Sunday, February 27, 2022
How the Traditional Latin Mass Reinforces Lent as a Fast

It is lamentable that so few Catholics keep the Traditional Lenten fast as practiced by our forefathers in the Faith for centuries. The Traditional Lenten fast - which was greatly watered down since the 1700s - generally constituted the following:

  • Fasting applies for those age 18 or older (but not obligatory for those 60 years of age or older)
  • Ash Wednesday and Good Friday: If possible, no solid food. Only black coffee, tea, or water.
  • Mondays through Saturdays: Only one meal preferably after sunset or at least until not before 3 PM. A morning frustulum and evening collation (i.e. the two "snacks") are permitted but not required. No meat or animal products are allowed for anyone, regardless of age - that included even fish in the Early Church.
  • Sundays: No meat or animal products allowed. Abstinence remained on Sundays even when fasting did not.
  • Holy Week (except Good Friday which is covered above): Only Bread, Salt, and Herbs are permitted for the main meal. Frustulum and collation permitted (of bread, herbs, and salt) but omitted if possible.
  • Holy Saturday: No food until Noon. Abstinence including from all animal products continues until Easter begins.

While we have happily seen an increase in the number of Traditional Latin Masses offered over the past decade, few Catholics have promoted a return to the fasting that our ancestors knew and practiced religiously. In fact, even the rules in place as of 1962 are substantially harder than what the average Catholic observes today. The laws of fasting and abstinence were as follows, as described in Moral Theology (copyright 1961) by Rev. Heribert Jone and adapted by Rev. Urban Adelman, for the “laws and customs of the United States of America”:

“Complete abstinence is to be observed on all Fridays of the year, Ash Wednesday, the Vigils of Immaculate Conception and Christmas. Partial abstinence is to be observed on Ember Wednesdays and Saturdays and on the Vigil of Pentecost. Days of fast are all the weekdays of Lent, Ember Days, and the Vigil of Pentecost.”

One highly interesting liturgical facet particular to the season of Lent is that every Lenten feria has its own propers. That is, each day of Lent has its own Introit, Collect, Epistle reading, Gospel reading, Offertory verse, Communion verse, and Post Communion Prayer. Lent further adds a prayer over the people immediately after the Post Communion. Dom Gueranger notes:

"Each feria of Lent has a proper Mass; whereas, in Advent, the Mass of the preceding Sunday is repeated during the week. This richness of the lenten liturgy is a powerful means for our entering into the Church's spirit, since she hereby brings before us, under so many forms, the sentiments suited to this holy time... All this will provide us with most solid instruction; and as the selections from the Bible, which are each day brought before us, are not only some of the finest of the sacred volume, but are, moreover, singularly appropriate to Lent, their attentive perusal will be productive of a twofold advantage."

Now the actual text of the Lenten Masses underscores the importance of the Lenten fast and repeatedly refers to the fasting done by the Faithful at this time. The Church in Her liturgy assumes and expects the Faithful in attendance at the Traditional Latin Mass to at least be keeping the fasting rules in place as of 1962 - if not the more robust fasting practiced before the mitigations of the preceding centuries.

The Preface for instance not only underscores the ongoing 40-day bodily fast but also mentions some of the benefits of this healing remedy:

It is truly meet and just, right and for our salvation, that we should at all times and in all places give thanks to Thee, holy Lord, Father almighty, eternal God: Who by this bodily fast dost curb our vices, lift our minds, strength and rewards bestow; through Christ our Lord. Through Whom Angels praise Thy Majesty, Dominations worship, Powers stand in awe. The Heavens and the hosts of heaven with blessed Seraphim unite, exult, and celebrate. And we entreat that Thou wouldst bid our voices too be heard with theirs, singing with lowly praise...

The collect for Ash Wednesday also highlights that day as the beginning of the fast of Lent and not a mere one day fast:

Grant, O Lord, to Thy faithful people, that they may undertake with fitting piety this period of fasting, and complete it with steadfast devotion.

The collect for Friday after Ash Wednesday for instance continues the reference to the Lenten fast:

Further with Thy gracious favor, we beseech Thee, O Lord, the fasts which we have begun: that the bodily observance which we keep, we may be able also to practice with sincere intention. 

And likewise with the collect for Saturday after Ash Wednesday:

O Lord, hearken to our supplications: and grant that we may celebrate with devout service this solemn fast, which Thou hast ordained for the healing both of soul and of body.

In the Mass Propers for the First Sunday of Lent, fasting is referenced in the Epistle while the Gospel reading recounts our Lord's forty days of fasting in the desert. And the collect, while not mentioning fasting, does mention abstinence, as our ancestors regularly kept abstinence even the Sundays of Lent up until the 1800s:

O God, Who dost purify Thy Church by the yearly observance of Lent: grant to Thy household, that what we strive to obtain from Thee by abstinence, we may achieve by good works.

Likewise, in the Divine Office, the ordinary of Lent refers to the bodily fast of Lent. It is a known peculiarity to the traditional Breviary that the ordinary of the Lenten season only begins with First Vespers for the First Sunday in Lent. The first four weekdays of Lent use the ordinary for time throughout the year, a holdover from ancient times before Ash Wednesday was established as the beginning of Lent. 

Starting therefore on the First Sunday of Lent, the prayers of the Breviary further underscore the traditional Lenten fast. In the hymn for Matins for this time, the hymn implores us to keep the Lenten fast. This hymn begins as follows:

The fast, as taught by holy lore, We keep in solemn course once more: The fast to all men known, and bound In forty days of yearly round. 

The law and seers that were of old In diverse ways this Lent foretold, Which Christ, all seasons’ King and Guide, In after ages sanctified. 

More sparing therefore let us make The words we speak, the food we take, Our sleep and mirth, —and closer barred Be every sense in holy guard. 

Avoid the evil thoughts that roll Like waters o’er the heedless soul; Nor let the foe occasion find Our souls in slavery to bind.

The little chapter of Terce taken from Joel 2:12-13 refers to fasting as does the antiphon of Sext: "With the armor of justice let us give ourselves to much patience and fasting." And the same can be seen in the hymn of Vespers which begins as follows:

O kind Creator, bow thine ear 

To mark the cry, to know the tear 

Before thy throne of mercy spent 

In this thy holy fast of Lent.

Turning again to the propers for the Mass, the references to fasting continue repeatedly and include the collect of Monday in the First Week of Lent; the Lesson, Collect, and Gospel for Ember Wednesday in Lent; the collect for Monday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, and Saturday in the Second Week of Lent; the secret prayer for Thursday in the Second Week of Lent; and more. The collect for Friday in the Second Week of Lent for instance prays:

Grant, we beseech Thee, O Almighty God, that cleansed by this holy fast, we may arrive in the right dispositions at the holy feast which is to come.

By the third week of Lent the references continue to refer to the ongoing fast of Lent as expressed for instance in the collect for Monday in the Third Week of Lent:

Pour forth in Thy mercy, O Lord, we beseech Thee, Thy grace into our hearts: that as we abstain from bodily food, so we may also restrain our senses from hurtful excesses.  

The collect two days later on Wednesday asks pardon from God for those who are undertaking "wholesome fasting" who also "abstain from harmful vices."

Abstinence is explicitly mentioned in the collect for Thursday in the First Week of Lent. And temperance - which is strengthened by both fasting and abstinence - is mentioned by name in the collect on Tuesday of the Third Week of Lent. 

The Gradual on Thursday in the Third Week of Lent, which is the exact middle of the Lenten fast, is taken from Psalm 144 and references God providing "meat in due season," which is certainly a reference to the upcoming celebration of the Lord's Resurrection on Easter Sunday when abstinence ends. Hence, by the time Lent reaches its midpoint, the faithful have heard either exhortations or references to fasting in the collects over a dozen times. And it does not end there as the next day's collect on Friday in the Third Week of Lent asks God to "bless our fasts" with His gracious favor as "in body we abstain from food, so we may fast from sin in mind." Similar words occur in the collect for Saturday in the Third Week of Lent.

This is a mere sampling. References to fasting continue. In one more example, the collect for Wednesday in the Fourth Week of Lent prays:

O God, who through fasting grantest to the just the reward of their merits and to sinners forgiveness: have mercy on Thy clients, that confession of our guilt may enable us to obtain pardon for ours sins.

When Passiontide begins on the Fifth Sunday in Lent, the focus in the Breviary and the Mass shifts from the corporal punishment we bear for our sins to an awareness of the suffering we cause our Lord. But even with this focus change, fasting references do not end as seen in the collect for Monday of Passion Week:

Hallow our fasts, we beseech Thee, O Lord: and mercifully grant us the forgiveness of all our faults.

Consequently, the Church in Her Liturgy through both the propers of the Mass and through the Breviary references and expects the Christian faithful to be observing Lenten fasting and abstinence. These repeated references to the Lenten fast unequivocally illustrate how the Lenten fast should be kept by every one of fasting and/or abstinence age who attends the Tridentine Mass. To attend the Traditional Mass and to keep the watered-down, virtually non-existent fast prescribed in the 1983 Code of Canon Law would be schizophrenic. Keep the Traditional Lenten fast and all traditional fasts. 

And for those looking for ideas on what to make to eat on fasting days, the Lenten Cookbook produced by Sophia Institute Press has a section on vegan recipes that is worth checking out.

Read more >>
Wednesday, February 16, 2022
How Catholics Will Stand Up to Big Tech

Guest Post by Kailash, Co-Founder of Fidei

Innovation and Salvation 

The next phase of software products will dramatically enhance the presence of the Catholic Church in our culture. I work in the technology sector and try my best to build innovative technology products. I used to discount the value of this type of work in the light of eternity. What does our work matter if our products are not with us in Heaven? Yes, God wants us to enjoy our work, "find enjoyment in [your] toil — this is the gift of God" (Ecclesiastes 5:19), but we know there is no work in Heaven, "We must work the works of Him who sent me, while it is day; night comes, when no one can work" (John 9:4). How can work and innovation have an important impact if it does not last forever? Recently, I have revisited this question and find myself moving towards the opposite position. Innovation is a critical part of leading souls to salvation and the new frontier of software technology has the power to allow Catholics to create self-sufficiency unlike any time in history and provide a platform for us to reclaim our fallen culture.

Personal Example

I arrived at this position by thinking about my own family history and journey to the Catholic faith. Those of us here in the West, and the United States, in particular, lose track of how social and economic stagnation affects a soul's journey to God. My family is from a region in South India called Tamilnadu. They lived in that region for at least five centuries, likely for many centuries before. There is a city Chennai in this state that holds the martyrdom site of St Thomas the Apostle. A few hundred miles to the south of Chennai in Palayur, Kerala is a church thought to be founded by St Thomas in the year 52AD. Christianity has existed throughout South India from the very start and my family had been exposed to Christianity in some manner for several centuries. Yet none found the true Catholic faith until me. 

My conversion depended on many innovations in order to receive the word of God at the time I was ready. For example, I do not think I could have found the Catholic faith unless I was born in the United States. The innovation of air travel allowed my parents to come to the United States in a palatable manner compared to sea voyages before. I also needed some way to encounter the Catholic faith and learn what its principles and founding implied for my life. The innovation of the internet allowed me to educate myself on the Catholic faith using resources from all over the world and all throughout time precisely when I was ready to know God. The skeptic may reply that I could still have found God without air travel or the internet. While this may be true insofar as God can do anything, the static, pre-industrial society my family lived in for many centuries never worked to draw my ancestors to the Truth. Innovation yielded my salvation.

Innovation Today 

What does the innovation of today mean for the future of the Catholic faith? Much of the innovation produced so far on the internet has centered around content distribution (Google, YouTube, Facebook, etc.). As I mentioned before, it has never been easier for a person to read the writings of the Church Fathers or to research the history of Church doctrine on any given issue. It has never been easier for someone to hear from authority on the Catholic Church than it is now. While St. Augustine had to travel to distant lands to finally encounter St Ambrose and eventually convert, we can encounter Blessed Fulton Sheen on-demand in the comfort and privacy of our home. While St. Monica had to worry about her son's salvation from afar in darkness, parents today can help their children stay close to the Truth over the phone in conversation when needed. These are not trivial matters; innovations have a real and measurable impact on the faith of Catholics today.

The next wave of innovation will go much further than the content channels for evangelization and education that helped lead to my conversion. These changes will allow Catholics to reclaim our culture through self-sufficiency in the digital economy. The Catechism says that "everyone has the right of economic initiative [and] everyone should make legitimate use of his talents to contribute to the abundance that will benefit all and to harvest the just fruits of his labor" (CCC 2429). For most Catholics in the United States, pursuing economic initiative means using internet-enabled software products. Until recently, this, unfortunately, meant we had to use software products provided by companies whose values were not only anathema to our own but who actively worked to undermine Christian culture. Today, however, this need no longer be the case. There have been developments in technology such as the decreasing cost of cloud computing and the maturation of open-source software that enable Catholics to break our reliance on Big Tech and finally be in business for ourselves in the digital world. 

We are entering a world where our right to economic initiative will include choosing explicitly Catholic companies to provide our basic internet services to communicate and transact online. Just like how generations ago we might choose to patronize a local Catholic baker, today in the Internet age we can choose to utilize a Catholic software provider. This will give consumers the power to use technology products without having to weigh moral compromises and disagreements with the company providing the product they use. No longer will Catholics inconvenience themselves and hide their true beliefs as an artifact of the culture Big Tech has created online and the knowledge these corporations have over our personal preferences and whereabouts. This new world of technology will end our legitimate fears of losing our job or making enemies with large corporations who hold all our personal data.

Instead, self-sufficiency among Catholics will create a platform for us to boldly evangelize in our fallen society. We will move from simply being “tolerated” to “in command” of expressing ourselves. Economic self-sufficiency points to the Benedict Option where Christian people "build intentional communities of counter-cultural witness." The point of self-sufficiency extends beyond providing means for Catholic people to exist in an insular society. Self-sufficiency will allow us to take risks and extend deeper into the darkness of our world that has forgotten about God.

This new phase of innovation will allow us to be leaven to the bread of the world and confidently fight for God for the salvation of all of mankind. Self-sufficiency in the digital world will provide a new foundation to take risks for God because it allows us to live intentionally together as counter-cultural Christians no matter how far away we are from each other. New software will furnish the ability for Catholics to live, communicate, bank, and transact online without moral compromise, without exposure to the great evils found on the Internet today, and without wondering what enemies they will make along the way. These changes will provide the platform for Catholics to boldly evangelize in our fallen culture. Find out how we are starting this trend starting with email at Fidei.

Read more >>
Sunday, February 13, 2022
History of Lenten Fasting: How to Observe the Traditional Lenten Fast

The Purpose of Fasting

In principio, in the beginning, the very first Commandment of God  to Adam and Eve was one of fasting from the fruit of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil (cf. Genesis 2:16-17), and their failure to fast brought sin and disorder to all of creation. The second sin of mankind was gluttony. Both are intricately tied to fasting.

Both Elijah and Moses fasted for forty days in the Old Testament before seeing God. Until the Great Flood, man abstained entirely from the flesh meat of animals (cf. Genesis 9:2-3). Likewise, in the New Testament, St. John the Baptist, the greatest prophet (cf. Luke 7:28) fasted and his followers were characterized by their fasting. And our Blessed Lord also fasted for forty days (cf. Matthew 4:1-11) not for His own needs but to serve as an example for us. Our Redeemer said, “Unless you shall do penance, you shall all likewise perish” (Luke 13:3). Fasting and abstinence from certain foods characterized the lives of man since the foundation of the world.

The Church has hallowed the practice of fasting, encourages it, and mandates it at certain times. Why? The Angelic Doctor writes that fasting is practiced for a threefold purpose: 

“First, in order to bridle the lusts of the flesh…Secondly, we have recourse to fasting in order that the mind may arise more freely to the contemplation of heavenly things: hence it is related of Daniel that he received a revelation from God after fasting for three weeks. Thirdly, in order to satisfy for sins: wherefore it is written: ‘Be converted to Me with all your heart, in fasting and in weeping and in mourning.’ The same is declared by Augustine in a sermon: ‘Fasting cleanses the soul, raises the mind, subjects one's flesh to the spirit, renders the heart contrite and humble, scatters the clouds of concupiscence, quenches the fire of lust, kindles the true light of chastity.’”  

St. Basil the Great also affirmed the importance of fasting for protection against demonic forces: “The fast is the weapon of protection against demons. Our Guardian Angels more really stay with those who have cleansed our souls through fasting.”

The Baltimore Catechism echoes these sentiments: “The Church commands us to fast and abstain, in order that we may mortify our passions and satisfy for our sins” (Baltimore Catechism #2 Q. 395). Concerning this rationale, Fr. Thomas Kinkead in “An Explanation Of The Baltimore Catechism of Christian Doctrine” published in 1891 writes, “Remember it is our bodies that generally lead us into sin; if therefore we punish the body by fasting and mortification, we atone for the sin, and thus God wipes out a part of the temporal punishment due to it.” 

Pope St. Leo the Great in 461 wisely counseled that fasting is a means and not an end in itself. For those who could not observe the strictness of fasting, he sensibly said, "What we forego by fasting is to be given as alms to the poor.”  To simply forgo fasting completely, even when for legitimate health reasons, does not excuse a person from the universal command to do penance (cf. Luke 13:3).

The Lenten Fast in the Early Church

The great liturgical Dom Gueranger writes that the fast which precedes Easter originated with the Apostles themselves:

“The forty days' fast, which we call Lent, is the Church's preparation for Easter, and was instituted at the very commencement of Christianity. Our blessed Lord Himself sanctioned it by fasting forty days and forty nights in the desert; and though He would not impose it on the world by an express commandment (which, in that case, could not have been open to the power of dispensation), yet He showed plainly enough, by His own example, that fasting, which God had so frequently ordered in the old Law, was to be also practiced by the children of the new…The apostles, therefore, legislated for our weakness, by instituting, at the very commencement of the Christian Church, that the solemnity of Easter should be preceded by a universal fast...”

The Catechism of the Liturgy by a Religious of the Sacred Heart published by The Paulist Press, New York, 1919 affirms the apostolic origin of the Lenten fast: “The Lenten fast dates back to Apostolic times as is attested by Saint Jerome, Saint Leo the Great, Saint Cyril of Alexandria and others.” In the 2nd century, St. Irenaeus wrote to Pope St. Victor I inquiring on how Easter should be celebrated, while mentioning the practice of fasting leading up to Easter.

Initially, the Lenten fast was practiced by catechumens preparing for their Baptism with a universal fast for all the faithful observed only during Holy Week, in addition to the weekly fasts that were devotionally practiced. But early on, the baptized Christians began to join the catechumens in fasting on the days immediately preceding Easter.  The duration of the fast varied with some churches observing one day, others several days, and yet others observing intensive 40-hour fasting, in honor of the forty hours that the Lord spent in the sepulcher. By the third and fourth centuries, the fast became forty days in most places. St. Athanasius, in 339 AD, referred to the Lenten fast as a forty-day fast that “the whole world” observed. 

Heortology: A History of the Christian Festivals from their Origin to the Present Day by Dr. K.A. Heinrich Kellner states the following regarding the Lenten fast in the ancient Church, noting the strictness that intensified in Holy Week and even more so on Good Friday and Holy Saturday:

"Among Catholics also abstinence was pushed to great lengths. The canons of Hippolytus prescribe for Holy Week only bread and salt. The Apostolic Constitutions will only permit bread, vegetables, salt and water, in Lent, flesh and wine being forbidden; and, on the last two days of Holy Week, nothing whatsoever is to be eaten. The ascetics, whose acquaintance the Gallic pilgrim made in Jerusalem, never touched bread in Lent, but lived on flour and water. Only a few could keep so strict a fast, and generally speaking people were satisfied with abstaining from flesh and wine. But this lasted throughout the entire Lent, and Chrysostom tells us that in Antioch no flesh was eaten during the whole of Lent. Abstinence from milk and eggs (the so-called lacticinia) was also the general rule."

Shortly after the legislation of Christianity in the Roman Empire, the bishops at the Council of Nicea in 325 AD fixed the date of Easter as the first Sunday after the first full moon after the vernal equinox. The canons emerging from that council also referenced a 40-day Lenten season of fasting.

To the Early Christians, fasting was performed until sundown, in imitation of the previous Jewish tradition. Dom Gueranger’s writings affirm, “It was the custom with the Jews, in the Old Law, not to take the one meal, allowed on fasting days, till sun-set. The Christian Church adopted the same custom. It was scrupulously practiced, for many centuries, even in our Western countries. But, about the 9th century, some relaxation began to be introduced in the Latin Church.”

And notably in the early Church, fasting also included abstinence from wine, taking man back to the same diet that mankind practiced before God permitted Noah to eat meat and drink wine. As such, in apostolic times, the main meal was a small one, mainly of bread and vegetables. Fish, but not shellfish, became permitted on days of abstinence around the 6th century. Hence, some Eastern Rite Catholics will abstain from meat, animal products, wine, oil, and fish on fasting days which harkens back to these ancient times.

Remarkably, even water was forbidden during fasting times in the very ancient church. Fr. Alban Butler, in Moveable Feasts and Fasts, provides testimony of this when he writes: "St. Fructuosus, the holy bishop of Tarragon in Spain, in the persecution of Valerian in 259, being led to martyrdom on a Friday at ten o'clock in the morning, refused to drink, because it was not the hour to break the fast of the day, though fatigued with imprisonment, and standing in need of strength to sustain the conflict of his last agony. 'It is a fast,' said he: 'I refuse to drink; it is not yet the ninth hour; death itself shall not oblige me to abridge my fast.'"

The Lenten Fast in the Early Middle Ages

The Lenten fast began under the Apostles themselves and was practiced in various forms in the Early Church. As time went on, the fast became uniformly observed under pain of sin. 

St. Augustine in the fourth century remarked, “Our fast at any other time is voluntary; but during Lent, we sin if we do not fast.” At the time of St. Gregory the Great at the beginning of the 7th century, the fast was universally established to begin on what we know as Ash Wednesday. While the name "Ash Wednesday" was not given to the day until Pope Urban II in 1099, the day was known as the “Beginning of the Fast.” 

In 604, in a letter to St. Augustine of Canterbury, Pope St. Gregory the Great announced the form that abstinence would take on fast days. This form would last for almost a thousand years: "We abstain from flesh meat and from all things that come from flesh, as milk, cheese, and eggs."  When fasting was observed, abstinence was likewise always observed.

Regarding Holy Saturday's fast in particular, Canon 89 of the Council in Trullo in 692 AD provides an account of the piety and devotion of the faithful of that time: “The faithful, spending the days of the Salutatory Passion in fasting, praying and compunction of heart, ought to fast until the midnight of the Great Sabbath: since the divine Evangelists, Matthew and Luke, have shewn us how late at night it was [that the resurrection took place].” That tradition of fasting on Holy Saturday until midnight would last for centuries.

Historical records further indicate that Lent was not a merely regional practice observed only in Rome. It was part of the universality of the Church. Lenten fasting began in England, for instance, sometime during the reign of Earconberht, the king of Kent, who was converted by the missionary work of St. Augustine of Canterbury in England. During the Middle Ages, fasting in England, and many other then-Catholic nations, was required both by Church law and the civil law. Catholic missionaries brought fasting, which is an integral part of the Faith, to every land they visited.

The Lenten fast included fasting from all lacticinia (Latin for milk products) which included butter, cheese, eggs, and animal products. And this abstinence was practiced even on the Sundays of Lent. From this tradition, Easter Eggs were introduced, and therefore the Tuesday before Ash Wednesday is when pancakes are traditionally eaten to use leftover lacticinia. And similarly, Fat Tuesday is known as Carnival, coming from the Latin words carne levare – literally the farewell to meat.


Collations Are Introduced on Fasting Days in the 8th Century

The rules on fasting remained largely the same for hundreds of years. Food was to be taken once a day after sunset. After the meal, the fast resumed and was terminated only after the sun had once again set on the horizon. But relaxations were to soon begin. 

By the eighth century, the time for the daily meal was moved to the time that the monks would pray the Office of None in the Divine Office. This office takes place around 3 o'clock in the afternoon. As a consequence of moving the meal up in the day, the practice of a collation was introduced. The well-researched Father Francis Xavier Weiser summarizes this major change with fasting:

"It was not until the ninth century, however, that less rigid laws of fasting were introduced. It came about in 817 when the monks of the Benedictine order, who did much labor in the fields and on the farms, were allowed to take a little drink with a morsel of bread in the evening...Eventually the Church extended the new laws to the laity as well, and by the end of the medieval times they had become universal practice; everybody ate a little evening meal in addition to the main meal at noon." 

The Lenten Fast in the High Middle Ages

Through the writings of St. Thomas Aquinas, we can learn how Lent was practiced in his own time and attempt to willingly observe such practices in our own lives. The Lenten fast as mentioned by St. Thomas Aquinas constituted of the following: 
  • Monday through Saturday were days of fasting. The meal was taken at 3 PM and a collation was allowed at night.
  • All meat or animal products were prohibited throughout Lent.
  • Abstinence from these foods remained even on Sundays of Lent, though fasting was not practiced on Sundays. 
  • No food was to be eaten at all on either Ash Wednesday or Good Friday, if possible.
  • Holy Week was a more intense fast that consisted only of bread, salt, water, and herbs. 
The Lenten Fast in the Renissance

By the fourteenth century, the meal had begun to move up steadily until it began to take place even at 12 o’clock. The change became so common it became part of the Church’s discipline. In one interesting but often unknown fact, because the monks would pray the liturgical hour of None before they would eat their meal, the custom of called midday by the name “noon” entered into our vocabulary as a result of the fast. With the meal moved up, the evening collation remained.

In the Middle Ages, abstinence from meat on Fridays and during Lent was not only Church law – it was civil law as well. And people gladly obeyed these laws out of respect for the teaching authority of the Church. Yet after the Protestant revolt which began in 1517 and continued through the middle of the 1600s, this was to change.

English Royalty proclamations, even after Henry VIII's illegal separation from the Church, supporting abstinence of meat continued to occur in England in 1563, 1619, 1625, 1627, and 1631. The same likewise occurred in 1687 under King James II. After the Revolution in 1688 and the overthrow of Catholicism by William III and Mary II, the laws were no longer enforced and officially removed from the law books by the Statue Law Revision Act in 1863. Similar changes occurred throughout Europe as Protestants reviled the fast. 

But changes continued even in Catholic nations. St. Epiphanius (367 - 403 AD), the bishop of Salamis at the end of the 4th century, wrote that "Wednesday and Friday are days of fasting up to the ninth hour because, as Wednesday began the Lord was arrested and on Friday he was crucified." Wednesday abstinence persisted for centuries. In Ireland for instance the use of meat on all Wednesdays of the year was prohibited until around the middle of the 17th century. This harkened back to the vestige of those earlier times when Wednesdays were days of weekly fasting as Father Slater notes in “A Short History of Moral Theology” published in 1909:

"The obligation of fasting on all Wednesdays and Fridays ceased almost entirely about the tenth century, but the fixing of those days by ecclesiastical authority for fasting, and the desire to substitute a Christian observance at Rome for certain pagan rites celebrated in connection with the seasons of the year, seem to have given rise to our Ember Days…About the tenth century the obligation of the Friday fast was reduced to one of abstinence from flesh meat, and the Wednesday fast after being similarly mitigated gradually disappeared altogether."

The Lenten Fast Begins Deteriorating in the 1700s

Some of the most significant changes to fasting would occur under the reign of Pope Benedict XIV who reigned from 1740 – 1758. 

On May 31, 1741, Pope Benedict XIV issued Non Ambiginius which granted permission to eat meat on fasting days while explicitly forbidding the consumption of both fish and flesh meat at the same meal on all fasting days during the year in addition to the Sundays during Lent. Beforehand, the forty days of Lent were held as days of complete abstinence from meat. The concept of partial abstinence was born even though the term would not appear until the 1917 Code of Canon Law. Yet even with these changes, Pope Benedict XIV implored the faithful to return to the devotion of earlier eras:

"The observance of Lent is the very badge of the Christian warfare. By it we prove ourselves not to be enemies of the cross of Christ. By it we avert the scourges of divine justice. By it we gain strength against the princes of darkness, for it shields us with heavenly help. Should mankind grow remiss in their observance of Lent, it would be a detriment to God's glory, a disgrace to the Catholic religion, and a danger to Christian souls. Neither can it be doubted that such negligence would become the source of misery to the world, of public calamity, and of private woe." 

Yet changes continued during the 18th and 19th centuries as Antoine Villien's "History of the Commandments" from 1915 documents:

The use of meat on Sundays [of Lent] was at first tolerated, then expressly permitted, for the greater part of Lent. Old people still remember the time when its use was completely forbidden in France from the Friday of Passion week to Easter. Later, new dispensations allowed the gradual extension of the Sunday privilege to Tuesday and Thursday of each week, up to Thursday before Palm Sunday. About the beginning of the pontification of Pius IX [c. 1846], Monday was added to the days on which abstinence need not be observed; a few years later the use of meat on those four days began to be permitted up to Wednesday of Holy Week. Lastly the Saturdays, expect Ember Saturday and Holy Saturday, were included in the dispensations."

Mitigations to fasting also began to accelerate for other periods in the 18th and 19th centuries and this is seen strikingly in the series of changes to occur to fasting in the American Colonies which can be read in detail in the two-part series: A History of Holy Days of Obligation & Fasting for American Catholics.

Father Anthony Ruff relates in his article "Fasting and Abstinence: The Story" the changes made by Pope Leo XIII in the document entitled Indultum quadragesimale:

"In 1886 Leo XIII allowed meat, eggs, and milk products on Sundays of Lent and at the main meal on every weekday [of Lent] except Wednesday and Friday in the [United States]. Holy Saturday was not included in the dispensation. A small piece of bread was permitted in the morning with coffee, tea, chocolate, or a similar beverage."

While the evening collation had been widespread since the 14th century, the practice of an additional morning snack (i.e. a frustulum) was introduced only around the 18th century as part of the gradual relaxation of discipline. Volume 12 of The Jurist, published by the Catholic University of America in 1952, writes, "It is stated that the two-ounce breakfast arose at the time of St. Alphonsus, since which time the usage of the popular two and eight-ounce standards for the breakfast and the collation, respectively, has been extant." 

Mara Morrow in Sin in the Sixties elaborates on the concessions given by Pope Leo XIII which in the late 19th century expanded the practice of the frustulum and further reduced strict abstinence:

"It also allowed for the use of eggs and milk products at the evening collation daily during Lent and at the principal meal when meat was not allowed. [It] further allowed a small piece of bread in the morning with a beverage, the possibility of taking the principal meal at noon or in the evening, and the use of lard and meat drippings in the preparation of foods. Those exempt from the law of fasting were permitted to eat meat, eggs, and milk more than once a day." 

Consequently, the Baltimore Manual published by the Third Plenary Council of Baltimore in 1884 states: "Only one full meal is allowed, to be taken about noon or later. Besides this full meal, a collation of eight ounces is allowed. If the full meal is taken about the middle of the day, the collation will naturally be taken in the evening; if the full meal is taken late in the day, the collation may be taken at noon. Besides the full meal and collation, the general custom has made it lawful to take up to two ounces of bread (without butter) and a cup of some warm liquid - as coffee or tea - in the morning. This is important to observe, for by means of this many persons are enabled - and therefore obliged - the keep the fast who could not otherwise do so."

The Catechism of Father Patrick Powers published in Ireland in 1905 mentions that abstinence includes flesh meat and "anything produced from animals, as milk, butter, cheese, eggs." However, Father Patrick notes, "In some countries, however, milk is allowed at collation." The United States was one of those nations whereas Ireland and others were not granted such dispensations. The use of eggs and milk during Lent was to drastically change in a few years with the 1917 Code of Canon Law.

In 1895, the workingmen's privilege gave bishops in the United States the ability to permit meat in some circumstances. Mara Morrow summarizes that these circumstances occurred when there was "difficulty in observing the common law of abstinence, excluding Fridays, Ash Wednesday, Holy Week, and the Vigil of Christmas. This workingmen's privilege (or indult) allowed only for meat once a day during Lent, taken at the principal meal, and never taken in conjunction with fish. This particular indult was extended not only to the laborer but to his family, as well. The motivation of such an indult was no doubt to allow for enough sustenance such that the many Catholic immigrants to the United States who worked as manual laborers could perform their difficult, energy-demanding physical work without danger to their health" (Sin in the Sixties).


The Remnant of the Lenten Fast Left by the 20th Century

The Catholic Encyclopedia from 1909 in describing that fast immediately before the changes to occur under St. Pius X enumerates them as follows: "In the United States of America all the days of Lent; the Fridays of Advent (generally); the Ember Days; the vigils of Christmas and Pentecost, as well as those (14 Aug.) of the Assumption; (31 Oct.) of All Saints, are now fasting days. In Great Britain, Ireland, Australia, and Canada, the days just indicated, together with the Wednesdays of Advent and (28 June) the vigil of Saints Peter and Paul, are fasting days." 

The days of obligatory fasting as listed in the 1917 Code of Canon Law were the forty days of Lent (including Ash Wednesday, Good Friday, and Holy Saturday until noon); the Ember Days; and the Vigils of Pentecost, the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary, All Saints, and Christmas. Partial abstinence, the eating of meat only at the principal meal, was obligatory on all weeks of Lent (Monday through Thursday). And of course, complete abstinence was required on all Fridays, including Fridays of Lent, except when a holy day of obligation fell on a Friday outside of Lent. Saturdays in Lent were likewise days of complete abstinence. Fasting and abstinence were not observed should a vigil fall on a Sunday as stated in the code: "If a vigil that is a fast day falls on a Sunday the fast is not to be anticipated on Saturday, but is dropped altogether that year." Eggs and milk (i.e. lacticinia) became universally permitted.

But additional changes quickly ensued. Mara Morrow, writing on the fasting days around this time, states, "In 1917 Pope Benedict XV granted the faithful of countries in World War I the privilege of transferring Saturday Lenten abstinence to any other day of the week, excepting Friday and Ash Wednesday. In 1919 Cardinal Gibbons was granted his request of transferring Saturday Lenten abstinence to Wednesday for all bishops’ dioceses in the U.S. This permission, as well as the workingmen’s privilege, were frequently renewed, but, after 1931, this permission was only on the basis of personal requests from individual bishops."

Pope Pius XII accelerated the changes to fasting and abstinence as Father Ruff relates: "In 1941 Pope Pius XII allowed bishops worldwide to dispense entirely from fast and abstinence except on Ash Wednesday and Good Friday, provided that there was abstinence from meat every Friday, and fast and abstinence on these two days and the vigil of the Assumption and Christmas. Eggs and milk products were permitted at breakfast and in the evening." And effective in 1956 per the decree in Maxima Redemptionis Nostrae Mysteria, Holy Saturday's fast and abstinence were extended from noon to midnight.

By 1962, the laws of fasting and abstinence were as follows as described in "Moral Theology" by Rev. Heribert Jone and adapted by Rev. Urban Adelman for the "laws and customs of the United States of America" copyright 1961: 

"Complete abstinence is to be observed on all Fridays of the year, Ash Wednesday, the Vigils of Immaculate Conception and Christmas. Partial abstinence is to be observed on Ember Wednesdays and Saturdays and on the Vigil of Pentecost. Days of fast are all the weekdays of Lent, Ember Days, and the Vigil of Pentecost." If a vigil falls on a Sunday, the law of abstinence and fasting is dispensed that year and is not transferred to the preceding day. 

Thus, even before the Second Vatican Council opened, the fasting customs were drastically reduced within only a few hundred years. 


The Lenten Fast Virtually Eliminated Post Vatican II

Shortly after the close of the Second Vatican Council, Paul VI an apostolic constitution on fasting and abstaining on February 17, 1966, called Paenitemini, whose principles were later incorporated into the 1983 Code of Canon Law. Paenitemini allowed the commutation of the Friday abstinence to an act of penance at the discretion of the local ordinaries and gave authority to the episcopal conferences on how the universal rules would be applied in their region. Abstinence which previously began at age 7 was modified to begin at age 14. Additionally, the obligation of fasting on the Ember Days and on the remaining Vigils was abolished. Paenitemini maintained the traditional practice that "abstinence is to be observed on every Friday which does not fall on a day of obligation."

The NCCB issued a statement on November 18, 1966. Abstinence was made obligatory on all Fridays of Lent, except Solemnities (i.e. First Class Feasts), on Ash Wednesday, and on Good Friday. Abstinence on all Fridays throughout the year was "especially recommended," and the faithful who did choose to eat meat were directed to perform an alternative penance on those Fridays outside of Lent, even though the US Bishops removed the long-establish precept of requiring Friday penance. The document stated in part: "Even though we hereby terminate the traditional law of abstinence binding under pain of sin, as the sole prescribed means of observing Friday, we ... hope that the Catholic community will ordinarily continue to abstain from meat by free choice as formerly we did in obedience to church law." And finally, fasting on all weekdays of Lent was "strongly recommended" but not made obligatory under penalty of sin.

The 1983 Code of Canon Law largely took Paul VI's apostolic constitution aside from the modification of the age at which fasting binds. Per the 1983 Code of Canon Law, the age of fast was changed to begin at 18 - previously it was 21 - and to still conclude at midnight when an individual completes his 59th birthday. Friday penance is required per these laws on all Fridays of the year except on Solemnities, a dramatic change from the previous exception being only on Holy Days of Obligation.

Per the 1983 Code of Canon Law, fasting and complete abstinence per these rules are required only on Ash Wednesday and Good Friday. The notion of "partial abstinence," introduced under Pope Benedict XIV in 1741, was also removed along with nearly all fast days. 

So What Should Traditional Catholics Do To Restore the Lenten Fast?

While no authority in the Church may change or alter any established dogmas of the Faith, the discipline of both Holy Days of Obligation and fast days may change. The days of obligation and the days of penance are matters of discipline, not matters of dogma. Lawful authorities in the Church do have the power to change these practices.

In the observance of the two precepts, namely attending Holy Mass on prescribed days and fasting and abstaining on commanded days, we obey them because the Church has the power by Christ to command such things. We do not abstain from meat on Fridays for instance because the meat is unclean or evil. It is the act of disobedience that is evil. As Fr. Michael Müller remarks in his Familiar Explanation of Christian Doctrine from 1874: "It is not the food, but the disobedience that defiles a man." To eat meat on a forbidden day unintentionally, for instance, is no sin. As the Scriptures affirm it is not what goes into one's mouth that defiles a man but that disobedience which comes from the soul (cf. Matthew 15:11).

Yet, even with such a distinction, the Church has historically been wise to change disciplines only very slowly and carefully. As Archbishop Fulton J. Sheen once remarked, "It is a long-established principle of the Church never to completely drop from her public worship any ceremony, object or prayer which once occupied a place in that worship." The same may be said for matters concerning either Holy Days of Obligation or fast days. What our forefathers held sacred should remain sacred to us in an effort to preserve our catholicity not only with ourselves but with our ancestors who see God now in Heaven.

St. Francis de Sales remarked in the 16th / early 17th century, “If you’re able to fast, you will do well to observe some days beyond what are ordered by the Church.” 

This Lent, I propose for Traditional Catholics the following Lenten fasting plan:
  • Fasting applies for those age 18 or older (but not obligatory for those 60 years of age or older)
  • Ash Wednesday and Good Friday: No solid food. Only black coffee, tea, or water.
  • Mondays through Saturdays: Only one meal preferably after sunset. A morning frustulum and evening collation are permitted but not required. No meat or animal products are allowed for anyone, regardless of age - that includes fish. No olive oil.
  • Sundays: No meat or animal products allowed except on Laetare Sunday. Exceptions for Palm Sunday are mentioned below.
  • Annunciation Day (March 25) and Palm Sunday: Fish and olive oil permitted.
  • Holy Week (except Good Friday): Only Bread, Salt, and Herbs are permitted for the main meal. Frustulum and collation permitted (of bread, herbs, and salt) but omitted if possible
  • Holy Saturday: No food until Noon. Abstinence including from all animal products continues until Easter begins.
And for those looking for ideas on what to make to eat on fasting days, the Lenten Cookbook produced by Sophia Institute Press has a section on vegan recipes that is worth checking out.

Want to learn more about the history of fasting and abstinence? Check out the Definitive Guide to Catholic Fasting and Abstinence.
Read more >>
Saturday, February 5, 2022
List of Diocesan Patron Saints for Every Diocese in the United States

Who are the patron saints for your Diocese? Do you know if your Diocese has secondary patrons in addition to your primary patron? Did you know that your Diocese's patron saint might not be the same as the Cathedral's titular patron? I was disappointed to find no list online of the various patron saints for each of the Roman Catholic Dioceses in the United States. Since the feastdays of these patrons should be kept as first-class feasts in each diocese, they are important to honor in our prayers at Mass and in the Divine Office in the local churches. In fact, the primary patron saint for each diocese would have been a Holy Day of Obligation up until the time of St. Pius X's changes in 1911. As a result, I sought to create such a list.

The following list details the principal patrons, secondary patrons, and titular patrons for each Diocese. Unfortunately, not all dioceses listed a patron. Some records on sites like GCatholic.org were inaccurate. I have attempted to list patrons in the respective categories only if the Diocese's website or historical records mentioned the patron. Unfortunately, there is certainly the possibility of some error, so if you see anything questionable, please contact me to research. I thank those who offered assistance during this research.

It is my hope that through this project Catholics will better honor their diocesan patron(s) by praying the Divine Office in a festive manner on their feastday(s) and hearing Holy Mass on these days. For those who travel often, this list can be a helpful reference for the feastdays of other American Dioceses.

May Our Lord, Our Lady, and all of these holy patrons bring about a resurgence of Christendom and Tradition which always included the proper honoring of Diocesan patrons as well as the honoring of the anniversary of the Diocesan Cathedral.

Download the List by Clicking Here

What is the Difference Between a Patronal Feastday and a Titular Feast?

At other times, in order to show special devotion to some mystery, or to some manifestation of God's love, the church receives a name that will keep that mystery or mark of love always before the people of the parish. Thus churches are sometimes called after the Holy Trinity, the Precious Blood, the Assumption, or, as in our own case here, the church of the Sacred Heart. 

The intention in so naming churches is, in the case of a saint, that the people should have special love for that saint; that they should place themselves under his protection, and, by the study and imitation of his life, make themselves worthy of his intercession before God. That saint, in whose honor the church is named, becomes the patron saint of the place, and his feast is called the patronal feast. But when a church is named in honor of some mystery or mark of divine love or divine object, the people are supposed to have great veneration and love for the mystery, mark or object commemorated by the church's name: and the name of the mystery, mark, or object is called the title of the church, and when the anniversary of the feast comes around, it is called the titular feast.

Source: The Sacred Heart Review published on June 29, 1889

Read more >>
Monday, January 31, 2022
Candlemas: A Forgotten Holy Day of Obligation

Dominican Rite Solemn High Mass for Candlemas in 2019

Fasting on the Vigil of Candlemas

While not a liturgical vigil in the Roman Rite, the day before Candlemas historically was observed by some as a day of fasting and abstinence. For instance, our ancestors in the New World in Florida and Louisiana would have known the following days of fast

"The fasting days were all days in Lent; the Ember days; the of eves of Christmas, Candlemas, Annunciation, Assumption, All Saints, the feasts of the Apostles except St Philip and St James and St John, nativity of St John the Baptist; all Fridays except within twelve days of Christmas and between Easter and Ascension, and the eve of Ascension" (ACQ). 

Hearing Holy Mass on Candlemas

Candlemas, known formally as the Purification of the Most Blessed Virgin Mary, always falls on February 2nd and it was kept in some places as a Holy Day of Obligation, though that practice has long since ended. For instance, the papal bull Altitudo Divini Concilii of Pope Paul III in 1537 reduced the days of penance and those of hearing Mass for the Indians out of pastoral concern due to the physically demanding lifestyle that they lived and also largely due to the fact that they fasted so much already. The natives were required to only hear Mass on a much smaller number of days: Sundays, Christmas, Circumcision, Epiphany, Candlemas, Annunciation, Sts Peter and Paul, Ascension, Corpus Christi, the Assumption, and the Nativity of the Blessed Virgin.

We see this reflected in Canada as well under the Diocese of Quebec which, at the time, included some of the modern-day states in the Midwest. The American Catholic Quarterly Review lists the Holy Days in place as 1694:

"The holy days of obligation as recognized officially in 1694 were Christmas, St Stephen, St John, the Evangelist, Circumcision, Epiphany, Candlemas, St Matthew, St Joseph 'patron of the country', Annunciation, St Philip and St James, St John the Baptist, St Peter and St Paul, St James, St Anne, St Lawrence, Assumption, St Bartholomew, St Louis 'titular of the Cathedral of Quebec', Nativity of the Blessed Virgin, St Matthew, St Michael, St Simon and St Jude, All Saints, St Andrew, St Francis Xavier, the Conception of the Blessed Virgin 'titular the Cathedral', St Thomas, Easter Monday and Tuesday, Ascension, Whitsun Monday and Tuesday, Corpus Christi, and the patronal feast of each parish."

In 1750, Pope Benedict XIV extended to the Spanish American colonies the indult previously granted to Catholic Spain reducing the days of obligation to all Sundays of the year, Christmas, St. Stephen, the Circumcision, Epiphany, Candlemas, Easter Monday, Annunciation, Monday after Pentecost Sunday, Corpus Christi, Ascension, St. John the Baptist, Sts. Peter and Paul, the Assumption, St. James, the Nativity of the Blessed Virgin Mary, All Saints, the Conception of the Blessed Virgin Mary, and the patron of each locality. Notice that Candlemas remained.

And the Catholics of the British Isles and colonies would have observed the following days as per The American Catholic Quarterly Review:

"The Catholics of the British Isles, after the reform of Pope Urban VIII kept as obligatory: Christmas, the feasts of St Stephen, St John, Holy Innocents, and St Sylvester, Circumcision, Epiphany, Candlemas, the feasts of St Mathias and St Joseph, Annunciation, Sts Philip and James, Finding of the Holy Cross, St John the Baptist, Sts Peter and Paul, St James, St Anne, St Lawrence, the Assumption, St Bartholomew, the Nativity of the Blessed Virgin, St Matthew, St Michael, Sts Simon and Jude, All Saints, St Andrew and St Thomas, and one of the principal patrons of the city, province, or kingdom. These were the holydays of obligation observed by the Catholics in Maryland, Virginia, and Pennsylvania."

Candlemas remained a Holy Day of Obligation in the British Isles and her colonies until the dispensation issued by Pope Pius VI on March 9, 1777, which eliminated Candlemas and a number of other days.

However, looking at our ancestors in the faith, we see both the importance of preparing for Candlemas and its importance. We may wish to observe February 1st as a day of fasting and abstinence and attend the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass on February 2nd.

Read more >>
Sunday, January 23, 2022
Choosing Music for a Tridentine Requiem Mass

Some years ago I wrote a short article entitled "Choosing Music for a Tridentine Nuptial Mass." As a follow-up, I thought it worthwhile to consider some particulars on choosing music for a Tridentine Requiem (Funeral) Mass. First though a few key points:

  1. Make sure you explicitly state in your will that you desire to have a Tridentine Requiem Mass and should not be given a Novus Ordo funeral for any reason. Use those words: "for any reason." For practical purposes, list the parishes or chapels you attend that could offer this and which you would find acceptable (e.g. a reverent priest who will pray for your soul, ample parking for those attending, driving distance not too drastic for people, distance not excessive from the funeral plot where you will be buried, etc).
  2. Make it clear in your will that you are only to be buried and not cremated. Again state "for any reason." We know that cremation is not permitted for Catholics, despite what modern clergymen are prone to say.
  3. Most importantly, appoint an executor for your will that you know will see to your final wishes. Even if you state that you wish to have a traditional Requiem Mass and be buried, it is possible for the executor to deny your wishes and have you cremated with no funeral. Appoint an executor who will undoubtedly see to the completion of your wishes. 

As to choosing the music to help your executor and the priest when it comes to your funeral, there is thankfully little that needs to be done. Most of the music is already mapped out for you.  There is an Ordinary proper to the Requiem and the Propers themselves leave little room for other musical selections.  At best, you can select Communion music since the Proper is relatively short.  

"Help, Lord, the Souls Which Thou Hast Made" is always a good choice, as it is about Purgatory.  "My Shepherd Will Supply My Need" arr. by Virgil Thomson is a lovely setting of Psalm 23.  There is some flexibility with the procession out of the church as well.  The prescribed chant is "In Paradisum", which could be chanted or sung polyphonically or chorally. 

You may find these PDFs from the Institute of Christ the King very helpful as well.  The first is the burial service.  Typically there is no procession to the church, so you will want to start with the "Subvenite" as the processional piece and then proceed from there.  The second is the Ordinary and Propers for the Mass.  

Lastly, consider putting in your will a request for Gregorian Masses to be said immediately after your death. Indicate where and how to order them (here are some helpful links) and state the approximate cost of each. Other traditional orders beyond that list do offer Gregorian Masses and accept the stipend in the mail. Orders like the Traditional Carmelites in Clear Creek come to mind as doing so.

Many thanks to a long-time friend, Daniel, for his invaluable contributions here.

Read more >>
Tuesday, January 18, 2022
Can A Valid Novus Ordo Mass Offend God? Are We Obligated to Attend It?

The Angelic Doctor goes on to summarize two ways in which worship directed to the True God is nevertheless evil. As to the first reason, St. Thomas Aquinas illustrates by way of example: “…in this way, at the time of the New Law, the mysteries of Christ being already accomplished, it is pernicious to make use of the ceremonies of the Old Law whereby the mysteries of Christ were foreshadowed as things to come: just as it would be pernicious for anyone to declare that Christ has yet to suffer.” Thus, observing seder meals, religious circumcision, abstaining from pork for religious reasons, etc. would now offend the True God.

As to the second example, the saint continues: “…falsehood in outward worship occurs on the part of the worshiper, and especially in common worship which is offered by ministers impersonating the whole Church. For even as he would be guilty of falsehood who would, in the name of another person, proffer things that are not committed to him, so too does a man incur the guilt of falsehood who, on the part of the Church, gives worship to God contrary to the manner established by the Church or divine authority, and according to ecclesiastical custom.”

Consequently, we can say that even valid worship offered by those who do so in a manner contrary to that established by the Church would offend God. This may be the case of a valid Catholic priest who ad libs the Missal and, while validly confecting the Holy Eucharist, mortally sins by intentionally neglecting the rubrics. This would also be the case of a valid Divine Liturgy offered by schismatic groups like the Orthodox Church. And this would certainly apply to rituals performed by heretical protestant denominations who do not follow the Church’s prescriptions, do not offer any valid Sacraments (exceptions aside ), and who teach a doctrine contrary to that taught by Christ our Lord.

Can A Valid Novus Ordo Mass Offend God?

Taken to the next logical question, we consider if it is possible for a valid Novus Ordo Mass to offend God. 

Even though it is possible for God to work good out of evil and lead to the Truth those in false religions, this does not make the Novus Ordo as praiseworthy or fitting for God. Rather, the defects in the Novus Ordo are not merely external but intrinsic in the prayers created for the New Rite of Mass.

The Holy Mass is the Sacrifice of Christ on the Cross. The purpose of Mass is to be present at the Sacrifice of Christ that is made present again through the priesthood of Jesus Christ.  We worship God at Mass in the manner which He has established for His worship. We are present at Calvary.  Rather than merely remembering the life and death of Christ, we are present at it and partake of its eternal fruits which flow to us from the altar and during the Canon when the priest stands in the place of Christ and offers the Eternal Victim on the Altar to God.  We can further receive grace by partaking of the Holy Eucharist if we are Catholics in the state of grace. This view of the Mass as a propitiatory Sacrifice has been lost in the Novus Ordo and replaced by notions of community, where the priest is a presider, and many Catholics falsely view receiving Holy Communion as the purpose of going to Mass, rather than being present at the august sacrifice of the Eternal Victim.

As Archbishop Lefebvre noted in Chapter 4 of the Open Letter to Confused Catholics, the changes to the Mass in the offertory, the sermon, the canon, and elsewhere mimic the changes sought by Martin Luther! They are in their very core protestant, especially for instance in the newly created prayers of the Offertory which bear no similarity to the Offertory in the Tridentine Mass.

Of course, while any validly ordained priest may consecrate bread and wine using the words of consecration, even while omitting the rest of the Mass (which is done at times in cases of necessity for instance by priests who are imprisoned and can only smuggle in a small piece of bread and a small amount of wine), this is not the same as promoting and saying protestantized prayers. 

Jean Guitton, an intimate friend of Paul VI wrote: “The intention of Pope Paul VI with regard to what is commonly called the [New] Mass, was to reform the Catholic liturgy in such a way that it should almost coincide with the Protestant liturgy. There was with Pope Paul VI an ecumenical intention to remove, or, at least to correct, or, at least to relax, what was too Catholic in the traditional sense in the Mass and, I repeat, to get the Catholic Mass closer to the Calvinist Mass.” And we know that the Calvinists - and any protestants for that matter - do not have a valid rite of Mass and do not confect the Holy Eucharist.

The Faith is not defined by merely external actions. Archbishop Lefebvre rightfully criticized the Novus Ordo – even when accompanied by Latin, ad orientem postures, and the external appearance of piety.  Our Lord Jesus Christ instituted a set of doctrines and established His one True Church as the means of bringing about the conversion of souls and their salvation. He did not institute merely external gestures while telling His disciples to ad lib the rest. And on the opposite extreme, the Lord also did not teach His disciples the precise words for Sacramental validity and tell them that their external postures, garments, and actions were useless since only the internal mattered. Our Faith not only includes heart-felt prayers, works of charity, and pious devotions, but also includes rich liturgical music, elaborate cathedrals, and ornate vestments. Even the presence of Eucharistic miracles in Novus do not mean that the Novus Ordo is pleasing to God.

Are We Obligated to Ever Attend Offensive Worship?

More than mere validity is necessary in the worship of God. If validity was the only basis for whether worship was pleasing to God, Catholics would be able to have their children baptized by an Anglican minister or attend receive the valid Eucharist from schismatic Greek orthodox priests. Yet, we know that attending the worship of any other denomination is a sin against the First Commandment. 

Consequently, we have an obligation to seek out not only valid Masses but those which are offered according to the Church’s immemorial rubrics and customs. We should not feel obligated to attend a Novus Ordo Mass – even on Sundays or Holy Days – since attending them is often a grave danger to our spiritual lives

Read more >>
Thursday, December 30, 2021
Catholic Resolutions 2022

 

Each year I have made what I call "Catholic Resolutions."  These New Years Resolutions are not centered on losing weight, eating more vegetables, or securing a raise. I make resolutions for all facets of my life including these.  Rather, these resolutions each year are centered around my spiritual life.  I encourage all of you to make resolutions specifically geared toward improving your own Faith life and your own knowledge of the Faith.  One's spiritual health needs the same care - if not more - than our physical, financial, or professional health.

Ask yourself:
  1. Do I know the Faith that I profess to believe in?  If not, how can I learn more?  For example, CatechismClass.com has an ideal Adult Course just for this purpose.
  2. Am I truly living a Catholic life?  Am I learning more prayers?  Am I helping others to learn the Faith and live it out?  Do I regularly receive the Sacraments?
  3. Do you struggle with certain sins or addictions? What actions do I need to take to really conquer them?
  4. Do you need to make more donations to Catholic organizations or pro-life charities?
  5. What is my dominant fault and how can I tackle it and grow in virtues?
  6. What additional days of penance can you observe as days of fasting and abstinence? Can you observe the vigils of the apostles as fast days? What about all 40 days of Lent or the 40 days leading up to Christmas? Will you keep all days of Lent including Sundays as day of abstinence? There are many venerable ways we can practice penance this year and fulfill our Lady's call for "Penance, penance, penance." See the 2022 Catholic Fasting Calendar for ideas.
This is the time of year to truly set Catholic Resolutions which will have eternal repercussions. When so many have already begun to set aside last week's New Years Resolutions, now is the time to actually make true and lasting Catholic Resolutions for the new year.

Some General Suggestions of Catholic Resolutions:
  1. Pray the Rosary every day, if you are out of the habit of it
  2. Pray Lauds, Vespers, and Compline (from the Little Office of the Blessed Virgin Mary or the Divine Office) every day.
  3. Say a prayer for the Poor Souls in Purgatory every day, such as the St Gertrude Prayer. Getting a copy of The Purgatorian Manual: Containing Spiritual Reading and Prayers for Every Day of the Month is also an excellent idea.
  4. Attend Mass one day extra a week in addition to Sunday. And if you have fallen away from Mass, start going weekly again.
  5. Make it a habit to go to Confession every 2 weeks. Ensure that you are sincere and actually detest your sins and desire to amend your life.
  6. Fulfill the First Friday Devotion as well as the First Saturday Devotion
  7. Start wearing the Brown Scapular if you do not already. But ensure you are properly enrolled by a priest.
  8. Determine what is your predominant fault and make a plan to fight it and conquer it this next year.
  9. Make time for a morning meditation and mental prayer each and every day before work.
  10. Identify one virtue to acquire and one vice to conquer this year. Make an action plan for how you will actually make progress on a daily and weekly basis to do so.
I encourage you to make Catholic Resolutions. What are yours? Share them below in the comments box.
Read more >>
Monday, December 20, 2021
Saturday Abstinence Dispensed in Christmastide

As highlighted through my A History of Holy Days of Obligation & Fasting for American Catholics in Part I and Part II, Saturday abstinence remained a part of weekly Catholic life for centuries. 

The Catholic Encyclopedia mentions, in regard to Saturday abstinence: “Gregory VII (1073-85) speaks in no uncertain terms of the obligation to abstain on Saturdays when he declares that all Christians are bound to abstain from flesh meat on Saturday as often as no major solemnity (e.g. Christmas) occurs on Saturday, or no infirmity serves to cancel the obligation.” 

Unknown to the overwhelming majority of even committed Catholics, abstinence from meat was previously required on both Fridays and Saturdays in the United States! For American Catholics, Saturday abstinence ceased around 1837 because the Baltimore fathers requested from Pope Gregory XVI a dispensation from Saturday abstinence. It was a 20-year dispensation that was renewed up until the 1917 Code dispensed the venerable practice of Saturday abstinence universally.

Sadly this aspect of the faithful's weekly penance had been in long decline as The Month - Volume 111 from 1908 mentions:

"Meanwhile, the very severe discipline which prevailed in the matter of fasting and abstinence days had been substantially mitigated by Pius VI and his successors. In 1777, most of the vigils occurring through the year, e.g. those of the feasts of the Apostles, ceased to be fast-days, though compensation was made by substituting the Wednesdays and Fridays of Advent. Still more substantial was the relief afforded in 1781 by the abrogation of the weekly fast on Fridays. The abstinence on Saturdays, on the Rogation days, and on the feast of St. Mark, was abolished in 1830, but it is plain from contemporary evidence, that long before this the Saturday abstinence had been little regarded by a number of the laity, and we may conjecture that the weekly Friday fast also, for some time previous to its abolition had not been very generally or strictly kept."

For those Catholics who wish to keep Saturday abstinence in honor of Our Lady's request for penance, how should we model our Saturday abstinence? In short, we should keep the teaching of Pope Gregory VII who declared that the exceptions to Saturday abstinence were major solemnities, which would seem to include for us both Holy Days of Obligation and great feasts, such as those which used to be among the 36 Holy Days of Obligation in past times.

Additionally, if we model our Saturday abstinence based on our forefathers in the Faith, one of the few exceptions to Saturday fasting - in places that maintained this as law - was the Saturdays (but never Fridays) of Christmastide (i.e. December 25th through February 2nd).  France had such an exception as the Catechism of Perseverance makes mention:

"In France, the law of abstinence on Saturday became general. There was no exception, save in some dioceses for the Saturdays between Christmas and the Purification. Hitherto, Spain has introduced no modifications as regards the liberty of eating meat on Saturday beyond this, that the intestines and extremities of animals may be used. The abstinence of Saturday, though less general than that of Friday, should not be less religiously observed. The authority that prescribed both is the same: the authority of our holy Mother the Church, of whom the Savior Himself said, If any one will not obey the Church, let him be to you as the heathen and the publican."

Such an exception also existed in at least some Dioceses of the United States before the dispensation from year-round Saturday abstinence - vigils, Lent, and ember days excepting - that began in the mid-1830s and continued until its complete abrogation by the 1917 Code.

1822 Laity's Directory for New York mentions this exception

Thus, for those of us seeking to perform additional penance in imitation of our forefathers and in answer to Heaven's call for penance, year-round Saturday abstinence except on the Saturdays of Christmastide and major feasts would be a fitting practice. See my proposed 2022 Traditional Catholic Fasting Calendar for more inspiration. Do note though that year-round Friday abstinence is to be always practiced unless December 25th falls on a Friday - the 1917 Code introduced the exception that any Holy Day of Obligation would dispense but that is a novelty.

Read more >>
Tuesday, December 14, 2021
Advent Ember Day Fast

Ember Days this Advent: December 15, 17, and 18

If you are in good health, please at least fast during these three days and pray additional prayers. Remember the words from the Gospel: "Unless you do penance, you shall likewise perish" (Luke 13:5).  Ember Days are days of fasting and partial abstinence. Please click here for a special PDF Ember Day Manual, including reflections for the Advent Ember Days.

Note, while most Missals call for Ember Wednesday and Ember Saturday to be a day of partial abstinence, this is a rather modern practice. Partial Abstinence refers to eating meat only at the principal meal of the day and do not permit meat to be eaten as part of the collation or the frustulum. Partial abstinence started only in 1741 under Pope Benedict XIV as a concession & as part of a gradual decline of fasting. It is better to keep all Ember Days as days of complete abstinence. Ember Fridays of course are in all Missals days of complete abstinence.

From Angelus Press Daily Missal:

At the beginning of the four seasons of the Ecclesiastical Year, the Ember Days have been instituted by the Church to thank God for blessings obtained during the past year and to implore further graces for the new season. Their importance in the Church was formerly very great. They are fixed on the Wednesday, Friday, and Saturday: after the First Sunday of Lent for spring, after Pentecost Sunday for summer, after the Feast of the Exaltation of the Cross (14th September) for autumn, and after the Third Sunday of Advent for winter. They are intended, too, to consecrate to God the various seasons in nature, and to prepare by penance those who are about to be ordained. Ordinations generally take place on the Ember Days. The faithful ought to pray on these days for good priests. The Ember Days were until c. 1960 fastdays of obligation.


To-day the Church begins the fast of Quatuor Tempora, or, as we call it, of Ember days: it includes also the Friday and Saturday of this same week. This observance is not peculiar to the Advent liturgy; it is one which has been fixed for each of the four seasons of the ecclesiastical year. We may consider it as one of those practices which the Church took from the Synagogue; for the prophet Zacharias speaks of the fasts of the fourth, fifth, seventh, and tenth months.[1] Its introduction into the Christian Church would seem to have been made in the apostolic times; such, at least, is the opinion of St. Leo, of St. Isidore of Seville, of Rabanus Maurus, and of several other ancient Christian writers. It is remarkable, on the other hand, that the orientals do not observe this fast.

From the first ages the Quatuor Tempora were kept, in the Roman Church, at the same time of the year as at present. As to the expression, which is not unfrequently used in the early writers, of the three times and not the four, we must remember that in the spring, these days always come in the first week of Lent, a period already consecrated to the most rigorous fasting and abstinence, and that consequently they could add nothing to the penitential exercises of that portion of the year.

The intentions, which the Church has in the fast of the Ember days, are the same as those of the Synagogue; namely, to consecrate to God by penance the four seasons of the year. The Ember days of Advent are known, in ecclesiastical antiquity, as the fast of the tenth month; and St. Leo, in one of his sermons on this fast, of which the Church has inserted a passage in the second nocturn of the third Sunday of Advent, tells us that a special fast was fixed for this time of the year, because the fruits of the earth had then all been gathered in, and that it behoved Christians to testify their gratitude to God by a sacrifice of abstinence, thus rendering themselves more worthy to approach to God, the more they were detached from the love of created things. 'For fasting,’ adds the holy doctor, 'has ever been the nourishment of virtue. Abstinence is the source of chaste thoughts, of wise resolutions, and of salutary counsel. By voluntary mortifications, the flesh dies to its concupiscences, and the spirit is renewed in virtue. But since fasting alone is not sufficient whereby to secure the soul’s salvation, let us add to it works of mercy towards the poor. Let us make that which we retrench from indulgence, serve unto the exercise of virtue. Let the abstinence of him that fasts, become the meal of the poor man.’

Let us, the children of the Church, practise what is in our power of these admonitions; and since the actual discipline of Advent is so very mild, let us be so much the more fervent in fulfilling the precept of the fast of the Ember days. By these few exercises which are now required of us, let us keep up within ourselves the zeal of our forefathers for this holy season of Advent. We must never forget that although the interior preparation is what is absolutely essential for our profiting by the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, yet this preparation could scarcely be real unless it manifested itself by the exterior practices of religion and penance.

The fast of the Ember days has another object besides that of consecrating the four seasons of the year to God by an act of penance: it has also in view the ordination of the ministers of the Church, which takes place on the Saturday, and of which notice was formerly given to the people during the Mass of the Wednesday. In the Roman Church, the ordination held in the month of December was, for a long time, the most solemn of all; and it would appear, from the ancient chronicles of the Popes, that, excepting very extraordinary cases, the tenth month was, for several ages, the only time for conferring Holy Orders in Rome. The faithful should unite with the Church in this her intention, and offer to God their fasting and abstinence for the purpose of obtaining worthy ministers of the word and of the Sacraments, and true pastors of the people.

From New Advent:

Ember days (corruption from Lat. Quatuor Tempora, four times) are the days at the beginning of the seasons ordered by the Church as days of fast and abstinence. They were definitely arranged and prescribed for the entire Church by Pope Gregory VII (1073-1085) for the Wednesday, Friday, and Saturday after 13 December (S. Lucia), after Ash Wednesday, after Whitsunday, and after 14 September (Exaltation of the Cross). The purpose of their introduction, besides the general one intended by all prayer and fasting, was to thank God for the gifts of nature, to teach men to make use of them in moderation, and to assist the needy. The immediate occasion was the practice of the heathens of Rome. The Romans were originally given to agriculture, and their native gods belonged to the same class.

At the beginning of the time for seeding and harvesting religious ceremonies were performed to implore the help of their deities: in June for a bountiful harvest, in September for a rich vintage, and in December for the seeding; hence their feriae sementivae, feriae messis, and feri vindimiales. The Church, when converting heathen nations, has always tried to sanctify any practices which could be utilized for a good purpose. At first the Church in Rome had fasts in June, September, and December; the exact days were not fixed but were announced by the priests. The "Liber Pontificalis" ascribes to Pope Callistus (217-222) a law ordering: the fast, but probably it is older. Leo the Great (440-461) considers it an Apostolic institution. When the fourth season was added cannot be ascertained, but Gelasius (492-496) speaks of all four. This pope also permitted the conferring of priesthood and deaconship on the Saturdays of ember week--these were formerly given only at Easter.

Before Gelasius the ember days were known only in Rome, but after his time their observance spread. They were brought into England by St. Augustine; into Gaul and Germany by the Carlovingians. Spain adopted them with the Roman Liturgy in the eleventh century. They were introduced by St. Charles Borromeo into Milan. The Eastern Church does not know them. The present Roman Missal, in the formulary for the Ember days, retains in part the old practice of lessons from Scripture in addition to the ordinary two: for the Wednesdays three, for the Saturdays six, and seven for the Saturday in December. Some of these lessons contain promises of a bountiful harvest for those that serve God.

From Catholic Culture:

Since man is both a spiritual and physical being, the Church provides for the needs of man in his everyday life. The Church's liturgy and feasts in many areas reflect the four seasons of the year (spring, summer, fall and winter). The months of August, September, October and November are part of the harvest season, and as Christians we recall God's constant protection over his people and give thanksgiving for the year's harvest.

The September Ember Days were particularly focused on the end of the harvest season and thanksgiving to God for the season. Ember Days were three days (Wednesday, Friday and Saturday) set aside by the Church for prayer, fasting and almsgiving at the beginning of each of the four seasons of the year. The ember days fell after December 13, the feast of St. Lucy (winter), after the First Sunday of Lent (spring), after Pentecost Sunday (summer), and after September 14 , the feast of the Exaltation of the Holy Cross (fall). These weeks are known as the quattor tempora, the "four seasons."

Since the late 5th century, the Ember Days were also the preferred dates for ordination of priests. So during these times the Church had a threefold focus: (1) sanctifying each new season by turning to God through prayer, fasting and almsgiving; (2) giving thanks to God for the various harvests of each season; and (3) praying for the newly ordained and for future vocations to the priesthood and religious life.
Read more >>


Copyright Notice: Unless otherwise stated, all items are copyrighted under a Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License. If you quote from this blog, cite a link to the post on this blog in your article.

Disclosure of Material Connection: Some of the links on this blog are “affiliate links.” This means if you click on the link and purchase the item, I will receive an affiliate commission. As an Amazon Associate, for instance, I earn a small commission from qualifying purchases made by those who click on the Amazon affiliate links included on this website. I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission’s 16 CFR, Part 255: “Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising.”