But it's a question I'm starting to ask about Anglicanorum coetibus. I'm drawn to the example of the diocesan parish my wife and I are in the process of leaving, in favor of one a few miles down the road. The old parish has a building that dates from about 1960, just before Vatican II. It's fearsomely bauhaus in its architecture and interior -- the odd thing is that the materials were quite expensive, and the marble marquetry is elaborate, but the whole effect is nevertheless coldly austere. The stained glass is extensive but neo-cubist, Guernica meets the Bible. (For what it's worth, this is the Our Mother of Good Counsel parish.)
It brings to mind Tom Wolfe's critiques of modernism in art and architecture -- it's at the same time overintellectualized and anti-intellectual. It almost says you're self-indulgent to prefer a traditional church interior. And this matches the theology of the clergy there -- from the start, my wife and I characterized them as "Vatican II-1/2". I think they were frankly disappointed that Pope Francis telegraphed all sorts of liberalizations that might come from the Synod on the Family but never quite came to pass. A couple of years ago, they featured the strange Bishop Remi DeRoo in their Lenten program.
Meanwhile, over the past year, they've reduced their mass schedule due to reduced attendance and a shortage of priests. According to the pastor, the school enrollment is 140 when the break-even number is 180, which is why he laid off the caretaker. I assume things will continue to play themselves out with the school. Other times, the pastor complains that only 10% of nominal Catholics in the parish's territory are even registered there. I notice that many of our neighbors are Catholic, and have even sent their children to the school, but I've never seen them at mass.
The organ is prominent in the transept, but I've only heard it played twice -- and it sort of wheezes, so maybe that's just as well. The new mass schedule meant there would be no choir at the 10 AM Sunday mass, just a cantor who mumbles, thinks she's a soprano, and screeches the high notes. What struck me about the Christmas mass the other day was that the music program actually seemed to work hard and try to do better -- but why do this just one day a year? I'm starting to think that one feature of what Bp Barron calls "beige Catholicism" is that in fact it makes few demands, and nobody works that hard at anything.
A few miles down the road in Glendale is a successful parish -- I realized why they have to keep Sunday morning masses to an hour, because there are so many of them that they have to clear out the nave for the next one. By all appearances, it's much more traditional. It appears to generate vocations. Based on remarks by clergy at Our Mother of Good Counsel, the budget at the new place is some multiple of theirs.
I'm all for bringing Anglican features into the Catholic Church if it means a renewed emphasis on excellence, appreciation of liturgy and music, and a reverential mass. But what problem is the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith really trying to solve?
