The Hermeneutic of Continuity

Prolonging suffering of dying patients through medical care is 'evil'  according to a senior spokesman of Healthcare Professionals for Assisted Dying ( HPAD Speaking to the British Medical Association, Professor Tallis said that: "Unbearable suffering, prolonged by medical care and inflicted on a dying patient who wishes to die is an unequivocal evil." Well naturally if anyone were to inflict unbearable suffering on a dying patient, that would be evil. If a patient is already suffering, it would also be an evil to fail to provide adequate palliative care, or to kill the patient. Dr John McGough, also a member of HPAD, used the example of vets putting down animals, saying that this was considered compassionate and kind. He wants doctors to be able to do the same for people. This is a shaft of light into the real thinking of the assisted dying lobby. Essentially we are being encouraged to see the medically assisted killing of human beings within the same moral ...

Here is my sermon for today, the feast of St Peter and St Paul: This autumn, we will begin the Year of Faith, called by Pope Benedict XVI, the successor of St Peter. We are invited to address three principal themes in this year. First, we will revisit the second Vatican Council which began 50 years ago in 1962, to try to understand it in the context of the whole tradition of the Church. Secondly we will look again at the Catechism of the Catholic Church, published 20 years ago in 1992. The Catechism is an authoritative account of the faith of the Catholic Church, the things that we believe as Catholics. Our Catholic doctrine is not like a policy drawn up by a committee for a government or a business. It is the teaching of Christ, given to the apostles, handed on by them and preserved intact in the Catholic Church for all future generations. Our Lord said to Peter that he was the rock on which He would build His Church. That is why the successor of St Peter is not just a "...

The Society of St Pius X's annual General Chapter will take place at St Pius X Seminary in Econe, Switzerland from 9-14 July, following a retreat for the participants (the General Council and the SSPX's major superiors). The SSPX has invited the faithful, religious and clergy to join the members of the SSPX in a novena to the Holy Ghost from June 30 to July 8. The novena will consist of praying the Veni Creator Spiritus with the addition of 2 invocations: Immaculate Heart of Mary, pray for us. (3 times) St. Pius X, pray for us. Here is the text of the Veni Creator Spiritus with translation. I will be praying this novena and I encourage you to do so in solidarity with the SSPX and especially for the cause of full canonical recognition for the Society.

Only as a presbyter, of course. Fr John Hunwicke was ordained yesterday at the Church of St Aloysius at Oxford, the home of the Oxford Oratory, by Bishop William Kenney, Auxiliary in Birmingham. Here he is, prostrate during the Litany of the Saints sung by Fr James Bradley: The Newman Consort sang Palestrina's Missa Papae Marcelli for the Kyrie and Sanctus, and the plainchant Introit, Gradual, Offertory and Communion. At the anointing, they sang Iam non dicam vos servos by Dominique Phinot, and at Communion Byrd's Sacerdotes Domini . The singing was sublime and I was glad that I made the choice to attend in choro since I was able to listen to the music as part of my actuosa participatio . Fr Michael Mary and Brother Martin de Porres were also in choir, along with Fr Edward van den Bergh of the London Oratory. Concelebrants, in addition to priests of the Ordinariate, and priests from the Oratory, included Fr John Saward, Fr Aidan Nichols OP and Fr John Osman The cerem...

Many Catholic bloggers hold Fr Hunwicke's Liturgical Notes in high esteem even though he has not been able to post much for a while. I am sure I am not the only blogger to be making my way to the Oxford Oratory today. Having carefully timed my journey to take a direct train to Oxford, I had to change at Didcot anyway because of "lineside problems". Now on the last leg, even though we are travelling at about 10mph and stopping every few minutes, I hold out hope of arriving in time for an unhurried late lunch (or early dinner) and then going on to St Aloysius early for Fr Hunwicke's priestly ordination. I am looking forward to seeing many friends there.

"The loss of religious freedom is now arguably the most serious threat that the Catholic Church and all people of faith in this country are facing" says Bishop philip Tartaglia in an article titled: At the Door of the Temple: Religious Freedom and the New Orthodoxy . The essay is adapted from a keynote address he delivered on April 11, 2012, at Magdalen College, University of Oxford, to a conference sponsored by the Religious Freedom Project at Georgetown University. Here is a quotation from the essay: Will the Catholic Church—and other religious bodies and groups—have the space to adhere to, express, and teach their beliefs in the public square? Or will these basic elements of religious freedom be denied, driving the Church and other religious bodies to the margins of society, if not actually underground?

While I was enjoying the always interesting discussion and questions from my Carthusian students at Parkminster today, various news items were exploding far away from the peaceful environment of the massive cloister and gardens glorious in one of our better English summer days. We're doing eschatology at the moment and have just got to heaven. There has been another serious leak (breach of trust) from someone within the SSPX wanting to make things difficult for Bishop Fellay. The letter is out on the internet - Rorate Caeli , after a delay, have included it on their blog since it is now in the public domain: For the record Confidentiality: like water through a sieve . The document, marked "Confidential" and "Internal" refers to the 13 June meeting and the revised preamble which Bishop Fellay was unable to sign (see also my post Nail-biting SSPX developments .) The letter also contains this paragraph: Furthermore, I inform all members of the Chapter that,...

The other day, the Our Lady of the Rosary Church Choir blog , I saw a post about the Saint John Fisher Missale which is now hosted at Musica Sacra . Today I was prompted by Berthold Kress, art historian and compiler of the Missale to put a notice about it here. The St John Fisher Missale is a collection of pdfs with the Ordo Missae and Kyriale as well as propers for many of the seasonal Masses and Saints. This is a work in progress and more material is planned. This might sound a bit "same old same old" given the wealth of materials posted on the internet in recent years in support of the usus antiquior . However, the St John Fisher Missale differs from other resources in some important ways. The Ordo Missae is set up with the sung Mass primarily in mind. This will be useful for people who have the advantage of being able to attend sung Mass regularly since many of the people's booklets available treat sung Mass as an incidental second option to Low Mass. The...

From Dilly on Blessed Pius IX a bit of a modernist? When I first saw the picture without my reading glasses, I thought it was a red nun. Probably Pope Pius wisely foresaw that if this outfit were not immediately banned, someone using Image Search on Google might confuse him with Sr Margaret Farley.

Know your questioner, where the question is coming from, and know some key principles for answering. This afternoon I was at Amigo Hall, next to St George's Cathedral, for a Day for Catechists organised by the Diocesan Centre for Catholic Formation . I was leading workshop G on "Answering Hard Questions." The response for the day was much larger than anticipated, and my session had about 50 people. There is a real thirst for formation and it was great to be able to play a small part in the day. I did not have enough copies of my notes, so I promised people that I would make them available on the internet this evening. Here is a link: Answering Hard Questions . If you click that link, you can read the notes online, download them, or print them off. Again as promised, the references to resources on the fourth page of the printed notes can all be found with links at the post  Hard Questions - Some Random References .

As I promised this afternoon, here are links to the resources that I mentioned as being of help for various hard questions. These are only a few resources, almost at random. The internet also gives us access to many fine books that are now out of copyright. We are no longer helpless simply because we do not have access to a Catholic library. For example, the works of GK Chesterton , Blessed John Henry Newman and others can be downloaded, put on a Kindle, quoted and read from your desktop (or iPad.) e-book collections are growing all the time and you could probably find these works as e-books already prepared for you. The Catechism of the Catholic Church (the go-to source for an authoritative explanation of the doctrines of the faith.) News.va (get the texts, not the reportage) Catholic Answers website (with apologetical materials and a good forum) Fr Andrew Pinsent and Fr Marcus Holden “ Apologia ” (A substantial CTS pamphlet which deals expertly with many questions po...