What's Happening?

.
The signs of the time are worrying.

The swine flu prohibition on Communion on the tongue feels, at least in some parishes in some dioceses, like an attempt to ban the practice completely.

The attacks, or rather the continual pinpricks, against Summorum Pontificum priests seems, if reports are true, to be on the increase: but there are some attacks as well and some of these attacks are vile and potentially high profile.

The staff at the E&W Bishops' Conference continue to plan for an Ad Limina visit which will take the attack to the Pope.

With the exception of the Archbishop of Westminster, not a single Bishop in E&W seems to have welcomed the idea of a Papal visit.

If I can be forgiven the analogy, we are in early 1942. The Americans have finally entered the War but the Japanese have conquered the Pacific and look unstoppable; the Germans still seem to be advancing in North Africa; and as the winter ends on the Eastern Front, everybody is expecting the worst.

Nobody has realised that the enemy has extended itself as far as it is able, and only two things are necessary for its defeat: unity, and a willingness to take all the time final victory needs, whatever the attraction of a negotiated peace.

They can't win. We can win, and we can lose.

Can The Bishops Ban Communion On The Tongue?

.

Fr Z offered advice to a correspondent who was being hounded by her PP for genuflecting before Communion and receiving on the tongue. According to the CDW’s 2004 Redemptionis Sacramentum, it seems that communion on the tongue may not be prohibited. Is swine flu such a uniquely deadly disease that Bishops are entitled to ignore the instructions from Rome? In how many countries, and in how many dioceses in those countries has such a ban been introduced?

[90.] “The faithful should receive Communion kneeling or standing, as the Conference of Bishops will have determined”, with its acts having received the recognitio of the Apostolic See. “However, if they receive Communion standing, it is recommended that they give due reverence before the reception of the Sacrament, as set forth in the same norms”.

[91.] In distributing Holy Communion it is to be remembered that “sacred ministers may not deny the sacraments to those who seek them in a reasonable manner, are rightly disposed, and are not prohibited by law from receiving them”. Hence any baptized Catholic who is not prevented by law must be admitted to Holy Communion. Therefore, it is not licit to deny Holy Communion to any of Christ’s faithful solely on the grounds, for example, that the person wishes to receive the Eucharist kneeling or standing.

[92.] Although each of the faithful always has the right to receive Holy Communion on the tongue, at his choice, if any communicant should wish to receive the Sacrament in the hand, in areas where the Bishops’ Conference with the recognitio of the Apostolic See has given permission, the sacred host is to be administered to him or her. However, special care should be taken to ensure that the host is consumed by the communicant in the presence of the minister, so that no one goes away carrying the Eucharistic species in his hand. If there is a risk of profanation, then Holy Communion should not be given in the hand to the faithful.

Archbishop Nichols On The Money Again

.
To what is to me a baffling lack of comment, the Archbishop has issued a pastoral letter about the importance of prayer and Confession, with a bonus of how to obtain a Plenary Indulgence when visiting St Thérèse's relics. He also says something else, talking about Cardinal Newman:

"As you know, he came only gradually to the fullness of Catholic faith. It was a difficult journey for him. Yet, in his own words, he came to recognise our faith as “a working religion”, not concerned with ideas or vague generalities, but taking us up into the true worship of Christ himself. At the heart of Newman’s sense of the realism of our faith was the real presence of Christ in the Blessed Sacrament, “as real”, he said “as we are real”.

We can learn from him to reawaken in ourselves this faith in Christ’s real, abiding presence in the Holy Eucharist, reserved in the Tabernacle. When this happens, we behave accordingly in His presence, giving Him our attention and the love of our hearts whenever we are in church. In this way we not only build up our own life of prayer but also encourage each other, in church, to give this precious time to Him. After all, He is the only one who can bring lasting peace into our lives."

We seem to have got a Catholic Archbishop of Westminster, who understands Catholicsm and who preaches it. But all there is to read about him on the Internet is how he gets things wrong.

"Tell it not in Geth, publish it not in the streets of Ascalon: lest the daughters of the Philistines rejoice, lest the daughters of the uncircumcised triumph".

Archbishop Nicols On Mission

.
On Sunday there was the annual Missions appeal, at which a nun told us that missionaries were not in Africa to convert people. Luckily, the Archbishop seems to have more robust ideas: read through to the end.

"St Paul, in his reflection on the outreach of faith to the Jewish community of his day, reminds us of the need for people who will speak of Jesus, who will act as missionaries. He asks ‘And how will there be preachers if they are not sent?’ This ‘missio’, this ‘sending’ is central to the dynamic of the Gospel. It is a dynamic in which we all share, for at the end of every Mass there is indeed a ‘missio’. We are sent out to fulfil our share in the mission given to us by the Lord.

St Matthew gives us the words and actions of the Risen Christ in ‘sending out’ his disciples and commissioning them to proclaim the Gospel and to baptise. It is, indeed, a co-missioning because Christ also gives us his unfailing and consoling promise to be with us always. Yes, the mission we receive is one and the same as the mission of Christ himself. He was sent by the Father ‘that we might have life and have it to the full’ (cf. John 10.10). And this mission of the Son exists from and in all eternity. Here is its deepest meaning on which we must reflect today.

The Father ceaselessly ‘sends out’ the Eternal Word, that expression of the very mystery of God, and does so in the utter, self-emptying love which is also the nature of the Godhead, the love which is the Holy Spirit. This giving out and receiving in of love, which is the very life of the Holy Trinity, is the first and unequivocal meaning of the word ‘missio’. God, of his infinite nature, is ‘missio’ and, of course, ‘communio’. These are the foundations of our use of this word, its most profound truth for us to keep in mind always.

The first outward expression or fruit of this inner ‘missio’ of the Godhead is, of course, the work of creation. St John tells us that all creation, every being, has its existence through the eternally spoken Word of God.

And so that this creation might indeed find its integral and full development or salvation, that Word become flesh in a particular and historical Incarnation. This ‘missio’ of the Eternal Word into our flesh and history gives all the defining characteristics of our sharing in that mission, in our work of ‘missio’ today. It is the full revelation of ‘integral human development’ and establishes for ever the need for the Gospel to be present as an essential part of human progress. Only in the Gospel is the full truth of our humanity told; only in the Gospel, which is Christ, does our humanity come to its true source and fulfilment, the mystery of God and God’s unequivocal love."

I Thought I'd Escaped

.

... but I think I might be going back here soon!

.

The Pope To The Bishops Of Brazil

.
Nobody else seems to have noticed this rather important text, or maybe I'm looking in the wrong places. Is reading what is being said on other Conferences' ad liminae a requirement for our Bishops before theirs?

(Not my best translation - I want this out there!)

Dear Brothers

in the decades following Vatican II, some people saw the opening to the world, not as a requirement of the missionary zeal of the Sacred Heart, but as a gateway to secularisation, seeing in this some values of great Christian density, such as equality, freedom, solidarity, being willing to make concessions and find areas of cooperation. This led to the intervention of some Church leaders in ethical debates, meeting the expectations of the public, but not talking about fundamental truths of the Faith, such as sin, grace, the theological life. Many Christian communities unconsciously fell into self-secularisation: these, hoping to please those who never came, saw the departure, cheated and disillusioned, of many of those who had come: our contemporaries, when they come to us, want to see what they do not see elsewhere, that is, the joy and hope that spring from the fact that we are with the Risen Lord.

There is at present a new generation born into this secularized church environment, which, instead of being part of this openness and consensus, sees the gap between Society and the Magisterium of the Church, especially in the area of ethics, widening even more. In this desert of God, the new generation feels a great thirst for transcendence. It is the young men of this new generation who are knocking at the door of the Seminary and they need to find true men of God, priests fully dedicated to formation, to witness to the gift of self to the Church through celibacy and an austere life, following the model of Christ the Good Shepherd. These young men will thus learn to be available to meet the Lord in daily participation in the Eucharist, to love silence and prayer for, first, the glory of God and the salvation of souls. Dear Brothers, as you know, it is the task of the Bishop to establish the essential criteria for the formation of seminarians and priests in faithfulness to the universal law of the Church: in this spirit the ideas on this subject, which arose during the plenary assembly of your Episcopal Conference, in April should be developed.

Assured of your zeal with regard to the formation of priests, I invite all bishops, priests and seminarians to emulate in life the love of Christ, Priest and Good Shepherd, as the Curé d'Ars did. And, like him, take as a model and as a protection of your own vocation the Virgin Mother, who responded in a unique way to God's call, by bearing in your heart and in your body the Word made flesh in order to give it to mankind.

To your dioceses, with a cordial greeting and the assurance of my prayers, please bear my paternal Apostolic Blessing.

Fr Fortescue

.
No, I'm not going to write the whole book out, bit by bit. I note that Abebooks has plenty of copies available. But I liked this enough to want to share:

"Our so called Missa Cantata is the compromise of a compromise, a Low Mass, with singing as at High Mass, only justifiable to enhance the dignity of Sunday Mass when a deacon and subdeacon cannot be had. (And the practice of saying a Low Mass while the choir sings bits of things is too dreadful to be described.)"

Lucky ...

.
A first edition of Fr Adrian Fortescue's "The Mass: A Study Of The Roman Liturgy" came my way today.

The person to whom thanks are owed has been thanked.
.

Welshmen And Their Sheep

.
Found by Jeffrey.

Welcome To A New Blogger

.
Any new blog whose first post begins:

"It is an honour and a responsibility to have been given the Catholic Faith of the Church that was founded by Christ on Peter the Rock"

feels like one worth following. Have a look here and say hello to Dorothy.

Seven Things

Mac tagged me for a meme: "What are the seven things that we, as Catholics, want or would like to see happen?"

1. The abolition of all Education departments in the diocesan curiae in England and Wales. The quality of teachers can be handled by headteachers; fabric can be sorted out by people who understand it, and RE becomes part of the catechetical department: because

2. Children are (normally - there will always be exceptions) prepared for Confession, First Communion, and Confirmation in their Catholic schools. Where there are Catholic schools, and Catholic parents choose not to send their children to them, the parents can face the consequences. (Some people will be surprised to know that at the moment children are prepared for none of these three sacraments in Catholic schools.)

3. The Bishop in each diocese appoints a Director of Liturgy who takes responsibility for the Liturgy in the diocese (responsibility here is a big word: it means doing things, rather than having a new paragraph in the CV, and it means doing them according to the book, in this case the Rubrics, and it means ensuring, with however big a stick necessary, that things are done according to the book throughout).

4. Any hymn book with hymns written or bowdlerised after 1970 is temporarily withdrawn so that they can be sorted out. We don't need hymn books for Mass. For the occasions we need hymns, the PP can print out a few sheets for the people attending.

5. Any parish which offers the EF also offers Vespers (at least in the simplest form) at least once a week.

6. Black vestments, unbleached candles and pleading for the soul of the departed are an option anybody can insist on for the funeral they are arranging.

7. The Church in England and Wales stops trying to be part of the Establishment, stops trying to be anything other than (and proudly!) the outpost of the Church of Rome in England and Wales, a challenge to everybody who is outside the fold of Peter.

Ad Limina: A Powerful Weapon

.
Is this a summer cold or swine flu? I've no idea. Pray for me, please.

A Roman correspondent has sent me a fascinating message about the results of the last Ad Limina visit. There is a story, that you either know or you don't, about the Bishop who was sure he was going to get Southwark: so sure that he'd packed his Library.

Now, the reason he didn't was that in the lead up to the visit, one of his flock had sent to the Congregation for Bishops evidence that the Bishop had done something wrong, and this was enough to stop his translation.

Because what the Congregation responds to is evidence, not assertion: if the Bishop has written to a person or group saying (for example) "you can only have an EF Mass if there are 50 parishioners", then you've got him; if you say "I know the Bishop isn't in favour of EF Mass" then you haven't. If you can show that a Diocese has sent £250K to an organisation that supports anti-Catholicsm, then you've got it; if you assert that "My Bishop doesn't support Catholic teaching on sex education" then you haven't.

This is the way to do it.

So let's do it.

Ad Limina: How We Might Influence It

.
I have been in correspondence recently with someone about our chances of influencing the Vatican before the Ad Limina visit. We have disagreed gently about the possibility of starting a petition about the way "relationships" are taught in Primary School. The disagreement was about tactics: I think that any attempt to draft a petition about sex education will end up causing more divisions and attracting less signatures; he, less cynical than me, thinks that wording expressing exactly what we all agree on can be found; I don't think many people will get involved; he does.

I suggested, however, that something in last week's Catholic Herald had left me really angry: "tamping mad" as my mother-in-law might say. Only Catholic Action seems to have noticed it online.

It's about Marriage Care, and its Director, Terry Prendergast, and the fact that the A of W is its patron, and the English dioceses fund it. The story is awful - this is just a bit:

The manual, called Foundations for a Good Life, is designed to help to teach pupils at Key Stage 3 and 4 - the last two years of secondary school - and college students about relationships, marriage, the family and sexuality.

The final two modules are aimed at young people over the age of 16 and deals with methods of contraception.

There is no discussion of the morality of the methods with the focus on function and effectiveness. The manual hails condoms as 98 per cent effective in avoiding pregnancy, and the Pill, the coil and hormonal injections as 99 per cent effective, but says that NFP methods are far less reliable.

...

Joe Mannion, the charity's director of relationship support, said he unaware that the information was inaccurate. He said that Marriage Care would be prepared to change the text of the manual if "it's shown to be different" by new evidence.

Terry Prendergast, the chief executive of Marriage Care, recently caused an outcry when he said marriage is no better for children than other family set-ups.

The charity has an annual income in the region of £900,000, about 10 per cent of which comes from diocesan grants. Its president is Archbishop Vincent Nichols.

It strikes me that this is our petition to the Vatican. This is a call to arms. This isn't about the precise detail in which aspects of the National Curriculum should be taught in primary education: this is about the Catholic Church allowing its teachings to be subverted by people claiming to speak for her.

Does Rome know about this? Have they read this article? Do they know what our Bishops support? Is the lay structure in the Diocesan curias and at Eccleston Square responsible for undermining the Church in E&W from within? Big questions. But unless Rome is invited to think about them, and turn them onto the Bishops of England and Wales, then not only will there be no challenge, but the fact of no challenge will be adduced by Eccleston Square as Vatican support.

I wonder whether this is one chance to stick it to the structures which have so corrupted catholic life in England and Wales for so many years ...

Tagged For Ches's Meme

For the person who had that very day received a couple of boxed sets framing the Classical Era: Haydn: The Six Late Masses; and Telemann: Brockes Passion; to be told that he has a pound in his pocket and three jukebox songs to choose might prove difficult. Very little music I listen to would ever find its way near a jukebox, but here's three that might.



Leonard Cohen, who, I realised one day, just did it for me.



Men At Work Down Under: I've never listened to the words: indeed, I'd never seen the video until I found this; but the noise it makes, a cheery reggae inspired celebration, always makes me think of Oz, a place I always enjoy going to.



And Ana Belén: she could sing "Matchstick Men" and "There's noone quite like Grandma" and still fell me.

Nice Day

.
We can't all afford Italy, but England will do sometimes.
.
.
.

Ad Limina: Another Staffer's Proposal

.
One proposal that was doing the rounds was that of showing the variety of diocesan educational curricula as a way of demonstrating the vibrancy of Catholic education: indeed, Catholicsm in Education.

The covering letter would go something along the lines of:

"You've seen and approved of PO'D's curriculum just because he happened to send it to you. All of our dioceses have curricula which respond in a Catholic manner to the National Curriculum, though most of us are modest enough not to burden you with every example of support to Catholic education we have been responsible for in the last six years."
.

Ad Limina: The Bishops Strike Out

.
At least, Eccleston Square wants to!

Damian, here, asked earlier:

Is the Holy Father aware that traditionalist Catholics in this country do not have a single bishop who shares his own understanding of the place of the traditional liturgy in the life of the Church?

Whether he does or not, I understand that one of the drafts prepared for the Ad Limina visit by a staffer at Eccleston Square (which might well have gone to and therefore have so excited The Suppository) insinuates that the troubles caused by Summorum Pontificum might actually have been caused by the uncollegial way in which it was implemented. Indeed, one wag apparently suggested adding a comment that the reason that the new translation of the Mass into English would eventually be so welcome was that there had been collegial discussion on the subject since 1994, thus guaranteeing that when final consensus was reached, everybody would be happy.

The interesting thing is that the Eccleston Square attitude to the Pope reminds me of The Guardian's attitude towards Middle England: they despise him, snigger at him behind their hands, ignore him whenever possible, and use such defiance as a shibboleth of belonging.

Archbishop Nichols needs to take on the mantle of Cardinal Pole.
.

Ad Limina: A Bishop's Examination Of Conscience

.
(Yes: I am going to get pretty boring on this subject. If you have anything you want to make public, themunimentroom@hotmail.co.uk is one place to think of sending it to.)

According to Francisco José Fernández de la Cigoña, here, a Bishop should ask himself the following:

"When the wolf gets into the fold, the shepherd neither sleeps nor rests; he works day and night to get rid of the wolf to save the lives of his sheep. If, through lack of care, of vigilance or of effort, we should lose lives, how would we answer Jesus Christ when he calls us to account for the souls he entrusted to us?"

How will those who have lost tens of thousands answer? What about those who barely have a flock left? Which believe in Jesus Christ? How do you follow a shepherd who doesn't care about his sheep? Is there a wolf? Are there sheep? Is there a shepherd?"

Just something to think about.

More On Ad Limina Visits

.
According to the Vatican website, here, the procedure for ad limina visits is as follows:

Art. 28 — In keeping with a venerable tradition and the prescriptions of law, bishops presiding over particular Churches visit the tombs of the Apostles at predetermined times and on that occasion present to the Roman Pontiff a report on the state of their diocese.

Art. 29 — These kinds of visits have a special importance in the life of the Church, marking as they do the summit of the relationship of the pastors of each particular Church with the Roman Pontiff. For he meets his brother bishops, and discusses with them matters concerning the good of the Churches and the bishops’ role as shepherds, and he confirms and supports them in faith and charity. This strengthens the bonds of hierarchical communion and openly manifests the catholicity of the Church and the unity of the episcopal college.

Art. 30 — The ad limina visits also concern the dicasteries of the Roman Curia. For through these visits a helpful dialogue between the bishops and the Apostolic See is increased and deepened, information is shared, advice and timely suggestions are brought forward for the greater good and progress of the Churches and for the observance of the common discipline of the Church.

Art. 31 — These visits are to be prepared very carefully and appropriately so that they proceed well and enjoy a successful outcome in their three principal stages — namely, the pilgrimage to the tombs of the Princes of the Apostles and their veneration, the meeting with the Supreme Pontiff, and the meetings at the dicasteries of the Roman Curia.

Art. 32 — For this purpose, the report on the state of the diocese should be sent to the Holy See six months before the time set for the visit. It is to be examined with all diligence by the competent dicasteries, and their remarks are to be shared with a special committee convened for this purpose so that a brief synthesis of these may be drawn up and be readily at hand in the meetings.

The organising body is the Congregation for Bishops, and that is, I imagine, the Dicastery to be addressed if we have points we would wish to be considered during the visit.

Its address is: Palazzo della Congregazioni, Piazza Pio XII, 10, 00193 Roma and its phone number is: 06.69.88.42.17 so we have no excuses.

Caught In My Tracks

.
Not quite what you expect to see in the middle of a Georgian streetscape on a sunny English Sunday afternoon!
.

Outnumbered

.
When even a repeat makes it worth watching TV on Saturday evening!



.

Ad Limina Visit From England And Wales

.
Fr Ray Blake has scooped the world by announcing that the somewhat overdue Ad Limina visit by the Bishops of England and Wales is now scheduled for January.

What I know of the mechanics of these visits is a bit limited: I know that the Bishops' Conference has to send in a report; I know that each Bishop has a private one-to-one with the Pope; I know that a final statement which can include what in secular terms might be called an "Action Plan" is published by the Vatican at the end of the visit.

What I don't know is how the Vatican carries out its own preparation for the visit: presumably the Nuncio has a significant input, but who else has? Can anybody write in? To whom? And if the answer is "yes", will anybody at the Vatican end actually bother to read what is sent?

My experience suggests that October and November will be when the preparatory work for a January visit will be carried out, leaving December for the Holy Father and his advisors to take their position and raise any last minute queries.

That gives us seven or eight weeks.

Great as is my admiration for Archbishop Nichols, I can't believe that he is yet in a position to achieve authoritative editorial control over what the staff at the Bishops' Conference will produce: it will be full of self-congratulatory guff about this or that pastoral initiative, and will give an impression of a Church in E&W in which clergy and laity (I nearly wrote workers by hand or brain) are well on the way to achieving the Kingdom through support to the third world and a drive for carbon neutrality or even negativity.

If anybody knows how we can counter this, will they please speak up.

Archbishop Nichols - Hope For Us All

.

There was a fascinating article in the Herald this weekend (actually there were several, but bear with me).

"Archbishop Vincent Nichols celebrated a Mass to mark the 150th anniversary of the founding of St Vincent de Paul primary school in Victoria, London on Friday July 17.

The opening of the school was marked by a Mass celebrated by Cardinal Wiseman in an attic in the building where the school was founded. One hundred and fifty years on the current Archbishop of Westminster, Archbishop Vincent Nichols, followed in the footsteps of his predecessor by celebrating Mass for the school. The Mass was attended by pupils, staff, parents and Sisters of Charity. In his homily Archbishop Nichols described the symbolism of his bishop's mitre, which represents the Bible, upon which his ministry is based. He said the two points of the mitre symbolised the Old and New Testaments, a reminder of his ordination as a bishop, when the Bible was held over his head. Archbishop Nichols also said that the crozier represented a shepherd's crook, to show everyone that, as Archbishop, he is the shepherd of Westminster."

There are several things here: the Bishop exercising his teaching mission, as well as his pastoral mission; his respect and fidelity for tradition and the past, both in repeating what his predecessor did 150 years ago and in having a mitre held properly; and knowing how to talk to (rather than down to) children.

Unlike some Catholics who seem to think that Archbishop Nichols is an unCatholic failure, purely because he doesn't seem to want to do what they want him to do, I think he is building up to being a Catholic success, precisely because he isn't doing everything I want him to do.

The full story of how Archbishop Nichols came to be selected will never be known, but there are three phases: first ++MO'C offered his resignation to the Pope, and a terna selected by the magic circle (presumably with ++Vincent's name on) was presented to Rome; after a while in which it seemed that the magic circle would have its way, a campaign began to debate the sort of man the Church in England and Wales would need to succeed ++MO'C and the Cardinal was asked to stay on for a while longer; a new terna selected by the magic circle (presumably with ++Vincent's name on) was presented to Rome and ++Vincent was named for Westminster.

The second phase is interesting, because, I believe, it marks a decisive shift in the Church in this country. Just as Cardinal Heenan, intent on ensuring that whatever else happened, he would not be succeeded by ++Worlock, asked the people of his Diocese to tell the Nuncio what sort of priest should succeed him, a group of (mainly) lay people opened a debate about how the succession should happen. Damian Thompson and his blog played a key part in ensuring that there was a focus for the exchange of information, not just about the archiepiscopal possibles, but about the fruit of their parish and diocesan work. And at least one high profile prelate, Cardinal Pell, who was never ever realistically a candidate for Westminster was nevertheless proclaimed to be one, in order to provoke discussion and thought.

What was happening? This is the first time in which candidates for high office in the Church in this country were measured publicly against the Pope's criteria. Not, this time, nudges and winks in Eccleston Square, and a library packed and ready to be moved before an announcement was made: instead we learned about candidates by watching them at work and then discussing them.

What gives me hope that the Pope has chosen splendidly well is the very fact that it is unlikely that we will see ++Vincent celebrate Mass in the EF. He obviously doesn't want to, but has both an Auxiliary Bishop and priests in his diocese who are prepared to do so (a situation not without parallel in the Diocese of Rome, though we might assume its Ordinary to be a bit keener) and he is encouraging them to. Like the Pope he is keen to avoid the EF becoming a shibboleth for disunity.

My point is that we have witnessed a lot of ++Vincent's journey from Fr Trendy to ++Seriously Catholic. He is a not a turn-the-clock-back Traditionalist - far from it! - but understands and appreciates the need to be faithful to Tradition, and to allow those more traditionally disposed than he is to feel welcome. Above all, he understands the direction in which the Pope is leading us and is prepared to lead in the same direction.

There seems to be a lot of faux-ingénus about at the moment who profess to believe that they stand for a sort of labeless Catholicsm: there's no such thing. Why I think ++Vincent is a good thing is that the label he has embraced seems to be "Benedictine".

Somebody said recently: "much better than his predecessor; not as good as his successor". That'll do me; and it will do a lot of very good Catholics who will never voluntarily go to an EF Mass as well. In fact, that would be a pretty good epitaph for any of us.

(By the way, if you've got this far: what was Cardinal Mahony doing at ++Vincent's installation?)

Typical Summer Day

.

You don't have to be some demented eco-nut to see that the climate is changing. You just note that this is the third summer on the trot that the jet stream has not behaved as it should and contrast what is happening here to what is happening all across the Mediterranean.

Photography

.

I chronicled last year my purchase of a Kodak ZD710. It is a bridge camera: half way between a point and click digital, and a "real" SLR.

I had bought my first digital camera shortly after the near coincident catastrophic failure of three 35mm cameras. I was always mildly obsessed by photography, something, like liking knives, I inherited from my father. My very first camera was not an Instamatic, but a serious (well, serious-ish, old, second-hand, war booty) German 35mm, and for many years I didn't look back.

After his death, I inherited my father's cameras and have been away in my time with Praktika and Olympus bodies and six lenses! But in 2002-3, all of my 35mm cameras gave up the ghost.

On a whim, just before a day I thought I might appreciate having a camera to hand, I bought a Canon Ixus. I was immediatrely converted: the thing I had never conceived was the idea that I could shoot hundreds of photos in one shoot. Setting, composition - thought - could all be set aside, as in a collection of a couple of hundred shots, there'd always be four or five which were worthwhile. This is, of course, balderdash. Without realising it, I'd sacrificed most of the hard-earned fun of photography for the meretricious satisfaction of instant gratification. There was no reason to stop using the Ixus, as I'd not really noticed that my approach to photography had changed completely. What stopped me in my tracks was another coincidence: a fault in the camera, and hearing one of my children saying that Daddy used to take really nice photos.

So I bought the Kodak: a bridge camera as I said above, and began to relearn the art of photography, but with the luxury of feeling encouraged by the very cheap price of memory of being able to make lots of mistakes. Over the last year and a half I have got more and more used to having the camera at my side again, and to have the feeling that recording the world is good.

And allied to this was the realisation that the Kodak simply wasn't up to what I wanted: this is no reflection on it, as it does exactly what it is asked to do. But if you want to set out on a big job, you need decent tools.

More Canon tools, as it happens. An EOS Digital SLR, with an 18-55 lens and a 55-250 telephoto lens to go with it. The power is awesome: full control again over depth of field and focus, the option to use real filters, but all of this allied to the option of fully digitised images (including the option of RAW format) to enable me to do whatever post-processing I might ever find myself wanting to do.

In an odd sort of way, this feels like growing up - I have achieved in my time exactly what my father achieved in his, and I feel a sense of contentment as I feel the weight of a proper camera again, and one I have to use the viewfinder for instead of that ***** screen on the back. This is what the modern age should be about.

.

A Prayer For Priests

.

This prayer, which was sent to me for whatever reason by the Priestly Society of St Peter, is a good one to try to say every day during this Year of the Priest.

O, Jesus, I pray for Your faithful and fervent priests; for Your unfaithful and tepid priests; for Your priests labouring at home and abroad in distant mission fields; for your lonely and desolate priests; for Your young priests; for Your dying priests.

Above all I recommend to You the priests dearest to me: the priest who baptised me; the priests who absolve me; the priests at whose Masses I assist and who give me Your Body and Blood in Holy Communion; the priests who have taught and instructed me; all the priests to whom I am indebted in any other way.

O, Jesus, keep them all close to Your heart, and bless them abundantly in time and eternity. Amen

What Do Others Write About?

.
It's fun: click on the pictures to see what bloggers have been blogging about.

Fr Ray:

Fr Tim:

Fr Z:

Mac:

What Do I Write About?

.
I like this.
.

For Father Z

.

To make Fr Z feel at home while in this green and pleasant.

.

The tits come to feed here, as well.

.

Forty Years On

.
And I remember my eleven year old self being got up at some uneartly hour by excited - yes, excited: that was strange - parents to watch TV, a TV which was strictly rationed as a rule.

I can still remember the feel of the pyjamas and the dressing gown I'd been given the previous Christmas. Half awake, I watched some grainy black and white TV footage, and was then sent back to bed.

Were my parents dressed or in nightclothes? I have no idea. But apart from the memory of the feel of the clothes, and the fact that I, but not my older sister (girl) or younger brother (baby) had been woken up, the memory I have is of those grainy black and white images.

What were you doing when Man landed on the Moon?

Yawning. And wearing pyjamas and a dressing gown. And watching TV.

And vaguely realising that this must be some massive deal, if I'd been woken up to watch television.

Archbishop Nichols: Better And Better

.
The latest information, courtesy of Damian Thompson here, is that Archbishop Nichols has continued his public ministry of dewreckovating by dereordering his private chapel. This is really important news: a statement of where this Archbishop is vis-à-vis both the Pope and vis-à-vis his predecessor.

As you might expect, the entire English Catholic blogosphere is alive with encouragement and support for a new leader who seems to want to reorient English and Welsh Catholicsm.

Or, rather, it isn't.

Odd, that, isn't it.

(Honourable mention to Fr Ray, who picked up on the fact that the Archbishop of Westminster wrote a defence of Life in Friday's Telegraph, in the context of the suicide in Switzerland of the Downes.)

England At Its Best

.
England was looking pretty good earlier today.

PO'D, Again - And A Thought

.
I wonder what late-flowering plant Bishop O'Donoghue would take as his emblem? What angel spoke to him and invited him to a completely new and different witness?

There is an irony that would be lost on Tabletistas that PO'D is being prohetic in the way they like to use the word: that he is comparing and contrasting the great and good of this world against God's will; that he is speaking out on behalf of those who have no voice; and that he is doing this as fearlessly within the Church as without.

Unfortunately for the Tabletistas, this started off by disassociating his diocese from its children's society, which wanted to observe government regularions, and has now ended up criticising bishops for distancing themselves theologically from Peter, and to diocesan clergy for distancing themselves from their Bishops.

Now here's what I'm beginning to wonder: is PO'D Archbishop Vincent's stalking horse? Has he agreed to take up a series of positions which once would have been as obvious to Catholics as that night follows day, just to see which ones have the sort of traction that will allow His Grace to choose the right first field of battle on which to take on his - our - enemies?

Just a thought.

Archives and Muniments

.
Most of the last week has been spent in an archive, and the hay fever which started to take hold a couple of years ago, has been aggravated this year by whatever lives in dirty old papers.

But it's worth it!

Serving the TLM

.
Once a week, I serve Mass for a priest who has learned the EF but who is not allowed to celebrate it publically. I have to serve for him sometimes when nobody else is present, because, as the Mass is not public or announced, the only people who come to it are those whom he or I invite, and there is an understanding that invitations are not a way of making these private Masses public or regular celebrations: anybody who comes thinks it's a secret one-off.

It is hard to express just how special it is to serve a priest when there is nobody else present, especially when he says Mass at a great High Altar which was built as an expression of the triumph of the Holy Sacrifice. The server's role is always subservient to the priest's, but the Priest always emphasises his unworthiness, and as a result, the craftsman and his apprentice, Don Quixote and Sancho, approach the altar as one person who happens to be able to do something he scarcely ought to, and his assistant who worries that he can only get things wrong.

And in amidst the mistakes, the mispronunciations, the difficulties with working out the optional memoria, God appears on the altar and humbles us. After he has had Communion the priest turns and holds up the tiny white focus of light that I am about to recieve and gives me the chance to say on my behalf and on behalf of the odd visitor who happens to be there that we aren't actually worthy just before God gives us Himself anyway.

The moment the server sees which nobody else does comes just before the Consecration: as the priest prepares to bring God to earth, in the final moment before he commences to say the prayer Jesus said, he runs his fingers and thumb along the cloth on which the host is resting to ensure that any speck of anything which might have touched his fingers since the Lavabo, a few minutes before, when they were cleaned, can be removed. How much does what is about to happen matter!

Thinking Back

Sat in the back garden, watching huge cumulus slowly pass behind the hill like clippers in full sail, like in a film about the Battle of Britain, only in colour, my mind goes back to pasts I know, even though they take place before I was born.

Courtesy of Cathcon, I find my way to the site of Pathe News, and discover that the Whit Walks in Manchester from the 20s and 30s are now available for all to see here. This selection covers the years in which each of my parents made their First Holy Communion: are they here?

And in the wake of Archbishop Nichol's Enthronement, look here at those of Archbishops Griffin and Godfrey, and here at Archbishop Heenan's. Look especially at this last one and see somebody who really fits into the vestments and the role. Here is a man born to achieve this See, and to suffer for it.

Back to the clouds.

St. Thérèse's Astronaut Visits Vatican

.
From Zenit. I can't think of a single thing that's wrong with this story.

VATICAN CITY, JUNE 24, 2009 (Zenit.org).- The U.S. astronaut who carried relics of St. Thérèse of Lisieux into space and put them in orbit around the earth attended Benedict XVI's general audience today.

On a Discovery shuttle mission one year ago, Colonel Ronald Garan brought the relics given to him by a Carmelite community in New Caney, Texas. The astronaut had called the women religious before his space flight to ask for prayers, and at that time he told them he could take some small item into space on behalf of the community.

The sisters reported that the words of St. Thérèse came to mind: "I have the vocation of an apostle. I would like to travel over the whole earth to preach your name and to plant your glorious cross on infidel soil. But oh, my beloved, one mission would not be enough for me, I would want to preach the Gospel on all five continents simultaneously and even to the most remote isles. I would be a missionary, not for a few years but from the beginning of creation until the consummation of the ages."

Garan stated that he will be bringing a second relic of the saint to space on his next mission, which is scheduled for March 2011.

The colonel is also the founder of the Manna Energy Foundation that, by using NASA technology and U.N. funding, is implementing a unique system to make potable water in the villages of Rwanda.

Posh Or What?

.

Things my mother would never had said to my father that my wife says to me:

"Can you stop off at Waitrose on the way home and pick up some lamb."

There was no Waitrose in North Manchester. There never will be.

Sainsbury's was posh enough. We did Tesco's.

My father did not "stop off" on his way back from work. He came home.

My mother shopped when she shopped. She didn't miss things.

Because you know what you're eating ever day.

My father did not get involved with "food shopping". He worked.

"Some lamb" would have been meaningless to him. A leg is "some lamb"; so is a chop.

And if they thought that en famille we'd be eating curry on a Wednesday evening they'd be worrying. And then they'd remember that "down South" is a foreign country and that they do things differently there.

Fr Rolheiser

.
Is it just me? Each week I look at the back page of the Catholic Herald, hoping that there won't be an article, and each week the enigmatic face is there, and I feel as though another little bit of oxygen has been stolen from the atmosphere.

Why is he in the Herald? Can the Tablet not afford his column?

Coincidence?

.
Is it really just a coincidence that just as Peter is locked into trying to exert his authority over the Austrian Bishops, the SSPX announces that it is going to ordain 30 new priests?

Is there a sense in which wishing a plague on both their houses might be licit?

More About The Past

.
One of the problems of researching Modern History is coming across the relentlessness of anno domini.

A friend found a reference in a 1945 document to Squadron Leader Newton-John, and established that, yes, it was Olivia's father.

He then found out that she's 60.

Learning About The Moral Compass From The Past

.

From the Telegraph, about Bletchley Park:

"Mr Greenish is the one who now paces the potholed paths and contemplates the task of rescuing what he believes is the single most important British site of the Second World War. He is up against Government indifference, but his vision is compelling: to use Bletchley's legacies of rigour and selfless service to lead a renaissance in the teaching of mathematics and the idea of public service.

At a time when incomprehensible financial instruments have brought down the banks, and MPs have lost their moral compass in a mire of expense abuses, does not the work of the devoted mathematicians who worked in secret for the national good not offer a refreshing model of service for modern Britain?

Mr Greenish certainly thinks so. "If we look at what was done at Bletchley, proper maths, proper analysis, everything recorded and accounted for, and if we look at the morality of those who worked here, who never spoke a word about what they did and when asked to keep the secret for the rest of their lives, have done, it is an example for the nation," he argues."

Mac's Meme

.

Mac tagged me for a meme: "How Many Statues Do You Have?"

The rules are simple. Count the number of statues in your house (NB. priests are not allowed to count the statues in their church as well as the ones in their house... unfair advantage!!) Describe the statues, and/or put up some photos. Then tag three people. I'm keeping the tag number low so that everyone has a chance to tag someone...

I went round the house counting and am ashamed to say that I reached a total of ... one! (And that one's really a holy water bottle from Lourdes.)

There's a crucifix in every room except the bathrooms.

Likewise, there's at least one holy picture.

There are icons (Russian and Greek).

There are devotional books, Missals, Breviaries.

But there are no statues, and I'm at a loss to work out what's happened to them. Where are St Anthony of Padua and St Martin de Porres? Where is the one of the BVM crushing the serpent's head? This is a deep mystery and one I shall set out to solve.

In the meantime, I tag: Phil and Kirk, even though they use Wordpress, and Brother James.

Eye Candy

.
For well dressed Bishops. From Spain.

Here's An Idea!

.
This comes from Fr Hunwicke's combox and might be the best possible way of stopping some of the terrible celebrations of Mass that many of us seem to have to endure regularly. Film the priest, then:

"They should be obliged to watch a recording of their mass to get something of what the people experience."

Yes, they should.

Archbishop Nichols' Opportunity

.
It suddenly became clear to me, as I was reflecting on a blogospheric contretemps in which I had become involved, that Archbishop Nichols has a tabula rasa in front of him.

When Cormac Murphy O'Connor was enthroned, he had little choice other than to try to maintain the position Cardinal Hume had established of "nice Christian Archbishop", at a time when the Anglican Church seemed keen on tearing itself apart. Apart from the annoyingly false accent, MO'C seemed to fit the bill to perfection, but the bill, and his relatively liberal Catholicsm, locked him into a place in the Establishment which I'm sure he didn't want, and in which he didn't fit.

Archbishop Nichols has a wonderful opportunity in front of him, because there are no such expectations weighing on him. As Nulabour expires painfully before us, so does soft political Christianity: it's not really a surprise that ++Cormac has turned down Blairs "'Faith' Foundation" because it showed itself up as the reductio ad absurdam it was always bound to be the moment Tone opened his mouth about it. But the silencing of the Cardinal is the Archbishop's opportunity: ++Vincent doesn't have to go anywhere ++Cormac went or might have been going.

And that's just the public square: what about his own constituency, the Church in England and Wales? It's his for the taking if he will lead. There are all sorts of single issue Catholics who want to impose their own monoculture on the way we live our Faith: (I was going to post a list but you can build your own: start with CAFODistas and with Lefebvrites); but ++Vincent doesn't need to bother with them. Nobody has any hold at all over him at the moment.

His interview about leaving Liverpool at the time when the Archdiocese seized on the Stalinist certainties of late 70s trade unionism, and opened itself for the Worlockian era rings another bell: he left. He knows how to make a break.

On behalf of the Catholic Association of Catholic Catholics for Catholic Catholicsm, I adopt the "sitting back carefully glass in hand and looking relaxed while watching closely for the signs which are likely to become apparent soon" position. The glass may need the odd refill, but I am confident we'll see our man in action soon.
.

D-Day

.
At the Commonwealth War Graves Commission Cemetery in Bayeux an inscription reads:

NOS A GUILLEMO VICTI VICTORIS PATRIAM LIBERAVIMUS

Borrowed from Iain Dale

.
Knock Knock

Who's there?

Hazel

Hazel who?

That's politics

Yorkshire Airlines

.
So close to Lancashire, it's almost unfair.

What Happens When A Church Loses Its Faith?

.
You see words like "postchristian", and you find people who "are Church", and you meet people who attend religious services on Sundays that are as unlike the religion we are used to as it is possible to be.

I can cope with fundamentalist Protestants; in fact, I sometimes like them: they have gone out looking for God's Will, and even if their discernment is shot to pieces, they have started from the right place and are aiming for the right place.

But what happens when the Church you belong to stops believing that its function is to bring people to a knowledge and love of God, and to his service?

This happens.

I came across this while trying to find out something about ekkklesia, a think tank Damian Thompson regularly (and, I now find, quite rightly) lambasts. I saw that one of its employees was a member of the Moot Community (although they seem to eschew the capital letter themselves as on a point of principle) and went out to find more about it.

"moot is a developing community of spiritual travellers who are seeking to find a means of living a life that is honest to god and honest to now. moot seeks to make connections and find inspirations in the meeting of faith, life and culture.

moot looks to the christian call for justice, equity and balance as a means of living politically and ethically. we recognise the inspiration of saints, mystics, philosophers and artists throughout the centuries.

moot seeks to live a christian spiritual rhythm of life through practicising presence, acceptance, creativity, balance, accountability and hospitality."

The politest thing that I can say is that this is the manifesto of the hermeneutic of rupture. If anybody cares enough to wade through the website to find out what these people do, be warned that you are in for a fairly boring experience: deep down, these people worship themselves.

I found this a couple of days ago and have been bothered ever since. (Mithered, to be absolutely accurate, but there's a few of you wouldn't get it.)

I think, somewhat tentatively, but with increasing assurance, that I'd rather somebody took up Free Presbyterianism than this. And this is far from being the rudest thing I could say.