Laudetur Iesus Christus and Merry Christmas! Today is the Sunday within the Octave of Christmas, for this weekend’s reflection we share two reflections, first the great liturgist, Dom Prosper Gueranger’s entry for today’s Mass: https://sensusfidelium.com/the-liturgical-year-dom-prosper-gueranger/christmas/sunday-within-the-octave-of-christmas/ and Dr. Mike Foley’s: https://www.newliturgicalmovement.org/2020/12/divine-adoption-sunday.html#.YcYa1llOmHs

Prayers for our priests: In your charity, please offer prayers for our priests who no doubt have a more difficult weekend offering a Sunday’s worth of Masses for at least 2-3 days (in future years we pray they all will be the Latin Mass).

Mass Announcements for Christmastide Week

• Monday December 27:  St. John the Baptist, Tryon (2 hours west of Charlotte): Special 11am High Mass
• Wednesday December 29: St. Ann parish: CANCELLATION: The 6pm Low Mass is cancelled for this day only.
• Thursday December 30: St. Thomas Aquinas will offer a special 10am Low Mass (the normal 7pm Latin High Mass is canceled)
• Friday December 31: St. Ann parish: The 7am Low Mass is cancelled for this day only. However, St. Mark parish’s regular 12:30pm Low Mass will be offered as normal.

Saturday January 1 – feast of the Circumcision

• Our Lady of Grace, Greensboro, 12 midnight Low Mass (1.5 hours north of Charlotte)
• St. John the Baptist, Tryon, NC 12 midnight Latin Mass (2 hours west of Charlotte)
• St. Ann, Charlotte – 9am Low Mass (followed by Confessions until 12 noon)
• St. Thomas Aquinas, Charlotte – 10am High Mass (followed by monthly blessing of religious objects)

FYI: The midnight Masses of January 1 are on the late evening of December 31 and begin at midnight January 1.

Feast of the Epiphany Schedule

Wednesday January 5 – Vigil of Epiphany: St. Ann, Charlotte – 6:00pm Low Mass (followed by blessing of Epiphany Holy Water, a 45-minute blessing)  Note: Please only bring EMPTY water bottles/containers. The priest will bless the parish’s large water containers and laity can fill up their empty containers with the blessed water.

Thursday January 6 – Feast of the Epiphany

• St. Ann, Charlotte – 6pm High Mass
• St. Thomas Aquinas, Charlotte – 7pm High Mass

Traditional Christmas Proclamation

If you attended St. Ann or St. Thomas Midnight Mass yesterday, you may have heard the beautiful chanting of the traditional Christmas proclamation in Latin. This ancient proclamation was in use for centuries until the late 1960s when it was eliminated. In the mid-1990s, Pope St. John Paul II brought back the proclamation, but modernized the text a bit. The traditional proclamation is based on Septuagint (Greek) Old Testament chronology which lists the years from creation of the world to the Nativity of Christ as 5,199 years. The modern proclamation however is instead based on sort of a modernist evolutionary version which presumes long ages of the earth (unknown ages).  While it should be noted that there are some transcribing errors with the Septuagint chronology, it does more closely aligns with the opinion of the ancient Church fathers who believed the age between creation and the Nativity was less than 10,000 years old, and likely around 4,000 years (hence the 4 weeks of Advent to represent the 4,000 years between creation and Christ). To learn more about this and how the Venerable Bede corrected this please read this great report from the Kolbe Center for Creation (whom the CLMC co-sponsored a year ago at St. Mark parish):

https://www.kolbecenter.org/kolbe-report-9-7-19/

Latin Mass & Traditional News

• Refurbished St. Edward new home to Traditional Mass community: With Latin Masses being temporarily restricted in some places, we share some uplifting and joyous news. The Archdiocese of Phoenix has now erected a 2^nd exclusively Traditional Latin Mass chapel in the city of Phoenix, to also be staffed by priests of the Fraternity of St. Peter (a society of priests offering the Latin Mass exclusively). This may indeed be the first time a diocese has two fully Latin Mass “parishes” in the same city and it shows the Latin Mass continues to grow regardless of what strangeness are occurring overseas in the Eternal City: https://www.catholicsun.org/2021/12/16/refurbished-st-edward-new-home-to-traditional-mass-community/ CLMC note: Phoenix has not only two exclusively TLM chapels, but also several Novus Ordo parishes that offer a Traditional Latin Mass, demonstrating the Archdiocese’s flexibility and openness in meeting the needs of all the Latin Mass faithful.

• BY THEIR FRUITS: The Decline of the Sacred Priesthood in the U.S. Catholic Church since 1970: A friend to the CLMC, Brian Mershon, has written an important article which asks the uncomfortable question of why there is a decline in vocations since 1970 (hint: one can guess why).  https://remnantnewspaper.com/web/index.php/headline-news-around-the-world/item/5746-the-decline-of-the-sacred-priesthood-in-the-u-s-catholic-church-since-1970

• Bishop Schneider on Latest Vatican Crackdown on Tradition: His Excellency, Bishop Athanasius Schneider (who visited us at St. Ann in 2017), has offered comments on some recent documents from Rome and encourages bishops to extend “creative charity” to the Latin Mass faithful in their diocese (one excellent way would be to follow Phoenix’s example above): Here Bishop Schneider’s hopeful remarks:

• We must keep in mind that violent acts do not last for long. The violence and injustice done to a considerable group of model sons and daughter of the Church, through the Holy See’s recent document, will have a counter-effect. The liturgical tradition will be even more loved and cherished. Some priests and faithful will be forced into a life of “Catacomb Masses.” Yet they should not become discouraged or embittered. Divine Providence has permitted this painful trial, in which we are witnessing the authorities of the Holy See persecute good Catholics who are attached to the millennium old liturgical treasure of the Roman Church. They should continue to love the Pope and their bishops and increase their prayers and acts of reparation and penance, humbly imploring God that He may open the eyes of the Pope and bishops and enkindle in them an esteem and love for the treasure of these ancient liturgical traditions. May Pope Francis and many other bishops remember the joy of the days of their childhood and youth, when they heard, or themselves spoke, these moving and ever-youthful words: “Introibo ad altare Dei, ad Deum qui laetificat iuventutem meam!,” i.e., “I will go to the altar of God: to God who gives the joy to my youth.” We firmly hope that, one day, the Roman Pontiff himself will again pronounce these words at the foot of the altar in St. Peter’s Basilica in Rome.

https://remnantnewspaper.com/web/index.php/articles/item/5751-exclusive-bishop-athanasius-schneider-on-vatican-crackdown-on-traditional-sacraments

• Who denies the Novus Ordo is valid? Prepare for a surprise: Often times, modernists or even conservative Catholics will accuse traditionalists (e.g. Latin Mass attendees) of denying the validity of the Novus Ordo Mass of Vatican II. However, in an insightful article long overdue, Phil Lawler, reveals the real surprise – the people who actually deny the Novus Ordo Mass are in fact the 70% of Novus Ordo attendees who themselves deny the real presence of Jesus Christ in the Eucharist at such Masses. This is really something to ponder and ask why are traditionists being singled out when the “800 pound elephant” in the room is ignored. The next time someone tries to bring up this issue, share this article with them and ask what they are doing to combat this offensive unbelief occurring in their own parish: https://www.catholicculture.org/commentary/who-denies-novus-ordo-is-valid-prepare-for-surprise/

Archbishop Vigano – Christmas Message to the American People

His Excellency and formal Papal Nuncio to the United States pens a special Christmas letter to the American people. Like a loving father and pastor, he exhorts the American people to rise up to their vocation and fight the new world order which is built on the culture of death:

Be proud of your identity as American patriots and of the Faith that must animate your life. Do not allow anyone to make you feel inferior just because you love your homeland, because you are honest at work, because you want to protect your family and raise your children with healthy values, because you respect the elderly, because you protect life from conception to its natural end. Do not be intimidated or seduced by those who propagate a dystopian world in which a faceless power imposes on you contempt for the Law of God, presents sin and vice as licit and desirable, despises righteousness and Morality, destroys the natural family and promotes the worst perversions, plans the death of defenseless and weak creatures, and exploits humanity for its own profit or to preserve power.

Be worthy heirs of the great Archbishop Fulton Sheen, and do not follow those of your Pastors who have betrayed the mandate they have received from Our Lord, who impose iniquitous orders on you or who remain silent before the evidence of an unheard of crime against God and humanity.

May this Holy Christmas illuminate your minds and inflame your hearts before the Infant King who lays in the manger. And just as the choirs of the Angels and the homage of the Magi united with the simple adoration of the Shepherds, so also today your commitment to the moral rebirth of the United States of America – one Nation under God – will have the blessing of Our Lord and will gather those who govern you around you. Amen.

https://guildofblessedtitus.blogspot.com/2021/12/archbishop-vigano-message-to-american.html

Don’t Stop Celebrating: After Christmas Day, Christmas continues

“Catholics ought to have a totally different conception of Christmas (from what the secular world offers).” – Dr. Peter Kwasniewski, December 24, 2019

In what is becoming an annual CLMC tradition and a rallying cry for the full restoration of the Traditional Latin Mass in Charlotte, we repost Dr. Peter Kwasniewski’s brilliant December 2019 article which reminds Latin Mass attendees of the treasure and precious gold they have in the traditional liturgical calendar, especially the traditional Christmas Season according to the 1962 Missal (and prior). If one hasn’t read this article, we can only encourage everyone to read it again, and again. While the world enters into their “post-Christmas fast” today December 26, traditional Catholics begin 40 days of festivals and feasts of the Christmas season, which runs in stages from December 25 – February 2^nd (Candlemas/Feast of the Purification)  We should be clear, this Christmas season can only be fully celebrated in the Traditional Latin Mass calendar, as sadly the Novus Ordo calendar eliminated much the Christmas season – particularly the Epiphany season: Here is an excerpt:

It is very important for us not to surrender to the secular approach that, in a way, celebrates Christmas before Christmas and not afterward. We should really make an effort — in the way our homes are decorated, the way we observe Sundays and holy days, the stories we read and the other activities we do in the house — to keep the spirit of Christmas alive, even if at a “low burn,” throughout this period from December 26 to February 2. Yes, the great feast is that big of a deal! Such observance also becomes a countercultural catechesis in one of the central mysteries of the Christian faith: the Incarnation of the Son of God. This is the pivot point of all human history and of the story of each man, woman, and child.

CLMC comment: In a materialistic post-Christian world that continues to demonstrate its perverted/inverted hunger for the authentic meaning of Christmas by feasting and impiously celebrating 4 weeks before Christmas, traditional Catholics in Charlotte have a historic opportunity to share how Christmas and the Incarnation can be fully understood and lived only through the Traditional Latin Mass, and its liturgical life that flows from it. Let us consider finding ways to share that this Christmas season.

• Don’t Stop celebrating: After Christmas Day, Christmas continues by Dr. Peter Kwasniewski: https://www.lifesitenews.com/blogs/dont-stop-celebrating-after-christmas-day-christmas-continues-2

A few newcomers to the Latin Mass might ask – what exactly is the difference in the Christmas season between the Traditional Latin Mass and Novus Ordo Mass? The CLMC’s Brian Williams teamed up with Dr. Kwasniewski a few years ago to briefly explain how the two calendars differ (and why the Traditional calendar is preferred):

• Just How Different are the Old and New Liturgical Calendars at Christmas and New Years?: https://liturgyguy.com/2019/12/30/just-how-different-are-the-old-and-new-liturgical-calendars-at-christmas-and-new-years/

Christmas has just begun and now begins 40 days of celebrating the Incarnation and all its mysteries. Only one Mass in the Roman Rite fully expresses and celebrates the Christmas season. What Mass are you attending on Sunday?