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It was my great honor to celebrate Mass for Fr. Willis’s flock at St. Benedict’s Chapel in Norfolk, VA. I met some wonderful people at the chapel. They are looking forward to starting their building project for a new church.
I don’t have any of my own photos of the Mass, of course, but I think I will be able to post some that other people may have taken, if in their goodness they send them or post them on their own blogs. (HINT, HINT)
I have audio of my sermon for this 3rd Sunday after Easter.
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UPDATE:
Fr. Cusick over at Meeting Christ in the Liturgy has a few photos of the Mass on Sunday.
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Darn,
I had I know you were going to be at the chapel I would have made the ride over from Newport News. That’s what i get fro letting my blog reading lapse ;-)
Father,
It was great meeting you and your sermon was wonderful! The choir was a little weak yesterday due to some members being sick, but even so it was a beautiful Mass.
St. Benedict’s is a warm, welcoming TLM community with a fantastic priest, we are so blessed to have been a part of it. After moving away we miss Father Willis sooooo much!
Uhhh, ‘scuse me, fodder, but St. Benedict’s is in Chesapeake, 20 minutes sourth of Nawfuk, as the locals pronounce it:-)
Chesapeake… Right! I sit corrected.
Hello Fr Z,
The photos you requested are now available at http://mcitl.blogspot.com. Thank you very much for the kind invitation and much pleased to be of help. Very much enjoyed your visit, the wonderful Mass and pithy sermon.
Ti auguro buon viaggio!
Padre K
I used to go here when + Fr. Damian Abbatichio OSB was chaplain and was impressed with Fr. Willis FSSP.
The faithful here don’t fit the often held reputation of being aloof from strangers as many EF chapels
and communities do embody. This chapel is proof that there is something going on with the EF in the Church.
Many Years!
This blog seems to be “preaching to the choir” most of the time. I simply don’t believe that the TLM is going to be anything other than “extraordinary” in the U.S. in the future. The number of Catholics who have never attended this Mass is huge, and getting bigger with younger immigrants coming into the country.
Gerry– you ought to see the size of this choir!
Until a short while ago, I was in the number of people who had never seen the Extraordinary Form, but now that I’ve had it– let me tell you what: it is EXTRAORDINARY. I’m a little surprised that the Church kept this rite basically in mothballs for so long, and feel like I’ve been deprived of knowing how the Church can glorify the Lord; indeed, most of my Catholic liturgical experience has been pretty un-glorious, and really…
…Ordinary.
Keep preaching, Father Zuhlsdorf! It’s just a matter of time before everyone in the pews will be singing in and with the choir!
Gerry: I simply don’t believe that the TLM is going to be anything other than “extraordinary” in the U.S. in the future. The number of Catholics who have never attended this Mass is huge
Is it your thinking that the great majority of U.S. Catholics are “ordinary” at best?
In which case the thought occurs that perhaps it’s not so much that our Catholics deserve an improved Mass, but that a Mass is needed that will improve our Catholics.
Seriously, this is why I think our bishops would be well-advised to promote the TLM enthusiastically, not so much because so many Catholics want it, but because so many need it.
Now that I’ve been exposed to what I’ve been deprived of, that choir is getting much bigger.
Amen!
Keep in mind that episcopal appts are the keystone of Benedict’s structure for the Church. Note the two recent appts of bishops who have long been known to offer the extraordinary form of the Mass both in France and the United States. This trend portends a snowballign effect. Vocations will shortly follow these bishops to their new sees and the seminaries to which these new vocations will be sent will train them in the EF.
“Patience, people” to quote an old musical standby of the St. Louis Jesuits 1970’s “patrimony”.
Henry: I hope that the TLM is “extraordinary” in the same way “extraordinary”
has been interpreted by the modernists with regard to the lay ministry post of
Extraordinary Minister of the Eucharist (i.e. commonplace and available
at every church for every Mass).
Fortis in Fide
Henry Edwards writes:
Seriously, this is why I think our bishops would be well-advised to promote the TLM enthusiastically, not so much because so many Catholics want it, but because so many need it.
Not least of all our priests. I think that is the reason why it is so disappointing when one of our bishops writes that a priest cannot offer the traditional Mass publicly on his own initiative. If we laypeople need the traditional Mass, how much more do our priests need it.
Fr. Cusick over at Meeting Christ in the Liturgy has a few photos of the Mass on Sunday.