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[Barf Alert] Vatican Council II: A seed that continues to grow A great grace, a true prophecy for the life of the Church, a new Pentecost: these are some of the expressions used by Pope John Paul II and Pope Benedict XVI to describe the most recent Council – a small seed that has become a tree and continues to bear fruit through the working of the Holy Spirit. By Sergio CentofantiThis year 8 December will mark the 55th anniversary of the end of the Second Vatican Council. It is an important moment in this period since a new debate...

In them, this brilliant and esteemed mystic and spiritual master expressed strong criticisms of Vatican Council II. Fr. Barsotti wrote: "I am perplexed with regard to the Council: the plethora of documents, their length, often their language, these frightened me. They are documents that bear witness to a purely human assurance more than two a simple firmness of faith. But above all I am outraged by the behavior of the theologians.” "The Council is the supreme exercise of the magisterium, and is justified only by a supreme necessity. Could not the fearful gravity of the present situation of the Church...

Who Was Paul VI?A review of Msgr. Villa’s Paul VI Beatified?By Robert J. Siscoe It was during the 35th Assembly of the Italian Bishops that Cardinal Ruini, President of the Italian Episcopal Conference, announced his intention to submit the cause for beatification of Paul VI. On May 13, 1992, he issued an Edict that appeared in the Roma Sette, inviting “every single faithful to communicate to us directly… any information which, in any way, may argue against the reputation of sanctity of the Servant of God [Paul VI]”. Fr. Luigi Villa, editor of Chiesa Viva, answered the call. In the...

Today is the 38th Anniverary of the Promulgation of Pope Paul VI’s Apostolic Constitution (the highest form of Church document) entitled Missale Romanum.  This was the instrument by which Paul VI established the Novus Ordo Missae. Let’s review this important document which has so affected our lives. My emphasis and comments. PROMULGATION OF THE ROMAN MISSAL REVISED BY DECREE OF THE SECOND VATICAN ECUMENICAL COUNCILMissale Romanum Apostolic Constitution of Pope Paul VI issued on April 3, 1969. PAUL, BISHOP Servant of the Servants of God For an Everlasting Memorial The Missale Romanum was promulgated in 1570 by our predecessor St....

The Catholic Church in the United States is in a state of profound transition. A priest or layman transported through time from 1965 to 2005 would be astonished and most likely disconcerted by the dramatic changes that have taken place in the 40 years following the close of Vatican II. Of course, the hierarchical and sacramental nature of the Church remains unchanged. What, however, has clearly changed are the numbers and status of laity, religious, and clergy in the mystical Body of Christ. Related to this is the altered understanding of their roles in the Church. I am writing this...

CASTELGANDOLFO, Italy: Pope Benedict XVI, who has made reconciliation among Christians a priority of his pontificate, will on Monday meet the leader of a schismatic group of ultra-traditionalists, according to a statement by the group. The Vatican has neither confirmed nor denied that the meeting will take place, but if it does it could be the first step to bringing the defiant traditionalists back into the Catholic fold, observers said. Bernard Fellay, the superior general of the Priestly Fraternity of Saint Pius X, based in Econe, Switzerland, will meet the Pope at his country residence here, the Fraternity said in...

Tracey Rowland on the Pope's Interpretation of the Council MELBOURNE, Australia, JULY 24, 2005 (Zenit.org).- Many believe that "Gaudium et Spes" was the key document that shaped the life of the Church in the years immediately following the Second Vatican Council. However, according to theologian Tracey Rowland, 40 years of post-conciliar history and reflection on the 1965 pastoral constitution have led many to conclude that the document had an inadequate understanding of culture, particularly that of the culture of liberal modernity. The result, Rowland reckons, was the unleashing of currents within the Church that gravely harmed the liturgy and offered...

             September 1998 No. 28     A KIND OF MUTINY It has been common knowledge for a long time that Pius XII (who died on Oct. 9, 1958) had already considered the possibility of summoning an ecumenical council. He was succeeded by John XXIII who, at the time, was regarded as a transitional pope (transitional from what to what?). Hardly three months after being elected, he announced his intention of convoking a council. The Curia and the Preparatory Commissions began their preparation and, after 18 months' work, presented 73 "schemas" which were either rejected or profoundly modified by...

This book has a very special appeal for those who love the Church and the traditional Latin Mass. It first appeared in Great Britain under the title Literary Converts, and then was reprinted by Ignatius Press in 1999 with the subtitle "Spiritual Inspiration in an Age of Unbelief." I especially like the subtitle because this book has reinforced my faith today by affording me the company of the authors with whom I grew up: G.K. Chesterton, Hilaire Belloc, Ronald Knox, Evelyn Waugh, Graham Greene, Malcolm Muggeridge, and a host of others. My main interest in them today is that many...

Bishop Donald Wuerl is calling on the people of the Catholic Diocese of Pittsburgh to prepare for a future with fewer priests. "Fewer priests does not mean less ministry," Wuerl wrote in a pastoral letter in this week's Pittsburgh Catholic.

Seattle Catholic is not affiliated with the Archdiocese of Seattle A Journal of Catholic News and Views 25 May 2004 The Sodomite Offensive in the Catholic Church by Erven E. Park The unfolding of the tragic dissolution of the Catholic Church in America today is truly frightening in its scope and depth. The scope encompassing both the spiritual (faith) and the temporal (morals) with the depth revealing real corruption and mendaciousness of certain bishops entrenched at the top. To date, three cardinals and no less than ten bishops have resigned or retired under circumstances connected to sexual abuse accusations....

HOT TOPICS: Consequences of Vatican II The Pact of Metz Atila Sinke Guimarães Published in Catholic Family News, September 2001,Daily Catholic website, September 29, 2001 Why didn’t the last Ecumenical Council condemn Communism? A secret accord made at Metz supplies an answer.  Those who pass by the convent of the Little Sisters of the Poor in Borny - on the outskirts of the French city of Metz - never imagine that something of transcendental importance occurred in the residence of Fr. Lagarde, the convent’s chaplain. In a hall of this religious residence in August 1962 - two months before...

Self-styled liturgists through-out the world have organized conferences to celebrate what they would term the happy anniversary of Sacrosanctum Concilium. They present it as the blueprint for a program of liturgical renewal which has been received by most of the faithful with joy and transformed their lives. Michael Davies, ex-President of the International Una Voce Federation, begs to differ. He sees Sacrosanctum Concilium as a charter for a disastrous revolution which would undermine the liturgy of the Roman Rite in a manner unprecedented throughout its 2000 year evolution through a process of natural development under the guidance of the Holy...

Kenneth Jones’ statistic research work first appeared in Latin Mass magazine in the Nineties. As a CPA working in the investments industry at that time, I was already immersed in charts, graphs and financial reports comparing projections and actual results. I knew the decline in the Church had been precipitous since the Sixties, but in page after page of simple bar charts awful truth sank in. A picture says a thousand words, good or bad. It occurred to me then that the quantitative approach to the charting the decline since Vatican II would make a good book someday, and that...

Forty years on, we are only just beginning to understand the significance of the Council, says Fr Ian Ker. And we are still a long way from implementing it It is 40 years since the opening of the Second Vatican Council. The Council was convoked by Pope John XXIII for two purposes: the renewal or aggiornamento of the Catholic Church and Christian reunion - two goals which are surely integrally related. The Pope expressed the hope that it would be the beginning of a new Pentecost for the Church. There have, indeed, been substantial achievements. A nineteenth century Catholic would...

Dear Madame, You are asking me for my opinion on the recent letter of the month of June from the Dominicans of Avrillé to their friends and benefactors. I just became aware of it in my faraway Canada. I will gladly share it with you and in a straightforward manner. One part of the letter is consecrated to the last encyclical of the Holy Father on the Eucharist: Ecclesia de Eucharistia. You know already that I have studied it in depth, as so many of my confreres have done as well, a good census, such as Father Hery, Father de...

With the renewal of the Second Vatican Council, certain Eucharistic heresies began to emerge within the Church. Oftentimes one is tempted to blame their resurgence on the reigning Roman Pontiff of the day, Paul VI. One notes that Paul VI broke with many customs during the era of the Second Vatican Council in his attempt to lead the Church towards a renewal in her Divine mission. One ancient custom in particular with which Pope Paul VI broke is that he interrupted an Ecumenical Council to promulgate a papal encyclical. Previous to the Second Vatican Council, it was unheard of that...

Editor's Note: Father Charles Fiore, a good friend of CFN, died on February 18 this year (2003). A month before his death, at his own expense, he mailed the book The Devil's Final Battle to a hundred of his friends and accountancies (I helped organized the mailing). What follows is the heartfelt cover-letter he sent with the book. By God's Providence, I was ordained to the priesthood as a Dominican in 1961, a year before the beginning of Vatican Council II. I was 27, had grown up and was educated in the pre-Conciliar Church, so that at the Council's opening...

Retired Bishop Hanifen reflects on effects of council on the life and ministry of the clergy So began the reflections of recently retired Bishop Richard Hanifen of Colorado Springs as he talked about "The elements of change in the life and ministry of the bishop since the Second Vatican Council." Some 175 people, young and old, packed Regis University's Science Amphitheater the evening of Feb. 19 to hear Bishop Hanifen's insightful, often funny and obviously fond observations, which he emphasized were "personal reflections, not scholarly reflections." The talk was the second in a series sponsored by the university to commemorate...

Since book reviews allow the reviewer simply to ignore difficult arguments, I propose to James Likoudis (and to anyone who wishes to take me up on it) that - if he really believes our arguments are really so easy to dispense with - he directly answer the following [eight] of them, which would make much more interesting reading than his fairly predictable review. Most of the following is drawn from the pages of The Great Façade. These are not necessarily the toughest challenges from the book by any means, but they are the ones that can be described most briefly....