Catholic Voice 19th June 2020 Issue 293

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Omnia possum in eo, qui me confortat

19 June - 2 July 2020

Issue 293

“Don’t Call Me Hero”

Please Help To

Irish Priests during

Support Your

the famine

Local Priest

- page 2

- page 20

What the Spirit Brings - page 8

RSE & Children - page 12

Saint Simon Stock Receives the Brown Scapular from Our Lady - page 16

Saint Clare and the Eucharist - page 20

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2 FAMINE PRIESTS

Catholic Voice

19th June 2020

“Don’t Call Me Hero” - The Catholic Attitude Fr William Slattery The most recent well-documented account of the attitudes and actions of priests during an epidemic occurred during the most devastating famine to hit Europe since the fifteenth century: the “Great Famine” in Ireland between 1845 and 1850.

According to Amartya Sen, the Harvard historian of famines, “[in] no other famine in the world [was] the proportion of people killed as large as in the Irish famines of the 1840s.”[i] The cause was a blight that destroyed the potato crop — the staple food for three million of the nation’s 8.5 million people — killing one million persons by starvation and related diseases of fever, diphtheria, cholera, smallpox, dysentery and influenza and forcing another million into exile.

When the famine struck, the Irish parish priests, though few in number and with minimal resources, rose to the occasion, acting according to their identity as spiritual fathers.[ii] Their heroism was repeatedly recognized by their political enemies. As a British government official seeking to alleviate the effects of the famine

wrote at the time, “all the Roman Catholic curates [assistant parish priests] . . . are labouring like tigers for us, working day and night . . . [without them] we could not move a stroke.”[iii] Even a revolutionary movement, the Young Irelanders, although bitter about the Church’s refusal to side with them, stated – somewhat hyperbolically – that the priests had cared for the people of their parishes “with a devotion unsurpassed in the annals of martyrdom”.[iv]

existence at the peak of the famine as follows:

Although they did as much as possible to alleviate the famine itself and its associated epidemic, the Catholics of Ireland wanted above all that their priests act as priests: to give them Holy Communion, hear their confessions, anoint them at their last hour, and remind them of Heaven. As Father Bernard O’Reilly, who accompanied his compatriots to exile in North America on the “coffin-ships” remarked, they wanted “the supreme consolation of an Irish Catholic - the last rites of his Church.”[v]

At these stations we have to remain up to five o’clock administering both consolation and instruction to the famishing thousands. . . The confessions are often interrupted by calls to the dying, and generally, on our way home we have to . . . administer the last rites . . . to one or more fever patients.

One priest, Father Hugh Quigley of Killaloe, narrated his daily

“We rise at four o’clock, when not obliged to attend a night call, and proceed on horseback a distance from four to seven miles to hold stations of [the sacrament of] confession for the convenience of the poor country people who . . . flock in thousands . . to prepare themselves for the death they look to as inevitable.

Arrived home, we have scarcely seated ourselves to a little dinner when we are interrupted by groans and sobs of several persons at the door crying out, “I am starving”, “if you do not help me I must die”, and “I wish I was dead”. In truth the priest must either harden his heart against the cry of misery or deprive himself of his usual nourishment to keep victims from falling at his door.

After dinner, or perhaps before it is half- over, the priest is again surrounded by several persons, calling on him to come in haste, that their parents, or brothers, or wives, or children are “just departing”. The priest is again obliged to mount his jaded pony and endeavour to keep pace with the peasant who trots before him as a guide through glen and ravine and over precipice to his infected hut. This gives but a faint idea of the life of a priest here.”[vi]

Memorial of the Great Famine - Dublin

A newspaper account described another priest’s schedule:

19th June 2020 Catholic Voice

FAMINE PRIESTS 3

“On last Sunday and Monday week, the broken-hearted clergyman had to drag his own tottering limbs, with scarce an interval of rest, from one corpse to another. In the three subsequent days, exhausted, overcome, feeble and faint, he had still to continue his attendance on the dying; to pass continually from townland to townland; to look on corpse after corpse, to behold, renewed over and over, all the agonies and horrors.”[vii] Alongside all of this, priests often ended up performing the gruesome role of ensuring that the corpses were buried in coffins.

People dreaded that they or their relations would be buried without a coffin, and it often fell to the priest to procure coffins, to coffin the dead, and to bury, Tobias-like, the victims of the pestilence.[viii] Father Troy of Skibbereen, County Cork narrated such an incident on January 10, 1847: “I went to the hut... provided with a coffin - had to creep in on my hands through an opening. The lifeless and putrid corpse was reclining against the wall...The poor wife and one of the children endeavoured to get to their knees (they could not stand) to help me to coffin his remains, but I had to beg of my curate to help us.”

Father Thomas Quinn in County Clare told how: “I had, together with my curate, Rev. Mr. Reid, to convey by torchlight two successive nights, the remains of two persons who were abandoned by their own immediate family and friends.”[ix] The situation of the clergy in many parts of Ireland was similar to that described in this letter: “The priests are absolutely exhausted having to attend so many sick calls and in many instances are obliged to walk, their horses being unable to carry them through want of sufficient feeding and the priest not getting as much as would purchase oats for his horse.”[x] Some priests, perhaps many, even gave away most of their few personal belongings:

Irish Famine Family with Blighted Potatoes - Daniel McDonald (1821 - 1853)

“When the terrible scourge of the famine descended upon his [Father Timothy Kelly’s] parish from 1845 to 1847, his reaction to the prevailing distress was what one would expect of the pastor and the man sprung from the people.

He was in every sense the father of his flock. He organized the provision of meals for the numbers who were starving and when every resource failed he sold all he had, even his horse, to buy food for his people.”[xi] It was no surprise, therefore, that as the famine devoured the country many of the clergy became almost as poor as beggars, without decent clothes or even a pair of shoes; indeed, some were almost starving.

As a government inspector reported: “In some instances where priests were confined with fever, I found in their cabins nothing available beyond stirabout. . . . There was no tea, no sugar, no provisions whatever; in some of their huts the wind blew, the snow came in, and the rain dripped.”[xii] Moving constantly amid deadly disease and corpses took its toll among these valiant men. From 1847 to 1852 eight bishops died,

some at least from famine fever. The highly documented authoritative work, by Donal Kerr entitled ‘The Catholic Church and the Famine’ (Columba Press, 1996) states, “Many priests, religious brothers and nuns certainly died as a result of the Famine”.

Another historian stated: ‘In 1847 at least thirty-six priests died of fever, sixteen of them during the month of May.’[xiii] Six priests died in Kerry. Of the sixty-four priests in the diocese of Kilmore, seven died in 1846-1847; at least

4 FAMINE PRIESTS seven in County Cork by June 1847; five died in the diocese of Killaloe in 1847-1848.

A Gaelic song of Famine times refers to a priest crossing the Atlantic from Galway Bay to Baltimore in the winter of 1847 or 1848, accompanying some 200 Irish, young and old: “Bhí sagart beannuí a labhair ó chroí linn gur thug sé saor sinn go Baltimore [A holy priest was there to speak from the heart with us, and he brought us safe to Baltimore].

Of some 100,000 Irish that sailed to Canada in 1847, about one out of five died from disease and malnutrition. The ships bearing the Irish to Canada in 1847 were authentic “coffin ships”: thousands died either on board or upon disembarking at Grosse Île, a quarantine island in the middle of the Saint Lawrence River in Canada, where at least 5,500 died.

When the ships came ashore with their “ghastly yellow looking spectres”, priests were waiting for them with food, medical supplies and the sacraments. A Celtic cross on the island commemorates forty-four priests who attended the immigrants. They paid the price there and elsewhere for their dedication: on Grosse Île twenty

Catholic Voice priests were infected with famine fever and six died; in Montreal, seventeen Grey nuns and seven priests succumbed; in Toronto, Bishop Michael Power (18041847) perished of typhus.[xiv] These priests did not regard themselves as heroes. This was all done in the line of duty; a matter of fulfilling what they had sworn to God to do when they touched the chalice and prostrated themselves on their day of sacred ordination; a matter of giving their people what was due to their people by sacred right.

They knew the Tradition: this had always been the attitude of priests from the lethal smallpox epidemic that swept through the Roman Empire during the years 165-180.

It was the attitude of the thirtyeight- year- old archbishop, Charles Borromeo, when the bubonic plague struck Milan in 1576. He spared no expense and risked every danger in caring for the suffering — and probably paid for it by hastening his own death due to intermittent fever eight years later on November 4, 1584. Mark Twain, describing him as he moved calmly amid the terrified people, was describing the Irish priests during the Famine and all the other priests through the ages: “He was brave where all others were cowards, full of compassion where pity had been crushed out of all other breasts by the instinct of self-preservation gone mad with terror; cheering all, praying with all, helping all with hand, brain, and purse; at a time when parents forsook their children, the friend deserted the friend, and the brother turned away from the sister while her pleadings were still wailing in his ears.”[xv] During two millennia, when plague or famine struck, all priests knew the Catholic attitude – the only possible one – regarding the administration of the sacraments, as confirmed by the Council of Trent

19th June 2020 with all the nuances and subtleties of theology: the Sacrifice must be present and the sacraments must be given because both are necessary.

An attitude alive and vigorous because the Catholicism of two millennia of Tradition was vibrant.

Tradition, the “Ring of Fire”! “Take now this Ring,’ he said; ‘for thy labours and thy cares will be heavy, but in all it will support thee and defend thee from weariness. For this is the Ring of Fire and herewith, maybe, thou shalt rekindle hearts to the valour of old in a world that grows chill.’”[xvi] NOTES [i] Amartya Sen (lecture at New York University, 1995), quoted in Cormac Ó Gráda, Black ‘47 and Beyond: The Great Irish Famine in History, Economy and Memory (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1999), p. 3. [ii] There were only 2,393 priests in parishes in Ireland in 1845: 1,008 pastors and 1,385 assistant pastors (“curates”); see A. Kerr, A Nation of Beggars? Priests, People and Politics in Famine Ireland, 1846– 1852 (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1995), p. 48. According to estimates based on the first religious census taken in Ireland by the British government in 1834, Catholics in 1841 were nearly 81 percent of the total population while the combined Protestant total made up most of the remaining 19 percent—i n round figures, 6,500,000 Catholics out of the total population of 8,175,000; see “First Report of the Commissioners of Public Instruction, Ireland”, Parliamentary Papers 33, no. 45 (1835). [iii] Lord Monteagle to Bessborough, October 1, 1846, Monteagle Papers, MS 13, 396, National Library of Ireland, quoted in Kerr, Nation of Beggars, p.

48. Italics mine. Lord Monteagle

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19th June 2020 Catholic Voice

Catholic Voice

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6 FAMINE PRIESTS had been Chancellor of the Exchequer in the British government from 1835 to 1839. [iv] Nation, July 24, 1847, quoted in Kerr, Nation of Beggars, p. 61. Italics mine. [v] Quoted in, Donal A. Kerr, “The Catholic Church and the Great Irish Famine”, March 7, 1997 lecture, online at http://www.vincenter.org/97/kerr.html [vi] Kerr, Nation of Beggars, p. 42. [vii] Limerick and Clare Examiner, May 17, 1849.

Quoted in the article “Father Thomas Moloney Pleaded for His Starving Flock”, Irish Identity, accessed January 20, 2015, http://www.irishidentity.com/stories/molony .htm, courtesy of Matthew Lynch and Austin Hobbs, of Clare Champion. [viii] Donal A. Kerr, A Nation of Beggars?: Priests, People and Politics in Famine Ireland, 1846-52 , Oxford University Press, 1995, p.38. [ix] Ibid., p.39. [x] Letter of Bishop Egan of Kerry to Renehan, April 22, 1846, Renehan papers, MCA, quoted in Kerr, Nation of Beggars, p. 170.

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Catholic Voice

19th June 2020

[xi] Account of the pastorship of Fr. Timothy Kelly, parish priest of Cooraclare and Kilmihil during the Great Famine, in Peter Ryan, History of Kilmurry Ibrickane (Old Kilfarboy, County Clare: Old Kilfarboy Society, 2002). [xii] Count P. E. de Strzelecki, agent for the British Association’s relief scheme in a letter to Clarendon, August 26, 1848, in Report and Minutes of Evidence of the Select Committee of the House of Lords on Irish Poor Laws, May 4, 1849, vol. 16, 979–80, quoted in Kerr, Nation of Beggars, p. 171. [xiii] T.P.O’Neill, ‘The Catholic Clergy and the Great Famine in Reportarium Novum, 1956, (1), p. 463. [xiv] See the documentary drama, Death or Canada: the story of the Irish Famine and its impact on Toronto in 1847 wherein the heroism of Bishop Power is portrayed. [xv] Mark Twain, The Innocents Abroad, autograph edition (Hartford, Conn., 1869), pp. 231–32. [xvi] J. R. R. Tolkien, The Silmarillion.

This article first appeared online at the Rorate Caeli blog www.rorate-caeli.blogspot.com. Reproduced here with permission from Fr Slattery.

19th June 2020

POETRY 7

Catholic Voice

The Ballad of Fr Gilligan William Butler Yeats

The old priest Peter Gilligan Was weary night and day; For half his flock were in their beds, Or under green sods lay.

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Once, while he nodded on a chair, At the moth-hour of eve, Another poor man sent for him, And he began to grieve.

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“I have no rest, nor joy, nor peace, For people die and die”; And after cried he, “God forgive!

My body spake, not I!”

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He knelt, and leaning on the chair He prayed and fell asleep; And the moth-hour went from the fields, And stars began to peep.

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They slowly into millions grew, And leaves shook in the wind; And God covered the world with shade, And whispered to mankind.

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Upon the time of sparrow-chirp When the moths came once more.

The old priest Peter Gilligan Stood upright on the floor.

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“Mavrone, mavrone! the man has died While I slept on the chair”; He roused his horse out of its sleep, And rode with little care.

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He rode now as he never rode, By rocky lane and fen; The sick man’s wife opened the door: “Father! you come again!”

“And is the poor man dead?” he cried.

“He died an hour ago.”

The old priest Peter Gilligan In grief swayed to and fro.

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“When you were gone, he turned and died, As merry as a bird.”

The old priest Peter Gilligan He knelt him at that word.

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“He Who hath made the night of stars For souls who tire and bleed, Sent one of His great angels down To help me in my need.”

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“He Who is wrapped in purple robes, With planets in His care, Had pity on the least of things Asleep upon a chair.”

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8 PENTECOST

Catholic Voice

19th June 2020

Remembering Past BRINGS Times WHAT THE SPIRIT Mary Kearns

Mary Kearns If there is a chance that we might have forgotten the very ordinariness of the apostles, the recent readings from scripture has highlighted them as people we can identify with in their familiar humanity.

Two sentences from the Gospel of John stand out as an example and it is worth pondering their meaning.

Simon Peter said “I am going fishing.” They replied “We’ll come with you.” When we look at the context it throws up a few questions. Firstly, we know that seven of the apostles went fishing together. These were Peter, Thomas, Nathanael, James, John and two others whose names are not recorded. The place was the Sea of Galilee (known as the Sea of Tiberias since Roman occupation). The apostles fished all night but caught nothing.

The second question is why did the apostles go back to Galilee?

Remember they had just been in Jerusalem which is approximately seventy miles away. That was quite a distance to travel. But there are other important questions.

Jesus had appeared to the apostles in the upper room where the Last Supper had been celebrated; where the Eucharist had been instituted and Holy Orders conferred on the them. Not alone were the apostles now priests, but bishops. They could confer the sacrament of Holy Orders on other men, which of course they subsequently did.

Pious tradition has always assumed that Peter had been privately reconciled with the Lord after his repentance. Following the resurrection of Jesus, Peter had been to the tomb and seen the discarded linen cloths. John, one of the sons of Zebedee had accompanied him. That same evening Jesus came to them in his now glorified body and gave them the power to forgive sins.

And what about Thomas? He had been absent on the occasion of the first appearance in the upper room.

He could not believe that the Lord had appeared. Later at another time, Jesus appeared and Thomas made his heartfelt profession on faith “My Lord and my God.” Despite all they had been through with the passion, death and resurrection, seven of the closest friends of Jesus travelled back to Galilee to go fishing. It is hard for us to understand this. What would we have done? We can speculate about their motivation

but in the end it is hard to escape the conclusion that they went back to their former lives, the lives they had before Jesus called them. Did they just want to do what they knew they could do? Would their association with Our Blessed Lord be just a wonderful memory?

Sometimes the lack of explanation in scripture can inspire us to ponder more deeply and so enter into a profound understanding.

St. John’s Gospel is a literary masterpiece and his depiction of the meeting at the Sea of Galilee is one that is memorable in its detail.

It was light by now and there stood Jesus on the shore, though the disciples did not realise that it was Jesus.

John recounts the miraculous haul of fish and how Peter, when he realised that the Lord was so close, threw his cloak over himself and impetuously as ever, jumped into the water.

There was a charcoal fire and Jesus was cooking breakfast. As Peter stood there, did the memory of another charcoal fire burning in a distant courtyard, come back to him? Was this why Jesus asked Peter three times if he loved him and why Peter was distressed at the repeated questions? Peter had been humbled and unlike Judas, had come back to the Lord. This is the time of the conferring on Peter of the great mission to feed the sheep and lambs. Jesus had earlier given him the keys of the kingdom but now his primacy was formally established.

19th June 2020 Catholic Voice When we look at the calling of the apostles and especially Peter, we can discern that there were different stages in his conversion. This applies also to our own lives. The great spiritual teachers, St. Thomas Aquinas, St. Francis de Sales and St. Teresa of Avila all testify to this. First there is the call to purification when the chief aim is to avoid living a sinful life. Then comes the purgative way when growing in virtue is undertaken and finally the illuminative way, when with the grace of the Holy Spirit, the soul is gradually brought into union with God and so prepares for eternal life.

The first call is to purification and it happens in the midst of everyday life. Peter and the others began to follow Jesus. But we hear them arguing among themselves and in many ways acting like ordinary people. Later as they witness the miracles and hear the teaching of Jesus they are moved to imitate him as far as they can.

The different gospel accounts show us that the apostles remained more of less in the same condition following the ascension of Jesus into heaven. He had commanded them to go and teach all nations but this does not seem to be what they actually did. They went back to the scene of the Last Supper. They were united and praying of course but mainly behind locked doors.

Then something extraordinary happened.

Jesus had promised the Holy Spirit but one wonders how well the apostles were disposed for this? They were occupied of course in the right way, praying with Our Lady for nine days in the place were they had witnessed the offering of the first Mass.

The tongues of fire that descended brought the gifts of the Holy Spirit and no longer were these men fearful.

This changed them entirely and as we know all of them with the exception of John suffered martyrdom in the following years.

Very soon after the coming of the Holy Spirit, in the Acts of the Apostles we see Peter full of the Spirit, publicly addressing the men of Israel and exhorting them to repent for the crime of having put the Messiah to death.

They must be baptised in the name of Jesus Christ.

He spoke to them for a long time using many arguments, and he urged them. ‘Save yourselves from this perverse generation.’ They were convinced by his arguments, and they accepted what he said and were baptised. That very day about three thousand were added to their number.

What the Spirit brings are the gifts of wisdom, understanding, counsel, fortitude, knowledge, piety and fear of the Lord. These are infused gifts, distinct from natural virtues. We can take heart from the witness of the apostles because we know that no matter how they tried and how much they desired to, they would not have been able to change themselves to the degree that

PENTECOST 9

we begin to see as they progress in their living witness to the story of salvation.

It is likely that there has never been a time when we needed the coming of the Holy Spirit more than we do at the present time. Wisdom, Understanding, Counsel, Fortitude, Knowledge, Piety and Fear of the Lord - the words are familiar but familiarly can often mean we fail to look seriously at what the words mean.

For catechesis and liturgical marykeenankearns@gmail.com

formation:

10 LETTERS

Catholic Voice

Letters

19th June 2020 Send your letters to: Letters Page, Catholic Voice, St Michael’s House, Castlemitchell South, Athy, Co Kildare or email to letters@catholicvoice.ie

Camino Companion Whenever I was on my own I never ever felt alone Guardian angel as my guide Silently walking by my side Pushing me gently along the way When I wilted a bit in the heat of the day Scaffolding me on the steep slope In times of tedium whispering hope.

My Guardian Angel Protecting me Conveying me to sanctuary.

Seamus O’ Connor.

HANDS OFF OUR KIDS

PROTECTING PARENTAL CHOICE IN THE CLASSROOM

This CD of the compelling talk given by Charlotte McQuaid-Bruen at Catholic Voice annual conference 2019, sums up the proposed sex education to be taught across schools in Ireland in 2020. Parents, grandparents, friends, family members and clergy need to be informed about what their children are going to be subjected to.

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Pray For The Unborn Dear Editor, With all the concern for taking measures to prevent people getting COVID-19, let us remember the millions of babies being butchered in the world despite lock-down. No Masses are being celebrated in public in Ireland, yet the killing of babies continues unabated, with no defence from those who have a duty to do so. Satan must be highly pleased. Pray to Our Lady to protect those babies who are being killed and about to be killed.

Our Lady help of the helpless pray for all babies.

Martin Hickey, Dublin.

19th June 2020

LETTERS 11

Catholic Voice

Letters Open letter to all Irish Bishops & Archbishops Your Excellencies, I am writing to you as a parishioner of Waterford City expressing my deep concern with regard to the crisis in our church as a consequence of the government’s current ‘management’ of the COVID-19 pandemic. As you know the current lock-down is now into its second month and as a consequence continues to deny the faithful laity access to the Holy Sacraments.

It is my belief that as a Catholic what we are now experiencing is a fundamental violation of our religious freedoms. The state should be attentive to the religious freedoms of all of its citizens, an issue I believe which is consistent within the legal tenets of our Constitution. God has made man to know, love and serve Him. We are faithfully obliged to observe God’s commandments, and the sacraments of reconciliation and the Eucharist are at the centre of our faith. What we are now witness to is the fact that our priests have been taken away from the faithful laity, which is now manifested by the continuing denial of access to the Holy Sacraments.

How many of the sick and dying were recently denied the comfort from the sacrament of the sick?

How many of the faithful laity continues to be denied the Body and Blood of our Lord Jesus Christ?

How long must this God given and inalienable right, as decreed within our Constitution, continue to be denied to the Irish people?

In last Sunday’s Gospel for Ascension Sunday, Christ said to his Apostles ‘Know that I am with you all days, until the end of time’.

What appears to be happening now is that our secular and unelected government are attempting to keep Christ separate from the faithful. There is no moral or legal justification for this.

Send your letters to: Letters Page, Catholic Voice, St Michael’s House, Castlemitchell South, Athy, Co Kildare or email to letters@catholicvoice.ie

Our secular state therefore appears to assume the authority of God. No human being has the right to assume divine law.

As you well know your Excellencies, we are living in extremely dark times. Our state and society have now openly implemented anti-family and anti-life policies, testament to the referenda out-comes of 2015 and 2018. It would seem now that the public denial of expression and devotion of our faith appears to be the next item on this agenda.

Churches are now closed to the faithful when ‘essential’ services to the public such as access to alcohol and abortion services continue to remain accessible. If there was ever a time when the laity need to freely engage in the expression of their faith, that time is now.

The US President, Donald Trump recently decreed that religious services are indeed essential for all American citizens. He is not a Catholic, but is probably the most Christian leader in the western world, and appears to be unafraid to lead by example. In this context, I

respectfully suggest that our current church leaders should perhaps follow President Trump’s example.

As an individual who values his faith, and the freedom to practice it, I respectfully and humbly ask you to open the Churches now and allow the faithful laity to receive the Holy Sacraments. I do sincerely appreciate and understand the gravity of this request, and the difficulty that this may put you in.

However, we are living in a time of profound moral crisis and it is times like this that we need leadership and our faith. If this will not happen, I firmly believe there will come a time when the faithful will indeed insist upon this request.

I sincerely thank you for taking the time to read this correspondence.

You and all of our local priests and servants of God will always remain in my prayers throughout this difficult and challenging time.

I remain your faithful servant in Jesus Christ.

Paul Hartney, Waterford.

12 RELATIONSHIPS & SEXUALITY

Catholic Voice

19th June 2020

The Sexual Revolution & Child Abuse John Lacken Let us pause for a moment to say one Hail Mary for our Irish Bishops that they will do all in their power to restore the sacraments to Christ’s faithful in a way that recognises that our spiritual needs are greater than our bodily needs and in a way that fully recognises and gives due honour and adoration to the True Presence - Body, Blood, Soul & Divinity - of Jesus Christ in the Most Holy Sacrifice of the Mass.

As I write this, it is more than 11 weeks since I last attended the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass. Lay Catholics need to be able to attend Holy Mass.

Someone recently sent me a copy of an article from a 2010 edition of ‘The Irish Catholic’ written

by David Quinn. The article in turn mentioned an Irish Times article which dealt with how “the radical left in Germany from the 1960s right through to the 1980s campaigned to legalise sex between children and adults.” David noted that, outside of Germany, the story did not gain much press attention as the international media preferred to focus mainly on scandals involving the Catholic Church whilst similar scandals that involved left wing ideologues were largely ignored.

In his article David Quinn men t i o n e d a n educational movement in Germany from the late 1960s. I had never heard of this movement so I decided to do a little bit of research because some of the perverted ideas mentioned in the article are now being promoted by the World Health Organisation and by the Irish Government under the guise of the proposed Relationships & Sexuality Education Programmes.

As a background, we need to remember that only those who are seventy-five and older remember the Second World War. Ireland was spared from most of the horrors inflicted by that war. In Germany, the aftermath of the war, especially concerning the discoveries of the concentration camps, led some Germans to search for a key to understanding how a nation could inflict such depravity on their fellow human beings. I was surprised to find that there were people who sought to identify the alleged sexual repression of the perpetrators as the cause of the holocaust in the concentration camps.

The work of the psychoanalyst Wilhelm Reich, which elevated the sexual aspect of man’s nature above man’s other attributes, fuelled the false understanding that, most problems within society are caused by sexual repression which in turn is enforced by authoritarian regimes. Reich wrote a book, which was published in English in 1939 under the title ‘The Sexual Revolution’, which promoted communism, sexual freedom, and which opposed traditional marriage and family life. Editions of the book after 1945, published for American audiences, were edited to remove the direct references to communism and to soften the anti-family stance of Reich. One is reminded of Our Lady’s warning at Fatima that Russia will spread her errors.

The progressive educational movement in Germany of the late 1960s sought to counteract these perceived negative and damaging influences by starting schools for young children where the children

would be left almost totally free from any enforced adult behavioural controls. The children were encouraged to feel free to express themselves in overtly sexual ways even if this included expressions of a sexual nature towards adults. The organisers of these schools also sought to undermine the natural family, blaming the traditional family as another vehicle for the repression of childhood sexuality.

Those who controlled the schools were anti-authoritarian in their views and they sought to mobilise the children from an early age to become involved in antiestablishment and anti-government protests.

Whilst space does not permit me to go into much depth on this subject, my interest arises from the fact that the German movement was influenced by left-wing ideological thought with roots in communism; that they saw childhood masturbation as a good thing which should be encouraged; by the fact that it was the German branch of the World Health Organisation which produced the depraved sexeducation guidelines in 2010 which recommend teaching children about masturbation from before the age of four; and that once again, children are being encouraged to become political activists most notably with the ‘climate strikes’ from school where young children were encouraged to leave school to take part in street protests against government policies.

The original movement in Germany was discredited, especially after it emerged that more than 130 pupils were sexually abused in one of

19th June 2020

Catholic Voice

RELATIONSHIPS & SEXUALITY 13

the most well-known, left-leaning, secular progressive boarding schools, but the ideological positions of the movement are alive and well and are now being contemplated for introduction into Irish Catholic schools by the NCCA. I am on the record as saying that the WHO guidelines from 2010 ‘Standards for Sexuality Education in Europe’ - constitute a manual for paedophilia and yet it is these guidelines which are influencing the Irish government’s policy for Relationships and Sexuality Education. In the same way that later editorial revisions of Wilhelm Reich’s book ‘The Sexual Revolution’ were ‘cleansed’ for the American public, the NCCA’s final report on RSE has been ‘cleansed’ of any references to the WHO guidelines even though these references were in the original draft reports.

Child abuse is a terrible thing and child sexual abuse does particularly horrific long-term damage. But we must be wary of those who promote radical ideologies under the guise of protecting children from child abuse. We must be wary of those who attack Catholic moral norms, especially concerning human sexuality, because some Catholic priests sexually abused children and this was covered up by some Catholic bishops. These priests and bishops were not following Catholic moral norms.

All Catholics are sinners, some more so than others. Neither baptism into the Catholic Church nor ordination to the priesthood confer sainthood on Catholics.

Catholics, being human, are just as capable of grave moral evil as anyone else, but, those who internalise Catholic moral norms are less likely to commit grave evils,

From The Pharisee & The Publican - James Tissot (1836 – 1902) provided they avail themselves of the Sacraments, acknowledge their own weaknesses, and seek Christ with humble and contrite hearts.

“A sacrifice to God is an afflicted spirit: a contrite and humbled heart, O God, thou wilt not despise.”

(Psalm 50:19) “Two men went up into the temple to pray: the one a Pharisee, and the other a publican. The Pharisee standing, prayed thus with himself: O God, I give thee thanks that I am not as the rest of men, extortioners, unjust, adulterers, as also is this publican. I fast twice in a week: I give tithes of all that I possess.

And the publican, standing afar off, would not so much as lift up his eyes towards heaven; but struck his breast, saying: O God, be merciful to me a sinner. I say to you, this man went down into his house justified rather than the other: because everyone that exalteth himself, shall be humbled: and he that humbleth himself, shall be exalted.” (Luke 18:10-14) A lack of catechesis and of proper moral formation leaves today’s Catholics probably just

as vulnerable to error in matters of human sexuality as their nonCatholic counterparts. The support amongst baptised Catholics for same-sex marriage, for abortion, for contraception, and for divorce, clearly shows us the lack of understanding of what it means to be Catholic. Many Catholics do not know of or understand the solid grounding in faith, reason, and science of Catholic moral teaching. They have been fooled by the relentless left-wing media propaganda against the Catholic Church and by those wolves in sheep’s clothing in high places of authority within the Catholic Church who publicly undermine her teachings.

These virtue signalling lefties who condemn the treatment of Jews in Nazi Germany whilst ignoring the Soviet Gulags and the murderous Chinese Communist regimes, also promote the abortion holocaust which murders Irish children in 2020. They cry crocodile tears over abused children whilst promoting the abuse of children through explicit sex education programmes.

Many Catholics, of every rank and status, being so badly catechised in the tenets of the Catholic Faith

14 RELATIONSHIPS & SEXUALITY remain unable to counter the arguments proposed in favour of these abusive policies.

Children are now being encouraged to experiment with sexual pleasure from before the age of four.

Teachers are being encouraged to groom school children into accepting sexual activity as normal from before primary school age.

The overall purpose of these programmes is to reduce the world’s population. Manic, wealthy ideologues have decided that there are too many people in the world, and they seek ways to reduce this number. The primary purpose of our human sexuality is the begetting of children. That sexual activity is accompanied by intense physical pleasures, does not change its primary end of children.

The population controllers are also eugenicists. They desire to purify mankind, to create in their own image, a super, god-like race of human beings who will rule over mankind.

They realise that you cannot stop people from engaging in sexual activity and so they seek to divert the purpose of sexual activity away from God’s purpose which is to have children within stable monogamous married relationships.

They do this by encouraging pre-pubescent children, who are incapable of fathering children, to become sexually active, either alone, or with other children. They are promoting a view of human sexuality which centres almost entirely on one’s own pleasure.

Pregnancy is seen as a distraction and an interruption of this pleasure principle, and so contraception and abortion are promoted to children as being normal and acceptable behaviours. Homosexual acts are promoted as being equal to heterosexual acts even though

Catholic Voice

homosexual acts are infertile and are therefore, not equal. This upholds and furthers the concept of widespread infertile sexual encounters the focus of which is purely pleasure seeking.

The pornography industry, which makes sexually explicit encounters freely available to view, even to young children, at the click of a mouse or the tap of a smart-phone screen, also furthers the false concept of endlessly pleasurable infertile sexual encounters with no regard for matrimony, or for faithfulness. The industry hides from public view the diseases caused by such sexual promiscuity and the subsequent murder of any children conceived through these filmed sexual encounters.

One of the dangers that we are faced with in our promiscuous world, is the danger of despair. It is easy for both young and old, being surrounded and immersed in a pornographic and hedonistic culture, which is prepared to kill children so as to satisfy the sexual cravings of the body, to fall into habitual sins of the flesh which become hard to resist given the pronounced sexual nature

19th June 2020 of our culture and of our own fallen human nature which is inclined towards evil.

A simple verification of this, is that during the so called and supposedly deadly Coronavirus pandemic, our Irish government has sought to make sure that those who wish to murder their unborn children will be facilitated, whilst those who may need surgery to improve their health and well-being, are denied access to surgical medical procedures.

Our Lady of Fatima warned Jacinta about how widespread sins of impurity would become.

Those who get caught up in the lies of the sexual revolution, may tend towards despair as they find it so hard to break the sexual habits to which they have become accustomed and even addicted to.

They have been encouraged and told throughout their school and college years that it is normal and perfectly healthy to engage in sexual activity even though one is not married; that it is perfectly normal to kill any of

“In the world you shall have distress but have confidence, I have overcome the world.” (John 16:33)

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RELATIONSHIPS & SEXUALITY 15

Catholic Voice

their own unwanted children which result from this irresponsible sexual activity; and that only prudes and religious nut-cases say anything different.

The moral teachings of the Catholic Church, which cannot be logically refuted, are undermined by pointing out that even Catholics commit sins of this nature. Those who fall into despair are often unaware of the great graces of the Sacraments of the Catholic Church which, through willing co-operation with God’s grace, can help people to escape their sexual and other addictions and be restored to wholeness. This is not necessarily an instantaneous process, and there may be many subsequent falls along the journey to living a holy life but, even as “a just man shall fall seven times and shall rise again” (Proverbs 24:16), so too those who persevere

in seeking first the Kingdom of God, will be able to overcome their sinful natures and, with God’s help, will reach the goal of Heaven.

Parents must be particularly alert in these dark and strange times. Now that the children have been kept away from school for more than two months, Catholic parents should once again consider the home schooling option in order to protect their children from the perverted ideologists whose programmes will corrupt the morals of very young children. Catholic parents have the onerous duty to protect their children and to educate them in all the truths of the Catholic Faith.

Catholics should focus on their duties and not on their rights.

Our modernist neo-pagan culture focuses on so-called rights and even Catholics can get caught up in promoting a rights-based culture.

LIBERALISM IS A SIN

But for Catholics, duty comes first.

Our first duty is to worship Almighty God and our second duty is towards our neighbour. A Catholic culture focuses on duty because duty is concerned with the ‘other’; with God; with my neighbour; and with community and the needs of others.

A rights-based culture on the other hand is focused on the individual; on myself; and on my selfish desires which are insisted upon.

A Catholic culture, where everyone does their duty, ensures that nobody’s rights are infringed.

Such a culture would never allow unborn children to be murdered because of the duty to protect innocent human life.

May God bless you

CATECHISM ON MODERNISM

the Catholic hierarchy.

On the 8th September 1907, His Holiness Pope Pius X, issued the Encyclical ‘Pascendi Dominici Gregis’ which translates as “Feeding the Lord’s Flock”. Pope Pius X was aware that the Catholic Church had been infiltrated by modernists who were seeking to undermine her doctrines from within.

Father J. B. Lemius, produced this ‘Catechism on Modernism’ in the familiar question and answer format of the time, in order to make the teachings of the Encyclical more accessible to ordinary Catholics and by way of explaining in a clear and concise manner the reasons why the Encyclical was published.

Paperback

Paperback

Don Félix Sardà y Salvany: – was born on May 21, 1844 in Sabadell, Catalonia, Spain. He was a Catholic priest and writer who wrote against Liberalism which he considered a grave sin. He was the editor of the weekly Spanish Catholic magazine ‘La Revista Popular’ for over forty years. He died on January 2, 1916 at the age of 71. This book, Liberalism is a Sin, is particularly relevant to the

times we live in today where Liberalism permeates every aspect of our society and has deeply infiltrated the thinking of many of

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16 THE BROWN SCAPULAR

Catholic Voice

19th June 2020

THE BROWN SCAPULAR The brown scapular of Our Lady of Mount Carmel, was revealed to St Simon Stock in a celebrated vision with which the Mother of God favoured him on the 16th of July, 1251, at Cambridge. Holding the scapular in her hand, she said: “Receive, my beloved son, this scapular of thy Order; it is the special sign of my favour, which I have obtained for thee and for thy children of Mount Carmel. He who dies clothed with this habit shall be preserved from eternal fire. It is the badge of salvation, a shield in time of danger, and a pledge of special peace and protection” As a garment, the scapular is a broad piece of cloth, with an aperture in it for the head, which hangs down in front and at the back almost to the ground, as may be seen in the habits of the Carmelites, the Benedictines, and some other religious Orders. The scapular worn by the faithful is a symbol of that worn by the religious of the Order of Mount Carmel. In form it is essential that it should consist of two parts, each oblong or square, in accordance with the custom that has long been observed and is sanctioned by the Church, fastened together with two strings, so that one part may hang on the breast and the other on the back.

When the Sacred Congregation was consulted as to whether it was lawful to make scapulars of an oval, round, or polygonal form, the response was that no innovation should be made; in other words, that the form up to that time in use should be retained as the only proper one. As regards the material of which it is lawful to make scapulars, it must be woollen cloth; cotton, silk, or other material is strictly forbidden; and by the word cloth is meant woven cloth, so that if threads of woollen were knit or worked with the needle into the form of a scapular it would not do. In colour the scapular must be brown or black. The habit of the Carmelites, of which it is a symbol, is brown, and hence that has always been regarded as the proper colour for the scapular; but it was maintained by some that the wool of a black sheep, inasmuch as it was the natural colour of the wool, and not dyed, would also be permitted.

It is permitted, although it is not necessary, to ornament the scapular with needlework, even though

the ornamentation is of a different colour from that of the scapular; nor need such ornament be worked with woollen thread; silk, cotton, or other thread may be used. But it is essential that the necessary colour of the scapular should predominate. It is not necessary to work any image or picture on the scapular; it may, however, be done if the colour of the scapular is left to predominate.’

Who may be invested with the scapular? The Church not only permits, but also wishes that all the faithful should enroll themselves among the devout servants of Mary, as she wishes them to make use of all the means of grace which in her liberality she places within their reach ; and hence all Catholics may be lawfully and validly invested with the scapular, there being nothing in the bulls or briefs of the Sovereign Pontiffs to forbid it. Even infants who have not yet come to the use of reason may be invested; and when they attain to the years of discretion it is not necessary for them to be again invested, or to do anything more than simply to comply with the necessary conditions for gaining the indulgences, and immediately they will begin to reap these spiritual advantages.

By whom can a person be invested ? By a priest of the Carmelite Order, or by any other priest duly authorized to invest with it. A priest who has power to invest others may also invest himself.

Whatever formulas were heretofore permitted for investing, the priest must now use the one prescribed by Pope Leo XIII, July 24, 1888. But one priest cannot bless the scapular, and another invest a person with it; the blessing and investing must both be done by the same priest.

What are the spiritual advantages of wearing the scapular? By wearing the scapular is meant that it be so adjusted upon the person that one part hangs on the breast and the other on the back, one of the strings passing over each shoulder. If both parts be carried on the breast, or both on the back, it is not wearing it, in the sense of the Church, and the person so acting would not be entitled to any of the graces or indulgences. Much less would a person be entitled to them who carried the scapular in his pocket. To keep the scapular about him in any way might indeed be a sign of devotion to

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Catholic Voice

THE BROWN SCAPULAR 17

THE SABATINE PRIVILEGE the Mother of God and of confidence in her protection, and as such would receive a fitting reward; but it would not in any sense be regarded as wearing it. It is not necessary that the scapular should be worn next the person; it may be worn over or under any part of the clothing. The religious who wear the large scapular are accustomed, as we know, to have it outside their habit.

The spiritual advantages of wearing the scapular are fivefold: those which are received during life; those received at the approach of death; those after death; the Sabbatine indulgence or privilege; and the other indulgences granted to those who wear the scapular.

And, first, as regards the advantages that may be received during life, it is to be remarked that the members of the Confraternity of the Scapular are associated with the religious Order represented by that scapular, which means that they participate in the fruit of all the good works of the religious belonging to that Order; that is, in the fruit of their prayers, meditations, Masses, fasting, penances, alms, and all else that goes to form the spiritual treasures of the Carmelite Order.

This privilege may also mean that sometimes, owing to the influence of the Blessed Virgin, the hour of death is postponed, to give an associate who is in sin a further opportunity of conversion; and writers add that this privilege may sometimes be exemplified in the case of obstinate and obdurate sinners when God permits death to come upon them when they are not wearing the scapular, either as the result of forethought or from indifference or neglect.

In the third place, as regards the graces after death, the deceased members of the confraternity have a special share in the fruit of the daily prayers of the Order of the Carmelites and of the Holy Sacrifice, which they offer once a week, and occasionally at other times during the year, for the deceased Carmelites and associates of the Carmelite Confraternity.

Fourthly, the meaning of the “Sabbatine indulgence” is this: the associates of the Scapular of Carmel enjoy, on certain conditions, the remarkable privilege known as the “privilege of delivery,” or the “ Sabbatine indulgence.”

This privilege refers to, and is grounded on, the promise of the Blessed Virgin, made to Pope John XXII, to withdraw promptly from purgatory, and especially on the first Saturday after death, associates of the Scapular of Carmel. The account of this revelation to Pope John XXII is embodied in his famous Bull ‘Sacratissimo Uticulmine’, more commonly called the Sabbatine Bull, on account of the promise of deliverance on the first Saturday after death.

Secondly, the favours granted at the approach of death to those who devoutly wear the scapular are that there is for them, like for those who wear the other scapulars, a formula for a general absolution at the moment of death, independent of the ordinary “Last Blessing,” which all the faithful are privileged to receive at their departing hour, as may be seen in another part of this work. Persons wearing the scapular are also encouraged to hope for the special assistance of the Mother of St Simon Stock Receiving the Scapular Fifthly there are many indulgences God at the moment of death, Giovanni BattistaTiepolo (1696 - 1770) associated with the wearing of the Brown Scapular including a plenary as she promised to St. Simon indulgence on the day of investiture. The reader cannot, Stock: “He who dies clothed with this scapular shall not but conclude from what has been said that we possess suffer eternal fire.” This is what is called the “privilege in the Scapular of Our Lady one of the richest fountains of preservation.” It means that the Blessed Virgin, by of grace the Church in her liberality has opened to us. her powerful intercession, will draw from the divine treasury in favour of the associates special graces to Adapted from ‘The Sacramentals Of The Holy Catholic Church’ by Rev. A. A. Lambing, L.L.D. Imprimatur. help the good to persevere to the end and to move + Michael Augustine, Archbishop of New York. sinners to avail themselves of favourable opportunities September 1, 1899. of conversion before death seizes on them.

18 PRO-LIFE CULTURE

Catholic Voice

19th June 2020

Changing the Culture: The Future for the Pro-Life Movement John Deighan

Editor’s note: John Deighan will succeed John Smeaton as CEO of SPUC next year, in this article he outlines his thoughts on the future for the Pro-Life movement.

In the quiet of the human heart the extraordinary value of life can be contemplated with wonder and awe. The gift of life with all its potential and opportunities can often however be overshadowed by the demands of the world around us with all its noise, worries, attractions and distractions. We live at a time when the world has never had such power to multiply human goods and pleasures but at the same time, we have never seemed more determined to degrade humanity in so many ways. A world which extols the value of human life, and multiplies ways to induce human pleasures, is at the same time willing to treat other human persons as objects, to hate those who think differently and to disdain those who are not young, beautiful and successful.

Modern entertainment media has, in the last few decades, grown powerful beyond the realm of imagination.

The youngest of children will often live in a virtual world that absorbs them through the screen of their mobile phone or tablet. Virtual worlds flourish with people often more integrated in a social media platform than they are in a physical community. The bread and circuses that once kept a population docile were crude at best in comparison to the global hegemony of streamed entertainment and ‘Just Eat’ home deliveries.

The wonders of science that have allowed such developments have unfortunately been accompanied by a collapse in cultural depth. The ideal of preparing young people to make their way in the world with a critical mind, an appreciation of human liberty and the virtues which direct it, has been displaced by a desperate attempt to inculcate youth in the ideologies of the reigning

elites. As a result many children clamour to join ideological groups with they barely understand.

The temptation is to despair and see the West as on the point of civilisational suicide. Even if the effort to promote an amoral and false humanism should fail to sink humanity, the corresponding collapse in birth-rates augurs badly for the social fabric and economy of the future.

However, rather than despair or be over-awed by the challenge of turning around a whole civilisation, we can diagnose what has gone wrong and assess how we can put it right.

It would take literally volumes, à la Arnold Toynbee or St Augustine’s City of God, to explore how a civilisation can destroy itself, but one thing that is evident is that it is not the masses themselves who lead in the collapse (or the prospering) of society, but those who shape the attitudes and lifestyles of the masses.

It has been the elites in positions of cultural influence that have taken control of the institutions which portray how we ought to live, and how we should think. They create a legal framework to promote their false values. Thus we see political edifices such as certain EU institutions or the United Nations, which were supposedly built on democracy and human rights, become instruments removed from democratic control and instead acting as ideological drivers of a distortion of human rights to an agenda comprising whatever human desires the socially powerful happen to have.

Of course there are genuinely good people in such institutions who care much about global peace, poverty, hunger and disease, but such sentiments are mixed with values that erode the foundations of society: the family, the procreative nature of marriage, the transcendent value

systems of faith and virtue-based education. This has culminated in an ethos that sees children in the womb as a threat and population growth as a most particular threat.

A quick check on how much money international organisations plough into population control in Africa instead of education may give a sense of that ethos.

What to do then if we are alarmed by the situation we face?

It is for us to be the new creative minority that infuses the society around us with the values that act as an antidote to the poisons infecting our institutions. It is for this reason that we need to use the talents of those committed to the value of life to engage in the areas where they can have most effect. Politics, of course, is one of those areas but politicians are formed from the milieu in which they live. Without addressing the ideological capture of the universities, trade unions, legal and medical professions, we will not make great headway with most politicians. In terms of the creative industries of media and entertainment, our fellow citizens are absorbing a secularist education through the manipulation of their emotions. Engaging in this area will require using appropriate tools of communication in order serve the truth and shape ideas and opinions, through thought-provoking images and personal stories.

The future of the pro-life movement is one which will embrace all these areas of cultural battle. At SPUC we are working tirelessly to reach these areas through our work with youth, our research, our growing social media efforts, drama productions, parish talks, targeted political campaigning, and grassroots organisation. This is the work which we will carry forward in the years ahead as we endeavour to find eventual success in the greatest human rights challenge the world has ever seen.

19th June 2020

Catholic Voice

CONSECRATION OF RUSSIA 19

Global Catholic Appeal

To Pope Francis and the Worlds Bishops Consecrate Russia to the Immaculate Heart of Mary Establish As A Universal Practice of the Catholic Church

The Five First Saturday Devotion Of Reparation On October 13th, 2020

The purpose of this Global appeal is to gather the signatures of Catholics from all over the World who wish to unite in the appeal to Pope Francis and to the World’s Catholic Bishops asking them to specifically consecrate Russia to the Immaculate Heart of Mary, as she herself requested. The consecration must be specifically for Russia and must mention Russia by name.

These signatures will be presented to Pope Francis on the 7th October, 2020, with copies of the signatures from each diocese being sent to the relevant Diocesan Bishop asking for the consecration of Russia to the Immaculate Heart of Mary, to take place on October 13th, 2020, the 103rd anniversary of the Miracle of Fatima.

The appeal will also ask for the formal establishment, as a Universal Practice of the Catholic Church, The Five First Saturday Devotion of Reparation to the Immaculate Heart of Mary.

It is hoped to collect the signatures on a country by country basis, or a State by State basis where this is more appropriate. Each country/state will have a central co-ordinator but all Catholic organisations will be encouraged to take part so that the appeal will have as broad a reach as possible and in an effort to avoid any partisanship.

The official launch of the appeal will take place on Friday 19th June, 2020, the feast of the Most Sacred Heart of Jesus and will close on Tuesday 15th September, the feast of Our Lady of Sorrows to allow time to sort and co-ordinate the signatures on a Diocese by Diocese basis.

In Ireland & Northern Ireland, the Lumen Fidei Institute & Catholic Voice will co-ordinate the appeal and printed forms for collecting signatures may be had by contacting:

The Lumen Fidei Institute - 085-1208779 By e-mail - secretary@lumenfidei.ie Signatures can also be given online at www.lumenfidei.ie - click the Global Catholic Appeal Banner We will publish the names of the organisations who will be co-ordinating the signatures in other countries as time goes on.

The focus will be for the laity to get involved in collecting signatures, but the support of Priests, Bishops, Cardinals and religious congregations will be most welcome and a prayer initiative will also be launched to ask Our Lady to grant us success in encouraging Pope Francis to consecrate Russia to Her Immaculate Heart.

This document forms a basic template for what is envisaged and suggestions are most welcome from anyone with ideas as to how best to accomplish this global Appeal.

Sacred Heart of Jesus, we place all our trust in You. Immaculate Heart of Mary, pray for us.

St Joseph, pray for us.

20 HELPING OUR PRIESTS

Catholic Voice

19th June 2020

The Loneliness of the Long-Distance Priest Christopher Monckton of Brenchley

This column, gentle reader, takes a down-to-earth approach to heaven.

We have taken a straightforwardly pragmatic approach to the Chinese v i r u s e m e r g e n c y. We h a v e dismissed the ludicrous notion, aired in some quarters, that the pandemic was visited upon us by a wrathful God. We have described how churches can take sensible, practical precautions to keep their congregations safe enough to allow them to open at once. We have shown how governments can at once end economically-crippling but no-longer-necessary lock-downs by realizing that those who are fit and under 50 are less likely to die of the Chinese virus than of the flu, and acting accordingly.

Today, we shall address another problem posed by the pandemic.

This problem is growing more acutely urgent by the day. It is something that you can help with straight away.

Consider the priests of the Church, how theirs is a lonely calling. By long tradition, they are forbidden to marry. Their flock is their family.

They live in poverty – often in dire poverty. But even with the parish around them, the road they are summoned to follow is a steep and, above all, a lonely road.

When I edited the Catholic newspaper The Universe, I used to conduct surveys of the readers to find out what was on their mind.

Of all the world’s social problems, they twice voted loneliness as Number 1. Now imagine how much more acute that loneliness becomes

A garden is a lovesome thing, God wot! Rose plot, fringed pool, fern’d grot.

when governments decree that the families of the priests – their parish congregations – can no longer gather about them in the Real Presence of the most exemplary of family men.

They cannot say Mass with the people. They cannot sing to the Lord a new song with the choir. They cannot take up their shepherd’s staff and go and knock on doors.

They cannot visit the sick or the dying. They cannot teach the Faith of our fathers, or anything else, to classes of youngsters. They cannot do any of the good works that they normally have the courage to do day in and day out.

To be a priest at all is a lifelong act of continuous heroism. The Church is in decline. People stay away in droves. Governments openly flout the decrees of heaven. News media concentrate relentlessly on our faults and seldom give us even the

briefest right of reply. Religious broadcasting has been squeezed out of existence.

The message of love that so moved the world that within a century of the descent of the Holy Spirit at Pentecost on the trembling Apostles, Christianity had spread right across the known world is now widely unheeded or, if noticed at all, treated with indifference at best and hatred and contempt at worst.

And yet the Fisherman’s friends, those who had the sheer guts to heed His call to be fishers of men at a time when men do not want to be fished, have stood faithfully to their posts. They have not wavered. And now, in that loneliest and bravest of all professions, our priests – our priests – are even more on their own than ever before.

The clergy are isolated by the antisocial distancing inflicted upon us

19th June 2020

HELPING OUR PRIESTS 21

Catholic Voice

all by governments some of which appear to be enjoying the exercise of wartime centralized power a great deal too much.

What are we going to do about the loneliness of the long-distance priest?

We shall begin with the simplest measures. As so often, we shall take my angelic wife as an example for all of us to follow. She lifts the telephone very nearly every evening to spend a few minutes laughing and joking with our saintly parish priest, who is almost 90 but had, until the pandemic, been saying Mass every week for us a quarter of a century after a lesser mortal would have hung up his cassock and retired.

She also keeps in touch with the priest who had married us 30 years ago this month. Just yesterday evening (as I write this) she and I were sitting in the tiny thatched summer-house, just big enough for two, that the Scots harmoniously describe as a “sitootery”. The telephone rang. It was the gentle Oratorian who, in the presence of the Bishop of Leeds, the Papal Nuncio, members of the Cabinet and every A-lister for miles around, had filled the vast Italianate London Oratory Church to celebrate the fact that Monckton had at last been taken firmly in hand and was off the market.

The Sitootery I shall not trouble you with the trifling but delightful inconsequentialities that kept us amused as we talked. But the holy Oratorian, who was grinning from ear to ear throughout, ended the conversation by saying how much he hoped we could have such conversations regularly in future.

You can do face-to-face video telephone calls for free if you sign up to one of the many social media platforms that provide such video calling. That makes the calls much more effective in banishing – at least for a time – the loneliness of the priest.

And what about sending a hamper of goodies to the priest with love from you and your household?

There are plenty of companies who make up and deliver such hampers, or – for a more personal touch – you can get baking and put your own hamper together.

The deadliest combination that our soldiers of Christ suffer is loneliness and poverty. I am hoping that the Catholic Voice and the Lumen Fidei Institute will be able to work rapidly to establish a charitable fund, Stand By Our Priests, so that every Catholic can donate by standing order once a week either to his or her chosen priest via the fund or for the benefit of any priest whom the Bishops recommend as being in particular need of our help.

“Ye shall know them by their fruits,” said the Lord of Life. It is going to be a splendid strawberry season this year: the long, dry early summer following the long, wet late spring will see to that. So let us be known to our clergy by our fruits, no less literally than metaphorically.

Here is what you can do. While we are working to set up the fund, copy this article around to all your Catholic friends. Tweet it, forward it, promote it. Alert them to the fact that we, the lay people, are now going to stand by our priests just as they have stood by us throughout their lives.

Finally, let us pray for our wonderful clergy. Let us pray for them every day. And let us remember the wise words of Cardinal Manning, amplifying an aperçu originally sent to him by Monsignor Talbot: “The duty of the Catholic layman is to hunt, to shoot, to fish and to contribute to the support of the clergy.”

The Sitootery

22 SPIRITUAL LIFE

Catholic Voice

19th June 2020

Discernment In The Modern Age Sr Anne Marie Walsh S.O.L.T.

One of the banes of modern life is the ubiquitous presence of bad entertainment, bad both in the sense of poorly crafted and in the sense of poisonous content. It’s an observation that can be applied to books, movies, music, TV, and other forms of leisure activity as well. What constitutes healthy food for the mind and soul? We have great concern for the health of our bodies and our environment.

And we feed them and protect them accordingly. At the same time, we seem to have much less conscious concern for what goes into our minds, our souls, our spirits.

We simply consume whatever is offered, no longer recognising the difference between junk food and delicacy, nutrients, and toxins.

thinking, take the water and drink it. But if someone told us that despite its inviting appearance, the water had E.coli in it, we would not approach it, much less drink it, no matter how thirsty we were, knowing it would be hazardous to our health.

This can be very dangerous. It’s a lot like seeing a glass of cold, refreshing water after coming in on a hot, dusty day. The reaction is immediate and almost overwhelming. We would, without

The reality, though, is that it doesn’t matter whether the poison is hidden in small amounts. A little poison will kill you just as dead over time. When our emotions, our passions, our senses, apart from

This is very much like what happens when we indiscriminately read or watch whatever is the latest rage, whether it be fictional stories, movies, TV shows that mock God, believers, our faith, or current book marketings of pornography (now especially targeting women’s readership). So many times, people say: “it’s not so bad. It’s just a little sex, or just a little violence, or just a little language.”

Indiscriminate TV and Internet Viewing is Dangerous

our intellect, make our decisions for us, we are capable of drinking to the dregs whatever contaminant is presented to us. And today, very deadly poisons abound. Our culture prizes acceptance, tolerance, and open-mindedness. It has been noted though, that the danger comes when people become so open-minded their brains fall out.

Pope Benedict mentioned that knowledge for its own sake only leads to sadness, and sometimes, to much worse things.

This is not a new problem. The young St. Teresa of Avila had an attraction to the romance adventure novels of her time, until she realised that the illusions, vanity and worldliness they sowed in her were a great obstacle to her life in general and her relationship with God in particular.

They did not help her live in reality and especially in the reality of her dignity as a woman, a beloved daughter of God with a great destiny, a great part to play in the life of the Church and the world.

St. Ignatius of Loyola, Founder of the Jesuits, also had this problem before his conversion. He is famous for realising how the books he read affected the movements of his soul, for better or worse. While recovering from a severe battle injury, he began to recognise that the worldly books he was fond of and which also fed his vanity gave him a feeling of excitement, which quickly passed and left him feeling discontented and restless.

On the other hand, when he read books on the lives of the saints and their great deeds, he found himself inspired and filled with a desire to follow their example.

These feelings did not change.

19th June 2020

Catholic Voice

From this simple observation St. Ignatius developed his principles for discernment, which are now indispensable teachings for anyone serious about the spiritual life.

We, of course, need discernment in many areas of our lives. And because we live in a complicated age, it is good to look for some general direction. One place to find this is back at the very beginning.

God gave some straightforward instructions for life in the Garden, and repeated them after the fall, through Moses. He told Adam and Eve that they could eat from the Tree of Life and the other trees in the Garden, but not of the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil.

Later, He reiterated this directive to the Israelites in Exodus. “Choose life that you may live.”

In all honesty, when our question becomes: “Is what I am about to say or see or do, life-giving to

me and those around me,” we can frame issues in a new light.

This is not the only question we sometimes need to ask. But it is a very good place to start and finish.

Is this life-giving or is this poison to me, to my relationships, to my dignity or someone else’s dignity?

It is a question that can be used with many of the choices we should make today with more deliberation than we do. And it is a question that avoids the dissembling of moral relativism. Something is either life-giving to all involved, or it is not. If it is not, it is to be avoided.

God’s commandments and the Church’s counsels are not meant to cramp our style or dampen our fun. They are meant to protect us.

God knows what is good, what is healthy for us. And He also knows what will make us sick in body, mind, and spirit. Technology and the creative powers of mankind in many different fields have the

SPIRITUAL LIFE 23 potential to serve life or to bring death, both physical and spiritual death, depending on how they are used. If we genuinely want to live and live well the abundant life Jesus promises us, then we have to stop starving our own souls and start discerning how to eat more plentifully from the Tree of Life.

Questions for Reflection 1. Where in my life am I eating from the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil instead of the Tree of Life?

2. What kinds of things does a person dealing with serious illness need to discern? Physically, spiritually, emotionally, psychologically?

3. What feeds me emotionally and spiritually when I am suffering or deeply challenged by life?

4. Have I ever sensed the mission and purpose of my life? If so, how have the challenges of life impacted that?

24 MASONRY-ISLAM-COVID

Catholic Voice

19th June 2020

Who is Leading Us? And to Where?

Anne Keeling

In my last article I referred to a statement issued on the 17th of April last by the Vatican’s Pontifical Council for Inter-Religious Dialogue which encouraged Catholics to participate in Iftar meals with Muslims.

This Pontifical Council for Interreligious Dialogue surfaced again in my recent reading in an article which referred to Fr Michael Heinrich Weninger, who is a member of the Council. He published a book in February of this year claiming practising Catholics can also be Freemasons without any inherent difficulty and without penalty of ex-communication.

Fr Weninger was himself “installed and invested as a Chaplain” at a Freemason lodge in 2014 and this can be read in a Freemason communiqué.

Fr Weninger appears in a photograph with Austrian Lodge Grand Master Georg Semler at the book’s launch.

He also appears smiling in another photograph on a Masonic website.

The publication of this book was a source of happiness for Grand Master Semler who, it is said, saw it as “a breakthrough” in “reconciliation” between the Catholic Church and Freemasonry.

As well as being a Freemason chaplain and a member of the Vatican’s Pontifical Council for Interreligious Dialogue, according to a Vatican Radio archive Fr Weninger was made responsible for “the dialogue with Islam in Europe and Central Asia” in the council in 2012.

This may have contributed to the afore-mentioned Iftar meal-sharing

Fr Michael Heinrick Weninger with His Book on Fremasonry (photo Fr Weninger)

exhortation by the Pontifical Council for Interreligious Dialogue.

If you’re not alarmed that a member of the Pontifical Council for Interreligious Dialogue is a Freemason and spearheading the Council’s relations with Islam maybe you ought to be.

Now, just in the last two weeks, in another article linking the Vatican, Freemasonry and Islam, is the revelation that the leading Italian Freemasonic magazine Nuovo Hiram of the Masonic Grand Orient lodge in Italy has enthusiastically hailed Pope Francis’s “Document on Human Fraternity for World Peace and Living Together”, which he co-signed in Abu Dhabi, UAE, with Sheikh Ahmed el-Tayeb, Grand Imam of Al-Azhar, on February 4th, 2019.

Remember that document? Which claims that diversity of religions is willed by God?

Nuovo Hiram alarmingly referred to the document as “a slow-release drug” and said the signing of it was “a turning point in civilisation because it will open a new era” if applied.

A “new era” sounds ominous. This is a Freemason publication that is saying this. When Freemasons are publicly applauding the actions of the Catholic hierarchy and anticipating these as leading to “a turning point in civilisation” we do well to worry.

Another thing Freemasonry promotes is Communism. I think I can speak for many Catholics when I say that the COVID-19 pandemic and the restrictions which the global lockdown have instituted come with an overpowering whiff of Communist totalitarianism.

Yellow Covid-19 signs everywhere you look. Pavement markings appearing overnight. Covid-19

19th June 2020

MASONRY-ISLAM-COVID 25

Catholic Voice

bulletins and ads on TV, radio, in newspapers, underneath YouTube videos. Covid-19-themed graphics dotted in computer imaging software. The euphemistically titled horror of “social distancing” that shows no sign of ending. The restrictions on healthcare coupled with easier access to abortion.

The threat of contact tracing apps and mandatory vaccination. The anticipation of mental health repercussions and planned “remote therapy” sessions. How can this universal nightmare not have been choreographed and stage-managed?

As for the continuing restriction on the Church and deprivation of the sacraments it’s glaringly obvious that it’s unnecessary, dragging on too long, while (unelected) Varadkar refers to the need for relieving strain on pubs, records a video greeting to the Islamic community at the end of the “holy season of Ramadan” (can’t recall the Christian community getting an Easter one) and Trump-bashing Sinéad O’Connor graces the final Late Late Show of the season in her hijab.

As I write the US is experiencing dreadful violence in cities right across the country. Antifa is behind much of this anarchy. First a pandemic, then a lockdown, now civil unrest fomented partly by a Marxist/Anarchist movement.

I recall seeing a placard with the Antifa logo held up silently by an individual on the footpath as I was walking in the Rally for Life in Dublin some years ago. More recently Antifa have turned up to violently disrupt peaceful free speech rallies here.

One of the sticking points in these free speech rallies is the issue of mass immigration and the labelling of the free speech protestors as racists and Nazis by Antifa and other leftists. The mass immigration issue has a religious as well as a cultural dimension.

Europeans are seeing the changing face of

New Covid-19 Warnings in Knock Shrine their countries. The once Christian continent is losing its identity.

Islam is being promoted as the acceptable religion now as “Islamophobia” is criminalised and prosecuted and anti-Islamic sentiment censored by social media overlords who simultaneously promote a benign view of Islam.

Indeed the Freemasons must have been thrilled at the announcement in September 2019 of the proposed building in Abu Dhabi of “Abrahamic Family House” – a “fruit” of the “Document on Human Fraternity for World Peace and Living Together”. This multi-faith construction is to contain, in three separate cubes, a church, a mosque

and a synagogue, altogether on a secular visitor pavilion, designed by an architect influenced by “soviet aesthetics”.

No doubt there are many other such mergers in the globalist pipeline.

As the burning and rioting began in Minneapolis, Michael Matt of the Remnant newspaper described what has been going on all over the world since early this year as “a global takedown of Christianity”.

Well, we’ll just see what Heaven has to say about all this.

“O Mary, conceived without sin, pray for us who have recourse to thee.”

Pope Francis and Ahmad Al-Tayyeb sign the Document on Human Fraternity in Abu Dhabi on February 4th 2019 - (Vatican Media)

26 SAINT CLARE

Catholic Voice

19th June 2020

St Clare - Liberatrix of Assisi Fr Leópold Chérance O.S.F.C. The first incident brings us close to I230 - an approximate date, for the Saint’s biographer, Thomas of Celano, who transmits to us the details with such care and guarantees their authenticity, omits, as usual, to fix the epoch.

In any case, it was the time when Frederick II, the powerful Emperor of Germany, the ungrateful pupil of Innocent III, entered on a campaign against the Roman Pontiffs, regardless of the oaths he had taken before the altars. Of unbridled as well as unscrupulous ambition, he aimed at nothing less than to plant his standard in the Eternal City, and to restore for his own advantage the universal dominion of the pagan Caesars.

Already his German archers, seasoned warriors upon whom he could rely, had made themselves masters here and there in Italy of the fortified places.

To swell their battalions, he had brought from Sicily a troop of twenty thousand Saracens, and given up to them at Nocera an old fortress, whence, as from an inaccessible aerie, these brigands dashed unexpectedly on the surrounding country to devastate it.

He left the patrimony of St. Peter a prey to their fury, and at once they invaded Umbria, beginning with Spoleto. There were no kind of atrocities that these barbarians, with a fanatical hatred of the Christian name, did not commit.

They sacked the towns, pillaged the villages, set fire to the vineyards, and massacred the inhabitants. Ravaging in this way, a band of these miscreants arrived under the walls of St. Damian’s.

The sight of the monastery excited their cupidity. In the middle of the

night they scaled the outer walls, uttering frightful yells, and had reached the door of the cloister. On hearing the cries of the invaders, the terrified and weeping nuns fled for refuge to the bedside of their Mother, then lying seriously ill.

Clare was undisturbed. In presence of the danger, she went straight to Him Who was her source of strength, as her ancestors went for their swords; and her strong support was the God of the Eucharist. Helped by two of her nuns, Sister Francesca of Colledimezzo and Sister Illuminata of Pisa, she rose, and had herself borne to her private oratory, where she was privileged to have the Blessed Sacrament.

Prostrate, face forward, on the floor, she thus addressed Our Lord: “O my Lord, will it please Thee, then, to abandon into the hands of these barbarians Thy loving handmaidens whom until now Thou hast nourished with Thy love ? Do Thou, O Lord, guard them, and of Thy mercy, which I now humbly implore, save these

poor virgins, whom I have not the power to save.”

Then a voice, as it were of a child, coming from the Blessed Sacrament, replied: “I shall always protection.”

be

your

Clare, with increased fervour and confidence, continued: “O most clement Lord, I pray Thee protect also this my country, which for love of Thee has so generously fed and assisted us.”

The same voice answered: “Thy country will have much to suffer, but My arm will defend it.”

Reassured by this promise, half rising and turning towards her companions, her face bathed in tears, she said to them: “Fear naught, my daughters; no ill will happen to thee, and nothing will occur to disturb thy peace. I promise it in the Name of the most clement Christ. Only have confidence.”

19th June 2020

Catholic Voice

SAINT CLARE 27

Then, consoled and encouraged, she advanced with the ciborium containing the Blessed Sacrament to an open window of the monastery, against which the infidels, who had scaled the inner wall which separated them from the cells, had already placed a ladder. At this sight a panic seized the Saracens. Those who mounted the wall, stricken with blindness, fell down precipitately, while the others, filled with a secret terror, fled. The convent and the city were thus saved from pillage.

Four years afterwards Vitale d’Aversa, Lieutenant of Frederick II., came in turn to lay siege to Assisi, threatening to put its inhabitants to the sword if they did not surrender at discretion. In this extremity, Clare and her companions prostrated themselves before the tabernacle, covering their heads with ashes, and prayed for the deliverance of their city. The next day (June 22, I234) the besiegers, surprised by a sortie of the inhabitants, were suddenly seized with terror, and fled in disorder.

Vitale d’Aversa himself perished miserably a short time afterwards. For the second time the seraphic city was saved. Let us add, to its credit, that it did not mistake the cause of such an unexpected deliverance. It did not attribute it to the wisdom of its chiefs nor to the valour of its soldiers, but to the merits and intercession of Favorino’s daughter.

These two prodigies are of incontestable authenticity.

They have the authority of a contemporary whose judgments are above all discussion, Thomas of Celano, and are aflirmed by secular writers, as well as by historians of the Order. The first forms part of the Liturgical Oflice, and Christian artists have popularized it by representing St. Clare carrying the Blessed Sacrament. Neither can the second prodigy be an interpolation. In fact, it is found not only in ancient manuscripts : it is inscribed on another document, the value of which cannot be denied. This record is the popular memory. Every year a festival, at once religious and patriotic, revives and prolongs throughout the ages the remembrance of that happy event. On June 24 the whole city of Assisi gives itself up to rejoicing. The clergy, escorted by the magistrates, pious confraternities, and the masses, go processionally to St. Damian’s.

An authoritative voice reminds younger generations of the miraculous deliverance of the city and of the name of the liberatrix; then all, kneeling, beg the seraphic virgin to still and always watch over them, over this corner of the land she loved so much during her life, and of which she ever remains the guardian angel.

This commemorative ceremony, aflirms a modern writer, a native of Assisi itself,* has survived all political changes, and annually repeats itself with a glow of enthusiasm which is inextinguishable, because it springs anew from a source always gushing - the gratitude of a whole city, of a whole people.

Saint Clare with the Eucharist Isidoro Arredondo (1655-1702) Paris is never weary of singing the praises of St. Genevieve, the conqueror of the Huns; Orleans elevates to the skies the Blessed Joan of Arc, the liberatrix of France; Assisi, too, has a good right to be proud of its heavenly protectress, and acclaim in her an envoy from God, a radiant virgin, a Christian Judith, one of those heroines who are an honour to their country because they have been its salvation.

There is nothing in history so interesting as these popular manifestations, nothing so attractive as the unforeseen appearance of . the supernatural which occasioned them. And in the case of St. Clare, what varied benefits ! Providential succour, sudden cures, unexpected deliverance—in all these events, with which her name is mixed up, the Divine element is luminously conspicuous, and environs it with an aureola which has attracted and held us. We do not regret it: the Divine is always soul-raising.

But, let us say at once, the greatest of all the miracles is the Saint herself—the Saint, with her interior beauties, the splendour of her virtues, and the merit of her victories. Oh, the touching spectacle!

Extract from ‘St Clare of Assisi’ - published 1910

28 SAINTS

Catholic Voice

19th June 2020

The Saints Attributes St Angeli Merici - The Cloak & The Ladder Canon Wulfran Lebocq I.C.K.S.P. Saint Angela Merici has the distinction of being the foundress of the Ursulines, an order of nuns renowned for its members’ devotion to the education of children and young women, as well as its work in war-time hospitals. The Saint was born the 21st March 1474 at Desenzano, in the Lombardy region of Italy. She was orphaned at the age of only ten years. Her uncle, in his charity, took Angela and her sister into his own home, and there they led a virtuous and happy life.

However, her sister was struck down by a sudden death, perishing without the Last Rites of the Church, causing Angela much anguish. She became a Franciscan tertiary and increased her prayers and mortifications for the repose of her sister’s soul. Sometime later she had the bliss of receiving a vision making known to her that God had saved her sister’s soul, and that she was now in the company of the saints in Heaven.

At the age of twenty her uncle died, and she returned to the village of Desenzano. The saint realised that young girls needed more and better instruction in their Catholic faith, and she founded a school for the youngest girls of the village; teaching them the basics of their religion. She would occasionally receive ecstatic visions from God, during one of which it was revealed to her that she should found an association of virgins dedicated to the education of girls. Her school at Desenzano met with great success,

and shortly thereafter expanded to the nearby city of Brescia.

Saint Angela made a pilgrimage to the Holy Land in 1524, suffering the unexpected trial of being struck blind while praying on the island of Crete. However, she continued as a pilgrim to the other holy places, and upon her return to the same place where the blindness had begun, she was miraculously cured while praying before a crucifix. In the jubilee year of 1525 she made another pilgrimage, this time to Rome to gain the indulgences. Pope Clement VII, being familiar with her reputation for holiness, invited Angela to remain in Rome. In her humility however, the saint elected to return to Brescia.

On the 25th November 1535, with twelve virgins she founded the Ursuline Order in a small house near the Church of Saint Afra.

After serving five years as the first superior of the order, she died the 27th January 1540.

The life of Saint Angela should teach us that our confidence in God is always rewarded. This saint’s parents perished when she was only ten years old, and only a short time later she suffered the grief of her elder sister’s sudden death without the Sacraments. That she received a warm welcome into the home of her uncle and a heavenly vision to reassure her of her sister’s happy eternity is a testament to the generosity and paternal solicitude of God towards his most humble servants.

Saint Angela Merici Saint Angela is most commonly depicted in works of art in the cloak of the Ursuline Order, as a symbol of her status as its founder.

She is also frequently shown with a young girl at her side, recalling her own teaching efforts and all the educational work her order has done in the centuries since its founding. Certain paintings of the saint will feature an angel as well as a sign of the miraculous intervention of God in her life at various moments, from visions to the healing of her blindness.

Another important attribute often seen is the ladder, symbolising the role of education and the benefits it bestows in this life on those who are privileged to receive it. More importantly however, the ladder is a symbol of education in the Faith, which is necessary for our eternal salvation.

19th June 2020

Catholic Voice

After Saint Angela’s death in 1540, in accordance with her desire she was buried in the Church of Saint Afra, as she wished to be near the remains of this martyr.

Her body remained miraculously incorrupt in this church until Allied bombing completely destroyed it on the 2nd March 1945, along with much of the surrounding buildings

of the town of Brescia. These were all rebuilt however, and the church was consecrated on the 27th January 1956; being dedicated to Saint Angela. She was canonised on the 24th May 1807 by Pope Pius VII, and her feast day is traditionally celebrated on the 1st June. She is invoked as a patron of the sick, the handicapped, and those who’ve suffered the death of their parents.

ORDINATIONS 29 Prayer: “May the Virgin Saint Angela never fail to commend us to Thy compassion, O Lord, we pray, that, following the lessons of her charity and prudence, we may hold fast to Thy teaching and express it in all that we do. Through our Lord Jesus Christ, Thy Son, Who livest and reignest with Thee in the unity of the Holy Ghost, one God, world without end, amen.”

Priestly Ordinations During The Coronavirus Pandemic It was an emotional but uplifting moment as two Franciscan Friars of the Renewal were ordained priests in an almost empty church in Newark, New Jersey. Fr. Oisin Martin from Dublin, Ireland, and Fr. Malachy Napier from Georgia, United States, entered into the priesthood despite the ordination almost having to be postponed due to Covid-19.

30 BOOKS

Catholic Voice

19th June 2020

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REFLECTIONS ON THE ABORTION ISSUE IN IRELAND:

“There is in every man and woman a belief below the level of consciousness that some things are inherently right or wrong. It is a natural moral sense that transcends borders and cultures. One such universal belief is that human life is precious and consequently human killing can never be countenanced. The deliberate killing of a human being is considered the ultimate crime. The most fundamental of all human rights is the right to life.

No person, no law, and no government can extinguish that right. Remove that right and all other human rights become meaningless.

However, many countries, including Ireland, have removed that right from the Constitution and given the legislature the power to legalise abortion, which by definition is the intentional killing of the unborn child. The assumption is that unborn babies have no human rights. The essays in this monograph expose the fallacy that unborn babies do not have the right to life and may be ‘terminated’ if that is the ‘choice’ of the mother. In the New Ireland, human killing is now legal. It is estimated that 800 – 900 unwanted unborn babies are ‘terminated’ every month. Abortion has become the murder machine of our time.”

James M Bourke has been involved in the pro-life movement in Ireland for many years. Like all those who cherish human life, he was very disappointed when the referendum to repeal the 8th amendment to the Irish constitution was passed. This removed all legal protection from unborn children. In this book James shares his reflections on how the referendum was won and on how we must restore legal protection to the unborn regardless of the cost.

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