Tea at Trianon: Liturgy and Personality

John Wilson Croker on Marie-Antoinette

"We have followed the history of Marie Antoinette with the greatest diligence and scrupulosity. We have lived in those times. We have talked with some of her friends and some of her enemies; we have read, certainly not all, but hundreds of the libels written against her; and we have, in short, examined her life with– if we may be allowed to say so of ourselves– something of the accuracy of contemporaries, the diligence of inquirers, and the impartiality of historians, all combined; and we feel it our duty to declare, in as a solemn a manner as literature admits of, our well-matured opinion that every reproach against the morals of the queen was a gross calumny– that she was, as we have said, one of the purest of human beings."

~from History of the Guillotine by John Wilson Croker, 1844

Edmund Burke on Marie-Antoinette

"It is now sixteen or seventeen years since I saw the queen of France, then dauphiness, at Versailles; and surely there never lighted on this orb, which she hardly seemed to touch, a more delightful vision. I saw her just above the horizon, decorating and cheering the elevated sphere she had just begun to move in, glittering like a morning star full of life and splendor and joy. Oh, what a revolution....Little did I dream that I should have lived to see such disasters fall upon her, in a nation of gallant men, in a nation of men of honor and of cavaliers! I thought ten thousand swords must have leaped from their scabbards, to avenge even a look which threatened her with insult. But the age of chivalry is gone; that of sophisters, economists, and calculators has succeeded...."

~Edmund Burke, October 1790

Tuesday, January 17, 2017

Liturgy and Personality

From Catholic Vote:

Hildebrand’s definition of a true personality may not be what we would first assume. It is not the person with the largest following, the most cheerful greeting, or the loudest voice. It is the one who most easily recognizes objective values such as Truth, goodness, and beauty and responds appropriately and with plenitude to each of these values. We find the highest examples of true personality, regardless of their level of innate talent, charisma, or genius, in the saints.

Hildebrand was, himself, a true personality, and it was reverent, daily participation in the Tridentine Mass and the Liturgy of the Hours that shaped him and enabled him to write Liturgy and Personality in just 23 days. The greatest evidence of Hildebrand’s just and complete response to values may be the fact that he was sentenced to death by the Nazis in the 1930s for his clear and public work to oppose them.

A primary message of Liturgy and Personality is that we participate in the liturgy not because of what we will receive through it—even spiritual formation. (For me, a 2002 revert to Catholicism, this was a real and welcome revelation.) We participate in each liturgy with total reverence and humility, immersing ourselves completely in the worship and adoration of God, without attachment to any effect for ourselves, because that is his due. We owe Him this—not because of what He’s done for us, but simply because He’s God. We participate in Mass seeking only to honor Him as He deserves. (Read more.)