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Confirmations - and the LMS

It has been pointed out to me that I should have mentioned the Latin Mass Society in my post about the usus antiquior Confirmations on Saturday. Apologies for the oversight. The LMS organises this wonderful occasion and we are all very grateful to them.
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Confirmations at Spanish Place

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It has been quite a busy weekend since yesterday I went up to St James's, Spanish Place for the Confirmation ceremony. Three of my parishioners were confirmed, and several servers were there. The photos in this post are taken from Mulier Fortis who has some more at her post Confirmation According To The Usus Antiquior . This was the first time that I have participated in the celebration of Confirmation in the usus antiquior . Judging by the enthusiasm of the families, I expect it will not be the last. The choir of the parish of Spanish Place sang magnificently and the organist contributed superbly to the proceedings. After the ceremony I went to Pizza Express with one of the families - and found that Fr Jason Jones of Our Lady of the Taper was also there with the group that he had brought from Cardigan.
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Gloria TV News - English focus today

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Fr Charles Briggs regularly poaches my parishioners for his 7.30pm usus antiquior Low Mass on a Friday evening and I often poach his parishioners for my Masses at Blackfen. We are cool about this in the spirit of inter-parish collaboration. So I dropped in to his Mass this evening before we both went out for a late supper of fish and chips. Fr Briggs is an assiduous follower of the compulsive source of Catholic information which is Gloria TV news. Presented by the lovely Doina Buzut (with whom, I am proud to say, I am friends on Facebook) this is a source of pleasantly presented but hard-hitting news items from the Catholic world. Today's news has a particular focus on England with an item at the beginning reporting on Cardinal Cormac Murphy-O'Connor's comments on the Holy Father's proposals for Anglicans to come into full communion with the Catholic Church. Bloggers will also be interested to see that Damian Thompson is also featured. The news picks up on his articl...
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"Is the Church a force for good?"

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There is an excellent letter in the Catholic Herald by Christopher Koe who points out that the motion "Is the Church a force for good?" was also debated at the university in Paris in the early 1830s, it was defeated, but the occasion led to Frederick Ozanam founding the Society of St Vincent de Paul .
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New proposals for sex-ed - dictatorship of relativism

You can read the CESEW response to the Governments latest proposals on sex education in schools, and a clarification which states: We welcome the government’s reiteration of its support for the important principles underlining SRE, which emphasise that schools continue to have the legal right to determine the content of what is taught in PSHE within their schools and that governing bodies retain the right to determine what is taught, and must determine this in line with the ethos of the school. The Times reports on the sex-ed proposals in its article: ( Pupils to be forced to have sex education under age of consent ). Here is an extract: Mr Balls said: “It is open to faith schools to teach what they believe, according to the tenets of their faith, that pupils should not have sexual relationships outside of marriage.” But faith schools would not be allowed to refuse to teach about contraception on the grounds that they do not believe in sex before marriage, he added. “You can teach th...
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Priestly blog: "Where the Rubber Hits the Road"

Fr Tim Moyle, parish priest of St Anne's in Mattawa, Ontario (Canada), a bilingual parish in the Diocese of Pembroke, has recently started a blog called Where the Rubber Hits the Road . He posts an interesting mix of articles on various subjects with the intention of evangelisation and the relationship between faith and society.
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UK Traditional Anglican Communion says "yes please"

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The South African Catholic blog Signum has an article reporting that TAC in UK accepts "Ordinariate" At the 2009 Assembly of the Traditional Anglican Communion UK, the following resolution was passed: That this Assembly, representing the Traditional Anglican Communion in Great Britain, offers its joyful thanks to Pope Benedict XVI for his forthcoming Apostolic Constitution allowing the corporate reunion of Anglicans with the Holy See, and requests the Primate and College of Bishops of the Traditional Anglican Communion to take the steps necessary to implement this Constitution. The Assembly also suggests Bishop Robert Mercer as a possible candidate for Ordinary. I hear a lot of skeptical comments about the Holy Father's offer of Personal Ordinariates, with the conventional wisdom being that it will not really attract many people. So it is good to hear news of twenty or so parish communities that will be interested. The TAC asked for the provision in the first place so it...
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ACN Annual Memorial Mass

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Aid to the Church in Need will have their Annual Memorial Mass for our Departed Benefactors and Friends with a sung Latin Mass (1962 Missal) at 7pm on Thursday, 26 November. the Mass will be at the Little Oratory, Brompton Road, and the celebrant will be Father Martin Edwards.
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Those elusive Catholic Homeschooling programmes

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As I reported yesterday, the Catholic Education Service for England and Wales has broadly supported the Government's proposals for registration and monitoring of home educators. In its response to the Government's consultation, the CES said that it was not aware of any model or programme for Catholic Homeschooling. Commenters have been industrious in offering the CES some helpful information in this regard. Looking at these sites, I am most impressed by the quality of material offered and the courageous approach to curriculum development. Commonly the programme websites list the various universities to which graduates of their programmes have transferred. First of all a couple for which I have found official recognition from the local Bishop: Seton Home Study School officially recognised by Bishop John Keating of Arlington as entitled to call itself "Catholic" under canon 803.1 Angelicum Academy A "Great Books" programme officially recognised by Bishop Mich...
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Baby pics

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The Daily Telegraph's Health Picture Galleries include this lovely set: A Child is Born: Photographs of the foetus developing in the womb, by Lennart Nilsson The above photo is of a baby at 8 weeks, protected in the foetal sac. Nowadays, there are plenty of ultrasound vids on YouTube. Here is an "oldie but goldie" that I remember seeing before YouTube was invented.
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Sodium and water

As schoolboys, many years ago, we found putting a pellet of sodium into water one of the more entertaining moments in the study of chemistry. Theoretically, you could pinch a larger lump from the lab and, after school, put it in a coca cola and retire a safe distance to watch it explode. Purely theoretically of course... In 1947, these guys had the chance to do the experiment on a larger scale:
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Popular posts from this blog

Saint Gabriel

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The angels call for our veneration and awe as part of God’s creation. Part of the destructive modernism of the 1970s included advice to Catholic school teachers that they should not talk to children about angels. This wrought lasting damage which continues to need rectifying. We should include in our prayers a heartfelt recourse to our own Guardian Angels. The Archangel Gabriel “God is my strength” would be terrifying were he to appear to any of us. Our Lady was “troubled” at the word of Saint Gabriel and wondered at the manner of the salutation. Immediately, according to his mission, the awesome messenger explained himself. Modern retelling of the event is often reduced to the jejune “Mary said Yes to God”. In fact, she said “Behold the handmaid of the Lord; be it done to me according to thy word”. This conveys more accurately the flawless faith and trust of the Immaculata. In the infinitely wise providence of the Father, we now know the structure of the event in even more detai...
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Is your alb back to front?

Fr Z has initiated a roaring discussion by asking the simple question whether maniples can be used in the Novus Ordo Mass. ( What Does The Prayer Really Say?: Maniples ) One commenter has referred to an important source for the question that has proved popular among modern liturgists. An answer in Notitiae of 1978 said: "When the rubrics of the Missal of Paul VI say nothing or say little on particulars in some places, it is not to be inferred that the former rite should be observed. Therefore, the multiple and complex gestures for incensation as prescribed in the former Missal are not to be resumed." This is, of course, a strange answer. Saying that it must not be inferred that a rite should be used does not imply that it must not be used. We need to check the Latin of this text. (If anyone with access to a library can check it, I have seen the reference given elsewhere as Notitiae 14 (1978) 301-302, no. 2) Let us in any case take the more restrictive interpretation, bel...
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Food at Parkminster

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The Conventual Mass at St Hugh's is at 8.15am during the week. Afterwards, I followed the custom of celebrating a private Mass as the Carthusian priests do every day. More about that later. After this and thanksgiving, the first period of manual work or study begins at 10.30am. At 11.15am, the monks say the office of Sext and then lunch arrives delivered by trolley around the cloister and placed into the hatch of each cell. Here is the lunch as it is delivered. The can on top is fresh milk. There are three trays with food in, a fruit basket and your preference of drink: The meal is taken at a shelf in the window recess, called the Refectorium . There is a personal tablecloth, a metal knife and a wooden fork and spoon to eat it with. To drink, there is a choice of fruit juice or Parkminster's home-made apple wine. It sometimes gets called cider but apple wine is probably a safer name because it is 10% abv. It is quite dry and decepively strong. I had this for the first two days ...
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1962 Missal pdf online

The Church Music Association of America and Jeffrey Tucker of the New Liturgical Movement have made available the 1962 Missal online in pdf format (72Mb). The file is hosted at Musica Sacra , the website of the CMAA, thanks to a generous gift from Fr Robert Skeris While you are at it, take a look at the articles clarifying the rules for music at Low Mass and music at High Mass .
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Tour of a Carthusian cell

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The Great Cloister of St Hugh's, Parkminster is the largest in the world. The photograph below shows part of two sides of the Great Cloister with the cells attached: The next photo shows the door to the cell I was given. Each cell has a text on the door: mine was "Where your treasure is, there will your heart be also". To the right of the door is the hatch where the brothers leave food and any other items such as toiletries, light bulbs etc. that have been requested. Inside is a spacious ambulacrum with windows onto the enclosed garden. There is thus room for the monk to take exercise if the weather prevents him from walking in the garden. The stairs go up to the main living quarters and down to the work area and garden. To the left of the cell door, you can see the inside door of the hatch. Here is a view of the ambulacrum from the stairs: Upstairs, the first room in the main part of the cell is called the Ave Maria . The custom is to kneel down and say a Hail Mary every...
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