Latest / The Catholic Current / Tyranny’s Favorite Tricks (Fr. Robert McTeigue, S.J.) 4/10/26

Transcript

Tyranny’s Favorite Tricks (Fr. Robert McTeigue, S.J.) 4/10/26 · The Catholic Current

0:00
This is The Catholic Current with Father Robert Mittag.
0:05
There are people who are waking up and they look at the wreckage of the past three years
0:09
and said, I can't be part of business as usual anymore.
0:12
And then they ask, now what?
0:14
And I say, the now what is the same as always.
0:17
It's a profound conversion to Christ.
0:20
The consequences of that worldview is becoming clear.
0:24
All this new speak, all these pronouns, these are just the latest translation of the
0:29
ancient hymns of the serpent, ye shall be as God.
0:33
Praise be Jesus Christ.
0:35
This is Father Robert Mittag of the Society of Jesus, your daily host for The Catholic
0:39
Current, where we bring Christ to the world and the world to Christ.
0:42
You're listening to us from the station of The Cross Studios, your local radio station,
0:46
the iCatholic Radio mobile app, where we proclaim the fullness of truth with clarity and charity.
0:51
As always, let's start with prayer.
0:53
In the name of the Father, Son, and the Holy Spirit.
0:55
Almighty God, through the intercession of Saint Ignatius Leola, we ask that you pour
0:59
forth your Holy Spirit upon us, a spirit of discernment, and we hear your voice and
1:03
obey your command.
1:04
In the name of the Father, Son, and the Holy Spirit.
1:06
Amen.
1:07
Well, friends, here it is.
1:08
It's Friday, The Catholic Current.
1:09
You know what that means?
1:10
You and me for the whole hour.
1:12
We start with, let's talk about this.
1:14
We walk through a complex issue together, and you want to stay with us for the whole
1:17
hour because we end up with weekend readiness, reviewing the headlines of the week in light
1:22
of the upcoming Sunday Scripture, so we'll be all prayed up for Sunday Mass.
1:26
By popular demand, I am continuing my series on tyranny.
1:32
This will be part four, and we're calling this episode, Tyranny's Favorite Tricks.
1:38
And I hope you heard or saw my message on Wednesday with the title, Tyrants Burn Libraries,
1:44
right?
1:45
Let me do a quick recap of that to set the context for what I want to do with us today.
1:48
I started with a very sad story based on a book I found which I really recommend, and
1:56
it is called The War That Ended Peace by Margaret MacMillan.
2:01
It's very serious history, and it's written like it's an excellent novel, but it's extremely
2:09
well written.
2:11
And one of the things she starts with is the German army moving into Belgium, and Belgium
2:16
used to be a very, very Catholic country.
2:19
And it's late August 1914, and the most famous university there is the University of Leuven,
2:24
which has been around, sometimes called Leuven, been around since the 15th century.
2:29
I've lectured there.
2:30
I visited there.
2:31
It's a beautiful campus.
2:33
And the Germans burn down the library.
2:37
This glorious collection of scholarship and masterpieces and artwork and heritage and
2:44
identity, and I ask the question, why?
2:49
Why do tyrants burn down libraries?
2:52
Because libraries are meant to be repositories of truth and beauty and goodness, and all
3:01
that becomes rivals to the tyrant, to the narrative, to the party, to the dear leader,
3:07
to the five-year plan.
3:09
And libraries give people a sense of heritage and identity, and also a sense of destiny.
3:17
So Josef Pieper was clear that if you had a past-less present, if you had a present
3:24
where all the libraries had been burned, you could only have a hopeless future, and a hopeless
3:31
future is pretty unbearable, and the tyrant steps in with, let me help you with that.
3:36
And so here's the question I asked on Wednesday, what if shouting back 100 plus years from
3:45
the future to that summer of 1914, today's tyrant said, you're doing it the hard way.
3:56
Work smarter, not harder.
3:59
You don't have to burn down the library.
4:04
You don't have to strike a match.
4:09
You don't even have to hide the index to the library.
4:15
You don't have to lock the doors.
4:18
All you have to do is ignore the library, to act as if the library doesn't exist, as
4:31
if the library never existed.
4:35
And the people who say, I really do remember a library.
4:41
I was there.
4:43
There was some wonderful stuff there, and there is stuff in there that's really kind
4:49
of different from, shut up, he explained.
4:53
Those people get disappeared, or silenced, or canceled, or dismissed as crazy.
4:59
Comrade, the Soviet Union is the worker's paradise.
5:03
If you're not happy, there must be something wrong with you.
5:08
And so the work of the tyrant is very much easier if we raise, incrementally, generation
5:17
by generation, people who never knew, never suspected there was a library.
5:25
Let me give a simpler, homey example.
5:29
When my sister's first daughter was old enough to kind of sit upright in a high chair and
5:36
eat finger food, and make a mess, because that's what kids did.
5:40
I don't know how old that is.
5:42
I don't know kids.
5:43
But she's got her hands full of just plain old Cheerios and stuffing them in her mouth.
5:49
Yum, yum, yum, yum, yum, yum.
5:51
And she ran out of Cheerios and was still hungry.
5:56
So she started pounding the tray.
5:59
So my sister was out of plain Cheerios, which is the only thing my niece had ever had.
6:05
And so my sister poured out some apple cinnamon Cheerios.
6:10
Now, if you've had plain Cheerios and you've had apple cinnamon Cheerios, you know it is
6:15
a significant upgrade from one to the other.
6:19
So Tegan grabbed a handful of stuff, put it in her mouth, expecting that taste of dried
6:26
sawdust and water, which is plain Cheerios.
6:29
And you could see her eyes widen as that burst of apple cinnamon came into her mouth.
6:38
What is this?
6:41
This is a thing?
6:43
What?
6:44
And then she looked at my sister with accusing eyes.
6:47
How long did you know about this?
6:51
This has been around and you've been giving me the sawdust Cheerios when you had the good
6:57
stuff all along?
6:58
What else have you not been telling me?
7:01
You see where I'm going with this?
7:04
The people who say the only thing that's real is what's in the present, what's in the very
7:12
immediate here and now with no relationship to past and future.
7:19
They control the whole show.
7:22
I mean, George Orwell had said, who controls the past controls the present.
7:26
You want to control the past, you don't have to burn down the library.
7:29
You just have to ignore it and convince people the library doesn't exist.
7:34
And then when you control the present, then you're allowed, then you're able, not allowed,
7:38
you're able to control the future.
7:41
And one of the things that rebels want to do in response to tyrants is, you know, I
7:50
think of back when the Simpsons was still funny and Homer Simpson used to carry a little
7:55
note in his pocket that says, always do the opposite of what Bart says.
7:59
So one of the things that I want to do is go to the library.
8:04
For example, I want to read and encourage other people to read really great things that
8:12
holy and wise popes and saints and scholars have written.
8:18
And not things that were hundreds of years old or thousands of years old, but things
8:26
you can find on the internet for free that are readily available in good English translation
8:32
because a lot of this good stuff really was written in English.
8:36
And there are some people would have us believe that creation and certainly the church began
8:43
in 1965, the onset of the second Pentecost and the new springtime.
8:50
And that my goodness, we've discovered these really important questions about church and
8:56
state and marriage and ordination and what it means to be the church and economics and
9:02
justice.
9:03
And, Glorioski, we have absolutely no idea what the heck we're doing.
9:09
God hasn't said anything.
9:11
God hasn't said anything in holy writ.
9:14
He hasn't said anything through the hierarchy.
9:17
He hasn't said anything through saints and scholars.
9:21
From living memory, we have to rebuild the church from scratch.
9:26
We have to find a new way of being church.
9:29
Or as the little ditty would go, let's sing a new church into being.
9:34
And I want to say, wait a minute.
9:37
Wait a minute.
9:39
I don't think we need to put chairs in circles and emote and emote and ask each other, how
9:45
was it for you?
9:47
And then whatever enough people emote becomes the work of the spirit.
9:51
I wish they'd be more specific of what spirit it was, just saying.
9:56
I think if we read things that are from, I don't know, 1962, the 1950s, the 1930s, the
10:08
1920s, the 1910s, a couple of times going back to the 1880s, 1890s.
10:16
It turns out a lot of the questions that we're told are brand spanking new questions that
10:21
God has never expressed any opinion about have been pretty well demarcated.
10:26
And then when you realize, gosh, there were people who used to have a map and a compass.
10:33
And if we look at the map and use your compass, oh my gosh, we're heading towards a cliff.
10:40
So rather than head off the cliff as the only route to happier days and better times, we
10:46
can actually turn the car around, go away from the cliff, and go to a better place.
10:53
And how we'll do that is how we'll begin segment two.
10:56
I'm Jesuit Father Robert McTague, your host here every day at the Catholic Current.
11:00
Remember, our rallying cry here at the Catholic Current is Christus Mundo, Mundus Christo,
11:04
bringing Christ to the world and the world to Christ.
11:06
We do it because our Lord says so, for the greater glory of God, the love of our neighbor,
11:10
and the salvation of our own soul.
11:12
After the broadcast today, go to thestationofthecross.com, get our resources list, download our audios,
11:17
podcasts, wherever you can find audio, you can find us.
11:20
Follow us on your favorite platform at a five-star review.
11:23
We need to attract the attention of the listeners so that these conversations get the attention
11:28
they deserve.
11:29
Everything you need to take us to your family and friends, we give to you.
11:32
Together, let's take it around the world.
11:34
We can do it with you.
11:35
We cannot do it without you.
11:36
Let's do this good work together.
11:38
We'll be back in just two minutes.
11:40
Please do stay with us.
11:42
I Catholic Mobile is a proud sponsor of The Station of the Cross.
12:04
When you use I Catholic Mobile, a portion of every dollar supports Catholic programming.
12:09
Plus, enjoy reliable service with unlimited 5G data, text and talk, and free roaming in
12:15
Canada and Mexico.
12:16
With I Catholic Mobile, you stay connected with family and friends while also spreading
12:21
the truth of Jesus Christ with clarity and charity.
12:24
More information is available at icatholicmobile.com.
12:27
You're listening to The Catholic Current with Fr.
12:33
Robert McTague from The Station of the Cross Catholic Media Network.
12:37
Stay connected with the show and our guests and topics by following the show on Twitter and Gab.
12:42
Just search for The Catholic Current.
12:50
Praised be Jesus Christ.
12:51
This is Fr.
12:52
Robert McTague of The Society of Jesus, your daily host for The Catholic Current, where
12:55
we bring Christ to the world and the world to Christ.
12:58
You're listening to us from The Station of the Cross Studios, your local radio station.
13:01
The I Catholic Radio Mobile app, where we proclaim the fullness of truth with clarity
13:05
and charity.
13:06
Hey friends, did you know I Catholic Mobile supports only Catholic causes?
13:10
I Catholic Mobile offers unlimited 5G data, text and talk, and I Catholic Mobile gives
13:15
a portion of every dollar earned to The Station of the Cross Catholic Media Network.
13:19
By subscribing to I Catholic Mobile, you help fund programs that defend our Catholic faith.
13:25
We're talking about tyranny's favorite tricks, and one of the favorite tricks is to have
13:31
people forget the past, either by burning the library, as the German army did in Belgium
13:37
in World War I at the University of Leuven, or just acting as if the library never existed.
13:47
And I want to give a vivid example of that.
13:49
We're recording this.
13:50
It's the octave of Easter.
13:52
We are all presumably still overcome with Paschal joy.
13:57
I hope you had a very blessed, edifying, grace-filled celebration of Holy Week.
14:02
I certainly did.
14:04
But I want to give you an example, because I'm going to bet that most of you had an experience
14:12
of Holy Week, however reverent and devout it was, that was more or less typical.
14:23
And there was a way of doing Holy Week in living memory that was very different.
14:32
And the folks who are in charge, members of what I'm calling now the Synodal School, would
14:40
have us go forward into a bright liturgical future with absolutely no reference whatsoever
14:49
to what was once available universally in living memory.
14:54
And I was trying to think of a succinct way of sharing that with you.
14:59
So I found a European online magazine called Heritage Standard.
15:05
And I found an essay written by a gentleman named Robert Lusink.
15:11
Mr. Lusink, I hope I'm saying that right.
15:13
And if you're listening, I really do want to interview you.
15:16
And I'm going to do something I don't do very often.
15:19
I'm just going to read large chunks of the description of the way Holy Week was done
15:28
everywhere, everywhere in the Roman Rite before 1955, which in the life of the Church is really
15:38
not all that long ago.
15:41
And I want you to compare and contrast and see how long.
15:45
You can listen to what this gentleman wrote about and then look at your own experience
15:49
of Holy Week.
15:50
How long does it take you before you start bursting into rousing choruses of one of these
15:55
things is not like the other.
15:56
And I want you to have in mind that example of my little niece in the high chair going
16:02
from the standard Cheerios to looking with wide-eyed wonder when she tasted the apple
16:09
cinnamon Cheerios for the first time.
16:12
So I'm just going to read chunks of Mr. Lusink because he writes well and he describes something
16:17
that's very beautiful.
16:18
So I'm going to be quoting Mr. Lusink now.
16:20
And this will be in the show notes.
16:22
He begins this way.
16:23
On Wednesday evening of Holy Week, the Church went dark, not gradually, not symbolically.
16:30
Darkness spilled from the back, candle by candle, psalm by psalm, until the only light
16:38
in the cavernous space came from a single triangular stand.
16:43
Fifteen unbleached candles.
16:47
The same wax was used for requiem masses.
16:51
The same wax used for the dead.
16:56
One by one, psalm by psalm, the candles were extinguished.
17:03
When the final psalm ended, the last flame was carried behind the altar and hidden.
17:09
The Church dissolved into absolute blackness.
17:14
Then came the strepitus, the great noise.
17:18
Books slammed on pews, feet stamped on stone floors.
17:22
The sound rolled through the nave like the tremor of an earthquake.
17:26
The chaos of the disciples, the signal to leave a lightless sanctuary.
17:33
This was tenebrae.
17:36
Tenebrae is Latin for darkness.
17:39
Three nights in a row, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, culminating in the same silence,
17:49
the same darkness, the same sudden disappearance of all comfort.
17:58
The faithful departed without a blessing, without a hymn, without consolation.
18:06
It had been prayed continuously since at least the ninth century,
18:13
but abolished in the 1950s and 1960s.
18:18
That's just the opening few paragraphs from this essay from Robert Luznik.
18:24
Tenebrae means shadows or darkness.
18:27
It symbolizes our Lord being taken away from us and his arrest.
18:36
I've never been to a tenebrae service.
18:42
My friends who have gone will absolutely swear it is the most moving experience they have in their calendar year.
18:49
It's shattering on a gut level.
18:53
It affects the senses.
18:55
It affects the heart.
18:56
It affects the mind.
18:57
It affects the soul.
18:58
It's a foretaste of hell, of being separated from God.
19:05
Then top men decided that you and I didn't need that.
19:19
Something that Catholics had been familiar with since around the year 800 until the mid-1950s
19:30
just went away overnight.
19:34
At the risk of appearing pedantic, I wonder how many of us here can even spell the word tenebrae,
19:40
much less have ever heard of tenebrae, have ever seen such a service.
19:48
Regarding tenebrae, this gentleman writes,
19:51
what was lost was not a ceremony but a language of the senses, a register of grief,
19:57
a way of inhabiting death itself.
20:02
The Reformed liturgy could teach about suffering, could sing the passion, could offer knowledge,
20:09
yet it could not make you feel the abandonment, the darkness, the absence of God in your bones.
20:19
That's what he wrote.
20:22
It's gone to us now.
20:25
Unless you're part of a very exceptional community, it's gone.
20:31
Most young people I know have never heard of it.
20:36
Most of my blood relatives who are still alive have never heard of it.
20:43
Is your pastor familiar with it?
20:46
See, this is the example of what I mean by tyranny.
20:51
You don't have to burn the library.
20:54
You just have to act as if the library's not there, that it never existed.
21:01
I'm not going to go through all of Holy Week.
21:03
Just let me read some more of what Palm Sunday was like.
21:07
Now, the Palm Sunday service that he described was something that I have had the privilege to lead.
21:15
And I'll tell you, just the blessing of the palms,
21:19
you would think those palms are going to be used to raise the dead.
21:22
But he used three semesters of Latin to bless those palms.
21:26
So here's what he says about Palm Sunday.
21:52
One hour passed before the Mass began.
22:09
The hour was not counted in minutes.
22:12
It was measured in the rhythms of steps, prayers, and song.
22:17
Then came the passion sung and the three voices carrying the role,
22:21
the narrative known as the cronista, the crowd, the sinagoga, and Christ, Christus himself.
22:29
The celebrant sang Christ's voice in a tone made for mourning.
22:34
Each verse began with a long decant that hung in the air.
22:41
When Christ died in the text, the singing paused.
22:46
Everyone in the sanctuary infused kneeling.
22:50
Silence fell.
22:52
The death of God was held in the church as a living thing.
22:59
So now I've got to ask, was your Palm Sunday like that?
23:03
Was your Palm Sunday like that?
23:06
Probably not.
23:08
So here's my next question for you.
23:10
Would you like it to be?
23:12
More importantly, did you even know that that was an option?
23:18
That that is what everybody in the Roman Rite used to do?
23:23
Now, maybe, maybe, maybe all of the top men are 100% right.
23:32
Reform is going to lead us to greater glory.
23:37
Maybe everything they told us in Promise is absolutely true,
23:42
and we are indisputably living in the second Pentecost, the new springtime,
23:51
progressing from glory to glory.
23:55
Maybe we are opening churches that are monasteries, convents, and seminaries
24:00
are bursting at the seams with new vocations.
24:03
Our Catholic schools are filled because you've got great Catholic marriages
24:08
with lots of married couples open to life.
24:12
Maybe all that is happening right now, even as I speak.
24:16
Even so, even so, doesn't it strike you as peculiar that you've never,
24:27
ever even heard of any of this?
24:34
That you didn't know that that's still an option in some places?
24:40
I mean, that description that I've read, is there anything in you that says,
24:46
gosh, you know, that might have been good for me?
24:52
And then the question becomes, well, why wasn't I told about that?
24:59
I mean, even if we are living in the era of the new and improved original flavor,
25:07
couldn't somebody give us a vivid depiction of what we had supposedly gladly left behind?
25:17
One of the works of tyranny is manipulation of the past to control the present,
25:23
to control the future.
25:26
And I don't like it.
25:28
I'm Jesuit Father Robert McTague, your host here every day at the Catholic Current.
25:33
After the broadcast today, go to thestationofthecross.com.
25:36
Get our resources list, download our audio as podcast.
25:39
If you can find audio, you can find us.
25:41
Follow us on your favorite platform, write a five-star review.
25:44
We need to attract the attention of the listeners so that these conversations get the attention they deserve.
25:49
Everything you need to take is to your family and friends.
25:51
We give to you.
25:52
Together, let's take it around the world.
25:54
We can do it with you.
25:55
We cannot do it without you.
25:57
Let's do this good work together.
25:59
We'll be back in just two minutes.
26:01
Please do stay with us.
26:03
This is the Catholic Current from the States of America.
26:06
I'm Robert McTague, your host here every day at the Catholic Current.
26:09
Thanks for watching.
26:10
We'll see you next time.
26:11
Bye.
26:12
This is the Catholic Current from the Station of the Cross Catholic Media Network.
26:34
Catch up on an episode you've missed or share them with your family and friends.
26:39
The Catholic Current is podcasted wherever you enjoy listening.
26:42
Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Podbeam, TuneIn, and the iCatholic Radio mobile app.
26:49
Praise be Jesus Christ.
26:50
This is Father Robert McTague of the Society of Jesus, your daily host for the Catholic Current,
26:55
where we bring Christ to the world and the world to Christ.
26:57
You're listening to us from the Station of the Cross Studios, your local radio station,
27:01
the iCatholic Radio mobile app, and we proclaim the fullness of truth with clarity and charity.
27:06
Hey friends, if you're buying or selling a home, there's an easy way to help the Station of the Cross.
27:09
At the same time, Real Estate for Life has 1,400 experienced morally grounded agents in the U.S. and Canada.
27:17
Visit realestateforlife.org to find a Christ-centered experienced realtor near you.
27:22
And don't forget to mention the Station of the Cross.
27:24
By popular demand, I'm continuing my series on tyranny.
27:29
I'm talking about tyranny's favorite tricks.
27:32
And one of them is to act as if the past never happened, as if no one can have access to the past,
27:40
or no one should have access to the past.
27:43
And remember, you know, again, George Orwell said,
27:47
if you control the past, you control the present.
27:49
If you control the present, you control the future.
27:51
And I want to pause for a moment as I'm sharing this gentleman's reflection on how Holy Week used to be done within living memory.
28:00
Some people might object, rightly.
28:02
Oh, here comes Father again, you know, old right good, new right bad.
28:08
And that's not what I'm saying.
28:11
I'm saying this.
28:13
Have you ever heard of this older way of doing things that used to be done in living memory?
28:22
Does any of it sound attractive to you?
28:27
And do you wonder, do you have any curiosity at all about why no one ever told you about this?
28:38
And does it make you wonder, is there anything else that they haven't told you about it?
28:45
I was talking with Mr. Engineer recently about how far I'm going to continue the series on tyranny.
28:52
And I certainly want to do something in response to the no kings rallies.
28:55
I said, no, no, we really do need a king.
28:56
In fact, we have a king, it's Christ.
28:58
I may end up with that.
29:00
But I think I need to do a whole other section on reading older stuff that a lot of people haven't been familiar with before.
29:09
In fact, just last night in relation to the time of this recording, I submitted a new essay to New Oxford Review
29:19
having to do with our kind of mental amnesia, the amnesia of the imagination.
29:26
Gosh, we've got all these problems to solve.
29:28
We have absolutely no resource, no precedent, no guidance from the past whatsoever.
29:34
So let's sit in synodal circles and reinvent the wheel and sing or dialogue or talk or write documents as part of bringing a new church into being.
29:48
And I want to suggest that before we do that, let's take a look at what people have said and done.
29:57
People who are still alive and say, is there anything that sounds attractive to you at all in that?
30:05
So I'm, and again, I'm reading from an essay from the Heritage Standard, a gentleman named Robert Lussink.
30:14
Gosh, I hope I'm saying that right.
30:16
And he's kind of walking us through his holy week.
30:20
And he's describing his holy week, which used to be everybody's holy week until about 70 years ago or so.
30:30
And he said, you know, we have the recital of the Passion on Palm Sunday.
30:38
And then again, we work our way through the different Passion narratives all through holy week.
30:45
So over three days, you have the Passion sung in full in three voices, he says, and a voice of grief.
30:54
And his statement here is arresting.
30:57
He says, by Holy Thursday, the congregation carried the weight of three deaths in their bodies.
31:05
The week had accumulated meaning beyond any single ritual.
31:11
Let me interject here.
31:12
He's talking about people going to the church pretty much every day of holy week,
31:21
as if worship was the source and summit of our lives.
31:27
The past couple of years, I've been working with a very wonderful holy congregation of good religious women.
31:35
We're modest in the extreme, I won't mention their name on the air.
31:39
But the way I describe their community is this.
31:42
They love our Lord so much, they want to worship him.
31:46
Do you feel like you're with that kind of people where you are on Sundays, weekday mass, holy week,
31:56
who want to give their absolute best and utmost to worship and are willing to be shattered in the process?
32:05
Because this is what this gentleman is describing.
32:09
So I'm going to take up the thread with what he says about Holy Thursday.
32:12
Holy Thursday was the mass of the institution celebrated in the morning.
32:18
Afterwards, the altars were stripped bare, the tabernacle left open and empty.
32:23
From that evening until Easter morning, no mass would be celebrated, no blessed sacrament rested on the altar.
32:31
The church had been altered, changed.
32:34
You could see it, you could feel it.
32:37
Good Friday, he says, was not a commemoration.
32:41
It was the missa pronsanctificorum, the pre-sanctified liturgy.
32:47
He says, a rite whose roots reached Jerusalem itself.
32:51
The priest prostrated in silence before the bare altar.
32:57
And I will say, having led the Good Friday service in the older form, I don't wear red vestments.
33:06
I wear black vestments because we're acknowledging a death.
33:14
He continues, the Passion of Saint John was sung again in three voices.
33:21
Then came the twelve solemn prayers for the whole world.
33:37
And then the cross was unveiled in three stages, each with ece linium crucis, behold the wood of the cross.
33:48
The congregation approached on their knees.
33:51
No music sounded, no organ played.
33:54
Let me interject that there was no one in the choir loft with a guitar bellowing out,
34:02
were you there when they crucified my Lord?
34:07
Now when I as the priest would approach the crucifix which the acolytes held,
34:14
because I wanted to signify that I was entering upon holy ground,
34:19
I removed my shoes and genuflected three times.
34:26
That sticks with you.
34:29
He goes on to say, Holy Saturday was the mother of all vigils.
34:34
Outside the church fire was struck from flint, new and primal.
34:40
Twelve prophecies unfolded from Genesis to Exodus to the prophets,
34:45
sweeping salvation history to the empty tomb.
34:49
The Easter candle was plunged three times into the baptismal font,
34:54
chrism poured, breath blown across the water.
34:59
Saints were invoked in litany, and just before dawn,
35:04
the first mass of Easter began in darkness, ending as the light broke,
35:12
as if creation itself were completing its work.
35:17
This was not a liturgical theater.
35:20
It offered an environment, temporal, physical, sensory,
35:26
that made the congregation's body feel the death and resurrection.
35:34
So I'm going to stop reading this gentleman here and pause for a moment and say,
35:38
look, maybe it is the case that your Holy Week was very, very different
35:46
from what I described in this gentleman's essay.
35:50
And maybe your very, very different Holy Week was transformative, illuminating,
35:59
ecstatic, worthy worship in every sense of the word worthy in worship.
36:06
Let us grant that for now as absolutely true without hesitation, without reservation.
36:15
But that's not my point.
36:17
My point is this.
36:19
I just described something very beautiful, very powerful, very ancient,
36:31
that used to be the readily identifiable heritage of all Roman Catholics
36:41
until shortly after my parents were married.
36:46
And then it went away overnight.
36:50
And let us even, for the sake of argument, agree that its going away was better
36:57
and we've only been progressing from glory to glory ever since.
37:04
Let's make all those concessions.
37:06
My point is still this.
37:09
If you've never heard of any of this before, does that bother you?
37:17
I mean, even if what was described in this essay is by every objective and subjective measure
37:25
inferior to what you experienced at your parish this Holy Week.
37:31
It sounds really good though, doesn't it?
37:34
And isn't it at least suggestive that there was a continuity
37:41
in the treatment of Holy Week for over a thousand years?
37:46
And now most Catholics have zero awareness that this ever existed?
37:55
Let me put it to you this way.
37:57
Do you think it's a good thing that almost no Catholic you know has ever heard of this?
38:06
Does it give you a sigh of relief?
38:10
I'm really glad people have no idea that people used to worship so beautifully,
38:19
especially since we all do it so much better now.
38:22
You can add that if you want, I'm not going to argue with that.
38:25
But if you don't think it's a good thing that people have no idea
38:33
how Catholics nearly universally used to worship so beautifully during Holy Week,
38:42
if you think that nearly universal ignorance is not something to be proud of,
38:51
I want to suggest it might make you wonder what else haven't you been told?
38:56
And was this by accident, by carelessness, or by design?
39:01
Now here's the really important question.
39:05
What are you going to do about it?
39:08
If there are very many neglected treasures just strewn about our feet,
39:18
I mean everything that I've described can be found in detail online
39:24
in your little magic story box that you always keep over your heart in your shirt pocket.
39:32
The texts, the rationale, the music, how those liturgies were actually done,
39:39
you can see and hear it for yourself.
39:43
And you might have a look at it and say,
39:45
all right, you know, that's fine, knock yourself out, that's not for me.
39:51
That's your call. I leave that to your discretion.
39:56
But I want to plant a seed of doubt and a seed of wonder.
40:02
Why is it that almost no Catholic alive today knows about these things?
40:11
Is it good for them not to know?
40:16
And are there other good things that are part of our heritage that we haven't been told about yet?
40:25
Should we do something about that?
40:27
Think on these things today, take them to prayer, and talk about it with those you love.
40:32
I'm Jesuit Father Robert McTague, your host here every day of The Catholic Current.
40:36
Be part of the conversation. Follow what we're following by following us on Gab.
40:41
That's G-A-B.com. The channel is The Catholic Current.
40:45
And you can influence the conversation.
40:47
You can contact us at thestationofthecross.com slash askfather.
40:52
Comments, questions, suggestions, recommendations, we want to hear from you.
40:58
What was your Holy Week like? Was it anything like what I described?
41:02
Do you think that's good or bad? We want to know.
41:05
stationofthecross.com slash askfather.
41:08
We'll be back in just two minutes with Weekend Readiness. Please do stay with us.
41:30
Have a question or feedback about today's episode?
41:33
Want to suggest a guest or a future topic?
41:36
Go to thestationofthecross.com slash askfather and help influence the conversation.
41:50
Praise be Jesus Christ. This is Father Robert McTague of the Society of Jesus,
41:54
your daily host for The Catholic Current, where we bring Christ to the world and the world to Christ.
41:58
You're listening to us from the Station of the Cross studios, your local radio station,
42:02
the iCatholic Radio mobile app, where we proclaim the fullness of truth with clarity and charity.
42:08
Hey friends, if you value thoughtful Catholic analysis rooted in clarity and charity,
42:13
help sustain this work at thestationofthecross.com.
42:16
Here on the Catholic Current, we engage the issue seriously and faithfully,
42:20
and that intellectual freedom exists because we are listener funded.
42:24
Please support us at thestationofthecross.com.
42:27
Here we are, last segment of Friday. You know what that means?
42:30
In readiness, you and me reviewing the headlines of the week in light of the upcoming Sunday Scriptures,
42:34
so we'll be all prayed up for Sunday Mass.
42:38
Well, it looks like nobody's getting nuked this weekend, as far as we can tell.
42:45
We're in sort of a kind of a maybe ceasefire between the United States and Iran
42:52
that might or might not include Israel and might or might not include Lebanon
42:58
and might or might not include Iran in relation to Israel and vice versa.
43:02
We'll see. I'm not a political partisan, but I don't know what President Trump said
43:08
about eradicating a civilization so that it never comes back.
43:12
If there's a way to defend that, I don't know what it is. I'll leave it there.
43:17
I want to see people stop killing each other and blowing stuff up.
43:21
And boy, oh boy, we live in a world that is more complicated than most people realize,
43:26
and if you want to find out how complicated it is and how so many people can suffer over a small piece of real estate,
43:33
just let the Strait of Hormuz remain closed.
43:37
There's not only going to be energy crunch, there's going to be a famine
43:40
because a lot of the goods necessary for industrial fertilization,
43:45
for big farming from the big green revolution that's been keeping people from starving since the 60s,
43:52
that all comes through the Strait of Hormuz, so we really need to pray for an end to this conflict.
43:58
Please, God, soon.
44:00
All right, that having been said, what are some of the other things on my mind?
44:04
Well, misunderstanders of the religion of peace continue to slaughter Christians, especially around Easter,
44:11
and secular and sectarian members of the People Who Should Really Know Better Club
44:16
are very disinclined to talk about it.
44:20
Father, it's the octave of Holy Week, let's have some good news.
44:25
Yes, let's.
44:27
Well, we can talk about, you know, there are a lot of converts came into the church, at least in the United States,
44:33
and no less an authoritative source than HALO has this headline penned by Stephan Spilak,
44:43
Catholic Church Sees Massive Growth in New Members in 2026.
44:51
Well, I remember, maybe it was Sesame Street or the electric company,
44:58
and they had a little ditty that said, it's about the size of where you put your eyes,
45:05
and that's about the size of it.
45:08
So, if you look at church growth through adults coming into the church,
45:15
through baptism or receiving the full communion, and you look back to, say, COVID,
45:23
then there has been a non-trivial increase.
45:29
Now, if you put your eyes back to 2015, the rate of growth is significantly less.
45:41
If you go all the way back to 2000,
45:48
what you'll see is that the number of adults becoming Catholic in the United States
45:55
has been in a very steep decline for the past 25 years,
46:02
and we had a bit of an uptick.
46:05
Now, on the one hand, every convert represents a sole one for Christ,
46:10
endlessly precious victory, absolutely.
46:14
But the idea that we have suddenly, inexplicably turned a corner, that's not true.
46:26
I also want to add, too, that the way the Catholic Church has grown
46:31
is not primarily through converts.
46:35
Granted, you have the Guadalupe event where you've got 8 million converts in a couple of years,
46:41
but ordinarily the church grows through people getting married and having kids
46:45
and raising them Catholics.
46:47
And you know what hasn't been happening very much in the United States in recent years?
46:51
People getting married in the church, having kids, and raising them as Catholic.
46:57
So I am delighted for absolutely every single convert who came into the church
47:03
on Easter Sunday at the Easter Vigil.
47:05
Thanks be to God.
47:08
Let's not dance in the end zone just yet.
47:13
Another question that needs to be asked is,
47:15
so, all right, we've sacramentalized these people.
47:18
Who's going to disciple them?
47:21
Who's going to mentor them?
47:24
Who's going to ensure their spiritual maturation?
47:29
Are we equipped for that?
47:31
Do we know how to do that?
47:33
Is there somebody on board for that?
47:36
I don't know.
47:37
I don't know.
47:39
Now, I try to have some unambiguously good news,
47:44
and I've got two because, after all, it's the octave of Easter.
47:50
There is a famous 500-year-old painting in Venice called Madonna and Child Enthroned,
47:57
and it is being comprehensively restored.
48:01
And this great work of art is not going to be lost to the ravages of time,
48:05
and we're linking to a place where you can see the process of its restoration.
48:10
Also, very significantly, the pope has appointed an archbishop from Holland
48:18
as the papal nuncio, the papal ambassador, to Germany.
48:23
Okay.
48:25
Germany is a hotbed of synodalism.
48:27
So is Holland.
48:29
But listen to what His Excellency has said here.
48:33
Western society's views on abortion, euthanasia, and gender theory
48:38
are clear signs of a society that has lost its moral compass
48:43
and is drifting helplessly on the stormy sea of human desires
48:49
tossed about and weakened in every respect.
48:53
Well, rock on, Archbishop von Magen.
48:57
Glad that you've got the job that you have.
49:00
Welcome aboard.
49:01
That having been said, let's turn to the scriptures.
49:04
If you're following the Novus Ordo calendar of the Pauline Rite,
49:07
we're looking at the second Sunday of Easter, Lectionary 43,
49:12
and the Gospel is from John 20.
49:16
And we've got another appearance of our Lord, and he says,
49:19
Peace be with you.
49:21
Then Thomas isn't there.
49:24
And, you know, I have to see, I have to put my hands in his side, etc., etc.
49:30
What's the moral of the story?
49:33
He missed out on the appearance of Christ,
49:37
and he missed out on some of the work of the Holy Spirit
49:42
because he separated himself from the body of believers.
49:48
Very important moral spiritual lesson here.
49:52
Let's not separate ourselves from the body of believers.
49:59
The idea that we can just stay at home and have me and my private Jesus
50:06
and work out my own salvation and somehow that's enough,
50:11
well, the Apostle Thomas is saying, yeah, don't do that.
50:17
Don't do that.
50:18
Don't separate ourselves from the body of believers.
50:21
And that includes the church triumphant who are already in heaven,
50:26
and that includes the church suffering who needs our prayers in purgatory.
50:33
Friends, the church is a big place spanning time and space.
50:37
Embrace all of it.
50:39
I'm Jesuit Father Robert McTeague, your host here every day of The Catholic Current.
50:43
Be sure to join us on Monday for another episode of The Catholic Current,
50:46
a hot topic, great guest, lively conversation.
50:49
That's what we do here day in and day out, The Catholic Current,
50:52
because here at the Station of the Cross, we are more than relevant.
50:56
After the broadcast today, go to thestationofthecross.com,
50:59
get our resources list, download our audio podcast,
51:02
or if you can find audio, you can find us.
51:05
Follow us on your favorite platform, write a five-star review.
51:07
We need to attract the attention of the listeners so that these conversations
51:11
get the attention that they deserve.
51:13
Everything you need to take is to your family and friends.
51:15
We give to you.
51:16
Together, let's take it around the world.
51:18
Through the intercession of Our Lady of Mt. Carmel,
51:20
may mighty God bless you, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.
51:23
Go in peace and please pray for me, for I am a sinner.