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[Catholic Caucus] Pope St. Pius X defended the Church against the rising tide of ModernismSt. Pius X was the first pope canonized since St. Pius V in 1672.The primary aim of his pontificate Pius X announced in his first encyclical letter, viz., “to renew all things in Christ.” Here we need but allude to his decree on early and frequent reception of Holy Communion; his Motu Proprio on Church music; his encouragement of daily Bible reading and the establishment of various biblical institutes; his reorganization of the Roman ecclesiastical offices; his work on the codification of Canon Law; his incisive...

Bell-Curve Catholicism So-called “Middle-of-the-Road” Catholics are becoming increasingly distressed at their own defectors to the camp of the “far left” of Fr. James Martin SJ and the camp of the “far right” of Dr. Taylor Marshall.  These Middle-of-the-Road Catholics are concerned at how many “pro-life Catholics” will still vote for Biden, especially as a new group of “defectors to the left” listens to the likes of Fr. James Martin. Such clergy of the far-left discount the notion of being a “one-issue voter” on abortion as we approach the election.  For this reason, liberal “pro-life Catholics” may have no problem voting...

At the beginning of time a snake slithered into a Garden called Eden. He entered quietly and quite unobtrusively, as is his wont. And he wreaked havoc on the human race.That same serpent slithered into the supernatural Garden of Eden, which is the Holy Catholic Church, in the waning years of the nineteenth century. Again, unnoticed and blending quite naturally into the human landscape. This Ancient Serpent had oft-times crawled into the sacred precincts of Holy Church since that first entre. But this time it was different. Dramatically different. His havoc this time would strike a thousand blows to...

It has been years since I have written about the topic of antisemitism and the Society of St. Pius X (SSPX). The story of my association and rejection of the SSPX was published with the Journal for the Study of Antisemitism in an article entitled, "Traditional Catholicism and the Teachings of Bishop Williamson". I spent the next few years after my 2010 article blogging about this topic and informing high level SSPX associates of the ongoing problem with radicals in the SSPX. While I was always told the right things like, 'The SSPX is trying to get rid of the...

Strange Moments In Liturgical History – How a Paragon of Liturgical Tradition May Have Caused Unintended Effects By: Msgr. Charles PopeIn the modern struggles and disagreements over the Liturgy, there tends to be a list of friends and opponents depending on one’s stance. For those of us with a more traditional leaning, Pope St. Pius X looms large as a friend and an image of tradition. He is usually seen as a defender of the tradition and a great proponent of what is called today the Extraordinary Form or Traditional Latin Mass (TLM)—so much so that the Society of...

In the modern struggles and disagreements over the Liturgy, there tends to be a list of friends and opponents depending on one’s stance. For those of us with a more traditional leaning, Pope St. Pius X looms large as a friend and an image of tradition. He is usually seen as a defender of the tradition and a great proponent of what is called today the Extraordinary Form or Traditional Latin Mass (TLM)—so much so that the Society of St. Pius X (SSPX) takes its name from him.And yet things, people, and movements are seldom as simple as we would...

One man whom I know holds that all popes since Pius X were heretics. Whole groups maintain that all popes after Vatican II are heretics, even John Paul II. He invited leaders of other religions to Assisi to pray together, but he failed to evangelize them or insist in uniqueness of Catholicism. At Vatican I, several notable figures did not accept the infallibility doctrine. The Reformation itself mostly declared all popes heretical back to Peter. Pope Paul III excommunicated Henry VIII precisely over the question of the indissolubility of marriage. The Eastern Orthodox have rejected the papal position for centuries....

The Second Vatican Council was not evil: no Council of the Church ever is. But because it was dominated by Modernist experts, periti, the considerations of its bishops reflected their influence. Thus, the Council served as a catalyst for the resurgence of the heresy within the Church.

On July 3, 1907, in a decree bearing the lachrymose Latin title Lamentabili, the Vatican's Holy Office, predecessor of today's Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, condemned 65 propositions that it had found contrary to Catholic orthodoxy. Pope Pius X followed up two months later, on September 8, with an encyclical named Pascendi Dominici Gregis (Feeding the Lord's Flock), in which he linked the condemned propositions to a heresy called Modernism and went on to identify its philosophical and theological roots. In conclusion, the encyclical specified stern disciplinary measures for stamping out the heresy.Considering these events from the...

VENERABLE BRETHREN, HEALTH AND THE APOSTOLIC BLESSING: 1. One of the primary obligations assigned by Christ to the office divinely committed to Us of feeding the Lord's flock is that of guarding with the greatest vigilance the deposit of the faith delivered to the saints, rejecting the profane novelties of words and the gainsaying of knowledge falsely so called. There has never been a time when this watchfulness of the supreme pastor was not necessary to the Catholic body, for owing to the efforts of the enemy of the human race, there have never been lacking "men speaking perverse things,"[1]...

One hundred years ago next Saturday [September 8] Pope Pius X issued a papal encyclical, “Pascendi Dominici Gregis,” that would have a huge impact on the Roman Catholic Church and consequently on its role in the blood-drenched history of the first half of the 20th century. Today, not many Roman Catholics, let alone others, could identify or describe “Pascendi.” Yet compared with the widely known encyclicals addressing social and moral problems, it has probably had a deeper impact on their religious lives. “Pascendi” was a sweeping and vehement condemnation of a loose movement of Catholic biblical scholars, philosophers and theologians...

A hundred years ago, on September 8, 1907, Pope Saint Pius X (1903–1914) published the Encyclical Pascendi Dominici Gregis (Feeding the Lord’s Flock) against the devastating doctrines of Modernism. It was the culmination of an offensive that caused irre-parable damage to Modernism. A month earlier, the Congregation of the Holy Office had published the Lamentabili Sane Decree condemning 65 distinct modernist propositions. Thus, it is fitting to celebrate the centennial of this great document that changed the Church’s history.... Modernist DoctrinesBelow are quotes that summarize the doctrine denounced in the Encyclical with subtitles to facilitate understanding.... It is an evolutionist,...

Unique and Exceptional Authenticated POPE PIUS X relics Current bid: US $1,876.00 End time: Mar-26-06 20:00:00 PST (5 days 10 hours) LINK

The time the emperor’s veto helped the election of a saintly pope A hundred years ago, on 4 August, Giuseppe Sarto was elected pope with the title Pius X. Not least thanks to the veto that Franz Josef, the emperor of Austria, put on the Sicilian Cardinal Mariano Rampolla del Tindaro by Andrea Tornielli         A hundred years have passed since the conclave in August 1903 elected Cardinal Giuseppe Melchiorre Sarto as pope. The last pontiff to have been proclaimed saint, a great pastor pope who gave small children the possibility of going to first communion. From the...

We wish to honor Pope St. Pius X, the first canonized pontiff that the good Lord gave us since St. Pius V, by remembering his teachings. The task is not easy, since the teachings of his 11-year pontificate are abundant: his Catechism;1 frequent Communion2 and at an earlier age;3 Catholic Action;4 devotion to Our Lady;5 the responsibility of those who govern the Church;6 the Priesthood;7 the doctrine of St. Thomas of Aquinas8 and that of many others. Some of the most interesting of St. Pius X's teachings to recall are those on Modernism. The three documents vital to the subject...

BOOK REVIEW The Church Confronts Modernity: Catholic Intellectuals in the Progressive Era (Thomas E. Woods, Jr. - Columbia University Press) reviewed by Walter M. Hudson As readers of this journal are aware, modernist control on preconciliar history has for decades been seemingly uncontested in Catholic universities and intellectual circles, continuously reinforced in the pages of journals such as Commonweal and America, and rigorously defended by the likes of Garry Wills and former Archbishop Weakland. The "resistance" to this intellectual paradigm has too often relied on a faulty ultramontanism that Newman warned us about over a century ago. But the modernist...

Pope Saint Pius X clearly recognized that his first duty as Pope was to protect his flock from false teaching, and to preserve the integrity of the Catholic Faith. It is a theme to which he returned constantly throughout his Pontificate.1 Last month, we focused on Pope Saint Pius X’s successful efforts to combat Modernism, the synthesis of all heresies. To fulfill his sacred duty of protecting his flock against poisonous doctrine, he issued three documents against Modernism: Lamen- tabile sane exitu (The Syllabus of Errors, 1907), Pascendi dominici gregis (Encyclical against Modernism, 1907) and Sacrorum antistitum (The Oath Against...