Vatican Radio "cleans-up" Pope's Sermon

One of the problems Pope Francis must address is the Church's relationship with the media, especially those closely associated with the Papal Court. I don't just mean the rather poisonous words of one or two Curial Archbishops who seem to want emphasise, not just a break in the Papal wardrobe with this Pope and his predecessor but real doctrinal differences. The problems seem much deeper.


Take for example yesterdays homily at the Pope's Mass, to which employees of the Vatican Bank had been invited, according to Rome Reports, the Pope made some pretty pointed remarks:

The Pope also said that the 'organizational aspects' of the Church should never be first in line. At that point, he said, the Church runs the risk of collapsing and becoming an NGO.

If you listen to the original, his unscripted weekday sermons are a bit rambling -see the RR recording of his St George's day sermon- but Vatican Radio in its English report seems to have airbrushed out these particular remarks, which, as there are strong rumours going around Rome that if the bank can't clean up its act it will be closed, seem pretty important.

As Peter above all the Apostles is given the specific role of feeding the Lord's Lambs it is important his words are reported accurately, it was precisely because his message was often distorted that Pope Benedict acted through Moto Propria and issued the texts of his teachings.

Tomas Luis Victoria: God's Composer

The BBC have a rather wonderful programme about Tomas Luis Victoria: God's Composer.
I hadn't realised St Theresa of Avila had actually written a reference for him, in fact I hadn't ralised he grew up in Avila, he seems to have been one of her many proteges. He would have associated with her other proteges like St John of the Cross, he was also a contemporary of El Greco.

In a world, even a Church, where beauty is so often held in contempt and everything seems to take on a certain uniform beigeness it is interesting to reflect on the extra-ordinary nature of the time of Victoria and his associates, his time in Rome I knew a little about, though it is hardly mentioned in the programme. He was an associate of St Philip Neri, he presumably knew St Ignatius, St Camillus de Lellis, he would have sang for and composed for St Pius V.

Holiness flourishes where there is holiness and where there is a general desire for excellence, external and internal beauty and even extravagance. The saints and artists, and saintly artists of the 16th century captured hearts and minds and formed a culture of beauty.

Do we have anything to learn from this extraordinary time, or is it just to be consigned to the museum?

A Modern George

  Sandro Magister has an account Bishop Ioan Ploscaru of the Greek-Catholic diocese of Lugo Romania who suffered for the faith through fifteen years of torture and imprisonment.

My cell was in the basement. The windows were broken, and the cell was very cold. I remained there for the whole month of December until January of 1950. The cold was torture for me. I was often taken to the interrogators at night. They would send me back and, after half an hour, I would be woken up again for another interrogation. The cold of the frozen cell consumed me. I slept very little, always with the urge to wake up again and move around. The chill came in through the broken window, leaving traces of frost on my beard and clothing. In three weeks I lost a great deal of weight. I prayed and offered all of the cold and all of the trials to the Savior. 

METHODS OF COERCION
The interrogations, like the beatings, took place right above our cell. We understood what was happening from the sounds, to which we listened in terror. Then the screams of those who were being beaten. They beat the soles of the feet with a bar of iron. The victim then had to run around if he did not want his feet to swell. The torture was repeated. Many had the bones of their feet dislocated. But heavier than a beating was isolation. They locked you in an empty cell and poured water on the cement floor. After a day or two the feet swelled and the heart could hold out no longer. The victim either fell into the water or asked to be taken out to “confess.”

Dragon Slaying Glorious Martyr

I love this altarpiece painted in honour of St George. One can dream that one day, when it is returned to the Church it might be possible to celebrate Mass before it.
It gives us the two narratives of St George, the dragon slaying, fair maiden rescuing, perfect chivalrous knight, and in the other panels the endless and painful tortures that led to him being called the "Glorious Martyr".
Dragons, speaking beasts with eyes and horns and crowns are very much part of the Apocalyptic tradition, so understanding them is no problem for us, George wrestles with beast in order to tame it, it is above all an image of the spiritual life, of the struggle that goes on within all of us until the tamed beast can be led chained into city of God.
The other panels show the various tortures George goes through before he dies for Christ, one suspects that any possible torture was added by the painter, until the whole thing becomes a catalogue of human brutality. The original story of this near eastern martyr is lost under layers of suffering upon suffering. In this sense George becomes an image of every-Martyr. His actual death is lost amid the process of enduring pain for Christ and receiving his divine reward.

It is the mythical nature of St George that I am sure made him so appealing to the medieval mind, and had him almost dropped even in England in the hyper-rational 70s. In my Paul VI breviary there is nothing except a hymn in the Propers for England an Wales.

To preach or not to preach?

I was rather taken by this headline, "Unemployed Sicilian man 'murdered his parish priest because he couldn't bear to listen to any more sermons".

I am one of those priests who preach a short sermon every day, and I suppose preach a little too long on a Sunday. I don't think I am untypical of priests around here.

But I wonder if we actually preach too much, certainly the daily sermon is modern phenonoma, even the Sunday sermon wasn't absolutely necessary before the Council, at least not at all Masses.

A friend tells me he was concelebrating with a priest and asked him to use the shorter version of the Gospel in the Lectionary, because he had rather a lot say. "Oh", said the other priest, "I'll look forward to that, I haven't heard much that is more important than the Gospel of the Lord!"

I don't tend to feel a need to preach at the Extraordinary Form.

I wonder if some priests, obviously not me, preach because they want to "control" the Word of God rather than leave it to work on the hearts of the faithful, is there a bit of mistrust here? or is it a compensation for the absence of silence? or is it insecure priests needing therapy?

Mrs T and the Fannon

One of my parishioners was up at St Paul's with the great and the good at Lady Thatchers funeral, I can't help but be a little amused by the thought of "Mrs T" preferring a privatised funeral put out to tender, but let's leave that wicked thought there.

Looking at the footage there were quite a few politicians and public figures who are not known for their Christian faith. I sympathise with the authorities at St Paul's, there is strange mixture of Church and State coming together to provide a piece of national pageantry. Now, as a nation we no longer follow the rhythms of the Christian calendar, there is a need for public celebrations of public grief and joy, and Royal weddings or funerals, or funerals like yesterday's fulfil a need.

The problem for the Cathedral authorities is how to avoid, on the one hand, merely supplying a space for a national event and on the other hand presenting something which is beyond the comprehension of those present and those viewing on the television. The answer the cathedral authorities came up with was a blend of stately ceremonial, using such signs and symbols as black vestments, unbleached candles, together music and texts that spoke of Christian hope. I know the hymns were the Baronesses choice, and presumably the use of the King James Bible, but I suspect much else was provided by the clergy in consultation with her children. As a 'bespoke' liturgy it worked well, it spoke of a Christian sense of the tragedy of Christian death and of Christian triumph over death. For all its splendour it had a simple message. For a different congregation such as group of ardent believers a more complex message might have been given.

I had a conversation with a priest friend recently and we were trying to understand the difference between Benedict and Francis and came up with the idea that Pope Benedict could speak to those who understood the significance of the pontifical dalmatic or the fannon whereas Pope Francis is speaking to people who barely understand that Christians are supposed to be good and trust in God. Hence so many journalists seemed incapable of comprehending anything Pope Benedict said but seem to latch on the Francis' baby kissing or condemnation of grumbling or tarot cards.

I am not sure how Archbishop Nichols, or more likely his successor will deal with the semi-state funeral of Tony Blair - now we have a precedent it is bound to lead to that. As Catholics we do not have the facility to strip down our liturgy (or our theology) at Requiem  Mass to the kind of service St Paul's put on yesterday. The tragedy of Christian death and of Christian triumph over death, is certainly there in a Requiem Mass but actually for a modern mixed congregation without careful explanation half of what happens - the liturgy of Eucharist - most are lost and have no idea of what is happening at the altar, and even more so at the altar rail.

So many of the people we celebrate funeral's for, both the corpse and its relatives, are very far from being Catholics in good standing, they are often like Mrs T herself in irregular marriages, with their own theology and with a morality that is far from that of the Church.

Blogs and Gossip

All means of communication are forbidden!

This seems to be what Archbishop Nichols is suggesting in a recent sermon in a Mass for Pope Francis.

Pope Francis understands this in practical terms. He has already identified two kinds of behaviour that destroy love in the Church. They are complaining and gossipping. He is a practical man. He knows that we live in a society in which complaining and gossip is a standard fare. They sell newspapers and attract us to blogs because we love hear complaints and to read gossip.

One of my parishioners used to work in a shady business were above the counter on the staff side hung a notice, which said, "The customer is always wrong!", actually it was a branch of Social Security, the Church can adopt this sort of triumphalism so easily.

His Grace, as Deacon Nick, points out is very seriously misinterpreting the Holy Father, bloggers who are hopefully within the Church are right to be a little concerned about His Grace's words following his condemnation of those who criticised his support of the Warwick Street dissident Masses with the sharp rebuke "they should hold their tongues".

Gossip is diabolic, especially when it is tinged with calumny, as Pope Francis has also pointed out. However there has been, especially over the last 40 years, a rather deliberate effort to silence any legitimate criticism of the Church whilst as Pope Benedict said "dissent" is mistaken "for a mature contribution to a balanced and wide-ranging debate". There is a certain bias in supporting those who we agree with and condemning those we disagree with.

The Church, or its leadership, should never regard itself as above criticism. We are no longer living in the age of the Inquisition, nor are we living in that time when the heirarchy could cover-up the clergy's criminal activity.Cardinal Sodano dismissed the media's reaction to sexual abuse scandals within the Church as "petty gossip". There is gossip and there is gossip, some gossip is actually necessary and a sign of health.

Fr Henry makes the comment, "some lowly Catholics further down the hierarchical system find that their "complaints" (i.e. concerns, anguishes, agonies and fears) often go unheard and unheeded - the use of the modern means of communication - including blogs - gives many a voice who are otherwise ignored. It democratises the Church in a good way but, of course, it means that those at the top are more readily held to account."

Today Pope Francis spoke about the Holy Spirit driving the Church forward and the danger of those who want to drag the Church backwards, "We don’t want to change and what’s more there are those who wish to turn the clock back.” "This is called stubbornness and wanting to tame the Holy Spirit.” The great achievement of the Second Vatican Council was to open up the Church and to recognise the legitimate pluralism within it. To go back to a time when people like Archbishop Nichols could command tongues to be held whilst at the same time permitting the Tablet to be sold at the back of his Cathedral and dissidents to lecture in his diocese is indeed a turning back of the clocks and quite contrary to everything we have seen of Pope Francis so far.