Msgr Brian Arahill’s concerns (NZ Catholic, June 26 - July 9) about aging priests being incapable of raising the Host
above their heads provide an excellent illustration of the reasons for "Kiwi
drift", as acknowledged recently by Bishop Patrick Dunn.
So does your headline, and the whole story. Cardinal Sarah didn’t "question" anything; he quoted our Pope Emeritus, who as Cardinal Ratzinger
wrote that it’s essential during the Eucharistic Prayer to look together at the
Lord.
NZ Catholic is pandering to our Kiwi habit of questioning rubrics
from "Rome". "We’re Kiwis," we say. "We do things differently here." The reason
why Kiwi priests are aging and can’t raise the Host above their heads, and why
aging lay Kiwis can’t kneel is, we’ve lost the fear of God which fears nothing
but sin, and perfects us in love. At Pentecost my cathedral omitted it from the
gifts of the Spirit. Without that filial fear which inspires humility and
obedience, how can we hope to staunch the haemorrhage of native-born New Zealanders from the Body of
Christ?
But to echo Cliff Corbett (Letters, June 26), accepting challenges like Cardinal
Sarah’s to the way we do things here means clergy who led the 20th century
charge to change would lose credibility.
Maybe that’s why they’ve only just noticed that gradual but great loss of Kiwi Catholics which Bishop Dunn describes as "the elephant in the room".
It’s been around so long, it seems like a pet.
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