Dear TIA,

In your article, Please, don't call Protestants Christians, you say that people have asked you how they can combat the heresy of Protestantism.

The answer is really quite obvious. The historical time line proves that Protestantism has no connection at all to Jesus Christ.

If a group of men came along today with a constitution and a bill of rights and said they planned to set up a new country, to be called The United States of America, they would be laughed at even by schoolchildren, who would say to them, "You are too late. The United States of America has already been here for two centuries."

Similarly, Protestants who imagine themselves to be Christians are fifteen centuries too late, because not one Protestant sect existed until 1517, when Martin Luther set up the first of hundreds of Protestant sects.

If further proof were need that Protestantism is heresy, consider that Our Lord promised that the gates of Hell would not prevail against His Church and that He would be with her until the end of time. Since the Catholic Church was the one and only Christian Church for 1500 years following the Ascension, then obviously He could only have been with the Catholic Church. What Protestants are saying, in reality, is that the gates of Hell did in fact prevail against Our Lord's Church while it was under His protection, and that they had to come along and correct His failure to protect her. Absurd! No.

Either Our Lord has been with His Church for all these centuries as He promised, or else He broke His promise and cannot be God. Protestants cannot have it both ways. They simply are not Christians.

     C.S.

Dear TIA,

Only the hard of heart could not be touched by the story of the destruction of St. George Lithuanian Church in Shenandoah, PA. To watch the video of the demolition, especially combined with its haunting music, is to watch the destruction of Holy Mother Church in microcosm.

The video reminds one of days past, of simpler times, more pious times, and of a bygone glory, authority and innocence.

Modernism-'s tool is the ravenous crane as it claws its way through stone and steel, reminding one of the devouring animosity of the devil and his progressivists. It claws its way through peace, beauty, piety and years of tradition and loyalty. It is truly a disaster, crowned by the loss of a life when one of the demolition workers fell tragically to his death (reported by the news, and not included in this video).

Thank you for touching our sympathies, which go out to St. George-'s loyal parishioners.

     In Maria,

     K.C.

TIA,

A man becomes a priest in the Novus Ordo after 2000. Shortly thereafter he becomes convinced of the evils of the NO and the rightness of the traditional Mass. He leaves the NO and puts himself under an independent traditional priest who teaches him the traditional Mass. Within months he too is saying the Traditional Mass and is now a priest in the independent priest's chapel.

My question is: Is he truly a traditional priest? Or does he need to go to a traditional seminary to complete his training since even he admits that his training was deficient? There's more to being a priest than hearing confessions and saying Mass and I believe that this quickly switch cheapens traditionalism and even the priesthood and isn't good for either him or the people he's trying to teach.

Many, many people hold that since the NO ordination rite has been changed and the training shortened, that the ordinations are invalid.

     T.W.



TIA responds:

T.W.,

There are two topics intermixed in your question.

1. Whether a priest ordained by the Novus Ordo is valid.
   
   
2. Considering that his ordination is valid, whether he should or should not study and form himself to be a priest according to the tradition of the Church.

Let us distinguish the answers for clarity's sake.

1. We believe that as a rule the ordinations of the Novus Ordo are valid. The Bishops were validly consecrated Bishops and the formulas they use - even though some are open to discussion - were duly approved by the Vatican. Therefore, it is our opinion that a priest ordained according to the rubrics of the Sacrament of Orders issued by the Liturgical Reform of Paul VI should be considered a valid priest.

2. When a Novus Ordo ordained priest realizes that the Conciliar Church is wrong and converts to be a true Catholic priest according to the traditional Magisterium of the Church, he must 'adore all that he had burned, and burn all that he had adored,' to paraphrase a famous command St. Remigius gave to the Frankish King Clovis when he converted from paganism. That is, this priest should make a complete abjuration of the errors of Progressivism that he had professed, and make every possible effort to learn the ensemble of Catholic doctrine that he had ignored.

We understand your objection: A priest cannot simply start to preach and direct people as if he had a good orientation. If he does so, he lies to himself and to others. There is no magical change regarding formation, even after he learns how to say the Tridentine Mass.

It is common, unfortunately, for a priest in the conditions you describe to believe himself dispensed from acquiring that formation. Surrounded by the respect of the faithful, he can enjoy this general high regard and forget his past. Nonetheless, it would be very difficult for him not to be influenced by his past bad teaching as he orients the people. If he does not make the effort to be properly formed, he will be accountable for the consequences of his semi-progressivist teaching before God.

You suggest that he should go back to a seminary to learn what he did not learn. It would be the correct solution if the times were not so bad and the Sacraments for the faithful were not so needed as they are today.

But this does not mean that the priest should not reserve at least two or three hours a day for the serious study of Catholic doctrine.

We hope this answers your questions.

     Cordially,

     TIA correspondence desk

Follow us

  Lutheran and Calvinist Mentalities

  St. George Church Unreasonably Destroyed

  Closing Churches, Incongruent Arguments

  Desacrificing the Mass

  Is the Catholic Crisis Really Explained?

  Resisting the Novelties of the Conciliar Church