The Crisis is Not Over IV

By Nicholas Wansbutter, Esq.

As the saying goes, "a picture is worth a thousand words" and no more so than in catalogueing the disastrous crisis that has ravaged the Catholic Church for close to fifty years now. Therefore, in this installment of my series "the Crisis is not Over", I wish to compare one element of the crisis as it manifested itself in 1988 to today. I do this especially for the benefit of those who feel that things have changed substantially for the good in the last twenty years and that therefore the S.S.P.X is no longer justified in its position.

Here is an example of a Church in Winnipeg that was planned and designed in 1988 around the time of the S.S.P.X Episcopal Consecrations constructed between 1989 and 1990 (formally blessed by the archbishop on April 29, 1990).[1] It is Our Lady of Perpetual Help Catholic Church:

As you can see, it actually looks like a church. It even looks like reminiscient of a Catholic church inside with a crucifix and stained-glass window in the sanctuary and a linear arrangement with the sanctuary at one end (i.e. not circular). Of course, the crisis is evident from the communion table, the felt banners, and the tabernacle off to the side.

So this was the crisis manifested in architecture at the time of Archbishop Lefebvre's consecration of four bishops, at least in the Archdiocese of Winnipeg. Fast-forward to the present, twenty years after "Operation Survival". Here is a new parish church, St. Gianna's, being constructed in the same archdiocese with the ground to be broken either this year or next. I note that both O.L.P.H. and St. Gianna's are in the same general part of town and would have as their parishioners people of similar demographics.

For the full 3D tour of the facility, go here: http://stgianna.ca/images/stories/videos/new_building.flv

This looks like a star port or alien embassy from a science fiction movie, not a church. The interior is massive and impressive, but has nothing to do with the worship of God. With its "in the round" layout, trees, and chairs, it would make a very nice convention centre. But a house of God? At least in the 1980s there was some sensus Catholicus left in people and a new church was commissioned to still look somewhat like a church. That they are builing things like the above is yet more evidence that the crisis is far from over.

In perusing the bulletins for St. Gianna's, one finds more evidence of the crisis in something that has effected every [Novus Ordo] parish in Winnipeg: Archbishop Weisgerber's new liturgical directives (which have been introduced in stages starting in September 2006)[2] that include:

1) Parishioners are asked to attend a 10 minute "Gathering Rite" before every Mass wherein "the assembly is greeted in a spirit of hospitality, introduced to the ritual music for the day’s liturgy, made aware of any current events in the parish and finally given an opportunity to acknowledge fellow worshippers."

2) Everyone must adopt the "orans posture" during the Our Father.

3) Everyone must remain standing after recieving the Eucharist in order to "break through the temptation to remain individual" by kneeling for their thanksgiving. Apparently "communal hospitality" is more important in today's Church than honouring God.

4) People are asked to bow while the person ahead of them is recieving the Eucharist as an act of "personal reverence and readiness".[3]

If the situation has changed in the last twenty years, it has changed for the worst, and the false "spirit of the Council" has become deeply entrenched in the minds and sensibilities of Catholics.

Posted on the Feast of The Nativity of St. John the Baptist, a.D. MMVIII

[1] “The History of Our Parish”. Our Lady of Perpetual Help Roman Catholic Church. <http://www.olphwinnipeg.ca/page7.php>
[2] “Liturgical Renewal”. The Archdiocese of Winnipeg. <http://www.archwinnipeg.ca/liturgical_renewal.php>
[3] 11 May 2008 Parish Bulletin. St. Gianna Roman Catholic Parish. <http://stgianna.ca/component/option,com_docman/task,doc_download/gid,72>