SPIRITED THINKING SINCE 1888
Joseph Shaw

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The Extraordinary Form: a call to arms
July 29, 2021
Rumours have been circulating that Pope Francis is planning some kind of restriction on the Extraordinary Form of the Mass (EF), the “Traditional Mass”. This form of the liturgy clearly still has opponents in the Church. Its supporters regard it as, potentially, being a key driver of the Church’s revival, because of the counter-cultural zeal
Could our annual pilgrimage work online? Only up to a point
September 29, 2020
What exactly are we losing as our lives move increasingly online? Few of us will be sorry to forgo long commutes, and we will all have our own experiences of online work meetings, email collaboration, and teaching by video-link. As for large-scale devotional events, the Latin Mass Society, like other Catholic organisations, had to learn
Homeschooling can broaden parents’ horizons too
July 10, 2020
The problem of children of all ages bouncing off the walls – while other children attempt to do their lessons, endless meals are prepared and the adult world of work impinges – has been trying for many people during the lockdown, but this describes normal life for a large home-educating family like our own. That’s
Masses cancelled and Confession impossible? We can still live the faith
March 19, 2020
In a time of church closures, we need both faith and reason
Great Books courses are richly rewarding – but they have a fatal flaw
October 24, 2019
How to Keep From Losing Your Mind By Deal Hudson Tan, 384pp, £22/$24.95 In the 1920s, some influential academics were dismayed to find that many graduates of elite American universities were, not to put too fine a point on it, culturally illiterate. They lacked the knowledge that could be taken for granted among cultivated Europeans
Did World War II undermine Catholicism?
August 01, 2019
Mass Exodus By Stephen Bullivant OUP, 302pp, £25/$32.95 Why Catholics Leave, What they Miss, and How They Might Return By Stephen Bullivant Paulist Press, 168pp, £15.71/$19.95 Was Vatican II in some way responsible for declining Catholic practice and “affiliation” (people calling themselves Catholics), or is this phenomenon a matter of trends beyond the Church’s control?
The Knights of Malta’s Mass ban is hardly chivalrous
June 20, 2019
Fra’ Giacomo Dalla Torre, the Grand Master of the Order of Malta, has informed members that henceforth all Masses celebrated in the context of Order events must be celebrated according to the Ordinary Form: that is to say, there must be no more Traditional Latin (Extraordinary Form) Masses. This will come as a heavy blow
Infiltration: an unconvincing tale of the Church’s enemies
June 13, 2019
Infiltration: The Plot to Destroy the Catholic Church from Within By Taylor Marshall Crisis Publications 224pp, £19.75/$24.95 In 1846, Pope Pius IX condemned schemes aiming at the destruction of the Papal States by Freemasons. In 1851, Mélanie Calvat, the seer of La Salette, sent an account of her visions to the pope, including the prediction
How Agatha Christie helped to save the Latin Mass
November 01, 2018
An unlikely intervention by England’s cultural luminaries rescued the Tridentine Mass from threatened extinction
How the Latin Mass was saved
November 01, 2018
On November 26, 1971, the front page of the Universe informed its readers as follows: As from this Sunday, the first in Advent, it is forbidden to offer Mass in the Tridentine rite anywhere in the world. In very special circumstances old or retired priests may apply to their own bishop for permission to use
Gregorian chant: the cultural front line of the new evangelisation
October 12, 2018
The cultural and artistic value of chant exercises a powerful attraction
Bishops no longer understand each other
April 05, 2018
In the 1973 film Catholics, Martin Sheen – playing a Jesuit come to bring a remote traditionalist monastery to heel – informs the abbot that Vatican IV has forbidden the Latin Mass and the Sacrament of Confession, except for mortal sins. Author Brian Moore’s dystopian vision has not come to pass, and one reason to
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