Posts

"You don't pick and choose traditions"

Image
Nadine Dorries is annoyed that the Speaker of the House of Commons no longer wears the traditional dress. This used to include a wig, knee breeches, silk stockings and buckled shoes. John Bercow wears a plain black gown over his lounge suit ("business" suit if you must.) Despite the simplifying of dress, it seems that MPs are still expected to observe the tradition of standing still with their backs to the wall and their eyes diverted when the Speaker walks down the corridor. Nadine Dorries has rebelled against this tradition, causing great annoyance to the Speaker by doing so. She writes: My response: if you want to drop the tradition of wearing the Speaker’s dress, then don’t expect me to honour the tradition of standing still in the corridor when you move along it. You don’t pick and choose traditions. If you do you begin to erode away at what brings millions of pounds into this country each year via our tourism economy. You erode the authority of the Speaker’s chair an...
Read more

Petition in support of the Pope

Chris Gillibrand, author of Catholic Church Conservation , has set up an online petition in support of Pope Benedict. It reads: We, the undersigned, welcome, with all our hearts and souls, the visit of Pope Benedict XVI to the United Kingdom, for the liberty and well-being of the church in our country and most especially for the spiritual benefits and pastoral care to be offered to all, whatever their beliefs. Sign the petition here
Read more

Pope Benedict: "Recognise dissent for what it is"

Image
The Holy Father spoke of several key issues during his Address to the Bishops of England and Wales today. The MSM (e.g. Times ,  Telegraph ,  Independent ,  Daily Mail ,  Mirror , BBC ) have zoomed in on his remarks about equality legislation: Your country is well known for its firm commitment to equality of opportunity for all members of society. Yet as you have rightly pointed out, the effect of some of the legislation designed to achieve this goal has been to impose unjust limitations on the freedom of religious communities to act in accordance with their beliefs. In some respects it actually violates the natural law upon which the equality of all human beings is grounded and by which it is guaranteed. I urge you as Pastors to ensure that the Church’s moral teaching be always presented in its entirety and convincingly defended. Fidelity to the Gospel in no way restricts the freedom of others – on the contrary, it serves their freedom by offering them the truth....
Read more

Missing the big story

Image
On Monday mornings, I teach Sacramental Theology at St John's Seminary at Wonersh. Usually, I leave around lunchtime so that I can get a couple of hours' work in before celebrating Mass in the parish so that people can come after work or school. This evening, however, I was up at Maiden Lane for 6.30pm Mass, which was followed as usual by a drink nearby. It was there that I learned from Leutgeb of Bara Brith that I had missed the main Catholic news story of the day: Pope Benedict's Address to the Bishops of England and Wales . Leaving reasonably early I reckoned that I would have time to write something without staying up too late. ... TFL (Transport for London) had other ideas. Having luckily caught a number 11 bus from the Strand to Westminster, I was on schedule to be home by 10pm. After I had descended through Westminster Station (which always reminds me of the Nazi rocket-firing bunker in Normandy) there was a platform announcement that the Jubilee line was suspen...
Read more

Sacred, Beautiful, & Universal

Thanks to Jeffrey tucker of NLM for posting this video which may help people to understand why music for liturgy matters. have a look at his comments , too.
Read more

Non-existent young women - the photos

Image
Krista Gesaman reported in Newsweek that there were no young women at the recent March for Life in Washington. Hilary has helpfully posted some photos of the non-existent young women. See:  Balanced reporting
Read more

Thanks to the Catholic Herald

Many thanks to the Catholic Herald which has spoken very kindly about me in the leader article of this week's paper. May I take this opportunity to draw your attention to the list of blogs by priests and religious in the sidebar. They represent a wide variety of styles and interests within orthodox Catholicism. As soon as this post is published, I will add to that list a new blog: Let the Welkin Ring , which is written by Fr Wilfrid Elkin of the Diocese of Hexham and Newcastle.
Read more

Persecuted German homeschoolers granted asylum in USA

Image
The Home School Legal Defense Association (HSLDA) provides advocacy to defend the rights of parents to direct the education of their family, and to defend the freedom of families. They are also involved in political and media lobbying. On their website today, there is news of a surprising case in which Immigration Judge Lawrence O. Burman granted the political asylum application of Uwe and Hannelore Romeike, Christians from Bissinggen, Germany, homeschool their children and have fled from Germany because of its draconian anti-homeschooling legislation. Judge Burnham said: “Homeschoolers are a particular social group that the German government is trying to suppress. This family has a well-founded fear of persecution…therefore, they are eligible for asylum…and the court will grant asylum.” See: Homeschooling Family Granted Political Asylum Mike Donnelly, staff attorney and director of international relations for HSLDA said: “This decision finally recognizes that German ho...
Read more

Good chastity presentation for schools

Robert Colquhoun has just published his presentation on " Theology of the Body for Schools ". This is a good and straightforward exposition of the Churchs' teaching concerning chastity, together with some hard-hitting information in response to some popular myths.
Read more

Mgr Marini's address and Jeffrey Tucker's introduction

Image
As an example of the use of the new media, encouraged recently by the Holy Father, a good example is the widespread distribution of the address by Mgr Guido Marini to the Confraternities of Catholic Clergy gathered in Rome earlier this month. The Wanderer are going to publish this paper as a special monograph and they have invited Jeffrey Tucker of the New Liturgical Movement blog to write an introduction. Understandably, he describes this as "a rather intimidating assignment" but I consider that he has done justice to the task. One quotation: Msgr. Marini has been a leader for Catholics of the world in the revival of the preconciliar form of liturgy and also in the reform of the modern ritual in a manner than makes it part of the great continuity of development that stretches from our times back to apostolic times. In this essay, he presents the rationale for reform from his perspective, from the perspective of the Pope, and also the perspective of uninterrupted Cathol...
Read more

Remembering Queen Katherine of Aragon

Image
Each year, the Anglican Cathedral of Peterborough holds various events in January to commemorate Queen Katherine of Aragon, the wife of King Henry VIII, who is buried in the Cathedral. This coming Friday 29 January, there are a number of events; of particular interest is that Mass will be celebrated by Fr David Jennings, of the Catholic parish of St Luke's in Peterborough, at the High Altar at 8.30am. The Peterborough Cathedral website has details of various other events throughout the day . At 5pm there will be a candlelight procession at which people will be invited to leave a pomegranate (Queen Katherine's personal symbol) or a prayer, card or flower at her tomb. It is good to see that the events also actively involve local school children. I am rather sorry that I cannot go to Peterborough on Friday. The saintly and heroic Queen Katherine deserves to be better honoured in the country to which she gave her life only to be humiliated by her lecherous husband; and Peter...
Read more

Popular posts from this blog

Bernini's elephant Inscription

Image
Here's the elephant. (That's the Pantheon in the background.) And here is the inscription: It reads: SAPIENTIS AEGYPTI INSCULPTAS OBELISCO FIGURAS AB ELEPHANTO BELLUARUM FORTISSIMA GESTARI QUISQUIS HIC VIDES DOCUMENTUM INTELLIGE ROBUSTAE MENTIS ESSE SOLIDAM SAPIENTIAM SUSTINERE Which is to say "Whoever sees here that the symbols of the Egyptian sage, inscribed on the obelisk, are carried by the elephant, the strongest of the beasts: understand that it is a proof of a robust mind to sustain solid wisdom." I first read this inscription on a tour of the twelve obelisks of Rome, led by the incomparable Fr Reginald ("Reggie") Foster. He was the best teacher of anything that I ever knew and I always try to call in at the beginning of his class. 25 years on, he teaches at the same time, in the same room, with the same dry sense of humour and the same passionate love of Latin. The obelisk is outside the Church of Santa Maria sopra Minerva where St Catherine of Sien...
Read more

How to make an act of perfect contrition

Image
How can you go from imperfect to perfect contrition? Gabriella D from Australia asked me this on Twitter today and I want to give an answer because I think that many people misunderstand what we mean when we talk about “perfect contrition.” Perfect contrition is sorrow and detestation of sin arising out of the love of God. One way of exciting this contrition in our hearts is by considering the passion of Jesus Christ and making acts of love for Him. We can also think of the infinite love which God has for us, and express sorrow in our heart in the presence of this great love which we have offended. Imperfect contrition is sorrow and detestation for sin arising from a consideration of the ugliness of sin or out of the fear of hell. Disgust at the ugliness of sin is more common today than fear of hell. That is because we do not preach enough, or with sufficient conviction about the four last things. If a person commits an act of impurity, for example, perhaps by deliberately ...
Read more

Hippolytus and Eucharistic Prayer II

Image
When I was a student in Rome, I remember going with a priest for Mass in one of the ancient Churches. The priest said that he was going to use Eucharistic Prayer II because it was the most ancient of all the prayers and was specifically Roman, composed by Hippolytus. This was the standard view at that time (early 1980s) but has since been called into question. A number of people have recently mentioned the matter to me and so here are a few notes for you. In the 19th century, a number of ancient texts were discovered that were similar to the "Apostolic Constitutions", (of which the first modern edition was published in 1563). Among these texts was a document which came to be referred to as the “Egyptian Church Order”. In addition, the Canons of Hippolytus and the Testamentum Domini were discovered. The scholarly consensus in the early 20th century on the dependence of these documents was that the “Egyptian Church Order” was in fact the "Apostolic Tradition" of Hipp...
Read more

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 .
Read more