No, of course not: don't be silly!
Of course, here, as in other parishes, we have had record congregations—record highs, that is, not lows. Our churches here in the Adur Valley have, thank God, been over-full for every one of the five Easter Masses so far. There will be one more this evening.
But no doubt the media will report that tomorrow that Catholics are abandoning the Church in droves……
And did you listen to the 1pm news today on Radio 4? If so, you will have heard an interview with a representative from We Are Church (that natural authoritative recourse for comment on all Catholic affairs) alleging that the Holy Father, as Archbishop of Munich routinely moved pædophile priests around, like all his colleagues; the ghastly man just alluded to it as if it were common knowledge, and indeed, his assertion went unchallenged. I was just about to boil, when they presented a far better interview with Damian Thompson.
Oh, when is this going to end? When they've gone the rounds of every country in the world, I suppose, or else got bored. Fortunately, the latter is likely to be the former, if you see what I mean.
6 comments:
Similarly Radio 5 had Lavinia Byrne giving the Catholic view.....
I was making a pot of tea at the time, and was unpleasantly surprised - but then again, not surprised - to hear that they were interviewing someone from We Are Church. I muttered a few harsh words! Glad they went on to interview Damian Thompson.
On the six o'clock news the correspondent described Easter as the festival of "renewal".
Anyway, never mind all that just for now, awful as it is ... I am really dropping in to wish you a very happy Easter, and to thank you for all the good work you do with your blog.
We never have people standing at the back- well not until today! And when I switched on to see the Urbi et Orbi blessing it was clear that despite the rain in Rome the crowd were spilling from St Peter's Square down the Via della Conciliazione.
While the cause of the attacks on the Church is inexcusable, what seems to be emerging is a state of civil war between different factions in the Church, helped by the secularist press. This has long existed quietly but what is emerging is wilful ignorance on the part of the adversaries against the vindication of the Holy Father from blame. Despite clear statements of the truth of these matters, the Pope's adversaries prefer to strew confusion and strife. As far as I can see, this is based on malevolence and sour grapes rather than truth. As such it is bound to be defeated because few will be able to deny the actual truth and the malignance will rebound against the pedlars of lies. Unfortunately the gravity of the cause of this crises - the exploitations of children and the destruction of their innocence by evil men - gives credibility to people who have little interest in their plight but a considerable investment in undermining the Church.
Delighted to say that the situation at the London Oratory was similar to yours, Father : abnormally large congregations, and high numbers of communicants. (It took 15 mins with four priests at three altars to deal with the 10:00 Mass alone; the 11:00 High Mass was even busier !)
The journalists are enthusiatically barking up the wrong tree when it comes to Mass attendance at this time of year. As any fule would kno, Easter Sunday and Christmas Day are the 2 occasions each year when standing room only is 100% guaranteed. I would not be surprised to find that it is similar for other denominations.
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