The passing of Father Leo Rampsperger - over 100 years old

We mark the passing of Father Leo Rampsperger, peacefully, at Humber River Hospital, Toronto, on Friday, August 2, 2024, at the age of 100 - an ordained priest for 70 years. His funeral was held yesterday in Toronto in the church of his baptism, St. Vincent de Paul. The parish is administered by the Toronto Oratory of St. Philip Neri and was a solemn Requiem according to the traditional rite, at his request. Every year, Father would send a donation to the parish of his baptism. May he rest in peace.

Will Toronto's "Vegan priest" push his ideology on the people at Guardian Angels in Brampton? Will he be welcomed with a pig roast?

The annual priest transfer is underway for the Archdiocese of Toronto. It is larger than it has been in several years, certainly since the No Mass For You period of Tom Collins.

In early 2021, the Catholic Register, owned by the Archdiocese of Toronto, featured the pastor of St. Ambrose in south Etobicoke who declared that our God is a vegan god Animal welfare and the Church (catholicregister.org):

“I remember in the beginning I was a little bit more urgent (with preaching about transitioning to plant-based living) because I was kind of going through it,” he said. “I understand it kind of takes (small) steps with certain people and obviously people have been open to it as well. If you’re always talking about it, I think there are people that don’t want to hear it all the time unfortunately. It’s a delicate matter at times because you are dealing with people’s palette.”

How much did this priest preach of Jesus Christ?

Good luck to him as he takes up his new role at Guardian Angels in Brampton, a parish where Filipinos and Africans dominate. I am sure they will welcome him with a parking lot pig roast.

Vox Cantoris: Food for thought! Toronto pastor preaches "veganism" from pulpit - says we have a: "Vegan-god!"

Archdiocese of Toronto Priest Liborio Amaral gets the CCP Virus "vaccine" and asks, "What would Jesus do?"

"When your time comes," take the vaccine, says Father Liborio Amaral. "One day we can use these sunscreens, put it on, enjoy the sun!" Sure Father, block your Vitamin D, get CCP Virus and its mutations.

"I believe that Jesus would want us" to take the vaccine says Amaral.

Yes, I am sure Jesus would want you to take an experimental injection that we already know is causing injury and death and has either been tested or contains fetal stem cells.  Not!  What a pompous liar. Jesus would not want you or me to benefit from the crime of abortion. Only a devil would try to convince you otherwise.

Do you want the proof? Here, you are:

"And fear ye not them that kill the body, and are not able to kill the soul: but rather fear him that can destroy both soul and body in hell." Matthew 10:28

If you are a part of St. Mary's Parish in Brampton, flee! Flee this parish, flee this priest. He is not your friend. He is a deceiver. If you take it on the advice of this pompous, narcissistic, effete, then you better well be ready, "when your time comes!" 

Liborio Amaral! If you wish to take this injection, that is your business, you take it knowing full well its development and dangers. You will be judged. You have no right to deceive your people at St. Mary's or those who come across this video that this is a gift from God and that Jesus would say to take it. 

Flee this priest and this parish!

Now, which Toronto priest is next, because if your dumb enough to do this and lie to the people that this is a gift from God or what Jesus would do, you get your own blog Label. 

Those who wish to help may write me out them may write me at voxcantoris@rogers.com.

905-451-2300

stmarysbr@archtoronto.org

St. Mary's Church, Brampton - St. Mary's Church, Brampton (archtoronto.org)

Food for thought! Toronto pastor preaches "veganism" from pulpit - says we have a: "Vegan-god!"

 

The Pastor at St. Ambrose Parish in Toronto's Alderwood neighbourhood is featured in Cardinal Collins' Catholic Register promoting veganism. Reverend Donatello Iocco had a traumatic experience watching a Netflix film. "It just moved me so much seeing animals suffer and being so scared of the human hand," said Iocco in the diocesan-owned Catholic Register.

I am sure that Father feels the same about the slaughtering of the innocent in the womb and the quote could have read, "It just moved me so much seeing babies suffer and being so scared of the human hand."

"Eden was vegan," says the vegan priest. (Yes, before the "Fall" as our erudite commenters have noted - which according to Blessed Anne Katherine Emmerich happened on the first day!) What does Holy Scripture actually say? Shall we look first at Genesis 1:28:

"And God blessed them, saying: Increase and multiply, and fill the earth, and subdue it, and rule over the fishes of the sea, and the fowls of the air, and all living creatures that move upon the earth."

Further on we read Genesis 9:1-4:

"And God blessed Noah and his sons, and said to them, “Be fruitful and multiply, and fill the earth. 2 The fear of you and the dread of you shall be upon every beast of the earth, and upon every bird of the air, upon everything that creeps on the ground and all the fish of the sea; into your hand they are delivered. 3 Every moving thing that lives shall be food for you; and as I gave you the green plants, I give you everything. 4 Only you shall not eat flesh with its life, that is, its blood."

Note that God says that "Every moving that that lives shall be food for you." The only restriction he puts on it us is that we don't eat an animal that is alive or slaughtered and not drained of its blood. That is what it says. As an animal lover and someone who loves a good tenderloin or lingcod, there is no contradiction. We must love God's creation and treat it with respect. We are educated, civilized and cultured and caring people and advanced societies. Our animals should be slaughtered with humane considerations - the unnecessary suffering of an animal is never acceptable. On this, we would have no argument. Even our native ancestors in North America understood that and revered the animals they slaughtered for food and clothing even thanking God for it, in their own way.

The Catholic Register of this Archdiocese reports that Iocco has been not so subtle with his parishioners - actually lecturing them from the pulpit - a place reserved for the Good News of Salvation, not politically or ideologically inspired messages of a personal nature:

"As an impassioned new convert to the plant-based lifestyle, Iocco soon began preaching to his congregation about the virtues of compassionate eating, presenting statistics where possible, but admits he did receive some pushback. Some congregants were not ready for that message, even quoting the Old Testament and Paul in the New Testament to show eating meat is biblically permitted."

This is a totally inappropriate use of the pulpit. How does this not result in a rebuke from his bishop rather than publicity in the diocesan press?

UPDATED:

At the parish website, Father promotes fishless Fridays by suggesting that we choose "plant-based" fishless fillets. Poisson Poison! Fabricated food that this priest suggests we put in our bodies. He even has the temerity to advertise a product and retail outlet. 

In the parish bulletin, he promotes recipes and web pages on veganism as an ideology.

Veganism appears to be Father Locco Iocco's new religion. Perhaps he needs to discern his vocation - he should have been a holistic nutritionist! But then, he would figure out that these plant-based food products are nothing more than laboratory chemicals and highly processed poisons.

By the way Father. The altar cloths are to be white!

304. Out of reverence for the celebration of the memorial of the Lord and for the banquet in which the Body and Blood of the Lord are offered, there should be, on an altar where this is celebrated, at least one cloth, white in color, whose shape, size, and decoration are in keeping with the altar’s structure. When, in the Dioceses of the United States of America,  (IDENTICAL IN CANADIAN EDITION OF THE MISSAL AND GIRM PRINTED IN THE FRONT - no longer online) other cloths are used in addition to the altar cloth, then those cloths may be of other colors possessing Christian honorific or festive significance according to longstanding local usage, provided that the uppermost cloth covering the mensa (i.e., the altar cloth itself) is always white in color. General Instruction on the Roman Missal, (GIRM)

Father was trained at St. Augustine's Seminary in Homiletics, no doubt. Has he forgotten what was taught or was he taught there that this is suitable? Not only is it inappropriate, but I would also argue that it is objectively sinful and abusive - he has people hostage and he chooses to push an agenda that is not about Christ, not about doctrine or morals and has no basis in Holy Scripture. In fact, if he is telling his flock from the pulpit what he says in the video below or in the article, he is outright misleading and lying. 

In June 2019, Father appeared on a YouTube video by a group called In Defense of Animals. Sadly, the poor priest displays a gross ignorance of Scripture and history.

The best starts at 52 minutes.

"God has never commanded us to eat meat," says Father. But what of this given which is very relevant to our season of Lent? As well-formed Christians, we know that the Lamb of the Passover was a precursor to the real Lamb of God, Our Lord Jesus Christ, the Paschal Lamb Itself, slaughtered and sacrificed for our sins and eaten by the priests and the people. Below is the first Passover. It sounds like a command to me.

“3 Speak ye to the whole assembly of the children of Israel, and say to them: On the tenth day of this month let every man take a lamb by their families and houses. 4 But if the number be less than may suffice to eat the lamb, he shall take unto him his neighbour that joineth to his house, according to the number of souls which may be enough to eat the lamb. 5 And it shall be a lamb without blemish, a male, of one year: according to which rite also you shall take a kid. 6 And you shall keep it until the fourteenth day of this month: and the whole multitude of the children of Israel shall sacrifice it in the evening. 7 And they shall take of the blood thereof, and put it upon both the side posts, and on the upper door posts of the houses, wherein they shall eat it. 8 And they shall eat the flesh that night roasted at the fire, and unleavened bread with wild lettuce.”

He continues that "God has given us a vegan diet, he commands that. That's his will. God's will is for us to eat a vegan diet."

3 Every moving thing that lives shall be food for you; and as I gave you the green plants, I give you everything. 4 Only you shall not eat flesh with its life, that is, its blood."

Father's ignorance of scripture and history is astounding and the blame for this must fall on his formation at St. Augustine's Seminary in Toronto. How can any priest make a statement such as, "God does not want (blood) sacrificial offerings" and link "the blood of lambs and goats" to eating meat? He continues that "Jesus said himself, I want kindness and not animal sacrifices." He suggests we Google, "Jesus as a vegetarian." He goes so far as to state that Holy Scripture is only affected by history and culture. He continues that we only eat meat because "after the flood, there was no vegetation to eat?" If that were true, how did the dove find the olive branch? He blames it all on the poor translation of Greek, Hebrew and Latin. 

Yet, we know that this is simply untrue. Father is either suffering from a delusion or is intentionally misleading. We know that Jesus ate the Passover meal which must include meat - specifically, lamb. We know that he ate fish as evident when he appeared to the apostles after the resurrection.

"We have a vegan God," according to Reverend Iocco. Such blasphemy.

Look, I'm sure Father Iocco is a nice guy, probably a very kind man. This reflects more on his formation and the abandonment of parish priests by their bishops. It speaks of a priest with too much time on his hands to watch Netflix. It speaks of a system that leaves pastors alone and on their own. No community. It speaks of a man who would preach from the pulpit a political agenda filled with manipulation and a made-up interpretation of scripture. The pulpit is no place for this kind of propaganda.

This is an indictment of the leadership of the Cardinal and his recent predecessors, his Auxiliary Bishops, his Seminary leadership and the entire clericalist structure of the Church in Toronto that has allowed such ideas to be foisted upon the faithful. The faithful that suffers for solid preaching of the Good News of Salvation, the efficaciousness of redemptive suffering, the cause of life and freedom of religion and trust in God, especially at this time. They have a right to sound homiletics, not political and ideological leftist bile from the pulpit.

Father has a right to be a vegan. He does not have the right to foist his views on the people in his parish in a Mass, nor does he have a right to his own private and quite incorrect interpretation of scripture as a Catholic priest and then to preach it publicly. 

Our Lady of the Assumption Toronto and its pastor Sherwin Hernandez - what's going on?

Here is a little oddity in the "Arch" of Toronto.

The pastor of Our Lady of the Assumption parish on Bathurst Street in the west end of Toronto has been suddenly removed and sent to live "in residence" at St. Boniface. 

He has been replaced by the pastor of Prince of Peace parish in Scarborough who will continue on as pastor of both. Odd, no?

Surely the pastor of much closer neighbouring parishes could administer in the interim.

The bigger question is, what is going on at the Church of Our Lady? What do the people know? 

Did someone get a fancy new Architectural Digest kitchen as at Our Lady of the Rosary under the Boys of St. Basil?

voxcantoris@rogers.com

And even at these two Toronto parishes there is still 

St. Margaret of Scotland in Toronto - A parish in collapse

The video below is of a priest ordained in Toronto by Thomas Cardinal Collins in 2018. I do not know this priest nor anything about him other than what he says in this video published by the communications department of the Archdiocese of Toronto. I am sure he is a good man, a faithful man. This post is not about him, but it is for him.

It is about the fact that this  thoughtful, persevering masculine priest has been ordered by his pastor, Andrew MacBeth, to cooperate in the complete shuttering of St. Margaret of Scotland Catholic Parish in the tony district of Avenue Road in Toronto. In this community of $4,000,000.00 homes and Filipino nannies, the people have indicted MacBeth, tried him and found him wanting. Obedience, it seems, works for some, not for others.

This is what happens when you choose to cower in fear rather than use the example of the founder of this Archdiocese, Bishop Michael Power - a man who died ministering to his dying kin from the Old Sod. An example that his Irish descendent Collins seems to have forgotten. This is what happens when you disobey the Cardinals niggardly munificence to provide a service of Holy Communion for ten rather than the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass for ten. This is what happens when you can't even open your doors for the Filipino nannies to come and pray.

They fight back the only way they can. And they go elsewhere. (If you can't find a priest for the sacraments, write me at voxcantoris@rogers.com)

Why has Cardinal Thomas "No Mass for You" Collins not ordered MacBeth and others (Our Lady of Perpetual Help in Moore Park is another rich parish in lockdown) to open their doors? I know many priests who are doing everything they can within the bounds of Premier Bumpkin's politburo diktats and the Cardinal's cowardly failure of leadership. Not here though.  

What does this example of MacBeth do to a new priest? What example does MacBeth give to Father MacDonald and what will Cardinal Collins do to save this young priest from becoming Andy MacBeth? I'm sure that St. Margaret of Scotland expects more out of the MacBeth and MacDonald clans than this.

Statue of Our Lady beheaded at Toronto's Our Lady of Lebanon Maronite Church

In the early hours of Sunday morning, the swarthy demon beheaded a statue of the Blessed Mother at our Toronto Maronite Church named in Her honour - Our Lady of Lebanon. The perpetrator is described as 5'11" to 6'1", clean-shaven with a thin build and long, dark, swept-back hair. He was wearing a black t-shirt with a large white design on the front, a thin red vest, beige shorts and Birckenstock-style sandals.

Sacrilege!

My family assisted greatly in the establishment of this parish. Family was buried from here.

Can the Lebanese never find peace?  

Statue of Our Lady at Markham Parish defaced - Where is the Toronto media?

St. Patrick's parish in Markham, a suburb north of Toronto, has had statues defaced. 

Priests of Toronto. Wake up. Get your security cameras and get them focused. Are there any "men" left in  your parish? Get them at the doors during Mass. Trained to lock and load? Why not? 

Is your Mass kit ready for house Masses? They are coming for us.

https://www.catholicregister.org/item/31866-statues-vandalized-at-markham-parish?fbclid=IwAR0iryIdfNxbYZdmGo5rwK6LLq4SJ-u9kF4QDBTLs1FsNxicFN0fe6TUeAg

Feast of St. Stephen and the death of his namesake, Father Stephen Auad

The Martyrdom of St. Stephen

In the southwest corner of Toronto is the old Village of Long Branch and the Parish of Christ the King. Toronto, originally known as York, is essentially a city of towns and villages amalgamated over the years into one city. Long Branch was a village in its own right until 1967, when it was amalgamated into Etobicoke, meaning “where the alders grow,” which was eventually amalgamated into Toronto.

Parish of Christ the King and Shrine of St.Anthony of Padua 

In the 19th and early 20th centuries, Long Branch was a summer resort area for the wealthy of Toronto, eight miles away, they would come on a ferry for the cool lake breeze. With cheap available land and the Canadian National Railway, it would later become an industrial community with companies such as Chrysler, Pittsburgh Paints, Castrol Oil right beside the church, Gabriel Automotive and Neptune Meters, all of which are now gone along with the good jobs and many of them, to Mexico. Long Branch had become a prosperous and pleasant community and it was to this little village that the Pastor of the Maronites, Father Stephen Auad, would come.

French postcard of Maronite militia, c. 1860

As with all immigrants at the time from Mount Lebanon, including my four grandparents to Canada, life in the old country was hard. My grandparents, along with Father Auad, were born just after the then latest wave of Islamic persecution. It was known as the Mount Lebanon Civil War or the Civil War of Syria, as Lebanon was officially part of the Greater Syria Province of the detestable Ottoman Empire. It began as an uprising by the Maronite Christians of Mt. Lebanon against their Druze overlords and culminated in a massacre of Christians at Damascus. Nearly 400 Christians villages and 500 churches were destroyed in a battle by Islamists which eventually spread even to the south of Lebanon. The British backed the Druze for economic reasons and political reasons, the French came to the rescue of the Christians at the urging of the Pope and the Ottoman's took advantage and fomented the strife. It included the Massacre of Aleppo, yes, that Aleppo, when over 5000 died as Mohammedans rose up against its Christians. It seems all too familiar now, no doubt and they may live quietly as your neighbour but as in Mosul, it was the Mohammedan neighbours that pointed out to the ISIS butchers where the Christians lived.

A year after my father was born in 1919 and only a few short blocks from the tenement on York Street where the Toronto Stock Exchange now stands, a Maronite Qurbono, literally "Offering" or Holy Sacrifice of the Mass was celebrated at St. Michael's Cathedral by the Rt. Rev. Shakralla Khoury. Khoury was the Maronite Eparch, or Bishop of Tyre and delegate from Mount Lebanon to the Paris Peace Conference following The Great War. The Qurbono was in Thanksgiving to God for the "virtual independence of Lebanon” from the defeated and vanquished Ottomans -- an independence that would not be totally realized for another thirty years due to the mischief and machinations of King Faisal.

Remarkably, the Qurbono, or Mass, at the Cathedral was reported on September 6, 1920, in the old Toronto World; and the earlier referred to "Pastor of the Maronites in Toronto," assisted at the Divine Liturgy.

Our Lady of Lebanon Maronite Church, Toronto

Sadly for the Lebanese of Toronto and in spite of Father Auad being termed in the secular press the "Pastor of the Maronites" there was no Maronite Church in Toronto. The closest was in Buffalo with the result of most Lebanese, my family included, becoming assimilated into the Latin Rite. 

In 1980, Toronto Archbishop Emmett Cardinal Carter assisted the new Lebanese immigrants with the purchase of the former Anglican Church of the Epiphany on Queen Street in Parkdale, now Our Lady of Lebanon Maronite Catholic Church and the Maronites finally had their home. Pope John Paul II had just established the Eparchy of St. Maron in Canada (Montreal). There is now a second Maronite Church in the region with St. Charbel's in Mississauga and given the more recent strife and suffering of Middle Eastern Christians, we also see Chaldean Catholic, Syriac Catholic and Coptic Catholic and Orthodox churches being built throughout the greater Toronto region.

While studying in Rome, Father Auad was able to offer the Holy Sacrifice e in both the Latin and Maronite Rites. He would learn Italian which would prove helpful to his future in Canada. The Church in Toronto was an Irish Church and these first Catholics in Toronto suffered many indignities in what was known as the Ulster of North America. The Church here was hardly prepared for the next waves of immigrants, particularly the demanding Italians.

The old parish of St. Patrick's, built in 1867 the year of Canada's Confederation, had a new church built behind it on McCaul Street with the former becoming Our Lady of Mount Carmel and assigned to the Italians as their first parish. Because he could speak Italian, the Maronite Lebanese Father Auad became their pastor. It still stands today serving Chinese Roman Catholics, the Italians having long since moved on from that community. It didn't seem to go to well. Professor John Zucchi of McGill University who specializes in immigration history wrote in 1983 that:

"In the late 1920's the Parish Committee of Our Lady of Mount Carmel parish filed a complaint in Italian with the archbishop regarding their pastor, Father Stephen Auad."

These Italians were villagers and more accustomed to a more active involvement of the laity in the parish than Toronto Catholics were accustomed to. The Irish were different; they had to escape persecution to forests and cliffs to find a rock to hear Mass. They were quiet in their Masses. Their history was different of course being persecuted on their own soil by the British, it was a different situation and they never questioned the priest or made demands. Given the prevailing climate in Toronto one can understand the Irish mentality. Their ancestors were persecuted in Ireland by the English and Scots and they came to York - later Toronto, and got it good here too in what was an English and Scottish protestant paradise dominated by Anglican, Presbyterians and Methodists.

The Italians were bolder and had their own customs and devotions and made demands unknown by the locals then. Father Auad had clearly adopted the prevailing official Irish culture of liturgical minimalism and flying below the radar for the reasons noted above and this conflicted with the Italians under his care. Professor Zucchi continued; 

"The committee was highly critical of Auad; he was too busy to hear confession; it was difficult to find him in the rectory or in the church; he rarely visited school children; his masses were too short, etc."

It wasn't only the local Italians that criticised the poor beleaguered priest unbelievably, even American Evangelical Pentecostals chimed in.  It was August 5, 1933 at Springfield in the state of Missouri and the Pentecostal Evangel displayed its bigotry and ignorance writing:

“The  following item  taken  from  the Toronto  press  will  show  how  it  is  possible for Christianity to catch the diseases of  the  old pagan religions:  "What  has become  an annual  public religious  function in Toronto will take  place tomorrow, when Rev. Father  Stephen Auad, pastor of  Mount  Carmel Church (notice that they left "Our Lady" out of the title!)  St. Patrick Street,  will bless  motor  cars and  other conveyances  after  the  11  o'clock  Mass. The vehicles will thus be placed under the patronage of St. Christopher,' patron saint of travelers. The time is coming when Christianity will be purged of all alien additions. Matt.13:41.”

It was now 1938 and Father Stephen Auad approached Archbishop James Charles McGuigan, later to be English-speaking Canada's first Cardinal, about building a shrine to St. Anthony of Padua in that old summer resort village of Long Branch now becoming an industrial centre. Finances being what they were at the time, just after the Great Depression and with Canada entering the Second World War, the Archbishop declined the request. Disappointed in the Archbishop's decision Father Auad went home and there he brooded about the situation obviously not happy and still fighting with the Italians until his housekeeper, one Mrs. Maggie Jobin, encouraged him to go back and ask again, but this time, more firmly.

So, he did and did so to the point of pounding on the desk of the future Cardinal. Astonished at the boldness, the good Archbishop, originally from Prince Edward Island, is reported to have laughed until tears flowed down his cheeks and then said, "If you feel so strongly about the church, go ahead, but keep it your responsibility" and on August 4, 1938, Father Auad was appointed the parish priest of the Village of Long Branch and directed to build a church.

Attending one weeknight Mass at Christ the King a few years ago, I noticed a window long overlooked. It seemed an odd Saint in a window here, St. Antony of the Desert. I started to look closer. In addition to St. Anthony of the Desert there was St. Maroun, the great mystic, monk and missionary to the people of Mount Lebanon and Syria who died in 410 A.D.  It is from him that the Maronites are named. The next window was Mar Youhana Maroun, or as we would say in English, St. John Maron who died in 707 A.D., the first Patriarch of the Maronite Church. Then a little further along, there she was, Our Lady of Mt. Lebanon whom the Maronite Patriarch of Antioch and All the East declared in 1908 to be "Queen of Lebanon." Knowing that the people of Long Branch would not know these Saints, each one has a little banner with their name under their image and quotes from scripture about "Libanus." Here was a little parish, built by a priest who came from the land named so often in the Psalms, who procured these windows to the greatest of Lebanon’s Holy Ones including the Mother of our Redeemer whose birth we celebrate.

Father Auad had a great personal devotion to St. Anthony of Padua and wanted this new parish at Long Branch to be named the Shrine of St. Anthony. Given that there was already a large church on Bloor Street dedicated to this much-loved Saint, the Archbishop did not agree. It was named Christ the King and a small grotto was built to house an Altar. “Shrine of St. Anthony” remains today engraved in the terrazzo flooring just below the plaque in memory of Father Auad. The first Mass offered there was celebrated by Father Auad on September 17, 1939, and on Sunday, May 26, 1940, the church was blessed by Archbishop McGuigan.



At Midnight Mass on December 25, 1944 and whilst delivering his sermon, Father Stephan Auad suffered a stroke. The next day, December 26, 1944, on the very Feast of St. Stephen, his name-saint, Father Stephen Auad went on to his eternal reward and a little bit of Lebanese history in Long Branch lay hidden.

On this anniversary of his death, may this little Christmas story serve as a tribute to this early and long forgotten priest of the first hundred years of the Church in Toronto. 

May Father Stephen Auad be rejoicing on this day with St. Stephen in the presence of the LORD whom he loved and served.  

Rev. Stephen Auad

You see St. Michael, I see St. James, let's call the whole thing off!

This is St. Michael's Cathedral in Toronto, the Seat of the Cardinal Archbishop of Toronto.

This is the Anglican Cathedral of St. James, the residing place of the Anglican Archlayman of Toronto.

This is the congratulatory advertisement taken out by Novalis on the back page of Toronto's Catholic Register special edition celebrating the 175th anniversary of the Archdiocese of Toronto.

That is all.

On this Feast of St. Michael, St. Michael's Cathedral in Toronto is rededicated

To write a history of this Cathedral of St. Michael, in Toronto, would take much time; I will be necessarily brief.

Early painting of cathedral interior

Bishop Michael Power

Toronto was a city of Irish immigrants from the famine. Michael Power was appointed our first bishop. At that time, there was one Archdiocese from Kingston, at the eastern part of Lake Ontario, all the way to Windsor, across the river from Detroit. Bishop Power commissioned the new gothic revival cathedral and laid the cornerstone on this date in 1848. He died of typhus after attending to the suffering Irish and did not live to see it completed. Toronto was known as the Belfast of North America. Catholics were hated. A good, brief history is written by the Bear over at the Spirit's Sword.  It was the "gangs of New York" on a smaller scale. Even back then, Toronto, or York as it was known, was always trying to emulate the Big Apple.

Those familiar with the recent renovations at St. Patrick's in New York will note quite the difference here.  There was little money when St. Michael's was built, the population of Irish was dirt poor, having just arrived. They may not have been much better off in New York but they had a few more years to establish and a many, many more faithful.

Msgr. John Edward Ronan

The Cathedral became the home of the renowned St. Michael's Cathedral Schola, now literally Choir School. Founded by the late Monsignor John Edward Ronan, pictured at left, the school, throughout the liturgical insanity of the last fifty years still maintained Gregorian propers, sung Latin polyphony Masses and motets, every single Sunday. The school was founded in 1937 and is one of the few in the world affiliated with Rome's Pontifical Institute of Sacred Music. 

Whether they have or not, usually not, liturgical musicians in Toronto are always able to look to the choir school for the standard they should follow. Msgr. Ronan stove to raise the liturgical arts in the Archdiocese to fulfil St. Pius X's vision as articulated in Tra le sollecitudini and to break out from the Sunday Low Mass mentality, something which still presents a problem in more than one Sunday "EF" Mass community, right?

In the 1930's, the Cathedral underwent a "wreckovation" of sorts. That's right. A few decided then that the vision of the original gothic revival should be replaced and the ceilings were painted in rather gauche faux mosaics with saints appearing bursting on vaulting that actually covered and preserved the original. The area over the altar was given a romanesque touch with paintings of the life of Our Lord as if taken from some quite dated holy card. The rest of the ceiling was stenciled murals. 

The high altar was lowered to not block the incredible east window some time in the 1950's. Alas, the the rector, or "wrecker," the late Auxiliary Bishop Pearce Lacey who told me himself, as I was driving him home, "I think we went too far," to which my response was, simply, "Yes, Your Excellency." 

Lacey was responsible for the removal of the communion rail destruction of the 1950's era simply gothic reredos and altar  and installed a concrete hulk. If he could have, he would have whitewashed the rest. Lacey was empowered by then Archbishop Pocock to transform Toronto's churches into Vatican II "compliance." He was described to me by one who would know, as "ruthless" in his zeal to destroy that which came before, but I can tell you as he told me himself at the age of 94, "I think we went too far."

A rector that undertook some sensitive restoration of sacred things, Altar, font, pulpit, tabernacle and a few other additions was the late Monsignor Kenneth Robitaille. He was also a great supporter of the Choir School unlike some who came after him who would opine, "what am I supposed to do while they're singing that Gloria!" Oh, I don't know, sit and pray it? Sheesh!

Under Cardinal Carter, the cathedral had a quick redo in 1984 because Pope John Paul II was coming, just a touching up of the existing paint. But there was something else happening in all of this time that nobody noticed or cared to notice. 

St. Michael's was almost literally falling down. From the foundation to the tower.

Enter Thomas Cardinal Collins.

One day, he complained to the Rector about the condition of the once beautiful front doors. Overpainted, over varnished, neglected by all and beaten down by Toronto weather of damp and frigid winters, and hot and humid summers. 

Ah, if it were only the doors. 

Suffice to say, six years and $128,000,000.00 later, St. Michael's Cathedral will, today, be rededicated. 

There was not a part of the building untouched. From the tower to the foundation. From the slate roof to the windows. Fire systems, water, heating and air, lighting, all the fundamental infrastructure. The best part is the return to the vision of the original neo-gothic design and new bespoke Casavant pipe organ to replace the decayed 1880 Karn. The most challenging and incredible achievement was the complete digging out of a full depth basement to construct washrooms and a crypt chapel from what was once a crawl space. 

Even included were commissioned statues for exterior niches on the east and west facades the tower.

This Cathedral, and the beauty of its windows and the sounds of its choir, were instrumental in my return to the Catholic faith. I had left the Church and out for a jog one Saturday morning thirty five years ago, I entered it for the first time. I was overwhelmed with what I saw. I recalled the invitation in 1963 to attend Ronan's school which I was not able to do. My father, a good man but a bit of a worrier, would not let me travel the distance on a streetcar. Not long before her death, my mother apologised for not insisting on my acceptance of the invitation to attend the then, fully private choir school. Interestingly, and since the LORD does write with crooked lines, I do more in church music now than many of the boys who did go and left it all behind, and I told her that.

The Catholic people of Toronto owe a debt of gratitude and prayers to Cardinal Collins. There were those who wanted it to "burn down." There were those who desired a new cathedral, some modernist hulk, no doubt.  It was this Cardinal Archbishop who fixed the mistakes of the past and made good to repair the literal neglect of his predecessors.

May the Lord bless Cardinal Collins for his vision; and may St. Michael protect him. 

May he be inspired to one day, go just a little bit further.

See also:

New Cathedral webpage
https://www.stmichaelscathedral.com/

Catholic Register features
http://www.catholicregister.org/cathedral-reborn

Webcast of the Rededication tonight at 7:00PM EDT
https://www.stmichaelscathedral.com/live-webcast/

Toronto Anglican Ordinariate parish moving today to Oratory Parish of St. Vincent de Paul - Divine Worship at 12:30 PM

It begins today at 12:30 P.M. - the Ordinariate of the Chair of St. Peter Parish of St.Thomas More begins at St. Vincent de Paul Parish in Toronto. 

Since the inception of the Ordinariate, St.Thomas More parish has been worshipping at Sacre Coeur parish in Toronto, a French-language, Dominican run affair, where they were relegated from a ridiculous 2:00PM to an intolerable 4:00PM Mass time. 

St. Vincent de Paul Parish is one of two under the administration of the Toronto Oratory of St. Philip Neri. Masses at St.Vincent de Paul on Sunday include the Traditional Latin Mass (Read) at 9:30AM (Solemn Mass is at Holy Family Parish at 11:00AM). The parish Sung Novus Ordo liturgy will move to 11:00 to facilitate the Ordinariate Mass.

While the Ordinariate Missal includes the new Lectionary, it also features the Prayers at the Foot of the Altar, the Tridentine Missals Offertory and the Roman Canon for Sunday use. If there is any hope for the "Reform of the Reform," which this writer highly doubts, this Missal is the way forward. It marks time in the Sarum tradition, "After Trinity," and restores the Gesima Sundays. Mass is celebrated "ad orientem." 

Congratulations to all of those associated with St. Thomas More and the Oratory. This agreement provides an opportunity for the Ordinariate to flourish and ensures the longevity of St. Vincent de Paul parish.

The Member of Parliament as "theologian." - This is the fault of her priests and bishops who failed to teach the faith!

The saga of Catholics in politics voting for abortion, euthanasia, same-sex marriage (so-called) and other issues against the Faith is very familiar to my readers in Canada, the United States of America and in Europe and really, throughout the broader "Christian" world. 

One of the saddest examples is in the United States with Nancy Pelosi, particularly when she opines on theology from Doctors such as Saints Augustine or Thomas Aquinas. Alas, we now have the same example here in Canada of a politician using warped theology and failed catechesis.

The post, one below, shows our good friend at Contra-Diction outside Holy Family Church in Whitby, Ontario, just east of Toronto in the same Archdiocese. He was protesting the fact that Celine Chavannes, a Liberal Member of Parliament, who aggressively supporting sodomitical "marriage," abortion and euthanasia receives Holy Communion there.  Now the banning of free speech and expression through the use of graphic imagery showing abortion, is on her agenda.

The Pastor, Father Nagy, went so far as to call the Durham Regional Police who harassed our good friend, notwithstanding his Charter Rights and the fact that he fully intended to stop before Holy Mass at 12:30.

Member of Parliament Celine, Cesare Chavannes has tweeted out her response:

Two months ago, I had a brief email exchange with Chavannes, explaining to her the facts of how her activist voting is in conflict with her Catholic faith and that by receiving Holy Communion, she is bringing "condemnation" upon herself. The goal then was to help her understand that her Catholic faith must come before her Parliamentary career. She is my Catholic sister and she is your Catholic sister.

But she is no, theologian!

Celina, you are wrong. On "judgement day" it will be you who will be asked by Our Lord Jesus Christ why you did not listen to the warning that you were given. You were given free will. Contra-Diction did not drive you out of the parish, you chose to leave because you could not stand to hear the truth. You did exactly what those did as recorded in John 6. Do you remember? They could not stand the teaching of Our Lord on the truth of eating His Body and drinking His Blood and they walked away. Just as you have done.

Celina, do not put Justin Trudeau, another badly-behaving Catholic, before Jesus Christ. 

That is what you have done.

What's up with Father Nagy and the people at Holy Family Church in Whitby, Ontario? Why did Father Nagy call the Police?

I've got to hand it to my good friend at ContraDiction. If all of us had his courage we would take back the culture.

Previously, I've written about the Member of Parliament, a Liberal pro baby murdering and pro-euthanasia and homosexualist who attends here and receives Holy Communion on a regular basis. Yet, the Pastor, Father Nagy, does not seem to address this public scandal. 

http://voxcantor.blogspot.ca/2016/08/catholic-member-of-parliament-celine.html

http://voxcantor.blogspot.ca/2016/06/canadian-catholic-members-of-parliament.html

My good friend at ContraDiction has taken it on directly.

If you don't have the time to watch all of it, start around 12 minutes. A few come out to try to take his sign and deny him his Constitutional right to assembly and expression. Then Father Nagy comes out to complain that his name is on the sign.

His name!

Shame on Father Nagy, would that he would deal with the Catholic politician and not be worried about his name.

Shame on Father Nagy for calling the Police. The first shows up at 27:00 the second at 29:34.

Shame on Father Nagy!

And no, Father Nagy, I won't be removing your name from this blog.

The Durham Regional Police think the images are "offensive."

No Law was broken, the Durham Police were interfering with his Charter Rights!

http://signofcontradiction.blogspot.ca/2016/08/holy-family-parish-in-whitby-shelters.html

Toronto parish of St. Leo's Mimico denies Holy Communion on the tongue

All the new marble and art work and beautification of a what had been a dirty, dilapidated, unworthy and terribly wreckovated Toronto church, means absolutely nothing. 

As much effort that was put into this has become worthless. Worthless if the liturgy is not worthy. As worthless as Canon Law and the Instructions from the Church, such as Redemptionis Sacramentum, as when a priest decides on his own what he will follow. His own clericalism, pride and modernist mindset.

"You denied me Communion," said the parishioner, a man known to me for at least a decade. "No," he replied, "I offered and you rejected Communion." 

This after the Communicant, who presented himself at the end of the Communion line with his little daughter in tow, knelt and put out his tongue to receive the Lord. 

This is clericalism. It is arrogance and a violation of the Law to dismiss the rights of the faithful. But with our current Pope, who cares about the Law? This is the Francis effect in the peripheries. The smelly sheep mean nothing to these men.

The renovation above is but a shell and fraud if this kind of abominable un-priestly behaviour continues.

There were twenty people at the Mass this morning and the father and his little daughter were the youngest. He was denied Communion on the tongue and told it was be "his choice," if he never came back. 

This generation of priests have no fruit to show. It is all a facade, just like much of what you see above.

This issue has been addressed previously on this blog, so many times and it keeps coming back. Within the last year, a similar situation happened at St. Pius X Church on Bloor Street, not far from St. Leo's, when another faithful Catholic was harassed over Holy Communion on the tongue and kneeling.

Unacceptable!

Fathers, is this what it takes to stop this? Do you have to be publicly "outed" to get it through your heads that you cannot do this?

It is not acceptable. It is scandalous and clericalist.

Far be it from me to target every priest with this statement, not all of you to be sure, some of you are friends and acquaintances so please forgive me -- but the rot from the Pocock, Carter and Ambrozic eras has a stench to it of effeminacy, modernism, clericalism and Arianism that is nothing more than a pussification of the priesthood of Our Lord Jesus Christ. It needs to be lanced no matter how putrid the smell.   

STOP IT NOW FATHERS, AND YES, I'M YELLING!

You will be held accountable for these games and you may even end up in Hell for it. 

Catholic people, do not let these clericalists and liturgical fascists manipulate you.

Oh, he'll be calling; you can count on it; and the last memory the little girl will have of this parish is to have this priest tell her father, "I don't care if you here for Mass anymore.

After 50 years of priesthood Father? Surely, you can do better than that.

Postcript.

Neil MacCarthy ‏@neilmaccarthy  1h1 hour ago

@VoxCantoris @archtoronto The GIRM is clear in its instruction. I'd encourage those concerned to speak to the priest or archdiocese.

I thank the Director of Communications, Neil MacCarthy, for the public statement, affirming what the GIRM states. Clearly, the Cardinal and Chancellor, in spite of the many, many problems on their desks, don't need this. 

Priests of Toronto, smarten up! 

The laity do not need your shenanigans!

With everything else going on, does Cardinal Collins or the Chancellor, Father Camilleri really need to deal with this kind of thing!

From the General Instruction on the Roman Missal (Ordinary Form of the Roman Rite)

160. ... In the Dioceses of Canada, Holy Communion is to be received standing, though INDIVIDUAL MEMBERS OF THE FAITHFUL MAY CHOOSE TO RECEIVE COMMUNION WHILE KNEELING.... WHEN RECEIVING HOLY COMMUNION ON THE TONGUE, THEY REVERENTLY JOIN THEIR HANDS;...

161. If Communion is given only under the species of bread, the Priest raises the host slightly and shows it to each, saying, The Body of Christ. THE COMMUNICANT REPLIES, AMEN, AND RECEIVES THE SACRAMENT [EITHER] ON THE TONGUE,or... As soon as the communicant receives the host, he or she consumes the whole of it.