Sorry, but I need to get this off my chest. The last couple of days being a faithful Catholic in Frankfurt, Germany, were a nightmare.
A little background. In Frankfurt we have 4 churches I have 1st-hand experience with:
- Deutschorden: Operated and named after the Teutonic Order (yes, they still exist). Offers TLM
- Liebfrauen (German for "Notre Dame"). Capuchins. Very good Masses, but currently closed for renovations.
- The Dome. The lead-church of the entire city parish-cluster.
- St. Ignatius: Jesuits (obvious, given the name). Very liberal.
I used to go to Liebfrauen (The Capuchin one) and was happy. Due to the renovations I had to go to different churches and this is where the trouble started, as I decided to go St. Ignatius (the Jesuit one).
St. Ignatius, on the face of it, is awesome. They offer a lot of programs and events, particularly for teenager. I'm already working, but was happy to help at some events (community lunch, a get-together after a newly-ordained priest's first Mass, decorating the community room for Mardi Gras, selling drinks during parish get-togethers, participating in a discussion group for young adults). There are people who do way more, but it felt good to help at least a little bit.
Yet I increasingly noticed that they are off. They would deviate from the norm during the Mass (the laypeople saying things with the priest that usually the priest says alone, clapping during the Lord's prayer, a big sign that they offer gluten-free hosts, encouraging Protestant spouses to receive Communion, ...). And apparently while the parish is liberal now, it used to be super-liberal a couple of decades ago when this was started by an activist Jesuit-priest.
During the community get-togethers there would be a boomer going around, trying to deconstruct Catholic doctrine, bragging about how that activist-priest "educated" them decades ago and how enlightened they are. There was literally a Protestants joining during the parish-get-togethers (because they like it there) who told me that Liebfrauen (the church closed for renovations, where I'm originally from) is all worship and praise but the Jesuits' church is for the thinking-man.
I told myself not to be squeamish and give them a fair try, but eventually I couldn't bear it any longer, neither the liturgy, nor the community and started going to the TLM at Deutschorden. I know this sounds like a stereotype by traditionalists or Jesuit-bashers but I pledge that this is what happened.
Meanwhile, the entire city was going bad.
Our city dean, during a visit at the Jesuits, held a homily in which he compared the Vatican with North Korea and President Trump for trying to remove a professor as the head of a local seminary. Said professor (Wucherpfennig, SJ) had demanded blessings for homosexual couples and had maybe already performed such a blessing. I actually walked out on that homily and went to a later mass in another church. (One of the parishioners at St. Ignatius later told me that he was deeply moved by the city dean and offered to send me a pdf with the homily. That was roughly when I decided to leave St. Ignatius for good).
Meanwhile the Dome is openly supporting a seditionist movement of feminist activists that try to exploit the abuse-crisis in their bid for female priests and against celibacy and what they call "clericalism". There was an open call on the website of our mother-parish (all churches in Frankfurt technically belong to the Dome-parish) to go a "Switch on the lights"- protest in front of the Dome and shine at it with flashlights (I honestly wonder whether they turned off the stationary high-power lights before that protest, because those would have drowned out any effect). If this was just about the abuse, OK, good, but they were literally using the infrastructure (website) of the church in order to attack church doctrine. That was hard to bear.
This brings us to the last couple of days, when everything came to a head.
It started at roughly the same time as the news dropped that a group of theologians had accused Pope Francis of heresy. That was obviously not an uplifting news in its own right.
Then I was shocked and disgusted that the Dome is going to use Mary's month of May in order to stage another round of protests, called "Maria 2.0" (apparently they think they can do better than Mary 1.0). Catholic women in Frankfurt are called to cease their roles in the parish (e.g. as First Communion lectors), not got to Mass and stage protests in front of churches (their motto is "Strength. Solidarity. Strike!") for one week in order to coerce us into allowing female priests. Our parish-website calls to participate with a giant banner. Posters in front of churches and flyers at a Catholic cafe in the city center call to participate. A big editorial in our parish newsletter calls to participate. Somebody is really pushing this and using our own infrastructure against us again.
Meanwhile, St. Ignatius is hosting a movie-night with "Don Camillo and Peppone". That's an Italian comedy about a parish priest squabbling with a socialist mayor who literally has Stalin-moustache. It's quite enjoyable and not hostile to the faith (as far as I can tell) and I was looking forward to this event until I read that one of the organizers summarized it roughly like this "[...] These old movies let you experience how pastoral work is done without annoyance by the institutional church. Or better: Used to be done. [...]" WTF? There is nothing in these movies that would allow for an interpretation such as yours! Don Camillo is part of the Church. But thanks for yet another reminder on why I stopped to visit St. Ignatius' Masses and get-togethers.
I was further dismayed to discover that Liebfrauen (the Capuchins, my original parish) will host professor Wucherpfennig (the blessings-for-gay-couples guy) to host an introduction to Ascension and Corpus Christi. This lead me to entertain doubts about their continued adherence to orthodoxy. I always thought that if Liebfrauen just reopened, things would go back to normal, but maybe they won't. And this would leave Deutschorden (the one offering TLM) as the last bastion of proper Catholicism in Frankfurt.
I mentioned that I try to go to a TLM there. Today I couldn't make it in order to attend a May devotion to the Blessed Virgin Mary. So I went to a Mass in the Dome instead. The homily was done by a layperson while the city dean just sat back and listened. So I had to walk out once more because this is liturgical abuse ("66. The Homily should ordinarily be given by the Priest Celebrant himself or be entrusted by him to a concelebrating Priest, or from time to time and, if appropriate, to the Deacon, but never to a lay person." Source).
Because of this pile-on I have been sad and miserable since Wednesday, with occasional bouts of rage and despair. I don't know what to do. There is nothing to rally behind while our enemies destroy us from within. This life sucks.
I cannot even voice my dissent via my wallet, as Americans could: In Germany there is a Church tax deducted straight from your payroll, so I'm required to financially support the Dome in its exploits or else I would be excommunicated.
Telling the higher-ups is also pointless. I'm certain that the bishop knows and possibly even approves. But even if he disapproves there is nothing he could do. He is the successor of an infamous bishop who built himself an expensive luxury apartment so he would be very vulnerable to an "another haughty bishop is trying to suppress the brave laypeople"-narrative.
And it doesn't matter anyway, as the conference of German bishops has hinted that they will advance female priests and end of celibacy on their own in what they call "the synodal way" and then my entire country will be in schism and our troubles in Frankfurt will seem small.
If I'm mistaken and all of this is normal and how it's supposed to be, then please do correct me. That would cheer me up.
Sorry for the wall of text. Thank you for reading it anyway. I hope your Sunday is better than mine. God help us all.
https://ift.tt/eA8V8J Submitted May 05, 2019 at 11:44PM by tinrond http://bit.ly/2J1mJuz
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