A tribute to Cardinal Meisner

In an exclusive interview with this blog, Pope Francis has paid tribute to Cardinal Joachim Meisner, who died this week.

"Look, even this puppet can say 'No, yes, yes, yes, yes!'"

"Johann, er, Joachim Meisner was one of my closest friends," explained the Holy Father. "Unfortunately we lost touch in recent years, although we used to exchange phone calls, Christmas cards and discussions of theology in the old days. In fact, I think I've got one of his letters here, which I never got round to answering. It was signed by four of my closest cardinal-friends, but Spadaro said that it was simply something complimenting me on the solid Catholic doctrine in Amoris Laetitia, and it didn't require any reply."

"Hey, Sosa! I've blocked ALL the Catholics on Twitter. Job done!"

"Anyway, he was a good man, and a good Catholic, which is probably why we grew apart in the last few months. I seem to remember that he wrote another letter, requesting an audience, but we popes are very busy men, and I just couldn't find time to see him. Or even to reply to his letter. We shall not see his like again - in fact I hope not!"

"And I wouldn't have given this numpty an audience, if I'd known he was going to wear Islamic rainbow socks."

My favourite things

To redress the balance, as some people think this blog is too "traddie".

With apologies to Rodgers and Hammerstein.

Masses with puppets and tambourine jingles,
Long-lasting "kisses of peace", where one mingles,
Rich German bishops all wrapped up in bling,
These are a few of my favourite things.

Cardinal Kasper and all his new teaching,
All of Pope Francis's aeroplane preaching,
Amoris Laetitia, and all that it brings,
These are a few of my favourite things.

Wacky professors who'd ordain some females,
People who sit in the Mass reading e-mails,
Paul Inwood's music, which everyone sings,
These are a few of my favourite things.

When the priest prays, when the choir sings,
When I meet a "Trad",
I simply remember my favourite things,
And then I don't feel so bad.

The eight most boring moments in church

Clearly, we don't go to church to be entertained (unless we're in the Calvary Chapel), but rather to worship God, and thereby to become more saved. However, there are parts of the service that count as "fatty tissue", and definitely waste our time.

A gripping moment in the Mass.

1. Before the service. Obviously, for a 10 a.m. service you shouldn't turn up at 10 a.m., on the dot. Sometimes the priest is too quick off the mark, and will already be galloping down the aisle; in any case it may be difficult to get seats together, if you are coming as a family. So you turn up at 9.30 instead, and - according to taste - gossip with your neighbours, play with your phone, pray quietly, read the newsletter, or sit thinking holy thoughts. By 10 a.m. all these sources of spiritual nourishment are over, and you're getting bored.

2. A bad hymn. You may not get one of these. Moreover, if you do, you experience a mixture of irritation and boredom. If only I had the courage to kneel down during "Walk in the Light" with my hands over my face in a "Lord, forgive them" attitude.

"No, not 'If I were a fuzzy, wuzzy bear, I'd thank you, Lord for my fuzzy, wuzzy hair'!"

3. Firing up the thurible. This will not apply in many churches, but watching the priest doling out a spoonful of gunpower - or whatever it is - into the thurible, about 20 minutes into the Mass, is very boring, and I don't know why he couldn't have done it beforehand.

Of course, there's always the possibility that Fr Bunsen will make a mess of it and set fire to his chasuble, but I've never seen it happen. The nearest I've ever got to that was when a priest I knew conducted a funeral at a crematorium and scorched his cassock - but it was on an electric fire after the service.

4. The sermon. Many priests are boring, we have to admit. Even (especially) when they steal their homilies from Fr Hezekiah Snoring's Collected Victorian Sermons in 12 bulky volumes. This year, Mercy is the big theme for us, and I never realised before just how boring it could be.

A variation on this is the Bishop's Letter, perhaps giving us even more Mercy ("This week we painted the Door of Mercy with rainbow stripes to show our commitment to the LBGT community, as its previous colours - red and white - suggested a commitment to St George, which many found offensive"), or What I Did This Month ("On Wednesday I enjoyed tea and Eccles cakes with the Medium-Sized Sisters of the Beretta"), or simply the bishop's strategy document ("Here is a list of churches that I am closing down this year").

The Medium-Sized Sisters of the Beretta

5. The kiss of peace. Again a mixture of irritation and boredom, especially, when someone else is trying to beat last week's record of 23 victims. I've said enough on this topic already.

6. Blessing of altar servers / candles / new hassocks / pets. Yes, all these are worthy of blessing - indeed, most things are blessable unless they actually lead one to sin (e.g. copies of the Tablet). But it's a distraction from the service. Also, bringing pet hippopotamuses into church, although not exactly boring, is too "modernist".

7. An end-of-service chat from a representative of CAFOD / the Freemasons / our very own Kate Drivel who spent her gap year ecumenically working with ISIS. The aim here is to drum up support, or possibly money. GO AWAY.

Next week's preacher.

8. Final announcements. Next week the Bishop will be visiting, and there will be a special puppet mass. Tina Beattie's lecture has been cancelled again. There are coffee and cannabis in the Church Hall. All these things are in the newsletter, Father!

Any more?

The Tablet's survey on the Family Synod

A revised version of something else. Any accusations that the survey is slanted towards getting the answers that the Tabletistas prefer are clearly baseless.

Explaining family life to the Synod.

1. Married couples will address the bishops every day of the Synod. Which most closely reflects your view?

• I'd rather hear from same-sex couples.
• Chuck out all the bishops and let Mrs Pepinster decide things.
• The bishops would learn more by watching Eastenders.

2. How can the Church best support families? Select up to three options.

• Rewrite all the church's teaching on sex.
• Recognise that the church shouldn't be teaching at all.
• Organize gay dating events.
• Give Kieran Conry a new role looking after distressed wives.
• Sponsor the Tablet to print photos of Page 3 lovelies.
• Offer family-friendly Masses with the religious bits removed.
• Who cares? The "family" is an obsolete idea.

A family-friendly Mass.

3. Do you believe that in an ideal world a child should be brought up by a father and a mother?

• No, a she-wolf was good enough for Romulus and Remus.
• No, a child should have 3 parents, one of them trans-sexual.
• No, "parents" is a traddy idea that was rejected by Vatican II.
• Yes, provided that the father and mother may each be of either sex, or none, or both.

5. Do you pray with your child(ren)?

• Pray? What's that?
• Only when they have exams coming up.
• No, but we watch Songs of Praise.
• No, but we read the Tablet's wine column and then get drunk together.
• No as I don't want to indoctrinate them in outmoded forms of worship such as prayer when many secular alternatives are available such as the music of Paul Inwood the beauty of liturgical dancing and doing one's own thing...

6. Do you talk to your child(ren) about faith?

• Yes, I read to them from the works of Hans Küng.
• No, since I am a Tablet-reader, and as such do not have any particular faith.
• Yes, as a child of the 1960s I have all the discs of Adam Faith.

That's as close to faith as we get round here.

7. If you are a divorced and remarried Catholic whose marriage has not been annulled, do you:

• Receive communion and hope nobody notices.
• Receive communion because my priest doesn't care who turns up.
• Turn up to church but try to trip up other people as they push past me to take communion how dare they try and feel superior...
• Stay away from church because obviously God is at fault.
• I am not a divorced and remarried Catholic, but I am working on it.

8. Is a couple’s decision to cohabit

• An indication that we should drop the sacrament of marriage.
• Not worth worrying about, unless one of them is a bishop.
• Unambitious - why don't they have a foursome with the neighbours?
• None of the church's business.

9. What do you hope will be the consequences of the current synod on the family and next year's? (Tick as many as apply.)

• Cardinal Kasper for Pope!
• The Church to allow every possible marriage as a sacrament, irrespective of the number of people involved or their sexes.
• Take-over of the Catholic Church by the Anglicans.
• Adultery to be re-classed as a cardinal virtue.
• ACTA to be allowed to run the Church.

"Once we stopped the EF Mass, we tried everything else: clowns, puppets, the tango..."

10. What is your marital status?

• Civil partnership involving three men and an elephant.
• Married, but I've locked my other half in the garden shed.
• Infatuated with Tina Beattie, but I know we can only ever be good friends.
• Divorced/beheaded/died/divorced/beheaded/survived.
• Married to myself.
• Can't remember.

Oh, I do love myself!

11. Where do you live?

• Westminster.
• Arundel and Brighton.
• Blackfen.
• Roehampton.
• Gallifrey.
• Somewhere normal.

At the drop of a biretta

With apologies to the original Flanders and Swann song Transport of Delight.

Some people like a Latin Mass: they say, "Credo for me!"
Or for bonny Agnus Dei, they'd lay them down and dee.
Such means of praise and worship do seem old and rather crass,
To the priest...
... yes, and the deacon...
... in a very modern Mass!
   
Sing Alleluia! Ch-ch!
Sing Alleluia! Ch-ch! 
   
When you are sitting in our church, the coolest place in town,
You'll see the priest processing in, dressed as a jolly clown.
He greets the congregation with "Hey folks! This is a gas!"
In a swinging sixties, Novus Ordo, 
Liberal and progressive modern Mass.

The Gospel reading

We start off with some dancing girls, for in our litur-gy
We take out all the holy bits and shout "Hey! Look at me!"
So let's have wild cavorting now from every lad and lass
In an all-inclusive, Tablet-sponsored, swinging sixties, 
Novus Ordo, liberal and progressive modern Mass.
   
This is a transport of delight. 
Of delight!
Walk in delight! Walk in delight!
This is a transport of delight. 
Walk in delight!
Walk walk walk walk walk in delight!

... your right arm in, and shake it all about...

We now bring on our puppet friends, to help us with our prayer:
For who can say that Mass is not improved by Fozzie Bear?
Those nasty traddy Catholics were faced with an impasse! 
The priest is putting on a show,
The deacon is Pinocchio
In the all-inclusive, 
Tablet-sponsored, 
Swinging sixties, Novus Ordo, 
Liberal and progressive modern Mass.

A solemn moment in our devotions.

We don't have moral standards now - that really is too tame!
Since Vatican the Second, things just haven't been the same.
We praise gay rights, abortion, women priests, divorce - 
   it's clear
That Jesus, Peter and St Paul had simply no idea!
Our secular religion they may say is a "morass".
We don't believe in Heaven or Hell,
And really, that is just as well,
For the priest is putting on a show,
The deacon is Pinocchio
In the all-inclusive, 
Tablet-sponsored, 
Swinging sixties, Novus Ordo, 
Liberal and progressive,
Liberal and progressive modern Mass!
   
Sing Alleluia! 
Ch-ch!

Saint of the week

In the beginning was the wood.

St Pinocchio is venerated in many South American churches.

Pinocchio is an unusual saint, having originally been constructed as a wooden puppet. His life is well documented in Carlo Collodi's biography, but his main claim to fame is the story of his nose. As Pope Francis explained in his sermon on St Pinocchio's day: "The nose of St Pinocchio is a lesson to all of us. It grew in length whenever he told lies, thus teaching him the Christian virtues of truth and honesty."

Pinocchio, before he became human (and saved).

Knowing that the new Holy Father looks favourably on the representation of St Pinocchio at Mass, many traditionalist parishes - such as Our Lady of the Rosary in Blackfen, the Church of Our Saviour in New York City, and Santissima Trinità dei Pellegrini in Rome - are expecting to employ giant dolls as an aid to worship in the near future.

The Brompton Oratory - when will we see Pinocchio puppets at Solemn High Mass?

St Pinocchio himself later became human - indeed, the wood became flesh, as St John almost put it. The circumstances of his eventual death are unclear, and some versions of the legend state that "he lived happily ever after." In that case he is still around somewhere, perhaps even writing a blog.

Other religious figures seen at High Mass (note Melvyn Bragg behind Our Lord).