"I Carefully Block My Ears With Wax": Marcel De Corte to Jean Madiran

Today is the final day of 2023. What a momentous year it has been, for better and certainly for worse. But rather than offer my poor commentary, I'm going to post a correspondance from the respected Belgian philosopher Marcel De Corte (1905-1994) to French journalist Jean Madiran. De Corte was a neo-Thomist who taught philosophy at the University of Liège, specializing in ancient philosophy and moral philosophy. Like many Catholic intellectuals, Marcel De Corte was deeply troubled by the reforms following Vatican II. In February 1970, he wrote a letter to his friend, the journalist Jean Madiran (1920-2013), who at that time was chief editor of the traditional Catholic journal Itineraries, which Madiran had founded in 1956 to combat the errors of progressivism. The following letter was published in Itineraries, wherein De Corte describes his disgust with the New Mass as he witnessed it's early implementation in Belgium in the fall of 1969 and his disillusionment with the pontificate of Pope Paul VI, whom he sees as a man of frustrating contradictions.

Bad Humanae Vitae Parallels

In the wake of scores of bishops rejecting Fiducia Supplicans globally, popesplainers have resorted to comparing Fiducia Supplicans to Humanae Vitae as a way to deflect criticism of the document. The hyperpapalist website Where Peter Is has said that critics of Fiducia Supplicans "need to be reminded of the reception of Humanae Vitae...before asserting that the public reactions to magisterial documents are markers of its "failure.'" Then there is this little gem, which was followed by a piece from the same influencer on all of the similarities between Fiducia Supplicans and Humanae Vitae. 

Six Books I Worked On This Year

Happy Advent brethren! I wanted to take this opportunity to draw your attention to several excellent new books I've had the privilege of working on this year in an editorial capacity. Some of these are original works, others  reprints of Catholic classics, but all are excellent additions to any Catholic library. These were all published through my publishing imprint Cruachan Hill Press over the course of 2023.