Fr. Z's Blog | Catholic commentary by Fr. John Zuhlsdorf

QUAERITUR: Does registering in a parish mean anything?

Posted on 5 June 2013 by Fr. John Zuhlsdorf

From a reader:

What does canon law say about becoming a member of a parish outside of the geographical jurisdiction of the parish closest to you? For example: Joining another parish farther away from you, but in your diocese, because the Mass is more reverent/you receive spiritual direction from that pastor/you fit in culturally with the people at that parish, etc.?

Canon law says nothing about “joining” a parish. “Joining a parish” is a concept foreign to the canonical system.

You become a member of a parish by virtue of where you live.

If you belong to an ethnic or national group, there may also be a personal parish to which you belong.

Recently, bishops have erected “personal parishes” based on factors other than ethnicity. For example, they may establish parishes for the deaf, for those devoted to the Extraordinary Form, for members of the charismatic movement, etc. It is therefore possible for one person to “belong” to several parishes as in the case of a hearing-impaired traditionalist-charismatic Wendish-Laotian.

In North America parishes about 80 years ago began developing this concept of “registering”. As a “registered” member, you get envelopes and other mailings from the parish office, you are listed on the books for easy reference (handy in parishes of 1000 families or more where it’s unlikely that the pastor personally gets to know everyone … especially when the pastor is transferred every six years… but that’s another vat of borscht).

Registering does not in itself allow one to acquire any canonical rights at the parish where one registers. Registering at one parish does not it cause one to lose any rights they have at their proper parish.

Remember: there are rights and duties, too.

Catholics are no longer obliged to attend Mass regularly at their proper parish’s church. They may freely choose to attend a parish across town, in another village, even a parish of another ritual Church (e.g., you are a Latin Church Catholic but you like to attend the Divine Liturgy at the Ukrainian Catholic Church). You may attend a different church every Sunday if you wish.

That said, in North America there are good reasons for registering at a parish. For example, you might have a pastor at your proper parish who doesn’t understand canon law and who refuses to offer sacramental or liturgical service to those folks who are not registered. He, of course, would be entirely in the wrong, but trying to argue over the matter as grandma is dying in the hospital is inconvenient at best.

Canon law doesn’t have anything to say about registering in a parish that is not one’s proper parish. Therefore there is nothing wrong with doing so and it may be of advantage.

Posted in "How To..." - Practical Notes, ASK FATHER Question Box, Our Catholic Identity | Tagged canon law, parish, parish membership, registration
49 Comments

QUAERITUR: Are gold vestments permitted?

Posted on 5 June 2013 by Fr. John Zuhlsdorf

From a reader:

Is gold a licit primary color for chasubles? I’ve seen it for many Eucharist-themed vestments, but I don’t know if that’s allowed or recommended.

Yes. Gold is allowed in the Latin Church as a primary color for vestments. Gold, as a matter of fact, like white, can substitute for other liturgical colors.

Here is a detail of the fabric of one of my nicer chasubles.

QUAERITUR: Are gold vestments permitted?

Posted in ASK FATHER Question Box, Liturgy Science Theatre 3000 | Tagged chasuble, gold, liturgical colors, vestments
21 Comments

YOUR URGENT PRAYER REQUESTS

Posted on 5 June 2013 by Fr. John Zuhlsdorf

Please use the sharing buttons! Thanks!

Registered or not, will you in your charity please take a moment look at the requests and to pray for the people about whom you read?

Continued from THESE.

I get many requests by email asking for prayers. Many requests are heart-achingly grave and urgent.

As long as my blog reaches so many readers in so many places, let’s give each other a hand. We should support each other in works of mercy.

If you have some prayer requests, feel free to post them below. You have to be registered here to be able to post.

Finally, I have a serious personal petition.

Posted in SESSIUNCULA | Tagged Your Urgent Prayer Requests
50 Comments

QUAERITUR: Mass during space travel

Posted on 5 June 2013 by Fr. John Zuhlsdorf

From a reader:

Could you hypothetically foresee Rome allowing Masses to
be celebrated extra-terrestrially? While it might seem more possible on the Moon or a planet, what about zero-gravity where things can’t be poured and other difficulties would arise?

We apply the analogy of Masses said aboard ships.

Initially, only bishops and cardinals were permitted to offer Mass on ships or other moving vehicles. The fear of the ship tilting and rocking, and the danger of spilling the sacred species, or other vagaries of motion, prevented widespread application of this which, in those times when an Atlantic crossing would take weeks, meant that sailors were deprived of Holy Mass, often for a considerable period of time.

In the 20th century, this permission was gradually extended, on a case by case basis, to certain chaplains, making sure that they were aware of the dangers and would take steps to prevent them – by waiting until the seas were relatively calm for Mass, etc.

In space, we have to worry about fluids wandering around. Thus, the “chalice” would have to be enclosed, a tiny amount of water could be injected at the right moment, and so forth. I don’t think there is any problem with Hosts. They can be consecrated even if the ciborum or pyx is not open. Care will have to be taken to avoid fragments floating away. Hosts would have to have well sealed edges. Perhaps even with some neutral coating approved by the Holy See?

I suspect that Mass in space won’t happen until large numbers of people are aboard some crafts. By then space-going vessels will have some sort of gravity generated in the habitable portions.

And if there are abuses, Father can go out the airlock!

Posted in "How To..." - Practical Notes, ASK FATHER Question Box, Liturgy Science Theatre 3000, Look! Up in the sky! | Tagged space travel
34 Comments

“Get on with the work we ourselves have to do”!

Posted on 5 June 2013 by Fr. John Zuhlsdorf

At Vatican Insider there is a piece that concerns the conference I want to go to in Rome (click the flag). The interview with a mover and shaker for the conference, Bishop Dominque Rey of Fréjus-Toulon is worth your time.

One paragraph in particular caught my eye. As I have been saying all along…

“Yet, the Bishop of Fréjus-Toulon, Dominique Rey, wants to reassure those Catholics who think that the moment for “liturgical renewal” – a shorthand definition for a return to a more solemn style of celebration hopefully ushered in by Benedict’s legalization of the pre-Second Vatican Council Latin Mass – is now over.

“Instead of anxiously wondering what Pope Francis personally thinks about every liturgical detail, we would do better to get on with the work we ourselves have to do,” he said in a recent interview with Vatican Insider.”

Posted in Francis, Liturgy Science Theatre 3000, New Evangelization, Our Catholic Identity, SUMMORUM PONTIFICUM, Year of Faith | Tagged Bp.Rey, D. Frejus-Toulon, Pope Francis, Vatican II
19 Comments

QUAERITUR: Recessional Hymn – to sing or not to sing?

Posted on 4 June 2013 by Fr. John Zuhlsdorf

From a priest:

Last Sunday at the end of Mass the musicians chose a song that just wasn’t striking a chord with me. I couldn’t muster the energy required to pretend to be gleeful and sing along. As I looked at the congregation I noticed only a handful were joining in the song. Most looked irritated and bored. I know the GIRM does not require a recessional hymn (90), but and I’m wondering if it’s time for my parish to change our thinking about the “closing” hymn. Your thoughts would be appreciated.

It seems to me that a lot depends on the hymn. Holy God We Praise Thy Name always gets people going. On the other hand, perhaps ACDC’s Highway To Hell isn’t such a good idea. It is nice to have a Marian antiphon appropriate to the season, followed by an organ piece.

What do you think?

Posted in "How To..." - Practical Notes, ASK FATHER Question Box, Liturgy Science Theatre 3000, Mail from priests | Tagged GIRM 90, recessional hymn
81 Comments

Voris video on Vatican II’s built in vagueness

Posted on 4 June 2013 by Fr. John Zuhlsdorf

Here is a video from Michael Voris in his usual non-committal, indifferent, ambiguous, vague, tepid, ho-hum style. o{];¬)

I will remind the readership that in the greater arc of the Church’s history, Vatican II wasn’t all that important. It is still in the living memory of many right now, which falsely magnifies its importance. Furthermore, the identity of many American Catholics of a certain age were formed under the influences of the civil-rights movement, anti-war protests, and the sexual revolution. Together, these influences fused into the minds and identities of many of a certain age together with Vatican II. Thus, Vatican II has taken on a kind of mythic importance in the identity of many Catholics of a certain age. When a challenge is raised to any aspect of Vatican II, they take it personally. When they see a biretta or hear some Latin or read a claim that the documents have some flaws, a loud buzzzzzzzzzz starts in their heads and they react negatively.

This can serve as the starting point of fruitful discussion.

Keep in mind that in the early Church, when bishops holding conflicting views met in synods and councils to work through a problem, they would produce creeds to which they could affix their signatures, as it were. The creeds had to precise enough to state something clear, but in order to build unity around a credal formula they also often had to leave as somewhat vague certain points which were worked out in later synods and councils.

During Vatican II, after many of the working drafts and schemata were junked, committees and subcommittees, working under pressure and time constraints, cobbled the documents together.

Is it any wonder that the documents have some problems?

If you can find a copy, I suggest reading The Rhine Flows into the Tiber: A History of Vatican II by Ralph M. Wiltgen. He gets into the debates and how many of the documents were put together. You could also drop a note to TAN asking them to reprint this, especially since we are in the 50th anniversary of Vatican II. On the Amazon page I send you to, there is a link you can click asking the publisher to make it available on Kindle. PLEASE CLICK THAT!

Posted in Our Catholic Identity, The Drill, The future and our choices, Vatican II | Tagged Card. Kasper, Michael Voris, Vatican II
68 Comments

Blog “New Liturgical Movement” under new management

Posted on 4 June 2013 by Fr. John Zuhlsdorf

Kudos to Jeffrey Tucker who has taken over the reins of the blog New Liturgical Movement!

Click on the image and go spike their stats as a welcome gesture.

Posted in Fr. Z KUDOS, The Campus Telephone Pole | Tagged blogs, Jeffrey Tucker, liturgy, New Liturgical Movement
4 Comments

GUEST POST: Gregorian Chant Will Save the World

Posted on 4 June 2013 by Fr. John Zuhlsdorf

Save The Liturgy – Save The Word has been a by word around this blog for a long time.

I saw this on the blog The Back Of The World:

Gregorian Chant Will Save the World

Click to buy!

A few weeks ago, I was sitting at the computer while my two-year-old son noisily played with some tupperware behind me. I clicked on a link to listen to a song from “Angels and Saints at Ephesus”, a new CD by the Benedictines of Mary, Queen of the Apostles (which, incidentally, has been tearing up the Classical music charts). The beautiful, a capella voices of the Sisters came softly over the computer speakers as they began a Gregorian chant in Latin.Suddenly, I noticed that the banging of tupperware behind me had stopped.

I turned to see my two-year-old, standing, staring at the computer, eyes wide open and mouth slightly agape. He took a few steps forward, and then said, breathlessly: “Dada…that’s Jesus music.”

I was stunned. How on earth did he know that? (Our parish certainly doesn’t do any chanting at the N.O. Mass we attend…). He crawled up into my lap, and we listened to the rest of the chant together. And then we listened to it again. And then again. And then again. My boy was totally captivated, totally transfixed, totally enraptured…each time the chant would come to an end, he would look up at me and plead “again, Dada?”

I bought the album, and now every night my son asks to listen to the “Jesus music” as he falls asleep…

***

Fyodor Dostoyevsky once said: “Beauty will save the world.”

Cardinal Ratzinger once said: “The encounter with beauty can become the wound of the arrow that strikes the soul and thus makes it see clearly, so that henceforth it has criteria, based on what it has experienced, and can now weigh the arguments correctly.”

Mother Theresa once said: “You have to learn from the Heart of Jesus. That is why Jesus said ‘learn of me’–not from books.”

And somehow, in ways I will never understand, my two-year-old boy is listening to the beat of the Sacred Heart. He is encountering beauty, and listening to it with childlike ears of faith. He’s learning lessons that only the gentle notes and chords of Heaven can teach him. And all I can do is sit back and treasure up all of these things in my heart…

Ex ore infantium!

Fr Z Kudos to the 2 year old and his father!

If you are in Canada or the UK, copy and paste the CD title (above) into my amazon searchboxes at the bottom of the page. Easy. Otherwise, the UK link is HERE and Canada HERE.

A brief sampling!