ABANDON 'CATHOLIC' SCHOOLS LIKE SACRED HEART NAPIER, ST ANTHONY'S PAHIATUA

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"About 20 years ago at St Patrick's Church Napier, two senior girls from the local Sacred Heart College were given the honour/duty of leading the Rosary.    We were flabbergasted that they didn’t know how to say the prayers, and it must have been extraordinarily embarrassing for them."

St Patrick's in flames - a symbol of our loss of Faith

St Patrick's Napier as it was once

The Lion of Bennydale is roaring again, giving vent to a subject close to my heart. I can't say 'dear to my heart' because it's actually downright painful, a heartache, you might say. Leo Leitch is on about 'Catholic' schools, and what's prompted him was yesterday morning's Sunday Mass in Otorohanga. 

"(Yesterday) morning," says Leo, "my wife and I attended Mass at Otorohanga, which is our custom now for Sunday Mass since the Te Kuiti debacle" (reported on this blog and also by the msm).  "The congregation is usually approximately 20-30. The numbers were swelled by the attendance of about 30 schoolchildren (almost all in their school uniform) and a couple of their teachers. There were apparently some parents there, also. 

"A couple of older schoolgirls did the Readings, and five younger schoolchildren read the Prayers of the Faithful. When it came time to receive Communion, all of the children filed up, but only approximately six of them received Communion; all the others put an arm across their chest and received a blessing. 

"I think it’s reasonable for me to assume that these are pupils who attend the local Catholic school. But Catholic school? What is the definition of a Catholic school?"

Logically, spiritually, a Catholic school is a school for Catholics. That's no longer the case and hasn't been, obviously, for twenty years at least - as Fr Bryan Buenger, beloved 'Pa' at St Joseph's Dannevirke and parish priest for Tararua, discovered at St Anthony's, Pahiatua. He noticed two of the three altar servers didn't receive the Eucharist. 

"When I asked them why," says Fr Buenger, "they said they were not Catholic - not baptised and so hadn't received First Holy Communion. On investigating I found there were several students in this situation. With full understanding that it wasn't their fault, my plan was to promote altar serving as something to strive for through the Sacraments - in other words, it was open to any student who had received them or was in preparation.

"I wasn't going to take it away from any of the kids who had been serving, but that "going forward" it would be a requirement to have the sacraments or preparing for them. I also wanted to stress the joy and privilege of serving at the altar and hopefully encourage some vocations through service at the altar. (Most studies of seminarians - at least in the US, 95% - indicate it was serving at the altar that encouraged the vocation, especially in their high school years.) 

"I was told by the Diocese of Wellington that this was the "old Church" way of thinking. 

"When I discussed the altar serving with (St Anthony's principal), she became quite confrontational and told me that I was going to "undo everything that [she did] to build a bridge between school and parish" and that she would "see about that." 

"She did contact (the then) Bishop Charles (Drennan) almost immediately and he asked me about the situation and I indicated my plan. 

"He informed me that "there was no requirement for altar servers to be baptised" so that I should "rethink" my plan.  While he never said I couldn't adopt the plan, there was no question in my mind what his meaning was in his statement."

In Fr Buenger's outline of the facts we see at once the calibre of the priest we lost (he returned to the US), and also of the bishop we lost (he resigned because of unacceptable behaviour of a sexual nature).

Presumably the Mass in Otorohanga was what's called a 'School' Mass - which expression implies that other Sunday Masses are not 'School' Masses, and so school children and parents don't need to attend. Coincidentally, St Joseph's Waipukurau endured a 'School' Mass yesterday too. I can't compare that celebration to Otorohanga's because rather than seeming to contribute to the insults and outrages inflicted on Our Lord in the Blessed Sacrament at these events, I attended the 'Vigil' (so-called but not a Vigil because it begins at 5.30 p m, not 6 p m), at St Patrick's Waipawa.

But when Bob Gill weighed in this morning with his experience of St Joseph's School Dannevirke children attending the Holy Souls' Mass this morning, it seemed that in spite of matters of worldwide importance, like Archbishop Vigano's letter to Donald Trump on the "Great Global Reset" weighing upon us, Something Needs to Be Said. Now.

"Not one pupil or teacher (at St Joseph's Dannevirke)," says Bob Gill, "genuflected on entering the pews, or even acknowledged the Blessed Sacrament. 

How was it at your church Mass elsewhere in NZ? Just curious."

Bob, there wasn't any Holy Souls' Mass in Holy Trinity Central Hawke's Bay today because Father, like all the PN diocesan priests (according to Father yesterday) are off on a retreat. It seems only 5 minutes since he was away for a week at an assembly of diocesan priests, and apparently this retreat is self-directed as the promised Australian bishop couldn't show, not due to Covid but due to Hitlinda and her cohorts across the Tasman. So for Holy Souls' Day I 'attended' a Latin Mass in Bristol, livestreamed,instead.

"Approximately 20 years ago," says Leo Leitch, "girls from St Joseph’s Maori Girls’ College in Greenmeadows attended a Sunday Mass at which my wife and I were in the congregation. Similarly, almost all of those girls received a blessing at Communion time."

 Twenty years ago! So many 'Catholic' girls who were not actually Catholic, at a 'Catholic' school, that long ago! 

"At around the same time, my wife and I attended at St Patrick’s church a Novena organised by the Napier Knights of the Southern Cross. On this occasion, two senior girls from the local Sacred Heart College were given the honour/duty of leading the rosary. We were flabbergasted that they didn’t know how to say the prayers, and it must have been extraordinarily embarrassing for them. We give them credit for being willing to take the role, but even after presumably being primed for it, they couldn’t recite a Hail Mary!"

 

St Patrick's today: there's the church, where's the steeple, open the door (what door?) and where are the people?

Tempus fugit, as we all know. Fast forward 20 years, and the Napier Parish is now in the hands of the Marist Order. Father Barry Scannell s.m.(self-styled), following his triumph at St Mary of the Angels Wellington where he spear-headed a $9.5 million fundraiser for earthquake strengthening, is intent on building a 'Parish Administration and Mission Centre' on the site of the old presbytery. 

These days, St Patrick's Church is too small to accommodate the Sacred Heart Prize Giving, which is held instead at the Anglican Cathedral of St John.

But rather than build a new church big enough for the Sacred Heart Prizegiving and 'School' and Requiem Masses - with the tabernacle in its proper place instead of demurely sidelined - the Marists believe 'Administration' is the priority. Really? St Patrick's already has the Hannigan Centre (pictured below) as a large gathering space.

As for 'Mission', isn't the church the true 'Mission Centre' of any parish? No! It seems that 'Mission' is now translated as tourism - maybe because 'The Mission', the original Marist seminary at Greenmeadows nearby, is now the Mission Estate Winery, a high-market restaurant and winery. If faithful Catholics want to add weight to their personal cross, I suggest dining out in its luxury surroundings with American and Asian tourists off the boats. 

St Patrick's, in the boom tourism town of Napier, apparently lacks 'a facility to welcome and offer hospitality to visitors [to Napier and Clive Square], as well as to the many local groups who meet in the Hannigan Centre.' That's what St Patrick's parishioners are asked to cough up for. 

And Fr Scannell has distinguished himself on at least one occasion by refusing Holy Communion to a female parishioner kneeling in front of him, presenting last in the queue. Obviously St Patrick's Napier is not one of those parishes which have 'established the custom of Communion on the tongue, if those receiving on tongue come up last in the queue for Holy Communion', a practice which Cardinal John Dew - in the absence still of any bishop for the Palmerston North Diocese - has said may continue.

Today at a Requiem Mass at St Patrick's another woman, attending weekday Mass not realising it would be a Requiem, presented last in the queue for Communion and was denied the Blessed Sacrament by Fr Damian Cacciopoli, who gave her a blessing, touching her on the head instead of risking life and limb and COVID by giving her Communion on the tongue. (Fr Cacciopoli is of the generation who would have been trained to give Communion on the tongue, in the days when there was no option.)

What can be the rationale for denying Communion in the mode It was given throughout all the plagues? What can be the rationale for It being okay in some parishes but not in others, in the same diocese? 

Fr Barry Scannell s.m.

"My wife and I removed three children from 'Catholic' schools and our youngest three children never attended 'Catholic' schools. We came to understand, along with Archbishop (now Venerable) Fulton Sheen, that it was better to send them to other schools, where they would have to fight for their Faith, than to send them to 'Catholic' schools, where they would have their Faith taken away from them."

That's exactly the decision, very reluctantly arrived at for the same reasons, taken by my husband and me for the secondary education of our youngest daughter, following her years at St Joseph's Waipukurau - my alma mater.  

"Surely, it is well past the time when the Church in New Zealand should abandon the pretence of providing Catholic schools. There is no doubt now that they are entirely secular and exist only to provide employment to teachers."

As I commented on this blog yesterday, at the bishops' meeting in PN's Cathedral of the  Holy Spirit last week one bishop dashed in and out again without any recognition of the Real Presence in the Blessed Sacrament, and another chatted with a local liturgical prima donna within a few feet of the tabernacle, with his back turned to the Blessed Sacrament.

It's these bishops who bear the responsibility for the Faith or lack of it in New Zealand's schools and dioceses, and it's the Pope who bears responsibility for these bishops. Actually, Bishop Athanasius Schneider, Auxiliary Bishop of Kazakhstan (now there's a bishop for you), maintains the appointment of bishops is the Pope's first and chief responsibility. 

We are forced to conclude then that the wooing of that old whore, the world, the establishment of the New Masonic Global Church and the promulgation of heresies keeps the occupant of the See of Rome, Jorge Bergoglio, too busy to worry about a bishop for Palmerston North, New Zealand.