Laudetur Iesus Christus! Sunday begins the new liturgical year and the season of Advent – the penitential season to prepare for Christ’s Incarnation at Christmas.  Dr. Mike Foley notes the providential timing of the Collect for the 1^st Sunday of Advent with the Church in crisis: http://www.newliturgicalmovement.org/2020/11/the-tempestuous-collect-for-first.html

Sunday Latin Masses in Charlotte

• St. Thomas Aquinas: 11:30am High Mass
• St. Ann: 12:30pm High Mass

Advent & Christmas Schedule

We will be posting the special Latin Masses during Advent on our webpage here: https://charlottelatinmass.org/mass-times/

Latin Mass & Traditional News

• Can the Catholic Church be the Champion against the forces of militant secular liberalism? – A good article by Fr. Cippolla (former pastor of St. Mary’s in Norwalk, CT who offered the Latin Mass frequently) on how the Church is the only institution that can respond to today’s crisis: https://rorate-caeli.blogspot.com/2020/11/can-catholic-church-be-champion-against.html

• Feast of St. Cecilia: Last Sunday November 22 was the feast of St. Cecilia, the patron of musicians. Dom Prosper Gueranger had a great reflection on her life and noted she can be an excellent saint to overcome fear. Since many people are anxious or have fear over our country, COVID, elections, etc. – she might be a good saint to have recourse to:

• • …Without doubt, this zeal is not extinct; it still works in some, and its fruits rejoice and console the Church; but why does it slumber so profoundly in so many hearts which God had prepared to be its active centres? The cause is unhappily to be traced to that general coldness, produced by effeminacy, which might be taken by itself alone as the type of the age; but we must add thereto another sentiment, proceeding from the same source, which would suffice, if of long duration, to render the debasement of a nation incurable. This sentiment is fear; and it may be said to extend at present to its utmost limit. Men fear the loss of goods or position, fear the loss of comforts and ease, fear the loss of life. Needless to say, nothing can be more enervating, and consequently more dangerous to the world, than this humiliating pre-occupation but above all, we must confess that it is anything but Christian. Have we forgotten that we are merely pilgrims on this earth? And has the hope of future good died out of our hearts? Caecilia will teach us how to rid ourselves of this sentiment of fear. In her days, life was less secure than now. There certainly was then some reason to fear; and yet Christians were so courageous, that the powerful pagans often trembled at the words of their victims. https://sensusfidelium.us/the-liturgical-year-dom-prosper-gueranger/november/november-22-st-caecilia-virgin-martyr/

• Feast of Pope St. Clement I: Monday November 23, was the feast of St. Clement, the 4^th Dom Gueranger has a fascinating story that confirms Papal Primacy. A controversy broke out in the Church of Corinth during Clement’s reign, and while St. John was still alive and nearby in Ephesus, the Corinth Church wrote to Pope Clement in Rome for his assistance:
  

• • The Corinthians at last felt the necessity of putting an end to a disorder, which might be prejudicial to the extension of the Christian faith; and for this purpose, it was requisite to seek assistance from outside. The Apostles had all departed this life, except St. John, who was still the light of the Church. It was no great distance from Corinth to Ephesus, where the Apostle resided; yet it was not to Ephesus but to Rome that the Church of Corinth turned. Clement examined the case referred to his judgment by that Church, and sent to Corinth five commissaries to represent the Apostolic See. https://sensusfidelium.us/the-liturgical-year-dom-prosper-gueranger/november/november-23-st-clement-i-pope-and-martyr/

• Feast of St. Catherine of Alexandria: Wednesday Nov. 25 was the feast of St. Catherine of Alexandria who was taken off the calendar in 1969 when the Novus Ordo Mass was introduced but then restored by Pope St. John Paul II in 2002 (it always remained on the Traditional Calendar). She is one of the 14 Holy Helpers, and as this article notes, perhaps a good recourse against Protestant heretics: http://www.newliturgicalmovement.org/2020/11/st-catherine-of-alexandria-in-counter.html (As a reminder the TLM calendar has many great saints who were unjustly removed in 1969 including St. Christopher, St. Philomena – the Novus Ordo’s loss is our gain!)

• The Miraculous Medal – the Safest Vaccine: Friday November 27 was the optional feast of Our Lady of the Miraculous Medal and Catholic historian Roberto de Mattei has a great article on the devotion, and it’s message for our times: https://rorate-caeli.blogspot.com/2020/11/de-mattei-safest-vaccine-against.html

• New Benedictine Monastery Developing Down Under in Tasmania: https://rorate-caeli.blogspot.com/2020/11/building-tasmanias-first-benedictine.html

COVID & Catholic Perspective on Vaccines

• Bishop of Fresno advises Catholics to avoid all COVID-19 vaccines connected to abortion: Bishop John Brennan of Fresno, California has issued an excellent video and warning to not accept a COVID-19 vaccine connected to abortion: https://www.lifesitenews.com/news/california-bishop-warns-catholics-not-to-take-covid-vaccine-connected-in-any-way-to-aborted-babies You can see his full video here: https://vimeo.com/479960613

• New Book on the Traditional Catholic View of Vaccinations: If there is one book to give this Christmas, it’s this book by Pamela Acker: Vaccination: A Catholic Perspective. Miss Acker, as some of you may recall, is a biologist who worked on vaccines and spoke at St. Mark parish a year ago at the Evolution & the Culture of Death conference (co-sponsored by the CLMC). Her new book looks into vaccination, its safety record, the science, and the theological perspective.
  

• • Drawing upon the latest research in the field, Miss Acker elucidates the many problematic aspects of vaccination as currently practiced and explains how they flow out of a materialistic, mechanistic, evolution-based understanding of the human person which tends to see man as a collection of parts rather than as a divinely-designed body-soul composite. With powerful examples she shows how the evolution-based approach to the study of disease has had disastrous consequences for scientific and medical research and has supported the maintenance of inadequate criteria for evaluating the efficacy and the dangers of vaccination as currently practiced.
  • The book goes on sale December 8: https://www.kolbecenter.org/product/vaccination-a-catholic-perspective/

• Bishop Schneider on the COVID situation: This is an older article from October but very timely. Our friend, His Excellency, noted that Catholics should not blindly follow the COVID protocols as the sanitary dictatorship is using COVID as a means for a “One World Government”. He encourages Catholics to resist the absurdities of these protocols that place the temporal needs above the supernatural. He also warns against COVID-19 vaccines derived from aborted fetal tissue. Perhaps helpful as we hear of more COVID edicts in our own state, and around the world: https://www.cfnews.org.uk/bishop-christians-must-refuse-covid-vaccine-derived-from-aborted-babies-even-if-it-means-martyrdom/

Lastly, if you’re wanting to begin to research more about aborted derived vaccines (and those which aren’t), we refer you to Children of God for Life, which has a listing of both COVID and other vaccines which contain aborted fetal tissue (see “Vaccine” tab): https://cogforlife.org/