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Latin Mass Society
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Chairman's Blog

    09/02/2019 - 10:00

    Sinners in the Queue for Communion
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    Queuing for Holy Communion in Westminster Cathedral at the LMS Annual Requiem

    A lot of the acrimonious debate about Amoris Laetitia boils down to the question of Catholics in a state of grave sin wishing to receive Holy Communion. Such difficulties are not new to the Church, which has long included unjust rulers, men who have mistresses, people enjoying the fruits of crime, and such like. Indeed, in one respect the situation was more difficult in past centuries, because more people voluntarily excluded themselves from receiving, to such an extent that in the High Middle Ages most lay Catholics only received Communion once a year, on Easter Sunday.



    So the question asked today was relevant: how can the Church both exclude Catholics in grave sin from Holy Communion, or foresee that they will exclude themselves, and still make them feel part of the Church’s liturgical life, a lifeline to the sinner who needs the grace of repentance?


    The answer is that the Church has found many ways of doing this, ways which are not, in general, employed today. It is instructive to consider them.


    The central point is a simple one: in past centuries, liturgical participation at Mass was not focused on the reception of Holy Communion.


    Catholics willingly attended Masses at which they would not receive, in order to ‘hear Mass’. Peasants went to early Masses before starting work. Nobles would have a priest celebrate Mass at an altar in their bedroom before breakfast. St Margaret of Scotland attended three Masses, one after the other, each morning. The complex ceremonial, the use of Latin and (if the Mass was sung) chant and other music, made it a deeply spiritual experience.


    What were they doing during these Masses? They were praying. They were uniting their prayers with those of the priest and of the Church. It was spiritual food for them.

    The high point of these Masses was the Consecration. As time went on the moment of Consecration was surrounded with greater ceremonial (such as raising the Host for people to see), and all kinds of architectural and musical techniques were employed to give it greater visibility, emphasis, and dignity. There were indulgences for those who witnessed the elevation and said a short prayer: ‘My Lord and my God’. Those who saw Christ in the elevation felt that they had done something important that day.



    Other things took place at a parish’s main Sunday Mass which further helped foster a sense of inclusion.



    First, Mass began with the congregation being sprinkled with Holy Water (the ‘Asperges’).

    Then, in many places the people participated in the ‘Kiss of Peace’ by kissing a metal or wooden object, a ‘pax’, which was passed from the priest to the server and then to each member of the congregation. This symbolized the Peace of Christ spreading out from the Altar, and the Consecrated Host present upon it at that point in Mass.


    At the moment of the Priest’s Communion, people made a ‘Spiritual Communion’, a form of words summarizing their intense desire for Christ to enter their hearts.


    At the end of Mass ‘Blessed Bread’ was distributed in some regions of Europe, and sometimes ‘Absolution Wine’. These made particular sense of the practice of fasting before attending Mass, even if one were not to receive Communion, and were sacramentals.


    When Holy Communion was received by the whole community, in the Middle Ages, on Easter Sunday, those not receiving, whether villagers or kings, were shown up as sinners. This happened, however, only once a year: today, we have this problem every Sunday. In the past, when the faithful had began to receive Holy Communion more frequently, another practice developed which stopped the Communion line being such a public spectacle: Communion was given betweenMasses, or in private. Coupled with the practice of going to Communion monthly or fortnightly, after careful preparation, this made it impossible to tell if your neighbor was a regular communicant.


    This last practice ended in the inter-war period. The kissing of the ‘pax’ and the customs of ‘Blessed Bread’ and wine died out, for the most part, in the centuries after the Council of Trent. A final idea worth noting, however, is this. Missionaries in Africa in the 20th century faced the problem that many non-Christian men well-disposed to Catholicism were impeded in their conversion by the fact that they had multiple wives. One approach to the problem was to encourage them to make a promise to be baptized before they died. This placed them in a clearly demarcated ante-chamber of the Church, and there could be no doubt, if one fell seriously ill, that those looking after him could baptize him validly even if he lost consciousness.


    My purpose here is not to suggest that all these practice be revived, necessarily, but to point out that a little pastoral imagination could address the problems all acknowledge and which can otherwise look insuperable.

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    08/02/2019 - 11:25

    Bad photographs showcased by the Catholic Herald
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    An imperfect photograph (of mine) of the chapel at Prior Park School, Bath, during the LMS Priest
    Training Conference 2018. Notice how natural light is coming in from the back, while the altar
    is bathed in yellow, artificial light. The vestments have a yellowish tinge and the surplices of the
    clergy in choir a blueish tinge: a compromise 'colour balance' I adopted when processing the photo.

    Another week, another rather second-rate photograph given the full-page treatment in the Catholic Herald. This time, as well as the poor lighting, the camera appears to have been focused on the altar (hardly visible in the gloom), whereas the brightly-lit reredos some distance behind it is out of focus.

    I'm sure a common response to my curmudgeonly comments will be that I should be more charitable to what is, presumably, an amateur photographer sending in a snap to the Catholic Herald for which he will not even be paid. This response, however, is part of the cult of mediocrity which has done huge damage to the Church, and should be ruthlessly uprooted wherever it is found.

    Naturally, small, charitable Catholic associations and impoverished parishes struggle to produce professional-looking publicity, or music; they struggle with the legal obligations imposed by data-processing, safeguarding, and employment law; they can't always answer the phone or process requests for documents as quickly as one would wish. The Latin Mass Society is in the same category. But let us not embrace a culture of incompetence, half-hardheartedness, and kindergarten artistic standards as if it were a good thing in itself. Let us at least continue the struggle against the difficulties inevitable to under-resourced organisations.


    And when there is a supposedly professional, commercial institution in our midst, like the shiny new magazine-format Catholic Herald, let us hold it to decent standards. Enough of this rubbish.

    As I wrote on this blog some years ago:

    I think most people can tell when a parish fails to rise to great heights of artistry through sheer lack of resources. The state of the building and nature of the parishioners will tell you enough. Such a situation, where poverty is matched with zeal, has made many Catholic artists want to contribute to community life at their own cost, as an act of charity. When artistic mediocrity is matched with pile carpets, expensive sound-systems and a well-heeled congregation, then you know that it is ideological.
    Here is the letter which the Catholic Herald declined to publish. In trying to be charitable, I cast the blame on the lighting in this particular case, but the fact is they should never have published the photograph I refer to.

    As a keen amateur photographer of churches and the liturgy (with more than 22,000 photographs on my Flickr account), I have been looking at your series of photographs of church interiors with increasing dismay. It is not entirely the photographers’ fault. The biggest problem has been poor lighting, but the latest offering displays, at the Lady Altar of St James’ Spanish Place in London (Jan 18), blue lilies.
    They might seem appropriate, but they are hardly credible.
    Parish priests who would like their churches to look good in photographs would do well to consider two principles. First, please don’t over-illuminate the sanctuary—or anything else—leaving the rest of the church shrouded in darkness. Second, please don’t mix yellow lights with white lights.
    It appears that the white cloak of the statue of Our Lady in the photograph you have reproduced is illuminated by a warm artificial spotlight, and the lilies are dimly lit with cool natural light: a photographer’s headache. Even worse, and entirely avoidable, are churches where yellow spotlights clash with white fluorescent lights.
    The problem is not nearly so obvious to naked human eyes—as Chesterton wrote, ‘Terrible crystal more incredible /Than all the things they see’—though poorly considered church illumination does nothing for the atmosphere.
    Sometimes the human eye and brain can be too clever by half. I once parked a yellow car for an evening in London, and set off home after dark in a white one. It took me some time to find it, but the number-plate was the same as mine and my key fitted the ignition. It was parked under a yellow street lamp, and where everything had a yellow tinge I was seeing ‘yellow’ as ‘white’.
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    07/02/2019 - 10:00

    Is repentance possible?
    My latest on LifeSiteNews. It begins:
    Today, entire bishops' Conferences appear to be telling people that living according to God’s law is impossible for Catholics in so-called irregular unions. I say ‘appear’ to be telling people this, but if they don’t really mean this, should they not then clear up the confusion?
    The answer to that question seems obvious enough. Less obvious, however, is the answer to the question: How did things come to this? How could it have come about that vast numbers of Catholics — from ordinary faithful to bishops, cardinals, and even the pope — should feel it possible, and apparently praiseworthy, to render systematically unclear, if not explicitly to deny, the seriousness of fundamental moral principles, like the Sixth Commandment – Thou shall not commit adultery?
    It has never been part of the Church’s teaching or pastoral practice to ignore the difficulties faced by sinners in changing their lives. Among the greatest saints, we find those who went through the most painful processes of conversion, such as St. Mary Magdalen, St. Mary of Egypt, and St. Augustine of Hippo: in modern times we find the example of Alessandro Serenelli, the murderer of St Maria Goretti, among many others. Humanly, what they did would seem impossible, but Christ tells us, speaking of the difficulties some have in reaching heaven: “With man this is impossible, but with God all things are possible” (Matthew 19:26).
    The Church exists, in fact, to make available the means which God has provided to make the impossible possible. What Christ was able to do for St. Mary Magdalen, to stimulate her repentance and to cleanse her from her sins, is available in the Church today. The hearts of sinners can be reached by the example of the saints, by grace flowing from the liturgy, by preaching, by means of sacramental confession and absolution. All of these are a means to cleansing the human heart of the heaviest sins and restore it to friendship with God.
    Read it all there.

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    06/02/2019 - 10:00

    Guild of St Clare Sewing Retreat, Spring 2019: photos and report

    Cross-posted from the Guild of St Clare blog.

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    This year's spring Guild of St Clare Sewing Retreat, like last year's, took place in the snow: last time it was the 'Beast from the East' in early March. By now we knew the route up Boars Hill which doesn't turn into a toboggan run for cars, so the disruption was manageable. I had even bought the car some 'snow socks' and other widgets for bad weather, which came in handy.

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    The last day of the Retreat, Sunday, also happened to be St Blaise's feastday, and we had the Blessing of Throats.

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    Lots of sewing was done, and various large projects for the Latin Mass Society and others were brought closer to completion. The Retreat was sold out--numbers are limited--and much edified by Fr Edward van den Burgh's spiritual conferences, Masses, and other devotions, and also by his joining in the sewing himself! He went home with advice on the repairs of one liturgical item he had brought with him and completed repairs on others.

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    Many thanks to the Guild of St Clare for organising another successful retreat!

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    05/02/2019 - 15:46

    Children at Mass: against Fr Michael White
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    An infant receiving the Blessing of Throats on the Feast of St Blase, during the
    Guild of St Clare Sewing Retreat, at Boars Hill, Oxford.

    I've written a fair amount on this topic on this blog; here is a piece I've done for LifeSiteNews.

    It begins:

    In a blog post on January 26, Fr. Michael White got himself into hot water by criticizing parents who bring their young children to Mass. 
    In an article titled “Why we don’t encourage (little) kids in Church” he wrote: “There is something in Catholic Church culture that insists kids belong in the sanctuary [church?] for Mass. I must say I don’t totally understand it, but it is definitely a Catholic thing. Part of the thinking is that sheer exposure to the service imbues them with grace and other good things in some kind of effortless and mindless sort of way. But if they can’t understand the readings and they cannot take Communion, it is unclear what they are ‘receiving’ Sacramentally.”
    Fr. White, who is pastor of Church of the Nativity in Timonium, Maryland, even quotes Scripture to back himself up: “Ezra the priest brought the law before the assembly, which consisted of men, women and those children old enough to understand” (Nehemiah 8:3).
    I was puzzled by this quotation because it appears to contradict another with which Fr. White should be familiar, as it is quoted with approval by Christ (and in relation to children taking part in what amounts to a liturgical event: Christ’s entry into Jerusalem): “Out of the mouth of infants and of sucklings thou hast perfected praise” (Psalm 8.3: see Matthew 21.15-16).
    Even more directly comparable is Joel 2.15-7:
    Blow the trumpet in Sion, sanctify a fast, call a solemn assembly. Gather together the people, sanctify the church, assemble the ancients, gather together the little ones, and them that suck at the breasts: let the bridegroom go forth from his bed, and the bride out of her bridal chamber.
    “Those who suck at the breasts” are invited to the Prophet Joel’s penitential liturgy. Are they really excluded from the High Priest Ezra’s solemn reading of the Law?
    The puzzle over these conflicting passages evaporates, however, when one notices that the word “children” does not actually appear in the text of Nehemiah. The Latin says simply “in conspectu virorum et mulierum et sapientium”: “in the sight of men and of women and of the wise”. Looking at the Bible Hub where multiple translations can be seen side by side, it is clear that Fr. White went to a lot of trouble to find one which mentions children. It is possible that “men and women” refers to Jews, and the extra clause refers to sympathetic non-Jews. In any case, if the meaning is unclear, we must refer back to precedents, for Nehemiah is re-enacting the solemn reading of the Law found in Deuteronomy 31.12:
    And the people being all assembled together, both men and women, children and strangers, that are within thy gates.
    (See also Joshua 8.35 and 2 Kings 23.1-2.) It is hardly plausible to claim that Nehemiah wanted to exclude those explicitly included by Moses.
    Read it all there.

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    03/02/2019 - 11:12

    Dialogos Institute colloquium 2019: Integralism

    14TH - 15TH JUNE 2019, NURSIA, ITALY

    The Second Vatican Council spoke of the “traditional Catholic doctrine on the moral duty of men and societies toward the true religion and toward the one Church of Christ”. Over the course of the last seventeen hundred years this his duty has been realised in many different ways. In recent years the concept of Integralism has inspired renewed interest and controversy. This summer eight scholars from around the world will gather in Norcia to consider the vision and the reality of a broad cross section of integrally Christian societies.

    SPEAKERS include Prof Tom Pink, Fr Thomas Crean, Dr Alan Fimister and Fr Edmund Waldstein.

    Full details here.
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    02/02/2019 - 15:54

    Covington: don't blame social media

    My latest on LifeSiteNews.

    People looking at social media over the first 48 hours of the story were presented with a wall of vituperation directed at the Covington boys, and this very naturally influenced their response. However, social media also speeded up the dissemination of a fuller set of evidence. In the old days of newspapers, steam-trains, and telegraphs, there was still a gap between initial, slanted reports of events, and later, fuller information, and still the urge among commentators to make statements before the fuller information became available: if it ever did.

    Read the whole thing there.

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    01/02/2019 - 11:10

    St Albert the Great Summer School at Norcia 2019 on the Gospel of John

    June 16th – 28th In Norcia, Italy

    Full details here.

    The St. Albert the Great Center for Scholastic Studies will hold its 8th annual summer theology session in Norcia, Italy, in partnership with the Monastero San Benedetto in monte. This summer’s program will be focused on a close reading of the first eight chapters of the Gospel of John, supported by the commentary of St. Thomas Aquinas on this Gospel.
    The St. Albert the Great Center is dedicated to the revival of higher studies in theology undertaken according to the mind and method of the great scholastics, and in particular the work of St. Thomas Aquinas.
    The tutors guiding the 2019 program include: Rev. Dr. Thomas Crean, O.P. of the Dominican priory in Leicester, England; Rev. Dr. Yosyp Veresh, a Byzantine Catholic priest of the Greek-Catholic Eparchy of Mukachevo (Ukraine); Dr. Alan Fimister, who is Assistant Professor of Theology and Church History at St. John Vianney Seminary in Denver.
    Besides the daily seminars and lectures offered by the tutors, there will be a guest lecture by one of the monks of the Monastero di San Benedetto. The two-week program reaches its climax in an authentic scholastic disputation, moderated by one of the tutors.
    In addition to the academic program, there is the opportunity to participate in the daily life of worship of the Benedictine monks who live and pray at the birthplace of Ss. Benedict & Scholastica, including Mass and the prayers of the Divine Office.
    There will be an optional excursion planned. The destination is still to be confirmed, but will likely be as in the past either Assisi or Orvieto, where Thomas lived for a time. Participants are encouraged to plan for extra time before or after the program in order to explore Rome.
    Full details here.
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    29/01/2019 - 09:44

    John Houghton Schola launched at Maiden Lane
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    Corpus Christi, Maiden Lane, in London, following recent restoration.

    The Latin Mass Society's new London Chant Schola, the Schola Cantorum Ioannis Hougton, has now had its first rehearsal and accompanied its first Mass.

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    The Masses at 6:30pm on Mondays at Corpus Christi Maiden Lane present a problem from the musical point of view because London-based singers find it difficult to get there in time for an extended rehearsal before Mass starts, after their work day. So the Houghton Schola rehearses on the previous Friday evening, in the Latin Mass Society's Office. I attended the first of these myself, as did the Schola's Chaplain, the usual celebrant at the Maiden Lane Masses, Fr Gabriel Diaz Patri.

    The Schola's eight members turned out to have every level of experience--from 'lots' to 'none'--and it will be very interesting to see them develop as a group. The first Mass went extremely well, thanks to the seriousness of the singers and the preparation and leadership of Matthew Schellhorn, its director and the Latin Mass Society's Director of Music for London.

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    The Schola's next dates in Maiden Lane are (Mondays)

    18th Feb; 11th March; 15th April; 13th May; 10th June.

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    23/01/2019 - 15:01

    Cafeteria Catholics won't save the Church

    My latest on LifeSiteNews

    It is often said in the context of the clerical abuse crisis that the laity must act, or be given responsibility. It is natural enough, in reaction to a problem arising with one part of the Church, to hope for salvation from another, and there are some wonderful historical examples of lay action to deal with clerical failures. 
    My personal favorite is the action of the laity between 1268 and 1271, during the time of the longest conclave (Papal election) in the Church’s history, which took place in the town of Viterbo. Becoming impatient with the Cardinals’ inability to agree on a new Pope, the town authorities locked them into their meeting room, and proceeded to remove the roof and restrict their diet to bread and water. Something similar had already happened in the conclave of 1241.
    Such rough handling of Princes of the Church must be seen in the context of the cheerful physicality of the Middle Ages, but the general principle is simply that the laity have, if they stop to think about it, all kinds of ways of making their needs and desires forcefully known to their pastors.
    There have been various actions by the American laity in recent months to protest against past crimes and present foot-dragging, but vigorous action by the laity is impeded by a number of factors.

    Continue reading on LifeSite.

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