NOVEMBER-DECEMBER 2022

The

“Instaurare omnia in Christo”

ngelus
T he V oice of T raditional C atholicism

The Victorian Er a
Newman and the Victorian Era by Fr. Yuhanna Azize
Jonathan Wanner, The Two-Toned Voice of Gerard Manley Hopkins
Isabella Childs on The Eternal Woman and Creaturely Conversion
England and the Immaculate Conception—Pauper Peregrinus
David Clayton: The Fresco of the Mother of God Enthroned in Glory

L etter from
the District Superior
Dear Reader,

Fr. John Fullerton
District Superior of the
United States of America

The recent passing of Queen Elizabeth II on September 8, 2022 turned
the world’s eyes toward the United Kingdom and its monarchical history—a history replete with fraught relations between the Catholic Church
and the Crown. Those relations began to improve ever so slightly in the
years leading up to the reign of Elizabeth’s great-great grandmother,
Victoria. When she ascended the throne in 1837, British Catholics were
enjoying nearly a decade of having many of their civil rights restored
through the Catholic Emancipation Act of 1829.
During the so-called Victorian Era, Pope Pius IX reinstated the Catholic hierarchy in 1850 with 13 sees and the Archdiocese of Westminster.
Not since the reign of Mary Tudor in 1855 had England seen a normal
Catholic ecclesiastical organization. The “Oxford Movement,” which
sought to return the schismatic Church of England to its Apostolic roots,
picked up steam before its most talented and visible proponent, John
Henry Newman, left Protestantism behind for the Catholic Faith. Joining Newman were a slew of other high-minded Anglicans, including the
future Catholic Archbishop of Westminster, Henry Edward Manning.
In this issue of The Angelus, we look at the prevalent cultural currents
during the Victorian Era with particular attention paid to Catholicism’s
role during it. While the advancements made by the Church during this
period were laudable and laid the groundwork for the British Catholic
intellectual revival of the early 20th century, many of its fruits have
been lost in the wake of the Second Vatican Council, which opened 60
years ago.
Let us pray that, in God’s good time, Catholicism regains its foothold in England so that the Gospel may again reign in the homeland of
so many saintly missionaries, hierarchs, and martyrs.
Fr. John Fullerton

ON OUR COVER: John Atkinson Grimshaw (1836–1893),
Blackman Street, London (1885).
 Most images in this issue are taken from
commons.wikimedia.org.

CONTENTS
Volume LXVI, Number 6

NOVEMBER - DECEMBER 2022
District Superior
Fr. John Fullerton
Publisher
Fr. Paul Robinson
Editor-in-Chief
Mr. James Vogel

FEATURED:
2 FEATURED Newman and the Victorian Era
Fr. Yuhanna Azize

CULTURE:
10 COMMENTARY The Eternal Woman and Creaturely Conversion
Isabella Childs

Assistant Editor
Mr. Gabriel Sanchez

15

Associate Editor
Esther Jermann

19

Marketing Director
Mr. Ben Bielinski

24

Executive Assistant
Annie Riccomini

26

Design and Layout
Mr. Simon Townshend
Mr. Victor Tan

28

Director of Operations
Mr. Brent Klaske

The Two-Toned Voice of Gerard Manley Hopkins

LITERATURE

Jonathan Wanner
HISTORY

A “Stupid Nineteenth Century”?

John Rao, D.Phil., Oxon.
ART

The Fresco of the Mother of God Enthroned in Glory

Prof. David Clayton
POETRY

A Child of the Snow

Gilbert Keith Chesterton
REVIEW

Seven Sacraments: The Traditional vs. the New Rites

Reviewed by a Priest of the Society

30

REVIEW

The Case for Liturgical Restoration

Reviewed by a Priest of the Society

FAITH:
34 FROM THE ARCHBISHOP Christ, the Only Mediator
Archbishop Marcel Lefebvre

“To publish Catholic
journals and place them
in the hands of honest
men is not enough. It is
necessary to spread them
as far as possible that
they may be read by all,
and especially by those
whom Christian charity
demands we should tear
away from the poisonous
sources of evil literature.”
–Pope St. Pius X

38

INTERVIEW

My Path to Tradition

Dorian Arnold

42

THEOLOGICAL STUDIES

P
 ius XII’s Clarifications on the Nature of the
Episcopate

Fr. Jean-Michel Gleize, SSPX

52

THEOLOGICAL STUDIES

England and the Immaculate Conception

Pauper Peregrinus

56

SCRIPTURAL STUDIES

Meditations on St. John’s Gospel—Chapter Fifteen

Pater Inutilis

60

QUESTIONS & ANSWERS

Fr. Juan Carlos Iscara, SSPX

65

THE LAST WORD

Fr. David Sherry, SSPX

The Angelus (ISSN 10735003) is published bi-monthly under the patronage of St. Pius X and Mary, Queen of Angels. Publication office is located at
PO Box 217, St. Marys, KS 66536. PH (816) 753-3150; FAX (816) 753-3557.
Periodicals Postage Rates paid at Kansas City, MO. Manuscripts and letters to the editor are welcome and will be used at the discretion of the editors.
The authors of the articles presented here are solely responsible for their judgments and opinions. Postmaster sends address changes to the address above.
©2022 by Angelus Press. Official Publication of the Priestly Society of Saint Pius X for the United States and Canada

1

FEATURED

Newman and
the Victorian
Era
Fr. Yuhanna Azize

Ex umbris et imaginibus in veritatem
“From out of shadows and appearances,
into the reality”
—The words Newman chose for his epitaph

J

ohn Henry Newman was born into this
world on February 21, 1801, into eternal life
on August 11, 1890, and canonized on October 13, 2019. He was, in mind and spirit as
well as nationality, an Englishman through and
through, but a Catholic and a priest before all
else. His epitaph, carefully chosen to sum up
both his life and his hopes for eternity in heaven, expresses the realization that God alone is
complete reality and truth, and that this world
is but a shadow cast in time.
If anyone has heard anything of Newman,
they probably know that he had been a famous
minister in the Church of England, and that
half-way through his long life he converted to
Catholicism, became a priest, and was made
a cardinal. Some people also know that as an
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Anglican, he had been one of the founders of
the “Oxford Movement,” and as a Catholic he
had transplanted into England the Italian way
of priestly life called “the Oratory,” adapting it
for contemporary English conditions, allowing
priests a settled, almost monastic life in one religious house, their Oratory.
John Henry Newman has long been celebrated in Catholic circles; many of his books,
including his lengthy poem The Dream of Gerontius have been continuously republished, and
his hymns “Firmly I Believe and Truly,” and
“Lead Kindly Light” are sung in many traditional churches. The University of Notre Dame
Press, together with Gracewing, are publishing
in an attractive series the entire body of his writings; and a large, substantial body it is, too. Of
the seventeen volumes which have appeared,
some are established classics, such as An Essay
on the Development of Christian Doctrine, and the
novel Loss and Gain; while others collect essays
and articles from his Irish and other periods,

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most of which have been hard to find in print.
Our task today is not to celebrate his sanctity
or his work in general terms, but rather to relate
this great saint to the Victorian era.
“Now there must be such things as First
Principles—that is, opinions which are held
without proof as if self-evident. … If you trace
back your reasons for holding an opinion, you
must stop somewhere … else, life would be
spent in inquiring and reasoning, our minds
would be ever tossing to and fro, and there
would be nothing to guide us.”
Lectures on the Present Position of Catholics in
England, 2000 edition, p.279.

The Victorian Era
The ground for the Victorian Era had been
prepared especially during the time of William Pitt the Younger (1759-1806), who with
but one intermission, served as Prime Minister
from 1783 until his death twenty-three years
later. Due to his genius for administration and
finance, and his ability to see where his powers should be directed, he was responsible for
charting and ensuring Britain’s recovery after
the disastrous defeat in the American Revolutionary War (1775-1783), when England’s ancestral foe, France, assisted the locals to obtain the
victory. France was, at that time, the most powerful state in Europe: only the English Channel
and some tempestuous weather saved Britain
from invasion once Bonaparte had defeated all
the continental powers (the losses at Bantry Bay,
and the Battles of the Nile, Trafalgar). It is difficult now to appreciate how close Britain came
to absorption into the Empire, and also how
powerful the English military was for almost
the entirety of the Victorian age, once Pitt had
built up its navy and assisted the development
of the Industrial Revolution.
By cutting punitive government excises, Pitt
both minimized the smuggling industry, and
raised government revenues. He also introduced, for the first time ever, an income tax,
which, although it was suspended for a time, put
the country’s finances on a stable footing, even
if the cost of the Napoleonic Wars consumed
the surplus he had been building up. Pitt had
also agitated for Catholic Emancipation and
the reform of Parliament: both measures which
were opposed by George III, but would come to

fruition after Pitt’s premature death. The prosperous and peaceful England in which Newman
lived was a product of Pitt’s statesmanship.
Queen Victoria reigned from 1837 to 1901.
So powerful was her image in Great Britain,
so powerful did Great Britain become, and so
powerfully did her character represent the mind
and heart of Great Britain, that the entire period
came to be known as “the Victorian Era.” It was
a distinctive age, marked by wealth, advances in
science, moral steadiness, and optimism. However, the shadow side of the era was the proliferation of large pockets of poverty, the incipient
decline of religion, the growth of amorality, and
self-criticism, even self-hatred, on a social scale.
All of these characteristics are sketched in the
novels of William Makepeace Thackeray (18111863), Charles Dickens (1812-1870) and Anthony Trollope (1815-1882), from the perspective of
the rising middle class to which these authors
belonged. Dickens’ novel Oliver Twist (1838)
graphically depicts the worlds of the miserable
and the comfortable, and how immorality permeated society together with a rather sentimental form of Christianity.
Perhaps the title of Thackeray’s classic Vanity
Fair (1847) accurately expresses the impressions
we have today of that era: a lively and colorful street market, full of fun and excitement,
but still, at its heart, vain. Yet, there was more
than mere pomp. There was the high-minded
seriousness of the Catholic Church which was
re-establishing itself and its mystical liturgy
throughout the British Isles, and attracting to
itself a multitude of converts, some celebrated,
others unknown, and very many belonging to
the burgeoning middle class. However, also in
this Victorian Era, Charles Darwin (1809-1882)
was instrumental in propagating a theory of
evolution which, as it ramified into all areas
of thought, partly caused and partly marked a
catastrophic change in how men viewed God,
human life, and the world. It is easy to forget
that although he was German, the work of
Karl Marx (1818-1883) was chiefly conducted
in England, referred to local conditions, and
that Marx (like Freud) was influenced by Darwin. By the end of the era, British politics had
been transformed from a fledgling into a rather
fully formed modern parliamentary democracy, in which more men, and now women, had
begun to receive the suffrage in certain elections, a process which continued until it was
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4

Oriel College (Oxford University) founded in 1324 (Source:
Andrew Shiva / Wikipedia / CC BY-SA 4.0). Newman was
elected a fellow at Oriel on April 12, 1822.

Christ Church Cathedral, Oxford (David Hawgood). Newman
was made an Anglican deacon on June 13, 1824 at Christ Church
Cathedral, and ordained an Anglican priest the year after.

The nave of the Oratory church, Birmingham. Newman
established the English Oratory of St. Philip Neri starting in
Birmingham in 1849. He also founded the Oratory School there
in 1859.

The London Oratory on Brompton Road (“Brompton Oratory”/
Church of the Immaculate Heart of Mary) . Newman established
the London Oratory in 1849 with Fr. Frederick William Faber as
its superior.

In 1854, at the request of the Irish Catholic bishops, Newman
went to Dublin as rector of the newly established Catholic
University of Ireland (1854-1858), now University College,
Dublin. It was during this time that he founded the Literary and
Historical Society.

Newman’s personal coat of arms upon his elevation to the
cardinalate (1879). The Latin motto, Cor ad cor loquitur,
translates as “heart speaks unto heart.”

The Angelus u November - December 2022

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consummated in 1928 when all citizens, male
and female alike, over the age of 21 were enfranchised.
At the beginning of the nineteenth century, the Church of England was the established
Church. By the end, it had effectively lost much
of its social and political power. As the Victorian Era dawned, the Anglicans were suffering
from the inevitable results of the Reformation:
having rejected the authority of the Church
and tradition for personal interpretation of the
Bible, Luther saw his “reformation” splintering
before his very eyes, and the historian knows
that the principle of disintegration has obtained
ever more and more power over Protestants,
Evangelicals, and Pentecostalists.
“It is a First Principle that man is a social
being; a First Principle that he may defend
himself; a First Principle that he is responsible; a First Principle that he is frail and
imperfect; a First Principle that reason must
rule passion.”
Lectures on the Present Position of Catholics in
England, 2000 edition, pp.280-281.

Newman
The future saint was born an Anglican. Writing of his childhood in the Apologia, Newman
recalls:
I thought life might be a dream, or I an angel,
and all this world a deception, my fellow-angels by a playful device concealing themselves
from me, and deceiving me with the semblance
of a material world.

He was precocious in his religious development. In his magnificent Apologia pro vita sua
(“defense of his life”), as to which, see further
below, Newman wrote:
I am obliged to mention, though I do it with
great reluctance, another deep imagination,
which at this time, the autumn of 1816, took
possession of me,—there can be no mistake
about the fact; viz. that it would be the will
of God that I should lead a single life. This
anticipation, which has held its ground almost
continuously ever since,—with the break of a
month now and a month then, up to 1829, and,
after that date, without any break at all,—was
more or less connected in my mind with the
notion, that my calling in life would require

such a sacrifice as celibacy involved; as, for
instance, missionary work among the heathen,
to which I had a great drawing for some years.
It also strengthened my feeling of separation
from the visible world, of which I have spoken
above.1

The “sacrifice” is clearly the forsaking of
marriage. In 1840, he wrote of having foregone “the sort of interest which a wife takes
and none but she … I willingly give up the possession of that sympathy, which I feel is not,
cannot be, granted to me. Yet, not the less do
I feel the need of it.” In this, Newman was setting an example: and the Oxford Movement of
which he was one of the leading lights, and by
far the most important theologian, inspired the
first Anglican order for men, which opened in
the USA in 1842, and in England in 1866. The
development of the tradition of High Church
Anglicanism in the Victorian Era, including a
new and favorable view of celibacy, was a major
result of Newman’s work.
The Oxford Movement, begun when Newman was teaching there, was an effort to find a
middle ground between Catholicism and Protestantism, so that the Anglicans could think
of themselves as part of a universal Church,
in possession of the full apostolic truth. They
were opposed to what Newman called the “liberal principle,” what we might call relativism,
opposing to it the “dogmatic principle,” that
there really is an ultimate truth about human
salvation, that it is known to the Church, and
the tenets of the faith must accordingly be held
to obtain salvation. The most distinctive productions of the Movement were the Tracts for
the Times, many of which have recently been
published in the Millennium edition. The most
important of these controversial documents,
which succeeded in causing Anglicans to consider fundamental questions about their faith,
were written by Newman. The final Tract, the
ninetieth of the series, was penned by Newman
to explain the charter document of Anglicanism
in a more Catholic sense. In 1841, the Bishop of
Oxford saw to it that the series ceased forthwith,
and the next year, Newman and some friends
moved to nearby Littlemore where they maintained a quasi-monastic fellowship. Ever cautious, Newman did not seek to be received into
the Catholic Church until he had completed
An Essay on the Development of Doctrine, showing
that he had intellectually and not just emotion5

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ally accepted the truth of the faith. On October 9, 1845 he was received, and in 1846 he
was ordained a Catholic priest in Rome, where
Pope Pius IX awarded him a doctorate in Divinity. The next year, he returned to England, a
member of the Oratory of St. Philip Neri, and
established the Oratory, as we have mentioned.

The Apologia
Newman had a relatively quiet and inconspicuous life, serving the Church and the Oratory and working in the education of children:
something of increasing importance for the
middle and lower classes of the Victorian Era.
He was invited to found a Catholic university
in Dublin. He worked to the edge of extinction,
and in the process produced lectures on education, culture, the idea of the university, and the
formation of young people, which have since
become classics. But at the time, his achievement was not appreciated. Indeed, he was treated rather shabbily. Newman was neglected not
only by his own Church (within which he was
unfairly regarded with suspicion), but also by
other Englishmen. Then, the January 1864 edition of Macmillan’s Magazine printed an allegation that “Truth, for its own sake, had never
been a virtue with the Roman clergy,” and that
Newman himself had taught this. This eventually led to Newman’s writing the Apologia pro
vita sua, which defended not only the author
himself but, the Church, too. The Apologia was
immensely successful, and brought about a cultural shift in how the Catholic Church was seen,
turning Newman into a treasured, even beloved
figure.
Newman had completely routed his opponent, Charles Kingsley, who was then the leading Anglican figure of his generation. Kingsley was Cambridge professor of history and
a highly successful novelist who had made a
large impact on his world with his ideas of “muscular Christianity” and “Christian socialism.”
Even Kingsley’s wife admitted that, in Newman, her husband had finally met more than
his match. All his life, Newman’s writing style
was unmatched. He delivered the most powerful sermons of his age. He had been a magnet
to the young intellectuals of Oxford University.
His works dealt with everything from Patristic
studies, to poetry, through to modern moral
controversies. He also studied mathematics to

a high level, and was an accomplished violinist.
But he gave it all up for the truth, and to live it.

An Essay in Aid of a
Grammar of Assent
A reputable work, Anthony Kenny’s A New
History of Western Philosophy, vol. 4, Philosophy
in the Modern World, gives an honored place to
Newman, and especially to his An Essay in Aid
of a Grammar of Assent. Newman’s work in this
regard was trailblazing: he inquired not into
what knowledge is, but how we come to believe
something, and when that belief can be said
to be rational. Against the attack that religion
is nothing more than superstition, Newman
argued, no, to hold a religious observance can
be a most rational activity, analogous to any
other reasoned position we may hold. If the religious attitude is to be distinguished, it is by the
fact that religion moves the whole man, feeling
and intellect together, to hold something as true.
As I read the Grammar, it effectively argues that
to be religious is to hold to a noble, intelligent,
and eminently defensible cause.

Newman’s private chapel in the Birmingham Oratory.
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The Dream of Gerontius
This extraordinary poem, telling the story of
the passage of a soul from this earth into eternity still retains the awe-inspiring and almost
eerie power which made it such a success. In an
artistic way, it completes the Apologia and the
Grammar because it allows us to glimpse the
soul of John Henry Newman which sustained
him through the hard years of his autobiography, and the sublimity of the Catholic faith
which the “whole man” adopted and defended.
It is best known for its wonderful hymn, “Firmly
I believe, and truly.”
Firmly I believe and truly
God is Three and God is One;
and I next acknowledge duly
manhood taken by the Son.
And I trust and hope most fully
in that manhood crucified;
and each thought and deed unruly
do to death, as he has died.
Simply to his grace and wholly
light and life and strength belong,
and I love supremely, solely,
him the holy, him the strong.
And I hold in veneration,
for the love of him alone,
Holy Church as his creation,
and her teachings as his own.
Adoration ay be given,
with and through the angelic host,
to the God of earth and heaven,
Father, Son, and Holy Ghost.

Conclusion
Newman paved the way for the great Catholic converts, among whom R.H. Benson, G.K.
Chesterton, and Ronald Knox might be singled
out. He has lent his name to countless student
societies. But it would take too long to trace his
influence. Newman’s diverse output shows not
that he was good at many things, but rather
that he excelled in one critical respect, and that
enabled him to do many things well: he excelled
in thinking about the fundamentals—the reality
and the purpose of anything. He always spoke
of what was “real” and what was “unreal.” He
always sought to see through the shadows (the
appearances of things) through to the reality.
He could stand back and look with clear eyes
at himself and whatever he was engaged in or

J. M. W. Turner, The Angel, Standing in the Sun (1846).

thinking about, and see, with a minimum of
self-deception, what it was he was doing, what
its value was, and where it was heading.
My own view is that, although his holiness
of life was necessary to see him canonized, the
reason he was remembered after his death,
and thought of as a possible saint, is threefold.
It is, I think, first because of the fame he had
achieved as the most important of the leaders
of the Oxford Movement. But the second matter is the extraordinary depth and range of his
thought. This was necessary to keep his reputation alive, when the others who shared in the
Movement with Newman are chiefly remembered now because of him. But I think the third
element is just as essential as the other two: it is
his unconditional willingness to sacrifice all the glories the Church of England had to offer its leaders,
and to work and suffer for the truth.

Endnotes
1

J.H. Newman, Apologia pro vita sua, ed. Ian Ker, (London:
Penguin, 1994), 28. The Apologia was first published in 1864.

TITLE IMAGE: John Everett Mills, John Henry Newman (1881).

7

The Broomielaw, Glasgow, John Atkinson Grimshaw (September 6,
1836 – October 13, 1893). Grimshaw was an English Victorian-era artist best known for his nocturnal scenes of urban landscapes. He was
called a “remarkable and imaginative painter” by the critic and historian Christopher Wood in Victorian Painting (1999). Grimshaw’s love for
realism stemmed from a passion for photography, which would eventually lend itself to the creative process. Entirely self-taught, he is known
to have used a camera obscura or lenses to project scenes onto canvas,
which made up for his shortcomings as a draughtsman and his imperfect knowledge of perspective. However, many recognized his mastery
of color, lighting and shadow, as well as his unique ability to provoke
strong emotional responses in the viewer.

COMMENTARY

The Eternal
Woman and
Creaturely
Conversion

Gertrude Von le Fort’s Metaphysical
Response to Modern Godlessness
Isabella Childs

F

ew years have seen such monumental
events as the years spanning the lifetime
of twentieth-century German Catholic
writer, Baroness Gertrud von le Fort,
who lived from 1876 to 1971. During Von le
Fort’s lifetime, Germany saw the rise of the German Empire, the fall of the German Empire,
World War I and devastating defeat, the authoritarian socialist rule of Hitler, World War II and
devastating defeat, and the Russian Communist rule of East Germany. Worldwide violence
and fear marked Von le Fort’s adult life, during
10

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which technological and political changes and
devastating bloodshed outpaced the early twentieth century’s fanciful faith in humanity and
hope in progress.
Von le Fort’s response to all this global
upheaval was conversion. Born into a Protestant aristocratic family in Minden, Westphalia,
to Prussian officer Baron Lothar von le Fort
and Elsbeth von le Fort, Von le Fort enjoyed a
happy childhood and a rigorous education with
private tutoring and education at Hildesheim
Girls’ College. She made the choice, unusual for

COMMENTARY

women in her time, to pursue advanced studies in history and philosophy at the Universities of Heidelberg, Berlin, and Marburg. Von
le Fort spent time in Italy, gaining an appreciation for the Catholic Faith. She met Edith
Stein, the influential German philosopher and
convert from Judaism, who eventually became
a discalced Carmelite and died at Auschwitz.
In 1926, at the age of fifty, Von le Fort entered
the Church. Her poetry collection, Hymns to the
Church, voices the exchange between her soul
and the Creator, in mystic verse comparable to
that of St. John of the Cross.
Von le Fort wrote over twenty books, containing poems, short stories, and novels, but the
essence of Von le Fort’s philosophical thought
and her answer to the political and spiritual
turmoil of her time is contained in her influential book, The Eternal Woman (1934). Many have
philosophized on the problems of the day and
their solutions. The secular world attempts to
attribute spiritual and moral suffering to a failed
economic system, as Communism did in Von
le Fort’s day, or a lack of equality and freedom
of expression, as in our day. Von le Fort’s vision
is deeper. She sees a world that has forgotten
the meaning of sacrament, of symbol, forgotten
the fundamental identity of the human being as
creature. Woman, considered metaphysically,
casts light upon this relationship of the creature
to the Creator in a special way. When the face
of the eternal reality of womanhood becomes
visible, the identity of each human creature is
also unveiled.

Woman as Symbol
Von le Fort’s Eternal Woman is not meant to
be simply an examination of woman’s biological
and psychological states, nor is it meant to be
primarily a refutation of feminism gone wrong.
“It is rather a matter of the cosmic, the metaphysical countenance of woman; of womanliness as a mystery, its religious rank, its archetype and ultimate image in God” (1-2). The
metaphysical identity of woman is glimpsed in
her willingness to surrender. In her surrender
to man, in her submergence within the stream
of generation, in her reverence for the natural
order, and in her humility before God, woman
is the bearer of the religious identity of the creature.
Von le Fort makes the profound observation that the human person only exists as “sub-

merged in the presence of the timeless, the absolute; and thus absorbed… appears no longer as
a value in itself, but as a thought or mirror of
the eternal, as its symbol or vessel” (1). Whenever we human beings try to attribute the eternal directly to ourselves, we lose sight of our
God-given value. Whenever we attempt to be
greater than we actually are, independent of
God, we degrade ourselves to a level below our
nature. “Only an age profoundly bewildered
or misled in its metaphysical instincts could
attribute the idea of eternity, be it regarded as
absolute value or absolute duration, to a creature, without becoming aware that the latter,
instead of being exalted, is thereby instantly
annihilated” (1).
A society obsessed only with the human personality, which is an individual and temporal
reality, loses sight of the value of the person,
who is eternal. In our day, this disordered philosophy has been taken to its extreme conclusion by those who imagine they can change
their God-given personhoods based upon
whims of personality. In her day, Von le Fort
saw the annihilation of nations due to the annihilation of the person. Communism and Socialism, which promised the exaltation of the individual, the freeing of the individual from the
cogs of industry, really annihilated the individual, both literally and metaphysically, because
such atheistic ideology denies the value of the
creature by denying the Creator. The value of
the creature has its source in God alone.
Far from being a weakness, “surrender is the
absolute power that the creature possesses” (14).
Von le Fort imaginatively embodies this philosophical reality with the character Blanche
de la Force in her 1931 novella, The Song at the
Scaffold.
Blanche is an extremely timid girl by
nature, born under traumatic circumstances—
her mother goes into premature labor due to
early uprisings of French peasants before the
French Revolution and passes away shortly
after delivering Blanche—and Blanche grows
up with deep trauma already developed within her. Blanche enters the Carmelite convent in
Compiègne, partly out of a desire to avoid the
growing unrest of the burgeoning Revolution.
The narrator, speaking to his friend, describes
Blanche as the most unheroic heroine: “Blanche
de la Force was the last on your list of heroines.
And yet she was not a heroine in your sense of
11

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the word. She was not elected to demonstrate
the nobility of mankind but rather to prove the
infinite frailty of all our vaunted powers” (Song
at the Scaffold, 14).
It is precisely in her fear, in her weakness,
that Blanche is able to die a martyr’s death in the
shadow of the guillotine. When the Carmelites
are captured by the Revolutionaries, Blanche
has fled the convent and gone over with revolutionary women. When Blanche sees her sisters
ascending the scaffold singing, however, she
timidly joins her voice to the nuns’ glorious Veni
Creator. She is immediately trampled to death
by mob women. The irony of Blanche’s name
disappears, as her weakness really becomes a
force. Blanche becomes a symbol of humanity;
as the mother superior of the convent notes,
Blanche seems to take on “all the fear in the
world,” joining herself to Christ’s redemptive
suffering (59).
Like the character of Blanche, woman
reminds man that both are equals before God,
both creatures endowed only with the power of
surrender. Woman’s reverence before the divine
reflects both the obedience of the universe to
God’s will, “the bridal earth” (Eternal Woman,

John Singer Sargent, The Acheson Sisters (1902).
12

The Angelus u November - December 2022

6), as well as man’s receptivity to God’s creativity.

Woman as Lived Reality
in Time and Eternity
Does the power of surrender, seen most clearly in woman’s earthly existence, mean earthly
powerlessness? Does becoming a mother and
retiring to the background of social, political,
and cultural life mean a loss of historical importance?
Von le Fort asks these questions, which many
people before her asked, and which many continue to ask.
Von le Fort answers that woman may not be
present in the historical moment, but her role
of bearing children extends her influence far
beyond the reach of the apparently more active
man. As a physical and spiritual mother, the
woman “conquers time… The timeless woman
is she who has become engulfed in the stream
of the generations; the maternal woman is she
who has submerged herself in the child” (72).
Von le Fort believes that a single woman in
the world may have a career externally identical
to that of a man, but her motherhood will be
inseparable from her more superficial identity
and external pursuit. Motherhood can never
become for woman the special assignment of a
certain time; it is her task, simply and utterly”
(67). Woman, as mother, is rooted in her identity as bride—virgin and mother—and in her care
of generations, physical, cultural, and spiritual.
In a sense, the motherly woman stands for
all of humanity in that she devotes herself in a
special way to all that is weak and small. The
virgin, who does not bear children in her body,
“represents the inherent value of the person
as independent of every achievement,” while
the mother who retires to the background of
society to raise her children “demonstrates the
final value of her every gift, her every achievement, entirely independent of success or recognition” (33). There is always a temptation to
base human worth on personality and external
achievements instead of on the person as created by God in the divine image. Woman, in her
apparent self-effacement, shows the triumph of
the person over external validation.
In becoming a bride, woman finds herself
and her charismatic achievement “along the
path of Mary,” the path of cooperation (32).
Though woman is often a cooperator with

COMMENTARY

Mary: Revelation of the Creature

Gertrude von le Fort [www.gosc.pl/doc/3002212.
Pisarka-milosci-nieodwolalnej].

man, this is not a loss either for her or culture.
“Upon the principle of their cooperation all life
depends, and the field of their power ranges
over all things, even over the domain of intellectual creation” (33). There would not be a Dante
without a Beatrice, a Saint John of the Cross
without a Saint Teresa, Von le Fort points out.
Woman’s cooperative existence represents
“the dawn of the humility of the creature” (48).
The union of man and woman mirrors the
wholeness of the Cosmos, itself a reflection of
the three Persons of the Blessed Trinity. Woman
reveals to man his identity as a cooperator with
God. “In the cooperation of woman as the mate
of his spirit, man experiences his own creativeness as a mere cooperation in the work of God
who creates alone” (48).
The willingness to be blessed, to be fruitful,
which the motherly woman lives out in a visible way, is the right attitude of every creature
in the face of the Creator. “The passive acceptance inherent in woman, which ancient philosophy regarded as purely negative, appears
in the Christian order of grace as the positively
decisive factor” (4).

Mary’s Fiat expresses “the mystery of
Redemption in so far as it depends upon the
creature” (4). The most a human being can
contribute towards his salvation is surrender
to God. Mary, in her act of surrender, reveals
both essential womanliness and the religious
quality of every human being.
Mary is the living archetype of the Eternal
Woman, and also of all human creatures, surrendered to God. “Mary is therefore not only
the object of religious veneration; but she herself
is the religious quality by which honor is given
to God; she is the power of surrender that is in
the Cosmos in the form of the bridal woman.
It is this that the Litany of Loreto means when,
with the power of great poetry as well as great
dogma, it invokes Mary as the Morning Star.
The morning star rises in advance of the sun in
order to lose itself therein, and the divine Son at
Mary’s breast signifies, with regard to her, that
within the radiance of the Child she herself is
submerged” (4-5).
Mary’s exalted role as Dei Genitrix, comes
from her profound surrender to God the Father.
After giving birth to her divine Son, Mary
effaced her own personality, as other mothers
do, in the glorious person and mission of her
Son. Von le Fort points out that even in Church
history, Mary’s personality is entirely eclipsed
by her Son. “Even in the dogma most intimately hers, [the dogma of the Council of Ephesus
proclaiming Mary Mother of God,] Mary does
not come into prominence for her own sake but
for that of her Son” (5). Like the hidden aspect
of all motherly women, like the spiritual value
of the human person, Mary’s human likeness
“rests veiled in the mystery of God” (5).
Von le Fort notices it is significant that the
dogma of the Immaculate Conception was the
second to last Marian dogma to be proclaimed
(in 1854.) Mary’s Immaculate Conception, both
in its historical and metaphysical occurrences,
precedes the Redemption of the world, yet it
was only defined after the dogmas of the Divine
Motherhood (Ephesus, 431) and Perpetual Virginity (Lateran, 649.) The Immaculate Conception reveals the countenance of the unfallen
human creature and signifies the coming of the
Redeemer.
Mary, the Immaculate Conception, the
unfallen creature, proclaims both the first and
final comings of the Savior. Von le Fort sees
13

COMMENTARY

Mary as the Madonna of the Apocalypse. By
Apocalypse, she means “the annunciation of a
new heaven and a new earth” (15).
If the salvation of the apocalyptic world
depends on the revelation of the Redeemer’s
Mother with the advent of the Redeemer, the
salvation of that world also depends in some
measure on the revelation of true womanliness.
Von le Forte sees the degeneracy of the modern
world as caused in part by the selfish refusal of
woman to surrender herself for the good of her
fellow human beings. The selfish woman “dedicated only to the most miserable of all cults,
that of her own body…has torn asunder the last
bond of her metaphysical destiny” (12).
A woman who refuses to surrender, even in
the physical sense, tears herself from the sacred
mystery of her femininity. Contraception and
abortion especially wreak havoc on the woman’s sense of her metaphysical destiny as mother, on the woman’s family, and on the world.
“Here it is no longer the inoffensively childlike face of feminine vanity that is looking at us;
in its stead, ghostly and banal, a countenance
emerges that denotes the complete opposite to
the image of God: the faceless mask of womanhood. This, and not the face of the bolshevist
proletarian disfigured by hunger and hatred,
is the true expression of modern godlessness”
(12). With these striking words, Von le Fort,
who surely saw and experienced more clearly
than most the horrible effects of Communism
in her own country, dismisses the evil of Communism as almost superficial in comparison to
the degeneration of true womanhood, womanhood that magnifies the Lord. Woman is meant
to be a special emblem of surrender and love,
of the creaturely Fiat, and when she fulfills this
role, she is “the bearer of salvation,” reflecting
Mary (13).
In this Marian age, the renewal of culture
and faith in the world depends upon the renewal of the Marian spirit, embodied most clearly by all motherly women. “As the renewal of
our culture depends on whether the other half
of reality, the woman’s countenance, becomes
visible again in the face of the creative man,
so the true salvation of the world depends on
whether Mary’s features grow visible also in
his face” (110).
The mystery of the Eternal Woman, the Marian mystery, is the mystery of the created world
and its redemption. “The Annunciation to Mary
14

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is a message to every creature, but to the creature as represented in Mary…Redemption [follows] upon the humility of acquiescence…the
unfolding of heaven [follows] upon its willing
acceptance, upon the ‘Yes’ of the creature” (110).

Works Cited
Von le Fort, Gertrude. The Eternal Woman.
Translated by Marie Cecilia Buehrle, The Bruce
Publishing Company, 1954.
Von le Fort, Gertrude. The Song at the Scaffold. Translated by Olga Marx, Ignatius Press,
2011.
TITLE IMAGE: John Singer Sargent, Cashmere (1908).

Enric Monserdà i Vidal (1850-1926), Madonna and Child.

LITERATURE

The TwoToned Voice of
Gerard Manley
Hopkins
Jonathan Wanner

“Poetry, the darling child of speech … must be
spoken; till it is spoken it is not performed.”
~Gerard Manley Hopkins

T

he poetry of Gerard Manley Hopkins is bread in the mouth. To speak
it aloud is to douse your lips in the
kind of butter that grows more fat-rich
as your tongue churns it. It is the kind of loaf
you cut with a fiddle-bow knife and eat on a
stump of wood. The kind that multiplies even
while you chew it, feeding anyone within earshot who has a heart full enough to listen. The
kind that, being leavened, sets the soul out to
rise: we break it to keep ourselves whole. Here
words are wheat-sprung, malt-savored, crustraw—set to the pyre like a boule on the peel.1
To chew it is to sing, for it is the kind of art that
must be read “not slovenly … with the eyes but
with your ears, as if the paper were declaiming
it at you.” 2 Poetry of this kind exists less on the
page and more in the throat, so that there are

as many Hopkins poems as there are mouths
singing them. Like a lute or a mandolin strung
with twin-pairs of strings, his is a two-toned
song—his voice is the sound of yours.
The enchantment of Hopkins’ poetry is that,
when your voice speaks his in this double way,
other doubles follow. In style, he couples words
into compounds (“fall-gold,” “rare-dear”), consonants into alliterations (“wimpling wing”),
vowels into rhymes (“sillion” … “vermillion”),
rhythms into meter (I caught this morning
morning’s minion), and phrases into parallel syntax (Degged with dew, dappled with
dew = [participle] [preposition] [noun], [participle] [preposition] [noun]). Aggregated together, these contribute to a larger stylistic duality: the simple complexity of his verse. On the
surface, Hopkins’ poems are easy to approach.
His words seldom boast more than two syllables; their conversational flow is ear-catching;
and the many clusters of rhymes, alliterations,
and word-parallels are harmonious, hypnotic.
15

LITERATURE

Yet, rarely does the average reader glean his
poem’s meaning upon a first cold reading. Take,
for instance, the opening lines of “Inversnaid”:
THIS darksome burn, horseback brown,
His rollrock highroad roaring down,
In coop and in comb the fleece of his foam
Flutes and low to the lake falls home.3

The rhythm mesmerizes. It is entrancing enough
to set to a double-dutch routine, and no wonder: it has end rhyme (“brown” … “down,”),
internal rhyme (“comb” … “foam”), alliteration (“rollrock highroad roaring”), assonance
(“low” … “home”), and four accented syllables
per line. Yet, as immediately delightful as the
poem sounds, its meaning baffles. What appear
to be barnyard images—“horseback,” “coop,”
and “fleece”—are hardly allusions to Old Macdonald’s farm. Rather, the passage describes a
“burn” (Scottish for “brook”) as brown as the
back of a horse. Hopkins invented the compound “rollrock” to describe the path of the
stream: it is like a “roaring” road (a “highroad”)
down which rocks roll. Fleece-like foam floats
upon the brook’s higher and lower regions (its
hollow “coop” and ridged “comb”): traveling
down the rock-ridden current, the foam “flutes,”
or divides into parallel lines like the grooves on
a Greek column, before uniting with the larger
lake.4 This all makes sense when we consider
that the title “Inversnaid” is the name of a village on the east bank of Loch Lomond, a region
famous for its cascading falls (“Inversnaid,” in
fact, means “the mouth of the needle stream” in
Scottish Gaelic). Hopkins took a daytrip there
in 1881, and the brief visit inspired the poem.
Looking back, we can gape at how simple
the poem’s introduction genuinely is. We could
summarize it in one sentence: how beautifully
the rocks roll down the muddy brook while the
lakebound foam divides. Remarkably, the vast
majority of the words—23 of 28—are monosyllabic, and the rest have no more than two syllables. Ironically, the very word “syllable” has
more syllables! The difficulty of the passage
lies not in long-winded words or labyrinthian
sentences, but in a few brief riddles: invented
words (“rollrock”), architectural jargon (“flute”),
uncommon definitions (“comb”), and a stream
of parallel sounds that, like Odysseus’ sirens,
charm the reader into a blissful stupor—disarming all powers of analysis. This hypnotic trance
is, of course, Hopkins’ charm: how gracefully
16

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he treads upon the line between speaking and
singing, and there is a nobility in the fact that
his music is desirable for its own sake (for in
music “all’s to one thing wrought!”). 5 Yet, if we
are to acquire a holistic view of his poetry—
down to the very bones of its meaning—we must
snap ourselves into sense and perform the kind
of x-ray that can only be done with logic, common sense, and the Oxford English dictionary.
With “couple-colored” eyes, we must look inside
and out in the same glance.
To show you what I mean, let us consider
the two-toned relationship between style and
content in Hopkin’s iconic poem “Pied Beauty”:
Pied Beauty
GLORY be to God for dappled things—
For skies of couple-colour as a brinded cow;
For rose-moles all in stipple upon trout
that swim;
Fresh-firecoal chestnut-falls; finches’ wings;
Landscape plotted and pieced—fold, fallow,
and plough;
And àll tràdes, their gear and tackle and
trim.
All things counter, original, spare, strange;
Whatever is fickle, freckled (who knows
how?)
With swift, slow; sweet, sour; adazzle, dim;
He fathers-forth whose beauty is past change:
Praise him.6

As before, Hopkins entrances us with clusters
of two-toned sounds and parallel constructions:
end rhyme (“things” … “wings”), alliteration
(“couple-colour”), assonance (“rose-moles),
repeated syntax (“For skies … For rose-moles”),
the juxtaposition of opposites (“sweet, sour”),
and five accented syllables per line. Since this
is an abbreviated sonnet, its overall structure is
also two-toned. Typically a sonnet has two sections: the first eight lines (the “octet”) present a
problem or observation, then the final six lines
(the “sestet”) present a solution or analyze the
observation. The last two lines of the sestet also
usually offer a wit-wrapped surprise: a clever
punch-line, an unexpected metaphor, a paradox, or some inventive reversal. In this case,
Hopkins has reduced the octet to six lines and
the sestet to four and a half lines. You can tell
because a distinct change in the triadic rhyme
scheme occurs between line six and seven:
abcabc|dbcdc. Before we even consider the
meaning of the poem, we can predict the two-

LITERATURE

toned form will create a two-toned argument—
one characterized by a call and a response.
Considering the content more closely, we
find puzzles similar to those we encountered
in “Inversnaid”: invented compounds (“rosemoles”), some rural jargon (“brinded”), and
uncommon definitions of common words
(“spare”). For the average reader, however, the
main roadblock is the imagery. Few folks these
days can provide an off-the-cuff description of
a European finch, or a newly-fallen chestnut,
or a brown trout. To “click on” the light of our
imagination, we may need to take a few extra
minutes—there is enough time even in this short
life to relish a poem—to find some photographs.
Once we have a clear gallery of images in our
memory, we can return to the poem’s title, since
it often gives us a sense of what the whole poem
is about.
“Pied Beauty” here refers not to “pious beauty,” but to two-colored beauty (think of the “pied”
piper of Hamlin). As the title anticipates, the
first section of the poem thanks God for adorning creation with a multi-colored beauty: the
sky is blue and white (“couple-coloured”); cows
are “brinded” (streaked or spotted with a second
color); brown trouts are freckled with red spots
encircled by lighter rings (“rose-moles”); freshly fallen chestnuts, red as coals, are tucked in
green-gold shells (Fresh-firecoal chestnut-falls);
European finch wings are black with yellow
bands; the landscape is marbled with the many
hues of stone sheep pens (“folds”), unsown farmland (“fallow”), and tilled fields (“plough”); and
society is variegated with the many tools and
trappings of man’s trades (“their gear and tackle and trim”). In a word, the world’s beauty is
multiplicitous, many-bodied, yet enrobed in the
flesh of singular beings.
As fractured and distinct as these images
are, they are linked on a more universal level.
Taken together, they emblemize the entire
“chain of being”: from the inanimate elements
(“sky”), to plants (“chestnut”), to fish (“trout”),
to birds (“finch”), to mammals (“cow”), and to
a humanity who tames nature with art (“landscape plotted and pieced … And àll tràdes”).
On a symbolic level, the poem reveals “an
ever-expanding system of relationships which
ultimately embraces the entire cosmos.”7 This
large-scale unity is accentuated by the fact that
the animals Hopkins chooses have a scientific
secret: under Victorian practices of classifica-

Gerard Manley Hopkins, S.J. (28 July 1844 – 8 June 1889) was an
English poet, Roman Catholic convert, and Jesuit priest, whose
posthumous fame established him among the leading Victorian
poets.

tion (a la Carl Linnaeus), the cow was considered “the largest, most diverse, and most widely distributed genus among the mammals,” the
finch was “the largest of all genera of birds,” and
the trout was within “the largest genus among
fish.”8 The trout, in fact, was “the most difficult
fish to classify because of its irregularities in
anatomy, its great variation of color and habit,
and its power of adaptability to its environment.” 9 In other words, Hopkins chose images
that not only befit a brisk country walk, but that
suitably represent the singularity and diversity
of all earthly beings.
In the second section of the poem (beginning
at line seven), Hopkins continues to enlarge our
scope by describing properties that all material
beings share:
All things counter, original, spare, strange;
Whatever is fickle, freckled (who knows
how?)
With swift, slow; sweet, sour; adazzle, dim;

As distinct as the sky, a chestnut, a trout, a finch,
a cow, farmland, and men may seem, they have
more in common than we might admit:
17

LITERATURE

1) Each possesses contrary (“counter”) qualities: their bodies are, for instance, both dark
and light.
2) Each is singular (“spare”) and irreproducible
(“original”). Just as no two snowflakes are
alike, no two material beings are quite the
same: they each have odd (“strange”) and
unique peculiarities. Even my identical twin
and I differ in some manner, by genetic mutations or epi-genetic modifications.10
3) Each is changeable in time (“fickle”), in
locomotion (“swift, slow”), and in outward
appearance (“adazzle, dim”).
In other words, Hopkins is continuing the
prayer he started in the opening lines, but on a
broader scale, as if to say, “Glory be to God for
all the changeable, multiplicitous, one-of-a-kind
creatures on earth.”
With the compact wit we would hope from
a sonnet, the concluding lines turn the entire
poem on its head: “He fathers-forth whose beauty is past change. / Praise him.” This is what I
call a gobstopping finale. Here we have been
adoring the world’s “two-fold beauty” for nine
hypnotizing lines only to end with God’s onefold beauty. At first glance, this resolution seems
to subvert “pied beauty” altogether by replacing it with God’s divine attributes. Admittedly,
the very properties that Hopkins admires in
creation—changeability, multiplicity, and particularity—are signs that creation is not divine
in nature. God, after all, has none of these attributes. Being immutable, He is supremely simple,
supremely one, and cannot be divided into parts
(the persons of the Trinity being “consubstantial”). While our existence is particular, one-ofa-kind, His is all-containing—all-of-a-kind, we
might say. Of course, the trick of the poem is
that, as much as God’s attributes are contrary
to ours, his Undivided beauty underlies even
the most multiplicitous articles of creation. By
His salvific grace, the changeable is bound for
changelessness, and the many are bound for
unity; for Christ’s Mystical Body converts limbs
into divisionless wholes. In this sense, the truer
“pied beauty” is the harmonious counterpoint
between God’s beauty and man’s, or between
Christ’s two-toned natures and a good-yet-fallen world. Of course, in another sense, creation’s
multiplicity is, in itself, an analogue of God’s
oneness: as a universal property of matter, it
binds together every page of nature’s book.
18

The Angelus u November - December 2022

To some ironic extent, we transcend change
when we contemplate the universal order of the
world’s mutable and multiplied beauty. For as
much as “all creation is separation,” as Chesterton observes, all creation is also containlessly
contained in God.11
If anyone could convince me that one plus
one equals one, Hopkins would be the man. He
has a way of welding multiplicity into unity, of
crossing the eyes, of ending where he began.
When he seems impossible to understand, he
sounds pretty enough to believe—only remember, he has the kind of tongue that is yours.
Don’t starve your voice by not feeding upon his.

Endnotes
1

A round loaf of crusty bread (“boule”) on a long-handled
paddle (“peel”).

2

Gerard Manley Hopkins to Robert Bridges, May 21, 1878, in
Gerard Manley Hopkins: The Major Works, ed. Catherine Phillips
(Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2009), 232.

3

Ibid., “Inversnaid,” 153.

4

Ibid., endnote 153, l..3-4., 366.

5

Gerard Manley Hopkins, “On a Piece of Music,” Poems of
Gerard Manley Hopkins, ed. Robert Bridges, (London: Humphrey Milford, 1918), no. 67.

6

Gerard Manley Hopkins, “Pied Beauty,” Gerard Manley Hopkins: The Major Works, ed. Catherine Phillips (Oxford: Oxford
University Press, 2009), 132-133.

7

Conrad Festa, “The Cow, The Finch, and Trout in ‘Pied Beauty’,” The Hopkins Quarterly, vol. 2, no. 2 ( July 1975): 93.

8

Ibid., 94-95. Hopkins’ letters allude explicitly to Linnaeus’
system. See Festa, 93.

9

Ibid.

10

Paul Gringaras and Wai Chen, “Mechanisms for Differences
in Monozygous Twins.” Early Human Development, vol. 64, no.
2 (September 2001): 105-117.

11

G.K. Chesterton, “The Flag of the World,” Orthodoxy (London: Catholic Way Publishing, 2013), 84.

TITLE IMAGE: John Singer Sargent, A Stream over Rocks (ca.
1901-8).

HISTORY

A “Stupid
Nineteenth
Century”?
John Rao, D.Phil., Oxon.

L

éon Daudet (1867-1942), one of the most
important figures in Charles Maurras’
(1868-1952) monarchist movement,
l’Action Française, wrote a book in 1922
entitled The Stupid Nineteenth Century. Although
he was himself tainted by some of the tempting flaws of the period in question, he certainly
seems to me to have been correct in many of
his complaints concerning the appallingly arrogant socio-political absurdities resulting from
the intellectual reductionism that came to dominate the western world in the 1800s. Forces
from a variety of European countries played
central roles in developing what was an ever
more mechanist, secularist “spirit of the times”;
a Zeitgeist that in English-speaking countries is
most popularly associated with the long reign
of Queen Victoria (1837-1901).
The passion-focused “Romantic” direction
of the overall naturalism of the Enlightenment,
which seemed triumphant earlier in the century,
began to cede pride of place to its more mecha-

nist version from the 1830s onwards underneath
the hammer blows of the “dismal science” of
liberal “Scientific Capitalism” and the Utilitarianism of Jeremy Bentham (1748-1832). Disillusionment with lofty ideals of all kinds then
became general after the failures of the Revolutions of 1848, which had at first been hailed
throughout Europe as promising a bright new
“Springtime of the Peoples.”
Post-1848 salvos against the Romantic outlook were launched in the name of the brutally
earth-bound literature of writers ranging from
Gustave Flaubert (1821-1880) with Madame Bovary (1857) to Émile Zola (1840-1902) through his
twenty-volume Les Rougon-Maquard series (18711893), and Thomas Hardy’s (1840-1928) description of the destructiveness of a class-structured
society in Jude the Obscure (1895). Meanwhile,
Charles Darwin’s (1809-1882) reduction of all
of life to biological evolution, mutation, and
survival of the fittest was translated by thinkers such as Herbert Spencer (1820-1903) into an
19

HISTORY

infallible guideline for all manner of social and
political questions.
There are many people, from the era in question to the present, who have interpreted the latter part of the century in terms of an existential
battle for the soul of the western world. On the
one side they have placed a “good,” “progressive” England (followed by the United States)
and the movements inspired by Anglo-Saxon
bourgeois liberalism seemingly everywhere. On
the other, they place—and lament—a reactionary authoritarianism, increasingly represented
by a wicked Prussian militarism whose spirit of “Blood and Iron” power politics was well
expressed by Otto von Bismarck (1815-1898)
and certain aspects of the German Empire to
which the wars he unleashed gave birth in 1871.
But despite this all too influential Manichean
depiction of the struggle of the century as one
of obvious liberal benevolence versus palpable
backward-looking evil, I think that Daudet’s
accusation of arrogant, naturalist, and secularist
stupidity can be applied to both camps simultaneously. For these supposedly opposing contestants for the soul of the century merely focused
on two different aspects of the same obsession
with the “Promethean lust for material power
that serves as the deepest common drive behind
all modern Western cultures” (R. Gawthrop,
Pietism and the Making of Eighteenth Century Prussia, Cambridge, 1993, p. 284).
20

The Angelus u November - December 2022

Such lust was expressed in the Anglo-Saxon—or rather Anglo-American—inf luenced
manner through a “promethean” individualism that also in no way excluded adulation of
an openly militaristic imperialism to help its
cause along. It was articulated in Prussian/German form through a “promethean” exaltation of
an increasingly reckless militarist attitude that
was still nevertheless very often accompanied
and shaped by more “peaceful” but ultimately
equally materialist bourgeois, liberal, “Victorian” economic and moral guidelines. Both saw
the opening of a new railroad line as a proof
positive of man’s “spiritual” progress, baptizing
it as such through the maintenance of a connection with a “Christianity” displaying less and
less interest in the message of Christ.
Moreover, the most prominent socio-political enemies of both of these approaches in
the Marxist camp were just as “promethean”
in their thirst for reductionist, ideological—and
therefore “stupid”—naturalist answers to the
dilemmas of human existence. The only difference in their outlook was that they openly
rejected the role of things spiritual to which
their liberal and militarist enemies ostentatiously still tipped their hat, while in practice ignoring their substantive claims where money and
power might be at stake. In short, the “flesh”
of the nineteenth century—once again, especially after 1848—appeared to be more than willing, while its supernatural spirit was exposed
as being correspondingly weak and even totally
non-existent.
Not that this dismal progress of an ever more
mechanistic civilization pleasing to individuals, militarists, and Marxists pursuing Francis
Bacon’s (1561-1626) “knowledge in the service
of power” went unchallenged. The anti-Bentham, anti-Utilitarian novels of the “Victorian” Charles Dickens (1812-1870), ranging from
A Christmas Carol (1843) with Scrooge to Hard
Times (1854) and the educational theories of
Professors Gradgrind and Choakumchild indicate as much. So does Matthew Arnold’s (18221888) anguish over the dead end to which nineteenth-century materialism was leading as can
be seen in his poem, Dover Beach (1867).
Although not nearly as blazing as in the pre1848 years, the fires of an anti-mechanist passion and mystery as fueled by the Romantic
Movement were still being regularly stoked.
These also warmed the worlds of literature,

HISTORY

music, and the visual arts. Those fires burned
in hearts eager to break through ironclad natural and cultural laws in movements baptized
with the names of “Symbolism,” “Decadence,”
“Impression,” “Expressionism,” and, when
Romantic composers began to push tonality
to its utmost extremes, in “Atonalism” as well.
True, Romanticism’s seemingly more “spiritual”
critique of the materialism of the era—like that
of the Anarchists, who were often influenced
by it—was also generally crippled by an inability to break out of its own “dumb,” reductionist
obsession with the earth-bound individual and
the satisfaction of his personal desires. A lust
for power over words, canvases, plaster, and
keyboards, albeit non-technological, was, sadly,
all too clearly at work here as well.
Nevertheless, there were many notable
exceptions to this rule. This was particularly
the case with Romantics whose initial intellectual imprisonment in a universe they thought
to be filled with innumerable clashing passions
and desires inexorably led them to deny the
existence of any overriding “natural law.” Once
they saw that this inevitably produced nihilistic despair, a significant number of them began
to question whether their underlying naturalist Enlightenment presuppositions were themselves erroneous, requiring an opening to the
possibility that earthly life could only be fully
understood and brought to fruition through the
message of Creation by a God beyond nature. It
became clear to them that here was no escape
from an existential choice. It was either Christian hope or the bottom of the Nihilist abyss
into which the brilliant Friedrich Nietzsche

(1844-1900) saw the “stupid nineteenth century” pushing its hapless successor; a century that
would be the bloodiest and most catastrophically destructive in history: as the 1900s indeed
proved themselves to be.
Hence, a steady stream of expressions of
profound religious sentiments coming from
anti-mechanist, anti-nihilist Romantics, along
with Anarchists with certain Romantic tendencies. Edgar Degas (1834-1917), one of the most
prominent Impressionist painters, is one example from the artistic realm. Charles Baudelaire
(1821-1867), Pierre Proudhon (1809-1865), Paul
Verlaine (1844-1896), and Arthur Rimbaud
(1854-1891) are but a few of the more troubling
writers representatives of this development,
which also effected the substantive conversions
of other fin de siècle representatives of self-proclaimed literary “decadence.” One could do
worse here than call upon the memory of Ernest
Dowson (1867-1900), a friend of Aubrey Beardsley (1872-1898) and Oscar Wilde (1854-1900),
other anguished souls who eventually made
the same leap that he did, in a letter dated 27
August 1890, a year before his conversion to
Roman Catholicism:
You ought to have come to N.D. de France
tonight. There was a procession after Vespers
of the Enfants de Marie. . . . It was a wonderful
and beautiful situation: the church—rather dark
the smell of incense—the long line of graceful
little girls all with their white veils over their
heads—banners—: a few sad faced nuns—and
last of all the priest carrying the Host, vested
in white—censed by an acolyte who walked
backwards—tossing his censer up “like a great
gilt flower”: and to come outside afterwards—

Jules Breton, The Blessing of the wheat in Artois (1857).
21

HISTORY

London again—the sullen streets and the sordid
people and Leicester Square: Really a most pictorial evening. . . . Children’s voices exercised
in the “Ave Maria Stella,” are the most beautiful
things in the world. What a monstrous thing
a Protestant country is! (Ernest Dowson, The
Letters of Ernest Dowson, ed. Desmond Flower
and Henry Maas, Cassell, 1967, pp. 172-173.)

In short, it cannot be denied that there were
impressive religious lights at the end of the
tunnel of nineteenth-century stupidity towards
which those who had eyes to see could and
did run. Those lights led Fyodor Dostoevsky
(1821-1881) back to Russian Orthodoxy and
the Christian vision, although admittedly as
a follower of the spirituality of the Philokalia,
which I think opens up a path to a certain type
of mischief making that has had its impact on
the development of progressive Catholicism.
They brightened up the highway built upon
more solid doctrinal rock on which a number
of Protestants of formerly purely ethics-focused
Pietist backgrounds then journeyed. But, most
importantly, they served as flares guiding men
across the nineteenth-century no man’s land
firmly onto the path to Rome.
At this point it is absolutely necessary to
underline a final condemnation of “the stupidity of the nineteenth century”; one, however,
that is totally unjust and also highly prejudicial

Jean-Baptiste Paulin Guérin, Felicité Robert de Lamennais (1827).
22

The Angelus u November - December 2022

to the defense of the True Faith in our own day,
when it is in the greatest need of protection than
ever before in its entire history. It comes from
those progressive Catholics, their vision deeply
rooted in the democratizing visions of Romantic Enlightenment origin developed in the 1800s
by the Abbé de Lamennais (1782-1854) and his
followers. They insist that the stupidity of the
nineteenth century was manifest not in their
own naturalist errors, but in the mainstream
thought and practices of a Roman Church of the
1800s: precisely that thinking and those practices that lit the light enticing naturalists away
from their tunnel vision and nihilist despair.
According to the myth that these progressives
have created, a nineteenth-century tsunami of
dull-witted obscurantism drowned everything
truly Christian, particularly from the reign of
Blessed Pius IX onwards. Only their takeover
of the Church of Christ in the 1960s, now ready
to seal its consequences through the victory of
“the synodal way,” has enabled Catholics to
walk the apostolic path upright once again. So
successful have they been in perpetrating this
myth that it is almost impossible to convince
people to reexamine what nineteenth-century
Catholicism actually did achieve. Its full history
has been liquidated. To hate the “intransigents”
who are said to have been responsible for this
obscurantism is to know them; to know them
in their fullness is beside the point and utterly
forbidden.
Hence, no one is permitted to learn of what
nineteenth-century Catholicism really accomplished, which, first and foremost, was the recognition of the need to fight the ravages of a
“stupid eighteenth century,” whose imprisonment of the western mind in the tunnel of naturalism had been voluntarily and apologetically accepted by much of the higher clergy and
influential laity. For, strange as it may seem to
those whose access to the truth has been cut off
by the progressive myth, the chief characteristic of mainstream Catholic life of the 1800s
was a general rediscovery of the entirety of the
Church’s historical past, which had been more
and more suppressed as the 1700s wreaked its
blinding havoc.
With this nineteenth-century rediscovery
came the joy that could not help but accompany the recapturing of that complete sense of
the primacy of the supernatural guidance that
could only be obtained through exploiting the

HISTORY

rich doctrinal and devotional life represented
by the whole of the history of the Mystical Body
of Christ. This was now seen, in ever greater
clarity, as not only being essential for the sake
of eternal salvation, but also for the possibility
of living a fully human natural existence, both
as individuals and as a Christian political and
social order.
It was this joy, to take but one example, that
inspired two “eminent Victorians” that the progressive Catholic myth try to depict as being
hopeless opposites: Cardinals St. John Henry
Newman (1801-1890) and Henry Edward Manning (1808-1892). Yes, there is no denying that
these were two quite distinct and often clashing personalities with different chief concerns
and practical labors. Nevertheless, both loved
and sought to contribute to an understanding
of the mystery of the Mystical Body of Christ
in their own way, the former through the history of doctrine, the latter through the strengthening of Church structure and the promotion
of social justice. And both, in their preaching,
their writing, and their organizational and episcopal endeavors, vigorously fought the real stupidity of the nineteenth century—an arrogant
naturalism that could guarantee nothing but
the “abolition of man.”
Still, how can someone know this unless he
actually consults a record declared unworthy of
investigation by a progressive Inquisition seemingly more powerful every day? I personally,
had discussions while at Oxford with a progressive Catholic don who magisterially condemned
La Civiltà Cattolica, one of the most important
nineteenth-century organs of the wicked forces
in question while I was enjoying the privilege
of cutting open large numbers of the thousand
pages of its volumes for the fifteen-year period
from 1850-1865—and, thus, presumably, becoming the first man actually to read them in the
university library.
I would not be surprised if the same were still
true for students in other libraries today. Thankfully, they have only to “look” to discover the
truth, as one of the other Catholic heroes of the
“stupid, naturalist, nineteenth century” whom I
repeatedly cite in these pages joyously insisted.
“The supernatural is finished,” Louis-Édouard
Cardinal Pie (1815-1880), speaking at the grotto
at Lourdes, quoted nineteenth-century man as
gloating. “Well, look here, then! The supernatural pours out, overflows, sweats from the sand

Henry Edward Manning (July 15, 1808–January 14, 1892)
was an English prelate of the Catholic church, and the second
Archbishop of Westminster from 1865 until his death in 1892.

and from the rock, spurts out from the source,
and rolls along on the long folds of the living
waves of a river of prayers, of chants and of
light” ( J.M. Mayeur, ed., Histoire du Christianisme, Desclée, Thirteen Volumes, 1990-2002,
XI, 350).
It may have been the stupidest of centuries—
although the next and the one thereafter have
given it more than a run for the money—but it
possessed its glories as well!

23

ART

The Fresco of

The Mother of
God Enthroned
in Glory
Prof. David Clayton

24

The Angelus u November - December 2022

ART

T

he Beuronese School is an interesting
cul-de-sac in the Christian tradition.
It is named after the town of Beuron,
in Germany, which is the location of
the Benedictine community in which the school
originated. The style is an attempt in the 19th
century to revive Christian art, and is a reaction against the dominating over-sentimental
naturalism of the time, which draws on Egyptian art and canon of proportion that was said
to be derived from that of the ancient Greeks
(although this is speculative, given that the
canon of Polyclitus which is what the ancient
Greeks used is lost).
The artists themselves were trained in the
methods of the 19th-century atelier. The result
is a curious mixture of 19th-century naturalism stiffened up, so to speak, by an injection of
ancient Egyptian art and geometric patterns.
Examples are to be found in central Europe
and also at Conception Abbey in Missouri. The
main artists in Europe are Lenz (d. 1928) and
Gabriel Wüger (d. 1892). The artists of Conception Abbey, their website tells us, were trained
in Beuron but moved to Missouri once the
abbey was founded.
The example shown is of the Mother of God
as Queen of Heaven flanked by Saints Scholastica and Benedict
An account of the geometric proportions
used in the human form can be found in the
book written by their main theorist, Fr. Desiderius Lenz, On the Aesthetic of Beuron. It is complex, so much so that my reaction is that it
would be very difficult for any painter to use
the canon successfully in any but very formal
poses (although it might be possible for a sculptor to follow it). As soon as you have to twist and
turn a pose, then the necessary foreshortening
requires the painter to use an intuitive sense
as to how the more distant parts relate to the
nearer. To be able to do so would require the
artist to have many years’ experience of working within that proportion, to the degree that
it would be unnatural for him to do anything
else. For this reason, those that have more formal poses are the most successful works. Those
that attempt a more naturalistic pose work less
well, in my opinion, and look like illustrations
from the Bible I was given when I was a child.
The approach of Beuron school is idiosyncratic and as such sits outside the mainstream
of Christian tradition. It does not as far as I can

ascertain have its form integrated with theology
in the way that the iconographic, the Baroque
or the Gothic do. Nevertheless it does follow
generally the traditional iconography (by this I
mean the visual vocabulary of symbolism) that
is traditional to Christian art and stylistically
does have something of the sacred to it, in my
opinion. It also has the one essential element of
sacred art as articulated later, by Pope Pius XII,
which is a balance of idealism and naturalism.
Writing in 1947, he said,
Modern art should be given free scope in the due and
reverent service of the church and the sacred rites,
provided that they preserve a correct balance between
styles tending neither to extreme realism nor to excessive “symbolism,” and that the needs of the Christian
community are taken into consideration rather than
the particular taste or talent of the individual artist.

He uses the word realism to mean corresponding to natural appearances—I prefer to
use naturalism; and symbolism to mean highly stylized or corresponding to an ideal—I prefer to use the word idealism for this. The ideal
form that the Beuronese artists drew on was the
classical Egyptian style. This is analogous to the
way that High Renaissance artists, for example,
drew on the ideal of the classical Greek style.
The artist uses line to describe the form.
There is very little tonal variation and the coloration is largely monotone. This again promotes the idealism (or ‘symbolism’) of the style
and makes it less naturalistic. So, rather like
the iconographic style of art such as we see in
Greek icons, the appearance is flat. The marked
stylization is introduced so that while it is still
naturalistic enough that we recognize these as
human figures, we cannot be confused into
thinking that we are looking at reality and our
imaginations take us to the real people in heaven.
Perhaps also their efforts to control individual expression have contributed to the sacredness
of the art. The school stressed, for example, the
value of the imitation of prototypes above the
production of works originating in any one artist. The artists collaborated on works and did
not sign them once finished, so it is not always
clear who the artist is.
TITLE IMAGE: Fresco by Gabriel Wüger on the facade of St.
Maur’s Chapel, Beuron (Danube Valley), built 1868–1870.

25

POETRY

A Child of the Snow
Gilbert Keith Chesterton
A great Christmas poem, which has inspired numerous song writers.
Chesterton’s Christmas poetry can be found in the Collected Works, Vol. 10.

There is heard a hymn when the panes are dim,
And never before or again,
When the nights are strong with a darkness long,
And the dark is alive with rain.
Never we know but in sleet and in snow,
The place where the great fires are,
That the midst of the earth is a raging mirth
And the heart of the earth a star.
And at night we win to the ancient inn
Where the child in the frost is furled,
We follow the feet where all souls meet
At the inn at the end of the world.
The gods lie dead where the leaves lie red,
For the flame of the sun is flown,
The gods lie cold where the leaves lie gold,
And a Child comes forth alone.

IMAGE: John Atkinson Grimshaw, A Moonlit Lane (1874).

27

REVIEW

Seven
Sacraments:

The Traditional vs. the New Rites
Reviewed by a Priest of the Society

Daniel Graham, Lex Orandi: Comparing the Traditional and Novus Ordo Rites of the Seven Sacraments (Preview Press, 2015).

T

he law of prayer determines the law
of belief and in turn the law of practice. How we pray determines what we
believe and how we live. This is the
premise of Daniel Graham’s Lex Orandi, Comparing the Traditional and Novus Ordo Rites of the
Seven Sacraments.
Graham lays the texts of the Novus Ordo
and Tridentine sacraments side by side to help
people chose the primary teacher of their law
of belief. He holds that as truth by its nature is
essential and doesn’t change: the rites of the
sacraments convey something immutable (6).
Therefore, changes to those sacraments for ecumenical purposes lead to a fragmented Church
(38). Graham’s presentation of the Novus Ordo
sacraments illustrates themes which convey
their ecumenical bent. A collective relationship
28

The Angelus u November - December 2022

in them to include Protestants comes from the
idea of universal salvation.
Penance is the sacrament which perhaps
best illustrates this new collective reality. Traditional Penance is an encounter with a judge
who suffers for us. Novus Ordo Penance has an
encounter with a judge, but the judge suffered
for the common good and the penitent is one
of the beneficiaries (49). Penance’s sacramental
value is completely devalued to make it seem
like counseling (39).
Although Penance presents this collective
relationship to Protestantism most clearly, it is
far from being the only illustration of the point.
Baptism becomes an inclusion ceremony exclusively, not a battle with the Devil over a person’s
soul (11). Faith in the Eucharist is devalued to
consent to a common opinion (66). Once the
idea of a collective relationship becomes apparent, the inclusion of Protestants in it is easily
established. Perhaps most illustrative of this is
the new baptismal rite which merely marries

REVIEW

the Anglican rite with Lutheran and Calvinist
ideals (36).
Protestant inclusion is a pervasive theme in
Graham’s work. Use of the New American Bible
texts at Mass is one of the more overt illustrations of it (64). That text serves the best ecumenical purposes. Confirmation’s new text likewise
presents an inclusion into a broader Christian
community (116).
A collective relationship with God which
includes Protestants has a more fundamental
basis, universal salvation. Indeed, the new rites
of the sacraments present a man already worthy of God (192). Already worthy of God, he is
merely welcomed at Baptism, not freed from
sin (37).
The Eucharist furthers that theme. Instead
of it being about Our Lord coming to change
sinners’ souls, focus shifts to illustration of the
fundamental ever-improving goodness of man
(104). An ancillary point to that is the changed
role of the priest. His focus is no longer sacrifice
and salvation but improving living conditions
for mankind (185).
Graham proves his thesis beyond doubt that
the New Rite of the Sacraments presents a new,
collective relationship between God and man.
That relationship points easily towards Protestant inclusion. The underlying theme of universal salvation underpins both points.
Though the author proves his thesis well,
he at times falls victim to his own attention to
detail. He is so eager to make connections to
expose the deficiencies in the New Rite of the
Sacraments that he makes some points that
seem a bit exaggerated:
As noted before, in Traditional Ordination, the
promise of obedience comes after ordination.
This sequence teaches that being a priest and
fidelity to Christ takes precedence over obedience to the bishop. In Novus Ordo Ordination,
the opposite is true with the promise of obedience before ordination, in the same manner as
the Anglicans; obedience to the organization
takes precedence over being a priest. (181)

only had meaning from the love of God, which
has primacy in the Old.
But he concludes, “Put in more modern terms,
loving God, which is the concern of religion, needs
to take precedence over loving neighbor, which is the
concern of politics” (193). To say that the love of
neighbor is the proper sphere of politics devalues the commandment to love our neighbor as
ourselves. It goes too far.
While the book is very informative and
deep, at times it becomes a little too deep. That
being said, it does provide very clear and useful
information to anyone making a detailed study
of the New Rite of the Sacraments.
TITLE IMAGE: Rogier van der Weyden, The Seven Sacraments,
detail (1445-1450).

While making a change that conforms to the
Anglican rite is far from ideal, to say that changing that order changes the order of precedence
seems to be a stretch.
Graham illustrates the shift in the New Rite
from God to man. He correctly points out that
love of neighbor, emphasized in the New Rite,
29

REVIEW

The Case for
Liturgical
Restoration
A Review

Reviewed by a Priest of the Society

The Case for Liturgical Restoration: Una Voce Studies on the Traditional Latin Mass, ed. Joseph Shaw
(Brooklyn, NY: Angelico Press, 2019).

R

eviewing a collection of studies written over years and concerning everything relating to the liturgy, from
silence in the liturgy to the liturgy in
contrast to the New Age Movement, is a daunting task. Fortunately the editorial work done
by Joseph Shaw and the quality of the studies
makes the impossible, possible. They clearly
present the Tridentine Rite (Usus Antiquior) as
the privileged instrument of Tradition to pass
on the integral Catholic Faith.
The book accomplishes this goal in two
clearly delineated parts:
Part 1 of the volume takes up a number of
aspects of the sacred action, showing how even
what may be considered smaller details, in fact,
contribute to the communication of heaven
with earth… Part 2 of the volume addresses
30

The Angelus u November - December 2022

the disposition of man to the divine grace that
both inspires sacred worship and is given and
increased through the worship of God (xxvi).
A deeper direction the book takes is through
the presentation of the Usus Antiquior to lead the
reader to a greater knowledge and love of Our
Lord. That goal is accomplished through three
intertwined themes throughout the work: reverence, continuity, and unity.
A reverential encounter with Christ demands
silence, as the study Silence and Inaudibility makes clear. Specifically, the silent Canon
models the intimate personal gift of the priest’s
silent prayer for the faithful. The “filled silence”
provides a sacred atmosphere, denotes import,
and as is illustrated later in the book, becomes
a tool for Western re-evangelization (31).
Continuity in the Faith is an equally prevalent theme with reverence in the work, as it
reflects the mind of the Church. The Service of
the Altar by Men and Boys points out, for instance,
how the use of female altar servers departs from

REVIEW

a tradition dating from the Council of Laodicea
in the 4th century for a concession given in 1994.
More importantly, it ties that tradition to the
exclusively male priesthood and the link of servers to future vocations to that priesthood (55).
Perhaps a more striking point about rupture
in continuity is presented in the four studies on
the use of Latin in the liturgy. Latin as a Liturgical Language presents Christian Latin as the
liturgy’s official language, officially presented
as such by Vatican II in Sacrosanctum Concilium
and ordered by Pope Benedict XVI to be taught
to priests to celebrate Mass (143). That Latin is
correctly proffered as a source both of devotion and civilization. The catechetical benefit of
using it comes from the dignity and universality
of texts which in turn contributes to sacrality
and results in effective communication.
Finally, the collection makes a heartfelt
appeal to the value of the Usus Antiquior in the
promotion of ecclesial unity. A study on the
Leonine prayers (195) used in the Tridentine
Rite, for example, points out the unification
of Catholics against common enemies of the
Church.
Perhaps more interesting is the relative utility of the Usus Antiquior over the Novus Ordo in
relation to current challenges in a strong, united Catholic Church. In the study The New Age,
for example, we see the value of the Tridentine
Liturgy to oppose the New Age Movement’s
increasing appeal to the Christian West.
The New Age movement presents each person’s life as a learning experience changed by
the individual. It promotes an alternative to religion promoting spiritual and emotional healing
by psychological or spiritual techniques that
appropriate Christian elements.
The Usus Antiquior emphasizes the need for
grace which exposes the New Age tendencies
of moral superiority and libertinism. It also
connects the supernatural and intellectual life
which the New Age Movement would tell us is
only preserved in the East [p. 217].
For us loyal SSPX adherents, however, the
differences in the Una Voce perspective can’t be
ignored. Post-Conciliar popes and Vatican II
texts are presented as supporting traditional
perspectives (217). Post-Conciliar popes have by
their actions done the contrary, and Vatican II
texts have left loopholes for tradition to become
altered. These elements are never addressed in
the book.

Moreover, one could question if the whole
perspective of contrasting two Latin rites is even
legitimate. It is not the same situation as other
rites in the Western world growing from custom or local traditions. The close link between
doctrine and the liturgy enforces our opposition
to modernizing changes to the Latin liturgy. It
is not simply that we find the Tridentine Rite
superior; we find the Novus Ordo wrong.
In conclusion, The Case for Liturgical Restoration shows the marked superiority of the Traditional Latin liturgy over the Novus Ordo. It
makes the strong case that the former is better
suited to today and should be restored. Unfortunately, the studies skirt the fundamental doctrinal problems in the papacy and in Vatican II
and in doing so sells itself short.
TITLE IMAGE: Illustration from a French medieval manuscript (1056-1065).
Joseph Shaw is Chairman of the Latin Mass Society of England
and Wales. Shaw is the son of the late Thomas Shaw, 3rd Baron
Craigmyle and Anthea Craigmyle (née Rich). He was educated
at Ampleforth College and the University of Oxford. He is currently a tutorial fellow in philosophy at St Benet’s Hall, Oxford.
His main areas of interest are practical ethics, the philosophy
of religion and medieval philosophy. In 2015, he was elected a
fellow of the Royal Society of Arts.

31

John Singer Sargent, A Venetian Interior, c. 1880–82. Some of the women in this dimly lit interior string together
Venetian glass beads, while others pause for a moment of convivial conversation. Bright light shines through the
windows at the far end of the room, drawing our eyes into the otherwise dark, cool space.
John Singer Sargent (January 12, 1856 – April 14, 1925) was an American expatriate artist, considered the “leading
portrait painter of his generation” for his evocations of Edwardian-era luxury. He created roughly 900 oil paintings and
more than 2,000 watercolors, as well as countless sketches and charcoal drawings. His oeuvre documents worldwide
travel, from Venice to the Tyrol, Corfu, Spain, the Middle East, Montana, Maine, and Florida. Born in Florence to
American parents, he was trained in Paris before moving to London, living most of his life in Europe. He enjoyed
international acclaim as a portrait painter.

ARCHBISHOP LEFEBVRE

Christ, th

December 3, 1

Sermon by Archbishop Lefebvre—Feast of St.
Francis Xavier—First Mass by Fr. Carandino—
December 3, 1988.
My very dear friends,
My very dear brothers,
We rejoice today and we give thanks to
God, with dear Father Carandino, on the
occasion of his first solemn Mass. It is only
right that seminarians and priests in charge
of the seminary should rejoice. Isn’t the seminary made to make priests, holy priests?
A priestly ordination in the seminary, a
First High Mass, is really the culmination of
studies, the culmination of the efforts made
by seminarians to become priests. We can
only rejoice. And for you, dear faithful, what
would parishes be without a priest, if not
dead parishes.
You also expect priests. For you need
these intermediaries between God and
yourselves: Sacerdos sacras res dat: (The priest
is) the giver of holy things.
So you also rejoice and rightly to attend
these ordinations and to participate in this
First High Mass of this dear Father Carandino.
For you, very dear friend, I invite you
on this occasion to take a look at the past,
in order to give thanks to the Good Lord
for all that has prepared your vocation, for
all that has prepared this day of your first
solemn Mass.
If anyone can account for all the graces received, it is you. You can rewind the
years from your childhood, your adoles34

The Angelus u November - December 2022

ARCHBISHOP LEFEBVRE

he Only Mediator

1988—First Mass by Fr. Carandino
Archbishop Marcel Lefebvre
cence, your dear Christian family here, your
parents, your brothers and sisters. The opportunities that have been given to you to feel within
you the call of the Good Lord. And then one
day to feel called to come to Écône.
What graces during all these years and
undoubtedly through many hesitations, many
trials—well here you have arrived at the goal you
have sought, particularly during the years spent
in the seminary. We congratulate you. We give
thanks to the Good Lord with you today in a
very profound way, in a moving way.
But if the priesthood and the first Mass are a
goal, it is also a beginning. From now on, leaving the past to the Good Lord and to His Providence, you must look to the future. So if I can
on the occasion of this first Mass give you some
advice, give you some indications on what you
are going to look for and on what your professors, your directors have oriented you during
the seminary, all of this can be summed up in
this adage: Sacerdos alter Christus: The priest is
another Christ. So let us ask ourselves who is
Jesus Christ, who is Christ?
Well then, I will insist on this fundamental
concept of Our Lord Jesus Christ: Mediator.
Our Lord Jesus Christ is the Mediator. Men
had broken off with God. God did not want
this rupture to be final. God did not want those
whom He had created for His glory; that those
whom He had created for their happiness would
be permanently removed from Him. So He proposed Himself, in His immense charity, in His
infinite mercy, He wanted to be this Mediator.
None of the men could mediate. We were all
this massa damnata, as St. Paul says, this crowd
condemned by our fault. And we could no lon-

ger become such mediators with God. We could
no longer find the path that led to God. Only
God Himself could do that.
And then, He realized this inconceivable
mystery, this mystery which is for us the occasion of incessant thanksgiving, but which is a
scandal for those who do not want to believe:
God became man. Yes, He was incarnated.
This whole liturgy of Advent prepares us
for this reminder of the Incarnation of Our
Lord. The Angel said to Mary: “Yes, a son will
be born to you and you will call him Jesus.” You will
call him Jesus, that is to say the Savior. The Savior, there is no other. That is to say the Mediator, the One who will make the bridge between
humanity and God. Our Lord is therefore, in
essence, the Mediator. And there cannot be others, since He unites in the same Person both
human nature and divine nature. This intimate
bond in the Person of Our Lord Jesus Christ
of humanity and divinity makes Him the born
Mediator of all mankind to God.
And He wanted to manifest this mediation
to us, in a very special way in His Holy Sacrifice of Calvary offering Himself a Victim to His
Father for the redemption of our souls.
And this is what the priest is: Sacerdos alter
Christus. The priest is therefore also a mediator, thanks to the mediation of Our Lord Jesus
Christ, participating in the mediation of Our
Lord Jesus Christ, he will also become a pontifex [bridge builder], the one making the bridge
between humanity and God.
Just as there can be no salvation apart from
Our Lord Jesus Christ, who is the only Mediator; from now on, there will be no salvation
without going through the priests responsible
35

ARCHBISHOP LEFEBVRE

But if, on the contrary, we
really have faith in this unique
Mediator and in all the means
He has provided to save souls,
then whatever the result of our
efforts; whatever the success of
our apostolate, we know that we
are carrying out the will of the
Good Lord. We know that we
are continuing the apostolate
of Our Lord Jesus Christ.

36

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for communicating salvation to souls. This
is at least the normal and ordinary way that
Jesus wanted. It is He who founded the priesthood.
It was He who wanted to associate and
choose men to make priests of them, so that
they could be mediators and continue the
work He had begun here below.
And you are going to continue it, very dear
friend, you are going to continue it above all,
through the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass. Just
as Our Lord offered Himself on the Cross for
the salvation of souls, well, you go up to the
altar to continue this Sacrifice and pour out
the graces of Calvary on souls.
Because there is only one mediator, we are
only participants in the Mediator. We are not
essentially mediators, we cannot be. It is only
by the grace of Our Lord that we participate
in His mediation, by the grace of the priesthood, by the priestly character given to us.
So that will be your role in the future. What
a sublime, extraordinary role. May it please
the Good Lord to choose people who participate in His mediation; who participate in a
certain way also, in His only Priesthood; who
participate in His royalty; who participate in
His holiness in order to spread the gifts of
salvation, the gifts of sanctification, to souls.
This is what will be your concern from now
on: to save souls. Our Lord said that without
the baptism of water and the Spirit, no one
can enter the kingdom of Heaven. Then you
will baptize; you will do what the apostles
did immediately after Pentecost: they baptized; they sanctified souls; they united them
to Our Lord Jesus Christ; they communicated
to them the divine life, the life of grace.
And that’s what counts. And that’s what
you have to have faith in. Faith in mediation
and in the only mediation and in the only
Mediator. And so it is necessary that the priest
have confidence in the grace of redemption
obtained by Our Lord Jesus Christ. And let
him trust that this grace saves souls; that this
grace transforms souls, communicates divine
life to souls.
When we no longer have faith, neither
in the only Mediator who is Our Lord Jesus
Christ, nor in the grace that Our Lord Jesus
Christ came to bring to save us and the means
by which He communicates this grace to us,
so we look for human means, purely human

ARCHBISHOP LEFEBVRE

means, invented by men to supposedly save
men. This is a serious mistake. These are means
which are not means, which are outside the
means foreseen by the Providence of God.
But if, on the contrary, we really have faith
in this unique Mediator and in all the means
He has provided to save souls, then whatever
the result of our efforts; whatever the success of
our apostolate, we know that we are carrying
out the will of the Good Lord. We know that we
are continuing the apostolate of Our Lord Jesus
Christ. And that only He can resurrect souls,
only He can sanctify souls. And this is what
gives consolation today to priests who have still
kept the faith.
Very unfortunate are the priests who no
longer believe in evangelization as Our Lord
planned it and as He wanted it. That they no
longer believe in the means of sanctification
which Our Lord Jesus Christ has instituted is
what makes the whole crisis of the Church.
This is what makes the difference between
those who no longer have faith in Our Lord
and those who have kept it, as we want to keep
it; how we beg God to keep it for us, for the good
of souls, for the salvation of souls.
Throughout the last decades we have been
able to see and we still read these last weeks in
the refectory, on this crisis of the clergy. We see
the priest abandoning his faith in the salvation
willed by Our Lord Jesus Christ and by the
means that Our Lord Jesus Christ has instituted. This is the crux of the crisis we are experiencing today.
Ah! keep faith in Our Lord Jesus Christ; let
us keep faith in this unique Savior.

today, well, dear friends, you will have consolations. There are still beautiful souls. There are
still souls who seek to be united with the Good
Lord. There are still souls who have faith. And
that will comfort you. This will help you to
maintain yourself in that faith which you have
been taught here in the seminary and in that
desire for holiness and sanctification so necessary to priests.
Finally, we entrust you to the Most Blessed
Virgin Mary, Mediatrix too: Mary Mediatrix,
it is through her that all the graces which will
descend on the faithful through your hands,
through your words henceforth, words of the
sacraments, words of the Holy Sacrifice of
the Mass, all these graces which are going to
descend on the faithful, will come through
Mary.
So trust in Mary Most Holy, turn your eyes
towards her and she will help you accomplish
a beautiful apostolate.
In the name of the Father and of the Son and of
the Holy Spirit. So be it.

Unus Mediator Jesus Christus!
Unus Salvator Jesus Christus!
Unus Magister Christus!
This is what we must think, this is what we
must keep deep in our souls in order to do a
fruitful ministry, a fruitful ministry in union
with Our Lord Jesus Christ. This is what the
faithful expect of us. This is what seminaries
must achieve: this deep union with Our Lord
Jesus Christ who is our All; without Jesus we
can do nothing. He said it Himself: Quia sine me
nihil potestis facere ( Jn. 15:5), says Our Lord. So
let’s trust Him.
And despite the difficulties in which the
apostolate of our young priests is carried out
37

INTERVIEW

My Path to
Tradition
Dorian Arnold

1. Tell us a little about yourself.
Where did you grow up,
and what was your level of
exposure to Catholicism as a
child and as a young adult?
I grew up in Denver, Colorado. My mother
is the granddaughter of an Irish Catholic pioneer who was one of the families that helped to
build the Cathedral Basilica of the Immaculate
Conception. Her mother married a Protestant.
My father grew up on a farm in Kinderhook,
New York. His mother, my Nana, was an Irish
Catholic who married a German Protestant.
My father’s love of the Latin Mass, and his
longing for it, was a powerful influence in our
lives. On Sunday mornings my three brothers
and I would pile into his little car with classical Gregorian chant blaring on the radio, and
we’d speed down to the Cathedral. He would
make us all hold hands and we’d jaywalk across
Colfax and up the steps to the big brass doors. I
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remember the powerful organ music that vibrated my heart and the incense floating up to heaven. I would stare at the stained glass windows
and make up stories about the holy people in
them while my brothers tried to make each
other laugh. My dad would always sing along
with the choir, his strong tenor hitting the high
notes. He would wipe away tears when they
sang the Ave Maria. On the way home we’d listen to Luciano Pavarotti, his favorite. My mom
preferred to go to Holy Ghost Church by herself
on Sundays. I never knew that this was unusual
until I was an adult. As a teenager I was allowed
to go with her sometimes. I think she wanted
to pray by herself. We were pretty wild kids, so
I imagine those moments alone with God were
precious to her and my dad wanted to give her
a break. Her cousin was also a priest in the
Archdiocese so she liked to see him. In the ’80s
my brothers were able to serve the Latin Mass
with one of the only priests given permission in
Denver, which my Dad loved because he was

INTERVIEW

an altar boy. Sometimes we would go to Mass
with my Grandmother. She attended daily Mass
for most of her life and later, sometimes twice
in a day. She said, “One day I won’t be able to
go to Mass so I have to save up all of the graces.” After she died, I inherited her Miraculous
Medal that she got when she visited Rome in
the 1930s.
I believe that because both of my grandfathers were Protestant, things were not very
structured in our household with regard to our
faith. In fact, I don’t remember ever praying as
a family when we were little, only at Mass. For
example, we didn’t say grace at the dinner table,
but my mom would tell me to pray a Hail Mary
if I had a nightmare or was ever scared. My Dad
would always tell us that our health, our family,
and the roof over our heads were signs of “The
Good Lord looking out for us.” Later on, when
my dad was in his last years, he developed a
really strong devotion to Padre Pio and prayed
basically all the time.
I attended Catholic school for nine years.
My time there was marked by confusing and
conflicting messages. Fortunately we had some
of the last Loretto nuns in Denver as teachers.
They were rock solid. I credit whatever shred
of academic discipline I ever had to their vocation to form me. They insisted we celebrate
the traditional May Crowning and taught us
all the beautiful Marian hymns. In spite of their
efforts, things were falling apart in the Church
in the ’70s and ’80s. These were the years of
guitar Masses and even liturgical dancing.
By the time I was 16, I was on my way out
of the Church. My mother’s last attempt to prevent it was to take me to a retreat at the Trappist
Monastery in Snowmass. There a monk told
me to go ahead and try other religions (I was
interested in Buddhism at the time) because my
roots were in Catholicism and I would surely,
eventually, return. His prediction was correct,
Dieu Merci, but only after twenty years of misery and suffering. My heart as a young girl was
so thirsty for the True Faith, but instead they
gave me the spiritual equivalent of a Diet Coke.

2. What experience first piqued
your interest in Tradition?
My quest was not for Tradition but for Truth.
I never thought about Tradition. Unknowingly, I was just searching my whole life for what
was promised to me at my Baptism as a baby.

I even looked outside of Catholicism for this.
Having my own child was the first unselfish
act in my adult life, and that began the process
of my return, thanks to the intercession of Our
Lady. It was after his baptism that I returned
to the Catholic Church in earnest.
By the Grace of God, a series of events led
me to the Latin Mass community in Colorado.
I absolutely loved everything about the Latin
Mass: the military precision of the movements,
the quiet, even the illustrations in the missal my
friend shared with me. It brought me so much
peace, but for some reason I categorized that
experience in my mind as something that was
reserved for special occasions. Also, it seemed
like all these Latin Mass Catholics were very
stern and overly solemn. I didn’t understand
the clandestine nature of the TLM community.

3. Why did you settle on the
SSPX as opposed to some
other TLM community?
At first I came to the SSPX because I couldn’t
bear the thought of receiving Holy Communion in my hands as was required at my parish
during COVID. I heard about St. Isidore’s on
Taylor Marshall’s YouTube channel, where he
interviewed Fr. Robinson. Father very kindly
agreed to allow me to sign up for a slot for one
of the Masses and I’ve been at the SSPX ever
since.
Not only was this Mass, and St. Isidore’s, the
perfect antidote to the poison of the tyrannical
lockdowns, but it also was the medicine for my
soul and my son’s that I had been seeking all
these years. I was delighted to discover Archbishop Lefebvre and read all about him and his
courage. What an act of heroism for that gentle
priest who already had many fruitful years as a
missionary. His response to Vatican II was one
of true fidelity to the Church, to Truth and to
God Himself. “Given the gradual degradation
of the priestly ideal, [we must] transmit, in all
its doctrinal purity, in all its missionary charity, the Catholic priesthood of Our Lord Jesus
Christ, as He transmitted it to His apostles and
as the Roman Church transmitted it until the
mid-20th century.”
Archbishop Lefebvre’s mandate has been
carried out faithfully and his spirit is evident in
my experience thus far with the SSPX. Now that
the priesthood is secured, the faithful are free
to build thriving Catholic communities around
39

INTERVIEW

them, like the monasteries in Late Antiquity
and the Middle Ages.

4. What issues did you wrestle
with during your conversion to
Tradition, and how have you found
resolutions to those concerns?
One of my main issues is that I am furious.
The post-conciliar madness that infected our
beautiful Church was the result of evil corruption and bad ideas dreamed up by liturgical
reformers. What was proposed at the Vatican
Council went way beyond the liturgical reforms
and constituted a radical break from the Faith
itself. The Benedict Band-aid of the hermeneutic of continuity was simply an ineffectual
academic exercise, totally useless to stem the
catastrophic hemorrhage caused by the grave
conciliar wound. One can easily draw correlations between this wound and the wages of sin
upon a whole generation of souls. It’s been an
absolute disaster, one that affected me personally and my whole family. Thankfully, as a laywoman I don’t have to prove this theologically
here, as there are countless articles written by
good and holy priests of the SSPX which go
through each nuance and change in the “new”
liturgy and how it undermined the essential
intent of every sacrament.
But now that I know the Truth, I want to
rescue all of those one billion baptized Catholics who have no idea what they are missing.
My heart aches for those young men who were
truly called to their vocation in the priesthood
by God. Think of how demoralized they must
be by what is happening. They responded in all
sincerity to that supernatural call but are forced
to serve the banal, effeminate, administrative
life of a glorified manager. How they must be
suffering!
People don’t wake up and say, “Wow, I’m
really glad I’m in the Novus Ordo Church.” We
are raised in it and come to accept it, or like I
did, leave it. From what I’ve gathered from my
mom, who experienced the change in the ’60s,
very few people opposed these big moves. The
laymen were to be obedient to the Pope and
never questioned the hierarchy. Furthermore, it
would be impossible for Catholics like my mom
to think that her friendly parish priest would
have anything but her best interests and the
salvation of her soul in mind. So she went along
with it, and now my dear mother defends it.
40

The Angelus u November - December 2022

Similarly, I just can’t imagine my great
grandfather wondering if he was a traditional
Catholic, although he was. No one posed the
question. He lived a fully integrated Catholic
life. When the good Bishop Machebeuf persuaded him, along with many others, to help
build the Cathedral for all the new pioneer
families moving to Colorado, he didn’t resist.
He figured out a way to find the cash, or the
lumber. My grandmother and her sisters and
brothers threw themselves into the Holy Days
and fundraisers for the new church bells with
the same enthusiasm that they went to school,
rode horses and flyfished the beaver ponds in
the High Country.
I can’t fully express just how grateful I am
to have found the SSPX, a sanctuary of sanctity. The Mass, the priesthood and the supernatural life of Catholics are all bound together
by a history that stretches back to the Apostles. Thanks be to God, I have reclaimed that
legacy for myself and my son. However, I still
don’t consider myself a “Traditional” Catholic.
I consider myself a Catholic. I don’t believe that
there are two types: the Traditional kind, and
the Novus Ordo kind. I think there are only
those that have been told the Truth and those
who have been told a lie.

5. What practices or devotions
within Tradition have you found
to be most fruitful for you?
Assisting the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass is
a balm for my soul, it has changed my life profoundly. My son and I have also now added a
rosary to our nightly prayers along with a prayer
to St. Joseph which we still pray after the novena
from March. Our library has expanded exponentially, partly with recommended texts from
Angelus Press but also from a new friend who
hosts a ladies’ book club for St. Isidore’s. Her
book list is outstanding. I also love the annual
Cabrini Shrine Pilgrimage and the Processions
for Corpus Christi and Our Lady of the Rosary.

6. Now that you are a traditional
Catholic, what are the greatest
challenges that you face?
In the ’70s there was this cheesy song played
with guitars and bongo drums called “They
Know We Are Christians by Our Love.” That
is a nice sentiment, and true Christian charity is a virtue to be sure. Lately though, I’ve

INTERVIEW

St. Isidore’s Church & Priory, Watkins (Denver), CO.

been thinking about how the Holy Spirit compels us to act, and that perhaps a bias toward
action may be the defining feature of Christians. I think those Apostles were so appealing
to the early pagans because of their extraordinary ability to make things happen. I have been
reading about all of the early saints, and one of
the consistent themes is how hard they worked
and what they accomplished by sheer force of
will and the fire of the Holy Spirit. Our Blessed
Mother went into action immediately after the
Annunciation to visit Elizabeth, in haste. After
a couple of years I still struggle to keep up with
the pace of the SSPX. The priests are the Navy
Seals of the Church and the families I’ve met
are tireless, including the kids. Those young
boys serving at the Easter Vigil are like little
knights, standing strong into the wee hours. The
ladies are especially stoic—never a complaint,
even with so many duties. These are hard-core
Catholics, in the best way possible.

7. Do you have any advice for the
reader who may be considering, but
not yet committed to, Tradition?
Do whatever it takes to conform your life to
the One True Catholic Church.
TITLE IMAGE: John Singer Sargent (1856–1925), The Façade
of La Salute, Venice (c. 1903).

41

THEOLOGICAL STUDIES

We Owe to Pius XII
Important Clarifications on

The Nature of
the Episcopate
Fr. Jean-Michel Gleize, SSPX

The following is a study by Fr. Jean-Michel Gleize,
FSSPX. It was published originally on the official
French District website of the Society of Saint Pius
X. We thank Michael J. Miller for this translation.
1. The motu proprio Ecclesia Dei adf licta,
which was published by Pope John Paul II on
July 2, 1988, characterizes in these terms (in
paragraph 3) the act by which Archbishop Marcel Lefebvre consecrated four bishops in Ecône
on June 30 of that year: “In itself, this act was
one of disobedience to the Roman Pontiff in a
very grave matter and of supreme importance
for the unity of the Church, such as is the ordination of bishops whereby the apostolic succession is sacramentally perpetuated. Hence
such disobedience—which implies in practice
the rejection of the Roman primacy—constitutes
a schismatic act.” In its day, this passage caused
a lot of ink to be spilled, and it continues to do
so today. It is, in particular, the deep root of the
division that affects the so-called “traditionalist” movement and in any case the difference
42

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that pits the Society of Saint Pius X against the
Fraternity of Saint Peter, since the latter was
founded by former members of the Society in
reaction to the consecrations in Ecône. A correct understanding—and a critical analysis—of
this declaration by the pope, which has such
momentous consequences, requires a precise
knowledge of the revealed truths concerning
the nature of the episcopate in the Church. This
article proposes to point out its substance, in
light of the traditional teachings of the Church
Magisterium, which were constantly repeated
until Vatican Council II introduced its novelties.
2. We owe to Pope Pius XII important clarifications concerning the nature of the episcopate and its place in the divine constitution of
the Church. These clarifications appear in three
major documents, three encyclicals, which are:
the encyclical Mystici corporis ( June 29, 1943)1;
the encyclical Ad sinarum gentem (October 7,
1954)2; and the encyclical Ad apostolorum prin-

THEOLOGICAL STUDIES

cipis ( June 29, 1958)3. The second and third documents refer to the teaching spelled out in the
first and develop it, in order to denounce the
schismatic undertakings of the Chinese Patriotic Church.

The Episcopate in Mystici Corporis
3. The encyclical Mystici Corporis deals with
the Church, “developing and explaining above
all,” Pius XII says, “those points which concern
the Church Militant.” The essential idea, which
will be repeated by Ad sinarum gentem and Ad
apostolorum principis, is that the Church is the
Body of Christ, in the sense in which Christ is
the Head of the society of the Church, in other
words, the one who governs it and communicates its vital impulse to it. But Christ exercises this invisible governance by means of the
governance of His vicar, placed at the head of
a visible hierarchy.
4. This essential clarification is operative
here in determining the place of the episcopate,
understood in the sense of a power of jurisdiction, in other words in the sense of an authority
founded on the power to govern the Church,
while dependent on its supreme Head, Christ.
This power of jurisdiction, as found in the Vicar
of Christ, is a universal, supreme power. This
power is universal because the pope exercises
it to govern all the members of the Church, and
it is supreme because every other authority in
the Church is subordinate to that of the Pope.
5. These are the first clarifications given by
Pius XII: he says, “We must not think that He
rules only in a hidden or extraordinary manner. On the contrary, our Redeemer also governs His Mystical Body in a visible and normal
way through His Vicar on earth” (n. 40). “They,
therefore, walk in the path of dangerous error
who believe that they can accept Christ as the
Head of the Church, while not adhering loyally
to His Vicar on earth. They have taken away the
visible Head, broken the visible bonds of unity
and left the Mystical Body of the Redeemer so
obscured and so maimed, that those who are
seeking the haven of eternal salvation can neither see it nor find it” (n. 41).
6. However, Pius XII offers other clarifications, because although Christ appointed St.
Peter and his successors as visible heads of the
whole Church, He also willed to confer part of
the authority in His Church to others besides
His Vicar. So it is that the bishops receive a

power of jurisdiction, not supreme but subordinate to that of the pope, not universal, but
restricted to definite limits. The bishops therefore necessarily are part of the divine constitution of the Church, and Pius XII explains
that authority in the Mystical Body of Christ
is distributed proportionally between that of
the pope and that of the bishops: “What We
have thus far said of the Universal Church must
be understood also of the individual Christian
communities, whether Oriental or Latin, which
go to make up the one Catholic Church. For
they, too, are ruled by Jesus Christ through the
voice and jurisdiction of their respective Bishops…. As far as his own diocese is concerned,
each one as a true Shepherd feeds the flock
entrusted to him and rules it in the name of
Christ” (n. 42).
7. This complexity of the Church’s government calls for a third clarification, and Pius XII
carefully explains how the pope’s power and
that of the bishops are connected. This is the
passage that contains the important facts that
will be repeated subsequently in Ad sinarum
gentem and Ad apostolorum principis, and which
should still serve as a sure rule and a reference point for Catholics today, who are confronted with a state of necessity. Although it is
true that the bishops govern, each one by virtue of an ordinary and proper power, the part
of the Church’s flock that is assigned to them,
they exercise this power while dependent on
the pope’s primacy of jurisdiction, and this is
so for two reasons. First, because, in the very
exercise of this power, they remain subject to
the pope. Secondly, because the very power
that they exercise is communicated to them
by the pope. Their subordination is explained
therefore not only by reason of their exercise of
power but also and more radically by reason of
the very being of this power, which is received
as a participation in the power of the pope, in
other words as a participation in the power of
the Vicar of Christ, and therefore as a participation in the very power of Christ, through that
of the pope.
8. This is the important clarification that
Pius XII gives: “Yet in exercising this office [the
bishops] are not altogether independent, but
are subordinate to the lawful authority of the
Roman Pontiff, although enjoying the ordinary
power of jurisdiction which they receive directly
from the same Supreme Pontiff.” The wording
43

THEOLOGICAL STUDIES

of the Latin text is unambiguous: “immediate sibi
ab eodem Pontifice impertita.” Note the presence
of the adverb “immediately,” which means “in
an unmediated way” or “without an intermediary.” The idea expressed by this term deserves
an in-depth explanation, which the other two
encyclicals of Pius XII will give us an opportunity to develop. For the moment, it is enough for
us to remember that the interconnection of the
powers of governing, in the Church, consists of
the fact that Christ, having communicated the
very essence of His own power to His Vicar, the
Bishop of Rome, also communicates, through
the latter’s intervention, a share in this power
to the other bishops, each of whom governs a
portion of the flock, while depending on the
supreme and universal Shepherd.

The Episcopate in
Ad Sinarum Gentem
9. When Pius XII addressed his encyclical “to Our dear Chinese people” and also to
the episcopate and the clergy of that people,
the Church in China was experiencing violent
persecution by its Communist-inspired government. The pope recalled that, despite this persecution, the principle must remain intact that
“it will be entirely necessary for your Christian community, if it wishes to be part of the
society divinely founded by our Redeemer, to
be completely subject to the Supreme Pontiff,
Vicar of Jesus Christ on earth, and be strictly
united with him in regard to religious faith and
morals” (n. 11).
10. Pius XII recalls furthermore on this occasion the distinction established by Christ’s own
will, consequently a distinction of divine right,
between two sacred powers: the power of order
and the power of jurisdiction: “eademque voluntate duplex constituitur sacra potestas, ordinis nempe
et jurisdictionis”4. And he explains that, “As has
also been divinely established, the power of
orders (through which the ecclesiastical hierarchy is composed of bishops, priests, and ministers) comes from receiving the Sacrament of
Holy Orders. But the power of jurisdiction,
which is conferred upon the Supreme Pontiff
directly by divine right, flows to the Bishops
by the same right, but only through the Successor of St. Peter” (n. 12). Therefore a distinction
is made here, not only between two powers of
different natures, but also between two different ways of communicating one power and the
44

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other. The power of order, which in the case
of a bishop is the power to confer Holy Orders
and to administer the Sacrament of Confirmation, is communicated by the reception itself
of the Sacrament of Holy Orders, for instance
when a bishop ordains a priest or when a bishop
performs the episcopal consecration of another
bishop. The power of jurisdiction, in contrast, is
communicated to the pope directly by Christ,
on the occasion of the acceptance of his election
to the Supreme Pontificate, and it is communicated to bishops “only through” the successor
of Peter, in other words, as far as the pope communicates to the bishop, by an act of his will, a
participation in the power of jurisdiction that he
himself holds in its fullness, as Vicar of Christ.
11. We should note that here Pius XII uses
an expression whose meaning agrees with the
one that we emphasized in Mystici Corporis. The
power of jurisdiction is communicated “only”
through the pope, in other words “without intermediary.” Such an intermediary, therefore,
could not be the performance of the sacred rite,
which for its part communicates only the power
of order. Each of the two sacred powers, order
and jurisdiction, is communicated in a manner
absolutely proper and specific to it, in two mutually exclusive ways. The power of order must
be communicated by a sacred rite, and the will
of the pope alone is not sufficient for that. The
power of jurisdiction must be communicated by
the will of the pope alone, and the sacred rite is
not sufficient for that.
12. This is a very important clarification that
is made here. The idea was already present in
Mystici Corporis, but the encyclical Ad sinarum
gentem, which appeared a little less than ten
years later, has the advantage of explaining it
in response to the necessities of the Church in
China. Pius XII affirms here that the power
of jurisdiction is communicated to the bishops
by the pope in a way different from episcopal
consecration. The latter communicates only the
power of order, so that, taken as such, a consecrated bishop does not yet enjoy the power of
jurisdiction. The latter power is communicated
by an act of the pope’s will, a supplementary
act that must be added to the act of episcopal
consecration performed by a bishop. This distinction, already explained by Pius XII in Ad
sinarum gentem, would be highlighted even more
fully four years later, in the encyclical Ad apostolorum principis.

THEOLOGICAL STUDIES

Archbishop Marcel Lefebvre consecrating the four bishops in June 1988.

The Episcopate in
Ad Apostolorum Principis
13. This encyclical letter is addressed by
the pope to the archbishops, bishops, priests,
and faithful of the Church of China. In it Pius
XII continues to encourage the Chinese Catholics, who face the persecution of the Communist authorities. But he must react also against
the schismatic initiative of a “Patriotic Association,” fomented by the regime in power. “This
Association … was formed ostensibly to join
the clergy and the faithful in love of their religion and their country, with these objectives
in view: that they might foster patriotic sentiments; that they might advance the cause of
international peace; that they might accept that
species of socialism which has been introduced
among you and, having accepted it, support
and spread it; that, finally, they might actively
cooperate with civil authorities in defending
what they describe as political and religious
freedom” (n. 10). But under this vague pretext,
the Association intends to lead Catholics to give
their support to Communism. In this context,

the so-called patriotic movement proclaims
the right of Catholics to entrust to bishops the
government of dioceses, with the agreement of
the civil authorities. “Certain ecclesiastics have
rashly dared to receive episcopal consecration
[on those terms], despite the public and severe
warning which this Apostolic See gave those
involved” (n. 37). Pius XII denounces here the
sign of a rebellion against the Church, and also
of “serious offenses against the discipline and
unity of the Church” (ibid.). And this leads him
to recall, this time with all the necessary details,
“the teachings and principles on which rests the
right order of the society divinely instituted by
Jesus Christ our Lord” (ibid.), which are absolutely opposed to these schismatic maneuvers
of the Patriotic Association.
14. The essential point of the teaching
recalled by Pius XII, which we must remember
here, is as follows. Moreover he refers explicitly to the teachings already given in the two
preceding encyclicals. “Bishops who have been
neither named nor confirmed by the Apostolic
See, but who, on the contrary, have been elect45

THEOLOGICAL STUDIES

ed and consecrated in defiance of its express
orders, enjoy no powers of teaching or of jurisdiction, since jurisdiction passes to bishops only
through the Roman Pontiff as We admonished
in the encyclical letter Mystici Corporis in the following words: ‘As far as his own diocese is concerned each (bishop) feeds the flock entrusted to
him as a true shepherd and rules it in the name
of Christ. Yet in exercising this office they are
not altogether independent but are subordinate
to the lawful authority of the Roman Pontiff,
although enjoying ordinary power of jurisdiction which they receive directly from the same
Supreme Pontiff.’ And when We later addressed
to you the letter Ad Sinarum gentem, We again
referred to this teaching in these words: ‘The
power of jurisdiction which is conferred directly
by divine right on the Supreme Pontiff comes to
bishops by that same right, but only through the
successor of Peter, to whom not only the faithful
but also all bishops are bound to be constantly
subject and to adhere both by the reverence of
obedience and by the bond of unity.’” [Ad apostolorum principis, 39-40]
15. Pius XII reaffirms here the twofold distinction already pointed out earlier: on the one
hand between the two powers of order and jurisdiction, and on the other hand between the two
different ways of communicating them. The
power of jurisdiction is communicated by the
pope and by him alone, independently of episcopal consecration, which for its part communicates only the power of order. Proof of this here,
if necessary, is the expression used at the very
beginning of the passage cited above: “Bishops
who have been neither named nor confirmed
by the Apostolic See, but who, on the contrary,
have been elected and consecrated in defiance
of its express orders, enjoy no powers of teaching or of jurisdiction.” A distinction is made
here between, on the one hand, the bishops
who were neither appointed nor confirmed by
the pope, without yet having been consecrated,
and on the other hand those who were neither
appointed nor confirmed by the pope but have
even been consecrated against his decision. The
fact of conferring episcopal consecration and of
communicating the power of order against the
pope’s will only aggravates the attack already
made against Church unity, without causing it.
What causes it is the fact of pretending to communicate the power of jurisdiction in conferring

46

The Angelus u November - December 2022

an appointment, which is the pope’s responsibility and his alone.
16. In the next part of the document, Pius XII
insists on the illicitness of the acts performed by
virtue of their power of order by bishops who
received their episcopal consecration against
the will of Rome, at the instigation of the Communist authorities. The pope says: “Acts requiring the power of Holy Orders which are performed by ecclesiastics of this kind, though they
are valid as long as the consecration conferred
on them was valid, are yet gravely illicit, that
is, criminal and sacrilegious” [n. 41]. He means
here acts resulting from the power of order, in
other words, the conferral of Holy Orders and
the administration of the Sacrament of Confirmation, performed by these schismatic bishops. Unlike the power of jurisdiction which they
were unable to receive, since only the pope can
give it, by appointment or canonical mission,
and which therefore is in their case null and
void, invalid, their power of order for its part
is valid and quite real, since it results from a
sacred rite per opus operatum, i.e. which is effective through the celebration thereof. But the
exercise of this power of order is illicit, since the
power that is its source was conferred against
the will of the Supreme Pastor of the Church.
17. We find here again the same distinction,
mentioned earlier, between a power of order
and a power of jurisdiction; these powers are
not only essentially distinct but also separable, so that one and the same subject, a bishop,
can have one without the other, since one is
conferred in a manner distinct from the other.
Episcopal consecration, which communicates
the power of order, can be performed validly
even though the canonical institution by the
pope, which communicates the power of jurisdiction, has not been carried out. The bishop
consecrated in this way will therefore be the
subject of the power of order without being the
subject of the power of jurisdiction. A situation
like this can occur for very different reasons:
either because the pope authorizes the episcopal
consecration, without giving to the consecrated
bishop the power of jurisdiction, as this happens
in the case of “titular” bishops, 5 honorary bishops ad honores consecrati, or auxiliary bishops;
or else because, even though the pope neither
authorized the episcopal consecration nor gave
the power of jurisdiction, the consecration was
performed anyway. In the first case, the conse-

THEOLOGICAL STUDIES

cration is legitimate while in the second it normally is not. But it is important to make another
distinction here.
18. Indeed, on the purely hypothetical and
theoretical level, someone who consecrates a
bishop against the pope’s will and illegitimately
can plan to do so with two different intentions.
First, he may plan to communicate simultaneously the power of order by means of the consecration and the power of jurisdiction, by means
of an authority that he arrogates to himself but
which belongs only to the pope. However, secondly, he may plan also to communicate only
the power of order by means of the consecration
without communicating the power of jurisdiction and without usurping the pope’s authority.
Of course, this distinction remains theoretical,
and in practice, most often if not always, those
who consecrate a bishop against the pope’s will
have the intention of communicating not only
the power of order by means of the consecration strictly speaking but also—and above all—
the power of jurisdiction, while usurping the
power of the pope. These are the schismatic
consecrators who unfortunately punctuate the
whole history of the Church. However, the other
alternative is still possible: consecrating a bishop against the pope’s will can be done without usurping the pope’s power, in other words,
without the consecrator claiming to communicate a jurisdiction that only the pope can communicate. In a situation like that, the consecrator communicates what he can effectively
communicate, since the power of order as such
depends on a valid consecration, with or without the pope’s approval.
19. Hence we see precisely where the “attack
against the unity of the Church” and, ultimately, schism is situated. Schism does not consist
of refusing to render to the authority what is
due to it, whether within the context of an isolated case or rarely, or else in most cases and
very often. That is disobedience, but that does
not cause a schism. Schism consists precisely
in refusing as a matter of principle to subordinate one’s action to the precept of the authority
and to separate oneself from it so as to set oneself up as a competing authority. Someone who
arrogates to himself the pope’s own authority in
order to communicate a power of jurisdiction of
which he is not the source fits this definition of
schism, while someone who performs an episcopal consecration against the pope’s will in order

to communicate the power of order does not fit
this definition of schism and commits only an
act of disobedience.
20. We see also exactly what would go
against divine right and would therefore represent a theological impossibility. To communicate somehow the power of jurisdiction in the
Church contrary to the will of the pope contradicts a principle of divine right and is therefore a
theological impossibility. No exceptional situation, no extraordinary circumstance could ever
legitimize, much less make possible, the communication of the power of jurisdiction against
the pope’s will. On the other hand, communicating the power of order against the pope’s
will, by performing an episcopal consecration,
does not contradict a principle of divine right,
since Divine Revelation does not teach that only
the pope can proceed to consecrate a bishop.
Divine right teaches that every bishop can do
this, since it is a question here of a theological possibility. It is true that the same divine
right also teaches that the communication of the
power of order, through an episcopal consecration, should be done in conformity with the will
of the pope, but here it is a question no longer
of a theological possibility or impossibility but
rather of a moral necessity on the level of action.
On this level, exceptional situations can arise
and extraordinary circumstances may be such
that the common good of the Church calls for
an episcopal consecration performed against
the abusive authority of a bad pope.
21. These clarifications, drawn from the document itself by Pius XII, elucidate the rest of the
encyclical. The pope says: “From what We have
said, it follows that no authority whatsoever,
save that which is proper to the Supreme Pastor, can render void the canonical appointment
granted to any bishop; that no person or group,
whether of priests or of laymen, can claim the
right of nominating bishops; that no one can
lawfully confer episcopal consecration unless he
has received the mandate of the Apostolic See”
[n. 47]. Carefully note the difference: no one
other than the Supreme Pastor can withdraw or
give the power of jurisdiction, whereas no one
can legitimately confer episcopal consecration
against the will of the pope. The first negation
concerns the very possibility whereas the second concerns not the possibility but rather the
legitimacy of something that remains possible,
in any case. And on the other hand, when in
47

THEOLOGICAL STUDIES

this document Pius XII goes on to insist on the
seriousness of an episcopal consecration that is
illegitimately conferred, this seriousness must
be understood about the additional act that
aggravates the usurpation of power by which
the power of jurisdiction was communicated
against the pope’s will. The consecration the
Pius XII is speaking about, precisely in reference to the events that occurred in China, is not
only illegitimate but also schismatic, since the
consecrating bishop arrogates to himself moreover the power to communicate jurisdiction.
“If consecration of this kind is being done contrary to all right and law, and by this crime the
unity of the Church is being seriously attacked,
an excommunication reserved specialissimo
modo [in a very special way] to the Apostolic
See has been established which is automatically incurred by the consecrator and by anyone
who has received consecration irresponsibly
conferred” [n. 48].

The Episcopate in the
Society Is Not Schismatic
22. Supposing—but not conceding—that the
act of episcopal consecration on June 30, 1988,
performed by Arcbishop Lefebvre, was “one
of disobedience to the Roman Pontiff in a very
grave matter and of supreme importance for the
unity of the Church,”6 one could still not say
that this disobedience “implies in practice the
rejection of the Roman primacy” and “constitutes a schismatic act” [Ecclesia Dei adflicta, 3].
Archbishop Lefebvre did not intend to arrogate
to himself the authority of the Supreme Pontiff
in order to communicate a power of jurisdiction
to the four bishops whom he consecrated. He
was content to communicate to them the power
of order, by means of the sacred rite of episcopal
consecration. This distinction is possible theologically, as we showed in light of the teachings
of Pius XII. Archbishop Lefebvre’s intention
was by no means schismatic (“far be it from me
to try to set myself up as pope,” he exclaimed
in the sermon that he gave on the occasion of
the consecrations). The consecrations in Ecône
were in no way comparable to the schismatic
consecrations performed in China at the instigation of the Patriotic Association. Archbishop
Lefebvre explains this, moreover, in his sermon
on June 30, 1988: “We are not schismatics! If
an excommunication was pronounced against
the bishops of China, who separated themselves
48

The Angelus u November - December 2022

from Rome and put themselves under the Chinese government, one very easily understands
why Pope Pius XII excommunicated them.
There is no question of us separating ourselves
from Rome, nor of putting ourselves under a
foreign government, nor of establishing a sort
of parallel church as the Bishops of Palmar de
Troya have done in Spain. They have even elected a pope, formed a college of cardinals… It
is out of the question for us to do such things.
Far from us be this miserable thought of separating ourselves from Rome!” This intention of
Archbishop Lefebvre formally excludes from
his act any schismatic significance, and it is not
utopian, because, as Pius XII teaches, such an
intention is theologically possible and feasible.
23. The initiative on June 30, 1988, must
therefore be understood and can find its justification in light of the most traditional and the
most authentic Magisterial teachings, in keeping with the three major encyclicals by Pope
Pius XII.

Endnotes
1

AAS, vol. XXXV (1943): 193-248. The passage that interests
us is the one that appears on pp. 210-212. English translation
from the Vatican website.

2

AAS, vol. XLVII (1955): 5-14. The passage that interests us
is the one that appears on pp. 8-9. English translation from
the Vatican website.

3

AAS, vol. L (1958): 601-614. The passage that interests us is
the one that appears on pp. 609-613. English translation from
the Vatican website.

4

AAS, vol. XLVII (1955): 9.

5

This designation “titular” comes from the fact that these bishops receive the symbolic title of an ancient diocese which
today is inhabited chiefly by unbelievers or schismatics.

6

We showed elsewhere (in Part Two of the article “L’été 88,”
published on the website La Porte Latine on May 10, 2022) that
there is no disobedience here but rather legitimate resistance
to an abuse of power committed by the authority.

TITLE IMAGE: Pope Pius XII receives his Apostolic Delegate,
Archbishop Lefebvre, in audience around 1954, in the company of Fr. Perraud, Secretary of the Apostolic Delegation
of Dakar.

New Titles from Angelus Press
Treasury of the Sacred Heart
A very rich manual of Catholic prayers, hymns and devotions. Published in 1867, it notes the
Indulgences attached to these devotions according to previous legislation. The second half contains
the epistles and gospels for all Sundays and festivals of the year. Inside you will find: • A multitude
of prayers, litanies, and hymns and meditations • The ordinary of the Mass • Devotional prayers to
say during Mass • Methods of hearing Mass • Vespers of Sunday • Benediction • Compline • The
epistles and gospels for all Sundays and principal feasts throughout the year (1879 calendar).
This beautiful volume is indeed a rich treasury that will become a lifetime keepsake.
1,051 pp. Gold foil on black cloth. Sewn hardcover. Ribbon. STK# 8820. $39.95

2023 Liturgical Calendar
15-month liturgical calendar for 2023. “Mysteries, Miracles, and the Mother of God,” covers the entire range of Our Lord’s earthly ministry with due attention paid to Our Lady’s
role in His salvific work. More than ornamentation, these images are intended to direct our
minds away from earthly cares to Heavenly things, even if only for a few moments. Combined with the daily liturgical notes, including fasting and abstinence days, the faithful
are encouraged to use this calendar to chart out their practical and spiritual lives, always
remembering that each morning brings a fresh opportunity to give thanks to God for all
His wondrous blessings. Contains a list of SSPX chapels and rules for fast and abstinence.
38 pp. STK# CAL2023. $12.95

Divine Light
A beautiful illustrated first prayerbook for very young
readers. It contains:
The most necessary prayers • the Commandments • acts of
faith, hope and charity • the Rosary • guide for Confession
• prayers before and after Communion • prayers for Holy
Mass • and the Stations of the Cross.
68 pp. Hardcover. STK# 8814. $12.95

His Own Received Him Not   English Martyrs of the Holy Mass
This book is about those who gave their life for the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass, saints who were
outlawed, mocked and hated by the ruling elite of their times. Their great conflict was played out
in prison, in torture chambers and on the scaffold. Most of them were priests, fugitive in their
homeland, who were caught by the pursuivants while saying Mass. Others were lay men and
women attending the banned Catholic worship or hiding hunted priests. Some of them were bishops who first fell into schism with Henry VIII… May the example of these saintly English heroes
increase our devotion in our troubled times plagued by disbelief in the sacrificial nature of the
Mass and irreverence towards the Blessed Eucharist.
264 pp. Softcover. STK# 8826. $18.95

Doors of Silence
By a Carthusian monk
It is for you alone, beloved soul, that the Lord draws you to the desert to speak to your heart; for
He has chosen you as unique; to make you better: you whom He has chosen as a host of praise
forever! Do you wish to burn before His adorable face like the purest wax? Consent to forget the
world, the universe, and yourself. As much as it is possible for you, in exact obedience and perfect
charity, you must avoid four things which are major obstacles to interior silence, and which render
habitual contemplation impossible. This being done, you will have passed through the doors of
silence.
64 pp. 4.25” x 7.25”. Hardcover. STK# 8780. $12.95

www.angeluspress.org | 1-800-966-7337

Please visit our website to see our entire selection of books and music.

John Atkinson Grimshaw (1836–1893),
“Boar’s Lane,” Leeds.

THEOLOGICAL STUDIES

England
and the
Immaculate
Conception
Pauper Peregrinus

52

The Angelus u November - December 2022

THEOLOGICAL STUDIES

F

r. Yves Congar (1904-95), an erudite if
problematic French Dominican, once
remarked to an Anglican bishop at the
University of Cambridge who was criticizing the dogma of the Immaculate Conception: “But it is England’s great gift to the Catholica [Catholic world]!” What did he mean?
From the earliest times, Christians have been
convinced of the unique holiness of the Blessed
Virgin Mary. Speaking under the inspiration of
the Holy Ghost, St. Elizabeth cried out: Blessed
art thou among women, and blessed is the fruit of thy
womb! When he came to define the Immaculate
Conception, Pope Pius IX personally insisted
that this scriptural verse be included in the bull
of definition, and it is not hard to see why. St.
Elizabeth’s words already suggest the unique
“communion of blessedness” between Jesus and
Mary: His divinity covered her like a cloak, so
that no taint of Adam’s curse would touch her.
Greek-speaking Catholics, from the early
days of the Church until now, have always honored Mary with the title of Panagia: all-holy
Lady. Among Syrian writers, St. Ephraim, a
doctor of the Church who was born around 306,
addressed Christ with these words: “Only you
and your Mother are more beautiful than everything. For on you, O Lord, there is no mark, neither is there any stain in your Mother.” A little
later, in the west, St. Ambrose referred to our
Lady as “a virgin who by grace is untouched
by any stain of sin.” The current of devotion
met an obstacle, however, with the coming of
the Pelagian heresy in the early 400’s. Pelagius
and his allies taught that men had the innate
power to avoid all faults, a belief that led them
to deny original sin. The Church’s doctors,
especially St. Augustine, reacted by insisting
upon the reality of this hereditary flaw in the
human race. But the Pelagians retorted: “You
claim that all men but Christ must inevitably
commit sins, since they all inherit Adam’s sin.
But what about the mother of the Lord?”
St. Augustine contented himself with knocking the question away. He already had enough
to do! “In regard to the holy virgin Mary,” he
said, “for the honor of our Lord, I want no question at all to be raised when we speak of sin” (On
Nature and Grace, 42). But he did not enter deeply into the special question of Mary’s relation
to original sin, leaving it rather to be untangled
by posterity.
The Pelagian controversy left its mark upon
the Church, especially in the west, and delayed

the universal acceptance among the learned of
the Immaculate Conception. At the same time,
it ensured that the question would be thoroughly discussed, so that the final definition when it
came would be precise.
As the words of Fr. Congar suggest, England
had a special part to play in the triumph of the
doctrine. There is some evidence that a feast
of Mary’s conception was already being celebrated in that country by the 9th century. It is
certain that it was celebrated there by around
1060, although a few years later, after the invasion of William the Conqueror, the over-zealous
Norman bishops would suppress it as a novelty.
The Normans could not suppress theological
reflection, however. Just before they invaded,
a child was born in England who was given
the name Eadmer. He became a monk in the
Benedictine abbey of Canterbury, and a disciple of the great St. Anselm. St. Anselm had
written: “It was fitting that the Virgin should
shine with a purity than which under God no
greater can be conceived.” Eadmer developed
this thought, and became the first theologian
to teach our Lady’s Immaculate Conception in
clear terms, in a short work called On the conception of holy Mary.
He offers various “arguments of fittingness”
for the doctrine. For example, St. John the Baptist is believed to have been sanctified before
birth, though not at conception: and would not
God wish to do something still greater for His
own mother? Again, he writes: “when the other
angels sinned, God preserved the good angels
from sin; and was he not able to preserve a
woman, who was soon to become his mother, from sharing the sins of others?” Eadmer is
aware that the question of the Immaculate Conception has not yet been settled by the authority
of the Church, but he himself, he declares, will
not change his conviction of its truth, unless
somebody can show him something still more
worthy of the Virgin.
Across the English Channel, however, St.
Bernard was hesitating. Writing in 1140 to the
canons of Lyon, he asks them why they have
begun to celebrate the feast of our Lady’s conception. He knows well, he says, that “her life
was protected immune from all sin,” but he does
not understand how her conception can have
been free from Adam’s influence, given that it
took place in the usual way. He tells them that
they had better limit themselves to those feasts
of the Blessed Virgin that have been handed
53

THEOLOGICAL STUDIES

down, though he professes himself ready to submit to the judgment of some wiser man, and in
particular to be corrected by the Roman church
if need be.
Not everyone was convinced by this letter, even though it came from so great a saint.
Back in England, a monk called Nicholas of St.
Albans went so far as to say that St. Bernard
had pierced Mary’s soul for the second time.
Clearly, feelings were running high.
The question was discussed but not satisfactorily resolved during the following century, by
such luminaries as St. Albert, St. Bonaventure,
and St. Thomas Aquinas. While all these men
naturally desired to attribute every excellence
to our Lady, they suffered the same scruple as
St. Bernard, and feared lest they should exempt
her from redeemed mankind. Christ, after all, is
the Redeemer of the whole race without exception.
The Franciscans in England found the way
forward. A certain Friar William, from Ware
in Hertfordshire, is supposed to have said of
the Immaculate Conception, potuit, decuit, ergo
fecit: “God was able to, it was fitting, therefore
He did it.” As such, it was less an argument
than an aphorism: but John Duns Scotus (d.
1308), who is thought to have been a pupil of
this same William, went into the question with
his usual subtlety, and was finally able to answer
the objections of earlier theologians. Teaching
at the University of Oxford, Friar John argued
that within a single moment of time, there can
still be a kind of “before and after,” not temporal but causal. In this sense, each human soul
precedes both the state of sin and the state of
grace, since a soul must “first” exist “before” it
can be in either one state or the other.
The Blessed Virgin, he argued, descended
from Adam by a natural process and therefore would have contracted original sin if the
grace of God had not been given to her in the
first moment of her conception. She is therefore redeemed, but in a unique way; by prevention, rather than by cure. Scotus argues that this
explanation, far from detracting from the honor
due to Christ, enhances it, since it attributes to
Christ the most perfect form of redemption. “A
most perfect mediator,” he writes, “must have
the most perfect possible act of mediation,” and
“it is a more excellent benefit to preserve someone from evil than to permit them to fall into
evil and afterwards to deliver them.” 650 years
54

The Angelus u November - December 2022

later, in his encyclical Fulgens Corona, Pope Pius
XII would echo this thought, declaring that the
Lord redeemed Mary “in a certain most perfect
manner.” Although the theologians would continue to discuss the question, and sometimes
warmly, the explanation of Duns Scotus, so profoundly in keeping with the instinct of the Catholic people, enabled the truth of the Immaculate
Conception to be ever more widely proclaimed
with the passing of the years. Many universities, beginning with the Sorbonne in Paris in
1497, made acceptance of this doctrine into a
condition for graduation, and early Jesuits such
as St. Peter Canisius and St. Robert Bellarmine included it in their catechisms. Finally, on
December 8, 1854, Pope Pius IX, enthroned
in the basilica of St. Peter and surrounded by
bishops and cardinals, solemnly defined that
the doctrine which holds that the Blessed Virgin
Mary, by a unique privilege of God, in view of
the foreseen merits of Christ, was immune from
all guilt of original sin from the first moment of
her conception, is a truth revealed by God and
thus to be held firmly by all Christians.
Meanwhile, what of England? She had gone
into schism, alas, three hundred years before.
But just before the papal definition, God had
raised up the greatest of modern English converts, John Henry Newman. He would write a
noble vindication of the dogma. His erstwhile
colleague in the Anglican church, Edward
Pusey, had attacked the Immaculate Conception as a departure from the faith of the early
Church. Newman, in a justly celebrated Letter to Pusey, shows that the reverse is true. The
fundamental belief of the early Church about
our Lady was that she is a new Eve. But as the
first Eve was created in a state of grace, so also
was the second. “She, who was to co-operate
in the redemption of the world … was not less
endowed with power from on high, than she
who, given as a help-mate for her husband,
did in the event but co-operate with him for its
ruin.” He finished his lengthy letter on December 7, 1865, with some words that were meant
not for Pusey alone, but for all his compatriots
outside the Fold: “May that bright and gently
Lady, the Blessed Virgin Mary, overcome you
with her sweetness, and revenge herself on her
foes by interceding effectually for their conversion!”
TITLE IMAGE: Giovanni Battista Tiepolo, The Immaculate Conception (1767-1769), Madrid, Museo del Prado.

New Titles from Angelus Press
The Story of Fr. George Kathrein
The life of Fr. Kathrein is a reminder to all readers, especially newer generations
who are too young to have experienced the spiritual abandonment that traditionalist
Catholics went through during the years after Vatican II. It also serves as a reminder
that the fight itself has not changed, even if the tactics have mutated with time and
circumstances: our goal is to eradicate the neo-Modernist errors from the Catholic
Church, and to restore the Church’s own unchanging and infallible Tradition to the
hierarchy and to the faithful, who have been left spiritually poor and abandoned due to
the erroneous teachings, poor catechesis, and liturgical anarchy of the past 60 years.
286 pp. Softcover. STK# 8823. $16.95

The Courage to Be Afraid 

By Fr. Marie-Dominique Molinié, O.P.
Translated by Fr. Alexander Wiseman, SSPX
The Courage to Be Afraid is remarkably different from other spiritual books. It is a tour
de force that examines many aspects of the Christian life, yet always returning to a
simple, powerful theme: we have to let God act. Fr. Molinié addresses himself to us,
children of the modern world, in order to recall us forcefully to what never changes, no
matter the state of things: the divine life is in us, and will transform us if we surrender
to it. “God’s love is a consuming fire…”
242 pp. Softcover. STK# 8797. $21.95

Manual of the Holy Face
St. Therese of Lisieux’s Favorite Devotion!
The Manual of the Archconfraternity of the Holy Face is a collection of traditional
devotions to the Holy Face of Our Lord in His Passion. It was approved by Pope Leo
XIII in 1895 and promoted by Pope Pius XII in 1958 and practiced by St. Therese
of Lisieux. This devotion exists as a specific form of reparation for the blasphemies
committed against Our Lord.
A powerful devotion of reparation much needed in our times.
346 pp. Softcover. STK# 8806. $14.95

Consecration to St. Michael
Beautiful hardback book with full-color illustrations!
Take up this ancient devotion to our most powerful angelic defender. Over the course
of the last century, as we measure the decline of civilization and faith, it is no surprise
that the devotion to St. Michael has diminished. The removal of the Leonine prayers
as well as St. Michael’s name from the prayers of the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass leave
little doubt that this glorious victor and powerful intercessor has all but been forgotten
by the world. This little book aggregates the history of shrines and devotions that
have been offered to St. Michael and presents them once again to be used and spread
throughout the world.
144 pp. Hardcover. STK# 8802. $14.95

Against All Heresies

Translated by Fr. Paul M. Kimball, SSPX
Against All Heresies was written at the request of Spanish merchants of Flanders
to combat heretics and was first published in Paris in 1534. It is a description and
criticism of more than 400 heresies, which had arisen in the Church since the time of
the Apostles, presented in alphabetical order. It was the author’s most popular work
for which he received the nickname, “the scourge of heretics.” King Philip II of Spain,
whom the author served as chaplain, wrote in the preface of this work that this book is
“such a useful and beneficial book for the Christian state.”
1,130 pp. Hardcover. STK# BD0364. $36.99

www.angeluspress.org | 1-800-966-7337

Please visit our website to see our entire selection of books and music.

55

SCRIPTURAL STUDIES

Meditations on
St. John’s Gospel
Chapter Fifteen
Pater Inutilis

S

t. John does not give us Our Lord’s last
“testament”—the new and eternal in His
Blood—but he certainly does give us His
“last wishes”: those things we see Jesus
repeating, and so insisting upon. In this chapter
15, we begin a long monologue of the Savior,
hearing again: His commandment, which is to
love one another (vs. 12 & 17)1; that we love
Him, if we keep His commandments (vs. 10 &
14)2; that, for those well-disposed, God will do
whatsoever they ask of Him (vs. 7 & 16)3; that
God will come to them (vs. 26)4 and abide with
them (vs. 4f)5.
Jesus starts this discourse, though, with the
“proverb” of “the vine.” The vine, its branches and their fruit are all of the same species:
here this is going to illustrate our partaking of
the divine nature.6 “I am the true vine, and my
Father is the husbandman” (vs. 1). The husbandman plants and nurtures the vine. The Father
does this by speaking His “Word” (1:1) and not
leaving Him alone, but being always with Him
56

The Angelus u November - December 2022

(16:32), doing Himself the works the Son does
(14:10). “I am the true vine.” Israel as a people
was already a vineyard planted by God from
which He expected fruits of holiness (Is. 5:17; Mt. 21:33-43) and was disappointed; it was,
however, not the true vine which it but foreshadowed [ just as it was “son of God” (Deut. 32:6-9;
Os. 11:1) but not the true son, the only begotten
(1:18)]. “Every branch in me…” (vs. 2). This is
the one in whom the Father and Son make their
abode (14:23). Of this one too the Father is husbandman: these branches are born of the will
of God (1:13) and are in the hands of the Father
from which no man can snatch them (10:29).
They are not to be like Israel, fruitless, but
like Jesus “the firstborn amongst many brethren” (Rom. 8:29). Fruitlessness means being
lopped off, rejected, as Israel (vs. 2); fruitfulness is assured by “purging” (vs. 2)—pruning—
being persecuted by the world, as was Jesus (vs.
18-20). “Unless the grain of wheat falling into
the ground die, itself remaineth alone. But if it

SCRIPTURAL STUDIES

die, it bringeth forth much fruit” (12:24f). And
yet, we are now being taught that what really
counts is not exterior conformity to Christ crucified, but that He be in us. “He that abideth
in me, and I in him, the same beareth much
fruit” (vs. 5). The fruit is divine, indeed eternal
life7—its principle must be also. What is not of
grace, from Christ living and working in us,
is worthless. This is absolute, “for without me,
you can do nothing” (vs. 5). It is He Who has
chosen us and appointed us to bring forth fruit
(vs. 16). His grace must precede and accompany all. [But this does not mean that we are not
to cooperate with His work in us, as if nothing
at all depended on our will, for otherwise His
exhorting us to abide in Him (vs. 4, 9) would be
pointless and His commanding us (vs. 12, 14,
17) to no avail; also, the being cast forth into
the fire (vs. 6) would be unjust, and “our” fruit
(vs. 5, 16) not actually ours.]
“Abide in me” (vs. 4). “Abide in my love”
(vs. 9). How do we do that? “If you keep my
commandments, you shall abide in my love”
(vs 10). Can they be summarized? What is the
essence of them? “This is my commandment,
that you love one another”—but not as the publicans and heathens (Mt. 5:46f); rather “as I have
loved you” (vs. 12). Now, He laid down His life
for us (vs. 13); He accepted to be hated (vs. 18)
and persecuted (vs. 20) by the world. Must we
too lay down our lives one for another? That
is precisely the lesson St. John draws: “In this
we have known the charity of God, because
he has laid down his life for us: and we ought
to lay down our lives for the brethren” (I Jn.
3:16). “The brethren”: other branches in which
Christ abides, or wants to (10:16; 17:20f). We are
talking about a love of charity, that our neighbor
be “in God.” This we must want and strive for,
unto sacrificing all. True, we too will be hated
(vs. 18f) and persecuted (vs. 20) by the world.
At this price, though, we shall not only bear
fruit that will remain (vs. 16) but also will have
a joy that will be filled (vs. 11). Joy is not the
fruit of self-seeking, but of self-sacrifice; this is
the secret of the saints. “I exceedingly abound
with joy in all our tribulation” (II Cor 7:4). It is
the spirit of the beatitudes.
Jesus has come (vs. 22) and so will the
Paraclete (vs. 26). Now, when it is a question
of Christ’s “coming” and “going” as man8 , we
understand readily enough: He came through
His incarnation and He goes through His ascen-

sion. But when it is a question of the coming
or going of a Person of the Holy Trinity, 9 what
are we to understand? God is a Spirit, infinite,
completely immutable and omnipresent. He
is whole and entire wherever He is, and He
is wherever there is any effect of His creative
power. All “coming” or “going” of God to a soul
is a change, not in God, but in the creature visa-vis God. To receive God is to perceive Him in
a new way or more fully. “He was in the world,
and the world was made by him, and the world
knew him not… As many as received him, he
gave them power to be made the sons of God, to
them that believe in his name” (1:10 & 12). Light
of reason, and light of faith. This power to be a
son of God is actuated when faith is living: one
loves. “If any one love me… my Father will love
him, and we will come to him, and will make
our abode with him” (14:23). This is the “gift of
God” (4:10), beyond the capabilities or demands
of any creature; and yet to be surpassed by the
light of glory, thanks to which “we shall see him
as he is” (I Jn. 3:2). That our fruit remain (vs. 16),
we have but to obey His commandment “that
you love one another” (vs. 17).10

Endnotes
1

13:34

2

14:15 & 21

3

14:13 & yet 16:23

4

14, 16 & 26

5

14, 16 & 23

6

II Pet 1:4

7

3:16 & 36; 4, 14 & 36, etc.

8

13 vs. 1, 3, 33; 14 vs. 2f, 13, 28; 16 vs. 7, 16, 28; 17 vs 11, 18

9

13:20; 14 vs. 16f, 23, 26; 15, 26; 16, 7

10

E.g. “Bear ye one another’s burdens, and so you shall fulfill
the law of Christ” (Gal. 6:2).

57

A Victorian Reading List

58

The Ball and the Cross
Gilbert Keith Chesterton

Bleak House
Charles Dickens

Jane Eyre
Charlotte Brontë

Middlemarch
George Eliot

The Strange Case of Dr.
Jekyll and Mr. Hyde
Robert Louis Stevenson

Mary Barton
Elizabeth Gaskell

Poems and Prose
Gerald Manley Hopkins

Selected Poems
Alfred Lord Tennyson

Selected Poems
Christina Rosetti

The Angelus u November - December 2022

SELECTIONS

Selected Poems
Emily Brontë

Selected Poems
Matthew Arnold

Selected Poems
Robert Browning

Autobiography
Harriet Martineau

The Renaissance
Walter Pater

The Storm-Cloud of the
Nineteenth Century
John Ruskin

“The Girl of the Period”
Eliza Lynn Linton

Past and Present
Thomas Carlyle

Apologia Pro Vita Sua
John Henry Newman
59

QUESTIONS & ANSWERS

Fr. Juan Carlos Iscara, SSPX

s
s
60

What does the first precept
of the Church command?
Natural law imposes on all men the obligation of worshiping God. And He Himself
defined how men had to fulfill this obligation
when He issued His divine positive precept in
the Old Testament. The Third Commandment
of the Law of God states:
“Remember that thou keep holy the Sabbath day.
Six days shalt thou labor and shalt do all thy works.
But on the seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord
thy God: thou shalt do no work on it, thou nor thy
son, nor thy daughter, nor thy manservant, nor thy
maidservant, nor thy beast, nor the stranger that
is within thy gates. For in six days the Lord made
heaven and earth, and the sea, and all things that
are in them, and rested on the seventh day: therefore
the Lord blessed the seventh day, and sanctified it”
(Ex. 20:8-11).

The Angelus u November - December 2022

Following Christ’s Resurrection, this day
became the Sunday, the “Lord’s Day”—“dies
Domini.”
Consequently, in her first precept, the
Church has determined how Christians should
sanctify the Sunday and holydays of obligation
by prescribing certain acts and forbidding others, as detailed in the 1917 Code of Canon Law:
“On feast days of precept, Mass is to be heard; there
is an abstinence from servile work, legal acts, and
likewise, unless there is a special indult or legitimate
customs provide otherwise, from public trade, shopping, and other public buying and selling” (canon
1248).

While the Jewish Sabbath was marked mainly by rest, the Church, from the beginning, has
given the Lord’s Day a more spiritual focus,
giving primacy to the positive aspect, that is,
the obligation of rendering to God the worship
that is due to Him, and of taking care of those
things that concern the interests of one’s soul.

QUESTIONS & ANSWERS

The Church’s law has made these duties concrete with the obligation to attend Mass, as a
minimum.
Nonetheless, the duty of rest undoubtedly
remains. It includes abstaining from servile
work, judicial proceedings and public markets.
Abstention from work and the rest that follows
from it, besides having the natural purpose of
replenishing our forces, has the clear religious
finality of helping us turn our attention and
activity towards God and away from the world.
In a previous issue of The Angelus (May-June
2022), we have considered how to fulfill the first
part of the ecclesiastical precept, the positive
obligation of attending Mass. Let us now proceed to the negative aspect, abstaining from
work, a duty that in today’s world is often disregarded, even by Catholics.

What is the traditional
discipline regarding work
on Sundays?
The Catechism of the Council of Trent had
explained that resting on the Sabbath means
abstaining from servile work:
“All servile works are forbidden, not because they are
improper in themselves, but because they withdraw
the attention from the worship of God, which is the
great end of the Commandment.”

But what is “servile work”? Although the
term has been used by the Church for centuries, it has never been defined, and even the
1917 Code of Canon Law refrained from doing
so. The description of what constitutes “servile”
work is to be found in the decrees of particular
councils, in the teaching of theologians, and in
the local customs that the Church has accepted.
Most manuals of moral theology describe it
as physical, manual labor, done for the needs
and advantage of the body; the kind of work
that was in the past performed by slaves or, in
more recent times, by domestic servants and
hired laborers. Such are agricultural labors
(plowing, digging, etc.) and mechanical or industrial labors (printing, building, plastering, etc.).
It is distinguished from “liberal” works,
which are the product chiefly of the mental faculties, immediately directed towards the development of the mind, and which in the past used

to be performed by persons who were not slaves
or servants. Works of this kind are intellectual
works (teaching, reading, writing, studying, etc.),
artistic works (playing music, singing, drawing,
painting a picture, embroidering, etc.), and also
works of recreation (moderate sports or diversions such as baseball, tennis, and chess).
In the traditional discipline, in order to discern whether an activity is either servile or liberal work, the determining factor is the nature
of the work itself ( finis operis), without taking
into consideration any extrinsic circumstance,
such as the purpose of the agent ( finis operantis) or the physical effort attending the work,
or its duration. Thus, if the work is “servile” it
remains forbidden whatever its motive may be.
The obligation is grave, but the contravention of the precept may be considerably lessened if the work does not require excessive
effort, does not last for more than two hours,
and does not provoke scandal.
As Our Lord has also said that “the Sabbath
was made for man, and not man for the Sabbath”
(Mac. 2:27), the Church, distancing herself from
pharisaical excesses, admits different reasons
that excuse from the abstention from work on
Sunday:
•

Necessity or duty to others permits one
to work on Sunday at least to some extent
(for example, those who must labor on a
Sunday in order to live, or to keep out
of serious trouble, or to perform services
or works of charity that cannot easily be
done at another time).

•

Piety towards God, by working in what is
immediately needed for divine worship;

•

Custom permits necessary labors, such
as cooking, ordinary housecleaning, etc.

•

Dispensations may be given under certain conditions by the parish priest for
his own parishioners. A confessor has
no power to dispense in this matter but
in doubtful cases he may interpret the
law and allow his penitents to undertake
necessary work.

It is clear that not every reason excuses from
the Church precept. Thus, those who unnecessarily place themselves in the impossibility of
observing the law commit a sin (for example,
by taking a job that requires them to work the
61

QUESTIONS & ANSWERS

whole Sunday), or whose excuses are frivolous
(as those who work on Sunday merely to keep
busy).
To avoid self-deception the faithful should
consult their pastor or confessor if there is doubt
about the sufficiency of the excuse.

What does the present
legislation say?
Throughout the 20th century, and especially after the two great wars, considering the
changed social and economic circumstances
of the world, there had been much discussion
among theologians with regard to the definition
of servile work.
A faint echo of those discussions is to be
found in the present discipline of the Church,
which is enshrined in the canon 1247 of the
New Code of Canon Law, promulgated in 1983:
“On Sundays and other holy days of obligation,
the faithful are obliged to participate in the Mass.
Moreover, they are to abstain from those works and
affairs which hinder the worship to be rendered to
God, the joy proper to the Lord’s Day, or the suitable
relaxation of mind and body.”

The new Code, in comparison with the previous legislation, does not mention “servile”
work, yet maintains the obligation of abstaining from work on Sundays while shifting the
emphasis on how it is to be done by adding the
reference to the “relaxation of mind and body.”
The Catechism of the Catholic Church (n. 2187)
elaborates on the canonical requirement:
“Sanctifying Sundays and holy days requires a
common effort. Every Christian should avoid making
unnecessary demands on others that would hinder
them from observing the Lord’s Day. Traditional
activities (sport, restaurants, etc.), and social necessities (public services, etc.), require some people to
work on Sundays, but everyone should still take care
to set aside sufficient time for leisure. With temperance and charity the faithful will see to it that they
avoid the excesses and violence sometimes associated
with popular leisure activities. In spite of economic
constraints, public authorities should ensure citizens a time intended for rest and divine worship.
Employers have a similar obligation toward their
employees.”

62

Then, what should we do?
As we see, the new legislation does not contradict or reject what the Church has demanded before, but expresses it in more general
terms. At the same time, it points out the spirit
in which the law is to be observed, that is, the
goal that the legislator—God and the Church—
have intended to achieve by imposing a particular obligation. As St. Paul (II Cor 3:6) had
already pointed out, we must avoid disregarding
the spirit of the law while keeping to its letter.
Therefore, in general, we should submit to
the traditional discipline, but without losing
sight of the expanded criterion of discernment
that the new law has pointed out.
The abstention from servile work aims at
allowing us to break away from our daily toil,
making us free to render God the worship due
to Him. It also allows us to care for the welfare
of our souls while giving ourselves time and
opportunities for rest and honest enjoyment.
From time to time, we need to take a break from
the worries and fatigue inherent in the daily
struggle for life. Without prudent and well-managed recreations, our physical and mental forces
would soon be exhausted, incapacitating us for
any kind of work.
Therefore, on Sunday, we must preferentially
give time to God, to spiritual things, and to the
elevation of our souls towards Him. Of course,
attending Mass is the minimum that the Church
requires, but that does not mean that we may
forget about God for the rest of the day and
focus exclusively on enjoying our leisure.
Though the Church does not impose an
excessive, pharisaical observance of the Sunday rest, neither does she admit laxity in the
observance of the Lord’s Day. As one author
puts it, “Sunday need not be funereal, but it may
not be Godless.”
We must neither indulge in things that are
awkward or harmful for ourselves or others, nor
completely lose our seriousness of soul, or do
something in dishonest circumstances.
Thus, our Sunday must not be taken over
by playing games or watching televised sports,
by idle conversations or mindless hilarity, or
by being glued to our computers, or ceaselessly checking our social media—actions that in
themselves may not be necessarily objectionable but that effectively divert our minds and
hearts away from God.

QUESTIONS & ANSWERS

Could you give some
examples of how that
translates into practice?
Sometimes, people of goodwill find themselves troubled because they find joy and relaxation in activities like gardening on Sunday,
which, strictly speaking, qualify as “servile”
work and are prohibited.
But even the traditional legislation considered that such work would not be a serious violation of the Sunday rest if it did not demand
strenuous physical effort, if it was done for a
short, limited time, without causing scandal,
and without interfering with our obligations
towards God.
In light of the new Code, the same work,
performed in such circumstances, would also be
permissible if intended as relaxation and recreation, as a simple way to break away from the
concerns that prey on our minds the rest of the
week. If that is the case, such souls should not
be unnecessarily disturbed.
On the other hand, the traditional legislation
allowed “liberal,” intellectual work, such as that
of a lawyer preparing a file, an architect drawing plans for a building, an accountant preparing tax returns, etc.
But in light of the recent legislation, these
activities—while not being a sin, as they are
authorized by the previous law—should nonetheless be discouraged, at least as imperfections,
if they unnecessarily prolong into the Sunday
the worldly concerns and tasks that absorb us
every day of the week, as in that case the spirit
of the law, the intention of the legislator, would
not be adequately fulfilled.

In this matter of abstaining from work, we
must keep in mind the terrible warning of Our
Lady at La Salette:
“If my people will not obey, I shall be compelled to
loose my Son’s arm. It is so heavy, so pressing that I
can no longer restrain it… ‘I have appointed six days
for working. The seventh I have reserved for Myself.
And no one will give it to Me’… This it is which
causes the weight of my Son’s arm to be so crushing.”

Knowing our own weaknesses, let us therefore address St. Joseph, asking for his help and
guidance in keeping the Lord’s Day holy:
“O most glorious Patriarch, St. Joseph, obtain, we
beseech thee, from our Lord Jesus Christ abundant
blessing upon all those who keep holy the Sundays
and Holydays of Obligation of the Church, and grant
that those who profane them may realize, while they
still have still, the great evil which they commit and
the punishment which they draw upon themselves
both in this life and in the next, and grant that they
may be speedily converted. O most faithful St. Joseph,
thou who during thy life on earth didst so loyally
observe the laws of God, grant that the day may soon
come when all Christians will abstain from forbidden works on Sundays and Holydays of Obligation,
attend seriously to the salvation of their souls, and
give glory to God, who liveth and reigneth forever
and ever. Amen” (St. Pius X, May 20, 1905).

In conclusion…
All these explanations aim at helping us to
make a prudent judgment when it comes to
decide whether in good conscience we may or
may not engage in certain work or activity.
Nonetheless, we must not only avoid sin
but also strive to a higher perfection in all our
actions. Thus, we must not be too eager to take
advantage of every loophole that we may find
or every excuse that we may think of. The love
of God, strengthening our common sense and
guiding our prudential discernment, must prevail in everything and above all.
63

The

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The
L ast Word
Fr. David Sherry
District Superior of Canada

Dear Reader,
Turin, Italy. Mid-nineteenth century. An
English cabinet minister, guided by a priest,
is visiting a boarding school. He observes the
study hall through a window. About three hundred boys are working—at least in appearance—
under the watch of a master. Finding that he is
missing a book or a pen or suchlike, the master
leaves the room. Remembering his school days
at Eton, Winchester or Greyfriars, the Right
Honourable Gentleman chuckles and awaits
the talking, moving, launching of ink-pellets
and general pandemonium. But it doesn’t come,
the work (for such it turns out to be) continues
as if nothing had changed, as if the master were
still there. The Englishman turns to his clerical
guide with a raised eyebrow and a question, if
there is no supervisor, why are the boys acting
as if there were one?
St. John Bosco—for he is the priest—answers.
“There are two systems in education,” he
explains, “the Repressive system consists in
making the law known to the subjects, and afterwards watching for transgressors and inflicting the punishment deserved. The words and
demeanor of the superior must always be severe
and even threatening, and he must avoid all
familiarity.”
The other system, that used by the saint, is
full of the spirit of the Gospel. It is called the
Preventive system. “It consists in making the

rules known, and then being always with the
pupils, so that the Rector or his assistants like
loving fathers can converse with them, take the
lead in every movement and in a kindly way
give advice and correction. This system is based
on reason and religion, and above all on kindness; it excludes all violent punishment and tries
to do without even the slightest chastisement.”
The Minister pondered. “If the master has
left the room,” he asked, “why are the boys still
acting as if he were there?” “The Repressive
system,” replied the saint, “aims at conformity,
the children obey because of the fear of punishment; but once that fear is gone, everything goes
haywire. The Preventive system on the other
hand actually makes them good. The friendly relationship between the educator and the
child engenders confidence. The one goal of
the educator which is to develop in the child the
habit of thinking, judging and acting in accordance with right reason and the Faith succeeds
because confidence is the secret sauce of education.”
Protect from corruption, make prayer and
the sacraments the foundation of all, and follow St. John Bosco’s advice. Your children will
develop true virtue—even when you’re not there.
Fr. David Sherry

The Society of Saint Pius X is an international priestly society of almost 700 priests. Its main purpose is
the formation and support of priests.
The goal of the Society of Saint Pius X is to preserve the Catholic Faith in its fullness and purity, not
changing, adding to or subtracting from the truth that the Church has always taught, and to diffuse its virtues,
especially through the Roman Catholic priesthood. Authentic spiritual life, the sacraments, and the traditional
liturgy are its primary means to foster virtue and sanctity and to bring the divine life of grace to souls.

The Mission of Angelus Press
Angelus Press, in helping the whole man, tries to be an outlet for the work of the Society, helping them
reach souls. We aspire to help deepen your spiritual life, nourish your studies, understand the history of Christendom, and restore the reign of Christ the King in Christian culture in every aspect.

The Fr . Troadec Series Is Complete!
NEW

By Fr. Patrick Troadec, SSPX

From the Assumption
to Advent
Fr. Troadec’s popular, daily-meditation, liturgical series ends with this
sixth and final book: From the Assumption to Advent.
This volume is the last in the best-selling daily liturgical reader and meditation series. The meditations and reflections in this book cover different
aspects of the Christian life, addressing our duties toward God, toward our
neighbor, and toward ourselves. Every season presents an opportunity to
renew our fervor with good, practical resolutions. With this goal in view,
a certain number of meditations focus on the life we are leading and the
meaning of the trials we endure. Still others bring us before the questions surrounding the close of our lives and the Last Four Things (Death, Judgment,
Heaven, and Hell). Finally, other meditations remind us that we are children
of God and help us live daily in the company of God and His angels and
saints.
Each of the daily meditations covered in this book includes a:
• Quote:
Taken from the Bible, The Mass, or the Spiritual Fathers.
• Meditation: A particular truth of the Faith and how it applies to us.
• Prayer:
Two short daily prayers for the reader to choose from.
• Thoughts:
Daily recollections that illustrate a profound point.
• Resolutions: Three simple and practical resolutions.
“If we foster our Christian life every day by a few words of love, little by little
we will enter a continual heart to heart conversation with Jesus Christ. . . . I
remember all of my readers in my priestly prayers, especially during the Holy
Sacrifice of the Mass.”—Fr. Patrick Troadec

From Advent to Epiphany 
From Epiphany to Lent 
Towards Easter 
Eastertide Day by Day 
From Trinity Sunday to the Assumption 
From the Assumption to Advent 

160pp. Softcover. STK# 8723 $16.95
222pp. Softcover. STK# 8758 $16.95
228pp. Softcover. STK# 8760 $16.95
220pp. Softcover. STK# 8758 $16.95
300pp. Softcover. STK# 8817 $16.95
304pp. Softcover. STK# 8790 $16.95

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