The Hermeneutic of Continuity

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Showing posts with the label laugh or cry

Missalette bonfire

December 06, 2009

Well I suppose we would all like to consign missalettes to the bonfire but being forced to do so by copyright legislation does seem one of the barmier consequences of the use of copyright on liturgical texts. See Jeffrey Tucker's article: Bonfire of the Missalettes

Rocket Science Examination

October 11, 2009

In addition to the magnificent crowds gathered at Aylesford yesterday , there was the Rosary Crusade of Reparation in Central London. Some of my parishioners went to this and were overwhelmed by the large crowd gathered for the procession from Wesminster Cathedral to the London Oratory where the day concluded with devotions and Benediction. Above is a picture from a small section of the over 2,000 crowd that came a couple of years ago when I was able to attend. It gives you a flavour of the international character of these events. It was possibly an unfortunate calendar clash that today also saw the Day With Mary at Westminster Cathedral. Nevertheless this was also well attended with hundreds of devout faithful taking part in Mass, processions and devotions to our Lady and to the Blessed Sacrament. So here is the Rocket Science Examination: UNIVERSITY OF THE FLIPPIN' OBVIOUS Bachelor of Commonsense Honours Degree Examination Rocket Science Level I (Faculty of drawing conclusions fr...

The atheist moral high ground

September 13, 2009

Above is one of the 20 coolest atheist t-shirts . Hmmm. Atheists have carried out various forms of torture and execution in the gulags of the Soviet Union, in North Korea, Cambodia, China, Mexico, and Spain, killing millions of people in the process in the unprecedented slaughters of the 20th century. But maybe they have never stoned anyone. I don't know.

Going Non-Canonical - and an alternative strategy

September 11, 2009

At the National Conference of the US Resource Center for Religious Institutes, to be held at the Atlanta Georgia Hilton hotel this October, one of the workshops is described as follows: Workshop #28: Going Non-Canonical Neal Smith, Mary David Walgenbach, OSB & Dan Ward, OSB The story of a small Benedictine community’s journey of becoming non-canonical. The content includes their ecumenical ministry, visioning process, development of an ecumenical board, relationship with the Federation of St. Gertrude and canonical and civil procedures for the transfer of assets. Mary David Walgenbach is indeed a good speaker for the topic since she and her fellow former Benedictine sister, Joanne Kollasch, have left their order but spent several years sewing up a legal arrangement whereby they could keep the assets and build a new property in Madison, Wisconsin. The new non-canonical, ecumenical foundation is called the Holy Wisdom Monastery . Bishop Morlino has forbidden priests from celebrating...

Abstinence? Don't even touch!

September 03, 2009

Creative Minority Report has a good piece on the advice given to students at schools in Long Island, New York. Apparently the danger of swine flu has prompted officials to advise youngsters not to touch each other. Strange, given the politically correct skepticism about abstinence programmes! (See: I Thought Abstinence Was Unrealistic .) CMR has better advice, surely: As studies (not shown here or even available anywhere) have clearly indicated, children are going to touch each other no matter what those in authority tell them, so it's best to simply protect the children so that they touch each other in the safest manner possible. Perhaps even full body condoms are the way to go. So we agree? Let's keep our kids safe.

Constitutional monarchy today

August 11, 2009

The sovereign of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland whose subject I am, has allowed the ancient protocol of walking backwards when leaving the room after seeing her, to be dropped. Apparently "royal aides", mindful of "health and safety issues" have said that somebody might get hurt and then sue Buckingham Palace for damages. In days gone by, suing the Sovereign would have got you damaged quite a lot more but one doesn't need to return to absolute monarchy to see that this ludicrous kow-towing to 'Elfin Safety makes a laughing-stock of the Queen's constitutional role. The passport I am carrying says proudly in the front: Her Britannic Majesty's Principal Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs requests and requires in the name of Her Majesty all those whom it may concern to allow the bearer to pass freely without let or hindrance and to afford the bearer such assistance and protection as may be necessary. That do...

Grumpy Britain

July 28, 2009

St Osmund and St Andrew's Primary School in Breightmet, Greater Manchester, is under investigation by Bolton Council because of complaints by neighbours that children laugh too loudly at playtime: Investigators have now caried out noises assessment tests to see if the levels of laughing exceed tolerable limits recommended by the World Health Organisation. Apparently the sports teacher also has an "annoying voice". Fortunately, Bolton council has found that the children's laughter "does not constitute a statutory noise nuisance". I wonder if perhaps the sports teacher's colleagues might stand him a drink if he manages to reach the statutory nuisance decibel level... See the Telegraph article: Children investigated for laughing too loudly

Beyond parody?

June 27, 2009

Mounted police, white van, three officers in body armour, follow-up visit by the hate crimes unit... for distributing an invitation to Easter services. It is going to be more and more difficult for Private Eye to parody this stuff. H/T Christian Concern for our Nation

Catholic Church discriminates against witches

June 19, 2009

A story doing he rounds over the last day or so is the complaint by a coven of witches against the Church for persecuting them by not allowing them to use a Catholic Church Hall for their annual "Witches Ball". (See: Witches' coven claims religious persecution after church hall ban ) Sandra Davis, the "high priestess" of Crystal Cauldron group in Stockport, said: "I thought we had made progress, that we could accept other people's religious paths." Well I suppose this brings up a thorny question about the whole religious dialogue business. If you look up the website of The Crystal Cauldron , much of what they say is pretty tame - they are fairly liberal witches in a way. They want to harm nobody, refrain from speaking ill of others, release the inner energy, be kind to all creatures and live in harmony with nature. (They even have a children's group called "Little Crystals".) They do believe in the "polarity of the deity", i...

More Blessed Sacrament Processions

June 16, 2009

Rome Oxford Arundel Papa Stronsay New Bedford MA St Thomas Aquinas, Zanesvill e Amsterdam Balornock And finally ... Linz

Sort out the reformation for me, would you, Sir Humphrey

March 30, 2009

Last Friday saw the debate in the House of Commons on the "Royal Marriages and Succession to the Crown (Prevention of Discrimination) Bill" which would modify the 1701 Act of Settlement by allowing royal claimants to marry a Catholic without forfeiting their claim to the throne. In fact, as Joseph has pointed out on Catholic Commentary , there are far more pressing cases of indirect discrimination against Catholics in Britain today (see: Real sources of anti-Catholic discrimination ) but it is always amusing to read MPs attempting to pronounce on religious matters (- arguably at least as funny as reading priests or Bishops trying to pronounce on political or economic matters.) Jack Straw, the Lord Chancellor, and Secretary of State for Justice seemed rather to be winging it as regards the contents of the Bill since Evan Harris had to point out to him that it concerned those who are allowed to marry into the line of succession, not those who might actually inherit the throne -...

Fr Mildew (and spirit-quenching global horror)

March 24, 2009

Fr Mildew was one of my teachers for a while at the John Fisher School in Purley and so I was interested in his reminiscences of his time there. Fr Clifton (to give him his real name) celebrates his golden jubilee this year and has been writing several posts on "My life from a religious perspective." The post on his time at Wonersh gives some details of life at the seminary in the 1950s. He also has chunks from a letter published in this week's Tablet. Let me give you a flavour: The ongoing revision of the ordinary rite, and the introduction of the extraordinary rite, together represent the same process of the surrender of the liturgy to the reactionary, spirit-quenching, traditionalist minority; and the surrender of the entire Church runs in parallel, making a mockery of the life of the Church before both God and the world. It gets better: There was a great move of the Spirit in the Church in Council in our time just over 40 years ago. I weep for its cold-hearted rej...

How the liturgy was viewed in 1968

March 10, 2009

An amusing element of browsing through old papers is to see the advertisements carried. This one from June 1968 helps to give an idea of what happened to the Liturgy at that time. ( click to enlarge ) From Geoffrey Chapman, it offers the Book of Collects and the Sacramentary from the Roman Missal. The descriptive text concludes: These books cannot be outdated as both are in a loose-leaf form which allows constant adaptation to change. The mindset of the liturgical soixante-huitards was that the liturgy would not be in a fixed form any more. Week by week, pages could be inserted or removed to meet the needs of an ever-changing "modern man." It is hardly surprising that many who were young adults at that time react so vehemently to Summorum Pontificum or even to the idea of the "reform of the reform."

Los Angeles RE Congress

March 03, 2009

For Catholic bloggers it is nearly that time of year again: viz . time for the photos of the RE Congress in Los Angeles. The REC website advertises photos for the 2009 event, just finished but they don't seem to be there yet. Here are a few photos from previous years in the "That was not my Mass" genre: On the website there is a light-hearted invitation to generate your own workshop. I went over and filled out the form: and here was the result: Somehow I don't think an invitation will be forthcoming. Meanwhile, Diogenes has been over to look at the customary Internet chat-room in which the faithful put their questions to Cardinal Mahoney and observes that "His Eminence deals with uncertainties by means of answers that would not occur to Ratzinger. Or Charles Borromeo." For example: "Troubled : Our parish priests are a bit stand off-ish. What are some suggestions to help us parishioners build a bond with our priests? Cardinal Mahony : Try giving them ...

Obama messiah quotes

January 31, 2009

In the combox of the post Save us Obama , de Brantigny gave the link to his post Obama The New Messiah . He has put together a good collection of quotes from true disciples of The One. Halle Berry will pick up paper cups from the ground to clear his path; Chris Matthews considers that this is the New Testament; Oprah feels that we are evolving to a higher plane... choose your favourite.

Frothy Scotsman swears

January 20, 2009

Today is one of those days when I offer heartfelt prayers of thanksgiving that I do not have a television in my house. Even so, the news of Obama's inauguration is seeping through the cracks in my firewall. The Guardian's PDA digital content blog has perhaps the most superfluous sounding article of the day entitled " Obama inauguration: where to find coverage online ". I am even getting one or two emails from Government offices over here with the latest silly items that are circulating ( see below ). So I thought I should join in the hysterical euphoria balanced appraisal. The BBC's coverage is obviously going to be modelled on its coverage of World Youth Day - though in this case they will show pictures of cheering crowds of young people, drop the snide slant, and focus on the positive. In fact, they look as though they will cover all bases, including the news that Obama is in fact Scottish . To follow the action more closely, you could always try Al Jazeera...

Policing standards

November 26, 2008

PC Cogman, whom I wrote about yesterday ( A policeman's lot is not an 'appy one ) has now been sacked by Norfolk Police. Cogman was found guilty of two charges: one of failing to comply with a lawful order over the use of police computers and another of failing to treat a colleague with politeness and tolerance. The truth, as both the BBC and Pink News agree in their reports, is that he was sacked for suggesting that gay sex was sinful. I would like to award the "laugh or cry" to the remark of Deputy Chief Constable Ian Learmonth, who said: "This officer's behaviour fell well below what we expect of our people."

When I was hungry you gave me a condom

May 22, 2008

The United Nations is to send nearly a quarter of a million condoms into Burma "to help needy survivors with no access to contraceptives." UNFPA aid advisor Chaiyos Kunanusont said "We don't want regular use of contraception disrupted." See South Africa news 24: 220 000 condoms off to Myanmar (Not a spoof.) H/T Catholic Caveman

Potato Mass

May 07, 2008

H/T to Orate Fratres: Mr. Potato Head Concelebrates The Holy Mass? for this "laugh or cry" video ( direct wmv link ) of the closing Mass of the Call to Action Conference at San Jose, California. You can see liturgical dancers ominously pursued by oversized puppets as they practice their katas from "The Karate Kid" while a choir earnestly tries to "sing a new church into being". During the Gloria, the same dancers do a sword-fight-cum-Mary Poppins asperges. Watch it and tell me honestly whether you weren't praying for the thurible to be mis-swung during the gospel tango. Notice the wine being brought up at the offertory in Ernest and Julio Gallo carafes with the labels soaked off - now there's posh! I have a suggestion for the final hymn: John Hegley's Poem de Terre which sounds funnier when he sings it. Unfortunately, there is a scene which looks very much like a valid consecration. One consolation is at the end with the blessing "in th...

This was the winner?!

January 30, 2008

Jeff Miller, the Curt Jester has an amusing post about the winning design for the pulpit, lectern and chair to be used for the Holy Father's visit to Washington. ( Curt Jester: Pope Kirk! ) Here is the work of art: I can only agree with Jeff in wondering what the losing designs were like. Have a look at the post for his further musing on the Star Trek theme.

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