A Curious Thing

 

A curious thing happened today. All the people from Mission #2 who like to go the increasingly popular Shooky's of a Thursday evening turned up at Mass first, without any prompting. That's right, with not a word from me, not even an annoyingly jocular clerical bribe, "Hey, there's a 10% discount if you go to Mass first," ha, ha, sorta thing. No, they just turned up.

Well done, team, and it makes sense. Our communion with one another flows from communion with God in the Mystical Body of Christ, nourished, vivified and deepened at the Altar. Get that right and the other follows naturally.

You know, I recall a priest in DC who told me, "We're at the point where the people here don't even think of doing a parish event without going to Mass first." Right on, worship, giving ourselves in love to God, comes first, always. 

It's what we're created for, and we saw a little bit of that North Central Texas this evening.

Stella Maris,

LSP

Uplifting

 

What uplifting worship this morning. The Word of God heard and preached, the Sacrament of the Altar administered and there we were, the local instance of the Mystical Body of Christ in rural Texas. No small thing.

You know, if any of you had told me a couple of decades ago that I'd be ministering out in the missions here in Hill and Bosque counties I'd have laughed. "What do you mean? Neither church has an 8' stone altar and where's all the polychrome?" Well, the joke would've been on me and God's been kind.

up your game, LSP

Speaking of which, many people are asking, "Where can we buy food and drink now that everything's gone full CorpCom Satan Rainbow?" Problem. Luckily Mission #2 has come up with a solution. Every Sunday the people bring food which they've grown and you can take what you want or need.

I tell you, it's like a small farmers' market, with fresh greens, beans, cucumbers, squash, eggs and more, and none of it's cursed by the wretched stamp of gaily hued degeneracy. Result, gotta get back to the garden.

In related news, infamous trans activist Scots goblin Nicola Sturgeon's been arrested. Allegedly the despised dwarven malfeasant was up to some kind of fiscal skulduggery. She's been released, annoyingly.

Cheers,

LSP

Sunday Message

 

I know, there's only so much hideous degeneracy dawgishness a person can take, so here's a short and uplifting Sunday message for Advent III from Austin Farrer:

JESUS gave his body and blood to his disciples in bread and wine. Amazed at such a token, and little understanding what they did, Peter, John and the rest reached out their hands and took their master and their God.  Whatever else they knew or did not know, they knew they were committed to him, body and soul; they were consenting that he should die for them, and that they, somehow, should live it out.  The cock had not crowed twice that night before Peter thrice denied, but still he knew he was committed to Christ, for Christ had given him his body and his blood.  Christ’s body and blood lived in him, and Christ forgave him; there was no breaking of the sacramental tie.  We are not worthy of Christ, but we are bound to Christ.  With all the sincerity of our minds let us renew the bond, and pray to live for him who has died for us.

God bless you all,

LSP

A Maundy Thursday Reflection

 

Here we are, it's Maundy Thursday and we're faced with two mandates, to "love one another as I have loved you," and "This is my body... this is my blood... do this..." With Christ washing his disciples' feet and then celebrating the first Mass on the night before he suffered.

The two might seem unrelated or even discordant, especially liturgically, but hold on, the one follows the other. Jesus washing his followers' feet is an act of humble love and where is this brought to a point, exemplified, played out to the full? 

On the Cross. "He humbled himself taking the form of a servant and became obedient, even unto death on a cross," and again, "Greater love hath no man but to lay his life down for his friends." The foot washing, then, serves as a type or figure of the crucifixion.

And what is the Last Supper, the first Eucharist, but that same sacrifice made present for us under the forms of bread and wine? This is my body, this is my blood, given and shed for us upon the Cross to cleanse us from  sin. So we find ourselves back at Jesus washing his disciples' feet.

In the face of such a gift, of God's unfathomable love for us given in sacrifice on Calvary, what can we do but love him back and in doing so keep his commandment to love one another as he loved us.

Watch and Pray,

LSP

Love The Lord Your God

 

Unlike the current Marxist, our last Pope was clear in his exposition of the Faith. Here he is, on loving God, the first and great commandment:

In the gradual unfolding of this encounter, it is clearly revealed that love is not merely a sentiment. Sentiments come and go. A sentiment can be a marvelous first spark, but it is not the fullness of love. Earlier we spoke of the process of purification and maturation by which eros comes fully into its own, becomes love in the full meaning of the word. It is characteristic of mature love that it calls into play all man’s potentialities; it engages the whole man, so to speak. Contact with the visible manifestations of God’s love can awaken within us a feeling of joy born of the experience of being loved. But this encounter also engages our will and our intellect. Acknowledgment of the living God is one path towards love, and the “yes” of our will to his will unites our intellect, will and sentiments in the all- embracing act of love. But this process is always open-ended; love is never “finished” and complete; throughout life, it changes and matures, and thus remains faithful to itself. Idem velle atque idem nolle — to want the same thing, and to reject the same thing—was recognized by antiquity as the authentic content of love: the one becomes similar to the other, and this leads to a community of will and thought. The love-story between God and man consists in the very fact that this communion of will increases in a communion of thought and sentiment, and thus our will and God’s will increasingly coincide: God’s will is no longer for me an alien will, something imposed on me from without by the commandments, but it is now my own will, based on the realization that God is in fact more deeply present to me than I am to myself. Then self- abandonment to God increases and God becomes our joy (cf. Ps 73 [72]:23-28).

Love of neighbour is thus shown to be possible in the way proclaimed by the Bible, by Jesus. It consists in the very fact that, in God and with God, I love even the person whom I do not like or even know. This can only take place on the basis of an intimate encounter with God, an encounter which has become a communion of will, even affecting my feelings. Then I learn to look on this other person not simply with my eyes and my feelings, but from the perspective of Jesus Christ. His friend is my friend. Going beyond exterior appearances, I perceive in others an interior desire for a sign of love, of concern. This I can offer them not only through the organizations intended for such purposes, accepting it perhaps as a political necessity. Seeing with the eyes of Christ, I can give to others much more than their outward necessities; I can give them the look of love which they crave. 

I find this beautiful, you may not, no rule. Except there is, the love of God, without which we are nothing.

Your Old Pal,

LSP

I Am The Bread Of Life

 

"I am the bread of life," says Christ in the sixth chapter of John's Gospel. It's a remarkable statement. Jesus claims that he is the spiritual food which came down from heaven, sent by his Father. That he is true manna, "not such as your fathers ate and died, he who eats this bread will live forever." 

He, Jesus, is the very food which endures for everlasting life, the fulfillment and embodiment of the Law represented by the 5 loaves of the miracle performed the day before. 

He is the glory of God which passed by Moses, who was hidden by God in a cleft in the rock, and spoke through the unquenchable fire of the burning bush. He is now unveiled, present, incarnate, "and we beheld His glory, a glory as of an only begotten from the Father, full of grace and truth." Glory that's given to us in sacrifice for our atonement on the Cross, "the bread which I shall give for the life of the world is my flesh."

Bread which we receive by faith, “This is the work of God, that you believe in him whom he has sent.” And that's just it. Do we dare to believe, to put our humble, perhaps desperate and fearful faith in the Son of Man who came down from heaven that we might live. To put it another way. Do we labor for earthly food, for bread and power, or for the heavenly food which is the life of God himself? 

Christ faced this temptation in the wilderness and answered Satan, "Man shall not live by bread alone but by every word which proceeds from the mouth of God." He said no to "all the kingdoms of the world and the glories therein," and went to the Cross, which became his throne. He invites us to do the same, "take up your cross," so that we, in him, will have life, divine life.

Of course you might want to choose bread and power instead, thus cunningly marking yourself with the number of the beast. Your call, good luck. But remember, it's all a Big Pharma congressional larf until you wake up and a demon's gnawing on your inner thigh.

God bless,

LSP

St. Michael's Conference, Southwest

recessional

Last week was taken up with St. Michael's Conference, Southwest, which is an unashamedly trad Anglo-Catholic event for young people. Each day's quite long, starting with Morning Prayer and Solemn High Mass, followed by three classes and lunch. After lunch the kids get to play around for several hours before reconvening for Evening Prayer, a talk, then dinner and more activities ending with Compline at 10.30 pm. All make their Confession, many for the first time, and that alone is incredibly moving, to say nothing of the intensity of classical liturgy entered into with great fervour. I'd say it was a life-changing event and I look forward to it year by year.

Hoist it higher, Dr. Keyes

I taught courses on prayer, Lewis' Great Divorce and something called Survey, which is a kind of round up of basic catholic Christian doctrine. I also lead a few discussion groups, which take place after dinner: Do Aliens Get to go to Heaven? was one, and the kids thought they probably did. You will be taken from this place... to be hanged by the neck until you are dead and may God have mercy on your soul. Is capital punishment right? Most children thought it wasn't, interestingly, and Why Communism is Evil. Marx got the thumbs down, especially from the many Latinos who seemed to have an issue with Cuba.

just me and the pygmy pony

Then, seemingly just as things had started, the conference was over. I'd say it's the best thing of its kind in America; there's no English equivalent.

St. Michael, defend us in the day of battle.

LSP