"And when they came to the floor of Nachon, Oza put forth his hand to the ark of God, and took hold of it: because the oxen kicked and made it lean aside. And the indignation of the Lord was enkindled against Oza, and he struck him for his rashness: and he died there before the ark of God." --2 Samuel 6: 6-7 Douay-Rheims
Quaeritur:
I: If there are two priests present distributing Holy Communion, why are two Extraordinary Ministers of Holy Communion necessary on a Saturday when there are less than 70 people present?
II: Why am I still shocked when whilst the priest is occupied as he should be in the Confessional, a woman feels it simply okay to attend to the Tabernacle to retrieve Consecrated Hosts for the sick?
How do we end this?
Discuss.
3 comments:
Vox,
These are two horrible abuses. I am personally convinced that the decay in the Church will not end until a number of things happen: 1) cease the distribution of the Blessed Sacrament into the hand; 2) preach the Gospel in its entirety -- e.g. Humanae vitae etc.; 3) cease general liturgical abuse.
These, and other issues are all organically linked. One notices that the obfuscation of the Gospel preceded the dissent of the Dutch (who introduced the illegal practice of distribution); at about this time too, one side effect of ceasing to preach the Gospel was wide spread dissent in matters sexual. "Religion in Our Day", a wonderful essay by Bl. Cardinal Newman seems as if it were written just the past week.
Concrete examples of the liturgical/moral dissent (their nexus point being a rejection of the authority of Peter) is the catastrophe in the school systems, whereby Catholicism has been diluted (generally speaking) into a horizontal sociological "christianity" that Paul VI warned strongly about in 1968. The Pope was not heeded...
This brings me to the up-coming Missal: will the dissenting clergy cease abusing the liturgy and actually follow the rubrics.
The proliferation of extraordinary ministers is form of clericalism as are many liturgical abuses. When the priesthood is seen as an elite class rather than the servants and pastors they are meant to be it is only natural that the laity will be tempted to envy and a perverse imitation. These things are born of pride, arrogance and ignorance. If you would remove the ignorance then you must preach the gospel. Only an inner conversion and repentance will deal with the pride and arrogance. Rejection of authority is at root a rejection of the gospel.
You cannot expect people who do not believe to behave as though they do. Expecting obedience from unbelievers makes for good Pharisees, not Christians. Reverence for the Blessed Sacrament begins with belief that it is Jesus Christ. Begin with the heart and mind if you wish to change the person. "Thus it is written, that the Christ should suffer and on the third day rise from the dead, and that repentance and forgiveness of sins should be preached in his name to all nations, beginning from Jerusalem. You are witnesses of these things." Jn 24:46-48
What should you do about those who perpetrate these liturgical abuses which irritate and disturb you so much? You are commanded to love them, pray for them, and preach repentance and forgiveness of sins to them in Jesus' name.
Spot on Freyr.
Pope John Paul II address to the Bishops of Brazil Sept, 21, 2002:
I have already had occasion to refer to the confusion and the idea of an equivalence between the common priesthood and the ministerial priesthood. I have also mentioned the scarce observance of certain ecclesiastical norms and laws, the arbitrary interpretation of the concept of "supply", to the tendency toward the "clericalization" of the lay faithful etc., pointing out that "it is also necessary that Pastors guard against a facile yet abusive recourse to a presumed 'situation of emergency' or to ‘supply by necessity' where objectively this does not exist or where alternative possibilities could exist through better pastoral planning" (Christifideles laici, n. 23).
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