Conciliar renewal a tremendous success in Holland

Not.

Because from where Melancholicus stands, he can see only devastation.

Perhaps the feverish apostles of aggiornamento will continue to claim that the renewal has been a great success, but that more time is needed for the good fruits to shine through.

To which Melancholicus replies that forty-five years is more than time enough, and that the fruits were incomparably better before the ‘renewal’ than after it.

Is it not a scandal, for instance, that the Mahometan holy month of Ramadan rings more bells among Dutch Catholics than does our own Christmas?

Or that the Dutch province of the Dominican Order promotes—in all seriousness—the celebration of ‘Masses’ by non-ordained persons of all genders and sexual orientations?

Adrianus Cardinal Simonis, Archbishop-Emeritus of Utrecht, has given an interview to the Italian newspaper Avvenire, which may be read here (scroll down).

The interview is titled Two generations have been lost, which itself is telling.

The whole may be summed up in the following quote: “It is a matter of starting over from the beginning, and within a culture that is indifferent to Christianity, among less than friendly media”.

The comparison drawn by C. S. Lewis between the virgin and the divorcee comes to mind.

Was this what Vatican II intended?

How could they have got it all so horrendously wrong?

It is encouraging to hear that there are now 45 students at the seminary in Haarlem. But what are they being taught, and who is teaching them? Melancholicus cannot imagine that Dutch seminaries (perhaps Haarlem is the only one left functioning in the country, as Maynooth is the only seminary still open in Ireland) are in much better shape than similar institutions in the United States, Great Britain, and Ireland.

The Netherlands, which until the catastrophe was (with Ireland) one of the foremost sources of vocations and missionaries, is now itself mission territory.

Ubi solitudinem faciunt, pacem appellant.

When the shepherd becomes a wolf...

...the flock has a right to defend itself.

Actually, according to Dom Prosper Gueranger, that right is more of a duty. Gueranger was referring to the protest registered by the layman Eusebius against the heresy of Nestorius, Patriarch of Constantinople, who in his Christmas Day sermon in the year 428 denied the Divine Maternity of our Blessed Lady before the entire congregation.

In the recent brouhaha in the church of Saint-Taurin, Thiberville, in the French diocese of Evreux, we see the lay faithful doing just what Eusebius did nearly sixteen centuries ago by rising up in wrath against their perfidious bishop and ejecting him from their church.

The bishop of Evreux, Mgr. Christian Nourrichard, removed the orthodox and traditionally-minded pastor, Abbé Francis Michel, and re-assigned him to a ministry among liberals. The faithful of Saint-Taurin were doubly upset since not only did they lose their priest thereby, but his traditional sacerdotal ministry was to be replaced, in true modernist fashion, by that of a ‘team’.

It might be objected that Mgr. Nourrichard’s crime was not of the same order as that of Nestorius; it cannot be claimed, for instance, that he openly denied a defined doctrine of the Church, and he violated no law, either civil or ecclesiastical.

Nonetheless, what the bishop was doing amounted to taking away the people’s bread in order to feed them with stones instead, a move in which we cannot help but discern ideological partiality in the post-conciliar religious wars within the Church.

“Or what man is there among you, of whom if his son shall ask bread, will he reach him a stone? Or if he shall ask him a fish, will he reach him a serpent?”—Mt. 7:9-10.

Mgr. Nourrichard’s contempt for the faithful of Saint-Taurin is emblazoned forth on the silly chasuble he chose for the occasion—rainbow colours more suited to a children’s birthday party than to the most holy sacrifice of the Mass. Furthermore, he cannot have been ignorant of the significance of the rainbow to the homosexualist movement, and the consequent scandal to the faithful on that account. What kind of statement was he attempting to make with such provocative gestures? The faithful of Saint-Taurin seem to have been in no doubt as to their bishop’s intentions.

Happily, the flock would not meekly submit to this wolf in sheep’s clothing. Their resistance was offered immediately and with great heat, as may be seen in the remarkable video footage below:



And this:



And this, courtesy of the French network TFI:



After a meeting with the Apostolic Nuncio, we are informed that Mgr. Nourrichard has “changed his mind”, and that Abbé Francis Michel is to remain in charge of Saint-Taurin, at least for the foreseeable future.

Concern has been expressed in certain quarters of the blogosphere regarding the reaction of the congregation to Mgr. Nourrichard’s behaviour. Some commentators were unhappy that the bishop was booed and heckled in the sanctuary, and that voices were raised in anger before the very altar of God. Likewise, concerns have been raised regarding obedience to legitimate authority. It is a difficult question, and we must not lightly toss aside the obedience and filial respect we owe to our spiritual shepherds. Melancholicus has considered the matter carefully over several days but in the end must come down on the side of the congregation of Saint-Taurin. For Mgr. Nourrichard’s actions do not constitute the exercise of lawful authority so much as the abuse of it. Recalling Dom Gueranger, when the shepherd becomes a wolf, the flock has a right to defend itself. The flock likewise has a right to bread rather than stones, and fish rather than serpents. We have scriptural precedents for dramatic, even violent, resistance to attempts to weaken or destroy the sacredness of holy religion: Mattathias slaying the apostate Jew on the altar of sacrifice (I Macc. 2:23-4), and the Lord Jesus driving forth the moneychangers from the Temple (Mt. 21:12-13), to recall but two such.

What the faithful of Saint-Taurin did was necessary. It may indeed be regrettable; but what is most regrettable is that they had to do it in the first place—for which Mgr. Nourrichard, and he alone, bears the responsibility.

The Bug

The Bugnini died in 1982, and—happily for those of us who seek some measure of beauty and solemnity in public worship—is still dead.

Long may he remain so.

Now all we need do is wait for his disciples to join him.

How long, O Lord, how long?

Farewell to a shitten shepherd

Meet Willie Walsh, the smiling, welcoming, thoughtful, paternal and ever-so-inclusive bishop of Killaloe.

He is your friend—unless, of course, you happen to be an orthodox Catholic (or, for that matter, one of his priests). But if you’re a just an ordinary “I’m ok, you’re ok” kind of Joe, with no fixed opinions about anything and a relaxed laissez faire attitude to Church doctrine, he’ll like you. If you’re an ethnic or sexual minority, he’ll positively gush over you. Just as long as you’re not one of those rigid, hidebound types that like services in Latin and think that good clean gay love is an evil thing, you should get along with him just fine.

It is less than a month since Melancholicus announced an end to blogging on Infelix Ego, but whenever a member of the Irish hierarchy opens his mouth in order to spew forth drivel, nonsense and general heretical ordure, the occasion just cries out for comment.

Mercifully, this barley-water prelate turns 75 in January and will tender his resignation to the Holy See. Doubtless his resignation will be accepted at once, since bishop Walsh has so far shown himself to be rather less than indispensable as a pastor of souls. By his retirement, bishop Walsh will have been steward of the diocese of Killaloe for fifteen years. Fifteen very long years. Let us take stock of his tenure and examine how he has arrested the decline in the fortunes of his diocese, how he has encouraged vocations, how he has revitalized catechetics in the schools, how he has restored the sacred liturgy, how he has injected a renewed vigour to the Catholic religion by expelling the secular ideological cockle that had been sown therein by enemies of the faith, and how he has reversed the stagnation and apathy brought on by three decades of gross mismanagement at the hands of the conciliar church.

Oh, wait.

He did none of those things, did he?

Bishop Walsh is the very type of the conciliar prelate. His words reveal him as that lamentable sort who yearns to turn the holy Catholic Church—of which he is a bishop—into a carbon copy of the Episcopal Church, replete with clerical divorce, lesbian priestesses, theological lassitude, blessing of same-sex unions, and a focus on the temporal which excludes any consideration of the hereafter—in other words, a sort of pseudo-religious social club in which the spirit of contemporary political correctness can flourish, where preaching the Truth is replaced by a convivial consensus-finding chat over tea and biscuits and in which nothing really matters at all so long as no-one ever says anything that might be construed as offensive.

Will the good bishop leave the diocese of Killaloe in better shape than he found it? That may be doubted. There were no “priestless parishes” in Killaloe when he took office in 1995. By 2004, there were five such parishes. God knows how many there are today, but Melancholicus would be surprised indeed if there were fewer than that. There are actually sufficient priests, between secular and religious, to staff the Killaloe diocese adequately, but bishop Walsh does not want the trouble of them. Priests, you see, get in the way of “lay ministry”, which is the current fad of the hour; apparently, the laity are unable to realize their “true vocation” or their “potential” with all those priests about. Sunday Mass: who needs it? Much better to have Sister Julia from the local Mercy convent or Mrs. Moriarty from down the road kit themselves out in quasi-sacerdotal attire and concelebrate a priestless communion service in lieu of the Holy Sacrifice—at least this sort of thing is what the empurpled princes of the conciliar church are anxious to promote.

What of vocations? Here Melancholicus cannot speak with authority since despite extensive trawling he has been unable to locate any statistical source on the number or quality of students for the Killaloe diocese in 1995 vis-à-vis 2009, but given that episcopal orthodoxy equals plentiful vocations whereas episcopal heterodoxy equals few or no vocations (which state has been observed so often as to require neither proof nor demonstration), he would be surprised in the extreme to discover that Killaloe is not one of the most consistently under-performing dioceses in the whole of Ireland. If any of his Irish readers is able to furnish him with the relevant facts and figures, by all means please comment!

What of the liturgy? Melancholicus is perhaps fortunate at never having attended a Mass celebrated within the borders of bishop Walsh’s diocese, save for a single offering of the Traditional Latin rite at Kilbaha in 2001. But the fact that, in a recent interview with the Irish Independent, the good bishop dismissed the entire liturgical heritage of the Church before 1969 with the remark that he had ever received “only one request” for the liturgy in Latin (whether traditional or novel was not specified) surely suggests he is unconcerned with theological precision, with beauty in worship, and with the shockingly irreverent manner in which the vernacular liturgy is so often handled; and that, Summorum Pontificum notwithstanding, he just can’t bother his arse.

Finally, has he brought an end to the apathy, the stagnation and the decline that has bedevilled Catholic dioceses generally since the revolution of the ’sixties? Has he taken pains to shake off the aura of the high-powered company director which has unaccountably attached itself to the modern episcopate, and begun to adopt the attitude of a genuine pastor of souls? Alas, not a bit of it. This scandalous newsletter, in which the new executive style is talked up in management-speak replete with countless buzzwords, says all that needs to be said on this score. All the clichéd bromides are there; all the tired formulae of yesterday, rehearsed as though this were something new and exciting. Melancholicus is already bored, so he shall not attempt to make a list. Souls eager for spiritual torment can follow the link if they have a mind to.

But don’t take my word for it, gentle reader; let Google assemble a litany of the fellow’s crimes and posturings and show us—via the Indo alone!—how far astray this successor of the Apostles has actually gone. True, there is wheat mixed in with the chaff. But the discerning reader will surely agree that there is an awful lot of chaff.

It is hardly necessary to add that, so far, none of his brother bishops have taken the trouble—publicly, at least—to encourage the faithful by explaining how their colleague’s secular liberal wish-list is at odds not only with the Tradition of the Church, but with the integrity of the faith itself. There is not a peep of a correction to be found on the website of the Irish Bishops’ Conference. Suppose that bishop Walsh had uttered something egregious from the liberal point of view; suppose that—mirabile dictu—he were to denounce homosexuals as “notorious sinners” and to describe their bedroom antics as “grotesque”. Need we rehearse what would happen then? His brother bishops would be falling over themselves in their haste to distance themselves from his remarks and to smother them with the face of welcoming, inclusive tolerance that the conciliar church considers the supreme virtue. Not hard to be politically correct, is it? Much harder to be a Christian. There is still time for one or more of the Irish bishops to practice a little discreet fraternal correction. But Melancholicus won’t be holding his breath.

The patron of the Killaloe diocese is St. Flannán, who (I am confident) would not see eye-to-eye with his Wishy-Washy successor on multiple matters. That being so, it behooves us (and especially the unfortunate Catholics of that wretched diocese) to pray fervently that when Wishy Washy’s vacant seat is filled again, the new incumbent will be an appointment worthy of such high office, that he will, and that he will not sow confusion and indifference among the flock or court the admiration of the media like his predecessor. The first task of the new bishop will be to begin repairing the damage wrought by this shitten shepherd.

The 'Mass presenter', part the second

A fortnight ago Melancholicus dreamed a ‘liturgical’ dream—a nightmare actually—the particulars of which are described in the post immediately preceding this one.

After recounting the gory details, he remarked that the good news is that it was only a dream.

The bad news, however, is that it has doubtless happened for real in some God-forsaken hell-hole of a parish in the wasteland of the conciliar church.

Confirmation of that grim remark was not long in coming. For now Melancholicus has stumbled upon this atrocity, related for us by Fr. Ray Blake.

A whole coterie of Mass presenters, engaged in an invalid and sacrilegious simulation of the holy sacrifice.

So outrageous is this incident that not a few of those who posted comments on Fr. Blake’s post are convinced it is a hoax.

Melancholicus would like to think that this is indeed a hoax, but such is the wretched state of the Church in our time and the profound ignorance of the holiest things one finds even among those few who still practice, that one cannot be sure.

We await further news regarding this sordid affair.

Fifty years on

L’Osservatore Romano, the official newspaper of the Holy See, has reported that the lifting of the excommunication of the four bishops of the Society of St. Pius X was timed to co-incide with the fiftieth anniversary of the convocation of the Second Vatican Council. Thus I have read on the blog of Damian Thompson.

The French newspaper La Croix, which claims to be a Catholic publication, still contemptuously dismisses Traditional Catholics as intégristes, and includes in its translation of OR’s original Italian—apparently in all seriousness—the amusing line:

Les bons fruits du concile sont innombrables

What fruits would those be, then?

Take as long as you need.

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.

Why all the fuss about this place?

Taizé.

If there is one word guaranteed to set the ageing renewalists aglow with gushing enthusiasm, it is Taizé.

Taizé is the centre of their religious universe, as Mecca is to the Mahometan.

Melancholicus was tidying up his room the other day and came across a newsletter from the local parish, the front page of which promoted this phenomenon with warm approbation. Melancholicus reproduces this blurb here for the benefit of his readers, and has taken the liberty of inserting a few barbed and sarcastic remarks in red.

Taizé «that little springtime»

The above description was given by the great Pope John XXIII [there is no doubt that John XXIII was very popular, but popularity hardly suffices to make one great. Ah, but silly me, John XXIII is great because he convoked Vatican II and so is the source of the wonderful renewal we are now experiencing in the Church today] referring to the Ecumenical Community of Brothers based at Taizé in France. The community was founded by Roger Schutz a Swiss Lutheran over fifty years ago. The community was visited by the late Pope John Paul II as well as the present Pope, who visited it as a Cardinal. Both praised it as venture to reach out to all people and particularly young people [emphasis mine] who visit the community in their hundreds [what, not thousands, as has oft been claimed?] and join the community of brothers in their prayer life and sharing of the Christian message. Brother Roger died in 2006 [there is considerable divergence of opinion as to whether Brother Roger died in 2005 or 2006. Maybe there were two Brother Rogers, one of whom is rumoured to have been a closet Catholic. Perhaps one of these Brother Rogers was the public figure and the other was kept hidden away in a dungeon out of sight. If we come across any photographs of Brother Roger purporting to have been taken in 2006, perhaps we should look closely at his ears] and has been succeeded by Brother Alois as head of the community of around one hundred brothers of various nationalities and denominations [the fact that these 'brothers' come from a large variety of sects—some are even Catholic!—is seen as one of the most wondrous aspects of this place. It is the ultimate ecumaniacal paradise].

If anyone wants to know more about this unique community they are invited to meet Brother Alois and some brothers who will be in the Pro-Cathedral on Friday 25 April at 8pm. They may even be tempted to visit Taizé and experience their very moving prayer gatherings and meet others who have been touched by this «little springtime» in the church [sic].

If you are on the web why not log on to: taizedublin@gmail.com [which is an e-mail address, not a URL]

Melancholicus missed Brother Alois’ visit, but has not lost any sleep as a consequence. I suppose the fellow was generously fêted at the pro-cathedral, and I dare say that in the run-up to his arrival parishes all across the diocese were active in love-bombing “the youth” (or what little youth they have left) in an attempt to bestir their interest in meeting this towering celebrity. For some reason that Melancholicus cannot quite fathom, the henchpersons of newchurch always seem to regard Taizé as especially relevant and appealing to “the youth”. Is this simply because as a phenomenon Taizé is a radical novelty, something totally untraditional, and hence buys into the patronising notion that young people are so shallow they will prefer the new simply because it is new?

What makes Taizé particularly dangerous—and hence totally undeserving of the promotion it receives from our parish clergy and religious—is that it is probably the one place on earth which most tangibly embodies the ecumenical lie. I refer to the notion that the unity of the Church does not actually exist, hence we have to go in search of it, along with our “separated brethren”, who are viewed by adherents of the lie as equal partners in the search for this “lost” unity. To put it simply, if Taizé is so cool, what’s so special about being a Catholic? The Taizé people aren’t Catholic (or if they are, they haven’t told us yet), but in spite of this they are praised to the skies by our fathers in God, as though Taizé holds the key to the cosmos. What lies at the bottom of this ecumenical search for “unity” is not unity at all, but universalism. Our young people are exhorted by the wild-eyed hippies that run parishes and religious orders to make pilgrimages to this place, effectively placing it on the same level as Fatima or Lourdes or even Rome itself, and in so doing, whatever faith they might beforehand have had in the singular importance of the Catholic Church is lost entirely.

But even if the Taizé community were a normal Catholic religious order—which it isn’t; as they say in Yorkshire, it’s neither nowt nor summat—Melancholicus would still object to its relentless promotion by the doyens of the new religion, and that simply because of its second rate tat. Take a look at their crucifix, for instance. Gaudy, garish colours; badly-proportioned figures with spindly limbs, evoking more than a whiff of the grotesque; mediocre artwork of a fairly middling standard; the odd shape of the thing, and not least, its propensity to be copied and mimicked in churches and parishes without number all over the world. Look at the photo of the sanctuary of the chapel here at the university where Melancholicus earns his living (in this post below), and you should notice a familiar-looking object adorning the wall behind the Lord’s board.

Now look at this thing, by which I mean the object she’s sitting on. They call it the “Taizé kneeler”, but it isn’t a kneeler really, is it? It’s actually a kind of stool. The weight of the body in this position is borne not by the knees (as in classic kneeling posture) but by the buttocks, hence the Taizé version of kneeling is really nothing other than sitting. At best it can be described as lazy man’s kneeling. The goal of this posture is not to abase oneself in humility before the majesty of God, but to achieve ‘relaxation’ à-la New Age, with a veneer of prayer. This attitude is fed by the Taizé style of prayer, in which mantras are chanted over and over with the aim of soothing the participants, inducing emotion or a kind of trance-like stupor more reminiscent of a guided relaxation session than genuine prayer.

And as for their music, well, I cannot praise it. Chemical weapons have oft been described as “the poor man’s atomic bomb”. In that vein, we might describe Taizé singing as the poor man’s gregorian chant. Melancholicus has never cared for it, even in the days before his discovery of Tradition. It has always seemed to him to be contrived and vaguely embarrassing. Why have Taizé chant when, with a little effort, one can have the real thing? Why be content with hamburger when one can have filet mignon?

Far from being a “little springtime”, Taizé, much like Focolare, the neo-catechumenal people and various other fads of the hour, is a weed rather than a flower in the vineyard of the Lord. Some weeds are quite attractive, sporting pretty petals and flowers of pleasing hues. Those unlearned in botanical matters may mistake these weeds for something the Gardener has carefully cultivated, when in reality they are invasive intruders, having installed themselves without His assistance, limiting the growth of other plants by blocking out the light and by using up nutrients from the soil. They have pretty flowers, emit a delightful perfume, wave pleasingly in the breeze, and look to all appearances like a well ordered flowerbed—but the vine, starved in soil rendered barren by their aggressive proliferation, begins to die. Weeds do not serve the Gardener; neither do these ‘movements’—least of all Taizé, which isn’t even Catholic—serve the Church.

What's wrong with this picture?

With each fresh outrage, one always thinks one has seen the very worst that the conciliar church can throw at our holy Catholic faith. But, as inevitably as day follows night, there is always some new pathology capable of plumbing still deeper depths just waiting around the corner.

This story may not be either as wacky or as sacrilegious as the Dutch Dominicans with their priestless “Masses” celebrated by non-ordained practicing homosexuals of either sex, but it is nonetheless equally conciliar in its inspiration, and hence offensive to the piety of the faithful.

From Yahoo! News:

Poster nuns to vie for 'Miss Sister Italy' title

ROME (AFP) - The first beauty pageant for nuns debuts next month with the advent of "Miss Sister Italy," aimed at erasing a stereotype of nuns as being old and sad, a newspaper reported Sunday.

"Nuns are above all women and beauty is a gift from God," priest Antonio Rungi of the southern Italian diocese of Modragone told the daily Corriere della Sera [Melancholicus wonders what Fr. Rungi's bishop thinks of this nonsense].

"This contest will be a way to show there isn't just the beauty we see on television but also a more discrete charm," he added [perhaps Fr. Rungi is here referring to interior beauty, i.e. beauty of the soul, or such beauty as would be pleasing to God who looks at the heart and not at the outward seeming. But such beauty is not readily apparent to the gaze of the human viewer, nor is it revealed by glamour photography either. So what is the point?].

Nuns wishing to participate in the contest should send their picture to Rungi, who will publish it on his blog [Melancholicus fears for the state of the vocation of any female religious thoughtless or reckless enough to participate in this mockery]. Internet surfers can then vote for their favorite nun online [based, of course, on her physical attractiveness. Regardless of what Rungi may say or believe about "discrete charm" (what is that, anyway?) he will find that most internet users actually prepared to cast a vote in this sacrilegious charade are conditioned to rate his nuns by the same criteria whereby they would rate their favourite FHM babes].

"You really think all nuns are old, stunted and sad? [what an outrageous insult to older religious women who have spent a life consecrated in service to God and who have faithfully observed their vows even amidst the devastation and the wreckage of the conciliar church. Does this man have even the slightest idea what he is saying?] This isn't the case any more, thanks to the arrival in our country of young and vital nuns," notably from Africa and Latin America, Father Rungi added [Here the foolish priest equates youth and vitality, as though they were synonymous. This is all of a piece with western secular culture, in which youth and beauty are exalted and age is disparaged. The man has no Catholic sense at all].

The idea of organising a beauty pageant had been pushed by the nuns themselves, he said, adding he expected roughly 1,000 candidates [Melancholicus wonders what kind of inverted, lop-sided view such women must have of their religious vocation, and what kind of rubbish they have been reading in their convents, if they are prepared to degrade themselves and their vows to this extent.].

"I hope the next (pageant) won't just take place online but that we can organise a real show that can take place during the Miss Italy contest," Rungi said [Holy God forfend. The spectacle of consecrated religious participating in this kind of thing would be to say the least embarrassing for the Church, even if it were not a sacrilege. If events such as "Miss Italy" and the like are, as is so often alleged, degrading to the dignity of women, how much more degrading must they be to the dignity of religious women?].

Talk about dragging the vocations of religious women through the mud, exhibiting these nuns to the public as though they were glamour models.

To put the most charitable possible interpretation on Rungi’s antics, we might surmise that what he is attempting to do here is to show that there are in fact young nuns, that the religious life is far from dead and that there are young, thriving orders with a plentiful supply of vocations.

But if such be the case, could he not have chosen some means of broadcasting the fact without stooping to such a tawdry and tacky stunt as this?

Melancholicus has been unable to locate this priest’s blog, but as he hardly expects it to be an upstanding model of Catholic orthodoxy, perhaps that is just as well.

Famous last words

John Charles McQuaid CSSp, sometime archbishop of Dublin (1940-72) and iconic personification of pre-conciliar Irish Catholicism that the mavens of the New Ireland^TM love to hate, was a father of the Second Vatican Council, having attended the council sessions which punctuated the latter years of his long archiepiscopate.

In more recent years, McQuaid became the subject of a tendentious biography (1999) written by our friend the egregious John Cooney, a biography which is by no means devoid of merit but is nonetheless marred by its author’s ultra-liberal partisan views.

McQuaid was one of those many orthodox prelates whose last years were troubled by the tension between their adherence to the Catholic faith and the obligation they believed they had to impose the nouveau regime of Vatican II upon their dioceses. McQuaid was clearly troubled by some of the more problematic new orientations inherent in the acts of the council, orientations which could be susceptible of an heterodox interpretation, and apparently felt the need to clarify the council’s continuity with sacred tradition. McQuaid would never have even contemplated engaging in any public criticism of the council—he could never have become an Irish version of fellow Holy Ghost Archbishop Marcel Lefebvre, for instance. Nor would he have permitted criticism of the council to be published by his diocesan clergy. But the fact that he felt it incumbent upon himself to reassure the faithful that the Catholic Church was still the Catholic Church is truly remarkable in itself. Having returned to his archdiocese from the last session of the council in 1965, he declared to his flock in Dublin’s pro-cathedral that nothing had changed, adding that “nothing in this council will disturb the tranquility of your Christian lives”.

He couldn’t have been more wrong, could he?

How many liturgists does it take... ?

Never before in ecclesiastical history has there been so much verbal diarrhoea on the subject of liturgy than in the forty-five years since 1963. Never have so many documents on the liturgy been released by the Holy See. Never has there been such a proliferation of liturgical workshops, courses, organisations, agencies, committees, resources, journals, summer schools, conferences, meetings, discussions, position papers, seminars, et cetera.

And practically all of it concerning the Novus Ordo, or as the liturgy freaks like to call it, “the revisions mandated by Vatican II”.

But despite this ongoing and frenetic activity, and the endless stream of verbiage thereon, the liturgy to which we are unfortunate enough to be subjected in our churches come Sunday is still shite and becoming more so.

Just gimme that old time religion. You can keep your “renewal”.

O, horrible! O, horrible! O, most horrible!

Further to my post on the forthcoming Eucharistic Congress in Dublin below.

We—the Catholic faithful of this island of Ireland—have at least four years to prepare for it. Thank God for this time; let us not waste it. Let us petition the archdiocese of Dublin to the end that the whacked-out, wild-eyed, Vat2-hugging, media-loving, greying boomer neo-litnik slimeballs shall not crawl out from under their respective rocks and be granted the liberty to hijack what should be a solemn and sacred occasion and turn it into the sort of impious parade of contrived, narcissistic, self-worshipping, perverted, pseudo-catholic, anti-liturgical, pop-arty nonsensical conciliar goof-ballery that we are horrified to discover was inflicted on the recent Eucharistic Congress in Quebec.

Go here and here if you want the gory details.

But if the conciliar church should go ahead with its own blasphemous programme—as it will, despite the anguished pleas of the faithful; Melancholicus finds it remarkable how the conciliar church blathers on and on about being a 'listening' church, seeking to 'collaborate' with the laity, but then turns around and savagely upbraids lay people for daring to criticize the non-Catholic nonsense that goes on routinely in their parishes and dioceses—faithful Catholics should boycott this impious event and should neither by their attendance give credibility to it, nor seem thereby to signal their approval of its juvenilia.

Pray God that the conciliar church may not hijack the Eucharistic Congress, an event which belongs to Christ and to the Catholic Church, not to drivelling heretics and secularizing fifth-columnists. Pray God also that it may please Him finally to restore to us the religion of our fathers, that the Church may be to us once more the spotless bride of the Lamb, and that He might remove from our midst the suppurating carbuncle that is the conciliar church, an institution that is nothing less than the ecclesiastical version of haemorrhoids, a hideous changeling smeared with excrement and unbeholdable offals, that, having slouched towards Bethlehem to be born, now usurps even the cradle of the Divine Infant Himself.

Melancholicus now thoroughly regrets that this sacrilege against Our Lord’s greatest gift to His Church will take place in Dublin.

What a contrast it shall be to 1932!

O horrible, O horrible, O most horrible!

I am lost for words.

Pauline year to be inaugurated at vespers on June 28th

From Catholic World News:

Ecumenical Vespers service to open Pauline year

Rome, Jun. 24, 2008 (CWNews.com) - A special year dedicated to St. Paul will be inaugurated on June 28, with a Vespers service at the Roman basilica of St. Paul outside the Walls, the Vatican has announced.

Pope Benedict XVI (bio - news) will preside at the evening service. The Orthodox Patriarch Bartholomew I of Constantinople will participate in the event to open the Pauline year.

Melancholicus must admit that his first reaction having seen the headline of this story was a most decided Yuck!, but having read the story itself he must aver that the headline is inappropriate, for “ecumenical vespers” conjures up cringe-making memories of those ghastly interreligious get-togethers of the previous pontificate, in which the Vicar of Christ used to rub shoulders with pro-abort Lutheran bishoppesses and pro-homosexual liberal Anglicans in watered-down interfaith ‘liturgies’ the contents of which were specially crafted so as not to offend the sensibilities of whatever persons of all faiths or none that might be in attendance.

Thank God the basilica of St. Paul is to be spared such nonsense, since it appears that this will actually be a celebration of the office of Vespers (doubtless in Latin, perhaps with bits in liturgical Greek owing to the presence of the Orthodox patriarch) but without the Lutheran pro-aborts and the liberal Anglicans (who will all be at Lambeth instead, won’t they?), and furthermore without the bongo-drums, feathered head-dresses and sari-wearing Hindoos beloved of the former papal MC.

The Society of St. Pius X and reconciliation

Rumours are flying around — as they have been doing on a regular basis since 2001 — of an impending reconciliation between the Holy See and the Priestly Fraternity of St. Pius X. Melancholicus does not pay much attention to these rumours, since he does not believe that the SSPX will ever return to full communion with the Church en bloc, any more than, say, the Lutheran or Anglican churches will reconcile with Rome in such fashion. Schism may hurt in the beginning, but one grows accustomed to it after a while, and ultimately it begins to feel comfortable and natural. One of the perks of schism is that one is free to do one’s own thing without having to worry about the approval of ecclesiastical superiors, diocesan ordinaries, or the Vatican.

Nevertheless, although the prospects for the regularisation of the SSPX seem unlikely, Melancholicus has chosen to reproduce this Catholic World News story on Infelix Ego, even though the original report in Il Giornale has not yet been verified, not because he wishes to address the predicted regularization, but because this story makes reference to a subject that claims his interest, and upon which he feels drawn to comment.

It concerns Vatican II, and the authority thereof. The reader will easily spot the words in question. Emphasis in the story below is my own.

Vatican proposal to regularize SSPX?

Rome, Jun. 24, 2008 (CWNews.com) - The Italian daily Il Giornale reports that Pope Benedict XVI (bio - news) has approved an offer to the Society of St. Pius X (SSPX) that could heal the breach between the Holy See and the traditionalist group.

The Vatican’s offer requires a response from the SSPX by June 28, Il Giornale says. The offer was apparently explained by Cardinal Dario Castrillon Hoyos (bio - news), the president of the Ecclesia Dei Commission, during a recent meeting with Bishop Bernard Fellay, the superior general of the SSPX.

[Note: CWNews has been unable to confirm the report in Il Giornale. Rumors of Vatican efforts to regularize the status of the SSPX have persisted for months.]

Il Giornale says that the accord proposed by the Vatican has two stipulations: the SSPX would be required to recognize the authority of Vatican II teachings and to affirm the validity of the Novus Ordo Mass. The late Archbishop Marcel Lefebvre, the founder of the SSPX, had accepted both of those terms before his break with the Vatican in 1986.

The Vatican proposes the erection of a traditionalist prelature, Il Giornale reports. This prelature would allow the SSPX to continue its work and to train its own seminarians.

So let’s get this straight. At least according to Il Giornale, the two conditions of regularization are that the SSPX 1) “recognize the authority of Vatican II teachings” and 2) “affirm the validity of the Novus Ordo Mass”.

The second of these conditions is straightforward. The Novus Ordo is a valid rite of Mass. End of story. Archbishop Lefebvre himself regarded it as such, and so have the Roman pontiffs from Paul VI down to the present incumbent of the Apostolic See. Unless they wish to come out of the sedevacantist closet, the adherents of the SSPX should have no problem affirming it also.

But it is the first condition that Melancholicus finds particularly interesting — and due to its inherent ambiguity, most irritating. What, exactly, does recognizing “the authority of Vatican II teachings” mean? And what teachings, precisely, are intended in this stipulation?

It is a standard rebuke levelled against Traditionalists—even those of us in perfect communion with the Church—that we are “against Vatican II” and that as a consequence we are schismatic and disobedient. But can those who reproach us with this charge explain to us precisely wherein the schism and disobedience lies? Does “recognizing the authority of Vatican II teachings” imply that the council is, for Catholics, beyond criticism? Does a less-than-rosy view of the council and its after-effects imply disobedience or a schismatic attitude in the mind of one who holds it? Is resistance to the flood of radical novelties and the disastrous opening to the world sufficient to put one outside the Church, even if one only thinks it?

In the eyes of some, it would seem so.

Now Melancholicus himself is “against the council”, at least in the sense that he regards it as the worst disaster to have befallen the Church since the days of the Reformation, but he is nevertheless in perfect communion with the Church, having denied no doctrine of faith or morals that has been defined as de fide for the Catholic faithful. It is incumbent upon those who would charge him with schism to answer the following two questions:

1. What does Vatican II require me to believe that I would not have been required to believe before 1965?
2. What does Vatican II require me to do that I would not have been required to do before 1965?

If the answer to both of those questions is nothing, as I firmly believe it is, then there is no case to answer, and the issue of obedience to Vatican II is a party political matter rather than a doctrinal one. If the answer to either one of those questions is anything other than nothing, then I for one would dearly love to hear it.

Now the SSPX may be in schism, but this is due to illicit episcopal consecrations which occurred in 1988, and not because of anything their bishops, priests or other adherents may have said or written about Vatican II. As far as their attitude to Vatican II goes, it should be sufficient for them—and for all Traditionalists—simply to profess that Vatican II was an ecumenical council of the Church, validly convoked by lawful authority, whose documents were validly promulgated, and which taught no formal heresy.

This much Melancholicus himself believes concerning the council.

But he does not, nor will he ever, believe that Vatican II was a good thing, let alone a blessing; and there does not exist an office in the Church, not even the Papacy itself, which has the authority to make him so believe.

Such are the wages of ecumenism

It was surely a mistake to admit this man to the communion of the Catholic Church.

Melancholicus had hoped — O, the naivete of the boy! — that when Tony Blair became a Catholic, he would convert to the Truth, repent of his errors, and reform himself; that in the conduct of his public life he would do the Church proud; that he would be, as it were, a great “catch” for the holy Roman Church.

But it seems that in switching his adherence from the Church of England to that of Rome, Mr. Blair has merely followed his personal taste rather than religious convictions of any depth, because to all intents and purposes, he is just as secular in his outlook now as he was before he was received into the Church.

Accordingly, he has since been a great disappointment — even an embarrassment — as a Catholic, and Melancholicus finds himself hoping that (fingers crossed!) the established church will soon take him back again.

Now the fellow has gone and established a “faith foundation” in New York which — as far as Melancholicus can see from its homepage and its description in the media — is a veritable sty of Sillonism, an organisation which will not advance the Catholic religion one iota, nor attract to it a single convert, but will instead sow the seeds of secularism and godlessness under the guise of promoting some vague and generic “power of faith”.

Let us now hear Catholic World News on the subject:

Blair's new foundation will fight religious extremism

New York, Jun. 2, 2008 (CWNews.com) - Former British prime minister Tony Blair has launched a new foundation dedicated to fighting against religious extremism and harnessing the power of faith to fight against poverty and disease.

Speaking in New York at the formal opening of the Tony Blair Faith Foundation, the former British leader said there is "nothing more important" than ensuring mutual understanding in the world and fostering cooperation among different religious groups.

Blair said that in addition to enlisting religious support for global development projects, his new foundation would fight against extremism in religion -- not only in Islam, but in every religious tradition. "Though there is much focus, understandably, on extremism associated with the perversion of the proper faith of Islam, there are elements of extremism in every major faith," he said.

It seems that Mr. Blair’s attitude is that a little bit of religion is quite alright, even to be recommended, but let us not commit the cardinal error of taking religion seriously, since that results in ‘extremism’.

It is quite clear that Mr. Blair’s faith foundation is quite unapologetic in treating all religions as essentially the same — hence, he is quick to offer excuses for Islam (islamist violence is a “perversion” of the “proper faith” of Islam, not part of the “proper faith” itself, despite the life of Muhammad and the testimony of the Qur’an) and has no hesitation in mollifying the Mahometans by assuring us that “there are elements of extremism in every major faith”. Well, fallen human beings are still fallen human beings regardless of the religion they profess, so anyone might be capable of violent acts, but can Mr. Blair explain to us the obvious disproportion between number of atrocities carried out by adherents of Islam as against the adherents of all other religions combined?

Clearly, all religions are not the same — it is a plain fact that they teach different and mutually-exclusive things, and that each religion expects a different standard of conduct and behaviour from its adherents. This truth is an embarrassment to the likes of Mr. Blair, since it is self-evidently divisive.

Hence, anything that divides man from his neighbour, anything that introduces division, must be suppressed. An insistence upon religious truth is by its nature considered ‘divisive’, and so must be eschewed like the plague. What the Tony Blair Faith Foundation has at its heart is the promotion of a single universal religion devoid of dogmas and creeds, to which all can belong, and centred upon the temporal needs of humankind in the here and now. Taking one’s own religion seriously, and claiming that it alone possesses truth while rival faiths are false is something this anthropocentric approach above all cannot tolerate, and so all religions — Christianity, Judaism, Islam, Hinduism, Sikhism and the rest — must be blended together in a syncretic mass such that each will lose its distinctive characteristics in favour of identification with the whole.

Needless to say, Roman Catholicism — the faith only recently embraced by Mr. Blair — is not exempted from such treatment. A strange position indeed for any man calling himself a Catholic.

But Mr. Blair is not so much a Roman Catholic as he is a Conciliar Catholic — and there is a world of difference between these two, since Roman Catholicism and Conciliar Catholicism are two different religions.

Accordingly, one cannot really blame our recently-received convert for this execrable blasphemy, at least not exclusively, since this essentially secular ideology of all men working together in harmony in order to realise paradise here on earth has been extolled and promoted even by the Roman pontiffs ever since the halcyon days of the ’sixties, in what Mark Fellows has described as ‘the papal vision’. Paul VI and John Paul II were the most enthusiastic proponents of this worldly ideology, but it also marred the pontificate of its originator, John XXIII, and, despite the damage it has done to the Church, is not completely absent from the teaching of even the present incumbent of the Apostolic See.

For is it not true to say that, if the Catholic Church had maintained her traditional stance vis-a-vis other religions, that it would not be possible today for any Catholic (except a dissident) to fall into such errors and delusions as our recent convert, Mr. Tony Blair?

A visit to Maynooth

Yesterday, Melancholicus took a trip out to Maynooth.

The purpose of this trip was work-related and of academic nature, hence his visit was to the pontifical university rather than to the seminary, although since both institutions share the same campus it was an easy thing to visit them together.

Arriving early in the morning and with time to spare before the conference he was attending began, Melancholicus decided to kill some time by browsing in the campus bookshop. As might be expected, he was drawn to the liturgy/theology/spirituality section particularly, which he found a more painful experience even than Cathedral Books.

This is the very bookshop that stocks the textbooks used in their studies by Ireland’s future priests. Melancholicus marvelled at all the modernist pap on display with a horrified yet fascinated mien, in much the same fashion as he might view a train wreck. There was little in the way of Catholic reading; he does not remember seeing St. Thomas, or even a commentary thereon. The liturgy section was full of those ubiquitous Sunday Missals (Novus Ordo, of course) and copies of The Divine Office (Pauline, of course), as well as the inevitable do-it-yourself liturgy manuals, but there was nary a whit to do with the ‘extraordinary’ form. As far as Maynooth campus bookshop is concerned, there might never have been a motu proprio. There was the usual heretical boilerplate by the likes of Hans Küng, Geoffrey Robinson, and even Richard Dawkins (!); there were loads of airy-fairy and dissenting Columba titles; there were at least some Church documents, but no solid encyclicals (Pascendi, as one might imagine, was not stocked). The spirituality in evidence was that of Anthony De Mello and Henri Nouwen rather than that of the saints. All in all a great disappointment, but no less than Melancholicus would have expected for an institution in such an advanced state of meltdown as the national seminary.

After the morning sessions of the conference had concluded, Melancholicus and his fellow delegates were treated to lunch in the historic surroundings of Pugin Hall, which formerly was the seminary refectory but now functions as a mere college eaterie; even members of the general public can walk in if they so wish. Any clerical students actually dining in Pugin Hall during your blogger’s visit would have been so carefully disguised in mufti as to be indistinguishable from the lay students—clerical dress being strictly proscribed by the college authorities for reasons of their own.

While walking through the cloister after leaving the refectory, Melancholicus paused to view the paintings and photographs hanging on the walls, paintings of prelates past and present (the most recent being that of his eminence Desmond Cardinal Connell, sometime archbishop of Dublin (quite a handsome portrait even if the blue background is a little too strong) and class photos of each year’s ordination class, in some instances going back decades. He noted that the number of faces in each class photo significantly decreased as one drew nearer to the present day, a testimony to the gravity of the damage inflicted by implementation of the conciliar revolution on priestly vocations in this as well as every other western country.

Melancholicus did not stay long at each photo, though occasionally he would see a face he knew, a priest now working in such and such a parish in the Dublin diocese, or a priest now fallen away from his vocation. He thought, in some bitterness, about how all these men had been betrayed and brainwashed by the revolutionaries that had been supposed to educate them in religion and prepare them for the Catholic priesthood, how they had been given serpents instead of fish and stones instead of bread, even to the extent that their heads are now filled with nonsense incompatible with the Christian faith and their apostolate weakened correspondingly.

In somewhat grim and pensive mood, Melancholicus was then arrested by a photo of another priest he recognised — Monsignor Míceál Ledwith, sometime president of St. Patrick’s college, and once tipped for appointment to an episcopal See. He was aghast that the college authorities have not seen fit to remove Ledwith’s photo, but have left it on public display in the cloister, as though Ledwith were a priest in good standing whose reputation is beyond reproach. Not many people know that Monsignor Ledwith (whose departure from office was accompanied by dark rumours of sexual impropriety with seminarians) is now living in Washington state, and teaches—wait for it!—at the New Age neo-pagan Ramtha School of Enlightenment run by JZ Knight. I’m not kidding — the reader who cares for such things will find Ledwith’s bio on the Ramtha website here, as well as links to his bizarre writings and broadcasts—things with such wondrous titles as The Great Questions in the Hamburger Universe and What The Bleep Do We Know!?. Kooky stuff, and no mistake. The recent history of the Church contains innumerable examples of clerics who went barmy, abandoned their priesthood and devoted themselves to left-wing politics or to some dotty ideology, but Ledwith has to be the weirdest of them all.

Before the afternoon session of the conference began, Melancholicus attempted to view the interior of the stunningly beautiful college chapel (Pugin, of course), but the doors were locked, so he was unable to do so. So he then headed away from the seminary, back to the north campus, passing by this curious-looking statute. It is a carving—in a very modern style, much at odds with the architecture of the seminary—of the late holy father, John Paul II, enfolding two children in his embrace and looking very unfortunately like a shell-toting insect in the process. Speaking of beetles—or should that be beatles?—some wag apparently christened the statue “John Paul, George and Ringo” when it was first unveiled, an amusing epithet which much outrages the John-Paul-The-Great piety of the humourless neo-orthodox, and the name has since stuck. Melancholicus was in the company of a northern protestant at the time, so he didn’t mind sharing a good laugh at it with his companion. And then it was back to the conference for the rest of the day’s deliberations.

And thus it was, this once proud seminary, which was once filled to its 800-man capacity, producing sufficient priests not only for all the dioceses of Ireland but for the foreign missions as well, now barely hanging on and laicised practically to the point of being closed altogether. Melancholicus was once considering going to Maynooth, back in the late 1990s when he was discerning a possible vocation to the priesthood in the Dublin archdiocese and before he had discovered the FSSP. But reading an alarming exposé of the wickedness, turpitude and heterodoxy of the seminary published in The Brandsma Review by a clerical student (who had to remain anonymous for obvious reasons), as well as viewing that jaw-droppingly astounding True Lives documentary on RTÉ about the lives of three seminarists, each of whom clearly had problems—and one of them was later ordained!—quickly convinced him of the wisdom of pursuing his vocation elsewhere. Talk about an advertisement for the clerical life!

Melancholicus has not heard any fresh news from inside Maynooth for many years, so he is unable to say whether the dire situation which obtained there at the turn of the century has been in any way ameliorated. Time will tell, but so far there is little sign of any improvement.

Neo-Catechumenal Way falls foul of the Japanese bishops

Why is Melancholicus not surprised by this news?

Because this kind of thing happens all the time. From Catholic World News:

Japanese bishops appeal to Vatican in clash with NeoCatechumenate

Vatican, Apr. 30, 2008 (CWNews.com) - A delegation of bishops from Japan visited the Vatican this week, hoping to resolve a conflict with the NeoCatechumenal Way, which operates a seminary in Japan, the UCA News service reports.

The visit by four Japanese bishops was the third such trip to Rome. "We hate to come so often but we had to give the serious nature of the problem that needs to be resolved", Archbishop Okada of Tokyo, president of the bishops' conference, told UCA News.

The archbishop said that the NeoCatechumenate had caused "sharp painful division and strife within the Church in Japan." He characterized the lay movement as a group engaged in "powerful sect-like activity" that was damaging the unity of the small Catholic community in Japan.

The Neo-Catechumenal Way is one of the so-called “new ecclesial movements” that, like fungus on damp and rotting vegetation, have mushroomed within the Church since the ’sixties and ’seventies.

These movements are generally hailed by both clergy and laity alike as evidence of “life” and “vitality” and “the movement of the spirit” in the post-conciliar Church. In the eyes of the apologists for aggiornamento, the new ecclesial movements are among the greatest fruits of the council, and a clear sign of the renewal of the Church that has proceeded from it. Pope John Paul II was a veritable embodiment of this view, as his frequent praise and endorsements of such groups as the Neo-catechumenate and Focolare testify. However, the support of the late pontiff for these movements was based on his own private view of them as a wonderful manifestation of renewal; this not being a doctrine of either faith or morals taught always and everywhere by the Church but instead a matter of individual opinion, no Catholic is bound to accept the late Holy Father’s views on the matter.

Melancholicus is at one with the conciliar apologists and with John Paul II in regarding these movements as indeed a fruit of the council. But rather than viewing them as the first flowers of the new springtime, Melancholicus considers them as symptoms of post-conciliar decline; they are weeds rather than vines in the vineyard of the Lord. Many of these movements are characterised by a spirit of independence from the rest of the Church. Some are bedevilled by scandal, corruption and rank disobedience. The mentality of a sect is in many instances observable in their adherents. Their fidelity to core Catholic doctrines is questionable. The leaders of such groups, far from being persons of undoubted sanctity, often display attitudes and behaviours that befit more the leaders of a cult. In such situations, loyalty to the group and to its leader becomes much more important than loyalty to the Church, or fidelity to the teachings of the Magisterium.

The Neo-Catechumenal Way displays all these warning signs, at least to those with eyes to see and ears to hear. That they have clashed with the Japanese bishops is not at all surprising, given their behaviour elsewhere and on past occasions. That the Japanese bishops have had to make four such trips to Rome in an attempt to rein in this out-of-control sect is more than a little disquieting. It is high time now for the Holy See to revoke the favour so ill-advisedly and precipitously granted by John Paul II to this rogue splinter group and demand that it fall into line with the teachings of the Church and be obedient to the local bishops.

Otherwise the time might be right for its suppression.

You've got to be kidding me

From the same nation that spawned the bishop who calls God Allah and whose Dominican province gave us priestless “masses” celebrated by Joe and Jane Bloggs, married or single, male or female, gay or straight, comes this latest howler:

Lent is now the “Christian Ramadan”!

From The Telegraph:

Lent fast re-branded as 'Christian Ramadan'

By Bruno Waterfield

Dutch Catholics have re-branded the Lent fast as the "Christian Ramadan" in an attempt to appeal to young people who are more likely to know about Islam than Christianity.

The Catholic charity Vastenaktie, which collects for the Third World across the Netherlands during the Lent period, is concerned that the Christian festival has become less important for the Dutch over the last generation.

"The image of the Catholic Lent must be polished. The fact that we use a Muslim term is related to the fact that Ramadan is a better-known concept among young people than Lent," said Vastenaktie Director, Martin Van der Kuil.

Three decades ago the Catholic Church was as strict as many Muslims are about Ramadan with a total ban on meat and alcohol during the 40-day Lenten period between Ash Wednesday and Easter.

Most Dutch Catholics now focus on charitable work after the Vatican loosened fasting strictures for all but the first and last days of Lent back in 1967.

Four million Dutch describe themselves as Roman Catholics and 400,000 people attend Mass every week but only a few tens of thousands still mark Lent by fasting, said Mr Van der Kuil.

Vastenaktie organisers hope that by linking the festival to Ramadan they can remind Christians who may be less observant than Muslims of the "spirituality and sobriety" of Lent.

"The agreements are more striking than the differences. Both for Muslims and Catholic faithful the values of frugality and spirituality play a central role in this tradition," said Mr Van der Kuil.

H/T to Dhimmi Watch.

What Melancholicus finds most disturbing is that in the Netherlands, apparently, Catholics are more familiar with Ramadan than with Lent. The chickens of Dignitatis Humanae have truly come home to roost. Furthermore, what kind of idiot could possibly think that the “agreements” between Catholicism and Mohammedanism “are more striking than the differences”? Let us not sully our holy Catholic faith with such a blasphemy now, please.

Out of a Catholic population of four million, only 400,000 attend weekly Mass. That’s 10%. Melancholicus is surprised by this statistic, since he was under the impression that actual Mass attendance in the Netherlands was closer to 2%. But since what passes for “Mass” in the Netherlands may not in fact be Mass at all, the true figure is probably much lower.

The Netherlands presents us with a case study of vital importance; this is a place where, prior to the council, the numbers of vocations and levels of Mass attendance were on a par with Ireland. Being one of the birthplaces of the conciliar revolution, it is the one country on earth in which the conciliar deformation has been carried to its furthest extent. What has happened to the Netherlands should serve as a salutary warning to the Church in other parts of the western world. The Dutch Church — if one can still speak of such a thing — is today a basket case, having descended to the lowest gibbering depths of self-worshipping congregationalism. It is not unreasonable to ask whether anything even remotely resembling Catholicism still exists in that unfortunate country.

Since our Dutch friends are so enamoured of Mohammedanism, why don’t they just observe Ramadan and have done with it? In fifty years the Netherlands will be a sharia state anyway.

The two faces of Cardinal Roger "Spirit of Assisi" Etchegaray

Recently we lauded him over his comments regarding priestly celibacy, but we’re definitely not praising him now.

From Catholic World News:

Leading cardinal sees papal resignations as future norm

Rome, Dec. 13, 2007 (CWNews.com) - Cardinal Roger Etchegaray (bio - news), the vice-dean of the College of Cardinals, writes in a new book that the resignation of the Roman Pontiff "in the future should be something normal," the Apcom news agency reports.

The French cardinal reportedly discusses papal resignation at some length in his forthcoming book, in the context of his recollections about the final days of Pope John Paul II.

Ah, Lord, alas that Thou shouldst have taken Alfons from us, and hast left us Roger!

Surely not!

Catholic World News regales us today with the following headline:

Pope speaks on St. Paulinus, precursor of Vatican II

Eewww.

So the whole purpose of St. Paulinus’ life was to point to Vatican II, as some kind of Teilhardian ‘omega point’? I’m sure the Holy Father didn’t say that, and Melancholicus is simply reading into the story owing to the utterly inappropriate headline given to this news item by the unnamed CWN reporter.

With all due respect to the Holy Father, however, Melancholicus would say that to compare St. Paulinus of Nola with Vatican II is to do St. Paulinus a great disservice. We wouldn’t wish to identify him with the robber-council of Ephesus now, would we, so what profit is there to be had from mentioning the good saint in the same breath as Ephesus’ spiritual descendant?

Regular readers of Infelix Ego will have noticed by now the strong animus Melancholicus has against Vatican II. He makes absolutely no apology for this stance. Truth is, Vatican II defined no new doctrine binding on the Catholic faithful; those teachings of Vatican II that are binding were binding already before the council, so they are not unique to this single council, having been defined better elsewhere. What is unique in Vatican II is the plethora of non-binding and non-doctrinal novelties to which no Catholic is obliged to give assent. Therefore Melancholicus can be AS RUDE AS HE LIKES towards the Second Vatican Council without fear of either heresy or schism.

So there!