The Internet is full of articles ignorant of or hostile to Catholicism, and it’s a good practice to mostly just ignore them. But sometimes you come across an article that is so ignorant and so hostile that you have to pause and contemplate whether it’s more stupid or more evil, or whether it’s the perfect combination of stupidity and evil that most anti-Catholics can only dream of.
A recent article by Daniel Panneton in The Atlantic, “How the Rosary Became an Extremist Symbol,” reaches these ignominious heights. Somehow Panneton is able to perfectly synthesize his ignorance of Catholicism with his contempt, and frankly, it’s a wonder to behold.
Aka, How The Atlantic Became An Anti-Catholic Rag
The general thrust of the article is this: so-called “radical-traditional” (aka “rad trad”) Catholics are weaponizing the Rosary and in doing so are joining with Christian nationalists in encouraging physical violence against their many enemies. I’ll understand if my Catholic readers need to take a minute to clean up their keyboards after spitting out their coffee reading that last sentence.
The howlers in this article come fast and furious and begin in the subtitle: “The AR-15 is a sacred object among Christian nationalists. Now ‘radical-traditional’ Catholics are bringing a sacrament of their own to the movement.” First, the Rosary is a sacramental, not a sacrament. Second, Panneton’s proof that the AR-15 is a “sacred object” among Christian nationalists is a link to a leftist website making that claim (and this is common in this article: to prove his points, Panneton mostly links to other leftist sites making similar claims.)
It would be painful—somewhat like watching a middle school play where none of your own kids are involved—to go through all the problems in this article, so I’ll just hit a few highlights.
The concept of the Rosary as a weapon has a rich history in the Catholic Church; it’s not some modern invention. But this “weaponization” of the Rosary is connected to something far deeper in Catholicism: the idea that we are engaged in a war, and each of us are called to be soldiers in that war. After all, Catholics here on earth have long been called the “Church Militant” for a reason.
As St. Paul wrote in the first century:
We are not contending against flesh and blood, but against the principalities, against the powers, against the world rulers of this present darkness, against the spiritual hosts of wickedness in the heavenly places. (Eph 6:12)
Being a Catholic means being at war. If you wish to ignore that war, then you cease being a practicing Catholic.
Of course, in our modern woke world all militaristic language has become politically incorrect. Heck, even the military shies away from this language in favor of promoting the diversity of their troops (“Look, we now have black transgender disabled overweight women flying our planes!”). Any military language is sure to run foul of the woke police, so it’s not surprising that the “Rosary is a weapon” language is considered highly suspect.
Panneton further considers the growing movement among Catholics to learn how to protect ourselves and become more self-sufficient as proof that “rad trads” are preparing for war. Yet he makes no mention of the increasing violence against Catholic churches and crisis pregnancy centers, the desire to force faithful Catholics out of their jobs and even out of society for their refusal to comply with transgender or other woke ideology, or the violent, I mean “mostly peaceful,” BLM riots of two summers ago. Hmm…I wonder why Catholics are starting to feel like just maybe they should prepare for bad times?
I also find it interesting that Panneton finds the Rosary as the “extremist symbol” of what he calls “rad trad” Catholics. The term “rad trad” originated among Catholics who didn’t like traditional Catholics. It was a way to ostracize them—to say, “Look, I’m a practicing Catholic, but I’m not like those Catholics. I’m safe!” Of course, as society has gotten more extreme in its anti-Catholicism, so has the simple practice of Catholicism become radical and traditional in today’s world.
You can see this in some of the examples Panneton uses to distinguish these so-called “rad trads:” they “actively campaign against LGBTQ acceptance in the Church;” they oppose “abortion-rights advocates;” and they resist the child groomers prevalent in homosexual and transgender circles. In other words, they act like Catholics.
Catholics of all stripes need to realize that it is Catholicism itself that is a radical traditionalist movement in the eyes of the world. Instead of fighting amongst ourselves in an effort to appear more acceptable to the world, it’s time we united under the mantle of Our Lady, with the Rosary as our weapon of choice.
The above comes from an Aug. 15 story in Crisis magazine.
I would bet a lot of money that Brandon can’t name all the mysteries of the rosary.
I wouldn’t bet a dime that he even knows what year it is.
I would bet that he can still beat the pants off of you in an intelligence test.
I think they mistook Catholics for Mr. Biden. Then-Senator Biden threatened to shove his Rosary beads down the throats of his political opponents. He doesn’t understand spiritual warfare. “For we are not contending against flesh and blood, but against the principalities, against the powers, against the world rulers of this present darkness, against the spiritual hosts of wickedness in the heavenly places.” Ephesians 6:12 It is a weapon, a spiritual one. May our Lord deliver people from spiritual blindness. Of course, as in the Bible, we need to call out to Jesus for healing.
https://www.facebook.com/CatholicMemebase/posts/pfbid0GsRMnJaqEGoSMvpV4DRzHWKxnn5zHHRGireJPknktibRDR2qzMiuM219sWLanLwNl
Biden is a moron, a fake Catholic and a disgrace
Who cares what a secular anti-Christian rag like the Atlantic has to say, they are just another mouthpiece of elitist and oligarchic thugs
Maybe we need to be aware that persecution may be coming.
That’s actually a Satanic rosary an inversion of that which is holy…
Posted this in the wrong place this a response to someone saying if they have seen an “LGBT Rosary”..no such thing..
Well, there are weapons and then there are WEAPONS!
The rosary is my weapon.” “Our Lady has never refused me a grace through the recitation of the rosary.” “Love the Blessed Mother and make her loved. Always recite the rosary.”
–St. (Padre) Pio of Pietrelcina
“let me but put the Rosary around the neck of a sinner and he shall not escape me”
St. Dominic
The rosary is fine if you’re into it. But I don’t like it when I arrive for Mass and a group is praying the rosary in church out loud. Keep it to yourself.
I am overwhelmed by your kindness and charity , perhaps they are praying for you , that is why they need to raise their voices , btw way in a church vocal prayer is not unheard of.
Why does the rosary brigade get to take over the church during the 15 minutes before Mass when other people are arriving who might want to pray in a quiet church before Mass begins? Charity extends to consideration of others when you are in a public space. Start the public rosary in church twenty minutes after Mass ends, when it is unlikely that those not in the rosary brigade will be in the church. Besides, the Mass is way more important than the rosary. Why tack the rosary onto it, as if the Mass isn’t the highest form of prayer, the source and summit of the Christian life?
Have you seen the rainbow LGBT rosaries? That’s a weapon.
I haven’t. Where can I get one?
Read about it here
https://www.lifesitenews.com/news/sacrilege-jesuit-priest-promotes-rainbow-rosary-with-prayers-for-full-accep/
I kid you not: the newest version of the rainbow flag has a pawprint on it to represent zoophiles: people who are sexually attracted to and have carnal relations with animals. It all started with the gays.
No that is not what it represents. Stop making things up.
I have heard that those who identify as animals are covered by q in the lgbtqia , the Matt Walsh documentary, goes into this as well with someone who identifies as a wolf .
You sound like Trump when he says “people are saying” and then he inserts some ridiculous lie.
It’s not a lie. watch the documentary.
I had to look up who Matt Walsh was. Why would he know anything about it?
Watch the documentary. He doesn’t offer his own expertise. He asks so-called experts in sociology and medicine and education what they think. You draw your own conclusions from the experts’ answers or their failure to answer his questions.
The q means queer but it used to mean questioning. I think. I am not that well versed in it all.
The letters mean whatever they want them to mean and they keep adding more because the covfefe
I am sorry. What does that mean?
The Bear flag is not about having sex with animals.
https://www.catholicnewsagency.com/news/252046/rosaries-atlantic-extremism
Pray the rosary. Some notorious celebrities wear them but I would suspect don’t pray them.
The term “rad trad” was not to ostracize. It was just to describe Catholics who attend the Latin Mass and do not accept Vatican II. It is usually only online or in a community like a college or homeschooling group that they will even go near Catholics of other beliefs.
Ah yes Vatican 2, that special council that started the Church, that has proven to be an utter disaster
The Church was started by Jesus Christ. The beginning of the Church is considered to be Pentecost where the Holy Spirit came down on the Apostles and Mary.
Behemond was using sarcasm. We all know, or should know, that Pentecost was around 2,000 years ago and not in the 1970s.
Yes thank you Anne TE, I was being completely sarcastic, its the progressive idiotic Catholics who think the Church started at Vatican 2. Well at least a new church’s foundation has been laid, they want to get rid of everything before it, so liberals can create a church in their own image. Where sins are the new sacraments and we all become gods.
bohemond, I don’t know what is going on where you live, and if I remember you do not attend your Catholic parish, but that is not what is going on.
The Church’s foundation is Jesus Christ, who is the same yesterday, today and forever.
It is really wrong for you to mischaracterize the Church like that. It is evil.
“The Church’s foundation is Jesus Christ, who is the same yesterday, today and forever.” oh I see don’t believe my lying eyes, they changed the liturgy and the rest of sacraments, they purposely physically destroyed hundreds of Catholic parishes, they have let a homosexual syndicate control the hierarchy. Whispers that Bergoglio will soon allow contraception but nothing has changed its still the same Church..OK sure, I have a bridge that crosses from Manhattan to Brooklyn I would like to sell you
Catholic prophecy (Our Lady of LaSalette and Good Success) stated that Rome would lose the Faith and become of the seat of the Anti-Christ. It is happening.
https://www.catholic.com/magazine/print-edition/la-salette-sorting-fact-from-fiction
Are you a sedevacantist?
Are you a sedevacantist? no I am just not blind or ignorant
The Bible does not say that the liturgy would not change. It does not say places of worship will not change. It does say that scandal is inevitable.
I think Behmond might be referring to a lot of ex Catholic New Agers in his area. I know there are a lot of them in my area. Many people who were baptized Catholic have pretty much apostatized and are into reincarnation, tarot, fortune telling and other occult stuff that has nothing to do with Christianity. Not that that was ever encouraged in the Vatican II documents. It was not. See the document “Jesus Christ the Bearer of the water of Life.”
“The Bible does not say that the liturgy would not change. It does not say places of worship will not change. It does say that scandal is inevitable.” Wrong first off we are not sola scriptura, the liturgy did not just changed it was decimated and results prove it.
We are not sola scriptura. We are Scripture and Tradition.
Private revelations, even approved ones, are not either.
You can believe them as long as they are not contrary to the Faith.
The apparition at La Salette was approved a few years after it happened.
There was nothing about the Anti-Christ or Rome in it..
It was a prediction of famine due to the sins of working on Sunday and taking the Holy Name of Jesus Christ in vain.
Here is a different website evaluating the claims that one of the visionaries said that quote.
https://wherepeteris.com/la-salette-and-the-true-meaning-of-apostasy/
To bohemond, you can find comparisons to the two forms of the Roman Rite online.
Though I suspect you don’t really read the things I suggest; not even the Bible.
I am curious as to what you mean when you say anti-Christ.
@me, there is NO comparison between the 2 rites; you can delude yourself to believe that if you want. Don’t ever presume anything about me. I have not bought the con job that the corrupt prelates have sold the Faithful. This weekend one of the worst people in the Church, McElroy, will be elevated to cardinal.
I take anything Jimmy Akin says with a small grain of salt…
What does the Bible say about the Anti-Christ?
I wonder if Oregon Catholic Press will publish The Battle Hymn of the Weapons-grade Rosary?
Why?
That may have been a rhetorical question.
Hilarious!
I guess the Atlantic would not like the one-decade Rosary I carry in my car that is made from parachute cord, after all parachutes are used in the U.S. Airforce.
Evidently, they have never heard of the Rev. Billy Graham’s past Crusades for Christ which were Protestant revivals, and “Onward Christian Soldiers” is definitely out.
It looks like A Mighty Fortress is our God is out then. Too militant sounding.
Besides, where I am, I’m not getting any royalties.
Doesn’t AR-15 stand for Automatic Rosary 15 (decades, three times around, like the original 150 Psalms prayed on the beads)?
Don’t give the Atlantic anymore “ammunition”, pun intended.
You’re not punny
I just had to give you a thumbs up on that one.
The guy who did the “documentary” is a nut job and nobody uses q in lgbtq to mean animals. It means queer or questioning. Anybody can pay an actor to “identify as a wolf”, especially a nut job “documentarian”. There’s enough stuff in this world to get upset about without resorting to nutjobs.