Pius XII’s Humani Generis from 1950 was the last major encyclical warning Catholics about the dangers facing the Church prior to Vatican II. In it, he denounced what he termed the “imprudent zeal for souls” that led some Catholics to question the necessity of belonging to the Catholic Church:

“Some say they are not bound by the doctrine, explained in Our Encyclical Letter of a few years ago, and based on the Sources of Revelation, which teaches that the Mystical Body of Christ and the Roman Catholic Church are one and the same thing. Some reduce to a meaningless formula the necessity of belonging to the true Church in order to gain eternal salvation. Others finally belittle the reasonable character of the credibility of Christian faith. These and like errors, it is clear, have crept in among certain of Our sons who are deceived by imprudent zeal for souls or by false science.”

To someone not initiated into the symbolic universe of the Roman Catholic Church, the liturgy, the Sacraments, and the interior of a church building mean nothing. Invisible to physical eyes, their profound and coherent meanings remain inaccessible. Comparing this situation to a foreign language doesn’t help because someone seeing a page written in, let’s say, Japanese, knows for sure that there is a language he does not understand. Yet, it is a language that, even if not comprehended, is rich with meanings. In the case of the sacred symbols, however, a profane observer sees only elements made from familiar materials: water, oil, fire, bread, wine, etc. These are things he could even use without realizing he is committing sacrilege because all of these are commonplace in the profane context of our everyday lives. So, an observer whose mind is not attuned to perceive their meanings will see nothing more than that. The only intelligible things, partially, to an accidental participant in a Sacrament or the celebration of the Holy Liturgy, would be the words spoken by the celebrants of the sacred mysteries. But even those words do not fully reveal their meanings.

New from RTV...

This edition of The Remnant Underground comes straight from London, England, where Michael Matt addresses the Family Life International Conference. In this important talk, Michael leans heavily on his own upbringing to share ideas on how to raise Christocentric children in a Christophobic world.

Of course, nobody likes to be told how to raise their children, and so Michael goes out of his way NOT to do that. He simply shares 10 points on what worked for his wife and him as they raised their seven children in the traditional Catholic Faith.

This one should be shared far and wide, but especially with adult children, grandchildren, and anyone just starting out in married life.  Michael goes into detail on what parents can do with iPhones, television, pop music, movies, education, and friends that do not share our family’s Christian values.

“Faith of our Fathers! Holy Faith! We will be true to thee till death.” (Faith of Our Fathers, Fr. Frederick William Faber)

The sign of Jonah

The confrontations of Our Lord Jesus Christ with the priests became all the more intense as His earthly life approached its end. After presenting Him as a dangerous sorcerer who performed exorcisms with the help of demons (Luke 11:15), they began to continuously tempt Him with questions designed to give his adversaries the opportunity to incriminate Him. Mockingly, they even asked Him for miracles: “Master, we would see a sign from thee.” (Matthew 12:38) However, knowing the hardness of their hearts, the Savior only offered them one sign: “An evil and adulterous generation seeketh a sign: and a sign shall not be given it, but the sign of Jonas the prophet.” (Matthew 12:39)

In his February 25, 2019 address on the fiftieth anniversary of Cardinal Augustin Bea’s death, Francis praised Bea’s ability to foster unity among all people as well as his immense influence at Vatican II: 

“[The Cardinal Bea Centre for Judaic Studies], in collaboration with the Pontifical Council for Promoting Christian Unity, the Pontifical Biblical Institute and the Center for the Study of Christianity in the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, is commemorating Cardinal Augustin Bea by a series of scholarly lectures marking the fiftieth anniversary of his death. You thus have an opportunity to reconsider this outstanding figure and his decisive influence on several important documents of the Second Vatican Council. The issues of the Church’s relationship with Judaism, Christian unity, and freedom of conscience and religion, remain significant and extremely timely.”