The Meaning of Catholic

Above: "Before Martyrdom" (2026) by artist Clorinda Galdos Bell. (OSV News photo/courtesy Clorinda Galdos Bell) Photo credit.
XXII Sunday after Pentecost
XXX Sunday Tempus per Annuam (aka “Ordinary Time”)
The Culture of Romanitas
* Old Roman Rite: also known as the “Latin Mass,” “Tridentine Mass,” “Mass of St. Pius V,” or the “Ancient Roman Rite”
* New Roman Rite: also known as the “English Mass,” “Novus Ordo Missae,” “Mass of St. Paul VI,” or the “New Mass.”
* East Roman Rite: also known as the Byzantine Rite, the liturgy of St. John Chrysostom / St. Basil, or the Greek or Slavic rite.[1]
An important thing to note here is that both old and new Roman rites contain ancient and modern elements.
* The old Roman rite contains ancient things, like the pre-Lenten Sundays, but also modern feasts, like the Feast of the Precious Blood.
* The new Roman rite restores ancient things, like lectio continua (the Biblical mind of the Church Fathers), or the spirituality of the Paschal Mystery and salvific efficacy of the Resurrection. But it also contains modern things like the feast of Mary, Mother of the Church.
MONDAY October 26
· St. Demetrios the Great Martyr, Myrrh-gusher (East)
TUESDAY October 27 – Vigil of Ss. Simon & Jude (Holy Day of Opportunity)
· Servant of God Camilla Nikolaevna Kruszelnicka – shot by Soviets on this day in 1937.
WEDNESDAY October 28 – Apostles Ss. Simon & Jude
· “In Persia, the birthday of the blessed Apostles Simon the Canaanite and Thaddeus, who is also called Jude; Simon preached the Gospel in Egypt and Thaddeus in Mesopotamia, and then they both entered Persia and suffered martyrdom there, after having made subject an innumerable multitude of that people to the yoke of Christ” (Roman Martyrology)
THURSDAY October 29
· Blessed Chiara Badano (1971-1990) – Italian young woman died of painful bone cancer and lived in abandonment to divine providence. Beatified by Pope Benedict
FRIDAY October 30
· St. Marcellus the Centurion
· St. Alphonsus Rodriguez (1617) – widower, lay brother (birthday into eternity Halloween)
SATURDAY October 31 – the Halloween Triduum
· The Beatification of the Georgian Martyrs
* Franciscans evangelising up the coast from Spanish Florida (St. Augustine)
* Martyred in odium fidei in September 1597
* Primary issue was polygamy and divorce/remarriage
* Approved under Pope Francis January of 2025
[1] The term “Byzantine” was originally a pejorative term when it began to be used by western Christians in the 16th centuries. The “Greeks” who lived in New Rome (Constantinople) and its surrounding regions called themselves “Romans” and their emperor was called the “Roman Emperor” for centuries. Nowadays, the term “Byzantine” is used by most Catholics without any pejorative meaning. Nevertheless the term feels foreign to many. Moreover, it is important to the liturgical controversies of our time to emphasize the Roman character of this rite, since the new Roman rite borrows from this rite in many significant ways (for example, the custom of standing for Holy Communion, or the formula for Confirmation). This is a subject for another book, but this is the term that will be used in this book for the purposes already stated.


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Above: Titian, The Archangel Raphael and Tobias (c. 1512−1514)
XXI Week after Pentecost
XXIX Week Tempus per annum (aka “Ordinary Time”)
MONDAY October 19
· Holy Prophet St. Joel (East Roman)
· North American Martyrs (USA and General new Roman rite calendar)
· St. Peter of Alcantara, one of the spiritual directors of St. Teresa of Avila

TUESDAY October 20
· St. Paul of the Cross (new Roman rite)
· St. John Cantius (old Roman rite)
WEDNESDAY October 21
· Marriage of Blessed Emperor Karl & Servant of God Empress Zita
THURSDAY October 22
· Pope St. John Paul II
FRIDAY October 23
· St. James, Brother of the Lord (East Roman)
· St. Anthony Mary Claret, bishop of Cuba & founder of the Claretians (old Roman, birthday into eternity: 10/24)
SATURDAY October 24
· Archangel St. Raphael (old Roman)
· St. Anthony Mary Claret, bishop of Cuba & founder of the Claretians (new Roman)
SUNDAY October 25 - CHRIST THE KING OF THE NATIONS (old Roman, yet modern feast)
· 40 Martyrs of England and Wales


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Painting above: Santa Teresa de Jesús (1868) by Benet Mercadé.
* The new Complete Works edition of St. Teresa Benedicta (Edith Stein) from CUA Press. The first volume published is a new translation of St. Teresa Benedicta’s metaphysical magnum opus:
* Edith Stein, Finite and Eternal Being An Attempt to Ascend to the Meaning of Being, new translation by Walter Redmond
* Edith Stein encountered St. Teresa of Jesus and was immediately converted.[1]
* St. Teresa of Jesus, “Doctor of the Council of Trent”[2]
* Against the false spirit of Trent, which is an excessive militarism against Protestantism
* The true spirit of the Church Militant and of Trent is St. Teresa of Jesus
* This is the same spirit which animated Pope St. John XXIII (who was inspired by Tridentine saints) and thus the true spirit of Vatican II, following the Tridentine saints like St. Francis de Sales, St. Philip Neri, St. Peter Canisius
* Vatican II: St. Teresa of Jesus was proclaimed Doctor of the Church in 1970
* Lumen Gentium sided with the Dominicans on the dubium regarding the interior life for the laity[3]
* Every saint practiced the “Three Ages of the Interior Life”
* But the Carmelites systematised this and explained it more than any other tradition within the Church
* The new Roman rite Collect for St. Teresa is more strict than the old Roman rite (aka the Latin Mass)
* St. Edith Stein says that St. Teresa of Jesus “says what is unsayable” about the interior life, creating a “coherent work of art.”[4]
* Not even St. Thomas Aquinas could speak about his own mystical life as St. Teresa did
* “Is there any tradition more important than the Latin Mass? Yes. And it’s the ‘One Thing Necessary’”
* The Avila Institute & Apostoli Viae has changed my life
* This institute and confraternity pass down the Christian mystical tradition under the patronage of St. Teresa of Jesus
[1] Teresia Renata Posselt, Edith Stein: the Life of a Philosopher and Carmelite (Washington, DC: ICS Publications, 2005), 63.
[2] Edith Stein, The Hidden Life: Essays, Meditations and Spiritual Texts (Washington, DC: ICS Publications, 2014), 13-15.
[3] Taylor Patrick O’Neill, “Vatican II and the Lasting Influence of Garrigou-Lagrange’s Mystical Theology,” Church Life Journal (January 31, 2022).
[4] Edith Stein, Finite and Eternal Being: an Attempt to Ascend to the Meaning of Being, trans. Walter Redmond (Washington, DC: CUA Press, 2023), 471.


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XXVIII Week Tempus per Annum (aka “Ordinary Time”)
XX Week after Pentecost
Romanitas - a new framework for Meaning of Catholic
* Romanitas is a note of the Church
* The east Roman rite
* Against the term “Byzantine”
* The old Roman rite is the tradition of Romanitas of the city of Rome
* Due to the false spirit of Trent, the entire Latin tradition was suppressed de facto and replaced by the old Roman rite = against Romanitas
* The new Roman rite has been judged Roman by six Roman Pontiffs to be the Roman rite celebrated by the city of Rome but this should not mean that the old Roman rite should be suppressed but rather cherished, preserved, promoted and spread more and more among Latin bishops.
* The new Roman rite restores Romanitas in relation to the local rites and customs if it is grounded in Tradition, especially the old Roman rite, as envisioned by Pope St. Paul VI.
* The new Roman rite (in the context of Lumen Gentium and St. Teresa of Jesus) answers the most pressing dubium of modernity, which is the debate between the OPs and SJs about holiness.
* The Collect for St. Teresa of Jesus - compare with the old Roman rite
* Doctor of the Church in 1970

MONDAY October 12
· Our Lady of the Pillar
* Thanksgiving for Columbus Day (“Why Columbus Day Matters to the Blessed Virgin Mary”)
TUESDAY October 13
· Miracle of the Sun Day
* Fatima Day in Russian Orthodoxy (Pokrov)
· St. Edward the Confessor – King and Patron of England
WEDNESDAY October 14
· Pope St. Callistus (222)
THURSDAY October 15
· St. Teresa of Jesus (Teresa of Avila) – Doctor of the Church
FRIDAY October 16
· “At Paray-le-Monial, in the diocese of Autun, St Margaret Mary Alacoque, a professed nun in the Order of the Visitation of Blessed Mary the Virgin. She won renown for her great merits in spreading devotion to the Most Sacred Heart of Jesus and in furthering its public veneration. She was by Pope Benedict XV added to the list of holy virgins” (Roman Martyrology). – Birthday into eternity October 17 (this is the old Roman feast)
· St. Hedwig – widow and noblewoman of Poland and Silesia. Patron of orphans.
SATURDAY October 17
· St. Ignatius of Antioch (new Roman)
· Prophet St. Hosea (East Roman)
· New Confessor of the Faith Bishop Pie Eugène Neveu (1877 – 1946) – secretly consecrated bishop by authority of Pius XI at the French Embassy in the USSR in 1926. Was able to work on setting up Catholic hierarchy against the Soviets, due to his French citizenship at the church in Moscow owned by the French government. But the Soviets arrested all his clergy that they could. But in 1936 he was forced to go to France for medical treatment and Soviets were able to keep him exiled until his death on this day in 1946.
SUNDAY October 18
· St. Luke the Evangelist – the Immaculate Heart of Mary


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