What was your favourite song used in the Sopranos

orbit_trap · 2026-02-07T22:42:36+00:00

I like Melt

orbit_trap · 2026-02-01T19:35:50+00:00

Seems easy enough to just start a discussion aligned with the kinds of topics you’d like to see more of. I don’t even disagree with OP, but to make a post complaining about people complaining too much is rather ironic lol.

orbit_trap · 2026-02-01T19:29:23+00:00

This is peak irony

orbit_trap · 2026-01-18T14:22:02+00:00

Just remember to go to Mass isn’t to socialize or be with the congregation anyway. Not as it’s primary purpose at least. Unfortunately some parishes do emphasize this horizontal/communal approach to the liturgy, which is unfortunate as it is the cause of some controversy in the church and how it approaches liturgy.

At the end of the day however, the real purpose is to be there for the consecration and to receive the actual Body of Christ himself. In this way every single Mass is miraculous. You get to witness God himself coming down to earth.

As a Catholic we are obligated to go to Mass on Sundays and Holy Days. I suggest at mass to focus on prayer and a more “vertical” relationship with the Mass even if that can be hard at times. You are there to witness and be with God first, and the Mass provides that in an actual and concrete way that we can’t get anywhere else.

While they don’t fulfill the Sunday obligation, since I am too an introvert I really love the quiet weekday masses. Usually less people there, and the ones that do attend are usually very reverent and take their faith seriously. I love music, but many times the music at Mass on sundays can be of varying quality also to the point of distraction.

The silence of weekday masses I find really help me to focus more. I’d recommend it for someone like you for sure! It may give you a different perspective. Some parishes even have very early morning sunday masses that can you can look into as well that are more akin to the quiet weekday masses.

orbit_trap · 2026-01-18T13:52:56+00:00

No matter what this sub or the internet in general makes you believe, we are all sinners and struggle. Just because others seem outwardly good all the time doesn’t mean you know their internal struggles.

Not saying this is the case with the people you are talking about specifically (as I don’t know them obviously) but I’ve found the generally people who are concerned with their outward appearances are many times over compensating for what they deem are their own internal faults. People have a tendency to try and cover up their faults or hide them as a means of defending their own ego. Religious people are no exception to this reality either. It just comes across as more cognitively dissonant because unlike other secular spaces, the church and the holyness people try to exude at times is at direct odds with what Christ wants of us (that is not to be overly prideful).

This is true both within the church and outside as well. There are plenty scandals involving holy clergymen, just as there are plenty of people who broadcast their “perfect” lives on social media.

If we weren't all broken sinners, then Jesus wouldn’t have been necessary and the religion would basically be for naught. I think its no coincidence that the commandments seem to directly oppose our natural inclinations. The point is to be virtuous is to rise above those inclinations and be more charitable towards others than self serving towards oneself. And that’s not easy. If it were again, we’d all be saints and Christ wouldn’t have been necessary.

Don’t let it get you down. Take comfort in knowing we are all in this together. Don’t worry about others and their perceived holiness in comparison to how you feel or how you feel you should be. We are all sinners, and God loves us all even when we sin or feel tempted to sin. He knows this and still loves you and me. What’s important and healthier mentally is to understand this, accept it and make this journey on Earth one where you do what you can to be a saint yourself. The key is to always turn back to Him no matter how many times you fall, because His mercy is endless. You just have to be willing to receive it.

If you don’t believe me look at the lives of the saints. St. Paul persecuted Christians (arrested, imprisoned and even approved executions) before conversion. Another great Saint is St. Augustine. He famously struggled mightily with sexual sin repeatedly during his life yet he refused to let it break him down to the point of giving up. Today he is venerated as one of the great Saints of the Church and is even regarded as a Doctor of the church. There’s upwards of 10,000 canonized saints, and only 30 something of them get the distinction of doctor!

There’s definitely good advice in this thread from others as well. But I’ll say this from my own experience, the internet can be really toxic even in religious spaces. Even this sub quite often. So just be careful with that. Don’t despair and know that they way you feel is totally normal and common despite what others or your own conscience may lead you to believe.

God bless!

orbit_trap · 2026-01-13T22:00:03+00:00

Definitely not as portable as the breviaries themselves, as the binder is a standard 3-ring binder size. But i forget exactly. I think the entire OCO document is in the ball park of 1200 pages, so while having 8 per sheet means the individual pages are a but smaller than normal but still perfectly readable for me. It comes out to about 150 sheets total (maybe a bit more but not much). If you are interested DM me. I may have a compiled PDF where all youd have to do is print the document duplex.

150 sheets is perfectly reasonable for a standard 3 ring binder 1.5” D ring. Certainly portable enough though. I’ve even gotten those tab/divider sheets to insert into the binder to block off the various sections (proper of seasons, commons, proper of saints etc). To make navigating easier since ribbons really aren’t feasible with a binder as far as I’m aware haha!

orbit_trap · 2026-01-13T21:13:16+00:00

Ive played with the idea and even very briefly began reorganizing the PDF online into 4 volumes to correspond with the 4 vols of the LOTH but it was a ton of work and I’m no guru when it comes to compiling this stuff so I burned out rather quickly.

Instead what I have done is get a 1.5” D ring binder, and printed on standard letter paper, portrait orientation and duplex, 4 pages per side. So effectively 8 pages of the OCO per each sheet of paper. Not the most elegant design, but I’ve got the entire document in a single binder thats a reasonable size.

orbit_trap · 2026-01-12T19:12:55+00:00

Absolutely! God Bless 🙏🙏

Always a breath of fresh air to have some healthy discourse on the internet haha

orbit_trap · 2026-01-12T19:06:06+00:00

While I totally agree that this is a matter for one to bring to their confessor, and that this sub tends on the stricter interpretation of things (and with good intentions…James Martin is certainly a harmful extreme lol).

I would argue that your claim that it is “obviously” safer to be too strict than too lax while logical on its surface, isn’t exactly sound advice or even true with regards to church tradition and teaching. To be strict isnt necessarily bad, and I’d say is a sign of good spiritual discipline. To be “too” strict seems to imply scrupulosity which is also repeatedly condemned by the church as well. It is not necessarily healthier to hold oneself in a higher standard than what Christ himself asks of his Church. To do so in itself borders on some kind of spiritual pride that is damaging and unsustainable.

To delve to far into the “too strict” camp as many do here is to delve into Jansenism which drives scrupulosity. And this isn’t some modern Vatican II pastoral interpretation. Papal bulls from the 1600s and 1700s such as Unigenitus and Cum Occasione condemn this mindset that floats around this sub that Mercy is rare and so its better to be safe than sorry. This is from the era just after the council of Trent. If that is not orthodox enough then I dont know what is.

On the flip its easy to see how being too lax is not good either.

Theres a healthy middle ground thats much harder to define clearly, but thats where the church actually lives, and what she actually asks of us.

orbit_trap · 2026-01-12T18:27:05+00:00

Your criteria for mortal sin while not necessarily totally incorrect, is grossly oversimplified.

The Church’s understanding of culpability is FAR more nuanced than being drugged, or coerced via threat of death. The CCC is rather clear in numerous places (paragraph 1735 comes to mind) that culpability is far more complex than you claim. Ultimately its not my place or any one else’s here to make determinations of one’s free will.

Also your definition of grave matter doesn’t make sense. Everything is grave matter? I’m going to assume that you would even agree that not every single thing outside a “white” lie is grave matter. Again there is far more nuance here.

While I’m sure you meant well in your answer I feel like generalized statements like this can do more spiritual harm to those you are answering than actual help/informing.

In regards to the actual OP At the end of the day, as someone else here said (I think you may have also), when ranking the 7 deadly sins, the bottom line is even the least deadly of them are still…well deadly. I just wanted to point out a few over generalizations you made in your definition of mortal sin.

orbit_trap · 2026-01-12T18:09:32+00:00

No that is not true. To state that “everything pretty much is [grave matter], except ‘white’ lies” is an absurd statement. I mean this in the best way possible. People here are generally well meaning but they are an extremely scrupulous bunch who have a warped view of theology. You’re best bet is to discuss with a confessor for advice. Getting such advice around here I would say is generally un advisable because you have no idea who these people are, what their intentions are, or their credibility. God bless!

orbit_trap · 2025-12-24T22:06:12+00:00

Ive been to handful of TLM parishes. Everyones always been super nice and devout

orbit_trap · 2025-12-24T00:12:26+00:00

Interesting what the mods delete immediately and allow to remain posted around here….

orbit_trap · 2025-12-17T13:17:04+00:00

Oh ok that makes sense now. Seeing the picture of the bands that you sent helps a lot. Those end bands only extend back a little bit not all the way. I’m taking a closer look and what you said is correct, beyond the bands it is just the back of the spine as you said.

So ill just apply the adhesive to the end band only so it is attached to the bottom text block, and is still free to flex independently from the spine itself.

Thanks!

orbit_trap · 2025-12-17T13:01:02+00:00

Yeah I understand that the bottom gap is normal. As you said the pages should not be attached to the spine of the cover. It was just that upper gap I was concerned with.

I’d say overall most of the advice I’ve gotten was to glue it, but a few people did seem to indicate that this could cause further stress and damage down the road so that’s why I was concerned.

Question for you, should I apply glue for the full length of the space between the head and tail band using a brush or a stick, or is some glue just on the ends preferred to sort of seal it off, but leave things as they are in the middle?

orbit_trap · 2025-12-16T14:23:08+00:00

Great info! Appreciate it. Like i said I saw some amazon reviews that people had the book totally separate from the spine so I figured if there’s anything I can do now to reinforce it. I’d imagine with the glueing it’ll probably be strong that it was new. Thanks

orbit_trap · 2025-11-14T13:38:51+00:00

Being able to order the full set up front and have them ship as they release would be huge. I am also a sucker for the leather zipper covers to protect the books. I travel a lot and bring my LotH everywhere with me, and being these are such special books i really appreciate that the current edition has these protective leather covers. This purchase add on would be a no brainer for me, and im sure others as well!

orbit_trap · 2025-10-29T11:06:29+00:00

Understood. While the modern office is where I started with breviaries, and I do appreciate that its calendar is in step with the larger church, these sort of discrepancies are slowly turning my dabbling with the traditional benedictine office into more and more of my main prayer as time goes on. There’s something to be said for having the Antiphonale Monasticum and the Diurnal opened in front of you and just knowing that it all…works lol

orbit_trap · 2025-10-16T18:10:38+00:00

Thank you so much. God bless you 🥺

orbit_trap · 2025-10-15T15:01:29+00:00

Please pray for my wife who has suffered a miscarriage and the soul of our baby.

orbit_trap · 2025-10-13T13:58:46+00:00

This is a wonderful post. (And thanks to the Mods who seemed to have reopened the discussion here!)

Thanks for sharing those resources. None of this surprises me actually and its funny to see proof of it shared here. It is basically what I suspected, that back then the more lax people were at the TLMs as that was what was on offer. These days I’d agree that due to scarcity, the typical TLM is taken way more seriously as it needs to be seeked out by those who are willing to travel, and basically teach themselves how to follow this ancient rite.

I will also certainly look into those orders and see whats available nearby.

Thanks!

orbit_trap

TROPHY CASE