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Opened May 3: St Mary's Immaculata, largest Catholic church in Kansas, largest SSPX church in the world
As lay Catholics in Palmerston North Diocese rejoiced at withdrawal of the decree of deconsecration threatening little St Anthony of Padua's in Martinborough, 3000 lay people and 155 priests, seminarians, monks and nuns celebrated the consecration of the largest Catholic church in Kansas, on May 3, to Mary Immaculata.
The new Immaculata Church is also the largest belonging to the Society of St Pius X (SSPX) in the world. The SSPX's status within the Catholic Church is canonically irregular but it is within the Church. It is not in schism; the SSPX prays for Pope Francis and the local ordinary (bishop) at all their Masses, which are of course the Traditional Latin Mass of the 1962 Missal.
In other words this Mass was the ONLY Mass celebrated in the Catholic Church up until the Second Vatican Council, and as Pope Benedict XVI famously remarked, how can something which was so RIGHT for hundreds of years in the Church suddenly become WRONG?
In New Zealand the Society is based at St Anthony of Padua's, Gonville Wanganui, where three readers of this blog went to Mass last Sunday. They bumped into one another in the little porch, one having been to the 7.30 Mass, the others arriving early for confession before the sung High Mass at 9 a m. You have to be early to get a seat anywhere, let alone in the confessional queue pew.
Parking your car at St Anthony's requires nerve. The carpark heaves with people departing the 7.30 and arriving for the 9 a m. Lots of children, adorable small children especially, the little girls in chapel veils, boys in ties with jackets, and don't get us started on the babies.
It was the first time one of our readers had ever knelt at the communion rail beside a dog. A Russian wolfhound, actually. She wasn't discombobulated (neither the reader or the dog) because they'd met before, on the SSPX annual Ignatian silent retreat. She'd spoken to the wolfhound's owner as they were leaving. Her name (the wolfhound's that is, the reader has no idea of her owner's) is Anya and she's an assistance dog. She has such soulful eyes ...
Anyway. After Mass they searched for Father Chrissemont (Christian name unknown, the SSPX don't do the palsy-walsy N O Father Tom - or Dick or Harry - thing) after the High Mass, wanting to give him a Mass offering for the Holy Souls, which he'd said he'd do but not before September, his Masses are all booked up till then. But when asked where Father was a religious brother told them, "He's saying Mass!" Of course.
It's not just three morning Masses with Confessions on a Sunday. There's evening Benediction and Rosary too. Last Sunday they offered a lecture on the SSPX by the American priest who'd sung the High Mass - and delivered a sermon on emotions, how they may or may not affect sin, crystal clear as to content and delivery. The fortunate reader who was able to stay for his lecture says it was just as good.
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| At the doors of the Immaculata Church |
Recently the traditionalist Society of St. Pius X (SSPX) consecrated a new church in the small town of St. Mary’s, Kansas. At first glance, this seems to be non-news. However, consider that the consecration was attended by more than 3,000 people (the town’s entire population is less than that!); the church is now the SSPX’s largest church in America; the new church is a sign of the SSPX’s growth in recent years; and many Catholic dioceses are in the midst of closing churches. That makes it newsworthy.
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| At Immaculata Church: small boys are not often so solemn and attentive |
This contrast—the SSPX growing and building churches while Catholic dioceses close churches—should raise questions in the minds of Catholic leaders, especially our bishops: Why is there a contrast in the first place? What is attractive about the SSPX? Why is it growing in this country (the USA) while ordinary Catholic parishes are declining?
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| Immaculata Church: nuns in the front pews (like St Anthony's Wanganui) |
Sadly, it appears that our bishops are not asking these questions; in fact, they seem wholly incurious, even at times antagonistic, about this juxtaposition.
For our purposes here, let’s ignore the SSPX’s irregular canonical status. That’s irrelevant to the point I’m trying to make. What matters is why they are attracting people when most Catholic parishes are repelling them. Bishops should not have their collective heads in the sand and refuse to see beyond their canonical borders for examples of success in promoting religion.
In fact, bishops should be looking at any and all religious bodies that are attracting new members and explore what makes them attractive, whether they be canonically-regular traditional Latin Mass (TLM) parishes, charismatic Catholic parishes, evangelical Protestant churches, or even non-Christian religious bodies that are successful.
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| Immaculata's nave and altar |
At a time when religious practice is rapidly declining in this country, a rapidly-growing subset of the Faith—of any faith actually—is an anomaly that should interest any religious leader. Instead of being too busy defending the status quo and managing the Church’s decline, bishops need to explore deeply what religious practices are attractive to modern man.
The point here isn’t that Catholic parishes should simply ape other bodies that are successful. There are traits and practices that are better avoided, even if they result in growth. For example, if it were found that almost everyone attending SSPX parishes is there simply because it is “outside” the canonical boundaries of the Church—i.e., they are attracted to its “rogue” status—then that would not be something to emulate.
Relics for Immaculata are processed to the altar Likewise, if a Protestant mega-church’s success is based on emotionalism or loose moral strictures, then that isn’t something for Catholic parishes to embrace. Man is fallen, and due to concupiscence is often attracted to things that are actually harmful.
Sealing the relics of Saint Emerentiana and Saint Caesarius of Terracina into the altar.
That being said, man is also attracted to truth, beauty, and goodness, and so if there are elements of those realities that attract people to these growing parishes and religious bodies, then Catholic leaders should take note.
Almost two years ago we did a survey of TLM-celebrating parishes (it was conducted right before Traditionis Custodes was released) and we found dramatic attendance growth at these Masses over the previous two years, at a time when attendance at regular Catholic parishes was significantly declining. Why? Are any bishops or chancery officials asking this question? Are they conducting studies to find out?
Our Lady of the Rosary N O parish church, Greenville South Carolina It’s not just the TLM. Our Lady of the Rosary parish in Greenville, South Carolina is, on the surface, just a regular Novus Ordo-celebrating diocesan parish in a medium-sized town in the South. Sounds ordinary, right? Yet Catholic families are moving from across the country to be part of that parish (and its school). Why? Isn’t this something that someone on the USCCB Committee on Evangelization might want to ask its pastor?
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| Interior, Our Lady of the Rosary - altar and tabernacle front and centre, pews |
Now the Catholic nattering nabobs of negativism will be all too quick to dismiss these examples. “They are just pulling people from other Novus Ordo parishes! It’s not real growth!” First, I doubt if such critics have actually looked into the numbers to see if that’s true. But even if it is—so what? Shouldn’t that lead Catholic leaders to ask why Catholics are willing to leave their local parish behind to attend another, one that may be much farther away and involves more sacrifice to attend?
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| Incense for Immaculata's consecration burns on the altar |
What our bishops need to do is find out what exactly these more successful religious groups are doing right. Is it greater reverence? A stronger call to a more disciplined lifestyle? A deeper focus on the person of Jesus Christ? A higher moral code? These are things that every Catholic parish should be embracing, so if they are not, bishops should be the first to urge their priests to do so.
Immaculata's first Mass The sad reality is that religious practice is quickly disappearing in this country. It’s unlikely the bishops can do anything to reverse that trend—they might only be able to slow it down a bit. But each statistic represents souls who need Christ, and so bishops fail in their primary task as shepherds if they do not work to attract those statistics—those souls—back to the flock.
The Immaculata choir processing Bishops should not seek growth for growth’s sake, but if souls are being lost because the bishops are incurious about ways to legitimately attract them, then they need to repent of their indifference and learn from those who are doing what works, no matter who they may be.Our Incurious Bishops - Crisis Magazine
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| Main street, St Mary's Kansas |
And now for the story of the Austrian philosopher and close friend of Pope John Paul, Professor Josef Seifert who has accused the Pontiff of “destroying the foundations of faith and morals.”
It's closely related to the story of the consecration of the largest Catholic church in Kansas by the Society of St Pius X, who have preserved the Catholic Faith along with the 1962 Missal and all Catholic doctrine and dogma - which must be believed and accepted by every Catholic - and which they preach so constantly - "in season and out of season" - in their churches throughout the world.
Prof Josef Seifert, Founder and Director, Dietrich von Hildebrand Institute of Philosophy
Renowned philosophy professor and intimate friend of Pope John Paul II, Josef Seifert, published an open letter addressed to the cardinals of the Catholic Church, in which he called the bishops of the Church to resist Pope Francis’ his heterodox actions, like the signing of the Abu Dhabi document.
“Pope Francis — I say this with a bleeding heart — is not the ‘guarantor of the faith’, but is constantly increasingly destroying the foundations of faith and morals with this and many other statements and pronouncements,” Seifert wrote.
The Austrian professor specifically criticized the “Document on Human Fraternity for World Peace and Living Together,” often referred to as the Abu Dhabi document, which Francis signed together with the Grand Imam of Al-Azhar. The document states that “[t]he pluralism and the diversity of religions, colour, sex, race and language are willed by God in His wisdom, through which He created human beings.”
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| https://www.churchmilitant.com/news/article/vatican-annuls-bulls-as-uncatholic |
READ: Pope Francis welcomes interfaith committee, controversial Abu Dhabi document
“Let us remember the Declaration on the Fraternity of All People signed by Pope Francis together with Grand Imam Ahmad Mohammad Al-Tayyeb,” Seifert said.
“Wouldn’t it be a heresy and a terrible confusion to claim that God — just as he willed the difference of the two sexes — i.e. with his positive will — also directly willed the difference of religions and thus all idolatry and heresies? Yes, isn’t the Abu Dhabi Declaration far worse than heresy, namely apostasy?”
“Shouldn’t all of you cardinals and bishops speak your firm ‘non possumus’ [we cannot] when Francis demands that this ‘document’ be the basis for the formation of priests in all seminaries and theological faculties?”
“True as it is in itself ‘that the pope is the pope and guarantor of the faith,’ this statement cannot be applied to a pope who signed the Abu Dhabi Declaration and spread it around the world, and who has said and done many other things contrary to the consistent teaching of the Church.”
“How should I answer a dear and deeply believing Lutheran friend, for whose conversion I have been praying for years, when he writes to me that with this Abu Dhabi Declaration the Catholic Church has left the soil of Christianity?” he asked.
“Wouldn’t all the cardinals have to write to the Pope as one man and ask him to withdraw this apostatic declaration?”
The philosophy professor also called out Francis’ promotion of same-sex “civil unions,” which directly contradicts Church teaching and his predecessors.
“His statement that one should promote civil alliances/civil unions of homosexuals directly contradicts the clear statements of the Church’s Magisterium (cf. the considerations on the drafts of a legal recognition of cohabitation between homosexual persons of June 3, 2003, published under the pontificate of St. Pope John Paul II), but above all the Holy Scripture and the entire Church tradition!” Seifert stated.
“Shouldn’t all of you cardinals, as Bishop Athanasius Schneider did wonderfully, perform a true act of love for the Pope and express this publicly and as clearly as he did, with all due clarity?”
Seifert reminded the cardinals of the Catholic Church that they would one day have to answer for their actions (or inaction) before the judgement seat of God.
“Must you cardinals not tremble before the moment when Christ will ask you how you could fulfill Jesus’ solemn missionary mandate if you did not protest against the Abu Dhabi Declaration, which says the diametrical opposite of Jesus’ words?” the professor wrote.
Moreover, Seifert criticized Francis for contradicting Church teaching on the death penalty and changing the Catechism of the Catholic Church.
READ: Pope’s change to Catechism contradicts natural law and the deposit of Faith
He also called out the pope for saying that damned souls are destroyed instead of going to hell for eternity. The Pontiff allegedly made these remarks in one of his infamous interviews with the atheist journalist Eugenio Scalfari.
“Wouldn’t all cardinals have to protest in many other cases, e.g. when the Pope arbitrarily introduces a theologically and ecclesiastically wrong change into the Catholic Catechism, which contradicts the clear words of God in the Holy Scripture (already in the Book of Genesis) and many doctrinal statements of popes about the death penalty formulated in uninterrupted tradition and also historical facts,” Seifert wrote.
“[O]r when — against many forceful words of Jesus and dogmas of the Catholic Church — he talks about empty hell or even, like Jehovah’s Witnesses, claims that the souls of incurable sinners do not go to hell but are destroyed?”
The Austrian professor went on to blast Francis for appointing members to the Pontifical Academy for Life who openly contradict “the core of biblical and Church moral teaching and the encyclicals Humanae Vitae, Evangelium Vitae, and Veritatis Splendor”.
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| Cardinal Vincenzo Paglia, President Pontifical Academy for Life and the homo-erotic mural he commissioned for his cathedral |
READ: New Pontifical Academy for Life appointees include the president of a pro-abortion institute
“How can you cardinals […] remain silent on this and many other ‘desolations of the sanctuary’ instead of doing much more than the critical laity and theologians to do everything possible to proclaim those many truths of the faith that the Pope openly or tacitly contradicts by words and also deeds (such as the celebration of the Reformation, the erection of the statue of Luther in the Vatican, the stamp celebrating the Reformation, the Pacha Mama cult in the Vatican Gardens and St. Peter’s Basilica, etc.) […]”
Seifert is a renowned Catholic philosophy professor who was fired from a Catholic university in Spain in 2017 for openly criticizing Pope Francis. He currently still teaches philosophy at the Ludwig-Maximilians-University in Munich.
READ: Fired Catholic philosopher: Pope Francis’ teaching could ‘lead many souls…to hell’Renowned Catholic philosopher warns Pope Francis is 'destroying the foundations of faith and morals' - LifeSite (lifesitenews.com)
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