TO Thee, before the close of day,

Creator of the world we pray...

This hymn was discovered, clearly painstakingly copied from an older text, wrapped in decaying silk and stored in a wax-sealed jar, in a hidden vault recently discovered in a Franciscan church that is undergoing some late 'updating' according to the 'norms' of Vatican II. I am told that while the workmen were levering up the marble of the sanctuary in preparation for the altar to be moved to the centre of the church, they discovered an oak and iron trap door that, when opened, led down a set of stone steps to a little room. I have no further information as to the contents of the room but suffice to recall that Franciscans in some places have some very odd methods of storing their dead superiors.

The hymn's exact provenance is unknown, but the subject matter oddly indicates events that happened centuries after it was written. It is thought to have been part of a longer liturgical piece, possibly a portion of the Divine Office.

I have been told by a Roman scholar of my acquaintance that its discoverers believe that it may be linked to a small sect of "spirituals", one of the early reforms of the Franciscans and possibly refers to events related by a visionary about the future. Exactly how the text came into my possession is something I shall keep to myself for the moment. Given the current climate, it is safe only to say that my source believes it relates a story of Pope Paul VI after the implementation of the "reforms" of the liturgy c. 1965.

I offer my interlocutor's note:

You may have heard that when His Holiness went in the morning to celebrate Mass in his private chapel, he was surprised to find that green vestments had been put out, instead of the red which the real Roman Liturgy prescribes on Pentecost Monday, the second day in the Octave of said Feast. With much consternation he asked his sacristan why the "wrong" vestments had been laid out, to which he responded, with not a little confusion: "But your Holiness abolished the Octave of Pentecost, and we are now in 'ordinary time'." At which the Pontiff wept.

It can be sung to the simple tone of Te Lucis

Funesta huc piacula,

Anni reduxit orbita,

Quae Paulus, horum artifex,

Deflevit Urbis Pontifex.



Qui mala nobis prodidit,

Curare gregem noluit,

Sed tantum acri sustulit

Amare flere lacryma.



Linguis loquuntur barbaris

Qui polluunt solemnia,

Ut quemque cogant flaminem

Nescire prorsus omnia.



Patrata sunt ab impio

Cum fraude ista crimina;

Novusque Poenus Hannibal

Romana sacra perdidit.



Audire voces supplicum

Deum precemur citharis:

"Novi repellas taedium,

O Christe, hujus Ordinis!



Imbutum felle deputa,

Quod sacra tibi serica,

Paraclito rubentia,

Tulit virens subucula."



Laus inclyto Paraclito,

Qui punit haec peccamina

Cum impiis in Tartaro

In saeculorum saecula.

Translation:

The annual cycle has brought back to this place the dire rites of expiation, over which Paul, the Bishop of Rome, wept, though he himself was the architect.

He who gave us all manner of wicked things, and did not wish to care for his flock, but only suffered to weep most bitterly.

They who pollute the solemn rites, speak in barbarian tongues, in order to force every single priest, to be utterly ignorant of everything.

Such crimes were perpetrated with guile by an impious man, and like a second Hannibal of Carthage, destroyed the holy Roman rites.

Let us beseech God with our guitars to hear the prayers of His suppliants:
"Drive away, O Christ, the boredom of this 'Novus Ordo'

Regard it as filled with gall, that the silks sacred to you, and coloured red in honour of the Holy Ghost, were replaced by a green poncho."

Praise be to the glorious Holy Spirit, who punishes with the impious these sinful crimes in the pit of hell, for ever and ever. Amen.

Well, now that the Big Kids are watching

I better get blogging then.

Just taking a quick glance at Steyn's thing on Mark Lemire and Mr. Warman. In truth, I've not really been following it all that closely. It's like the US presidential thing, I let Dale and Steve bore themselves into a coma over that. On the Iraq thing, David is the expert, so I don't have to do the work. Same with CHRC. What can I add that hasn't been said way funnier and better by others?

But something did pop into my mind when I read this:

Let's take it as read that Marc Lemire is guilty, if only because, if you're unfortunate enough to attract their attention, you're guilty: in the entire history of the CHRC, not a single defendant charged with a federal Section 13 "hate messages" crime has ever been acquitted.

It just reminded me of something.

Several years ago, I went through a phase of reading the Greeks. I ploughed through the Odyssey and then went systematically through the plays that dealt with the aftermath of the Trojan war, the pivot around which almost all Greek literature revolves. I remember quite distinctly coming away with the impression that the very worst thing that could happen to you is to be noticed by the horrible, fickle and perverse Greek gods. It never goes well.

If Apollo hates you, you're toast. If he falls in love with you, some other god will become jealous and...toast again. Even if no one else gets upset, and you happen to fancy the village blacksmith instead of the god...you guessed it...toast. Even if some other god comes along and tries to rescue you. Look what happened to poor old Daphne. A tree!? That's the best he could do?

The theme "You can't win" is the guiding principle in Greek thought, pagan fatalism. Once you are noticed by the gods, you're toast. It was the thing that finally put me off any sort of modern revival of paganism. It isn't all sipping absinthe and dancing around trees to Enya CDs.

The whole mindset is alien to me. Gods shouldn't do bad things and problems ought to be solvable. There ought not to be traps like these and I'm infuriated when people just shrug and say, "what can you do?" I'll tell you what you can bloody well do!

Take the case of Iphigenia, the daughter of Agamemnon and Clytemnestra, sister to Orestes. Now there's a disaster that everyone always thinks was "fate". Inescapable. But the solution was perfectly obvious to me, a Christian and a white Westerner.

Agamemnon (who in this production was not played by Sean Connery) wants to go to war with Troy. This has Artemis quite annoyed because she heard Agamemnon, after shooting a deer, boasting about how he's a better hunter even than the gods, and she has raised a lot of storms and things to prevent the fleet from setting out. He asks his soothsayers what to do and they say, sacrifice Iphigenia to the goddess.

OK, right there, Agamemnon had a chance to do the right thing, but, being a pagan fatalist, he blew it.

So he kills his daughter, the storms drop and he sails happily off into legend. But the string of events leads to disaster after disaster. He comes home, Cassandra in tow, to be greeted ten years later by a still furious Clytemnestra who murders him and poor old Cassandra (who has, herself, annoyed Apollo, if I recall, who cursed her with the worst thing I can imagine as a blogger,) and triumphs over his blood in a most grisly and exciting way. Orestes, the good son, and also an idiot, hears this and decides that in order to avenge his father he must murder his mother... which he duly accomplishes, thus incurring the wrath of the furies who pursue him to his miserable end.

UGh.!

Who spotted the flaw in all this?

The one thing that could have been done right from the start that would have solved everything?

No?

It's obvious.

Kill the soothsayers.

Don't play along.

If you hear from the CHRC

don't play along.


The gods are thugs. The gods are fascists. Don't grant them the moral authority. Don't be a dhimmi.

There's no such thing as fate. Fate is pagan nonsense and it's another way in which the CHRC and all their little minions, friends and relations, are opposed to the stoic manly Christian virtues. They expect everyone to just shrug, say, "it's the will of the gods" and sacrifice Iphigenia.

DO NOT sacrifice Iphigenia.

Kill the effing soothsayers and go to war anyway.

Welcome Mark Steyn readers!

Just got a little note from Kathy that The Great Steyn linked to me. I can't find the exact spot, but the site meter confirms it.

Yikes! And all I've been doing all day is sitting around blithering on about the Catholic side of things, as if anyone cares about that stuff.

Now I feel like jumping up and washing all the teacups and setting the sofa cushions straight.

Thoughtcrime of the day: Rachel Carson was a twit

and banning DDT has been a disaster.

Kathy Rules

She posted me again.

Wooo!

Watch that site meter whirl!

Thanks woman.

(I never get sued! Hmp.)

I win

I thought I'd share a discussion I've been having with one of the members of my Greek Chorus of supervisors. (Everyone who knows me at all, even by reading regularly, will agree with my former Oratorian Spiritual Director about the danger of allowing me to run about loose in the world without supervision. I believe it was the one of the few reservations he had about letting me move away from Toronto. I must say, I rather enjoy being free to get into trouble without having to go report it every week in the Oratory parlour.)

As I've mentioned, I no longer darken the door of St. Plegmund's Hovel here for the NO Mass in the village. I tried. I really tried. I went dutifully, arriving late, sitting in the back, and leaving early, for the first few months after arriving. I sat. I pulled my mantilla waaay over my eyes. I took off my glasses. I squeezed my eyes shut. I dug my nails into my palms... I even tried to pray, a bit...in between entertaining fond fantasies involving sticking my foot out during the procession Entrance Stroll; throttling/smacking the children playing with their action figures; praying loudly for an end to abortion/restoration of the True Mass etc. at the self-congratulation session intercessory prayers; feigning Tourette's...

But finally I got the the point where it was becoming almost impossible to resist these urges. I was almost at the point of standing up and pointing and screeching like a pod person, when I realized that this was doing me no good. I would arrive at my aunt and uncle's place after Mass for a cup of tea red faced and breathless and close to tears with fury. I started fantasizing about running away to an SSPX monastery. About finding a cave in Wales or the Highlands. About (God forbid) moving to Manchester to be closer to the SSPX establishment. It was, quite simply, becoming a danger to my faith, not to mention the health and safety of my fellow parishioners.

I always wondered what life would be like, after my deprogramming, in parishes other than the Oratory. Now I know. I can't hack it.

After that, for a while I got lifts to the True Mass Travelling Road Show, in which a most determined and devoted priest comes over from the Continent every weekend and drives like a mad thing all over the Midlands and into Wales to offer the Mass in various places. In the colossal peevishness (see below) of the doddering hippies who have been left in charge of the Church in Britain, one of the ways they have succeeded in stamping out the Faith has been to ensure that the True Mass is offered in a different parish every week, all between ten and fifty miles apart and none served by the rather sporadic Sunday country bus service. One cannot go on forever bumming rides and, with the dismalnes of the Cheshire winter weather, lack of transport, and isloation from my former Catholic world, I just finally let it slide. One can only fight so long.

But it preyed upon my mind...(that whole "spending eternity in hell" thing...you know...)

So I consulted. Most of the conversation happened by phone, but I can share the end of it:

On 12/04/2008, Hilary White wrote:

So, let's talk about me for a second. Me me me...

In your learned opinion, assuming one cannot get to a Mass on a Sunday, does making a pilgrimage to a shrine count as "keeping it holy"?

I've a mind to walk to Holywell in Wales and make some petitions to St. Winifrede. It's a good full day walk, starting early. Probably take the bus home though.

Fr. Supervisor wrote (smacking forehead):

Ok, you, you, you.

First off let me note that Canon Law classified the 'impossibility' of going to Mass as being either because "no sacred minister is available or for some other grave reason". The grave reason is not specified, so it's up to your conscience as to whether your situation in Tattenhall is a grave one.

The same canon tells us that for those who cannot go, they are 'strongly recommended' (which of course is not an obligation) to go to a Liturgy of the Word if there be such in the parish church (not something for you I suspect), 'or to spend an appropriate time in prayer, whether personally or as a family or, as occasion presents, in a group of families.'

Fr Hardon, who's pretty trustworthy, has this to say: "the causes that might excuse from assisting at Sunday Mass are: physical impossibility which applies to those who are unable to hear Mass because they are sick, or who have no priest to say Mass for them; moral impossibility, when it would be very difficult to attend Mass, say because of the absolute necessity of fulfilling other grave duties; and the practice of charity, when Mass is sacrificed to remain at the bedside of the sick or give urgent assistance to someone in great need." Your reason would seem to fall under the 'moral impossibility'.

Of course, there is also the obligation to abstain from such work or business that would inhibit the worship to be given to God, the joy proper to the Lord's Day, or the due relaxation of mind and body.

As to your particular proposal, I own that it's a little odd. You're proposing to walk 27miles to Holywell in order to fulfil the precept of keeping the Lord's Day holy because you can't get the 8.8miles to Chester to go to a Mass...

Obviously I'm all in favour of your going to Holywell, but I'm not sure that these contortions work!

On 12/04/2008, Hilary White wrote:

Six points for me! I could see you spluttering...heh.

Well, there's always St. Alban's. They have "liturgy" there, and the Word is proclaimed, and I happen to know that the "minister" at least believes in the Triune God. Does that count as a "liturgy of the Word"? Quite nice architecture too. And I'm sure I'd make some nice friends. You've got to know that these days, the Anglicans still going to church on a Sunday are the real believers. It would certainly count as "time spent in prayer" with a "group of families".

I'm impressed that you looked up how far Holywell and Chester are from Tattenhall.

I knew you cared!

Fr. Supervisor wrote:

I think private prayer would be preferrable to worshipping with schismatic heretics.
Google maps is a useful tool.

On 12/04/2008, Hilary White wrote:

My point precisely about St. Plegmund's

On 12/04/2008, Hilary White wrote:

I win.

Dear English "Catholic Bishops"...

(Not my church...yet)

Last weekend, I'm happy to announce, we started enjoying the extraordinary privilege of Mass in the True Rite of the Latin end of the Catholic Church, right here in our miserable little "English Catholic" brick hovel, with gorgeous Gothic St. Alban's looming and glowering [see above] over us a few yards away. I have to say, I felt quite relieved and not a little sympathy for my Irish ancestors at their Mass Rocks, with one chap stationed at the road on the look out for the Black and Tans. I half expected some aging tie-dyed Bikenstocked priest to come bursting in, but the Mass was conducted with great decorum and with fewer interruptions and less chattering than that wretched little garage has likely ever experienced.

We are starting with monthly. I'm sure his excellency said nothing about "starting with", but of course, we have been taught as modern, adult, We-are-Easter-People Catholics to read between the lines and interpret official statements according to our own Lived Experience.

I told Fr. ______ at the tea n' snax that I would write a letter to Bishop Noble thanking him for his generous permission for the implementation of Motu Proprio that, as we all know, specifically states that we don't need his permission...but never mind. I was told that this would be imprudent.

Probably true, but ooo how tempting to do a little polite gloating. I would start by informing his excellencye that I was born after their precious Council and then wax rhapsodic on the glories of the Church's traditional liturgy and how glad I am that it is experiencing such a resurgence among the young in the Church... But of course, I promised to behave. Fr. ______'s a real priest, after all, the kind we're supposed to obey.

The peevishnes of the revolutionaries as they are increasingly forced to recognise the failure of their revolution is starting to make them look ridiculous. Though how they could look any more ridiculous than they've been looking in the last few decades is hard to imagine.

They're mad, and who wouldn't be? But the more they jump up and down squeaking in impotent fury and outrage, the more amusing they become. The pathetic attempts by the tie-dyed revolutionaries to hold on to their power is starting to be a subject of comic blog posts, cartoons and running jokes everywhere. The reason? All you have to do is attend "Mass" at one of their churches, climb up to the choir loft and look down at the tops of heads. From that perspective, the answer becomes self-evident.

In this vein, Damien Thompson today, in a laudably gratuitous poke at the E&W Episcopate, mentions Bishop Arthur Roche of Leeds, [to my utter lack of surprise, a former champion figure skater], who is known for his generosity towards Traditionalists:

I would never accuse Bishop Arthur of suppressing the 1962 Missal in his diocese.

I gather that he has very generously given permission for the Traditional Mass to be celebrated on the third Monday of the month at 5.30 in the morning in a remote village in the Yorkshire Dales - provided, of course, that the celebrant has the necessary Vatican doctorate in ecclesiastical Latin.

To paraphrase Ezra today: Just so you know, Cardinal Bubbles, when they're all laughing at you, you've lost.

Or, as it is increasingly being said on English Catholic blogs: Face it hippies...

Mollycoddles

There's something about 'liberalism' that is becoming more and more clear.

There then follow several spooky paragraphs warning the media not to use freedom of expression as a “guise” to “target vulnerable groups and to further increase their marginalization or stigmatization.”

As a journalist, I found this part particularly chilling:

“It is the Commission’s view that the media has a responsibility to engage in fair and unbiased journalism. Bias includes both an unfair and one-sided portrayal of an issue as well as prejudicial attitudes towards individuals and groups.”

Actually, the National Post — like Maclean’s and every other media outlet — has no such responsibility — except inasmuch as we want to be respected, and our product bought, by as many people as possible. If we choose to be “unfair,” or simply to have an opinion that some people, or even everyone, disagrees with, that’s our right. We’ll pay the price in lost readers and advertisers.

There's a reason we refer to the leftist goal as the "Nanny state". Look at the difference in attitude here. On the one hand the CHRC, perhaps the ultimate expression in our 'liberal democracies' of the triumph of the socialist ideal, is telling journalists what they ought to be doing. It is an injunction based on a desire to bring about a particular kind of society, one that is closely reminiscent of the kind of senitmentalist Victorian art depicting beautiful glowing-cheeked, glossy-locked children dressed in immaculate pinnafores and Little Lord Fauntleroy suits playing noiselessly and tidily with wooden tops and kittens. Good children must play nicely, be tidy, look pretty and not disturb the neighbours. It is, essentially, the relationship between a nanny or a mother and children.

Contrast this with Mr. Kay's assertion that journalists and writers, including bloggers, have every right to charge about, chuck conkers at each other, shove each other into puddles, roll about the playing field getting covered in mud playing footie.

The difference is between the values of manliness and the feminine values. The stoic, vs. the female virtues. Kay says they must both give and take lumps and, in the end, square their shoulders and take the consequences...like men.

It is not a coincidence that bodies such as the CHRC are overwhelmingly governened and staffed by women and homosexual men. The one characteristic that defines modern woman, with her collaborators among the light-loafered, is her refusal to accept the proper ordering of things. Female virtues are necessary and good in their proper venue; indispensable. That venue is in the personal, the domestic, the homely and subjective. But taken out of their proper context and order and placed in supremacy over the objectivist and external manly virtues they turn into an infantilising tyranny. Women and woman's virtues, must know their place or we end up in the Star Chamber trying to explain why freedom and personal responsibility are needed in a free society. Indeed, we seem to be having trouble now even explaining to them what a free society is and why it is a good thing.

Speaking of zombies

One of the Canuckistan Five, Jonathan Kay writes about a memo from Canada's politburo CHRC:

In Ottawa, the attempted censorship of Canadian magazines in the name of “human rights” has caused such a backlash that some politicians are openly talking about amending the Human Rights Act (HRA). But the Ontario Human Rights Commission hasn’t gotten the memo: In a politically tone-deaf statement released on Wednesday, the OHRC told Canadians that it covets the same censorship powers that have brought so much discredit to its counterparts in Ottawa and other provinces.

Of particular concern to the OHRC is Islamophobia, “a form of racism that includes stereotypes, bias or acts of hostility towards Muslims and the viewing of Muslims as a greater security threat on an institutional, systemic and societal level.” (I am quite curious about the use of the word “stereotype” here. One supposes that all sorts of Jewish, Buddhist, Ba’hai and Confuscian terrorist cells are getting busted up all the time — but the Islamophobic media never reports it.)

...and those Amish...what are they up to anyway? Eh? Eh?! Think we believe they're just raising barns? What's in the barns? I think we deserve to know.

All the details and background here and here.

Drop a shilling or two in Kathy's tip jar to cover her upcoming legal expenses.

Zombies

Just sent the following note to Steve.

Last night was a big zombie night around here.

I dreamed that I was back in some big city (which I must say is far fetched; I came to Tattenhall specifically to avoid the zombies) with a few friends after The End and we were holed up...like Chuck, in a fortified house, but, naturally, zombies being fairly clever for the undead, they got in and we fled. We took a train "south" and ended up in California somewhere where we found you organising the survivors into an army of sorts. I thought it was odd that you were in California and that I'd recognized you since I remembered that we'd never met (but not, apparently, that I no longer live in North America). I wanted to join your army but you said I had to be in charge of the girly stuff and wouldn't give me a gun.

Well, you were sorry about it later when the zombies staged an ambush...heh. so there. There was some kind of argument, in the midst of this, about the proper way to iron chasubles and I recall that we were somewhat miffed that, although we had a priest with us who would say Mass, there were nothing but ugly N.O. vestments around. The zombies didn't care for the Traditional Mass, I suppose.

When I woke up, I remarked to the cat that zombies can be fun but I would rather fight them in Britain. They can have California, as far as I'm concerned, since they more or less already have it now.

...and no, I don't normally dream about other bloggers, but I do dream quite often about zombies. As does everyone, I guess.