The wrong furniture

Gromit! I said get the 'oly Father a sofa from DFS, not fetch one of 'is own chairs from out t' cupboard.

H/T Fr Steven Fisher

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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 .
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Plenary indulgences not impossible

Dilexit Prior in Letters from a Young Catholic asked some useful questions today about indulgences. I thought it would be best to do a post here especially to cover the controversial question of detachment from venial sin. But first the other questions: The conditions for gaining a plenary indulgence Pope Paul VI set down a number of norms relating to indulgences at the end of Indulgentiarum Doctrina . Norm 7 states: To acquire a plenary indulgence it is necessary to perform the work to which the indulgence is attached and to fulfil three conditions: sacramental confession, Eucharistic Communion and prayer for the intentions of the Supreme Pontiff. It is further required that all attachment to sin, even to venial sin, be absent. If this disposition is in any way less than complete, or if the prescribed three conditions are not fulfilled, the indulgence will be only partial, except for the provisions contained in n.11 for those who are “impeded.” It is worth reading the other norms bec...
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The eternal truths and the threefold remorse of the damned

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CZAS UCIEKA WIECZNOŚĆ CZEKA (Time flies. Eternity waits.) Left footer reports on this  text on a sign near the sanctuary where he attended Mass. (H/T Mundabor ) The photo above is from the Cathedral at Trier - the inscription says "You do not know at what hour the Lord will come" and applies both to the second coming and to our own death. St Alphonsus Liguori used to quote St Augustine "God promises us His grace, He does not promise us tomorrow." At this time of year I devote four Sunday sermons to the four last things. It is easy to gloss over the eternal truths even though they are an obviously major part of the teaching of Jesus Christ in the gospels. St Alphonsus, in his Sermons for every Sunday of the year focussed mainly on the four last things. His sermons were what we would today call "talks" or "conferences" - they were not given during Mass but at a separate devotional service. His aim was to bring people back to the practice of...
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A brother priest has alerted me to the digital release today by Erasure of the track "Gaudete" which is apparently the first single from a new album "Snow Globe" which is to be released as a CD and download bundle in a couple of weeks. I confess that my knowledge of popular music nowadays is as close to zero as makes no difference so I had to look up the above details from the Wikipedia article on Erasure . This also informs us that one of the duo is a gay icon, which made me hesitate about posting this at all. However, on balance I agree with my correspondent that the problem is outweighed by the possibility of making Christ known to a secular audience at Christmas. It is a good idea to know what singers are singing. This would apply to Lady Gaga's recent celebrated performance: I guess some of those cheering it might be less enthusiastic if they knew what she was actually singing about. So here are the lyrics to Gaudete and a translation to help along ...
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Hippolytus and Eucharistic Prayer II

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