Here is today’s installment of the Boston Globe‘s series on keeping open ultra-liberal parishes slated for closure. This is at least the fourth or fifth article in the Globe about St. Albert’s in Weymouth. Compare that to the zero articles on the closing of, say, Holy Trinity Church in the South End, home to the indult Mass. In fact, almost every single one of the parishes profiled in the Globe have been demonstrably liberal parishes slated for closure.
I bet the St. Albert’s parishioners and the Globe reporter think their little anecdotes about the parish will convince the archbishop to change his mind. I doubt it. That they’re hiring lawyers and raising a legal defense fund shows a lack of obedience to their bishops’ authority. Then we have the descriptions of parish life: Fr. Coyne in his Snoopy vestments (yeah, that’s dignifed and sacred), the one-sided slams against the former pastor, the run-down of parish activities that say absolutely nothing about the faith actually being handed on. The kids think Fr. Coyne is cool. So what? Sponge Bob Squarepants is cool, too, but I don’t want him celebrating Mass or being my pastor.
There actually was a pretty decent Globe article about Holy Trinity, just before the closure list came out.
I can’t believe Fr. Coyne is still wearing those ratty Snoopy “vestments” around. Maybe he commissioned someone to stitch together a new set of Disney bedsheets.
One prays that he’s only wearing them in classrooms and not on the altar, but I doubt it.
I know that the legal precedent in other states has been for the courts to stay out of parish closings and not try to intervene. But is there any indication whatever that the courts in Mass. would in fact try to get involved – or are these people at places like St. Albert’s just completely wasting their time?
Even if the courts do get dragged in, they’re likely to treat existing church law as binding. A few years ago, a conflict at a Boston Episcopalian parish led to a suit, and the court there confirmed the bishop’s authority over the parish, based on the relevant canons of the Episcopal Church.
http://www.tcrnews2.com/Carr.html
Here is a glimmer of real Hope.