Etter saligkåringsseremonien søndag og også hele mandagen (regner jeg med) var en stor mengde mennesker inne i Peterskirken å så den salige pavens kiste – som da lå midt i kirken, foran høyalteret. Tirsdag ble så kisten flyttet til sitt faste hvilested, i den hellige Sebastians kapell.
Jeg har nevnt noen ganger at jeg for 3-4 måneder siden begynte å lese de tradisjonelle katolske tidebønnene. Når man begynner med noe nytt, er det alltid en del detaljer man må lære, og jeg vet ikke om noen prester eller ordensfolk i Norge som bruker disse tidebønnene her i Norge – etter at pastor Taxt døde.
Derfor hender det at jeg sjekker med Father Z. om jeg virkelig har forstått hvordan det skal gjøres. Det gjorde jeg nå i dag tidlig; sjekket vesper fra i går som han (i natt, norsk tid) hadde lest inn og lagt ut på bloggen sin her. Lytt gjerne til bønnene der.
Prestebloggeren «The Hermeneuticalness» skriver at konferansen var mye bedre enn han hadde regna med:
The Vatican meeting of bloggers was a great success by all accounts. With touching honesty, bloggers who were formerly skeptical have basically agreed that «Yes, they understood us, they weren’t trying to control us, and they were keen to co-operate with bloggers.» ….
Her summary for CNA of the Vatican meeting:
«What I think is that they (the Vatican) are trying to do today is to send out a message to the national bishops conferences to say ‘let them go, bloggers are here to stay and that they’re going to keep saying things that people don’t want them to say and they’re going to keep looking under rocks that nobody wants them to look under’.» …
På denne korte videoen kan man se hva som skulle skje/ skjedde i Roma de siste dagene: Fredag ble pave Johannes Pauls kiste flyttet fra krypten opp i Peterskirken, lørdag kveld var det en stor samling (200 000) i Cirkus Maximus, søndag kl 10.00 begynte saligkåringsmessen og etter messen kunne folk (i alle fall noen få av dem) få komme inn i Peterskirken for å ære den salige Johannes Paul, og i dag, mandag, kl 10.30 er det en takksigelsesmesse på Petersplassen.
I en kommentar her på bloggen i går kveld ble det skrevet: «… TV2 viste bilder fra Roma og kommenterte at seremonien hadde begynt ute, men nå var den visst flyttet inn. De viste bilder av kisten foran høyalteret, og programlederen kommenterte at det trolig var pave Johannes Pauls legeme som var i kisten, men at de ikke hadde fått det bekreftet. Men de anså det som sannsynlig. På 21-nyhetene var det ingenting om den “såkalte saligkåringen” som de så treffende uttrykte det tidligere i dag. Den såkalte nyhetskanalen viser sitt sanne kulturelle jeg. Dekningen av hendelsen i Roma som de tilfeldigvis må ha fått øye på i internasjonale medier i dag, står i grell kontrast til totaldekningen av vielsen i England forleden.»
På sine nettsider har flere norske aviser tatt med en NTB-melding (Vårt Land har den her ganske komplett), ser er ganske grei. Det eneste jeg ikke har fått med meg er om bønnen inne i kirken ved den salige Johannes pauls kiste var før eller etter messen på Petersplassen. Vårt Land har også mange bilder på sine nettsider.
Denne videoen ble lagt ut fredag – kisten ble flyttet som en forberedelse til salingkåringen søndag.
Denne skikkelig tabloide overskrifta viser til en artikkel av William Oddie i dag i the Catholic Herald. Han forsvarer med stor kraft saligkåringa kommende søndag, og sier at pave Johannes Paul II gjorde mye mer enn mange nå ser ut til å huske for å få Kirken på rett kurs igjen. Slik skriver han bl.a.:
We have short memories; we take our recent history too easily for granted. Few people, it seems – at least among those who imply that the problems we still face as a Church were actually Pope John Paul’s fault – remember the state of the Catholic Church at the end of the reign of the unhappy Pope Paul VI, during which forces of disintegration were unleashed within the Church which brought it to the edge of losing all credibility as a defender of basic Christian orthodoxy. …
He was speaking particularly about the liturgy: but just as disastrous was the unchallenged rise during his pontificate of the so-called “alternative magisterium” of Küng, Schillebeeckx and the rest of their malign brood. It was a time of great destruction; and to destroy is always easier than to rebuild. Recovering from the aftermath of the Council will take 100 years. But Pope John Paul began the fightback: he set the barque of Peter, and the Church with it, firmly back on course.
His greatest achievement, as I have already written in this column, was that he did more than any pope of the last century to defend and reassert beyond any doubt the stable and objective character of Catholic teaching. He saw off the alternative magisterium, not by suppressing individuals (though Küng, for instance, had his licence to teach Catholic doctrine removed) but by clear and unequivocal teaching: and as I wrote when the beatification was announced, as a result he made it possible for hundreds of thousands of non-Catholics like myself, tired of the uncertainties of secularised versions of Christianity, to come into full communion with the Holy See. …
Oddie har også med et sitat fra Malcolm Muggeridge som viser tendensen på 70-tallet (og som var nytt for meg). I boka om mor Teresa, «Something Beautiful for God», skriver han bl.a.:
“…that the Church, for inscrutable reasons of its own, has decided to have a reformation just when the previous one – Luther’s – is finally running into the sand.
I make no judgment about something which, as a non-member, is no concern of mine; but if I were a member, then I should be forced to say that, in my opinion, if men were to be stationed at the doors of churches with whips to drive worshippers away, or inside the religious orders specifically to discourage vocations, or among the clergy to spread alarm and despondency, they could not hope to be as effective in achieving these ends as are trends and policies seemingly now dominant within the Church. …»
Slik skriver romereports.com om audiensen på Petersplassen i går: During the general audience, Benedict XVI explained the meaning of Easter. The pope noted that «Christ rising from the dead is the foundation of our faith, which radiates throughout the liturgy of the Church, giving content and meaning to existence.»
Det er sikkert flere enn meg som husker pave Johannes Paul IIs requiemmesse (på bildet over) svært godt – NB i en paves begravelse skal røde messeklær brukes.
Noen har vært kritiske til saligkåringen, og katolsk.no har i dag lagt ut en artikkel som tar opp denne kritikken – og sier at kritikken er grunnløs. Slik skriver de bl.a.:
I et ferskt intervju med CNA tilbakeviser den pavelige biograf og akademiker George Weigel kritikken mot saligkåringen av Johannes Paul II. Weigel er mannen bak Johannes Paul-biografien «Witness to hope» fra 1999. Bind to av den omfattende biografien ble sluppet i 2010 og fullførte mange års arbeid med å sikre livshistorien og arven etter den polske paven.
Undersøkelsene rundt Johannes Paul IIs liv er meget grundige, og resultatet utgjør fire tykke bind, sier Weigel til CNA. Samtidig tilbakeviser han påstandene om at saligkåringsprosessen er gjennomført på en ukritisk og for rask måte. – I Mor Teresas tilfelle tilsidesatte Johannes Paul selv den vanlige femårsperioden mellom en persons død og den offisielle åpningen av saligkåringsprosessen. …
… Ropene fra folkemengden om snarlig helligkåring under Johannes Pauls begravelse – santo subito – ga gjenklang også i det påfølgende konklavet. Dette avslører kardinal Camillo Ruini, daværende leder av Den italienske bispekonferansen. I følge Ruini ble han under konklavet overlevert et opprop fra kardinalene, som oppfordret den neste paven til å tilsidesette femårsregelen for umiddelbart å kunne sette i gang saligkåringsprosessen av Johannes Paul.
Da vi gjorde vår entre inn til konklavet, ble jeg overrakt et brev signert av mange kardinaler som anerkjente folkekravet om å igansette saligkåringsprossessen umiddelbart. Brevet ble gitt til meg siden kardinalene ikke visste hvem som kom til å bli valgt i konklavet, sier Ruini til det italienske nyhetsbyrået AGI. …
John Allen skriver også interessant om det samme spørsmålet: Beatification Q&A #1: What’s the Rush? – In death as in life, John Paul a sign of contradiction.
I dag tidlig leste jeg litt mer på «Pray Tell» bloggen – jeg leser den bl.a. for å få en kontrast de mer konservative nettstedene jeg også besøker, og det er noen dyktige folk som skriver om liturgi der. En benediktiner med svært norske (+svenske og tyske) aner forteller om sin oppvekst, og svarer på spørsmål om sin konversjon fra luthersk til katolsk tro:
When people hear that I was raised Lutheran, they sometimes become curious and ask three questions: 1) From which Lutheran synod? 2) When did you convert? and 3) Why?
I’ll attempt to formulate my thoughts here in response to these recurring questions in hopes that this exercise might help me to reflect on my personal religious wanderings while also creating a means for sharing these thoughts.
My home parish, Vinje Lutheran Church in Willmar, Minnesota, was originally part of the Synoden for den Norsk Evangelisk Lutherske Kirke i America (the Norwegian ethnic synod which was affiliated with the state church in Norway). Today, Vinje is part of the larger ELCA. My grandfather (mother’s father) was a pastor of the Synoden and preached in both Norwegian and English. I also have an uncle who is an ELCA pastor, and my mother’s cousin is a retired ELCA bishop. On my father’s side, my grandmother was Augustana Synod (the Swedish ethnic church which is now ELCA), and my grandfather was baptized and confirmed Missouri Synod (German ethnic). However, my dad was raised in the Norwegian church because my Swedish grandmother and German grandfather joined a Norwegian congregation.
Det er nesten utrolig det går an å ha en så norsk oppvekst i USA! Han går så videre og forteller hvorfor han konverte (et ord han absolutt ikke liker å bruke) til Den katolske Kirke – det ser ut til å være mest musikken som gjorde det.
I kommentarene til dette innlegget, er det en helt ting, også den kirkekritikken som er typsik for denne bloggen:
… It appears that the forthcoming Assisi interfaith gathering on the 25th anniversary of the original event will be a repudiation by Pope Ratzinger of the earlier event. Not only will the interfaith prayer aspect disappear, but the ecumenical dimension will also be removed. Instead Benedict XVI will pray in St Peter’s the night before with the catholic faithful. And other christian churches are invited to do something similar. The image of filletting comes to mind. …
… I agree. Why even bother with Assisi. Better to call it off than to treat it so ungenerously and with such a legalistic attitude. Pope Benedict appears to be genuflecting again to the neo Ultramontanist harpies and the SSPX crowd. …
Her er hele pave Benedikts påsketale (se kilde):
Dear Brothers and Sisters in Rome and across the world, Easter morning brings us news that is ancient yet ever new: Christ is risen! The echo of this event, which issued forth from Jerusalem twenty centuries ago, continues to resound in the Church, deep in whose heart lives the vibrant faith of Mary, Mother of Jesus, the faith of Mary Magdalene and the other women who first discovered the empty tomb, and the faith of Peter and the other Apostles.
Right down to our own time – even in these days of advanced communications technology – the faith of Christians is based on that same news, on the testimony of those sisters and brothers who saw firstly the stone that had been rolled away from the empty tomb and then the mysterious messengers who testified that Jesus, the Crucified, was risen. And then Jesus himself, the Lord and Master, living and tangible, appeared to Mary Magdalene, to the two disciples on the road to Emmaus, and finally to all eleven, gathered in the Upper Room (cf. Mk 16:9-14).
The resurrection of Christ is not the fruit of speculation or mystical experience: it is an event which, while it surpasses history, nevertheless happens at a precise moment in history and leaves an indelible mark upon it. …
«I din oppstandelse, Kristus, gleder himmelen og jorden seg»Les mer »
En av mange rapporter fra Petersplassen i dag skriver bl.a.:
Benedict celebrated Easter Mass in St. Peter’s Square, packed with pilgrims and tourists and awash in the bright colors of spring flowers as he marked the church’s most joyous day of the year. …
.. Christians worldwide on Easter Sunday recall Jesus’ resurrection, a sign of eternal life, following his crucifixion. This year, Easter fell on the same day in the Orthodox and Roman Catholic church calendars.
But while «in heaven, all is peace and gladness,» Benedict said in his message, delivered after the Mass from the central balcony of St. Peter’s Basilica, «alas, it is not so on earth.» He lamented that hunger, disease, war and violence still cause suffering in the world.
He prayed for people in the Middle East, «so that the light of peace and of human dignity may overcome the darkness of division, hate and violence.» …
.. By the time the pope delivered his speech, well over 100,000 people had thronged to the area. Resplendent in gold-colored robes, Benedict led the ceremony from an altar set up on the steps of the basilica, under a red canopy to shield him from rain or sun. Skies over the Vatican alternated between clouds and peeks of sun.
The 84-year-old Benedict looked relaxed, although his voice cracked a bit as he intoned prayers during the sung parts of the Mass. His voice had sounded hoarse at times the previous evening, when the pope led a late-night Easter Vigil Mass lit by candles in the basilica. …
På liturgibloggen Pray Tell (ganske progressiv/liberal) leste jeg for et par dager siden et innlegg som uttrykker frustrasjonene til en del katolikker som med glede tok til seg alt det nye rundt 1970. De sier:
There’s no denying it. Many people involved in the Church admit they are tired out, or in any case without hope.” Thus begins a disturbing article in the latest issue of the Italian monthly Jesus. The author is Enzo Bianchi, prior of the Monastery of Bose near Turin. For decades he has been one of the best-selling spiritual authors in Italy and a nationally recognized symbol of mainstream Catholicism. His recent article should make Catholics everywhere stop and think. …
Those Catholics who “struggled to change” nearly 50 years ago, and obediently followed “the directives of the Council and the Pope”, are now filled with “confusion” and even “frustration” by this suspicious attitude towards Vatican II. … “I am nearly 70. I have worked my entire life for church unity and communion within my Church, but today I see many contradictions,” writes Bianchi. “And I ask with many others: where is the Church heading? This, our Church, that we have loved so much, and want to continue to love, as members that are loyal – not ones who are adulterous or who are looking for privileges and promotions.”
Som vanlig (i USA) er det kommet mange friske kommentarer til dette innlegget – her er utdrag fra noen få av dem:
Just wanted to let you know, that there are also many younger people that are “tired of the shenanigans going on in the Church”. We are tired of people “mainly older–in their 60s, products of Vatican II” who can’t get with the program and realize that you guys have already had your chance. The Church didn’t get any stronger when you guys were in charge. Mass attendance has gone down and many of your ilk have done nothing that actually brings people back into the pews (or the sanctuary for that matter). …
… In my opinion, the battle over liturgy is merely a proxy for more grave ecclesiological, social justice, and theological issues. I strongly suspect that the movement in some traditional Catholic circles to “revisit the Council” is more akin to a hostile rejection. In particular, some traditional Catholics harbor hostility towards the Conciliar acknowledgement of religious conscience and a call for justice towards Judaism and the Jewish people. I am also convinced that there is a strong desire in some sectors of the traditional community for a return to a tiara triumphalist papacy. I am utterly convinced that the advances of the Council and the model of a shepherd-bishop are intrinsically bound. I do hope that we must never return to a fortress monarchial Church which rejects dialogue and blinds itself to historical injustice. …
… Most Catholics welcomed the conciliar changes and struggled to put them into effect. Most Catholics felt betrayed by Humanae Vitae. And in fact it turned out that Humanae Vitae was the first shot in the battle to suppress Vatican II. …
Stavanger Aftenblad har i dag et bilde (over) av arbeidet med St Svithun kirke i Stavanger, og bl.a. følgende tekst:
En heisekran senker ned utstyr til bygningsarbeiderne som står inne i kirken ved Løkkeveien. Den mangler fortsatt tak, men flere bøyler er satt opp og markerer det som skal bli den nye katolske kirken i Stavanger.
I år blir det en annerledes påske for katolikkene i byen. St. Svithun kirke er under ombygging, noe som betyr at høytiden må markeres andre steder. …
… Planen er at kirken skal være innflytningsklar i juli/august og at den skal innvies 25. september i år. Da som den fjerde største kirken i Stavanger, etter Domkirken, St. Petri og St. Johannes, og som den største katolske kirken i landet, med 550 sitteplasser.
Jeg er glad for at man nå kan se enden på den lange byggeperioden. St Svithun kirke trengte absolutt mer plass, selv om jeg da jeg var der syntes at man kunne ha klart seg en mindre dramatisk (og langt billigere) utbygging – og satset mer på Sandnes og omegn, der faktisk 1/3 av katolikkene i området bor.
Over ser man illustrasjonen til Påskedag fra Breviarium Romanum. En større kopi av bildet kan sees her.
Her er starten av pave Benedikts preken fra påskevigilirn i Peterskirken sent i går kveld:
Dear Brothers and Sisters,
The liturgical celebration of the Easter Vigil makes use of two eloquent signs. First there is the fire that becomes light. As the procession makes its way through the church, shrouded in the darkness of the night, the light of the Paschal Candle becomes a wave of lights, and it speaks to us of Christ as the true morning star that never sets – the Risen Lord in whom light has conquered darkness. The second sign is water. On the one hand, it recalls the waters of the Red Sea, decline and death, the mystery of the Cross. But now it is presented to us as spring water, a life-giving element amid the dryness. Thus it becomes the image of the sacrament of baptism, through which we become sharers in the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ.
Yet these great signs of creation, light and water, are not the only constituent elements of the liturgy of the Easter Vigil. Another essential feature is the ample encounter with the words of sacred Scripture that it provides. Before the liturgical reform there were twelve Old Testament readings and two from the New Testament. The New Testament readings have been retained. The number of Old Testament readings has been fixed at seven, but depending upon the local situation, they may be reduced to three. The Church wishes to offer us a panoramic view of whole trajectory of salvation history, starting with creation, passing through the election and the liberation of Israel to the testimony of the prophets by which this entire history is directed ever more clearly towards Jesus Christ. In the liturgical tradition all these readings were called prophecies. Even when they are not directly foretelling future events, they have a prophetic character, they show us the inner foundation and orientation of history. They cause creation and history to become transparent to what is essential. In this way they take us by the hand and lead us towards Christ, they show us the true Light. …
Resten kan leses her.
Over ser man illustrasjonen til Påskelørdag fra Breviarium Romanum. En større kopi av bildet kan sees her.
Over ser man illustrasjonen til Langfredag fra Breviarium Romanum. En større kopi av bildet kan sees her.
Når 1000 tidligere anglo-katolikker denne uka blir katolikker, og også (av pave benedikt) har fått muligheten til å styre seg selv, og ta vare på sin egen tradisjon, vil de kunne hjelpe alle katolikker ut av den estetiske ørkenvandringen de har vandret i i 40 år. Det skriver i alle fall Damian Thompson:
… But one thing the former Holy Trinity people will be bringing with them is a meticulous and dignified Anglo-Catholic tradition of interpreting the Roman rite. In England, at least, this could turn out to be the essence of the “Anglican patrimony” of the Ordinariate. Many of those coming over anticipated the Benedictine liturgical reforms that, until now, the Catholic bishops have been slow to implement. If the Ordinariate congregations celebrate the Eucharist in the spirit of the great Mass at Westminster Cathedral that the Pope attended on the Saturday of his visit – a rare glimpse of Benedict’s ideals put into practice – then Rome will be delighted. And, at long last, cradle Catholics will be shown a path out of the aesthetic desert in which they have been wandering for 40 years.
Han skriver også i samme artikkel:
… Now we enter delicate territory. I don’t want to suggest that there is tension between the Bishops of England and Wales and the Ordinariate: on the contrary, the Bishops’ Conference is far more warmly disposed towards the new body than we could have anticipated a year ago. That is one of the fruits of the papal visit. Also, I’ve yet to come across any evidence that these new Catholics see themselves as a Church within a Church: for example, the former parish priest and many parishioners of Holy Trinity, Reading, are clearly looking forward to becoming integral to the town’s Roman Catholic community, celebrating their own Mass at St James’s, the town centre Catholic parish. …
Avisa Dagen skrev for et par dager siden (og Vårt Land hadde en lignende artikkel i papiravisa, om de mange hundre anglikanerne i England og Wales som denne uka blir opptatt i Den katolske Kirke:
I Storbritannia forbereder i alt 33 større grupper av anglikanere seg til å bli opptatt i Den katolske kirke i dagene før påske. Ifølge nyhetsbyrået Kathpress dreier det seg om ca 20 prester og 600 legfolk, som vil slutte seg til det nyoprettede ordinariatet «Our Lady of Walsingham». Etter flere ukers forberedelser vil de konvertere skjærtorsdag eller 1. påskedag, hvor de vil motta fermingssakramentet (konfirmasjonssakramentet) og offisielt bli opptatt i Den katolske kirke. Den første prestevielse til det nye ordinariatet vil skje i pinsetiden.
Vatikanet etablerede i november 2009 gjennom det pavelige dekretet «Anglicanorum cætibus» en ordning for anglikanere som ønsket å tre inn i Den katolske kirke. Dermed er det blitt mulig for grupper av anglikanere å konvertere til den katolske tro og samtidig beholde en rekke av sine egne tradisjoner. I den kommende tid vil det bli etablert lignende ordinariater i USA, Canada og Australien, opplyser Rom.
Dette er interessant lesning, men jeg reagerte litt på det lave tallet som ble nevnt. BBC melder her om 900 lekfolk og 61 prester. Og her kan vi lese om 1000 lekfolk og 64 prester.
Bildet under viser Mgr Keith Newton. «He is picutred at Southwark Cathedral after receiving former Anglicans into full communion with the Church on Tuesday. Note the crozier. He is not just a Protonotary Apostolic, but an Ordinary.»
