Marian Franciscan Vocations retreat, August

From the Friars at Gosport

This is a "Marian Franciscan" Vocation Discernment Retreat to be held on the weekend of the Solemnity of St. Maximilian Kolbe and the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary into Heaven body and soul. 

This will be held in the Marian Home of Walsingham from 13th to 15th August at the Little Way Association. For those interested, and discerning a Franciscan Vocation, please either email or contact the Friars according to the details on the attached Flyer.  

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Who is Pope Francis punishing?

In his Apostolic Letter Traditionis Custodes and its covering letter, Pope Francis is introducing stringent new restrictions on the celebration of the ancient Latin Mass, now called not the Extraordinary Form but simply the 1962 Missal or “earlier Missal.”

Pope Francis writes, in the letter, that the use of the 1962 Missal is

often characterized by a rejection not only of the liturgical reform, but of the Vatican Council II itself, claiming, with unfounded and unsustainable assertions, that it betrayed the Tradition and the “true Church”.

Pope Francis indicates that this concern, and the desire for measures such as those he has adopted, has been expressed by bishops responding to the survey on the implementation of Summorum Pontificum which the Congregation for Divine Worship carried out in 2020. This is very surprising, since those who had sight of the results consistently reported that a great many bishops were positive about the place of the Old Mass in their diocese. Even the French bishops, whose rather negative collective response was leaked, had to acknowledge many positive aspects of the phenomenon, and concludes that “if it [Summorum Pontificum] honors a principle of reality, then a tireless work of unity is always necessary.” What the French bishops had in mind, to assist this “work of unity,” was things like reconciling the calendar and lectionary, issues which Pope Francis has not broached.

Read the whole things there.

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Some Comments on the Apostolic Letter Traditionis Custodes

This has already gone out by email to LMS supporters.

This document will be a grave disappointment to those many priests and lay Catholics who responded to the words of Pope St John Paul II and Pope Benedict XVI, who encouraged the use of the earlier liturgical tradition, calling it a ‘rightful aspiration’ and ‘riches’ for the Church, respectively. These Catholics have worked hard over many years, particularly since 2007, to build up the unity of the Church, which as the Second Vatican Council declared does not depend on liturgical uniformity but on unity of faith under the Pope (Sacrosanctum Concilium 37; Orientalium Ecclesiarum 2).

The provision that the EF not be celebrated in parish churches appears entirely unworkable, in the context of the careful provision which has been made over many years by bishops all over the world.

The overall negative judgement of the EF and the communities which attend it seems wholly unwarranted, and we would challenge any apologist for this document to produce real evidence that the EF has undermined the unity of the Church, compared, say, to the celebration of Eastern Rites in the West, the special liturgical celebrations of the Neocatechumenate, or the great variety of liturgical styles found in the context of the Ordinary Form of the Roman Rite.

In detail, looking at the provisions of the document:

Art 1: This appears to overturn Pope Benedict XVI’s claim that the Roman Rite can be considered as having two ‘Forms’, Ordinary and Extraordinary. The document adopts the terminology of ‘the 1962 Missal’.

Art 2: This rolls back the presumption of authorisation for the 1962 Missal which was created by Summorum Pontificum in 2007. However, that claim was based on the fact that the older Missal had never been abrogated. Since this document does not formally abrogate it, this creates a legal anomaly.

Requiem for Fr Anthony Conlon

As a priest, the catafalque (coffin stand with pall, representing the body)
has a chalice and paten, and biretta, on it.

Yesterday evening the Latin Mass Society arranged a High Mass of Requiem for our former National Chaplain, Fr Anthony Conlon (14th July 1947-19th April 2020). It took place in the church of Our Lady of the Assumption and St Gregory in Warwick Street. It was celebrated by the Parish Priest Fr Mark Elliot Smith assisted by Fr Stephen Morrison O.Praem and Fr Rupert McHardy Cong Orat, accompanied by Cantores Missae under Charles Finch. Arranged by the Latin Mass Society.

Concelebration: a new front in the liturgy wars?

Individual Masses at the LMS Priest Training
Conference in Prior Park a few years ago.

My latest on LifeSite.

The celebration of priests together, when two or more priests celebrate one Mass, has long caused controversy. For decades after the Second Vatican Council priests have felt under pressure to take part in “concelebrated” Masses instead of celebrating their own Mass, perhaps without a congregation. Concelebration is now being enforced in St Peter’s Basilica in Rome, ending the long tradition of large numbers of priests celebrating individually at side altars. Now concelebration is being used as a weapon against priests who celebrate the Traditional Latin Mass: the Archbishop of Dijon, Roland Minerath, is ending the 23-year-old apostolate of the Fraternity of St Peter in the Archdiocese because the priests serving it prefer not to concelebrate.

Many bishops, religious superiors and seminary rectors like concelebration, as it gives them effective power over the celebration of Mass by their priest subordinates. They can insist that these priests not only attend a “conventual” or “community” Mass when priests are gathered together, but do so in a way which prevents them from celebrating a Mass of their own. When there is a large number of priests, most of them have hardly anything to do in concelebration, and of course they have no control over it: they can’t celebrate it at an earlier or later time, in a chapel with special significance to them, or using liturgical options of their choice, such as a votive Mass. Concelebration is a control-freak’s dream.

Read the whole thing there.

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Who is afraid of the Traditional Mass?

My latest on LifeSite.

On Sunday July 3, the FIUV — the International Una Voce Federation — took out an advert in the Rome edition of the Italian newspaper La Repubblica, to make a statement about the Traditional Latin Mass. It points out:

“The growth of interest in the traditional liturgy is not due to nostalgia for a time we do not remember, or a desire for rigidity: it is rather a matter of opening ourselves to the value of something that for most of us is new, and inspires hope.”

That it is controversial to be attached to the liturgy used by the Church for more than a dozen centuries is the sign of a deep malaise in the Church. Two prominent prelates in the Roman Curia have recently been reported making remarks about the Extraordinary Form (EF) of extraordinary hostility, and these have come after weeks of speculation about a new official document which will in some way roll back the freedom which Pope Benedict XVI gave to the more ancient liturgy in 2007.Possibly all these stories and rumors are false or taken out of context — the Vatican can seem like a hall of mirrors sometimes — but the mere fact that these stories are circulating is a reminder that the Old Mass has determined enemies in Rome.

Read it all there.

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Statement from the FIUV

Cross-posted from the FIUV blog.

The Una Voce Federation has taken out an advert in the mass-circulation Italian daily newspaper La Repubblica, appearing today Sunday 4th July.

The English text is as following (for other languages see here):

Living the faith, living the future:

The Extraordinary Form of the Roman Rite

Declaration of the International Federation Una Voce