An Episcopal Church much more "catholic" than your average Roman Catholic parish?

[David_B]

When I think of traditional catholicism I think of altar rails, Mass celebrated with servers in cassocks and surplices ad orientem, incense, bells, and chanting. This is most certainly lacking in most Catholic parishes these days, but surprisingly I discovered on the internet this parish in Boston, but was dismayed to realize it was not in communion with Rome.

theadvent.org/

How can we make our average Catholic parishes more “Catholic” without orders from the top reinstituting the 1962 (or earlier) Missal(s)?

 

[rcn]

David B:

How can we make our average Catholic parishes more “Catholic” without orders from the top reinstituting the 1962 (or earlier) Missal(s)?

How can we make our average Catholic understand that what makes us “Catholic” is not defined by insisting upon reinstituting the 1962 (or earlier) Missal(s)?

 

[David_B]

rcn:

How can we make our average Catholic understand that what makes us “Catholic” is not defined by insisting upon reinstituting the 1962 (or earlier) Missal(s)?

Good point!

 

[Wolseley]

How can we make our average Catholic understand that what makes us “Catholic” is not defined by jettisoning everything that came before 1965?

 

[David_B]

Wolseley:

How can we make our average Catholic understand that what makes us “Catholic” is not defined by jettisoning everything that came before 1965?

Also true

 

[porthos11]

But still, a valid Catholic Mass riddled with abuses is still infinitely better than an Espiccopalian service, in any case.

 

[Brian_C]

It’s not the furnishings of the church but the attitude of its ministers and parishioners. Praise God though that my own parish has raised the money to return our church building to a more traditional look. It was rennovated in a 1976 post V2 fit of breaking with the past. After 30 years of reflection, it seems the old was not so bad after all…

 

[BillyT92679]

But still, a valid Catholic Mass riddled with abuses is still infinitely better than an Espiccopalian service, in any case.

exactly, because the Mass is the Mass celebrated by validly ordained Priests who received ordination from validly consecrated Successors to the Apostles
sure, there are some Anglicans who received ordination from Old Catholics, but they are so few and far between it’s almost irrelevant

 

[VociMike]

But still, a valid Catholic Mass riddled with abuses is still infinitely better than an Espiccopalian service, in any case.

Even so, who is prepared to say to God, “Here is the best we bring to offer you, though it is riddled with abuses.”?

 

[Genesis315]

I understand where you are coming from, but, it is the substance of the Mass that makes it Catholic. Those Episcopalians may have a beautiful liturgy, but at it’s heart, it is basically empty–empty might be two harsh, but it is at most some nice prayers–which (as an aside, most Episcopalian liturgies are not like the one you describe). Second, even if you think a Catholic Mass is less beautiful, at it’s heart it is infinitely beautiful, Heaven on Earth. At Mass we enter into the Heavenly Holy of Holies where the one true sacrifice of Christ is made present and in Holy Communion we partake the substance of the Second Person of the Trinity under the sacramental veils (just as in Heaven we will partake of the Divine nature, but face to face, not under the appearances of bread and wine). The Holy Victim (truly present on the altar) and High Priest (of whom the priest stands in the person) of this Sacrifice are before us and that same Sacrifice is offered to the Father that the Son eternally offers in Heaven

 

[athanasiusrc]

As much as I can’t stand most Masses I attend, I would say that an appropriate analogy would be this:

A high Anglican service is like a Lamborghini that doesn’t have an engine. It sure looks pretty but it’s not going to get you anywhere.

Your average Catholic Mass is like a 150,000 mile Pinto that leaks oil and smokes. It may look bad, sound bad and make you embarrassed to be in it but at least you know that it will get you where you need to go.

 

[Titus]

As much as I can’t stand most Masses I attend, I would say that an appropriate analogy would be this:

A high Anglican service is like a Lamborghini that doesn’t have an engine. It sure looks pretty but it’s not going to get you anywhere.

Your average Catholic Mass is like a 150,000 mile Pinto that leaks oil and smokes. It may look bad, sound bad and make you embarrassed to be in it but at least you know that it will get you where you need to go.

Love that analogy!

 

[Cavaille-Coll]

That analogy is something like a situation in a nearby town. On one side of town is a beautiful new church built by the SSPX with a bell tower, high altar, stained glass, a resident pastor, and a little school that has so far produced four seminarians for the SSPX. In the vestibule is a large portrait of Pope Benedict XVI.

On the other side of the town is the little diocesan mission parish, which is administered by a rather eccentric layman who occasionally conducts his own baptisms in a stock tank. It is an run-down little wooden building with all the ambience of a Boy Scout hall that is served weekly by one of several priests from another town.

The grand irony is that the diocesan parish is in union with Rome and the SSPX parish is not.

 

[chevalier]

But still, a valid Catholic Mass riddled with abuses is still infinitely better than an Espiccopalian service, in any case.

Who’s closer to God? An abusive modernist/libertine/relativist/whatever priest with his like-minded congregation or a pious and reverent pastor with his congregation?

The New Advent Encyclopaedia talks about those people who are considered Catholics in spirit. Those are Protestants who through no fault of their own do not belong to the Catholic Church the normal administrative way, but who are in the right spirit as regards the theology and the approach to the faith.

We are not a denomination, after all. We are the Church.

 

[GKC]

exactly, because the Mass is the Mass celebrated by validly ordained Priests who received ordination from validly consecrated Successors to the Apostles
sure, there are some Anglicans who received ordination from Old Catholics, but they are so few and far between it’s almost irrelevant

Actually, I’d be surprised if you can find any Anglican priest who was ordained by Old Catholics. What you find all over the place, since joint Anglican/Old Catholic/PNCC consecrations of bishops began in 1932 (for Old Catholics) and 1946 (for PNCC) are Anglican bishops with OC/PNCC lines. Which conveys valid orders when they ordain priests, or consecrate other bishops, even considering Apostolicae Curae.

Or, that’s one way to look at it.

GKC

Anglicanus Catholicus