Tell the revolutionaries that. It probably would have saved a few people their lives during the French Revolution or the Stalinist purges, for example.

Revolutionaries don't deal in reason and moderation. They deal in emotion and extremes, perhaps with some rationalization along the way.

Dioceses were granted a two year reprieve in which they were to "shepherd" us traddies into the Novus Ordo Mass. We just don't understand how wonderful and totally not questionable or problematic it is. It's all just bad catechesis on our end.

So it begins.

I've already located the nearest SSPX mission in case my parish gets shut down.

@English Catholic - Thanks for the article. That news hasn't made it across the Atlantic, to my knowledge. I think it makes some good points, especially how any psychological technique isn't going to be as effective as religious belief.

Maybe what I've been taught isn't mindfulness, or is a stripped-down version. What I was taught was essentially consciously focusing on my breathing or to engage my physical senses as a sort of distraction (focus on how the worry stone feels, focus on how the beads feel, focus on how my feet feel in my shoes, etc). It's worked well for me when I start to get sensory overload (I'm on the spectrum but can usually "pass"). And I only do it when I'm on the verge of getting overwhelmed. It's not a continuous practice. When I deliberately contemplate my faults, it's in the context of prayer. Our Lady of Sorrows is wonderful at letting you know what your vices are.

One technique I used with young students is 5-4-3-2-1, which is name five things you can see, four things you can hear, three things you can touch, two things you can smell, and one thing you can taste. Usually by the time you do that, you usually calm down.

Honestly, I don't think you're unlucky. I don't think the good Fathers meant any harm when they wrote their books, but they're very much in line with that Modernist ambiguity that we've seen in Church documents for the last 100 years. The logical conclusion of that ambiguity is apostasy but most people don't think it through.

Centering prayer and mindfulness (another concept borrowed from the East) are often linked together. I actually don't think mindfulness is a bad thing in of itself. Focusing on what's going on immediately around you is a good way to short circuit a panic or anxiety attack, since those obsess on potential threats in the future. It's the same thinking behind worry stones (and honestly, when I feel amped up, I tend to touch my Rosaries to bring me down and remind myself to breathe). But it doesn't have a place in Catholic spirituality.

When I was in undergrad, one of the friars loaned me some books on centering prayer by the big proponents of the day (Fr. Basil Pennington and Fr. Tom Keating). Having done martial arts as a kid and possessing a natural interest in religion/philosophy in general, I recognized that most of the techniques described were more aligned with a Buddhist understanding of metaphysics than a Western one.

The Cloud of Unknowing (which both Pennington and Keating claim to be re-presenting for a contemporary audience in their texts) describes what St. Teresa of Avila would consider the fourth stage of prayer - the prayer of simplicity or perhaps something akin to the hesychism of the Orthodox. During this stage, the Christian is to be more receptive than active in their prayers - a sort of waiting for God. When I would explain it to my catechumens back in the day, I usually liken it to Elijah in the cave waiting for the gentle breeze of the Lord rather than the powerful and chaotic shaking of the earth and wildfires. As the kids would say, if you know, you know. The author of The Cloud recommends mentally repeating a single word and gradually reducing the frequency of repetition to still the mind and prepare it for God's action (if He chooses to act).

The issue is that the post-modern spirituality has been strongly influenced by Eastern practices via the New Age movement. In Buddhist meditation (and some Hindu schools of thought), the repetition of the mantra (a word/syllable/phrase) is meant not to still the mind but to prepare it for enlightenment, which is best understood as annihilation of the self.

In short, Catholic contemplation encourages the mind/soul to assume a passive/receptive position to be filled by God's grace, while an Eastern understanding of meditation has the goal of total annihilation of the self. The externals are similar, but the end goals are radically different. I think it's possible to read Pennington and Keating in a more traditionally Catholic sense, but it's ambiguous at best. For that reason, the author of The Cloud strongly discourages neophytes and non-religious from reading his work until they have a particular maturity.

I used to listen to Catholic Stuff You Should Know back before COVID. It worked for me at the time and is probably one of the better Novus Ordo ones out there. I also have a fondness for Scott Hahn, although I haven't read him in years either.

Word on Fire? I find Bishop Barron to be overrated.

I don't think so. Fernandez has even less charisma than Francis. It was a blessing that we got him instead of Martini. Same theology and politics, but he was smooth as silk.

My personal tin-foil hat theory? Fernandez is going to be a fall guy. Either Francis or his successor will punish Fernandez for pushing the envelope while promising to moderate things, all the while allowing the modernist agenda to continue to creep. At least creep as compared to the current pace.

@V.R.S. - I read the title and realized that the document would more or less be garbage. I still read it over a few times to understand exactly why it's garbage because I knew other people would latch on to the "good stuff" and ignore all the problems. "But it condemns transgenderism", "Yes, but not for the right reasons, and that's going to be a problem down the road."

My wife was one of those people. She doesn't have any training in philosophy, so I walked her through the foundational problems of the text. She gets it now.

@Boanerges Boanerges Because it makes sense. Pope Francis knows he won't live forever. I don't think he'd ever retire, but he is getting older and his health is declining. Even though JPII held on for a good five years after the Parkinson's really sank in, Francis isn't going to bank on that, particularly when he can't even say Mass any more (unlike JPII). So he's working to protect his legacy. Get as much done (or at least started) as fast as he can and make it clear whom he wants to succeed him.

You have to remember - the Holy Ghost doesn't descend on a man to appoint him Pope. It's very much a political process like any other. We just hope and pray the cardinals are open to the Holy Ghost.

If you mean pious beliefs, colloquially called "little-t tradition", then yes. If Tradition were not infallible, we would not be bound to believe in the Immaculate Conception, for example. Yet we are.

Of course, if you're not a Catholic, I don't expect you to get that point.

When I was little, I had a tendency to wander off and explore places. Even in the wild and crazy 80s it wasn't a good idea. I was probably six years old and very trusting (I hadn't been introduced to Stranger Danger yet). But I was an only child, and there weren't many boys in my neighborhood, so off I'd go.

To address this my grandparents told me if I went too far into the woods, I'd be kidnapped by gypsies. Worked until I turned 12. Same principle at work.