Today let’s talk about visions. There are different kinds
of visions. Some are natural, and others, supernatural. In either
case, some visions are produced by an external object, and others
originate in the brain itself. All of these are visions are
of something “material.” But there are some visions
that concern abstract thought. Thus we say that somebody’s
thoughts on a particular issue are his “vision”
of the problem at hand, past, present, or future. If some “material”
visions can be weird or scary, it is nothing compared with some
“abstract” visions. For instance, let us recall
the visions Hitler, Stalin, Mao Tse Tung and others had of the
way the world should be! That was some pretty heavy stuff, as
millions of dead people have learned the hard way!
Somehow, I myself am feeling a little bit scared about a specific
vision. No, No, nothing happened to me, and I am perfectly sober.
So it doesn’t concern a “material” vision,
but rather an abstract one. And surely not a “vision”
of mine, but that of our beloved Archbishop of Winnipeg, His
Excellency James Weisgerber. Indeed, on Nov. 19th last, in order
to begin the celebration of his Archdiocese’s 90th anniversary,
and to prepare for the centennial commemoration, he announced,
through a Pastoral Letter, his vision of the future of the archdiocese.
I’ll tell you what: It’s scary!
Our readers already understand that Winnipeg is no better
than any other diocese in the world. We have the same lay ministers,
altar girls, women “parish administrators,” diluted
catechism classes, rock-and-roll Masses, “inclusiveness,”
etc. etc. Now, what’s really scary with Archbishop Weisgerber’s
vision, is that his intention for the future of his archdiocese
is “to rediscover the Council’s teaching.”
He adds: “The documents of Vatican II remain
the prism through which we see ourselves and discover who we
are called to be as church… The Church is always a project
under construction.” Mgr Weisgerber goes
on saying: “Together we are called to continue
to build a church of communion.” He does
not explain why he sometimes says “Church,” and
at other times says “church.” Maybe by the former
he means the universal Church, while he uses the latter to express
the concept of the “Winnipeg church.” Who knows?
In any case, it seems the archbishop sees himself donning
the white construction helmet of a foreman, directing the building
of his “church,” following the blueprints laid out
by Vatican II. It is worrisome to realize that even if his archdiocese
has followed the modernist trends since the sixties, the archbishop
considers he has to implement the Council, as if we were still
in the aftermath of Vatican II: “How can this
vision of Vatican II take root in the Archdiocese of Winnipeg
today? First of all, we must recognize this is a new time. AS
CHURCH WE HAVE NEVER BEEN HERE BEFORE; WE ARE BREAKING NEW GROUND.”
(Our emphasis). Can’t you see Mgr Weisgerber, surrounded
by bulldozers, cranes, and what not? So he writes his pastoral
letter to commemorate the diocese’s 90th anniversary,
and yet he says that as church, “we have never
been here before.” Gone are the toils, prayers,
sacrifices, of his predecessors! Mgr Weisgerber seems to acknowledge
that the traditional Church has been destroyed, and that a new
one must take its place, hence the “breaking
of new ground.” Now, you will maybe tell
me the Archbishop’s words simply mean that the members
of the Winnipeg Church have never before lived in our time.
Well, that’s the same thing than to say: “Hey! People!
We’ve never lived in 2006 before!” I am sure that
would be acclaimed as the discovery of the century! But that
would hardly be an excuse for trying to continue, and even speed
up, the Vatican II Revolution! We live in 2006, all right, but
as far as I know, humanity has not evolved. We are still wounded
by original sin, and we still need to be preached the true doctrine
of Our Lord, and to receive His Sacraments. So there is nothing
that justifies saying “we are breaking new
ground!” One way or the other, Mgr Weisgerber
is turning his back to Tradition, and this is the reality, whatever
his ambiguous words may mean! Our Pastor wants to build something
new…
And he seems enthralled by the idea, as he enthusiastically
says: “Receiving the teaching of the Council,
implementing its new vision (here we are again…
a new vision…) and building new ways of working
together create challenging times. But it is also a time of
creativity, risk taking, a time of victories and disappointments,
a time for understanding, compassion, and forgiveness. A truly
wonderful time!” Aye! Aye! Aye! I told you,
this vision is scary! For the Archbishop, to find it wonderful
to take risks, when the salvation of the souls entrusted to
his care is at stake, shows he doesn’t really understand
his true mission as God sees it.
But what is pathetic and sad, is that Mgr Weisgerber seems
to think that, failing to do something new, he would just be
a nobody. Well, I have bad news for His Excellency: What he
announces as his measures to build a new “church”
have nothing new at all. Most other members of the illustrious
“Post-Vatican II” episcopacy have already done so
forty years ago, and some very famous at that! Let us just mention
Bishop Fulton J. Sheen. Yes! You hear me: THE Bishop Sheen!
Indeed, we just have to read an article about him in the November
1968 issue of the “Catholic Digest,” written by
a Douglas J. Roche. Mr. Roche says that eight months after his
having been made Bishop of Rochester, NY, (on Oct. 28, 1966),
Mgr Fulton Sheen published a document by which “the
Conciliar revolution, launched by Pope John, was brought down
to earth in local soil…” Mr. Roche
says that the Bishop “started to listen to
his people, to involve them, to provide openings for those who
wanted to move ahead.” Mgr Sheen started
by the creation of a senate or council of priests to help him
in governing the diocese. He then transferred the financial
affairs of the diocese to a group a laymen. The chancery’s
name was changed to that of “Pastoral Office,” as
the old name had “too strong legal overtones.”
He appointed a group of lay persons to “help
the Bishop and the seminary authorities to decide on the suitability
of candidates for ordination to the priesthood.”
Bishop Sheen also was experimenting “home Masses”
held in house basements, with all the characteristics of the
then upcoming Novus Ordo Missae.
So Archbishop Weisgerber’s “vision” is far
from being all that new. Nevertheless, there are some elements
in it that indicate a will to go further than his predecessors.
They are not spelled out in the Archbishop’s Pastoral
Letter, but we can have a “preview” of what they
are going to be in the text of a Winnipeg Free Press article
dated Nov. 19th, and published also on the Archdiocese’s
Website. Journalist John Longhurst indeed says: “one
area where Weisgerber hopes to see more lay people involved
is by leading services: ‘By the way we pray together we
show what we believe… That all the people are involved,
not just the priest in front.’ ...Weisgerber says the
liturgy itself needs to be revised or repackaged, and that it
needs to be presented ‘in words, terms, and symbols that
people understand today… We need to find new forms, and
that will take some real creativity’.”
Longhurst also reports that “the archdiocese
is holding workshops for musicians about their role in leading
services, and also wants to help people develop skills for reading
the scriptures (sic).”
As Mgr Weisgerber hopes that more lay people will “share
their gifts,” and be involved in pastoral
activities, he gets positive responses by some already involved.
As Mr. Longhurst says: “Cathy Laviolette,
pastoral administrator for St. Michael’s Parish in Gimli,
likes how the new vision de-emphasizes distinctions between
clergy and lay people. ‘I love that part of the vision,’
she says, adding that although she has a good team of lay people
working with her, there are many more people in the parish ‘who
have gifts to bring’.”
We can see why she is happy, because Mgr Weisgerber, in his
Pastoral letter declares, after quoting St. Paul who said there
was no distinction between Jew and Greek, slave and free, etc.
: “Nor, would I add, is there any distinction
between clergy and lay… Each of the baptized is anointed
with the Spirit… In baptism, we are all equal in dignity…”
A bit further on he explains that the reason why there is a
hierarchy in the Church is that “while we
share equality in baptism, there are a variety of tasks which
call for different forms of leadership. To preserve and order
the gifts to the common good, the Lord established shepherds
with authority to ensure that this gifted community would remain
united in faith and love.” Here is the
basic principle of the Archbishop’s vision! From the truth
of the common gift we share in Baptism, he elaborates a new
perspective about Church structure: We are all equal in
baptism, consequently there is no fundamental distinction between
clergy and lay. Bishops and priests only have a special authority
to ensure order and unity in the Church. Therefore, everybody
can participate in administering parishes and leading liturgical
services, according to their own particular gifts. What the
Archbishop, then, is striving to build is a new “church”
structure and worship based on the sacrament of Baptism. In
that “church” there would be no “clergy,”
because the Sacrament of Holy Orders would be considered only
as a symbol of the authority that the “ordained”
minister would have for ensuring order and unity within the
“church.” And, as the celebration of the Mass would
already have been changed, to allow lay people to take an ever
dominant part in it, and as it looks already as a simple commemorative
meal, the day would soon come when there would be no obstacles
left to hinder lay people to completely conduct liturgical services.
At that point, since protestant “churches” don’t
have a true priesthood, the last obstacle to common worship
with them would have been removed. Then, Hurrah! We would have
a truly lay and ecumenical “church”! I told you:
The Archbishop’s vision is scary! Indeed, Catholics who
know their Faith know that the sacrament of Holy Orders confers
a special “character” on the soul of the priest,
and gives him special powers not shared by the lay people: That
of consecrating the Holy Eucharist, of absolving sins, of anointing
the sick, of giving Confirmation and Holy Orders (in the case
of Bishops). With these supernatural powers comes also the distinction,
established by Our Lord Himself, between the Church “Teaching”
and the Church “Taught.” By this we mean the distinction
between the Pope and the Bishops, (and the Priests and Deacons
delegated by them), and the ordinary Faithful. This distinction
is that of the clergy teaching the Faith to the laity. In other
words, the Catholic Faith teaches us that the distinction between
clergy and laity is based on two things: The real and supernatural
character and powers conferred by the Sacrament of Holy Orders,
and the Mission given to His Apostles and their successors by
Our Lord Himself. I don’t think Mgr Weisgerber has the
power to change that!
Now, what on earth prompted this vision of a lay “church”?
Although the answer is everyone’s guess, I think we could
find it in the situation of the Archbishop’s diocese:
It is crumbling. Mgr Weisgerber is well placed to know it. Indeed,
official statistics show a devastating reality: If the trend
is to continue, there will soon be no priests to run parishes,
administer the sacraments, celebrate Mass. Let us compare the
figures provided by the 1955 “Catholic Year Book”
on the Winnipeg Archdiocese, and those available on the same
diocese’s Website:
WINNIPEG ARCHDIOCESE |
1955 |
2005 |
Catholic Population |
70,000 |
170,590 |
Number of Parishes |
75 |
68 |
Secular Priests |
62 |
64 (including 14 retired) |
Religious Priests |
83 |
28 |
Total Priests |
145 |
92 |
Seminarians |
18 |
4 |
Ratio Priests/faithful |
1/482 |
1/1854 |
Now, if we compare the ratio Priests/faithful of 1955 and 2005,
we see that this proportion has decreased by 280% in the last
fifty years! Forget all the subtleties and nice talk from modernist
Church officials, and look at those numbers! It means there
are almost three times less priests to minister the faithful
today than there were fifty years ago! This is the concrete
result of Vatican II! And I have been generous! I included in
the figures of 2005 the 14 retired priests. When we know that
today’s priests are working themselves out, we understand
that these 14 retired ones are probably all in wheelchairs,
and not able anymore to minister to the faithful. If we were
not to count them, the ratio Priests/faithful in 2005 would
instead be 1/2187, and we would thus have a 353% decrease compare
to the 1955 ratio! We can also see that even if the catholic
population has increased by 100,000 in the last fifty years,
the number of vocations passed from 18 to 4, almost five times
less! So the future for the Winnipeg Church is not bright at
all. Confronted with this situation, Archbishop Weisgerber had
to take a stand. Unfortunately, instead of trying to change
the trend, he decided to go along with it, and to transform
the church. There are three times less Priests, and five times
less Seminarians today? Fine, let’s just say there are
no more distinctions between clergy and people, and let’s
ask the people to take over! After all, we are all “anointed
with the Spirit,” and we are “all
equal in Baptism.” The members of the hierarchy
are just exercising authority “to preserve
and order the gifts to the common good,”
are they not?
My! My! My! What a terrible vision! Mgr Weisgerber seems to
need new glasses! Instead of seeing that the Council’s
aberrations are the cause of the crumbling of his Archdiocese,
and instead of trying to repair the walls, he says “As
church we have never been here before; we are breaking new ground.”
And he is probably not the only Bishop in the world to think
that way. They are all faced with the same dire situation, and
I have never heard of one having decided to get rid of Vatican
II, and to rebuild his diocese on the sure ground of Catholic
Tradition. So my dear friends, we are forced to admit that the
Vatican II “church” is becoming more and more that
of a new Religion. May God have mercy on our souls!
