1-8 November: Indulgences for Praying for the Dead – HOW TO!

Posted on 2 November 2024 by Fr. John Zuhlsdorf

While one of the corporal works of mercy is to bury the dead, one of the spiritual works of mercy is the pray for the dead.

November is dedicated in a special way to this important work, the first 8 days of the month in particular.

To encourage this good work, Holy Church – being a good Mother – prompts her children by enriching these days of 1-8 November with indulgences.

Indulgences are for the remittance of temporal punishment after death in Purgatory due to sins we commit in this life and for which we have not done adequate penance.

Indulgences are not for the forgiveness of those sins.

Digression….

Sins are, in the way Christ desired, ordinarily forgiven the Sacrament of Baptism, at first, and then through the Sacrament of Penance. In certain circumstances the Sacrament of Anointing can effect forgiveness of sins. There are extraordinary moments with acts of perfect contrition can result in forgiveness. However, Christ gave us a Sacrament precisely for this matter and that is what He intends for our ordinary circumstances. He gave it to us so that we would USE IT. So…

GO TO CONFESSION!

Going to confession is also what you need to do to gain indulgences.

For the November indulgences for praying for the dead, what do you need to do? After all, this is a good “work”. You have to do something.

Here are some bullet points.

  • Visit a cemetery, and
  • Pray for the deceased, for the “poor” souls in Purgatory.

To receive the plenary indulgence, the usual conditions must also be met:

  • Be in the state of grace and – for a plenary indulgence – free from all attachment to sin, even venial sins (which requires an act of will… more on that  HERE).
  • Receive Holy Communion
  • Receive Sacramental Confession (within 20 days)
  • Pray for the intentions of the Supreme Pontiff (that is, for the intentions designated by the Supreme Pontiff)

The classic intentions of the Supreme Pontiffs have traditionally been (more about this HERE):

  • The Exaltation of the Church.
  • The Propagation of the Faith.
  • The Extirpation of Heresy.
  • The Conversion of Sinners.
  • The Concord between Christian Princes.
  • The Further Welfare of the Christian People.
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Rome 24/10 – Day 32: All Saints

Posted on 1 November 2024 by Fr. John Zuhlsdorf

The curial calendar suggest that the sun rose at 06:41.  06:42 is more accurate.  But, hey!  The sun will set, according to the same, at 17:06.

The Ave Maria is at 17:30.

This is the Feast of All Saints, a Holy Day of Obligation and a (canonical) Solemnity.  Hence, although it is Friday, today you are not obliged by the Latin Church’s law to fast or abstain.

I think I’ll make a cheeseburger.  Alas, I can’t get really good pickles at any place nearby.

Apartment report: Yesterday I saw a different place, not quite as close to The Parish™ but not really all that far.   A rather prestigious street, in view of a a place which is constantly guarded by police.  I am optimistic.  St. Joseph!  Guide this with your benevolence, asking from God what is best.

Lord, for the day, I thank you.   And on this Feast of All Saints, prompt with Your graces all those who read this to be saintly in their earthly lives so they can enjoy the joys of Heaven with the holy angels and our brothers and sisters in the Church Triumphant.

Yesterday I went to the clerical shops for errands.   I had to go to Gammarelli to figure out that white pianeta situation.   Then Barbiconi for clerical shirts for a stateside priest friend.  I remembered that I need a red cincture to replace the one that is all used up.

Some fabrics.  Meh.

Hi from the happy elephant.

Hi from a bored cat.

I saw this truck outside my place and thought it worthy of a share.

“Hands dirty from work give off the scent of dignity.”

I wasn’t able to track down the source of this quote in a short amount of time so I gave up.  However, something similar is attributed to St. Francis of Assisi.  It strikes me as a communist thing, although it is redolent – if you get me – of something that John Paul II would have written about the dignity of work in Laborem exercens.   Remember John Paul II?

The other day I had a meeting with a woman who was the silver restorer for famous museum collections in London. She taught me something about cleaning gold and silver vessels. The first thing I already knew from my silver/goldsmith who made my chalice.  Use only 99% isopropyl alcohol (or very high).  She told me also to use acetone.  Fingerprints are really bad for gold plating.   So, get them off!  There is also a special wax for polishing that will protect the gold and silver. She said to use also Renaissance Micro-Crystalline Wax Polish, a tiny amount on a silver cloth.  US – HERE  UK – HERE It was quite a useful conversation. So… FATHERS! Clean the gold cup of your chalice (when needed) with high purity alcohol! (Vodka won’t work.)   In general, don’t let sacristans or kind ladies who volunteer anywhere NEAR your chalice.

Since I wrote about shirts…

HEY PRIESTS OUT THERE!

How about a clerical Guayabera shirt?

In chessy news…. HERE

(White mates in 4)

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Rome 24/10 – Day 31: The game’s afoot

Posted on 31 October 2024 by Fr. John Zuhlsdorf

The weather here should be perfect for the rest of my stay.   Thus say the forecasts.

On this 305th day of the calendar year and the 31st of my Roman Sojourn, the sun rose at 06:40.   It will set at 17:07.    Such short days, each shorter.

The Ave Maria ought to ring at 17:30 for a few more days before the cycle changes.

Thank you for this day, O Lord.

Apartment sleuthing news: I have consulted with the wonderful rather senior lady with the realty agency in the area.   I have suspected a rat about the place I had been looking at.  However, they found me another possibility that will work very well, though it won’t be as luminous.  It will have a very quiet address, across from a place guarded by the police, with a small interior courtyard I can use freely.  The rent is good.  Ground floor.   I had yesterday in a Holy Votive Mass of St. Joseph asked for help again.  He is so powerful as an intercessor and he was my guy when, some time ago, I needed a place with urgency.  I am hopeful.  The next few days will tell.   If it goes, I’ll let you know.   The way I figure, even if I cannot spend a great deal of time here, it’ll still be less expensive in the long run than the way I am doing it now.   Sure, my place now is really nice.  But, damn.

Please say a prayer for this, perhaps quickly, to St. Joseph: Help Fr. Z with his apartment project.

Since it is Reformation Day, we might observe it by checking out a book about Martin Luther.  It was written by someone just a couple decades after Luther, hence firmly within living memory.  It was originally in French, vetted by the University of Paris, and then Latin. The title (with apologies to a priest friend and piper) is:

The Devil’s Bagpipe: The True Life of Martin Luther by James Lang (Author) and Fr. Robert Nixon (Translator)

US HERE – UK HERE

It is a short read, but packed, as is consistent with writers before the age of word processors.

On 1 Nov, All Saints at The Parish™, there will be an exposition of the relics here.  The World’s Best Sacristan this morning was doing some work on reliquaries of St. Erasmus, martyr and St. Agapitus, martyr.

Something is definitely afoot.   Maybe this saint can help with my pied-à-terre?

Spotted last night at the Campo… at the bar restaurant “Eretico” next to the statue of the heretic Giordano Bruno.

They are also against spelling.

Something has to be done about the pedana at the vestment cases in the sacristy.   It is getting really bad and one day it is going to hurt someone.

Last night I wanted chicken… so I made chicken.

Thank you to a reader who made it possible to get bottles of hot sauce from my amazon wish list before I came over. US – HERE I brought a couple.   It was a nice addition to the chicken.

In churchy news… after the end of walking together about walking togetherity there is a 3 days of darkness … conference on walking together about walking togetherity.  HERE

“From the Council to the Synod: Rereading a Church’s Journey, 60 Years on Since Lumen Gentium (1964–2024)” — was hosted by the Pontifical Gregorian University in Rome from Oct. 28–30.

In chessy news…. HERE

(White to play and mate in 2)

QUAERITUR: How’s it going having the chessy stuff in a comment?

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31 October: All Hallows Eve – Vigil of All Saints

Posted on 31 October 2024 by Fr. John Zuhlsdorf

The Roman Church for centuries observed a vigil before the Feast of All Saints.

All Saints is a Holy Day of Obligation.  Make a plan.

We Roman fast before our feasts. The fast was intended also as a way to help the poor, in that it was a time also to deny one’s self and give alms not from one’s excess, but from one’s own need. Vigils – which are penitential – were/are held before feasts and ordinations and also for the sake of pressing petitions. In the Roman Rite the Masses were somewhat simplified and shorn of more joyous elements, for example, no Gloria, Alleluia or Ite.

On 30 October, after the priests have said their usual morning Masses, The World’s Best Sacristan is already setting up Missals and vestments for observance of the Vigil, though strictly speaking it is not in the 1962 calendar. That said, if the Triduum can be used from earlier books and if new saints since 1962 can be incorporated into the older schedule, there shouldn’t be a compelling reason to be worked up about saying the Vigil of All Saints rather than texts of … whatever, since it is a “dies non“. What? A Mass for of Alfonso Rodriguez, SJ (+1617) with the common of a confessor? A Votive Mass of the Holy Spirit? Why not the Vigil, in the true Roman style?

We are our rites… and we are flexible and reasonable.

As Schuster wrote of this day:

When we pray to the saints in heaven they do as Joseph did when his brothers arrived in Egypt. He went before Pharaoh and, full of joy, announced : Fratres mei et domus patris mei . . . venerunt ad me. And the King out of love for Joseph gave to them the land of Gessen.

COLLECT:

Dómine, Deus noster, multiplica super nos grátiam tuam: et, quorum prævenimus gloriósa sollémnia, tríbue subsequi in sancta professione lætítiam.

Multiply Your grace upon us, O Lord our God, and grant that by our holy profession of faith we may attain to the bliss of those whose glorious celebration we anticipate.

 

 

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IMPORTANT about the Confessional, Your Phone, and … Who Knows?

Posted on 30 October 2024 by Fr. John Zuhlsdorf

At the National Catholic Register there is a story about how the Bishop of Lincoln has told priests, “NO PHONES in the Confessional”.

HERE

Bishop James Conley of the Diocese of Lincoln, Nebraska, formalized a new policy this year banning priests from using their smartphones in the confessional.

The fact is, these phones are really sophisticated and you can never quite shut them down. And they are listening. They are sensing your movements. They are watching through lenses. They do these things to know when to “wake up” for use, or to shovel ads at you. I saw a couple of videos recently on what they phones do when they are “asleep” or “turned off”.

Dear friends.. if priests should not take phones into confessionals, then NEITHER SHOULD YOU!

Please please please… GO TO CONFESSION!

Leave your phone in the trunk of your car.

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Rome 24/10 – Day 30: A little help, please

Posted on 30 October 2024 by Fr. John Zuhlsdorf

On 30 October, after the priests have said their usual morning Masses, The World’s Best Sacristan™ is already setting up Missals and vestments for observance of the Vigil on the 31st, though strictly speaking it is not in the 1962 calendar.

The purple vestments at The Parish™ seem to be in good shape.  I don’t think we will need a Purple Project.  However, it is possible that The World’s Best Sacristan™ put out one of the better ones here.

Recently I’ve said Masses from DMcN, from AS, from LK, from DvH, from EW, from VD, from FQ, from AW, from TE… upcoming… from JF, from LD, from SH.  I have also said Masses for my parents and my benefactors.

Apartment news… I am anxious.

I went to see a place and there were EIGHT other people there to see it, which was an annoying surprise. There is something not altogether right with the paperwork and the way this is being done and I am perplexed. I have an expert realtor giving me a hand to maneuver in these waters.

Meanwhile… please, someone, send me 2,000,000 euro so I can buy instead of rent and be rid of this … thing.   A little help.   Thanks.

In the meantime…

Please remember me when shopping online and use my affiliate links.  US HERE – UK HERE  WHY?  This helps to pay for health insurance (massively hiked for this new year of surprises), utilities, groceries, etc..  At no extra cost, you provide help for which I am grateful.

In churchy news….

This priest really gets it.

Yes, that can be filed under “churchy news”, particularly because we need pastors of souls to say what is what.

The Bernini baldichin over the main altar of St. Peter’s was cleaned.

“Trick or treat!”  Francis again cut the salaries of the cardinals who live in Rome. HERE    It seems that people – mainly Americans – aren’t giving like they used to.

Remember Barry’s war on the Little Sister of the Poor?  To force them by fining them to pay for contraception, etc., for employees?  (The late Charles Krauthammer quipped that it was bad optics; after all, they were picking on the Little Sisters of the Poor … not even the Big Sisters of the Middle Class).   He is missed.  A great chess player, too.   At The Federalist there is a piece about what an future dem admin in the White House would do to Churches under the Queen of Abortion.

Speaking of the Queen of Abortion, did you see the photos of her with that hideous anti-Catholic drag perv group in California – the one that the traitorous dogs of the Dodgers snuggled up to and only Bp. Strickland of the bishops protested?   I can’t tell which I dislike more, the Yankees or the Dodgers.  However, I know what I think about the Queen of Abortion and her crowd.

Speaking of the Yankees and the Dodgers…
This… I’ve never seen.

The Carmelites in Texas have been booted out of the officially recognized consecrated religious life for bucking the system. HERE I suspect they just wanted to be left alone and things got out of hand. Pretty sad.

The Archbp. of Cincinnati has cut diocesan ties with the Girl Scouts because of their twisted gender trash. Good for him. HERE

The Diocese of Jefferson City (Missouri, for those of you in Columbia Heights) has issued a list of banned hymns! It isn’t nearly long enough. I have suggestions. But it is a good thing. HERE I noted with pleasure that anything by David Haas is a no no. “Dear Father, do you have a reason for such a thought?” Yes, apart from the fact that he lived with us at my US seminary and we suffered his music in agony, he was a heretic and perv. So, yeah… no music by him.

In chessy news…. HERE

(Black to move and mate in 2.)

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Celebrating Palestrina at at Sacred Heart Church in Grand Rapids, MI in 2025 – world famous choirs

Posted on 30 October 2024 by Fr. John Zuhlsdorf

Any number of parishes could do something like this.  Here is a parish that has done something!

My friends at Sacred Heart in Grand Rapids, MI had a wonderful idea which they have executed expertly.

They are celebrating in 5th centenary of the great composer Palestrina (Giovanni Pierluigi da Palestrina – +1594).

HERE

Succeeded by Nanino and Giovanelli, Palestrina is one of the Roman greats along with Tomas Luis de Victoria and Orlando de Lassus.   His tomb is somewhere in St. Peter’s Basilica.  They aren’t sure exactly where.

Along with being the master of the choirs of the Lateran, Santa Maria Maggiore and the Cappella Sistina, Palestrina also directed at The Parish™.

Last Sunday for the Feast of Christ the King, a choir from London was in town.  They sang one of Palestrina’s most important works the Missa Papae Marcelli, which touches the very heights of the polyphonic music which at the time of the Council of Trent was hotly debated.

Look what they are doing… look especially at the names of the groups coming to sing:

Remember Floriani?  They were on a pilgrimage I had a role in.    HERE   These guys have got game.  But look… The Tallis Scholars… Gesualdo Six… good grief.

This is very exciting stuff.  I shall have to make a pilgrimage to Grand Rapids for at least one of these.

YouTube thumbnailYouTube icon

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UPDATED! – Really? I ask the readership… a serious question… no, really… the MASCOT for the Jubilee Year

Posted on 30 October 2024 by Fr. John Zuhlsdorf

UPDATE: 30 October 2024

More… below.

UPDATE: 29 October 2024

From bad to…whatever level this is.   More work by the same guy who designed this… whatever this is.  BELOW.

And remember the logo for the 2025 Jubilee (which you see on the Doll-Thing?)  HERE 

ORIGINALLY POSTED  Oct 28, 2024 at 16:38

Really? I ask the readership… a serious question… no, really…

QUAERITUR: Is there really a need for a mascot for a Holy Year?

I am not making this up.

Non-specific sex. Rainbow “rosary”. Staff that looks like a stang.

Named… “Luce” (Loo-chay). Short for …. Luci (something)… maybe? Ohhh… right, it’s Italian. Because that’s what the whole world speaks.

Mental exercise:

You can get this poster anywhere in Rome, any touristy shop. All the Popes.. right?

So, cover your eyes and throw a dart at this poster. Find which pope it hits.

What would THAT pope say about this mascot thing?

It’s just a mental exercise.

Honestly. I don’t understand what they are thinking.

UPDATE: 29 October 2024

More from the same… I’m sensing a theme.

And the 2025 Jubilee logo:

UPDATE: 30 October 2024

And now people are getting the idea…  HERE

Translation:

The Vatican entrusts the Jubilee to a gay pride and sex toy designer.

by Andrea Zambrano

Just introduced and already in the storm: the mascot “Luce” for the Jubilee 2025 not only resembles Greta Thunberg, but was created by the designer Simone Legno, very active with his brand “Tokidoki”. And who in his collection has produced gadgets for Gay pride and a line of vibrators. Is it possible that the Dicastery for the Evangelization of Monsignor Fisichella did not know this?

[…]

UPDATE: 30 October 2024

HOWEVER… on my way to church I pass by the Palazzo Spada. On the pavement by the building are potted plants. One of them was moved a while back to reveal an icon – like a mascot figure of pilgrim – from a Jubilee of some years past. I shot a pic of it today, with pigeon feathers and mozziconi.  These showed the visitor of Rome which path to follow from pilgrimage place to place.

Hey?  What’s with the non non-specific sex suggestion facial hair?  What’s with the staff?  It doesn’t look like the reverse of a staff to be used in satanic rites!   I hardly know what to say!  Although… that hat… could be … a… a…

UFO!

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Meanwhile, the actual teenagers….

Posted on 29 October 2024 by Fr. John Zuhlsdorf

UPDATE:

UPDATE:

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Rome 24/10 – Day 29: “The lady doth protest too much, methinks”

Posted on 29 October 2024 by Fr. John Zuhlsdorf

I note that the Vatican curial calendar is back on track several days after the end of the “ora legale”. Good work guys. The sun rose at 06:37 (if the calendar is to be believed), 7 minutes after I did. It will set at 17:10 well before I go to sleep.

The Ave Maria ought to ring at 17:30. This is the 303rd day of the year. Being a dies non, I said a Votive Mass of the Holy Angels today. I’ve been working my way through Mass intentions sent by readers. However, Sunday was for all my benefactors and yesterday was for my parents. I read in the older Roman Martyrology that today is the feast of Hyacinthus, Quinctus, Felician and Lucius. Not a clue. To get at them, I suppose we have to have recourse to the unwieldly but replete Acta Sanctorum.

Still no clue. Looking more… bingo.

It’s remarkable what you can find.  Someone did a lot of work to put this online.

Last night at the Campo de’ Fiori The Great Roman™ and I witnessed a protest against how the tourist industry of the restaurants and night spots is disturbing the quarter and making life unpleasant for the locals.  I must say that I’ve been better protests.   The fact is that the restaurants and bars on the Campo do go on until 2:30 and it gets noisy.   And there are not supposed to be musicians (if you can call them that), but the police who are always present do nothing about them.

Some people dressed as “ghosts” came by to help. I’m not sure that they made a big impression. One woman – in the spirit of the thing – stood in front of a restaurant… a good place but which has pushed its tables waaaay out into the piazza… blowing a whistle until she tuckered out. The best moment was when a young man from one of the restaurants came by and said with colorful Romanesco expressions which I mustn’t write here about how those lovely people could resolve their problem by selling their lovely places and moving. The Great Roman™ and I were reduced to giggles for while at the colorful Romanaccio.   There is something special about the Roman way of turning a phrase.

Thanks to KA for the cigars. He was missed.

The alstroemeria has not been the very best, so I’ve opted for roses, which Moses still knowses.

The Campo this morning without ghosts. I was on my way home from the fishmonger.

In churchy news, I’ve been getting reactions to the new Jubilee mascot “Luce” (aka …?). Those with whom I have shared it have not yet had anything good to say. One person who is a well-known radio commentator in the upper midwest wrote to me with a link saying: “WTH is this?”

However, I’ve noticed something on TwitterX. I searched “mascot jubilee” and came up with tweets about beeple and cyber trading and chains and hot meme tokens and value and market cap. Does someone out there understand what this is? My spidey sense suggests to me that it has something to do with the anime influence on the image… not to mention Cthulhu (as a commentator pointed out).

Something about the final document of the walking together about walking togetherity: HERE at the National Catholic Register (not to be confused with the Fishwrap)

In chessy news…. HERE

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