Sunday 19 November 2017

Seminary



It's a weepy!

The whole of Michael Davies's 'Timebombs in Vatican II', more relevant than ever, is available at this website.


Michael Davies's statistics are from 2002. That was 15 years ago! Things are much worse now. Here in the UK, more and more people are becoming more and more familiar with Bishops announcing that there will be 'difficult decisions' at a local level with parishes 'merging'. I am certian this is a nationwide phenomenon. The whole issue of parish mergers becomes the most wonderful form of Newspeak, with Bishops announcing 'mergers' which amount to a near shutdown of ordinary parish life  - with, you know, no resident priest - for existing parishes. This is predicted to become more and more common, never less. What many Catholics are seeing at a local level is a reorganisation and restructuring that almost imitates what is happening to British libraries. I'm told many British libraries are closing with a central one being manned mostly by volunteers. Most are being sold off to private firms who manage them, restructure them, gut them, sack their staff and then say, 'Good job done!'

Only the beginning of sorrows at Ground Zero.

Parishes don't 'close' they 'merge' and it is often glibly slipped in that we have to see as a diocese where 'the Holy Spirit is taking us'. There is never or rarely an assessment from Bishops as to whether it is the Holy Spirit, or rather a spirit of godlessness and faithlessness, the collapse of perhaps an entire culture that has led us to parish closures a.k.a 'mergers', the taking over of parishes by lay communities, the drastic decline in vocations, a dearth of religious and the increasing isolation and pain of those heroic priests who are still alive holding the fort as best they can.

The question that I and others would like to have answered is: Do bishops even want more vocations to the priesthood or are they now so comfortable with the management of decline that the management of decline is in fact the de facto policy of the Church in England, Wales, Germany and elsewhere in the West? Have they already decided that 'the Holy Spirit' is leading us to a priestless (or even Christless) Church?

'I'll just leave this 1962 Missale Romanum and maniple here for fifty years.'

The ideas that I hear from many bishops are about a 'creative' or 'innovative' response to the crisis of vocations (not that it is ever regarded or alluded to as a 'crisis' in public, after all, we don't want to upset the children!), but these responses rarely amount to a resolution to 'up the game' on making the priesthood look attractive to men who are devoted enough to Christ to consider it, nor to encourage such devotion among the clergy to the venerable Rite of the Church that might foster embryonic vocations.



One could be forgiven for wondering if a culture of acceptance about the loss of so many Catholics in two generations has bred not only a culture of pessimism about the future of the priesthood in the average diocese, but indeed a culture of death and sterility sweeping over the Church. It is never the Holy Spirit Who takes the Church to Hell in a handcart. It is always Bishops (of elsewhere, but not excluding Rome) who do that.



There are of course real reasons for optimism for the growth areas in the Church but they seem to lay within traditional orders and traditional communities. I have spoken to at least two people in the last week or two who promote the Traditional Latin Mass online and on social media but in fact do not even attend the Mass in the Extraordinary Form because it is not available within a 50 mile radius of their house. 

I think the late and great Michael Davies (RIP) may have prophecised the coming of Cardinal John Dew, having examined the Second Vatican Council and discovered the various loopholes therein that could be the seeds of the destruction of the universality - read Catholicity -  of the Church if bishops so willed it. But then even Cardinal Dew could not do what he has decided to do without the aid of an atmosphere of lawlessness encouraged by Francis, courtesy of Magnum Principium and other 'signs' destructive to the unity of the Church. It is with a sense of dread that one anticipates what stories we shall hear in the coming weeks and months of liturgical innovations being touted in other major Dioceses around the World.

A number of bloggers are using the word 'antipope' in relation to Pope Francis. I'm beginning to think that this is most unjust and deeply unfair.  

Let's be fair to the antipopes of history.

No antipope in Church history has sought to do what Francis is doing. 

Nor would any of the antipopes of history even dreamt of doing what Francis is doing.




Pray for bishops and pray for vocations to the Priesthood.

Pray for the Pope and pray for an end to the crisis in the Church.


Please note: Cats ears and whiskers have no been placed on the Princes of the Church in order to mock them as individuals (whoever they may be) but to add a humourous dimension and to make more visually effective a parody of the Andrew Lloyd Webber West End musical, 'Cats'. 


11 comments:

Highland Cathedral said...

I don't know what Cardinal Marx made of this, right in the middle of his own archdiocese:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DwTcRbqdWGs
Does anyone know anything about this church? Everything seems quite traditional. They've even kept the altar rails. But they've got female altar servers. Very strange. Traditional but...

Highland Cathedral said...

In July this year I spent four weekends in Germany so went to Mass four times. On two of the occasions the priests saying Mass were not native Germans. One came from Africa and the other from India. Admittedly, this was July and the usual priests might have been on holiday but it shows that the Church in Germany is becoming dependent on priests from other countries. Incidentally, after reading the Gospel passage, the priest from India sat down and a lady stood up and gave a speech. My German isn’t very good and I didn’t understand what she was saying. For all I know she was talking about her holiday or giving a chat about her cats but it did come directly after the Gospel.

Highland Cathedral said...

This information is on the website of Alte Peter church in Munich:
The services in St. Peter are characterized by a strong bond with traditional forms of liturgy (celebration at the high altar and kneeling communion reception at the Communion Bank). In particular, the (celebrated in Latin) parish service on Sundays and public holidays is designed church music on a high to highest level, including the many distributed over the year orchestra masses of great masters. (Wikipedia translation from the original German.)

Highland Cathedral said...

More Germans who haven't got in line with the Marxist message:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5YSCk2d07Fk

Pelerin said...

How sad that two people who promote the EF are not within 50 miles of an EF Mass. There must be so many in this predicament.

Here in Brighton we are so lucky. I have just come from Seaford where Mass in the EF is celebrated usually on the 3rd Sunday of the month (though not next month.) On the lst Sunday it is celebrated at St Pancras in Lewes and also on each Saturday. And at St Mary's Brighton every Thursday evening with a few exceptions.

Sixupman said...

My diocese in NW England is embarking on a massive programme of closures/amalgamations, will not consider Traditional Orders or Ordinariate, heaven forbid SSPX. Demographic changes to blame - tell me another one! Three adjacent adjacent diocese have a more open minded approach.

Felix M said...

My understanding is that priestly vocations rose under Pope John Paul II. Yes, he had his faults, but he was genuinely devout and was not ashamed to teach the Catholic Faith. And, of course, young men were attracted by his example ...

susan said...

Bones...wish you hadn't put the stupid kardashian ears/nose/whiskers on the good guys (Burke, Schneider, Fellay)...they deserve to look noble. The Mickey Mouse belongs with the idiots only, to make them look like the clowns they are.

The Bones said...

Susan

I considered only putting cats whiskers and ears on those characters who are doing a disservice, rather than a service to the Church. However, the song is from the Andrew Lloyd Weber musical 'Cats'. The whole joke is that these characters - all of them - are in some sense playing a role in a West End musical. It logically followed therefore, that they must all be in costume.

God bless!

Physiocrat said...

I don't do conspiracy theory but the shutdown could have been the intention from the start. On the other hand, it could also be the end result of a process that began more than a thousand years ago. Or possibly it could be both.

That said, it is worth remembering that a substantial chunk of the Catholic church has been completely untouched by the Second Vatican Council and after a long period of persecution is going from strength to strength.

Our Lady of Good Success-pray for us. said...

Great Apostasy. Yes, many know that old nick wants all to get supremely bored with Truth. https://novusordowatch.org/category/tradcast/

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