The First Commandment

In the light of recent events in the Vatican, and the various reactions to them, I have been pondering the First Commandment.

And the Lord spoke all these words:
I am the Lord thy God, who brought thee out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of bondage.

Thou shalt not have strange gods before me.
Thou shalt not make to thyself a graven thing, nor the likeness of any thing that is in heaven above, or in the earth beneath, nor of those things that are in the waters under the earth.
Thou shalt not adore them, nor serve them: I am the Lord thy God, mighty, jealous, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children, unto the third and fourth generation of them that hate me:
And shewing mercy unto thousands to them that love me, and keep my commandments.

Of course, the modern enlightened mind realises that the idea of God being jealous is clearly a nonsense, so we can disregard this passage...

However, I have an old-fashioned, unenlightened mind, so I treat it differently.  Of course, God as jealous is anthropomorphic - a metaphor. So, of course, what I want to understand is what the passage really means; and to inform that, how has the Church, the guardian and interpreter of Sacred Scripture, under the tutelage of the Holy Ghost, understood this.

The Penny Catechism is always helpful (I am a simple, as well as old-fashioned and unenlightened, soul).  It explains the first commandment (in part) thus:

181 The first Commandment does not forbid the making of images, but the making of idols; that is it forbids us to make images to be adored and honoured as gods.

182 The first Commandment forbids all dealing with the Devil, and superstitious practices such as consulting spiritualists and fortune tellers, and trusting to charms, omens, dreams and such-like fooleries.

Which is pretty clear.

And reflecting further on this, I was thinking about the folly of thinking that one can break God's commandment.  In one sense, one can, of course; but at a deeper level, one can only break oneself against the commandment.

If one takes the Law of Gravity as an analogue: one can defy the Law of Gravity by throwing oneself from a high building; but actually, the law takes effect, and one is damaged - or indeed killed - by the subsequent fall.

I think that the Commandments of God are the same; the implicit second half of each commandment is '... or you will bring spiritual death on yourself, (and harm to others).'

And these Commandments apply to all humanity. It is true that the subjective guilt may be less if one is genuinely ignorant, but these are bad things for people to do.  Not bad (only) because they offend a jealous God (to talk in metaphor - as that is the principle way in which we can talk about God) but bad because they are bad for us, in just the same way that jumping off a high building is bad for us - they will damage us (and normally, hurt others, too).

That is why any enculturation that encourages the pagan to persist in pagan practices is wrong; and any enculturation that encourages Catholics to indulge in pagan practices is even more wrong. Not only is it offensive to God, but it is necessarily damaging to the spiritual welfare of all involved.

However much indigenous people may revere Pachamama, we may not do so, nor encourage them to continue to do so, even out of the wish to befriend them.  We may not do evil that good may come of it.

Not to mention the small matter of scandal...

I end with my usual caveat: I am no theologian, merely an old-fashioned, unreconstructed and rather simple Catholic: I am always open to correction by those better informed.

Of your charity...

Of your charity pray for the repose of the soul of Cardinal Murphy-O'Connor.

It is understandable that when someone we love or revere dies, we want to imagine that he or she has gone straight to Heaven.

However, the Catholic Church has always cautioned against this approach; instead, we assume as a default position that people need our prayers at this time.

I am just finishing reading the autobiography of St Teresa of Avila, and she recounts some extraordinary visions that bear witness to the power of praying for the dead.

The traditional liturgy, of course, captures the full range of emotions and resonances of this time: ranging from the Dies irae to the In paradisum, and with the wonderful prayer Tuis enim fidelibus, Domine, vita mutatur, non tollitur.

The premature emotional beatification of people immediately after their death is not only theologically suspect, but risks denying them the prayers they may need at this stage of their journey towards heaven.

So pray for Cardinal Murphy-O'Connor, that he may speed through purgatory, and enjoy the fulness of redemption in the company of Our Lord, Our Lady and all the angels and saints, in Heaven.

Good News

It is excellent that our bishops have chosen to reinstate the Feasts of the Epiphany and the Ascension as Holy Days of Obligation, on their correct days.

Not only does this bring us into alignment with Rome (and with our separated brethren in the Anglican Communion) but also with our forefathers, which I see as equally, if not more, significant.

Joseph Shaw has written about this, (including the importance of celebrating Feasts on their correct days) here.

I was slightly puzzled at first by the decision not to restore Corpus Christi to its traditional day: the Thursday after Trinity Sunday (given that it is a celebration of some of Maundy Thursday's key events, but removed from the shadow of Good Friday).

However, it was heartening to learn (from Stephen Morgan - @trisagion on Twitter) that the reasons for this were that the bishops had noticed a growth in Corpus Christi processions on Sundays, and did not want to do anything to discourage that.

Whilst one might disagree with that judgement, the grounds on which they are acting are also very heartening. It is not that long ago that some liturgists (and some bishops) were waging war on that kind of popular expression of the Faith, so it is heartening to know that those days are behind us.

All in all, very good news for the Church in England and Wales, and their Lordships are to be heartily congratulated.

And remember to pray for them.

An Inclusive Church?

One of the truths of modern life that seems completely unquestionable is that we should always be (or at the very least, strive to be) inclusive. Especially the Church.

I think this bears examining. 

And especially for the Church.

For nowhere in the Gospel do I hear Our Lord preaching that inclusion is a virtue. And indeed, time and again, we read of him selecting people, and thereby, of course, excluding others.

This struck me particularly as I was reflecting on the Transfiguration. Christ had chosen 72 (to the exclusion of many others, doubtless). He chose 12 men (excluding all women and many other men). And then He chose Peter, James and John to ascend the mountain and witness the Transfiguration.  What did the other apostles make of that? They were a querulous bunch, so I bet they had something to say about it...

And whenever He talks of His return in glory, He talks of separating out: sheep from goats, those who clothed, fed and visited Him from those who did not, and so on.

And yet this drive for inclusion seems to dictate so much that has changed in the Church: the removal of the altar rails, the opening up of the sanctuary to all and sundry, girl altar servers, blessings at the altar steps for those not receiving (when all are blessed at the end of Mass), the Sign of Peace ritual, lay people reading, the bidding prayers, the choir that anyone can join (whether they can hold a tune or not) and which therefore cannot attempt serious music, and now, the reception of communion by those living in a public state of sin.

I think much of this is misguided, though well-intentioned, because it is driven by a secular standard and not by the example or teaching of Our Lord or the traditions of the Church.

Traditionally, Catholics excluded others from their worship (even catechumens had to leave before the Canon of the Mass). We excluded women from the Sanctuary during worship (with the symbolic exception of the Nuptial Mass). And so on...

'But... but... you can't want to exclude people!'

My point is, inclusion and exclusion are a particular frame we put around certain social situations. 

In some cases it may be a relevant frame, but in others it may not be. 

But insofar as I would argue for the exclusion of (say) public sinners from Holy Communion, it is because a higher set of values comes into play: ones that are rooted in the Gospel - values such as charity, and truth.

Sola Fide in support of Sola Scriptura? I think not...

My friend who styles himself Presbyterian Prince has gone to the trouble to start a blog, in order to have more space than Twitter allows to refute what he sees as my errors. It may be found here.

The trouble is, of course, the more space we have, the more we write and the bigger the debate gets.

That is compounded as I am very busy at work, at present, and travelling a lot, so have little time to blog. So I shall not answer every point in detail (at least, not today).

Rather I shall focus on just a couple of issues.  The first is one of the biggest errors, as I see it, to which he has fallen victim.  He writes:

you have 3 items:  Scripture, Tradition, and Church.  But these 3 cannot be equal authorities.  What if the Church contradicts something taught in Scripture?  I can show you it does.  The Bible undeniably teaches Sola Fide. "whoever believes has eternal life" John 6:47.  Yet Rome teaches that justification is by faith + works.  Both cannot be true.  Someone is wrong.  Is it Scripture or the Church?

Needless to say, I do not accept that Scripture, Tradition and the Church are ever in conflict. To me, that is as absurd as saying that Truth and Love cannot be equal authorities: what if Truth contradict Love? 

He goes on, to offer as proof of such a conflict the claim that 'The Bible undeniably teaches Sola Fide.' That is clearly (to say the very least) a highly debatable proposition. Of course he can quote John 6:47 at me; and indeed other verses that can be interpreted in support of Sola Fide.

But on the other hand, Our Lord teaches that Baptism is necessary to enter the kingdom; that unless we eat His body and drink His blood, we cannot enter the kingdom.  He teaches that on the last day, we will be judged by what we have done. How do these 'works' fit with the idea of Sola Fide? 

St James is even more explicit:  You see that a man is justified by works and not by faith alone. This is the only time we find the words 'Faith alone' together in the Bible. Indeed, Luther was moved to call St James' 'an Epistle of straw' because it ran counter to his doctrine of Sola Fide. When the man who invented Sola Scriptura is moved to denounce Scripture for disagreeing with his doctrines, which allegedly put Scripture as the supreme authority, I think we can see that we are in troubled waters...

I do not need, here, to prove that Sola Fide is wrong (though I believe it to be so); merely to prove that the Bible does not clearly teach it. We have to look at these verses (and the rest of the New Testament) and decide what they mean; it is far from self-evident. That very fact undermines Sola Scriptura: we need an interpretive authority, or each man will decide for himself what Scripture means - and that is what we see with the fragmentation of the reformed denominations.

The other really interesting point in PP's argument is this:

The reason why only 27 books made the NT Canon was because the Church recognized that these were the Books that were breathed out by the Holy Spirit. 

Here, it seems to me, he undercuts his whole argument: for he recognises the authority of the Church over Scripture: that it is indeed that Church that has decided what the Canon of Scripture is. The authority of Scripture Alone is not enough for us to know what we are to believe, because it cannot even tell us what books are Scriptural. 

No, we believe in Scripture on the authority of the Church, and we believe in the Church on the authority of Tradition, and Scripture ratifies both Church and Tradition; for each of these rests ultimately on the authority of Christ, who commended them all to us; who founded the apostolic Church to pass on, from generation to generation, whatever He taught, by inspired word and inspired teaching; who established the Sacraments as the works by which his saving work was made ever-present to succeeding generations, and who continues to pour out His Holy Spirit on the Church, as he promised to do, so that the gates of Hell may never prevail against her.

But in that case...

On the face of it, the best defence for the Holy Father's apparent desire to admit the divorced and 'remarried' to Holy Communion, is his view that many (or even most) marriages are in fact null, as the couple do not fully understand and believe in what they are undertaking.  If that is the case, if the first marriage was never in fact a marriage, then a second union may be entered into, and there is no question of adultery and thus no breaking of Our Lord's teaching.

But let's follow that train of thought a bit further. If we allow the hypothesis (and in fact, for many reasons, I do not) that most marriages are null, due to ignorance, lack of proper intent and so forth, then we should also address the fact that most people receiving Holy Communion do so in a similar state: they are equally poorly formed, and therefore quite probably not discerning the Body of the Lord - and we know what St Paul has to say about that. Further, do we conclude that most baptisms are probably invalid too, for similar reasons? In which case, people should certainly not be presenting for Holy Communion: I don't think even Kasper is advocating Communion for the unbaptised (or at least, not yet...)

But I think the problem lies in setting the bar of understanding too high. Just as a child can understand enough worthily to receive Holy Communion, without a full sacramental theology; so a couple - any couple who are capable of such understanding - can understand what the marriage vows mean.

The Church's immemorial practice, for reasons that are clearly wise, prudent and just, has always been to assert the validity of the marriage bond, unless there is clear and substantial reason in a specific case to prove that it was not valid. If the Holy Father intends to reverse that, we really are in trouble.

Scandal

In discussing the problems associated with some interpretations of Amoris Laetitia, I have mentioned the word scandal.  This is an unfashionable notion, and one that I think the proponents of a particular brand of mercy fail to understand.

In J B Priestley's play I Have Been Here Before (produced in 1937, the same year as he was writing the rather better known Time and the Conways), it was taken as axiomatic that a schoolmaster having a liaison with another man's wife would be a source of such great scandal that he would have to leave his job.

Seventy years on, that seems very archaic. And all that has changed is that such a scandal has been perpetrated so frequently that it has become common-place, and finally has been accepted as part of normal - indeed respectable - life.

Scandal, in fact, serves a role in society that is analagous to that of shame in the individual. It makes certain actions and behaviours almost unthinkable - actions and behaviours that are deemed particularly harmful both to the individuals involved and to society more broadly.

Our Lord, of course, had something to say about scandal, and it involved millstones...

That is why the doctrine of 'tolerance' is so misguided. When we tolerate aberrant behaviour, we teach others, and ultimately ourselves, that it doesn't matter. And once a critical mass of people in society indulge in it, it becomes normalised and deemed respectable: the examples are all around us. Perhaps the most obvious is contraception, where the scandal of Catholics contracepting is so widespread that nobody is scandalised any more. Yet we should be.

The Church, of course, still believes that divorce is a fiction: that valid marriages endure until the death of one of the spouses, and that any pretended union by a spouse with anyone else is adultery. 

One of the concerns I have about some of the proposed interpretations and implementations of Amoris Laetitia is, then, that it scandalises; and ultimately will normalise what should scandalise. As more and more Catholics witness people in objectively adulterous situations welcomed back to sacramental communion, they will conclude - as will the world - that the Church no longer believes what it officially teaches: and that is a very unmerciful situation to visit on the Church and on the world.

Still confused

I know I'm a simple sort of chap, but I am still confused. Despite all those who say that the four cardinal's request for clarification is a tactic of dissent, and that there is nothing to be confused about, I remain puzzled.

What precisely is it that people (and here I mean those advocates of mercy who believe that the divorced and civilly 're-married' should be admitted to communion without change to their behaviour) think that Amoris Laetitia is teaching?

It seems to me that it must be one of two things. On the one hand, it might be that there should be a new process for declaring a marriage null, when there are practical reasons why the current process will not work. That seems to be implied, for example, here: 'Let us suppose she cannot, for technical reasons, obtain an annulment (these are rare cases), and the first husband has long since remarried.' (I don't want to keep picking on Austen Ivereigh, but he is the one who keeps writing about it...)

On the other hand, it might be that there are situations in which the circumstances are so difficult that the only reasonable (or merciful) thing for the Church to do is to recognise a second union as being good (or at least, not adulterous). That seems to be implied here: a woman abandoned by her abusive husband who remarries to provide for her children might be in the same legal category as the philandering playboy who ditches his wife for a younger model, but no one could claim that both are in the same moral category.  But oddly, that is the same example.

Nowhere does Ivereigh, nor anyone else I have so far read, say precisely which is intended. And that is problematic, for a number of reasons. 

The former suggestion is, I suppose, possible to consider: if a marriage really were a sham from the start, and for complex reasons, that is hard to prove via the normal process, it might be worth looking closely at the case. However, for clear and obvious reasons, the Church has always assumed in favour of the bond, with the onus of proof being on the one who claimed it never existed. So any change here would need to be very carefully thought through and clearly articulated, to avoid grave miscarriages of justice, scandal, and so on.

But an awful lot of the language of the liberal interpreters of AL (and indeed the Holy Father's own reported response to the questions from South America, and his reluctance to answer the Cardinals' dubia) all suggest that the second line of thought is the one that is to be followed: 'many such cases require an individual discernment because they cannot simply be lumped together as ‘adultery.’' What does this mean? Ivereigh makes a distinction between the legal and the moral categories of different people. What he does not address is their married status. If they are validly married, and are engaging in sexual relations with someone other than their spouse (no matter how evil, duplicitous, philandering, etc he or she may be), they are committing adultery. No amount of discernment will alter that fact.   

The Church's role, then, is certainly to extend them mercy: the mercy that consists of engaging with them in love, to lead them to the truth, resulting in the change of their behaviour to conform it to God's plan. The sacraments are there to support them in this journey of transformation: sacramental confession including a firm purpose of amendment, and holy communion as the supreme gift of grace to strengthen and nourish them.

Otherwise, the path of discernment becomes a way to help people stay locked in the grip of sin. We are not the best judges in our own case - particularly if we have been through the trauma of a relationship falling apart; and to be asked to evaluate whether God is really asking us to leave our new, comfortable, loving relationship is a tough ask...  Not least because, as has often been observed before, God gives us the grace we need when we need it - not before. So it may seem an impossible demand that we should remove ourself and our children from the protection of a new partner - and as it seems impossible, we conclude it cannot be what God really wants. But actually, if we start from the other end, knowing that it is what God wants, mysteriously, as we start to follow his will, we gain the very grace we need to make it possible.

That seems to me the real failing of all those promoting what I might call cheap - or even counterfeit - mercy: that they underestimate the transformative power of God's love and grace when people really do submit themselves to the Divine Will, rather than justify themselves in the status quo...

But as I noted earlier, nowhere do the pro-readmittance interpreters of AL make clear precisely what they think the document teaches; which of these options - or is it both?

Further, the Holy Father's refusal to answer the dubia, and the increasing amount of noise without light from the commentators, suggest that clarity is the one thing that they want to avoid. Rather let everything be done privately and discretely. After all, what business is this of mine? Or yours?

Well, as the Cardinals have made clear in their dubia, confusion about Amoris Laetitia risks leading souls into mortal error: we should all be concerned about that. Moreover, the interpretation of some of the bishops in Germany and the Americas, for example, is effectively introducing Church-sanctioned divorce, which is a grave moral evil and will have devastating consequences (as widespread divorce already does throughout western civilisation). And the whole project, as conceived by some of them, is in fact an assault on Catholic truth and Catholic unity. Of course it is our business!

Living in a Parable

Reflecting on today's Gospel ('they look but do not see' etc) I was struck by the fact that my life, too, is like a parable. I cannot understand it, unless I listen to Our Lord's explanation. And when I do, 'blessed are your eyes because they see, and your ears, because they hear.' 

My Lord and My God!

In the end, however, these words send us on a never-ending journey. They are so vast that we can never grasp them completely., and they always surpass us. Throughout her entire history, the pilgrim Church has been exploring them ever more deeply. Only by touching Jesus' wounds and encountering his Resurrection are we able to grasp them, and then they become our mission.

Jesus of Nazareth,  Joseph Ratzinger, p 305

--

How do I touch his wounds? In others, the wounded; in myself, the wounded...

How do I encounter his Resurrection? In death to self, in re-birth in Him; In sacramental confession.

Chartres 2016 (4)

Having coped very well, physically, with the rigours of the pilgrimage, with a mere few blisters to show for it, I awoke on Tuesday morning feeling very rough, after a somewhat disturbed night. I am still not quite sure why; I suspect I had dehydrated a bit, and seen a bit too much of the sun on the previous afternoon, during the Mass. It had not been bright or hot, so I had not covered my head or ensured I drank lots of water. And then it may have been the addition of having a (small) beer before dinner and two (small) glasses of wine with dinner. Whatever the cause, I felt pretty dreadful and had an upset stomach to boot. What was worse was that I had also wrecked my voice by over-singing in the final miles. The reason that mattered was that I was meant to be teaching and leading the chant for our final High Mass in the crypt of Chartres Cathedral.

Fortunately James Belt and Brother Rosario were quick to learn the double Alleluia, and we all already knew the sequence. We started to learn the Introit (I have a keyboard app on my phone, which was helpful, as I couldn't sing a note to guide them) but ran out of time. For the Mass we were joined by Jamie Bogle, and between us we made a reasonable go of it (though we managed to start the Gloria at the wrong time and had to stop and wait for the Mass to catch up with us - still not quite sure how that happened).

The Mass was sung by Fr Ian Verrier, with Fr Mark Withoos as Deacon, and Fr Gerard Byrne as Sub-Deacon. Fr Withoos preached a powerful sermon on Christ as the Door. A wonderful and fitting end to the pilgrimage.

The crypt at Chartres has some claim to be the oldest Christian shrine, as it is a pre-Christian one! Apparently the Druids had had a revelation and had inscribed an altar with the words virgini pariturae: the virgin who will conceive.... This is one of the wonders of Chartres, and we were very blessed to have a Mass there.  (Amongst the other great treasures of the Cathedral are Our Lady's veil and the statue of the Black Madonna, both of which we had time to visit. ) We concluded the Mass, of course, with the Regina Caeli and the great French Marian Hymn, Chez Nous. 

After Mass, we were privileged to receive First Blessings from Fr Ian Verrier, one of our chaplains, who was ordained in the FSSP just under a year ago.

Then, it was back on the coach, and back to London, via a train that runs under the sea (What will they think of next?). I have to confess that I slept for a lot of the journey, after my rather restless night; but that did mean I was able to bowl up at my London friends' house in a fit state to be a reasonable guest for the night...

And so ended my eighth (I think) Chartres pilgrimage. 

The true highlights, of course, I have not, and cannot, describe: my confession; the reception of Our Lord in Holy Communion; some of the reflections arising from the meditations; some of the conversations with fellow pilgrims. For these, gentle reader, you will have to come to Chartres yourself.

Chartres 2016 (3)

I realise that I left out a couple of important moments on Pentecost. After the Mass we marched on, of course, and eventually ascended a hill, covered in barley fields and some light woodland, until, as we rounded a corner, we got our first glimpse on the horizon of the twin, but asymetric, spires of Chartres Cathedral. That is always a moment of special joy, and we always greet it with the Regina Caeli.

And it was not long after that I noticed what the increasingly boisterous chapter of French girl guides were singing: an old French marching song that I had first heard on the train back to Paris last year. The chorus runs as follows:

Buvons un coup, buvons en deux

A la santé des amoureux

A la santé du roi de France

Et merde pour le roi d'Angleterre

Qui nous a déclaré la guerre!

This was sung with such gusto that I was pretty sure that it was being sung in our direction. But this year we ignored it, and pressed on for the campsite at Gas.

On Monday morning we always get a lie-in. It was 5.30 before they woke us up... It was also slightly less cold than it had been the previous morning: no ice on the tents, though still pretty fresh. And the same routine: breakfast, tents packed, luggage onto the lorry... No! Jerk awake. Luggage goes onto our coach, for those staying in the hotel in Chartres. Those unfortunates who forget this have to trek down to the yard the other side of the station, and lug their luggage back up the hill to the hotel at the end of the day.

And then we march. But the end is in site, and today's march is a mere seventeen and a half miles: hardly worth putting your boots on...

By the lunch stop we are getting positively light-headed, as we realise how close we are to Chartres. And then we are singing one last rosary as we enter the city and wend our way through the outskirts. As we ascend the hill we always sing a quick Requiem aeternam at the war memorial, before launching into some serious singing of Jubilate Deo as a canon, which will take us right up to the Cathedral, until we are drowned out by its tolling bells.

This year, as the Cathedral is still full of scaffolding, as they work on the magnificent restoration project, fewer chapters than usual could fit inside. As we were well down the order of march, we were right at the back of the square outside, so could barely even see the screen. However, we got a fantastic view of the procession entering and leaving, including seeing St Joan of Arc's ring proudly carried by, which has only recently returned to France, after being bought at an auction from its previous English owner. 

And then scores of clergy, many very young, and of course the banners of all the chapters; and then a couple of bishops...  And then the High Mass, the culmination of the pilgrimage. And once again, with all the nationalities filling the square, the eminent good sense, and simple Catholicity of having Latin as a common language was apparent.

After Mass, we gathered for the traditional photo, having already said goodbye, unfortunately, to those who had to rush off for trains in order to get back to England that night. 

Then it was back to our hotel for a celebratory dinner and a glass or two of wine, before retiring to bed - bed, I tell you! For the first time since Friday night!

And just before retiring, I looked at the data captured on my iPhone:

Chartres 2016 (2)

It is often cold over night, camping on the pilgrimage, and given that the day had been relatively mild, I put on extra layers before crawling into my sleeping bag. Nonetheless, I awoke in the small hours feeling very cold, and struggled to get back to sleep. For once, I was grateful when it was time to get up (at 5.00) and that cheery French voice that we know and love of old resounded throughout the campsite via the formidable PA System:  ‘Bonjour, chèrs amis pèlerins, il est cinq heures, et il est l'heure de se réveiller.'  Within minutes, he is chivvying us further. “Chèrs pèlerins, il est l'heure de sortir de vos tentes pour les démonter.’  And only seconds after that: “Je vois qu’il y a toujours des tentes qui ne sont pas démontées!' And all too quickly: "Les premiers chapitres départent en quelques minutes!"

Despite having been so cold, we were surprised to find that there had been such a heavy frost that some of our tents had ice on them! Packing wet tents with frozen fingers is not a lot of fun, but it did make us appreciate the hot coffee (or hot chocolate à choix) provided for breakfast, along with the ubiquitous bread rolls.

We were some way down the marching order, so had plenty of time to get our luggage to the legendary camion sac (étranger),  before raising our flags, gathering the chapter together and starting out again.

We started the day, as usual, with a morning offering, and then, it being Pentecost, sang the Veni Creator Spiritus. And then on with the same routine: marching, rosaries, meditations, songs sacred and secular, chat...

Perhaps it is worth reflecting a little on the role of the Chef de Chapitre. Nobody has ever given me a job description, but Julie Carey, (who along with her husband Francis organises the whole thing every year) let slip that they had identified me as a future Chef on hearing me sing Green Grow the Rushes-oh with great vim one year... So I conclude that one aspect of the role is to keep the chapter singing, at least intermittently. And it is certainly important: clearly singing fifteen decades of the rosary every day is at the heart of the spirituality of the pilgrimage; but also the hymns and songs are very helpful in keeping weary feet marching.

At the end of the first day, there is a long and steep hill: when one has been marching for nine hours or more, and covered some 23 miles, it is easy to find the heart sinking a little at the sight, and for limbs to feel heavy, and the whole thing to slow down. But we sang our way up the hill with gusto, and although it was long and steep (and of course, singing requires more oxygen) that really does help.

So motivating the chapter to keep going is a key role. Not least because we are, of course, required to march to someone else's pace. That is one of the things that is not immediately obvious, but actually makes it tough. There are times when the pilgrimage proceeds very slowly, with lots of stops and starts, when we have to cross roads etc. And then there are times when we are walking at a fast pace, normally to make up time when we are behind schedule.  Our job is to maintain a constant distance between ourselves and the chapter in front: close enough to stay in touch, but not so close we are breathing down their necks. 

That gap also allows the priests to walk between the chapters and hear confessions. But of course it gets more difficult when people in the preceding chapter start to straggle behind. We maintain the distance, they drop further and further behind their chapter, and suddenly their is too large a gap: we have to overtake them and catch up. And so on.

Allied to that is the maintenance of a modicum of discipline: keeping the group together, and not allowing our chapter to spread out too far, to the inconvenience of following chapters. 

Then there is the aspect of looking after people as they walk: particularly keeping an eye out for anyone struggling; but also for anyone who is alone, especially new pilgrims, and trying to make sure that they are integrated into the group.

And then there is balancing the activities as we walk: trying to have the right amount of praying, meditating, singing, chatting and so on, so that people feel that they are busy with purposeful spiritual activity, but also have sufficient unstructured time for chat, or private prayer and reflection.

As always with me, I am very much better at the theory than the practice of this art...

The highlight of this second day, of course, is the big Pentecost Mass, celebrated in the open air on a magnificently constructed altar. We were a long way back from the altar, but there was also a large screen and a good PA system, so that we could see and hear everything. Also, one of our pilgrims, Mordi, kindly does a simultaneous translation of the sermon for us, so that we can follow that (the rest of the Mass is in Latin, of course, so following it is easy). 

The Consecration is always an important moment, of course; and at this Mass is marked by the banners to the sides of the altars bowing, as well as the bells ringing; for some reason I always find that a moving spectacle. 

Distribution of communion to so large a gathering (I think between 8,000 - 10,000 this year) could be problematic; but not so. Large numbers of priests, each accompanied by a server carrying an communion plate, and another carrying a large umbrella as an ombrellino, distribute communion to the pilgrims, who kneel in the dust and receive reverently on the tongue. It can be done, where there's a will...

And after Mass, we had a lunch break, and then three more marches to the campsite; on this second day we had covered 27 miles, but again the mild weather had made it very much less arduous than in some previous years.  We arrived singing loudly, as before, and then collected luggage, pitched tents and had some soup for supper.

The campsite is in an old quarry at Gas.  Here there is another altar, and adoration continues throughout the night (indeed I was awoken at 4.00 am by the Tantum Ergo, followed by the Divine Praises in French...). But for myself, I just made a quick visit to the Blessed Sacrament before retiring for the night: I find that sleep is very important (if possible) if I am to maintain that cheerful demeanour and high energy level that seems a requirement of the Chef de Chapitre role. It was another cold night, but not quite as cold as the previous one; and until the early morning Benediction, I slept well.

Chartres 2016 (1)

So, another year, another pilgrimage to Chartres...

I have written about this so many times in previous years, that it is hard to know what to say without repeating myself endlessly (see the tag Chartres for previous accounts).

One difference this year was that I went alone; none of the children were free to come with me, for various reasons.  So I travelled down to London alone the night before, and arrived very late, due to an incident on the line, and stopped at a B&B in Victoria.  

We start the pilgrimage with Mass at 7.00 am in the Cathedral Crypt, which was surprisingly empty at 7.00 am. I wondered if I had got it wrong, but Fr George Roth was there to say the Mass - it was only the congregation who were lacking. They all piled in a minute or two later as Mass was starting: I never did find out why.

The Mass, of course, was in the traditional Roman Rite (the Extraordinary Form, as we now call it), and was very prayerful. The other priests on the pilgrimage also said their Masses at the same time in other chapels in the crypt. (This was the only photo I took on the whole trip. Those wanting pictures should look at the LMS Facebook page, or the official pilgrimage site.)

Then we all got on the coach, and it was off to Dover to catch the ferry. Avid readers will remember that a couple of years ago, my eldest daughter had left her passport behind. This year, it was one of the Readings who could not find his passport, so cancelled - he clearly hadn't heard how we had smuggled Ant over the border... Rumour has it that Fr Roth did not have his passport with him, either, but we pass lightly over that.

The ferry crossing was pleasant enough, with fish and chips for lunch (it being Friday) and we got to our hotel outside Paris without further ado, with a few hymns and a rosary or two. There we went to an Italian restaurant just around the corner (why, I don't know: go to Paris and eat pizzas....) but it was pleasant enough, and the company convivial.

The next morning we started the tougher part of the pilgrimage: up at the time my children normally go to bed, so as to have breakfast at 5.00, get on the coach by 5.30 and get to Notre Dame for 6.00 am. There we met the indefatigable and inimitable Fr Mark Withoos, the chaplain of our chapter, who had flown in from Rome (he is Cardinal Pell's private secretary, and had been granted an exeat on condition that he didn't wreck himself as he did last time he came...)

Then we had High Mass in the Cathedral, which is always a wonderful and moving celebration, and finally set off on the long march out of Paris; onto the rive gauche, past the Luxembourg gardens, and out through the suburbs. This first march is one of the longest, and often one of the toughest: two and a half hours of city walking, until we get to the park in the suburb of Plessis-Robinson, some 6 1/2 miles from Notre Dame. The apples we are always treated to at this park are provided by the local municipality as a gesture of welcome.  The official website for the pilgrimage carries a wonderful sentence in English (almost) on this subject:

An apple a day keep the pelgrin alive ! 

During the marches, we sang hymns (Faith of our Fathers, to start with, and then a variety of others) said prayers (starting, as each day, with a morning offering) and sang the rosary (in decades variously in Latin, French and English). We also have a meditation, normally read by one of the priests marching with us (as well as Fr Withoos, we were looked after by Fr Roth and Fr Verier, who was ordained almost a year ago into the FSSP). We also have plenty of time to chat amongst ourselves, and this Catholic conviviality is an important part of the pilgrimage. Indeed, a few marriages have resulted, over the years...

The English were marching in two chapters, one under the banner of Our Lady of Walsingham (until the banner pole snapped) and the other, the youth chapter of which I am titular Chef de Chapitre, under the patronage (but not banner, as it too had broken) of St Alban.

This year the weather was very kind to us; pleasantly mild, which was perfect walking weather. The rest of the day followed the same pattern: march for ages, rest for minutes, march for more ages... until we got to the campsite at Choisel, somewhere around  8 o'clock. By this time we have been up for about 16 hours, and marching for 10 of them, covering a fraction less than 25 miles.  So we always make a point of singing lustily as we arrive, to show that we Brits are nothing daunted by such a trivial stroll. This year was no exception, and we made a decent noise as we arrived.

Then bags were retrieved (they travel by lorry, mercifully), tents pitched, soup and rolls eaten, and the sensible ones among us retired for the night as soon as possible, putting in our earplugs, against the carousing of the French Scouts...

Naaman's Lesson

Today's first reading (or lesson, as it is sometimes called), about Naaman the Aramean is a powerful story, about the lesson that Naaman had to learn in order to be cleansed of his leprosy; and it contains an equally powerful lesson for us, in order to be cleansed of our sins.

'If the prophet had told you to do something extraordinary, would you not have done it? All the more now, since he said to you, 'wash and be clean' should you do as he said.'

And so it is with us. If someone we trusted advised us to do something truly challenging, in order to be free from all worry, guilt and sin, would we not do it? Even more, since He tells us to repent and confess our sins, should we do as He said.

Why are all orthodox Catholics nutters?

Intellectual debate is a staple of our household, as I am sure you will appreciate. So it is perhaps no surprise that my wife and I often discuss the deepest and most intractable problems. Yesterday, we touched (yet again) on the questions: Why are all orthodox Catholics nutters?

Those who read my ravings on a regular basis will know that I am wary of splashing absolutes about too freely, so I will quickly qualify that to 'almost all.' The exceptions, of course, gentle reader, include you and me.

But it remains the fact that many of our best, and most orthodox, friends are (how shall I put this?) well off the centre of any standard distribution of normality. The same seems to be true of many of those orthodox Catholics whom I don't know personally, but who contribute to the public debate.

Why should that be? I suppose one reason is that in order to be an orthodox Catholic in our society (and even, alas, in most of our Catholic parishes) demands that one be well-differentiated (as a psychologist friend of mine once remarked of me). That may have other aspects that strike the average observer as somewhat reminiscent of a candidate for an asylum.

But in reality, I suspect what really goes on is that we judge, at least in part (and probably wholly out of our conscious awareness) by the standards of the world, and that nuttiness in largely in the eye of the beholder.

The Feast of the Purification of the Blessed Virgin Mary

One of the joys of tradition is that one does not have to keep inventing new stuff all the time. So without further apology or justification, here is my regular post on today's feast.

Today is the feast of the Purification of the Blessed Virgin Mary, also known as the feast of the Presentation of the Lord. It is also known as Candlemas:

It marks the occasion on which we meditate in particular the fourth Joyful Mystery of the Rosary: that extraordinary visit of the Holy Family to the temple, to be met by the prophet Anna and Simeon, the priest, and to make the required sacrificial offering for a first-born son.

There is so much to meditate on: the humility of Our Lady (of all people) being ritually purified;  the devout Jewishness of the Holy Family; the idea of Our Lady offering God back to God, and being entrusted with God by God; the extraordinary prophecies of Anna and Simeon; the pre-figuring of the replacement of the temple of the Old Covenant with the Temple of the New, in the person of Christ: the locus of the one true redemptive sacrifice.

Today also marks the end of the Christmas season: our cribs will be taken down in the evening, and we will sing the Alma Redemptoris Mater, for the last time. Thereafter, we start singing the Ave Regina Caelorum.  That is sung daily until compline of the Wednesday of Holy Week.

Ave, Regina Caelorum,
Ave, Domina Angelorum:
Salve, radix, salve, porta
Ex qua mundo lux est orta:
Gaude, Virgo gloriosa,
Super omnes speciosa,
Vale, o valde decora,
Et pro nobis Christum exora.

Hail, O Queen of Heaven enthroned.
Hail, by angels mistress owned.
Root of Jesse, Gate of Morn
Whence the world's true light was born:
Glorious Virgin, Joy to thee,
Loveliest whom in heaven they see;
Fairest thou, where all are fair,
Plead with Christ our souls to spare.

The Heresy of Worshiptainment

I saw a link on Facebook to an article called The Heresy of Worshiptainment, along with a comment by a Catholic saying that it was good as far as it goes, given it is written from a Protestant perspective.

I partly agree. The emphasis on entertainment in liturgy is a corruption, and many attempts at stimulating participation fall foul of this. But even from a Protestant perspective I think it a bit lacking.  From a Catholic perspective, of course, it lacks a great deal. 

At the heart of Catholicism is the imitation of Christ. Christ, of course, included reading the scriptures, but also singing the Psalms. He taught us to adore, He taught us to pray the Our Father, and He taught us to invoke the Holy Spirit.  He told us to offer the bread and wine that become His Body and His Blood, and He offered the sacrifice of His life to the Father. He instituted and consecrated the Catholic apostolic priesthood to continue this Saving Work.

Not unnaturally, the Catholic Mass includes all of these elements, and any Protestant service, however full of worship, is lacking at the highest and deepest levels: adoration, the Sacrifice of Calvary made present, and the Real Presence received in Holy Communion.

Christ also ratified, through the Incarnation, the principle that our bodies, as well as our minds, hearts, and souls are important. So the bodily, or even sensory, aspects of our religion are also important. That is why  sacred music has always been an essential element of Catholic liturgy and sacred art an important part of our ecclesiastical buildings. We are not, after all, puritans - and perhaps that is the other error implicit in this article.

And another thing

I have continued to think about the Holy Father's sermon on the Holy Family, about which I have already posted.

In particular, I have been thinking about the Immaculate Conception, and the difficulty that poses for us, inheritors of Original Sin, to read Our Lady's words accurately.

One of the effects of Original Sin is that our passions are not properly subject to our souls: that is the seat of the will and the intellect. But in Our Lady, preserved from Original Sin and its effects, that is not the case. Her passions are subordinate to her will, that is her capacity to love, and her intellect, her capacity to know.

Further, we know that any turning of the will away from the will of God is a sin: so by definition Our Lady never allowed her will to deviate from the will of God. 

Her intellect was also endowed with those preternatural gifts which the rest of us lost through Adam's sin: knowledge of God, of her relationship to Him and of Her eternal destiny.

It is in that context that we have to read Our Lady's words to her Son, both here in Luke 2, and also, for example, at the Annunciation and at the Wedding Feast in Cana.

It is of course tempting to read Our Lady's words as 'containing a certain reproach,' but is that correct, given her Immaculate status? Certainly, if a normal mother said those words, reading reproach into them would seem completely reasonable; but in this respect (freedom from Original Sin and Actual Sin) she is not a normal mother. 

All I believe we can legitimately read into them is the intellectual question they pose: "How could you (whom I know to be all-good) do this which has caused us such distress?"  - Faith seeking understanding. And it is no defect in her intelligence that means she does not understand all her Son does; it is natural for the human intellect to be unable to fathom the full mysteries of God - indeed, that is what we mean by a mystery.

So just as her words at the Annunciation (unlike the very similar ones of Zachary) do not display any failing in Faith, so her words here do not display any failing in Love; nor do her words at Cana display any failing in Hope.

Indeed, Cana is in some ways my favourite: when Protestants level the charge of Mariolatry at us, I reflect that it is a charge made in ignorance. Anyone who has turned to Our Blessed Mother for counsel or comfort knows that she always ends by telling us the same thing: 'Do whatever He tells you!' The Mother always points to the Son, and to honour her is to draw closer to Him.

As always, I issue the usual disclaimer: I am no trained theologian, and if I have got anything wrong in this post I invite correction. Indeed, as I have mentioned before, one of the delights of blogging is to provoke those wiser, better instructed, or more holy than myself to educate me.

Alma Redemptoris Mater, 

Quæ pervia cæli porta manes, 

Et stella maris, 

Succurre cadenti,

Surgere qui curat, populo: 

Tu quæ genuisti,

Natura mirante, 

Tuum sanctum Genitorem

Virgo prius ac posterius, 

Gabrielis ab ore

Sumens illud Ave, 

Peccatorum miserere.