A nice, brief bio of Blessed Karl von Hapsburg November 5, 2013
Posted by Tantumblogo in awesomeness, Basics, Christendom, Four Last Things, General Catholic, Glory, Grace, manhood, martyrdom, persecution, Tradition, true leadership, Victory.comments closed
The final ruler of a family that at various times ruled half of Europe, Blessed Karl (Charles) von Hapsburg was the very model of a Catholic prince. Would that we would have more leaders like him, men of true virtue and Christian concern for not only their own citizens, but for the entire world! Like so many virtuous men in our endlessly unvirtuous times, he was coldly and cruelly treated by the brutal terms imposed by the “victorious” allies (if you count tens of millions more having to die to basically refight the same war 20 years later as victorious) after the war. He was, in a sense, murdered by cold, liberal, anti-Catholic and anti-monarchical neglect, as someone inconvenient to be quietly gotten rid of in a world that didn’t want to be reminded of such things as Christian duty and national societies founded upon the Reign of Christ the King.
But Fr. George Rutler can eulogize the Blessed Karl much better than I can, via Bishop Rene Gracida:
May our two splendid parishes, Holy Innocents in the Garment District and Saint Michael in Hell’s Kitchen (gradually becoming Heaven’s Kitchen), grow ever closer in strengthening their witness to the power of the Resurrection. In these days of the Octave of All Saints, do bear in mind that 
countless saints, mostly unknown, have walked through these troubled and challenging streets. Last Monday His Excellency, Dom Teodoro de Faria, Bishop Emeritus of Funchal, on Portugal’s Island of Madeira, celebrated Holy Mass at the altar of the Church of the Holy Innocents. It was in his diocese that Blessed Karl [Charles] von Habsburg, the last emperor of Austria-Hungary, died. With today’s medicine, Blessed Karl [Charles] might well have survived the pneumonia that afflicted him, but instead he died at the age of 34 in penurious exile, a victim of the bigotry of many, including—sad to say—our own country’s Calvinist president, Woodrow Wilson. The novelist Anatole France said, “No one will ever persuade me that the war could not have been ended long ago. The Emperor [Karl] Charles offered peace. There is the only honest man who occupied an important position during the war, but he was not listened to.”
Blessed Charles von Hapsburg, beatified by Pope John Paul II whose father had served under Emperor Charles and who bore the Emperor’s name. Blessed Charles was shocked to inherit the imperial throne, as he was remote in the line of succession. It was the worst time in history, and by the end of the First World War more than half of his fellow countrymen had died in battle. In his brief two years of reign, Charles instituted many reforms of 
the army and the nation, even using imperial carriages to transport food and fuel to the poor, modeling himself after the social teachings of Pope Leo XIII.
His love was boundless for his wife, the Empress Zita, whom he told on the day after their glittering wedding, “Now we must help each other to get to Heaven.” His feast day is not on the anniversary of his death or birth, but on the anniversary of their wedding. In cruel exile after the war, he was not allowed firewood, and the family shivered in the cold on the island of Madeira. Before his death, Charles blessed his eighth child, still in the Empress’ womb, young enough legally to be “eliminated” in our present society. The young father was reluctant to let his eldest son Otto, who would be a principal figure in the collapse of European Communism, watch him die, but he did, saying that the son must see how a Christian king goes to God.
The Empress and her eight children removed to various lands, most recently living in Tuxedo Park, New York in our own archdiocese. In Quebec she and the children were so neglected that she had to comb the public park for dandelions to feed the royal family.
We rejoice in the heroism of these saints and pray that, whatever our state in life, we may serve the King of the Universe as they did.
Blessed Karl was a true martyr
Happy Days! 1/3 of Texas abortion mills closed, over 100 babies saved by Texas pro-life law!! November 5, 2013
Posted by Tantumblogo in Abortion, awesomeness, Basics, contraception, Dallas Diocese, General Catholic, horror, sadness, scandals, self-serving, sexual depravity, sickness, Society, Victory.comments closed
God be praised! This is glorious! The pro-aborts are in a panic, over a third of mills statewide are closed and hundreds of abortions have been prevented between last Friday and today! Let us pray this continues! The pro-aborts have asked the US Supreme Court to issue an injunction, preventing actuation of the Texas law until the final appeals cases are decided (the case before the 5th Circuit Court of Appeals is set for January), but for now, the Appeals court temporary ruling remains – the Texas law remains in force until it is overturned at the Appeals or Supreme Court level. Hundreds or thousands of babies could literally be saved by this:
Abortion providers on Monday asked the U.S. Supreme Court to reinstate a lower federal court’s injunction that blocked Texas from implementing strict new abortion rules.
The 5th Circuit Court of Appeals on Thursday lifted a lower court’s injunction, allowing the state to implement two provisions in House Bill 2 that require abortion providers to obtain hospital admitting privileges nearby the facility and follow federal guidelines, rather than a common, evidence-based protocol, when administering drug-induced abortions. [Hospital admitting privileges are not overly difficult to get. But if you are a quack doctor whose only real alternatives are peddling painkillers semi-illegally (or totally illegally) or butchering babies, they might be. What does it say about the quality of these doctors that they can’t even get the barest privileges at local hospitals? And yet these are the purveyors of “safe, legal, and rare (if rare happens every 3 seconds) abortions?]
The plaintiffs argue that a third of abortion providers in the state have been unable to obtain hospital admitting privileges and that, as a result, more than 100 women had their abortion procedures canceled on Friday and many more are unable to schedule appointments. The Tribune has confirmed that at least nine abortion facilities have stopped performing abortions due to the new law.
If you want to see one of the saddest, most tragic episodes of denial you’ll ever witness, watch this (note, the Texas Tribune is very lefty, so you’ll hardly get a dispassionate look at the issue):
That poor, sad, deluded woman. She does not know the world of hurt she is about to bring down on herself, and her “fiancee.”
Statistically speaking, most women will develop horrendous guilt and remorse after the murder of their child. Most relationships that caused the murder to take place terminate in a wave of bitter recriminations. Even if the relationship survives (and it might, this women appears to have turned the murder into an ideological event), and 5 years from now Marni feels “capable” of having a child at the age of 42, due to the adverse effects of surgical abortion, conceiving may be very difficult. Will she then demand heroic efforts to achieve conception at an advanced age? Will there then be dozens of embroyos frozen, the fate of which is also to be eventually discarded? Is there not a wicked sense of irony in all this?
I also find some nasty irony in this couple’s complaints that government is “intruding” into a very private matter. So, do they oppose all the other ways government intrudes into private matters, from telling people what kind of food they can eat to demanding all citizens purchase incredibly expensive and often highly unnecessary health insurance policies, or do they only oppose it when it happens to complicate their sex life?
You can also see the complete disregard for the rights of the child, which is simply a de-humanized, inconvenient thing to be gotten rid of.
One other thought – I thought contraception never failed? I don’t doubt they were using it, but every form of contraception fails, and quite often, over the course of years.
Wow. The banality of evil, indeed. This couple needs a lot of help. I pray God touches their hearts, and softens them. I pray they repent and have true contrition, and become powerful advocates against the murder of children.
Nevertheless, good days. At least until Nov. 12, the Appeals Court injunction will remain in place and abortions will be a lot harder to get in Texas. Let us pray the Supreme Court chooses to let the Appeals Court decision stand! Thousands of children could be saved in that case.
Italian priest – post-VII Church a return to the corruption that reigned prior to Trent November 5, 2013
Posted by Tantumblogo in Basics, Dallas Diocese, disconcerting, episcopate, General Catholic, Holy suffering, persecution, scandals, self-serving, sexual depravity, shocking, the return.comments closed
Wowzer. That’s an interesting claim, but one that, on the surface, might be shocking to some. Let’s see what this Don Ariel Levi di Gualdo has to say, via Rorate (I add emphasis and comments):
What do you know about Brother Carmelo Cortez? November 5, 2013
Posted by Tantumblogo in awesomeness, Basics, Christendom, General Catholic, Glory, Grace, Interior Life, Our Lady, sanctity, Spiritual Warfare.comments closed
A reader queried me over the weekend about a Filipino Brother Carmelo Cortez and his – it is said – miraculous rose petals. Apparently, Brother Cortez has been given some special Grace by God, so that when he is present and rose petals are distributed, miraculous images of the Crucifixion, or of Our Blessed Mother, or of angels, form on the rose petals. See the video below. I have to say, even if these images were made by human hands, their clarity and composition would appear to be virtually miraculous in themselves, for being able to impose such an image on something as delicate as a rose petal. From what is claimed, the rose petals are just handed out, bearing no image, and then the images form over time during prayer? Some evidence (the images come around halfway through the video):
This video perhaps describes the “process” in action a little more directly:
When it comes to this kind of thing, I have to admit, I am normally rather skeptical. I have seen a lot of alleged “images” of the Blessed Mother, for instance, that are just so blurry or vague they could be anything. But these images are very clear. You can really see Joseph and the Child Jesus, or Our Lady, or the Crucifixion. Those giving testimonies in the videos state they are just regular old rose petals, but through some undefinable action in Brother Cortez’ presence, they reveal amazing images. From what I gather, the roses are brought by participants, not by Brother Cortez.
But as the priest points out in the first video, and I thank God he did, the REAL miracle that is so beyond our understanding and also the very Font, the Source and Summit of our Faith, resides every day in the Tabernacle – God willing! That is why the Tabernacle should always have “pride of place” in every church!
Nevertheless, if these miraculous rose petals be real, they are certainly a great testimony to Our Father and Our Savior, giving us these external signs of Their reality, a reality that is in fact much more real than all the stuff we see around us and occupy ourselves with.
I will note there are some sites out there purporting to “debunk” the rose petal images, but I do note that almost all the critical claims were pretty easily refuted by those stating they had eye-witness testimony – that Brother Cortez did not even handle the rose petals personally, they were brought in my random people participating so that Brother Cortez had no means to manipulate them beforehand (perhaps tracing a very light image, which then showed when the petals were immersed in water), that the images appeared suddenly, after prayer, and that they showed absolutely no evidence of an image under close examination before the claimed miracle.
Anyone have any personal experience of Brother Cortez, the rose petals, and the miraculous healings that are supposed to be associated with both? That is another aspect I completely failed to mention above, participants in these events claim miraculous healings occur, as well.
I will say one thing: I think it is sad the degree to which Catholics often feel ashamed about the mystical, as if we have to be embarrassed about it. We have been indoctrinated, by the culture, to disbelieve such things as “unscientific” and even medieval. That is a great shame, and it’s had a big impact. The Church’s claim to authenticity is based on miracles! Miracles by Christ, the Apostles, Saints, martyrs, etc. It was the plethora of miracles fired by great faith that caused the conversion of a worldly, pagan empire. We do a great disservice to God, the Church, and ourselves if we take an overly skeptical attitude towards the miraculous. I am not endorsing or claiming that Brother Cortez’ images are miraculous, only that miracles certainly DO occur, and on a regular basis. Most are mundane and hidden. But that doesn’t make them any less real.
Liberal protestantism is even deader than I thought….. November 5, 2013
Posted by Tantumblogo in Basics, disaster, Ecumenism, error, foolishness, General Catholic, secularism, self-serving, silliness, Society.comments closed
……..which is like, mouldering in the ground for decades dead, but, I was wrong. It’s crumpled into dust so that there is no longer even any measurable remain.
What am I on about this time? A little article reader Dismas sent me, highlighting a lesbian (“Lesbian” was in the lede. It seems she married a man in 1996. But she still goes on as lesbian? Once a lesbian, always a lesbian, even after 17 years of marriage and, of course, 2 kids. Wait, I thought homosexuals were “born that way,” that their sexuality was the utterly dominant and unchangeable aspect of their personality to which all other aspects, and all of human society, must kneel in quivering obeiscance?) wiccan tattooed potty-mouth as being the savior of the geriatric liberal protestant set. Even the wiccan seems ashamed at what she’s sunk to for some fat remuneration. The whole thing is so obviously contrived, so obviously carefully calculated to appeal to that very elderly and very sad remnant of liberal protestantism that wants more than anything else in the world to be told they are not only right, but also still somehow, in their sensible shoes and decaffe soy lattes, hip:
Nadia Bolz-Weber bounds into the University United Methodist Church sanctuary like a superhero from Planet Alternative Christian. Her 6-foot-1 frame is plastered with tattoos, her arms are sculpted by competitive weightlifting [eh. Not so “sculpted.” If she’s “sculpted,” I’m “ripped.”] and, to show it all off, this pastor is wearing a tight tank top and jeans.
Looking out at the hundreds of people crowded into the pews to hear her present the gospel of Jesus Christ, she sees: Dockers and blazers. Sensible shoes. Grandmothers and soccer moms. Nary a facial piercing.
To Bolz-Weber’s bafflement, this is now her congregation: mainstream America. [Perhaps not so mainstream.]
These are the people who put her memoir near the top of the New York Times bestseller list the week it came out in September. They are the ones who follow her every tweet and Facebook post by the thousands, and who have made the Lutheran minister a budding star for the liberal Christian set.
And who, as Bolz-Weber has described it in her frequently profane dialect, “are [mess]ing up my weird.” [Yes, weird, in a very conformist way. This is the “weird” that presently gets the most cultural approbation, especially the sexuality aspect, so it’s all good for this charlatan. Nothing to threaten the wealthy libs who constitute her fans. Now, try trotting out some hardcore Liguori or Peter Damian for these folks, and see how they react. All that peace and love will go out the window, in a heartbeat…..]
Bolz-Weber’s appeal is unquestionably part packaging: dramatic back story, cool appearance, super-entertaining delivery. She launched a successful church for disaffected young people and has headlined youth gatherings tens of thousands strong. For a part of American religion that’s been in a long, slow institutional decline, this gives her major credibility. [These same gimmicks have been tried for decades, and they have all, virtually universally, proven not to generate true converts, people who will go to church week after week and support these dying sects over the long term. What they do is generate a whole bunch of surface-level emotion, which dissipates as fast as it came. It is not true conversion, and of course it’s not, because it’s based on complete error………]
Her message: Forget what you’ve been told about the golden rule — God doesn’t love you more if you do good things, or if you believe certain things. God, she argues, offers you grace regardless of who you are or what you do. [The essence of protestantism. It was Luther who said “sin boldly, but have faith all the more boldly,” completely trashing 1500 years of Christian theology. But this is what these people soooo want to hear, they want so very much not true conversion, but to be confirmed in their sins, and told they are “good.”]
Christianity, Bolz-Weber preaches, has nothing to do with rules; it is the process of things constantly dying and then being made new. [Straight up Hegelian modernism, thesis-antithesis-synthesis. This is the program the moderThis woman gives quite an education, but not the one she intends. She appears to be a compendium of modern self-serving liberal “Christian” error. The same error that has left these liberal protestant sects utterly broken and prostrate. All the tattoos and piercings in the world can’t convert error into Truth.] Those things, she says, might be the alcoholic who emerges into sobriety, some false narrative we have about ourselves, religious institutions that no longer inspire. [So don’t give your money to your boring old Unitarian church, give it to ME!]
All these articles regarding the great “future” of liberal protestantism are just fantasy. There is no future. It died a very long time ago, it is just inertia carrying them on now. Even this great “savior” of liberal protestantism? Her church attracts a whole 180 people on Sunday, which some local parishes exceed on a Monday morning Mass.
There is no future in error. Rejecting works as efficacious of Grace is, alongside private interpretation/rejection of authority, the foundational error of protestantism.
Progressives all atwitter – first “female cardinal” to be Pelosi’s BFF? November 5, 2013
Posted by Tantumblogo in asshatery, disaster, episcopate, error, foolishness, General Catholic, Papa, pr stunts, scandals, secularism, self-serving, Society.comments closed
They just can’t contain themselves anymore. There are so many ifs, maybes, and might be’s built into this article, I can’t believe it was printed by an ostensible “serious” news organiztion. This is nothing but a puff piece, and an opinion puff piece at that, masquerading as news. Incredible:
She’s married and a feminist to boot, but Irish theologian Linda Hogan is being touted as a candidate to become the first female “prince” of the Catholic Church.
Hogan, 49, has become the subject of widespread speculation that Pope Francis will someday choose her to break the Holy See’s stained-glass ceiling. [This is just so stupid a comment it’s unworthy of a response. Yet I’ve seen it dozens of times, from worldlings who are only able to think in terms of money and power.]
The reformist Argentinian Pope, considered liberal on social issues, has made one of his top goals boosting the role of women in the Church, saying it needs to develop “a truly deep theology of women.” [He has said that. I’ve seen it. But the Church already has a “truly deep” theology of women. Or Woman. As if women need a “different” theology from men. That’s a rather materialist conception right there. But these people all forget that the greatest pure human to ever live is a woman. The Church venerates a woman like no other person. The Church has an enormous theology surrounding Her. Our Blessed Mother was, however, denied by the progressives Her own document at Vatican II, due to “ecumenical concerns.” The bit on Our Lady was appended onto Lumen Gentium. She was not proclaimed by the Council, formally, Mediatrix of All Graces, again due to progressive opposition. I would say the “truly deep theology of women” (ever read St. Teresa of Avila? St. Catherine of Siena? St. Therese?) already exists, but perhaps the progressives don’t like what it says, because it’s not marxist-feminist power dynamics agitprop.]
Catholic scholar Juan Arias, a former Brazilian priest, was among the first to say the possibility of a woman cardinal was “not a joke……..” [That’s it. A disgraced progressive former priest is the only source they have for this inanery.
…..A Catholic canon law of 1917 restricts the Pope to appointing only ordained men to cardinals. But Pope Francis has the authority to ignore the law and select whomever he wants. [He has the authority to do many things. But that doesn’t mean it would be prudent to do so. Even Karl Rahner stated it would be sinful – mortally sinful! – for a Pope to abrogate a time honored and venerable Rite of the Mass, but of course, he said that several comfortable years distant from the installation of the Novus Ordo, and we all know progressives only ever look forwards, never back. To do so might reveal to them the wreckage of their actions.]
I really don’t think this is a serious issue, but who knows. I really don’t think this poor Hogan and Pelosi know each other very well, but whatevs. The whole thing is a progressive day dreaming:
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