The Priestly Fraternity of St. Peter is happy to announce the following Priestly Ordination date:

• On Saturday, March 17th, Bishop Alexander Sample of the Diocese of Marquette, MI, conferred Diaconate ordinations at Our Lady of Guadalupe Seminary in Denton, NE.
• On Saturday, May 19th, Bishop Fabian Bruskewitz of the Diocese of Lincoln, NE, will confer Priestly ordinations at the Cathedral of the Risen Christ in Lincoln, NE.

On Saturday, March 17th, Bishop Alexander Sample of the Diocese of Marquette, MI, conferred Diaconate ordination on five men. See more information about the 2012 Diaconate ordinations or sign up for our newsletter for full coverage.

His Excellency, Bishop Fabian Bruskewitz (Diocese of Lincoln, Nebraska) ordained seven Priestly Fraternity of St. Peter seminarians to the Subdiaconate on Saturday, January 28, 2012. The ceremony took place in the Chapel of Sts. Peter and Paul at Our Lady of Guadalupe Seminary in Nebraska. Our thanks to Bishop Bruskewitz and to all those were able to attend and celebrate this day.

On Thursday February 2nd, His Grace Archbishop Thomas Wenski celebrated a Pontifical Solemn High Mass for the feast of Candlemas at the Church of the Epiphany, Miami, Florida. The Liturgy included the distribution of candles for the Feast, as well as a procession of the clerics around the interior of the church.

The assistant clerics were Very Rev. Msgr. A. Wadsworth (Westminster, England), Rev. Fr. Guy Nicholls (Birmingham Oratory), Rev. Fr. R. Vigoa, Very Rev. Fr. C. Marino, Rev. Fr. J. Fishwick and Very Rev. Msgr. J. O’Doherty (Archdiocese of Miami), Rev. Fr. C. Saenz (Society of Jesus), Rev. Fr. J. Fryar, Rev. Fr. J. Nolan and Rev. Fr. B Austin (Priestly Fraternity of St. Peter).

The Florida Schola Cantorum, under the direction of Rev. Dr. Edward Schaefer sang Wadsworth’s Missa Brevis, and the Women’s Schola Cantorum sang the Gregorian Chant propers for the Mass and Terce, under the direction of Dr. Jennifer Donelson.

Video of the Pontifical Mass can be viewed by following this link:

http://livemass.net/christmas/miami.m4v

In introducing the Priestly Fraternity of St. Peter Latin Mass training video, Cardinal Dario Castrillon-Hoyos speaks to priests about the Extraordinary Form of the Roman Rite and comments on the Holy Father Pope Benedict XVI’s motu proprio “Summorum Pontificum.”

by Fr. Eric Flood, FSSP
From the December 2011 Fraternity Newsletter

When we profess our belief in the Church Christ established, we proclaim that it is one, holy, catholic, and apostolic. These four marks must necessarily be present in the religion founded by the God-man. They distinguish false religions from the true one, and, once found in a particular religion, they guarantee the integrity of the doctrines it teaches.

The first mark of Christ’s Church is that it must be “one.” Many today consider themselves to be broadminded when they study various religions and then make a personal decision as to what to believe. Others, however, simply accept—and live according to—the latest creed of the current population. Both of these not only lack a firm foundation upon objective truth, but they are easily influenced by the transitory opinions of the mass media, political agendas, and new “religions.”

But the faith upon which Christ established His Church must—of necessity—have the characteristic of an unending truth enduring throughout the centuries. Christ established His religion upon His own immutability; therefore, its teachings reflect His permanency. When falsity and sin are rampant, Christ’s Church serves as a beacon of light drawing scattered mankind home to unchanging and recognizable truth.

It was to be expected that some men would be bold enough to oppose the teachings of Christ when He walked the earth, but He showed by His example that His teachings would not be influenced by the transitory standards of such men. Similarly, the transient standards of society in the twenty-first century cannot be a reason to call into question the teachings of God. The truth taught two thousand years ago must also be true today.

For instance, consider how, less than a hundred years ago, nearly all the major religions taught that  contraception was intrinsically wrong. Now the Catholic Church is virtually alone in upholding that doctrine, while others have changed their teachings in order to acquiesce to modern social thought or to cushion consciences which prefer an easier religion to practice.

True ecumenism, then, strives to build upon the sacred edifice which has Christ as the cornerstone. It does not have a nonchalant attitude towards the proliferation of creeds nor does it ignore certain biblical passages to achieve a common agreement. Similarly, it does not water down the doctrine of Christ; rather, it confidently presents the teachings of Christ in an effort to gather the nations into the one flock.

The oneness of the faith of Christ is further rooted in the unity of God. Christ likens Himself to the good shepherd who watches over his flock. There is only one shepherd, and there is only one flock. Other sheep may be wandering outside the flock who can join the one flock when they attend to the shepherd’s voice. But as Christ shows in the Gospel of St. John (6:67), He will not water down His teachings in order to keep attendance at a high number in His Church.

In His parables, Christ likens the Church to various things: a kingdom, a city, a field, and a vineyard. In every instance, it is a singular thing, not plural kingdoms, cities, fields, or vineyards. Furthermore, the Church is likened to the spouse of Christ (Eph. 5:24-29), but a husband is permitted only one wife. Thus, the Church founded by Christ is one and only one at any given time.

Christ instructed the Apostles to teach “all things whatsoever I have commanded you” (Mt. 28:20). He did not give them permission to change His teachings. Even if the majority of people believed otherwise, or if the truths seemed difficult to believe to the possible converts, the Apostles were to “stand fast in the faith” (I Cor. 16:13) as there is only “one faith” (Eph. 4:5).

Knowing that the truth was in danger of being adulterated, St. Paul also warned of those who “would pervert the Gospel of Christ (Gal. 1:7-8) for “if any one preach to you a gospel besides that which you have received, let him be anathema” (Gal. 1:9). And for those who attempt to pervert the truth, to “mark them who make dissensions and offences contrary to the doctrine which you have learned, and avoid them” (Rom. 16:17).

Christ, too, warned that “there will rise up false christs and false prophets, and they shall show signs and wonders, to seduce, if it were possible, even the elect” (Mark 13:22), and these would be known by their refusal to submit to the Church. “If he will not hear the church, let him be to thee as the heathen and the publican” (Mt. 18:17). For Christ is the same today, yesterday, and forever (Heb. 13:8), and the faithful must be cautious to “be not led away with various and strange doctrines” (Heb. 13:9) for “no other foundation can a man lay, but that which is laid” (I Cor. 3:11).

The abomination of heresy and schism is rooted in the willing withdrawal from unity. But the person who has so withdrawn himself must not be allowed to pretend that he is still “unified.” Hence, unity among the flock of Christ sometimes requires the severing of “dead” members so they do not sap energy from the body of the Church. Furthermore, the oneness of the Church is proclaimed every time it exposes such error or falsity.

Since the Church is one (has a unity) in its principle—God; one in its invisible head —Christ; one in its informing Spirit—the Holy Ghost; one in its aim—Heaven; and one in its communion among members; the unity cannot be broken. Thus, the essence of the Church, being founded upon the rock— Christ, must necessarily have unity.

Unity, then, is an external mark whereby the world can distinguish the false prophets and teachers from the Teacher of truth. This oneness of the Church will persist until the end of time, for even the gates of hell cannot overcome it by instigating division or a multiplicity of religions.

by D.Q. McInerny, Ph.D.
From the December 2011 Newsletter

We are all familiar with the response Our Lord gave to the Herodians and Pharisees when, with their typical disingenuousness, they attempted to trap Him in His words over the issue of giving tribute to Caesar. Was it or was it not, they asked, proper for Jews to render such tribute? The Herodians were very probably looking for an emphatic Yes answer, whereas the Pharisees were fishing for an emphatic No. Such it always is with narrow-minded partisans, strangers to wisdom as they are. They know only extremes, and are blind to the possibilities that can lie between them. The answer they received to their question resounds down through the ages, and it is addressed as much to us as it was to them: “Render to Caesar the things that are Caesar’s, and to God the things that are God’s.”

In reflecting on that response, it should be immediately clear to us what it is that we ought to be rendering to God, what it is that we owe to Him. In a word, everything—our whole heart, soul, strength, and mind. “Caesar,” for us, could be said to represent whatever duly established civil government we happen to be subject to. The question then becomes, What is it that we owe to Caesar? What kind of obligations do we have toward the political community to which we belong and the government that guides and directs it?

Before we attempt to answer that question, and to ensure the soundness of the answers we give to it, we have to understand it as having very much to do with the virtue of justice, so perhaps it would be helpful if at this point we were to refresh our memories regarding certain aspects of that most important virtue. We are all familiar with the classic definition of justice, which can be stated as follows: “the rendering to others what is due to them.” Justice is one of the four Cardinal Virtues, but unlike the other three, prudence, fortitude, and temperance, the principal focus of which is inward, on the self, the principal focus of justice is outward, on others. Justice, then, is preeminently a social virtue. It is the virtue which, faithfully practiced, binds human communities together, making them coherent wholes.

Next we recall the three principal divisions of justice, called respectively distributive justice, commutative justice, and social justice. Distributive justice applies to those whom St. Thomas Aquinas describes as “having the care of the community,” which is to say, those who are part of the government in one capacity or another. They have many obligations towards those whom they govern, but the most basic of which, according to St. Augustine, is to establish and maintain a society that is marked by “the tranquility of order,” which is St. Augustine’s definition of peace. But the peace in question must be true peace, that is, peace based on justice. Those who govern must govern justly, which means that they must foster the common good. Commutative justice is the justice which the citizens of a political community display toward one another. And social
justice—sometimes called legal justice—is the just behavior of the citizenry as directed toward those who govern them. We can see, then, that it is social justice which has directly to do with the question of what it is that should be rendered to Caesar.

It is important that we be clear about the fact that what is involved here is a matter of justice, and that implies real obligation on our part. We might be tempted to balk at the idea that we owe anything at all to a government to which we are subject, apart, say, from meeting purely legal obligations such as obeying traffic laws and paying taxes, and in that hand-washing attitude quote from the Letter to the Hebrews to the effect that, “We do not have here a lasting city, but seek one to come.” But such an attitude will not do. True enough, the city in which we now find ourselves is a temporal one, but so long as we ourselves are in time it is the city in which we have been appointed to dwell, and within which, to the best of our abilities given the circumstances, we have to work out our salvation. We cannot, then, shirk the responsibilities we have, in justice, towards those who govern us in the political order.

Nonetheless, we have to admit that we are often confronted with onerous difficulties when it comes to showing an active fidelity toward a government, by freely meeting the obligations we have toward it as citizens, and that is because, we can honestly say, the government, such as it is, is not worthy of our fidelity. The most important obligation of any government, in justice, is to promote a true common good for its citizens, that is to say, to create a cultural atmosphere in which moral virtue is fostered and protected. There are today hundreds of civil governments throughout the world, and most of them fall far short of meeting that obligation. How many of them would even regard it as an obligation? And consider a government that is positively tyrannous, where the people are effectively dehumanized, and rank not so much as citizens but as slaves. What is an honest, conscientious person to do who finds himself in such a situation? St. Thomas argues that the person would be justified in doing all he can to thwart the purposes of the tyrannous regime, and in that would even be showing a foundational kind of fidelity.

St. John Chrysostom, in commenting on the response Our Lord gave to the Herodians and Pharisees, wrote the following: “But when you hear the command to render to Caesar the things of Caesar, know that such things only are intended which in no way are opposed to religion; if such there be, it is no longer Caesar’s but the Devil’s tribute.” Our obligations toward a government do not cease if the government is not what it should be—e.g., if it disregards the common good, if it enacts laws which, because they are contrary to the natural law (the universal moral law) do not even have the status of law and therefore cannot command obedience—but in circumstances such as these the manner in which we meet those obligations takes a new form. We are confronted with a situation where the government is behaving unjustly because it is not meeting its own obligations toward the citizenry. That being the case, the citizens must do everything in their power to return the government to its senses, so that it acknowledges its obligations in justice, and lives up to them. Practically speaking, this would entail effecting a thoroughgoing reform of the government or, if that fails, bringing about a change in government. In the end, the most valuable tribute we can render to Caesar is the coin of justice.

On Sunday, November 13th, Archbishop Terrence Prendergast, of the Archdiocese of Ottawa, Canada, conferred minor orders on a number of seminarians from Our Lady of Guadalupe Seminary in Nebraska. The orders conferred were those of Porter/Lector and Acolyte/Exorcist, and took place in the beautiful chapel of Sts. Peter and Paul at the seminary. Our great thanks to His Excellency for his generosity in presiding over the ceremony.
Please keep these men in your prayers as they continue in their path of formation and preparation for the holy priesthood.

For more photos, please visit the Seminary website.

On Saturday, October 22nd, Tonsure was conferred on sixteen seminarians of Our Lady of Guadalupe Seminary by His Excellency, Bishop Fabian Bruskewitz, of the Diocese of Lincoln. The ceremony took place in the seminary chapel of Sts. Peter and Paul. Please pray for these men and all the priests and seminarians of the Priestly Fraternity.

For more photos go OLGS Seminary News

By D.Q. McInerny, Ph.D.
From the November 2011 Fraternity Newsletter

What is the common good? As the very name indicates, it is a good that is shared by many, and as such it stands in contrast to the individual good, a good that is peculiar to this or that person. One can say that any organized “society,” such as the family, an army, or a religious order, is bound together by a common good.

Strictly speaking, however, when we speak of the common good we have in mind that good which is the defining mark of a political society, or state. The common good is the final end of a state, in that it explains the very purpose for which the state was organized.

The common good is essentially a moral good, which is to say that it is a good which, once established and faithfully adhered to, enables the members of a political community, the citizens of a state, to live virtuous lives. Everything having to do with the structure and the running of the state, its constitution, the whole body of its laws, should contribute to the fostering of virtue. Such was the opinion of Plato and Aristotle, and of St. Thomas Aquinas as well. How many modern legislators, one might wonder, would view the matter in that light?

Laws, then, as the expression of the common good, are intended to make people good, but they can do so only if they are good laws, otherwise they will have just the opposite effect. The explanation for a situation where a state has developed the practice of promulgating bad laws is to be traced to a defective common good. It may be called “good” by such a state, but that is to misname it.

To understand this, we need to recall a basic distinction we make in ethics between a true good (bonum verum) and an apparent good (bonum apparens). St. Thomas gives considerable stress to the point that in all of our moral choices we always choose what we perceive to be good. We are constitutionally incapable of choosing evil just as evil. It may in fact be evil, objectively considered, but we have to “translate” it in our minds, making it out to be something good, before we can actively will it. If this happens on the individual level, it happens on the social level as well, with respect to the common good. A political community can set in place and dedicate itself to a common good which is not a true good but an apparent good only. And when that happens the political community in question is heading for disaster.

The common good, we said, is to be contrasted with the individual good, but the two should work together harmoniously. The common good, the good shared by the entire political community, must support and enhance the individual good, and in no way inhibit it. And the individual good of any particular citizen should not be at variance with the common good. And those smaller societies which are included within the embrace of the larger society which is the state, especially the family, should have their proper goods protected and nurtured by the common good. There should be no conflict between the good of the whole and the goods of the parts of the whole.

In recent times we have witnessed a number of governments who have operated under a perversely distorted understanding of the common good. I have in mind those totalitarian regimes which did anything but foster a genuine common good, for, first of all, they certainly were not intending to create a virtuous citizenry, and, second, far from preserving and protecting the individual good, they did everything they could to suppress it.

These governments allowed only for a single, monolithic “good” which tolerated no competitors, and to which everyone had slavishly to conform. If any individual attempted to pursue a good that was antithetical to the pseudo-good of the Party or the Cause, prompt and often lethal action was taken against him.

The common good, again, is a good which is shared by many. It is not exclusively my good, nor yours; it is ours. The common good is what binds a society together; it is a unifying factor, making a political community a coherent, integral whole. This being the case, any movement within a civil society that has the effect of undermining its unity, such as programs that seek to promote “diversity” and “pluralism,” can be said to militate against the common good.

Aristotle defined an oligarchy as government by the rich. An oligarchy would be a defective form of  government because it is incompatible with a genuine common good, benefiting, as it does, not the whole society, but only a small part of it. Another defective form of government cited by Aristotle was what he called “extreme democracy”; this is a democratic government which has run amok. What chiefly characterizes extreme democracy is the dominant influence within it of a false idea of freedom, where what is called freedom is really little more than license. In extreme democracy extreme individualism — i.e., sheer selfishness — reigns, with the result that individual goods are pursued to the extent that the common good is blithely ignored.

A current and fairly prevalent misunderstanding of the common good has it that it is no more than the sum total of individual goods. The poverty of such a notion consists in the fact that it fails to recognize the common good precisely as common. One can sum up individual goods from now to Doomsday and never arrive at a common good, for the individual good and the common good are different in kind. An individual good, by definition, is proper to one person; a common good, by definition, is a good shared by many.

The good is the proper object of the human will. It is that for which we were created, and the attainment of which makes for true human fulfillment. All goods, if they are true goods, derive their identity and desirability from the fact that they have their ultimate source in the Supreme Good, God Himself. In the final analysis, then, the test of whether or not any political community is guided by a genuine common good is to be found in the degree to which that good is rooted in a dedication to the Supreme Good. The good that is common to any state should be the same good that is common to the whole of humanity.