Church

Just think what tomorrow will do

On January 22, Archbishop Arthur Roche, secretary of the Congregation for Divine Worship, had a lengthy commentary in L’Osservatore Romano on the decree In Missa in Cena Domini, the official document that permitted women to be included in the rite of the washing of the feet on Maundy Thursday. Archbishop Roche, formerly bishop of Leeds in England, offers an interesting historical discussion of the rite, from its origins as a separate ceremony to its inclusion in 1955 as part of the Maundy Thursday Mass, including the gradual development of the requirement of 12 viri selecti. One statement in his commentary leapt out at us,

La lavanda dei piedi non è obbligatoria nella Missa in cena Domini. Sono i pastori a valutarne la convenienza, secondo circostanze e ragioni pastorali, in modo che non diventi quasi automatica o artificiale, priva di significato e ridotta a elemento scenico. Neppure deve diventare così importante da catalizzare tutta l’attenzione della messa nella cena del Signore, celebrata nel «giorno santissimo nel quale Gesù Cristo nostro Signore fu consegnato alla morte per noi» (Communicantes proprio del Canone romano); nelle indicazioni per l’omelia si ricorda la peculiarità di questa messa, commemorativa dell’istituzione dell’eucaristia, dell’ordine sacerdotale e del comandamento nuovo dell’amore fraterno suprema legge per tutti e verso tutti nella Chiesa.

(Emphases added.) In the partial translation at CatholicCulture.org, this is rendered,

“The washing of feet is not mandatory,” he added, and pastors should “evaluate its suitability” in their circumstances. The rite should not be “automatic or artificial, deprived of meaning,” nor should it become “so important that all the attention of the Mass” is focused on it.

There you have it, from no less a personage than the Number Two Man at the Congregation for Divine Worship: the washing of feet is not obligatory. In addition to this, one must remember that the Missa in Cena Domini is hugely important and significant, and it is so whether or not a single foot is washed; the Mass commemorates both the institution of the Eucharist and the institution of the priesthood of the New Testament. These are important things by themselves. It also opens the door to the grave solemnity of Good Friday. For this reason, Archbishop Roche suggests, the washing of feet should not become the central event in the Missa in Cena Domini. But the washing of feet has value of its own, and that value ought not to be degraded by turning the rite into an automatic chore that Father has to get through to get back to the “real part” of the Mass. And if a priest thinks that there’s a risk of either happening, then he should feel free to omit the rite altogether.

It seems to us that, whatever the washing of feet now symbolizes (we would have said that the Holy Father has chosen to emphasize the humble service aspect over the ritual cleansing as part of the institution of the priesthood, but Fr. John Hunwicke disagrees with that), it is better emphasized outside of the Missa in Cena Domini. Some pastors will likely choose to omit the rite, but we don’t see why it needs to go that far. We have written—and written and written—about the importance of the Divine Office, particularly public celebrations of the Divine Office. Perhaps a priest could arrange for a celebration of Tenebrae to be followed immediately by the washing of feet. (With breakfast following in the parish hall afterward.) Or he could arrange for the celebration of vespers in the afternoon, followed by the washing of feet. (With a light supper following in the parish hall afterward to fortify Father and others for the evening’s liturgy.) One could get fairly creative about these things and come up with services that manage to point up whatever it is that the washing of feet now symbolizes. (Mercy? Humble service?)

One can speculate as to why Pius XII felt compelled to move the washing of feet rite to the Missa in Cena Domini (we suspect that his advisers wanted to get laity inside the communion rail as part of a broader project), but there’s no reason, really, why that has to be the case.

The Holy Father limits lack of faith as a ground for nullity

Yesterday, the Holy Father gave his annual address to the Roman Rota. These speeches tend to be combinations of pep talks for the Rota as it begins its new term and careful discussions of points of law by the pope. Accordingly, these speeches are very important sources for the interpretation of canon law. The speeches, for example, of St. John Paul II are hugely important sources on matrimonial law, given that John Paul addressed, over the course of years, quite a few thorny questions on the subject. We had hoped that the Holy Father would address Mitis iudex Dominus Iesus, the Holy Father’s motu proprio reforming matrimonial cases, which, for now, is his most important contribution to the Church’s law. We were not disappointed.

One question arising from Mitis iudex has been to what extent is lack of faith a ground for nullity. Recall that article 14 § 1 of the Ratio Procedendi annexed to Mitis iudex states:

Inter rerum et personarum adiuncta quae sinunt causam nullitatis matrimonii ad tramitem processus brevioris iuxta cann. 1683-1687 pertractari, recensentur exempli gratia: is fidei defectus qui gignere potest simulationem consensus vel errorem voluntatem determinantem, brevitas convictus coniugalis, abortus procuratus ad vitandam procreationem, permanentia pervicax in relatione extraconiugali tempore nuptiarum vel immediate subsequenti, celatio dolosa sterilitatis vel gravis infirmitatis contagiosae vel filiorum ex relatione praecedenti vel detrusionis in carcerem, causa contrahendi vitae coniugali omnino extranea vel haud praevisa praegnantia mulieris, violentia physica ad extorquendum consensum illata, defectus usus rationis documentis medicis comprobatus, etc.

(Emphasis supplied.) In the Vatican’s official translation, this is rendered,

Among the circumstances of things and persons that can allow a case for nullity of marriage to be handled by means of the briefer process according to cann. 1683-1687, are included, for example: the defect of faith which can generate simulation of consent or error that determines the will; a brief conjugal cohabitation; an abortion procured to avoid procreation; an obstinate persistence in an extraconjugal relationship at the time of the wedding or immediately following it; the deceitful concealment of sterility, or grave contagious illness, or children from a previous relationship, or incarcerations; a cause of marriage completely extraneous to married life, or consisting of the unexpected pregnancy of the woman, physical violence inflicted to extort consent, the defect of the use of reason which is proved by medical documents, etc.

(Emphasis supplied.) Now, obviously, article 14 § 1 refers to situations that “can allow a case for nullity to be handled” according to the processus brevior. But there has been some concern that article 14 § 1 also sets forth grounds for nullity. (To put it another way, article 14 § 1 sets forth some “red flags” for cases to be transferred to the processus brevior, and thus those “red flags” have been seen by some as grounds of manifest nullity (cf. can. 1683, 2º.) And these new grounds would include, of course, lack of faith. In fact, the criterion of lack of faith has been offered as a justification for the argument that half of all marriages are null, a sentiment that has been attributed to the Holy Father.

In his speech to the Rota, the Holy Father offers a refreshing correction to that idea,

È bene ribadire con chiarezza che la qualità della fede non è condizione essenziale del consenso matrimoniale, che, secondo la dottrina di sempre, può essere minato solo a livello naturale (cfr CIC, can. 1055 § 1 e 2). Infatti, l’habitus fidei è infuso nel momento del Battesimo e continua ad avere influsso misterioso nell’anima, anche quando la fede non è stata sviluppata e psicologicamente sembra essere assente. Non è raro che i nubendi, spinti al vero matrimonio dall’instinctus naturae, nel momento della celebrazione abbiano una coscienza limitata della pienezza del progetto di Dio, e solamente dopo, nella vita di famiglia, scoprano tutto ciò che Dio Creatore e Redentore ha stabilito per loro. Le mancanze della formazione nella fede e anche l’errore circa l’unità, l’indissolubilità e la dignità sacramentale del matrimonio viziano il consenso matrimoniale soltanto se determinano la volontà (cfr CIC, can. 1099). Proprio per questo gli errori che riguardano la sacramentalità del matrimonio devono essere valutati molto attentamente.

(Emphasis supplied.) In the translation available from Rorate Caeli, in the context of an article by Antonio Socci, this is rendered,

It is a good thing to reiterate that quality of faith is not an essential condition for matrimonial consent, which, according to perennial doctrine, may be undermined only on the natural level (cfr CIC, can. 1055 § 1 e 2). Indeed, the habitus fidei is infused at the moment of Baptism and continues to have a mysterious influx in the soul, even when faith has not been developed and seems psychologically to be absent. It is not rare that those preparing for marriage, induced into a true marriage by instinctus naturae, at the time of the celebration have a limited awareness of the fullness of God’s plan, and only afterwards, in family life, discover all that God [Our] Creator and Redeemer has established for them. The lack of formation in the faith and also the error about unity, the indissolubility and the sacramental dignity of marriage vitiate marriage consent only if it is determined by the will (cfr CIC, can. 1099). For this reason the errors regarding the sacramentality of marriage must be evaluated very carefully.

(Emphases and italics added.) (We think that there’s an error in translation, both with our limited Italian skills and from looking at the English portion of Mitis iudex, in the second emphasized passage. Check out the linked translation at Rorate.) It seems to us that the Holy Father moves here to explicitly reject the broad interpretation of Mitis iudex that lack of faith or lack of formation in the faith constitutes ipso facto a ground for nullity.

Women now included (lawfully) in the Washing of the Feet

Today, the Vatican has released a letter from the Holy Father to Cardinal Sarah, prefect of the Congregation for Divine Worship, and a decree of the Congregation, In Missa in Cena Domini, both to the same effect: women may now be lawfully included in the ceremony of the washing of feet on Maundy Thursday. The Holy Father had previously included women in the rites he personally celebrated, but the liturgical law of the Church had still referred to viri selecti. And so, for the past couple of years, as Maundy Thursday came around, there would be a little debate about whether it was proper for rank-and-file priests to follow the Holy Father’s lead, notwithstanding the rubrics in the Missale Romanum. (One’s answer depended largely on one’s ideological orientation.) New Liturgical Movement has translated the relevant portions of the Holy Father’s letter and Cardinal Sarah’s decree implementing the Holy Father’s wishes.

As you might imagine, traditionally minded Catholics have noticed.

The current rites for the washing of feet, as Cardinal Sarah’s decree notes, really go back to 1955, when the Sacred Congregation for Rites handed down Maxima redemptionis, the decree reforming the entire Holy Week liturgy. And, as even casual observers of the liturgy know, the 1955 Holy Week reforms were a sign of things to come. First, the 1962 Missale Romanum of St. John XXIII, then the various post-Conciliar revisions to the liturgy, culminating, of course, in the 1970 Missale Romanum of Bl. Paul VI. So, really, in a sense, today’s decree is simply another milestone along the road that began all the way back in 1955. However, given the connection between the washing of feet by Christ and the priesthood, it is not an insignificant milestone. The argument is already making the rounds that this weakens one of the symbolic justifications for the all-male priesthood. While Ordinatio sacerdotalis remains an essentially infallible pronouncement, given the haste and glee with which other aspects of John Paul’s magisterium have been dismantled, we are not altogether sure that Ordinatio sacerdotalis is an impregnable fortress against the innovators. So, while we are not as given to alarmism as some are, we do not wholly discount their warnings.

We do not see any indication of whether this decree is to have effect for the Forma Extraordinaria. The Holy Father did not mention it specifically in his letter and the decree did not mention it, either. Recall that the Instruction Universae Ecclesiae, which implemented more particularly Summorum Pontificum, and which remains in full force and effect, provides (no. 24) that “[t]he liturgical books of the forma extraordinaria are to be used as they are. All those who wish to celebrate according to the forma extraordinaria of the Roman Rite must know the pertinent rubrics and are obliged to follow them correctly.” (Italics in original.) Thus, it seems to us that, in the Forma Extraordinaria, the washing of feet is limited to men, but in the Forma Ordinaria, the washing of feet may include both men and women. (Father Hunwicke notes that, in both forms, the rite is limited to Christians even under today’s decree, though the Holy Father’s personal practice usually includes Muslims.) One imagines that Archbishop Pozzo will have to release some statement from Ecclesia Dei before Maundy Thursday this year, lest real confusion take hold.

Of course, we note the usual consternation from traditionally minded Catholics—though, if our instincts are right, and this change does not affect the Forma Extraordinaria, it is unlikely that traditionally minded Catholics will be affected by the change—and we anticipate that there will be more consternation over the subject. However, this practice, illicit though it was, has existed for some time in Novus Ordo parishes. The Holy Father has made it lawful, but he certainly hasn’t made it up for the first time. The real issue, as New Catholic notes at Rorate Caeli, is that this appears to be essentially an irreformable act. The Holy Father’s reform on this point is “so great and symbolic no successor of his could ever overturn [it].” (Practically speaking. Legally speaking, his successor could abrogate the decree as soon as he walks back inside from the Urbi et Orbi.)

It falls like tears, like wasted years

At Rorate Caeli, there is a very lengthy, very interesting piece about the probability of a unified date for Easter. The author’s assessment: nil. In short, the Church of Rome has long insisted upon the Gregorian calendar for the date for Easter, and the Orthodox churches have long insisted on the Julian calendar. While there have been favorable noises from both the Holy Father and the Ecumenical Patriarch about a unified date for Easter, the Moscow Patriarchate, which does not take orders from the Ecumenical Patriarch, to put it mildly, prefers the retention of the status quo. And if Moscow doesn’t go along, the proposal will be dead in the water in Constantinople—dead in the Bosphorus, as it were. Read the whole thing there.

We add briefly that the talk of a unified Easter seemed to come out of nowhere, and that the mentions we saw were awfully enthusiastic. While ecumenical dialogue is one of the great loves of the Church after Vatican II, it should be noted that very few results are actually achieved. Certainly, enthusiastic joint statements, lengthy joint declarations about shared beliefs and stumbling blocks to full communion, and the like are regularly produced, but, as far as results in the ut unum sint sense, well, that’s another story. And the Rorate Caeli piece shows why: ecumenical dialogue involves not only the Church and her doctrine but also the other institution and its doctrine. In this case, the Orthodox have a long, complex history about their calendar preferences. And a surge of ecumenical enthusiasm is not likely to overcome those preferences.

I was shocked to find what was allowed

Recently, a sharp Catholic woman of our acquaintance inquired whether St. Alphonsus Liguori had held that a parent with the care of children was dispensed from the obligation to hear Mass. Others noted that the great Doctor Zelantissimus addresses the subject in Theologia Moralis III.3.3.5 where he holds, essentially, that mothers who do not have a safe place to leave their infants or who cannot bring their children to church without causing a notable disturbance, are excused from attending Mass. Of course, if there’s a parent with whom the children may safely be left while the other attends Mass, one imagines that the relaxation tightens back up pretty quickly.

This subject has been on our mind over the past few days, given the exchange between Tommy Tighe at Aleteia and Steve Skojec at One Peter Five. Tighe makes the points, not wholly novel, that (1) he knows his kids are messy and distracting and (2) the woman who rebuked him was being un-Christian and thereby missed an opportunity to improve the state of her own soul by rising above the distraction. Or something. He also suggested that, well, he didn’t know what was in that woman’s life that led her to rebuke him. (Maybe she’s infertile! Maybe they’re each other’s crosses to bear! Or something.) Skojec, perhaps predictably, was having none of this, and responded point by point to Tighe. He also updated his post, moderating the snark a little bit, but standing by the substance of his argument. But the thrust of the discussion is this: how do parents deal with potentially loud, usually messy children at Church? (Especially in Forma Extraordinaria parishes, where there are certain norms of conduct that are usually a little more stringent than what’s going on at the “contemporary choir” Mass.)

This is not the first go-round on this debate, either, though this may be the first time that Tighe and Skojec have been the disputants. (We don’t know, though. We are more familiar with Skojec’s commentary on other issues in the Church and we had not heard of Tighe before now. Perhaps we ought to pay more attention.)

And the easy answer, of course, would be to point to St. Alphonsus and say, well, if you can’t leave the children at home safely and if you’re pretty sure that they’re going to cause a major disturbance, then you are excused from hearing Mass. Of course, parents who can watch children in shifts can surely safely leave their children at home. But, as the Holy Father and the Synod of Bishops have reminded us repeatedly in recent months, there are all manner of families that have suffered injuries and no longer have both parents living under the same roof. And, even then, the inquiry is not as straightforward as one might first imagine. That is, whether one can more safely leave children at home than in Alphonsus’s time and whether children are less likely to raise a ruckus than in Alphonsus’s time are open questions—though we suspect, with respect to the latter question, that toddlers’ ruckuses are probably pretty comparable across the years.

But, we wonder to what extent do we owe it to each other to help out? (Cf. Gal. 5:14.) When our acquaintance raised the issue, our first thought was that it would be nice if suitable men and women without children offered to help out. (Suitability is obviously an important criterion in all this, and that cannot be understated.) For example, if a couple without children at home habitually attended the vigil Mass on Saturday night, it would be awfully nice of them to offer to watch their neighbor’s toddler while he heard Mass on Sunday morning. Or vice versa, if an unmarried woman without children habitually heard Mass on Sunday mornings but rarely made plans for Saturday evenings that would conflict with the vigil Mass, she might offer to watch the neighbor’s children while their mother heard the vigil Mass. There are any number of permutations to the arrangement. Such an offer may well obtain graces for the men and women who help out or serve as penitential offerings, in addition to potentially obtaining the Jubilee Indulgence attached by the Holy Father to all the physical and corporal works of mercy during the Year of Mercy.

But more than that, it seems to us that this sort of cooperative childcare arrangement, which, for all we know, happens in almost every parish in Christendom (except, seemingly, our own), is exactly the sort of thing that helps build the sort of community that Rod Dreher has talked about at staggering length in recent years. You know, the so-called Benedict Option. While we disagree with Dreher about some of the particulars of his idea, not the least of which is the fact that you need a priest willing to play along, we certainly do not dispute the basic contention that Christians need to form tighter-knit communities to deal effectively with an increasingly hostile culture. This goes double for traditionally minded Catholics who are usually, to quote Magazine’s 1978 single, shot by both sides. But it seems to us that a sense that the world has moved into another, more aggressive phase in its doomed campaign against Christ and Christ’s Church is probably not the sort of thing that really knits a community together. But a tradition of charity, especially when it takes the form of looking after each other’s children, seems like the sort of thing that just might do the trick.

Of course, justice, whether it’s distributive or commutative, consists of giving each person his due. (E.g., ST IIa IIae q.58 a.1 obj. 1 & co.; q.61 a.2 co.) By those lights, maybe the arrangement we have discussed above isn’t justice—that is, maybe we don’t owe each other this sort of cooperation, though certainly one could find precedents for it throughout the life of the Church and the life of Christendom before things went off the rails—but if it’s charity, it seems like the sort of charity that seems like it would serve the common good of the community tremendously. And, even if one isn’t interested in forming a tight-knit community of Christians in any given setting, it’s the sort of charity that may well make common life a little smoother. Instead of getting shirty with the parent of a rambunctious brood or making comments in a stage whisper about those ill-bred children, it may well be good for the life of the parish to offer politely to sit with the children at home next week while the parent hears Mass. (And to provide one’s references!)

 

If you called your dad, he could stop it all

At the Catholic Herald, Damian Thompson has a very interesting piece about Father Benedict, the cloistered monk of the Mater Ecclesiae monastery in Rome, who is world famous for his great personal devotion to St. Celestine V. We have said—and said and said—that Benedict is the most interesting man in the Church today. Thompson offers a question-and-answer format. A couple of examples:

1. Why did Benedict XVI resign? This is regarded by many commentators as the greatest mystery in recent Church history. Not by me, however. The simple answer to the question is that the Pope felt that, at his age and with his health beginning to give way, he wasn’t up to the job. This isn’t a complete answer, because there are things we can’t know. If you’re looking for a “final straw”, then you can take your pick between the VatiLeaks affair, the machinations of Benedict’s enemies and the pope’s creeping awareness that he was losing his powers of concentration. Maybe he had a fit of despair brought on by the realisation that he’d inherited the papacy too late to implement long-term reforms while firefighting paedophile and financial scandals. If Ratzinger had become pope at 75, these challenges would have been less terrifying. He didn’t because St John Paul II insisted on holding office while incapacitated – the first pontiff to do so for a very long time. Perhaps this persuaded Benedict to take the plunge. I doubt that we shall ever know, so let’s move on.

2) Would Benedict have resigned if he knew Francis would succeed him? Purely hypothetical but interesting. Benedict must have known there was a chance that Cardinal Bergoglio would succeed him. My guess is that when the Argentinian emerged on the balcony the Pope Emeritus was dismayed but concluded that God works in mysterious ways. A more interesting, albeit even more hypothetical, question is whether Benedict would have resigned if he’d known Francis would call a synod that threw open the question of whether divorced and remarried Catholics should receive Communion.

(Emphasis in original.) For longtime observers of Church politics—especially the politics surrounding the Vatileaks I scandal, the Holy Father’s election, and the 2014-2015 Synod—the piece may not contain any bombshells. However, as a source to point people to, the piece is hard to beat.

For our part, the most interesting thing about the Pope Emeritus’s retirement is that he has, seemingly, maintained his silence on matters of pressing concern to the Church. In particular, Benedict is unlikely to have missed the fact that there are those who seek to dismantle many of the accomplishments of John Paul’s reign—accomplishments that he played no small part in, especially from 1981, when he became prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith. When the Kasperites and their friends in the Synod secretariat go on about what Familiaris consortio meant or didn’t mean, they apparently forget that John Paul promulgated the exhortation at almost the same time that he named Ratzinger prefect (November 1981). It is likely that the exhortation came up in conversation between John Paul and his closest doctrinal collaborator. And, certainly, the subsequent skirmishes over communion for bigamists involved Ratzinger intimately.

Were we in the Pope Emeritus’s shoes, we would scarcely be able to resist taking to the air to correct certain misstatements and misquotations. But, of course, that is probably why we are not in the Pope Emeritus’s shoes.

Should I be fractured by your lack of devotion?

We have read at Rorate Caeli—and elsewhere, we think—that the next Synod of Bishops is to take up the question of married Latin-rite clergy. (Among other questions.) Rorate tells us that Sandro Magister reports that a dearth of priests in some parts of South America, and Germany’s age-old obsession with innovation in the direction of, say, the liberal Lutherans, will be the thin end (thin ends?) of the wedge this time. But of course.

And Fr. John Hunwicke tells us what’s really at issue here:

Be in no doubt: the call for Married Priests is but a surrogate and a tactical preliminary for the real battle: the struggle for the admission of women to Holy Order.

Women Priests; and Abortion; and Dissolution of the bonds between Sexuality, Matrimony and Fertility; are the unholy and inglorious Triad with which the Enemy at this particular historical moment plots the de radicibus destruction of the whole state of Christ’s Church militant here in Earth. People who can’t see that are a major part of the problem.

Believe me, I know. I’ve spent most of my life as an Anglican; and we refugees from Old Mother Damnable know exactly how these things are managed. The tools include Gradualism (give people time to get used to the idea: if you spring things on them too abruptly they might discover that they have principles). And Dialogue (“We just want our voices, our experiences to be heard; why can’t we all just talk?”). 

At the heart of it is getting the whole jigsaw complete except for just that one last piece … which now so easily and so naturally slips into its allotted slot.

(Emphasis and colors in original.) The problem, of course, with this plan is Ordinatio sacerdotalis, which has generally been seen as an infallible pronouncement. But have no fear: the infallibility of Ordinatio sacerdotalis, as Cardinal Ratzinger pointed out in his doctrinal commentary on the Profession of Faith required by Ad tuendam Fidem, stems from the fact that the limitation of ordination to men has been set forth infallibly by the Church’s ordinary and universal Magisterium, not an exercise of the pope’s extraordinary Magisterium (as governed by Pastor aeternus). Ah, they’ll say, John Paul never proclaimed it as a dogma! Even Ratzinger said so! It’s up for debate!

This, of course, is in keeping with what Raymond Cardinal Burke has identified, correctly, as part of the obliteration of John Paul’s pontificate. Remember that the tendentious misquotation (or partial quotation) of John Paul’s Familiaris consortio is one of the key pillars of the Kasperites’ argument. In a recent interview with The Wanderer, Cardinal Burke observed:

I was truly disheartened that the final report stopped short of presenting the full teaching of Familiaris Consortio in the matter. First of all, the truth as presented by St. John Paul II in Familiaris Consortio was misrepresented in the Synod’s document as was the truth as illustrated and underlined in the Pontifical Council’s document. That in itself discouraged me very much, especially in consideration of the fact that it was done at the level of a Synod of Bishops.

At the same time, I was also disturbed because I knew this would be used by individuals like Fr. Spadaro and others to say that the Church has changed her teaching in this regard, which, in fact, is simply not true.

I really believe that the whole teaching in Familiaris Consortio should have been addressed through the final document of the Synod. During my experience of the 2014 Extraordinary Synod of Bishops, it was as if Pope John Paul II never existed. If one studies the Synod’s final document, the richness of the magisterial teaching of Familiaris Consortio, which is such a beautiful document, is not there.

(Emphasis and some formatting supplied.) And, really, that seems to be what the last few years have been—a forgetting, one way or another, of John Paul’s pontificate.

Obviously, John Paul’s teachings are hugely inconvenient to the progressives—especially his teachings about birth control, priestly ordination, and divorce and remarriage, to say nothing of his Rotal jurisprudence (which most progressives probably don’t know too well)—but orthodoxy usually is. The desire to obliterate John Paul’s memory, while raising him to the altars and recalling the extraordinary scenes that accompanied him wherever he went, seems to go beyond that, however.

What was it about John Paul, then, that provokes such a desire to forget him?

Further dialogue with the Anglicans in the shadow of schism?

Edward Pentin also has a very interesting piece about the Anglican conference in Canterbury. He begins,

The Anglican Communion stands on the verge of formal schism this week, as its leaders began meeting today to discuss the issue of homosexuality and other matters in Canterbury, England.

The five-day meeting, called by Archbishop of Canterbury Justin Welby, is seen as a last-ditch attempt to keep the ecclesial community together following a long-running dispute over homosexuality and deeper differences over how Anglicans should interact with today’s largely secular, post-Christian society.

(Emphasis supplied.) We, of course, are interested in this as the Anglican church is an interesting topic. Not being Anglican or a member of one of the Ordinariates, we would not however say we have a rooting interest one way or the other. Except with respect to this point:

The Vatican, meanwhile, is watching events in Canterbury closely. It argues that, for dialogue between Rome and Canterbury to effectively continue, the Anglican Communion must stay as one, but it recognizes that its dispersed authority model makes that an almost impossible task. It is perplexed at Anglicans’ wish to allow local and regional bishops to decide on doctrinal matters without seemingly having a sense of what is owed to the communion as a whole, but recognizes that Welby is not, as he has said himself, an “Anglican pope.”

(Emphasis supplied.) Wait, what?

We were under the impression that the Anglicans drew a bold line through, not under, further dialogue with Rome when they went forward with making some women bishops. One can get into Apostolicae curae and whether Anglican orders were ever valid—the good and holy Pope Leo XIII reached his own conclusion, notwithstanding contrary views—but it’s not really necessary now. Whatever you’d have to do about women presbyters (and Rome’s answer is simple but perhaps hard to sell to the female ministers), you’d have to do about women bishops and the presbyters they ordained, man or woman.

Which is, of course, to say that whether there is one Anglican communion or a Canterbury Group and a GAFCON, the question is not whether Rome can conduct dialogue with all Anglicans. It can’t. The question is whether Rome can conduct fruitful dialogue with some Anglican jurisdictions. And that’s a harder question to answer, as it seems that the GAFCON jurisdictions take the protestant and reformed bits of the Anglican identity somewhat more seriously than the Canterbury side of the line of scrimmage. On the other hand, it is good to see that Rome is taking the Anglican crisis seriously, since the Anglican crisis could expose some of the potential fault lines within the Church. But one doubts that that is the message that they’re taking away from all this.

Obviously, it would be good if the Anglicans returned to full communion with Peter, but dialogue is a two-way street.

A fresh shipment of tea leaves

The Holy Father has a new book out tomorrow—a lengthy interview or series of interviews with Andrea Tornielli called The Name of God Is Mercy—and Edward Pentin has some extracts at the National Catholic Register. We found this passage particularly interesting, largely because almost no one talks about John Paul I these days:

The Holy Father also remembers being touched by the writings of his predecessor Pope John Paul I, Albino Luciani. “There is the homily when Albino Luciani said he had been chosen because the Lord preferred that certain things not be engraved in bronze or marble but in the dust, so that if the writing had remained, it would have been clear that the merit was all and only God’s. He, the bishop and future Pope John Paul I, called himself ‘dust’.”

“I have to say that when I speak of this, I always think of what Peter told Jesus on the Sunday of his resurrection, when he met him on his own, a meeting hinted at in the Gospel of Luke. What might Peter have said to the Messiah upon his resurrection from the tomb? Might he have said that he felt like a sinner? He must have thought of his betrayal, of what had happened a few days earlier when he pretended three times not to recognise Jesus in the courtyard of the High Priest’s house. He must have thought of his bitter and public tears.”

“If Peter did all of that, if the gospels describe his sin and denials to us, and if despite all this Jesus said [to him], ‘tend my sheep’ (John 21), I don’t think we should be surprised if his successors describe themselves as sinners. It is nothing new.”

(Quotation marks in original.) However, we suspect, since the anticipation is that the Holy Father will issue his post-Synodal exhortation sometime this year, that The Name of God Is Mercy will be read and re-read for hints, if one needs or even wants further hints, on the Holy Father’s inclination on the Kasperite proposal. It is our understanding, however, that the interviews took place prior to the Ordinary General Assembly in October 2015, so we wonder if the book has been tweaked or edited to reflect any shifts in the Holy Father’s thinking since then.

Vespers at Hampton Court Palace on Feb. 9

Late last week, the Catholic Herald reported that vespers will be sung in the Chapel Royal at Cardinal Wolsey’s great Hampton Court Palace for the first time since the English reformation. From the Herald,

On Tuesday February 9 Cardinal Vincent Nichols will celebrate Vespers in King Henry VIII’s chapel.

The Vespers, at Hampton Court Palace’s Chapel Royal, will be celebrated in the Latin Rite and the Anglican Bishop of London will deliver a sermon.

The service will be dedicated to St John the Baptist, as the Chapel Royal was built by Cardinal Wolsey on the site of a chapel of the Knights of St John Hospitaller, dedicated to that saint.

The music will be performed by Harry Christophers and his ensembles The Sixteen and Genesis Sixteen.

Before Vespers is celebrated, Cardinal Nichols and the Bishop of London will host a discussion on the bonds between their churches and the dialogue they have had over the centuries.

(Emphasis supplied.)

We suspect that the point of this service is not to sing vespers in a Catholic rite at the Chapel Royal, but to provide an edifying and pleasant liturgical framework for a Catholic-Anglican prayer service in the aftermath of the meeting of Anglican primates this month. Had we been asked, we might have suggested bringing in some Benedictines from Farnborough to sing vespers according to the traditional Benedictine rite, which would be, for the most part, very familiar to Henry VIII, Cardinal Wolsey, and the rest of the men and women who made Hampton Court Palace so famous. It would also be a nice way of nodding to the long, rich history of the Benedictines in England.