Fr Carola`s Book

I got back last night from Lyon where I had been with eight other  priests from England on a pilgrimage/retreat led by Fr de Malleray FSSP. I hope to write a report soon. Among my emails I found one from the Midwest Theological Forum with the news that Fr Carola`s book which I mentioned in writing about the Rome conference is available from their website for $10. You can find the details here.

Lent Course

Last year I reviewed bishop O`Donoghue`s Fit for Mission? Church for the LMS magazine Mass of Ages. This year I`m proposing to see how it works and to run it as a Lent course for the parish. Meetings will take place on the Thursdays of Lent at 7.30pm at St Mary`s and I hope we have some lively discussion and deepening of our understanding of the faith in a relaxed atmosphere.

Rome Conference Day 4: the talks, Day 4

Sorry to say that this blog has somewhat ground to a halt over the last couple of weeks. Part of the problem was thinking about this post. The trouble is that I never thought to take notes during the conference. If I had thought about it at all I would have realised I should have for the purposes of blogging but I hadn`t given any thought as to how I was going to write about it.

So here goes with the fourth day. The first talk was given by the Irish Dominican, Fr Paul Murray. I had first come across Fr Murray at Ushaw in probably 2001 ( although I could be wrong on the date) when he gave the annual retreat to the priests of this diocese. I remember enjoying his talks more than I usually enjoy these things and was delighted to see him in this context. I had the chance to talk to him a couple of times during the week and found him most encouraging. Father`s talk to us was entitled `Preaching to priests: wisdom from the Middle Ages` in which he focussed on St Bernard of Clairvaux and St Catherine of Siena.

The next talk was gioven by Fr Paul Gunter, a monk of Douai who is a professor at the Pontifical Institute S. Anselmo in Rome as well as Consultor of the Office of the Liturgical Celebrations of the Supreme Pontiff since 2008 and a member of the Editorial Board of "Usus Antiquior", a journal dedicated to the Sacred Liturgy. Father spoke on `The Genius of the Roman Rite in the identity of the priest` the first half of which was devoted to looking at the work of the nineteenth century liturgist Edmund Bishop in identifying the `genius` or guiding spirit or essence of the Roman Rite, which was the subject of his doctorate. The second half of the talk I mainly remember for the happy way it spoke of the Extraordinary Form as much a part of the everyday life of the modern church as the Ordinary Form of the Roman Rite.

Apologies to both speakers for my sketchy recall of their talks. I did have a conversation with Fr Gunter after his talk and was impressed by his knowledge of all the parishes in Hexham and Newcastle which were formerly staffed by Douai monks and the details of the church buildings with their good and bad points.

That was the last of the talks in the conference. At 11.30 we split into national groups to discuss what we could do next.

Latin Mass Society Full-Time General Manager

From the LMS.

The LMS wishes to appoint a full-time General Manager will be responsible for the day to day administration and development of the Society as directed by the Committee. The post is based in the LMS’s office in Holborn, London WC2. Applicants will have excellent managerial and communication skills and a proven track record of success. They will also have a knowledge and love of the Traditional liturgy and movement. The salary and pension package is in the range of £35K to £40K.

Much of the work involves the co-ordination and organisation of flagship national/international events including training conferences, the LMS AGM and the production of the annual Accounts, major Masses and liturgical events with national importance. It also involves maintaining and developing contacts with the hierarchy, diocesan authorities, Traditional Catholic bodies in England and abroad and the Traditional priestly and monastic orders. The General Manager will develop the LMS’s Seminarians Fund in order to assist vocations.

The General Manager will also make strategic recommendations to the Committee, particularly concerning development, the generation of increased publicity, membership and income, and the timely control of expenditure. He/she will oversee and administer legacy generation work and will support the Society’s network of diocesan representatives.

This position will entail some evening and weekend work, and travel, both UK and internationally.

A job description and details of the application process are available from the LMS office at 11-13 Macklin Street, London WCB 5NH. Tel: 020 7404 7284.

E mail: info@latin-mass-society.org

The closing date for receipt of applications is Thursday 4 March 2010. Interviews will be held in London from mid to late March.

British government retreats after Pope's critique of Equality Bill :: Catholic News Agency (CNA)

British government retreats after Pope's critique of Equality Bill :: Catholic News Agency (CNA)

For a useful look at the issues see this article by Br Lawrence Lew OP.

Benedict XVI: Church must participate in life of society

Mgr Marini and Forest Hall

Today the bishops of England and Wales set off for Rome for their ad limina visit where they submit reports about their dioceses and discuss them with the various Vatican departments. I`m sure our prayers will be with them that the whole process will be helpful in strengthening the Church in England and Wales. The Scottish bishops follow next month.

As bishop Seamus Cunningham goes off he has two saintly predecessors who made the journey before him when travel was not quite so easy: St Wilfrid and St Benet Biscop. These two Northumbrian saints made many visits from this part of the world to the Holy See. St Benet Biscop mainly seems to have gone for the shopping in that he brought back items to enhance the life and worship of the monasteries of Jarrow and Monkwearmouth. His greatest coup was to persuade John the arch-cantor to leave St Peter`s, Rome and come to these Monkwearmouth to teach the monks how to sing chant in the authentic Roman way. This is a recurring obsession of mine and I see I blogged about it just over a year ago.

Well, this weekend at St Mary`s Forest Hall the words of Mgr Marini, the papal MC were heard at Mass. I read out part of the talk we had heard at the conference: the part on active participation. I`ve been keen to share something of that talk with the parish since getting back and the Mass readings at the OF seemed to lend themselves to the topic as we had St Paul`s first letter to the Corinthians on the complementary roles of the members of the Church while the first reading from chapter eight of Nehemiah and the Gospel from Luke chapter four (14-21) laid the ground for talking about the liturgy.

I mentioned in a previous post the whole talk can be found here.

Why I mention this is that I was quite tacken aback by the reaction afterwards. Normally I don`t get much reaction or if I do it is people wanting to disagree with me. This morning it was different, people were queuing up (well not quite) to say how much they enjoyed it. Even one of my regular critics said it was so good to hear something like that from the pulpit. (We don`t have a pulpit but it, like altar rails, seems to have stuck in popular ways of referring to church life.)

I was so glad that there was such a warm response to Mgr Marini`s words. I`m now thinking of sharing what he said about music and adoration and may get on to his section on orientation and liturgical prayer.

New Priest Blogger

As others have commented, in this year`s message for World Communications Day, the Holy Father has encouraged priests to use blogs and other modern means of communication to promote `dialogue, evangelization and catechesis`.  I am glad to say that another priest of Hexham and Newcastle, who has always kept up with new technology, has started a blog. Fr Elkin is parish priest of Barnard Castle in Co Durham. His blog is called Let the Welkin Ring.

Fr Elkin started saying the Extraordinary Form again in about 1994 if my memory serves me right, helping with Masses at St Dominic`s in Newcastle where the `indult Mass` had been established on a Sunday in 1992. I`m glad to see that his latest post is a reminisence about his time in the priesthood. It must have been in about 1995 I had the privilege of celebrating a Missa Cantata at St Patrick`s, Consett. The large church was packed and the Missa de Angelis sung lustily by a full congregation raised the roof: I`ve never heard anything like it since. Unfortunately there was never another EF Mass again at St Patrick`s. However Fr Elkin preached and he spoke about an issue that always fascinates me: what were the hopes of young priests for the liturgy in the 1950`s and 1960`s? Basically Fr Elkin described how he had been full of hope for a great revival of the faith through the introduction of the vernacular and other reforms but how disillusionment set in and how he has happy to come back to the Latin Mass. I hope I`ve got the drift of this right and hope Father will maybe blog on this topic now he is reminiscing.

I hope to be finishing of my account of the talks at the Rome conference very soon.

Rome Conference Day 3: the talks, Day 3

This is all taking me longer to get round to writing up than I imagined. On the third day we had two talks. However the day had to be re-arranged in that we were supposed to be having EF Vespers in the church of St Stephan of the Abyssinians in the Vatican but since it was discovered that the Abyssinian church was closed with the Epiphany being a holiday in the Vatican, Vespers were re-scheduled to be in the FSSP church of Santissima Trinita dei Pellegrini which I had wanted to see any way. This meant that Fr Lang`s talk on the new translation of the OF missal had to be moved to after dinner. Fr Lang works for the Congregation for Divine Worship.

So the first talk of the day was given by Mgr Guido Marini, the Pope`s Master of Ceremonies. Monsignor does not speak English well enough to give talks in it so he spoke in Italian. However he spoke so clearly and calmly that this listener whose Italian is rather rusty was able to understand almost everything. An English translation of the talk had been prepared the day before and copies were available for people to follow. Much has already been written on the internet about this talk which was entitled Introduction to the Spirit of the Liturgy. It is available here. This talk was the highlight of the conference for me and I`m sure for many others. It was wonderful to hear about the ideas for the `reform of the reform` from one so close to the Holy Father. Many of the conference members had commented how the morning`s Mass with the Pope in St Peter`s had shown how far things had come in quite a short time in improving the qualilty of papal Masses. At the end of the session the conference gave Mgr Marini a standing ovation. I`m hoping to share some of the ideas from his talk with the parish to introduce some of the principles governing modern liturgical thought.

After dinner we had Fr Lang`s rescheduled talk. This was the most intellectually demanding talk of the week and as it did not start until after 9pm some of the Fathers were beginning to wilt after a long day. Fr Lang`s talk was entitled Liturgy and language: The "Sacral Vernacular" (Liturgiam authenticam 47) of the new English Translation of the Roman Missal. Father began by demonstrating the nature of sacral language in the Roman Rite, referring to the work of Christine Mohrmann. In the second part of the talk, Father took us through the new translation of the first half of the Roman canon explaining each section. The text has been available on the internet for quite a while now. It will be wonderful to use a translation which is close to the original instead of the current version. Talking to many priests there is some reluctance to embrace the new translation but then religions tend to be conservative. At seminary I lost count of the number of times we were quoted Newman`s saying about to live is to change! Any liturgical change always arouses opposition but surely it is better to have a translation of the Mass which is accurate and captures the spirit of the original rather than our current version which used the now discarded notion of `dynamic equivalence`

Father Lang was unable to say exactly when the new translation will come into use. It was hoped that it would be ready by 2010 but it looks as if it will now be Advent 2011. That at least gives time for preparations to be made to introduce it to the clergy and faithful. In the question session one priest voiced my thoughts when he said how much training does there need to be for someone to read a text? It is hard to see what the training for using the new missal will involve: not all priests will have the linguistic background to enable them to appreciate what has happened and there is no question of the new translation being the subject of debate as it is definitely going to happen. However it will be useful to have an opportunity for things to be explained as far as they can given the level of anxiety there appears to be about it all.

Rome Conference 2: the talks, Day 2

When looking at the conference programme before setting off I saw that the first morning was due due to begin at 8.30am with a lecture on Three Patristic Texts on the Priesthood. This looked like a daunting topic for an early morning start. However Fr Carola`s talk brought to life the teaching of Ss Gregory Nazianzus, John Chrysostom and Gregory the Great and made them relevant to our age and situations. Fr Joseph Carola SJ has been Professor of Patristic Theology at the Gregorian University (in Rome) since 2002. When the opportunity for questions came after the talk the topic of priests facing a crisis in their vocation and leaving active ministry came up. Fr Carola spoke of how quite a number of his former pupils at the Greg have left active ministry. It is a question of knowing that a priest will eventually face a crisis and for there to be support systems to help a priest at that stage to help him get over this and remain faithful to his vocation. Unfortunately this is still not well provided for and priests are left to sink or swim. I`m glad I was one of the many who bought a copy of Fr Carola`s new book ( just published this month) entitled Conformed to Christ Crucified: Meditations on Priestly Life and Ministry which consists of Father`s sermons and reflections on this theme. The book is published by the Gregorian and Biblical Press.

Next we heard from Fr Dodaro OSA the director of the Patristic Institute Augustinianum in Rome. His talk was entitled The Priest as sinner in the thought of St Augustine and dealt with the Donatist view of the clergy as spiritual superstars such that if a priest was found to be less than perfect it greatly troubled the Donatist laity as for them the efficacy of the sacraments if not their validity depended on the sanctity of the minister. While it is easy to fall back on the theory of ex opere operato, Fr Dodaro spoke of Augustine`s awareness of the priest as sinner and the need to avoid putting the priest on a pedastal in today`s Church. There must be a way for the priest to convey that he too needs forgiveness from God and needs the prayers rather than praise of his congregation.

The third talk of the morning was by Mgr Feichtinger of the CDF who spoke on The Hermeneutics of the Inquisition which was not as might be deduced from the title a look at the work of the CDF but an exploration of the philosophical background to the `Hermeneutic of Continuity`.

In the evening, after dinner (where we were joined by the Australian ambassador to the Holy See) we were treated to a talk by Blackfen`s Fr Tim Finigan ( pictured above in mid-speech). Fr Finigan`s experiences as a seminarian seemed familiar to the conference. (`Take a stone out of a bag and pretend you are that stone and what do you want to say` etc) He recounted a visit by Mother Teresa to the English College where she caught sight of what was the must-have book of the time, `I`m OK. You`re OK` which moved her to say `Well I`m not OK and you`re not OK. That`s why we need Jesus.`! Fr Finigan echoed the thought I often have ( and the last words I ever said to bishop Kevin Dunn before his death) which is that I wake up every morning and no matter how bad the weather or whatever problems there are, I thank God that Ratzinger is Pope. Father also asked us to thank God for Pope John Paul II who started the fight back against the collapse of the Church. Father`s speech was very warmly received.

And after that I retired for the night.

Rome Conference 1: the Talks, Day 1

Sorry to have been so slow to getting down to writing about the conference for English-speaking priests in Rome last week. I think it was only on Tuesday that I recovered from the 3am start we had to make on Monday 3rd January to get the 6am flight from Newcastle to Amsterdam and from there to Rome. (I went with another priest of this diocese who prefers not to be named.) There is only a direct flight from Newcastle in the summer nowadays. Although I slept most of the flight it never seems to make up for getting up in the middle of the night and once we got to the conference the pace was quite intense so I was mainly operating on adrenalin. However there was a lot going on to keep the adrenalin flowing.

After an introduction to the conference by Frs John Trigillio and John Walsh (chairmen of the CCC and ACCC respectively) we had Vespers in the Domus chapel at 5.30pm. I`ll be doing another post about the liturgies. This was OF Vespers in English celebrated with the Blessed Sacrament exposed. It was our first encounter with the Lassus Scholars who provided the music during the week and from the start we knew that we were in for a musical treat. They sang a Lassus Magnificat. However I`m trying to stay away from talking about the liturgy. The sermon was given by Bishop Geoffrey Jarrett of Lismore, Australia. What I enjoyed about this was that bishop Jarrett soon made it clear that he had suffered what we had suffered. It was encouraging to hear a bishop talk like this and I think it is the first time I`ve heard a diocesan bishop talk like this. Bishop Jarrett is a member of the ACCC so it should have come as no surprise but I`m so used to hearing how wonderful everything is from bishops that it was at the very least refreshing to hear a different point of view and one which reflected much of my and I`m sure most of the other particpiants` experience of life in the church as regards problems over catechesis and all the rest.

After dinner there was a talk by Mgr McDaid of the Congregation of Clergy which was probably the most stirring talk of the conference. He clearly had faced the same obstacles as many of us. He sounded the theme which was to be taken up by many talks during the week: that the priest is to be conformed to Christ. For couples who wanted to know how to be good parents his advice was that they love one another. For the priest his advice was to love God. I didn`t take notes but I think I remember him talking about a lady in a position of responsibility in the Church who made it known that she did not believe in the divinity of Christ. If anyone challenged this they were accused of having problems with relating to women! (I hope I have this right: if anyone can tell me if I`ve not, then do let me know.)

There was an oppprtunity to enjoy the first convivium of the conference after this but after such a long day I couldn`t wait to get to my bed.

Habemus Papam

I spent New Year`s Eve with two friends, one of whom kindly cooked an Indian meal for us. I should have taken some pictures à la Fr Z. After this we played the board game Vatican ( `Unlock the secrets of how men become pope`). I`d bought this quite some time ago but had never had an opportunity to play. As it was all new to us our understanding of the rules took a bit of time to settle down. Players get cards as they pass the corner squares which are either challenges to take a stand on the issues facing the Church today or incidents affecting their career. Many of the latter seem to involve the players being kidnapped by guerrilla groups although that only involves getting or losing a few points and doesn`t delay progress around the board. However it took a while to realise that the purpose of going around the board is to collect sufficient jobs in either the local episcopal conference or in Vatican congregations to move on to the next stage which is the nine day interregnum between the death of the pope and the opening of the conclave. The conclave when it happened was over after one day and I am happy to announce that I became pope although I`m still mystified as to how it happened as it all seemed rather quick compared to the first stage. However the game kept us entertained and I look forward to having another try.

The picture above is a recreation of the scene in the dinning room as I forgot to take pictures last night.

Oh and a Happy New Year to everyone. 2010 should be a special year for English Catholics with the visit of the Holy Father in September and the beatification of Cardinal Newman as well as the setting up of the Anglican Ordinariate and the preparations for use of the new translation of the OF Roman Missal.

Christmas

A very Happy Christmas to everyone.

Lost Antiphons

I have given up trying to find the antiphons for the vigil of the Nativity for the minor hours in my lovely new 1962 breviary and have had to use the wonderful Divinum Officium site. Any clues would be appreciated. While I`m here can anyone tell me where the invitatory antiphon for the common of a virgin, non-martyr is to be found? There seems to be no option but to say that all virgins are martyrs.

UPDATE: Thanks to Gregor and Mark for the information on the antiphons. All is clear now. Thanks for your swift responses.

St Wilfrid: not entirely forgotten.

I didn`t post anything about St Wilfrid on his feast day (October 12th) as it seemed the general policy was to ignore this saint even in the year of the 1300th anniversary of his death. People I`ve mentioned it to say `Well he`s more of a Yorkshire person`. It`s true he was bishop of York but he was also bishop of Hexham and was bishop of Hexham when he died in 709. Of all the Northumbrian saints he was the one who most exemplifies unity with Rome. Maybe this is why he is unpopular.

Yet not everyone forgot. In this month`s Northern Cross there is an article (p.9) about the choir of Hexham abbey making a trip to Rome to commemorate the 1300th anniversary of the saint`s death. They sang a Mass in St Peter`s. So at least the Anglicans think he is worth remembering.

On the subject of Anglicans and English bishops, in a recent interview , Mgr Faley, the assistant general secretary of the episcopal conference of England and Wales spoke to the BBC about the new ordinariate for former Anglicans. While the complementary norms for Anglicanorum Coetibus say the bishops of the Ordinariate are to be chosen from a terna presented by the Governing Council of the Ordinariate and thus would be expected to be a member of the Ordinariate, Mgr Faley thinks it is unlikely that this will be the case.

"I really don't know," says Mgr Faley. "There is the possibility that he would be - but within the culture of the bishops' conference I think that's highly unlikely."

I keep thinking about the phrase `the culture of the bishops` conference`. There is no mention of it in canon law as regards the suitability of a candidate for episcopal consecration. The code asks that a candidate be `outstanding for his solid faith, good morals, piety, zeal for souls, wisdom, prudence and human virtues and endowed with other talents` as well as having a good reputation, be at least thirty-five years old and have a doctorate or at least a licence in theology, canon law or scripture or be at least `truly expert` in these disciplines.

I can`t help wonder whether St Wilfrid would have fitted into the culture of the episcopal conference?

PS I`m delighted to see Mgr Mark Davies of Salford has today been appointed as coadjutor bishop for the diocese of Shrewsbury. That`s cheered me up.

Breakthrough at St Peter`s, Rome.

I`ve been sent news that things are improving at St Peter`s with regards to priests being able to say Mass in the Extraordinary Form. My information says:

Cardinal Comastri, Arch-Priest of St. Peter, has ordered the sacristy of the Vatican Basilica to have four 1962 Missals available for priests wishing to celebrate the Holy Mass according to the usus antiquior. The whole story is in this Italian link.

More of the background to this and the recent FIUV conference in Rome can be read on Joseph Shaw`s blog here.

The background to the icons at St Mary`s

I thought the notes Sr Petra Clare sent explaining the symbolism used in the icons may be of interest.

The icon draws on the account of the childhood of Mary of the Protoevengelion of James. Although from time to time there are questions about the historical veracity of the events, the tradition has been maintained in the icons because it underlines certain important mysteries in the life of the Mother of God.

The protoevangelion tells us that Joachim and Anna were left childless and the elderly Anna conceived, in a similar miracle to the conception of Isaac. The parents made a vow to give the child to the temple. I found from another source that there was a place for women - old women like the prophetess Anna and virgins given into their care to be brought up piously, serving the needs of the temple, including sewing.

After Mary is espoused to Joseph, the temple needs a new veil, and the tradition is for the undefiled virgins of the house of David to spin the veil. The priests cast lots to choose who was to spin gold, white, linen, silk, blue, scarlet and purple. Mary was drawn for the scarlet and purple spinning. In the protoevangelion, Mary is actually sitting and spinning the scarlet and purple when the angel visits her.

Whatever the material truth of the story, later exegesis takes it as a symbol that the flesh of Christ - the veil both revealing and concealing the godhead - is woven from Mary's body. I have followed an icon pattern which indicates the mountain of Sinai topped with cloud on the case of the spindle.

In the icon Mary, as a daughter of David, sits on the throne of the house of David, who will bear the new Godking of David's line. This is why her seat is always so thronelike. The MP OV is Mary Theotokon ( Mother of God). The letters are kept in Greek because the gospels were written in Greek. They are always in red and shortened, which links then to the similarly shortened name of Christ IC XC, and derives from the way of indicating the name of God in the Hebrew Bible.

The angel is always depicted below Mary, and at a distance from her. As the throne of God, she is higher than the angels. Because the angel only indicates that a divine birth will come about and the mystery is concealed from the messenger i.e. 'at a spiritual distance' from him, the space between the two, composed of gold, indicating the presence of God, is vitalling important. It is God who stands between the two. In your church, God literally is enthroned between the two in the tabernacle, and the central pillar forms the decisive division between the messenger and the Mother of God which is a feature of the icon.

Sr Petra Clare

North East Catholic History Society

I really should write these notifications rather earlier but this afternoon we have the December talk for the NECHS. The topic today is Mary Ward 1585-1645 Foundress and Educator and the speaker is Sr. Patricia Harriss cj. As always we meet at St Andrews, Worswick St, Newcastle and begin at 2pm. All welcome.

The icons arrive at St Mary`s

I`m delighted to say that the icon of the Annunciation arrived today for St Mary`s and I was able to get it installed straightaway in time for the Immaculate Conception tomorrow. This is the work of Sr Petra Clare who lives in the Sancti Angeli Benedictine Skete in Cannich, Inverness-shire. Many thanks to Davey and Derek who fitted them today: the same team that installed the hanging crucifix in SS Peter and Paul`s Longbenton a couple of weeks ago. Here are a few pictures although my camera doesn`t get the colours exactly right all the time

Many thanks to the parishioners of St Mary`s who have made this possible by their donations over the last few years.

Mrs. Beamish

I`ve just heard this on the radio and it made me smile.