St. Augustine: Books and comments on a painting

Posted on 28 August 2025 by Fr. John Zuhlsdorf

Some years ago I posted a round up of books about St. Augustine.   Rater than reproduce it here, I’ll link to it HERE

However, I want to update with a couple of additional volumes.   Books and articles on Augustine pour forth.

Here is a recent offering from Emmauus Road Press

US HERE

Return to the Heart: The Biblical Spirituality of St. Augustine’s Confessions  by Shane Owens

Christ and the Altar Fire: Sacrifice as Deification in Matthias Scheeben by David Augustine

US HERE

One of my favorite images of St. Augustine is a painting by Philippe de Champaigne. Right click for much larger.

Firstly, you will note the flaming heart and the light on the left with the word “veritas… truth”. There is a quill, for Augustine was a writer. There are texts under foot with the names of heretics like Pelagius , Celestinus, and Julian of Eclanum. On a stand is the Bible with its pages in motion, perhaps to indicate that Scripture is in-breathed by the Holy Spirit.

Augustine peers towards divine truth. His burning heart’s flames are stretching towards the truth through Augustine’s head. The affective affects the intellective in accordance with the Augustinian phrase, “Nisi credideritis non intelligetis… unless you will have first believed you will not understand”.

What’s going on with that heart? Augustine, who authored the unforgettable “our hearts are inquiet/restless until they rest in Thee”, described us and our love as working like gravity, which in the thought of the ancients was a force within a thing that sought to go to its proper place of balance in relation to all other things.

“Amor meus pondus meum” (conf 13, 9, 10) said Augustine, “My love is my weight”, drawing the restless soul to God, the only source of lasting peace.

We are all made in God’s image and likeness, made to act as God acts. He reveals something of His will to us. When we obey Him we act in accordance with the way He made us and what He intended for us. All things that live and move and have their being must come to rest in God or forever be in conflict with themselves and the cosmos.

In the painting the burning heart is by it’s internal need striving to go to the divine light.  In turn it enflames the intellect which can then find its way to the divine light of Truth.

In the dynamic of this tension, Augustine is writing under the illumination of Truth and the insights of the inquiet heart.

One might be tempted to subtitle this work “continuous conversion” or “work in progress”.

Posted in SESSIUNCULA |
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From “The Private Diary of Bishop F. Atticus McButterpants” – 25-08-24 – Another visit to a Hispanic parish, Fr. Luis update

Posted on 28 August 2025 by Fr. John Zuhlsdorf

August 24th, 2025

Dear Diary,

Back to Christ The King today.   Its been a while.  In our weekly planning meeting I quipped it ought be Christ The Ever Expanding because of all the undocumenteds pouring in.   Somebody mumbled Atticus The Ever Expanding but I couldn’t see who it was.  Funny, tho, sort of.

Fr. Ernesto had met me at the door of the rectory, dripping sweat and talking about “fund-raising.” The AC was out. I signed whatever paper he shoved at me.

The parish has visibly increased in attendance, though I can’t follow the announcements since they were all in Espaniol.    To think that I sent Fr. Luis there two? years ago to improve his English.  Luis bounced into the sacristy to concelebrate with me and Fr. Ernesto, all smiles.  His English has not improved.  He said, “Hellow Beeshup” and then launched into a paragraph of … something.  When I said, “How’s your English practice?” he answered, “Ekselente!”, so I congratulated him anyway, which made him smile. He seems happy and I haven’t had a complaint from Ernesto.  Sleeping dogs, I guess.

After Mass I blessed three dozen scapulars – haven’t done that since Fr. Tommy was around more – a pickup truck and a rooster.  In the hall they sat me down near the food tables. I was brought tamahlees and something that looked like pancakes but fought back when I cut them.   Poo-poo-something.  Hah!  Had those before.  A lady brought Fr Gilbert a little foil pack with a note which he tried to get out of my line of sight.  It had a note like “NO PAR EL OPISBO”.  When I unwrapped it were things I thought was a kinda candy for dessert.  Boy was I wrong.  I might have seen part of my life flash before my eyes.  I guess they’ve gotta be tough to eat that stuff all the time.  Gilbert told me that the note said “not for the bishop” because they were really hot.   What’s the phrase?  “The sheep know me”?  Must remember: Don’t eat those chileetoes.

So CTK is in pretty good shape, though now with a lot more Spanish. I must prepare for the next visit by practicing the local linguo.

Since August is wrapping up things will start coming from Rome I suppose.  I wonder how fast.

Posted in Diary of Bp. McButterpants | Tagged ,
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Daily Rome Shot 1419 – Prayers for the faithful of Charlotte

Posted on 28 August 2025 by Fr. John Zuhlsdorf

Please remember me when shopping online and use my affiliate links.  US 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 chessy news… I am, of course, delighted.

Annunciation Church in S. Minneapolis posts the confession schedule outside along with Mass times.  Kudos.

 

 

Posted in SESSIUNCULA |
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Fr. McTeigue again… kaBLAM! Video offerings: Can Christ Heal Broken Men? & Want Priests? Stop Hating Men!

Posted on 27 August 2025 by Fr. John Zuhlsdorf

I must share these videos.

First, among his defense of manhood, which is enough…  his description of “Fr. Cheerful at St. Typical’s”… oh my.  When he describes the banality of what many men find in parishes … oh my.

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Excerpt

You’ve heard me talk about St. Typical’s before. It’s an outpost of the business of churchianity. It’s the place where you have your weekly anti-hell insurance renewed every week. So you show up on Saturday and Sunday. You endure painfully bad music. You endure an even worse sermon. You get your liturgical participation trophy in one hand to facilitate your hasty exit. You put a couple bucks in God’s tip jar. And the deal is, as long as it doesn’t take too long and as long as you pay up, you can run out the door and get on with real life. And if by bad luck you die that week, it’s okay, because God owes you heaven.

So, long as you “pay up”. Yeah… where did we hear that recently?

And there is this one…

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From this one:

There are all sorts of people to blame: families, absent fathers, the schools, the culture, the internet, the churches, Christian communities. But I want to give a shout-out to my brother priests, and in particular, to my brother priests who are pastors at St. Typicals. Guys, you know who you are. You say, “We’re a welcoming community,” which usually means you don’t work very hard at enforcing standards because some people might get snippy or complain. You say, “We meet people where they’re at.” True story: 99.99% of the priests who tell me that phrase—“we have to meet people where they’re at”—have absolutely no plan for leading people anywhere once they meet them where they’re at.

And

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Extended quote…. but listen to the WHOLE THING…

How are we going to fix this? How are we going to make it better? Well, here’s how not to make it better. Imagine saying to a group of young men, “Hey guys, have you ever thought about being a priest? Because here’s what you’ll do. We’ll send you to a parish and you’ll be in charge. And by being in charge, what we really mean is that if things go wrong, you’ll be in trouble. You’ll get fired. Your name will be on the lawsuit. And it’ll be great because you’ll be the spiritual father—insofar as you’ll be calling meetings. And you’re going to show a lot of masculine initiative and courage and daring by…listening. You will be the spiritual father by listening a lot to committees and assemblies and congresses and councils and senates and more committees and more listening. And people whom you don’t know very well, whose competence and goodwill are not readily apparent to you, are going to tell you what to do. Won’t that be great? And on top of that, whenever there’s an HR dispute, you’ll have to fix it. Whenever the toilet backs up, you’ll have to fix it. Whenever it snows outside and the roof leaks, you’ll have to fix it. And when other people get your community into debt, you’ll have to fix it. And in exchange we’ll ordain you and demand that you be celibate. Won’t that be great? And we’ll teach you to think of your celibacy only as a restriction, only in terms of the things you can’t do, and we’ll never really tell you why it’s worth it.”

And that’s what we’re telling our young men over and over again: do this difficult, demanding, largely not-masculine thing. Sacrifice home and family and spouse and freedom. And then we’re going to make you a bureaucrat and an HR manager and a property manager. And every now and again you’ll do some sacramental something. Then we’ll badger you for not praying, and we’ll mock you because you don’t have the time to prepare a decent sermon. You know, that’s what we’ve been doing for decades. And the proof of that is the nearly universal decline in numbers in seminaries and ordinations. There are exceptions of course, and I’m sure you’ll tell me about them. But those are the exceptions.

So what we need to do is recapture the transcendent, mystical, spiritual aspect of being a man—to reclaim the masculine archetypes of pilgrim and warrior and to be united with Christ in his role as priest, prophet, and king.

Posted in Mail from priests, Priests and Priesthood, Seminarians and Seminaries, The Coming Storm, The Drill, The future and our choices | Tagged
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27 August – St. Monica: “put my body anywhere”

Posted on 27 August 2025 by Fr. John Zuhlsdorf

Here is an oldie post, appropriate for the day:

Today in newer, Novus Ordo calendar of the Holy Roman Church is the feast of St. Monica, the mother of St. Augustine of Hippo.

In the traditional calendar her feast was back in May.

Her name, which is Punic in origin, is also properly spelled Monnica.

This is the chapel in the church of St. Augustine in Rome where the mortal remains of St. Monica (+387), the mother of Augustine of Hippo now rest.

To the right is a shot of the chapel on the day some years ago when the bones of her son, St. Augustine, were brought from their resting place in Pavia (near Milan) to Rome.

How did St. Monica’s tomb wind up here? 

Here is an excerpt from an article I wrote for Inside the Vatican (December 2004) on the above mentioned event.  I used the alternate (Punic) spelling of the saint’s name – “Monnica” (emphasis not in the original):

Most visitors to the Eternal City find it puzzling and wondrous that Monnica’s remains would be in Rome and even more so that Augustine’s should be in northern Italy, or that we have them at all.  How did this come to pass?  Monnica died at age 56 of a malarial fever at Ostia, Rome’s port city, not far from where modern Rome’s port, DaVinci airport, is situated.

After Augustine’s baptism in 386 by Milan’s bishop St. Ambrose (+ AD 397), Monnica and Augustine together with his brother Navigius, Adeodatus the future bishop’s son by his concubine of many years whom Monnica had forced Augustine to put aside, and friends Nebridius, Alypius and the former Imperial secret service agent (agens in rebus) Evodius were all waiting at Ostia to return home to Africa by ship.  They were stuck there for some time because the port was blockaded during a period of civil strife.

As she lay dying near Rome, Monnica told Augustine (conf. 9): “Lay this body anywhere, let not the care for it trouble you at all. This only I ask, that you will remember me at the Lord’s altar, wherever you be.”  She was buried there in Ostia.  In the 6th century she was moved to a little church named for St. Aurea, an early martyr of the city, and there she remained until 1430 when her remains were translated by Pope Martin V to the Roman Basilica of St. Augustine built in 1420 by the famous Guillaume Card. D’Estouteville of Rouen, then Camerlengo under Pope Sixtus IV.  As fate or God’s directing have would have it, in December 1945, some children were digging a hole in the courtyard of the little church of St. Aurea next to the ruins of ancient Ostia.  They wanted to put up a basketball hoop, probably having been taught the exciting new game – so different from soccer – by American GIs.  While digging they discovered the broken marble epitaph which had marked Monnica’s ancient grave.  Scholars were able to authenticate the inscription, the text of which had been preserved in a medieval manuscript.  The epitaph had been composed during Augustine’s lifetime by no less then a former Consul of AD 408 and resident at Ostia, Anicius Auchenius Bassus, perhaps Augustine’s host during their sojourn.

It is possible that Anicius Bassus placed the epitaph there after 410 which saw the ravages of Alaric the Visigoth and the sacking of Rome and its environs.  One can almost feel behind these traces of ancient evidence Augustine’s plea to his old friend sent by letter from the port of Hippo Regius over the waves to Ostia.

Hearing of the devastation to the area, far more shocking to the ancients than the events of 11 September were for us, did Augustine, now a renowned bishop, ask his old friend to tend the grave of the mother whom he had so loved and who in her time had wept for her son’s sins and rejoiced in his conversion?

Looking for a great book on Augustine?  Try this!

Meanwhile, in here is my relic of St. Monica.

May she pray for us, for widows, and for parents of children who have drifted from the Church.

Be sure to pray for the departed.  Pray for them!  Don’t just remember them.  Don’t just think well of them.  Don’t just, as the case may be, resent or be angry at them.  Pray for them!  Prayer for the dead is a spiritual work of mercy.

Finally, I want to remind you of a book on Augustine

REVIEW: The book on Augustine which Pope Benedict would have wanted to write.

I had a note that when I originally posted this, the publishers at Oxford had to have a meeting to figure out what to do because your purchases outstripped their supplies.

Posted in Saints: Stories & Symbols |
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Minneapolis church murderer and YOU

Posted on 27 August 2025 by Fr. John Zuhlsdorf

You’ve no doubt seen news by now about the shooter in S. Minneapolis (my native place) at Annunciation Church during a morning school Mass. first of the new school year. The killer – “trans” – killed children (8 and 10), injured many, and killed himself.

Pray for the victims and their families, perhaps a chaplet of the Rosary.

One of the most important petitions raised to Heaven by the Church is in the Litany of Saints which is sadly used infrequently.

“A subitanea et improvisa morte… From a sudden and unprovided death, spare us O Lord.”

A sudden death can be a blessing.

A sudden and unprovided death is a horrifying prospect.

Unprovided means no access to the sacraments.  No time to make an act of contrition much less make a confession, be absolved or anointed. No Viaticum.  No Apostolic Blessing.

We don’t know when our time will be up.

It could be unforeseen.  It could be soon.

Say it with me?

GO TO CONFESSION!

Posted in Four Last Things, GO TO CONFESSION |
4 Comments

Daily Rome Shot 1418

Posted on 27 August 2025 by Fr. John Zuhlsdorf

The tomb of St. Joseph Calasanz.

In the sacristy of The Parish™ in Rome there are four large paintings showing the activities of the members of the Archconfraternity of the Most Holy Trinity , especially with St. Philip Neri the founder.  In this detail you see well the habit of the archconfraternity for lay members (right) and priests (left) which is a portrait of St. Joseph Calasanz, Universal Patron of all Christian popular schools in the world.

Please remember me when shopping online and use my affiliate links.  US 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.

Welcome Registrants:

Charlotte Nancy
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White to move and mate in 4.

NB: I’ll hold comments with solutions ’till the next day so there won’t be “spoilers” for others.

In St. Louis, the Sinquefield Cup wraps up. Fabiano is is 1st followed by Prag and Wesley (tied with Levon in 3rd). Yesterday Wesley with black drew against Prag after getting a dicey position out of the opening.

Posted in SESSIUNCULA |
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ASK FATHER: Latin Catholic father, Ukrainian Greek Catholic mother – To which Church does our child belong?

Posted on 26 August 2025 by Fr. John Zuhlsdorf

From a reader…

QUAERITUR:

I am Latin Catholic and my wife is Ukrainian Greek Catholic.

Our fourth child was born recently.  We would have liked to have our child be baptized utilizing the Extraordinary Form of the Roman Rite, but despite the desire of our pastor and the chancery to grant this to our family, they feel that Traditionis Custodes too severely restricts the sacraments in this regard.

We are going to have the child baptized (though, not confirmed or communed) utilizing the Rite in the Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church but not have the child be Ukrainian Greek Catholic and remain Latin Catholic.

My question is: how do we get the baptismal records to reflect that the child is Latin Catholic and for that record to be stored at the Latin Rite parish?

The sooner we are emancipated from that dreadful act of cruelty that is Taurina cacata the better.

Since the promulgation of the 1990 Code of Canons of the Eastern Churches (CCEO), some things which were murky have become clearer. One of those things is what canon law refers to as “ritual Church ascription.”

Every Catholic is, at the time of his or her baptism, ascribed to a Church sui iuris. In the old days, they were sometimes called “Rites” but the new terminology is clearer. A rite is way of celebrating the liturgy. A Church is an institution with its own laws, customs, and practices. There can be multiple rites within one Church sui iuris (for example, the Latin Church has the Roman Rite, the Mozarabic and Ambrosian Rites Etc.) There can be multiple Churches which use the same or (same-ish) rite (for example the Ukrainian Catholic Church and the Melkite Catholic Church both use the Byzantine Rite).

But I digress.

The CCEO states (can. 29) that a child under the age of 14 is

“ascribed in the Church sui iuris of the Catholic father, or the Church sui iuris of the mother if only the mother is Catholic, or if both parents by agreement freely request it.”

The default position – regardless of what ritual is used for the baptism – is that the child is ascribed to the father’s Church.

The parents could, by mutual agreement, if both are Catholic (as in your case) choose to have their children ascribed to the mother’s Church.

The CCEO doesn’t give specifics of how this is to be recorded.   Falling back on the ancient axiom “scripta manet” is probably best to have it in writing.

You can perhaps do this.  Both of you, father and mother, sign a note stating your desire to have little “Eusebius” ascribed to the Latin Church. Ask the Ukrainian pastor to note that in the baptismal register of the Ukrainian parish. The record would be kept at the Ukrainian parish where the baptism took place, not at the Latin parish. It would be possible, if the pastor agrees, to make a notation in the Latin register along the lines of this:

BORGIA, Eusebius, born 4 July 2025 to Rodrigo Borgia and Sophia (née) Kravchenka, was baptized on 29 September 2025 at St. Josaphat Ukrainian Catholic Church in Pigs’s Eye, Minnesota, by Msgr. Stephen Knapp. By agreement of the parents and in accord with can. 29 of the CCEO the child is ascribed to the Latin Church of his father.

Posted in Canon Law, SESSIUNCULA |
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IMPORTANT: At First Things by canonist and civil lawyer Michael Mazza – “A Solution to a Kafkaesque Clerical Conundrum”

Posted on 25 August 2025 by Fr. John Zuhlsdorf

At First Things find a piece by Michael J Mazza who is one of the best canon lawyers around and who is also a civil lawyer. He has done yeoman’s work in defense of priests and their good reputations.

Someone must have slandered Josef K., for one morning, without having done anything wrong, he was arrested.” When Franz Kafka wrote the opening line of his famous story The Trial a century ago, the clerical sexual abuse crisis in the Catholic Church was a long way off. Yet Josef K.’s tragic fate parallels the experience of many Catholic priests in twenty-first-century America.

Hyperbole? Think again. An elderly priest, still hard at work as pastor of a town parish, may easily find himself removed from his rectory, indefinitely and immediately, without having done anything wrong. The Essential Norms, adopted by the U.S. bishops in 2002 at the same time as the Dallas Charter, require a priest to be removed from ministry the instant there is “sufficient evidence” of an accusation of child sexual abuse. In many situations, the “evidence” supporting an allegation comes only within the pages of a civil complaint, filed by a plaintiff’s attorney on behalf of an alleged victim.

By its very nature such a statement has yet to be proven and is “substantiated” only if and to the extent it is supported by the unilateral affirmations contained in the complaint. While some complaints may contain very detailed assertions, including dates, times, and places where the alleged abuse occurred, other complaints are extremely vague and do not rise to the level of “sufficient evidence.” They are mere allegations.

Dioceses, religious orders, and their liability insurers—eager to put years of scandal behind them—often cut deals that leave priests vulnerable and unable to defend themselves. The plaintiffs’ firms know this. So the lawsuits mount.

[…]

Most of the article visible, but First Things – annoying – put a paywall blocker at the lower part. One might make a guess what it covers up… the last part might go something like this:

While the evil of clerical sexual abuse of minors is a scourge that must be stopped, the answer to the problem does not lie in the intentional abandonment of the rule of law or the deliberate neglect of due process for accused priests. There is no room in the Church for Kafkaesque narratives. Understood in the correct way, as described above, a careful reading of the Essential Norms and a thoughtful application of canon 88 may serve to be powerful tools in the hands of a Catholic bishop or religious superior who seeks to do the right thing in a difficult situation, rendering justice to all parties.

Posted in Cancelled Priests, Canon Law, Priests and Priesthood | Tagged , , , ,
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FILM: Bread Not Stones – about the impact of Traditionis Custodes upon a faith community (Diocese of Charlotte)

Posted on 25 August 2025 by Fr. John Zuhlsdorf

Spread this around. Share it. Use the share buttons.

Regina Magazine has produced a film about the plight of the faithful in the Diocese of Charlotte, where the local bishop has conducted what amounts to a pogrom against those who desire traditional expressions of their Catholic Faith.

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The film, “removes the polemics and simply shows real people, with real names and faces who are suffering”.

This film touches on so many themes which we’ve explored on this blog for… decades, now. It’s as if this blog wrote the story board about the knock on effects of the Traditional Latin Mass on priests and the faithful.

Reverence
Silence
Ad orientem
A birthright stolen
Conversions to the Church
Priests not the same after learning the TLM
Going deeper
Processions
Unity of groups in Latin
Sense of peace
Young people, families
Vocations
Disruption caused by suppression
Heartbreak

Posted in Traditionis custodes |
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