Posted on 01/25/2005 2:58:28 PM PST by csbyrnes84
Father Paul Sretenovic, a priest of the Archdiocese of Newark, New Jersey, who was ordained to the priesthood in 2002, has abandoned the Novus Ordo in order to embrace Catholic Tradition without compromise. Father Sretenovic (pronounced Stre-ten-o-vich) informed his ordinary, the Most Reverend John Myers, the Archbishop of Newark, of his decision in a letter mailed to his Excellency’s home address on the Feast of the Holy Innocents, Wednesday, December 28, 2004:
“Your Excellency: I am writing to inform you of my decision to leave the Archdiocese of Newark. It is a decision that is eighteen months in the making, and it has finally come to a head. This archdiocese, while retaining some very good priests, is, like every other diocese in the Catholic Church today, plagued by the heresy of modernism in many different forms. I recently attended a Monday afternoon of Reflection at Southmont with the Opus Dei priests and listened as one of them said that we are not looking to return to Christendom. To me, that said it all. It is not just about the Latin Mass. It is something much, much deeper, and it is the basis of my decision. Pope Pius XI in his encyclical, Quas Primas, said that Jesus Christ is not only the Lord of every individual, but also of every human society. The Syllabus of Errors of Blessed Pius IX, #77, in particular, exposes the error of separation of Church and State, a doctrine now upheld by the Vatican as the ideal, using both the Second Vatican Council’s Declaration on Religious Liberty, which could very easily have been called the Declaration of Religious Liberty (reference to our Declaration of Independence intended), as well as individual decisions from the Vatican to accelerate such a separation in what were otherwise thoroughly Catholic countries, such as, among others, Colombia, 98% Catholic. The orientation of the Church is now very much in line with the principles of the French Revolution, namely liberty, fraternity, and equality. Hence, the mainstay catchwords from the Council—religious liberty, ecumenism, and collegiality. That is not a coincidence, and it is evil. The Liturgy is just one of the many lambs to be slaughtered along the way towards a Christian Democracy, which, to the dismay and shock of many in the Church, will lead directly to the worldwide takeover of Atheistic Communism, warned of indirectly by Our Lady of Fatima in 1917, and communicated by Sr. Lucia to the Catholic historian William Thomas Walsh in 1946. Russia has still not been consecrated, and she continues to spread her errors until one day, it will be too late. In the meantime, I choose to exercise my priesthood in the way intended by Almighty God, teaching sound doctrine and leading the flock by holiness of life, as St. Paul exhorted St. Timothy in his pastoral epistle.
“In the situation in which I am now, and basically in any Novus Ordo parish anywhere in the world, let alone this particular Archdiocese, I always have to watch my back and I always, at each and every Mass that I offer, have to compromise. Whether it is in the bad wording or bland prayers of the Sacramentary, or in the distribution of Communion in the hand, or in the virtually mandatory use of Extraordinary ministers of Holy Communion, there is always something there to remind me, as the song goes, and it stops now. I pray to God and to Our Blessed Mother that you obtain the grace necessary to perceive the gravity of the present situation and to act accordingly. I include my email address below for further correspondence. I know this is a shock, but for me, even the FSSP would be a compromise. Haven’t we all done enough of that?! As people were looking East this Advent season, Our Lady was leading me to, go West. In Christ the King, Fr. Paul Branko Sretenovic.”
In an e-mail to this writer sent on January 9, 2005, Father Sretenovic explained the sequence of events after this point:
“To give you the backdrop of my correspondence with the Archbishop, he said that parts of what I wrote, without specifying, were ‘inaccurate’ and ‘unfair.’ I responded through the Vicar General for the time-being that what I wrote was not ‘inaccurate’ and ‘unfair.’ I then asked the question as to whether the Archbishop would say that Cardinal Ratzinger was either of the two, specifying the terms, when he wrote that through the Council, the Church had ‘come to terms with the principles of 1789.’ I left it at that and will write the Archbishop directly within the week.”
Father Sretenovic had determined quite clearly that he could no longer make any further compromises with a Mass that did not give God the full honor and glory that are His due and a pastoral approach to the problems of the world that was premised upon a rejection of a defined teaching of the Catholic Church, the Social Kingship of Jesus Christ, and an actual embrace of the errors of Modernity and Modernism.
Father Sretenovic did indeed head west, leaving Our Lady, Queen of Peace Church in Maywood, New Jersey, on Thursday, December 29, 2004, the Feast of Saint Thomas a Becket, to drive out to Our Lady Help of Christians Church in Garden Grove, California, joining Father Patrick J. Perez and Father Lawrence C. Smith in the offering of the Traditional Latin Mass and the totality of the Catholic Faith in all of its integrity to Catholics in one of the most liturgically revolutionary places in the whole Church, the Metropolitan Province of Los Angeles, California. Father Sretenovic distributed Holy Communion to the faithful at Our Lady Help of Christians on the Feast of the Holy Family on Sunday, January 9, 2005, saying, “I have never before felt like I did in my first Traditional giving of the Eucharist, or however you want to put it. It was awesome and I felt like a priest in a way that I haven't before. The formula is much better, not to mention the signing of the Cross, and the use of the paten for the Sacred Particles, AND the posture of the people with open mouths, heads tilted upwards like chicks eagerly welcoming their mother with the food that she is providing for them.” [He offered his first Traditional Latin Mass there on Sunday, January 16, 2005.]
Father Sretenovic, who was born on January 8, 1974, found his way to Our Lady Help of Christians within three months of meeting Father Perez at Father Nicholas Gruner’s Fatima conference in Glendale, California, at the end of September, 2004. Father Perez’s mother, Mrs. Margaret Perez, saw Father Sretenovic and told him that he had to meet her son, making sure that the two of them sat down for dinner after Father Perez’s talk at the conference. Father Sretenovic was impressed with Father Perez’s knowledge of the Faith and of the development of the Mass. Mr. John Vennari, the editor of Catholic Family News, also spoke to Father Sretenovic about the crisis in the Church and of the necessity of fleeing from the Novus Ordo structures. Seeds were being planted.
Father Sretenovic contacted this writer in early December of 2004, and a luncheon meeting was arranged in Wayne, New Jersey, following a First Friday Mass at Our Lady of Fatima Chapel in Pequannock, New Jersey, on December 3, 2004. This writer and his wife, to put it charitably, pummeled Father Sretenovic, asking him bluntly as to how long he could continue to give out Communion in the hand and continue to offer a Mass that less fully communicates the truths of the Catholic Faith and does not render God the full honor and glory that are His due. Father Sretenovic listened, particularly to Mrs. Droleskey’s heartfelt plea to give Our Lord and His flock unfettered access to the fullness of the Catholic Faith. Father Sretenovic promised to contact Fathers Perez and Smith. He also wrote fairly immediately to Father Stephen P. Zigrang, whose association with the Society of Saint Pius X prompted the soon-to-be promoted Archbishop of Galveston-Houston, the Most Reverend Joseph Fiorenza, a protégé of the late Joseph Cardinal Bernardin, to suspend him for an association with a “schismatic” group that, among other things, denied the “enduring validity of the Old Covenant God made with the people of Israel.”
Father Sretenovic carefully weighed his options, keeping in close contact with Father Lawrence C. Smith, who left the Diocese of Davenport, Iowa, on September 8, 2003. Father Sretenovic also had contact with priests in the Society of Saint Pius X, determining ultimately that it would be best for him to be with Fathers Perez and Smith in California. Father was most intent on placing himself in a situation where the gaps in his preparation for priestly ordination could be closed and he could concentrate on his own personal sanctification while offering Catholics the Immemorial Mass of Tradition. He arrived at his decision after a great deal of reflection and a bit of indecision, coming to the conclusion in the final analysis that he needed to make a clean break from the diocesan structure sooner rather than later, understanding that the faithful have a right in perpetuity to the Traditional Latin Mass, which can never be subject justly to any limitations or conditions by any bishop, including the Pope himself. Father Smith was most instrumental in helping Father Sretenovic to come to this decision, saying that “it was his call that put me over the edge. Within 20 minutes after my conversation with him, I was writing my letter” to Archbishop Myers.
Father Sretenovic was not heedless of the fact that his own ordinary, Archbishop Myers, though not a traditionalist himself, has been sympathetic to priests desirous of offering the Traditional Latin Mass. Father Sretenovic also understood, however, that the embrace of Tradition, while it starts with the Mass, involves quite fundamentally an embrace of the totality of the Catholic Faith without any taint of corruption by the novelties and errors of the past forty to forty-seven years. Father Sretenovic also knows that ordinaries come and go, a point demonstrated quite graphically when Bishop John Myers of Peoria, Illinois, was elevated to the archbishopric of Newark. Although Bishop Myers had granted permission to Father Michael Driscoll, the pastor of Saint Mary’s Church in Rock Island, Illinois, to offer the Traditional Latin Mass on a daily basis, that permission was revoked by Myers’s successor, Bishop Michael Jenky, who demoted Father Driscoll to the post of an assistant hospital chaplain at Saint Francis Hospital in Peoria. Father Sretenovic, understanding, as eight cardinals noted in a finding sent to Pope John Paul II in 1986, the binding nature of the Traditional Latin Mass can never be abrogated, did not want to subject himself to the vagaries of episcopal arbitrariness. He realized that he needed the stability offered by the Traditional Latin Mass for his own sanctification–and that the people have the absolute right to safe harbor found therein.
The story of Father Paul Sretenovic continues, therefore, a remarkable display of courage on the part of diocesan priests who have been willing to forsake all of their canonical safety and human respect in order to embrace Tradition without compromise. Men such as Fathers Sretenovic and Zigrang and Smith were ordained after the implementation of the liturgical revolution had begun. Father Zigrang was ordained in 1977. Father Smith was ordained in 1997. Father Sretenovic was ordained in 2002. Although there have been priests (such as Father Stephen Somerville) who were ordained in the Traditional rite and have returned thereto, the embrace of Tradition by priests who are relatively young (in the case of Father Zigrang) or very young (in the case of Fathers Smith and Sretenovic) is particularly galling to the liturgical revolutionaries, men and women who brook no opposition and who protest with great vehemence the glories of the “liturgical renewal.” How can it be, they ask themselves, that men who have been immersed in their handiwork all of their lives can become counter-revolutionaries and reject all of their “enlightened” schemes and programs?
The revolutionaries can protest all they want. The plain fact of the matter is that there are a number of priests across the nation who may be following the examples of Fathers Zigrang, Smith and Sretenovic. More than a handful of priests are on the fence as this is being written. Some are waiting for Rome to come to their “rescue” by means of an Apostolic Administration. Some are afraid of what will happen to their sheep should they simply leave their diocesan assignments. Others are simply afraid to pray for the graces to muster up the courage to stop participating in sacrileges such as the distribution of Communion in the hand. From the vantage point of one who travels great distances across the nation to get his family to the daily offering of the Traditional Latin Mass, it is time for our shepherds to give us our due, the Immemorial Mass of Tradition, understanding that Our Lady will take care of their temporal needs and that the rectitude of their actions will be understood fully only on the Last Day at the General Judgment of the Living and the Dead.
Indeed, the witness given by Fathers Zigrang, Smith and Sretenovic, as well as the witness given by the bishops and the priests of the Society of Saint Pius X, to the necessity of proclaiming the fullness of the Catholic Faith without compromise and without any dilution serves as an inspiration to the sheep who are seeking safety and security in the midst of doctrinal and liturgical instability and turmoil within the diocesan structures. They are willing to be calumniated, even by fellow traditionalists who have anointed themselves to be in the august and pristine "mainstream," in order to bear a witness to the authentic Tradition of the Church without any compromise at all. No loss of human respect and no amount of name-calling or sloganeering will ever deter them from giving their sheep the fullness of the Catholic Faith.
At least some of the sheep will respond when their shepherds put themselves on the line to give them what is their due, namely, the Traditional Latin Mass. Hundreds upon hundreds of people, for example, have found their way to Our Lady Help of Christians Church in Garden Grove, California. Most of these people have never heard of The Remnant, Catholic Family News, or Christ or Chaos. They've never heard of Christ the King College and most of them probably think that GIRM Warfare has something to do with bacteriology. They're just Catholics who understand that the first law of the Church is the salvation of souls and that they do not have to sit idly by and be subjected to the rot of conciliar novelties in the context of what pretends to pass for the Church's liturgy and catechesis. These good souls are fed up with what is going on in their local dioceses and parishes and they simply want the fullness of the Catholic Faith to be made manifest to them during Holy Mass and in the life of their parish. The same is true of the fifteen families who have found their way from Saint Andrew's Church in Channelview, Texas, to Queen of Angels Church in Dickinson, Texas (and Saint Michael the Archangel Chapel in Spring, Texas), following after their inimitable pastor, Father Zigrang. The sheep want Christ and His truth to be made manifest to them without novelty or dilution. This is nothing other than one of their baptismal birthrights as Catholics.
Father Paul Sretenovic finds himself some 3,000 miles away from his parents, who are residents of New Jersey. He has gone this distance to serve sheep without compromise. He is in need of our prayers. More of his brother priests need to follow his example of humility and fidelity, to say nothing of his courage. As a son of Our Lady, Father Sretenovic has entrusted himself entirely to her Immaculate Heart. He knows that she will take good care of him as he acts in the person of her Divine Son as a sacerdos. Father Sretenovic delivered his first sermon at Our Lady Help of Christians on Sunday, January 16, 2004, stating that he had come to realize that the devil has essentially used the hierarchy of the Church to communicate the belief that one can eat from all of the trees in the "garden" today (Judaism, Islam, the New Age Movement, Wicca, Modernism) except the tree of Tradition, from which it is forbidden to eat. He said that the Novus Ordo Missae breeds lukewarmness, crediting Father Paul Kramer’s The Devil’s Final Battle and this writer’s G.I.R.M. Warfare with helping him to see how he was stuck in this lukewarmness himself. His sermon resonated with the 700 parishioners in attendance at the three Masses offered at Our Lady Help of Christians.
Our Lady Help of Christians, pray for Father Sretenovic. Pray for all traditionally-minded priests to follow his example of pure love for Tradition without fear of the canonical and/or temporal consequences. Pray for us sheep, that we might make the sacrifices necessary to help our shepherds feed us with the pure milk of Tradition.
Your sense of the situation is well-tuned.
The 'smell test' failed.
Correct. I AM a Catholic. Not a Schizzie of either the SSPX or Rembertine variety.
Venezuela's semi-socialist; you'd fit right in.
The Principality of Liechtenstein (whose bishop I understand has been friendly to the SSPX), not the Republic of Venezuela, is probably the present-day country which comes closest to the ideals of Catholic monarchists. However, I don't speak German, and I believe their immigration policies are pretty strict. Besides, theoretical preference for a different form of government is not sufficient reason to emigrate if one is not being persecuted for one's beliefs.
Many of the pseudoTrads are also delusionally nostalgic for what disappeared long, long ago and refuse to accept the fact that Catholic Europe is dead other than the Vatican.
Never! Dying, perhaps, but not dead. As long as there are still even a few people who cling to the old ideals of Christendom, as exemplified most recently by the commemoration of the 212th anniversary of the murder of King Louis XVI, the true spirit of Europe, which is Catholic AND monarchical, will never die.
Somehow they are not as offended by France and its organ grinder's monkey Jacques Chirac.
Not true. The French Republic, built as it is on the blood of Their Majesties King Louis XVI and Queen Marie Antoinette, the innocent victims of the Terror, and the martyrs of the Vendée, is an abomination. Jacques Chirac is contemptible because he claims to hold an illegal and illegitimate office (the fictitious and ridiculous title of "President of France"), not because he opposed the Iraq war.
As for the alleged "schism" of the SSPX, I wonder what advice you would give a prospective convert like me who is interested in Catholicism, but only the Latin Mass version, and does not live anywhere near an indult. I may not agree with everything on the SSPX website, but I am grateful to them for providing me with the only Latin Mass within a reasonable distance. You have said yourself that the Novus Ordo, while valid, is a "cultural abomination." I do not attend "cultural abominations." I am not a naturally spiritual person, and Latin and Gregorian Chant is what speaks to me, and may yet persuade me to enter the Catholic Church; English and Marty Haugen never will. In any case, if I do convert under the auspices of the SSPX you will not be able to accuse me of having left the Church since I was not in it to begin with.
There was a time when I would have angrily defended Queen Elizabeth II to you; however, I must admit that I myself was rather disconcerted by HM's multiculturalist 2004 Christmas address. However, one must learn to separate the office from the person. Abandoning monarchism because Queen Elizabeth II is not exactly Queen Elizabeth I (which is perhaps a good thing from a Catholic point of view) would make about as much sense as abandoning Catholicism because Pope John Paul II is not exactly Pope St. Pius X.
Most of what I posted was the words of St. Thomas Acquinas, not Mrs. Hertz. I trust you do not object to him as a source?
I am aware of Mrs. Hertz's eccentricities; however, that doesn't mean she is wrong about monarchy and Americanism.
I couldn't find the exact quotes on the online version of the book, but I think this must be the "all religions" reference you refer to:
I remember a very graphic anecdote. In a particular city which will remain anonymous, the corporation was debating a grant of money for an educational activity conducted by members of Opus Dei — which, like all the corporate activities fostered by the Work, was making a definite contribution to the good of the community. Most of the councillors were in favour of the grant. One of them, a socialist, explained his opinion, saying that he knew the activity personally: 'This is an activity', he said, 'which is characterised by the fact that the people who conduct it are good friends of personal freedom: students of all religions and ideologies are welcomed in the residence.' The communist councillors voted against the grant. One of them, saying why he did so, told the socialist: 'I am opposed to it because if that is the way things are, this residence is doing effective propaganda for Catholicism.'
My royalism is focused on those countries were monarchy is or was an integral part of their heritage, which includes practically every European country not mentioned above. In these cases, monarchies ought to be preserved or restored, and there is generally little difficulty in determining who the monarch ought to be. (See this page.)
One motivation for promoting monarchy as an American is my fear that if U.S. foreign policy continues in its current Wilsonian direction of spreading "democracy" worldwide at whatever cost, should a European country by some miracle take steps someday towards the restoration of a real monarchy (not a ceremonial ornament), a delusional successor of George W. Bush might intervene to prevent them from doing so. If this were to happen I would have no choice but to become as truly "anti-American" as today's paleoconservatives are falsely accused of being, as I would have been "anti-American" had I lived during the Spanish-American War or World War I. Indeed, there is anecdotal evidence that the Clinton administration prevented royal restoration in Serbia and the Bush administration did so in Afghanistan. This sort of behavior is what I fiercely oppose. But I do not advocate that the US become a monarchy; I would be satisfied with a constitutional republic that minded its own business as we generally did before 1898.
Sure, monarchy has had a few mistakes. But what form of government hasn't?
Ping me as a closet "pseudo" monarchist. I would prefer to call myself a believer in the Kingship of Christ, no matter the form of government. I think it could even work within the framework of our current political system and constitution. But I am no Americanist, as that too, is a heresy.
Don't forget besides actual kings and queens, many saints have been members of royal families, like Sts. Elizabeth of Hungary and Elizabeth of Portugal.
TA's a very good source.
"Americanism" is deficient because it seems to create in its adherents two distinct problems: indifferentism, and moral relativity.
The form of Gummint is not really the problem--it's the fact that "Americanists" lose sight of First Things, allowing judicial rulings to substitute for moral verities.
The democratic republic, per se, is not objectionable so long as it maintains a Judaeo/Christian understanding of foundational principles.
Yes; thanks. I wonder if there's a complete list somewhere of canonized and beatified royal persons. That would be a useful resource.
To be ecumenical, the Orthodox Grand Duchess Elisabeth of Russia (1864-1918) is a good example of a royal who lived a saintly life until she was murdered by the Bolsheviks.
Depends how it came about. I would maintain that a republic is objectionable if it owes its existence to the disestablishment of a monarchy (which arguably excludes your conditions, in which case we would be in agreement). This does not apply to the US since the rebellion of 1776 did not interfere with George III's position as King of Great Britain. However, the current republican governments of France, Portugal, Austria, Hungary, Germany, Italy, etc. most certainly are objectionable, and would continue to be so even if they attempted to bring their laws more in line with Judaeo-Christian morality.
Thanks. I think it is clear from history that a Catholic monarchy is far more likely to conform to the Kingship of Christ than any other form of government. I can think of only one republican president who shared your beliefs: Gabriel Garcia Moreno of Ecuador, and he was murdered for his troubles.
Especially since he could have just as easily attached Malachi Martin's name to it. Martin in an Art Bell interview,(I believe his last) told a "white witch" who called in to ask it she would go to heaven that she would. He proceeded with the same unCatholic gobbledy gook that the new-agers do. "Good person,loves god blah-blah,yada,yada." But I guess Fr. S's purpose was to impugn Opus Dei,not Malachi Martin.
Another little proof of the "eye of the beholder" genre, is this statement by Drolesky: More of his brother priests need to follow his example of humility and fidelity,to say nothing of his courage".After reading everything written in the article I have my own interpretation of Father S. From the perspective of someone with only a bachelor's degree and fifteen years of Employee Relations management in a Human Resource department,I would change the tail end of that statement to more accurately reflect the situation to: his example of pride and perfidy,to say nothing of his arrogance.
Taking scandal in our prelates or situations in the Church is never an excuse to break away from her either spiritually or canonically.
Besides, his letter is not strong and relies upon his interpretation (or misinterpretation) of Fatima. Last I checked, belief in Fatima was not an article of Faith.
Perhaps I am wrong though...
If the conflict is between Church and Constitution, then it is Constitution that must be compromised, for the Church cannot.
As for running for office: democracy is a creature of the atheistic Revolution, not the Kingdom of God. Popular government supposes that man is wise enough to make his own laws, including the laws of morality. In a people's state, vox populi is vox Dei. This idea, which is as old as the Serpent himself ("Ye shall be as gods, knowing good and evil...") is antichristian, anti-life, and antihuman.
The Revolutionary ideas of voting, popular sovereignty, and the libertarian "do as thou wilt" are pagan, heretical and foreign to Christianity. Our Lord is not the President of the Republic of Heaven. He is King of the Universe. The social structures we live under should flow from this Divine structure, not contradict it. Popular government is a fist shaken in the face of authority, including God, the ultimate Authority; it is the cry of Lucifer, a political "non serviam" from the pit of Hell. As such, it is doomed to fail, sooner or later - and when authority is restored, it won't be pleasant. The Lord sends rain upon the just and the unjust, I'm afraid.
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