As I troll through blogs and Facebook pages where Anglicanorum coetibus is discussed I frequently see posts along the lines of “Is anyone else in the Podunk area interested in starting an Ordinariate community? “ The subsequent conversation reveals that the original poster and his (it’s pretty much always “his”) responders are already Catholics, often with no previous Anglican connection. Responders often suggest trying the TLM, which then leads to a discussion of why the TLM hasn’t gotten a foothold in Podunk—-usually lack of support from the local bishop.I let this percolate for a while, but a version of my perennial question then popped up: what problem are these people trying to solve? And I can't come to a good answer until I can get more information. For instance, although the people making these queries are apparently initiated Catholics, we don't know if they're currently attending any mass on Sundays and other days of obligation. I think if people were doing this, a different set of questions might come up.Sometimes a sidebar about how any priest can offer the EF, where people who have never been on a payroll demonstrate a complete lack of understanding of why a priest might not wish to antagonise his superior. But in any event it’s crystal clear that the interest in AC is nothing about evangelism or Anglicans and everything about aesthetic preferences and being in a small group of like-minded people.
When my wife and I became Catholic, our unspoken assumption was that if we were going to the trouble of getting into RCIA, trying to locate our baptismal certificates and the like, we were going to buy into the whole program, Sunday mass, regular confession, and other opportunities like Bible study and adoration as they arose. On that basis, if you happen to find yourself anywhere on a weekend, your job is to locate a mass, whether or not it's to your particular taste. If the cantor plays the guitar, shut up and receive the sacrament.
This would apply more widely if, as an initiated Catholic, you find yourself for whatever reason regularly attending a happy-clappy, flip-flops and halter-tops mass. It seems to me that if you;re not satisfied with that, there's a range of possible good options well short of either an ordinariate or a Latin mass. An OF parish 15 minutes farther down the road may have a more reverent atmosphere and a better music program. The OF mass is, after all, the one that's normally authorized, and what puzzles me is that it, and the associated three-year lectionary, have been major influences on Episcopalians and Lutherans.
So I'm wondering if the problem people who express these views on social media are trying to solve has more to do with saying something like "I'm not going to mass until I find a version that's actually unattainable anywhere near where I live, but I son't go to mass until I find one." Or at least, that's one option.
Another may be some form of oversompensation. There may be some part of Church teachings I find uncongenial, but the traddie sites like Church Militant and Lifesite News get people so stirred up against the bishops that they can disregard the Catechism until the bishops someday get themselves sorted out, and meantime they'll find an ordinariate group that shares their general resentments and receive the sacrament there from some poorly formed ex-Protestant who won't ask questions, if for no other reason than he can't imagine what questions to ask.
I can't think that if people are focused on being Catholic, they'll ask a whole different set of questions and think of a whole different set of possible solutions than "is anyone interested in starting an evensong ordinariate group in the Boise area?" And it probably says more than we think about active Catholics that so few people seem to think this route is any sort of living option.
