Anyone who knows Jessica over at Shower of Roses knows that she is one of the sweetest people, always willing to help. She takes time to create relationships with with people who read her blog and she always finds a way to be charitable and assume the best even of those who aren't always as charitable towards her. She recently found herself in an awkward position. She discovered that she had been used by a particular person to promote their bookstore and their products under the false pretense of believing they were a traditional Catholic family trying their best to help promote the faith with beautiful products meant to increase devotion and strengthen faith. In the course of her business conversation with this person about reviewing more of their products, it was revealed to her that this family practices sedevacantism. For those of you not familiar with sedevacantism, they don't believe in the validity of our Pope, or any of the priests who have been ordained, or even the validity of the Extraordinary Form Tridentine Mass, much less the Novus Ordo Mass.
Jessica felt that because she had unknowingly promoted this family's business in the past, she owed it to her readers to share this information with them so that everyone would be free to make their own decisions about how much business they were comfortable with giving this online bookstore. And now, she's taking a little heat in the comments. So far, only one comment, but it's a pretty mean comment. Again, Jessica handles it with a lot more charity than I think I would be capable of.
Here is my concern (other than for my sweet friend)... do you think these people should be more honest and specific about their practices before they take the money of traditional Catholics who might not even know that such a group actually exists?
When you go to their website, their header reads "Creating a Rich Catholic Family Life Based on the Catholic Church's Liturgical Year". On their blog, they host a feature called "Keeping It Catholic Monday". There is even a section of the website dedicated to the importance of keeping Sunday holy and the importance of going to Mass. This by a family that belongs to a schismatic group that won't attend even a Tridentine Mass because they don't believe that any current priests and Bishops are validly ordained, that the Pope is not the true Pope, that the seat of Peter is vacant. Sedevacantists don't recognize the validity of even Vatican I, much less Vatican II.
I can't even wrap my brain around it, but these people exist. We believe they have cut themselves off from the one true Church, but at the same time, they believe we are the ones who are following heretics (that would be all of the popes since Pius XII).
Some people might make the argument that the books they are reprinting are perfectly fine, just old, OOP Catholic books. That they are just trying to sell good Catholic products to make a living and not influence anyone, which might be true. Jessica never says that people should boycott this store. But I can't help but think that if they didn't want to encourage people to their version of Catholicism, why not be honest about their position? Why not post it openly on their website, bookstore and blog? Why hide it? I don't understand the need to hide it unless it's because they know that most faithful Catholics wouldn't be comfortable purchasing their products. And that seems dishonest to me. If you have a different opinion, maybe you could share it and help me understand it. If you agree, it might be nice for Jessica to know that you appreciate her commitment to her readers and friends.
