)

DECEMBER 2009

$4.45

“Instaurare omnia in Christo”

A JOURNAL OF ROMAN CATHOLIC TRADITION

INSIDE

SSPX in Kenya

CREMATION

SAINT OF THE SANHEDRIN

Authority of Vatican II Questioned

TELEVISION: The Soul at Risk

Dr. White on Modern Music

Tales of Foreign Lands: The Pirate’s Prisoner, PART 2

Pope Paul’s
New Mass
Liturgical Revolution: Vol. III
Michael Davies

O UT
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BACK A D
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IN HA ECADEOR
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Sacrifice of the Mass. “...I had the good fortune to meet him several times and I found
him to be a man of deep faith and ready to embrace suffering. Ever since the Council
he put all his energy into the service of the Faith and left us important publications
especially on the sacred liturgy....”— Joseph Cardinal Ratzinger, 2004

P

ope Paul’s New Mass is the third and final book of the Liturgical Revolution trilogy. It is the unparalleled history of how
the New Mass was devised, created, and implemented. Beyond
this, a list of the manifold liturgical problems of the past generation is documented: from Mass facing the people and revolutionary legislation to Communion in the hand and the problem of the
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the most thorough critique of the New Mass in the English language. (From the back cover)

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Pope John’s Council
Liturgical Revolution: Vol. II
Michael Davies

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theological liberals who consign to the trash the documents of the Council Preparatory
Committee (of which Archbishop Lefebvre was a member), shut off the microphones
of those who attempt to defend the Faith (suffering this indignity was no less than the
illustrious Cardinal Ottaviani), and co-opting the media so that their spin became “reality.”
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Cranmer’s Godly Order
Liturgical Revolution: Vol. I
Michael Davies

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King Henry VIII and Thomas Cranmer understood that if you change the way people
pray, then you will change what they believe. Cranmer’s Book of Common Prayer (1549)
began a process that changed the Catholic Church in England to the Anglican sect.
Davies compares these changes to the modern liturgical “reform,” and the similarities
are shocking. Cranmer’s Godly Order sets the stage for the next two books of the
Liturgical Revolution trilogy.

✗

372pp. Color hardcover. Illustrated. STK# 3069✱ $29.95 $24.95

“Instaurare omnia in Christo—To restore all things in Christ.”
Motto of Pope St. Pius X

The

ngelus
A Journal of Roman Catholic Tradition

2915 Forest Avenue

“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

December 2009
Volume XXXII, Number 12

• Kansas City, Missouri 64109

English-language Editor and Publisher
for the International Society of Saint Pius X
PublisheR

Fr. Arnaud Rostand
Editor

Fr. Markus Heggenberger
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Letter from the editor. .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  . 2
Fr. Markus Heggenberger, SSPX

the authority of
vatican ii questioned . .  .Part
 .  .  .  .  .  .  . 1
 .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  . 3
Fr. Jean-Michel Gleize, SSPX

validity is not enough . . Part
 .  .  .  .  .  .1 .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  . 7
Fr. Scott Gardner, SSPX

AFRICA . .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  . 11
Fr. Dominique Bourmaud, SSPX

cremation versus apostolic tradition . .  .  .  .  .  . 15
M.H.H.M. Jansen

The pirate’s prisoner . . Part
 .  .  .  .  .  .2 .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  . 17
Fr. Joseph Spillmann, S.J.

Church and world . .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  . 20
the problem with modern music . .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  . 25
Dr. David Allen White

saint of the sanhedrin . .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  . 29
Scott Montgomery

television: the soul at risk . . Part
 .  .  .  .  .  .1 .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  . 39
Isabelle Doré

on being held back . .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  . 41
Robert Wyer

Questions and answers. .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  . 43
Fr. Peter Scott, SSPX

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2

Letter
from
the
Editor

In the science fiction novel Fahrenheit 451, written
by Ray Bradbury in 1951, the author describes a
society in which it is forbidden to read or even own
books. A special “fire brigade” ensures that the law is
observed. If they get a message about books that have
been discovered, they go at once, collect the books,
and burn them in a strange perversion of a real fire
department. At the end of the novel, the reader meets
an underground group whose objective is to memorize
books, thus saving them for a better future.
In this novel, Bradbury envisioned a future
American society in which the masses are hedonistic,
and critical thought through reading is outlawed. It is
a critique, based on what Bradbury saw as the most
important issues in American society of that era.
Although the background of Fahrenheit 451 (which
is the temperature at which book paper spontaneously
ignites) is not Catholic, the questions raised therein
are of general interest and are closely connected to
the questions that Catholics today should ask. For
example: What are the signs of socialism in a society?
How close are we to arriving at such a form of society?
What is the inherent value of knowledge, especially of
history and moral principles? Why does a tyrant have
an interest in keeping people ignorant?
These are the questions that form the background
of the sociological critique of Ray Bradbury. At a
certain point, they are not only of historical interest
(e.g. that someone in the ’50s had those opinions), but
of general interest for us as well. Book printers might
deplore modern culture with its shifting from books
to movies, but the more important question (than
the loss of money for book printers) is the question:
Is the loss of culture a preparation for a new kind of
totalitarianism? Are people who are under the spell
of promiscuity and the illusion of wealth without
effort prepared to resist the temptation of using
power against justice? Are they prepared to resist the
temptation of forgetting the Gospel in the name of
efficiency and profit?
These questions are not new. They describe the
eternal challenge of power against justice. When Our
Lord Jesus Christ came into this world, He took a
clear position: nobody can doubt that He was willing
to die for the justice of God, which is opposed to the
power of this world. Pilate was a symbol of the most
powerful nation of the time. His question “What is
truth?” shows well that there is an essential difference
between power and justice, as there is between politics
and (true) philosophy.
THE ANGELUS • December 2009    www.angeluspress.org

A second glace at the above-mentioned novel
of Bradbury shows us that in modern times the
questioning of religion has been superseded by the
questioning of human nature itself.
In the novel, the common people are dominated by
the leaders of the government by drugs, television, and
ignorance. There is also a description of uncivilized
behavior in the streets so that human life seems to be
worth nothing. These are all elements of a science
fiction novel, but we understand the message: Could
these examples be a possible pattern for the future?
The lack of morality in a given society might not
be evident as long as there is sufficient food for
everyone–but what will happen in times of privation
and hardship?
It is true that ideas like those described above
seemed more natural in the ’50s than they do today.
The recent “bail out,” however, and the general crisis
in the economy should teach us better. What other
than virtue can save us in a truly bad situation when
the essentials of life are no longer guaranteed? Then
remember the principles of “justice before power” and
“Seek ye therefore first the kingdom of God, and his
justice, and all these things shall be added unto you”
(Mt. 6:3).
Another consequence of the ignorance of human
nature today is this: The spiritual combat today
is essentially a combat for the family, the primary
natural institution of human society. We can say that,
in the supernatural order, the spiritual combat is for
the Kingship of Christ (the modern heresy being the
Church’s adaptation to the world and watering down
of its liturgy), but in the natural order, it is the combat
for the family with all its ramifications (opposed to
abortion, divorce, etc.). This is–rightly understood–a
complete program against the actual evils of the day.
For altar and hearth; for Church and family!
Instaurare Omnia in Christo,
Fr. Markus Heggenberger

3
F r .

J e a n - M i c h e l

G l e i z e ,

S S P X

thE authoRity oF

VaticaN
ii
QuEstioNEd

PART 1

SERIES PREFACE BY
BISHOP FELLAY

Fr. Gleize is a professor of
ecclesiology at the seminary of
the SSPX in Ecône and now
a member of the commission
involved in the doctrinal
discussions with the Holy See.
In 2006, he compiled and
organized Archbishop Lefebvre’s
thinking about Vatican II. It was
published by the Institute of St.
Pius X, the university run by the
SSPX in Paris, France. With the
doctrinal discussions beginning,
we will serialize it in The Angelus,
beginning with the Preface
of Bishop Fellay and
Fr. Gleize’s Introduction.

“In the end, you are just like the Protestants: you
prefer ‘private interpretation’ above the magisterium.” “You have no right to pit magisterium
against magisterium.” These two kinds of objections are frequently raised against the explanations
and positions of Archbishop Marcel Lefebvre and
the Society of Saint Pius X, reproached for having
the audacity to criticize the Second Vatican Council.This book offers the reader the explanations
furnished by the bishop charged with traditionalism: one can see that the principles still guiding
the Society of St. Pius X are indeed anchored in
sound Catholic theology, despite the seriousness
of the objections raised. One can also see how the
great pastor of souls knew how to turn to the highest principles of our faith in order to illuminate his
decisions and actions.
May these pages enlighten more than one today
and fortify those who are reacting against the
disaster!
Ecône, September 22, 2006, on the Feast of St.
Maurice

+ Bernard Fellay

Superior General of the Society of St. Pius X
www.angeluspress.org....The.ANgelus.•.December.2009

4

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At the close of a long life, Archbishop Marcel
Lefebvre (1905-91) laid stress on the importance
of the Third World War which was the Second
Vatican Council (1962-65).1 The unprecedented
disasters heaped up by this war are still before our
eyes. Indeed, Vatican II was and still is a disaster,
because the Council consecrated the triumph of
modernism and liberalism in the Church. It was “the
letting loose of the forces of evil for the ruin of the
Church.”2
More fascinated by the glory of the modern world
than by the glory of God and of our Lord Jesus Christ,
the members of the clergy have changed the ship’s
course to arrive at all costs at being well received by the
modern world….This is the mortal sin of modernism,
which abandons the exigencies of the faith, and even
of reason, in order to enter into a world of ambiguities
and equivocations, which stray from dogma and truth
and relish the indeterminate, the haziness, the vagueness
of a language purported to be adapted to the modern
world, which declines to define anything, permits any
and all interpretations, and thus allows free rein to
heresies, errors , and moral laxity. The very foundations
of the Church, Revelation, and philosophy are shaken,
challenged. There is no more truth, nor objectivity;
everything becomes subjective, subject to the individual
conscience, subject to evolution. This is what St. Pius
X described and condemned in his encyclical Pascendi.
That is why the Council was intended to be “pastoral,”
the council of aggiornamento…So it was that Vatican II
justified religious freedom, collegiality, and ecumenism.3

The conciliar war was already well under way
when the liturgical reform of 1969 occurred. The
New Mass was only one of the consequences, one of
the principal poisoned fruits of the Council. But the
Council was already baneful in itself, New Mass or
not. In the beginning of that year in which, for a few
months more, the traditional rite of the Mass of St.
Pius V had the force of universal law and benefited
from unfettered freedom throughout holy Church,
Archbishop Lefebvre was already denouncing
the veritable seeds of dissolution. These were the
errors of Vatican II, errors which had succeeded in
breaching the faith.
The disorder is very serious throughout the Roman
Curia. They condemn the effects and support their
cause. Rome is locked in a contradiction from which
they do not wish to escape because it would disclose
scandalous responsibilities while the Council was in
progress.4

Archbishop Lefebvre maintained the same
assessment at the end of his life:
We are not up against a little thing. It is not enough for
them to tell us: “You may say the old Mass, but you have
to accept it [the Council].” No, it is not only that [the
Mass] which divides us, it’s doctrine. That’s clear. That
The.ANgelus.•.December.2009....www.angeluspress.org

uEstioNEd

is what is so serious about Dom Gerard’s [choice], and
that’s what did him in. Dom Gerard never saw anything
but the liturgy and monastic life. He does not see clearly
the theological problems with the Council, with religious
freedom. He does not see the malice of these errors.5

The malice of these errors led the former
Archbishop of Dakar to oppose the Council, then
to refuse all the reforms that issued from it. Far
from being disobedience or the sign of a schismatic
mind set, this opposition and this refusal were in
Archbishop Lefebvre the principal manifestation
of the gifts of the Holy Ghost, the expression of a
purely supernatural lucidity and strength, such as
can be observed in the great defenders of the Faith.
For everything depends on faith: the hierarchy of the
Church, the sacred functions of the magisterium and
of ecclesiastical government, and even the authority
of the Sovereign Pontiff, have no other meaning or
reality than for the transmission and defense of the
deposit of faith. The desire to make a clean sweep
of, or even to barter with, apostolic doctrine in order
to impose a new theology previously condemned by
the Popes St. Pius X,6 Pius XI,7 and Pius XII,8 is to
divest oneself of any authority, for it is the betrayal
of Christ’s teaching. No pope, no council–not even
an ecumenical council–can shake off the yoke of the
sacred deposit of divine revelation.
He who believes will be saved; he who does not
believe will be condemned. This is the primary law of
laws, a divine law. The human laws, which are canon
law, penalties, and so on, are all very good, we desire
to be subject to all these laws, but only insofar as they
uphold the principal law for which they were made.
Canon law is made to safeguard our faith, to uphold our
faith–that is why canon law was made. The Church’s
positive law was made to support and defend natural
and positive divine law. There is, after all, a hierarchy
among laws….That is why, even were I to receive a letter
from the pope telling me that you are excommunicated,
you are under interdict, you are suspended, etc.; even
if they laid upon me all the penalties of canon law, it
would mean nothing. I would continue as if nothing
had happened, because they cannot, by the pressure of
ecclesiastical law, make us disobey divine law.9

Such is in summary the reply given by
Archbishop Lefebvre to the question raised by
the authority of the Second Vatican Council. This
answer is self-evident to a mind enlightened by
faith, for it is the transmission of the Faith which
constitutes the reason why the Church exists. If
this truth is out of sight, the Church ceases to be
the government of the Vicar of Christ; it is no
more than the government of a man; it becomes a
human society. Since Vatican II, we find “in the very
bosom and heart of the Church,” to appropriate
the expression used by Pope St. Pius X in speaking

5

of modernism, the society of men who have seized
power in the Church in order to impose their own
theology. And the obedience one should wish to
lend to these men would be false and blind, because
it would be bereft of the indispensable light. Such
obedience to men, contrary to obedience to God, is
no longer rooted in the supernatural virtue of faith.
Blind obedience is an oxymoron, and no one is
exempt from responsibility for having obeyed men
rather than God. It is too easy to say, “As for me, I’m
obeying. If he’s mistaken, then I’ll be mistaken with
him. I prefer to be wrong with the pope than to be
right against the pope!” This should be construed as
“I prefer to be against our Lord Jesus Christ with the
pope than to be with our Lord Jesus Christ against the
pope!” Incredible! We are for our Lord Jesus Christ and,
consequently, insofar as the pope is truly the Vicar of
Christ and acts as the Vicar of Christ and gives us the
light of Christ, we are, of course, ready to close our eyes
and follow him everywhere. But since this light is no
longer that of our Lord Jesus Christ and they are leading
us towards new horizons explicitly called new–they do
not make a secret of it; everything is new: new code
of canon law, new missal…new ecclesiology–that’s no
longer any good at all….The resistance must be public
if the evil is public and an object of scandal, according
to St. Thomas.10

In the following pages you will read the text of
the main interventions by which the founder of the
Society of St. Pius X did his utmost to explain to
his priests and seminarians the real reasons for his
attitude. These reasons have not changed, and the
current successor of Archbishop Lefebvre reiterated

it again during the last priests’ retreat at Ecône: “As
long as Vatican II and the New Mass remain the
norm, an agreement with Rome is suicide.”11
Today it is indispensable to read, or reread, and
to ponder over these lines. In spite of sometimes
subtly traditional appearances, the declarations
and initiatives of men of the Church will remain
unacceptable so long as they remain the unaltered
expression of the same conciliar errors. “I accuse the
Council”: forty years later, this is still the essential
motive of our battle in fidelity to the holy Roman
Catholic Church of all time and to its chief defender
in these times of silent apostasy, our venerated
founder, Archbishop Marcel Lefebvre.
(To be continued.)

Archbishop Marcel Lefebvre, Spiritual Journey (1990; Angelus Press,
1991), p. v.
2
Lefebvre, “The Council or the Triumph of Liberalism” [French], Fideliter,
No. 59 (Sept.-Oct. 1987), p.33.
3
Lefebvre, Pourquoi le changement profond intervenu à l’intérieur de
l’Eglise à partir de Jean XXIII, Paul VI et Jean-Paul II? Manuscript notes
conserved in the Ecône Seminary archives.
4
Lefebvre, Letter of 28 January 1969 to Msgr. Sigaud, conserved in the
Ecône Seminary archives.
5
Lefebvre, “Je poserai mes conditions à une reprise éventuelle des colloques
avec Rome,” Fideliter, No. 66 (Sept.-Oct. 1988), pp.12-14.
6
In the motu proprio Lamentabili of July 3, 1907, and in the encyclical
Pascendi Dominici Gregis of September 8, 1907.
7
In the encyclical Mortalium Animos of January 6, 1928.
8
In the encyclical Humani Generis of August 12, 1950.
9
Lefebvre, Spiritual Conference at Ecône, September 14, 1975.
10
Lefebvre, ibid., December 19, 1983.
11
Bishop Bernard Fellay, Conference during the Priests’ Retreat at Ecône,
September 8, 2006.
1

About Vatican II, Once More
Fr. Yves le Roux, SSPX

Why is it important to consider
this Council? Do we not risk drifting
into a systematically negative criticism
that is itself non-Catholic?
Obviously, we cannot define ourselves as against the Second Vatican
Council. We have no need to define
ourselves in function of something
else. It is sufficient for us to be Catholics–Catholics whose ideal is to fight
as soldiers of Christ to bring about
His kingdom, and especially His social
kingdom on earth. But a soldier can
only fight effectively if he is armed and

trained to fight; if he has received an
adequate training and knows his enemy.
That is why it is important to meditate
on this fateful Council.
We must not fear to say it: the
present situation is revolutionary.
From the first session of the Council,
with a shocking lack of even the most
elementary respect for the rules of
propriety, a commando force took over
the command posts in the Council,
thanks to a long-prepared infiltration,
and indelibly marked it with Liberalism. Afterwards, strengthened by the

influence acquired within the Council
and thanks to its efficacious technique
of infiltration, that commando force
worked from within for the destruction
of the Church.
The danger for us would be to
forget this and think that the present
situation is only a simple crisis that
will pass away by itself. Let us not be
deceived: the enemies of the Church
have sworn Her destruction–and that
of our souls–and they will keep fighting
to the very end. They will seem to be
ready to make some concessions and

www.angeluspress.org....The.ANgelus.•.December.2009

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uEstioNEd

About Vatican II, Once More
grant some permissions.They will give
way nimbly, hoping that we will take
the bait, but they will never agree
to give up their goal–the complete
destruction of Holy Mother Church.
They already have claimed victory. They are mistaken. Their battle
is lost in advance and their momentary triumph resembles that of the
enemies of Christ on Good Friday.
Let’s not fool ourselves: error will
not win. Christ permits this success as a chastisement, to purify His
Church and to bring Her to His side
on the cross. We must look beyond
external appearances, and find within
our souls the peaceful certainty that
God permits the present humiliation
of His Church in order to assimilate
Her more completely to His Son. He
will share with Her the triumph of His
Resurrection. We must wait for that
hour, while remaining always vigilant,
as the temptation to seek peace by
compromising will be great.
We must also be attentive to see
that the error of Liberalism–that
error that makes a religion out of
human freedom and whose poisons
we daily drink, even unwittingly–does
not furtively enter into our souls. Let
us remember St. Augustine’s warning:
“By seeing everything, we end enduring
everything, and by enduring everything,
we are ready to accept anything.” That
is to say that what at the beginning
justly scandalizes us, little by little
becomes so habitual that we take
part in it, and thus, unconsciously, we
drink the poison. If we are not on our
guard, we will be so filled up with this
mortal error of Liberalism that, in turn,
we will also fall and contribute to the
destruction of the Church.
This is the time to be vigilant. We
must pray and be formed at the source
of the true doctrine, so that error will
not contaminate us.
After forty years of seeing the application of the decrees of the Council,
we can follow the advice of Our Lord
and judge the tree by its fruits. Certain

The.ANgelus.•.December.2009....www.angeluspress.org

advocates of the Council challenge this
evangelical judgment and try to separate the Council from its aftermath. But
it is not so! The reforms that followed
are, in fact, the natural outcome of the
Council. Without the Council, these
disastrous reforms would never have
seen the light of day.
What more can we say about this
delirium? May God have pity on us–the
children of God ask for the bread of
doctrine, but they have received only
stones for food!
Our reaction ought to be a reaction
prompted by Faith, and only by Faith.
We must not reduce the mystery of the
Passion of the Church to an intellectual
problem, or worse, to a sentimental
one. It is not for us to understand this
mystery of the identification of the
Church with Christ crucified, but to
acknowledge that it is a providential
design of God and then adore Him.
In concrete, we must remain
faithful to this adoration due to God,
following the advice of St. Vincent of
Lerins, who teaches us to hold fast
to what the Church has always and
everywhere taught. That is to say,
our attachment to Tradition is not a
question of custom or preference, but
a question of Faith and of fidelity to
this Faith. This is also why we cannot
sign some practical agreement with
“neo-modernist Rome,” because we
would be drawn into a slippery slope
of compromise and would, slowly but
surely, lose the Faith.
Our duty is clear–we cannot let
the insult pass without desiring to
make reparation for it. Our reparation
consists of living in a way that renders
homage to God, and not in enjoying
the sinful pleasures that the world
proposes. We will make reparation
by loyally fulfilling the duties of our
state in life. This fidelity to duty rests
on two pillars–prayer and penance. A
soul that desires to offer reparation
is essentially a soul of prayer and
sacrifice.

We pray simply to ask pardon for
all those who have introduced novelties in the Church, prayers that repeat
for them the words of Our Crucified
Lord: “Father, forgive them, they know not
what they do.” Let us not forget also
to pray for those who follow these
mercenaries and are lost.
Our times are critical.The Immaculate Spouse of Christ, our Holy Mother
the Church, agonizes, insulted and
mocked. Her children no longer know
what it is to be Christians or no longer
dare to affirm it loudly and forcefully.
Vocations are diminishing, and we fear
that tomorrow, deprived of pastors,
men will fall into idolatry, as a great
number of them already have, alas! The
Second Vatican Council promised us
a new springtime in the Church, but
has left behind it only rubble piling up.
Our times are critical. It is not,
however, a time for despair. It is the
hour of the Cross. It is also, mysteriously, the hour of victory. It is the
time when we need to go to Mary,
who stood strong in Her unwavering
Faith, praying and uniting Her sorrows
with the sufferings of Her Son. She is
our Mother and She will protect us, so
that we will keep the Faith by prayer
and mortification.
And if Our Lord hears us, who
could succeed against us? Let us pray.
We are the youthfulness of God and
of Holy Mother Church. We belong
to the youth full of faith, of the faith
that vanquishes the world, ready to
live and to die defending the honor
of God, repairing thus the offenses
committed against Him.
In Christo Sacerdote et Maria.
Fr. Yves le Roux
Fr. Yves le Roux is Rector of St. Thomas Aquinas
Seminary in Winona, MN. This is adapted from
his October 2009 Letter.

7

F r .

S c o t t

G a r d n e r ,

S S P X

Validity Is
Not Enough
PART 1
The Vocation
and Suitability
of Candidates
for Holy Orders

Another one of “those phone calls”
They generally come in one of two forms: “Father, there’s
a new priest, Fr. So-and-So, saying Mass near my house; is it
okay for me to go?” or “We’ve got a chapel, and we’re thinking
of hiring Fr. Such-and-Such, who was just ordained by Bishop
Peregrinus. Do you think we should hire him?”
These calls are always difficult to handle. The Church is quite
obviously in a state of crisis in which faithful Catholics are often
called upon to make great sacrifices and travel long distances to
have access to the traditional sacraments, sound preaching, and
accurate teaching. When good people are traveling for hours to
reach Mass, or when they are simply too far from any established
mission to go there at all, it is painful to be obliged to disappoint
them when a new opportunity seems to present itself. Alas, this is
what we priests of the Society of Saint Pius X must often do when
confronted with such questions.

The Society’s position on such
“independent” ordinations
Despite widespread calumnies to the contrary, the Society
of Saint Pius X does not consider itself the “only pebble on the
beach.” Especially in the early days of Archbishop Lefebvre’s
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8
expansion into the United States, but also to a
certain extent today, there were and are numerous
sound priests–mostly older–who have been forced
out of their dioceses or religious orders through
no fault of their own, merely for their refusal to
compromise with the modernism which has ravaged
the human element of the Church and corrupted
the faith of millions. All honor to them, and may
they receive the reward of their labors on the Day of
Judgment!
However, the question of those priests who
have sought out ordination from one of the plethora
of “independent bishops” at large in the United
States today is much more delicate. Their number is
always increasing, and it has increased quite rapidly
during late 2008 and early 2009.1 If it were always a
question of solid, well-formed, single men, ordained
by a bishop who has a stable relationship with them
as superior to subject, the situation would be much
better than that which we so frequently find.2

Tales from an ecclesiastical
House of Horrors
Indeed, there are widespread instances of
such ordinations which are simply astonishing.
The author knows of two men (one married) who
were ordained explicitly to exercise their Orders
privately. One bishop offered to ordain two married
men the first time he met them. (They declined.)
Another bishop is reported to have ordained
a twelve-year-old boy. Determined to “have a
vocation” regardless of their former superiors’
thoughts on the matter, numerous men who had
tried their vocations at established traditionalist
seminaries and left before reaching ordination have
sought out ordination from “independent” bishops.
Worst of all, from time to time there circulate
rumors of this or that bishop’s having committed the
sin of simony,3 offering the grace of Holy Orders for
a fee.

Vigilance–according to the mind
of the Church–is the key
Clearly, the sin of calumny is both grave and
frequent. Not all such reports and rumors are
necessarily true, but the number of confirmed cases
of grave abuses of the Sacrament of Holy Orders
must make today’s Catholics vigilant. Traditional
Catholics are, by and large, fairly vigilant when
there is a question of Novus Ordo abuses, but some
of them tend to relax their vigilance when it comes
to traditionalist abuses.4 This can be extremely
perilous.

THE ANGELUS • December 2009    www.angeluspress.org

Scylla and Charybdis
Two main currents of thought compete for
the attention of serious Catholics in the midst of
today’s crisis. They are opposite extremes, and,
not surprisingly, many people vacillate between
these extremes. When these currents of thought are
described, it is easy to see why balance (or, in other
words, virtue) is needed.
On the one hand, when looking at the chaos
which reigns in the Church at large, it is tempting
to adopt a legalistic attitude: “The modernists have
broken all the rules, so we must keep them all to the
letter; then we will be fine!” On the other hand, the
laissez-faire spirit is also quite enticing: “Rule 2b: The
Church is in crisis; therefore, we can do whatever
we want!” Both attitudes are deadly. It matters not
whether we perish on the shore or in the whirlpool;
we shall perish still. Whether we put all of our faith
in the letter of “the rules,” absolving ourselves of
having to live the Faith integrally, or we regard “the
rules” as merely so much window-dressing, we will
still end by doing exactly what we want–and by
rationalizing our behavior, thus cutting ourselves
off from the very possibility of repentance if that
behavior is sinful.

The straight and narrow path
between the two perils
Bringing these currents of thought to bear upon
the issue of priestly ordinations outside the normal
channels of dioceses or religious orders in 2009,
one can hear the legalists cry out in horror that
any ordination could ever take place outside of the
letter of the (new) Code of Canon Law.5 Yet, with
the normal legal channels of the Church effectively
closed to Tradition, one is also faced with the laissezfaire multiplication of the “independent” ordinations
noted above. What is the solution?
A wise priest once declared emphatically to the
author that “The Catholic religion is the religion
of reality.6” One must admit that it is unrealistic
to place so much emphasis on the letter of the
law when souls are suffering–indeed, dying–from
the lack of sound and holy priests made available
through the normal legal channels of the Church.
Canon Law exists for the good of souls and the good
of the Church. Any law which undermines that end
ceases to bind the conscience to the same extent
that it undermines it. Even if the normal canonical
channels do not facilitate the ordination of sound
and holy priests for the good of souls, bishops are
still capable of ordaining, of setting aside the letter of
the law in favor of its purpose–its “spirit.”
However, it is also unrealistic to jettison the
entire canonical heritage of the Church simply
because the strict application of the letter of the law
is impeding the ordination of the sound and holy

9

priests who are so urgently needed for the good of
souls. “Canon Law is the accumulated prudence
of the Church”;7 circumstances such as the current
crisis do not justify going beyond the “mind of the
Church” simply because the letter of the law no
longer supports its purpose.

“Sentire cum Ecclesia”
The only possible reconciliation between the
two perilous extremes of legalism and the laissezfaire spirit–and the only way one can properly
evaluate the question of traditionalist priestly
ordinations today–is to learn to think with the
Church. Fortunately, we are not required to make
a long or complex study, nor are we expected to
wait for the Holy Ghost to infuse the answers into
our minds. The 1917 Code of Canon Law and
subsequent legislation on the subject of ordaining
priests can still be referenced. Along with examining
the principles and practices which flourished
before the Second Vatican Council and the crisis
of the priesthood, we will be able to apply the
accumulated prudence of the Church to the question
of ordinations outside the normal channels. In short,
we will be able to think with the Church, even if
such thinking is painful and complicates answers to
“those phone calls.”
The author’s principal aim in this article is to
examine what the Church, in her accumulated
prudence, requires of a man who is to be ordained.
After looking briefly at the requirements for valid
ordination–a subject which is of course crucial even
if only preliminary–we shall see which positive

characteristics the Church seeks in a future priest
and which warnings or even prohibitions she makes
concerning some qualities which may disqualify an
ordinand. In other words, we shall learn not only
what makes a man a valid candidate for ordination,
but what makes him a suitable candidate–what will
make him not only a validly ordained priest, but a
sound and holy one. In this way, it will be easier to
discover the answers to the questions so often asked
in “those phone calls.”

Validity and lawfulness
One of the biggest–and, unfortunately, one of
the most common–mistakes traditional Catholics
make in questions concerning the sacraments is
to confuse the issues of validity and lawfulness.
To some, “valid” means “good or pleasing,” and,
likewise, “bad or displeasing” means “invalid.”
Nothing could be further from the truth. For a
sacrament to be “valid,” the only requirements are
that a minister capable of conferring that sacrament
applies the necessary form to the necessary matter,
with the intention of “doing what the Church does.”
To put it another way,
minister+form+matter+intention=sacrament.
The sacrament “worked.” Grace was poured
out “by the very work.”8 The infant who was an
enemy of God because of Adam’s sin becomes the
adopted child of God when water is poured over
him by anyone at all who has the intention (however
confused it may be) of “doing what the Church
does” and who says “I baptize you in the Name of
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10
the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost”
while he is pouring that water. Such baptism is to
be presumed valid9 even if it takes place in a bad
context.
The Church has established laws for conferring
the Sacraments precisely to prevent them from being
abused by bad circumstances even though they
are valid. Sacraments may certainly be valid but
unlawful; what is valid is not always good for souls.
“Lawfulness” means either that all of the Church’s
laws were followed in conferring a sacrament, or
that one or more of them was allowed by Church
authorities to be disregarded for a proportionally
serious reason, always for the good of souls.10
To illustrate the difference between “validity”
and “lawfulness,” let us continue to take the example
of infant baptism. Suppose that an infant, the child
of Satan-worshippers, was perfectly healthy, but
that his pious Catholic grandmother (with every
good intention, but no prudence) baptized him
secretly while bathing him. Was the baptism valid?
As long as she poured water over him while saying,
“I baptize you in the Name of the Father, and of
the Son, and of the Holy Ghost,” with the intention
of “doing what the Church does,” the baptism was
certainly valid. The infant is now in the state of
sanctifying grace, and he is (at least radically) a
member of the Catholic Church. There is an eternal
mark in his soul–the character of Baptism. It was
valid, so it must be good!
No! This newly-baptized child has practically no
expectations of being brought up as a Catholic. He
is (secretly and unknown even to himself) a member
of Christ, but he will, in all likelihood, be raised as
a Satan-worshipper. Satan-worship is bad enough in
itself, but Satan-worship as carried out by a baptized
person is a great abomination. This child, if he ends
up in hell, will suffer more keenly because of the
eternal mark of Christ in his soul. His baptism was
valid–no doubt about it–but it was not lawful.
Why? Because the Church’s law forbids the
baptism of infant children of unbelievers except
when they are in danger of death. The Church’s
“accumulated prudence” tells us that such baptisms
usually have the long-term result of harming the
souls of these children rather than helping them,
and, consequently, Catholics are forbidden to
baptize the healthy children of unbelievers. Many
more such Church laws exist–for the Sacrament
of Baptism and for all of the others–because Holy
Mother Church wants to ensure not only that the
Sacraments “work,” but that they are fruitful in
souls.
Since the Church has established laws for the
(at least hopefully) fruitful administration of the
sacraments, it behooves all sacramental ministers to
follow those laws for the good of the souls to whom
they are ministering. They must be concerned not
THE ANGELUS • December 2009    www.angeluspress.org

only with the validity of the Sacraments they confer,
but with making sure that they are lawful.
The same principle holds true in the conferring
of Holy Orders, and, in fact, Holy Mother Church
is even more concerned, so to speak, with the
validity and lawfulness of Holy Orders because this
sacrament has such a far-reaching influence on souls.
The priest must not receive Holy Orders for
himself primarily, but for others. His ministry will
influence untold numbers of souls–for good or ill–
and the Church, following St. Paul’s exhortation,
will not allow bishops to “impose hands lightly
on any man,” lest they “be partaker in other
men’s sins.”11 The Church considers the personal
responsibility of an ordaining bishop for a new
priest’s soul and for the souls that the new priest
will influence–again, for good or ill. She has thus
made some fairly stringent guidelines, through her
“accumulated prudence,” for the lawful conferral
of Holy Orders, and anyone–whether bishop or
ordinand–who lightly sets these guidelines aside is
imprudent, to say the least.
Sad experience has shown what great havoc
imprudent ordinations can wreak at every level:
from individuals and families to parishes and
dioceses, even to the Church and civil society
at large. A prudent consideration of these laws,
established by Mother Church for the good of all
her children, can help serious Catholics in our time
to avoid the disasters which follow in the train of
imprudent, unlawful ordinations.
(To be continued.)
Rev. Fr. Scott Gardner, ordained for the Society of Saint Pius X in 2003, is
currently assigned to St. Mary’s Assumption priory in St. Louis, MO, where he
coordinates the work of the St. Raymond of Peñafort Canonical Commission.
He is also the United States District Chaplain for the Third Order of Saint Pius
X, and he serves the Society’s Chicago mission, Our Lady Immaculate, on
weekends and holy days.
One such bishop is reported to have ordained no fewer than 17 men to the
priesthood during that time period.
2
There are other factors involved, such as sedevacantism, which we need not
address in this article, but which certainly have a bearing on the situation.
3
See Acts 8:9-29.
4
One of the most frequent questions about “independent” ordinations, “Is he
validly ordained?” misses the point entirely. In this view, if he is a priest, he
is a good priest by definition, regardless of the abuses which his ordination
may have entailed. This attitude discloses an extreme lack of vigilance,
along with a curious form of legalism (“But it’s valid!”) mingled with a
laissez-faire spirit (“We’re home free! No need to inquire further.”)
5
Consider the attempts to pressure the Society of Saint Pius X not to confer
any ordinations in Germany earlier this year.
6
Rev. Fr. James Buckley, a priestly collaborator of the Society of Saint Pius
X in the 1990’s.
7
Thanks to Rev. Fr. James Doran for this elegant and lapidary definition,
from his course of Canon Law at St. Thomas Aquinas Seminary, Winona,
Minnesota.
8
ex opere operato”
9
See the response of the Holy Office concerning marriage cases, December
28, 1949 (Dz. 2304). The (rebuttable) presumption is for the validity of
baptisms conferred by people with confused or even wrong intentions, as
long as the valid form and matter are used.
10
“The Sacraments are for men,” is a theological axiom.
11
I Tim 5:22.
1

11

F r .

D o m i n i q u e

B o u r m a u d ,

s s p x

Africa
“K
aribu Kenya!’’ This is one the first
expressions you hear to let you know
how welcome you are in black Africa.
It is obviously the case for any white
tourist–which means a source of revenue for the
country, attracting millions of foreign tourists to the
wild safaris and the beaches, which are sunny and
warm year round.
Kenya welcomed Tradition little more than five
years ago. The faithful have done their very best to
make us feel at home. Having spent about six months
there, I got a general picture of the first steps of the
Society’s work in East Africa. It started with a wellorganized group of Marian souls, struggling to hold on
to traditional customs. They regularly sent complaints
to the local clergy since they were mistreated and
ostracized all along. They were scattered from
Mombasa and Nyeri to Nairobi and Kampala
(Uganda).
Contacts were established by the General House,
visits were made, and prospects for a foundation were
established. One such contact was a famous retired
doctor (the first Kenyan doctor to graduate from a
British university), Dr. Migue. He offered to help the
beginning of a priory with a plan to extend it into a
house of formation for potential vocations.
Thus, St. Michael’s was founded in 2003. The
locals, however, were primitive in more ways than
one. Frs. Esposito and J. Grün were not long in
seeing that things were far from simple for their
independence and health. The apostolate was
removed from any popular access and far from the
center of Nairobi.
By 2004, with the help of Fr. Groche (visiting
from Gabon in West Africa) and a real estate
connoisseur, the Society acquired a charming double

KENYA
Nairobi

Johannesburg

SOUTH
AFRICA

Frs. Bedel & Nouveau’s Kawangware Catechism Group

Fr. Bourmaud on safari
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12

Fr. Bourmaud
blessing the
Easter water
during the
Easter Vigil

Sunday Mass at Holy Cross Church in Nairobi

house surrounded by a large, two-acre park. It
was well-suited for the proposed foundations,
and certainly more convenient for a priory. At
this point, Fr. Nouveau, already tempered by
the Caribbean climate and the people from
Gabon, was sent in with another Frenchman to
guide the ship and launch out into the deep.
Kenya was quite different from his West
African experience, where he had acted as
teacher in a busy Society day school and
participated in the huge catechism program
there. Arriving in Kenya, he had to tackle
the problem of brushing up his poor English
to make himself understood. This was before
considering Swahili, the other official Kenyan
language! It is said that, when some government
official came to check on the Society’s church
which had just been purchased and opened in
town, the (spying) official concluded that we
were harmless because, first of all, no one could
ever understand what we were saying!
Another police officer came as a beggar
requesting some assistance to avoid government
reprisal, trying to find out whether we were
involved in politics or not. Having thus passed
these tests with flying colors–if not with a
brilliant British accent–the Frenchmen, not
abashed, went straight to the ranking Catholic
cleric of Kenya, Archbishop Dingi of Nairobi, a
staunch defender of the Faith, exacting religious
discipline and the wearing of the religious
habit or clerical garb for all priests and sisters
in the Archdiocese. He, at first suspicious of
our relations and company, revealed himself
an ardent, though discreet, supporter of our
work–to the extent that he was longing for the
day when our priests could give clergy retreats
to restore the priestly discipline already largely
damaged. This is how he gave our priests the
necessary approval for establishing a proper
religious entity, the “Marcel Lefebvre Society.”
We were, until then, no more than a group of
tourist priests, renewing our visas every three
THE ANGELUS • December 2009    www.angeluspress.org

Nairobi Church and Priory

Congregation of Mombasa with Fr.Vernoy

robi

13

The first is Fr. Bourmaud in front of the oldest vineyard
in South Africa, De Groot, near Cape Town

A field of tea seen from the property in Kampala
(Uganda) which was donated to the SSPX for use as
the site of a future priory and nursing home

A lesson in Kenyan
gardening

ory

oy

Cyprian and John face
the Rhinoceros

months, with no legal existence whatsoever, liable to
be chased out of the country for good at any time. This
permission allowed us to legally straighten out our
properties and to open a church with the Catholic title
proudly displayed for all to see. This allows us to buy
schools, convents, etc., since, in this part of the world,
the Chairman, i.e., the prior, has all power. It is worth
noting that convents and religious schools are legion
and growing everywhere.

Having settled the legal aspect of things, which
took a major thorn out of our sides, our musketeers
went about the task of gathering souls to teach
them the Faith. After the thousands of Gabonese
children he had attended, it was a sore sight for the
prior to see a handful of parishioners and so few
children to teach. Any occasion was thus a golden
one. They were led to Kawangware, the ill-famed
slum near our Lavington church. This provided
much consolation to our priests since, together
with its train of beggars, starved bodies, liars, and
problems, it gave them the ineffable joys of teaching
a few children the Faith and getting them out of the
ghetto. Now that the oblate sisters, including two
Kenyans, are taking over the original house, and the
priory is adjacent to the church, the faithful have
the encouraging sentiment that we, the Society of St.
Pius X, are here to stay.
As things stand today, the priory has received
a select group of Kenyans and Nigerians in order
to test their vocations before sending them to the
seminary, primarily Australia. Our church on any
given Sunday has about 150 faithful at Mass. There
is, however, an average of 300 faithful coming
regularly to the capital over the period of a month
since travelling is no easy matter for those who
struggle already with the bare necessities of life.
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14
Our little groups at Kiserian, near the capital,
Nyeri and Othaya to the north, and Mombasa on
the coast, are slowly consolidating, averaging 30
persons and now all settled in public halls. The
priory also services Kampala regularly (with the
same amount of faithful) and has been offered a
Catholic hall to use.
Contacts are maintained with Dar El Salam
of Tanzania in the south, and especially with an
extensive group of priests all over East Africa
and Sudan. It is still too early to know what
these meetings will provide, but at least our little
Society is known to these poorer areas. Materially
speaking, we have been offered by our Kampala
faithful a large piece of land near Lake Victoria
for a potential priory, near a nursing home they
are slowly establishing. Also, in Taveta, a vast
compound has been offered us by the town council
to establish a school in the future. We hope that, in
ten years, after the growth of the Lavington church
and primary school, we will be able to extend the
curriculum to the high school level. This eastern
location could prove an ideal spot for a priory,
servicing the Kenyan and Tanzanian coast.
Needless to say, the future belongs to divine
Providence. There is no doubt that, in these
poorer parts of the world where, at every corner,
one meets truly starving beggars, people who
struggle for life and subsistence have still retained
the proper sense of God and of work. No doubt,
genuine vocations are numerous. To us belongs the
serious duty of putting them to the test and sorting
the wheat from the cockle.
I was quite impressed to see that modesty and
cleanliness are deeply rooted even in the most
remote parts of Kenya and Uganda. You find
neither a poor dress code nor improper behavior
in the street here. Even when they live in small,
unimaginable huts, they are clean, gracious, modest,
and normal. Woe to the ladies trying to draw men’s
attention! They are just as much despised as the
yuppy European tourists sun-bathing in the midst of
the capital.
The other thing which is noticeable is the
healthy spirit of the villagers compared to the tired
and often sad citizens of Nairobi. In the villages, life
is simpler, quieter, hard-going but happy. Kenyan
children know what work means: if you do not
work or do not work hard enough, you will be sent
to bed starving, hoping that tomorrow will bring a
better deal. It is not rare to see Kenyans walk four
miles to save a quarter, which will provide for the
family dinner. Woe to the nation when drought sets
in; there are no food coupons or savings which help
the larger part of the population which lives off a
dollar per day.

THE ANGELUS • December 2009    www.angeluspress.org

Safari to South Africa
Leaving East Africa and arriving in
Johannesburg is like landing on another planet. At
first sight, South Africa looks very Western and
American in the architecture, the organization of
the large cities, with luxury cars, roads, and malls
everywhere. Like in the US, the downtown is run
down and better avoided at night. Yet a closer look
tells a different story. The culture shock between
two extreme civilizations, the rapid taking of power
by the natives, the large scale reshuffling of entire
populations enticed by the foolish government
promise of a house and job for everyone in the big
towns–such things have created envy, riots, and
havoc which are far from being totally settled.
In such circumstances, Tradition has had to
defend itself at a heavy cost of sacrifice and work
to keep the apostolate alive in a predominantly
Calvinist country. Present now for over 20
years, our chapels are facing the departure of
entire families who think the grass is greener
elsewhere for better or worse. A primary school in
Johannesburg, which hopefully will develop into a
higher level of studies, has kept families who are
not tempted by foreign jobs and security.
Durban, on the coast, has had a recent upsurge
of activity with a large group of 300 Zulus joining
forces with us and giving joy to our priests as
they sing their traditional Zulu hymns for Mass.
The Society is also present in Port Elizabeth
and Cape Town, which has a lovely new chapel
with accommodations. It is a delightful corner of
paradise with the sea, mountains, and vineyards
found virtually everywhere. Our southern
priests also provide the sacraments to pockets
of individuals disseminated through largely
deserted Namibia, and they also provide logistic
and spiritual support to our priests resident in
devastated Zimbabwe.
In Gabon, our work has been abundant for
about two decades with a large score of priests. All
of Africa is supervised by the recently appointed
District Superior, Fr. Vernoy, whose job it is to
foresee the future implantations of missions, a
potential convent, and a pre-seminary. His travels
have led him to Nigeria and Cameroon, and
contacts have been made with Burundi so that,
with the grace of God, in the not so remote future,
we can expect progress in these areas, especially
Nigeria, where a former parish priest, Fr. Obih,
has joined forces with us. Little by little, the light
of Tradition and the true Faith is making inways
through Africa. We may hope to see in years to
come the harvesting of our predecessors’ sweat.
Fr. Dominique Bourmaud has spent the past 25 years teaching at the Society
seminaries in America, Argentina, and Australia. He is presently stationed
at St. Vincent’s Priory, Kansas City, where he is in charge of the priests’
training program.

15
M .

H .

H .

M .

J a n s e n

cREMatioN
VERsus
aPostolic
tRaditioN
The number of cremations has been increasing
annually, and in many Western countries now
exceeds the number of burials. In the Netherlands,
the pivotal date was February 20, 2004: “For the
first time in the history of the Netherlands, this year
the number of cremations exceeded the number of
burials.” This was the conclusion reached by the
LVC (the Dutch National Cremation Society). In
2003, the Netherlands had 71,815 cremations for
141,082 deaths. If the percentage of cremations
was 49.8 in 2002, it was 50.9 per cent last year.
The first cremation in the Netherlands took place
90 years ago, on April 1, 1914, at the “Westeveld”
Crematorium of the Royal Association in Support of
Optional Cremation of Driehuis, near Ijmuiden.
“It’s an historical fact: for the first time, the
number of cremations surpasses the number
of burials,” declared J. Keizer, president of the
Administrative Council of the Facultatieve Groep,
an offshoot of the above-named Royal Association.

Dechristianization
The decisive shift from burial to cremation took
place during the 1960’s and ’70’s, an orientation
that can be explained, according to Keizer, by
dechristianization.
With time, people have gotten used to the
idea. He adds that children have attended the
cremation of their parents and have opted for the
same for themselves. Mr. Keizer thinks that personal

convictions are the deciding factor in the choice
between cremation and burial. This evolution
also has to do with the removal of legal obstacles,
which has also opened to unbelievers the path to
cremation.
The deeper reason, according to the theologian
G. de Koning, is unbelief.1 Dechristianization has
certainly been a determining factor in the slide
towards cremation. The biblical conception of
life and death is progressively giving way to a
materialistic conception, which no longer admits of
any belief in the resurrection and the here-after.
So-called “enlightened” man, confined
within the darkness of his materialist incredulity,
despises religion. This “modern man, thinking for
himself and imagining himself to be living in total
independence” henceforth refuses to answer for
his actions before a God. He proclaims himself
God and decides on the end of life. Euthanasia
and abortion have become “legalized” murder.2
Clearly, this way of thinking, like cremation, is
linked to Nazi ideology. The idea of holocaust alone
ought to be enough for cremation to be rejected.
If people believe that death is a final point, the
corpses are cast into the crematorium furnace since
they no longer represent anything or have any
future. The return of cremation can be explained
by the desire to destroy the bodies forever and to
ridicule Christian belief in the resurrection of the
body.
Yet for God, it is no more difficult to reanimate
an incinerated body than a decomposed one.3
www.angeluspress.org....The.ANgelus.•.December.2009

16

The Church’s Prohibition
on Cremation
The current trend deeply concerns Christians.
One priest sees it as a “resurgence of paganism.”
The Church enjoins the faithful to treat the body
of the deceased in a fitting manner. The body of
the deceased is to be treated with respect and love
because we believe and we hope in the resurrection.
The burial of the dead is a work of mercy, a mark of
respect for the children of God, temples of the Holy
Ghost. Till Vatican II, the liturgy made allowance
for burial only. Moreover, Canon 1203, 1, of the
Code of Canon Law expressly forbade cremation.4
The future legislation of the Church will have to
show that it is in accord with Apostolic Tradition.
Cremation, or the incineration of the body, is not
forbidden for dogmatic reasons, but because it is
contrary to Christian morals.
The Church has always buried the dead, and has
required converted peoples to do likewise. In 789,
Charlemagne forbade the Saxons to use cremation
under penalty of death. The Norwegians, Swedes,
and Danes definitively adopted the burial rite in
1205; the Prussians, in 1245. A long time elapsed
before cremation was spoken of again. Around 1789,
the epoch of the French Revolution, new attempts to
reintroduce cremation came to the fore, especially
among the enemies of the Church.5
Paragraph 2 of Canon 1203, mentioned above,
forbids the execution of any arrangements for
cremation formulated in wills or in any other way
whatsoever. Canon 1240, para. 1, 5, stipulates that
ecclesiastical burial will be refused to whomsoever
shall have opted for cremation. The Church’s
legislation concerning cremation as stipulated in
the 1983 Code of Canon Law and the practice that
subsequently appeared will have to be harmonized
with the authentic dispositions of the Apostolic
Tradition.

The Church’s
Traditional Practice
The burial of the deceased has been at all times
the only rite actually recognized. Jewish customs,
especially the fact that Christ was buried only to
rise from the tomb, and consequently belief in the
resurrection of the body, have strongly marked
Catholic liturgy.
In the 19th century, the promotion of cremation
in Western societies was favored by Freemasonry
and materialism. The defenders of cremation try
to promote the idea that the “flexibility” of the
Church’s position implies its “adhesion,” and
confusion over the matter has only increased with
its practice. The advent of Christianity gradually
eradicated cremation, and by the fifth century, this
THE ANGELUS • December 2009    www.angeluspress.org

usage had totally ceased in the Roman Empire.
In our time, on the contrary, the extinction or
marginalization of Christianity in our Western
societies finds its expression in a manifest revival of
cremation.
From the outset of the Apostolic Age, Christians
were always buried. They refused to cremate the
bodies of the deceased even at the risk of serious
trouble. They vigilantly kept their burial places
secret lest they be profaned or even outlawed, as
happened under Emperor Valerian (253-260). They
also endured the risk of having the dead exhumed,
as was ordered by Emperor Diocletian (283-305).
So, why did the Christians refuse so steadfastly
to cremate their dead at great risk to themselves?
If the choice between burial and cremation had
been without importance, they would not have
exposed themselves to such serious consequences.
If they were ready to sacrifice their lives, it was for
a more profound reason, that is to say, an apostolic
precept imposing on Christians the duty to bury
their dead. This practice has existed since apostolic
times, it is universal, and it has been maintained
intact until quite recently.6 Pope St. Innocent thus
did not hesitate to declare that every infraction of
these dispositions was fraught with consequences
and that they could not therefore be abrogated.
The precept of burial rests upon the entire tradition
of the Church and has been maintained through
the centuries from apostolic times. The argument
of Tradition, the constant practice of burial, is an
authoritative fact and determinant for the future.
This question ought to induce Christians to
reflect, to give them the courage to bear themselves
once again as defenders of burial, and to oppose
the impious practice of cremation. Priests would be
well inspired to refuse a funeral to those who have
requested cremation. Their presence at crematoria
is already sinful. Catholic cemeteries should not
have installations for funerary urns or places for
the spreading of ashes. Such arrangements are
displeasing to a good number of Christians, who see
in them a way to ridicule apostolic tradition.
Translated from the SSPX Belgian District’s quarterly, Pour qu’Il Règne,
No. 95, pp.7-8.

Cf. Ger. De Koning, Begraven of Cremeren Wat Zegt de Bijbel? (Doorn,
Editions Het Zoeklicht), p.7ff.
2
Ibid., p.20ff.
3
Ibid.
4
1917 Code of Canon Law.
5
Cf. Jacobus Moleschott, for example.
6
Notably P. Steccalmella, La guerre aux morts, pp.152-5.
1

Catholic Stories of Adventure in the Mission Lands

Tales of Foreign Lands
F r.

J o s e p h

S p i l l m a n n,

S. J.

The

risoner
(From Tales of Foreign Lands, Volume 2)
Continued from the October 2009 issue.

V

At the Slave Market
IT was early in the morning, and the business
shops along the street were still vacant. So it was time
that the prisoners be taken from the ship and brought
to the slave market. The poor victims, pushed and
jostled by the rough pirates, painfully made their
way to the deck. The fetters, indeed, had been taken
from their feet, but in spite of their freedom, they
could hardly stand erect. Finally they reached the
open deck; yet, unaccustomed to the sunlight, they
could hardly see any object before them. Many of
the unfortunate captives stumbled over the disorderly
deck and fell to the floor, but the rough jerks and
kicks of the inhuman pirates painfully forced them

to their feet again. In the meantime Achmed and
his men had prepared the boats and lowered them
to the sea. The prisoners were driven into them like
cattle, and immediately the oars splashed in the water
pulling the plunder to shore.
On landing, the small band arranged themselves
for the sad march to the slave market. Two by two,
with their hands tied to their backs, the prisoners
started their weary march through the narrow,
crooked streets, patrolled by the pirates. As Padre
Isidore had hoped, little Francesco remained at
his side. The good priest had many things to tell
the little boy, for he feared that the very next hour
might separate them, and what might then become
of the innocent youth thrown in among so many
unbelievers, he could not imagine.
“Francesco, soon, perhaps, you will be with me no
more; will you promise me never to forget your God
and to say your prayers every day?”
www.angeluspress.org....The.ANgelus.•.December.2009

18
“Certainly, Padre, but why can we not stay
together? I shall be very sad if they take me away
from you, for then I shall have no one who will be
good to me.”
“They will sell us, dear child.”
“To whom, Padre?”
“I do not know, Francesco; but if they become
even very cruel to you, will you still continue to say
your prayers faithfully?”
Tears came to the eyes of the boy, and amid sobs
and sighs he asked the priest: “Why should they strike
me, Padre? I have done no wrong.”
“Be quiet, child, we hope it will not be so bad;
but do not fail to say your prayers ev­ery day to your
dear guardian angel and the Blessed Virgin, that they
may protect you and bring you back safely to your
parents.”
“Oh, I am afraid,” said Francesco; “I want to stay
with you; they ought to sell the both of us together.”
Thus far their presence had been some­what
concealed through the darkness of the narrow streets.
Now the prisoners had come to a more open place.
In gay colors the people of Tunis swarmed to this
center. To the right and the left the open square was
lined with shops and booths of mer­chandise. There
could be seen on display all the richness of the East.
Elaborate Turk­ish rugs and silks from India attracted
one’s attention immediately with their bright col­ors.
Glaring swords and glittering daggers, with richly
ornamented handles and gilded sheaths, held the
admiration of the Arabs, these brawny sons of the
desert, whose greatest pride is the weapon at their
side.
Bedouins from the Sahara desert made their way
solemnly and silently through the winding crowd.
Wide shawls, at one time white, but now looking like
the disgusting yellow desert sands, hung closely about
their heads and shoulders. Some were leading camels,
some were driving mules, and others were carrying
water in earthen jars on their heads, and all of them
pushed their way with equal authority through the
crowd.
Police officers, with bright-blue uniforms
ornamented with conspicuous gold braids, assumed
an air of importance as they pa­raded to and fro to
keep order among this unharmonious gathering. At
the end of the open square the food venders had set
up their stands and were ready at all hours of the day
to satisfy in haste the hunger of the many strangers,
as well as of the city dwellers, whose busy day left
them little time for food and rest. Longingly the poor
prisoners looked over to the corner whence this
appetizing aroma ascended, for they had received but
a few crusts of dry bread for the last two days. Alas,
there was not a single sympathetic hand in the crowd
that would offer them the smallest bit of food.
Forced on by the lashes and blows of the pirates
and pursued by a hideous and jeer­ing rabble, the
poor unfortunates had to make the final stretch of
THE ANGELUS • December 2009    www.angeluspress.org

their sorrowful journey. At last, but with little relief
from their suffering, they reached their destina­tion.
Like a herd of cattle they were driv­en together into a
small slave market. No chair, not even a stand, offered
them comfort upon their entrance to rest their weary
and ragged bodies. Exhausted at the bit of re­laxation,
most of them sank to the hard floor, but the whips
of their guards brought them groaning to their feet
again. Thus, leaning against the dusty walls of the
houses that enclosed the market square, and upon the
shoulders of their fellow prisoners, they gave each
other whatever comfort they could to await the sad
hour that would de­cide their future lot.
What a pitiable sight this picture of hu­man misery
presented to the eye! Black men from all parts of
Africa, white men from the shores and islands of the
Medi­terranean Sea, and even from England, hav­ing
only in common the sad state of their captivity, were
put on display as chattel for bargaining.
Children, boys, men, and even weak old
grandfathers, had been dragged together to this heap
of misery by the lustful greed of the pirates. The
prospective buyers passed through the sad rows with
a critical eye.
When they found one that pleased them, the poor
unfortunate had to allow himself to be examined
and tested like an animal for the slaughter; had to
lift weights to try his strength, and woe to him if
his weakness betrayed him. If he failed, the whips
of the sailors slashed unmercifully about his neck
and shoulders. If the buyer seemed pleased, then
the bidding and bargaining be­gan for the human
merchandise.
Hardly had Achmed set his booty up for display,
when eager buyers sought good bar­gains. Slave
scouts for greater masters carefully examined the
new arrivals with an experienced eye and judged for
them­selves the price of each individual. Fran­cesco
immediately became the center of at­tention of all
the buyers. True, the hard­ships of the last few days
had driven the youthful vigor from his cheeks, his
rich dark locks hung disheveled over his fore­head,
and his usually bright eyes were no longer capable
of their former cheerful greeting. Yet, in spite of all,
his appearance enforced such a winsome influence
that even the pirate captain expected a rich profit in
compensation for parting with him.
The boy still clung closely to the side of Don
Isidore, who never tired in preparing his young
charge for the coming days of trial. He tried placing
about this youthful character the guards of courage,
that were to help him fight off the threatening dangers
to his faith and innocence. Francesco was listening
attentively and with some under­standing of the
importance of the words of the priest as Achmed
stepped in front of him with one of the buyers.
“Child, never forget your prayers, and think often
of the Blessed Virgin.”

19
“Certainly, Padre,” the boy quickly answered.
Just then another merchant stepped up to examine
the boy whom Achmed offered for sale; and when the
bargaining began, any further conversation between
the priest and the boy became impossible.
The newcomer was a very talkative little man
with a sharp, staring countenance, concealed partly
by a shabby beard that made his features the more
mysterious.
“May the day bring you luck, courageous
Achmed,” began the little fellow in a nasal tone.
“May it be prosperous to you,” was the mumbled
answer. “But what is your wish today, Mulad?”
“Allah be blessed! My youthful slave ran away
from me. May the rage of the prophet strike him! I
have always treated him like a son.”
“Be consoled, Mulad,” Achmed interrupted; “here
are enough sturdy rascals to suit the tastes of any
master.”
“Sir, do not become sarcastic. Allah has denied
me riches, and the fugitive slave has taken all the rest
of my scanty savings with him. Were I not so old, I
would gladly get along for myself.”
“Make it short, poor Mulad,” the pirate grunted
sarcastically.
“Sir, that boy there will be useless to you: I would
indeed like to have a better slave, but, the money!”
“I see, you grumbler, you are looking for a
bargain–what do you offer?”
“Twenty piasters, sir, and that is my last.”
“Twenty piasters! By the prophet, not bad, Mulad!
Twenty piasters, ha, ha!”

“Your laugh pains me, noble Achmed; be
generous and let me have the boy.”
“Think of the gold you have laid away for a
useless purpose. Go home and fill your bags with
worthy ducats, then come back, and we will continue
our bargaining.”
“Sir, you are joking; let me have the boy for thirty
piasters. I will treat him as my own child.”
“What good would that mean with a poor man
like you?” Achmed jeered. “You ought to look for one
who has already learned the business of fasting. Look
at this one,” he said, pointing to Isidore. “He looks as
though he could observe Lent all year round.”
With a sigh of disappointment Mulad drew
his money bag out from beneath the folds of his
garment and counted out the required amount, and
Padre Isidore was handed over to his new master. At
the parting, he said once more, “Francesco, do not
forget your love of God and the Blessed Virgin, and
remember your daily prayers.”
“Surely not, Padre,” —the answer was cut short,
and the boy was separated from his last friend.
Many a good offer was made for the young boy,
but Achmed demanded such a high price that finally
every merchant turned away in despair of being able
to close a good bargain.
“I will keep him for myself,” said the pirate. “If
he will deny his unbelief and become a Moslem, I
will later adopt him as my own son, provided he gives
hope of becoming an able sailor.”

...to be continued.VI

Fr. Joseph Spillmann’s Tales of Foreign Lands series contains 21 booklets,
consisting of edifying and tastefully illustrated stories for the young. They
have been translated into many languages. Newly reprinted by Angelus
Press, Volume One combines four of these stories into a single volume.

Love Your Enemies. The Maoris of New Zealand have had enough of being cheated

by the English and rebel. Meanwhile, the Patrick O’Neal family, trying to start a new
life there, are overtaken by a marauding tribe and must flee for their lives, all the while
trying to practice in earnest that hardest of Christian maxims: “Love Your Enemies.”

Maron. It is Lebanon in 1860, and the Druses are persecuting the Christians under

the complicit eye of the Turkish government. The Mufti of Sidon incites the mob
to kill the Christian dogs even as his son Ali, sickened by the slaughter, helps his
Christian friend Maron flee to the hills, and learns from his actions the reality of grace
and the gifts of the Holy Ghost.

The Festival of Corpus Christi. Don Pedro and his nephew have accepted their

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government’s commission to shut down the Jesuit missions in Bolivia. Reaching the
mission, they discover a village where the Indians are living a civilized, Christian life.
Their preparations for the annual Corpus Christi procession and the taming of a
savage tribe form the backdrop of this tale.

The Cabin Boys. It is 1798, the ninth year of the bloody French Revolution, and

fifteen-year-old Paul and twelve-year-old Albert embark as cabin boys on a sea voyage
with unusual cargo in the hold: 200 priests, condemned to forced labor in Cayenne.
Gripping adventures await the boys, aided by wise priests at sea and on land, until the
tale brings them back home again.

Church an

20

Beginning of
the Doctrinal
Discussions
Between Rome and
the Society of Saint
Pius X
On Monday, October 26, from
9:30am until 12:30pm, at the Palace
of the Holy Office, the first doctrinal meeting between the Holy
See and the Society of St. Pius X
took place. Late in the morning,
the Vatican Press Office issued a
press release, and a little later a
correction about the bimonthly
rhythm of the next meetings and
not semimonthly as it was erroneously announced previously. In the
press release, we can note that the
list of “the questions of a doctrinal
character which must be dealt with
and discussed” omits none of the
theological problems which raise
difficulties: “the notion of Tradition,
the Missal of Paul VI, the interpretation of the Second Vatican Council in continuity with the Catholic
doctrinal Tradition, the themes of
the unity of the Church and of the
Catholic principles of ecumenism,
the relationship between Christianity and non-Christian religions, and
religious liberty.”
One point of agreement has
already been reached: the observance of full discretion regarding
these works, which could not be
done in the frenzy so dear to the
media. In fact, at the end of the
meeting, the participants went to
lunch without making any declaration to some ten journalists waiting
for them outside. The only exclusive “revelation” reported by the
Vatican observer for Il Giornale,
Andrea Tornielli, was that the
theologians were henceforth to
“work actively, using the Internet
to exchange their viewpoints” until
The.ANgelus.•.December.2009....www.angeluspress.org

the next meeting, scheduled after
the Christmas season. Likewise, La
Repubblica thought it was making a
scoop by revealing that, during this
first meeting, the criticism which
has been made by the Society of
Saint Pius X about religious liberty
and the relations of the Church
with non-Christian religions for
more than 40 years came under
discussion.
When he met with journalists
in the middle of the day, Fr. Federico Lombardi, head of the Holy
See Press Office, declared: “At last,
competent and authorized persons
discussed doctrinal questions.” In
his opinion, this first meeting and
the next are guided by a “spirit of
trust.” (DICI, No. 204)

In the Press

For lack of direct information,
journalists are reduced to conjecture and surmise–or even to imagine. Some are noteworthy for their
interesting creativity.
The ex-journalist of Le Monde,
Henri Tincq, already sees the dusk
encroaching on traditionalists: “No
one is unaware of the crumbling
state of integrist Catholic circles
today.…As years went by, integrist dissidence became a pitiful
prey to the deviations customary to
any sectarian small group” (Slate.
fr, October 25, 2009). Except he
forgets that he wrote the contrary
last year: “The ‘Tradis’ are still
there. Mainly French at the beginning–because of the nationality of
Archbishop Lefebvre and the tensions about the modern liturgy in
the Hexagon [France--Ed.]–the phenomenon became worldwide.…
The seminaries of the Society of
St. Pius X, the hard core of the
schism, have spread to Germany,
Australia, the United States (Minnesota) and Latin America. The
generations of priests (some 500)
which were trained in them, and

the faithful (600,000 according to
Vatican sources) are being renewed.
They are settled in more than 30
countries. The typically European
model of an authoritarian Church,
unyielding, anti-ecumenical and
anti-modern, dominated by the
figure of the holy priest in charge
of all that is sacred, became an
exported product” (Le Monde, July
2, 2008).
The Swiss agency Apic spoke
of doctrinal discussions which
might last for years or even a century: “Confirming a widely spread
impression within the Roman
Curia, the Superior of the Society of
St. Pius X, Bishop Bernard Fellay,
recently said that, in his opinion,
these discussions might be long
and might even last ‘perhaps a century.’ ” (Apic, October 15, repeated
in the October 23 issue under the
header: “Years or even a century
of discussions?”). This quotation,
taken out of its context, is to be
found in the interview granted by
Bishop Fellay in South Africa on
September 15: “We have to be realistic. The return, the restoration of
the Church will take time. The crisis
which is hitting the Church has
touched every aspect of the Christian life. To get out of this situation
will take more than one generation
of constant effort in the right direction. Maybe a century.” It is not a
matter here of the theological discussions, but of the solution of the
crisis which is shaking the Church,
and about which, shortly before
his election, Cardinal Ratzinger
acknowledged that it was “like a
boat taking in water from every
side.” Concerning the length of the
discussions themselves, in the same
interview Bishop Fellay merely
answered: “I have simply no idea
about the length of the discussions.
It certainly will depend also on
the expectations of Rome. They
may last quite a while. Because the

and World
topics are vast.” (See integral text
of the interview in DICI, No. 203.)
Better informed, the journalist in charge of religious matters
in Le Figaro, Jean-Marie Guénois,
recalled the points that the Society wants to be brought up during
the discussions and indicated the
principles which would guide the
Roman experts: “Concretely, what
are they going to talk about? Three
weeks ago, in South Africa, Bishop
Fellay on a visit to the Society
houses there summed up the issues
causing ‘difficulty’: ‘Religious liberty, ecumenism, collegiality’ and
‘the influence of modern philosophy, the liturgical novelties, the
spirit of the world and its influence
upon the modern thinking holding sway in the Church.’ A vast
program which does not frighten
the Roman negotiators. On their
part, they rather rejoice that ‘at long
last’–there has been no such official
dealings since 1988–they will be
able to know ‘the official’ position
of the Society of St. Pius X concerning all these questions which arose
from the Second Vatican Council.
They will no longer have it second
hand through the many viewpoints
given by so and so.
“From very reliable sources,
it is added that three principles
will guide the talks. The first deals
with ‘the hermeneutic of continuity’
and not of ‘rupture’ with tradition
desired by Benedict XVI for the
interpretation of Vatican II. And
here there is ‘a point of convergence’ regarding this will of the
Church’s reconciliation with her
own past. The second principle is
more problematic: Rome considers
the deposit of the faith ‘as a whole.’ It
does not accept ‘a pick and choose’
attitude among the teachings of the
last council. The third principle will
certainly be decisive: it is a matter
of ‘turning back to the letter of the
Second Vatican Council and not

21

to its spirit.’ Plainly speaking, it
means working on the original texts
and not on their interpretations or
simplifications… Consequently, it
will be a kind of rereading of the
council, during which the experts
would clarify the ‘meaning of the
terms’ or the ‘ambiguities’ so often
denounced by the Lefebvrites” (Le
Figaro, October 20, 2009).

protect it contributes not only to the
well-being of the spouses but also of
the society at large.”
According to the Department of
Justice, the bill aims at getting rid of
“superfluous red tape procedures,”
thus making it possible to “reduce
the overload for the tribunals” dealing with divorce cases.
(Source: DICI)

Lithuania: Bishops
Denounce Bill to
Make Divorce
Easier

Italy: Benedict
XVI to Visit Roman
Synagogue on
January 17, 2010

The Catholic bishops of Lithuania have criticized a bill aiming at
making the procedure for divorce
easier, stating that this would only
increase the number of broken
marriages in a country where the
divorce rate is already one of the
highest in Europe. Indeed, according to the latest statistics, in Lithuania, half of all marriages end in
divorce. In this small country of 3.5
million people, 80% of the population is Catholic.
“Marriage and the family are
values which are protected by the
Constitution. The juridical relationships created by marriage are the
foundation of the State and of society,” the bishops wrote in an open
letter addressed to the Department
of Justice, the Parliament, and the
government on September 11.
“Consequently, the State ought
not to favor procedures which simplify the break-up of marriages but
should rather come to the help of
couples so as to maintain and support the family.” They denounce an
attitude which fosters “the idea that
the State seeks to ‘reduce’ marriage
to the level of arbitrary private
relationships.” They reaffirm that
“marriage is always a mutual commitment for a lifetime. To foster and

On October 13, the Press Office
of the Holy See announced that
Pope Benedict XVI would visit the
synagogue of Rome on the afternoon of Sunday, January 17, 2010,
“on the occasion of the 21st Day
for the Development and Deepening of Dialogue between Catholics
and Jews.” For the Jews, January 17
corresponds with the day in 1793
when their co-religionists evaded
“the fury of the Roman people”
who accused the ghetto of being at
the origin of revolutionary movements arriving from France, said
the Press Office. On this occasion
the Pope will meet the Chief Rabbi
of Rome, Riccardo Di Segni, as well
as the Rome’s Jewish community.
Benedict XVI will be following
in the footsteps of his predecessor
John Paul II, who made a visit to
the Synagogue on April 13, 1986,
becoming the first pope to enter a
synagogue since the earliest days
of the Church. On that occasion,
he told the Jews that they were the
“beloved brothers” and the “elder
brothers” of Catholics.
(Source: DICI)

www.angeluspress.org....The.ANgelus.•.December.2009

22

Church an

Switzerland:
Muslims Seek
Official State
Recognition
The desire for official recognition has been expressed by the
Islamic community in the Canton
of Lucerne, in which reside 14,000
Muslims, according to the daily
Neue Luzerner Zeitung of September 11. In fact, the new cantonal
Constitution opens up the possibility for non-Christian religious
communities to be recognized
as official churches. They would
be granted certain rights, such as
that of collecting taxes from their
members. The Islamic Community of Lucerne (IGL) is looking
forward to seize this opportunity
in order to ensure a better integration and to carry out their responsibilities. “Muslims want to be part
of Lucerne society, not remain
in the background,” said Petrit
Alimi, the vice-president of IGL.
With these taxes, the work of IGL
could become professional and the
community would have financial
resources at its disposal for social
projects.
At this moment, only the
Roman Catholic, Protestant, and
Catholic Christian Churches have
the benefit of official recognition.
Among the conditions imposed
on non-Christian communities in
order to be recognized by the state,
are: a democratic organization,
open accountability, and equality
of the sexes as far as public law is
concerned. Any eventual recognition must first be approved by the
Cantonal parliament. If necessary,
it is also possible that such a bill
would have to be put to an obligatory referendum. In the current
discussion on this article of the
Lucerne Constitution, a proposal
has been put forward to this effect.
The.ANgelus.•.December.2009....www.angeluspress.org

Archbishop Robert Zollitsch

Following the Muslims, the
Serbian Orthodox and Tamil
Hindu communities have also
expressed an interest in having
official recognition in the canton
of Lucerne.
(Source: DICI)

Germany: Catholic
Church Laments
Continued Decline
in Number of
Faithful
On September 21 in Bonn,
the German Bishops’ Conference
announced that 121,155 Catholics
left the Church in 2008. This rise
in the number of people leaving
the Church follows the trend of
recent years: 84,389 in 2006 and
then 93,667 in 2007.
The statistics show a simultaneous fall in the number of new
entries into the Church and of persons returning to the Church. In
2008 returns to the Church totaled
9,546, compared with 10,207 in
2007 and 10,823 in 2006. At the
same time, the number of new
entries fell to 4,388 in 2008 compared with 4,881 in the previous
year.
Archbishop Robert Zollitsch,
president of the German Bishops’

Conference and the archbishop of
Freiburg im Breisgau, described
the statistics as “distressing.” He
declared himself unable to explain
the reasons for them. This phenomenon needs to be analyzed,
he said. These figures obviously
have an effect on the taxes collected by the Church in Germany.
The prelate anticipated a 10% fall
in revenue.
Thus, the Catholic Church had
25.18 million faithful in 2008, that
is, 280,000 fewer members than
in the previous year. In the same
period, the number of parishes
and chaplaincies fell from 12,265
to 12,080. Last year, 48,841 couples were married in the Church,
which is 552 fewer than in 2007.
The number of religious funerals
rose by 5,300 to 256,735.
The Society of St. Pius X gave
an explanation for the increase in
the number of people leaving the
Church in Germany. The district
superior, Fr. Franz Schmidberger,
condemned “the terrible banality
of the Faith, the low profile of the
Church in Germany, the aggressive advance of secularism, and
the lack of missionary zeal in large
parts of the hierarchy.” In fact,
“Catholics with a strong faith do
not turn their back on the Church
during periods of economic and
financial crisis,” he said in a message issued on September 24. But,
“no bishop in Germany has come
up with a program for winning
back those who no longer practice or have left the Church, nor
organized any diocesan catechesis in accordance with the true
Faith. Duplicity and cowardice
in place of a new evangelization
are the order of the day. Thus the
process of erosion will continue,”
explained Fr. Schmidberger.
Furthermore, during their
autumn meeting at Fulda, the
German Bishops’ Conference

and World
spent an entire day looking into
its commitment to Islam. On
September 25 Archbishop Zollitsch said that he was in favor of
training German-speaking Islamic
teachers for work in the religious
domain. This would constitute an
important phase with regard to the
integration of Muslims and interreligious harmony in the Federal
Republic, said the President of the
Bishops’ Conference. Such an initiative would also help to combat
the use of religion for political
or economic interests, he added,
while regretting that at an international level, there continued to be
painful barriers to dialogue. For
it is not rare to see this exchange
refused to Christians, he admitted,
mentioning Turkey and some African countries. In spite of everything, the German prelate felt that
the Church must make sure that
there were suffi cient competent
speakers available in the domain
of interreligious dialogue.
(Source: DICI)

Vatican Voices
Its Opposition to
Replacement of
Religion Classes in
School
The Congregation for Catholic Education addressed a Circular
Letter to the presidents of Bishops’
Conferences worldwide concerning religious education in schools.
Dated May 5, the letter was published on September 9. Indeed, the
Congregation “deemed it necessary to recall some principles that
are rooted in Church teaching, as
clarification and instruction about
the role of schools in the Catholic formation of young people,
about the nature and identity of

the Catholic school, about religious educations in schools, and
about the freedom of choice of
school and confessional religious
education.”
Thus, Cardinal Zenon Grocholewski and Archbishop Jean
Louis Brugues, O.P., respectively
prefect and secretary of this dicastery, observe in this long letter that
“the nature and role of religious
education in schools has become
the object of debate. In some cases,
it is now the object of new civil
regulations, which tend to replace
religious education with teaching
about the religious phenomenon
in a multi-denominational sense,
or about religious ethics and culture–even in a way that contrasts
with the choices and educational
aims that parents and the Church
intend for the formation of young
people,” lament the prelates in
this document available in five
languages on the Vatican web site.
The document specifies that
“religious liberty is the basis and
guarantee of the presence of
religious education in State-run
schools.” And they add: “If religious education is limited to a
presentation of the different religions, in a comparative and (socalled–Ed.) ‘neutral’ way, it creates
confusion and generates religious
relativism or indifferentism.” “For
these reasons, it is for the Church
to establish the authentic contents
of Catholic religious education in
schools. This guarantees, for both
parents and the pupils themselves,
that the education presented as
Catholic is indeed authentic.” “For
her part, the Church, exercising
the diakonia [service] of truth in
the midst of humanity, offers to
each generation the revelation of
God from which it can learn the
ultimate truth about life and the
end of history,” the Congregation
for Catholic Education concludes.

23

This Roman document raises
once more the question of the conciliation of religious liberty with
the teaching of the Catholic Faith.
The Conciliar Declaration on Religious Liberty has substituted the
human person for revealed divine
truth, thus paralyzing the Church
in advance by depriving her interventions in the social sphere of any
authority. Consequently, as John
Paul II declared before the European Parliament in Strasbourg, in
1988: in this situation, “confronted
with this diversity of viewpoints,
the noblest function of the law consists in guaranteeing equally to all
citizens the right to live in agreement with their consciences.” With
such a principle how can we fight
against the confusion, relativism,
and indifferentism, which do not
fail to stem from a religious education limited to an exposition of the
various religions precisely because
it intends to be in agreement with
the conscience of everyone?
(Source: DICI)

Open Letter to
the Pope about
Sacred Art and
Architecture
On November 5, 2009, a group
of Catholic artists, writers, and philosophers released an Open Letter
to Pope Benedict XVI concerning
a restoration of a “healthy relationship between art and the Catholic
Church.” Among the signatories
were Martin Mosebach, author of
The Heresy of Formlessness, Enrico
Radaelli, a disciple of Romano
Amerio, and Duncan Stroik, the
famous American Catholic architect. Some selections from their
letter:
“Architecture and sacred art
have spread through the followers
www.angeluspress.org....The.ANgelus.•.December.2009

24

of the famous masters, but have in
the modern age been virtually prohibited among modern architects
and in architectural education. The
Church has a great patrimony of
architectural forms and historical
styles–Byzantine, Romanesque,
Gothic, and Classical–that are all
unified in their common goal of
expressing the sacramental realities expressed in Scripture that the
Church is the Body of Christ, the
Heavenly Jerusalem, the Temple of
the Holy Spirit, the Holy Mountain
of the Lord, and so forth. Various ages have sought to expresses
these sacramental ideas, and have
produced an extraordinary body of
sacred architecture, valued for its
artistic, architectural, and religious
merit due to a positive ‘imitative’
process.
“Maybe in the arts devoted
to the service of worship, music
is the strongest, for that constant
‘catechetical’ meaning which the
Magisterium has constantly recognized, and also the more delicate
because, by its nature and unlike
the other arts, requires a tertium
medium between the author and
the viewer, or the interpreter. For
this reason the Catholic Church
should take better care of the music
than of other arts and should, as
happened in the past, encourage
the education of both authors and
interpreters: for surely today the
effort is much more difficult than
in the Middle Ages, the Baroque
period, or in the 19th century,
since society is completely secularized. However today a clear
knowledge of the fundamentals is
needed so that the musicians–once
endowed with the needed expertise–can recover the sensus Ecclesiæ
together with the sensus Fidei....
“We beseech you, Holy Father,
to read in our heartfelt appeal
our most pressing concern for the
appalling conditions of contemporary sacred art and sacred archi-

tecture, as well as a modest and
most humble request for your help
so that sacred art and architecture
can once again be truly Catholic.
This so that the faithful can again
enjoy the sense of wonder and
rejoice once again at the presence
of the beauty in God’s House. This
so that the Church can once more
regain her rightful place, in this
era of irrational, mundane, and
malforming barbarism, as a true
and attentive promoter and custodian of an art that is both new and
truly ‘original’: an art that today
as always flowers in every age of
progress, which reflowers from its
ancient roots and eternal origin,
faithful to the most intimate sense
of Beauty that shines in the Truth
of Christ.”
(Source: Angelus Press)

A Film about
Archbishop
Lefebvre
Everything has been said
or written about Abp. Marcel
Lefebvre, the founder of the Society of St. Pius X, sometimes quasi
exhaustively, as in the magnificent biography devoted to him by
Bishop Tissier de Mallerais; sometimes tendentiously or critically,
by those who cannot tolerate the
oneness of Truth; and sometimes
unfairly or selectively by those
who sift the texts because they
reject the very idea that Rome
might one day agree to “renew all
things in Christ.”
For its part, the District of
France plans to make a documentary on the life of this surprising
bishop, sometimes called “the
Rebel Bishop,” who once was the
Apostolic Delegate of the great
Pope Pius XI I, Archbishop of
Dakar, Superior General of the
Holy Ghost Fathers, and an active

participant in the Second Vatican
Council all at the same time.
Why a film? Because in the
Age of the Audio-visual and the
Internet, it has become urgent to
make known to the younger generation by means of a channel
familiar to them how a single man
was able to take a stand against the
powers that be: the power of the
majority, the power of money, and
the power of the politically and
religiously correct.
Why this film? To put the
events back in context. To honor
Archbishop Lefebvre and to do
him justice. To make more widely
known the extraordinary love of
the Church lived daily by a Catholic priest.
The project has obtained
the support and encouragement
of Bishop Bernard Fellay, who
granted all the necessary authorizations for its production. All
the archives have been opened to
us, and we plan to interview the
bishops, priests, and friendly communities who had the good luck
to know Archbishop Lefebvre.
We are also going to interview
the members of the Archbishop’s
family still living and all the laity
who would like to cooperate in this
epoch-making event.
Needless to say, a project like
this involves some expense, even if
many contributors offer their services. So I invite you to participate
either by placing at our disposition
any documents you may have, or
by making a donation to the Association de Défense du Patrimoine
Chrétien [ADPC], our partner on
this project.
To get an idea of the inspiring enterprise this documentary
represents, please visit the trailer
[“Bande Annonce”] on the movie’s
web site, www.monseigneurlefebvre.org.
(Source: La Porte Latine)

h
t
i
w
m
e
l
b
o
Pr

25

t e

c
i
s
u
M
n
r
e
d
o
M
D a v

i d

The

D r .

“Modern music,
for many of our
youth, is the
center of their
being. It defines
who they are and
gives them a core
of belief....”

“It is not the
lyrics which grip
the young today
so strongly.
The lyrics do
not create
such passion,
devotion, and
addiction. It is
the music itself.”

A .

W h i

This article is about addiction, an addiction that has hold of most
people today. To give you an idea of how pervasive this addiction is,
simply consider the mystical fervor with which most young people await
the release of a new album by their favorite “band.” Modern music, for
many of our youth, is the center of their being. It defines who they are
and gives them a core of belief, meaning they do not so much dislike the
faith and the Church; they are simply indifferent toward them. They are
apathetic toward the most important aspects of life; they are not, however,
apathetic to modern music.
As a teacher, I remember that the only two things I could not make
fun of with my students were their cars and “their music.” Girlfriends,
family, appearance, anything else—fair game. But cars and “their music”
were entirely off limits. They would rise up in anger, ready to defend these
elements of their existence. For this they would fight. Their “music” has
them in its grip.
It is important to understand that this grip does not come from the lyrics.
Most attacks or critiques of rock music concentrate on the fact that the
lyrics are often abominable. And this I do not deny. But we already know
that the lyrics will usually be bad. What I am concerned about is the music
itself. It is not the lyrics which grip the young today so strongly. The lyrics
do not create such passion, devotion, and addiction. It is the music itself.
When I began teaching, I was a graduate student at Indiana University.
After years of study, I was very excited to teach my first classes. The
arrangement there was that a senior professor would give a single lecture
and then those of us who were Teaching Assistants would have smaller
discussion groups throughout the week. The subject of these freshman
courses, however, changed semester to semester, year to year. All senior
professors could choose what they wanted to lecture on that semester.
Some did “The Novel,” others did “Comedy,” and others focused on
“19th-century British Poetry.”
I was assigned to a very peculiar senior professor who appeared to
be a casualty of the 1960s. It was 1970. He told me the topic of his class
that semester would be “The Modern Rock Lyric.” I was horrified. Of
course, I had grown up with the music so I was familiar with it. I was not,
however, prepared to teach it; I knew that there was nothing to say and
thus nothing to teach. So my first assignment from this professor was to
transcribe the lyrics to a stack of records so the lyrics could be duplicated
and distributed.
I had assumed the music would be by Bob Dylan or the Beatles or
some other of those popular artists who had some small claim to originality.
No. I found myself facing recordings of bands such as Commander Cody
and His Lost Planet Airmen, Stoneground, Dan Hicks and His Hot Licks.
For the space of a few days, I tried to transcribe those lyrics. I nearly lost

www.angeluspress.org....The.ANgelus.•.December.2009

26
my mind. After hour upon hour of sitting in front of
my phonograph, I realized that many of the lyrics
were simply incomprehensible. You simply could
not understand what they were saying. Now of
course the record companies often print the lyrics
with albums—no matter how sick and disgusting the
words are—because between the lousy enunciation
and the level of noise, no one is expected to discern
the actual words.
I started to wonder if the problem extended
beyond the lyrics. And this was long before I was
a Christian, much less a Catholic. I was an atheist
who loved music. Even then I found modern music
offensive. I knew even then that the “Christian
rock” groups were just as offensive, even if the lyrics
happened to reference God, Jesus, or God’s love.
There was a problem that covered the whole range
of “rock.”
Much later, after I had joined the Church, I
began to look at this subject more seriously. I saw
all of my students totally enmeshed in this music. It
meant more to them than their God, their families,
and their friends. So I set out to discover what was
going on.
What we do know about music? In one sense,
music has something in common with the traditional
Catholic Church: it is universal. Music is absolutely
universal. People speak of it as the universal
language—and such a comment is not untrue. All
people, everywhere, respond to music.
It is also a thing of the spirit. Scientifically, music
is vibrations in the air sent off from an instrument,
whether a human voice or a violin or a set of
drums. These vibrations hit our ears and cause a
reaction. But as with most things scientific, this is
only a technical explanation and thus only a partial
explanation. It only tells us so much. There is much
more to the reality than simply the science thereof.
The core of it is this: those vibrations set off a
responsive vibration deep inside us that is not
merely physical. Music is the most spiritual of all the
arts. It is the least dependent on the material world.
Music is somehow a bridge between this world and
another higher one. We have all felt this at times.
Anyone ever fortunate enough to have attended
a Solemn High Mass with a schola knows there
is nothing that is so moving or that penetrates so
deeply into the soul as the sheer glory of that music.
So I am not only claiming that music is
universal; I am claiming that music affects the soul
in a way that other arts cannot. We know from
recent experiments that good music can make
plants grow more abundantly, that good music can
cause cows to give more milk, that Mozart can help
students improve their exam scores. We also know
that music has healing properties. For those ill or
troubled, or those who have some other difficulty
in life, music can be a true means of release and a
THE ANGELUS • December 2009    www.angeluspress.org

method of healing. The playwright is right: “Music
hath charms to soothe the savage breast.”
We must then, however, allow the opposite:
music has charms to inflame the breast and make it
more savage. How does this work? St. Thomas and
the Peanuts comic strip can both help us understand.
Thomas tells us that the soul has different faculties;
the soul can perceive things in a variety of different
ways. And as these faculties apprehend what is
given to it by the senses, knowledge comes to us.
St. Thomas further says that the soul has its own
appetites, such as the concupiscent and the irascible.
The soul can know and the soul can be inflamed
with certain passions, it can be stirred, for good or
ill.
There is a delightful Peanuts comic strip from
many years ago. Lucy van Pelt runs into the
musician Schroeder, the little boy who plays his
toy piano, as he is coming out of the record store,
carrying a new album under his arm. Lucy asks him
what he has bought. He replies, “I’ve just bought a
new recording of the Brahms Fourth Symphony!”
She asks him what he’s going to do with it. “I’m
going to go home and listen to it.” She asks him if
he means he’s going to whistle along with it. “No.
I’m going to listen to it.” She asks him if he’s going
to dance to it. “No. I’m going to listen to it.” She
asks if he will march around the room while it
plays. He says: “No. I’m going to listen to it.” As he
walks away, Lucy says: “I’ll never understand these
musicians.”
Keeping St. Thomas—and Peanuts—in mind, we
can say that music appeals to us on three levels: the
mind, the heart, and the lower passions. The levels
correspond to the three basic elements in music, of
which all music is comprised: melody, harmony,
and rhythm. These three elements correspond to
the three “centers” of every human being. God,
who ordered and designed the universe, designed
us with these “centers” in a certain order to tell us
something about ourselves. As everything in God’s
universe is ordered and hierarchical, so each of us
as a human creature has been designed by God as
ordered and hierarchical in our being. The intellect,
the mind, is at the top and thus should rule over
everything below. The heart, always considered
the center of the emotions, is located at the center
of our being. The seat of the lower passions is
appropriately located below. We see this in order as
we stand upright and we can also see the nature of
the hierarchy in the design–the intellect must rule
over the emotions, the intellect and the emotions
must rule over the lower passions. The mind must
discipline the heart, and the mind and the heart
must discipline the lower passions. When all three
work in order, we have a coherent and balanced
human being.

27
Music, of necessity, must operate the same way.
It also has three elements. Melody is primary, just
like the human mind. Harmony is of the heart.
Rhythm arouses the lower passions. If we take a
short tour through music, we know that the first
great music that Western man created came from
the Mass: Gregorian Chant, designed to assist while
the Mass was being celebrated. All great Western
art comes from the Mass, the most glorious creation
not designed by man, but given by God. It is a great
work of art, from which flows other works of art.
One of these outpourings was great music.
What is Gregorian Chant? It is nothing more
or less than pure melody. This means it is pure
mind—pure thought. The reason it touches us so
profoundly is because it is great melody which goes
directly to our soul. It is pure. There was a great
controversy in the Church at the time of Palestrina,
a great 16th-century composer. He introduced
polyphony into Church music, more than one
melodic line operating simultaneously. This resulted
in note balanced against note, tone set against tone:
harmony. It stirred up a huge, justifiable debate in
the Church–was the added emotional energy that
harmony produces appropriate for Church music?
Palestrina added a new element to ecclesiastical
music. Palestrina’s music is magnificent, but
there were Church Fathers who, in their wisdom,
understood that such music meant a profound
change in the nature of the sounds that accompanied
worship. Palestrina gave the Church great music,
but he also initiated a process of change that has
continued from that time, eventually leading to the
plague of guitars that has afflicted modern worship.
Over time, rhythm began to play a more
important role in both sacred and secular music.
Rhythm being the skeletal structure, the pulse
of energy, imaginative composers used it to
generate new sounds and new dynamism in their
compositions. An earthquake eventually shook
the classical world. It was caused by another great
composer who took rhythm and raised it from its
supporting role as the skeletal frame of music. The
great Ludwig von Beethoven elevated rhythm to
a more dominant role in the musical structure. In
his Fifth Symphony he uses a rhythmic motif to
compose a whole grand musical work. I love this
symphony; it is a masterpiece of the mind of man,
a work of great genius. But in that composition,
Beethoven the romantic and the revolutionary took
rhythm and made it dominate to a much greater
degree; he shifted the balance among the musical
elements. And thus began a new era in the history of
music.
The Romantics often put the heart above
the head. Here was a romantic composer putting
passion (rhythm) above everything else. Rhythm
began to become a more important and defining

power in musical composition. Melody began to be
attenuated. Melody in itself is not easy to create. It
is not easy to sit down and write a memorable tune;
it requires hard work, sweat, and much thought
(or divine inspiration). Harmony is easier, as note
aligned with note will naturally cause an emotional
response. And any idiot with a stick can create
rhythm: all you need to do is pound on something.
The elements of music, which had been in order,
became disordered. Over time, we began to see
in the classical sphere an unleashing of rhythm as
primary, leading eventually to the ugliness of much
modern classical music. A typical symphony concert
these days usually has three parts: a lovely overture
to begin, a major symphonic work to conclude, and
some ghastly piece of modern music sandwiched
in between that the audience must endure to get to
the reward of the final piece on the program. Often
it is from one of the men who disposed of melody
altogether, Schoenberg, Webern, Alban Berg, or
one of their legions of disciples. They called their
system the Twelve-Tone System. Recognizable
melody is gone; harmony is gone with it. It is
simply a collection of pre-determined mathematical
progressions or random notes with innovative
rhythms. Rhythm has taken possession of music.
The same thing has happened in popular music.
Rhythm, that should be the servant of music and
that is not objectionable in itself when in its proper
place, has been crowned the king. Melody has
disappeared, harmony has followed and rhythm
triumphed. If you ever have any doubt about this,
go live in a modern apartment building. The lyrics
coming from the apartment next door do not make
your walls shake; it is the insistent pounding beat
of King Rhythm. The servant who has usurped the
monarch’s position makes the noise that keeps you
up at night.
Power rhythmic music had its place. Most march
music is strongly rhythmic for the good reason that
its intent has always been to stir up men marching
into battle. Music dominated by rhythm inflames the
passions. This is a necessary passion for men going
to war; it is not a good thing for young people going
out to socialize on a Saturday night. The rhythms of
rock music (and now rap and hip hop) are aroused
in an unhealthy way because they cannot be
properly released. Inflamed passions need an outlet
and we know what outlets young people find today.
Those passions, once aroused and released, lead to
sad consequences. It is neither soothing nor healing.
No one leaves a string quartet concert intent on
committing sin. We know the sins that follow from
so many modern rock concerts. These sins connect
directly with the music, specifically because the
music, the disordered music, the endless incessant
pounding beat, inflames those passions. The young
who leave a rock concert or a live music club on a
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28
Saturday night are not thinking of attending Mass
on Sunday morning; their impulses that have been
stoked by the music are much more primal.
It does not matter the name of the group
for their name is legion. Any idiot who can pick
up a drumstick or plug in an electric guitar can
call himself a “musician.” It is a kind of perverse
Democracy in Music. As a result, “pop” music
today consists of shouting, banging, shrieking and
deafening noise. But fundamentally, the common
denominator is the beat. Melody is dead and
harmony is buried. With the death of harmony,
the emotional bond between notes, the basics
of dance vanish as well. Folk dance is gone, the
minuet is a memory and the waltz, once considered
questionable because of its intimacy, only survives
in the concert hall. Now “dance” is leaping and
banging and gross grinding. How could it be
otherwise? The lower passions unleashed, savagery
is inevitable. The beat rules. And it is listened to
and pulsed to hour upon hour upon hour. Modern
man simply surrenders himself to it and becomes a
slave of his passions. And the record producers and
the promoters and the talentless performers rake in
billions of dollars.
A worship of the savage is entering every field
of human endeavor today, including music and
art. It is simply a rejection of Western art. It is a
rejection of the Catholic Faith. All Western thought
and art come from the Catholic Church; this is
simply a historical fact. In order to destroy this, the
enemies of the faith have turned toward savagery
and primitivism. All art has become disordered and
human nature follows–truth becomes lies, good
changes to evil, beauty is transformed to ugliness.
And the so-called “artists” who create the false
substitutes are admired not for their talent but
worshipped because of their celebrity; they have
become gods, especially for the young.
This is again a movement that began with the
great Romantics, the time when the artistic disorder
began to become pervasive. The artist became a
substitute deity to be worshipped instead of God. It
is seen as early as Franz Liszt, the great composer
and master pianist who became the rage of Europe.
Women followed him and threw themselves at him.
It is the equivalent of young women today who
throw their hotel keys on stage. The passion may
dominate, but the poor withered soul is still there,
crying for help, longing for meaning. The desire
to be a celebrity or associated with celebrity is an
attempt to find meaning. The rock “artist,” the
musician, may become a substitute deity, along with
the athletes, the movie celebrities; the poor lost souls
are desperately seeking a connection with something
or someone higher and greater. Sadly, they go
searching in all the wrong places and worship all the
false idols. It is pathetic, but it is inevitable, given
THE ANGELUS • December 2009    www.angeluspress.org

the disordering of human nature. It is the logical
consequence of a long process. The disordering of
music has helped create a disordering of the human
personality.
So what can be done? We face an overwhelming
problem. We are up against the inversion of order.
And we know who is at the root of such disorder;
the one who first said non serviam. It was that being
who first tried to turn the universe upside down,
who continues his work, including in the field of
music. So how do you fight it? It is not easy.
Criticism is largely useless since so many are
simply entrenched in it. They are bathed in it, hour
after hour. Fire must be fought with fire. First, pray
unceasingly for your children and anyone else
addicted to modern music. It is the most important
thing you can do. On a practical level, the problem
is an unleashing of rhythm. It must be fought with
other rhythm, properly ordered rhythm within good
serious music. If rhythm is what the young respond
to, then music with great rhythmic propulsion is
useful. Baroque music is a great aid in this regard:
Vivaldi, Bach, Handel, etc. Baroque music is defined
to a degree by energetic, powerful rhythm, but
rhythm placed within a proper musical, and thus
human, order. Even modern youth will respond to
The Four Seasons or the Hallelujah Chorus.
Give them Beethoven, a musical genius. They
will love the Fifth Symphony—and they should. It is
a marvelous piece of music. Yes, in the big picture,
there is a problem with what Beethoven unleashed.
But if one has to choose between Beethoven and
rock, the choice is obvious. Ravel’s Bolero may also
be helpful; it is in one sense a study in incessant
rhythm, but perhaps the introduction to it may lead
a young listener to other Ravel pieces which are
more varied and gloriously beautiful.
We must introduce beauty to these souls. They
are cut off from the beautiful. It is the beautiful
which heals and leads upward. These poor damaged
souls need healing and need to be uplifted. And as
with any addiction, the process of overcoming the
compulsion is slow and difficult. Patience, that great
virtue, is a necessity. Perhaps after a long healing
process, the healed ears and the refreshed soul
can sit down, intellect above heart above passions,
and truly enjoy and appreciate something like a
Mozart piano concerto where the music is ordered,
and, as Lucy wished, we can whistle along to the
melody and dance to the lovely harmony and march
about to Mozart’s life-enhancing rhythms. Or we
can simply be as Schroeder, listening with joy and
thanking God for the great gift of glorious music.
Dr. David Allen White taught World Literature at the Naval Academy in
Annapolis, Maryland, for the better part of three decades. He gave many
seminars at St. Thomas Aquinas Seminary in Winona, Minnesota, including
one on which this article is based. He is the author of The Mouth of the Lion
and The Horn of the Unicorn.

29
S c o t t

M o n t g o m e r y

Saint of the

Sanhedrin
“B

Photo by Bro. Lawrence Lew, O.P.

u­­t one came an­d told them: Behold, the men
whom you put in prison are in the Temple,
standing and teaching the people. Then went
the officer with the ministers and brought
them without violence: for they feared the
people, lest they should be stoned. And when they had
brought them, they set them before the council. And
the high priest addressed them, saying: Commanding,
we commanded you that you should not teach in this
name. And behold, you have filled Jerusalem with your
doctrine: and you have a mind to bring the blood of
this man upon us. But Peter and the Apostles answering,
said: We ought to obey God rather than men. The God
of our Fathers has raised up Jesus, whom you put to
death, hanging Him upon a tree. Him has God exalted
with His right hand, to be Prince and Savior, to give
repentance to Israel and remission of sin. And we are
witnesses of these things: and the Holy Ghost, whom
God has given to all who obey Him. When they had
heard these things, they were cut to the heart: and they
thought to put them to death.

“But one in the council rising up, a Pharisee,
named Gamaliel, a doctor of the Law, respected by
all the people, commanded the men to be put forth
a little while. And he said to them: Men of Israel,
take heed to yourselves what you intend to do with
these men. For before these days rose up Theodas,
affirming himself to be somebody, to whom a number
of men, about four hundred, joined themselves. Who
was slain: and all who believed him were scattered
and brought to nothing. After this man, rose up Judas
of Galilee, in the days of the enrolling, and drew away
the people after him. He also perished: and all, even
as many as consented to him, were dispersed. And
now, therefore, I say to you: Refrain from these men
and leave them alone. For if this council or this work
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30
be of men, it will come to nought: But if it be of God,
you cannot overthrow it, lest you be found even to
fight against God. And they consented to him.” (Acts
5:25-39)
What would lead a respected member of the
Sanhedrin to save the lives of the Apostles? To answer
this question we must go back to the formation of
two great schools of Judaism that would shape the
thoughts and attitudes of nearly every person in
Israel. In doing so, we will see a divergence in the
teaching of the masters of these schools that will help
to explain why some devout Jews, with the help of
God’s grace, recognized Christ as the Messiah, while
others rejected Him as an imposter and sought His
death.

Preparing the Way of the Lord
In 30 B.C., the Rabbis Hillel and Shammai were
the two greatest teachers of the Law in Jerusalem.
Though both were Pharisees and members of the
Sanhedrin, they were very different from one another
in their understanding and practice of the Jewish
faith. The Mosaic Law consisted of 613 precepts
which governed in detail nearly every aspect of daily
life. Whereas Shammai fanatically held to the letter
of the Law, Hillel was more practical in his approach.
The Catholic Encyclopedia summarizes the conflict:
The differences between the two schools had regard
chiefly to the first, second, third, and fifth parts of the
Mishnah ( Jewish oral Tradition)–i.e. to religious dues, the
keeping of the Sabbath and Holy Days, and the laws in
regard to marriage and purification. The law, for example,
to prepare no food on the Sabbath had to be observed by
not allowing even the beast to toil; hence it was argued
by Shammai that an egg laid on the Sabbath must not be
eaten (Eduyoth, iv, 1). Another debate was whether, on a
Holy Day, a ladder might be borne from one dove-cote
to another or should only be glided from hole to hole.
In these and other discussions much pain was taken to
push the Mosaic Law to an unbearable extreme, and no
heed was given to the practical reform which was really
needed in Jewish morals. It was the method of the school
of Shammai rather than that of Hillel that Christ would
condemn.1

Rather than focusing on strict interpretation,
Hillel was much more concerned about observing
the spirit of the Law given to the Children of Israel
by God. In this way he served as an instrument of
Heaven. Though he did not realize it, this was the
first step in preparing the way of the Lord spoken of
by Isaiah and embodied more forcefully by John the
Baptist. In fact, two of Hillel’s relatives would play
modest, but important, roles in the beginnings of
the Christian Faith–one as a witness to the divinity
of its Founder, the other as the teacher of its greatest
Apostle.
In the second chapter of Luke’s Gospel, the
Evangelist describes the birth of our Lord and
THE ANGELUS • December 2009    www.angeluspress.org

the events that followed. When speaking of the
Presentation of Jesus in the Temple, Luke introduces
us to a man named Simeon, who is believed by some
Church Fathers to be the son of the Rabbi Hillel.2
What ensues is a foreshadowing of the Transfiguration
and the first public declaration of Christ as the
Messiah to be made in Jerusalem. Just as Moses and
Elijah (representing the Law and the Prophets of the
Old Covenant) would give witness to the divinity of
Jesus upon Mt. Tabor, so too Simeon, who is both a
Rabbi of the Law and a prophet, recognizes Christ as
the Anointed One on the Temple Mount. He delivers
one of the most beautiful and powerful discourses to
be found in Sacred Scripture, and eloquently reveals
our Lord to be the fulfillment of Salvation History:
“Now dost thou dismiss thy servant, O Lord, according
to thy word in peace. Because my eyes have seen thy
salvation, which thou hast prepared before the face of all
peoples: a light of revelation to the Gentiles and the glory
of thy people Israel.” And Simeon blessed them and said
to Mary His mother: “Behold, this child is set for the fall
and for the rise of many in Israel and for a sign which shall
be contradicted. And thy own soul a sword shall pierce,
that out of many hearts thoughts shall be revealed.” (Lk.
2:29-32, 34-35)

Only through God’s grace was Simeon able
to make such a statement. But it was the holy
and balanced system of observing the Old Law
established by Hillel that enabled him to see beyond
the legalisms of the Deuteronomic Code and become
a worthy vessel of election. Moreover, Simeon
instilled this same view of God and the Law in his
own son, Gamaliel, who would perfect it and bring
it even closer to the teaching of Christ. This would
be important in the formation of one of Gamaliel’s
students in Jerusalem–a bright and zealous young Jew
from Cilicia named Saul.

At the Feet of Gamaliel
Tarsus, in Cilicia, was a city of the Diaspora and
home to a large number of Jewish citizens. It was
here that the Apostle of the Gentiles was born to a
family of Hellenized Jews in either 7 or 8 A.D. His
parents were descendants of the Tribe of Benjamin
and were attached by way of religious practice to
the Pharisee sect.3 Because of the Greek influence
on their faith, the young boy’s parents gave him two
names; Saul (Hebrew) and Paul (Greek). Though
Tarsus at this time was considered to be a great center
of learning behind only Athens and Alexandria, the
Jewish citizens of the city did not send their sons to
the secular pagan schools. Instead, Saul would have
been instructed in his early years in what the Jews
affectionately referred to as “the Sacred Grove”
or “the Vineyard,” a local school considered so
necessary that without it they believed a city would
be doomed to destruction.4 At the age of five he was

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to be introduced to the reading of the Torah (the
Law), at ten years of age he would be taught the
Mishnah (the oral Tradition), and at fifteen he was
to learn the Gemara (commentaries on the Mishnah
which, along with it, compose the Talmud).5 It was
at this point that Saul’s father made the decision to
send his son to Jerusalem to study under one of the
great masters of the Law who had established their
schools in the Holy City. In God’s providence, Saul
was enrolled in the School of Gamaliel. It was a
decision that would have far-reaching implications in
preparing him for his work as an Apostle of Christ.
Like Hillel and Simeon, Gamaliel had a much
more spiritual approach to Judaism than did the
followers of Shammai, whose rigorist views still
held sway with the Sadducees. His teaching was
full of hope, and he sought to lift the hearts of the
faithful to God while still remaining true to the Old
Covenant. He saw little value in dwelling upon the
minutiae of the Mosaic Law or engaging in protracted
disputes over its observance. Instead, he provided
his students with instruction that would later prove
to be remarkably suited to Christianity. Rather than
fighting the Romans with swords, Gamaliel taught his
students to concentrate on extending the Kingdom
of God over the whole earth.6 He also taught that the
Gentiles were worthy of being treated with caring
and respect, especially those who were in the greatest
physical or spiritual need. When it came to matters
of faith, he expressed a desire for the emergence of
an infallible authority who would end all disputes–a
perfect description of Christ and His Church.7 The
young Saul would spend at least seven years studying
at the feet of this sage, whose orthodoxy, despite his
unique views, was so recognized that he was the first
Doctor of the Law to be given the title of Rabban
(“our master”).8 One of Paul’s biographers deftly
summarizes the impact that this man had in molding
the future Apostle:
It could scarcely be denied that Rabban Gamaliel had
a deeply religious soul and sound conscience....Such a
man must have had a profound influence on a liberal
mind such as Saul’s. A doctrinal influence, first of all,
for the Pharisees believed in the immortality of the soul,
providence, free will, the resurrection of the dead, the
judgment of the just and the unjust; still more, an influence
of spiritual enthusiasm and orientation in life, for with
them religion was the end and means of everything, faith
was the very pith of existence, and nothing that happened
escaped the eye of God. Saul the Pharisee was never to
forget these lessons.9

Why Dost Thou Persecute Me?
By the time Saul left the School of Gamaliel in
30 A.D., he was a master of the Law in his own right.
He was a devoted Pharisee who was steeped in the
traditions, history, and doctrine of his people, and he

returned to Tarsus full of zeal for the glory of God. It
is a great paradox, then, that after being taught by the
broad-minded Rabban for so long, Saul had become
very hard and inflexible in his beliefs. He was at this
stage an uncompromising Scribe who was in some
ways reminiscent of Shammai in his approach to
the Law–and he was prepared to crush anyone who
did not share his point of view.10 This, of course,
manifested itself most clearly in his approval of the
execution of St. Stephen and in his active persecution
of all Christians following his return to Jerusalem in
34 A.D.
As if by divine providence, Saul had left Israel
just as our Lord was beginning His public ministry.
He had never seen Jesus and was not present during
His trial or Crucifixion. But from his home in Asia
Minor Saul had heard that the radical new sect
established by this Rabbi was growing in popularity
and drawing converts from among his fellow
Pharisees. He returned to Jerusalem breathing fire
and was determined to do everything in his power
to snuff out what he considered to be a great heresy.
When standing before Herod Agrippa years later,
Paul recounted his persecution of the first Christians:
And I indeed did formerly think that I ought to do
many things contrary to the name of Jesus of Nazareth,
which also I did at Jerusalem. And many of the Saints
did I shut up in prison, having received authority of the
chief priests. And when they were put to death, I brought
the sentence. And oftentimes punishing them, in every
synagogue, I compelled them to blaspheme: and being
yet more mad against them, I persecuted them even unto
foreign cities. (Acts 26:9-11)

It was on such a trip to Damascus to arrest
Christians that Saul’s life took a dramatic turn.
Gamaliel had warned against this course of action
and was opposed to the persecution of Christians. In
his mind, the God of Israel was a God of mercy and
everything should be placed in His hands.11 But Saul
disregarded the counsel of his teacher and set out
for Syria to hunt the enemies of Judaism. It would
now take the intervention of the Supreme Master
and Lawgiver to redirect the ardor of this zealous
Scribe. With a great flash of light and some words
from Jesus that cut straight to his heart, Saul was
changed forever. Suddenly, the fog that had clouded
his mind for so long was lifted and Saul could see the
error of his ways. Another of his biographers paints
a vivid picture of the conviction and wonderment
experienced by Christ’s most recent conquest:
His Pharisaism had misled him. Gamaliel’s warning
had pointed to the inner truth–the disease of sin needed
a healer. The words and demeanor of Stephen were not
merely those of Stephen; through him and in him was a
mystery. Stephen, and all those men and women whom
Saul had arrested and cruelly thrashed in Jerusalem,
and whom he planned to bring bound from Damascus,
all these were actually Jesus. They had the same air, the
same atmosphere, the same Spirit as the Master who had
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32
subdued him. And Jesus was alive–in them, through
them, and beyond them. Here was the reality of the
Messiah, the Christos on whom Saul had meditated for so
long: the Judge, the Man of Power, who was the Master of
the world. Here He was at last, beyond all question, and
more mysterious than any had ever dreamed.12

Echoes of the Master
Over the next three years Paul (as he would
now refer to himself) received the complete deposit
of faith that had been revealed by Christ to the
Apostles. Jesus appeared to him in ecstasies and
gave him the doctrinal knowledge that would be
required to evangelize both Gentile and Jew. In his
Second Letter to the Corinthians, Paul also mentions
a vision in which he may have been shown the very
essence of God, for he says that he was “caught up
to the third heaven...and heard secret words which
it is not granted to man to utter” (II Cor. 12:2, 4). St.
Augustine and St. Thomas Aquinas both believe that
Paul, like Moses upon Mt. Sinai, was temporarily
given the Beatific Vision; “and not without reason,”
says the Angelic Doctor, “since as Moses was the
first teacher of the Jews, so Paul was the first teacher
of the Gentiles.”13 Whatever Paul was shown in this
ecstasy, it is clear that Christ revealed Himself to the
Apostle in a very intimate way in order to prepare
him for the work and suffering that lay ahead.
Now, armed with this knowledge of the
Almighty, Paul began his labors as a slave of Heaven.
In addition to the doctrine he had received from our
Lord, Paul would also employ much of the wisdom
that had been imparted to him by Gamaliel during
his youth. As mentioned previously, Gamaliel had
been the first of the great teachers of the Law to
indicate that the Gentiles also had a place within
the Kingdom of Heaven. Though the mission to
preach the Gospel to the Gentiles was given to
Paul by Christ, he would always exhibit the mind
of Gamaliel in the generosity that he displayed
toward them and in the way he fought for their
prerogatives against Jewish converts to the faith who
often opposed them. After the great debate at the
Council of Jerusalem over what would be required
of Gentile converts, it was agreed among the Princes
of the Church that for the time being Paul would
concentrate upon evangelizing the pagans, while
some of the others (Peter, James the Lesser, and John
in particular) would focus much of their effort upon
the Children of Israel both in the Holy Land and the
Diaspora (Gal. 2:1-10, Acts 15:1-30). This was not
an exclusive arrangement, as Paul’s battles with the
Jews in Thessalonica and his Letter to the Hebrews
both attest. It is in the latter especially that much of
what was poured into him during his school years in
Jerusalem surged to the forefront.
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The broad-minded interpretation of Jewish
doctrine originally rejected by Paul was now
embraced by him and used to confirm his fellow
Jews in Christ. In this also, he displayed the mind of
his teacher. Some Church Fathers, such as St. John
Chrysostom, have seen Gamaliel as a man who was
patiently awaiting the Kingdom of God and who
realized that the Mosaic Law was not the final word,
but a means to an end. This allowed him to espouse
ideas that were rejected by the Sadducees, but
showed Christianity to be the logical outgrowth of
Pharisaic Judaism.14
This overarching philosophy that was instilled
in Paul by his old mentor forms the basis of his
Epistle to the Hebrews. In it, he does not discredit
Judaism but shows it to be the precursor of the
Christian faith. His comparison of the imperfect
Temple sacrifices with the perfect Sacrifice of Christ
(chs. 9-10), the Levitical priesthood with the Eternal
Priesthood of Christ (chs. 7-8), and his exhortation
on Christ’s superiority over the Angels and Moses
(chs. 1-3) are all intended to reveal that Jesus is the
long-awaited Messiah, and that He and the New
Covenant established in His blood are the fulfillment
of everything that was spoken of in the Law and the
Prophets of the Old Testament.
Likewise, an echo of Gamaliel can be heard
in Paul’s teaching on the doctrine of justification.
Gamaliel’s rejection of the pointless minutiae of the
Mosaic Law and his emphasis upon moral reform
bore tremendous fruit in the heart and mind of his
star pupil. In his letters to the Romans (chs. 3-4) and
the Galatians (chs. 2-4) Paul speaks of the necessity of
faith over the works of the Law. This should not be
interpreted, as was done by Martin Luther, to mean
that faith alone is required for salvation. When Paul
declares that we are justified by faith and not works,
he is condemning the teaching of those Pharisees
from the School of Shammai who taught that strict
adherence to the Mosaic Law was all that was needed
to obtain Heaven. Like Gamaliel, Paul teaches the
importance of placing our trust in God and living in
accordance with the spirit of His Commandments.
He refers to this as a “circumcision of the heart,” one
of the spirit rather than the letter (Romans 2:29).
Such a view of religion will manifest itself in
works of charity–in the corporal and spiritual works
of mercy spoken of by St. James in the second
chapter of his epistle when he states that “faith
without works is dead” ( Jas. 2:14-26). That this is
so is confirmed by Christ in His discourse to the
Apostles on the Final Judgment (Mt. 25:31-46): only
those who alleviate the sufferings of the least of their
brethren will enter into the Kingdom of Heaven;
those who do not, even though they have faith, will
be condemned to eternal punishment. Thus, we are
justified by both faith and works; and there is no
contradiction between the teaching of St. Paul and

33
that of St. James, no matter how desperately various
Protestant commentators may wish to create one.
Finally, beyond the philosophical and moral
preparation given to Paul by Gamaliel, other
commentators have seen in the Apostle’s manner of
expression the influence of his teacher. In the School
of Gamaliel the Rabban would often combine the
written word, oral Tradition, and right reason to craft
his argument on any particular topic. Gamaliel was
also not afraid to go beyond the literal meaning of
Scripture. Fr. Constant Fouard describes this teaching
method which was adopted by Paul and by the
Catholic Church as a whole:
The Judaic education (Paul) received from Gamaliel
was like a mold from which the Apostle’s thought received
from the outset that form which it kept ever after, and
is especially to be noted in his Epistles....His method is
the same as the Talmud has preserved for us–the method
of the Jewish Schools–where the lesson consisted in a
long conversation between the master and his disciples.
The interrogative and colloquial forms, so frequent in
the Apostle’s letters, his persevering effort to base his
argument upon the Jewish Traditions or the mystical
meaning of Scripture; what is all this but the vestiges of
an earlier education, a reminiscence of Gamaliel?15

Saint of the Sanhedrin?
From this brief overview we can see that
Gamaliel was cut from a different cloth than many
of his peers within the Sanhedrin. But what became
of this Pharisee who exhibited such leanings toward
Christianity? Many Jewish historians claim that he
remained a devoted teacher of the Mosaic Law for
the rest of his life. They cite a passage added to the
Mishnah several years after his death which declares,
“Since Gamaliel disappeared the honor of the Law is
no more; with him died purity and piety.”16 However,
Christian tradition states that Gamaliel converted
to the Catholic Faith and remained a member of
the Sanhedrin in order to aid his fellow Christians
in Jerusalem.17 The historian Photius writes that
the Rabban, his son Abibo, and Nicodemus were
baptized by St. Peter and St. John,18 and indeed all
three of them are listed in the Roman Martyrology
for August 3rd as saints of the Church.
Which opinion is correct?
A difficult question that can be posed by critics
of the Catholic position is as follows: If Gamaliel
accepted the teaching of Christ and wielded enough
influence within the Sanhedrin to possibly save
His life, where was he during our Lord’s trial?
One would expect to see Gamaliel rising up in the
Council to do battle against the Sadducees if he truly
believed that Jesus was the Messiah. But the biblical
record is silent. One possible explanation is that, like
Saul, Gamaliel did not convert to Christianity until
after the Resurrection of our Lord. A more plausible

explanation is that the opportunity to intervene was
denied to him by the enemies of Christ. We know
from history that Annas, Caiaphas, and the rest of
the Sadducees decided to hold an illegal hearing in
the middle of the night and that they did everything
in their power to secure a conviction. Therefore, it is
within the realm of possibility that only like-minded
members of the Sanhedrin were informed of these
proceedings and that those who would object to the
trial were not summoned.
Perhaps the best explanation is to say in all
simplicity that neither Gamaliel nor any other man
would be allowed by God to mount a successful
defense. Jesus had come into this world to die for
our redemption. Had Gamaliel spoken out on
His behalf, His passion and death may have been
indefinitely postponed or avoided altogether; but
by the most holy will of the Father, our Lord was
to be immolated for the sins of mankind during the
Passover. Christ would offer Himself in sacrifice
upon the Cross, the veil of the Temple would be torn
in two, and the Old Covenant would come to an end.
Nothing would prevent God’s greatest act of love
from being consummated.
Is Gamaliel then truly a Saint of the Catholic
Church? While his acceptance of Christ as the
Messiah is difficult to prove with absolute certainty,
a good case can be made for his conversion. His
understanding of the Mosaic Law as a precursor of
the definitive covenant to be established between
God and man suggests an openness to the possibility
that Judaism as he knew it would cease to be
practiced. Moreover, his belief that the Gentiles had
a specific place within the Kingdom of God shows
that he viewed the New Covenant as something
that would extend beyond the borders of Israel and
include men of all nations. Thirdly, his formation of
St. Paul, his desire for an infallible religious authority,
and his courageous defense of the Apostles before
the Sanhedrin all have the marks of predestination.
Lastly, though there is scant documentary evidence
of his conversion and canonization, his inclusion in
the Roman Martyrology and the attitude displayed
toward him by some Church Fathers is persuasive.
Despite the mystery that surrounds his life, it is
clear that Gamaliel was a man whose heart belonged
to God. The Holy Ghost beckoned him through
the words of the prophets and prompted him to
seek the Messiah who would make all things new
(Is. 65:17, Ezk. 11:19). One can only wonder what
Gamaliel felt when he beheld Jesus for the first time
and heard the voice of the One who had created
him. Christ had said to his disciples, “I am the Good
Shepherd; I know Mine, and Mine know Me” ( Jn.
10:14). While many of the reprobate among the Jews
and the Romans mocked Jesus as an imposter as
He was lifted high upon the Cross, the predestinate
whispered beneath their tears, “My Lord and my
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God.” I believe Rabban Gamaliel was among their
number. St. Gamaliel, pray for us.
The Catholic Encyclopedia (Robert Appleton Co., 1912 [online copyright:
K. Knight, 2003 by]), s.v. “Shammai.”
2
Abbé Constant Fouard, Saint Peter and the First Years of Christianity (1892;
reprint, Fort Collins, CO: Roman Catholic Books, n.d.), p.35.
1

Note: There has been an ongoing debate among Church historians as to
the exact identity of the man named Simeon mentioned in Luke’s Gospel.
Some claim he is the rabbi named Simeon who is the son of Hillel and
the father of Gamaliel. According to Cornelius a Lapide, S.J., those in this
camp include St. Athanasius (lib. de Communi essentia Patris et Filii), St.
Cyril of Jerusalem (orat. de Occursu Dom.), St. Epiphanius (Treatise on
the Fathers of the Old Testament), and Genebrardus (lib. 2 Chronologiae).
Lapide quotes Genebrardus as saying: “The Rabbi, Moses the Egyptian,
records that (Simeon) was not only the disciple, but also the son of Hillel,
and the teacher, and indeed the father, of Gamaliel, at whose feet Paul
learned the Law” (Pirke Avoth or “the chapters of the fathers”).
Others claim that Simeon was a layman whose lineage is unknown.
Among those believing this to be the case are Theophylact, Euthymius,
Jansenius, and Barradius. Fr. George Leo Haydock states in his Bible Commentary: “Many have pretended that Simeon was a priest. The best and
oldest interpreters say he was a laic.” When we consider that St. Athanasius
and St. Cyril of Jerusalem hold the opposite opinion, however, it is difficult
to know what Fr. Haydock is referring to.
Though Fr. a Lapide comes down on the side of Simeon being the son
of Hillel and the father of Gamaliel, he cautions: “All this, however, while
highly probable, is at the same time uncertain.”

In this article I have presented the teaching of Sts. Athanasius,
Cyril, and Epiphanius which indicates a familial relationship among
Hillel, Simeon, and Gamaliel.
(Material from Fr. a Lapide taken from The Great Commentary of
Cornelius a Lapide: The Holy Gospel According to Saint Luke, Michael
J. Miller, ed. [Fitzwilliam, NH: Loreto Publications, 2008], p.270.)
3
Ibid., p.101.
4
Ibid., p.105.
5
Rt. Rev. Joseph Holzner, Paul of Tarsus (St. Louis: B. Herder Book Co.,
1944), pp.17-18.
6
Fouard, First Years of Christianity, p.107.
7
Ibid., p.108.
8
Henri Daniel-Rops, Saint Paul: Apostle of Nations (Chicago: Fides Publishing Assoc., 1953), p.21.
9
Ibid.
10
Fouard, First Years of Christianity, p.112.
11
Robert Sencourt, Saint Paul: Envoy of Grace (New York: Sheed and Ward,
1948), p.48.
12
Ibid., pp.51-52.
13
Aquinas, Summa Theologica, II-II, Q. 175, Art. 3 (Benzinger Brothers,
1948), p.1909.
14
Acts of the Apostles, trans. by Joseph F. Fitzmyer, S.J., The Anchor Bible
(New York: Doubleday, 1998), p.333.
15
Fouard, First Years of Christianity, p.110.
16
Daniel-Rops, Saint Paul, p.21.
17
The Catholic Encyclopedia, VI, 1.
18
Ibid., p.1.

APPENDIX A

The Finding of St. Stephen’s Relics

This second festival in honor of the holy
protomartyr St. Stephen (August 3) was instituted by the Church on the occasion of the
discovery of his precious remains. His body had
long lain concealed under the ruins of an old
tomb in Caphargamala, a place 20 miles from
Jerusalem, where there was a church served by
a venerable priest named Lucian.
In the year 415, on the 3rd of December, the
priest was sleeping on his cot in the baptistry,
where he habitually retired in order to guard the
sacred vessels of the church. Being half awake, he
saw a tall, comely old man of venerable aspect,
clothed in white and gold, who approached
him and called him by his name three times,
bidding him to go to Jerusalem and tell Bishop
John to come and open the tombs where his
remains and those of certain other servants of
Christ lay. This act would permit God to open
the gates of His clemency to many souls, the
visitor affirmed. Lucian asked his name, and he
replied, “I am Gamaliel, who instructed St. Paul
in the Law.” Gamaliel then said they would also
find the tomb of St. Stephen, protomartyr, and
of Nicodemus, who came to visit Jesus at night
and who, when driven out of Jerusalem by the
authorities, had been sheltered by himself in
his country residence at the present site. This
vision was twice repeated, and on the third visit
the priest was reproached for his delay. He was
promised that the discovery would cause the
current famine to cease.
After the third vision, Lucian went to Jeru-

salem and laid the whole affair before Bishop
John, who directed him to go and search himself
for these relics. And Gamaliel appeared again,
this time to a holy monk of the same region, to
indicate the exact site where the inhabitants of
the village should dig.There indeed were found
three coffins or chests with the respective names
engraved on them; and without opening these,
Lucian sent immediately to acquaint Bishop
John with the discovery. The bishop was at the
Council of Diospolis, and, taking with him the
bishops of Sebastis and Jericho, he journeyed
to Caphargamala.
Upon the opening of St. Stephen’s coffin the
earth trembled, and there came from the coffin
an agreeable scent.There was at that moment a
vast multitude of people assembled at the burial
place, among whom were many persons afflicted
with various maladies; 73 recovered their health
instantly. They kissed the holy relics, and then
the chests were closed again.The bishop left the
relics of Gamaliel and Nicodemus for the village,
and consented to leave a small portion of St.
Stephen’s relics there; then, amid the singing of
psalms and hymns, the rest of them were carried
to the Church of Sion in Jerusalem. They were
later transferred to a magnificent church built
in his honor in that city toward the end of the
fifth century. The greater part of his relics are
presently in Rome.
Les Petits Bollandistes: Vies des Saints, by Msgr. Paul Guerin
(Paris: Bloud et Barral, 1882), Vol. 9.

A

35

APPENDIX B

Authorship of the Epistle to the Hebrews
Fr. Fernand Prat, S.J.
(Fr. Prat was one of 40 consultors appointed by Pope St.
Pius X to the Pontifical Biblical Commission in 1903.)

Character and
Style of the Epistle
Alone among the Epistles of the New Testament, the Epistle to the Hebrews is anonymous.
The Introduction, in which the author usually
discloses his name and titles, is suppressed. The
allusion to chains–which might be those of Paul–
rests upon a false reading. Some rather vague
characteristics, which present certain difficulties, have suggested St. Paul, but may very well
suit other writers: “Know ye that our brother
Timothy is set at liberty; with whom (if he come
shortly) I will see you....The brethren from Italy
salute you.” This is the most definite detail; and
in these few words there are three ambiguities. Elsewhere the author seems to distinguish
himself very clearly from the first generation of
Christians and to number himself among those
who have received the Gospel at second hand.
At least, nothing thus far betrays a distinct personality.
The style completes our bewilderment.
Nothing differs more from the language and
manner of Paul. I do not speak merely of the
choice of words, to which too much importance is often given in questions of authenticity,
although the absence of certain expressions and
particles which Paul does not seem able to dispense with, and the presence of phrases foreign
to his terminology, give us food for thought; I
refer to the diction in its broadest sense, images,
comparisons, and the way of conceiving and
presenting things. We can only subscribe to the
verdict of Origen: “The style of the Epistle called
that to the Hebrews is of a totally different
character from that of the Apostle....The Epistle
is written in better Greek, as everyone who is
capable of forming a judgement in this matter
must admit.” It is sufficient to read the first paragraph, so musical, so well balanced and harmoni-

St. Paul window.,The Cologne Cathedral, Cologne, Germany.

ous, to be convinced that it is not of Paul’s writing. And the sequel
does not belie the promises of the beginning. No biblical author, not
even excepting St. Luke, writes so purely. There are few Hebraisms,
and very few of those irregularities and inaccuracies–anacolutha,
hyperbata, sense-constructions–which fairly swarm in the Pauline
Epistles. The perfect connection of the ideas in the discourse, the art
of natural transitions, the oratorical tone maintained without effort,
the mastery of a language which is always copious and rhythmical,
distinguish him clearly from Paul. The eloquence of the latter, made up
of passion and logic, resembles an impetuous torrent which bursts its
dykes, while the Epistle which we are now considering is like a majestic river, the windings of which only afford relief from its monotony.
The Epistle is full of reminiscences and biblical allusions; but its
way of quoting and using the Old Testament is very far from Pauline.
The Apostle almost always quotes from memory, often combining
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36
fragments of texts, while the author of this Epistle copies his manuscript of the Greek Bible word for word and never allows himself to
make composite citations. Although he usually follows the Septuagint
version, Paul does not fail to have recourse to the original when it
is too divergent; the author of this Epistle, on the contrary, nowhere
shows any knowledge of the Hebrew, even in cases of remarkable
divergence between the two texts. Paul only attributes directly to
God the words put by Scripture into the mouth of God; the other
calls words of God even scriptural passages in which God is spoken
of in the third person. Finally, the formulas of quotation are entirely
different, as a simple comparison is sufficient to show: the Epistle to
the Hebrews does not once employ the expression “as it is written”
(gegraptai), which is the usual form of the Apostle.

Eastern and Western Tradition
And yet it is the best judges of style, the Fathers of Alexandria,
who unanimously, as far back as one can go, see in it the work of Paul.
Clement, following his master Pantaenus, Origen, St. Dionysius, St.
Peter, St. Alexander, St. Athanasius, Didymus, St. Cyril, Euthalius–Arius
himself apparently–all, without one exception, agree in this. Not that
they shut their eyes to the differences in style. In order to explain it,
Clement supposed that the letter, written originally in Hebrew, had
been translated into Greek by St. Luke–an untenable hypothesis not
defended now by anyone. If there is one thing positive, it is that the
Epistle was composed in Greek. Never has a translation had such
suppleness and freedom of movement. The author of it makes use
of the Septuagint exclusively, even when its writers depart from the
original text. He pours forth a perfect stream of plays upon words,
assonances, and alliterations to a degree impossible in a translator.
The art with which he rounds his periods would be an unheard-of
literary feat if he had to deal with the little juxtaposed and coordinated clauses of some Hebrew original.
Finally, to say nothing of the rest, the reasoning based upon the
double meaning of the word diatheke–covenant and testament–would
be absolutely impossible in Hebrew. According to Origen, the ideas
are Paul’s and the diction that of one of his disciples known to God
alone. “The historical documents that have come down to us,” adds
Origen, “name either Clement, Bishop of Rome, or Luke, the author
of the Gospel and the Acts,” as the writer of this Epistle.Thus, though
fully conscious that there are difficulties, Origen holds to what he
calls the ancient tradition and practically, forgetting his doubts as
critic and linguist, he quotes the Epistle without hesitation under
Paul’s name. Eusebius does the same, although he places it once
among the number of disputed writings, out of deference to the
opinion of others. All the Greek Church, with the Council of Antioch
(264) and that of Laodicea (390), with St. Gregory Thaumaturgus, St.
Cyril of Jerusalem, St. Isidore of Pelusium, St. Epiphanius, St. Basil and
the two Gregories, St. John Chrysostom and Theodore of Mopsuestia, Severianus of Gabala, the Syrian Church with the Peshitto, with
St. Ephraem and St. James of Nisibis, give the same testimony as the
Alexandrians. In a word, the East is unanimous.
Very different was the situation in the West. Known at Rome,
from the time of the first century, by St. Clement, who makes use of
it as his own property, the Epistle to the Hebrews was not generally
regarded either as authentic or canonical. The Muratorian fragment
and the priest Caius recognize only 13 Epistles of St. Paul. Neither
St. Irenaeus nor St. Hippolytus, according to Gobar, admit its authenticity; it is a fact that the former does not once quote from it in his
great work against heresies, and it is doubtful whether he ever makes
THE ANGELUS • December 2009    www.angeluspress.org

an allusion to it. St. Cyprian refrains also from
citing it; and when he affirms, with several other
Latin writers, that Paul wrote to seven churches,
he seems, indeed, equivalently to deny that it
is the work of the Apostle. Tertullian, on what
ground is unknown, attributes it to Barnabas,
and the way in which he quotes it shows quite
well that he does not believe it to be canonical.
Among the heretics, Marcion rejected it; but, on
the contrary, the banker Theodotus, the leader
of the obscure sect of the followers of Melchisedech, accepted it. We do not know what the
attitude of Novatus and Novatian was in regard
to it, but we have no reason to claim, as has
sometimes been done, that they took advantage
of it to deny the Church’s right to remit sins. In
the fourth century doubts on this point still persisted, and were not yet dissipated in the fifth.
Nevertheless, St. Jerome exaggerates when he
maintains that the Latins were not accustomed
to receive the Epistle as canonical; there were
disputes and disagreements, and there was no
unanimity either in one direction or the other.
If Ambrosiaster and Pelagius do not comment
on it, if Phebadius, Optatus of Milevis, Zeno,
Vincent of Lerins and Orosius make no use of
it, if the codex Claromontanus and the codex
Mommseianus exclude it from their canon,
Victorinus, Hilary of Poitiers, Ambrose of Milan,
Lucifer of Cagliari, Pacian, Faustinus and Rufinus
are favorable to it; Pelagius and Ambrosiaster
quote it sometimes unreservedly; and Philaster,
contradicting himself, treats somewhere as heretics those who attribute it to anyone but Paul.
It must be said that Philaster, according to the
fine observation of St. Augustine, attaches to
the word “heretic” a meaning peculiar to him.
But when the Council of Hippo in 393 and that
of Carthage in 397 had inscribed in the list of
canonical books 13 Epistles of Paul and the Epistle to the Hebrews of the same Apostle, when
Innocent I in his letter to Exuperius of Toulouse
in 405 and the Council of Carthage in 419 had
simply catalogued 14 Epistles of St. Paul, the old
doubts about its canonicity disappeared, and,
although no new argument was brought forth
in favor of its authenticity, little by little people
accepted the general opinion or at least the
usual way of speaking about it. Only the scholars,
such as Isidore of Seville, retained the memory
of the past discussions, the trace of which still
exists in the place assigned to the Epistle, either
in the tenth rank, or at the end of the Pauline
Epistles, or even outside of the series.
It was precisely when the question appeared
to have been decided irrevocably by three
councils of which he had been the soul, that
Augustine began to doubt its authenticity. His
scruples increased steadily and, while formerly

37

St. Paul with Aquila and Priscilla

he had been accustomed to quote the Epistle
as Paul’s, he abstained from doing so in his last
years, or did so only with express reservations.
The idea did not occur to him that the decision
of a council would settle the question, any more
than it occurred to St. Jerome, who, after having
been present at the Roman Council where the
Epistle to the Hebrews had been for the first
time attributed to Paul, did not fear to write:
“Nihil interesse cujus sit, cum ecclesiastici viri sit
et quotidie Ecclesiarum lectione celebretur (When
you are a man of the Church daily celebrating
the lessons of the Church, it is of no interest ).”
The public reading of the Epistle was an argument in favor of the canonicity, but did not at
all prejudice the authenticity of an anonymous
writing. To bind canonicity to authenticity and to
maintain, as Cajetan did, that, if the Epistle were
not from Paul, it would not be canonical, is one
of the greatest of theological errors. It is, indeed,
only by an abuse of language that authenticity is
here spoken of, for authentic is the opposite of
apocryphal, and nothing in the Epistle leads us to
suspect that the author wished to pass himself
off as Paul.
Since Origen’s time the question has not
advanced. Although originated by Clement of
Alexandria, accepted by Eusebius and St. Jerome,
and adopted subsequently by several theologians
of the Middle Ages, the hypothesis of a translator who clothed the Hebrew original of Paul in

Greek, even taking the word translator in the broadest sense, is
wholly abandoned today and does not now merit a refutation.
On the other hand, the authors suggested instead of Paul are not
very satisfactory. Harnack proposes Aquila and Priscilla, especially
the latter, because of some doubtfully feminine touch discoverable
in the Epistle. Godet, without much more foundation, thought of
Silas. Some ancient writers name Luke and Clement of Rome, either
as translators or editors. It is certain that Clement knew and made
use of our Epistle, but his style is so different that it can be affirmed
with certainty that it does not belong to him. He coordinates his
sentences instead of subordinating them, he abounds in doxologies,
he quotes Scripture in a way peculiar to himself, and, finally, all his
ideas and manner of expressing them show another cast of mind.
Against St. Luke we should be less positive, principally because of the
authorities who favor him. He has this in common with the author
of the Epistle, that he writes Greek with purity and moves in the
sphere of Pauline ideas. His relations with Timothy and his sojourn
in Rome furnish two other favorable data. As Clement of Alexandria
remarked, there exists between the Epistle and the Acts a certain
affinity in the use of words and in diction. But in addition to the fact
that the points of contact have nothing decisive or even striking in
them, how can we persuade ourselves that St. Luke, a converted
pagan, could know the Mosaic ritual so thoroughly and take so much
interest in observances of no value in his eyes? And St. Luke nowhere
betrays the peculiar rhetoric and Alexandrine culture with which the
writer of the Epistle seems imbued. It is this last characteristic which
has caused some to think of Apollos as the author, who was put
forward by Luther and supported by numerous critics. Apollos was
one of the confidants of Paul and was acquainted with Timothy; he
was from Alexandria and might have frequented the school of Philo;
he was very eloquent and “very well versed in the Scriptures.” But
that proves at most that Apollos might have composed the Epistle to
the Hebrews, if there were no decisive objection. Now it is not easy
to see either when or how Apollos could have acquired the right to
speak as a master to the Jewish-Christian Church, and it must not
be forgotten that the theory which attributes our Epistle to him is
wholly devoid of historical foundation or traditional support.
As far as hypotheses go, Barnabas is to be preferred. He has in
his favor the positive testimony of Tertullian and of a considerable
part of the West. He was a Jew by race, a Hellenist by education;
as a Levite, he was familiar with the Mosaic ritual, and as a citizen
of Cyprus Alexandrian literature must have been familiar to him;
moreover, he possessed great authority in Jerusalem and in the
Churches of Palestine. It is true, if the Epistle published under his
name more than a century ago was his work, we could not think of
him for a moment, but the scholars of our day are more and more
agreed that the so-called Epistle of Barnabas is not by Barnabas at
all. Hence there is no longer any valid objection to him, and he could
be considered as the editor of the Epistle under the direction or the
inspiration of Paul himself.

Pretended Relations with Philo
Certain modern critics, giving up all hope of finding the name of
the great unknown, are satisfied with pointing out as the author an
Alexandrine, or a disciple of Paul tinged with Philonism. This formula
is deceptive. If we limit ourselves to a general and superficial comparison, we easily find quite numerous points of contact between
our author and Philo; but if we press the parallel with texts in supwww.angeluspress.org    THE ANGELUS • December 2009

38
port, most of the similarities vanish or take
a contrary meaning.
Philo, indeed, calls
his Logos high priest,
messenger, mediator,
and intercessor; but
what honorable titles
does he not give to
the Logos? Moreover,
the Logos of Philo is
high priest of the universe, the immense
temple of divinity, just
as reason is the high
priest of that other
temple of God, man;
what connection is
there here with the
high priest of the St. Paul
New Covenant? We
are assured that the Logos of Philo, like the Son in the Epistle to the
Hebrews, is called the apavgasma (“radiance”) and the charakter
(“characteristic”) of the divine substance; but the Epistle certainly
borrows the former appellation from the Book of Wisdom; and in
Philo it is the human soul, not the Logos, that is the “charakter”
of God. Some have wished to see a striking analogy in the way in
which the two authors treat the history of Melchisedech; but Philo
emphasizes chiefly the offering of bread and wine, of which the
Epistle says not a word, and the resemblance is reduced finally to a
very ordinary etymology, for no one is ignorant of the fact that in
Hebrew melek signifies king and that zedeq means justice (Leg. alleg.,
iii, vol.i, pp.102-3).
As for the rest, the use of allegory by the two writers has
nothing in common: the allegories of Philo are only moral symbols
tending toward an accommodative sense; those of the Epistle to the
Hebrews, if we insist on calling them by that name, are prophetic
types. The same difficulty, still more pronounced, exists at another
point where similarities are sought for in vain. The two writers often
oppose heaven to earth, the visible to the invisible, the temporal
to the eternal, the image to reality; but while the Alexandrian philosopher Philo turns toward the past and...contemplates the world
of ideas (the intelligible world [kosmos noetos], which has served
him as an archetype) the gaze of the saintly writer (of Hebrews)
is constantly turned toward the future, and the events of Jewish
history are the book in which he reads the destiny of the heavenly
Jerusalem, unchangeable and eternal. We will not dwell upon similarities of less value, many of which are purely imaginary. Have not
some critics claimed that “the word of God more piercing than any
two-edged sword” (Heb. 4:12) ought to be derived from the logos
tomefs (“the separating word”) of Philo? As if the dividing Logos of
Philo were anything but a demiurge, occupied in separating the elements of chaotic matter, a concept entirely foreign to the Epistle. The
word more piercing than a sword (logos tomoteros) is the prophetic
(penetrating) word infallibly attaining its aim. As to the use of the
verb metreopatheen (to moderate one’s feelings or passions), which
belonged to the philosophical language of that age, one must be
truly short of arguments to maintain that the author of the Epistle

THE ANGELUS • December 2009    www.angeluspress.org

must have borrowed it from Philo (See Cremer,
Worterbuch [1902], pp.799-800).

Various Conjectures
If the dependence of the Epistle upon Philo
is more and more problematical in proportion
as it is closely studied, its dependence upon
Paul–a dependence of ideas, not of words–
becomes from day to day more evident. It is
admitted at present by the majority of critics.
The impression received from a repeated reading of it is well expressed by one of the best
biblical linguistic scholars: “The resemblance
of its thoughts with those of Paul becomes
at once apparent with constantly increasing
evidence, and at the same time we are more
and more surprised that anyone should have
been found to attribute its style and diction to
Paul” (Moulton, Commentary for English Readers [1884], vol iii, p.279). We are, therefore,
brought back to the opinion of Origen, shared
again in our day by the majority of critics and
exegetes, both Catholic and heterodox. Origen
distinguished between the author and the
editor, making the share taken by the latter a
very large one. Paul would then have furnished
the ideas and the inspiration, and a disciple of
Paul, known only to God, would have collected
them into a whole from memory, adding the
necessary explanations to them. It is to him
that the diction, the arrangement of the parts,
in a word the composition, is due. He was the
writer of which Paul remains the author. It was
said formerly in the same sense that the second
Gospel was the Gospel of Peter, and the third
Gospel that of Paul, because St. Mark and St.
Luke were thought to have reproduced respectively the preaching of the two great Apostles.
The hypothesis of Origen is sufficiently elastic
to yield to all the requirements of criticism. It
takes account of the similarities and differences,
and satisfies the data of tradition. We think it
is necessary to adhere to this, and today the
majority of Catholics, with infinite shades of
opinion that it is neither possible nor useful to
discuss, think the same. Directly or indirectly,
the basis of the Epistle is Paul’s; the form is that
of an unknown person, whose name is known
to God alone.
Fernand Prat, S.J., The Theology of Saint Paul, translated from
the 11th French ed. by John L. Stoddard (Westminster, MD:
The Newman Bookshop, 1926), I, 355-63.

TELEVISION
39

THE SOUL AT RISK
I s a b e l l e

D o r é

PART 1

This is the first installment of a series on television.
It was originally published as a book by Clovis in France.
The preface and introduction below are from the original
version. It will continue every month in The Angelus.

A

few years ago, the superior
of a religious congregation
met with many priests of
the institute, all involved in the
education of boys. Having observed
a steady decline in the intellectual
and moral caliber of the youth, he
asked each of the priests at the
meeting to make investigations so
that they could respond confidently
to the following questions: What
is the main thing the boys are
suffering from? And what is the
cause? After a diligently conducted
and seriously considered inquiry,
the priests were able to give an
answer. They were as surprised as
their superior to discover perfect
agreement in their conclusions.
They answered unanimously:
the boys suffer from weakness
of intellect and will; the principal
cause of this shortcoming is the
hold of audio-visual media on the
life of the boys.
With the Internet and video
games, television is at the center of
a system that strengthens its hold,
year after year. It is a salutary work
to expose an evil, and this is what

Isabelle Doré set out to do. Among
other qualities, her book has three
particular assets worth mentioning.
It examines the menace posed by
television from the most instructive
psychological angle of the dangers
inflicted on our spiritual faculties by
the screen. It abounds in examples,
almost never borrowed from other
writers. Lastly, it allies brevity and
simplicity
Mrs. Doré is the mother
of a big family. Some readers,
perhaps perplexed by the author’s
categorical judgments, may wonder:
Is there a television in the author’s
home? If so, how can she advise
others not to do likewise? If not,
how can she conjure up a reality
so far removed from her daily
experience? Have her children
perhaps become marginalized and
strangers to their world?
Let me answer, reassure, and
encourage you. In answer to these
anticipated questions, we can
assure the reader that Isabelle
Doré does not have a TV in her
home. However, by a series of
circumstances we shall pass over,

she is in a position to know how
things stand with the reality of
television. By the way, the author’s
children are, as far as I can tell,
sound of body and mind, and,
should I add, friendly, joyful, and
cultivated. As with all children, of
course, they have their faults to
overcome. So much for the answer
and reassurance.
As for the encouragement, and
to be brief, we invite the reader to
read this little work with as little
bias as possible. May you examine
it, reflect on it, and appreciate it
with the freedom that an earnest
inquiry into knowing what is to be
done or not done gives.Afterwards,
may you draw the applicable
conclusions for yourself and for
others. May you be unafraid: taking
the high road is also good for you.
If it comes at a sacrifice, it is only to
give up a shadow for the real thing.
Thank you, Madame. May the
good God bless you and give your
readers light and strength.

–Abbé Philippe Toulza

www.angeluspress.org....The.ANgelus.•.December.2009

40

The Presence of Television
French television viewers spend 3 hours and 26
minutes every day in front of the TV. The company
which conducted the study does not explain how
this result was obtained. Is it an average derived
from habitual viewers, occasional viewers, and nonviewers? If so, the real time spent by habitual viewers
is much higher. Further, studies of surveys show that
TV viewers underestimate the amount of time spent
in front of the screen. When researchers take the
time to add up the hours actually spent in front of the
TV, based on the length of the programs or movies
watched, the number of hours is even higher than the
viewer’s estimate.
Two explanations are possible: either the TV
viewers do not correctly assess the time spent or they
are a little ashamed to admit the amount of time they
really spend and prefer to conceal it.
According to Mediametrie,1 the amount of
time spent watching TV increases annually,
even though video games would seem to have
unthroned television among adolescents and young
adults. According to a Quebec statistic, television
is the primary family activity. The expression is
paradoxical, for it does not involve an activity and
the effect on family life is essentially noxious.
It is unfortunately true that television regulates
the lives of most Western families: they wake up,
eat, dine on a TV tray sold as a promotion at a big
box store, put the children to bed, or make plans
depending on scheduled TV shows.
Television also imposes its rhythm on
organizations, towns, and churches: people will not
attend if a program being televised is more attractive.
When the Mass schedule is changed, people protest
because they are going to miss Sunday football or
some other program. Another statistic tells us that
the television guide is the only publication read by
most families.
In conversation on any topic, it has become
commonplace to make some kind of reference to
the audio-visual or what one saw on television. If
you give your children singing lessons, it is because
they’ve seen a certain movie; if your child plays
sports, it is because they watch them on TV.
It happens not infrequently in parishes that
sermons at the New Mass begin with a review of the
news. As for the universal prayer, it consists of taking
the most spectacular current events and adding a
few invocations to it. There used to be a universal
prayer in the Eastern Catholic Churches (and the
Gallican and Ambrosian rites) but the text was fixed
in the missal and the universal prayer was said at the
altar, as the priest and faithful turned towards the
Lord. As Msgr. Klaus Gamber noted, “In our days
we are witnessing the most egregious digressions in
the free elaboration of this prayer. Even the formulas
THE ANGELUS • December 2009    www.angeluspress.org

presented to the faithful in ad hoc collections are
scarcely usable.”2
How do habitual television viewers assess
television? Sometimes positively, for in conversations
you will sometimes hear rather favorable remarks:
it’s a tremendous cultural tool, it’s an opening to the
“real world,” you can learn much, you have to face
the widespread misery in the world, it helps pass
the time, it is relaxing after a long day at work, or it
helps me daydream.
Fr. Marcel Jousse, the bard of oral civilization,
imitation, and memorization, said: “A thing-based,
mimodramatic civilization of tomorrow will be
awakened by the universal and educative use of
television.”3 It is past time to admit the obvious:
TV has not helped to awaken a “thing-based” and
mimodramatic civilization. It has destroyed it.
On the other hand, TV watchers express some
critical opinions about television: I get dumbed-down
in front of the television after work, you become
passive, the children only think of TV–nothing
else interests them, there is no more family life, the
children do their work haphazardly, there is nothing
beautiful, or you see too much violence.
Sooner or later, we all have to make choices:
Television in the home or not? Moderate use or not?
Grudging toleration or opposition with all one’s
might? The best thing to do in making a choice is to
consider all the aspects of television and audio-visual
media in general. Movies, videos, and DVD’s have
points in common as well as differences with TV.
The differences basically reside in the quantity and,
sometimes, the content.
Many television viewers justify their use for
educational reasons: “It’s to know what’s going on
in the world, to be informed, to be aware of what’s
happening, so the children can participate in debates
at school.”
In reality, in daily practice, television quickly
becomes something other than a way to be informed.
From this consideration proceed the two main
questions examined in this study: 1) How does
television affect the intellect’s capacity to apprehend
what is true? 2) How does television affect the will’s
capacity to love what is good?
Translated from La Télévision, ou le péril de l’esprit (copyright Clovis, 2009).
An independent French organization specializing in the measurement of
mass-media audiences. This organization serves producers who desire to
assess the performance of their programs.
2
La réforme liturgique en question (Ed. Sainte-Madeleine, 1992).
3
Marcel Jousse (1886-1961) was the only son of an illiterate mother who
knew the Sunday gospels by heart and taught them to him by chanting them.
He always admired the illiterate peasant society of his childhood in which
men received and transmitted their knowledge by observation, imitation,
and memorization.
		 He attempted to prove the authenticity of the Gospels by explaining that,
in oral societies, men were used to memorizing literally what they heard.
This presupposed certain conditions: a certain formalism on the speaker’s
part and an activity on the listener’s part–the manducation of the word.
1

R o b e r t

41

W y e r

On Being
Held Back
Initium sapientiae timor Domini (Ps 110).

Like so many good things in my life, this one
comes from my wife. Every year, on the Feast of
Pentecost, she gathers the whole family (and friends–
anybody in the vicinity) and makes each of us draw
a gift of the Holy Ghost. Enough folded pieces of
paper are collected (a gift written on each one, so
sometimes there might be fourteen slips, two sets of the
seven gifts) to accommodate all who are present. We
say a little prayer, Come Holy Ghost, and each person
draws a slip of paper. The gift named is the one you
are supposed to learn about and pray for during the
coming year. Part of this is recognizing the particular
gift God knows best you need to concentrate on in the
months ahead. Since my wife and I have been married
20 years, we’ve been through this many times. To be
honest, I sometimes forget which gift I drew. That

hasn’t happened lately though because for the last five
or six years, I’ve drawn the same gift: Fear of the Lord.
Reflection suggests God is trying to tell me
something. First of all, it’s obvious that the Third
Person of the Holy Trinity is neglected. We think
of Him on Pentecost, and hear mention of Him in
sermons on the Feast of the Holy Trinity; we name
Him in every Gloria Patri at the end of every decade
of the Rosary; and we recognize His existence and His
role in the Incarnation when we say the Creed and
occasionally wonder about the things said of Him–“He
has spoken through the prophets.” Still, it’s probably
fair to say that we don’t really know much about His
role in our daily Christian life and that we don’t pray
to Him, invoke Him as we ought. God is God; each
Person is equally God: Father, Son, and Holy Ghost.
The Holy Ghost is God! Go back and read the passages
www.angeluspress.org    THE ANGELUS • December 2009

42
in the Gospels, particularly in the chapters where
St. John recounts the words of Our Lord at the Last
Supper. Over and over again, He refers to the coming
of the Paraclete:
And I will ask the Father, and He shall give you another
Paraclete, that He may abide with you for ever. The spirit of
truth, whom the world cannot receive, because it seeth him
not, nor knoweth him: but you shall know him; because he
shall abide with you, and shall be in you.
But the Paraclete, the Holy Ghost, whom the Father will
send in my name, he will teach you all things, and bring all
things to mind, whatsoever I shall have said to you.
But when he, the Spirit of truth, is come, he will teach
you all truth.

One of the best ways to read Holy Scripture is
to read one verse in light of another. The Fathers
constantly do so; they show us how to understand the
sacred text. St. Augustine says “the New Testament
is hidden in the Old, and the Old is revealed in the
New.” As it happens, the Church appoints the reading
of the Old Testament wisdom books during the month
of August for the office of Matins. Read the above
lines from St. John’s Gospel, juxtaposed to these verses
from the first chapter of the Book of Wisdom:
For wisdom will not enter into a malicious soul, nor dwell
in a body subject to sins. For the Holy Spirit of discipline
will flee from the deceitful, and will withdraw himself from
thoughts that are without understanding, and he shall not
abide when iniquity cometh in.
For the Spirit of the Lord hath filled the whole world:
and that, which containeth all things, hath knowledge of
the voice.

“Knowledge of the voice” appears in the context
of what a man may think and say that might be against
God: perverse thoughts, murmuring, detraction, and
lying. In a broader sense, on the positive, the verses
refer to the “Spirit of truth” Our Lord promised to
send. Being “true” is much more than not telling a lie,
even more than being honest. It suggests an entire
disposition of soul, being “just” or “righteous”–as we
speak of a line being true. Put more simply, being true
is being holy. Every part of our lives, what we think,
what we say, what we do, perfectly ordered to God.
Though all of the Divine Persons are involved in
works outside of the Trinity (think of what happens
when St. John the Baptist baptizes Our Lord) the work
of our sanctification is attributed to the Holy Ghost. In
other words, He makes us true–holy. The sacrament
of confirmation completes the work of baptism. The
Gifts–fear of the Lord, piety, knowledge, fortitude,
counsel, understanding, and wisdom–are permanent
dispositions, the Holy Ghost acting in us. Fr. Gardeil, a
son of St. Dominic, puts in this way:
There are two ways in which the Holy Spirit leads us.
He, the breadth of love of Father and Son, acts upon us
with inspirations which take a double course. Sometimes,
he simply leaves us to act by ourselves–to make acts of
faith, hope or charity, acts of prudence, justice, fortitude
or temperance; we ourselves set these acts in motion; it is
The.ANgelus.•.December.2009....www.angeluspress.org

under the impulse of divine love, yet we ourselves hold the
mastery, rule the conduct of our lives....The Holy Spirit is not
absent, he is the first cause himself applying our supernatural
energies to the acts we make, but we retain the direction.
This is the basis of the Christian life: the supernatural, but
personal government of ourselves by the Christian virtues.
[Secondly], the Holy Spirit, by inspirations corresponding
to his gifts, presses us on to action, and in his hands we
become no more than instruments. We lose the first place in
the direction of our conduct; filled with divine assistance we
have only to give our consent to his work; the task becomes
easier, difficulties are eliminated.

This is why both St. Augustine and St. Thomas
relate each one of the gifts to one of the Beatitudes.
The Beatitudes, the Gospel for All Saints’ Day, offer
a portrait of the perfect Christian life. When the Holy
Ghost, operating in the modes of the gifts, each with its

Novena to the Holy Ghost

Many novena books are heavy on piety and short
on doctrine, yet, as St. Thomas tells us, “you cannot
love what you do not know.” Each day includes a
short definition of a gift of the Holy Ghost, then a
meditation followed by a prayer appropriate to that
gift, then a Pater, Ave and Gloria followed by the Act
of Consecration to the Holy Ghost and the Prayer
for the Seven Gifts. This should ESPECIALLY be
in the hands of every confirmand, sponsor, parent,
teacher, priest, and religious.
24pp. Softcover. STK# 8152 $3.95

particular object, takes the rudder, He produces in us
those marvelous realities: poverty of spirit, meekness,
mourning, cleanness of heart, a hunger and thirst for
justice, mercifulness, peacemaking, and the ability to
suffer joyfully for the kingdom of heaven. Through this
divine government, the Holy Ghost forms anew, in the
mystical womb of Our Blessed Mother, other Christs.
And that is the whole point. As we are taught, God
became man so that men might become divine–not by
nature, but by adoption.
Like a student who has been held back in school,
I’m still praying for that first gift. Wisdom comes last,
but as the Psalmist tells us, the Fear of the Lord is
the beginning. Of course, effort is required, not just
consent. St. Thomas treats of Fear of the Lord under
the heading of hope. We frequently think and speak of
faith and of charity, but hope tends to get short shrift.
Yet we know God is faithful to His promises. As Fr.
Gardeil says:
Such is the difference between the two ways of working
out our salvation. We may compare them to the respective
progress made by a rowing boat and a sailing boat. Progress by
oar depends on the physical strength we expend and our skill
at control of the boat, and we retain mastery over our craft;
but with sails and a favorable wind less labour is required,
greater speed is attained, and we become less tired.
Robert Wyer teaches high-school English in Wisconsin and attends St. Pius V
Chapel in Mukwonago.

F R .

p e t e r

R .

s c o t t

QuEStionS And AnSWErS
Is it permissible to baptize a person
who is senile or who has dementia?

43

Q

The answer to this question is clearly given in
the rubrics of the Roman Ritual. In the section on
Baptism of Adults, Rubric §9, the Ritual treats of
adults who do not have the use of reason, and makes
a distinction. Those who have never had the use of
reason, whose condition stems from birth or before
the attaining of reason, may be baptized in the same
manner as infants, and it is both valid and licit.
However, the question here concerns those
who once had the use of reason and who afterwards
lost it due to illness or old age. In this case, the
resolution is governed by §1, which states:

Where do altar stones come from, and
how do we know which saints’ relics
they contain?

An altar stone is technically called a portable or
movable altar, as distinct from a fixed or immovable
altar, for it can be removed from the wooden
or plaster structure in which it has been fixed.
However, an altar stone must be consecrated, as are
fixed altars, according to the ceremony contained
in the Roman Pontifical. Any bishop can consecrate
an altar stone, and the bishops of the Society of St.
Pius X do this regularly to add to the altar stones
consecrated before Vatican II that we use when we
can.
It is usually not possible to know which saints’
relics are contained in an altar stone. The rubrics
require that the relics from the bodies of at least two
martyr-saints be contained in a consecrated altar,
whether it be movable or fixed. There must be a
certificate of authenticity for each relic, but each
certificate must be enclosed with the relics and three
grains of incense in the sepulcher that is cut out
from the upper surface of the altar stone. A natural
stone cover is placed over the sepulcher to close it
off, and is cemented in place. Thereafter there is no
way of knowing what is inside without breaking the
cement seal and lifting off the cover, which causes
the altar stone to lose its consecration.
Altar stones that have recently been consecrated
usually have a certificate of consecration from the
consecrating bishop, attesting to the names of the
martyr-saints whose relics are contained in the stone
(if known). However, with time such authenticates
are frequently lost, and they are not necessary for an
altar stone to be presumed as consecrated and used
as such, as we read in Matters Liturgical, 10th ed., p.
119:

A

An adult shall not be baptized except with his own
knowledge and consent, and only after being duly
instructed. Moreover, he must be disposed to true
compunction for his sins.

However, a person who suffers from dementia,
and who consequently no longer has the use of
reason, cannot ask for the sacrament of baptism. His
intention must be, therefore, as it was before he lost
the use of reason. If he had the explicit intention
of being baptized and sufficient knowledge of the
Faith, then he can be baptized absolutely and with
certitude. However, for the baptism to be fruitful,
he must have had, before the loss of the use of the
reason, at least imperfect contrition for his sins in
general, without which the baptism will be valid
but cannot produce its effect of sanctification, and it
would be illicit to administer it.
Frequently, it happens in such a case that
there is a doubt about the person’s intention to be
baptized, or whether he believed all the truths that
the Church teaches. In such a case the Ritual has
this to add:
If it is impossible for him to ask for baptism, but has
either before or in his present state manifested in some
probable way the intention to receive it, he should be
baptized conditionally. If afterwards he recovers, and a
doubt remains as to the validity of the baptism, he should
be rebaptized conditionally. (Ibid.)

Consequently, a priest will have to do some
investigation to elucidate some positive sign of
intention (e.g., asking for instruction or regularly
attending Mass when lucid) before proceeding with
the baptism of a person with dementia.

The consecration of a sacred stone is suffi ciently
attested to by the marks of the burnt incense on the
crosses and by the cement securing the cover of the
sepulcher. It is, however, customary to attach a document
signed by the consecrator to the cloth in which the stone
is wrapped.
Fr. Peter Scott was ordained by Archbishop Lefebvre in 1988. After assignments as seminary professor, US District Superior, and Rector of Holy Cross
Seminary in Goulburn, Australia, he is presently Headmaster of Our Lady of
Mount Carmel Academy in Wilmot, Ontario, Canada. Those wishing answers
may please send their questions to Q &A in care of Angelus Press, 2915 Forest
Ave., Kansas City, MO 64109.

www.angeluspress.org....The.ANgelus.•.December.2009

The Mother and Child

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