If You've Never Watched The Catholics, Now is the Time!

In 1972 Brian Moore wrote a short novel titled Catholics about a remote abbey on an island off the coast of Ireland. [online here] It's the year 2000 and the monks continue to offer the Latin Mass after Vatican II and even after Vatican IV. The Protestants have long been acclimated to the new Church and the new faith. The move now is to incorporate the Buddhists and a conference is scheduled in which the head of the order is participating. 

The monks have become an embarrassment and stumbling block to the new church. Ever since a television crew televised the Mass thousands of Catholics from all over the world flock to the liturgy offered on the mainland. The crisis comes when the head of the order in Rome sends a young priest to examine the abbey and order the monks to immediately adopt the new mass. There are no more private confessions. No one is required to believe that the bread and wine really become the Body and Blood of Christ at the consecration. No clergy are allowed to resist. They are ordered to conform.

Will Bishop Strickland be Banished to Muck Island!

Editor's note: Msgr. Antall's article struck me immediately when I saw his reference to the book, The Catholics, which was made into a film of the same title later changed to The Conflict. I recommend both the book and the film. It's amazing how prophetic they were. We are now experiencing a very similar situation to the Catholic flock in the movie who are deprived of the Latin Mass and other devotions. 

Read the article! 

Anyone who is currently attending a Traditional Latin Mass is on a modern Muck Island. We can hope and pray, however, that our modern Fr. Kinsellas, with no belief in Catholic doctrine praying to who knows who from their lotus positions, will be converted. Nothing is impossible with God!

We don't know what happens as time moves forward at the end of the movie. Neither do we know the end of God's story here and now. But we can be ever confident in the reality that "All things work together for good to those who love the Lord and serve according to His purpose." 

Welcome to Muck Island

by Msgr. Richard Antall

After the Vatican Directives, What's Next in the Diocese of Arlington for the Latin Mass?

And so it begins. 

My bishop, Michael Burbidge, Bishop of Arlington, spoke about the Vatican directive that came out last weekend in his 12/20 podcast, a portion of which I've transcribed below. The bishop won't be issuing his own implementation document until the new year, but it's pretty clear that it will be bad news for those of us who attend the "extraordinary form" at diocesan parishes, even if only occasionally.