... was a son of Evelyn; and himself a very considerable satirist. C.A.P.D..
I gather from a book review that someone has published a selection of his output. The reviewer mentions 'Bron's' comment on the introduction of WCs (I think some dialects of English call them Restrooms or Washrooms) into rural Anglican churches ... observing tartly that such things had been unnecessary in earlier ages when the churches were full, but appeared to be required now that they were largely empty.
It is a neat point, but as so often the satirist sharpens his barbs by eliding contextualising nuance. A pedant might remind you that before the invention of what the Victorians called 'ecclesiology', churches mostly contained Georgian 'box' pews. The pews which were provided for Gentry families had higher walls than the plebeian pews, and contemporary critics sometimes alluded to what these walls could conceal. Ladies' maids, apparently, kept close at hand discreet ceramic receptacles which could conveniently be slipped under voluminous garments. Gentlemen, perhaps, just popped out and made use of the ... er ... environment. The Victorians not only restored decayed buildings but radically reformed the informalities which had accompanied preTractarian churchgoing habits. Canon Chamberlain, my own predecessor at S Thomas's in Oxford, pointedly alluded to the indelicacies perpetrated in box-pews as good reason for his own policy of eliminating them ("scenes were enacted that prevented females attending church"). I believe there is a Hogarth print making some of these points.
Even in my own experience, it has not been uncommon for binating or trinating country clerics arriving in a hurry from their previous church to seek the traditional hospitality of the spaces betwen the buttresses on the North Sides of churches. Might it be that the women clergy of today do not find the gracious customs of English rural life so much to their taste?
Travelling clergy do deserve some sympathy. I used to spend my College Summer Vacations serving a couple of Church of Ireland churches. Most years, on one of my summer Sundays, Ned Darling the Bishop of Limerick used to make the long journey from Limerick all the way (remember that he was Bishop of seven other dioceses too, including Ardfert and Aghadoe) to the Dromod Union in County Kerry. His wife and driver Patricia was accustomed to select apt roadside bushes outside townlands for his Lordship therein to find comfort.
Happy days, for which seminary had not entirely prepared me.
One Sunday morning I cadged a lift with the Darlings from Knightstown to Waterville ... as we drove through one village, we were passed by a large and unconstrained bovine animal, travelling, very hurriedly and not without an implication of menace, in the opposite direction. "I think", said Patricia, "that was a bull".
Her eyes had not deceived her.
Ireland was such fun before it decided to move into the twentieth century.
24 January 2019
23 January 2019
C S Lewis and ... porn ..
There is a tiny exhibition in the atrium of the New Bod (you young things probably call it the Weston Library) devoted to the old Phi classification in Bodley. This denoted indecent books which undergraduates were not allowed to order up.
Not allowed, that is, unless their tutor wrote a note authorising them to do so. Among the exhibits is a note written by C S Lewis authorising one of his pupils to order up some Phi books.
Trouble is, I am growing some interesting things called cataracts, which means that my eyesight, formerly A1, is now poor.
Out of prurient curiosity, I would like to know what the books were which Lewis allowed his pupil to read. If anyone who habitually passes along Broad Street could pop in and find out for me, I would be grateful.
Not allowed, that is, unless their tutor wrote a note authorising them to do so. Among the exhibits is a note written by C S Lewis authorising one of his pupils to order up some Phi books.
Trouble is, I am growing some interesting things called cataracts, which means that my eyesight, formerly A1, is now poor.
Out of prurient curiosity, I would like to know what the books were which Lewis allowed his pupil to read. If anyone who habitually passes along Broad Street could pop in and find out for me, I would be grateful.
22 January 2019
A bit confused
Somewhere on the Internet there is a clip of a couple of homosexuals presenting their son for Baptism in one of those very liberal Catholic Churches that they seem to delight in over the water. One of these parents wittily said that Jesus had had two fathers, and He turned out all right.
Possibly like you, I was so irritated by the blasphemy that it was only later that it struck me how illogical the poor (if rather loud) fellow was.
Certainly over here, a big step in the campaign for 'ordaining' women to sacerdotal ministries in Old Mother Damnable came when many of the homosexual clergy cottoned onto a bright idea. If 'development' was the Magic Wand which sanctioned the ordination of women; then the same instrument of Circean enchantment could surely sanctify 'same-sex marriage'. All of a sudden, cohorts of the lace and silver-buckles gentry in the diocese of London allowed their subscriptions to organisations opposing Women's Ordination to lapse. Roger the Lodger could piggy-back into paradise on the backs of the ladies. (Now there's some rich imagery for you.)
But this dapper and jokey American homosexual, swaying back and forth as he clutched the baby, was implying that the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ was ... a Father.
But that, duckie, is off-message. As some of the Anglican womenbishops over here feel it important to explain (my goodness me, how intellectual they are), God is not masculine.
Possibly like you, I was so irritated by the blasphemy that it was only later that it struck me how illogical the poor (if rather loud) fellow was.
Certainly over here, a big step in the campaign for 'ordaining' women to sacerdotal ministries in Old Mother Damnable came when many of the homosexual clergy cottoned onto a bright idea. If 'development' was the Magic Wand which sanctioned the ordination of women; then the same instrument of Circean enchantment could surely sanctify 'same-sex marriage'. All of a sudden, cohorts of the lace and silver-buckles gentry in the diocese of London allowed their subscriptions to organisations opposing Women's Ordination to lapse. Roger the Lodger could piggy-back into paradise on the backs of the ladies. (Now there's some rich imagery for you.)
But this dapper and jokey American homosexual, swaying back and forth as he clutched the baby, was implying that the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ was ... a Father.
But that, duckie, is off-message. As some of the Anglican womenbishops over here feel it important to explain (my goodness me, how intellectual they are), God is not masculine.
21 January 2019
Fromthecardinalsdesk
"I am told that some wicked men, not content with their hitherto cruel conduct, are trying to bring in [the] doctrine of inherent infallibility, of which there is not a hint in the definition. Perhaps they would like to go on to call [the Pope] a Vice-God ...".
20 January 2019
The Tyranny of the Ignorant
Papa Ratzinger tried to establish a correct translation of the word pollon [many] in the Eucharistic Prayer. He was unable to secure compliance from some Episcopal Conferences.
In this reversed-mirror-image pontificate, PF desires a correct translation of me eisenengkes hemas eis peirasmon [lead us not into temptation] to be replaced by a false one. And the Italian Episcopal Conference was not allowed even to have an opinion about whether the old, accurate, translation could be one of the options upon which they voted. They were instructed, from above, as it were, that the only liberty to be allowed to them was between new and erroneous translations.
One crack of an Argentine whip and people, it appears, hardly dare breathe. So much for the proud notion of the 1960s that Bishops are successors of the Apostles rather than mere Vicars of the Roman Pontiff. What price now, Vatican II and all those brave words!
And whatever did happen to the policy of leaving matters to local decision? Only weeks ago, the American bishops were forbidden to discuss the Abuse Crisis ... because the February meeting in the Vatican (with PF sitting there to hear every word that is said and to mark every speaker) will be primed and programmed to decide that "Clericalism" is the real problem. It would have been so dangerous to risk any alternative analysis acquiring traction among those several hundred American bishops. Papa knows the answer already, because Papa knows everything.
Our Protestant brethren sometimes forsaw more clearly than Catholics did, where the dangerous papal personality cult could lead us if it ever got into the wrong hands. Fifty years ago, non-Catholics might say things like "Even if the pope were to change the Ten Commandments or the Lord's Prayer, you'd just do as you were told. When he says jump, the only question you people ask is 'Please Sir, how high do we have to jump?'".
"Dearie me No", we would confidently reply in honest innocence. "No pope could possibly dare to go as far as that!!".
No previous pope would have dared to "go as far as that". But, as one of PF's own circle has claimed, PF is free from the constraints of Scripture and Tradition. And it became clear in the debate about 'remarried' divorcees that we now have a Roman Bishop who has no problem whatsoever about setting aside the most explicit recorded words of the Incarnate Second Person of the Blessed and Undivided Trinity. Words sustained by two millennia of Holy Tradition. Truths still authoritatively taught by his immediate predecessor only a decade previously.
And we have a pope whose poor sight lacks the acuity to detect incontinent Sexual Lust when it is staring him right in the face. (Readers of C S Lewis may recollect Fernseed and Elephants.)
The problems of this pontificate have nothing whatsoever to do with Primacy or Infallibility, so wisely defined and so moderately taught by Vatican I. Bergoglianism, as promoted by PF's elite circle, is nothing less than a vulgar and preposterous claim to Divine Omniscience and Divine Omnipotence and Personal Inerrancy.
No wonder PF describes critics and whistle-blowers ... amid much other abuse ... as Judas Iscariot.
In this reversed-mirror-image pontificate, PF desires a correct translation of me eisenengkes hemas eis peirasmon [lead us not into temptation] to be replaced by a false one. And the Italian Episcopal Conference was not allowed even to have an opinion about whether the old, accurate, translation could be one of the options upon which they voted. They were instructed, from above, as it were, that the only liberty to be allowed to them was between new and erroneous translations.
One crack of an Argentine whip and people, it appears, hardly dare breathe. So much for the proud notion of the 1960s that Bishops are successors of the Apostles rather than mere Vicars of the Roman Pontiff. What price now, Vatican II and all those brave words!
And whatever did happen to the policy of leaving matters to local decision? Only weeks ago, the American bishops were forbidden to discuss the Abuse Crisis ... because the February meeting in the Vatican (with PF sitting there to hear every word that is said and to mark every speaker) will be primed and programmed to decide that "Clericalism" is the real problem. It would have been so dangerous to risk any alternative analysis acquiring traction among those several hundred American bishops. Papa knows the answer already, because Papa knows everything.
Our Protestant brethren sometimes forsaw more clearly than Catholics did, where the dangerous papal personality cult could lead us if it ever got into the wrong hands. Fifty years ago, non-Catholics might say things like "Even if the pope were to change the Ten Commandments or the Lord's Prayer, you'd just do as you were told. When he says jump, the only question you people ask is 'Please Sir, how high do we have to jump?'".
"Dearie me No", we would confidently reply in honest innocence. "No pope could possibly dare to go as far as that!!".
No previous pope would have dared to "go as far as that". But, as one of PF's own circle has claimed, PF is free from the constraints of Scripture and Tradition. And it became clear in the debate about 'remarried' divorcees that we now have a Roman Bishop who has no problem whatsoever about setting aside the most explicit recorded words of the Incarnate Second Person of the Blessed and Undivided Trinity. Words sustained by two millennia of Holy Tradition. Truths still authoritatively taught by his immediate predecessor only a decade previously.
And we have a pope whose poor sight lacks the acuity to detect incontinent Sexual Lust when it is staring him right in the face. (Readers of C S Lewis may recollect Fernseed and Elephants.)
The problems of this pontificate have nothing whatsoever to do with Primacy or Infallibility, so wisely defined and so moderately taught by Vatican I. Bergoglianism, as promoted by PF's elite circle, is nothing less than a vulgar and preposterous claim to Divine Omniscience and Divine Omnipotence and Personal Inerrancy.
No wonder PF describes critics and whistle-blowers ... amid much other abuse ... as Judas Iscariot.
19 January 2019
"Where were you when ...?"
Charles Ryder remarks
"Since the days when, as a schoolboy, I used to bicycle round the neighbouring parishes, rubbing brasses and photographing fonts, I had nursed a love of architecture, but ... my sentiments at heart were insular and medieval. [Brideshead] was my conversion to the Baroque. Here, under that high and insolent dome, under those coffered ceilings; here, as I passed through those arches and broken pediments to the pillared shade beyond and sat [drawing], hour by hour, before the fountain, probing its shadows, tracing its lingering echoes, rejoicing in all its clustered feats of daring and invention, I felt a whole new system of nerves alive within me, as though the water that spurted and bubbled among its stones, was indeed a life-giving spring."
Where were you when you first were struck dumb and breathless at the wonder of the baroque? In my case, it was walking along the riverside at Greenwich, when we got to the water-steps and I turned to look through the gates and up the hill between the Hall and Chapel to the Queen's House. Mind you, I had met the rococo before I even entered my teens, in Bavaria and the Tyrol, where, to my childish eyes, every little village church was a magical wonderland.
Paradoxically, it was among the Gothic perfections of Lancing that I first really understood the baroque. A little of this was the experience of handling it: saying once a week a Latin Mass before a crucifix, Bavarian, 1620s, ebony and silver, using an early baroque portuguese chalice crawling with putti. But mostly, it was reading Ovid's Metamorphoses with the VI Form. That is how I first plunged into the spirit of the baroque; its never-failing inventiveness, its exuberant fun, its intriguing intertextualities, its antitheses and syntheses, its endless teases and surprises, the way it offers you a permanent ticket to a country of exquisite delight.
Above all, the baroque makes it easier, indeed very easy if not compulsory, to be an orthodox and Catholic Christian. Nobody who is formed by the baroque delight in paradox will have any difficulty believing that a Bethehem Bambino is God; or that the round white disk winking at us among the sunbeams of the monstrance is the Power that made the galaxies.
"Since the days when, as a schoolboy, I used to bicycle round the neighbouring parishes, rubbing brasses and photographing fonts, I had nursed a love of architecture, but ... my sentiments at heart were insular and medieval. [Brideshead] was my conversion to the Baroque. Here, under that high and insolent dome, under those coffered ceilings; here, as I passed through those arches and broken pediments to the pillared shade beyond and sat [drawing], hour by hour, before the fountain, probing its shadows, tracing its lingering echoes, rejoicing in all its clustered feats of daring and invention, I felt a whole new system of nerves alive within me, as though the water that spurted and bubbled among its stones, was indeed a life-giving spring."
Where were you when you first were struck dumb and breathless at the wonder of the baroque? In my case, it was walking along the riverside at Greenwich, when we got to the water-steps and I turned to look through the gates and up the hill between the Hall and Chapel to the Queen's House. Mind you, I had met the rococo before I even entered my teens, in Bavaria and the Tyrol, where, to my childish eyes, every little village church was a magical wonderland.
Paradoxically, it was among the Gothic perfections of Lancing that I first really understood the baroque. A little of this was the experience of handling it: saying once a week a Latin Mass before a crucifix, Bavarian, 1620s, ebony and silver, using an early baroque portuguese chalice crawling with putti. But mostly, it was reading Ovid's Metamorphoses with the VI Form. That is how I first plunged into the spirit of the baroque; its never-failing inventiveness, its exuberant fun, its intriguing intertextualities, its antitheses and syntheses, its endless teases and surprises, the way it offers you a permanent ticket to a country of exquisite delight.
Above all, the baroque makes it easier, indeed very easy if not compulsory, to be an orthodox and Catholic Christian. Nobody who is formed by the baroque delight in paradox will have any difficulty believing that a Bethehem Bambino is God; or that the round white disk winking at us among the sunbeams of the monstrance is the Power that made the galaxies.
18 January 2019
Two cultures?
We have been having some diverting debates in the Lower House of our Legislature; a couple of days ago, the Opposition moved the grand old motion That This House has no confidence in Her Majesty's Government. A rather bumptious young government backbencher, mindful that the best mode of defence is attack, was in the course of an onslaught upon the Right Honourable Gentleman the Member for Islington. He was interrupted on a Point of Order by an Opposition Member, who asked Mr Speaker for a ruling on whether the abusive term "Pillock" was Parliamentary.
Mr Speaker explained that what the bumptious youth had, in the heat of his intemperate rhetoric, actually accused the Leader of Her Majesty's Opposition of being was not "a pillock" but "a palaeoMarxist".
Erskine May, apparently, expresses no views on the propriety of this latter term.
[Is it true that 'Pilosi' is a North American variant of 'Pillock'?]
Mr Speaker explained that what the bumptious youth had, in the heat of his intemperate rhetoric, actually accused the Leader of Her Majesty's Opposition of being was not "a pillock" but "a palaeoMarxist".
Erskine May, apparently, expresses no views on the propriety of this latter term.
[Is it true that 'Pilosi' is a North American variant of 'Pillock'?]
17 January 2019
From Fraenkel to Finnis
When I was an undergraduate, the Faculty of Litterae Humaniores in this University was still enjoying the glorious aftermath of the arrival, in the 1930s, of the flower of European Classical scholarship from the great German universities. Not least, of Edward Fraenkel, still occupying the Corpus Chair of Latin when I came up in 1960.
He, like most of his fellow refugees, was a Jew. Jews were not much welcomed in the universities of Hitlerite Germany. Oxford, to her credit, welcomed them with enthusiasm. (And how it benefitted!)
Forward to 2019. The young people ... correction: a few of them ... are now trying to get rid of one of modern Oxford's most distinguished scholars: John Finnis, Fellow of University College, one of modern Oxford's main claims to fame and respect throughout the world of academic Jurisprudence.
Professor Finnis is also a Catholic who is articulate in his expression of the Teaching of the Church.
Of course, these dim youths and youthesses will not be successful in their campaign of intimidation. (Although it might have been amusing to see the University being sued in the courts by one of her own best known jurists.)
But I think we all know, or have heard of, less well-known academics in less well-known institutions who have been deprived of their livelihoods because of their Catholicism or even, may God help us all, their unenlightened pronouns.
They came for the Jews, but I said nothing because I was not a Jew ... ... ... lastly, they came for me ...
They are indeed "coming for us" now.
[That, incidentally, is why I would defend the rights of Jews to eat according to inherited traditions. S Paul agrees with me.]
He, like most of his fellow refugees, was a Jew. Jews were not much welcomed in the universities of Hitlerite Germany. Oxford, to her credit, welcomed them with enthusiasm. (And how it benefitted!)
Forward to 2019. The young people ... correction: a few of them ... are now trying to get rid of one of modern Oxford's most distinguished scholars: John Finnis, Fellow of University College, one of modern Oxford's main claims to fame and respect throughout the world of academic Jurisprudence.
Professor Finnis is also a Catholic who is articulate in his expression of the Teaching of the Church.
Of course, these dim youths and youthesses will not be successful in their campaign of intimidation. (Although it might have been amusing to see the University being sued in the courts by one of her own best known jurists.)
But I think we all know, or have heard of, less well-known academics in less well-known institutions who have been deprived of their livelihoods because of their Catholicism or even, may God help us all, their unenlightened pronouns.
They came for the Jews, but I said nothing because I was not a Jew ... ... ... lastly, they came for me ...
They are indeed "coming for us" now.
[That, incidentally, is why I would defend the rights of Jews to eat according to inherited traditions. S Paul agrees with me.]
15 January 2019
Episcopal Resignation (2)
In the current period of crisis within the Church Militant, bishops and religious superiors commonly explain that they are unwilling to put their heads above the parapet and to criticise the current management of the Latin Church because they have, they feel, a moral obligation to stay where they are so as to to protect their subjects. It would be mere self indulgence to let off their own steam when others would have to do the suffering.
It is easy for those of you who, like me, who have no such obligation, to be critical.
But what about the position when a bishop is just coming up to the age of seventy five?
How do things stand then? If he speaks out, then, before breakfast on the morning of his birthday his resignation will indeed have been accepted. But, well, his card was probably marked anyway, and his resignation would pretty certainly have been accepted without a great deal of delay. The delatores would have done their job!
So why should he not be frank?
Why should he not be frank and decline to submit his resignation? [vide the previous section of this piece, posted a couple of days ago.]
Think of the scenes of mayhem and panic from the top to the bottom of the marbled halls, in the crowded bars and jacuzzis, of the Domus Sanctae Marthae!
Of course, it will not be difficult for Roman functionaries to devise some canonical way of hoofing him out. That handsome, youthful Cardinal Coco will know exactly how to do it!
There's nothing worse, after all, than Naked Tyranny!!
But ... there is something worse: covert tyranny! Bullies fixing things behind the scenes.
My Lord, there are worse things to do than to go out in a cloud of glory ... your Lordship is in good health ... and in good voice ... and articulate ... your Lordship could hit the headlines with a Vigano-style Testimony!!!
My Lord ... you know it makes sense.
Go for it!
It is easy for those of you who, like me, who have no such obligation, to be critical.
But what about the position when a bishop is just coming up to the age of seventy five?
How do things stand then? If he speaks out, then, before breakfast on the morning of his birthday his resignation will indeed have been accepted. But, well, his card was probably marked anyway, and his resignation would pretty certainly have been accepted without a great deal of delay. The delatores would have done their job!
So why should he not be frank?
Why should he not be frank and decline to submit his resignation? [vide the previous section of this piece, posted a couple of days ago.]
Think of the scenes of mayhem and panic from the top to the bottom of the marbled halls, in the crowded bars and jacuzzis, of the Domus Sanctae Marthae!
Of course, it will not be difficult for Roman functionaries to devise some canonical way of hoofing him out. That handsome, youthful Cardinal Coco will know exactly how to do it!
There's nothing worse, after all, than Naked Tyranny!!
But ... there is something worse: covert tyranny! Bullies fixing things behind the scenes.
My Lord, there are worse things to do than to go out in a cloud of glory ... your Lordship is in good health ... and in good voice ... and articulate ... your Lordship could hit the headlines with a Vigano-style Testimony!!!
My Lord ... you know it makes sense.
Go for it!
14 January 2019
Foundation of the Ordinariates!!
January 15, 2011, the Ordinariate of our Lady of Walsingham was erected and Mgr Keith Newton was appointed Ordinary. We invite all our friends to join in our thanksgivings and supplications!!
Suggested Extraordinary Form ORDO entry, providing for due commemoration on tomorrow's anniversary:
Cras in Ordinariatu: secunda oratio Deus omnium fidelium pastor et rector (cum orationibus Super Oblata et Post Communionem) additur sub una conclusione cum orationibus diei in omnibus Missis ob inaugurationem Reverendissimi Keith Newton Ordinarii Protonotarii Apostolici Episcopi emeriti Rutupiensis.
Within the Collect etc., perhaps the simplest text would be ... pastorem ecclesiae huic praeesse voluisti ... . Or, if you must, ... pastorem Ordinariatui Beatae Mariae de Walsingham praeesse voluisti ... .
I have heard it suggested that Silvester is the Latin for Keith. Moi, in the Te igitur I always just say antistite nostro Keith.
Suggested Extraordinary Form ORDO entry, providing for due commemoration on tomorrow's anniversary:
Cras in Ordinariatu: secunda oratio Deus omnium fidelium pastor et rector (cum orationibus Super Oblata et Post Communionem) additur sub una conclusione cum orationibus diei in omnibus Missis ob inaugurationem Reverendissimi Keith Newton Ordinarii Protonotarii Apostolici Episcopi emeriti Rutupiensis.
Within the Collect etc., perhaps the simplest text would be ... pastorem ecclesiae huic praeesse voluisti ... . Or, if you must, ... pastorem Ordinariatui Beatae Mariae de Walsingham praeesse voluisti ... .
I have heard it suggested that Silvester is the Latin for Keith. Moi, in the Te igitur I always just say antistite nostro Keith.
13 January 2019
Episcopal Resignation (1)
It is commonly thought, and asserted in the Meejah, that a Bishop is obliged to submit his resignation when he has completed his seventy fifth year of age.
This is not quite accurate.
What Canon 401 (1) requires is that the Bishop rogatur [is asked] ut renuntiationem ab officio exhibeat Summo Pontifici. This is based upon Christus Dominus [21] of Vatican II, which is vaguer; without mentioning any particular age, it merely says that when the bishop has become less capable of fulfilling his duties properly because of age or some other serious reason, he is asked to offer his resignation.
Christus Dominus does put an adverb before rogatur: enixe [earmestly].
Canon 401divides the requirement into two halves: (1) the Bishop who has reached his 75th birthday is asked to submit his resignation; (2) the bishop who is ill and weak or has another gravem causam is earnestly asked to submit his resignation.
You are probably wondering ... no; the 1917 Code has no comparable provisions.
OBSERVATIONS
Canon 401 makes the request stronger if the bishop is old, ill, or weak, than it is if he has merely reached a specific age. rogatur, without the enixe, is not a particularly powerful word. English translations of the Conciliar documents and of the Code of Canon Law usually translate it as requested.
Before the Council, most bishops, like the popes, died of old age in possesssion of their sees (having been given a coadjutor if they had become particularly frail). This would respond to the old conviction that a bishop was wedded to his Church and would be an adulterer if he were translated to another See. The twentieth century provisions forget all this and treat the post as if it were a matter of efficiency and competence, like being a supermarket manager. Having a spot of trouble doing the job? Out you go! Good sales returns? Excellent! Have a bigger shop or become regional manager!
In my view, this is untraditional and, I would go so far as to say, corrupt.
To be continued.
This is not quite accurate.
What Canon 401 (1) requires is that the Bishop rogatur [is asked] ut renuntiationem ab officio exhibeat Summo Pontifici. This is based upon Christus Dominus [21] of Vatican II, which is vaguer; without mentioning any particular age, it merely says that when the bishop has become less capable of fulfilling his duties properly because of age or some other serious reason, he is asked to offer his resignation.
Christus Dominus does put an adverb before rogatur: enixe [earmestly].
Canon 401divides the requirement into two halves: (1) the Bishop who has reached his 75th birthday is asked to submit his resignation; (2) the bishop who is ill and weak or has another gravem causam is earnestly asked to submit his resignation.
You are probably wondering ... no; the 1917 Code has no comparable provisions.
OBSERVATIONS
Canon 401 makes the request stronger if the bishop is old, ill, or weak, than it is if he has merely reached a specific age. rogatur, without the enixe, is not a particularly powerful word. English translations of the Conciliar documents and of the Code of Canon Law usually translate it as requested.
Before the Council, most bishops, like the popes, died of old age in possesssion of their sees (having been given a coadjutor if they had become particularly frail). This would respond to the old conviction that a bishop was wedded to his Church and would be an adulterer if he were translated to another See. The twentieth century provisions forget all this and treat the post as if it were a matter of efficiency and competence, like being a supermarket manager. Having a spot of trouble doing the job? Out you go! Good sales returns? Excellent! Have a bigger shop or become regional manager!
In my view, this is untraditional and, I would go so far as to say, corrupt.
To be continued.
12 January 2019
Not very Kosher
Surely, it is outrageous that the Belgian regime should outlaw the provision of Kosher and Hallal meat.
I seem to remember that the Polish Bishops' Conference opposed, successfully, the adoption of such a law in Poland. I wonder how long it will take for the generality of people to realise that secular liberalism as promoted by the Zeitgeist will give you tyranny; while a robust Catholicism is more likely to support freedom.
But then, we recall how sensitively the Belgians ran their Empire.
I wonder how aware they are that the claim of one of their ministers, that State law takes precedence over Religious law, aligns them with so many great historical figures, from Nero and Domitian down to Stalin and Hitler.
"Plucky little Belgium", indeed.
Boorish Bully-boy Belgium.
I seem to remember that the Polish Bishops' Conference opposed, successfully, the adoption of such a law in Poland. I wonder how long it will take for the generality of people to realise that secular liberalism as promoted by the Zeitgeist will give you tyranny; while a robust Catholicism is more likely to support freedom.
But then, we recall how sensitively the Belgians ran their Empire.
I wonder how aware they are that the claim of one of their ministers, that State law takes precedence over Religious law, aligns them with so many great historical figures, from Nero and Domitian down to Stalin and Hitler.
"Plucky little Belgium", indeed.
Boorish Bully-boy Belgium.
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