On a snowy day in early winter….

His Excellency Bishop Athanasius Schneider, auxiliary bishop of Astana, Kazakhstan, arrived in the United States last night. This morning he visited Regina Pacis Academy in Norwalk, CT. He will be speaking in a conference tomorrow night at 5:30 pm at St. Mary Church, Norwalk and offering a Solemn Pontifical Mass. information

(Above) The concluding mass of the 2017 pilgrimage for the restoration at the Shrine of the North American Martyrs in Auriesville, New York. (This photo courtesy of the Extraordinary Form in the Albany Diocese Facebook page)

This year,  we could only visit the shrine the day before the pilgrimage mass. As always, these parts of upstate New York exhibit a melancholy magic around this time of year. In a way, the Shrine is best seen when visitors are few – that is most of the time nowadays. Above, the silent ravine is a sacred and meditative spot.

(Above) The coliseum seen from a nearby overlook. Below, the interior of the architecturally uninspiring and virtually empty coliseum.

It has not always been so. (Above) a “full house” in 1959 with Cardinal Cushing. (Below) More recently, on October 21, 2012, 5500 of the 6500 seats were filled for a mass commemorating the canonization of Kateri Tekakwitha. She was born in the Indian village here.

Wandering around the grounds, the pilgrim encounters a host of other shrines and devotions accumulated since the 1880’s. Some have been recently restored. (Below) The tiny original chapel prepared for the Traditional mass.

(Above and below) the first martyrdom – that of Rene Goupil – occurred here.

One recent positive development is the departure of the Jesuit order which had managed the Shrine from its beginning. In the last years of its control, the grounds and buildings had deteriorated in many spots. Reversing years of practice, Traditionalist pilgrimages were either excluded from the coliseum or banned from the shrine entirely (like the FSSPX). Indeed, at the end of 2015 the Shrine was at the brink of closing – after Kateri Tekakwitha had just been canonized and after millions had been raised that year  for urgent restorations! But now a separate not-for-profit corporation – with the support of the Albany diocese – has taken over most of the Shrine. They are working hard to make  the Shrine once again a nationally known center of pilgrimage. Improvements are visible in many areas. And, as you can see from the first photograph of this post, already a more welcoming reception is being given to Traditionalist Catholics. The only fly in the ointment seems to be the threatened installation of a grotesque sculpture by a “modern master.”

(Below) The Jesuit cemetery. The Jesuits have retained control of this and the Ravine. Cardinal Avery Dulles is buried here.

One legacy of the Jesuits was the sale of the Jesuit residence/retreat house to a Chinese religious group –  the “World Peace & Health  Organization” (WPHO).  Indeed, they aim to transform this corner of New York State into a center of their activities – among other things, they have acquired two former Catholic churches in nearby Amsterdam (St. Michael’s and St. Casimir’s) and have converted them into  Buddhist temples.

WPHO have transformed the former Jesuit building with towers,  gables and gates in the traditional Chinese style. Their “great wall” now overlooks the graves of the Jesuits and the grounds of the Shrine of the Catholics.

Is this our future – the ever increasing number of graves of the priests of one of the main Catholic religious orders contrasted with the growing complex of a Buddhist sect? Or will the new managers of the Shrine succeed in reversing the developments of the last decades?

Additional note: We recommend a posting by “Florentius” in the blog Gloria Romanorum which fills in the history of the purchase of the shrine lands from the Jesuits. http://gloriaromanorum.blogspot.com/2010/09/buddhist-temple-at-auriesville.html

Traditional Mass was offered today at the Convent of St. Birgitta in Darien, CT for a day-long retreat organized by St. Mary Church, Norwalk. The celebrant and speaker was Fr. Anthony Mastroeni. The Bridgetttine Sisters run a guest house here in this picturesque mansion filled overlooking Long Island Sound.

One of the many antique statues in the convent.

The convent is a peaceful spot with beautiful views.

A well-attended Solemn Mass for the Feast of St. Michael on September 29 in the Shrine Church of the Most Precious Blood in Little Italy, New York, sponsored by the Sacred Military Constantinian Order of St. George. Photos courtesy of Diana Yuan.

We at the St Hugh of Cluny Society sponsored a Solemn Mass yesterday at the historic church of the Most Precious Blood in New York, for the start of the festival of San Gennaro. Fr Richard Gennaro Cipolla was the celebrant; Fr. Chris Salvatori served as deacon; Will Haffey as subdeacon. Bill Riccio was master of ceremonies snd David Hughes conducted the splendid music. The Sacred Constantinian Military Order of Saint George was present, maintaining their commitment to Italian culture and to the Traditional liturgy. We thank Msgr. Donald Sakano, pastor of Old St. Patrick’s,  for his invitation to the shrine church of the Most Precious Blood.

We greeted many old friends of the Society.  And as the mass progressed the congregation grew – many who had wandered in from the festival stayed for the mass. By communion it was a full church! It demonstrates what can be done to return a Catholic religious presence to what has become an almost exclusively secular event. (We also note that, further to the north on Mulberry Street, the Russian Catholic chapel of St. Michael also had its doors open to visitors. They too realized the potential for evangelization in this apparently unreligious festival.)

This week, St. Mary’s Church, Norwalk, CT, began offering daily Traditional Low Mass at 7:30 am, Monday through Friday. On Wednesdays and Fridays, the Mass is followed by exposition of the Blessed Sacrament in the St. Patrick Chapel downstairs for all-day Eucharistic adoration.  Today in a homily, Father Cipolla urged parishioners to thank God for the gift of the Traditional Mass in the parish.

St. Mary’s also has Traditional Mass on Wednesdays at 6 pm, Saturdays at 9 am, and, of course, Sundays,  Solemn Mass at 9:30 am.

(Above) Sound and Light Show, Amiens Cathedral.

Let me share some thoughts and impressions from a recent excursion to the cathedral towns of Northern and central France. But I do not intend to describe here what are indisputably the most perfect examples of Christian architecture ever created. Likewise, this is not the place to talk about the medieval Church and society that created them. Rather, I wanted to say a few words about what we saw of the world of today: the contemporary Church of France and its presence in the modern society.

On the whole the Church in France today presents an image of desolation. In the cathedrals we visited there were hardly more than handful of worshippers outside of mass times. And other than in Chartres there were not many more tourists. A large percentage of the visitors to places like Amiens were focused more on the area’s World War I battlefields amid the 100th anniversary of some of the most terrible battles of that struggle. Only Chartres, within easy striking distance of Paris, attracts a considerable – if not overwhelming – crowd. In some cathedrals we could not find any posted mass times.

The early cathedral of Laon, virtually deserted, towers in splendid isolation over its medieval town and far above the beautiful countryside. The pilgrimage church of Notre Dame de Liesse sits forlorn and quiet in a small rural town of the same name. At times the visitor feels like a witness to a long dead and departed people and faith, just as when he is confronted by Paestum or Angkor Wat. As in the case of some ancient monument, one sometimes needs to speculate as to the exact time this or that church arose – or was destroyed. We can only be grateful for state ownership, which is undoubtedly the reason these monuments remain relatively intact, in generally good condition and open to the public.

(Above) Laon cathedral. Including the photographer and one woman (not visible here) in the chapel of the Blessed Sacrament, at this time there were a total of 7 people in this grand church (except for the woman, all tourists).

In Chartres the chapel of the Blessed Sacrament is a pathetic affair with an electric light burning before it. Only a couple of worshippers pray here. Not many more kneel before the image of Our Lady – a “black Madonna” until it was drastically cleaned and “restored.” I seem to recall that as recently as 5 years ago there were so many more people kneeling before this shrine, which was also surrounded by banks of burning candles. By the way, here, as in other French churches the traditional long tapers – the ones you stick on a spike – have largely been replaced with “American” votive lights. But not, thank God, the half-size ones of the New York Archdiocese.

(Above) Notre Dame de Liesse. (Below) Abbey of St. Jean de Vignes, Soissons (destroyed in the aftermath of the French Revolution)

Sound and light shows utilizing the facades of (above) Amiens and (below) Chartres cathedrals.

(Above) Restorations? The “Black Madonna” of Chartres in 2012;(Below) the same statue in July 2017.

The same is true of other aspects of Catholicism. Many do not realize that these grand churches often owed their magnificence to their precious relics they contained. Today these are as a rule totally neglected. What is left of the “veil” or “chemise” of the Virgin Mary, once the pride of Chartres, is now exhibited a not very prominent side chapel.  The grand cathedral of Amiens partially owes its origins to its acquisition of the head of John the Baptist from Constantinople. That relic now can be seen only in a tour of the cathedral treasury. The (secular) guide informs us that all recent tests have indicated that the head belonged to a man living around the time of St John in that part of Palestine – but these findings obviously haven’t produced a new influx of pilgrims.

(Above) The “Veil” of the Virgin Mary – Chartres

(above) A reliquary at Notre Dame de Paris created under Napoleon for the crown of thorns, after its predecessor was destroyed in the Revolution. It is no longer used as a reliquary for the crown of thorns, which now can be viewed in a modernistic shrine in the cathedral.

The involvement of the non-, even anti-Christian French state in Catholic affairs of course has not always been beneficial, now or in the past. At every step one still encounters the ravages of the French revolution: razed churches and cathedrals, smashed statues, burned relics. The pilgrimage statue of Notre Dame de Liesse is actually only a copy containing ashes of the original, burned by the revolutionaries. The relics of St Stephen at Bourges and the famous ”druidic” Madonna and child of Chartres were utterly destroyed. Chartres, however, did recover a least a part of the Veil of Our Lady.

(Above) A revolutionary painting, recently discovered in the course of the Chartres restoration. It (like its sister “Constitution”)dates from the time the cathedral had been converted into a “temple of reason.” Later it was painted over.

More recently, state-sponsored vandalism has taken the form of excessive restorations. Chartres has been the main victim. We have talked about the former Black Madonna. That had been preceded by a not uncontroversial cleaning of the stained glass windows. Currently, there is a campaign to give the interior a bright white finish. At a minimum, we can say that aesthetically this is not a total success. 1) Finally, the less said about the use of cathedral facades for sound-and-light shows, the better.

(Above) The unrestored columns of the ambulatory of Chartres (in 2010)

(above) The “restored” ambulatory and (below) nave (both July 2017).

The practice of the Faith is livelier in Paris. Is it because Paris, having pioneered the exodus from the Faith from the 18^th Century onward, ”bottomed out” decades ago and is now surpassed in irreligion by regions that have more recently jumped on the secularist bandwagon?? Or is it due to the greater number of foreigners and tourists in the capital? The devotions in the chapel of the Miraculous Medal in the Rue du Bac still draw multitudes. We have to mention, however, that the majority of the clergy and up to half the congregation were African. You also still can find a fair number praying before the statue of Our Lady in the church of Notre Dame des Victoires, known for the innumerable marble ex-votos covering every available surface commemorating Our Lady’s miraculous intercession. Sacré-Cœur indeed may be a tourist meccca (how appropriate an expression these days!), but like St. Patrick’s in New York City, it attracts the faithful as well. Moreover, there is exposition of the Blessed Sacrament, and the presence of sisters in full habit. And one thing that Paris does do well – in contrast to New York and everywhere else: almost every church has a manned welcome desk for those who have spiritual questions or needs.

(Above) Sacre-Coeur. Adoration of the Blessed Sacrament; (Below) Where Paris prays – Our Lady of the Miraculous Medal in Rue du Bac

(Above) Notre Dame des Victoires.

(Above) Ex-Votos in Notre Dame des Victoires; (Below) The faithful before the image of Our lady (note the similarity to the image that used to adorn the recently sold Manhattan French church of St. Vincent de Paul)

And what of the masses? A Novus Ordo Latin mass was celebrated in Chartres Sunday morning. The altar of course is one of those pathetic blocks that here, as elsewhere, has been inserted in the transept of the cathedrals. Yet ceremonial and music were dignified despite various errors and the difficulties of what appeared to be a rather aged volunteer schola. I’d estimate some 70-100 people were in the congregation, which like the schola and the celebrant, were largely of an older generation.

(Above) the “Novus Ordo” altar of Chartres Cathedral.

(Above and Below) Notre Dame de Consolation (after the mass).

(Above) A fountain before St. Sulpice:four greats of the 17th-18th century French church.(Below) St. Sulpice. Nowadays the 17th – 18th century church has to take pains to refute claims of occult links by Dan Brown (it features prominently in one of his novels). The parish bulletin also  expresses the hope that those who come to hear the organ might consider participating in the liturgy as well.

The following Sunday we first attended mass at Notre Dame de Consolation, an elaborate neo-baroque chapel commemorating a terrible fire in the 1890’s. In recent years the association that owns it assigned it to the FSSPX. Thing seem to be going well – a mass that the 2015 parish website described as taking place in the basement chapel is now upstairs with music. A much younger congregation than usual in this part of the world filled the smallish church. Even a ”crying room” was utilized!

Finally, later that morning we attended mass again at St. Sulpice, nowadays, the second largest church in Paris. A congregation of 200-300 was in attendance – although many if not most were present for the organ concert that follows the main service. The mass hardly reached the level of your average US suburban parish, complete with a tone-deaf ‘leader of Song’ flailing her arms. The contrast of the Novus Ordo service with the music of organ – one of the finest in the entire world – was shattering. Admittedly, there were a remarkable number of concelebrants at this mass – then it turned out 4 or 5 were from the New York Archdiocese….

1. Ramm, Benjamin, “Which Past Should We Preserve?” (The New York Times, September 2, 2017 at C1). This article on the Chartres restorations coincidently appeared today. The author very perceptively points out that that while the columns, wall and ceiling are “restored” the floor and the lower parts of the columns remain in their original state bearing the marks of 800 years of wear.

On Sunday, July 9, at the Pontifical Shrine of Our Lady of Mount Carmel in Manhattan, Divine Liturgy according to the Rite of Alexandria (Egyptian Coptic Catholic) was be celebrated.

The Celebrant was  Abouna Francis Fayez from the Coptic Catholic Church of the Resurrection in Brooklyn. There was beautiful chanting throughout the liturgy. After the liturgy, there was the blessing of the sick.

This liturgy at Our Lady Mt. Carmel is a part of the Pallottine tradition of presenting Eastern Catholic liturgies.

Special thanks to Diana Yuan for sending this photo and providing a report.

NY Purgatorial Society’s monthly sung Requiem Mass in the Dominican Rite yesterday evening at the Church of St. Vincent Ferrer, New York.

The next sung Requiem Mass will be on Monday, July 24.

Photo courtesy or Diana Yuan