URGENT ANNOUNCEMENT: The Pontifical High Mass in the Traditional Latin Rite due to be offered in Cardiff Cathedral on Sunday 18 May at 11.00 am has been cancelled at the last moment. The LMS withdrew its involvement with this Mass after the Cathedral Dean insisted that a lady server be present in the Sanctuary during Mass. The LMS apologises to members and supporters for the disappointment and inconvenience caused. For those who might wish to register a polite protest the telephone number for the Cathedral Dean is 029 2023 1407. Email: cardiff.met.cath@btinternet.comThis all seems a pity. I should have thought it was fairly obvious that the Latin Mass Society would not be willing to accept the participation of women altar servers in the sanctuary. That could have been diplomatically explained to any women who usually serve at the Cathedral. After all, nobody is obliged to attend the extraordinary form and I am sure there were other Masses that people could have participated in today at the Cathedral.
Perhaps it was meant to be a "test case"; if so, I suppose it is one of those things that needs to be clarified by the Ecclesia Dei Commission.
42 comments:
Hrmmm...
Of course, I agree with the LMS' actions, but I don't actually want to come across as partisan. However, correct me if I'm wrong, but I always thought there was some rubric which forbad female servers until the Mass of Paul VI.
Is the Cathedral Dean playing 'political correctness' with Our Blessed Lord? I sincerely hope not. Was the Dean acting out on his own incentive? Any strings being pulled from higher echelons? Well, whatever the case, how very sad. And what of the female altar server, was she put up as a 'pawn' in this game or was she going to be part of the service no matter what the cost. You know, so steeped in pride that it was all about 'her' and nothing else matters?
Yes, questions need to be asked and the whole issue clarified urgently before it could happen again.
I too was very sorry to hear of this, and I don't understand the reasons for the dean's insistence - after all, female servers are not compulsory.
Things are very different at Lancaster cathedral, where I have served the traditional mass a few times now. The MC there is a young woman whom I don't know personally but who is well thought of by the cathedral clergy. Of course, she has not been able to serve the traditional masses there and, although I think she would like to be able to do so, there has been absolutely no fuss. And there should be no fuss.
I've just come across this on the Spectator Coffee House Blog and would flag it on my blog but many more folk read yours (not tricky - mine's in a state of neglect at the moment), so I thought I'd tell you about it instead.
I thought the LMS shouldn't have had a hissy fit and just gone ahead and done the Mass woman server or not. Does she know the responses? Does she know where/when to stand/sit/kneel? Then they should have shut their pieholes and not inconvenienced a lot of people or brought their own servers who they wanted especially.
This sort of thing would make me LESS likely to attend regularly...to know that they COULD have had a Mass, but then didn't because even though there is no canon law forbidding a woman from serving in this function, they acted like 10 year olds in a clubhouse with a "no grils alowd" sign. I'm thinking "keep your clubhouse" and stick it where the moon don't shine.
What does it say about *them* that if the server happens to be a female they can't deal with it? The Mass changes slowly over time with organic additions. And frankly women/girl servers are organic additions. I bet the LMS wouldn't get bent out of shape if the women helped take up the collection or count it or clean the sanctuary. A PORTER'S job. IF they're going to have a hissy fit about a laywoman standing in for acolyte they ought to have a hissy fit about women standing in for porters, and if that's the case then the MEN can do all the vacuuming too while their at it. And they can roll up the pennies too. "Z" can put that in his pipe and smoke it.
JMO. Naturally.
lady server is very polite, i prefer the word 'serviettes'.
If the PCED's decrees are any indication, they are more than willing to accomodate any modernization of the TLM in the direction of the Novus Ordo.
So, should we even ask PCED to intervene?
The LMS have done the right thing, thanks be to God. So long Catholics are not astonished at motherhood--spiritual and biological--then we will be confused about the role of women. One altar girl recently asked why girls cannot be priests. She might as well have asked why can't men be mothers.
If there is anyone out there who finds this line of thinking demeaning to women, perhaps that is because you have not grapsed how astonishing motherhood is.
I had arranged to make a flying visit my daughter late on Saturday and together we would attend the Mass on the Sunday.
However, on the advice of the notice on the LMS website, I cancelled.
But on the sunday, my daughter popped into the Cathedral to see what had happened, and discovered a Latin Mass just ending (presumably the Novus Ordo)
It strikes me that if the Bishops don't want traditional Masses in their Cathedrals, all they have to do now is insist on female altar servers. Neat huh?
But very disappointing
Test case? Not at all, Dear Father! The Dean of the Cardiff Cathedral probably knows VERY WELL what the supporters of the Extraordinary Form are willing to undertake and female altar servers are certainly not one.
I see no good will from him. Just the will to be a nuisance as much as possible, in order to provoke what's finally happened. That man is unworthy of his title of Dean, and it says a lot about the state of the Church in the present day. How unfortunate...
caritam non habemus
The real battle is one of cultures: two opposing and, I believe, mostly mutually antagonistic worldviews came into conflict in this story. One is riven with quasi-marxist PC-ism; the other belongs to a wiser Church. Was it in fact a deliberate provocation? If so, it is exactly the lack of charity the Holy Father's motu proprio warned everyone to avoid.
I am in two minds about the LMS's decision not to go ahead. My immediate reaction was to say, "Yes, well done - give way on small things now and the Restoration will be mired in little battles before it even starts". After all, to change mentalities is the work of several generations. Living in Russia as I do, one sees very clearly every day here just what a struggle it is for Russians to finally lift themselves clear of Stalinism.
But one must also take into account the Instruction "Redemptionis Sacramentum" (On certain matters to be observed or to be avoided regarding the Most Holy Eucharist), 25th March 2004, from the Congregation for Divine Worship and the Discipline of the Sacraments. It states:
"[47.] It is altogether laudable to maintain the noble custom by which boys or youths, customarily termed servers, provide service of the altar after the manner of acolytes, and receive catechesis regarding their function in accordance with their power of comprehension.[119] Nor should it be forgotten that a great number of sacred ministers over the course of the centuries have come from among boys such as these.[120] Associations for them, including also the participation and assistance of their parents, should be established or promoted, and in such a way greater pastoral care will be provided for the ministers. Whenever such associations are international in nature, it pertains to the competence of the Congregation for Divine Worship and the Discipline of the Sacraments to establish them or to approve and revise their statutes.[121] Girls or women may also be admitted to this service of the altar, at the discretion of the diocesan Bishop and in observance of the established norms".
In the absence of a clear Vatican Instruction on the saying of the EF, perhaps the best advice to the LMS would be to check things out thoroughly in advance of any Mass, and get it in writing.
"This all seems a pity. I should have thought it was fairly obvious that the Latin Mass Society would not be willing to accept the participation of women altar servers in the sanctuary."
Even if it wasn't obvious it is clear that the LMS made it so, the Dean is obviously against the Latin Mass and so has acted like a spoilt brat and a bully. I hate bullies, this person is not suitable for his position and should be removed, I won't hold my breath.
Its a sad day when Catholics aren't welcome in Catholic churches.
I honestly don't think it needs clarification, does it ?
It's called pastoral insensitivity.
.
On this subject, one of my co-bloggers is looking for help with finding the passage from Pope Gelasius cited by Benedict XIV:
"“Pope Gelasius in his ninth letter (chap. 26) to the bishops of Lucania condemned the evil practice which had been introduced of women serving the priest at the celebration of Mass. Since this abuse had spread to the Greeks, Innocent IV strictly forbade it in his letter to the bishop of Tusculum: ‘Women should not dare to serve at the altar; they should be altogether refused this ministry.’ We too have forbidden this practice in the same words in Our oft-repeated constitution Etsi Pastoralis, sect. 6, no. 21. ” - Benedict XIV, enc. Allatae sunt, 1755"
Any references/suggestions/interpretations? If so do leave them here or at ours. Muchos thanks!
Father, you should be careful about posting e-mail addresses, because if too many e-mails are sent to one address in a short period of time, the e-mail account is likely to be suspended. I shall warn Fr Z as well.
@ Simon Platt
How wonderful is to see that Lancaster welcomes the Latin Mass the proper way. Let me congratulate you, because you guys are an example for the rest of the Church :)
Perhaps the Revd. the Dean ought to have the following Letter brought to his attention. It is from the Congregation for Divine Worship, July 27, 2001, clarifying the 1994 Legislative Texts letter which originally allowed for female altar servers.
The pertinent phrase is:
"...such an authorization [to allow altar girls] may not, in any way, exclude men or, in particular, boys from service at the altar, nor require that priests of the diocese would make use of female altar servers" (my emphasis).
This is one change in a line of other changes from above...
Michael Davis warned in his lifetime that the PCED are not sympathetic to traditional sensitivities. They have already tried to fiddle with the 1962 Missal by incorporating changes from 1965 onwards, until Una Voce frankly said that this would not be supported and that it will only confirm what the SSPX have suspected for a long time: Rome is dishonest with traditional Catholics and posessed with the typical post-conciliar frenzy, that any change = good change. It should be clear from their waspish response to the Bishops in E & W about the Holyday fiasco, that "mutual enrichment" is only one way for the liturgical wreckers in Rome. Already Ignatius press have been crassly presumptuous and incorporated prefaces from the Novus Ordo into a mass booklet. At this rate the 1962 Missal will be unrecognizable in a half a century. Cut and paste at will seems to be the order of the day and the PCED love every minute of it.
About 90% of todays Catholic clergymen or self-styled "traditionalist reform of the reformers" (maybe with the exception of the Holy Father) do not grasp concept of preservation. There is nothing, no matter how time tested or sacred, that can't be manipulated to suit immediate needs. This is exactly the reason why I have my doubts about this "Reform of the Reform" movement. They wish to incorporate all failed innovations from post 1962 onwards, in order to appear "obedient" to Rome. It is the worst form of ultramontanism possible. In their thinking, if it seems like a good idea at the time, then by all means, plug and play. If you give a someone with a conniving agenda a toe in the door, they'll use it to kick the door in.
Happens every time. It's human nature.
What I do not understand is how this could have been insisted upon: does not a server for a TLM need lengthy training and memorization of much Latin? Who would have trained a woman who even had the knowledge of what to teach? An unprepared server has no business at the Mass regardless of gender.
Does it occur to no one but myself that just because a girl or woman serves at the altar, that doesn't mean she's some sort of left wing PC hack? Maybe she just wants to be close to God in the same way that her brother has to opportunity to be? Why are our motives ALWAYS questioned? I wish I could change some men into woman and live back in the 50's when men throughly patronized women's abilites. "don't worry your pretty little head about such things....blah, blah...hand me a cocktail...."
So if you like the Latin Mass you automatically have to believe that women should sit at the back of the bus and bow and be doormats?
James M: Glad we're not related, because we'd have gotten into arguments every thanksgiving on why girls can't be doctors, engineers , etc.and just stick to "womanly things" because, by God, the best judge of what a "womanly thing" is is what a man says it is. I'm not a mother, so I suppose that makes me less of a woman in your eyes.
I fully accept that women can't be priests on the grounds of form/matter -- Jesus only instituted that job for men. Why, we don't know. Maybe it would be okay...but we DON'T know...so in that case it makes sense to be conservative. If Jesus were alive today, would he have used Hawaiian fruit punch and tortillas to confect the Host? I wouldn't chance that either.
But serving at Mass is something absolutely man-made...and by that I mean human rule. Again.....if you guys are so insistent about women not serving, then you can do the cleaning, the locking up, counting the money and all those things too since they are "men's jobs." If the're "men only" then DO THEM ALL...and stop being wussies about when it suits you and when it doesn't. Have the testicular fortitude to enforce that. But somehow I wouldn't bet the farm that you'd follow through on that either.
As for some pope centuries ago forbidding this and forbidding that...that was THEN, this is NOW. Social customs change over time.
The LMS also could have avoided this. There is no theological objection to female servers. The issue has nothing to do with arguments about women priests. Priests represent the male Christ; servers do not. The main argument against female servers is that boys will not want to perferm the role with girls and future priests vare nurtured by being servers but that is another matter. The same applies to girl choristers in Cathedrals but most Cathedrals have seperate choirs. The LMS has been made to look silly and if that was the intention of the cathedral authorities, the LMS has walked into the trap.
Remember that UNA voce is also represented by the Association for Latin Liturgry in the UK. The ALL supports Latin in the liturgy whatever the rite.
Sadley I think this matter has already been addressed, and not in the way that we might like, girls are not forbidden to serve at the Ritus Antiquior! However,it must be said that the permission to use female altar servers related to a "pastoral demand" which could harldly be sustained with regard to those who prefer the Classical Rite. In any event on a pastoral level the Dean's behaviour is a disgrace!
Stephanus Ferrarius - Sydney
No one appears to have mentioned this yet, so I will.
The matter of female altar servers is not (up until now, anyway) covered in the rubrics of the Mass, but in the universal law of the Latin rite. That law allows an indult for female altar servers. Many canonists are convinced that, pending further clarification from Rome, the universal law would apply here, regardless of which set of books is used.
That being said, it would appear unseemly for anyone to tell the priest celebrating the Mass whom he can and cannot have to serve him. I don't know whether the LMS made the right decision -- short run, maybe; long run, not so sure -- but I cannot imagine many girls or women who are sufficiently well versed in serving the Traditional Mass, unless they would object to the use of women themselves.
Maybe six female torchbearers. They could call them "vestal virgins." Just a thought.
Does this female altar server exist ? If so, where did she learn to serve the 1962 Mass ? If she exists, then she will, herself, realize that her place is not on the sanctuary for this Mass, and she would not have wished to be at the centre of so much bad feeling. She would have naturally stepped down on this occasion. Was she present at the evening rehearsal on May 15th ? Or was she mentioned as being part of the team at that rehearsal so as to annoy the LMS man.
Details, mere details, but we know who is always in the detail.
Having just read this announcement I am deeply saddened by it. I should have thought it would stand to reason that women servers would not participate in a Latin Mass and this could have been explained without any offence to those in question. My daughters used to serve at Mass but were aware that this was not appropriate during a Latin Mass and they were 10, 11, and 13 years of age.
Surely avoiding disappointing a congregation anticipating and looking forward to a Latin Mass, would have outweighed any offence that could have been taken by one lady altar server (whom I am sure would not have been upset but would have put her love of God and the Church first). Humility is a virtue we all need to strive for.
Dear gemoftheocean, we all have our duties and roles on this earth, men and women compliment eachother they are not identical (and they are equal only in the eyes of God).
Yes, i jump up and down when i've had enough of the housework which is never equally shared. But I try to remember that everything I do is for the love and glory of God and if I don't moan it might shorten my term in purgatory.
On the other hand men don't have it that easy either:
Western men die some five years earlier than women. They suffer more from nearly every medical disease and ailment that there is. And yet, far more money is spent by governments on women's health than on men's health. Men are also nowadays educationally disadvantaged significantly compared to women; with the curriculum, the teaching methods and the resources being designed to cater far more for women and girls than for men and boys. Men make up 80% of the homeless. There are more of them in social service care-homes as boys. They are many times more likely to be wrongfully arrested, wrongfully imprisoned, mugged, assaulted or murdered. They are 5 times more likely to lose their children when families break down, 4 times more likely to lose their homes, 4 times more likely to commit suicide, 20 times more likely to be killed or injured at work, 20 times more likely to be imprisoned, and, probably, more than 100 times more likely to be demeaned, denigrated and ridiculed by the mainstream media. Men also pay much more in taxes than women but receive far less in benefits from the government.
In other words, when compared to women, men are significantly disadvantaged when it comes to their health, their lifespans, their homes, their children, their education, their families, the tax burden, the law, the benefit system, and even when it comes to their own personal safety.
So let's all avoid the politically correct aim for 'equality' between 'men' and 'women'
"The LMS also could have avoided this. There is no theological objection to female servers...."
Not a theological one, so much as psychological, or pastoral. While all other liturgical functions of the layman serve the assembly, only the acolyte (altar server) serves the priest. This implies a relationship which the others do not possess. It is why even the 1994 decree allowing female altar servers acknowledged the traditional role of the acolyte as fostering vocations to the priesthood.
gemoftheocean:
Sorry, but I respectfully have to differ. Rome allowing female servers was in no way an organic change. The change was rather very inorganic. Rome has always condemned female altar servers. At some point it even used a rather harsh language when referring to this practice. Than, right after the V-II, when the liberal influence was so strong that everybody thought that the Church had change and when many priests had gone wild, many abuses crept it into the liturgy. These include female altar servers. Rome, like in many other cases, instead of saying NO, allowed this practice. It was not an organic change but response of weak Rome to the liberal abuses of that time. If female altar servers are to be classed as organic change then perhaps communion on hand all other early abuses are as well.
Fr. Tim,
Elizabeth's comment is music to my (male) ears. Whenever I attend Masses where the priest has a penchant for fem-speak liturgical abuses ("Pray, sisters and brothers, that this sacrifice..." etc. etc.) and is clearly trying to up the female presence in the sanctuary, it makes me think that all seminarians should be made to sit a mathematics and statistics exam before being ordained.
Why don't these priests just look at the gender composition of their congregations? Women are in the majority and "alienating" them isn't the problem with the liturgy. It's men who are the Catholic Church's major evangelization challenge, and everything that feminizes the liturgy -- altar girls, linguistic manipulation, the mum's army of extraordinary ministers -- alienates the men and diminishes their interest in attending Mass.
The attempt to introduce a female altar server at Cardiff Cathedral has wider ramifications than deforming the extraordinary rite and deterring boys from an office which has always been a big generator of priestly vocations, important as these matters are. Ultimately, it's about whether there will be any men at all in Catholic congregations in 25 years' time.
I cannot see how female servers could be regarded as an authentic liturgical development. One of the aims of the liturgical reforms was supposed to be a removal of later accretions & restoration of ancient form of the liturgy. Many of the changes consist of a reintroduction of older customs which had fallen out of use eg the ambo, or borrowings from other Rites which were believed to be more primitive than the Roman, eg concelebration. We can debate whether these reintroductions were wise or pastorally effective, but at least they have historical precedent. There is no precedent for female servers. Surely this is an example of a "late accretion" which the liturgical renewal was supposed to remove?
Gemoftheocean,
How can a woman be less in anyone's eyes for not having biological children? Is this supposed to apply to St Catherine of Sienna, or St Theresa of Avila, or St Joan of Arc, or St Benedicta of the Cross, or Blessed Teresa of Calcutta or SS Agatha, Lucy or Cecilia??
Gem, no doubt you have very many spiritual children! May your reward in Heaven be great.
I'm sorry to say the truth of the matter is that the LMS has accepted every single innovation that has been added to the "old Mass", including the 1962 changes and including (somewhat perversely) the new Good Friday prayer for the Jews. It's the same mentality whereby we have new "old" Missals (with St Oliver still just "Blessed Oliver" - Ahem!) with the Luminous Mysteries of John Paul II in their appendices. More and more priests are reading the "readings" in English (again, somewhat perversely - Why translate the least important bit of the Mass and leave the most important in Latin?) and more and more "traditional" Masses seem to be turning in "dialogue" Masses, with people joining in with the bits they know/like. "Traditionalists" have blithely gone along with the surrender of the non-Marian Holy Days of Obligation. (How many "old" Masses are going to be Masses of Corpus Christi on Sunday?) As the old Latin Mass becomes more "mainstream" we will inevitably see more and more communions on the hand at the old Mass and eventually female altarboys at the old Mass as well.
And it will of course all be grist to the SSPX mill.
I see that Mr. McCarthy is increasingly optimistic on the FSSPX and that the current situation will benefit them.
We've seen it worldwide. Your "crusade" is to deprive other traditional movements of all legitimacy to perform the Old Mass. So I won't fall into your wicked game, Sir.If you wanna be a Ghetto-Catholic, I'm fine with that, but I won't be dragged by your fears towards the Luminous Mysteries or the "somewhat perverted" (I love the expression) Good Friday prayer for the Jews...The first you're given a choice to pick. The second it's compulsory. But then, again, that's for the ones that want to stick to the Catholic Church, not the ones that have set a Parallel Church around themselves, claiming that they are better than His Holiness himself. I've always been taught that problems are faced to be solved. Whining is of no use.
I can see that, very much like the Left-Wing catholics, you guys are pretty nervous that Benedict XVI is putting the Liturgy back on track. Now, the SSPX not alone celebrating, so you have to whine about any single thing that you don't like, suffering the self-inflicted paranoia that everybody else will be thinking like you. That's why you permit yourself of INSULTING the LMS gratuitously, saying, in the end, that they will end up being bi-ritualistic... Your capacity of abstraction, Sir, is wonderful. You should write Literature, instead of wasting yourself on the Internet. Really, leave the topic to the ones that have still some foot on the ground.
Like we say in Spain "se os ve venir", we can see you coming. By far.
@ Miguel Vinuesa
Thanks for your kind comments, but the credit isn't mine. Credit should go to the Dean of Lancaster, Canon Shield, who is a great friend of the traditional mass, and to the lady server concerned, whose name I don't know. I'm just an occasional interloper in the sanctuary there.
(Those living closer to Lancaster than Miguel does might like to know that the next traditional mass at Lancaster cathedral will be a missa cantata tomorrow at 12.15)
With regard to the situation in Cardiff, several people have commented along the lines "how can she have gained the necessary skills to serve mass - surely it's not possible". I would disagree. One has to start somewhere and, besides, it's not that hard. And for a high mass the sacred ministers make the responses. It would have been be quite feasible for the cathedral's regular servers to play a part on the sanctuary, for example as torchbearers. And this would have been a Good Thing - but only for the men and boys.
How UNPASTORAL!
Is it customary for female servers to take part in ordinary form pontifical Masses?
Thank God Cardinal Egan does not use female servers. They are sometimes forced upon him when he visits parishes. However, at St. Patrick's its only males as is proper.
Ah, Bishop Vinuesa has spotted my wicked game! Zounds! The game is up! Curses! (Etc.)
I’m certainly no apologist for the SSPX. Many of their priests are actually leading the way on nonsense such as Dialogue Masses and readings in English (or French, rather).
The “Old Mass” (by which I think he means Mass in the old rite) is not a performance.
I didn’t write that the Good Friday prayer was “perverted”. Insisting on the new prayer but the old rite however is decidedly weird. But then so is the SSPX’s attachment to the 1962 Missal, despite their brickbats against the Pope who promulgated it and the agenda he embraced!
I’ve been a member of the LMS for fourteen years and know a little bit about it. I know a good deal less about the SSPX, with whom I’ve only ever had indirect contact.
Oliver, you wrote:
"Many of their priests are actually leading the way on nonsense such as Dialogue Masses..."
Among the perpetrators of the "nonsense" are several Popes of the early 20th century, including Pope Pius XI, who actively promoted the "dialogue Mass" as early as 1937 (the copyright on my St Andrew Daily Missal which instructs the faithful accordingly). As to Corpus Christi being celebrated on a Sunday, I don't know about the UK, but Pope Leo granted the USA an indult to do just that in the 1880s.
Which would mean the conspiracy is far worse than even YOU imagined.
So that's all right then!
Phew!
So long as the Conspiracy includes every Pope since Pius IX there's clearly no need to worry about the suicidal course the Church has been on for the last century and we can all rest easy in our beds.
So, to get back to my point...
Pope John Paul II approved of female altarboys.
Pope Benedict XVI approves of female altarboys - and he likes the "old Mass" as well, so he must be OK.
Every Pope in our lifetime (for the next hundred years, at any rate) will also approve of female altarboys.
Sooner or later the LMS will cave in, just as the rest of the Church has.
Conspiracy?
What know they of Conspiracy that only the Conspiracy know?
"So long as the Conspiracy includes every Pope since Pius IX there's clearly no need to worry about the suicidal course the Church has been on..."
It was Pius XI, actually. And whatever dark days the Church has endured in Her history, She has retained the promise of Christ, as opposed to a "suicidal course."
I'm not sure you have a point, but I know I do.
That John Paul II was pope when female altar servers were approved is true. Beyond that, there is sufficient testimony that, not only did he not personally approve of them, but was displeased that his reply to a canonical query was taken by some curial officials as a go-ahead for letting the genie out of the bottle.
There is no evidence that Pope Benedict is a party to this either. He did not approve them, and one has yet to see them in any Mass he celebrates, and altar service in the Vatican is still limited to males. Can he change the practice? Well, he can issue a decree, but can he enforce it? Is there a point to issuing a decree which he has no chance of enforcing, or does he allow time to wear away at innovations, by allowing the free use of a timeless alternative?
Which bring me to MY point. The traditional Mass is back. The war is over, and we won. Now we have to build on that, whatever the resistance. We need to have some sense of proportion here. The TLM is not rampant with cases of altar girls being thrust on people; the incidents are very rare. This case is even rarer, in that the celebrant's own wishes were not taken into account, which makes it even more serious, and highly unlikely that it will be repeated.
But at some point, you are going to have to pick your battles with more care. We wanted Rome to show some authority in this matter, so we need to quit complaining when they do so. Let Rome be Rome!
"Is there a point to issuing a decree which he has no chance of enforcing, or does he allow time to wear away at innovations, by allowing the free use of a timeless alternative?"
I totally have to aggree with your point. Furthermore, I'd say that people like the Dean are a large minority in nowadays Church. The problem is that they either have a lot of power, or that they make a lot of noise, so that everyone thinks they are more. The "Silent majority" of the Church, is people that do what they have to do, and they don't nag about their duties. Publicity is of this world, after all...
I would not not say is "our" victory, for I don't feel I'm fighting a war. This is a Victory of the Church and of Our Lord, that is finally worshiped again with the right solemnity.
Fr. Z brought this up previously. We operate (regardless of the form of the Latin rite) under the current set of Canon Laws. If female servers are canonically allowed for the ordinary expression, they are allowed for the extraordinary expression. If receiving communion standing and in the hand is allowed for the ordinary expression, it's allowed for the extraordinary also.
Now don't get me wrong, I don't think that "allowed" necessarily translates into "should", but simply if this is to be addressed in the future, Canon law needs to be altered.
Of course, I'm not a Canon lawyer, so I welcome any who have more complete knowledge than I.
"Fr Z brought this up previously..."
He also said, if I recall correctly, that such was the opinion of most canonists, pending a clarification from Rome. Until then, all servers regardless of gender serve at the pleasure of the priest.
Am I the only one in this discussion who appears to notice that little fact?
Post a Comment