A real toughie!
So Eccles consulted a few friends, each of whom received Communion in a different way, and this is what they said:
Fay Risee, receiver in the hand.
I thank God that I am not like that wretched publican over there, who is kneeling down and hoping to receive on the tongue. My bishop really hates anything that smacks of "traditionalism", "believing in the Real Presence", "reverence", etc., and he has given instructions to all his priests that if they attempt to offer the sacrament on the tongue, they will be cast into the outer darkness, where there is wailing and gnashing of teeth. Or perhaps the SSPX. Who cares whether it is safer to receive on the tongue or in the hand? My bishop is the only God I believe in!
"Nervous" Odo, worshipper at St Daryl the Apostate's.
In ordinary times, Fr Phil would consecrate bread that he had bought from Tesco's on the way to Mass. Sometimes he couldn't get bread and used Eccles cakes! No way could they be delivered on the tongue. But now for safety reasons, we have individually packaged hosts in little envelopes, which we can take home and consume at our leisure. Or give them to friends!
Self service!
Telly Addict, watcher of livestream masses.
For me it is not an issue, as I no longer attend Church, but watch all my masses by livestream. Unless there is something better on. That Ed Stewpot with his semi-religious BBC show "Sunday" is very good, isn't he? Last week he had the Dalai Lama, George Soros, and the Chief Satanist all commenting on climate change. Anyway, when I do listen the priest encourages us to make a "spiritual communion" instead. Of course, I don't always manage to do this - last time, the man from Amazon rang the doorbell, delivering my copy of the best-selling Bumper Book of Bishop Barron Burbles - but it's the thought that counts, isn't it?
Chairman Ivereigh has spoken.
An opportunity to chat.
It's very dull coming in to an EF Mass just before the start. You will normally find the church in total silence, with people praying, meditating, who knows what? Come to a jolly NO service, and we have none of that! A steady buzz of conversation - gossip, rumours, quarrels, chat about what people did last week, the shops, ... this is how it would have been like in Biblical times, when Jesus could hardly get a word in edgeways because of chatter about the price of fish, the latest rumours about Judas Iscariot's beach house, and the discomfort of the seats at the Last Supper.
Waiting for the priest to arrive.
The vernacular.
Go to an EF Mass and it's all in Latin, and even if you go a hundred times you will never be able to understand a single word of it. But go to Scotland, to France, to Poland, to Samoa, and you will find that everyone speaks Vernacular, as Vatican II told them to! Don't worry, you'll soon learn the Hungarian for "Lead us not into temptation", or "Let us not fall into temptation", or "Oooh, don't tempt me!" or whatever the Pope would like us to say this week.
No kneeling.
Well, there is some kneeling, but you can usually avoid it. After all, the Pope does. All postures are welcome. In France they stand up and block your view at the Elevation of the Host. In the Vatican they sprawl on cushions sniffing cocaine - well, some of them do. You can stand, sit, kneel, hop around on one leg, wave your hands in the air... drawing attention to yourself as a particularly holy person is very popular (I think it started with the Baptists).
Marty Haugen lets rip.
The hymns.
Oh, Gregorian chant is so boring! It may have meaningful words, dignified music, and a general air of sanctity... but, admit it, wouldn't you rather have "I am the Lord of the Dance," or "Gather us in," or even "Shine, Jesus, Shine" - all good quality sources of spiritual nourishment where the words may be heretical, banal, and boring, but they are at least the sort of songs you can sing when totally blotto (even if you may have difficulty when sober)?
Clowns, puppets, and balloons.
These are not a compulsory part of the Novus Ordo Mass (except in parts of Germany and Austria), but they are certainly a popular feature. When did you last see a priest holding up a Kermit the Frog puppet when giving a general Absolution? I think I've made my point.
We also recommend liturgical dancing.
The Grope of Peace.
The Novus Ordo Mass is so tactile. Cuddle your neighbour, pinch her backside, or - for neighbours you aren't so keen on - give him a hearty kick in the ankle. This week's top score at St Tharg's is 36 Signs of Peace - this took brother Bosco about ten minutes to complete. Admittedly, he's now facing charges of assault, grievous bodily harm, and manslaughter (how was he to know that Sister Dominatrix would have a heart attack?) but it's all Biblical, innit?
The Communion.
Kneeling down and receiving on the tongue are so rigid. Sidle up and grab the Host from the priest. Use the standard Vatican II liturgical response "Thanks, Daddy-o" rather than a silent "Amen". Do not cross yourself. Look! As with all these rituals, just do it whichever way you want. God doesn't expect our reverence, our sincerity, or even - these days - that anyone believes in Him. Ask the Bishop!
In fact, it usually turns up on Twitter via its moronic quizzes. Which Famous Serial Killer Are You? Which Heretical Jesuit Are You? Which Fatal Illness Are You?
Excuse my French! Apparently someone is paid to produce this garbage.
Still, we stumbled across something, and it turned out to be the immortal prose of one Joseph Bernstein. In the eyes of little Joseph, anyone who is not a committed Democrat is probably alt-right. Three of the sad little figureheads of Catholic Liberalism (or do I mean Liberal Catholicism?) are wheeled out: alt-Jesuit Jimmy Martin (catchphrase, "it's HATE"), odd-bod theologian Massimo Faggioli, and "Catholic Whiners" founder Austen Ivereigh. They all get a chance to put the boot in.
Well, I don't always agree with Father Z: indeed I have blogged about his fondness for guns (but he's American, and they still need them in Wisconsin for predatory redcoats, Injuns, buffaloes, drug-dealers, Democrats, Jesuits, etc., so I guess he has an excuse). There's also his excessive use of red ink, and, worst of all, the fact that I'm not allowed to comment on his blog, whereas so many less-saved people can do so. Oh, and he plugs "Mystic Monk" coffee, when my own "Numinous Nun" brand is far better.
An oldie, but a goodie. Fr Z takes the cure.
Well I looked up Joseph Bernstein, and his track record for boring articles is pretty good. Some time I must find out who Chelsea Manning is (all I know is that he was originally called Aston Villa Manning), and try and get excited about a museum that wants all its donors to believe in climate change...zzz...zzz...
Sorry, where was I? Oh yes, the bitter pills fired at Father Z. Well, as Father DL notes (more-or-less), Mr Weinstein doesn't realise that Catholicism is more about tradition/modernism and orthodoxy/heterodoxy than straightforward right/left politics. Although you nay suspect that Benedict XVI votes for the Partito Italiano Conservativo, while Francis leans towards the Marxisto-Leninisto Socialisto Partito.
"Sigh! I guess our prayers are cancelling each other out as well."
Anyway, I need to change my name from Eccles to something extravagantly long, so that I can then be referred to affectionately as "Frater E". Something like Ecclesiasticolongendorf should do the trick. Then I too can be noticed by... drat, I've forgotten his name already. That Buzz Lightyear person.
A traddy nativity scene, unsuitable for modern use.
Traditionally, at least, there were three wise men, called Kasper, Müller and Baldisseri, but nobody knows how many shepherds there were, nor any of their names.
My own detailed research suggests that there were three shepherds (because Biblical stuff comes in threes, sevens, twelves and forties). I thought at first that Baa-lamb was a shepherd, but many scholars now say that he kept a donkey, and was nothing at all to do with the first Christmas.
Shepherds only! Clear off!
A study of the Archers, a long-running religious radio programme broadcast by the BBC, suggests that one of the shepherds might be called Walter Gabriel, originator of the phrase, "Me old pal, me old beauty", although Gabriel is also the name of an angel, so one cannot be sure.
The Tony Hancock character Joshua Merryweather (another Biblical name!) is also a possibility, with his classic hymn of praise (now available in The Graham Kendrick Book of Hymns for Today):
I've got mangel wurzels in my garden, I've got mangel wurzels in my shed, I've got mangel wurzels in my bathroom, And a mangel wurzel for a head.
Were these the three shepherds?
Well, it's all very mystifying. Also, why did the angels summon shepherds to the manger? Why not celebrities - by which we mean actors, footballers, comedians, politicians, professors of zoology, professors of human flourishing, etc.? Or even celebrity clerics, bloggers, and professors of theology, who could have explained what was going on? It all sounds like an almighty mix-up.
"There will be a time for the canonization of King Herod," explains a distinguished professor.
Note: "While shepherds washed their socks by night / All seated round the tub" is © The Graham Kendrick Book of Hymns for Today.
It started at the Telegraph, moved on to the Catholic Herald, the Spectator, and ever onward: the demise of the professional "suit and tie" blogger, who was actually paid for writing his or her piece for a newspaper or website. For it was discovered that the "pyjama" or "underpant" commentators, who offered their services for free, had so much more to say, even if they were never allowed out of their bedrooms.
"Would you care to write a blog for us, your Majesty? Any old rubbish will do."
Originally designed as learned essays on matters of common interest, in the tradition of Bacon, Swift, Chesterton, Orwell and so many others, the professional blogs gradually declined, as people were invited to read them and comment on them. Would Francis Bacon have written a piece on whether James I ate too much custard? Would Chesterton have criticised Cardinal Vaughan's haircut? Did George Orwell have a crush on Judy Garland? No, these were heavyweight essayists.
Scarecrow, Dorothy (Judy Garland), Lion and Tin Man in the Izzard of Oz.
In the end, it was not necessary to write a full blog post in order to generate the valuable "clicks" that so delighted the advertisers. A simple one or two-word title, such as "UKIP" (mysteriously written "Ukip" by the Telegraph), or "Islam", or "David Cameron", or - in the great days of "Holy Smoke" blogs - "Vincent Nichols", would guarantee pages and pages of mouth-foaming nonsense, as shelf-stackers, donkey-obsessives, drunken journalists, sinister deacons, bad-tempered Australian grandmothers, mollusc-molesters, implausible priests, and perverts from Stockport would tumble over each other as they rushed to issue insults, to suck up to the blog's author, to dump the contents of their brains, to explain why the Catholic Church was damned and they alone were saved, or to tell tedious anecdotes about life in Adelaide. Or perhaps it was just one person using an army of sockpuppets.
Of course, an army of semi-literate "muddlerators" was required to keep them in order. Sometimes the blog author himself was muddlerated, sometimes rival bloggers would drop in to join the fun.
"I see they've moderated my comments about giving communion to adulterers."
Curiously, the Guardian, a newspaper that will be totally forgotten by about 2025, took an entirely different approach. To write for Comment Shall Set You Free, you had to buy into the liberal consensus, where men could become female just by putting on a dress, where an abortion was considered to be every woman's dream, where Shami Chakrabarti was actually taken seriously, where a man could marry another man - or his mother - or indeed his pet hamster, and where Keith Vaz was regarded as a saintly character of irreproachable morals. Then, any comment below the line other than "I agree with you, Fr Fraser" (or whoever the writer was) was rewarded with instant banishment and accusations of "hate crime". But nobody read the Guardian so it didn't matter.
The fate of "professional" bloggers was inevitable. The best writers went off and wrote their own spiritually nourishing blogs, in a world where deadlines did not exist, the writer was not obliged to produce any old tosh if he or she didn't feel like it, and no money changed hands. Hence there were casualties among the professional bloggers: Fr Dwight Longenecker's family starved to death when his own blog was drowned in a sea of rivals; Fr Zuhlsdorf had to sell coffee to make ends meet; and as for that huge army of brilliant Telegraph bloggers - Thompson, Delingpole, Hannan, Hough, Mary Riddell no not Mary Riddell - they disappeared without trace. Although sometimes you may see Ed West selling matches in Trafalgar Square; he still wears a suit and tie.
"You will leave the EU..." Hannan has a new career as a stage hypnotist.
P.S. Comments are welcomed. They're usually better than anything I have to say, anyway.
* traddy Latin expression meaning "with peace", here meaning "with due deference to".
Pope Pius I (2nd century A.D.). Accepted by most trads.
Traditionalistus Sedevacantus. These are the extreme trads, who do not accept any pope since Pius XII (or Pius X, or possibly Pius V; one of the Pii, anyway) as being legitimate. They have severe reservations about the "modernistic" Tridentine Mass, preferring the Sarum Rite, although some prefer to celebrate the Whitby Rite dating from A.D. 664, in which "Yorkshire" Latin (lingua ebagumsis) was recommended. Some theories you may hear from T.S. include the notion that Pope St John XXIII was replaced by the demon Telbat, just before he summoned Vatican II, and that the next Pope - "who will come from a Minster to the West" - will be the last before the final Armageddon, the great battle between Conservatism and Liberalism.
Archbishop Lefebvre looks on in horror as a giant puppet walks up the aisle.
Traditionalistus Nonvaticanduensis. Next on the scale we have a variety of traditionalists who reject parts of Vatican II. Bishop Fellay, the head of SSPX, has said that his team accepts 95% of the teachings of Vatican II, which is not a bad score: an A* grade, surely? Of course nobody has ever read all the Vatican II documents (739 pages of fine print, as contrasted with 42 for Vatican I and 179 for Trent), although we are all waiting for the movie, which will star Stephen Fry as Hans Küng and Kermit the Frog as Basil Loftus. The documents have titles such as Decree concerning the sacred pastoral dogmatic constitution on the apostolate of the renewal of priestly mission through the divine ministry of the ecumenical activity of social communication with the laity, which roughly means Kick-starting our priests.
T.N. will of course only attend a Latin Mass, regarding the Novus Ordo as - at best - inferior, and - at worst - invalid. Although they accept that Pope Francis is the legitimate pope, they tend to dislike him so much that he might easily be the Beast of the Apocalypse in a white suit.
Flamenco dancing in church? At my age?
Traditionalistus Orthodoxus. These are the most numerous, and in fact tend to be totally orthodox Catholics who see no point in changing things just for the sake of change. They may well prefer the traditional Latin Mass for its universality, purity and beauty (enabling them to focus on God rather than worrying about whether they will catch a loathsome disease from young Ernie Grotchet in the Kiss of Peace); still, they accept that the Novus Ordo is a totally valid way of worshipping.
They have no particular quarrel with Vatican II itself (after all, if you look closely, you find that it stressed the importance of Latin). However, they go for the "hermeneutic of continuity" approach, and therefore believe that the so-called Spirit of Vatican II - motto "Anything Goes" - is just a snare and a delusion leading to liturgical dancing, clown masses and banal hymns such as Shine, Jesus, Shine. Often, they prefer Pope Benedict XVI's approach rather than Pope Francis's, but they console themselves with the thought that the Holy Spirit never promised that all popes would be supermen.
Not Pope Francis... or is he?
One could go on, with an analysis of watered-down Catholicism: does a fondness for Walk in the Light mean that you automatically subscribe to the weird views of Tina Beattie? If necessary, we can advise you.
Pull the tassel and his head lights up.
This blog denies any responsibility for the Giles Fraser idea, but here are some possible suspects.
Standing on my head by Fr Dwight Longenecker. Was this the origin of the "Christ would have approved of same-sex marriage" joke?
The Beaker folk of Husborne Crawley by Archdruid Eileen. Could she have invented the "I don't object to suicide on religious grounds, merely because it is a tool of market capitalism" quip?
Linen on the Hedgerow by Richard Collins. Surely nobody else could have come up with the idea of a priest who sells his soul to the Guardian?
Dr Spaceley-Trellis.
One obvious ancestor of the Giles Fraser character is Peter Simple's Dr Spaceley-Trellis, the go-ahead bishop of Bevindon, who regarded Christ as a social worker, and was anxious to reject His miracles and moral teaching. Another ancestor is probably Tolkien's character Fr Gollum, with his cries of "Bigotsess, I hatess them!"
... and I was wondering whether you could invite Fr Gollum onto Thought for the Day?
Of course the Catholics have their own comedy characters, some as hilarious as Giles Fraser. We were thinking especially of the brilliant Basil Loftus, who is generally agreed to be an invention of Dr Joseph Shaw.
In other Anglican news, the former Archbishop of Canterbury, Dr Rowan Williams, has admitted to being strongly influenced by Buddhism. When he runs out of socially aware prayers to say, a spot of navel-contemplation keeps the archiepiscopal spirit fully nourished.
The mystic art of Can-tu-ar.
A liberal Mass. Note that the Cross is replaced by something Greener.
One of the riches of the Catholic Church is her unity and diversity. Within the Catholic big tent we have many who accept the Church's teaching - informed by scripture and tradition - but there are also many who want to make up their own rules, because they know better.
Do you really need to follow Christ to call yourself a Christian?
What liberal Catholics have concluded is that all this stuff about "eternal verities" is simply nonsense. It is the duty of the Church to adapt to the Spirit of the Age. We mustn't get left behind, trying to teach something different, must we? People might think of us as "different" from atheists, cranky, even. They might even stop inviting us to fashionable dinner parties!
St Paul - wrote nothing important.
Liberal Catholics understand that we have to rewrite our religion from scratch. Out goes all that old-fashioned stuff believed by Christ, the Apostles, the Saints and Martyrs, the Popes, and lots of other dead people. We have to find new religious teachers: Leonardo Boff, Hans Küng, Tina Beattie, David Cameron, Barack Obama, and Polly Toynbee! Only by taking a little wisdom from each of these sages can we move forward.
"Let us pray." Pol replaces Paul.
Now, if you want to understand modern liberal Catholicism, you need to watch the BBC, or read the Guardian. Remember even Jesus, in one of His more advanced moments, said, And you shall know the comments, and the comments shall make you free (John 8:32). He saw that one day His teachings would be superseded. The teachings of Alan Rusbridger are more modern, and their scriptural authority is undeniable, since the writers are all still alive, and can be located in your nearest nursing home.
Of course liberal Catholics do not reject all moral teaching: adultery, murder, and false witness may no longer be sinful, but we must still condemn all bigoted attempts to impose ideas of sexual morality, any attempts to obstruct Choice, and the denial of climate change.
Forgive us our carbon dioxide, and deliver us from climate change.
I realize that traditionalists may not appreciate my take on the matter, but like it or not, the second Vatican Council has taken place. And although nobody ever talks about what it decided, God (if you don't mind my using an old-fashioned term) has sent His Spirit of Vatican II to tell us what it should have decided, and liberal Catholics are in the vanguard of inventing new things that could have been decided.
The vernacular Mass is now accepted as the Ordinary Form, and modern liberal Catholics see this as an opportunity for further development of the rite. Since most of them don't attend Mass very often, anyway, they cannot get used to the new translation, and so they have invited Kevin Mishmash, the publisher of Walk in the Light, Follow Me, and so much more, to produce a version without any of the hard words.
Do your hymns make people ill? If so, Kevin Mishmash may want to publish them.
Out goes: We believe in one God, the Father Almighty, Maker of heaven and earth, and of all things visible and invisible.
In comes:
We believe, We believe, We believe, That the Father's been making things! Earth and Heaven, Heaven and Earth, The Father's been making things! Things that we see, things that we don't. The Father's been making things! Yeah!© 2014 Kevin Mishmash.
I, for one, am glad that the liberals are there to interpret Catholicism as it was never interpreted before. They are a gift to the whole church.
When you're writing a blog, it is important to be able to show your readers what you've had to eat. Probably, this is because the reader says to himself, "If I eat frogs' legs/ cornflakes/ roast camel/ peas with honey, then I too can become an archbishop/ a celebrity blogger/ a Tablet journalist/ a saved person." Alas, this is usually not going to happen.
In fact, today I had the best that French cuisine could offer.
Other things that you can do to add the "personal" touch to your blog include photographing key items in your everyday life, such as your cats, your kitchen, your dustbins, perhaps your lavatory.
Now the easiest kind of blog to write is one where you post spiritually nourishing paintings and poems. Such blogs are usually very good, because the material is, by definition, produced by someone talented. This is the sort of thing I mean:
Old Noah he had an ostrich farm and fowls on the largest scale, He ate his egg with a ladle in a egg-cup big as a pail, And the soup he took was Elephant Soup and fish he took was Whale, But they all were small to the cellar he took when he set out to sail, And Noah he often said to his wife when he sat down to dine, "I don't care where the water goes if it doesn't get into the wine."
Painting by Breughel, poem by G.K. Chesterton.
See what I mean? This has already improved the quality of my post, immeasurably. And Noah is in the Bible, so is a spiritually nourishing person. Come to think of it, why do I waste my time trying to produce original stuff?
Some blogs are co-operative efforts. Jessica Hof has an excellent blog called All along the watchtower, which has several different authors - some Anglicans, Catholics, a Baptist, and - occasionally - my dear brother Bosco of the Calvary Chapel, who was the inspiration for my own blog. This keeps the blog very active, although there is necessarily a divergence of opinions: if an article begins All pictures of my Lord are false images and idolatry, and shows that the artists didn't have Jesus in their lives like I do, and they'll all be left behind when the Rapture comes. Ha ha! - well, that was probably written by Bosco rather than someone from a mainstream branch of Christianity.
Sorry, Rubens - it's the Lake of Fire for you!
Let's finish today with some ideas on how to write an American priest's blog. Now American priests all have complicated names, such as Zuhlsnecker or Longedorf, so are best referred to simply as "Father M" or "Father Q", as if they were James Bond characters. Unlike British priests, who always lead luxurious well-paid lives, with regular holidays in Tahiti and deacons to wait on them hand and foot, American priests are generally broke, and often need to raise money through their blogs. Their demands vary from 10 cents, which will buy a crust of dry maggotty bread for dinner, up to $500, which will buy a new silk biretta with a special compartment in which to store the priest's handgun.
Do give generously. Buy the coffee they're sponsoring - remember, Mystic Monk coffee makes you live longer and develop a sharper mind, while the rival Numinous Nun coffee causes arthritis and dizzy spells. You know it makes sense.
Finally, two tips for rescuing a blog post when it's running out of steam, as this one is:
Post a picture of some sweet furry creatures (these are possums).
Or use a picture of people making fools of themselves in church.
A rare photo of Michael Voris, sans wig.
It isn't necessarily a bad thing to criticise Catholic laymen who make videos. But there are serious problems with the way Longenecker has made his criticism. First of all, what status does he have as a Catholic watchblog? Attacking Michael Voris - a person whose influence in the Catholic Church is less only than that of the Pope, Father Z, Eccles and Damian Thompson - is not something to be undertaken by anyone under the rank of Cardinal.
Second, some people may misinterpret Father L's attack as motivated by envy. Longenecker is a hard-working priest with a wife, four children, three goldfish and a pet rat called Mahony. In order to make ends meet he has to write books, give lectures, and stand at traffic lights offering to wash people's car windscreens. Also, his name is almost impossible to spell correctly.
Fr Dwight Longenecker.
Voris, on the other hand, is a Hollywood superstar, who earns slightly more than George Clooney and Tom Hanks put together.
Don't get me wrong, here. There is a certain class of people (often called "priests"), who feel that they are somehow qualified to speak to the rest of us about good and evil, even to hear confessions and give absolution. Go into any church on a Sunday and you may find one of these people, often talking for ten or fifteen minutes without any interruptions or opportunities for questions. As a liberal Catholic I am shocked that such people should exist!
A priest.
Anyway, forgive me if my words seem harsh. I have endeavoured to remove the speck from my own eye before taking the planks out of everyone else's. Or whatever the saying is.
