Need a Good Read for Lent? Credo Will Build Your Faith!

I decided to read Credo: Compendium of the Catholic Faith by Bishop Athanasius Schneider for Lent. If you want to love God, you first have to know Him. And what better way to know Him than to study the faith using a solid Catholic catechism. 

Unfortunately, the Catechism of the Catholic Church, like so many things coming in these modernist-infected times, has been corrupted.  Studying a catechism like the Catechism of the Council of Trent or the Baltimore Catechism or, in fact, Credo is more likely to build up the faith without introducing novelties that twist the truth.

Traditionally most Catholic catechisms begin with the creed. I'm on Chapter 16 "I believe in the Holy Catholic Church, the Communion of Saints." With all the chaos in the Church at present, this chapter offers clear teaching on the nature of the Church, the papacy, and our obligations as Catholics. I'll quote several questions: 

Bishop Schneider Warned Pope Leo about Five "Wounds" in the Church that Need Healing.

Pope Francis often described the Church as a "field hospital" for sick people. Thinking along those lines, I see Bishop Athanasius Schneider as a doctor who correctly diagnoses the plague invading the Church when so many "doctors" claim the patient is healthy. He brought up five wounds in his December 18th meeting with Pope Leo and described what he sees as the prescription for healing. One of those wounds dealt with the Traditional Latin Mass and the situation with the SSPX.

Archbishop Vigano: “''pastoralism' of synodal officials is a hypocritical rhetorical pretense."

Archbishop Vigano responded to the SSPX letter to Cardinal Fernandez outing him for hypocrisy. Really! 

Hypocrisy at the Vatican? Can you believe it? Or has that become the default position of many of our spiritual fathers? I personally wonder how many of the magisterium actually believe what the Church has taught for millennia. If they do, how can they abandon it so completely that they are ready to canonize a man I can only describe as a sexual predator, Bishop Alejandro Lbaka. What else can one call a priest who cavorted nude with young men and let them touch his genitals and bring about arousal? Is he going to be the patron of all the clergy sex predators who brought such scandal on the Church? Will his canonization be used to justify nudity and sexual play as natural?

Good for Michael Matt, Chris Jackson, and Others: The "Best revenge" of the SSPX!

Today my focus is on the recent meeting between Fr. Davide Pagliarani and Cardinal Victor Fernandez, head of the Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith (CDF), about the upcoming SSPX consecration of new bishops scheduled for July 1st. Many of us recognize the ploy for what it is, a last ditch effort to gain control over the Society. They (the modernists at the Vatican) want to control the Society because the SSPX is the main roadblock to what they want, complete annihilation of Sacred Tradition: not only the Traditional Latin Mass, but all the sacraments, the rites (e.g., exorcism), etc. All that reeks of that old fashioned Church. must be purged to make way for the new, ever-evolving Church. Watch the movie, The Catholics, with Martin Sheen to see the end game. The book and film were truly prophetic.

If You Really Want a Holy Lent, Walk it with Mary!

On the first and third Sunday's of the month we have catechism after Mass. It's short, only about twenty minutes, but what a grace! There is always a message that touches the heart and brings clarity to the "fog of the moment"* in which we live. 

Several Sundays ago Fr. Albert, a retired Dominican in residence at St. Thomas Aquinas Seminary, delivered the teaching and focused on discouragement and Mary's role in protecting us based on the teachings of St. Maximilian Kolbe, Knight of the Immaculata.

Lent is about identifying our disorders and choosing penances that attack them.

This guide will help us make really valuable choices during Lent that bring us closer to Christ by the time we reach Easter. I've listened to several times and it's already helped me identify a disordered thing in my life that needs attention. Father discusses penance, mortification, and making concrete resolutions "to clean things up in the future." Those are the luggage we need to take on our Lenten journey.

"What we're after during Lent is to remove obstacles to God's grace -- to remove those obstacles from our souls and our lives."

Want the journey to Easter to be fruitful? This is a good starting point? May God pour out His grace on us that we may reach our goal and be able to say, "That was a really fruitful Lent. Thank you, Lord. Help me continue to grow closer to You during the Easter season of celebration." 

And People are Saying the SSPX is in Schism? Get Real!

Thanks to Fr. Z for posting this.

Anything and everything is allowed except for the TLM pic.twitter.com/2B7OulGgj5

— T C (@TC_HELLCAT) February 16, 2026

Be Careful Who You Trust! Not Everyone in a Roman Collar Is Reliable!

I recently read several articles on substack defending the Novus Ordo by Msgr. Arthur Holquin, a retired priest of the Diocese of Orange in California. I don't subscribe to his account and won't. Once I realize someone isn't trustworthy, I shake the dust off my feet and move on. I left one comment and that's it. Someone else can argue with him. He writes a dissertation responding to anyone who disagrees with him and mentions over and over how educated he is. 

Need a friend for the year? There's a whole heaven full from which to choose!

I recently read that a Catholic tradition for Valentine's Day is to choose a saint for the year to be your special friend. What a great idea! I've been pondering the question. So many saints deserve a better acquaintance. Who would bring me to a closer walk with Jesus this year if I beg their intercession every day? Padre Pio? St. Gemma? St. Alphonsus Liguori? St. Philomena? St. Joseph? St. Francis de Sales? St. Jacinta? What a wealth of friendship there is in the Communion of Saints.

Those who embrace Sacred Tradition are uniting behind the truth: The SSPX is NOT in Schism!

STATE of EMERGENCY: Is the Society of St. Pius X In Schism?

Michael Matt's video is a must see. He presents the situation very well. 

"The faith must survive in someone!...The thing that unites us is the Catholic faith itself.....God has given us, even in the midst of this darkness, He has given us oases of light....God has not left us orphans. He has not abandoned us, Yes the shepherd has been struck with the sheep. Maybe we don't need to scatter as much as we thought. Because God has provided us faithful shepherds....So what do we do? We support them.

Where is Your "Third Space?"

I'm sure many of my regular readers know I like the Epoch Times. I almost never read an issue without clipping an article to send to someone. Today it was this:

 Reclaiming the Third Space

The Games Have Begun! How Long Can the Vatican Stall the Consecrations with their Fake Dialogue?

BREAKING: Cdl. Fernandez urges SSPX to drop plan to consecrate bishops

OR ELSE!

Cognitive Dissonance Is Engulfing our Beloved Church

We are becoming the Church of cognitive dissonance. Let's begin by defining that psychological term:

Cognitive dissonance is the mental discomfort that occurs when a person holds two or more contradictory beliefs, values, or attitudes, or when their behavior conflicts with their beliefs. This discomfort motivates people to change their beliefs, justify their actions, or avoid new information to reduce the inconsistency.

Think about that. What happens when the actions of our pope and bishops show diametrically opposed philosophies. How do you reconcile two mutually exclusive propositions? You can't! Jesus called Himself "The way, the truth and the life."  Embracing truth means one has to choose. Which of two things is true, or are both untrue and is the truth elsewhere altogether.

St. Cyril of Alexandria Reminds Me of Archbishop Lefebvre

Today is the feast of St. Cyril of Alexandria, bishop and Doctor of the Church from the 5th 
century. As I read the entry in Butler's Lives of the Saints this morning I came across this statement which immediately put me in mind of Archbishop Marcel Lefebvre:

Throughout his life, he made a rule never to advance any doctrine which he had not learnt from the ancient fathers. 

Would that those bishops who love introducing novelties and errors adulterating the faith were followers of St. Cyril. And what did Archbishop Lefebvre say? Unlike our dissenting and scandalous bishops, the archbishop wanted to pass on faithfully what he had been given. I think he and St. Cyril have much in common, both Catholic in the fullest sense, both lovers and defenders of the Blessed Virgin Mary and enemies of heresy. Archbishop Lefebvre was never looking for a fight. He simply wanted to pass on the faith as he had received it, protecting Sacred Tradition:

Thank God for Bishop Strickland and His Defense of the SSPX!

Bishop Strickland: The Church is facing a ‘real emergency’

Every Texan knows this story:

Long before we knew about politics, before we knew the arguments, before we knew how to quibble over details, we were taught something in school that shaped our bones. At the Alamo, there came a moment when there were no more letters to send, no reinforcements coming, no negotiations left to try. The enemy was at the gates. Surrender had been demanded. And everyone knew what surrender would mean.

Repairing the Ruins; the Challenge of Life!

When I visited Ireland about 35 years ago, I remember seeing ruin after ruin. Ruined round towers, ruins of ancient monasteries, castles, and abbeys. Everywhere there were reminders of ancient Ireland and her long connection to the Catholic faith. Those ruins are a metaphor, I think, for what's happening in that poor country today. The faith is in ruins for many Catholics whose relationship with the Church is fractured and broken.

Sunday Meditation a Day Early: When God Sends you three feet of snow.....

We all know the saying, "When life gives you lemons make lemonade." Well...two students at Notre Dame decided that three feet of snow from the heavens was an invitation. They accepted and created something beautiful for God, an ice chapel. 

So...Shall We Talk About Schism and the SSPX?

With the announcement of the SSPX plans to ordain new bishops this summer, we return to the question of schism. That question has to begin with whether Archbishop Lefebvre, Bishop de Castro Mayer, and the four bishops consecrated by Archbishop Lefebvre without pontifical mandate in 1988 actually committed a schismatic act. If they did, they were excommunicated automatically (Latae sententiae). If they did not, they committed an act of disobedience not an act of schism. There's a world of difference.

Who cares about What's Her Name?

Everyone in the United States at this point probably recognizes and knows these names:

George Floyd - career criminal involved in numerous violent actions

Michael Brown, the "gentle giant" who was an upstanding citizen except when he was robbing convenience stores and attacking cops

Renee Good - just your average lesbian mom minding her own business

Alex Pretti - kind, caring nurse who loved everyone except when he was spitting on ICE and breaking the tail light on their van.

Is Your Novus Ordo Mass the One Described by Bishop Schneider? I'm Betting Not!

I don't go to daily Mass these days. One of the things that impacted my decision was a description of a wedding a priest friend attended at a very conservative Lutheran parish. The groom, a widower and a Catholic was marrying a Lutheran woman whose branch of Lutheranism is the most conservative, even more than the Missouri Synod Lutherans. She wanted to be married in her church by her minister. They got permission from the bishop so all was in order.

Another Confusing Head Scratcher: Pope Leo Tells Material Heretics "We are One! We Already are!"

If anyone wondered whether Pope Leo XIV is Francis II, he only had to listen to the pope's address to the band of material heretics joining him for the week of Christian unity. Don't get me wrong. I love my Protestant friends, but I would never (and neither would they) agree that we are "already one". But that's what the pope said:

Septuagesima Sunday Means the Final Goodbye to Christmas and Turns Our Faces To Lent

Yesterday was Septuagesima Sunday when we fully turn our faces from the celebration of Christmas to the Suffering of Lent. Over the weekend I finally took down the creche and the Christmas tree -- reluctantly. With all the frigid weather, the lights spread a cheery glow in our dining room at every meal spreading warmth, if not to the body to the soul. 

When I use the term liberalism and liberal, this is what I mean.

Since I often discuss liberalism which undergirds the nature of liberals, I think it might be helpful to define terms and explain exactly what liberalism is. Socrates often began his dialogues by defining terms. How can people have an intelligent discussion if they aren't using words in the same way? They can end up arguing with Humpty Dumpty who says, "When I use a word, it means just what I choose it to mean- neither more nor less." Unfortunately, many liberals follow Humpty Dumpty's rules of engagement which is a ticket to the Tower of Babel. To use a silly example, suppose an alien landed in Washington, D.C. and someone told him that the first Catholic president, JFK, was born with a silver spoon in his mouth. Imagine the confusion going forward. But that's often true when people use language in contrary ways.