The Church in History Website

The Church in History Website has some excellent articles on James II, Bismarck and the Gospels, Joan of Arc and many other subjects. The articles are very useful for apologetics, dealing with questions such as "Did St Thérèse want to be a priest?", the anti-christian roots of Nazism, and the Crusades.

Popular posts from this blog

1962 Missal pdf online

The Church Music Association of America and Jeffrey Tucker of the New Liturgical Movement have made available the 1962 Missal online in pdf format (72Mb). The file is hosted at Musica Sacra , the website of the CMAA, thanks to a generous gift from Fr Robert Skeris While you are at it, take a look at the articles clarifying the rules for music at Low Mass and music at High Mass .
Read more

SPUC Clergy information day

Image
SPUC today held a Clergy Information Day. Unfortunately, because of an urgent meeting I had to be late for this so I missed the first half of the morning lecture by Fr John Fleming. I could catch up with most of it from his notes and look forward to the published version when it is available from SPUC. Fr Fleming was speaking about the rights of the unborn under international law, the pro-life battle at the UN and the nature of the early human embryo. As a lecture, it was certainly not "dumbed down". He presented some of the latest research on the biochemistry of the human embryo in relationship with the mother and then tied this in to the philosophical question of the status of the embryo, dealing with such hoary chestnuts as twinning and the differentiation of cells in the embryo. It was a most helpful and informative presentation: intellectually challenging but well put together. I think that the sheer quality of these presentations has been the important factor in the gr
Read more

Summorum Pontificum three years on

Today is the third anniversary of the publication of the Motu Proprio Summorum Pontificum which established that the older form of the Mass has never been abrogated and that in consequence, no permission is needed to celebrate Mass or the other sacraments in that form. In the letter accompanying the Motu Proprio, the Holy Father said: In the history of the liturgy there is growth and progress, but no rupture. What earlier generations held as sacred, remains sacred and great for us too, and it cannot be all of a sudden entirely forbidden or even considered harmful. It behooves all of us to preserve the riches which have developed in the Church’s faith and prayer, and to give them their proper place. On Saturday, 7 July 2007, we celebrated the old Mass in my parish and afterwards had a little champagne and cake . The effect of Summorum Pontificum has been extraordinary in itself. Although there are some dioceses around the world where positive obstruction is attempted, in many cas
Read more

A stunning Kyrie Cunctipotens

Via the excellent messainlatino.it , this video shows the schola Exsurge Domine , a young group of singers who got together to provide the music for the usus antiquior Mass celebrated every Sunday and Holyday at the Basilica of the Holy Cross in Cagliari by Monsignor Dante Usai. Their style recovers some of the connection between the western and byzantine traditions of chant and reminds me of the schola which sang at the Masses I celebrated in Estonia last year. Here they are rehearsing the singing of Kyrie "Cunctipotens" of Mass IV.
Read more