Christmas Masses And A Question

My regular correspondent e-mailed me a week ago wondering if the close proximity of Advent IV and Christmas could prove a problem for some OCSP communities, and this turned out to be prophetic:

Fr Kennedy was too ill last Sunday/Monday to offer mass at St Timothy, Ft Worth, so services for Advent IV and Christmas were cancelled. According to the bulletin of SMV, Arlington TX Fr Kennedy is the only priest on staff there besides the Pastor, so things must have been stretched at SMV too. St Timothy's has been without an ordained parish administrator since Fr Stainbrook was reassigned to St John Vianney, Cleburne in July, 2016. The major news items posted on the St Timothy's FB page are the final illnesses/funerals of long-time parishioners. The parish website has remained untouched since April 2017. Manpower is of course an issue, but Our Lady of Hope, Kansas City, where Ed Wills was ordained as a transitional deacon this summer to assist Fr Sly, did not even bother to post Christmas mass times this year. The FB page looks up to date only because the most recent post is pictures from Christmas 2016. There will apparently be many ordinations in the OCSP in 2018, but if we see that the new clergy are deployed as leaders of tiny communities-in-formation they have put together in random small towns, while the first generation of incoming parish groups quietly folds, I think the whole future of the enterprise will look very precarious. As you have commented before, clergy with the entrepreneurial/pastoral skills to build up a thriving parish from a handful of initial members---clergy like Fr Phillips---will always be few and far between. The core strength will always come from competent men who can maintain and build on established communities. If even these cannot be found, things do not look good.

Well, if it had been important to hold Advent IV and Christmas masses at St Timothy, couldn't available OCSP priests have been found in Texas? The four-hour drive from Houston would be tough but doable on all but minimal notice, and overnight stays with a parish family seem like a reasonable possibility. This raises serious questions, among those we've already seen, about the stability of the OCSP.

Here's a question I've been pondering. Ex-Anglican (and Anglican is very flexibly defined) priests who want to be ordained Catholic in the US have two options, the Pastoral Provision and the OCSP. The usual assignment process for the OCSP is for the candidate to take over tiny groups-in-formation without a stipend. In fact, some must take diocesan, though often non-pastoral, jobs to pay the bills. Why are we multiplying entities? Cut out the little Potemkin village groups, take the candidates in via the Pastoral Provision, and give them diocesan jobs, which they'd probably need anyhow?

If you think about it, the ex-Anglicans would probably wind up better occupied, with less time on their hands for mischief, more closely supervised, and have better formation while working closely with diocesan clergy.

A New Angle On The Oxford Movement

I got a very worthwhile book as a Christmas gift from our niece, Simon Jenkins, Britain's 100 Best Railway Stations. More than an enthusiast coffee-table book, Jenkins, a major figure in the historic preservation movement, has quite a bit to say about architecture and social context. He doesn't mention Tract 90, and Newman had almost nothing to say about railways, but Tract 90 appeared in 1841, just as the technological and commercial success of railways was initiating the Railway Mania.

Established historical analysis places the Oxford Movement in the context of the 1832 Reform Act, which granted civil rights to non-Anglicans. But the Reform Act itself occurred in a wider context, and the first successful English railway on the modern paradigm was the Liverpool and Manchester, which opened in 1830. More than expanded suffrage, railways in the first half of the century represented a much more direct threat to English cultural norms. Jenkins points out that the architecture of railway stations, the most direct interface people had with the new technology, had to represent something unthreatening and reassuring.

Thus railway station architecture tended to display historical eclecticism, deliberate archaism, and even escapism, for both commercial and political reasons. The Oxford Movement is a parallel tendency, a response to the industrial revolution, social upheaval, and the commercialization of society. Not only did stations have to draw in customers, but they had to be satisfactory to the local landowners, on whose lands they were often built, and whose properties the railways needed to cross.

Jenkins points out, in fact, that the unique style of 19th-century English railways, one of archaism and eclecticism, has proven exportable in the form of the enormously popular Thomas the Tank Engine and JK Rowling franchises. The Oxford movement has been similarly exportable -- but I think we need to recognize that it's a franchise, a stylistic product, in considerable measure an escapist fantasy.

Jenkins sees English railway stations certainly as an effective fantasy, one that can now contribute to renewed social cohesion -- but they're nonetheless a commercial product, and indeed a social construct, even a form of propaganda. (They're now owned by the government.) The UK railway system acted to reinforce social cohesion during two world wars. As did, of course, the Church of England, which found eclecticism and archaism suited its purpose for much of the same period.

One feature of Protestantism, at least the Lutheran-Reformed version, is that it proved from the start amenable to state control. Anglo-Catholicism is, let's face it, a version of state-controlled Protestantism that is not really compatible with Roman Catholicism. I don't think Cardinal Law recognized this, and I don't think Bp Lopes does, either.

In the end, though, it's a style, something that emulates the thing, not the thing itself. It's a means to an end, not the end itself.

Holy Martyrs Temecula?

My regular correspondent sent along this news:

Starting January 7, Fr Bartus will be celebrating an 8 am Sunday mass here. The venue looks less than ideal and the time will make for a long day for Fr B, who has two morning masses in Irvine and a 6 pm mass in Pasadena. For whom is he getting this group up and running, I wonder?

The site, Monteleone Meadows, is a wine country-style wedding and banquet venue, not a Catholic church. My correspondent continued,

On further inspection of the map I see that it would not be possible for the same person to celebrate the 8 am in Murrieta and the 9 am in Irvine. We await particulars. The fact that the first Sunday get-together is a mass tells us that the attendees are expected to already be practising Catholics, like the 349 members of the "Events" group are, judging by their names, jobs, etc. Another exercise in faux evangelism.

The group's Facebook page is here. Fr Jack Barker was Pastor of St Martha's Catholic Church in Murrieta until his retirement in 2013. However, the new gathered group in Murrieta so far doesn't have any visible connection with that parish and for whatever reason is not meeting there. Murietta is 58 miles from Irvine via a highly indirect route. It's possible that Fr Barker is taking the 9 AM Sunday mass in Irvine while Fr Bartus celebrates in Murietta, or Fr Barker may take the Murietta mass on a more permanent basis. On the other hand, it's hard to understand why the mass is at 8 AM at all, unless Monteleone Meadows has a conflict with any later time.

My regular correspondent observes,

Fr Bartus collects groups of Catholics who have never met an Anglican to celebrate DW. Not only do OCSP groups divert ordained men needed more urgently elsewhere, they divert cradle Catholics and those who entered the Church years ago. We are told that the Ordinariate is preserving the splendours of some ill-defined "patrimony" for the Catholic church, although when one seeks details it seems to consist of everything from Christmas crackers to pink chasubles. "Ordinariate" worship and parish culture runs the gamut from guitars and keyboards to Palestrina, OF to DW, cupcake rosaries to simnel cake. Even if we could define the project I am sure that it means nothing to the average Catholic bishop, and that goes for the current Bishop of Rome, in my observation. And why would a bishop wish to encourage parishioners who were supporting a parish in his diocese to start diverting their contributions to another Catholic jurisdiction, even if he cared that Thomas Cranmer was a great prose stylist? The formation issue is probably the least of his worries; he is already probably dealing with many clergy ordained in Third World countries who are struggling with English. But at least their parishes are supporting his diocese.

It's also troubling that the California efforts are spread so thin. There seem to be groups of a dozen or two now in Pasadena, Murrieta (in formation), and San Diego, with only the Irvine group showing any potential for growth. Are the efforts to gather little cliques of oddball Catholics diverting attention from the need to find a permanent home for the Irvine group?

Also troubling is a pattern that's starting to emerge, that small and distant groups suffer from lack of effective supervision, so that potential scandals can develop out of sight until they become unmanageable. Each of the four California groups is in a different diocese, which makes it likely that problems in any will escape the attention of diocesan authorities who might otherwise be in a position to notify Houston.

As we saw with the Athens, GA group, announcements are made before a permanent venue can be located. This seems like a slapdash way to set things up, perhaps playing to an audience in Houston, not to serious parishioners in the geographic location.

We're departing more and more from the original Anglicanorum coetibus model of established groups of Anglicans, originally meant to be whole parishes or rumps thereof, coming into the Church and catechized with their original clergy. That model didn't last much past 2012. Now we're starting to get cliques of cradle Catholics who for whatever reason can't find satisfactory parishes in their dioceses, notwithstanding the existing variety of Latin mass, music programs, devotional activities, social opportunities, and celebration styles available there.

And we'll be in a situation, if a scandal develops (it seems like we're getting close here and there), the diocesan bishop will have to do some sort of explanation for the 5 o'clock news about how yes, these are Catholics, but they aren't his Catholics.

Cardinal Law

Cardinal Bernard Law, as I'm sure most know, passed away yesterday. The obituaries all portray him as the face of the sex abuse scandal, but of course, this was endemic, and Cardinal Mahony of Los Angeles was eventually barred by his successor from functioning in a public role due to equivalent complicity in the scandal. But Law was also a prime mover in the Anglican ecumenism project, which will almost certainly not be mentioned in the media.

This blog is about St Mary of the Angels, and Law was a key figure in initiating the bizarre recent history of that parish we've been following here. We know from Fr Barker's account that Law was familiar with the trends that led to the 1977 Congress of St Louis and the quixotic "continuing Anglican" movement. I don't believe Fr Barker has ever given a full account of when contacts between him and Law, or Law's surrogates, began, and as far as I know, it isn't completely clear what role Law may have played in encouraging Fr Barker to take the parish out of TEC.

Whether Law first whispered an idea in Fr Barker's ear, though, is less important than the practical result: the parish filed revised articles of incorporation in January 1977 to remove itself from TEC; TEC filed the first lawsuit the following month. Forty years and three lawsuits later, the fate of the parish is still unresolved.

Certainly by late 1977, according to Fr Barker, Law's people were actively discussing the idea of a personal prelature that would incorporate the St Mary of the Angels parish and the limited number of others that saw such a move as an option. But the Anglican Use Pastoral Provision was not authorized until 1980, while the St Mary's parish was badly divided and embroiled in an expensive lawsuit. Either Law didn't foresee such a result, or he didn't care; he certainly never provided, and likely never advised, a more prudent option for the parish.

Once the first lawsuit was resolved, Law was unable to secure a favorable reception of the parish into the Archdiocese of Los Angeles. Neither Cardinal Manning nor his successor, Cardinal Mahony, accepted the parish's petition, Mahony in particular questioning whether the parish could accept Catholic authority if it couldn't accept TEC. In light of subsequent history, Mahony had a point.

But there's an additional question. The Anglican ecumenism project, irrespective of its practical lack of success, did represent a momentous shift in policy. Such policy changes need to be thoroughly prepared, and those affected need to be brought on board. It appears that Law never did this with Cardinals Manning and Mahony, who were key figures that clearly held a veto over the early test of the project that St Mary's represented. I've had the impression that, although St John Paul approved the Pastoral Provision, he always took an arm's-length position, and I would guess that his view would have been that if Law wanted it that badly, he could bring Manning and Mahony around himself.

Instead, I wonder if Manning and Mahony thought Law was trying to interfere with their archdiocese, telling them without saying so in words what priest and parish they needed to bring in. But I think there's a concern that mostly isn't addressed, why should a bishop bring in a former Protestant priest whom he hasn't fully vetted? Might this be behind the apparent resistance to bringing in OCSP priests in Rochester and St Petersburg? Note that Matano in Rochester seems to have changed his mind when offered the possibility of a celibate Catholic seminarian, while the Bishop of St Petersburg seems to have resisted an OCSP group but had no objection to the same candidate coming in under his own supervision.

Let's also keep in mind that Law, from accounts we've heard, maintained contacts with Jeffrey Steenson and other dissident TEC figures in the late 1980s. We don't know what was on his agenda (or for that matter Steenson's) at that time, but I think it's safe to say not much good came from it then. But the 1993 meeting between Ratzinger and TEC figures Pope and Steenson was facilitated by Law and meant to pursue the idea of a personal prelature, which St John Paul had rejected once already at the time of the Pastoral Provision.

We may assume that the personal prelature was intended to fix the original problem posed by the St Mary of the Angels fiasco, but clearly this didn't happen. St John Paul was still not well disposed, and even when Ratzinger as Benedict was able to establish it on his own, the project was too poorly resourced to succeed. No matter what's been tried so far, the parish still hasn't come in, and if it were up to me, I'd advise the parish and Abp Hepworth to hold out for a better deal, given the extremely valuable property they bring to the party.

My regular correspondent reflected the other day,

"450,000 Anglicans to join Catholic church." Right. How desperately do we think the Vatican wishes that Pope Benedict had never come up with Anglicanorum Coetibus? If you are correct in your surmise that Fr Kenyon left Calgary under a cloud---and the fact that he appears to be under a form of house arrest certainly supports this idea -- [complaints] regarding his would-be replacements must be the last thing they want to hear about.

Leaving the sex abuse crisis entirely aside, there are reasons not to eulogize Cardinal Law. He had direct responsibility for the 40-year St Mary of the Angels disaster, fostering the break from TEC but unable to secure its reception into the Catholic Church, but he also bears some behind-the-scenes responsibility for the whole "continuing Anglican" boondoggle.

Not a happy record.

Fr Kenyon's Current Status

My regular correspondent reports on what reference can be found to where Fr Kenyon is currently serving. A few weeks ago, a Stockport observer relayed news that he had been assigned to a "team ministry" in the Shrewsbury diocese, but his exact role there is still not completely clear:

As you will see on page 3 of the newsletter here, Fr Kenyon is putting in a full schedule of Ordinariate liturgies at St Aidan's Wythenshawe: daily Morning and Evening Prayer, Confession and Mass, plus a Vigil and a Sunday celebration. Given the number of OF Sunday masses offered in the St Bonaventure's Missionary Area, he may be saying one of them as well. He is living in a nearby suburb. But he is not listed as a member of the Wythenshawe Clergy Team, and only has a personal email address and phone number. The St Aidan's parish office is "closed until further notice." What gives? There is no local Ordinariate group listed on the OOLW website , other than the Manchester group led by Fr Starkie for which Fr Kenyon preached some months back. As I mentioned previously, most of the church of St Aidan, Northern Moor was converted into social and community space, leaving a relatively small worship space as a mass centre.

In a subsequent e-mail, my correspondent characterizes this as "a form of house arrest". It's hard to think other than that Fr Kenyon has a very low profile, with duties closely circumscribed even within a "team ministry". I would guess that most of the DWM liturgies he celebrates are for himself exclusively. It would seem that Fr Kenyon's return to the UK has primarily been a headache to his new bishop, adding to and not relieving his workload and that of his priests. This simply can't reflect well on Bp Lopes or the OCSP.

I've put out feelers to Stockport contacts, but so far have heard nothing back.

Diocesan Background Checks

My regular correspondent sent me a 2009 USCCB document, Background Evaluation Methodologies, which, although it focuses mainly on child and youth protection, gives an insight into background checks typically performed by US dioceses. Entries generally look like this:

The background check used by the Diocese is through HIRERITE, Inc. It consists of a seven year criminal record check in all states resided, a sex offender‘s registry search, and social security number verification.

This sounds roughly like what I went though as a lay volunteer who completed the Virtus program. I would assume that background checks for clergy might, formally or informally, need to be more comprehensive. In particular, a juvenile conviction, which could certainly indicate criminal tendencies, might not appear on such a search, either because juvenile records are sealed, or simply because it took place more than seven years earlier.

I also heard from a visitor who went through the background check and psychological evaluation for clergy in the OCSP during the Steenson era. He noted that he'd been in the military earlier in life, and in the course of that service, he'd had FBI-style background checks for security clearances. (I've had the same thing; they do in fact go through your friends, acquaintances, co-workers, neighbors, and ask detailed questions.) He said the background checks for OCSP clergy were, at least in his case, performed by the local diocese where he lives and were nowhere near as thorough as the FBI checks he'd had. The OCSP being what it is, we can't necessarily expect consistency, though.

It's worth noting that his experience with the psychological evaluation was not as good. He was coming from an Anglican denomination that was friendly to same-sex marriage, and he gave that to the psychologist conducting the interview as one reason that led him to consider the Catholic priesthood. In other words, he conformed to the teachings of the Catholic Church. However, the interviewer apparently then told my visitor that he was openly gay, and he accused my visitor of being a "homophobe" and a "hater".

I suppose we must recognize that even diocesan screening procedures can be flawed. (It wouldn't surprise me if seminarians in that diocese learned informally how to answer questions from psychologist x, information that might not have been available to my visitor, who effectively was a walk-on candidate.) Michael Voris ain't just blowin' smoke, it would appear.

Again, though, if seminarians normally come from diocesan parishes, where their progress toward formation can be fostered and observed through much of their youth, this would serve the purpose of a detailed FBI check. In addition, from what I've learned of the clergy sex abuse crisis, the conduct of the bad priests had often been generally known or suspected by fellow clergy. The problem was that the offenders were shunted around to get rid of the problem as quietly as possible, rather than facing the issue directly. Thus background checks per se weren't the issue; the backgrounds were in fact often known and understood -- the question was the remedy.

But this would be much less the case with candidates coming to the Church already ordained as Anglicans. They wouldn't have been known to the diocese (or the prelature) from their time in seminary or before. There's the additional problem of jurisdiction-hopping. If a priest is being carefully eased out of an Anglican denomination, especially in such a way as to avoid scandal there, the Anglican bishop has a motive to give the bad apple an enthusiastic recommendation, or at least not to mention the problem issues that could result in his staying right where they were trying to get rid of him.

So, whatever background check on an OCSP candidate a diocese might perform, it could be adequate as a way of vetting a lay volunteer or employee, but it might well not be due diligence for clergy, who see the most vulnerable in their weakest times. I seriously question whether this issue has been adequately addressed, simply in the basic architecture of Anglicanorum coetibus. It assumes that Protestants essentially do things the same way Catholics do, which is dangerous.

Hold On! Somebody Else Is The Last Of The Gilbertines!

A visitor e-mails:

As far as I know +William Paul Vincent Hains-Howard a Canadian Old Catholic bishop styled himself the last of the Gilbertines. So there is a Canadian connection.

One of the more Anglican bishops up there told me that he used to wear a huge pointy miter at various functions. LOL!

I think he’s been departed since the late eighties, early nineties.

In all this I don’t understand +Lopes. Lean and mean would be a better approach rather than replication of officialdom. Everyone forgets that Episcopalianism started out in a house church in Scotland.

Google isn't much help here. The only reference I can find is on the site of the Neo-Luciferian Church, which describes itself as Apostolic and Gnostic, and frankly, that's about as far as I prefer to go.

There are certain sections of the Anglican patrimony. . .

I've asked a few of my contacts if they have other info on Bp Hains-Howard, but so far, nothing's come up.