Wednesday, Friday and Saturday of this week bring us the Lenten Ember Days, which always fall on the week after Ash Wednesday. Ember Days are traditional days of fasting, abstinence and prayer, their purpose being to give thanks to God for the gifts of Creation and to ask His grace in using them well. They happen four times a year (the weeks after Ash Wednesday and Pentecost, and the third weeks in September and Advent) in conjunction with the four seasons, as they were traditionally tied to the seasonal cycles of farming and harvesting. The penitential observance of these days is voluntary (except of course for the required abstinence on the Friday of the Lenten Ember Days), but we encourage you to participate as you are able.

Fr. Arnaud Devillers, pastor of Queen of the Holy Rosary Parish, our apostolate in Vienna, Ohio, wrote an informative piece this time last year for our Meménto newsletter regarding the history and liturgical purpose of the Ember Days. One of the interesting items he mentions is the connection between the Ember Days and priestly ordinations, and the possibility of employing the Ember Days as a particular time to pray for priests and vocations. You can read the full article here! +

Mentes nostras, quaésumus, Dómine, lúmine tuæ claritátis illústra: ut vidére possímus, quæ agénda sunt; et, quæ recta sunt ágere valeámus.

We beseech Thee, O Lord, illumine our minds with the light of Thy brightness: that we may see what has to be done and have the strength to do it. 

– Prayer Over the People for Ember Wednesday in Lent

Applications are now being accepted for FSSP Los Angeles’ 5th annual Sacred Music Symposium! Hosted by St. Vitus Parish, our apostolate in the City of Angels, and taking place from June 15th – 19th at a nearby parish, the Symposium is a week of concentrated training for choir singers and directors featuring classes, workshops and rehearsals with world-class instructors. It is an extraordinary opportunity for ordinary singers and directors (not professionals or the specially-talented) to gain skills and experience that they can then take back to their own choirs and parishes. This year’s theme is, “Rehearsal Techniques for Volunteer Choirs: How to stand in front of a choir and live to tell about it!”

Cost of the Symposium is just $275, which includes the deposit, conference fee and meal plan. Deadline for applications is April 5th, 2020. To learn more, watch videos from past Symposia and sign up, click here. You can also download and share the Symposium flyer by clicking the image below. +

A most blessed Ash Wednesday to all! Today is a day of obligatory fasting and abstinence and marks the beginning of our 40-day trek through the season of Lent. The ashes we receive today and the words of the priest as he crosses our foreheads with them are a reminder of our mortality and the brevity of our earthly life, the relatively small amount of time we have to prepare ourselves for the life to come. The Church gives us the Lenten season each year to bring us back to this reality and to refocus our lives on what is spiritual.

Christ, of course, never asks us to do anything He did not do before us; the 40 days of Lent recall His own 40-day preparation for His public ministry, when “the Spirit led Him into the desert.” Being God, He had no need of such things, but He desired to illustrate for us the value of fasting, penance and prayer in drawing closer to God, freeing ourselves from earthly attachments, and defeating the devil when he arrives with his temptations. And Christ moreover always desired to identify Himself with us, to live our life, to suffer with us, to be one with us, even to die a mortal death for us, and it is the anniversary of His death on the Cross on Good Friday that is the summit of our Lenten journey.

Let us prepare then well for it, walking willingly with Christ in the desert and upon His Via Dolorosa, and ask Him to help us make the most of this time of Lent. +

Thus saith the Lord: Be converted to Me with all your heart, in fasting and in weeping and in mourning. And rend your hearts and not your garments, and turn to the Lord your God: for He is gracious and merciful, patient and rich in mercy, and ready to repent of the evil.

– Joel 2:12-13, from the Epistle for Ash Wednesday

Happy Shrove Tuesday, the final day before the commencement of Lent tomorrow! Today we encourage you to enjoy a few traditional Shrove Tuesday pancakes or whatever the spiritual equivalent is for you. Pancakes became a traditional meal on this day in Britain and other countries because families would make pancakes as a way to use up their stores of butter, milk and eggs, which, back in the good old days, were forbidden along with flesh meat (be sure to check with your parish priest or spiritual director before taking on any severe penances). The word “shrove” comes from the word “shriven,” meaning “absolved,” referring to the once-common practice of confessing one’s sins in preparation for Lent.

Today we have extra cause for celebration because it also happens to be a second-class feast – that of the Apostle St. Matthias, whom we meet in the Acts of the Apostles as the replacement chosen for the traitorous Judas. St. Matthias’ usual February 24th feast day is celebrated today, the 25th, because 2020 is a leap year, an occurrence which transfers both his feast and that of St. Gabriel of the Sorrowful Mother (usual feast day February 27th) one day forward.

If you haven’t yet selected what you will “do” for Lent, there’s still time to contemplate it as you enjoy the last of the pancakes and sausages. Of course, giving up things we enjoy such as sweets or television is a good place to start, but we also encourage you to select something to add in to your spiritual regimen, such as 15 minutes of daily spiritual reading, the frequent practice of the Way of the Cross, or an extra weekday Mass. Happy Shrove Tuesday and feast of St. Matthias, and may your Lent be happy and holy! +

A happy and most blessed feast of the Chair of St. Peter! Today is a patronal feast of the FSSP and a first-class feast for us, so we invite you to join us in celebrating this joyful day. Today was once divided into two feasts – the feast of St. Peter’s chair at Antioch, formerly kept on January 18th, and that of his chair at Rome, kept on this day – but the two were eventually combined and we celebrate the combined feast today. January 18th still marks, however, the opening of the Church Unity Octave, a week of prayer dedicated to the unity of all people under the authority of Rome. Both the January Octave and today’s feast offer us particular opportunities to pray that all may come into the one, holy, Catholic and apostolic Church, founded on the rock of Peter, an intention that Christ Himself desired so greatly: “And I have other sheep, that are not of this fold; I must bring them also, and they will heed my voice. So there shall be one flock, one shepherd” (John 10:16).

Today, members of the FSSP and the Confraternity of St. Peter can gain a plenary indulgence under the usual conditions. If you would like to learn more about how you can spiritually support the Fraternity through membership in the Confraternity, click here. +

Thou art Peter, and upon this rock I will build My Church, and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it.

– Matthew 16:18

On February 8th, 2020, seven men from Our Lady of Guadalupe Seminary were ordained to the subdiaconate by His Excellency the Most Reverend Fabian Bruskewitz, Bishop Emeritus of Lincoln, Nebraska. Among those assisting Bishop Bruskewitz at the ceremony and the Solemn Pontifical Mass that followed were Fr. Michael Stinson, North American Superior, and FSSP Harrisburg pastor Fr. Gregory Eichman, whose twin brothers, Nicholas and James, received the subdiaconate that day.

The new subdeacons will not remain sub for very long. They will spend the next month preparing for the diaconate, which they will receive on March 28th, 2020. The diaconate is the last stage in their formation before their priestly ordinations next year, so please pray for them during this important time!

The 2020 subdeacons for the Priestly Fraternity of St. Peter:

Rev. Mr. John Audino, FSSP
Rev. Mr. Brendan Boyce, FSSP
Rev. Mr. Joseph Dalimata, FSSP
Rev. Mr. James Eichman, FSSP
Rev. Mr. Nicholas Eichman, FSSP
Rev. Mr. Joel Pinto Rodriguez, FSSP
Rev. Mr. Thu Truong, FSSP

Please keep also in your prayers our two Wigratzbad seminarians, Rev. Mr. Charles Berger de Gallardo from France and Rev. Mr. Josef Unglert from Germany, who received the subdiaconate one week later from the hands of the Most Reverend Wolfgang Haas, Archbishop of Vaduz, Liechtenstein. 22 other seminarians received minor orders in the same ceremony. You can see pictures of that occasion below the Denton gallery. +

Our Lady of Guadalupe Seminary, Denton, NE

Priesterseminar Sankt Petrus, Wigratzbad, Germany

On Friday, January 24th, 2020, tens of thousands of pro-lifers, FSSP priests and parishioners among them, descended on our nation’s capital to witness to the sanctity of human life at the 47th annual March for Life.

The crowds that moved from the Washington Monument down Constitution Avenue on their way to the Supreme Court created an inspiring and colorful landscape under the cloud cover of a grey winter afternoon. Out of so many they were one, an unmistakable and united voice demanding the just treatment of the most innocent and defenseless among us. Indeed, the incredible variety of human beings who poured onto the streets that day bears witness to the universality of the message. Black, white, Latin, Native American, Asian – they all were there. The old, the young, men, women, teenagers, children, babies – they all were there. University students, high school students, religious orders, youth groups, Catholic dioceses and churches, FSSP parishes, Protestant churches, secular organizations – they all were there.

Powerful too were the individual witnesses of participants who marched with signs that told their stories: women who had bravely chosen, as pregnant teenagers, to give their babies life; adoptive mothers who were grateful that their children’s biological parents chose life; adopted children who proclaimed the value of their existence. One young woman was a child of rape who was alive because her mother had left her Planned Parenthood appointment; another held a sign commemorating her four siblings who were aborted. Each one re-echoed the same theme: no matter the problem, abortion is never the solution, and life is always a beautiful, God-given thing.

We’ve gathered the photos. Some of the best ones were shot by Allison Girone, who takes the beautiful pictures at St. Mary’s, our parish in Philadelphia, PA. Lucas Brown of All Saints Parish, our apostolate in Minneapolis, captured the experience of the busload of parishioners who traveled over 1,000 miles to participate in the March. We’ve also included photos from the West Coast March for Life that took place the next day in San Francisco and was attended by many of our California parishioners. Enjoy, and we’ll see you at next year’s March for Life. +

Photos by Allison Girone

Photos by Lucas Brown

Photos by the Missive

Walk for Life West Coast – Photos by FSSP San Diego

FSSP Houston is making progress. If you were a Missive reader back in July 2018, you may remember a post about Regina Caeli Parish’s exciting plans for expansion that included the Blessed Solanus Casey Gatehouse and eventually a new church. The buildings are being constructed in phases as the necessary funds are raised, and this past weekend, the parish celebrated the groundbreaking of the Gatehouse, which constitutes the second building in the overall plan. Their current chapel, St. Athanasius Chapel Hall, was the first; this will eventually be converted into a event/reception hall when a new church building is constructed further down the road. The Gatehouse will provide much-needed additional space to accommodate the parish’s current congregation and encourage future growth while also opening up the possibility of a third priest and expanded Mass schedule. It will contain classrooms, offices and a rectory.

The ceremonial groundbreaking took place on Sunday, January 26th, 2020. More than 360 faithful attended the morning High Mass celebrated by Fr. Zachary Akers, FSSP, Director of Development for North America, and the groundbreaking and reception that followed.

As the Litany of the Saints began after Mass, the faithful processed behind the priests and altar servers to the site of the Gatehouse. Chalk on the ground and stakes helped with visualization by marking the future building’s perimeter and rooms and the gate entrance. Pastor Fr. Charles Van Vliet, FSSP and Fr. Akers welcomed the guests at the conclusion of the Litany, Fr. Van Vliet thanking parishioners and supporters for the many sacrifices and volunteer hours that allowed for the $2.6 million construction to be funded through gifts and pledges. Fr. Akers expressed the Fraternity’s appreciation for the generosity of the faithful, and in noting the vibrant growth of the apostolate, he reminded us that we are blessed to have land for expansion, which many apostolates lack. The remarks ended with a blessing of the site. Fr. Van Vliet, Fr. Akers and Jerry Tipps, architect, then broke the ground with a gold shovel last used on December 20th, 2014, for the groundbreaking of St. Athanasius Chapel Hall.

Please keep the parish in your prayers as they embark on this new phase in the expansion project. For more information about the parish and to see detailed plans of the anticipated buildings, please visit www.reginacaeliparish.org. +

By Fr. John Killackey, FSSP

It is often difficult to pin down one event or person responsible for a vocation. The many puzzle pieces of life, some big and some small, used by the delicate but firm hand of Providence need to be taken together to map out—as far as our limited minds can—what God had in store for us all along. My path to the priesthood was no different, and there are many people to whom I am indebted. But there are some pieces which are more significant than others, and the biggest influence was my family.

I was blessed to be born into a loving family in Wayne, New Jersey with parents who really took the Faith seriously. I remember every year on the Feast of the Immaculate Conception my mother would bring me and my three siblings to a statue of Our Lady and consecrate us to her. We later began to say the family Rosary every night, which of course further helped cement our devotion to Our Blessed Mother. Also, we would often go down to a local adoration chapel, and there, in the Presence of Our Lord, I began to learn better how to pray and to silence myself in His presence.

For all these practices, however, I had no desire to consider the priesthood at first. The life seemed “boring” to me, and other things distracted me from looking honestly at the question. This started to change gradually after we started attending Our Lady of Fatima Chapel, the FSSP’s apostolate in Pequannock, NJ. I remember at first disliking the whole thing, since I didn’t understand it. But we soon found ourselves going there more and more often because of the availability of Mass and confessions every day. Soon my brother and I began altar serving, and I began to love the Traditional liturgy more and more, and to see it as a beautiful expression of the Catholic Faith. I will always remember the first Sung Mass my brother and I served, which was the Easter Vigil. The reverence, incense, Gregorian Chant and symmetry of it all left me with a faint taste of what the grandeur of God must be like. In addition to this experience, the increased interactions with the priests of the Fraternity helped replace the shallow idea I had of the priest’s life with an idea of a life that was intensely identified with Our Lord, and was also well balanced: little did I know that a formidable mental hurtle had been overcome when, in early high school, we started playing regular Sunday soccer with the priests after Mass!

Before I knew it, I had a strong conviction that God wanted me at least to try the seminary, and I never thought of anywhere else than with the Fraternity, which had provided me with many good examples of the priesthood. But I was not completely ready at the end of high school. I went to Christendom College, worked a year as a teacher at a Catholic school and then felt that the time had come to apply. I entered Our Lady of Guadalupe Seminary in the fall of 2012.

My seminary formation, in many ways, was another beginning to my vocation. It had its good and bad days as God purified any imperfect ideas I had of being a priest. Despite my faults, however, I always felt confident at the end of each year that Our Lord wished me to stay. I was blessed with great confreres and diligent seminary formators, and I am grateful to them for their direction and sacrifices. After seven years, by the grace of God, I was ordained a priest and stationed at Mater Dei, our apostolate in Harrisburg, PA, which has been a wonderful experience. I ask for prayers that I may be faithful to the graces that God gives us each day to be His saints. +

Now Thou dost dismiss Thy servant, O Lord, according to Thy word in peace; because my eyes have seen Thy salvation, which Thou hast prepared before the face of all peoples: a light to the revelation of the Gentiles, and the glory of Thy people Israel.
– Luke 2:29-32

A most blessed and joyful feast of Candlemas, also called the feast of the Purification of the Blessed Virgin Mary! Today the Church rejoices with Simeon at the sight of the Christ Child, the Light that has come into the world. This feast provides us a beautiful example of humility and obedience, as the Holy Family goes to the Temple in obedience to the Mosaic law, which required the ritual purification of the mother of a male child 40 days after his birth and his dedication (if he is the firstborn) to the Lord. Christ coming into His own Temple to be dedicated to His Father is particularly striking, in that it emphasizes Our Lord’s total obedience to His Father from the very outset of His life and the self-sacrificing nature of His mission. He reiterates this point throughout the Gospels, saying in John 6:38: “For I have come down from Heaven, not to do My own will, but the will of Him who sent Me…”

The feast of the Purification originated in the east in the early centuries of Christianity, but gradually spread throughout the world. The special role of candles on this day developed during the Middle Ages, and remains in today’s liturgy with the blessing of candles before Mass for use throughout the year. The priest blesses not only candles for liturgical use, but also those presented by the faithful that they may use for personal devotion. Dom Guéranger specifically mentions that “these blest candles ought also to be lit near the bed of the dying Christian, as a symbol of the immortality merited for us by Christ, and of the protection of our Blessed Lady” (The Liturgical Year, Vol. II, p. 475). After the blessing of the candles, they are lit and carried in procession as the choir sings three beautiful passages commemorating the events of this day. +

Adorn thy bridal-chamber, O Sion, and welcome Christ the King: with loving embrace greet Mary, the very gate of Heaven; for she bringeth to thee the glorious King of new light: ever Virgin she remaineth, yet in her arms doth bear the Son begotten before the day-star: that Child Whom Simeon did take into his arms and proclaim to the nations as Lord of life and Savior of the world.
– the First Antiphon of the procession