Tomorrow on the feast of Our Lady of Lourdes I have been invited, by a good Italian friend of mine who lives in Florence Italy, to be interviewed on his podcast about the anchorite vocation and The Practice of the Presence of Mary: To Live and Die with Mary. He interviews Catholic authors and has dual citizenship in Canada and Italy; I was so moved when he said that he would trade them both in for citizenship in the United States of America. That, “America is the greatest country in the world. We may have beauty here, but you have freedom. Your system is not perfect, but it is still the best and can be fixed. I have read your constitution from beginning to end.”

How many Americans have even done the latter? ITALIANS love America more than we do! We need to step back and remind ourselves how blessed we are to live in such a country. Are we perfect? Nay, but this land belongs totally to Mary. Our two minute “test” phone call yesterday turned into two hours of talking Church politics, American politics, the Latin Mass, the papacy, Our Lady and the current crisis in the Church. His wife Rima and himself are completing their 33-day consecration to Mary tomorrow; please keep them in your prayers.

Once the podcast is uploaded, he is allowing me to repost it on our blog. I was initially hesitant about doing something like this, because hermits in general should not be conversing with the world. But I was also smiling in remembering how shortly before entering Carmel Our Lady desired that I be interviewed by the (liberal) Huffington Post about the beauty and joy of the cloister. Now I feel as though, since I am still in my current state of limbo, She is desiring me to speak about the ancient vocation of the hermit, which as we know, preceded community life.

I like how podcasts are set up like a radio show since I do NOT like showing my face. Even when God-willing back in the habit I would never allow my face to be seen on videos or photos. Why? Because when cloistered nuns and monks with their promise (sometimes even a vow is taken) of enclosure is violated by publication of oneself, this is a grave, GRAVE error. Pictures that are even taken by family members can only be used for frames in a private home, but to post on social media is absolutely prohibited. How much more should this apply to the hermit?

Yet, I look around and see hermit priests CONSTANTLY uploading videos of themselves, selfies are being taken… this entirely defeats the purpose of the hidden life and quite frankly makes me cringe. These very “hermits” are violating the law of enclosure and seeking human respect. You want to do all that? Fine, but do not call yourself a hermit. I marveled this morning about how my good friend Axel in the Military said, “the country cannot exist without a military” and my immediate reaction was “and the Church cannot exist without contemplatives”.

There is that saying that the cloister is “a call within a call” and I call the hermit call “a call within a call, within ANOTHER call”. When the Church officially was founded, the Magdalen joined the ranks (the spiritual military) and laid down her life for it by living the rest of her days in total seclusion in a cave until her death. Other women who were found at the foot of the cross also spent the rest of their days as hermits: contemplatives. Our Lord always calls contemplatives to battle during the foundations of the something (the founding of the Catholic Church as we saw with the Magdalen) or during catastrophes and heresies; I think we can safely assume the latter is our current lot.

 I heard from a very reliable source of one who is in touch with the Vatican, that apparently Bergoglio has pancreatic cancer and is hooked up to I. V’s every night so he can be “normal” during the day. He is planning on producing another document banning the Latin Mass completely by Ash Wednesday, in case he dies. Is it not the way of Satan to choose prominent feasts to do his dirty work? How ironic too, as we are all called to give something up for Lent, and it is as though Lucifer is saying: “don’t worry, I’ve got you covered… I will pick it for you- you will give up the Mass of the Apostles.” This would mean Ecclesia Dei groups would be no more, and our only option (as Archbishop Sneider said) would be SSPX- until they are excommunicated at the hand of heretics and evil men in Vatican.

However, Vigano said that anything produced by this man must be ignored. I do believe however that a beautiful unity can be produced in all this between the “war” that currently exists between FSSP and SSPX- it is as though Our Lord is forcing them into the same corral, in order to stop the discord between them, and instead make them fight HAND IN HAND as they aim the sword at the snake. I am astounded now because I once did a rose novena to Therese asking her where I am supposed to go: FSSP or SSPX and you know what? I did not get a rose for either one. IS NOT THAT TELLING? Because when Our Lady’s Heart triumphs, there will no longer be any groups, because the Liturgy will be restored to its rightful state.

However, for now, this will all be a true test for FSSP and other traditional priests under the current hierarchy. This is the hour and time of evil, but only because Mary’s triumph of Her Immaculate Heart comes next. Everything will be alright… we must pray without ceasing. I pray daily, especially at the Te Igitur for Pope Benedict, as we all should! However, the Latin Mass will endure; nothing can stop this as Our Lord’s Church centers on His sacrifice where Mary is found standing firmly at the cross. Our Lady is choosing the contemplative members of Her army for this battle:

1.) priests and anchorites

2.) cloistered monks and nuns (ANY faithful religious for that matter)

3.) I must NOT exclude the lay people, married couples and third order members as YOUR ROLE IS EXCEEDINGLY INMPORTANT.

We are in this decisive battle with the Virgin together my friends; may we never fail The Blessed Virgin Mary and Christ the King. Since the Church is very well near entering into the Passion, I wanted to republish this old video I made but instead added my two favorite songs from The Passion of the Christ and when I finished editing it, I knew the angels helped and timed everything perfectly… especially at the end: