There is no shortcut to sanctity. There is no Christianity without the Cross. Holiness is a thousand decisions daily, each one a cut, until you bleed out for Christ.
Wow. You’ve summed up the spiritual life in one article. Every Catholic, indeed everyone who calls themself a Christian, needs to read this. I’ll be sharing it far and wide. I hope others will too. And if I may be so bold, maybe you could send this to other outlets for wider publication? It’s that good. Thank you! Thank you for this excellent guidance.
Hey Rob! No need for “Father.” I liked the article and thought it was worth sharing. How are you? I was recently thinking of Fr. Wendell’s early morning history class and the struggle to stay awake. Man that was so long ago.
Well said. One of the most pernicious fruits of Vatican 2 and its new mode of worship was the great dilution of days and seasons of fasting. Traditional Church calendars, east and west, implore fasting throughout the year. In many "Catholic" circles that has been replaced by giving up meat on Fridays, but only during lent. For centuries, Holy Church knew that fasting (with prayer) was critical for people to control their appetitites in order to maintain a good prayer life and stay in a state of grace. Those who can control their stomachs can control every other appetite. The lack of catechesis on this point cannot be overstated. I once told a Franciscan priest that it was difficult to fast during advent because of all the distractions around the holidays. He suggested I was confused - "Catholics only fast during lent not advent."
This comment isn't intended as a criticism of your article (which is very good) but simply a broader consideration of some theological trends I have been noticing within the "traditional" world. When it comes to the mainstream culture, it is true that men have been demoralized and would benefit from more militant rhetoric and emphasis. However, among men (and people in general) who already understand the militant nature of Catholicism, there's another (more subtle) problem, which is a lack of nuance regarding the roles of men and women that leads to the presentation of Catholic teaching in a one-sided way that harms everyone.
Messaging about being strong, courageous, and militant is directed primarily if not exclusively to men, and on more than one occasion, I've seen SSPX priests heavily imply that women shouldn't spend much time studying the faith because they are not equally soldiers of Christ (contrary to Aquinas). The means of salvation are militant, but being in a state of grace essentially means being in friendship with God (as sin severs the relationship), and this relational aspect which comes more naturally to women is very rarely spoken about in trad circles. Add this to the fact that most people don't clearly distinguish between the vice of effeminacy and the perfection of femininity because they don't know philosophy and it sends the message that women are less suited to spiritual battle because they are "soft" (without distinguishing between ordered and disordered "softness").
I've personally seen the mass exodus of young women from trad communities because they've gotten the impression that their minds and natures are somehow inferior and that whatever they do for the Church is inherently less valuable than what men do. This leaves them susceptible to the errors of feminism because both feminism AND a vocal minority within traditionalism begin from the premise that femininity means being weak and spineless, and no real woman wants to be weak and spineless. The idea of sitting by passively and doing nothing when the faith is being attacked simply because there are no men around at the time because my job as a woman is to be soft and pretty and smile makes my skin crawl.
That's not a caricature of what I've seen either. As a woman who naturally has a choleric temperament and intellectual inclination, I was constantly chided by SSPX priests for doing the exact same thing my male counterparts were doing: uncompromisingly explaining real Catholic teaching to liberal theology professors at a mainstream university. "Don't be so provocative." "A little honey catches more flies than vinegar." "You're a lady; you should be nicer." Good grief! Anyone who thinks that being argumentative in an academic context is "sour" seriously needs to stop whining and grow another layer of skin. Abp. Lefebvre's mother's biography states that she was full of energy when she was in school and never let weakness deter her from standing her ground in a discussion.
Or my favorite: "Leave the intellectual stuff to the men and go stand at the foot of the cross." As if there's a conflict between defending Catholic teaching aggressively when needed and standing at the foot of the cross!
What motivated the women at the foot of the cross to stand and suffer with Christ (when most of the men had fled) was love. The reason why the vast majority of victim souls are women is precisely because of the relationship between Christ and the Church, His Bride: https://dorothealudwigwang.com/p/the-bride-of-christ-and-the-mystical. To be a woman is to be a mother, and to be a mother means to suffer, and there is no escaping that, physically or spiritually. And to suffer for your children means aggressively defending them against their enemies.
But no one ever talks about this beyond waxing poetic about "Holy Mother Church" (practically regarded by most trads as an "it" and not a "she") which is going to have disastrous consequences for all Catholics. Without clarity on WHO the Church is and her relationship to Christ, one cannot have perfect clarity on what one is fighting for in the first place. One cannot even have a real spiritual life without understanding that the soul, as part of the Church, is herself a bride of Christ. Not only is bad ecclesiology in trad circles pushing women away from Catholicism, it also leaves the men, especially young men, susceptible to one-sided messaging from the manosphere and redpill type rhetoric, which are not Catholic.
The solution to this is the promotion of consecrated virginity, because abstract concepts must be lived by real people in the flesh to impact society, but I've spoken to many traditionalist leaders who've largely responded with words of approval but no plan of practical action to actually bring consecration to their communities.
Thanks for this essay, much to ponder here! Your call to arms is a firebrand thrown into the dry tinder of a complacent age, a necessary conflagration, for only in the crucible of suffering is the dross of mediocrity burned away. Yet one wonders if even this militant fervor, so bracing in its urgency, risks becoming another kind of evasion… a flight from the deeper, darker mystery at the heart of the Cross.
For the Incarnation is not merely a call to battle, it is the unbearable descent of the Divine into the very marrow of human frailty. The Christ who rides forth in the Apocalypse with eyes of flame is the same who wept at Lazarus’ tomb, who trembled in Gethsemane, who whispered “I thirst” from the Cross. The militant and the mystic are not opposed, they are one flesh, just as the God who commands is the God who bleeds.
To my mind you rightly excoriate the effeminate, therapeutic counterfeit of Christianity, but let us not mistake hardness for holiness. The saints did not suffer gladly because they loved suffering, but because they loved Him. Their joy in agony was not masochism but the ecstasy of the bride who has found her Beloved in the very heart of dereliction. This is the scandal of the Incarnation: that God’s strength is perfected in weakness, that the sword of the Spirit is wielded from the scaffold, that the true warrior kneels to wash the feet of his betrayers.
Where, then, is the militancy of the broken? Where are the soldiers who will march into battle with tears in their eyes, who will strike down sin with a hand that trembles in love? The essay speaks of resoluteness of will, but what of the will that is shattered on the wheel of divine abandonment, only to be remade in the kiln of obedience? The martyrs did not die with clenched fists, but with arms outstretched, conformed to the cruciform love they imitated.
And what of the Church herself… this wounded, harlot Bride who is also the spotless Mother of Saints? The essay’s disgust for her modern deformations is understandable, even prophetic. Still, the mystic knows that the Church is not merely an institution to be purified by our fury… she is Christ’s own flesh, bleeding yet radiant, corruptible yet indestructible. To love her in her squalor is part of the martyrdom.
The path to sanctity is indeed Calvary, but let us not forget that Calvary is also the path to the Resurrection. The militant treads the winepress of God’s wrath, the mystic drinks the wine that has become Blood. Both are necessary. Both are one. I realize you are not suggesting otherwise.
In the end, the most radical fidelity is not to the battle, but to the Beloved, the God who is both Lion and Lamb, whose victory is hidden in defeat, whose glory is revealed in the scandal of the Cross. The true soldier of Christ does not merely fight, he falls in love. And love, as the saints know, is the fiercest war of all.
Actually, I am working on a book project that may provide a practical answer to the problem situation you have described in this insightful article. The work is essentially a revival of the ideal of chivalry. One might think that that is impossible because the world has changed radically since the Middle Ages. However, the human psyche has not. Anyone who doubts this just needs to read an account of the sinking of the Titanic. The captain's willingness to sacrifice his life so that a woman or child could have access to one of the limited spaces among the inadequate number of lifeboats on the Titanic testifies to the survival of the chivalrous attitude throughout the ages.
You have given voice to the inner rumblings of my soul. I would like to share this with the priests of my diocese and the bishops of our Bishops’ Conference. Can you tell me how I can do this?
Hi Donald. Feel free to share with anything. If you click on the share button it should give you options such as email, WhatsApp etc.... Thank you for reading.
Hi. You can copy or screen shot the article. I assume you can print that? Alternatively send me an message with your email address ad I will mail it to you.
I encourage everyone to put the virtues explained in this excelent article to use in defense of the Church by reporting on the double scandalous election of Cardinal Prevost.
Scandal #1: One month before the conclave Survival Network for Abused priests published the list of cardinal electors who had protected pedophile priests and Prevost was on it. And they willingly went ahead and elected him! We can forget about the current claimant to the throne of St Peter doing anything about sex abuse in the Catholic Church.
Scandal #2: The second scandal is that the cardinals violated Pope JPII papal law on elections Universi Dominici Gregis by having 133 cardinals voting when the maximum allowed is 120 and also because they elected a candidate who had made statements against catholic doctrine (Fiducia Supplicans, Amoris Laetitia etc), contrary to Pope Paul IV’s Bull Cum ex Apostolatus Oficio.
Because that a man is pope is not a presumption of fact but a conclusion of the law, and the law was not followed in the election of May 8th, 2025. Jesus himself confirms the juridical nature of the Church when he tells St Peter in Matthew 18:18 “Truly I tell you, whatever you bind on earth will be bound in heave, and whatever you loose on earth will be loosed in heave.”
Great Article!!! I gotta study it for awhile. It's an article which justly exposes corruption and offers direction...........that many need, especially me! Thanks RF!
Brilliant read and true to the bone. Have you read "Action" by Jean Ousset? It takes a lot of these insights and makes them very practical, actionable. Cannot recommend this enough.
Wow. You’ve summed up the spiritual life in one article. Every Catholic, indeed everyone who calls themself a Christian, needs to read this. I’ll be sharing it far and wide. I hope others will too. And if I may be so bold, maybe you could send this to other outlets for wider publication? It’s that good. Thank you! Thank you for this excellent guidance.
Hey Father. This is Rob Cui. We were classmates in Suffield I believe. Great article.
Hey Rob! No need for “Father.” I liked the article and thought it was worth sharing. How are you? I was recently thinking of Fr. Wendell’s early morning history class and the struggle to stay awake. Man that was so long ago.
Hey Scott. Where are you assigned now? It was so long ago. Hope you’re well. You’ll be in my prayers. I try to pray for priests whenever I can.
Well said. One of the most pernicious fruits of Vatican 2 and its new mode of worship was the great dilution of days and seasons of fasting. Traditional Church calendars, east and west, implore fasting throughout the year. In many "Catholic" circles that has been replaced by giving up meat on Fridays, but only during lent. For centuries, Holy Church knew that fasting (with prayer) was critical for people to control their appetitites in order to maintain a good prayer life and stay in a state of grace. Those who can control their stomachs can control every other appetite. The lack of catechesis on this point cannot be overstated. I once told a Franciscan priest that it was difficult to fast during advent because of all the distractions around the holidays. He suggested I was confused - "Catholics only fast during lent not advent."
This comment isn't intended as a criticism of your article (which is very good) but simply a broader consideration of some theological trends I have been noticing within the "traditional" world. When it comes to the mainstream culture, it is true that men have been demoralized and would benefit from more militant rhetoric and emphasis. However, among men (and people in general) who already understand the militant nature of Catholicism, there's another (more subtle) problem, which is a lack of nuance regarding the roles of men and women that leads to the presentation of Catholic teaching in a one-sided way that harms everyone.
Messaging about being strong, courageous, and militant is directed primarily if not exclusively to men, and on more than one occasion, I've seen SSPX priests heavily imply that women shouldn't spend much time studying the faith because they are not equally soldiers of Christ (contrary to Aquinas). The means of salvation are militant, but being in a state of grace essentially means being in friendship with God (as sin severs the relationship), and this relational aspect which comes more naturally to women is very rarely spoken about in trad circles. Add this to the fact that most people don't clearly distinguish between the vice of effeminacy and the perfection of femininity because they don't know philosophy and it sends the message that women are less suited to spiritual battle because they are "soft" (without distinguishing between ordered and disordered "softness").
I've personally seen the mass exodus of young women from trad communities because they've gotten the impression that their minds and natures are somehow inferior and that whatever they do for the Church is inherently less valuable than what men do. This leaves them susceptible to the errors of feminism because both feminism AND a vocal minority within traditionalism begin from the premise that femininity means being weak and spineless, and no real woman wants to be weak and spineless. The idea of sitting by passively and doing nothing when the faith is being attacked simply because there are no men around at the time because my job as a woman is to be soft and pretty and smile makes my skin crawl.
That's not a caricature of what I've seen either. As a woman who naturally has a choleric temperament and intellectual inclination, I was constantly chided by SSPX priests for doing the exact same thing my male counterparts were doing: uncompromisingly explaining real Catholic teaching to liberal theology professors at a mainstream university. "Don't be so provocative." "A little honey catches more flies than vinegar." "You're a lady; you should be nicer." Good grief! Anyone who thinks that being argumentative in an academic context is "sour" seriously needs to stop whining and grow another layer of skin. Abp. Lefebvre's mother's biography states that she was full of energy when she was in school and never let weakness deter her from standing her ground in a discussion.
Or my favorite: "Leave the intellectual stuff to the men and go stand at the foot of the cross." As if there's a conflict between defending Catholic teaching aggressively when needed and standing at the foot of the cross!
What motivated the women at the foot of the cross to stand and suffer with Christ (when most of the men had fled) was love. The reason why the vast majority of victim souls are women is precisely because of the relationship between Christ and the Church, His Bride: https://dorothealudwigwang.com/p/the-bride-of-christ-and-the-mystical. To be a woman is to be a mother, and to be a mother means to suffer, and there is no escaping that, physically or spiritually. And to suffer for your children means aggressively defending them against their enemies.
But no one ever talks about this beyond waxing poetic about "Holy Mother Church" (practically regarded by most trads as an "it" and not a "she") which is going to have disastrous consequences for all Catholics. Without clarity on WHO the Church is and her relationship to Christ, one cannot have perfect clarity on what one is fighting for in the first place. One cannot even have a real spiritual life without understanding that the soul, as part of the Church, is herself a bride of Christ. Not only is bad ecclesiology in trad circles pushing women away from Catholicism, it also leaves the men, especially young men, susceptible to one-sided messaging from the manosphere and redpill type rhetoric, which are not Catholic.
The solution to this is the promotion of consecrated virginity, because abstract concepts must be lived by real people in the flesh to impact society, but I've spoken to many traditionalist leaders who've largely responded with words of approval but no plan of practical action to actually bring consecration to their communities.
Lovely reply…..thank you.
https://ordodei.net/2025/07/02/the-catholic-burden-in-an-age-of-infidelity-by-fr-hansen/
Thanks for this essay, much to ponder here! Your call to arms is a firebrand thrown into the dry tinder of a complacent age, a necessary conflagration, for only in the crucible of suffering is the dross of mediocrity burned away. Yet one wonders if even this militant fervor, so bracing in its urgency, risks becoming another kind of evasion… a flight from the deeper, darker mystery at the heart of the Cross.
For the Incarnation is not merely a call to battle, it is the unbearable descent of the Divine into the very marrow of human frailty. The Christ who rides forth in the Apocalypse with eyes of flame is the same who wept at Lazarus’ tomb, who trembled in Gethsemane, who whispered “I thirst” from the Cross. The militant and the mystic are not opposed, they are one flesh, just as the God who commands is the God who bleeds.
To my mind you rightly excoriate the effeminate, therapeutic counterfeit of Christianity, but let us not mistake hardness for holiness. The saints did not suffer gladly because they loved suffering, but because they loved Him. Their joy in agony was not masochism but the ecstasy of the bride who has found her Beloved in the very heart of dereliction. This is the scandal of the Incarnation: that God’s strength is perfected in weakness, that the sword of the Spirit is wielded from the scaffold, that the true warrior kneels to wash the feet of his betrayers.
Where, then, is the militancy of the broken? Where are the soldiers who will march into battle with tears in their eyes, who will strike down sin with a hand that trembles in love? The essay speaks of resoluteness of will, but what of the will that is shattered on the wheel of divine abandonment, only to be remade in the kiln of obedience? The martyrs did not die with clenched fists, but with arms outstretched, conformed to the cruciform love they imitated.
And what of the Church herself… this wounded, harlot Bride who is also the spotless Mother of Saints? The essay’s disgust for her modern deformations is understandable, even prophetic. Still, the mystic knows that the Church is not merely an institution to be purified by our fury… she is Christ’s own flesh, bleeding yet radiant, corruptible yet indestructible. To love her in her squalor is part of the martyrdom.
The path to sanctity is indeed Calvary, but let us not forget that Calvary is also the path to the Resurrection. The militant treads the winepress of God’s wrath, the mystic drinks the wine that has become Blood. Both are necessary. Both are one. I realize you are not suggesting otherwise.
In the end, the most radical fidelity is not to the battle, but to the Beloved, the God who is both Lion and Lamb, whose victory is hidden in defeat, whose glory is revealed in the scandal of the Cross. The true soldier of Christ does not merely fight, he falls in love. And love, as the saints know, is the fiercest war of all.
Actually, I am working on a book project that may provide a practical answer to the problem situation you have described in this insightful article. The work is essentially a revival of the ideal of chivalry. One might think that that is impossible because the world has changed radically since the Middle Ages. However, the human psyche has not. Anyone who doubts this just needs to read an account of the sinking of the Titanic. The captain's willingness to sacrifice his life so that a woman or child could have access to one of the limited spaces among the inadequate number of lifeboats on the Titanic testifies to the survival of the chivalrous attitude throughout the ages.
You have given voice to the inner rumblings of my soul. I would like to share this with the priests of my diocese and the bishops of our Bishops’ Conference. Can you tell me how I can do this?
Hi Donald. Feel free to share with anything. If you click on the share button it should give you options such as email, WhatsApp etc.... Thank you for reading.
Okay. MANY THANKS. Would like to print it, with due attribution. They are more likely to read it that way. Your post is SPOT ON!
You are welcome to share it anyway you see fit as long as it is attributed to Radical Fidelity. 🙏
Truth.
Amen!!!!!
Amen!!!!!
How can I get a copy of this???
Hi. You can copy or screen shot the article. I assume you can print that? Alternatively send me an message with your email address ad I will mail it to you.
This is excellent and spot on. Thank you!
I encourage everyone to put the virtues explained in this excelent article to use in defense of the Church by reporting on the double scandalous election of Cardinal Prevost.
Scandal #1: One month before the conclave Survival Network for Abused priests published the list of cardinal electors who had protected pedophile priests and Prevost was on it. And they willingly went ahead and elected him! We can forget about the current claimant to the throne of St Peter doing anything about sex abuse in the Catholic Church.
.
https://apnews.com/article/sex-abuse-snap-zero-tolerance-92d2770ffc6ddf2f10c828ed26f1cb17
https://www.conclavewatch.org/cardinals/prevost
https://www.snapnetwork.org/survivors_respond_to_pope_leo_xiv_s_election_with_grave_concern_about_his_record_managing_abuse_cases
Scandal #2: The second scandal is that the cardinals violated Pope JPII papal law on elections Universi Dominici Gregis by having 133 cardinals voting when the maximum allowed is 120 and also because they elected a candidate who had made statements against catholic doctrine (Fiducia Supplicans, Amoris Laetitia etc), contrary to Pope Paul IV’s Bull Cum ex Apostolatus Oficio.
Because that a man is pope is not a presumption of fact but a conclusion of the law, and the law was not followed in the election of May 8th, 2025. Jesus himself confirms the juridical nature of the Church when he tells St Peter in Matthew 18:18 “Truly I tell you, whatever you bind on earth will be bound in heave, and whatever you loose on earth will be loosed in heave.”
https://www.fromrome.info/2025/06/01/project-save-rome/
Excellent
Thank you
Great Article!!! I gotta study it for awhile. It's an article which justly exposes corruption and offers direction...........that many need, especially me! Thanks RF!
Brilliant read and true to the bone. Have you read "Action" by Jean Ousset? It takes a lot of these insights and makes them very practical, actionable. Cannot recommend this enough.
Yes :) https://open.substack.com/pub/oswald67/p/to-form-or-to-be-formed-iconic-bridges?r=2r3au&utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=web&showWelcomeOnShare=false
Thank you, will definitely read.
This is my more general position-in-process viz a Catholic/Christian postliberal political economy https://open.substack.com/pub/oswald67/p/postliberalism-a-very-quick-response?r=2r3au&utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=web&showWelcomeOnShare=false