The Bishop's Weekly Column from the Parish Bulletin

OUR LADY OF FATIMA

CATHOLIC CHURCH

When your chickens

come home to roost...

September 29th, 2006

Americans have a wonderful saying: "What goes around comes around" which means that what you sow you shall reap. There, now, I've said the same thing three different ways already !

In my case, history repeated itself on Sunday but at my expense. 13 years ago I was the Assistant Pastor of one of the biggest sede lodges in the business. Curiously I never was told of my "promotion" to this title it just "appeared" in the Sunday bulletin one week without my knowledge. In addition to teaching Sophomore Boys' Religion class, I also had the task of sharing hearing confessions of the High School students with one of the CMRI priests whilst the daily 8 am school Mass was being offered by the Principal and Pastor. After Mass the three priests would have breakfast in the dining room beneath the chapel.

Our conversations were usually light-hearted except one day the Pastor asked me an odd question: he asked if I thought it would be possible to celebrate the Novus Ordo Mass at the High Altar in Latin without anybody realizing it. Now that kind of floored me for a while. Mentally confused by the reason for the question and trying in my head to figure the logistics of faking a Tridentine Mass (where parts are said quietly so that only the priest can hear them) with the text of the New Mass (almost all of which is said out loud) I at length offered the opinion that I did not think it could be done. The Pastor shot back at me: "Oh, really ?". Now at this moment, a lay-man interrupted breakfast and we never returned to our discussion. Indeed, I never had the opportunity to follow up on this.

Now fast-forward a few months to just prior to my departure from MSM. I was in a discussion with a disaffected lay-woman over lunch who thought MSM wasn't Traditional enough anymore. I told her about that conversation with the Pastor and intimated my concern that such a question would even be posed. Then, in a typical moment of feminine charm, (don't worry she was old enough to be my great-grandmother) she said: "And did I tell you that he uses the new form for the distribution for Communion ?" (The "charm" was that confidential tone a woman employs just before she delivers a piece of gossip - and that's not meant to be a "chauvinistic" remark - hastily added before all my lady parishioners get ready to stone me with their missals again !)

Now I made it a point to verify this statement for myself (namely the use of "The Body of Christ" - "Corpus Christi") by the Pastor. The next Mass he was due to celebrate I stationed myself in the front pew and listened hard at Communion time. I heard:

"Corpus Domini Nostri Iesu Christi....Amen." ("May the Body of our Lord Jesus Christ (inaudible mumbling) followed by "Amen." In the context of the need to distribute Holy Communion as rapidly but as reverently as possible, it is standard fare for Traditional priests to begin the Traditional form out loud and complete the rest quietly to themselves. It is an expediency to which I have recourse almost daily. To the untrained observer it may easily be mistaken for the new form, however, the clear give away is that the priest says AMEN and not the communicant as in the modern Church.

Now fast-forward again to after my departure from MSM in July of 1996. Rumors were swirling: the Pastor was saying the Novus Ordo he was using the new form of distributing Communion - the litany was endless. Now I am sure the Pastor thought that I started those rumors myself. I can state categorically that I did not. The Traditional Chinese Telephone was vibrantly at work ! In England we call it Chinese Whispers. In the age before television (and I was 11 before we ever had one - which accounts for my passion for books and reading) families used to play games in the evening after Dinner on occasion. Chinese whispers was one of my childhood favorites, one person whispers a phrase only one time into a person's ear and so on down a chain. The last person blurts out loud what he or she thinks the first person said. Almost invariably the statement bears absolutely no reflection to the original statement, but small matter it makes for great fun ! Not so funny, though, especially in a community when gossipy whisperers mistake what they hear and relay it to someone else until distortion reaches perhaps the sin of calumny (lying with malice) or detraction (saying bad stuff but supposedly in good faith).

Well on Sunday my chickens came home to roost. Just as 13 years ago I recalled a question about the hypothesis of saying the New Mass in place of the Traditional Mass became the fact that the Pastor had done this, and just as confidentially I was told he used the new form, so a lady arrived for Mass on Sunday declaring that she had heard it on the telephone (one made in China I'll be bound - and confidentially as well from her fellow female interlocutor I'm sure !) that I use the new form as well !!! Well I don't, and I went into orbit only so long as to recall the expression, what goes around comes around - and in my case 13 years later !

+TF

P.S. There was also an issue of my not using the so-called second confiteor. Now I explained that issue over 2 years ago here (Sunday July 22 2007 as a matter of fact) to the entire parish. I didn't do away with anything... I conformed my mind to the Church. It was Pope John XXIII that suppressed the second recitation and consequently if I use the missal in which that reform was approved (which I clearly do) then I must accept his legitimate change that in no way affects the integrity of the rite. Personally I prefer the second confiteor and every day I think about its absence just before I turn around and say the Ecce Agnus Dei but then I always remind myself that liturgy is not just about personal preferences but all about accepting the liturgical law in force according to the authentic liturgical texts in effect in 1962 - which texts I have used ever since 1998.

The same thing goes for the so-called "New Holy Week" introduced in 1956 (new ?), St. Joseph the Worker (May 1st) also introduced in 1955 in time for its first celebration in 1956. I can't stand those rites but (in these matters at least) I have learned to submit my preferences to the mind of the Church.

With regard to the feast of St. Joseph the Worker, the monks of St. Peter's Abbey in Solesmes, France, so long charged with composing Gregorian melodies for new liturgical feasts flat-out refused to do so for the rest of the Pius XII Pontificate so much did they (like myself) despise that feast. It was John XXIII who ordered the music written and they complied, but it has to be the most cacophonous load of rubbish you ever did hear. The monks had the final word, (or should I say notes ?) on that feast. I'm sure the conventual Mass that day was never sung in Solesmes ! I can only remember singing that Mass once in the seminary schola and one of the Alleluia verses is absolutely hideous - completely discordant and unsingable corresponding to no other piece in the Gregorian repertoire of which I am aware and I'm not surprised either !

Surprisingly, by comparison, the Introit for the feast of St. Pius X also introduced in 1955 for its first celebration in 1956 is absolutely beautiful. Even monks can send coded messages and in music !