George Weigel on the SSPX

This from Newsweek. H/T to Fr. Zuhlsdorf, who fisked Weigel’s article (somewhat too kindly, in Melancholicus’ opinion). Some further matters bear pointing out in this piece, which is why it is further reproduced here:

Rome’s Reconciliation

Did the Pope heal, or deepen, the Lefebvrist schism?

By George Weigel | Newsweek Web Exclusive
Jan 26, 2009

What do the Cardinal Richelieu and King Louis XVI, the Bastille and the Reign of Terror, the Bourbons and Robespierre, the revolutionary depredations in the Vendée, the Dreyfus Affair, the anti-clericalism of the French Third Republic, and the World War II Vichy regime have to do with the schismatic movement that the late Archbishop Marcel Lefebvre led out of the Roman Catholic Church in 1988—a movement that Pope Benedict XVI is now trying to move toward reconciliation by lifting the excommunications of its four illegally ordained bishops on Jan. 21?

In a word: everything.

There are, of course, many different kinds of people in the Lefebvrist movement; the great majority of them are men and women who find the older forms of Catholic piety—especially the Latin Mass celebrated in the Tridentine form—more spiritually beneficial than the reformed liturgy that followed the Vatican Council II (1962-1965). And it is also true that Archbishop Lefebvre, one of the leaders of the anti-reformist faction at Vatican Council II, was very unhappy with what was done to the Church's liturgy after the council.

But Lefebvre was also a man formed by the bitter hatreds that defined the battle lines in French society and culture from the French Revolution to the Vichy regime. Thus his deepest animosities at the council were reserved for another of Vatican Council II's reforms: the council's declaration that "the human person has a right to religious freedom," which implied that coercive state power ought not be put behind the truth-claims of the Catholic Church or any other religious body. This, to Lefebvre, bordered on heresy [to be fair to the Archbishop, the Weltanschauung of the council documents is to say the least difficult to reconcile with that of the Church prior to the council. For Vatican II has since been viewed—by all factions within the Church as well as those without her—as an astonishing volte-face with respect to the Church’s approach to the secular world. Did not our present Holy Father once describe Gaudium et Spes as a “counter-syllabus”, in that its orientation ran totally contrary to Pius IX’s syllabus errorum of 1864? Surely the Archbishop is to be commended, not condemned, for questioning the wisdom of embracing the world at precisely the time that the world was energetically casting out what little remained of Christendom in its foundations?]. For it cast into serious question (indeed, for all practical purposes it rejected) the altar-and-throne arrangements Lefebvre believed ought to prevail—as they had in France before being overthrown in 1789, with what Lefebvre regarded as disastrous consequences for both church and society [in other words the Church, through Dignitatis Humanae and Gaudium et Spes had accommodated herself to modernity. This would not have been a problem were ‘modernity’ founded upon the Christian religion, but it is not, for it bases itself philosophically upon secularism, which latter can provide no faith productive unto eternal life, nor any code of morals for human behaviour which is not subject to alteration upon a whim. The social normalisation of aberrations such as homosexual partnerships and abortion are the logical consequences of modernity. In the political sphere, both Nazism and Communism are modernity’s children. She may since have disowned them, but she bore them nonetheless, and who knows what future horrors she will spring upon us?].

Marcel Lefebvre's war, in other words, was not simply, or even primarily, against modern liturgy. It was against modernity, period [this is a perceptive comment, probably Weigel’s most valuable insight in the whole of his article]. For modernity, in Lefebvre's mind, necessarily involved aggressive secularism, anti-clericalism, and the persecution of the church by godless men [not just in Lefebvre’s mind, Mr. Weigel. It is a matter of the historical record]. That was the modernity he knew, or thought he knew (Lefebvre seems not to have read a fellow Frenchman's reflections on a very different kind of modernity, Alexis de Tocqueville's "Democracy in America"); [and how’s that going, eh? Look at what democracy in America has given us—Barack Obama, a holocaust of forty million unborn souls slaughtered since 1973, gay “marriage” and a host of other abominations too numerous to mention] it was certainly the modernity he loathed. And to treat with this modernity—by, for example, affirming the right of religious freedom and the institutional separation of church and state—was to treat with the devil.

The conviction that the Catholic Church had in fact entered into such a devil's bargain by preemptively surrendering to the modern world at Vatican Council II became the ideological keystone of Lefebvre's movement. And the result was dramatic: Lefebvrists came to understand themselves as the beleaguered repository of authentic Catholicism—or, as the movement is wont to put it, the Tradition (always with a capital "T"). For 10 years, Pope John Paul II tried to convince the recalcitrant Archbishop Lefebvre otherwise; he got nowhere [one is not surprised he got nowhere. How did he expect to convince Archbishop Lefebvre while engaging in highly questionable acts like the prayer meeting of religions at Assisi, and kissing the profoundly anti-Christian Qur’an? Actions speak louder than words]. Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger then tried to mediate. But at the end of the day, Marcel Lefebvre hated modernity more than he loved Rome [pithy]. So in 1988, rejecting the personal pleas of John Paul II and Ratzinger (men who could hardly be accused, reasonably, of preemptive concessions to modernity) [hmm, this is a matter for debate], an aging Lefebvre ordained four bishops to carry on his work, without the requisite authorization from Rome. Those four bishops (whose orders, while illegally conferred under church law, are nonetheless valid sacraments in the church's eyes) [yes] automatically incurred excommunication by participating in a schismatic act—an act in conscious defiance of church authority that cuts one off from the full communion of the church. It is those excommunications that have now been lifted by Benedict XVI, in an effort to move the Lefebvrist movement toward reconciliation with Rome and toward the restoration of full communion [yes, because we’re not there yet].

That one of the Lefebvrist bishops, Richard Williamson, is a Holocaust denier and a promoter of the "Protocols of the Elders of Zion" has drawn considerable attention and commentary, particularly from Jewish scholars and religious leaders who have made large investments in Jewish-Catholic dialogue since Vatican Council II. Their concern is entirely understandable, although it has to be said that the lifting of Williamson's excommunication in no way constitutes a papal endorsement of Williamson's lunatic view of history [a very important point], or a retraction of John Paul II's 1998 statement deploring the Holocaust, or a revocation of Vatican Council II's teaching on the sin of anti-Semitism. At the same time, it ought to be recognized that Williamson's Holocaust denial and his embrace of a crude anti-Semitic canard like the "Protocols" is not all that surprising, given that Lefebvrist political ideology grew out of the same French fever swamps that produced the anti-Dreyfusards. (Even as it ought to be recognized that the hypersecularists of the Third French Republic hated Catholics as much as some anti-Dreyfusards hated Jews.) [I’m sure Williamson has some grasp of these matters, but he is not himself French, was not born in France, did not grow up there, and is hardly likely to share the keen penetration of these politico-religious questions the late Archbishop shows in They Have Uncrowned Him. Williamson has long engaged in fruit-and-nuttery, but his holocaust denial—at least at this present time—is more likely to proceed from a desire to forestall the reconciliation of the SSPX than from adherence to the Archbishop’s politics.]

Williamson's inanities, while deplorable and disgusting, are something of a sideshow, however [correct]. For the highest stakes in this drama hove into view when Bishop Bernard Fellay, the current head of the Lefebvrist movement, issued a Jan. 24 letter on the lifting of the excommunications to the movement's faithful. It is an astonishing document, declaring as it does that "Catholic Tradition is no longer excommunicated" and that the Lefebvrists constitute those "Catholics attached to Tradition throughout the world." [if Weigel has reported Fellay accurately here, the latter has made a sweeping statement of breathtaking arrogance, as though there were no Catholic Tradition at all outside the ranks of the SSPX]. The letter goes on to affirm "all the councils up to the Second Vatican Council about which we express some reservations." And it implies that the talks that will now commence between the Vatican and the Lefebvrists, now that the excommunications have been lifted, will focus on those "reservations." [it is perfectly legitimate for the SSPX to seek dialogue with the Holy See about their reservations. How many times must I say that it is fruitless to require of them a blanket submission to the teachings of Vatican II, when no-one seems to be able to define authoritatively what those teachings are? Who shall interpret the council for us? George Weigel?]

Responsible canon lawyers have raised questions about whether this arrogance on the part of Bishop Fellay does not cast into question his fulfillment of the canonical requirements for a lawful lifting of his excommunication. In any event, non-canonists will read his letter as Fellay's unilateral declaration of victory: the Lefebrvists have been right all along; the Holy See has finally recognized the error of its ways; the only things left to discuss are the terms of surrender. Ironically, but hardly coincidentally, the Catholic left (which has been clever enough to avoid formal schism while living in intellectual and psychological schism since Pope Paul VI's 1968 encyclical on family planning, Humanae Vitae) has welcomed Benedict XVI's canonical rescue of the Lefebvrist bishops, with numerous left-leaning Catholic dissidents now saying, in effect, "Where's my bailout?" [pithy. But to whom is Mr. Weigel here referring? How many of his “left-leaning Catholic dissidents” have, like the bishops of the SSPX, been excommunicated, or suffered any real punishment at all? The only such that Melancholicus can think of is the crack-potted handful of womynprysts who from time to time simulate the reception of sacred orders in synagogues or on riverboats. These can never be reconciled unless they retract their error and abjure their pretended “orders”. They are not in a situation even remotely comparable to that of the Lefebvrist bishops.]

Benedict XVI undoubtedly intended this lifting of excommunications as a step toward healing a wound in the church. Bishop Fellay's letter, in response to the pope's gesture, suggests that the healing has not taken place. Moreover, Fellay's letter raises the stakes for everyone, and to the highest level. For what is at issue, now, is the integrity of the Church's self-understanding, which must include the authenticity of the teaching of Vatican Council II [the teaching of the council and its continuity with sacred tradition MUST be clarified as a matter of urgency, not merely to satisfy the Lefebvrists but for the good of the whole Church. It is not sufficient to declare the teaching of Vatican II “authentic” and to leave it at that, when no two individuals can agree on what precisely that teaching is.]

Father Federico Lombardi, SJ, the pope's spokesman, emphasized to reporters on Jan. 24 that the lifting of the excommunications did not mean that "full communion" had been restored with the Lefebvrists [this is true. The four bishops, as well as all the clergy in communion with them, are still suspended a divinis, and lack the faculties required to absolve penitents and solemnize marriages]. The terms of such reconciliation are, presumably, the subject of the "talks" to which Bishop Fellay referred in his letter. Those talks should be interesting indeed. For it is not easy to see how the unity of the Catholic Church will be advanced if the Lefebvrist faction does not publicly and unambiguously affirm Vatican Council II's teaching on the nature of the church, on religious freedom, and on the sin of anti-Semitism [what, precisely, is “Vatican Council II’s teaching on the nature of the church” [sic] or, indeed, on any other matter? Mr. Weigel cannot say. Nor can Melancholicus, and nor can anyone else, save the Holy Father speaking ex cathedra. Let us not expect theological miracles from the leaders of the SSPX when the holy Catholic Church herself has not authoritatively defined what that teaching is]. Absent such an affirmation, pick-and-choose cafeteria Catholicism will be reborn on the far fringes of the Catholic right, just when it was fading into insignificance on the dwindling Catholic left, its longtime home [this closing remark is neo-catholicism at its very ripest, all the more so since it has absolutely no correspondence with the facts on the ground. It also betrays the cocksure smugness of the neo-catholic position, confident that he alone holds the key to the Catholic faith against the heretics and schismatics on either side of him, and blind to his own mediocrity. Since when does the political position of the Lefebvrists—however much one may disagree with it—contradict defined dogma? It is not sufficient for Mr. Weigel to argue that their political stance contradicts what Vatican II seems to say, for a case can be made that Vatican II itself seems to contradict the socio-political teachings of the Roman pontiffs from the age of the Enlightenment down to 1960. Let the teachings of Vatican II be clarified and defined with the precision of earlier Magisterial decrees before we begin accusing those who are not neo-catholics of “pick-and-choose cafeteria Catholicism”. Furthermore, since when is this pick-and-choose attitude “fading into insignificance” on the left? In Melancholicus’ personal experience, both in Ireland and the United States, this attitude is as robust as ever. The ranks of the left may gradually be thinning, but those who remain still cling to their cherished ideology as resolutely as when they were forty years younger, and they are plenty capable of doing severe damage to what remains of Catholicism in many countries before departing into that good night. They have not gone away simply because the last conclave elected Benedict XVI.]

Not a bad article overall, and quite perceptive in many respects, but Mr. Weigel exhibits two of the most frustrating traits commonly found in the neo-catholic mind. The first is this notion of the “authenticity of the teachings of Vatican II”, the acceptance of which all neo-catholics demand as a sine qua non—but none of them ever takes the trouble to explain to us what that means. Perhaps to them it is self-evident, but they cannot expect us to agree. We can affirm with them that Vatican II was an ecumenical council of the Catholic Church, validly convoked by lawful authority, whose documents were lawfully promulgated and which taught no formal heresy. But what, precisely, did Vatican II teach? The council defined no new doctrine binding upon the faithful. It proposed a plethora of policy changes and new orientations, to be sure, but these things are not de fide after the manner of doctrines of faith or morals. What does Vatican II require us—under pain of sin—to believe that we were not required to believe before 1965? Nothing! What does Vatican II require us—again under pain of sin—to do that we were not required to do before 1965? Again, nothing!

The second is Mr. Weigel’s notion that Archbishop Lefebvre’s hatred of modernity was somehow misplaced and that, with the importuning of John Paul II, he and his followers ought to have ‘gotten with the programme’, so to speak. On the contrary, there needs to be a debate at the highest levels of the hierarchy up to and including the Holy See about the opening of the Church towards the world set in motion by Vatican II. This will—and should—involve revisiting the council documents and at the level of the Magisterium clarifying the copious ambiguity therein. The post-1789 world is NOT something intrinsically good, from which the Church has nothing to fear. In his book They Have Uncrowned Him, the Archbishop traced the pedigree of this modernity: conceived at the Renaissance, brought to birth at the reformation, through adolescence in the age of Enlightenment to a ghastly maturity in the blood-soaked twentieth century and then seemingly embraced uncritically and with open arms by the Catholic Church at Vatican II, on her knees and seeking the world’s approval—on the world’s own terms!

Maybe it’s just me, but how any synod of bishops can get together less than twenty years after the most horrifying human carnage the world had ever seen and draft a document proclaiming in fulsome and ebullient terms the wondrous virtues of modern man truly beggars belief. And how could the Holy Father of the day really believe, after everything he had seen in his own lifetime and with his own eyes, that error would correct itself as though automatically, with no intervention from the Church or other external coercion?

Well, Nazism corrected itself, didn’t it? So... it wasn’t necessary for the Allies to resist Hitler, then?

And in the religious sphere, it has been nearly five hundred years now and we all know how Protestantism corrected itself in the meantime...

Olivia O'Leary, and other animals

Is there any wonder Melancholicus has ceased listening to the news and to current affairs programmes on the radio while driving home from work, when all that can be heard thereon are gloomy prophecies of impending economic catastrophe and similar woes?

However, out of curiosity he switched on Drivetime on RTÉ 1 yesterday evening, whereat he was confronted with Olivia O’Leary’s weekly radio diary.

This is not normally a trial; Melancholicus has no animus against Olivia O’Leary (at least he used not to have such), and not a little of what she says is sound common sense.

But that all changed yesterday evening, for Ms. O’Leary opened her broadcast with an entirely gratuitous attack on the Catholic religion—that’s right: not the institution of the Church, nor even the clergy—the Catholic religion itself was her target.

Those who wish to be scandalised may listen to her pomposity on the Drivetime podcast page here (at least when RTÉ get around to fixing the link, for if one clicks on the Olivia O’Leary 27 January podcast, one will, to one’s great annoyance, find Joe Duffy instead).

What does the reader think of her breathtaking statement that “other religions had, I think, a sense of justice, something to be worked out openly and rationally; we had dark confessionals and agonies of guilt”? This remark is so risible it hardly bears comment.

Her arrogant and profoundly ignorant denigration of our holy religion is all the more galling insofar as there was absolutely no need for her even to mention it, for the subject of her broadcast was not religion at all, but the economy, real estate, property tax and suchlike things.

Catholicism only made an appearance because Ms. O’Leary wanted to set the stage for all her later blather about “guilt” with regard to financial misfeasance by government, financial institutions and property speculators. Does she think it right and good to throw ugly slurs against the religion of the majority of this country’s population in order to make a point about the economy? Pleading that she is herself a Catholic is no excuse. If she is herself a Catholic, she ought to know better than to trot out such tired and shopworn stereotypes.

Of course RTÉ did not deign to edit Ms. O’Leary’s comments before they were aired yesterday evening; the editors of Drivetime either concur with her dismissive attitude or else reckon that alone among all religions, Catholicism is fair game for slander and abuse.

Now imagine she had chosen to attack not Catholicism, but the Islamic religion. What would have been the reaction? Of course RTÉ—a paragon of great cultural sensitivity—would never have permitted it to be broadcast in the first place, but let us just indulge in a little fantasy and imagine how that would have gone down.

There would have been a whirlwind of protest—but not from crazed fanatics seeking to cut off her head, for the ummah in Ireland is as yet too small to be so openly belligerent. The furious response would have come instead from the good people of Dublin Four, and from those who read The Irish Times as though it were scripture. Today Joe Duffy would be inundated with calls to Liveline by people horrified at Ms. O’Leary’s insensitive remarks; The Irish Times likewise would receive a flood of letters by decent citizens protesting against such outrageous cultural racism. The news would be reported abroad in Britain, and perhaps further afield, and Muslim groups there (the good old MCB, no doubt) would not be slow to voice their displeasure and to score political points. In the end, RTÉ (and not forgetting Ms. O’Leary herself) would be forced to make a humiliating and abject apology in order to abate the tempest.

But because Catholicism is the object of her venom, no-one shall so much as bat an eyelid.

UPDATE: RTÉ have now fixed the link. Listen to Ms. O’Leary’s ramblings here.

Le Figaro: poll shows most opposed to SSPX reconciliation

Approuvez-vous la décision de Benoît XVI de lever l’excommunication des évêques intégristes?

Le Pape a levé samedi l’excommunication de quatre evêques, frappés par cette sentence depuis 1988. Parmi eux, Mgr Richard Williamson, qui s’est notamment illustré par des propos négationnistes: il avait mis en doute l’existence des chambres à gaz dans les camps de concentration nazi. Le vote est clos. Vous êtes 13780 à y avoir participé.

13,780 votes were cast in this poll asking whether readers approved of the decision of the pope to lift the excommunications of what the French newspaper calls “the integrist bishops”. Perhaps intégriste is routinely used as a neutral term in French to denote Traditionalists in general and lacks the pejorative connotations it has in English, but Melancholicus somehow doubts it. In any case, the newspaper asks a leading question since Williamson’s denial of the historicity of the holocaust and the gas chambers is right in there.

43.3% of those who voted were in favour of the excommunications being lifted, but 56.6% were opposed, which, all things considered, is hardly a surprise.

A Magna Carta of the Holy Spirit?

Melancholicus was going to turn over a new leaf in 2009 and cease tilting at the council, even if only because his readers are probably weary with his incessant polemic. But this article expresses a view one should have hoped would have gone the way of the dodo by now. One is disheartened to find it still alive and kicking even fifty years after the council was called.

Bishop Patrick O’Donoghue is one of the more orthodox and impressive prelates in a hierarchy of wolves and hirelings. Last year he drew praise for his publications Fit For Mission? Schools and Fit For Mission? Church in which genuine Catholic doctrine is upheld in clear and unambiguous terms.

But nonsense is still nonsense, regardless of the pen whence it proceeds, and the following article written by bishop O’Donoghue for the Catholic Herald just cries out for fisking. Let the reader count the number of ebullient bursts of sunshine in his rhapsodical eulogy of the council. We might be reading Gaudium et Spes.

A Magna Carta of the Holy Spirit

Bishop Patrick O’Donoghue on why Vatican II still matters
23 January 2009

On January 25 we commemorate the 50th anniversary of Blessed Pope John XXIII’s convocation of the Second Vatican Council.

There is a story I’d like to recount that conveys something of the frame of mind that existed before the Council among some English bishops. Canon Oliver Kelly, my predecessor as Administrator of Westminster Cathedral, was in a meeting with Cardinal William Godfrey, Archbishop of Westminster (1956-1963).

Cardinal Godfrey, waxing eloquently about the purpose of the future Council, walked over to his bookcase and picked out one of the 12 bound volumes containing the draft schemas prepared for debate by the Council Fathers. Fondling the book in his hands, Cardinal Godfrey declared the schemas marvellous and suggested that nothing could possibly be added to them. “It will all be over in three months!” he said [indeed it would have been, and the Church would have benefitted from it, and Cardinal Godfrey was right: the schemas were marvellous. Precise, concise and to the point. Unmistakable Catholic doctrine. But that was before the council was hijacked by the liberal faction ON ITS VERY FIRST DAY and thus deflected from the course originally charted for it by Pope John and the commissions he appointed. The good bishop clearly hasn’t read Fr. Wiltgen, or Romano Amerio, or Michael Davies, much less Archbishop Lefebvre. So instead of theologically precise, accurate and clear documents, we had a council that passed verbose and turgid ambiguities, under cover of which toxic novelties were introduced into the life of the Church the fruit of which is all too apparent today. Bishop O’Donoghue may rejoice in this anniversary, but given the ecclesiastical history of the past half-century, to my mind it is no matter for rejoicing].

However, the reality of the Council was very different [and the rest, sadly, is history].

In November 1962, after heated debate about the sources of Revelation, the pre-prepared schema De Fontibus Revelationis was rejected by the Council Fathers, later to be replaced by the wonderful Dogmatic Constitution on Revelation, Dei Verbum [why is Dei Verbum wonderful, whereas De Fontibus Revelationis was not? Is it because Dei Verbum became one of the official documents of the council, and that is why it is so wonderful? Or is it not rather because the former schema was precise and to the point, whereas Dei Verbum is manifestly lacking in both concision and precision, instead replete with ambiguous phrasing sufficiently open-ended it can be interpreted in accordance with the prejudices of the reader?].

This willingness not to be constrained by the pre-prepared schema [willingness NOT TO BE CONSTRAINED?? What sort of a re-writing of history is this?] set the precedent for a far-reaching and creative [hah!] debate among the Council Fathers, lasting three years and producing a body of documents that are a Magna Carta of the Holy Spirit for the modern Church [that is merely your opinion, my lord bishop, and as such neither I nor any other Catholic is bound to share it]. If we truly lived by the decisions of Vatican II we would know how to balance continuity and change, ressourcement and aggiornamento [of course we would, since we would follow a council that was neither hot nor cold, neither up nor down, neither left nor right, neither truly traditional nor truly novel, neither crystal clear nor totally obscure, neither all for the Church nor all for the world, in a word, the very epitome of mediocrity].

Looking back across the years we are prone to forget, or dismiss as naïve, the sheer energy and hope of the Sixties, a decade that saw the rise of the modern world from the wreckage of the Second World War. It was the age of President John F Kennedy, the first manned space flights, the Third World’s green revolution in agriculture, the civil rights movement, and women’s rights [the ’sixties were also the age of Tsar Bomba, the Cuban missile crisis, the proliferation of mind-altering drugs, the legalization of abortion in the UK, the revolt of the youth against both morality and restraint, and a general revolt even among clergy and religious, against the authority of the Church. Surely bishop O’Donoghue does not look back on the anarchy and dissent which greeted Humanae Vitae with nostalgia? And what gives with the eulogising of John F Kennedy? Surely the bishop cannot be aware of how bad an example that profoundly disappointing family has been for Catholics, especially those involved in political life, ever since?].

The Council Fathers judged rightly that it was time for the Church to find a new language to speak the eternal truths of Faith to modern men and women. I remember the excitement when people heard the Church speaking in a way that was straightforward, biblical, personal, and pastoral [indeed so straightforward was the Church’s new way of speaking that today nearly everybody under the age of 65 has an heretical understanding of the Catholic faith. One might say that when the Church begins proclaiming Christianity in a secular idiom, she will end by proclaiming secularism in a Christian idiom. Can the good bishop deny that such has been the result of this ill-conceived experiment?].

As I wrote in Fit for Mission? Church: “It was as if we were in Galilee again during those heady days when the apostles walked with the Lord, hearing the liberating truth of His words and seeing His love, bringing miracles to all wounded by sin, sickness and doubt [the ’sixties reminded you of this, did it, my lord bishop? What on earth were you smoking?]. And the world flocked to Him, knowing that He spoke with power and authority. And the world flocked to Rome – through the media – during the Council knowing that something wonderful was happening, Christ was speaking His words of hope and healing with authority to the peoples of our times.” [No, no, no and no! Pre-programmed by the media, who exerted an undue and baleful influence on the public perception of the council, the world waited for the Church to announce she was going to change. This influence was not confined to the lay readers of newspapers and magazines in western countries; it was exerted even upon clergy and upon the very council fathers themselves. The world was not waiting for Christ to speak “words of hope and healing with authority to the peoples of our times” but for a definitive sign that after so many centuries of resisting the Weltanschauung of the Enlightenment, the Catholic Church was finally going to embrace the world on the world’s own terms—and not before time too.]

I really hope that in 2009 we all return to the documents of the Council, especially the four Constitutions, because they are our direct link to a time in the life of the Church dramatically blessed by the Holy Spirit [once again, my lord bishop, this is your personal opinion, and I do not share it. It is difficult for me, in the light of everything that took place then and in subsequent years, to regard the early ’sixties as in any way “a time in the life of the Church dramatically blessed by the Holy Spirit”. Nevertheless, you have a point, for it is important that the Church as a matter of urgency clarify the ambiguities and contradictions that abound in the text of the decrees. Until this is done definitively, the council—even in its officially-promulgated documents—will continue ever more to be a source of confusion and dissidence for clergy and laity alike.]

I have little sympathy with those who argue that we should somehow get past the documents of the Council – which they say are fatally flawed by compromise and politics – and try to re-construct the “event” of the Council in order to know the “true” intentions of the Council Fathers and periti [theological advisers]. [Hmm. Who is he attacking here? Much like the documents he so highly praises, his Grace of Lancaster’s words are ambiguous on this point and could be interpreted either way.]

Just as many scripture scholars involved in the historical search for Jesus created a “Jesus” that merely reflected themselves, there is the danger that those involved in the historical search for the Council will create a picture of the “Council” that reflects their own likes and dislikes. If Catholics really knew the documents of the Council there would not be so much confusion about what they actually say: [Yes, but how can Catholics “really know the documents of the Council”, when the documents are sufficiently open-ended as to be susceptible to widely varying and even mutually-exclusive interpretations? Does it not strike the good bishop that there must be something seriously wrong with this council if there is a danger that even the study of its official documents will create for Catholics “a picture of the Council” that reflects merely “their own likes and dislikes”? Does this not rather highlight the dangerous ambiguity present in the conciliar texts? His Grace then goes on to cite examples of policies called for by the council documents which run contrary to the popular perception—a useful illustration of how the council has been mishandled by those responsible for its implementation, but does this not illustrate the failure of the council to convey its own message when so many different (and mutually-exclusive) interpretations exist?]

1) Catholics could not continue to live lives focused on their own prosperity if they truly knew that Gaudium et Spes 69 teaches, among other things, that we must “feed the man dying of hunger, because if you have not fed him, you have killed him” [Did we need the convocation of an ecumenical council at great labour and expense just to tell us this? Has this not rather been perennial Catholic social teaching for centuries?].

2) Catholics could not say that Paul VI’s prophetic encyclical, Humanae Vitae, went against Vatican II if they knew that Gaudium et Spes 51 teaches that couples “may not undertake methods of birth control which are found blameworthy by the teaching authority of the Church in its unfolding of the divine law” [Here we have an example of one norm contradicting another within the same document, since Guadium et Spes also says (§52) “Those too who are skilled in other sciences, notably the medical, biological, social and psychological, can considerably advance the welfare of marriage and the family along with peace of conscience if by pooling their efforts they labor to explain more thoroughly the various conditions favoring a proper regulation of births” which, on the face of it, is hardly a disavowal of contraception. In fact it takes some reading and re-reading to figure out what it means, and even then we’re not sure].

3) Catholics would not mock the Mass of Paul VI if they accepted that Sacrosanctum Concilium 36 teaches that “the use of the vernacular... may frequently be of great advantage to the people” [O come on. As though the only thing amiss with the Mass of Paul VI is that it is celebrated in the vernacular. Such is the very least of its problems].

4) Catholics would not say that Pope Benedict XVI’s Summorum Pontificum went against Vatican II if they knew that Sacrosanctum Concilium 36 teaches that “the use of the Latin language is to be preserved in the Latin rite”. [His Grace fails to notice the disorientating confusion inherent in Sacrosanctum Concilium, which in one and the same paragraph mandates the retention of Latin but at the same time permits the vernacular! Furthermore, those bishops, clergy and laity who object to the Church’s traditional liturgy do so not for the language wherein it is celebrated, but for reasons of ecclesiology. Surely his Grace is aware of the enormous ecclesiological cleavage between Tradition and the Revolution, yet he chooses to reduce it to a simple matter of linguistic preference. I am not impressed.]

Looking back at the ages of the saints, such as St Francis, St Clare and St Dominic, it’s tempting to think: “Wouldn’t it have been wonderful to have lived during that golden age, when the Church was young and creative?” [And where are the saints of the ’sixties? Ah, silly me, here they come:]

It is time for us to wake up to the fact that during and after the Council, giants have walked among us: Blessed John XXIII, Blessed Mother Teresa, Servant of God Pope John Paul II, Servant of God Pope Paul VI, Cardinal Henri de Lubac, Fr Karl Rahner SJ, Fr. Hans Urs von Balthasar, Brother Roger of Taizé, Archbishop Oscar Romero, Chiara Lubich, Dietrich Von Hildebrand, Pope Benedict XVI, and many more [this is a motley crew, and no mistake. I can understand the inclusion of John XXIII, Benedict XVI, Dietrich Von Hildebrand, (to an extent) John Paul II, and even Paul VI, Mother Teresa and Cardinal de Lubac, but Rahner?? Von Balthasar?? Chiara Lubich??? Brother Roger of Taizé???? In the immortal words of Alcuin, Quid Ingeld cum Christo? It reminds me of the evil spirit in Acts 19:15 saying to the sons of Sceva “Jesus I know, and Paul I know, but who are you?”].

I suspect that future generations will look back and say: “Oh, to have lived in times so blessed by the Holy Spirit!” [Did the Israelites look back on their forty years’ wandering in the desert with wistful yearning? I think not. Nor will Catholics of a future age look back with nostalgia upon the wretched time that bishop O’Donoghue seems to think was so wonderful. Blessed by the Holy Ghost, you say? Let us not blaspheme Him by attributing the greatest cataclysm to strike the Church since the Reformation to His holy inspiration now please]

So is the council, as the good bishop avers, a “Magna Carta of the Holy Spirit”? Let the reader decide.

Anno Domini MMIX

It is likely that blogging will be light in January, for on Saturday Melancholicus will remove himself to the left coast of the USA, there to visit his sweetheart whom he has not seen in the flesh for many months.

He shall do his best to get near a computer some time over the next three weeks so as to keep his regular readers—all eight of you!—informed of developments in the God-forsaken half-catholic wasteland that is the archdiocese of Seattle, or indeed anywhere else on earth that might claim his passing interest.

Melancholicus was once a seminarist, and 2009 was to be the year of his ordination. Almighty God hath disposed otherwise, however, and so the state of life to be embraced this year will not be holy orders at all but holy matrimony.

We would both be grateful, gentle reader, for your prayers.

Infelix ego, Melancholicus, peccator

O Emmanuel

The last of the O Antiphons is sung at vespers this evening, for tomorrow’s vespers will be the first of the Nativity:



O EMMANUEL, Rex et Legifer noster, exspectatio Gentium, et Salvator earum: veni ad salvandum nos, Domine Deus noster.

O EMMANUEL, our King and Law-giver, the desire of the nations and the Saviour thereof, come to save us, O Lord our God.

Tagged

Another milestone in the annals of Infelix Ego, for today Melancholicus has been tagged, and that for the very first time.

The rules of this particular tag are as follows:

• Link to the person who tagged you: The Bovina Bloviator.


• Post the rules on your blog.


• Write six random things about yourself.


• Tag six people at the end of your post and link to them.


• Let each person know they've been tagged and leave a comment on their blog.


• Let the tagger know when your entry is up.

Melancholicus shall refrain from tagging six others, for he moves in narrow and esoteric circles, and despite the length of his blogroll (see right) is not confident of finding six suitable fellow bloggers to tag. Many of his regular reads no doubt will have already been tagged in this wise by someone else. Instead he shall modify the rules on his own authority. Anyone reading this with a blog of their own may consider themselves tagged if they wish to play.

And now for six random pieces of trivia about Melancholicus:

1. He was born and raised in Ireland, but has lived for extended periods in Utrecht (the Netherlands), Oslo (Norway) and Nebraska (USA).


2. After lapsing from the Catholic faith in his teenage years, he was converted at the age of 24 by reading a book on Christianity—written by an Anglican!


3. He has at least some knowledge of the Irish, French, Dutch, German, Norwegian, Russian and Arabic languages, but speaks none of them with any degree of fluency (and can not yet read Arabic script), so (with the possible exception of Germany and the Netherlands) he would be quite unable to function in any country in which these are spoken without having to resort finally to English. He also has a reading knowledge through his academic training of Early Irish, Anglo-Saxon, Old Norse, Gothic and Latin.


4. As a boy, his ambition was to be a bus driver for CIÉ. This ambition was thwarted when the buses which inspired it were withdrawn from service at the end of their working lives while Melancholicus was still too young to hold a D-class driving licence, after which he lost all interest. He has no desire to be associated with these bland, characterless modern yokes.


5. He is fascinated with the subject of nuclear weapons, loves looking at photographs and archive footage of nuclear tests and would love to have the opportunity to witness a real live atmospheric high-yield test at sufficiently close range to feel the heat on his face and the onrush of the shock front, but no so close as to risk serious injury or death, naturally.


6. He really likes the interface presented by Safari browser, though for blogging purposes, Firefox is his clear favourite. Microsoft Internet Explorer he regards as the novus ordo of web browsers and hence not worth bothering with.

And that’s that.

O Rex Gentium

This evening’s vespers sees the chanting of the penultimate O Antiphon:



O REX GENTIUM, et desideratus earum, lapisque angularis, qui facis utraque unum: veni, et salva hominem, quem de limo formasti.

O KING OF THE NATIONS and the desire thereof, Thou cornerstone that makest both one, come and deliver mankind, whom Thou didst form out of clay.

O Oriens

The fifth of the Great O Antiphons will be sung at vespers this evening. The fourth Sunday of Advent has no proper Magnificat antiphon at either first or second vespers, since the occurring O Antiphons take liturgical precedence:



O ORIENS, splendor lucis aeternae, et sol iustitiae: veni, et illumina sedentes in tenebris, et umbra mortis.

O DAY-SPRING, Brightness of light eternal, and Sun of Justice, come and enlighten them that sit in darkness and in the shadow of death.

O Clavis David

The fourth of the Great O Antiphons will be sung at vespers this evening:



O CLAVIS David, et sceptrum domus Israel: qui aperis, et nemo claudit; claudis, et nemo aperit: veni, et educ vinctum de domo carceris, sedentem in tenebris, et in umbra mortis.

O Key of David, and Scepter of the house of Israel, that openest and no man shutteth, and shuttest and no man openeth: come and bring the prisoner forth from the prison-house, and him that sitteth in darkness and in the shadow of death.

O Radix Jesse

The third of the Great O Antiphons will be sung at vespers this evening:



O RADIX JESSE, qui stas in signum populorum, super quem continebunt reges os suum, quem gentes deprecabuntur: veni ad liberandum nos, iam noli tardare.

O ROOT OF JESSE, Which standest for an ensign of the people, before Whom kings shall keep silence, Whom the Gentiles shall beseech: come and deliver us, and tarry not.

O Adonai

The second of the Great O Antiphons will be sung at vespers this evening:



O ADONAI, et Dux domus Israel, qui Moysi in igne flammae rubi apparuisti, et ei in Sina legem dedisti: veni ad redimendum nos in brachio extento.

O ADONAI, and Leader of the house of Israel, Who didst appear to Moses in the flame of the burning bush, and didst give him the law on Sinai: come and with an outstretched arm redeem us.

O Sapientia

On 17 December, which is today, the Church enters upon the second and more solemn half of her Advent observance. The countdown to the appearance of the Divine Infant at Christmas has begun in earnest, and the first of the seven Great Antiphons chanted at the Magnificat in the office of vespers will be sung this evening.



O SAPIENTIA, quae ex ore Altissimi prodidisti, attingens a fine usque ad finem, fortiter suaviterque disponens omnia: veni ad docendum nos viam prudentiae.

O WISDOM, Which camest out of the mouth of the Most High, reaching from end to end and ordering all things mightily and sweetly: come and teach us the way of prudence.

H/T to Rev. Giles Pinnock, on whose blog Melancholicus found the video.

What the devil...?

In September last Melancholicus installed on Infelix Ego a device called NeoCounter.

This device is one of many handy tools that measure and log internet traffic such that one has some idea where one’s visitors are from.

Noticing today that one of his most recent visitors pushed the number of countries from which his blog has been browsed since September up to the grand total of 60, Melancholicus waited eagerly to see the identity of the new country.

To say that it surprised him when he found it would be an understatement.

Which country would that be, then?

One that isn’t a country.

Look at the image to the left, paying particular attention to the spotlit area.

Just what is that, between Cameroon and the United Arab Emirates?

Since when, gentle reader, is Europe a country, any more than Africa or Asia or, for that matter, Antarctica are countries?

This is most sinister.

But wait, there’s more! The flag accompanying this ‘country’ is a circlet of twelve gold stars on a blue field. This is the flag of a political, economic and increasingly judicial entity known as the European Union.

So is this just an error on the part of NeoCounter? For the European Union is not itself a country. It is not a state, although the officials presiding over its institutions are tirelessly striving to elevate it to statehood. It is a legal construct composed of twenty-seven separate and independent member states. These twenty-seven states are the countries, and all except Luxembourg, Lithuania and Slovenia have registered hits on Melancholicus’ counter.

So what is this ‘Europe’? The EU has no right to statehood alongside its twenty-seven members, much less to statehood at their expense.

Melancholicus has not so far tracked down the origin of that (so far) isolated visit, but would not be surprised if it proceeded from an IP address in some bureaucratic office in Strasbourg or Brussels.

But if this is indeed an indication that the commissars are trawling the blogs and indentifying troublesome commentators advocating unwelcome right-wing views—as has been threatened—would they not do better to keep their surveillance secret?

They’ll catch more baddies that way.

The things one sees on the highway

Yesterday evening, after checking on his students in the exam hall at the RDS, Melancholicus was driving through Ballsbridge on his way back to the north side.

He stopped at traffic lights at the junction of Anglesey Road, and noticed that the vehicle in front of him—a silver 2008 Nissan Note with a Dublin registration—bore an Obama ’08 bumper sticker, obnoxiously displayed to the public view.

This is unusual in Ireland. It is uncommon to see vehicles on Irish roads registered in the state with bumper stickers of any sort, political or otherwise, never mind those to do with American presidential elections.

So it is typical that the very first one Melancholicus ever set eyes upon in this country should belong to a supporter of the Man of Sin, and he grunted to himself in sour disapproval behind the wheel.

When the lights turned green, the Obamobile moved into the lane to turn right onto Shelbourne Road, stopping at the junction thereto since the filter light had not yet appeared. Melancholicus remained in the northbound lane, since he was heading towards Morehampton Road, and as he passed the queue of traffic waiting for the Shelbourne filter light he turned his head to get a look at the driver.

The Obamobile was driven by a fat, dumpy-looking, middle-aged woman with an angry mien and a scowl that could crack a plate. Although Melancholicus cannot pretend to know this woman, or be privy to the secrets of her conscience, if appearance is anything to go by she looked every inch the radical feminist, and, if the truth be told, she looked more than a little like one of those ladies that prefers the bed-company of her own rather than the opposite sex. Melancholicus surmised that at the beginning of this year this woman must have been eagerly rooting for Hillary Clinton but, when the latter failed to win the Democratic nomination, decided to make the best of a bad job and root for the candidate otherwise most likely to deliver with respect to the feminist/abortionist/homosexualist agenda.

But why are liberals so angry? Why are they so eaten up with fury and hate? Are they not aware that all their cherished designs are, one by one, gradually being realised? Have they not copped themselves on to the fact that their side, at least at the present time, is winning? Have they not, after all, secured the election of the Chosen One, at least where the US presidency is concerned?

Can they not be gracious in victory?

Can they not even manage a smile?

No, because just like the islamists, each fresh victory does not abate their hatred, but increases it.

Everyone who knows an ideological liberal can testify to the horrifying depths of bitterness, rage and even malice that lie seething beneath the surface, ready to spill over at the slightest provocation. A feature common to all totalitarian ideologies is an absolute intolerance of the existence of persons whose views differ from the ideological orthodoxy. Liberalism is no exception. Make no mistake about it, Liberalism is every bit as totalitarian as Nazism and Communism; it differs from these only in that its proponents have not yet secured sufficient raw power to impose their will violently upon their opponents and upon society at large.

Let us suppose that the liberals achieved all their objectives: not some, not most—but all. This is impossible since the indefectibility of the Church is divinely guaranteed until the end of time, but let us imagine for argument’s sake that it were so. Having completely revolutionised the social order and imposed all their cherished inversions and perversions (it is surely unnecessary to list these); having attained such total control over education and the dissemination of information that every last member of society could not help but be thoroughly indoctrinated in their ideology, without any possibility of opting out (so no homeschooling or anything similar); having disposed of persons who somehow managed to evade this indoctrination or showed themselves capable of independent thought by the expedient of having them confined to psychiatric wards, lobotomised or ‘euthanised’, would they then, finally, be happy?

If traditional morality and the Christian religion were eradicated completely, would they then rest content, delighted with their achievements and with the heaven on earth they believe they can decree into being?

Or would they not rather find themselves bereft of all purpose and desire, since there would be no-one left to hate?

Christmas stamps 2008

Last year Melancholicus was struck with wonderment at the fact that, even in this brave new age of cultural ‘sensitivity’, An Post was so coarse and majoritarian as to use the word Christmas openly and shamelessly on their website. As if such were not sufficiently offensive to the devotees of lesser gods, to ethnic ‘minorities’, to Irish Times readers and to the liberal intelligentsia generally, An Post did not even scruple to issue, even to the very public, a special set of seasonal stamps with an unmistakably Christian theme.

Well, those good fellows are at it again this year! For Melancholicus has today sent off his first batch of Christmas cards (with more to go out tomorrow), and in doing so discovered that last year’s themed stamps were not an isolated incident quickly corrected by the self-appointed watchdogs of p.c. orthodoxy, but an annual event which brings a timely reminder amidst the commercially-driven excess of materialistic spending sprees of what Christmas is really all about.

This year’s offerings lack the aesthetic quality of those from 2007 (at least in Melancholicus’ opinion), but for all that they are just as unmistakably Christian. They feature (right to left) the Annunciation, the journey of the Blessed Mother and St. Joseph to Bethlehem, and the Divine Infant lying in the manger.

Once again, kudos to An Post for doing their bit to keep the religious tradition of this country alive in the face of the assaults it receives daily from ideologues who think they know better than the Holy Ghost.

And Christmas is still Christmas in Ireland; we do not (yet) address each other with banalities such as “happy holidays”, and the Angelus bell is still rung daily even on the mordantly anti-catholic media organ known as RTÉ.

But, the way things are going, for how much longer?

Lisbon take two

Isn’t democracy beautiful?

Isn’t it wonderful when the people at large have the chance to determine their own future instead of having a cadre of politicians, businessmen and vested interests deciding it for them?

On 12 June last, the Irish electorate voted against the ratification of the Treaty of Lisbon. One would think that an institution such as the European Union, committed as it is to promoting the spread of western-style democracy throughout the globe, ought to respect that result. Was it not delivered by the democratic means so dear to the hearts of our European rulers, heirs as they are to the Revolutionaries of 1789, with their ideals of Liberté, Fraternité and Egalité?

Now it has been revealed that Taoiseach Brian Cowen is to offer the referendum on the Lisbon Treaty to the Irish electorate a second time, in exactly the same fashion as was done in 2002 with the Treaty of Nice.

What part of “No” do they not understand?

Melancholicus predicted as much last May, and he does not rejoice in the discovery that his prediction has been fulfilled.

What is the response of our European “brothers” to this travesty of the democratic process? Are concerned voices being raised in Brussels, opposing the Irish government’s decision to hold a second referendum since the voice of the Irish people has already been heard?

On the contrary, the EU commissars will offer the Irish government every assistance, every inducement, every warning and every threat in order to assure the correct result is obtained in the second Lisbon referendum, and that because the only thing that really matters is ratification, and the furtherance of the objectives of the Grand European Project. Democracy is allowed to be democracy only when the electorate deliver the desired outcome. That’s not really enfranchisement, is it?

So why not drop the pretence and just admit that the EU has designs on fashioning itself, by whatever means necessary, into a totalitarian state, whose executive, legislative and judicial powers shall in every conceivable instance trump those of its constituent nations provinces?

This scandalous repeat of the Lisbon referendum shall be held in October 2009, on a date yet to be appointed. Due to his forthcoming marriage, Melancholicus will by then be living in the People’s Republic of Obamaland, but he will make every arrangement necessary for being able to cast his vote in the re-run. He shall vote the same way he voted last June, for his mind has not changed in the interim. The result is a foregone conclusion in any case. Referenda shall continue to be put to the people until the people finally say what their betters want them to say. The final outcome is merely postponed, not averted. The game is rigged against us; we have to win every throw. The other side has to win but once.

This story courtesy of RTÉ:

Second Lisbon poll likely before October

Thursday, 11 December 2008 09:09

The Taoiseach is in Brussels today at an EU summit where he is set to agree to hold a second referendum on the Lisbon Treaty by next October.

A draft agreement, to be presented to the summit this evening, sets out a series of steps that the French presidency hopes will be enough to secure ratification of the Lisbon Treaty in Ireland.

'The Irish government is committed to seeking ratification of the Lisbon Treaty by the end of the term of the current commission,' the text said.

The Taoiseach will discuss the Irish view with EU colleagues today and tomorrow,' a spokesman for the Government said, declining to comment further.

All states would firstly agree that if the Lisbon Treaty comes into force, they will use its provision to ensure every country keeps a permanent commissioner [dream on; there is no way of holding them to this promise. It can be revoked without a backward glance once the Irish electorate have accepted the Treaty].

The second step would see a series of legally binding guarantees being drafted over the next six months by the Czech presidency on issues of concern to Ireland [Melancholicus would tend to mistrust the Czechs less than he mistrusts the French, but there is no reason why 'legally binding guarantees' must always remain so. Laws often are, by force of events and circumstance, subject to constant revision].

If those guarantees are acceptable, then the Government promises to hold a referendum by the end of the term of this Commission, which would normally [be] the end of next October [the Irish government is going to do the bidding of its EU paymasters anyway, regardless of whether any 'guarantees' offered are acceptable or not].

The draft also sets out the areas of concern to Ireland, including military neutrality, tax sovereignty and the primacy of the Irish constitution on social issues, such as abortion and marriage laws [while it is heartening to see that social issues are addressed, at the very least by being mentioned, once the Lisbon Treaty is ratified it is very doubtful whether any of the 27 constituent nations will have the powers to retain their own laws on issues like marriage and abortion against the uniform social engineering desired by the European Commission].

It includes new language on the protection of workers rights, and the provision of public services like health and education by government and local authorities.

We knew this development must surely come, but for all that it is no less bitter to the taste, and no less hard to swallow.

We shall see if these promised ‘guarantees’ will actually come to anything. But Melancholicus shall not be holding his breath.

In memoriam A.H.M., part the third

Melancholicus has now finished reading Martyr of Ritualism, and is still infused with an after-glow of awe at the extraordinary life and labours of its protagonist.

If only a tenth part of our Roman clergy were as energetic, devoted and holy as Father Mackonochie, how different would the Church now be!

In any case, Melancholicus shall now surcease from comparing the Roman Catholic clergy unfavourably with Mackonochie, lest readers who disdain Anglo-Catholicism consider such talk impious and altogether without merit.

A picture is worth a thousand words. Melancholicus shall now conclude his reminiscences of Father A.H.M. with some photographs of the man and his companions so as to furnish his readers with some flavour of this martyr of ritualism even if they have not read his life.

Father Alexander Heriot Mackonochie at the height of his powers

Mackonochie as a young priest, probably in the St. George’s Mission days. (This profile looks to Melancholicus not unlike a certain Simon N. from Limerick—although perhaps mutual friends of ours would disagree)

Father Charles Fuge Lowder, founder of the Society of the Holy Cross (Societas Sanctae Crucis), to which Mackonochie belonged

Father Arthur Stanton as a young man. Stanton (with biretta!) was one of Mackonochie’s curates at St. Alban’s, ministering there for almost his whole priestly life. He died in 1913

The clergy of St. Alban’s, Holborn, in 1874, the same year in which parliament passed the notorious Public Worship Regulation Act—which, incidentally, is still on the statute books though honoured more in the breach than in the observance. Front row (from left): H. A. Walker, A.H.M., Arthur Stanton, H. E. Willington. Back row: H. G. Maxwell, E. F. Russell, G. R. Hogg. Note that nearly all the clergy are either wearing or holding birettas. Melancholicus can’t get over the birettas

Mackonochie’s cross marking the spot where he died in the Mamore Forest not far from Ballachulish, Scotland, on 15 December 1887

Footnote: astoundingly, Father Mackonochie is omitted from the liturgical calendar provided by Common Worship; despite the impact of his ministry on the Church of England and his legacy which survives to this day, he has no holy day of his own. Yet undeservers such as Martin Luther are commemorated—scroll down to October 31 (Luther is commemorated on Halloween—are we at liberty to take such tongue-in-cheek?)

The clarity of his teaching makes me glad to be a Dubliner...

... and even gladder to be a Catholic. Not.

This story courtesy of Novus Ordo Catholic World News, and is Melancholicus’ first hosting of a story from that source since it was ‘renewed’ by its owners back in August:

Irish archbishop denies disagreement within hierarchy on civil partnerships

December 01, 2008

After Dublin's Archbishop Diarmuid Martin said that the Irish episcopal conference had not expressed an opinion on proposed legislation allowing civil partnerships for same-sex couples, the Irish Times saw "significant differences" between Ireland's two leading Catholic prelates on the issue. Archbishop Martin took issue with that analysis.

Cardinal Sean Brady of Armagh had earlier delivered a stern warning against legislation that could undermine traditional marriage. Archbishop Martin said that other bishops agreed with the cardinal but "may have said it in different ways." The Dublin archbishop added that while opposing same-sex marriage, Church leaders were "not against other forms of intimacy." The Irish Times saw "significant differences of emphasis" in the archbishop's statement.

In a prompt reply to the Irish Times, Archbishop Martin decried what he said was "false interpretation" of his public remarks, and emphasized that he was "supportive of the basic content of Cardinal Brady's position." The archbishop went on to say that the relevant Christian teaching begins with an emphasis on the fundamental importance of marriage, but added: "I am fully aware of the need to protect the rights of a variety of people in caring and dependent relationships, different to marriage."

The offending article by Patsy McGarry, Religious Affairs correspondent for the Irish Times:

Bishops differ over emphasis on civil unions

PATSY McGARRY Religious Affairs Correspondent

SIGNIFICANT DIFFERENCES of emphasis among Ireland's Catholic bishops on the Civil Partnership Bill have emerged.

Yesterday, the Archbishop of Dublin Most Rev Diarmuid Martin said that, while he didn't feel any of his fellow bishops were opposed to what Cardinal Seán Brady said about the Bill at the recent Céifin conference in Ennis, they might have said it differently.

"We haven't expressed an opinion as an Episcopal Conference (on the Bill)," he said. "I don't think anyone in the conference is against what Cardinal Brady said, but they may have said it in different ways."

The Archbishop also said that while the Catholic Church favoured marriage, "it is not against other forms of intimacy".

Catholic teaching "is linked to the complementarity of the sexes", he said, "and this was not something it was possible for any individual to change. It is part of the order of things since Creation." He noted that while "the Catholic Church is in favour of marriage, it is not against other forms of intimacy". He added that "consistently, all Christian churches emphasise the uniqueness of marriage based on the complementarity of the sexes", but they addressed other forms of intimacy on other bases.

Archbishop Martin was speaking at a press conference in Maynooth yesterday which was also attended by the Bishop of Down and Connor, Most Rev Noel Traenor. It took place as the three-day winter meeting of the Irish Episcopal Conference was under way. It ends today.

In his address to the Céifin conference on November 4th, Cardinal Brady indicated that the Government could face a legal challenge if the Civil Partnership Bill became law. "Those who are committed to the probity of the Constitution, to the moral integrity of the word of God and to the precious human value of marriage between a man and a woman as the foundation of society may have to pursue all avenues of legal and democratic challenge to the published legislation if this is the case," he said.

The Bill was "perhaps the greatest revolution in the history of the Irish family" and the Government was obliged by the Constitution to guard the institution of marriage "with special care", he said.

The Civil Partnership Bill is expected to become law next year and will give greater protection to cohabiting and same-sex couples in areas such as pensions, inheritance and tax. Cardinal Brady said a complete assessment could not be made until the legislation was published, but that it appeared the Government was prepared to grant to cohabiting and same-sex couples the status of marriage in all but name. Apart from the restrictions on adoption by same-sex couples, "it is difficult to see how anything other than the introduction of de facto marriage for cohabiting and same-sex couples is envisaged", he said.

The cardinal said he found it "remarkable" that "Ireland looks set to repeat the mistakes of societies like Britain and the US by introducing legislation which will promote cohabitation, remove most incentives to marry and grant same-sex couples the same rights as marriage in all but adoption".

He said one in four children of cohabiting parents experienced family breakdown before they started school, compared to just one in 10 children of married parents. "Other studies in Britain and the US suggest that children born outside of marriage are more likely to do worse at school, suffer poorer health and are more likely to face problems of unemployment, drugs and crime," he said.

What was it Melancholicus said yesterday about his local ordinary? If memory serves me rightly, I believe it included the words ‘equivocating’, ‘double-tongued’, ‘politicised’ and ‘careerist’ among sundry other unflattering epithets. But whatever else might be said against Melancholicus on that account, he cannot be accused of having not given all sides in this instance a fair hearing. So he invites his readers to decide. Was Mr. McGarry, or was he not, justified in drawing the inferences he did after his Grace’s ambiguous ramblings on marriage and sexual intimacy at that press conference in Maynooth? The answer to this question hinges on whether his Grace of Dublin expressed himself and expounded Catholic teaching on the subject clearly and forthrightly; my lord archbishop’s words were obviously so clear and forthright as to necessitate the sending perforce to D’Olier street of a letter exculpating himself of any pastoral negligence in an attempt to explain his position.

His Grace of Dublin’s response, in the letters section of the same newspaper:

Archbishop and civil unions

Madam, - I have received a number of calls from people who feel that my remarks, as presented in your report of November 26th, "Bishops differ over emphasis on civil unions", seem to indicate that I do not accept Catholic teaching on marriage.

I was responding to a series of questions from journalists regarding a variety of aspects of the forthcoming Civil Partnership Bill. It is possible that the manner in which my different remarks appeared may have given rise to false interpretation.

While saying that I might have addressed the theme differently, I did clearly say that I was supportive of the basic content of Cardinal Brady's position on the Bill and of his comments at the recent Céifin conference.

Above all my remarks wished to stress that the Christian teaching on marriage, rather than starting out from negative criticisms, is a positive endorsement of the unique and irreplaceable contribution to society made by the family based on marriage, that is, on the mutual and exclusive love of husband and wife.

While stressing, as I have consistently done, the Christian teaching on the mutuality of the sexes as fundamental to the understanding of marriage, I am fully aware of the need to protect the rights of a variety of people in caring and dependent relationships, different to marriage.

Unfortunately, some members of the public and some public commentators seize on such comments and concern as an opportunity to say that I advocate positions in conflict with Catholic teaching. For my part, I regret if my comments may have appeared unclear. On the other hand, the contrived polemic of such commentators does little to promote marriage and its value to society.

- Yours, etc,

Archbishop DIARMUID MARTIN, Archbishop's House, Drumcondra, Dublin 9.

His Grace’s statesmanlike composure slips in the closing sentence, his self-control having clearly been stretched to its absolute limit, enabling us to catch a quick glimpse of the fury beneath. He refers, scathingly, to ‘such commentators’, in the plural. Obviously his pique has been roused by others besides Mr. McGarry alone. Who are these others? Catholic bloggers and news agencies, both at home and abroad, most likely. At this stage this story has gone all around the world, and his Grace is clearly furious that he has been publicly exposed in an evasive and calculating dodge worthy of Rowan Williams so shamelessly misrepresented.

“For my part, I regret if my comments may have appeared unclear. On the other hand, the contrived polemic of such commentators does little to promote marriage and its value to society.”

May have appeared unclear? There’s no may about it, dear Diarmuid. Your words were unclear, period. Stop trying to cover your arrogant arse and admit your fault. Had you the humility to do that, we would hold you in a new respect. But alas, one can’t teach old dogs...

And what about the contrived polemic? You have some cheek, dear Diarmuid. You tried to straddle both sides of the fence. You tried to please both parties—your flock and your secularist enemies—simultaneously. It didn’t work, and the fault is your own. In case it may have escaped your attention, permit me to remind you that your appointment to the See of Dublin makes you one of the two most senior leaders of the Catholic Church on this island. Do the words ‘Primate of Ireland’ hold any meaning for you? You have a great power to influence others, for good or for ill, and it is disgraceful—not to say demoralising—for Christ’s faithful to behold their bishop, their archbishop, the shepherd of their Church, playing games with semantics and dodging urgent questions of doctrine and morals with the brazen aplomb of a lying politician, all simply to avoid a few days’ critique at the hands of the outraged and anti-catholic press. I don’t know why you went to the effort; surely you knew it was inevitable you would have been criticised by someone. If you had taught forthrightly, we would not have lambasted you with our ‘contrived polemic’; the other side would have. But which is better? To please your flock and enrage the enemies of Jesus Christ, or vice versa? Personally, I think you made the wrong choice. I seem to remember something in the Gospels along the lines of “woe to you when the world shall speak well of you...”, and all that. But you might disagree; well, it’s your prerogative.

Furthermore, dear Diarmuid, since when is it up to ‘such commentators’ to ‘promote marriage and its value to society’? We do so when we can, certainly. In fact we are doing it now by offering you our criticism, since you are not doing it yourself. You are the archbishop. Is it not your job vigorously to promote Catholic morals, including the unpopular teaching on marriage and sexuality?

That having been said, I guess I just bagged myself 8,000 points. Cheers, Diarmuid.

Perfectionism

Melancholicus is a perfectionist.

He is a perfectionist at least when it comes to himself; it takes him an unseemly length of time to finish works of intellectual or creative labour, since he expends so much time and care on trying to make the thing as perfect as possible; and of course it never is.

Composing a single short blog-post which would not take more than five minutes in the hands of a writer less fastidious might be for Melancholicus half a day’s labour or even more.

But when it comes to the works of others, Melancholicus does not demand the same level of punctiliousness; instead, he often marvels at how much more perspicacious, eloquent and witty are their efforts than his own.

There is no shortage of souls in our time scandalized by the breathtaking mediocrity of our fathers in God; there is among certain of the faithful a perfectionism which imagines that our clerical governors ought to be perfect, never putting a foot wrong, never saying or doing anything that might reflect badly on holy mother Church, or on the sanctity of their orders.

Melancholicus does not bracket himself with that cohort, scandalized though he certainly is by episcopal nonfeasance and sacerdotal turpitude. He is at least sufficiently familiar with both Church history and human nature to know that poor to middling bishops are a perennial fact of life, even in the good old days when the Mass was in Latin. It is natural that the members of the flock should desire their shepherds to be saints; but the fact that more often than not they are sinners instead does not make the Church founded by our Lord Christ any less the Church founded by our Lord Christ.

BUT, that having been said:

There is at least a minimum standard that the faithful are entitled to expect from those men in holy orders in positions of authority over them.

When one goes to church for the hearing of holy Mass, one has every right to expect that the celebrating priest will, as the adage has it, “do the red and say the black”; that he will be properly vested; that he will celebrate the liturgy given to us by the Church, and not substitute for it some banality of his own concoction; that he will treat the most holy Body and Blood of the Lord Jesus with due reverence, and that he will not preach in such manner as might cause doubt or confusion regarding any doctrine of faith or morals.

This much—or rather, this little—the faithful have every right to expect, and their anger when it is denied them (as it often is) is a just and righteous anger.

When the bishops speak, either as individuals or as a body, the faithful have every right to expect that they will set forth Catholic doctrine in such wise as cannot be misconstrued or misinterpreted, or leave in doubt on any point the teaching of holy mother Church thereon. The faithful have every right to a teaching that is not expressed ambiguously, so as to hide its real import from the enemies of the faith. For whom do the bishops serve when they speak in so cryptic a manner? Is it less important to them to teach forthrightly, than to be tolerated by the denizens of D’Olier street? On the contrary, let their yes be yes and their no, no; anything above that comes from the evil one.

As far as Melancholicus is concerned, it is not asking too much to expect a Catholic bishop to teach the Catholic faith, without any admixture of error, or doubt, or confusion. When the bishops fail in this essential duty, when they persist in an erroneous or ineffective policy despite the misguided nature of that policy having been pointed out to them time and time again, the anger of the faithful against such bishops is no sin, or disobedience, but a right and Godly anger.

For let us not forget that the architects of the Reformation, who led entire nations out of the Church and into heresy, were not private persons who dared to criticize their bishops, or who wrote articles against the misdeeds of priests for reactionary journals; those who initiated the Reformation were almost without exception priests, professed religious, and bishops—men with positions of spiritual and governmental authority within the Church.

It was not the lay persons who resisted their novelties that fell away into heresy; it was those who went with them who so did.

Is it really asking too much to expect our bishops to know the teaching of the Church? Have they not been through seminary? Are they not all, or nearly all, Doctors of Divinity? Indeed they are; but their minds seem to have been clouded by a false religion, namely conciliar religion; sufficient of the world’s bishops seem to believe that everything in their ministry refers back to Vatican II, which is taken as the starting-point for everything they do and say. Conciliar religion is a false religion because it disposes the minds of its devotees to accept as good and true and consonant with the Gospel the false maxims of the world. Hence the proliferation of anthropocentric and irreverent liturgies; the refusal of our shepherds to condemn the gross immorality of our age, except in the most indistinct and general terms, lest any practitioner of immorality be offended; the widespread and conveniently ecumenical attitude that one religion is as good as another, hence proselytism is now viewed as a embarrassing discourtesy; the human respect which places the opinions of sectaries and unbelievers above the teachings of the Church; the evil political correctness which has infected even those consecrated to God, such that they approve warmly of the falsest philosophies as well as the most execrable vice. In essence, the world is placed before the Church, and within the Church the so-called ‘rights’ of Man are placed before the honour and service due to almighty God.

Such is the conciliar church, this counterfeit institution conceived by periti in love with novel ideas, carried to term in the womb of the Second Vatican Council, and delivered by the midwifery of Pope Paul VI, without whose decisive aid the whole disastrous project would have been stillborn.

To which we might reply, in the words of one of Papa Montini’s illustrious predecessors, that we have heard enough about the ‘rights’ of Man; let us hear about the rights of God for a change.

A.H.M. reditus

Melancholicus is still racing through Martyr of Ritualism. He is right near the end of it now.

In his declining years, in the autumn of 1884, Father Mackonochie went so far ‘Romish’ as to preach, at the invitation of certain of his brother clergy, a retreat for priests.

The experience was not altogether a happy one for Mackonochie, for he was conscious of the failing of his intellect due to the fatigue of a life given to extraordinarily hard work among the urban poor, not to mention the seemingly endless prosecutions that placed so great a strain on the last twenty-five years of his life. His ability to preach and deliver conferences was not what it was, and as might be expected he was embarrassed by this deterioration, even if he took it in a spirit of Christian resignation. He was not an old man—he had not yet turned sixty—but he was worn out from his labours nonetheless, with the diminished vigour of a man at least twenty years older. His friend, bishop Chinnery-Haldane of Argyll and the Isles, recalled that there had been “a certain amount of hesitation and perhaps a little confusion at times, but what he said was always helpful and edifying”.

In any case, the retreat was judged a success by those who attended it, and would have been followed up with another that December had Mackonochie been both willing and able.

But reading this episode made Melancholicus realise what he probably needs most right now, namely a retreat.

It is a long time since he went on retreat. Retreats at the beginning of every semester were mandatory when Melancholicus was in seminary. These were week-long affairs, preached by a variety of persons, sometimes handled by more than one person simultaneously. Some of them were good, others mediocre. The last retreat he attended was in January 2005, at the commencement of his final semester in clericatu. But Melancholicus would now welcome the opportunity to go on retreat, with daily Mass (clean, please, or better still, Trad), silence, spiritual conferences (wholesome and solid, based on the writings of the saints, not on dubious fluff about “our brokenness” and “healing”), self-examination, and of course confession of sins.

Since leaving seminary in 2005, he has neglected the practice of going on retreat very properly. This is due in large part to the non-availability of opportunities in Ireland to go on an authentically Catholic retreat. Just take a look at the website for this sty of heretical nonsense and the reader will have some idea of the kind of drivel on offer. Expensive drivel, too. Look at the prices they charge for a weekend of the spiritual equivalent of tinted steam, and from which one would not likely come away a better person, with grace in one’s soul, and with resolutions to acquire some lacking virtue, or conquer some besetting vice. This place might possibly be the worst stronghold of self-centred, pseudo-Christian New-Agery in the country, but it is probably mimicked to a greater or lesser degree by other establishments and religious houses who offer to the public such retreats and days of recollection.

Some rare trad retreats have occasionally been preached in Ireland over the last few years; one must keep one’s ears close to the ground to get wind of such in the secretive world in which trads are by force of circumstance compelled to operate. Happily, there are rumours of such a retreat being planned for next spring in a Cistercian monastery by a certain industrious young man whom Melancholicus shall not embarrass by divulging his name; but it will be an excellent opportunity for spiritual spring cleaning, especially in view of the fact that Melancholicus shall be entering the married state a couple of months later.

Should any of Melancholicus’ Irish readers be interested in attending such, he shall post the details as soon as they become available.

In Memoriam A.H.M.

At present Melancholicus is reading a book.

This used to happen more regularly than it does at present owing to his unfortunate discovery last year of this wonderful piece of software—I say unfortunate because though an immensely enjoyable pastime, Rome: Total War has proved to be a tremendous thief of time and hence an occasion of sin.

But back to reading. The book in question is called Martyr of Ritualism, by Michael Reynolds, and was first published in 1965. It is a life of Father Alexander Heriot Mackonochie (1825-87), vicar of St. Alban’s, Holborn.

This book is absorbing reading. Melancholicus found it gathering dust in a little-visited corner of the university library, and when he went to borrow it he discovered with some satisfaction that he was the very first reader to do so. It has been in his possession for only two weeks, but he is already on the final chapter.

Martyr of Ritualism is in many ways a powerful and moving story. The ritualists, as they became known, were the immediate heirs of the Tractarian school of the Church of England in the middle years of the nineteenth century. If men like Keble, Pusey and Newman laid the foundations by setting forth the intellectual basis for the Catholicism of the English Church, it was left to those who followed after to implement the practical consequences of the Oxford Movement. The gradual Catholicising (some might—and did—say ‘Romanising’) of the English Church was a protracted and often painful affair; those whose pioneering labours in the liturgical and pastoral expression of rediscovered Catholic doctrines suffered much from the harrassment of protestant agitators such as the Church Association, as well as from unsympathetic bishops. Some prominent ritualists such as Mackonochie were prosecuted repeatedly for illegal liturgical acts and appurtenances, such as vestments, Confiteor and Last Gospel, ceremonial mixing of the chalice, wafers, the lavabo, hiding of the manual acts, the sign of the cross, the sanctus bell, incense, portable lights, lights upon the holy table, holy water, the blessing of palms, Tenebrae, the paschal candle, the stations of the cross, the observance of days not appointed to be observed by the Prayer Book, the eastward (ad orientem) position, the elevation of the host and chalice, and the recitation of the Canon of the Mass. Although Mackonochie was never actually imprisoned, other ritualists such as Arthur Tooth and Richard Enraght were sent to gaol for their liturgical defence of Catholic doctrine (at least as they understood it). They were also pilloried in the newspapers, often becoming the victims of caricatures and cartoons in such publications as Punch and Vanity Fair. But, in marked contrast to the lily-livered milquetoast prelates of the contemporary Roman and Anglican Churches, they held their ground, not allowing fear of persecution or media ridicule to budge them one inch from their principles. Mackonochie was prepared to suffer ceaseless litigation, suspension, deprivation and even imprisonment for those eucharistic ceremonies he recognised as integral to the liturgical expression of the Faith.

What a breathtaking contrast to the thoroughly secular, de-catholicised and effeminate clergy of our own day.

For all their portrayal in satirical cartoons as precious ‘lace and holy water priests’, the Anglo-Catholic ritualists of the 1860s and 1870s were tough guys. Heroes. They were men. Manly men. And they had a tremendous appetite for work and ministry in some of the poorest and most deprived slums in England.

What are we to think when so many of the ceremonial items, vestments, acts and gestures for which Father Mackonochie fought so hard and suffered so much, would just a hundred years later be jettisoned without so much as a backward glance by an entire generation of supposedly ‘Catholic’ priests and bishops drunk on the fanaticism of ‘aggiornamento’, and all that hated word connotes?

What would Father Mackonochie have had to say about the kind of Mass Melancholicus witnessed yesterday in the chapel of the university?

It is a scandal. Truly a scandal.