Today I read the reflection for Wednesday, March 16 in the Benedictus Magazine. (Side note – if you follow the traditional Roman calendar, this magazine is amazing). Dom Benedict Baur is writing in 1963, so just a handful of years before the Mass, and the message, completely change to embrace the heresy of modernism with open arms.
First, the beautiful message to us all:
We wish to share His love of poverty, His privations, His mortifications, His self-denial, by patiently bearing the hardships of our state in life. We follow Him by a willing acceptance of difficulties, sufferings, troubles, and reverses. Thus we become martyrs of love, confident of His love and providence.
I particularly love how Dom Baur points out the difficulties of our state in life because that will look different whether you’re a priest or a mother, and to find Christ in that unique suffering is what leads us back to Him.
Now, the heartache:
The Church prays for her children and leads them to Christ and makes them share His suffering and humiliation. We should not fear when she invites us to share with Him fasting, self-denial, and the cross. By this inviting us she proves that she is from above and out of the earth. She is filled with the spirit of God, not the spirit of the world.
Sigh … “not the spirit of the world.” Now, before I lament and end with begging for prayer, let me be clear, Mother Church is not the heresy of modernism you hear about, and perhaps witness, in some Novus Ordo parishes. Mother Church is timeless, holding always to the truths that have been handed down from the Deposit of Faith to the Apostles by Christ. She will never change her stance on the value of life, marriage, the roles of women and men, the last four things, and anything else satan attempts to destroy.
Yet, having grown up in the post-V2, modernist Church, my heart aches for what I know so many hear, and don’t hear. My heart aches for the lukewarm Catholics that know no other way because they’ve never been challenged as Christians. They just come to Mass Sundays and perhaps go to Confession once a year, without a good examination. I know because this was me, for a long time. The desire to live, and die, for Christ is missing. They don’t understand what it mean to “be in love” with Christ.
“By their fruits you shall know them.”
The fruits of the heresy of modernism are dismal, with over 70% of Catholics not even believing, not having to faith to comprehend that Christ’s Body, Blood, Soul, and Divinity is coming into their own mouths each Communion and merging with their souls, desiring to administer grace. (Side note: that grace is conditional – if you’re in mortal sin, no grace is given. If you’re lukewarm, it’s much less than if you’re truly in love with Christ.).
My heart aches for my old self and for anyone else who walked deeply in sin because they never heard of Hell from a priest. Instead, they spent their lives hearing “Jesus loves you and forgives you,” taking that as a free hall pass to do anything as long as they “feel good” about their decisions. This is not freedom. And this is not Mother Church, the Church of the Ages.
My Plea
If you have woken up from the stupor of the heresy of modernism, I have two challenges for you:
ONE
Please join me in praying daily for Mother Church. Pray that what is internal, what She will always possess and believe, once again is worn outwardly for the whole world to see. Join me in praying for the Pope’s conversion, for modernism to disappear, and for the light of Truth to shine forth from Rome and from every Catholic church. Also, pray that priests and nuns return to their traditional vestments and wear them humbly but strongly in public, once again showing the world that Catholicism is present everywhere. Think of the conversions that would come from this small move!
TWO
Teach the Faith. The True Faith. Educate yourself first with a good Catechism. Watch Sensus Fidelium. Seek a holy priest to confess to that will give you a good penance and perhaps some spiritual advice, time permitting. Study the Saints. Attend a Latin Mass if you never have, to understand what was almost lost and what is currently being persecuted. And then, armed with Truth, gently start teaching others – anyone who you have proper authority to do so with. Be loving and kind. Most of us had a long walk away from modernism. Your mom isn’t going to likely jump in and embrace her cross the first day.
Always Hope
My heart aches, but there’s always hope. The fruits from the TLMs have astounded the modernists. Let’s continue to lean into that, to build up the Truth from within. We are the Church Militant – let us take up our cross and show the world what it means to be Catholic.