Sermon for Easter Sunday, April 17th, 2022 (from March 2016)

 

In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost. Amen.

 

My dearly beloved in Our Lord,

 

“This is the day that the Lord has made – Haec dies, quam fecit Dominus. (Ps 117)”, Holy Mother Church is chanting throughout the Easter Feast and Octave.

How glad are we, true Catholics, to know that Christ has indeed risen from the dead. We know it not only because during all the Christian centuries the empty tomb not far from Calvary has been venerated – until its destruction by the Muslim around the year 1000, which triggered the Crusades. We know it by the surest and the most solid knowledge which has been given to mankind: that of divine revelation. If our intelligence receives God’s revelation and accepts it willingly, then we have and practice Faith.

When modernists go on about the Resurrection, at the end you still do not know for sure whether they believe in a physical Resurrection, or only in “our experience with Jesus living on in our minds”. Let a horse kick them – will they get up and doubt whether they really, physically hace received a blow? If they are logical with themselves, they will!

How glad are we, true Catholics, then, to reject such outrageous doubt or skepticism. Were our hearts not pierced when we heard, in the Passion according to St John, how Pontius Pilate dismissed Our Lord's solemn proclamation of his true kingship and divine mission by the futile words: “Quid est veritas? - What is the truth?” Here the one who is the Truth, God incarnate, was standing before him, talking to him – and then that...! When God speaks, man must listen and believe.

Certainly the presence of the risen Lord is somewhat “ethereal”. He is present although the doors are locked and bolted; then he disappears just as abruptly. He joins the two disciples on their way to Emmaus, on the evening of Easter day; and then he vanishes as soon as they recognize him. But this in no way means that Our Lord only “exists in the disciples' minds”, but it is sufficiently explained through the precise condition of his resurrection body, which is real, but spiritual.

The Fathers of the Church, in their comments, make a clear connection between those different episodes after the Resurrection, and the disciples' faith or charity. Christ himself tells off the Apostles or the disciples because of their lack of faith, or because they are so slow to believe, in spite of the irrefutable proofs of his Resurrection.

The Apostles came back to Faith, Hope and Charity slowly during these days. In this they are an example, but a bad one, for us. On the other side we see Mary Magdalen whose ardent love for Our Lord earns her the grace to be the first one to see Christ at the tomb where she had persevered. She is “the Apostle of the Apostles”, and the Church on her feast day says the Creed at Mass!

Our Lady had not hesitated to “hope against all hope”; she alone had kept faith in her Son: she knew he would die, and she wanted him to die for our Redemption, in accordance with the will of God. But even while holding his dead body on her knees and contemplating the consequences of sin in the terrible wounds of his Passion, her faith never failed, not even for one instant. She did not go to the tomb, on the first day of the week, with the pious women who wanted to anoint the body of Jesus because she knew that he would rise from the dead – that he had risen indeed.

How glad are we true Catholics to be able to call such a mother our own: “Regina caeli laetare, alleluja...” God has delivered up his Son to death on the Cross, in order to redeem us, the slaves of sin, as we have sung in the Exsultet.

So let us adore the profound wisdom of God, His marvelous plan of Redemption which He has conceived and executed in such a perfect way. Let us rejoice during this great Octave with a true spiritual joy and exultation, in order to get rid of the old leaven (Epistle), and in order to seek that which is above, where Christ is sitting at the right hand of the Father (Ep., Holy Saturday). Christ is risen indeed, and he is now always with us (cf. Introit) – let us also be with him, let us be true to him.

 

In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost. Amen.

P. Arnold Trauner (paterarnold@hotmail.com), njemački i engleski.

Sermon for Maundy Thursday, April 14th, 2022 (from 2021)

 

In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost. Amen

 

My dearly beloved in Our Lord,

 

 

“On Maundy Thursday the Church commemorates the institution of the Blessed Eucharist. On this day one Mass only can be said in the same church and that must be a public one. White vestments are worn by the priest, the altar is decked with flowers, and even the purple veil, which covers the cross during Passion-tide, is replaced by one of white. The celebrant consecrates two hosts, one for the priest who officiates on Good Friday, when there is no consecration. This host is carried in procession to a place known as the Repository or Sepulchre, where it remains until the following day. After the Mass on Maundy Thursday the signs of mourning proper to Passion-tide are resumed: the altar is stripped of it coverings and of ornaments of all kinds, the lights in the sanctuary are extinguished, and the door of the empty tabernacle is left open. On Maundy Thursday the yearly consecration of the holy oils takes place, each bishop consecrating a sufficient quantity of these oils for the three in number: the oil for the sacrament of Extreme Unction; that for anointing those who are to be baptized, and also for anointing the priest’s hands at his ordination; and the sacred chrism, a mixture of oil and balsam used in the sacrament of Confirmation, and at the consecration of bishops.” (The New Roman Missal, Frs Lasance & Walsh, 1945)

The Church does not celebrate or commemorate “the Last Supper” on this day – but the Sacrifice of the New and everlasting Covenant which Christ has instituted after having eaten the Paschal Lamb with his disciples.

“In hac mensa novi Regis,

Novum Pascha novae legis

Phase vetus terminat. -

Vetustatem novitas,

Umbram fugat veritas,

Noctem lux eliminat.” (Corpus Christi, Sequence “Lauda Sion”)

By the words “This do ye for the commemoration of Me” (Epistle; 1Cor 11:24;25) Our Lord gives to the Apostles present the power to consecrate. He ordains and consecrates them as priests and bishops of the New Testament. For Our Lord cannot possibly give this order to the Apostles without transmitting to them the appropriate power and capacity to fulfill it.

The sacrifices of the Old Testament had no efficiency by themselves, as St Paul has explained on Passion Sunday (Epistle). They were all foreshadowing the one true Sacrifice offered by Our Lord on the Cross, and only in this way could they achieve whatsoever good effect. With Our Lord’s death those sacrifices became useless; and they became evil and sinful after the destruction of the Temple, which constituted the definite and obvious demise of the Mosaic rites. The Sacrifice of Our Lord has obtained our redemption, and its fruit will be dispensed by the priests reenacting this same and sole Sacrifice throughout the centuries in Holy Mass.

Our Lord today asks his Apostles after he has washed their feet – to the great astonishment of all, particularly St Peter: “Know you what I have done to you?” (Jn 13:12) He has given the Apostles an incredible example of humility out of charity: “You call me Master, and Lord; and you say well, for so I am. If then I being your Lord and Master, have washed your feet; you also ought to wash one another's feet. For I have given you an example, that as I have done to you, so you do also.” (ibid. v.13-15) St Paul resumes this teaching brilliantly, two chapters after today’s Epistle in his famous praise of the virtue of Charity: “If I speak with the tongues of men, and of angels, and have not charity, I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal. And if I should have prophecy and should know all mysteries, and all knowledge, and if I should have all faith, so that I could remove mountains, and have not charity, I am nothing. And if I should distribute all my goods to feed the poor, and if I should deliver my body to be burned, and have not charity, it profiteth me nothing.” (1Cor 13:1-3) After his resurrection Our Lord will ask St Peter to make up for his terrible threefold denial, and the soon-to-be first Pope does so by confessing that he loves his Lord and Master above all, and more than the other disciples (cf. Jn 21:16-17).

Dearly beloved! Do we know what Christ has done to us? I think we hardly do! The hardness of heart we so often manifest through lack of charity; the little fervor we show for serving God; the great reluctance to give the best of what are and of what we have received to Our Lord… are as many proofs of how little we usually care about “the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord” (Rom 8:39) and which Christ demonstrates through his actions, today and tomorrow.

Only a few days ago has Holy Church celebrated the feast of the Annunciation (March 25^th) where all things come to a head in Our Lady’s answer to the Archangel Gabriel and which we recall three times a day when we recite the “Angelus” by the will of the Church: “Ecce … Fiat … – Behold the handmaid of the Lord, be it done to me according to thy word”. Had she answered otherwise; had she only withheld one morsel of her heart, mind and will from her beloved God, there would not have been any possibility of Redemption! Lucky for us she did not! Blessed us if we learn from her daily, and imitate her total gift to God.

May the burning love of Our Lord for our souls warm our hard and cold hearts. His Sacred Heart will soon be opened in order to show that he has withheld nothing, not even the last drop of blood, in his redeeming sacrifice. May we follow the example of St Peter and the other ten Apostles, and not that of the traitor Judas! We are great sinners – let us repent and show worthy fruit of penance, through love for Our Lord who has given his life for love of us.

 

In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost. Amen.

P. Arnold Trauner (paterarnold@hotmail.com), njemački i engleski.

Sermon for Palm Sunday, April10th, 2022

 

In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost. Amen

 

 

My dearly beloved in Our Lord,

 

Holy Church begins the liturgy of Holy Week with the Blessing of Palms and the Procession before today’s Mass.

The first prayer makes us to demand: “O God, whom to hold dear and to love is righteousness, multiply in us the gifts of Thine ineffable grace: and do Thou, Who hast made us, by the death of Thy Son, to hope for the things we believe, make us by His Resurrection to attain the end for which we strive.”

It is a most beautiful prayer which traces the grand lines not only of Holy Week, but of our entire Christian existence. For during Holy Week the essence of the work of Redemption is condensed and put before our incredulous eyes and our hearts slow to believe (cf Lk 24:25).

As our earthly life progresses, so also should our Christian life progress. The Christian life consists essentially in intimacy with God and Our Lord Jesus Christ, through love and charity. Only he who loves God above all things, is found to be just and righteous before God. Thus the Church prays: “O God, whom to hold dear and to love is righteousness.”

The Jews, as St John throughout his Gospel consistently calls those who refused to pull away the veil of incredulity from their hardened hearts, put their righteousness into the fact that they descended from Abraham, and into the outward observance of prescriptions and rites.

Many Catholics follow them, alas, in this attitude! They fall back into naturalism, at least in the practical order. They totally ignore the necessity of God’s grace for any good thought, word and deed we accomplish. As true Catholics we need to be aware of the fact that there is no good which does not originate from God! “Multiply in us the gifts of Thine ineffable grace!”, we pray.

The opening prayer of the Blessing of Palms then sums up what is going to happen, mystically and sacramentally, before our eyes during these sacred days: the redeeming suffering and death of Our Lord, followed by his Resurrection, as he has foretold. The Church prays: “and do Thou, Who hast made us, by the death of Thy Son, to hope for the things we believe, make us by His Resurrection to attain the end for which we strive.”

The great woes that follow each other in our times at incredible speed – institutional godlessness; tyranny and thought-police under the pretext of health, well-being and prevention of death; destruction of the social, economical and political foundations… – are all driven by the enemies of human salvation, the henchmen of immortal souls. One may well think of the great woes that St John describes in the Apocalypse. This thought should also direct well our behavior: The early Christians, many of whom received Baptism knowing fully well that it might mean their earthly death at the hands of the Roman persecutors, turned their minds and hearts resolutely towards Our Lord. Unlike them, many Catholics today lament and whine in the face of the obvious and undeniable injustice, cynicism and brutality of the self-declared lords of this world, the helpers of Satan. They make no case of St Paul’s admonition which Holy Church gives us in today’s Epistle: “Brethren, Let this mind be in you, which was also in Christ Jesus!” We must adapt and adjust to the mind and the feelings of Our Lord who “made Himself as nothing, taking the form of a servant”, who “humbled Himself, becoming obedient unto death, even the death of the cross.”

Most Catholics today equally fear to be true Catholics who with St John of the Cross aspire to suffer and to be despised for Our Lord’s sake – pati et contemni pro Te – and to be true Jews and Judases. This tepidity is an abomination before God, as He has told us unequivocally: “I know thy works, that thou art neither cold, nor hot. I would thou wert cold, or hot. But because thou art lukewarm, and neither cold, nor hot, I will begin to vomit thee out of my mouth.” (Apc 3:15-16)

May the great spark that Our Lord and His Church ignite during Holy Week, find a great mass of fuel in our hearts and minds. This fuel consists of humility, contrition and charity. Thus Christ speaks: “I am come to cast fire on the earth; and what will I, but that it be kindled?” (Lk 12:49) The flame, the fire of charity has been kindled by Our Lord’s humble love shown forth in his death on the cross. Let us not put out this living flame of love, but allow it to consume all that we are and all that we have!

 

In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost. Amen.

 

(please see below!)

Remarks:

First there now follows the Blessing of Palms in the form of a “missa sicca”, a dry Mass, similar to the Mass of the Presanctified on Good Friday.

Then the blessed Palms are distributed. Come and kneel at the communion rail. First you need to kiss the Palm, then the priest’s hand. Liturgical kisses are always to be SILENT and DRY. Carry the Palm in your (right) hand during the Procession and during the reading or singing of the Passion.

The Procession goes through the garden and back in front of the closed chapel door. There a hymn is sung, after which the processional Cross strikes the door three times before it is opened.

After the Procession the Mass starts. During the Mass the Passion according to the Gospel of St Matthew is read or, as in our case, sung. (The Passion according to St Mark is read on Tuesday, St Luke on Wednesday, St John on Good Friday.)

P. Arnold Trauner (paterarnold@hotmail.com), njemački i engleski.

Zaustavi Huna!

 Američka propaganda protiv Njemačke iz I sv. rata:

Ima li sličnosti sa sadašnjom situacijom?

Kramatorsk, ne tako brzo iznositi krivca

 Ukrajinska Tochka U:

Veliki stabilizatori na dnu, krila ne pri dnu. Ruski Iskander nije takav. Raketa koja je eksplodirala ima oznake Tochke U.

 

 

 

Kod covida vidjeli smo mnogo istine u medijima.

Sermon for Passion Sunday, April3rd, 2022

 

In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost. Amen

 

 

My dearly beloved in Our Lord,

 

“Brethren, Christ being come, a high priest of the good things to come – Pontifex futurorum bonorum” (Hebr 9:11, Epistle)

A reproach against Holy Church has often been made – especially among the would-be Catholics after Vatican2: that she is just putting people off till eternity by her teaching about our duty to save our immortal soul. How silly this argument is, becomes more obvious with each day passing in the present turmoil (which is far from over…). How lucky are we to be able to turn our eyes towards that which is not passing or failing anymore – the day of eternity, the good things to come – while we witness the liberal world order falling to pieces!

In ch. 8 of the Gospel according to St John Our Lord speaks about Abraham. He is our father in the Faith, having given us such an extraordinary example of believing in God against all appearances… in believing in hope against hope (cf. Rom 4:18). “And you shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free. They answered him: We are the seed of Abraham, and we have never been slaves to any man: how sayest thou: you shall be free? Jesus answered them: Amen, amen I say unto you: that whosoever committeth sin, is the servant of sin.” (vv. 32-34) “I know that you are the children of Abraham: but you seek to kill me, because my word hath no place in you… They answered, and said to him: Abraham is our father. Jesus saith to them: If you be the children of Abraham, do the works of Abraham. But now you seek to kill me, a man who have spoken the truth to you, which I have heard of God. This Abraham did not.” (vv. 37.39-40) “You are of your father the devil, and the desires of your father you will do. He was a murderer from the beginning, and he stood not in the truth… When he speaketh a lie, he speaketh of his own: for he is a liar, and the father thereof. But if I say the truth, you believe me not.” (vv. 44-45) Then follows the passage of today’s Gospel at the end of which Our Lord clearly professes that he is God: By pronouncing the word “I am” which the Jews must never pronounce, he makes it clear that either he is an eminent blasphemer – as the Jews will conclude – or truly God who had thus manifested Himself to Moses: “I am who am… He who is, hath sent me to you.” (Ex 3:14)

These days the Church has celebrated the feast of the Annunciation when the Divine Son was made man in the holy and pure womb of the Virgin Mary. God has become man, in order for man to become God, as the great St Augustine says. Our Lord humbled himself in order to exalt us. He has come into the world in order to call us away from this world, towards the true and everlasting reality: “If you had been of the world, the world would love its own: but because you are not of the world, but I have chosen you out of the world, therefore the world hateth you.” (Jn 15:19)

The opposition between truth and error or lie; between the unfailing faith of Abraham and belief in science and progress; between love of God eternal and love of things passing is irreconcilable. Peace and reconciliation between these opposites are impossible. One side must be overcome and die – and we know which side that is: “Mors et vita… Life and death in combat fierce engage – Marvel dazzling every age. – Prince of life, by hellish monster slain – Liveth now, shall ever reign.” (Sequence, Easter Sunday). Therefore we must choose ever more deliberately and resolutely on which side we stand, particularly in a time of crisis.

This opposition between Our Lord and his enemies becomes more and more important in the liturgy as we approach the days of his sacred Passion and Death. Any given person will take their stance. Pontius Pilate will ask his smart question: “What is the truth?” and dismiss Our Lord into the hands of his enemies. Judas will seek contact with the Temple, the destruction of which has already been announced by Our Lord; a little later he will seal his fate by killing himself. Peter will be all over the place, first denying knowing Our Lord, but soon weeping sincere tears of penance that would leave their traces on his face for the rest of his life, “communicantes Christi passionibus – partaking of the sufferings of Christ” (1Petr 4:13). Our Lady, comforted and consoled by other holy women and St John, will fulfill her mission of the divine motherhood and assume that of co-redemptrix and universal mediation of grace by persevering at the foot of the Cross, “Stabat Mater dolorosa...”

Our Lord has assigned to each one of us our special place and mission. He knows what he is doing, so let us allow him to lead us on the paths of justice, for his own name’s sake (cf. Ps 22).

 

In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost. Amen.

P. Arnold Trauner (paterarnold@hotmail.com), njemački i engleski.