The Sermon I Did Not Give
...But Wished I HadMy dear friends in Jesus Christ,
I am not a member of the Latin Mass Society nor do I celebrate the old Mass these days but I do have the opportunity of reading your excellent magazine on a regular basis. I know that on occasion you have asked for articles from priests and you promise absolute confidentiality. Recently, and quite unexpectedly, I was moved from my previous parish to this present one and I was most unhappy with what I found. I decided to prepare my first sermon with the intention of making my position perfectly clear from the outset and setting right a few wrongs. I enclose a copy of the thoughts I had intended to relay to my new parishioners but, sadly, I did not deliver - I leave it to you to guess why.Should you decide to publish these thoughts then I would ask for absolute confidentiality - in fact whether you publish them or not. You will appreciate also that I have changed the names of the parishes.
Father Anon.
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I was very surprised to receive the phone call from my bishop in which he informed me that I would be taking over here at St. Joseph's. I thought I would be seeing out my days in my previous parish of Our Lady of the Rosary and had, I must admit, settled a little bit for a quiet life until retirement. It was such a surprise that I was grateful for the four weeks sabbatical he granted me before coming here so that I could catch my breath, as it were, and gird my loins (to use the biblical phrase) for the unexpected task ahead of me. Those four weeks have proved invaluable to me, as I will explain shortly.
Can I just begin, in this my first sermon to you, by saying that my priestly life has been full of unexpected surprises - many pleasant and some less so. As a young man I received a call from God and, with His grace, I responded with my vocation and, in the fullness of time, I was ordained; ordained to serve God and His faithful in obedience to our Holy Father and our bishop and the laws of the Church.
The servants of the servants.
Did you know that one of the Pope's titles is the Servant of the Servants of God? Isn't that a wonderful name for our Holy Father? I suppose, if one follows the logic of this and consider that in the hierarchy we have the Pope, then the cardinals, then the archbishops, and then the bishops, it puts us humble parish priests way down the pecking order. We are, I suppose, the servants of the servants of the servants of the servants of the Servant of the Servants of God. The point I am trying to make here is that we all owe obedience to somebody, even our Holy Father at the top of the tree is still obedient to God and the laws of the Church.But I am digressing. As I said before, I found the four weeks leave between my former parish and this one to have been a great blessing. It gave me time to think. When I was ordained in the 1950s, life in the Church was much different to what it is today. Many of you here will know what I mean. There was greater obedience, and respect, and order, and, if I may use the word, greater piety. Things were much more clear-cut and we took our faith for granted. We were born into the Church, we received our first Holy Communion, we were confirmed, we got married in church (not me, of course), we raised our children in the faith, and then in the fullness of time we were buried by the Church. Perhaps we were too blasé, too set in our ways, and maybe we did need to be shaken up a little to make us realise that in our faith we possessed the pearl of great price but had taken it too much for granted.
So when the Second Vatican Council came along we were surprised, but not too concerned, as we maybe needed to be shaken up a bit and rejuvenated in our faith. Now this is where the surprises started. Where we had expected some degree of change we were, in the main, if I may speak on behalf of my brother priests, taken aback at some of the things we were instructed to do. But as we had taken a vow of obedience at our ordination we had to see things through as best we could. I won't dwell too much on these things because most of you - I can see very few youngsters here today - will know what I am talking about.
Bombarded incessantly with instructions.
For the past 30 years then, we have been bombarded with instructions from the 'experts' telling us what to do, when to do it, how to do it, why we must do it, and what the results of all this activity would be. The only things they didn't tell us was how much it would cost, who would pay for it, and what to do if anything went wrong. But that's experts for you, full of grand theories and big ideas, lots of rose-tinted spectacles, but often no practical common sense.Anyway, as I was saying, we were bombarded incessantly with all these instructions that in the end we didn't know whether we were coming or going. Sadly, as events have showed us, many of the faithful, both clergy and laity, were going. Most of you will have seen those little white mice trapped inside the spinning wheels and the faster the poor wee mouse runs, the faster the wheel spins. Probably the only time the wheel stops is when the poor mouse drops dead or someone physically removes the mouse from the trap. You may be surprised to hear me say it but I feel that, in giving me four weeks sabbatical, my bishop has unknowingly removed me from the wheel of perpetual motion. I have been able to relax, to draw breath, to take a step backwards and see a wider view, and, most importantly, to put things in their proper perspective.
By now, my dear friends, you may well be wondering what is coming next. Well. I'll tell you. As I said just a few minutes ago, there is a hierarchical structure in the Church, from God downwards, to which a parish priest must be obedient. There has been so much turmoil over the years that this once-clear structure of obedience has been obscured. In my four weeks sabbatical I have spent all my time reading, consulting, and deciding, and have arrived at some very clear conclusions. You may be surprised at what I am about to say; some of you may be pleased, and some of you may be disappointed and perhaps annoyed. I am prepared for all reactions. I would also say at this point that I have all the factual evidence I need to back up my decisions and this will be available to anyone who wishes to see it.
Obviously, in a sermon, I do not have the time to go into great details about my decisions but I do intend, after this initial statement of intent, to preach in more detail on each topic over the next few weeks.
We have to decide our priorities.
I have taken, as my first point of reference, the actual documents of Vatican II, which clearly indicate the wishes of the Fathers of the Church at that time, and secondly, the personal statements of Popes Paul VI and John Paul II. These documents take absolute priority over any other instructions from the innumerable self-styled experts that have sprung up like mushrooms over the past 35 years or so. I couldn't help thinking, as I wrote those words, that mushrooms thrive best in darkness and it seems to me that many of our experts have thrived somewhat in the dark in that most of us have no idea who they are. What we have to do is decide our priorities and who it is to whom we must be obedient.The Sanctuary: This was re-ordered at great expense some years ago. I make no critical comment about this as I did the same thing in my previous parish ten years ago. Rather belatedly, I found that the Council's document on the liturgy makes no mention of re-ordering sanctuaries, a point recently confirmed by Cardinal Ratzinger, the Prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, who said that sanctuary changes " cannot, however, be said to have been required by the legislation of the Church." I can only confess that I was misled. I do not wish to impose further expense on you, you are burdened enough, but I have decided to restore the tabernacle immediately to the high altar. In addition, I will be adding a small step, a footpace, around the altar that will have the effect of raising the altar of Our Blessed Lord, once again, to the highest place on the sanctuary. Also, I have found the altar rails in a cellar in the presbytery and I intend to restore these as soon as they have been cleaned. When this is done I will return to the practice of distributing Holy Communion along the altar rails. You will the have the opportunity to kneel or stand as you wish.
Mass facing the people: There is no mention in any document of Mass being celebrated facing the people and, in fact, the rubrics in the Missal of Pope Paul VI actually instructs the priest to turn and face the people at certain points. We priests just went along with the fashion. I hope you understand that it is very difficult to stand alone when, as they say, everyone is doing it. I intend to be faithful to the Missal of Paul VI and return to celebrating Mass facing the east, as it still done, for example, in Brompton Oratory in London which, perhaps, attracts the biggest congregations in the country. Please do not think I am turning my back on you; we will, in fact, all be facing the east towards the risen Christ symbolised by the rising sun, as we did when I was ordained and as priests had done for nearly 2,000 years. No one ever complained years ago that the people in the pew in front of them had their backs to them. Actually, it's a nonsense when you think about it, because the only people who weren't looking at anyone's back were those who were in the front pew. The Mass will be celebrated strictly according to the rubrics and, therefore, I will be discontinuing the children's liturgy and the liturgy committee.
Latin: This one is much more difficult. You may be surprised to learn that Latin is still the official language of the Church and that Vatican II ordered that (and I quote) "the use of the Latin language is to be preserved in the Latin rites." As for the vernacular, the Council said it 'may' be used in readings, directives, and 'some' prayers and chants. Why, then, has Latin gone? I don't know. Why is Latin no longer taught in our seminaries or schools? don't know. Too much happened in the 1960s for anyone at parish level to keep pace with. We, the priests and people, were simply swamped and overrun with documents, decrees, and directives, and we were misled into believing that everyone else in the wider Church was welcoming the changes with open arms. The reality, however, is that we were all deceived but by the time we realised this, the Catholic world had changed out of all recognition. In an attempt to recover some of the ground and be obedient to the Council and to Pope Paul VI and John Paul II I intend to resume the traditional Latin Benediction every Sunday evening and I ask for volunteers to form a small choir to learn some basic chants and Mass settings such as the Missa de Angelis that many of you will remember.
Extraordinary ministers. A number of you have been very active in this role and everyone is grateful for your commitment to your parish. Permission for the use of these ministers was originally given only for use in the mission lands where priests are few and their parishes, if one can call them that, cover hundreds of square miles. It was never intended for parishes such as ours but, like many of these things in recent years, what was to be the exception became the norm. In an attempt to rectify this situation Pope John Paul II and the heads of eight Vatican congregations issued a document in November 1997 with the rather lengthy title of 'Instruction On Certain Questions Regarding the Collaboration of the Non-Ordained faithful in the Sacred Ministry of Priests." This was approved 'in forma specifica' by the Holy Father. This means that he has read and approved every single word. In it he says, "Extraordinary ministers may distribute Holy Communion at Eucharistic celebrations only when there are no ordained ministers present or when those ordained ministers are truly unable to distribute Holy Communion." He then states that extraordinary ministers may only be used when there are particularly large numbers of the faithful and the celebration would be excessively prolonged. A copy of this document will be pinned at the back of the church. In obedience to the Holy Father I intend to retain only two extraordinary ministers and these will be required only on very special occasions. I am sure that you will all agree that we must be obedient to the Holy Father.
Altar servers: I know that permission has been given for female altar servers and we have two in this parish. You are all aware that there is a shortage of young men in our seminaries training for the priesthood and something must be done to rectify this. I believe that, generally speaking, good priests often come from good altar boys. Therefore, I will be recruiting no more girls to be altar servers and I intend to take personal charge of instructing our servers from now on. I will also be restoring the traditional black cassock and white cotta which, I know from conversations, is preferred by most people,
Parishioners are my priority.
I have one final point today. I know very well that parishioners complain that they don't receive any home visits from their priests these days. Unfortunately, Almighty God only made 24 hours in the day and there are many calls on my time. Always allowing for the unexpected I have decided the following. You, the parishioners, are my priority - I am here to serve and minister to your spiritual needs. Within this, I have certain obligations to carry out such as celebrating holy Mass and hearing confessions. In my last parish I found too much of my time was being taken up with ancillary tasks; time that I could have spent more fruitfully with my parishioners. As this is your parish I intend to leave all financial, building and maintenance responsibility with you - subject to my final approval of course. I will welcome anyone who has the necessary skills in these fields.I know that ecumenical matters are greatly valued these days, and we must respect all our friends in their chosen faith, but these issues in the past have taken up a great deal of my time that was not directly related to the spiritual needs of my own parish. I intend, therefore, to excuse myself from all ecumenical functions for the next twelve months. I intend to devote all my spare time in visiting our school at least once a week and to visit you all in your homes at least once in the next four months. I also intend to do all the sick visits with the Blessed Sacrament. This will give the housebound the opportunity of regular confession should they wish it. As part of this programme I also intend to write a personal letter to all those who have lapsed and invite them to come and see me here at the presbytery or for me to visit them at home. If I can establish why people no longer go to church then perhaps I can start to do something about it.
Please forgive me, I have spoken for longer than I had intended but at least you will know how I intend to proceed here at St. Joseph's. I ask for your understanding, and your patience, and in twelve months time we will assess together how these changes I have outlined have affected the parish. I ask you to pray for me and may God bless you all and look kindly upon our parish. Editor's note: Any priest or religious who contributes an article and asks for anonymity can be assured their wish will be fully respected.
[Taken from the Latin Mass Society's November 1999 Newsletter.]