As we count down the days till Christmas, the Church presents several beautiful liturgical items for our contemplation as we prepare ourselves interiorly for the coming of the Savior. If you find yourself getting overwhelmed right about now by the tasks on your holiday to-do list, perhaps take a moment to recall the things that the Church places before our minds at this time in Advent.

On Saturday the 14th, many parishes celebrated the traditional Rorate Mass, the early-morning votive Mass in honor of Our Lady that is celebrated in the hour before dawn. With a plethora of candles providing the only light for the Mass, it is an image of the Light Who is soon to dispel the darkness of the world. The next day was Gaudete Sunday, when, amidst the waiting and penances of Advent, we expressed liturgically the joy and excitement that is building in our hearts: Gaudéte in Dómino semper: íterum dico, gaudéte (“Rejoice in the Lord always: again I say, rejoice.” – from the Introit for Gaudete Sunday).

This week brings us the Advent Ember Days on Wednesday, Friday and Saturday, as well as the first of the Greater Advent Antiphons, commonly called the “O Antiphons.” These occur on the 7 days leading up to Christmas Eve, today through the 23rd, and are a part of the office of Vespers on those days. While not all of us say the Divine Office regularly, these Antiphons probably sound familiar to us nonetheless, because one of the best-known Advent hymns, “O Come, O Come, Emmanuel,” is based on them. They are a beautiful reflection on the role of the Savior, the long expectation of His coming among the people of Israel, and the convergence of the events of the Old Testament into the point in history, the fullness of time, when the Savior was to appear.

So we encourage you to reflect on the O Antiphons as we draw near to the time of Our Lord’s Nativity, and may these final days of Advent be free from worldly worries and filled instead with the peace of the coming Savior. +

Cover photo by Allison Girone shows the Rorate-style Mass of the Immaculate Conception at FSSP Philadelphia in 2018.

The O Antiphons

December 17th

O Wisdom, Which camest out of the mouth of the Most High, reaching from end to end and ordering all things mightily and sweetly: come and teach us the way of prudence.

December 18th

O Adonai, and Leader of the house of Israel, Who didst appear to Moses in the flame of the burning bush, and didst give unto him the law on Sinai: come and with an outstretched arm redeem us.

December 19th

O Root of Jesse, Which standest for an ensign of the people, before Whom kings shall keep silence, Whom the Gentiles shall beseech: come and deliver us, and tarry not.

December 20th

O Key of David, and Scepter of the house of Israel, that openest and no man shutteth, and shuttest and no man openeth: come and bring the prisoner forth from the prison-house, and him that sitteth in darkness and in the shadow death.

December 21st

O Day-Spring, Brightness of light eternal, and Sun of Justice, come and enlighten them that sit in darkness and in the shadow of death.

December 22nd

O King of the Gentiles and the desire thereof, Thou cornerstone that makest both one, come and deliver mankind, whom Thou didst form out of clay.

December 23rd

O Emmanuel, our King and Lawgiver, the desire of the nations and the Savior thereof, come to save us, O Lord our God.

On Saturday, November 23rd, 2019, North American Martyrs Parish, our apostolate in Seattle, WA, officially began operations at its new location with the blessing of its church by His Excellency the Most Reverend Paul Etienne, Archbishop of Seattle. After the blessing, His Excellency attended in choir as pastor Fr. Joseph Heffernan, assisted by assistant pastor Fr. Caleb Insco and FSSP Director of Development Fr. Zachary Akers, celebrated the opening Mass at the building that was purchased over the summer. Also in attendance were Fr. Timothy O’Brien, pastor of St. Joseph Parish, our nearby apostolate in Tacoma, WA and a number of other clerics. The pews were full, and it was no surprise: North American Martyrs parishioners have been waiting a long time – about 10 years – for the day they could witness the blessing of their own church building. The parish and the Fraternity are deeply grateful to the Archdiocese of Seattle for assisting the apostolate in finding its permanent home, and to the Archbishop in particular for coming to perform the blessing and for joining us on this memorable day.

NAM, as the parish is fondly acronymed, has already brought its new facility a long way. A beautiful wooden altar and communion rail now grace the sanctuary, matching well the Northwest aesthetic contributed by the rustic pinewood ceiling above. Stations of the Cross line the side aisles, and statues of Our Lady and St. Joseph stand in their accustomed places to the left and right of the sanctuary. The floor of the sanctuary and center aisle, formerly afflicted with teal-blue carpet, have been redone and now sport wooden floorboards. The basement of the building includes classrooms and a gym, which provide abundant space for parish events such as the reception that was held after the blessing.

We look forward to seeing how the church continues to develop over the next several months, and we congratulate our Seattle apostolate on settling into its new home. +

Photos by Michael Curtis.

A happy and most glorious feast of Our Lady of Guadalupe, Patroness of the Americas! Today is a particularly joyful feast not only for our Mexican apostolates in Guadalajara and Mexico City but also for our seminary, which is under the patronage of Our Lady of Guadalupe. They hold a fiesta for their patroness every year, celebrating Mass in her honor, decorating the altar dedicated to her in the seminary chapel with bouquets of roses and other festive flowers and carrying her statue in procession. They also observe the tradition of las mañanitas, a Mexican custom where the faithful serenade Our Lady with songs. Many of our parishes, too, host their own celebrations on this great feast day.

The feast commemorates the apparitions of Our Lady to St. Juan Diego, an indigenous Mexican who saw her four times between December 9th and December 12th, 1531 at Tepeyac Hill near Mexico City. She appeared as an Aztec lady, and it being near the time of Our Lord’s Nativity, she was with child. She spoke to St. Juan in his native Nahuatl, identifying herself as the Mother of the True God and requesting that a chapel be built in her honor on the hill. When the Bishop requested a sign to prove the verity of the Lady, she gave St. Juan miraculous roses to carry in his tilma to the Bishop – miraculous because they were growing in December and were Castilian roses, not native to Mexico. When St. Juan brought the roses to the Bishop, they fell to the floor and on his tilma was imprinted the beautiful image of Our Lady now venerated at the Basilica of Our Lady of Guadalupe in Mexico City.

The apparition of Our Lady of Guadalupe precipitated the conversion of millions of the Mexican people. Her appearance included symbols that would have been familiar to the Aztecs and illustrated her identity as the Mother of God and the conqueror of the cruel Aztec religion, infamous for its horrifying practice of human sacrifice. Her appearance also evokes the words of the Book of Revelation, which describes Our Lady as the “woman clothed with the sun, with the moon under her feet, and on her head a crown of twelve stars.” She is honored as the Patroness of the Unborn, and we pray today for an end to the terrible evil of abortion, today’s human sacrifice, and for the conversion of all hearts to the One True God. +

Who is she that cometh forth as the morning rising, fair as the moon, bright as the sun? As the rainbow giving light in the bright clouds, and as the flower of roses in the days of spring.

– the Gradual for the feast of Our Lady of Guadalupe

by Fr. Jesus Valenzuela, Assistant Pastor, FSSP Guadalajara

If you had asked me ten years ago, right after finishing high school, where I saw myself in the future, I definitely would not have said, “in the middle of Nebraska studying for the priesthood,” much less for a traditional order. Growing up in Mexico, I did not know anything other than the new Mass. For me that was the standard, and when other priests mentioned the old rite, they would do it in a derogatory way. Normally, I thought in that same way about the old Mass. I certainly did not expect that this would become the Mass to which I would dedicate my whole life.

My family had a tradition of sending the boys to the United States for high school right after finishing middle school. When I was fourteen, my turn came. Leaving my parents behind and coming to the United States was the starting point of a new life. It was then that I started thinking of the possibility of becoming a priest. The summer after my freshmen year, I went to a discernment camp in Chihuahua, Mexico. The seminarians there taught me the basics of the spiritual life and of discerning God’s call, and at that point I started taking my vocation somewhat seriously.

I returned for the second level of that discernment camp, and after that, I returned once again. At the end of the retreat, the superiors of the seminary asked me to join, but I refused. It was my senior year in high school. I dated, applied for scholarships, graduated with honors and for those reasons I tried to put my vocation away, but no matter the struggles, God always “bugged me” with the thought of going to the seminary. This restlessness continued for two years, and for two years I put it away. I felt like Jacob wrestling with the angel.

I decided to attend college for engineering. I learned about the traditional Mass through a friend. I gave it a shot, but was not immediately drawn to it. I had my doubts. I decided to learn more about it, and even though the emotional appeal lacked, everything else just made sense. With this in mind, I said to myself: “If I am going to be a priest, I am going to say this Mass.” I visited the Fraternity apostolate in Guadalajara to discern for two weeks. I was hoping that the priests would tell me that I did not have a vocation, but against all odds they suggested that I join the seminary. Now as a priest, I am stationed in this same place where I started my discernment with the Fraternity.

The following year, I joined the seminary in Nebraska, and eight years later became a priest. It was never easy because, as I realized later, it was never meant to be such. God does not always ask us to do the easy things. As a seminarian in Chihuahua told me: “What is easy is already done, the difficult is for you to do, the impossible is up to God.” Leaving family, friends, perhaps a good future in the world always poses a struggle. Nevertheless, I have to admit that I do not regret it. All of that seems small in comparison to what I have gained in return. +

A happy and most glorious feast of the Immaculate Conception of Our Lady! We would normally say that today is a Holy Day of Obligation so be sure to go to Mass, but since it’s Sunday anyway we needn’t remind you of the obligation. What is noteworthy is that this feast, being of the first class, supersedes the Sunday, and so, in one of those occasional twists of the liturgical calendar, we do not offer the Mass of the 2nd Sunday of Advent but rather commemorate it within the Mass of Our Lady (we are reminded of 2017 when the Vigil of Christmas superseded the 4th Sunday of Advent…).

Today we celebrate the unique privilege bestowed upon Our Lady of being preserved immaculate from all sin from the first moment of her conception. Save Our Lord, she alone among all human beings was free from the stain of sin throughout her life; she alone pleased God and obeyed His Will most perfectly at every moment; she alone was full of grace and adorned with every virtue to the greatest degree. She was indeed the most perfect dwelling place which God prepared for the Son He sent among us.

Our Lady, under her title of the Immaculate Conception, is the patroness of the United States of America, as unanimously decided by the Bishops of the United States in the Sixth Provincial Council of Baltimore in 1846:

We take this occasion, brethren, to communicate to you the determination, unanimously adopted by us, to place ourselves, and all entrusted to our charge throughout these United States, under the special patronage of the holy Mother of God, whose Immaculate Conception is venerated by the piety of the faithful throughout the Catholic Church. By the aid of her prayers, we entertain the confident hope that we will be strengthened to perform the arduous duties of our ministry, and that you will be enabled to practice the sublime virtues, of which her life presents the most perfect example (Pastoral Letter of the 6th Provincial Council of Baltimore, 1846).

Today, then, is a most fitting day to pray for our country and for the flourishing of the Church in America. It is also fitting that so many of our American apostolates are under the patronage of the Immaculate Conception, and we wish a happy patronal feast to them all: Colorado Springs, CO, El Paso, TX, Omaha, NE and Rapid City, SD! +

Gloriósa dicta sunt de te, María: quia fecit tibi magna qui potens est.

Glorious things are said of thee, O Mary, for He Who is mighty hath done great things for thee.

– the Communion for today

We want to extend a huge “thank you” to all who donated during our recent Giving Tuesday campaign! Thanks to your generosity, we raised $55,846 for the formation of future priests at Our Lady of Guadalupe Seminary. That’s only $4,154 short of our $60,000 goal! We well surpassed last year’s mark, and we are so grateful for your assistance in covering the considerable costs we face as we form new priests for Holy Mother Church.

We are still accepting Giving Tuesday donations through next week, so if you didn’t get a chance to donate, head on over to our secure donation page to add your dollars. What do you think, can we get to $60,000? +

Catholicism and…baseball? What do the two have to do with each other? This past June, they were combined into a five-day camp headed up by Mr. Ryan O’Connor and his group from Highlight Catholic Ministries, based in Denver, Colorado. The Catholic baseball camp was designed for boys ranging from first to eighth grade, and was serious both about teaching the Catholic Faith and about teaching the fundamentals and virtuous habits of baseball.

The Priestly Fraternity of St. Peter, represented by former professional baseball player and FSSP Baltimore assistant pastor Fr. Michael J. Cunningham along with seminarians Sam Florance and Joe Duffy, had a hand not only in the layout of the camp and in teaching the Catholic Faith, but also in coaching the boys in the many different skills of the game. The schedule included drills and instruction in hitting, infielding and outfielding, organized games, and contests that tested such skills as throwing accurately, fielding grounders and hitting home runs. Each day opened and closed with prayer and included talks and team prayer with Our Lord in the Blessed Sacrament.

When it comes to a Catholic sports camp, one might ask if, aside from the time in prayer, there is any real connection between the baseball skills the campers learn and their Catholic Faith. The answer is a most definitive yes: baseball offers a training ground for the soul as well as the body. For those who have the courage to try baseball, or any sport, and perform before friends, family and strangers, they put themselves at a definite risk of failure, injury and humiliation, all of which are opportunities to grow in patience and humility. Additionally, if we have the courage to risk failure, to get up when we fail and to learn from it, improvement and wisdom will follow. On the other hand, sports also give us a chance to win, succeed and be honored, and to learn the humility, gratitude and other virtues that, for the Christian athlete, must accompany success. Many other virtues come into play on the baseball diamond as well, players learning how to balance such emotions as anger and competitiveness with kindness and good sportsmanship.

Learning the virtues associated with the challenges, successes and failures of a game equips young people with the skills and experience they will need to navigate the twists, turns, losses and victories of life. Through a Catholic baseball camp, our youngsters can learn not only how to get to home plate, but how to get to Heaven, and how to perform with grace, no matter how many curve balls life throws at them. +

Photos provided by Frassati Sports.

Today is Giving Tuesday! Will you help us raise $60,000 for Our Lady of Guadalupe Seminary?

The Priestly Fraternity of St. Peter wishes a happy Thanksgiving to you and your families! Today is a perfect opportunity to pause amid our everyday routine and consider all that we truly have to be thankful for. We begin a new liturgical year this coming Sunday, the First Sunday of Advent, and we enter once again into the Church’s year-long commemoration of the life, death and Resurrection of Our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father’s great Gift to the world. The liturgy’s continual cycle of praise is permeated with ever-renewed utterances of thanksgiving, expressed so often through the words of the Psalms that constitute such a large part of the prayers of the Mass and form the backbone of the Divine Office.

Interestingly, one of the Votive Mass options for the day of the week that Thanksgiving always occupies (Thursday) is the Mass of the Most Blessed Sacrament, the summit and center of the Church’s life. The Mass is taken from that of Corpus Christi (which is always the Thursday after Trinity Sunday), and is filled with the praise of this wonderful Sacrament, wherein Christ gives Himself as our heavenly Bread. On a holiday which is marked so distinctly by an earthly feast, it seems apt to recall first and foremost – and to give thanks for – the infinitely superior spiritual feast which He bestows on our souls not once a year, but every single day. +

The eyes of all hope in Thee, O Lord, and Thou givest them meat in due season. Thou openest Thy hand, and fillest every living creature with blessing.

– Psalm 144:15-16, the Gradual for Corpus Christi and the Votive Mass of the Blessed Sacrament

“Is your father wearing his uniform?” the girl asked.

“He’s on deployment,” the boy responded. “He’s on a ship.”

The two children, along with many others, were waiting in line outside St. Benedict’s Parish, the FSSP’s apostolate in Chesapeake, Virginia, the afternoon of Sunday, November 10th, 2019. They had just attended the parish’s annual Veterans Day Mass and were waiting to partake of the refreshments available afterwards in the parish hall. The question and the answer – and the apparent absence of the boy’s father – encapsulated in a few words the sacrifices made by those who serve, and the families who sacrifice alongside them. Many daddies were there that day in their uniforms, but at least one was not, and his son was just one of many sons and daughters, husbands and wives, fathers and mothers who daily wait and pray for the safe return of their loved ones.

St. Benedict’s began the Veterans Day Mass several years ago as a way to honor the veterans and servicemembers who are found in such large numbers in that area of Virginia and at St. Benedict’s in particular. The concentration is due to the proximity of many military bases, including the largest Naval base in the world, Naval Station Norfolk, and Joint Base Langley-Eustis, an Air Force and Army base a little further north. All in all, every military branch as well as NASA is represented in the area.

This is the 9th time the Chesapeake parish has observed this tradition, but the roots of it go back to Benedictine Preparatory School, an all-boys military high school in Richmond and the alma mater of pastor Fr. Neal Nichols, himself the son of a veteran. He and his fellow cadets, he recalls, would participate in a military Mass each First Friday, and he decided to bring the tradition to St. Benedict’s, inviting the current cadets from his former school to participate.

“It was just a big hit immediately, right away with the parishioners,” explained Fr. Nichols. The Richmond native performed his own piece of military service in 2003, when he served on a contractual basis for the 181st Support Battalion of the Washington State Army National Guard during their two-week summer training exercise. In the simulated battlefield environment he said Mass in camouflage tents or on the tailgate of a Humvee, with camouflage vestments, and offered confessions and support to the many soldiers comprising the multiple units involved in the exercise.

Back in Chesapeake, servicemembers are invited to attend the Veterans Day Mass in uniform, with the frontmost pews being reserved for the grey-clad Benedictine cadets, who are responsible for adding the military ceremonies to the Mass. They presented the colors before the processional, with one cadet bearing the flag of the United States and another the flag of the Vatican, each flanked by another carrying a ceremonial rifle. They placed the Stars and Stripes near the statue of Our Lady on the left (see the picture of 2018’s Mass in your 2020 Fraternity calendar) and the Vatican flag near the altar of St. Joseph on the right. Soon after, Mass began.

The celebrant was assistant pastor and Army veteran Fr. Anthony Forte, with Deacon Paul Minner and Fr. Nichols assisting as deacon and subdeacon. As they processed in, they first passed under a stately row of flags affixed to the front of the choir loft: a trio of colors representing the United States, the state of Virginia and St. Benedict’s Parish took the center spot, with the flags of each branch of the armed forces and the POW memorial flag accompanying them on either side. Proceeding down the aisle, the ministers and altar servers were greeted by a majestic saber arch provided by the cadets, who stood in two rows on either side, holding their swords aloft. After Mass, the arch was repeated as the ministers exited and several verses of America the Beautiful were sung by choir and congregation.

Servicemembers of various stripes then gathered before the church. One could spot the dark blue uniforms and bright white covers of several Navy officers, the classic star-edged flap collar of a sailor, the royal blue of an Air Force Master Sergeant, and even the khaki attire of a number of French NATO officers (the parish welcomes a consistent stream of French families that attend St. Benedict while they are stationed at the NATO installation in Norfolk). The sacred ministers stood in the midst, cadets to their right, military to their left. All smiled in the warm, coastal sun as the cameras captured another year of this beautiful tradition.

The parish deliberately joins the Mass to one of their regularly-scheduled Family Fun Days in order to give the cadets a chance to refuel before they depart for Richmond. As a bit of an extra thank-you to the young men who give up their Sunday to come and serve at the Mass, the parish always secures for them a tour of one of the commissioned military vessels at harbor in Norfolk. This year it was the USS Gravely, a guided-missile destroyer. The hoped-for object of the tour was an aircraft carrier, but since there wasn’t one available for tours that day, the destroyer had to do. It’s unlikely that anyone was disappointed; the cadets would probably tell you that a tour of an active military ship of any sort is certainly fair recompense for their trouble.

Offering fair recompense to a military member for his or her life of service, on the other hand, always seems like a more complicated proposition. You might say “thank you,” and a common response – especially among those who have shown uncommon valor – might be, “I’m just doing my job.” But they didn’t have to choose such a job, one that entails long separations from their families, holidays away from home and the possibility of danger or even death, and those of us who benefit from their sacrifice may find that “thank you,” or anything we could give them in return, just doesn’t seem enough. After all, what can you give a man in exchange for his life?

But we’ve been here before, it seems. Nothing we can give could ever constitute a fair recompense for the greatest Sacrifice, the one that the most valorous of men made for all of us upon the Cross. He knew that we could never adequately thank Him or the Father Who sent Him, so He gave us a way to do it. He gave us the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass, at the center of which is the Eucharist, a word which means thanksgiving. And so offering the greatest Sacrifice, the greatest act of thanksgiving, on behalf of our military personnel is by far the best and most fitting thing we can do.

The Veterans Day Mass at St. Benedict’s furthermore proffers the idea that the sacrifices for which we thank our servicemembers are a reflection of, and a participation in, this one Sacrifice. Self-sacrifice is that thing that makes us uniquely Christ-like, Who said on the eve of His Passion that laying down one’s life for one’s friends is the highest proof of love (John 15:13). He said it, moreover, on the same night He instituted the Holy Eucharist, and directly after His True Vine discourse, wherein He speaks of the unity of Himself and His members and instructs us to abide in His love. It is, in essence, Christ Himself we are aspiring to and uniting ourselves to when we give selflessly, when we love as He did. “…having loved His own who were in the world, He loved them to the end” (John 13:1).

The mysterious union between Sacrifice and sacrifice became evident during the Consecration, when, as the Sacred Host was elevated, the cadets held a sword salute and the mournful notes of Taps drifted softly through the church. The universally-known melody, heard at every military funeral, calls us whenever we hear it to pause and reflect on the sacrifice of those who have given everything that a human can give. That day the solemn music commemorated the One Who gave every last drop of Blood, the perfect Sacrifice that our King and Captain offered once for us all and which was at that moment being offered again on the altar. It’s a Sacrifice that reverberates in the actions of everyone who, by means of his own blood or simply by the daily sacrifices that accompany military service, lays down his life for his friends. +

We thank Marine veteran Shalone Cason for his service and for all photos used in this article, except those otherwise credited.