As a Knight who takes his Vocation very seriously – my Philosohy has always been and always will be:
…….”I will know, love and serve the Lord, my God with all of my mind, heart, soul and strength. I will love my Neighbor as I love myself. I will do unto others as I would have them do unto me. More importantly, I will do unto others as I would have them do unto those that I love. As our Lord Jesus commanded us, I will love others as He has loved me.”
Jesus said that the “Two Great Commandments” to love God and love our Neighbor, are the greatest Commandments of all. There are none greater to be found anywhere. Upon those Two Great Commandments depends the whole of the Law and the Prophets.”
After “The Two Great Commandments” everything else is just commentary.
Sir Knight Forgette –
When I was within inches of becoming an Evangelical, I had pared everything down to the simple love of Christ which then extrapolates (for lack of a better word) to all particulars of life. I felt that all of the discussions people had about religions, amongst other things, became more of an effort in splitting hairs. I wasn’t interested. Yet, I couldn’t get over the fact that if it were truth I was seeking and Christ came to share His truth, then could I really trust that I was capable of discerning the truth on my own? I realized that my simple brain had discerned things very differently 10 years prior and would probably do so again in another 10 yrs. Which ‘brain’ of mine had it right? (Never mind that people of different beliefs also have the same trouble.) So, I prayed for the gifts of wisdom and understanding. I realized that to love as Christ wanted us to love and to know as Christ knew, we would need to be ‘perfect’, which we are not. Without that perfection, we may ‘think’ we are following those 2 greatest commandments but in reality, we are probably doing a pretty poor job of it. That’s why Christ needed to set up a vicar … a HUMAN person to keep us all on par over the years or we would clearly all begin to follow our own, very imperfect understanding of things. Therefore, nothing else made sense to me but to love on this earth as we need to love, requires that we be called to obedience to this Church which Christ founded. This is what the Church teaches – so the Evangelical Church no longer made sense. I was to take on the very difficult task of obeying a Church that I didn’t understand at the time.
And this is where all of the problems stem i think. It’s EASIER sometimes to go off on your own tangent (with the greatest of intentions) and not obey this Church which Christ founded. We don’t need to look very far to find very imperfect people in the Church to discourage us. But, to love as those 2 greatest commandments suggest … how do we do this without loving in the context that Christ Himself gave us?
Jennifer,
Please, don’t misunderstand me. As a Knight, I am take loyalty and fidelity to the Holy Roman Catholic Church, to our Supreme Pontiff, oru Bishops and Priest very seriously indeed. I am as far from becoming an “Evangelical” as one could possible get. I was born, baptized and raised as a Roman Catholic and shall always remain dedicated to the Church that Christ founded and placed St Peter (our first Pope)in the position of Vicar.
As a Knight, the Code that I live by, is called “The Grail Code” which simply put, is “The Golden Rule” or “The Two Great Commandments.” I find that when I endeavor to live by this “Knightly Code of Conduct” I am being loyal to my Lord & King – Jusus Christ. Thank you for your post….
Thank you, Father, for all of the guidance you’ve given concerning these difficult times. We seem to be living in an age of increasing demagoguery, and the sneaky thing about such times is that demogoguery never really looks like it when you’re following a demagogue. Instead, it usually feels more like an adrenalin rush of self-righteousness, which can be very fun while it lasts, but is always embarrassing or much worse when finished.
There are some games that are too deadly, and the only way to win is not to play. I would suggest to layfolk like myself that many of these theological debates are in fact power games, and they can be spiritually deadly to all involved. Our safest road is often not to play.
I’m grateful that Fr. Angelo Mary has provided a reminder to us that we need not fight at all, in fact, unless it is to wage war by praying the Rosary, serving our King and Queen, and remembering that the barque of Peter is safest way to shore (and that we are all enlisted sailors, so to speak–unless we choose to walk the plank). Let’s remember our Lord called us sheep, and that unless we accept such a reality–and all its implications– humbly, it is bound to end up a humiliating fact that we will have to accept anyway.
Living life as a faithful Catholic husband and father (in my case) is hard enough in this world without my trying to tell a shepherd how and when to prod me and the other sheep. Christ chose the shepherds: He will also keep us safe. Let’s pray for each other.
I have made this point time and again. Thank you for your support. There exists a sort of Catholic self-consciousness today that has assets and liabilities. The asset is the maintenance of orthodoxy in the face of dereliction of duty. The liability is the tendency to be more Catholic than the pope. In the end traditionalists are working at cross purposes.
I know many faithful Catholics like you who are just trying to make through their very difficult day with work and kids and just want to make it to a Catholic Mass. They are not looking for anything particularly remarkable: just the Mass as it should be celebrated.
A reactionary agenda is not helpful. Again modernists and traditionalists just play into each other’s hands.
According to former Papal Secretary of State, Cardinal Agostino Casaroli, “Knighthood presupposes a solemn commitment.” The basic criteria for Catholic Knighthood,” he said at the Order’s Centennial Convention in 1982, include, “Service of a Noble and difficult cause, a pure and arduous ideal.” A Catholic Knight, he continued, will “Fight Evil, promote Good, and defend the weak and oppressed against injustice.”
That Chivalric Ideal can best be described in what is referred to as “The Two Great Commandments” – Love of God & Neighbor. Or as we like to call it “The Grail Code.”
Way back in the 1950’s, when I was in grade school. The Sisters taught us about our faith from the Baltimore Catechism. One of the very first questions that we were asked was, “Why did God make you?”
Of course, the answer was “God made us to know Him, to Love Him and to Serve Him in this word, and to be happy with Him in the next.”
The first part of that answer, defines Catholic Knighthood to a tee. “To Know, love, and serve God in this world.” The only change that i would make, would be this, “To know, love and serve God in this world AND in the next.”
Lead on, Fr Angelo. You’ve shed light on a dark corner of traditionalism. Pride is the ultimate chameleon, disguising itself as whatever virtue we need to make it invisible to us. Righteousness. Piety. Whatever. I hope your words will foster some thought among the ranks of the “true” Catholics who, by virtue of their frustration with liturgical abuses, have thrown the proverbial baby out with the bathwater.
Mary Victrix 
“Where Peter is, there is the Church” St. Ambrose
As a Knight who takes his Vocation very seriously – my Philosohy has always been and always will be:
…….”I will know, love and serve the Lord, my God with all of my mind, heart, soul and strength. I will love my Neighbor as I love myself. I will do unto others as I would have them do unto me. More importantly, I will do unto others as I would have them do unto those that I love. As our Lord Jesus commanded us, I will love others as He has loved me.”
Jesus said that the “Two Great Commandments” to love God and love our Neighbor, are the greatest Commandments of all. There are none greater to be found anywhere. Upon those Two Great Commandments depends the whole of the Law and the Prophets.”
After “The Two Great Commandments” everything else is just commentary.
Sir Knight Forgette –
When I was within inches of becoming an Evangelical, I had pared everything down to the simple love of Christ which then extrapolates (for lack of a better word) to all particulars of life. I felt that all of the discussions people had about religions, amongst other things, became more of an effort in splitting hairs. I wasn’t interested. Yet, I couldn’t get over the fact that if it were truth I was seeking and Christ came to share His truth, then could I really trust that I was capable of discerning the truth on my own? I realized that my simple brain had discerned things very differently 10 years prior and would probably do so again in another 10 yrs. Which ‘brain’ of mine had it right? (Never mind that people of different beliefs also have the same trouble.) So, I prayed for the gifts of wisdom and understanding. I realized that to love as Christ wanted us to love and to know as Christ knew, we would need to be ‘perfect’, which we are not. Without that perfection, we may ‘think’ we are following those 2 greatest commandments but in reality, we are probably doing a pretty poor job of it. That’s why Christ needed to set up a vicar … a HUMAN person to keep us all on par over the years or we would clearly all begin to follow our own, very imperfect understanding of things. Therefore, nothing else made sense to me but to love on this earth as we need to love, requires that we be called to obedience to this Church which Christ founded. This is what the Church teaches – so the Evangelical Church no longer made sense. I was to take on the very difficult task of obeying a Church that I didn’t understand at the time.
And this is where all of the problems stem i think. It’s EASIER sometimes to go off on your own tangent (with the greatest of intentions) and not obey this Church which Christ founded. We don’t need to look very far to find very imperfect people in the Church to discourage us. But, to love as those 2 greatest commandments suggest … how do we do this without loving in the context that Christ Himself gave us?
Jennifer,
Please, don’t misunderstand me. As a Knight, I am take loyalty and fidelity to the Holy Roman Catholic Church, to our Supreme Pontiff, oru Bishops and Priest very seriously indeed. I am as far from becoming an “Evangelical” as one could possible get. I was born, baptized and raised as a Roman Catholic and shall always remain dedicated to the Church that Christ founded and placed St Peter (our first Pope)in the position of Vicar.
As a Knight, the Code that I live by, is called “The Grail Code” which simply put, is “The Golden Rule” or “The Two Great Commandments.” I find that when I endeavor to live by this “Knightly Code of Conduct” I am being loyal to my Lord & King – Jusus Christ. Thank you for your post….
Thank you, Father, for all of the guidance you’ve given concerning these difficult times. We seem to be living in an age of increasing demagoguery, and the sneaky thing about such times is that demogoguery never really looks like it when you’re following a demagogue. Instead, it usually feels more like an adrenalin rush of self-righteousness, which can be very fun while it lasts, but is always embarrassing or much worse when finished.
There are some games that are too deadly, and the only way to win is not to play. I would suggest to layfolk like myself that many of these theological debates are in fact power games, and they can be spiritually deadly to all involved. Our safest road is often not to play.
I’m grateful that Fr. Angelo Mary has provided a reminder to us that we need not fight at all, in fact, unless it is to wage war by praying the Rosary, serving our King and Queen, and remembering that the barque of Peter is safest way to shore (and that we are all enlisted sailors, so to speak–unless we choose to walk the plank). Let’s remember our Lord called us sheep, and that unless we accept such a reality–and all its implications– humbly, it is bound to end up a humiliating fact that we will have to accept anyway.
Living life as a faithful Catholic husband and father (in my case) is hard enough in this world without my trying to tell a shepherd how and when to prod me and the other sheep. Christ chose the shepherds: He will also keep us safe. Let’s pray for each other.
Eric,
I have made this point time and again. Thank you for your support. There exists a sort of Catholic self-consciousness today that has assets and liabilities. The asset is the maintenance of orthodoxy in the face of dereliction of duty. The liability is the tendency to be more Catholic than the pope. In the end traditionalists are working at cross purposes.
I know many faithful Catholics like you who are just trying to make through their very difficult day with work and kids and just want to make it to a Catholic Mass. They are not looking for anything particularly remarkable: just the Mass as it should be celebrated.
A reactionary agenda is not helpful. Again modernists and traditionalists just play into each other’s hands.
According to former Papal Secretary of State, Cardinal Agostino Casaroli, “Knighthood presupposes a solemn commitment.” The basic criteria for Catholic Knighthood,” he said at the Order’s Centennial Convention in 1982, include, “Service of a Noble and difficult cause, a pure and arduous ideal.” A Catholic Knight, he continued, will “Fight Evil, promote Good, and defend the weak and oppressed against injustice.”
That Chivalric Ideal can best be described in what is referred to as “The Two Great Commandments” – Love of God & Neighbor. Or as we like to call it “The Grail Code.”
Way back in the 1950’s, when I was in grade school. The Sisters taught us about our faith from the Baltimore Catechism. One of the very first questions that we were asked was, “Why did God make you?”
Of course, the answer was “God made us to know Him, to Love Him and to Serve Him in this word, and to be happy with Him in the next.”
The first part of that answer, defines Catholic Knighthood to a tee. “To Know, love, and serve God in this world.” The only change that i would make, would be this, “To know, love and serve God in this world AND in the next.”
Lead on, Fr Angelo. You’ve shed light on a dark corner of traditionalism. Pride is the ultimate chameleon, disguising itself as whatever virtue we need to make it invisible to us. Righteousness. Piety. Whatever. I hope your words will foster some thought among the ranks of the “true” Catholics who, by virtue of their frustration with liturgical abuses, have thrown the proverbial baby out with the bathwater.