Our Lady Who Turns Her Face to the Wall

Some years ago, my late mother gave me a small statue of Our Lady of Torreciudad.  She sits on top of the chest of drawers by my bed, in the corner of the room.  And she turns her face to the wall.

Or to be more accurate, perhaps, she turns her whole self to the wall.  She does this gradually, over time, so I don't notice it happening, until suddenly, one day, I see that she's facing the wall (or nearly) and turn her back.

The explanation, of course, is simple and natural; the statue has come free of its base, and every time I shut one of the drawers, it shifts a little on its base, with the net result I have described.

But because I am a very simple soul (or a very profound one - you decide) I see meaning in such things. There's a line in CS Lewis somewhere (That Hideous Strength, I rather fancy) about Our Lord doing all things for all people. 

And so I ask myself, why would Our Lady turn her face to the wall?  And the answer, of course, is sin.  So now I have developed the practice of only turning Our Lady back to face the room when I have been to confession: and when she turns to the wall, I know it's time to go again.

And that works pretty well...

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.

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.

Saying Hurtful Things

I have been trying to place the best possible interpretation that I can imagine on the woeful lack of leadership and teaching about crucial moral issues (like, say, sin, and especially sins that are endemic and socially acceptable, such as contraception, adultery, fornication, homosexual practice) by our bishops, individually (with noble exceptions) and collectively.

I remembered the bishop I spoke to many years ago, who set me on the path to becoming Bitter and Twisted, as I recount here. Essentially, he didn't want to upset anyone.

And more recently, another member of the hierarchy has told me that they are extremely sensitive to the difficulties that people face, as an explanation for various concerns I raised (these sorts of things...)

So one possible interpretation is that the bishops just don't want to upset anyone. 

Whilst a laudable aim, there are some problems with that, if it is elevated above the central mission of the Church, to proclaim Christ's saving truth, in order that people repent and believe the Gospel, so that they may be saved by Christ's Redemptive Work, operating through the Sacraments, and thus attain eternal life.

Of course we should strive not to hurt others unnecessarily; but that is a secondary good, not the primary one.

Furthermore, when I read the Gospels, I see that Our Lord would frequently say ‘hurtful’ things. Imagine how the Syro-Phoenician woman felt, when told she was a dog who should not eat the childrens' food;  or how the Samaritan woman at the well felt, when Our Lord named her sordid 'lifestyle choices;' or how St Peter felt, when Our Lord said: vade post me, Satana! Or the pharisees, when they were called all sorts of offensive names; or Martha when she was trying to make everything perfect for Our Lord and was rebuked; and I could go on. 

For Him, truth and love are inseparable, and He confronts people with the truth, in order to call them to repentance, and thus to become open to His love. That seems to me where the Church is failing in this country, which is why our confessional queues are empty, and so, eventually, are our Masses.

Secondly, the unwillingness to hurt the feelings of any one group inevitably hurts the feelings of another. Thus the kindness extended to the divorced and remarried, if it goes so far as to imply they have a right to live with a new partner, becomes extremely cruel to the abandoned spouse, particularly when she or he has stayed faithful to the marriage vows in obedience to the Church. Or the welcome extended to homosexuals, if it condones or celebrates those who are openly living in same-sex relationships becomes extremely cruel to those who are tempted to same-sex relationships, but pursue chastity, in obedience to the Church.

Further, if one consistently compromises with the truth in order to avoid giving offence, there is the risk that one eventually loosens one’s grip on it. For how ‘hurtful’ it would be to say that someone in a loving relationship needs to repent.  The Church can’t really mean that… and so on. But if that loving relationship is in fact adulterous (and Our Lord was quite clear about this) then it is sinful: and sin will damage those who indulge in it, so it is no kindness at all to collude with it. And so, as I say, one loosens one’s grip on the truth.

So yes, we should avoid saying hurtful things where we can; but never at the cost of compromising the truth when that needs to be said. And if our role is a pastor or catechist, then we have a responsibility to proclaim the truth, in season and out, not to compromise it for 'pastoral' reasons - because we have the example of the Good Shepherd to follow.

Fear of Sin

So, pulling together the threads of recent posts, both about Fry and regular reception of Holy Communion, I think we are back to one of my old hobby horses: the fear of Sin.

There are two types of fear of Sin, the holy and the unholy.

The holy fear of sin is that fear that is mandated in the Bible and supported by a constant stream of Catholic teaching until, say, the mid 1960s.

It is the fear that we may end up, as Christ warned us, in Hell, where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth; that fearful knowledge that each of us, personally, contributes to the sufferings of Christ by each and every sin we commit; that fear that, but for the Divine Mercy, Divine Justice would send us to our proper place.

Such fear is healthy: sin is the greatest evil that can befall us, and if we die in unrepentant mortal sin, then we go to Hell.

Here is what the Catechism has to say on the subject of Hell:

IV. Hell

1033 We cannot be united with God unless we freely choose to love him. But we cannot love God if we sin gravely against him, against our neighbor or against ourselves: "He who does not love remains in death. Anyone who hates his brother is a murderer, and you know that no murderer has eternal life abiding in him." Our Lord warns us that we shall be separated from him if we fail to meet the serious needs of the poor and the little ones who are his brethren. To die in mortal sin without repenting and accepting God's merciful love means remaining separated from him for ever by our own free choice. This state of definitive self-exclusion from communion with God and the blessed is called "hell."

1034 Jesus often speaks of "Gehenna" of "the unquenchable fire" reserved for those who to the end of their lives refuse to believe and be converted, where both soul and body can be lost. Jesus solemnly proclaims that he "will send his angels, and they will gather . . . all evil doers, and throw them into the furnace of fire," and that he will pronounce the condemnation: "Depart from me, you cursed, into the eternal fire!"

1035 The teaching of the Church affirms the existence of hell and its eternity. Immediately after death the souls of those who die in a state of mortal sin descend into hell, where they suffer the punishments of hell, "eternal fire." The chief punishment of hell is eternal separation from God, in whom alone man can possess the life and happiness for which he was created and for which he longs.

1036 The affirmations of Sacred Scripture and the teachings of the Church on the subject of hell are a call to the responsibility incumbent upon man to make use of his freedom in view of his eternal destiny. They are at the same time an urgent call to conversion: "Enter by the narrow gate; for the gate is wide and the way is easy, that leads to destruction, and those who enter by it are many. For the gate is narrow and the way is hard, that leads to life, and those who find it are few." Since we know neither the day nor the hour, we should follow the advice of the Lord and watch constantly so that, when the single course of our earthly life is completed, we may merit to enter with him into the marriage feast and be numbered among the blessed, and not, like the wicked and slothful servants, be ordered to depart into the eternal fire, into the outer darkness where "men will weep and gnash their teeth."

1037 God predestines no one to go to hell; for this, a willful turning away from God (a mortal sin) is necessary, and persistence in it until the end. In the Eucharistic liturgy and in the daily prayers of her faithful, the Church implores the mercy of God, who does not want "any to perish, but all to come to repentance":
Father, accept this offering
from your whole family.
Grant us your peace in this life,
save us from final damnation,
and count us among those you have chosen.

However, it seems to me that we have replaced that with another fear: the fear of talking about sin or Hell. That is the unholy fear to which I referred.

I think many priests and bishops, and even cardinals, are running scared on this one. I imagine that they are worried that they will lose people, and that they have listened to the secular voice that says that people don't want bad news.

The trouble is that without the bad news of sin and damnation, the Good News of the Gospel is completely meaningless, as I have pointed out before (here for example, inter alia).

What the Church truly has to offer is what our broken world is longing for at the deepest level: healing, wholeness, forgiveness and redemption. But these require a change of heart on the part of the individual: a turning away from sin. If we who are in the Church have lost that understanding, we are like salt which has lost its flavour: good for nothing and to be trampled underfoot.

The challenge is how to present all this in a hostile world. To do that, we need to be grace-filled; and we will not be grace-filled unless we regularly confront the sin within us, and beg for God's mercy and grace, through the sacramental means that Christ established for that very purpose.

More reflections arising from Chartres...

As my blisters heal, and my tiredness recedes, more reflections are coming to the surface, which I thought I should record, mainly related to blisters.

One was the wonderful reflection (I think by Fr Byrne) after a meditation on St Francis.  One of the themes of the pilgrimage was Creation for the adoration of God. St Francis is naturally a prime exemplar of that philosophy, and Fr Byrne (if it was he - memory is necessarily somewhat hazy) pointed out that we should therefore welcome as friends 'Brother Mud and Sister Blister.'

(Perhaps you had to be there....)

But I also reflect on the body's capacity to heal itself - or not. Many of us got blisters, and our feet will heal themselves of their own accord - as long as we do nothing foolish and follow the advice we are given. However, others had more serious problems and needed medical attention. Without it, they could make their various problems very much worse.

All of which prompted me to reflect on sin: some sins (venial) we will recover from as long as we are repentant, make an act of contrition, and indeed receive Holy Communion with the right dispositions. But for more serious harm to our soul (mortal sins) we need more serious intervention: that is sacramental Confession. If we ignore that we risk doing more damage to ourselves...

Of course, one of the glories of the pilgrimage is the availability of chaplains to hear confessions as we walk: there is always a gap between the chapters, in which the chaplains often walk, and penitents can join them to have their confessions heard.  I think the vast majority of our chapter went to confession over the three days, and some more than once.

Doubtless, as my mind catches up with me, further reflections will follow.

A Catholic Joke

Just before Easter, I promised some Catholic jokes.

Here is one of my favourites:

Some time ago, a priest was asked to cover for a colleague who was the Chaplain at a Catholic boys’ school.

He agreed to do so for the weekend, including hearing confessions and saying Benediction on the Saturday afternoon, and offering the Sunday morning Mass.

He arrived at the school and was impressed by its lovely location: rolling green lawns led down to the river, and bridge over it led to the sports fields.

At that school, it was the tradition that for confession, the boys would go in order of seniority.  The Head Boy would go first, then the deputy head, then the prefects and the rest of the Sixth Form.  Then the upper fifth, lower fifth, and so on, right to the youngest boys.  (I told you it was some time ago!)

So the priest went into the confessional and heard the first confession: the Head Boy’s.  It was nothing sensational, but the visiting priest was somewhat surprised at the final sin the Head Boy confessed: ‘Oh, Father, and also, throwing peanuts in the river.’

He forbore to comment, realising that in such a setting there were bound to be school rules about not littering the river.

He was slightly surprised when the Deputy Head Boy, at the end of his confession, also confessed the same sin.

He was beginning to imagine them on the bridge over the river, playing pooh-sticks with peanuts.

Sure enough the next, and the next, and indeed all of the Sixth Form boys confessed to this same sin.

Beyond wondering where they got such a supply of peanuts, he was beginning to take it in his stride: clearly it was some local pastime which, while not allowed, was hallowed by ancient usage.

And so it went on through the school: the fifth form and the fourth form: to a man confessed to throwing peanuts in the river.

It was therefore with something of a shock that he heard the final confession, from the youngest and smallest boy in the school: the only one, it seemed with the moral fortitude not to join in this reprehensible activity.

So he decided to check:

‘Are you sure there’s nothing else, my son?’

‘No, Father, nothing!’ quavered the boy on the other side of the grille.

‘Not... not throwing peanuts in the river?’ he asked, triumphantly, demonstrating his local knowledge, wisdom and insight.

‘F..Father,’ stammered the boy, ‘I am Peanuts.’

--

No apologies, no regrets. More Catholic jokes to follow soon.

God Bless Our Bishop

At yesterday's EF Mass at Lancaster Cathedral (as indeed at all Masses in the Diocese yesterday) a pastoral letter from our bishop was read out.  You can download it here.


He started by placing Lent in the context of the imitation of Christ, who fasted for forty days in the desert, where he was tempted and tried by the devil (yes, our bishop mentioned the devil, God bless him - the bishop, I mean of course...).


But the thrust of the letter was a call to confession: 

My dear people, as you will know, in every parish church in the Diocese of Lancaster on each Wednesday evening of Lent there will be the opportunity for Confession and Sacramental Reconciliation. We have called this initiative The Light is On for You because the light of God’s grace will shine for each person who avail themselves of this wonderful sacrament. I recognise that for many people the sacrament of Confession has long been missing from their lives, but I now urge and encourage you to enter into your own hearts, as Christ did in the wilderness, and there encounter in joy the Father of mercies in this sacramental moment of Reconciliation. And your own experience of healing and peace will enable you to point others in the direction of this truly unique sacrament. Let nothing hold you back!

 I have blogged before about his Light is On initiative: this pastoral letter is further evidence of a bishop leading his flock back to Christ.  We are blessed indeed, so please pray for him!

Blighter Unrocked

Just when I was wondering what to write, whether to bother continuing with the blog and so on (see my last post...), a commenter, Part-time Pilgrim, posted a comment that I thought worth a reply. And a reply can become a post, if one rambles on for long enough...

Here’s what P-t P (to whom thanks for an interesting and thought provoking comment) had to say, with my comments interspersed.

I think you have a point when you call for an increased respect for the sanctuary and it is easy to see how the removal of altar rails may have resulted in a lack of reverence for a holy place within a holy place. I have no argument with a call for more reverence on and for the sanctuary.

A civil post, starting with points of agreement: always a courteous strategy, and one I could adopt more often, perhaps...

However the call to keep the sanctuary all-male is dubious. You claim authority from the Old Covenant but in the Old Covenant the Holy of Holies was only accessible to a select few.

I think that this slightly misunderstands my point. I was not claiming authority from the Old Covenant, but example. There is a difference. I think the Jewish people were formed in this way for a reason, even if we do not fully understand it.

When Jesus died the veil of the temple which divided the holy of holies from the court of the priests was torn from top to bottom marking the end to this exclusive access and the beginning of the New Covenant. In this New Covenant, all, Greek or Jew, woman or man, slave or free can receive the incarnate God body, blood soul and divinity.

Indeed, but the question here isn’t about reception of the incarnate God. [NB Another tradition I like is not using the Holy Name in normal conversation: we always used to talk about 'Our Lord' when mentioning Him in this kind of context.] There has never in the history of the Church, as far as I am aware, been any move to exclude women from reception of Holy Communion. The issue is about ways of service, and there is an unbroken tradition, instituted by the Incarnate God Himself, of male-only priesthood. So the question becomes: does service in the sanctuary follow the traditions and laws associated with admission to the priesthood or those associated with admission to the reception of Holy Communion?

Neither can you argue the idea of a sanctuary can be traced unbroken down to the institution of the New Covenant. It is something that emerged under the guidance of the Holy Spirit as the Church grew. If we accept that God guides the Church are we to beleive [sic] that he stopped guiding it so that it could go astray and allow women on the sanctuary? Is it not more likely that this, too, is part of God's guidance?

I do not know of any evidence that demonstrates female ministration at the altar, or at the ‘breaking of the bread,’ even at the earliest times. I think the idea that this 'emerged' is speculative. I have noticed that those who challenge traditional practice often make claims about earlier practice in absolute terms, when they are in fact speculation. I don't blame P-t P for this, as I suspect he or she has 'learned' this from someone else... There has been a lot of dubious misinformation put about to support some of the 'progressive' changes.

The second point here, about God’s guidance, is more thought-provoking. However, we know that the Church has never claimed to be inerrant in terms of practice. Indeed, the urgent need for a better translation of the Mass than the very poor one foisted on us by ICEL in the late 60s and early 70s demonstrates that the Holy Spirit allows the Church to wander off-track for short periods in areas that do not directly contradict Faith and Morals. I believe that admission of women to the sanctuary (and many other aberrations permitted since the Second Vatican Council, but never authorised, let alone mandated, by it) is an example of such an error.

If forced to choose between the Church’s tradition for centuries and a fad of a few decades, I will give the tradition far more weight. When one looks at the cumulative effect of the de-sacralisation of Catholic worship in Europe, I think it is hard to argue that this is all under the guidance of the Holy Spirit. Our children are abandoning their Faith in catastrophic numbers, our priests and nuns are in decline, our Catholic population is barely Catholic (given the numbers contracepting, the paucity of attendance on Holy Days of Obligation, the lack of queues for confessionals, and the appalling irreverence and ignorance betrayed by so many who wander round our sanctuaries - or indeed any other measure you care to look at...). I think most of this is in accordance with the permissive will of God (ie allowing us to make mistakes and to sin), not His active will.

I don't think you have made your case (and neither did William Oddie - the decline in vocations preceded the introduction of female altar servers)

Yes, I think Dr Oddie’s case was poorly made, too. As for mine - clearly I think I have made it, but then I am not precisely an unbiased observer... What I would say is that the decline in vocations may have been (and causality is always hard to prove: post hoc propter hoc and all that...) a result of the cumulative changes made in the name of (though not in strict obedience to) the Second Vatican Council.

What I am really interested in, though, is how you explain to Mrs Trovato, Antonia, Bernedette [sic] and Dominique how their presence on the sanctuary (without a vacuum cleaner) desecrates it. And assuming you are ever that reckless, how they respond.

A great question, and the one that really provoked this response (the rest, as I was candid enough to admit early on, was largely a ramble...)

The answer is actually very simple. We attend the Extraordinary Form of Mass (typically once a month) and the Ordinary Form the rest of the time. They observe, and they draw their own conclusions. None of them would venture onto the sanctuary, and none of them feel ‘excluded’ or ‘de-valued’ or anything else negative as a result. They simply recognise the wisdom of the Church’s historic tradition in this area as in so many others. It works - and they all prefer the Extraordinary Form, as they find it more prayerful, more sacred.

A good weekend...

It felt like the start of the holidays this weekend (though I still have to work for while yet...) All the family are home, as Ant is back from University, and Bernie and Charlie are back from their orchestra trip to Italy.

So went to adoration and confession first thing on Saturday (and how great it is that my teenage girls still see this as the best way to start a weekend - marvellous example for Charlie and Dominique). Then had a relatively quiet day at home until later in the afternoon when we went to the local County Show.

Last year, we won a number of prizes (well Anna, her mum and the kids did - I have no appropriate talents...) but this year we didn't win a thing (though I thought Bernie was unlucky not to win with her painting or her photography, and Anna didn't win with her muffins simply because they went for chocolate over fruit...but perhaps I'm biased).

In the evening went to see Toy Story 3 in the evening, which we all enjoyed enormously.

Today we went to the Extraordinary Form of Mass at Lancaster Cathedral - and this time you could really hear the impact of Nick Gale's training workshop: the Schola sang better than I have ever heard them before.

And this afternoon, we've packed Charlie and Dominique off to Sail Camp to improve their sailing - and Bernie is there as an assistant instructor. And has a summer job, so can't help at sail camp this year - but as her summer job is teaching sailing, she's not too disappointed...

Confession

We all went to confession today (except Ant who is away at University these days); and learning from past experience were all particularly careful immediately afterwards not to start bickering etc.

We have learned the hard way that you only have to be cleansed from sin to become an immediate target for silly temptations...