Rainbow Houses and Fashions

How weird the North American Presidential Residence looked on our TV, in all those silly colours. Time some sensible person sent an army to burn it down. Have we still got an army?

Call me a Daft Limey, or anything else you like: I can't see why there's all this celebrating in honour of Gay Marriage. Everybody knows that the up-to-date and cutting-edge idea in homosexual circles is that homosexuality is inherently promiscuous; therefore, we are told, all the stuff about gay monogamy and fidelity is an attempt by heterosexual imperialism to impose alien concepts and restrictions upon homosexuals. Furthermore, in utilitarian terms it is easy to justify monogamous heterosexual fidelity for as long as there are children to be nurtured, but such considerations are not so obviously inherent in homosexual couplings.

It's a fad. By the time the novelty has worn off, say, in about twenty years, the number of gay 'marriages' will have slumped to something like zero. Betcha. When the new fad has become state-affirmed (simultaneous) polygamy or incest, the picture of two blokes or two gals getting 'exclusively' 'married' 'for life' will seem as deliciously retro as that of a Victorian spinster in crinolines riding a penny-farthing bicycle over cobblestones in a London smog.

Note

I am taking another, I hope blissful, fortnight away from emails. I hope to post something every day but I shall not moderate and enable comments and I shall not reply to emails.

The Feast of Our Lady of Perpetual Succour

Very best wishes to the Papa Stronsay brethren, and their NZ brethren, on this wonderful solemnity. I said Mass this morning, from the Appendix pro aliquibus locis, for their Good Estate and for their Intentions. I have the most happy memories of this day, in 2012, when some of them made the journey down to Oxford, and accompanied me into London the following day for my First Mass in Full Communion with the See of S Peter, at that lovely Lady Altar in the Brompton Oratory, together with the admirable Fr Ray. And of my stay at the Monastery last year.

Right thinking people who don't already subscribe to Catholic, the Papa Stronsay newspaper, would be well advised to do so. Loads of news from all over the world; and loads and loads of absolutely magnificent pictures. In the most recent number, pictures of the S Agatha's Day celebrations in Catania; I think I'll send that page to our Ordinariate Shrine of S Agatha in Southport, where I had the privilege of preaching at their Patronal Festival a couple of years ago. Loads of decent religion down there! I enthusiastically commend their Sunday Mass to those within range who hunger for true Catholic Liturgy. Especially if you can't get to Catania ...

And pictures of His Excellency the Bishop of Copenhagen, Czeslaw Kozon, ordaining subdeacons in Gestratz. A truly pastoral bishop, who invited me to celebrate the Extraordinary Form in his Chapel (he served it himself) and breakfasted me afterwards. Kind, interested, humble, and gracious. He was glad to hear all about the Ordinariate. Indeed, all right thinking Catholics are!

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Catholic Ecumenism

Whooppee!!! A fascinating post on the Eponymous Flower about an attempt to reconstitute a united Church of the East, in communion with the See of S Peter, out of the three fragments into which it is currently broken. I hope and most devoutly pray that this may be true, and may lead to the desired goal. Rome has already prepared the way for this by its Christological agreement with the Assyrians; and its acceptance of the adequacy of the rite of Addai and Mari.

And the Society of S Pius X tells us that, after the June ordinations, it will have a priesthood of over 600.

My own view is that Separated Brethren should be viewed differently depending on whether they are officially set on a course of convergence towards, or divergence from, Catholic Unity. For example: the worldwide Anglican establishment increasingly distances itself from Catholic teaching on Holy Order and Sexual Morality. Since the latter is the main point currently at issue between the Church and the World, we must, surely, take seriously the plain fact that our 'partners in dialogue' are now increasingly committed to assisting the Devil's work, in opposition to the Body of Christ. Can anyone doubt that they are becoming more and more part of the Enemy's plan? Of course, we should not decline to talk to them; but that dialogue, as Walter Kasper made clear when he addressed the English Anglican bishops, must, realistically, be on the basis of a changed understanding of what they are and what they want.

Christians, however, who are on a course of convergence with Catholicism, should surely be treated differently. I hope that the authorities in Rome will not make an issue of details which, in a situation of restored unity and amity, would settle themselves. And, to put it crudely, our Christian brethren in the Arab world could do with a bit of a break from bad news and bloody death.

One final point. There are still some good Catholic folk in exsilio within the Anglican Communion. I think there should be a renewed openness towards Anglican clergy who are considering their position. I am far from being part of the inner counsels of the Church, but the rumours we all hear suggest that, somewhere deep in the machinery, there may be a more grudging spirit with regard to the integration of such excellent men into Catholic Unity and Catholic priesthood. We hear talk of age-limits; of delaying ordination until after a period of formation. I would be so very relieved to be proved wrong ...

Unity matters. We should actively discern the places where the Holy Spirit is actively and manifestly at work bringing schism to an end and we should actively and generously collaborate with Him.

Mass in Greek at S Denys

My friend Joshua, an erudite contributor to this blog since the beginning, draws our attention to a fascinating example of the Roman Rite partially in Greek, as used in Bourbon France. Should we see this as an example of a marriage between Catholicism and the Renaissance of Greek language and literature in the educated classicising West? See the thread. Read it and be enthralled.

"Science says", does it?

The Irish Times is a very Grauniad sort of newspaper in its editorial biases, so it must be a pure coincidence that, on the very day when the Holy Father's Encyclical on the Environment was published, its long-time Science Correspondent, Professor Emeritus William Reville (a biochemist and a very accessible writer) of University College Cork (go there ... a lovely quadrangle worthy of Oxford ... fantastic Harry Clarke glass in the Chapel ... they do their academic ceremonies in Latin ...) dropped rather a bomb-shell. Half of the research work published in the Natural Sciences is, he says, so dubious as not to be fit for purpose. He cites writers including a former editor of the New England Journal of Medicine ("It is simply no longer possible to believe much of the clinical research that is published ...") and speakers at a meeting (Chatham House Rules) organised by the Academy of Medical Sciences, the Medical Research Council, the Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council, and the Wellcome Trust.

The Editor-in-chief of the Lancet attended that meeting, and wrote: "The case against Science is straightforward: much of the scientific literature, perhaps half, may simply be untrue. Afflicted by studies with small sample sizes, tiny effects, invalid exploratory analyses and flagrant conflicts of interest, together with an obsession for pursuing fashionable trends of dubious importance, Science has taken a turn towards darkness ... The apparent endemicity of bad research behaviour is alarming. In their quest for telling a compelling story, scientists too often sculpt data to fit their preferred theory of the world. Or they retrofit hypotheses to fit their data. Journal editors deserve their fair share of criticism too. We aid and abet the worst behaviours. Our acquiescence to the impact factor fuels an unhealthy competition to win a place in a select few jornals. Our love of 'significance' pollutes the literature with many a statistical fairytale ... Universities are in a perpetual struggle for money and talent, endpoints that foster reductive metrics, such as high-impact publication ... and individual scientists, including their most senior leaders, do little to alter a research culture that occasionally veers close to misconduct."

It would be thoroughly puerile to try to use all this to mount some sort of gleeful attack upon the Natural Sciences. It would also leave one deservedly wide open to a gigantic Tu quoque. Only yesterday, I was reading a large book in the field of Papyrology, written by somebody who had needed to reexamine a large number of published papyri for his own research purposes. He repeatedly discovered that the published accounts were inaccurate. His realisation generated a large, originally unintended, part of his book, his Appendix 3, listing thousands of examples of error ... which he had discovered entirely obiter! I made a similar discovery a decade ago when working on late medieval records in Devon. You can't rely on published accounts; you just have to go back to the manuscript originals. And take them with a pinch of salt! Don't totally believe anybody! And as for what is laughably called "New Testament Studies", two thirds of it is rubbish written by people who are blithely unaware that, if you start with a theory which is, let us say, roughly .75 probable, and put on top of it another theory which is roughly .75 probable, you're already down to something like .56 probable, and one more similar stage takes you down to well under .5 probable; in other words, your brilliant cumulative theory in its three humanly highly plausible and attractive stages, accompanied by all your terribly persuasive rhetoric, is more likely to be false than it is to be true.

However, there is something slightly different about the Natural Sciences: (1) there are some poor, simple, credulous  souls out there who believe that 'scientists' are invariably austere and logical high-minded individuals, servants of a stern mistress, devoted to following the objective evidence wherever it may inexorably lead them; and: (2) a belief exists that 'Science' is very important and that 'Science' equals Truth and should be believed and followed by governments and individuals. "We should let ourselves be guided by the Science", cry the politicians. For as long as it suits them.

'Scientists' are, quite simply, human beings just like the rest of us. And 'Science' is one academic discipline, often imperfectly pursued, among many other such. That's all I'm saying. Nothing more.

Reville concludes: "That great cathedral of scientific progress, the peer-reviewed scientific literature, is beginning to crumble."

Join the club! Welcome back to the Human Race!

Instrumentum Laboris (VIS)

"Eventual introduction of a Penitential Way": suspicious.
Synod Fathers allowed to communicate at their discretion with the Media: good.

English Public Schools

I accidentally heard the 'Sunday Service' on the Home Service. It consisted of a paean of praise for some place called Wellington College (over here we are still wallowing in self-satisfaction at having just about managed not to lose the battle). Never have I heard such a brazen display of using religion (and, what is far worse, the BBC) in order to promote the fortunes of a fee-paying establishment. It included a cameo 'appearance' by Sir Anthony 'Shameless' Selden himself, reading the 'College Prayer'. Arthur Wellesley is now (equipollently?) canonised, and Welly Colly is his shrine.

Better news about Winchester College, or rather, about everyone's favourite Wyccamical bishop (is he the only one? I suspect so. How are the mighty fallen!). From him we now hear positive talk about Russian Orthodoxy; and even use of S John Paul's phrase about the Church "breathing with two lungs"! Ecumenism seems to be infiltrating 'the Resistance'!! Where will it all end!!! Three cheers for the Bishop of Broadstairs!!!! ... er ... up to a point, Lord Copper ...

Respect for canonical superiors

Readers will know how punctilious I am in never criticising my canonical superiors, even by implication. Today, however, I shall break the rule of a lifetime.

Every year, on this day, the Summer Solstice, New Age and Neo-Druid and assorted nutters gather at Stonehenge to observe the rising of the Sun.

This year, it is reported, Providence intervened with a cloud cover preventing Sunrise from being visible.

This is good, but it is only one step in the right direction.

If I were Providence, I would ensure that this happened every year for a dozen or so centuries.

Eventually, they might get the point.

Am I the only person who reacts to all this "Stonehenge is a primitive astronomical observatory" stuff by murmuring "The port is with you, my lord"?*

*Vide the film Kind Hearts and Coronets.

Encyclicals

I would be grateful if somebody who happens to notice when Laudato si is made available in its official Latin Text could let me know, so that I can read it.

I would like to make a preliminary comment. I think it becomes us all to read this Letter intending to be taught by it and by the one who sits in the Chair of Peter and wears the Fisherman's Ring. It is not infallible, but then, neither am I. We rightly condemn those who rubbished Humanae vitae when it was published; and those who do not accept the binding authority of Ordinatio sacerdotalis. We stand under our own condemnation if we treat this Encyclical with that same disrespect with which the Wolves malevolently treat the Church's Magisterium. (This is still true, even though it is obvious that this Encyclical does not intend to impose dogma or definitively to settle a particular and precise moral question, as each of those two documents did.)

If we find in this or in any other Encyclical some particular teaching which we genuinely have trouble understanding or appropriating, then, in my view, the most fitting response is simply not to talk about that particular aspect of its teaching until we do find that we can speak positively about it.

There is something else we should remember. This Encyclical, like all such documents, was not whimsically dreamed up in the middle of the night by some individual called Jorge Bergoglio. It is the formal teaching of the Mother and Mistress of all the Churches, and its text will, beyond any possible shadow of doubt, have been in and out of the competent dicasteries in a succession of different drafts. In particular, it will have been scrutinised under the care of Cardinal Mueller. And it is not just that Mueller has shown himself a very safe pair of doctrinal hands (he was, after all, entrusted by Pope Benedict with editing his opera), but he has spoken candidly about the enhanced role his dicastery inevitably, structurally, has when the Roman Bishop is himself not a professional theologian. Arrogant though I may be, I am not sure that I wish to back my own judgement against Gerhard Mueller's on any ordinary day of the week!

And, while I'm about it, another cognate point: I am not panicking about the appointment of Bishop Bonny to the Synod. Nobody will be able to say, later, that the heterodox were refused an opportunity to put their views across. This may very well be the reason also for that infamous lecture by Kasper. I am increasingly inclined to suspect that this Pope, while not a subtle sophisticate like his predecessor, does a rather good line in plain homely wiliness. Perhaps he has even heard the old Anglo-Saxon adage that it is best to have ones enemies inside the tent ****ing out than ...  And I rather think he might recently have suggested to Kasper that the latter should set the record straight on the degree of support the lecture had from Francis himself. Otherwise, why do you think Kasper made that embarrassing retraction? And don't you feel that the Enemy is rather more on the defensive, knowing that so many of his emissaries have been flushed out?

Mutual Enrichment

Another old post of mine, in support of Cardinal Sarah's enlightened views about the Enrichment od the Ordinary Form

The Abbot of Fontgombault, in an interview reported in the blog Rorate Caeli, said (among many interesting things) the following:

Many young priests ... want a liturgy that is richer in the level of rites, associating more strictly the body to the celebration. Would it not be possible to propose in the Ordinary Form the [EF] prayers of the Offertory; to enrich it with [the] genuflections, inclinations, signs of the cross, of the Extraordinary Form? A rapprochement would [thus] easily take place between the two Forms, giving an answer to a legitimate [desire] and, additionally, a longed-for desire of Benedict XVI.

What Father Abbot calls for is exactly what the Ordinariate Use leads the way towards.

Mutual Enrichment: it's happening!

(1) I know many readers will disagree; but I believe that an important way ahead in the direction of resacralising the Novus Ordo is through the sanctioning of alternatives derived from the Vetus Ordo. Happily, the Ordinariate Ordo Missae has led the way to a very significant and exemplary extent. Its authorisation deserves to be bracketed with Summorum Pontificum and the New English translation of the Missal, as one of the three major achievements of the last Pontificate in terms of Liturgy; and as a major contribution, from our beloved Anglican Catholic tradition, to the whole Western Church.

Mass may begin with the Tridentine Praeparatio at the foot of the Altar.
The Tridentine Offertory Prayers may be used; they are printed as Form 1 of two alternatives.
Mass may conclude with the Last Gospel.

(2) Moving in exactly the opposite direction: alternative Eucharistic Prayers should be ruthlessly cut back. Their introduction was a flagrant violation of Sacrosanctum Concilium 23; the defence of the innovation by Pietro Marini (p141: " ... consistent with the early Roman liturgy, which actually had used several anaphoras") seems to me ... until someone enlightens me ... a plain lie.

Here again, the Ordinariate Ordo Missae leads the way. It prints, in its main text, (an Anglo-Catholic translation of) the Canon Romanus, the First Eucharistic Prayer, used daily and universally in the Roman Rite until the disorders of the 1960s. (In an appendix, it does provide the pseudo-Hippolytan Prayer "not to be used on Sundays or Solemnities".)

I believe that the single most important liturgical reform which traditional clergy of whatever jurisdiction (if obliged to use the Novus Ordo) can effect, completely lawfully and without any permission from anyone, is to have a definite personal principle of exclusively using the Roman Canon, weekdays as well as Sundays. However much the Roman Rite varied in its various dialects and in different centuries, the Canon was the profoundly sacred moment of Consecration and of Uniformity, both synchronic and diachronic, binding together all who had ever celebrated, all who were at that moment celebrating, that Rite. I regard the introduction of alternative Eucharistic Prayers as by far the worst of the post-Conciliar corruptions. In an act of amazingly arbitrary Clericalism, the revisers placed the central Act of the Rite totally at the mercy of the daily whimsy of each celebrant.

(3) Rubrics should be redirected towards the holiness of the Great Sacrifice.

The most significant example of this is the the double genuflexion, i.e. before and after each Elevation, prescribed in the Ordinariate Rite.

Such things can be found among Novus Ordo celebrants ... both Benedict XVI and Francis have been noticed (thanks to the immediacy of Vatican Player) observing usages derived from the older form of the Roman Rite. And there is someone called Malcolm Ranjith ...

I conclude with a brief comment on today's post in Rorate Caeli. It is post which speaks negatively about the Reform of the Reform. Anglican Catholics for a century brought in the Tridentine rite gradually. While there were parishes where they went overnight from Mattins to the Missal, most clergy gradually added more of the Missal to the Prayer Book, both in terms of text and of ritual, until, perhaps decades later, they had got there. Should we undermine Catholic Clergy who feel they can take their people with them most easily by a gradual transformation of the OF ... until the day comes when the transition to the EF is totally painless?