Tuesday, August 7, 2018

What's Happened To St John Fisher Orlando?

Prompted by curiosity over who, if anyone, is updating the OCSP Find a Parish feature, my regular correspondent noted,
I noticed that the mass times (actually mass time, singular) at St John Fisher, Orlando was no longer posted on the Diocese of Orlando website, nor, as of June 27, on the Incarnation, Orlando website or FB page (SJF has never had either a website or a FB page). Does this mean that as of Fr Jason McCrimmon's ordination to the priesthood on June 29 the SJF group, such as it was, has served its purpose and been quietly folded? Bp Lopes visited there in October 2016; you posted a picture (June 21, 2017) of him celebrating mass on "the windowsill"---one of my favourites among your lines. But as we noted then it seemed to have no raison d'ĂȘtre other than to be part of Fr McCrimmon's ministry plan.

David Hodil, who was ordained a transitional deacon at the same time as now-Fr McCrimmon, remains a deacon, BTW.

As best anyone can determine, Fr McCrimmon is now assisting at the main Incarnation Orlando parish, and the St John Fisher parish seems to have disappeared. Exactly what his status is, paid or unpaid, is an open question, but he's featured in a new Facebook page for Incarnation Orlando:
Incarnation FB page has saturation coverage of Fr McCrimmon's ordination, first mass, a special "Sung Mass for the Propagation of the Faith through Fr Jason McCrimmon" offered on June 27, ways of celebrating his ordination by contributing to the parish, etc. The FB page is new, so Jason McCrimmon-related info currently constitutes 90% of its content.
My correspondent referred me to my post here from July 20, 2017 for more background on Fr McCrimmon. He decided not to go into the OCSP with the rest of the Incarnation parish when it was received, because he was an Anglican chaplain. But then he went from the ACA to the ACNA and seems to have changed his mind about becoming Catholic later still. (The ACNA is notably low-church, so it would appear McCrimmon's theology is quite flexible.)

This raises a number of questions. I believe the St John Fisher group was initially proposed as an example of "satellite" groups that would form to ease the task of driving to more distant central OCSP communities and encourage growth -- and I feel pretty confident that it was used as an example to convince Bp Barnes of San Bernardino that there was no ulterior motive in starting the Holy Martyrs storefront in Murrieta. But now it's hard to avoid thinking the St John Fisher group lasted two years at best, and interest fell off to the point that it was no longer worth anyone's time.

Except, apparently, as a reason to justify Fr McCrimmon's ordination, following much hesitation and postponement on Fr McCrimmon's part. Dcn Hodil, on the other hand, remains a transitional deacon. Depends on who's on the bishop's good list, I guess.

Meanwhile, none of this is publicized. We don't know if an announcement was even made to the St John Fisher group, or if interest had fallen off to the point where no announcement was thought necessary. It's probably just as well that the OCSP sees no apparent need for a Director of Communications (although this could potentially be a good intern-type job for a college student in the OLW parish or nearby who might be considering a career in the field).

If I were doing it, though, I'd feel deeply uncomfortable trying to put any sort of positive or consistent face on what's going on. And if one "gathered" group can disappear so quickly and easily, what of all the others? Who'll be left holding the bag when the Murrieta group fails? Will Fr Bayles even ever be compensated for his mileage on all those trips to Pasadena, for that matter?