Ugly Rumours

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This was, of course the name of the former Prime Minister's "band" when he was at Oxford. Rest assured that that is not my subject.

The ugly rumours of which I write concern a cabal, a combination, of priests who are setting out to subvert the Pope's intentions in respect of the Extraordinary Rite. There are alleged to be e-mails doing the rounds among priests who are opposed to "the return of the Latin Mass" (as one English diocesan website puts it) suggesting that they are allowed, in the terms of the Motu Proprio, to declare themselves incapable of celebrating Mass in any form other than the Ordinary Rite. If enough priests in any given locality agree, then the only way to accomodate the Extraordinary Rite will be for the local Ordinary to ask a priest from outside to say it. "The pressure of normal Sunday services" will be quoted to ensure that legitimate celebrations of the Extraordinary Rite will take place at odd times: like 4.00 pm on a Sunday afternoon; and in a different parish every week: thus making the building of a community difficult.

Were such ugly rumours true, it would suggest that the current extent of Indult Masses accorded to the LMS might be as much as would be achievable even under the Motu Proprio. Surely this can't be what the Holy Father intended!

But look to the websites of the dioceses of England and Wales and, with the honourable exception of the Archdiocese of Birmingham, look in vain for a welcome to a Church in which our common Rite has, from September, two Uses.

We shouldn't start planning for the worst; a few ugly rumours might be no more than just that: ugly, and rumours. But it might be worth spending five minutes thinking about the way me might mobilise ourselves were such a thing to come to pass where we live.