We have a weekly column in our paper called "Ask the Clergy", Every few weeks they will have a lay person give the Catholic answer. Annoying. I wonder if they will ever have a Muslim woman stand in for an Imam?
Funny thing is, our parish is about as "modern" (at least in appearance) as you would expect for an upper-middle-class suburban town. But to my knowledge, all the rites are exactly according to Hoyle. Maybe (and maybe more than maybe) it has a lot to do with Fr. Bevington, our parish priest. He's 83 years old +/- and just recently celebrated his 56th ordination anniversary a few months back. Not a big experimenter, he. If it ain't broke, don't fix it. He is scheduled to retire this summer, and he will be missed.
Except for a handful of places in the Mass in which the priest has freedom to "ad lib," any additions, changes, and deletions are FORBIDDEN by the Church's liturgical law.
It is a grave abuse for a priest to modify the words of the Scriptures or the Eucharistic Prayer. It is "double sin" -- disobedience and bad example. In my opinion, it is a MORTAL sin, if the usual conditions for such are present.
Why this particular abuse, Kelly? "Father Relevant" wants to be the pal, not the pastor, of the congregation. He does not want the "clergy" to stand out as a separate entity of higher standing than the "laity." No, we are ALL the "people of God."
[Ironically, an 86-year-old priest at the parish that I just left (in disgust) perpetrates the same abuse, though he leaves out the word, "holy."]
These priests are silly-'70s "democrats" (with a small "d" and a big "D"). Some of these priests are ashamed of being priests. Some will not encourage young men to be priests. Some want a church without priests (or with female priests). Some are using "false humility" to try to make up for the priestly sexual abuse scandals.
It is not by accident that the Church prays "for the clergy" at that point in the Eucharistic Prayer. These foolish priests don't bother to notice that they pray for the rest of us elsewhere in the EP, so they are slighting themselves and fellow clergy, and they are not doing us any favors.
COME ON, ALL YOU DISOBEDIENT PRIESTS. SSSSSTTTTTTOPPPPPP ITTTTTT, ALREADYYYYYYYYYYYYY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Some of us have been suffering through your garbage for FFFFFFFFFFOOOOOOOOOORRRRRRRRRRRRTTTTTTTTTTYYYYYYYY
YYY years now. Isn't that forty years in the wilderness long enough??????????? Grow up, Father Relevant!
It is called DENY THE CLERGY. Deny they exist. Deny often enough in word and deed and soon there will be a complete laity takeover. Protestant laity that is. Their way of coming Home without the humility, without the conversion. Just whittle the mountain down low enough to just climb over the walls like the thief in the parables.
That is what the entire VatII business was about. The more lunatic stuff was just the extra fruit of their darkness. The contributions of the Communists involved in it all.
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