Election issues

With the presidential election campaign dominating TV both in advertising and news we get a daily surfeit of information, accusations, half-truths, misinformation and downright lies. Most of us take it for granted as the price of democracy.

 There are certain facts that we should keep in mind. Most candidates are basically decent people who really have the impression that they can do what is best for you. But in their efforts to get elected they try to "spin"  the facts in a way that will appeal to you. That may mean denying their own failures and twisting what their opponents do/say/plan in a way that makes them look bad. So don't believe everything they tell you. They are not angels and their opponents are not monsters. They are human which means they can make mistakes and some of their mistakes come back to haunt them.

You will make mistakes too in the candidates you vote for or against. But you can try to make good choices by listening to and reading what they have to say. Don't vote for somone just because they carry a label of a party your family always voted for. Two of my favorite candidates in the past were Bobby Kennedy and Barry Goldwater who were philosophically  opposed to each other. But both were consistent in their policies and spoke with conviction. I felt that you knew where they stood even when you disagreed with them, that they would make hard choices, not necessarily popular ones. On the other hand I thought Jimmy Carter was a better person than Richard Nixon, yet Nixon was a better president.

Sometimes we need to vote for a candidate with whom we disagree because we respect his character and honesty. Sometimes we will make mistakes about policies but character is harder to fake.

Rampant Restorationism

The attached account grabbed my attention as it is so similar to some of what is transpiring in my own parish since our pastor of a dozen years retired and was replaced by a younger, recently ordained priest. Not all of the restorations described have come to pass yet, but they are looming in the not too distant future. Will this be the same story everywhere?

"My (former) Catholic Parish has been transformed in less than two years. Our last priest was a good solid man but over-shy. Our parish is small-town, immensely good-hearted but not exactly thoughtful or progressive, and not young in this employment-starved area of England. But we were united and loving, and co-operated widely with other Christians in town.

The new man came with a reputation for the old ways - as a 39 year old he had no personal experience of the Church pre-Vatican 2. He had been required to say that he would celebrate Sunday Mass for the Parish in English, and this promise he has kept - thus far. However, within his first fortnight he had abolished the elected Parish Pastoral Council, forbidden services of Word and Communion led by the Deacon in the absence of the priest saying Mass, established a celebration of the Tridentine Latin (1962 authorised) EF Mass 6 days per week, cut the English weekday Masses which he would celebrate at top speed and provided a table-full of literature promoting ultra-retro books, newspapers, liturgy, retreats, pilgrimages.

Within his first two months he had estranged himself from his fellow priests in the Deanery, refused to work with the other local Christian clergy, introduced old-style devotions (eg Quarant'Ore), attempted to oust the deacon from his very much valued chaplaincy in the local prison. His supporters were about 5% of a 100 approx total parish numbers and the remainder laughed at his biretta brandishing and highly decorated vestments but made allowances for 'difference' _ "After all, we still have Mass, and he's very good with the children."

Two years on he has eliminated the free-standing altar though without reference to the deacon or the foreign priest who comes regularly to celebrate a Sunday Mass for our immigrants in their own language, refuses to celebrate Mass facing the people, has expressed hatred of the English of the Ordinary Form of Mass we were formerly allowed to use and has preached publicly his contempt of the Second Vatican Council. He has disobeyed the Bishop when told to restore the free-standing altar - a defiance that has lasted 8 months already.

Some parishioners, myself included, no longer attend. Others, reasonably, refuse to be driven from their own church which they built, and the school to which they sent their children, the place where they have buried and mourned parents, spouses, off-spring and friends. A Requiem these days is celebrated in full black vestments. or if the chief mourner forbids this, in a green so dark that it is indistinguishable from black.

The Latin Mass, now 7 days a week attracts a zealous company on Sunday who drive in from far and wide. Our country parish church is effectively now the Latin Mass centre of the diocese, a diocese which is often regarded as the most open to the Tridentine forms of all the Sacraments, not just the celebration of Mass. The financial collections have been spectacularly boosted, but members of the drive-in congregation play no part in the social life of the parish and have no responsibility for maintenance of church premises let alone supporting the school.

Some contributors to liturgy blog discussions suggest that there is scope for both forms of Mass (Ordinary and Extra-ordinary) to be celebrated regularly in the same parish. I can assure them that where a priest has an overwhelming preference for the EF, he is put under a considerable tension when celebrating OF. This tension can make attendance at his OF Mass so intolerably agonising that it cannot be deemed worship for the parishioner and presumably not for the priest either.

I have to say to our readers, in my experience these words are possibly all too true a description of a parish situation that may arise next to you - or even take you over. Soon. The majority of seminarians in this country are asking for this style of liturgy, theology and management. By the time they.ve learnt better, most of us will be dead."

We need to stand up and remember that WE are the Church. The body of Christ is one,  whole and entire; without the laity the clergy and the hierarchy are a head without a body or limbs.

By their fruits you shall know them.
This simple test tells us a lot about all the venom and hatred spewed out in the last few days against the CEO of Chick-fil-e and many of those who workl for him.

I am not even going to get into the the question which led him to answer honestly what he believed. I was reminded of him when reading how the Pharisees questioned Jesus in order to entrap Him. Apparently he should have lied to satisfy his critics. Alternatively they do not accept that in this country religious freedom is protected by the constitution, at least until now. Perhaps our bishops were not so far off the mark in warning us recently that this freedom was threatened.

But an issue which was ostensibly about the right to love your neighbour even when they are of the same sex as yourself sure produced a lot of hatred without regard for sex.

I apologize to the many gays and lesbians I know and respect who I feel are being used and manipulated for the agendas of those who could not care less about their human rights and dignity.

Lost in the desert

I was reflecting on the tone of my comments in reacting to a variety of articles in the NCR last night. Why are some angry and critical while others appear thoughtful and helpful? To some extent they reflect my mood as I start to write. And I think other writers do the same.

Very often today I feel that we as a Church are wandering in a desert without a compass, angry at our lack of leadership. We look back to the Church of the sixties and seventies, the warm, joyful celebrations, the enthusiastic communities of which we were a part, the larger-than-life shepherds who led us. What has happened, where have they gone?

The metaphor of wandering in the desert drew me to the Israelites led by Moses in the desert of Sinai for forty years. They too started out with high hopes after they had escaped from Egypt and crossed the Red Sea into Sinai. But as they pushed ahead to their ultimate goal, the Promised Land, their leaders seemed to lose their way. They rambled about aimlessly.They grumbled incessantly. They were distracted by a variety of conflicts and just bogged down in the wilderness.

If we substitute "Church" for "Israelites" the story is still the same fifty years after Vatican II. I wonder how the Israelites felt a year or even a month before they stormed Jericho. Does our frustration today match theirs? Apparently the old men who had left Egypt died off before they achieved their final goal. Must the old men, like me, who remember Vatican II, disappear before we reach our goal?

You know it really does not matter. What matters is God's will, not mine.