Formerly the Thinking Catholic Strategic Center
Confirming Culture=Religion+Politics
Vic
Biorseth, Saturday, December 14, 2019
https://www.CatholicAmericanThinker.com/
Well, we're running out of priests; so what's so brutal about closing another small parish?
I can't prove it, but I know in my heart that this priest shortage was and is planned; it was and is orchestrated. Multiple times over many years we were all involved in meetings and discussions about dealing with the annual lack of priests to maintain the number of Catholic parishes in the Cincinnati Archdiocese.
Always, every time, the end result was a "plan" to have two or more parishes share the same pastor. The "clusters" of parishes were growing and the individual parishes with their own pastor were shrinking.
It was the exact opposite of the situation when we were kids, back in the '40s and '50s. Then, parishes were bursting at the seams, standing room only at multiple Masses per Sunday, two or three priests and almost always a bevy of nuns or brothers in the choir or teaching in the school, at every parish.
And then, post Novus Ordo Mass introduction, and post Vatican II, the decline in ordinations began, due in large part to Lefty-Liberal, Mushy-Theology, Feminist-Dominated, Misandry-Heavy, Homo-Friendly, Doctrine-Lite, Catholic Clerical Gatekeeping. (See the Cafeteria Catholic pages.)
I remember in one of those archdiocese seminar-type priest-shortage meetings, facilitated by highly paid professional lay facilitators, if that makes any sense at all, with all the spreadsheets and graphics on the screen before us showing the projected priest decline and resulting need to "cluster". The projections of priest numbers were always declining, and there was no project or visible effort to change that particular factor. The only suggestion was, always, to pray for more vocations and ordinations. And that was it. As if we were not praying enough. There wasn't even an effort to look at the reasons for the decline and do something about them.
After listening to a long speech on the declining numbers, and the projected continuing decline - in x number of years, there would be one priest for four parishes, and then the next step would be one priest for six parishes, etc. And I asked the "facilitator", in the counting of the statistically declining number of priests over time, in counting backwards, what number comes after the number 1.
And the question was brushed aside as if it wasn't important.
They were cruising at a situation of no priests at all, and that was not considered to be "real", let alone important or worthy of discussion, and so they brushed it aside and just changed the subject. Something would happen and the situation would turn around before we hit zero. Don't be ridiculous. Bishop Binzer was there, and he, too, was a brush-er-aside-er of that quite serious question.
And my takeaway from that discussion, right then, was that the unspoken remedy to the problem would be, coming to the rescue,
They wouldn't come right out and say it, but that was the real goal.
Even the then growing out-of-control scandal of homosexual priests abusing boys and young men was blamed on "unnatural" priestly celibacy rather than the overabundance of homosexual priests in the priesthood. And married priests and ordination of women would fix that problem, too.
Right.
All of this was extremely upsetting to us, as we so loved this little Church, which was so important to us as a couple coming back into the Catholic faith; this had become our Church, and we could see the writing on the wall: they were going to shut it down, so soon after we had entered it.
We had become non-practicing, weak, kind-of-sort-of Catholics after the radical changes to the Divine Liturgy in the mad scramble of innovations and radical, seemingly every-pastor-on-his-own wildly varied offerings of the Novus Ordo Mass.
But then, in a period of serious crisis for us when we were just returning to Catholicism to help us through that crisis, we happened go to the Amber Rose restaurant in Dayton Ohio, which offered familiar European cuisine. My father was Norse and mother was Lithuanian; Marcie's father was German and mother was Polish, so we saw a lot of familiar offerings on the menu.
While we were studying the menu, we were joined by the owner, Elinor Sluzas, who introduced herself and actually sat down and joined us to make us feel at home. A wonderful lady and and wonderful cook, she was also a wonderful Catholic evangelist. As soon as she found out we were Catholic, and that I was half Lithuanian, she told us - she directed us - to go and join Holy Cross (Lithuanian) Catholic Church.
And we did.
She was absolutely motherly, and we will always remember her that way, may she rest in peace.
And Holy Cross turned out to be perfect for us; a perfect, obviously Catholic in the old sense of Catholic design, and holy place. The Blessed Sacrament was right where He was supposed to be, on the Altar, with all those magnificent stained-glass Lithuanian crosses lit up behind Him. The Church is quite literally a work of art, to the glory of God.
It got us through our personal crisis, it brought us closer to God and got us fully back into the faith we were raised in.
Many or most of the parishioners spoke Lithuanian, but I did not; a minor problem. My Lithuanian maternal grandmother insisted that her grandchildren be brought up as Americans, not Lithuanians, and that they learn English and speak it well, and not Lithuanian. Personally, I wish we had learned a little Lithuanian, like most other Lithuanians.
Anyway, there is a hymn to the Blessed Virgin sung in Lithuanian, called Maria Maria, which was sung quite frequently at Holy Cross. I can sing it all the way through, although I couldn't tell you the English meaning of any of the words. Having read it in English, I know that it is a prayerful devotion to Mary, and that is more than good enough for me. I learned it by simultaneously reading the Lithuanian words and listening to the pronunciations from a couple of older and very devout Lithuanian gentlemen who had rather distinct singing voices that stood out from the rest. Singing along with them was how I learned to sing Maria Maria.
After these two gentlemen passed away, there were occasions when I still heard their very distinct voices when we sung Maria Maria. When I would look, they were not there. When I would stop singing, they would stop singing. When I started singing again, again, I heard them singing.
Very gingerly, I tried to find out if anyone else heard them; I think I am the only one. I am not making this up; I heard them. Not every time, but many times. If I can borrow a phrase from Sleepy Joe Biden, I am not going nuts. Julius and Stephen are there in spirit when the congregation sings Maria Maria. This I know. God knows.
This little Church was built brick by brick by poor immigrant Lithuanians; poor by today's standards, but middle-class, from the era before the middle-class was relatively prosperous. Today's congregants are families descendant from those early Catholic American Lithuanians. They are almost all related, from the original families all intermarrying. You don't get a tighter knit community than that.
As time went on we were being drawn in the direction of the old Latin liturgy. When we visited family in Michigan, we went to Assumption Grotto Church and fell in love with it. They offered the Latin Mass, and also the Novus Ordo all in Latin, and properly offered, including receiving Communion on our knees at the Communion Rail, on the tongue. And orchestral Masses, with a full orchestra and Latin choir.
And we fell in love with it.
Back in Dayon, we occasionally "played hooky" and went to Holy Family for a traditional Lain Mass, rather than our own Holy Cross, just to recharge our Latin Mass batteries. We were becoming addicted. Eventually, we just made the switch and joined Holy Family because the liturgy was just so much more in tune with Catholicism; the liturgy matched the theology more perfectly than the variability of the Novus Ordo ever could.
But we missed Holy Cross. How we loved Father Mike! And so many others, especially Father Roten, and Father Eric. And the families, who had become our Dayton family since we moved here from Michigan.
And now, quite suddenly, without prior notice, the axe is falling on Holy Cross. The evil plan continues. The Archdiocesan "cluster" and "region" plan has now reversed itself, because the multi-parish pastoring has become to stressful and strenuous for the continuing to shrink (according to plan) number of priests. Cincinnati now has a 3 to 5 year plan to arrive at one pastor for one Church, and all the other Churches in the "cluster" or "region" will be closed, or turned into chapels where Mass is no longer offered.
We're talking about most of the Churches in the archdiocese here. If you think the number of Catholic Churches has been going down rather precipitously so far, you ain't seen nothin' yet.
Holy Cross was suddenly told that their last Mass would be 12/29/2019. No prior warning; no input or discussion from them, just the decision was made. After strong questioning of why the sudden rush, the closing date was changed to the end of the fiscal year, with the last mass being offered 07/28/2020, but that was it.
Since I don't get on Facebook any more since the Facebook Hacking, we only found out about it through a note on a Christmas card.
This Christmas will be the very last Midnight Mass at Holy Cross.
We're still having a hard time believing it.
Most of the Bishops in America seem to be treating their sheep the same way the corrupt Washington self-made ruling class are treating the American citizenry.
The Bishops are not shepherding, and the Congress is not representing.
They just don't give a damn. They have their own ulterior motives.
The Bishops are not subservient to God, and the Congress is not subservient to the Constitution.
Just as a side-note, if and when the Lefties get their wish and we have Married priests, and we have Catholic priestesses, the decline in ordinations will continue, and indeed it will accelerate.
That is Satan's hidden plan.
Just as, if Marxocrats in Republicrat clothing like Lindsey Grahamnesty and Turtle McConnell get their way and have a quickie one-week Impeachment Trial in the Senate, they will most certainly not be able to "end it" and "get back to the nation's business", because the Marxocrats will just keep going and draft more articles of impeachment. And the Republicrats know it, because they are in on it, and they don't want their own corruption to ever be uncovered either.
That is the hidden plan of the Deep Swamp.
The only thing Truth has going for Him in this world is us.
The restoration of Truth = Reality in the hearts and minds of men is now totally dependent upon you and me; if we don't do it, it won't get done.
Pray for a strategic alliance between President Trump and excommunicated Archbishop Carlo Maria Vigano against the common conspiratorial criminality in the American and Catholic political parties.
=====
EENS: Extra Ecclesiam Nulla Salus
(Outside the Church there is no salvation)
With fear and trembling, work out your salvation--Phil 2:12
Seek the Truth; Find the Way; Live the Life.
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Date: Sat Dec 14 22:03:18 2019
From: Channing Fell
Email: Channingfell@gmail.com
Location: Hillsboro/Texas/USA
Comment:
What is being done to the Church by evil cowards is a sin against the Eucharist... pray for their souls...
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