Luzarches
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Oh, Samuel, I think that it’s pretty ghastly! No offence taken.
The only reason I post it is because I imagine that there are similar laws in Italy regarding permitted developement in historical churches, probably more stringent than Ireland I imagine. I think that the chancery in Cobh isn’t really interested in compromise: The unstated motivating factor is not merely that there ought to be a permanent forward-facing altar but that it should never be possible to go back to the old arrangement should the wind change in Rome ten, twenty years hence… It is intended to be an aggresive act towards the historic fabric. Regardless of the weird, inappropriate and frankly tasteless additions in Turin it would only take four burley men five minutes to re-reorder the church back to how it was…
Regarding the possibly unsurprising on-going efforts to radically reorder Cobh, I thought I’d point out an example in a spirit of helpfulness.
(As has probably been clear from my previous posts, I regard the practice of the priest deliberately ‘facing the people’ as a very regretable innovation in the liturgy of the church. I believe that it will gradually fade away as the authentic organic understanding of the western liturgical rites becomes more widespread; alongside this process there will be a reclamation of the Council texts via a dissemination of the ‘hermeneutic of continuity’. The observations that men like Bouyer and Ratzinger made in the late 1960s will come to be more widely known and shared.)
I’ve heard it said in this thread that the model for the last Cobh project was the duomo in Milan. This was a disgraceful ‘adeguamento’ that thoroughly subverted the sixteenth century sanctuary. It is also irreversible. Given the conservation angle at Cobh, it would seem that any solution that is ‘irreversible’ is profoundly unsuitable. Whilst I question the aesthetic content of this reordering of Turin Cathedral, if the bishop is adamant that something has to be done at Cobh prior to his having to write the letter why not take a look at the approach adopted here?
The new furniture gives the necessary impression of permanence, but clearly only rests on the pavement.
Courtesy of the very excellent website The New Liturgical Movement: http://thenewliturgicalmovement.blogspot.com/ comes news of this story in England, concerning the reordering of the cathedral in Leeds which is the church of Bishop Roche.
http://www.dioceseofleeds.org.uk/fullstory.php?newsid=455
If you are very patient, the slide show at the bottom of the window, once it has gone through interminable pictures of various dignitaries, shows some details of the new sanctuary.
It commits one of Prax’s favourite liturgical sins of having the bishop descend from his cathedra to an altar placed at the same general level of the sanctuary, not having a footpace of its own.
Also one of mine: Having an axial cathedra in a neo-Gothic church…
I would urge all visitors here to check out The New Liturgical Movement which is a serious minded site dedicated to the very necessary ‘reform of the reform’ of the sacred liturgy and also to the wider provision of the Classical Rite. It has features on architecture, sacred chant and polyphony and scholarly articles on liturgical issues. These range from the conservative to the ‘traditional’ spectrum; many are, however, very suitable for consideration for those mythical dwellers on the sun-lit uplands; The ‘mainstream’.
Re: St Nicholas’ Church, Killavullen.
It’s rather nice though that the laity sit in an entirely untouched nave; traditional, you might say. And the clergy sit in the new and reordered sanctuary; modernist, you might say. Perhaps the architect knew that he had a free hand to indulge all the latest fads in the clerical zone, but knew better that to interfere with the faithful’s?
I hope that this reflects the instincts of the Irish church and that the old pieties will endure.
“Again, as with Armagh, it has to be said that it is better than the enormous megalomaniac mess made of St. Peter’s by Cathal Daly’s destructive boot-boy penchant.”
Do we have any pictures of this era at St Peter’s?
@Praxiteles wrote:
You could be putting ideas into some people’s heads, here.
Quite. During the French Revolution various commisions for ‘Equality’ during The Terror tried to find various ways to promote their particular brand of joylessness and malice: There was an idea, at Strasbourg, that because the cathedral had only one tower, when two were intended, this should be demolished on the grounds that it offended the principle of equality. Fortunately, this did not occur. However, at Laon cathedral at least one of the exquisite 13th century towers, because it had a spire and the others did not, was demolished on the same grounds.
I wonder how far into the future we’ll have to wait for spires and towers to be demolished on political and/or ideological grounds?
@goldiefish wrote:
I still don’t see what all the fuss is about St Colmans Cathedral. Its not as if they are knocking the spire and replacing the roof tiles with red slate. Much of this “protest” is merely a means of venting dislike of Bishop Magee.
Another comedian.
@Praxiteles wrote:
That is a terrible pity. There was a time when the liturgy in Rheims was superior to that of Notre Dame in Paris. Furthere déchéance!!
How recently was that?
Luzarches wrote:Of course, the altar at the eastern arch of the crossing, an eighteenth century replacement of a rather finer mid-sixteenth century altar AND reredos, is a double-mensa altar]In fact, since the gradine and big six are all that separates the two sides I’m surprised that one of the distinctly liberal archbishops of Reims hasn’t thought of eliminating them….(!)
It’s terrible at the moment: There is a table in front of the western face of the double altar (that JPII was made to use at an outdoor mass in the parvis) and another table at the eastern face of the altar so that the canons are spared the sight of the back of a priest’s chasuble. So there are thus 3 permanent altars in the choir and crossing of Reims and 2 temporaries.
It’s the medieval multiplication of masses again!
@Praxiteles wrote:
A view of Rheims Cathedral showing the High Altar, retro Choir and the East chevet.
Of course, the altar at the eastern arch of the crossing, an eighteenth century replacement of a rather finer mid-sixteenth century altar AND reredos, is a double-mensa altar; the canons, seated in choir, thus face west, although inadvertantly.
It seems astonishing, for all the expertise and pooled resources of this thread, that only one good picture seems to be available of Armagh 1904-’82. Could there be some way of finding more? Many photographs must have been taken during various liturgies so surely close-ups of the sanctuary for first Holy Communions and Confirmations exist?
As for the absence of documentary photos, it only serves to underline a discussion we had in the office today: Catholics have only just got around to thinking of their own churches as ‘historical’ and objectively meritorious. This attitude to a largely Victorian stock of buildings would have been unthinkable in the ‘mainstream’ even 10 or 15 years ago. When I grew up, not so long ago, I never used to consider the Victorian as historical at all, but as near modern and therefore, I suppose, still ours to possess, mutate and change in a fairly abitrary way. With the change of century I think that we have suddely all woken up to the fact that these are now venerable buildings, worthy of the respect that we would unthinkingly accord to buildings of the eighteenth century and earlier.
However, an eighteenth century style clerical dilettante-ism with respect to the Gothic style still exists in pockets. I think that this is still evident in BQ’s recent renovation, though it is still a great improvement of the scandalous paganism of the previous ‘sanctuary’. I mean that I think it is odd to treat the floor with a nod to the Gothic, but then, in another design mentality altogether, to erect an altar and ambo that are still aesthetically incongruous. It reminds me of one of those reordering projects where the poor old architect gets to design the sanctuary steps and the new disabled lavs whilst the parish priest, fancying himself a Maecenas of the arts, commisions some New Age artist to come up with the liturgical furniture.
Reminds me of Cobh, where the good folks at An Bord were being asked to approve a new sanctuary without seeing detailed designs of the most important things in it (aka that ‘worship space for the 21st century), because ‘an artist’ was going to get to do it. Anyone for blobs?
“…above all under the species of the Eucharist. For in this sacrament Christ is present in a unique way, whole and entire, God and man, substantially and permanently. This presence of Christ under the species “is called ‘real’ not in an exclusive sense, as if the other kinds of presence were not real, but par excellence.”
EM 1967
In Newry it is precisely this sense which is being deliberately undermined. The font, though used on occasion, is permanently on view and competes visually with the altar. At least the altar is on axis, although it seems to be at the same level as the ‘presidential’ chair and the ambo.
But consider the length of time at which the priest spends at the altar and let’s take a guess that EP II is frequently used. Out of a parish mass of say 45 minutes, the priest might have spent 3 minutes at the altar. Now what are the people supposed to take from that? That the real presence in the Eucharist is the ‘pre-eminent’ event in the liturgy? Or maybe that’s Father’s 10 minute homily, the exhaustive lay-led bidding prayers, or the elongated liturgy of the word, not to mention the improvised comments?
In the new liturgy, if anything, the altar needs to be even more elevated, central and imposing than in the old rite, precisely to guard against what Rhabanus accurately characterizes as a flatening out or equalizing of the modes of Christ’s Presence in the liturgy, which Paul VI, for all the unfortunate things that happened in his reign, at least pointed out in his teaching.
Of course, the GIRM is the principle normative text for the disposition of churches. But it is not without it’s problems. BQ uses it with reference to Drumaroad in accordance with his interpretation of the text. The text itself is written in such a way that may be interpreted in any different numbers of ways, and the physical results of those paths might appear very different or even contradictory: One could end up with a conservative basilican church or a trendy antiphonal one. The problem here is that the Church seems to have given up on a degree of ‘rubrical’ precision with regard to this question. The Church expects that one reading the GIRM will interpret it in the light of precedent, using the ‘hermeneutic of continuity’, so to speak, and not from a premise of radical freedom which is not in any way ‘constrained’ by tradition. The fault lies therefore in the context in which interpretations are made and, to some extent, conditioned by. For example, it is no surprise that the idea of ‘the People of God’ is not in some way modified by an inappropriate idea of democracy or functional equality. This tendency could also be said to be manifested in the equal sizing of the liturgical furniture. I maintain that it is simply not correct, theologically, to appear to give a greater prominence to the ambo than to the altar. Similarly, to dispose of both of these elemnts around the central axis, but neither on it.
Anyway, Chuck. What have you got against Christian martyrdom? Not relevant today, eh? I’m sure the Christians in Iraq and the Holy Land would agree with you there…
As for those forelock tugging peasants you mentioned, devoutly telling their beads. Do you think that God was deaf to their prayers? Their knowledge of God would have been so much more superior if they’d lived to sing ‘Shine Jesus Shine’, of course.
@Chuck E R Law wrote:
Catholicism is quite simple – it is a another form of Cargo Cult. First the physical shape of the church must be just right and there should be lashings of gorgeous Victorian mosaic on the floor and lurid images of martyred saints on the walls. Then people start to really believe in God and the decor gradually makes them more devout and you begin to hear again the sound of beads being thumbed…. and craws being thumped… and forelocks being tugged…
Chuck,
In your sarcasm you have seemed to confuse Catholicism with the most joyless strand of puritanism. You seem to have an almost manichean disdain for the material order and, more importantly, beauty itself. You would have us worship in plain boxes lest we fall into the dire error of being distracted by some ornament or image. That’s against a commandment anyway, you suppose?
You have signally failed to answer the constructive criticisms here on the basis of any theology. Are you sure you’re not a bishop, because you seem to be working from a position of pure complacency?
@Chuck E R Law wrote:
You don’t practice what you preach. When it suits your cause you insist that Bishop Magee is obliged to have the consent of Adrian O Donovan. You are so intent on pursuing a nasty personal vendetta that you have no regard to the long term damage you might inflict on the structures of authority and leadership within the church.
“…damage…inflict[ed] on the structures of authority and leadership within the church.”
As opposed to the damage and division created by those who would force a reordering through in the teeth of impassioned and principled opposition across whole dioceses? Oh, I forgot, that’s just a small number of reactionary crypto-Lefebvrists. How silly of me.
Chuck,
“…the laity and the pastoral clergy have taken to reform in a way never intended by the control freaks within the Vatican.”
Every Catholic is bound by tradition. Popes are not fabricators of the faith, still less the laity. I’m interested to know which the reforms are that those crazy ‘control freaks’ at the Vatican are trying to rein in? I pressume we’re not talking about the ‘We Are Church’ agenda?
Do you feel threatened by the ‘hermeneutic of continuity’? Or is it the Church that was supposedly founded in 1965 that you feel under attack?
You can tell us! We’re all Easter People, after all…
@Praxiteles wrote:
It is nice to know that the popular movement to save the interior of St. Colman’s Cathedral can draw on the writings of no less a personality than Martin Mosebach. The link leads to the translation of a very interesting article by him on the subject of iconoclasm and its inherent denial of the Incarnation:
http://cathcon.blogspot.com/2006/08/iconoclasm-and-liturgy.html
I’ve ordered his book ‘The Heresy of Formlessness’ from the Ignatius Press in the US, but it is, alas, taking an age to arrive.
@Dieter wrote:
When Benedikt XVI visited the parish church of St. Oswald in his hometown of Marktl am Inn he prayed at the baptismal font where he was baptised in 1927. The font had been used as a garden ornament since the church was reordered in 1965 but was reinstated last Easter as a focal point for visitors.
I notice, Dieter, that this fine baptismal font you mention is now placed directly in front of the old Gothic altar and reredos. Perhaps in such a way as to impede it’s use?
I have also noticed that in many German Gothic medieval churches that passed into Protestant hands that there was a trend to place the baptismal font on the main altar-table axis, presumably to underline the perfect equality of the sacraments in the new theology. I wonder whether that’s going on when modern ‘Catholic’ liturgists seek to place the font in very close proximity to the main altar…. (along with the larger-than-altar-ambo)?
