Houston: Extraordinary Form PARISH to be established by Card. DiNardo

Speaking of Houston, I just noticed that our friends at Rorate posted this.

For your Brick by Brick file.

Wonderful news for the faithful of the largest city in the great state: a full Parish, exclusively dedicated to the Traditional Roman Liturgy (the “Extraordinary Form” of the Roman Rite), is to be established by the Archbishop of Galveston-Houston, Cardinal DiNardo, as foreseen by Summorum Pontificum, art. 10.

The future Parish will be staffed with priests of the Priestly Fraternity of Saint Peter (FSSP), who begin celebrating daily Mass in the diocese already on September 4; their page adds: “A beautiful 40 acres parcel of land has been donated for this new Traditional Latin Mass Parish [near Breen and Fairbanks N. Houston – see Google Maps for surroundings] which will eventually have a full parish complex including a traditional style church, rectory, parish hall with room for a retirement facility, retreat house, and possibly a parish school.”

Thanks be to God, and congratulations to Cardinal DiNardo, to the faithful of Houston and surrounding areas, and to the state of Texas, which will now host three personal parishes dedicated to the Traditional Mass (the first one being Mater Dei, in the Diocese of Dallas, and the second one St. Joseph the Worker, in the Diocese of Tyler).

I will add my WDTPRS kudos to Card. DiNardo and also add that just because there is to be a parish in the area, that doesn’t mean that other pastors of parishes cannot implement Summorum Pontificum.  The Holy Father wasn’t interested in creating ghettos, as is clear from the PCED’s explanatory document Universae Ecclesiae.

About Fr. John Zuhlsdorf

Fr. Z is the guy who runs this blog. o{]:¬)
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21 Comments

  1. Tominellay says:

    I’m not surprised; Cardinal DiNardo is superior.

  2. KAS says:

    Cardinal DiNardo is a huge blessing from God to the people of his diocese! I am excited to read about this new parish. Awesome!!

    I think this will be a blessing for the people of Houston. So few priests are comfortable with the EF mass and this will let those who love it have somewhere they KNOW they will be able to attend the EF.

    And who knows? Other priests who want to learn but were not sure where to go will be able to attend and learn!

    I agree it would be wrong to create ghettos, but our Archbishop would do no such thing. He is marvelously orthodox.

  3. jacobi says:

    “just because there is to be a parish in the area, that doesn’t mean that other pastors of parishes cannot implement Summorum Pontificum”

    This is good news, Father, but I also support the point you make regarding other pastors. The Traditional parishes will be the yardsticks against which the liturgy will be compared in future, but what I think we all would like to see is the widespread availability of the Traditional Mass in ordinary parishes, and on Sunday morning, perhaps as the later High Mass alongside a “reformed” Novus Ordo earlier family Mass.

    So all you priests out there who have an interest in the Taditional Mass, get trained and get on with it. Remember you do not now need permission from you bishop!

  4. Cathomommy says:

    Wonderful, wonderful! We attended a Tridentine Rite diocesan parish (St Joseph’s) when we lived in Richmond, VA and it was so beautiful to be able to receive all the sacraments in the older form. Long confession lines before every Mass…but what a nice problem to have! :)

  5. mschuster says:

    That is nice that there will be another parish in the Archdiocese that will offer the EF. Annunciation downtown has being offering it for quite a while.

  6. teaguytom says:

    Anxiously awaiting Bishop McFadden to upgrade Mater Dei community in Harrisburg to quasi-parish. We progressed greatly in 3 years. Father rents an apartment that functions as his rectory, we have more than 200 registered families and will be starting our own CCD. We obviously still don’t have the funds to buy the St Lawrence chapel outright, but we have a stable community that can help to upkeep the chapel. The Cathedral can’t keep doing it on their own. The woodworking is starting to show its age. The doors and belltower slats are worn and peeling. The pews are put together with multiple jury rigs. We would volunteer to help fix up the place more if asked.

  7. MJ says:

    Great news! I have friends in Texas, in Houston in fact…I believe they’re “SSPXrs”…methinks I should send ’em this wonderful news!

  8. Geoffrey says:

    As much as I love the Extraordinary Form of the Roman Rite, I do not think personal parishes devoted to it are the answer. Doesn’t this run the risk of banishing the EF to a sort of liturgical ghetto? “Okay, you people go over there now and do your thing… meanwhile we’ll do ours over here.”

    I would much rather see the EF and the OF side-by-side in parishes, though I am aware there are many pastors out there who have little to no interest in this. It will take the “JPII” generation of priests to do this.

  9. MarkJ says:

    “The Holy Father wasn’t interested in creating ghettos…”
    Having experienced TLMs in “mixed” parishes, and now being a parishioner in an FSSP parish, I much prefer the latter. Let’s face it, in most parishes with an “add-on” TLM, the TLM is relegated to a (usually inconvenient) free time slot. In my experience, the TLM crowd in such a situation loses cohesiveness with the parish – no CCD for the kids, no morning donut socializing, etc. On the other hand, in a parish dedicated to the Traditional form, the TLM crowd IS the parish, and all have access to everything. From my experience then, and in my own humble opinion, the ghetto metaphor could be more aptly applied to those attending an isolated EF Mass in a predominantly OF parish, than to those in a dedicated Traditional parish, who have the freedom to live a full Traditional parish life. That being said, I agree that in this transitional period, the more EF Masses the better, no matter where (or when) they are celebrated. Brick by brick…

  10. trad catholic mom says:

    Deo Gratias

    Although I’m a little bitter over the fact that my husband didn’t get the job in Houston, I miss attending an FSSP parish.

    I’ve done both also and much prefer a dedicated TLM parish to a mixed one.

  11. ivan_the_mad says:

    @mschuster – Indeed! We love Annunciation! God bless Monsignor!

  12. Lucas says:

    While we have a few EF masses in MD, I’d love for a parish staffed by the FSSP here. My kids would love it.

  13. PeterK says:

    I lived in Houston from 1988 to 1997. during that time period there was a Tridentine Mass said every Sunday in downtown Houston. the Archbishop at the Fiorenza did everything within his powers to hamper the celebration of the EF. I clearly remember him issuing an “edict” that said if the attendance at the Mass was below 100 attendees for 3 weeks in a row he would cancel his permission for the Mass. He would send an official counter each Sunday.

    while I applaud the establishment of the EF Parish one need only look at the size of the diocese to realize how inadequate it is. http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/2/27/Archdiocese_of_Galveston-Houston_in_Texas.jpg/220px-Archdiocese_of_Galveston-Houston_in_Texas.jpg

    I would much prefer the His Excellency promote the saying of the EF in as many parishes as possibility. The Bishop of my home diocese (Richmond Va) announced shortly after the motu propio was issued that there was no need to say the EF in the various parishes since the diocese already had an EF Parish (St. Josephs) http://www.stjosephrichmond.org/

  14. In practice, when the two forms are offered in the same parish, like it or not, two separate parishes begin to form in one physical location. OF and EF types don’t mix very well.

    In my very liberal city, establishing an FSSP parish was the only way to bring in the EF, since all the other parishes are exceedingly hostile towards traditional Catholicism (and even orthodox Catholicism).

  15. ocds says:

    It’s a little far (3 1/2 hours) for a day trip “just” for Mass, but maybe I could make a weekend of it . . .

  16. flyfree432 says:

    It’s not that our bishop would not let anyone who wanted to offer the EF Mass, its just that no one wants to. The one priest who did got to start his own parish here too. We have other parishes who offer it in our diocese, but they also offer it exclusively. The only parish that offers both only offers the EF Mass on Christmas Eve at midnight.

  17. teomatteo says:

    Maybe Fr. Z. could have a poll:
    Is it preferable for the good of the faithful to have:
    1) both forms of the mass at parishes.
    2) isolate the forms to a particular parish.
    vote??

  18. Why either/or? Traditional EF parishes work well. So do parishes with the OF and EF alongside each other. We need as many parishes of both types as possible. Why would anyone oppose either?

  19. Antony says:

    God bless Monsignor, indeed! And God Bless Fr. Van Vliet!

    Neighboring Brenham has an EF Mass every Sunday @ 4, offered by 2 fine local priests (Chapel Hill and Hempstead). St. Theresa in Sugarland also has made some efforts at an EF Mass and has a wonderful priest as well. There are other fine parishes in the area, a couple of which also offer the OF in Latin.

    Regarding Geoffrey’s comment about “ghettos”…I attended Mass in Little Rock at the FSSP parish about a year ago. While we were making our preparation, we were distracted by the altar boys in cassocks lugging temporary altar railing in from the back room. The thought came unbidden that we were sharing a building with another religion entirely. I had to quickly remind myself that this was not the case, but that left an impression on me. I’m fine with a “ghetto”. Like oil and water, the two forms will not exist (harmoniously) side-by-side. I love Annunciation, but I’ll be clicking my heels on September 4th.

    Praised be our Lord Jesus Christ, Eternal High Priest!

  20. gloriainexcelsis says:

    I will be celebrating the Houston apostolate at St. Joseph the Worker in Tyler, Texas, at Mass that morning, along with my September 4th eightieth birthday. We are also praying that whoever the new bishop will be for the Tyler diocese will be as supportive as Bishop Corrada, who will be leaving for Mayaguez, Puerto Rico. We will miss him.

  21. mamosco says:

    When is something like this going to occur in the NY metro area???

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