Sustained by Tradition: A Prisoner’s Journey (Part 3)

Long-time readers of this Substack will remember the two posts I made, back in July and August, sharing some deeply moving passages in letters I received from a prisoner in a maximum security prison with whom I have been regularly corresponding for years now. At the time I said that I would share more in the future — but I then had no way of knowing quite how long that would take! We’ve certainly been very busy here at Tradition & Sanity, tackling a lot of different topics over some very eventful months.

(Don’t you just long for a pontificate in which nothing distressing, disastrous, or destructive ever happens? Wherein, when you bother to pay attention to what the pope in Rome has just said, it turns out to have been a serene restatement of what the Church has always taught and lived, so much so that… wonder of wonders!... you can peacefully assist at your local TLM, turn your mind to charity at home and the blessedness of heaven? Well, let us keep doing exactly those things just as well as we can, remembering that no evil afflicting the Church on earth, or us her members, lasts forever; God will deliver His people — and our prayers, penances, and daily good works are part of the way in which He will deliver her.)

On June 1, 2022, my correspondent writes:

As I prayed the prayers yesterday for our Queen [May 31, the Queenship of Mary], I know we are united in His Sacred Heart, through the Immaculate Heart, with the Chaste Heart of St. Joseph! The Lord has been so good over these past few months… There are good days and bad days. I’m battling—trying. His grace is so very important. I’m not sure how to describe it, but there is a sense of urgency. As in now is the time to get right. Prison is a struggle, but there is also the interior battle against sin… Sometimes I wish I would’ve been sent to a Carthusian monastery!

I think we can all relate to that last sentiment.

I’ve recently finished two great books. First, Bp. Schneider’s Christus Vincit. Wow! It was absolutely perfect. His diagnosis of the Church today was correct. I enjoyed the read, and took much from it. Yesterday, I finished the book you edited, From Benedict’s Peace to Francis’s War. Excellent!... I found every article [in it] to be a sobering assessment. I was surprised to see that no author mentioned the vote on the Novus Ordo as its introduction at the Synod [of Bishops in 1967]. It did not receive the required 2/3rds vote. Sire pointed this out in Phoenix [from the Ashes]. It speaks so much that Mass was brought up for a vote. But also that it didn’t get 2/3rds. Would Pope Francis have accused those bishops of being “against the Council”?

I agree, by the way, with his assessment of Bp. Schneider’s book—one of the best written in the past decade. Sire’s Phoenix from the Ashes is also a very enlightening read, with perhaps the best compact account of the postconciliar liturgical reform one could wish to find. (I have only one substantive disagreement with Sire; he sees the 1965 “interim rite” as the faithful fulfillment of Sacrosanctum Concilium and seems to think there’s nothing wrong with it; au contraire, see here, here, and here.)

The prisoner concludes:

Throughout Paschaltide, and now on the brink of Pentecost, I am amazed at how beautiful the Missal is. Even the sanctoral cycle is amazing!... This month is a liturgical banquet!