THE TAOS TATLER.

A surprisingly even-handed account of the Latin Mass movement in the Catholic Church. I was so gratified I took out a (trial) subscription to the New Yorker.

Happy Easter to all my readers! I am humbled by and grateful for your taking in my scribblings and rants.

Some years ago, Good Friday, I was seated in a pew at my beloved Anglo-Catholic parish in Manhattan. The Mass of the Pre-Sanctified was being celebrated. For those not in the know, it is a liturgy long ago removed from the Catholic Missal, having been abolished in the reforms of 1955. It is, however, still celebrated by Anglo-Catholics.

During the mass, I was marvelling at the beauty of it, the chants, the clouds of billowing incense, and the celebrants resplendent in their black vestments. Then something strange happened. Amid the glory and pomp, I distinctly heard a voice, not mine, in my head say to me: “Jesus is not here.” I was startled by that, and after mass pondered the meaning of it while riding the uptown train to Washington Heights, where I lived. I continued to ponder it for quite some time after.

One day, while walking down Ninth Avenue in Hell’s Kitchen to my job, I again heard a voice in my head, but this time it was clearly mine, and it solved the mystery I had been pondering all the while. The voice told me: “You have to go to Rome.”

I had in the past considered the possibility of swimming the Tiber, owing to the increasing disarray in the Episcopal Church, in which I had been raised. Additionally, I was deeply impressed by the new pope, Benedict XVI.  At the same time, though, I believed the little jewel of a church I attended was sufficient for salvation, and I should stay put. Now I no longer believed it.

I did not know any Catholic priest, either in person or by name, whose counsel l might seek, but a little later the name of a priest did occur to me, one whose writings and talks on ESPN I had much enjoyed, Fr. George Rutler. I found his church online and since there was no email address on the website, I sent him a letter snail mail, including in it my email address, asking if I might see him. The very next day I received an email from Father that simply read: “Come see me.” I did.

That was the beginning of my embracing the full Catholic faith. Father and I talked for a good hour. He suggested some books I should read, including Newman’s Apologia, Augustine’s Confessions and several others. He told me catechism classes at his church were just beginning for the year and that I might like to attend them, but he also told me I didn’t have to: “I give Anglicans a pass,” he said. I went to one anyway and was so impressed by the two young men conducting the class I decided to attend all of them

We had to work in those classes. We read the entire Catechism, many papal bulls and encyclicals and were even given writing assignments. After seven months I felt I was a reasonably well-informed catechist.

Not long afterward, at the Easter Vigil in the Church of Our Saviour in New York, I was confirmed and received into the Holy Catholic Church by Fr. Rutler.

My Catholic journey has since had its ups and downs. One of the ups was shortly after being received, coming across the Church of the Holy Innocents in New York and learning of its incipient celebrations of the Tridentine Mass. I soon took part in them by joining the church’s Schola Cantorum, in which we sang the chants of the mass. It was an experience I treasure to this day.

One of the downs included the unexpected retirement of Benedict XVI, who was one of the inspirations that led me to the Catholic Church. His successor, alas, has not proved inspirational and after much frustration over the years, this past January I decided to leave Holy Church for the Eastern Orthodox Church. I attended Divine Worship for a few weeks at a beautiful church in Santa Fe. When sure this was the direction in which I wanted to go, I emailed the pastor of my local church informing him I was leaving. That same day he called me and had the same message Father Rutler had for me years back: “Come see me.” Again, I did and after two hours of productive argument and reasoning, I told my pastor I would carefully consider all we had discussed and let him know my decision. Two days later I called and told him I was staying.

And stay I will. For all her manifold faults, her lousy liturgies, scandals beyond number, and a pope who seems determined to drive out of the Church all that is beautiful, traditional and true, this is the Church founded by Peter the Church whose birthday we celebrate on Maundy Thursday. Our Lord promised us the gates of hell shall not prevail against His Church and much as the devil has attempted to destroy Her over the millennia, he has failed to do so and will continue to fail. Even if I do not live to see it, Holy Church will triumph over her present woes.

Tonight’s Easter Vigil marks the 15th since my reception into the Catholic Church. I pray I may see many more of them. Deo gratia, amen.

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The Dems don’t want him at all.

Earlier this week I wrote about Robert F. Kennedy tossing his hat into the ring for the race to presidency in ’24. I suggested he might be a welcome lifeboat for Democrat party leaders hoping to find an alternative to bumbling Joe Biden. It turns out RFK, Jr. is anything but welcome and party leaders may do anything they can to sink his candidacy, this according to a report in PJ Media.

Interestingly, the reason why party leaders may be out to get RFK, Jr. is the one I cited as a credit to the man: his brave stand on the all-too-cozy relations between drug companies and regulatory agencies, as well the safety and efficacy of vaccines. The author of the report, Ben Bartee, claims the Dems are just fine with these cozy relationships as some of their biggest donors like Bill Gates are also recipients of Big Pharma’s largess. They want to keep things just as they are, which explains why they are mum on this scandal.

Barti writes:

Imagine the damage RFK Jr. could do to the biomedical state were he permitted to broadcast his honest perspective to an audience of millions in a televised debate. This is, again, why he must be stopped at all costs before the primary ever gets to that point.

In other words, the Dem’s would rather stick with flan-for-brains Joe Biden, who will anything they tell him to do, including keeping Big Pharma’s gravy train chugging along.

The surrender proceeds apace.

From the Catholic Herald:

‘One of the foremost colleges [Magdalene] at the University of Oxford cancelled its annual St George’s Day celebration for 2023 – and will celebrate the end of Eid instead . . .

‘The event customarily featured a banquet in which all academics, staff, dons, and students were invited to dine together from a “special English menu”.

‘On April 23, the college’s first day of “Trinity” term, students will be offered a meal which will “follow Muslim customs”. They have been told that “the meat dish will be halal and no alcohol will be served”.

‘The decision has caused contention. Dons at Magdalen College and staff at Oxford University denounced the move.’ One academic at the college told the Daily Telegraph:

‘“The cancelling of St George’s Day is yet another example of the deep antipathy that the leaders of so many of Britain’s academic institutions seem to feel towards the country that built and maintains them.”’

No kidding, fella, but the pig is out of the barn, if you’ll pardon the expression. Where were you and your colleagues decades ago when the encroachment started, beginning as a trickle, but gradually increasing to a torrent; why were you, your colleagues, and the politicians bending over backward to accommodate the Muslim host, instead of welcoming them but insisting they observe and accept the ancient traditions of Mother England? It’s reached the present state because you allowed it to and there’s no going back now. TiSbaH ‘ala khair.

A little progress.

Sitting up front, attending the skeletal remains of the Mass of the Pre-Sanctified in my local parish, I was encouraged to note at least eight out of ten communicants were receiving on the tongue and a substantial number were even kneeling.

(From here.)

But what about . . .

Those Swedish archeologists must be mistaken. After all, who are you going to believe: a team of experts, including a member of the U.S. Armed Forces Medical Examiner System’s Armed Forces DNA Identification Laboratory (AFMES-AFDIL), as well a forensic geneticist and others, who after carefully and scientifically examining human remains determined they were of a woman; or an anthropologist with a Ph.D. no less, in a classroom in an American college who claims it is impossible to determine the sex of human remains? Sadly, in the US we have no choice but to believe the latter.

Thanks to GWR.

From Crux.

After season of division, Pope calls clergy to spurn ‘disunity’ and ‘polarization’

The “enemy,” Francis said, referring to the devil, “never comes out into the open, loves gossip and insinuation, foments parties and cliques, fuels nostalgia for times past, distrust, pessimism, and fear”  (Emphasis added).

Tu quoque, Holiness?

From the Epoch Times.

Another Democrat liberal with the same tired ideas and rhetoric, but bearing a once-famous name.

Is the Kennedy mystic still extant? Does Robert F. Jr. possess the same winning appeal his glamorous predecessors had? His father was assassinated 55 years ago and the last and least Kennedy, Teddy, died in office 14 years ago, which means only aged baby boomers like your Tatler and those even older are likely to take notice of the name Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. Will today’s history-challenged young voters recognize it? I have my doubts.

Still, young Democrats will have little say in who will be the Democrat’s pick for president in the ’24 election. That will be up to the ancient hacks in charge of the party, who surely swoon as wistfully at the name Kennedy as they do the name, Obama. With the Republicans digging up more and more damning evidence of the Biden clan’s non-stop sleaze machine of corruption and selling out our country to the Chinese; and with the patriarch now so befogged he can’t even read off a teleprompter without stumbling, Democrat party leaders are undoubtedly casting about, albeit discretely, for someone, anyone to replace the doddering crook in the White House.  If, as expected, Donald Trump beats the make-believe charges against him and thirsts for revenge, the need for a fresh Democrat candidate will become especially urgent. Another Kennedy might be just the thing for the old-timers who head the party.

RFK, Jr., holds few views at variance with the Democrat status quo, though to his credit he has expressed concern over the cozy relationship between big pharma and the regulatory agencies, a serious issue at which most Democrat politicos turn their heads, lest they appear siding with conservatives on the matter. That alone won’t make him a viable candidate of course and he doesn’t seem to have the charm or wit of his namesake or his namesake’s brother. There is also evidence the Kennedy name no longer has the drawing power it did in the past. RFK Jr’s brother Chris ran for governor of Illinois in 2018 and didn’t even make it out of the primaries. If however, this Kennedy does become the 2018 presidential candidate, all Donald Trump has to do is hammer away non-stop at his being a Democrat and remind voters what the party’s officeholders have done to this country since 2021.