PARISH DREADS CHANGE

San Jose Mercury News ^ | Friday, March 15, 2002 | By Richard Scheinin

[Flying Circus]

The parishioners of Our Lady of Peace are angry.

For 32 years, Father John Sweeny has built the Santa Clara parish into a bastion of Roman Catholic orthodoxy -- the only such place left in the Diocese of San Jose, they maintain.

[Flying Circus]

This article is a Followup to Tradition 24 Hours a Day

[Flying Circus]

Bump.

[Longshanks]

I attend Our Lady of Peace every Sunday. Everybody here suspects "Swishop" McGrath intends to force his modernist heresy down our throats like has been done to all the churches around us. He is making a big mistake. There are 7000 rightously angry parishoners only a few minutes away from where that fat faggot lives and works. This story has only just begun.

[sockmonkey]

I have heard so many good things about this Parish.

And so many horrid things about the Diocese of San Jose. The pictures of the 2001 confirmation extravaganza on the Diocesan website with all those bizarre, not wearing too much in the way of clothes dancers was really yucky. Of course, I'm just not into that whole aztec thing.

Prayer Bump for Queen of Peace.

[gjbevil]

As a Catholic, you know that obedience to your bishop is required when he is not behaving in a heretical manner. I also am concerned with the liberalization of the liturgy and prefer a more traditional mass. But to call your bishop a "fat faggot" is over the line. I suspect you in fact are an anti-Catholic biggot attempting to discredit our great faith.

[Revelation 911]

But to call your bishop a "fat faggot" is over the line

that caught my eye too - WAY over the line. Though I wouldnt be so quick to blame a basher - perhaps he is in an unrighteous walk.

The article stated Mass is performed in Latin - maybe I am incorrect but Vatican II did away with that didnt they ? (Im ex & cant recall). Wouldnt the present Bishop be schismatic ? or is it the choice of the Diocese ?

[fineright]

Good question.

[nickcarraway]

Ping

[nickcarraway]

Vatican II didn't ``do away'' with Latin, just introduces vernacular. Usually a parish needs to have permission from the diocese, although there are other ways. OLP has Latin Mass on the first Saturday of the month. Another priest in the area has permission to perform Latin Masses from a Papal commission or something like that.

[Libertina]

I am not Catholic, but here is an example of a thriving, living church and someone wants it changed. If they asked Father Sweeny to help choose a person who will assist him and take over for him gradually, it would be such a intelligent solution. The parishioners would be secure in the knowledge that their traditional worship would continue, and the faithful Father would be rewarded for his dedication. It seems to be similar in some ways to the Simon win in CA. As if the people were saying BIG NO to liberalism and Small NO to moderates. BIG YES to traditional values. I hope the parishioners win the day.

[Canticle_of_Deborah]

This is my understanding of it also. When I went to the Latin Mass in the Diocese of Fresno it was frequently mentioned that it was allowed with permission of the Bishop. I think anyone who wants this in their diocese must get permission of the Bishop. I understand that the Stockton Diocese also has a church doing Latin Masses as I'm sure many dioceses do.

I don't do the 'Kumbaya--hand holding with strangers--lovefest thing'. It turns me off. The more modern (read-secular) the Mass gets the more 'other' centered and less 'God' centered it becomes. I spend my whole week dealing with other people. When I go to Mass I am looking to interact with God only. The Latin Mass provides a very tangible, more intense, mystical experience IMO. But if someone else has a different worship style that's fine with me as long as it remains respectful. I want the same respect in return though.

[Canticle_of_Deborah]

The last I read, the seminaries teaching the traditional, pre Vatican II styles were packed and unable to accommodate all applicants.

[Longshanks]

But to call your bishop a "fat faggot" is over the line

Sorry to dis-edify you. I am loyal to bishops loyal to the magisterium but am concerned about the infiltration of the hierarchy with homosexual pedophiles and modernist heretics. These bold enemies of the faith have succeeded only because Catholics are immobilized by their own cowardice. What will our generation have to say on the Day of Judgment?

I am glad you prefer a more traditional mass, but in these times of apostasy that is not enough. Do you have homosexuals and modernists working (or leading) in your diocese? As a Catholic, you are obliged to fight this. Non-Catholics view us as hypocrites for protecting and financing child-molesters while preaching to the world about morality. That wouldn't be so bad if except that these critics are 100% correct!

What is the solution? Our Catholic for-fathers show us the way. Holy Inquisition was instituted for just purpose of rooting out heretic infiltrators that had devastated the Church in whole regions of France and Spain through false teaching and rampant perversion.

Spiritual descendants of these roasted deviants have returned to persecute the church once again. Democratic governments will not administer the same austere justice as the Catholic monarchs, but with good evidence they will imprison a pedo-priest. Dominicans should resume investigations of suspected infiltrators and turn over molesters to the courts. Practicing fag-priests/bishops should be stripped of their collars and pensions.

Would that be unkind? We should save our pity for the thousands of young Catholic boys with stretched anuses and damaged souls. They deserve justice! The pope is impotent and most “conservative” bishops are cowards. Laymen must rise to the occasion and rid our Holy Church of her enemies.

[Longshanks]

``Father Sweeny is the most wonderful priest... we have to move on.''

McGrath used the same hypocritical language in a talk he gave last year at the OLP auditorium. He is huge, talks with a nasal voice, and behaves like a total swisher. A priest buddy that came along gave a speach where he compared following tradition to a sled-dog not in the lead who looks at a dog's butt instead of looking at the mountains as scenery ahead.

[nickcarraway]

McGrath is originally from Ireland. He was in the San Francisco Archdiocese for many years before becoming Bishop.

[Revelation 911]

-you make very passioned sense - in that tenor, I understand where you are coming from and agree -

[Bellarmine]

Great Article! Thanks for posting this.

For those of us born after the Post-Vatican shake-up in the Church, this provides a glimpse at just what went on in the decade or so following the council. Will the next pastor rip out the communion rail, tear down the high altar, remove the statues?

If your church was built before 1965, see if you can find where the communion rail used to be, or the high altar if it has been removed, and then try to imagine the great pain it caused those devoted Catholics of old in your parish.

[nickcarraway]

There are no every-Sunday indult masses approved by the local ordinary in the Diocese. However, Fr. Pedro Otonello has received direct permission to say the old mass from Augustin Cardinal Mayer when the latter was President of the Ecclesia Dei Papal Commission, and this permission has never been revoked. The Supreme Pontiff granted that Commission authority to grant celebrets to priests publicly to offer Mass in latin according to the typical edition of the Missale Romanum of 1962. (Such celebrets were issued only for the first several months after the foundation of the Commission.) Accordingly, Fr. Otonello's mass is completely licit and the faithful are free to fulfil their obligations there. In December of 1999, the local ordinary, Bishop DuMaine, resigned and he has been succeeded by his coadjutor bishop.

Our Mother of Perpetual Help Mission Chapel 1060 Minnesota Ave., Suite 8 San José, California 95125-4455 Celebrant: Fr. Pedro Otonello Sundays: 8.00 a.m. & 10.00 a.m.

Section B: Other than every-Sunday traditional latin masses:

Our Lady of Peace Church 2800 Mission College Blvd. Santa Clara, Cal. 95054-1803 1st Saturdays: 7.30 p.m. (Missa Cantata)

[Flying Circus]

I think your response is a bit uncharitable to the bishop. It does not the least bit of good or serve Christ to make these kinds of accusations against the man.

I love this church and drive 30 miles from Morgan Hill every Sunday to go here, and I am not sure what I would do if this parish were to become like every other parish I have attended since moving out here. However, Msgr Sweeney will not be with us forever and Bishop McGrath will likely be with us a long time. This is no time to make an enemy of him and far too many have taken an adversarial attitude that is likely to do just that.

Maybe the fears are well founded, but until we see what happens let us not make the mistake of pushing the bishop into doing exactly what we fear. Nor would we want to turn whomever he chooses against what we value most at OLOP. As Msgr Sweeney has admonished many times, lets pray for the Bishop and his selection that he may be guided by the Hold Spirit.

[Flying Circus]

I have been to Fr. Otonello's mission once, before I found OLOP. He has done a very nice job with the space he has. Unfortunately, it is small and on the second floor of a small business building in a space better suited for an insurance agent or such. Also, he speaks with such a heavy accent, compounded by poor accustics, so that I could hardly understand the readings, Gospel and Homily. I do hope that he gets a better space, or maybe even a real church from which to do the latin Mass.