I am left wondering about what motivated this vile act; not hatred for God, I'm thinking, but certainly hatred for Catholics, and wanting to strike and hurt us most profoundly. It is puerile and spiteful, not at all an act which one might suspect of one who is a university academic. I'm also told that it has inspired others to do the same.
And who, really, is he trying to impress? Surely anyone with half a brain , whether they believe in God or not, can see that this childish malice is the act of a knave or a fool. I dare say he made sure that has tenure in his academic post, because I don't imagine any serious institution would want to employ a loose cannon like this even if they privately sympathize. And of course, were his own institution to want to get rid of him, as they should, since he is likely to become a liability.
And let's all make an act of reparation for this sacrilege. I suggest a visit to the Blessed Sacrament. I shall celebrate a Mass of reparation, and ask people to pray at Benediction this afternoon.
And who knows? Perhaps good may come out of this after all if there is a great worldwide surge of prayer on the back of this incident.
5 comments:
Do you not think this is precisely the type of reaction these people were trying to ellicit?
I rather doubt that anyone is going to be that bothered to steal a communion wafer from London and send it via AirMail to a cynical professor in an American University.
In Dublin recently I noticed two consecrated wafers drop to the ground in the Franciscan church, both times when communion was being given on the tongue. Nobody noticed.
Some years ago in London I saw teenagers passing consecrated wafers between them - it apparently was a popular sort of game.
The answer is clearly to follow Orthodox practice and give communion on the tongue from the chalice with a spoon: the chalice having the particles of consecrated bread poured in from the paten.
Fr Sean
Of course this is appalling and the Oratory are to be congratulated on organising quickly an Evening of Reparation. But what adds a special poignancy for me is that the music being played is (I think) Byrd's Ave Verum (which would indicate that the sacrilege took place on 12 July, a day on which the celebrant (Fr Creighton-Jobe) preached a profound and beautiful homily on the significance of the Precious Blood and the sacrificial nature of the Mass.
So in this context, whilst the choir were proclaiming the Catholic belief in the Real Presence in one of the most beautiful settings in the repetoire, the sacrilege took place. Who can doubt that the Devil was involved here, and what better words can we use for our prayers of Reparation than those of the Ave Verum itself:
Hail the true body,
Born of the Virgin Mary,
Truly suffered, sacrificed
On the Cross for mankind,
Whose pierced side
Flowed with water and blood,
Let it be for us, in consideration,
A foretaste of death.
...puerile and spiteful, not at all an act which one might suspect of one who is a university academic
Irony, right?
Hasn't it been a while since God "smote" anyone? (While still on earth, I mean....)
HAIL
THE
NAIL
“and the Word was made Flesh”
Memento Myers
Nailed the Host,
Father, Son and
Holy Ghost
Where flesh - by a word
From Nero was toast -
Myer's, the Word
Nailed Flesh, his boast.
But the Word is made Flesh
At Mass daily doth dwell -
So nail Myers nail...
Till it freezes in Hell!
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