At the peripheries

Pope Francis' Urbi et Orbi address on Christmas day referred to situations in different parts of the world where people who suffer might feel, with some justification, that they have been abandoned by the international community. In doing this, Pope Francis placed these peripheries at the heart of international attention. Pope Francis spoke in a particularly forceful way about the suffering of children:

May Jesus save the vast numbers of children who are victims of violence, made objects of trade and trafficking, or forced to become soldiers; children, so many abused children..... 

The Child Jesus. My thoughts turn to all those children today who are killed and ill-treated, be they infants killed in the womb, deprived of that generous love of their parents and then buried in the egoism of a culture that does not love life; be they children displaced due to war and persecution, abused and taken advantage of before our very eyes and our complicit silence. I think also of those infants massacred in bomb attacks, also those where the Son of God was born. Even today, their impotent silence cries out under the sword of so many Herods. On their blood stands the shadow of contemporary Herods. Truly there are so many tears this Christmas, together with the tears of the Infant Jesus.

On Christmas Day, Cardinal Vincent Nichols was interviewed on BBC Radio 2's Good Morning Christmas (ie the Christmas Day equivalent of the weekly Good Morning Sunday). It was very striking that Cardinal Nichols chose to identify as his highlight of 2014 the work of the Santa Marta Group , which brings together bishops and police authorities from around the world in an effort to prevent people trafficking and provide support to those who are victims of trafficking. The group is led by Cardinal Nichols and Sir Bernard Hogan-Howe, Commissioner of the Metropolitan Police, and held its second meeting in London in early December 2014. This page at the website of the Romanian Embassy in London gives some indication of the potential of the Santa Marta Group to engage at the highest international levels. The work of the Group is also linked to the elements of the Bakhita initiative - see this page at the website of the Catholic Bishops Conference of England and Wales.

A word or two on marriage

The BBC News website reported just before Christmas that Sir Elton John and David Furnish marry. The BBC report includes the sentence:

Mr Furnish and Sir Elton, who have two sons, became civil partners in 2005.

We were all invited to join the ceremony and celebrations by way of the electronic media.

From the point of view of Catholic teaching, of course, Mr Furnish and Sir Elton did not marry. According to Catholic teaching, marriage can only take place between a man and a woman, and not between two men. Their two sons are sons of a surrogate mother, so they are not uniquely the sons of Mr Furnish or Sir Elton, as if two men were able to have children together.

I do think it is worthwhile, from time to time, to explicitly recognise that there is a discordance between the use of language about marriage in the wider world and the use that accurately reflects Catholic teaching. While same-sex marriages now provide an immediate occasion to avert to this, the marriage of celebrity divorcees has been presenting such occasion for decades. It would be unfortunate, in the light of the two Synods dedicated to the mission of the family, if Catholics were to so readily assimilate the two usages of language to each other that they were as a result no longer able to distinguish what is truly Catholic teaching.

The Feast of the Holy Family, celebrated on the Sunday after Christmas Day, is an opportunity to reflect on marriage and family life. In different ways, bishops in England and Wales are doing this in the form of pastoral letters:  Bishop Davies (Shrewsbury) has chosen to affirm Catholic teaching, Bishop Campbell (Lancaster) has thanked Catholic families for the care offered in the circle of the extended family; and Bishop Williams (Brentwood) quotes St Francis:

As we gaze at the scene from Bethlehem we can make some words of Saint Francis our own: “We are mothers of Christ when we carry Him in our heart and body through divine love and a pure and sincere conscience and give birth to Him through a holy activity which must shine as an example before others.”

Pope Francis invites the Curia - and the Church - to an examination of conscience

When he met with the members of the Curia for the traditional exchange of Christmas greetings, Pope Francis gave an address that was an invitation for both himself and his collaborators in the Holy See to an examination of conscience (English language press release here; at the time of posting no full English text on the Vatican website):

Desidero insieme a voi elevare al Signore un vivo e sentito ringraziamento per l’anno che ci sta lasciando, per gli eventi vissuti e per tutto il bene che Egli ha voluto generosamente compiere attraverso il servizio della Santa Sede, chiedendogli umilmente perdono per le mancanze commesse “in pensieri, parole, opere e omissioni”.

E partendo proprio da questa richiesta di perdono, vorrei che questo nostro incontro e le riflessioni che condividerò con voi diventassero, per tutti noi, un sostegno e uno stimolo a un vero esame di coscienza per preparare il nostro cuore al Santo Natale.

[I wish together with you to offer to the Lord a lively and heartfelt thanksgiving for the year that is just ending, for the events experienced and for all the good that He has wished generously to complete by way of the service of the Holy See, asking Him humbly for pardon for the failures committed "in thought, word, deed and omission". And beginning particularly with this request for pardon, I wish that this our meeting and the reflections that I will share with you will become, for all of us, a help and a prompt to a true examination of conscience to ready our heart for a Holy Christmas]

 And Pope Francis prefaced his "catalogue" of fifteen temptations that face the Curia - and indeed all parts of the Church, of the Mystical Body - with the observation that members of the Curia can only fulfil their mission if they maintain a living relationship with Christ, and that, without that relationship, they become simply bureaucrats.

Pope Francis certainly has a hard hitting turn of phrase as he presents each of the temptations. And sometimes his choice of phrase, removed from its complete context, gives a misleading impression of what was said in the Sala Clementina. A good example is his warning against "spiritual Alzheimer's", where he refers to a very specific circumstance which is lost if the phrase is taken apart from its more developed explanation:

C’è anche la malattia dell’“alzheimer spirituale”: ossia la dimenticanza della propria storia di salvezza, della storia personale con il Signore, del «primo amore» (Ap 2,4). Si tratta di un declino progressivo delle facoltà spirituali che in un più o meno lungo intervallo di tempo causa gravi handicap alla persona facendola diventare incapace di svolgere alcuna attività autonoma, vivendo uno stato di assoluta dipendenza dalle sue vedute spesso immaginarie.

[There is also the illness of "spiritual Alzheimer's": that is the forgetfulness of one's particular history of salvation, of a personal history with the Lord, of "the first love" (Ap.2:4). I am speaking of a progressive decline of the spiritual faculty that in a more or less long passage of time causes a serious handicap to the person, making them become incapable of undertaking any individual activity, living in a state of complete dependence on their views, often imagined.] 

[Do look up the reference to Revelation 2:4, and perhaps read 2:1-2:5.]

 Now this invitation to a shared examination of conscience..... is it fairly described as "sixteen paragraphs of sustained and immoderate abuse"?....... Was it a "stunning and very public 'dressing down' of his staff"?....... Was it "a coruscating and very public critique"?

No. It was an invitation to a shared examination of conscience.

And it is unfortunate that both secular and Catholic media are reporting it otherwise.

It is worth noting that, as with a number of the other statements by Pope Francis that have been taken badly by those of traditionalist inclination, some of the themes articulated here are not original to Pope Francis or original to this particular occasion. I was able to find, for example, an account of "Martha-ism" identical to that of Pope Francis, in a book by Terry Rush, a book written, I think, from an Evangelical Christian background. I expect, too, that the idea headlined "spiritual Alzheimer's" is also part of an ecclesial conversation that precedes Pope Francis' address. If you are not familiar with this wider context to what Pope Francis says then you will end up thinking it is a more specifically directed critique than it in reality is. My own quick look suggests that it is those familiar with the writing and life of the Charismatic Renewal who will most readily recognise the wider conversation of which this address forms a part. [A comment at another blog suggests the Spiritual Exercises and Pope Francis' Jesuit training as a background.] If anyone can shed further light on this aspect of Pope Francis' address, please do so via the comments.

UPDATE: For those who read French, Isabelle de Gaulmyn has posted to suggest that the essence of Pope Francis' proposal for the reform of the Curia is spiritual in nature and not managerial: Curie, la réforme spirituelle du pape François.

SIGNIS - an international public association of the faithful

I noticed a month or so ago, in passing, the recognition by the Pontifical Council for the Laity of the organisation SIGNIS as an international public association of the faithful. A report on SIGNIS website is here.

This recognition does have points of interest. First of all, the organisation that is now known as SIGNIS - "World Catholic Association for Communication" has a long history in two predecessor organisations, one dedicated to the field of radio and television and the other to the field of cinema - see here. The organisation therefore has a background of a genuinely lay engagement of Catholic professionals in these fields of communication, that is, an engagement arising from the professionals themselves and not by delegation from the hierarchy. In the present times of the Church that is something that might be taken for granted, but I suspect that in the early days of the two founder organisations this was something quite novel. [Corrections will be gratefully received in the com box if anyone knows otherwise with regard to the history of these organisations.] The objects of SIGNIS, which are included in their newly approved statutes, are here. The move towards recognition as a public association of the faithful, with an Ecclesiastical Assistant appointed by the Pontifical Council for the Laity, represents an assurance of ecclesial communion alongside the principle of a rightly autonomy of lay expertise in fields that more than many other do require a specialist expertise.

A second point is the way in which SIGNIS contributes to the professional development of Catholics (and others) in the field of cinema, radio and television. This is of particular significance in less developed countries, where funding and technology will be less available. So, for example, SIGNIS trains colleagues to take part in festival juries.

A third point of interest is the strongly ecumenical dimension to SIGNIS work, both in practice and as expressed in its Statutes. One of the most prestigious aspects of SIGNIS work is its presence at major film festivals throughout the world, through a jury that will evaluate films from a Christian perspective (see here). Not infrequently, the juries involved are ecumenical juries - which not only enables a wider Christian dimension but also allows access to a wider range of professional expertise. It is the kind of field in which ecumenical collaboration is almost natural. The presence of these juries - some of them reaching back a long way in the history of the relevant film festival - is, so far as I can tell, accepted readily by festival organisers. It thereby facilitates a dialogue between Christians and their fellow professionals, the presence of Christians in the field being welcomed.

A particular aspect of SIGNIS work that I have found helpful for some time now has been their publication of reviews of, or statements about, recently released films (see here, and the links to recent reviews on this page). Topical at the moment might be their statement on Exodus: Gods and Kings.

The Year for Consecrated Life: No to "temporary commitment"

A blog post at The Tablet for the beginning of the Year of Consecrated Life suggests that a form of temporary participation in religious life should be offered alongside the permanent commitment that is the traditional form of such life in the Church: Commitment-shy young people need mini tasters of consecrated life.

Bishop Hugh of Aberdeen has observed that, since Vatican II, one area of the Church's life that has not shown a great flourishing is that of the religious life. The Year for Consecrated Life certainly provides an opportunity for those who live other vocations in the Church to gain some experience of consecrated life, perhaps by spending some time with religious communities or sharing in the apostolic activity of such communities. One impact of the decline in religious life has been that a typical parish now has little or no visibility of religious in the day to day life of the parish - and so young Catholics grow up without any direct experience of consecrated life. So, not only might the lay faithful spend some time in an experience of religious life, but also religious might make a particular effort during this year to be more visible to the Church at large.

But is the kind of "temporary commitment" suggested in The Tablet blog post really the way forward?

Louis Bouyer observes in the Preface to his book The Meaning of the Monastic Life (with my italics added):

The purpose of this book is primarily to point out to monks that their vocation in the Church is not, and never has been, a special vocation. The vocation of the monk is, but is no more than, the vocation of the baptized man. But it is the vocation of the baptized man carried, I would say, to the farthest limits of its irresistible demands. All men who have put on Christ have heard the call to seek God. The monk is one for whom this call has become so urgent that there can be no question of postponing his response to it: he must accept forthwith.

And Pope Francis said something similar in an interview, cited in the letter from the Congregation for Institute of Consecrated Life linked above (again with my italics added):

“It is a question of leaving everything to follow the Lord. No, I do not want to say ‘radical’. Evangelical radicalness is not only for religious: it is demanded of all. But religious follow the Lord in a special way, in a prophetic way. It is this witness that I expect of you. Religious should be men and women able to wake the world up.”

Can this evangelical radicalness admit of a temporary response, a temporary commitment to consecrated life?

In two complementary essays in his book Elucidations, first published as long ago as 1971, Hans Urs von Balthasar argues that the evangelical counsels so characteristic of consecrated life are the form in the Church of a decisive act of discipleship, a decisive choice to follow Jesus Christ:

But nothing has been said about the attitude of the man who gives himself....[The counsels] mean discipleship, not only material, but above all, spiritual discipleship. They mean precisely and centrally our total offering of ourselves to be disposed of by the Lord, just as he puts himself totally at the disposition of the Father's will.

And in an essay entitled "Temporary Christians", von Balthasar challenges explicitly ideas of temporary commitment in marriage, in the priesthood and in religious profession:

For here the very basic act of the Christian life is put in question, namely that God in Jesus Christ can dispose of a man's life once and for all and that this man is enabled to ratify that act of God's disposing. 

Recognising that the Church might by way of dispensations free those who might otherwise break under the demands of a task they have taken on; and recognising that "temporary vows" or first profession exist as a step towards a final and complete consecration; von Balthasar nevertheless argues that, if the permanence of the commitment in the Christian life of discipleship ceases to be the expected norm in favour of the "limiting cases", then it is all up for the essence of such discipleship.

The fear of lifelong decision gnaws today at the marrow of the life of society, most dangerously in the Church. Perhaps young people speak about commitment so much today because they are frightened of the "once for all" character of decision. They seek refuge in provisional commitments which for their limited period are meaningful (a spell of work in overseas development), which hold open the possibility of changing over to something else later. They imagine that they are being serious about it but in truth, a truth which is hidden to them, they are only flirting like half-virgins who have all kinds of experience but not the decisive one: namely, that of finally giving oneself...

.... ultimately what stands behind these three programmes, "temporary marriage", "temporary priests", "temporary vows", is the unsaid "temporary Christians"....

 [It is interesting to see in this essay how vividly von Balthasar compares the commitment of man and wife in marriage to what is to be expected of commitment to consecrated life.]

There will always be those who start out on the way of religious life, with every intention of persevering, but who do not stay the full course and leave before permanent consecration. Some might even try several times, and in different institutes. This kind of temporary participation in consecrated life there will always be.

But it is quite different than the acceptance in principle of "temporary commitment", of commitment that knowingly and deliberately from the beginning is going to be temporary. The kind of temporary commitment that undermines the authentic decision for Christian discipleship, not just for the religious, but for the lay faithful too.

Whatever initiatives are undertaken during the Year for Consecrated Life to make such life better known and lived in the Church, they should avoid any encouragement of a sense of temporary commitment as the norm.

Pope Francis speaks to Europe

The early BBC news reporting of Pope Francis' address to the European Parliament is utterly woeful - even to the extent of suggesting the figure of 200 years as the extent of the Christian influence on Europe rather than the 2000 years that appears in the full text. Presumably some correction, and fuller reporting, will follow in due course, but I would not rely on it.

Read the complete text: Pope Francis’s address to the European Parliament in full. I think it will reveal a side to Pope Francis that many have not wanted to recognise. Not for the first time, I have read Pope Francis and been reminded of Pope St John Paul II and Pope Benedict XVI (and this happens before you even look at the footnotes). This is Pope Francis in an absolute line of continuity with his immediate predecessors. Do read the whole, because it is only then that you can really appreciate the import of any small extracts you will see in news reporting - even the extracts below, which I offer in the expectation that they will be missed out of most media reporting:

Men and women risk being reduced to mere cogs in a machine that treats them as items of consumption to be exploited, with the result that – as is so tragically apparent – whenever a human life no longer proves useful for that machine, it is discarded with few qualms, as in the case of the terminally ill, the elderly who are abandoned and uncared for, and children who are killed in the womb....

The family, united, fruitful and indissoluble, possesses the elements fundamental for fostering hope in the future. Without this solid basis, the future ends up being built on sand, with dire social consequences....

A Europe which is no longer open to the transcendent dimension of life is a Europe which risks slowly losing its own soul and that “humanistic spirit” which it still loves and defends.

Taking as a starting point this opening to the transcendent, I would like to reaffirm the centrality of the human person, which otherwise is at the mercy of the whims and the powers of the moment. I consider to be fundamental not only the legacy that Christianity has offered in the past to the social and cultural formation of the continent, but above all the contribution which it desires to offer today, and in the future, to Europe’s growth. This contribution does not represent a threat to the secularity of states or to the independence of the institutions of the European Union, but rather an enrichment. This is clear from the ideals which shaped Europe from the beginning, such as peace, subsidiarity and reciprocal solidarity, and a humanism centred on respect for the dignity of the human person....

The absence of mutual support within the European Union runs the risk of encouraging particularistic solutions to the problem, solutions which fail to take into account the human dignity of immigrants, and thus contribute to slave labour and continuing social tensions. Europe will be able to confront the problems associated with immigration only if it is capable of clearly asserting its own cultural identity and enacting adequate legislation to protect the rights of European citizens and to ensure the acceptance of immigrants. Only if it is capable of adopting fair, courageous and realistic policies which can assist the countries of origin in their own social and political development and in their efforts to resolve internal conflicts – the principal cause of this phenomenon – rather than adopting policies motivated by self-interest, which increase and feed such conflicts. We need to take action against the causes and not only the effects....

 And the concluding paragraph:

Dear Members of the European Parliament, the time has come to work together in building a Europe which revolves not around the economy, but around the sacredness of the human person, around inalienable values. In building a Europe which courageously embraces its past and confidently looks to its future in order fully to experience the hope of its present. The time has come for us to abandon the idea of a Europe which is fearful and self-absorbed, in order to revive and encourage a Europe of leadership, a repository of science, art, music, human values and faith as well. A Europe which contemplates the heavens and pursues lofty ideals. A Europe which cares for, defends and protects man, every man and woman. A Europe which bestrides the earth surely and securely, a precious point of reference for all humanity!

UPDATED: Pope Francis' address to the Council of Europe - also well worth reading in full - is here: Pope Francis’s speech to the Council of Europe in full. I must admit to not having yet fully understood the notions of "multipolarity" and "transversality", but I am going to make sure I do within the next few days!

See also the following recent addresses by Pope Francis, which have not received as much attention as they might have done (Aunty is right again!):

Address to Participants in the International Colloquium on the Complementarity between Man and Woman

[And Lord Sacks' address to the same colloquium: In full: Lord Sacks speech that brought Vatican conference to its feet .]

Address to Participants in the Commemorative Conference of the Italian Catholic Physician's Association

The Church we are in

Introduction

Writing in 1935, in the interval between the First Vatican Council and the Second, Dom Anscar Vonier wrote in the Foreword to his book The Spirit and the Bride:

I have noticed with a feeling of pain how several recent books by Catholic writers of fame make a distinction that is a surrender to Protestant feeling between an ideal Church and the real Church. Being themselves very orthodox Catholics the writers in question abound, of course, in their encomiums of the beauty of the Church conceived ideally. But after that they seem to gloat on the Church's human infirmities, piling it on and letting the Protestant have it his own way with his century-old fault-finding. Different, indeed, was the mentality of the Vatican Council [ie the First] which considered the Church in her actuality to be a testimonium irrefragibile, a "witness that cannot be gainsaid", of her divine mission: The Church, through herself, on account of her admirable extension (propagationem), her exceeding sanctity (eximiam sanctitatem), her inexhaustible stability, is a great and everlasting motive of credibility and a witness to her divine mission that cannot be gainsaid (Vatican I, sess, III, cap. 3,7).

The Council means, of course, the actual living Church, not an ideal, or a mere system of the means of sanctification. To say the least, it is very bad taste on the part of a Catholic to represent Catholicism as a divine religion and to speak of Catholics as having been the world's worst sinners.... The eximia sanctitatis, "exceptional holiness", which the last of the General Councils perceived in the Church is the true portrait of what exists.

In a subsequent chapter entitled "The Great Metaphors", Dom Vonier insists that the titles used of the Church in the Scriptural writings of St Paul and of Revelation refer, not to an "ideal" Church of some kind, but to the actual living experience of the Church in the immediately apostolic period.

There is a limited parallel to the quoted passage from Vatican I in the constitution Lumen Gentium of Vatican II (nn.39-40, my italics added to draw out the parallel):

....in the Church, everyone whether belonging to the hierarchy, or being cared for by it, is called to holiness, according to the saying of the Apostle: "For this is the will of God, your sanctification". However, this holiness of the Church is unceasingly manifested, and must be manifested, in the fruits of grace which the Spirit produces in the faithful; it is expressed in many ways in individuals, who in their walk of life, tend toward the perfection of charity, thus causing the edification of others...

Thus it is evident to everyone, that all the faithful of Christ of whatever rank or status, are called to the fullness of the Christian life and to the perfection of charity; by this holiness as such a more human manner of living is promoted in this earthly society.....  In this way, the holiness of the People of God will grow into an abundant harvest of good, as is admirably shown by the life of so many saints in Church history.

The Catechism of the Catholic Church quotes the passage from Vatican I, though with slight difference in translation compared to Abbot Vonier (n.812), referring to the historical manifestations of the unity, holiness, catholicity and apostolicity of the Church as speaking clearly to human reason of the truthfulness of her mission. Hans Urs von Balthasar, in a passage of The Office of Peter and the Structure of the Church (p.196 ff in the Ignatius Press translation), suggests the figure of Mary as the point, theologically speaking, where the temptation to divide the Church into "ideal" and "earthly" realities is overcome.

Abbot Vonier was speaking to a very different ecclesial context than the one that pertains today; and clearly he was not denying the human frailties that must have been as much present in the Church of his time as they are in the Church of our own time. (If the Church of our own time has offered sorrow and repentance for failings of the past, then so to has the Protestant ceased from using those failings as an argument to denigrate the Catholic Church.)

But it is of value, I think, to take Abbot Vonier's fundamental insight - that there is no distinction to be made between a Church "ideal" in its faithfulness to Christ and a Church "real" in the vagaries of its earthly life - and use it to reflect on the Church during the papacy of Pope Francis.

Reform-minded Catholics

As an example of the movement that self-identifies as a "reform movement" in Catholicism we have ACTA. On 25th October 2014, they held a national conference at Liverpool Hope University. One of the talks was entitled "Remarriage and the Eucharist - after the Synod". You have to dig down to page 10 of the text on the ACTA website (it is the talk by Fr Buckley) to find the suggestion that indicates just how far away from an authentically Catholic position it is (my italics added):

....we have been willing to accept that we understand more about the psychology of human relations and therefore the possibility that the bond of marriage may not have been validly formed for many more reasons than hitherto thought possible, but we don’t seem willing or able to question a theological notion that has tied us up in knots and leaves us with little or no room for manoeuvre. If we are willing to accept the judgement of a tribunal on whether or not an indissoluble bond was formed, why can we not also accept that the very fact that two people subsequently become totally estranged and unable to live out their marriage commitment is itself a sign that the bond was never properly formed? I fail to see how such a judgement would mean that we had abandoned our belief in the sanctity and permanence of marriage. It would simply acknowledge that there is much that we will never know for certain on this earth, in spite of our best efforts.

Unfortunately, and somewhat inaccurately, Fr Buckley has earlier in his talk given the impression that Pope Francis appears to support his position, even though I am not aware of any suggestions that Pope Francis would accept the idea that marital breakdown is sufficient evidence for invalidity of the original marriage:

..... I sense that more and more people’s instincts now lead them to conclude as I did that the official position simply doesn’t add up and it is a relief to find that it would seem that the Pope himself thinks likewise.

It is Professor Mary Grey's comments on the ordination of women to the Catholic priesthood - see pages 5-6 of the text of her talk at the ACTA website - that reveal how far she is from a truly Catholic position:

.... some Roman Catholic women of great courage have sought to authenticate their own call to ordained ministry. One group is the well publicised ordination on a boat on the Danube in 2002. These pioneering women are referred to as “The Danube Seven”. This event was swiftly followed by excommunication from Rome, even though technically speaking, the ordinations might be reckoned as valid. Dramatic consequences ensued: nine further women sought ordination in the Roman Catholic Church on July 25 2005, in the international waters at the mouth of the St Lawrence Seaway (known as the St Lawrence Nine). Two other women Catholic theologians, Christine Mayr-Lumetzberger of Austria, and Gisela Forster of Germany, now bishops, came to the St Lawrence River to ordain these women. Other ordinations have followed, and now, as WOW (Women's Ordination Worldwide) attests, there are increasing numbers of women being ordained and practising ministry especially in the United States...

Fr Tony Flannery's blog reveals something of the extent of this latter development in posts during his tour of America: here  and here. Elizabeth Scalia posted recently on Christine Mayr-Lumetzberger here.

Traditional Catholics

But equally absurd in its distance from being an authentic Catholic position is the following, commenting on Archbishop Nichols pastoral letter after the October 2014 Synod on the Family (my italics added):

.... it makes for incredibly concerning reading in the wake of the Synod. Cardinal Vincent Nichols uses some striking language that prompt more questions over the 'mind' of Pope Francis and the safety, in his hands, of the Deposit of Faith.

 Or this, from the same source:

To Muslims, Jews, Evangelicals and other religions, Pope Francis has only good things and words of encouragement to say (though actual pagans could be offended by recent remarks).

Yet, I am beginning to wonder whether he believes in and prays to the same God as Cardinal Burke and many others. Where is the "fraternity" and "brotherhood" for those who uphold the Magisterium and defend Church teaching from pagans and the 'enemies of the Cross of Christ'? They don't seem to be terribly welcome in Rome.

Sitting in the background to these more explicit comments is an array of more discretely expressed antipathy towards the papacy of Pope Francis, which appears very rational and mature, until recognised as an incessant carping that undermines the office of the Successor of St Peter. Some blogs have a greater discretion than others - compare Fr Ray to Eponymous Flower, for example - but nevertheless maintain the same line of thought. Hans Urs von Balthasar wrote many years ago of an "anti-Roman attitude" or "anti-Petrine attitude" on the part of some Catholics. It is difficult to read the Traditionalist blogs today without being reminded of such an attitude.

 

Elizabeth Scalia has written tellingly of how both the Traditionalist and Reform-minded in the Church are creating idols of Cardinal Burke on the one hand, and of Pope Francis on the other.

It takes conceit to imagine that the Holy Spirit is not to be trusted, does not know what it is about, and needs the instruction and exhortation of liberal writers to sustain a direction — or of traditionalist bloggers to “turn the course” — of an event like the recent synod.

Yes, one might want to support the position of Cardinals Burke, Pell et al with regard to the controversies of the recent Synod (or, if one is so minded, the proposals of Cardinal Kasper), and to do so with the energy that questions of faith will prompt. But when the former are given adulation at the expense of the Office of Peter and the latter excoriated as encouraging the Church to accept mortal sin; or Pope Francis is adored for incorrect assumptions of radical change to come; then we are in the realm of idols in Elizabeth Scalia's sense of the term.

A conclusion: the Church we are in

To return to the reflection based on Abbot Vonier's notion that the Church should not be seen as divided into an "ideal" and a "real", but exists as a single entity whose beauty and holiness shine out to the world. If we look around us during the papacy of Pope Francis, we see the Church that we are in, and some of it - perhaps more on the reform-minded side than on the Traditionalist side - appears pretty far off the wall. But if we take Abbot Vonier's insight seriously, there is an abiding beauty and splendour that is there in all of it. And we need to trust that it is there and that it does still shine out.

The touchstone of that shining out is, as it has ever been, the office of the Successor of Peter. Nothing is to be gained by excoriating - or mis-representing -  its holder.