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[Catholic Caucus] Irony Alert: Postconciliar Iconoclasts Arrive at the Feast of St John Damascene and Smash ItSo much to observe about today's confluence in the Roman Rite, on this Thursday of the third week of Lent, with a commemoration of St. John Damascene.First, the ancient Roman liturgy keeps a station today at a church in honor of the physician brothers and martyrs Cosmas and Damian. Obviously the Gospel about the healing of Peter's mother-in-law fits right in; the propers also mention "salus," whose basic meaning is "health" although it takes on the supernatural meaning of "salvation."The TLM, by remembering Cosmas...

EXPOSED: Inside the anti-Catholic agenda of the parish hymn industryWho controls the 'hymnal industrial complex'? The people reaping the profits are not just business executives. They are ideologues with a mission to reshape Catholic worship. Since the 1960s, the ancient chants and beautiful hymns that once elevated the Mass have been discarded in favor of a more “modern” sound. Organs and choirs have given way to guitars, pianos, and tambourines, a shift many faithful Catholics find deeply inappropriate. Yet few realize that this transformation is not just a matter of musical preference – it is rooted in a deliberate, anti-Catholic...

[Catholic Caucus] Attendance at Mass and How to Fix ItIn October of every year, my diocese, the Diocese of Arlington, Virginia, conducts a “head count” in order to determine average Mass attendance. The results of the 2024 count were published in the diocesan newspaper, The Arlington Catholic Herald, in the Jan. 30 – Feb. 12, 2025 edition. Out of an estimated 433,000 registered Catholics in the diocese, approximately 28.8% attended “weekend” Mass in October, 2024.The article compared this result to national attendance rates, citing a Gallup survey in 2024 that showed 23% weekly Mass attendance and a Georgetown University survey...

The Post-Conciliar Ecumenism and the Great DiscontinuityThere is no other error (or, rather, sum of errors) as specifically (neo)modernist as the so-called “ecumenism.” This is why rejecting it and the relativism and indifferentism it generates is absolutely necessary.One of the most debatable directions inaugurated by the Second Vatican Council is that in favor of ecumenism. In blatant contradiction to the Church’s constant Magisterial position regarding the positive reception of religious pluralism, this new teaching has become the dominant feature of post-conciliar Catholicism. Things have gone so far that, in addition to the formation of a special dicastery for the “promotion...

[Catholic Caucus] Vatican II and the Hermeneutic of God Allowing Us to Learn Painful LessonsIf we simply look at these three realities from the first days of the Council — abandoning the practice of condemning errors; appointing heterodox theologians as experts; and allowing the progressives to hijack the Council — it should be obvious that Vatican II began by betraying God and His truth.“The Holy Spirit does not always prevent the necessary consequences of our negligence.” (Fr. Alvaro Calderon, Prometheus: The Religion of Man)Among faithful Catholics who truly seek to understand the ongoing crisis in the Church, serious disagreements frequently...

Remember the Springtime in the Church: Reality is Demographic Winter!It's bad news for Catholics from a PEW Survey on Religion in America, the first since 2014. For every 100 new Catholics entering the Church, 800 leave. This from Eric Sammons at Crisis Magazine:No other religion has nearly as bad of a join/leave ratio. For every 100 people that become Protestant, 180 leave. That’s bad, but it’s not Catholic bad. Conversely, for every 100 people who leave the religious “nones” (i.e., they join a religion), a full 590 become part of that irreligious cohort. Where are the former Catholics going? Of...

[Catholic Caucus] HISTORY'S VERDICT: After 60 Years, Vatican II Was a DisasterIs the Catholic Church better off today than it was in 1965? Back in 2013, Pope Benedict XVI admitted that the Second Vatican Council had been co-opted and made into what he called the "Council of the Media," which led to "so many calamities, seminaries closed, convents closed, and the liturgy was banalized." So, what really happened and why must every Catholic on earth remain forever loyal and true to Vatican II? And, for that matter, WHICH Vatican II -- the real one, or Benedict's "Council of the Media"...

Cardinal Roche: ‘Nothing wrong’ with Latin Mass but Church needed to ‘move away’ from itCardinal Arthur Roche, a leading enforcer of Pope Francis’ restrictions on the Latin Mass, has said there is ‘nothing wrong’ with the traditional liturgy but insists the Church deliberately moved ‘away from’ it for ‘very good reasons.’After vigorously implementing Pope Francis restrictions on the traditional Mass, Cardinal Arthur Roche has said there is “nothing wrong” with the Latin Mass but that the Church wished to “move away from what had become an overly elaborate form of celebrating the Mass.”Prefect of the Dicastery for Divine Worship and...

[Catholic Caucus] Pius X’s 1903 call to ‘restore all things in Christ’ is even more relevant todaySt. Pius X knew there would come a time when God’s enemies would believe they had triumphed. Paradoxically, it is at that moment that God’s victory is near: 'the victory will ever be with God — nay, defeat is at hand at the moment when man, under the delusion of his triumph, rises up with most audacity.'In the first encyclical of his papacy, E Supreme Apostolatus, St. Pius X emphasized the pressing need to restore all things in Christ. As he saw it in...

The Charismatic Cardinal Suenens Architect of the Vatican II RevolutionEditors Note: We are happy to republish this previously ‘lost’ (unpublished since 1997) article in conjunction with a history of the CCR with Kennedy Hall on our YouTube Channel. The late John Vennari was a crusader for Catholic orthodoxy and our former Editor-in-Chief.Part I Recap:Part I of this article (October 1997) explained that Charismatics gained “legitimacy” within the Catholic Church primarily due to the efforts of the late Cardinal Leon Joseph Suenens of Belgium. It was demonstrated that since Suenens was one of the most liberal Cardinals of this century, it...

The Council’s Origins: Heaven or Hell?As reported by Catholic News Agency (CNA), Catholic University of Valencia recently gave an honorary doctorate to Cardinal Kurt Koch, Prefect of the Dicastery for Promoting Christian Lunacy.This is the department that is charged with carrying out the conciliar church’s ecumenical operation, specifically, by propagating and implementing Unitatis Redintegratio of Vatican II.In his acceptance speech, Koch said:For the Council, fidelity to its origins and conformity to the times were not opposed to each other. Rather, the council wanted to proclaim the Catholic faith in a way that was both faithful to its origins and appropriate...

Sacrificing Catholics for EcumenismIt’s no secret that the Catholic Church is bleeding members. According to Pew Research, those who have left Catholicism outnumber those who have joined the Catholic Church by nearly a four-to-one margin. As such statistics continue to worsen, the emphasis on evangelization grows. Yet, few can state what that ought to look like. So much of the focus has been upon reaching “across the aisle” and attempting to assimilate with Protestants. A recent case of a Catholic young adult group chat that was admonished by clergy for sharing memes with a jocular approach to Protestant themes serves...

<p>One of the most devastating casualties in the period after Vatican II has been the practical elimination of the distinction between objective redemption and subjective redemption. This has contributed to various evils, ranging from mass apostasy to the Vatican’s persecution of those Catholics who believe what the Church has always taught. Indeed, in one way or another, almost every aspect of the ongoing crisis in the Church relates to the effective elimination of the concept of subjective redemption.</p>

Trad Godfathers at Vatican II: Lefebvre on the Eve of the CouncilTowards a Better Understanding of the Second Vatican Council: The Importance of studying the Cœtus Internationalis Patrum. Read part I The Coetus: Trad Godfathers at Vatican IIPart II: What Did the Leading Members of Coetus Want Vatican II to Address?The Case of Archbishop Marcel LefebvreWhen the progressives won their first procedural victory at Vatican II on November 21, 1962 (John XXIII withdrew the schema on Revelation that had been prepared before the council), a conservative resistance formed around Archbishop Marcel Lefebvre throughout the rest of that first conciliar session....

“Once a Catholic Always a Catholic”? Not Necessarily.Many Catholics casually say the following line to ex-Catholics in order to get them back into a Church building: “Once a Catholic, always a Catholic.” It sounds welcoming, but it’s theologically wrong.This is because the Magisterium of the Catholic Church and the Church Fathers, St. Thomas Aquinas and the Popes all taught: A bad Catholic never ceases to be a Catholic, provided his failure be not faith-based but morality-based (and also provided those moral failures be not excommunicable.) On the other hand, a baptized person who has purposely rejected even one tenet of...

The Charismatic Cardinal Suenens | Part 1Editors Note: We are happy to republish this previously ‘lost’ (unpublished since 1997) article in conjunction with a history of the CCR with Kennedy Hall on our YouTube Channel. The late John Vennari was a crusader for Catholic orthodoxy and our former Editor-in-Chief.Part 2 will be published soon.The August 1997 issue of Catholic Family News featured the article “A ‘Catholic’ Charismatic Extravaganza” which contained a report on the Charismatic’s 30th Anniversary conference in Pittsburgh. The article also catalogued a brief summary of the most serious problems with “Catholic” pentecostalism as being radically opposed to...

[Catholic Caucus] Archdiocese of New York dismisses increased requests for altar rails, claims ‘no need’ for themThe Archdiocese of New York says requests for altar rails, which easily allow for the proper posture of kneeling while receiving Holy Communion, are ‘picking up steam.’“Some pastors have been inquiring about reinstalling an altar rail. According to the current directives, there is no need for it. The General Instruction of the Roman Missal (GIRM) specifies that the normal posture for the reception of Communion is standing,” states the memo, found in the December 2024 combined mailing from the Vicar General.“To install a rail...

[Catholic Caucus] What would the pre-Vatican II popes tell us if they were alive today?If we were able to go back in time and ask the pre-Vatican II popes what would happen if subsequent generations ignored their warnings by embracing the errors they had condemned, they would surely tell us that such folly would bring about widespread calamity and apostasy.Pope Leo XII began his 1826 encyclical on secret societies, Quo Graviora, with an image of how vigilant the Successors of Peter must be in protecting the Church against “the sects threatening the complete ruin of the Church”: Blessed Peter, Prince...

[Catholic Caucus] Chapter 6: ModernismEditor’s note: we continue our weekly serialisation of Dr. Edward Schaefer’s new book A Simple Man’s Case for Tradition. This book is an excellent introduction to Traditionalism and provides an easy way for Trads to introduce the movement to fellow Catholics who are seeking deeper answers to today’s questions. Proceeds from the book sale also help promote the Collegium Sanctorum Angelorum, one of only two traditional Catholic colleges in the United States. Read the IntroductionRead chapter 1: Equally Valid and HolyRead chapter 2: the New MassRead chapter 3: LatinRead chapter 4: Practice & BeliefRead chapter 5:...

Francis Tells Methodists That He Professes Their FaithDuring his December 16, 2024 audience with a delegation from the World Methodist Council, Francis falsely suggested that Catholics profess the same faith as Methodists:“Next year, Christians around the world will celebrate the 1700th anniversary of the First Ecumenical Council: Nicaea. This occasion reminds us that we profess the same faith, and thus have the same responsibility of offering signs of hope that bear witness to God’s presence in the world.”While it is true that Methodists and other Protestants accept the Nicene Creed, it is obviously incorrect to suggest that Catholics and Methodists...