) by Roberto de Mattei

Someone should be canvassing for miracles for him too...

Crisis: The Man Who Was “Ante-Pope”
by Julia Meloni

Before his death in 2012, Cardinal Carlo Martini eerily called himself an “ante-pope,” a “precursor and preparer for the Holy Father.” Martini was the leading antagonist to Popes John Paul...

Popesplaining

CWR Dispatch: New CDF document is clear and succinct, but why was it needed? by Christopher R. Altieri

Titled “Placuit Deo,” the new document, although quite short, effectively reaffirms the Christocentric focus of Dominus Iesus.

Pavel Chesnokov