In the Gullet of a Wolf

Two Catholics died in January of this year. One I’d been acquainted with for some time; the other I’d never met. Both had three things in common: 1) They kept the Faith and served the Church throughout their lives, 2) They gave to the Church, besides decades’ worth of tithing, a good number of children and 3) On their deathbeds, both were shown less regard by their bishops than death row inmates are shown by their wardens.

Their “crime”? Faithful adherence to the Mass of their childhood. This is their story.

On the 3rd of January, 2005, Allen Francis Cain died at the age of 89. I’d known Mr. Cain (though not well) for many years. He was a kind and gentle soul, well beloved by those who knew him. He’d somehow managed to raise twelve children while working himself to the bone on a 200-acre, 100-year-old family farm in Murdock, Minnesota. He was part of that dying breed of Catholic farmers who proudly work the land and till the soil even as their fathers had done for generations before them.

After the constraints of old age had forced him from his fields, Mr. Cain, by that time a widower after some five decades married to his high school sweetheart, spent his last years making rosaries…lots of them. The local newspaper printed the following lines as part of a glowing obituary: “Allen was a member of Our Lady’s Rosary Makers, long ago passing his goal of making a rosary for every day of his life...Many times every day you could find him quietly reading, reciting his prayers, and making rosaries.”

Get the picture? This was one of those living saint types who comes along only every now and then but who makes the world a better place for having been born. Look up “faithful Catholic” in the dictionary and you might just find a picture of Allen Cain. Trouble is, after 1965 he became increasingly ostracized by this noisy new world of ours, and especially by the “renewed” Catholic Church of Vatican II. Come to think of it, family farms like his were being swallowed up during those years about as exponentially as Catholic high altars were being bulldozed. In any event, Mr. Cain never became a traditional Catholic; he just sort of stayed on that way all the days of his long life.

He lived the Faith as he’d been taught it by the Catholic nuns and priests of his childhood almost a hundred years ago. He wasn’t interested in being “renewed”.

Over the years, small checks from Allen Cain came into The Remnant office on a regular basis. They were always attached to handwritten orders for a new subscription or a reprint article for this family member or that friend or the barber or the butcher or some acquaintance who the old man was gently leading back to Christ. He never made a “big deal” about it; he just quietly went about the Lord’s work as best he knew how. And so in peace his years passed.

After raising twelve children and who knows how many flocks of turkeys, and after threading miles of wire though several hundred thousand beads, he was quite unceremoniously called home to the God he’d well served. He died like he’d lived—without making a fuss. To the very end he asked nothing of anyone, except, that is, for one final request: “Bury me in the old way, with the old Latin Mass that I learned to love when I was a boy.”

Who could refuse such a simple request from one so guileless, and just moments from death? For that matter, who’d even consider refusing it, except, perhaps, a bully with an axe to grind.

Nevertheless, someone did refuse the last request of Allen Cain. Never mind that, even on death row, the final wish of the most hardened criminal is respected; old Mr. Cain’s was not. As if all the sexual abuse cover-ups weren’t enough, yet another scandal involving an American Catholic bishop was brewing.

A day after Mr. Cain had passed, his son, Colin Cain (a trusted board member at a Catholic parish in So. St. Paul) called the Murdock parish priest and informed him of his father’s last request. Because it was the church where Mr. Cain had been baptized, married his bride, been a life-long parishioner, dropped who knows how many thousands of dollars into the collection basket, Sacred Heart Church was the natural choice for his funeral.

The pastor, or “Sacramental Minister” as he’s now called in the Parish Directory, said “no problem,” but permission would have to be obtained from the Most Reverend John C. Nienstedt, Bishop of New Ulm.

With the help and close cooperation of a sympathetic priest in St. Paul, Colin Cain called the Vicar for the Diocese of New Ulm, asking to speak to Bishop Nienstedt. The Vicar stated that the Bishop was on retreat. Could the Vicar himself, then, perhaps expedite the old gentleman’s deathbed request? He was sympathetic but said that the Bishop does not grant permission for those.

“But,” the son pleaded, “the pastor has given his permission and we have two priests who are willing to say the Mass.”

The Vicar thought a moment and then promised that he’d take it under advisement and pass the information along to the bishop.

The family waited but there was no call-back. Finally, they called the chancery office again. This time the Vicar’s response was: “The Bishop said no.”

“The Bishop gave no reason; he will not give permission for a Tridentine Requiem Mass to anyone.”

This prompted letters from the family, pleading and begging the bishop to honor their father’s dying wish….Daughter-in-law Jane wrote to the Bishop. Granddaughter Maria wrote to the Bishop. Daughter Catherine wrote to the Bishop. Catherine’s coworker — a non-Catholic, scandalized by the Bishop’s refusal to honor a deathbed request — wrote to the Bishop. Another of Catherine’s shocked coworkers wrote to the Bishop. Daughter Patti wrote to the Bishop. Daughter Ann wrote to the Bishop. Youngest daughter Shannon wrote to the Bishop and even telephoned the Vicar.

Many friends sent letters to the bishop and many more called his office, but all of this was met with a disdainful silence from the “castle on the hill”.

Out of options and running out of time, the “peasants” had to settle for a burial service in Murdock, sans a Requiem. A simple burial service would have to suffice to accommodate the old man’s many friends, neighbors, and family members, including his last surviving sister, who wanted to say goodbye to a pillar of their small community and join together in prayer for his soul.

And so, rather than violate the sacred last wishes of the deceased, a faithful Catholic of 89 years was laid to rest without any Mass at all.

A Requiem was eventually offered in St. Paul, long after Allen had been interred in Murdock. It was the best the family could do. As Jane Cain pointed out in her letter to the Bishop, in the past there were really only two reasons why a body might not be present at a funeral Mass: the person had died on the battlefield or drowned at sea. As Mr. Cain had died in his hospital bed, there now seemed to be a third, more sinister, reason involving the personal power trips of individual bishops who think they know better than the Pope. This apparently rattled His Excellency, for he did finally respond. The pertinent portion of his letter to Jane Cain follows:

…because of our close proximity to the Archdiocese of St. Paul Minneapolis, which does offer this possibility [to offer the old Mass] at St. Augustine Church in South St. Paul, there would be no need to add to the parochial responsibilities of our priests in responding to this request [to grant Mr. Cain’s Requiem].

What the Holy Father’s document does not consider, however, is an individual request for the Tridentine Mass in a specific instance such as Allen Cain’s funeral. One has to understand that the Sacred Liturgy is a communal event. Every celebration of the Mass is of and for the whole Church, as clearly enunciated by Pope John Paul in his encyclical, “The Eucharist in Relation to the Church.” What Mr. Cain’s deathbed request would entail, therefore, would be turning the Mass into a private devotion, which would be totally wrong and diametrically opposed to the theology of the Catholic Church.

“Diametrically opposed”? Allowing a Catholic to have a funeral Mass offered exactly as it had been for well over a thousand years is, according to the Bishop of New Ulm, a “private devotion” that is “diametrically opposed to the theology of the Catholic Church”? Evidently, the Holy Father never anticipated this “diametric opposition”? I realize that post-conciliar seminaries aren’t exactly bastions of vast intellectual acumen, but is this man serious?!

How could a shepherd of souls develop such a transparent loathing for the venerable Catholic liturgical heritage of the Roman Rite and those attached to it? The Archbishop of St. Paul Minneapolis, Harry Flynn, certainly doesn’t share this peculiar phobia of the old Mass. What is Bishop Neinstedt afraid of— a grassroots movement of octogenarians in New Ulm, rising up from their deathbeds and demanding the return of the old Mass?

Such an attitude against something so sacred—a foundational stone of Christendom and the touchstone of the Faith itself—savors of the demonic, whether the Bishop of New Ulm realizes it or not. This is the Mass of St. Thomas Aquinas, Pope Pius X, St. Maximilian Kolbe, Pope Pius XII! Granting permission for that Mass—the only

Mass the saints ever knew—constitutes something that is “opposed to the theology of the Catholic Church”? One is reminded of the vampires of folklore cringing in horror at the sight of a crucifix or holy water…or the Mass. After all, what difference does it make to the Bishop if one old man in Murdock wants a Latin Mass at his funeral? What could possibly explain such intolerance?

And it gets worse: it turns out that there were Protestant observers taking all of this in, having become privy to this apparent contempt for the Roman Catholic liturgical heritage and for a dying man’s last request. Sensing that the Cains were getting nowhere, one Protestant friend of the family tried to intervene, in fact. When her efforts also failed, one can only imagine the distain for all things Catholic that she must have felt in her heart. After all the sex and sewage and ecclesiastical scandals of the past decade, imagine how this Protestant lady’s worst anti-Catholic suspicions were beautifully confirmed by the bull-in-a-china-shop antics of the Bishop of New Ulm:

My name is Denise Stipes and I am a dear friend of Catherine Cain (and her family) whose father, Mr. Allen Cain of Murdock, MN, recently passed away. He was 89 years old. I was informed today that he has been denied a Tridentine Funeral Mass. I would like to ask for your reason for denying Mr. Cain the dignity of this service.

It is my understanding that one of the great strengths of the Tridentine Mass is its uniformity. Wherever Catholics go in the world, the Tridentine Mass is exactly the same. The movements and gestures of the Mass are clearly prescribed, so there’s no room for “personalization” of the liturgy. The time-honored Latin of the Mass reverently reflects the sacrificial nature of the celebration.

The Pope approves the Tridentine Funeral Mass. In his 1980 letter to the Bishops on the Holy Eucharist, Pope John Paul II said: “There are also those people who, having been educated on the basis of the old liturgy in Latin, experience the lack of this ‘one language’, which in all the world was an expression of the unity of the Church and which, through its dignified character, elicited a profound sense of the Eucharistic mystery. It is therefore necessary to show, not only understanding, but also full respect towards these sentiments and desires. As far as possible, these sentiments and desires are to be accommodated.”

From what I understand, the parish priest has no objections to this request. I respectfully ask that you reconsider your decision and allow Mr. Cain his last dying wish to have a Latin Mass at his funeral. I fully support the Cain family and the rights of Mr. Cain. I look forward to a positive response.

In the dismal “ecclesial reality” of Vatican II, one is no longer surprised by anything, even such previously unthinkable realities as Protestants who are more sensitive to the will of the Pope, exemplify more compassion, and practice greater charity than a Catholic bishop. But, there it is.

One wonders what the Bishop’s reaction might have been had the Cain Family requested that a Buddhist monk be allowed to perform a smoking bowls ritual at the funeral Mass in Murdock…. “Certainly! The Church understands the great value of other faith expressions. And this would promote greater ecumenical awareness. So long as the Buddhist reveres Vatican II, we have no objections and we welcome him to our worship space.”

I did not know Mrs. Virginia Teehan (who died in Maryland six days after Allen Cain), and so her story will here be told by a compelling letter written by her daughter and addressed to the attention of the Most Rev. Sean Patrick O’Malley, Archbishop of Boston, successor of Cardinal Bernard Law of most unhappy memory. Though the Teehan Family had found two priests willing to offer the Tridentine Requiem at Mrs. Teehan’s parish church, St. Pius X Church in Milton, MA, the Archdiocese flatly refused to grant permission for it, even though traditional Requiems are allowed in Boston’s Holy

Trinity Church (Indult). With considerable finagling and at the very last moment, the family did manage to have a hastily thrown-together Requiem for Mrs. Teehan all the way down in Boston. But the Archdiocese in no way suggested this as a possible recourse; permission for the Requiem in Milton was simply denied with no reason given. Despite their grief at a very difficult time, the family members were left to fend for themselves.

Our family recently requested the Tridentine Latin Mass for our beloved mother’s funeral. We had no problem finding a priest willing to say it but the Archdiocese denied our request.

Virginia Teehan passed away on Sunday, January 9, at 12 noon, as her family finished saying the rosary. She was a devout Catholic who loved the Tridentine Latin Mass and made the trip to the South End with her missal in hand whenever she could. When she become ill a year ago, she attended Mass at a local church. She asked the priest if he would say the Tridentine Latin Mass once. Again he was willing but the Archdiocese said, “No.”

Our mother prayed hard for our Holy Father, bishops and priests her whole life; but while she was in Brigham and Women’s Hospital at various times throughout the year, she requested Communion from a priest. They kept sending a layperson, and she kept requesting a priest. After many, many requests the priest came—without Holy Communion. He told her he couldn’t promise to bring it to her; so, basically, if she didn’t accept Communion from a layperson that was her tough luck. He never did come back. Oh, but before he left, he asked our father and me to put our hands on her and gave her a blessing?!

On January 9th at about 4 a.m., my mother was about to be put on a ventilator and was told she may never be able to communicate again. She requested a priest. Eight hours later she passed away. A priest never came.

Unfortunately, this was not an isolated incident. We were calling priests all over Boston throughout the year to bring her Communion, and the majority of them were just too busy.

We find it extremely tragic that the leaders of the Church that she devoted her life to and prayed so hard for could deny her her right to the Tridentine Latin Mass, Communion from a priest and a priest by her side on her deathbed. The latter two we need for you to be aware of, but please tell us why you denied our request for the Tridentine Latin Mass for our mother’s funeral. What could you possibly have against that Mass? We found a priest, actually a couple of them, willing to say it; my mother loved that Mass, and the Archdiocese said, “No.” Why? Our mother found parts of the “new” Mass offensive because of irreverence and many things that were done and said. Whether you agree with this sentiment or not, our Holy Father said you could allow us to have the Tridentine Latin Mass.

So why did you deny our request and make an extremely stressful time for us even more stressful? We don’t understand and nobody else does, either…

There are problems within the Church, in case you haven’t noticed, and we’re begging you and praying that you will do something about them. We don’t have our mother here anymore to set us straight according to the old Catholic teachings, so we can only depend on you. The salvation of our souls and others depends on you.

Enclosed are some poems by our mother that we never really appreciated before, but they’re helping us get through this difficult time. We’d like to share them with you and hope that you will cherish them as much as we do.

It is said that a society can be judged by the way in which it treats its young and its elderly. If this is so, and it certainly is, then what can be said of the “renewed” Church which has failed to teach the Faith to its children (most Catholic grade-schoolers have trouble with the Hail Mary, let alone an entire rosary), which has victimized its young men (or covered for priests who did so), and which is now in the business of denying the sick and dying their deathbed requests? What are they so afraid of? That their habit-less nuns, altar-less sanctuaries, congregation-less churches, priest-less parishes, and vocation-less seminaries are signs that the end is near for them? Is this why they resent tradition-minded Catholics enough to lord it over them whenever possible, even those lying on their deathbeds? It would seem so.

It’s no wonder there’s standing room only at chapels operated by the Society of St. Pius X!

I’d like to close with one of those little poems written by the late Mrs. Teehan. To think that it was penned by a beautiful Catholic soul whose Bishop denied her simple request to have a Requiem Mass just as all Catholics for centuries had been given. Shame on him and God help us all!

I guess having a conversation with you is going to be pretty difficult, huh?

All over the country parishes are being closed and mess attendance is dwindling. All over the country Catholics are finding their way to Traditional Latin Masses even when their local bishops fume and gripe about it. Their demands and their prohibitions are a disgrace to their office, and when you and others like you persist in their lies of calumny and hatred, you dig yourself deeper into the pit. The blind leading the blind and you both fell in.

My words won't change your outlook, just as the words of St. John Fisher didn't change the outlook of other defectors from the Church at his time. It's the same situation today, only the apostacy is no longer individual countries, it is universal.

I guess having a conversation with you is going to be pretty difficult, huh?

Yes, especially when you use language like this:

when you and others like you persist in their lies of calumny and hatred, you dig yourself deeper into the pit.

Try to refrain from insulting me by calling me a liar, and we can have a conversation.

It is a FACT that the number of people attending the TLM under the indult is less than 300,000, while a minimum 15 million Catholics attend the Novus Ordo each Sunday.

Statistically, you are simply wrong about Catholics flocking to the TLM. They're just not.

"It is a FACT that the number of people attending the TLM under the indult is less than 300,000, while a minimum 15 million Catholics attend the Novus Ordo each Sunday."

It is also a fact that this Catholic and many others would attend an Indult Mass were one available within reasonable driving distance. At present we are looking at a seven hour plus round trip.

There are several folks locally who make the trip, like us, as often as they are able.
Our progressive bishop has made comments showing himself to be an enemy of tradition. A few years ago he put the skids under the parish with the best supported Traditional Liturgy in the diocese by assigning a modernist priest.
There is no doubt in my mind that as long as this Bernardin protege is bishop there will be no more Indult Masses. Each year our Masses become more liberal with such as "picnic Masses", "children's Mass canon" being said at weekend Masses, Rock and other pop-slop music.
If it gets much worse I will stay at home watch Mass on EWTN and make the trip to Portland when possible.
I will not condone sacrilige with my presence.

When Jesus said, when I return shall I find, do you think, faith on earth? was he making a joke?

How could he question whether there would be faith on earth after the great apostacy, and also predict that the gates of hell shall not prevail against the Church?

It's not me saying this, because the topic has been addressed by real scholars and theologians very well throughout the centuries. The corruption of the one true Faith will have to come from within the Church, from the top down. If we can't see that today, then we are one of the blind.

Welcome to the great apostacy, that "must come first."

Who said "indult"? Did I say "indult"? I know the "indult" which is acutually a lie in itself, because no "indult" is necessary for a priest to do what all the priests in history have done. The real "indult" should (properly) be for a priest to say the protestantized novus ordo, because it is the change, it is the deviation. It was never made mandatory by the pope, only illicitly by local bishops, for which they have no power to do. I did not say, nor did mean "indult."

When you go to a so-called indult, you are getting little of what you came for and a lot of what you came trying to avoid. You won't hear anything clearly critical of the rot that is being put out as "authority" from the chancery office, will you? You might want to avoid the chance that the communion hosts were leftover from novus ordo messes, but that's a given, because they USUALLY ARE. You will hear words from a priest who is very afraid of saying too much. I know several priests who have been so fed up with this living lie, that's right, living l-i-e, that they took their future by the horns and put it into God's hands, making a real leap of faith.

If anyone wants to join the debate, this is a hot topic, and there is now an ongoing exchange in the pages of the Remnant under the watch of Michael J. Matt. Anyone can weigh in...

You won't hear anything clearly critical of the rot that is being put out as "authority" from the chancery office, will you?

We Catholics go to mass expecting to hear about Jesus. To hear otherwise would be highly inappropriate.

When you go to a so-called indult, you are getting little of what you came for and a lot of what you came trying to avoid.

So, one has to go to an illicit SSPX Mass to "get what they came for"? How strange.

A "hot topic" at the Remnant? How many people are involved in this discussion? Five?

For all the lurkers, if you paid attention to nothing but FR, you would be under the illusion that there are hordes of Catholics just beating down doors for the Tridentine Latin Mass.

In truth, there aren't.

"For all the lurkers, if you paid attention to nothing but FR, you would be under the illusion that there are hordes of Catholics just beating down doors for the Tridentine Latin Mass."

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-religion/1237433/posts

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-religion/985284/posts

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-religion/983129/posts

So, one has to go to an illicit SSPX Mass to "get what they came for"? How strange.

Words mean things. "Indult" means special permission. "Novus Ordo" means New Order.

We now need "special permission" from the resident (possibly gay) episcopate wolf in charge of the flock if we're participating in anything other than the "New Order".

That's what I call "strange".

You would have to wait for the printed edition, so far. The editor only announced it in the current issue (Feb. 15th). The next one comes out in a week or so, after the 28th. He hasn't said what the format is, or what rules to follow, so you'll have to be patient.

Maybe I'll type in here, the first few paragraphs, if someone wants to see it and they don't subscribe.

I don't understand. The Novus Ordo isn't especially profound and it is susceptible to liturgical abuse. The fact that more people attend the Pauline Rite than the Tridentine Rite is irrelevant in terms of popularity. It's availiblility (or lack thereof) of the TLM and the bad press it gets from both liberal newspapers and from the opinions of many of the clergy may be cause for the lack of visible "popularity". The fact is, there are few priests who can speak any Latin whatsoever or even pronounce it correctly, and the bishops are unwilling to act civil towards those who want to attend the old rite. I know, I live in the Detroit Archdiocese. Adam Cardinal Maida has been very reluctant to even allow the Indult. His plan is to offer it till all the old people die off and to phase it out completely (or from what I read in the Detroit Free Press.)

Give them their Mass.

I agree. But a TLM Mass will only be provided where it is attended. A couple of hundred people at one Mass in a diocese indicates that's about all the interest there's going to be.

It's up to those who want the TLM to actually get others to attend it.

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