This is me, Eccles

This is me, Eccles
This is me, Eccles

Monday 6 May 2013

Liturgical abuses

QUAERITUR: Our parish priest frequently turns up late for Mass, because he has to finish watching his favourite television programme beforehand. In order to start the service on time he has programmed a rather gloomy robot to say the words for him until he arrives. Is there any problem with this?

Marvin the paranoid android

"Ego miser et indignus peccator (I think you ought to know I'm a very depressed sinner)."

Father X writes: No, I can't see any problem with that, provided that the real priest takes over before the Gospel is read out.


QUAERITUR: Although our parish priest turns up on time, he is a rather timid chap with a very dominating mother and two sisters, who insist on correcting him all the time. Last Sunday, he began to say "Through my fault, through my fault, through my most grievous fault" and they interrupted him with "Actually, I blame the bishop." Worse, they dress up in the most hideous vestments, evidently wishing that they themselves were priests. What can we do?

Women dressed as priests

Now John always gets the words of the creed wrong, so we'll do it our way.

Father X writes: Never argue with a woman!


QUAERITUR: Our parish priest is very fond of pizza. Last week he became a little confused, and, evidently thinking he had a supply of bread and wine, he started consecrating a pepperoni pizza and a bottle of diet coke. Were we right to stop him?

pizza box

At least the priest is wearing a biretta!

Father X writes: It is never right to interrupt a priest, even one who seems to be barking mad.


QUAERITUR: Our parish priest writes a blog on which he keeps advertising coffee. I drank some of it, and felt very ill afterwards. If I can't trust him to recommend good coffee, how can I trust his interpretations of the Gospels?

bad coffee

Liturgically invalid coffee.

Father X writes: Disgraceful! This is definitely a liturgical abuse. Drink "Mysterious Monk" coffee, guaranteed to kill 99% of all known germs.

2 comments:

  1. Our parish presbyter uses Hobnobs for communion and chocolate coated ones for solemn feasts. This has doubled the Sunday attendance to 8 parishioners. Clearly a creative liturgical solution the post-conciliar fathers would have been proud of.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Dear Fr X

    I recently visited a beautiful country church with an altar ad orientem, dating from 1296, in an agreeable village, abutting an excellent pub. Only trouble is - it is Anglican and has a lady vicaress. Could we possibly do a three-way swap - sending the lady vicar to the parish of the hen-pecked John, where she can merge cycles and live agreeably with the two other ladies - swapping recipes and reading aga sagas. John could go to the first parish, and as he will be grateful for his escape, he will doubtless disconnect the robot's motherboard, rather than brook any more interference. The original priest can then come to St Oswalds, Peover, and say the trad Mass ad orientem, while the Latin Mass Society rep ushers both protestants out and into the pub for a liturgical happy hour.

    ReplyDelete