An Unprecedented Problem

Unprecedented within the past 37 years, anyway.

Some of us here in this section of southern California, now have to make decisions as to where to attend the traditional Mass. In a few very short years, our Mass situation has gone from non-existent, to once per month, to one location per diocese each Sunday, to our current situation which includes "choices".

The following are available every Sunday:

6:30 a.m. Ss Peter & Paul Church in Wilmington. This will begin on 2 December 2007, the first Sunday of Advent. In preparation, one of the Norbertine assistant priests will be teaching a 4 week course on the traditional liturgy on the four Sundays of November.

7:00 a.m. in Yorba Linda at the Pope John Paul II Polish Center

8:00 a.m. the Serra Chapel at San Juan Capistrano Mission

1:00 p.m. St Theresa Church in Alahambra (currently on the 3d, 4th, and 5th Sundays of the month; "every Sunday" is the projected goal and will happen when the pastor learns the traditional rite.)

1:00 p.m. St Peter Chanel Church in Hawaiian Gardens (in the old church for the time being; later in the new church if attendance warrants)

The "indult rotation" Masses are still available also. The list can be found at the Una Voce Los Angeles site here.

Even the traditional Mass at St Mary's by the Sea my reappear at some point. Fr Tran announced that it would a few months ago. And then advised that it would be a while yet. We shall see.

But in the meantime: wonderful choices.

Found While Looking for Something Else

While rummaging about in some of my traditional Mass bookmarks, what should I find but An Aifrionn Tradiseanta Laidinneach, a page listing traditional Latin Mass locations put up by Una Voce Scotland in Gaidhlig.

Glé mhaith, UVS.

(And to forfend any communications in Scots Gaidhlig, it is, alas, not one of my languages. I had a year of Irish (a.k.a., Gaelige until the class dwindled down to just me. At which point the teacher went on to other things. Gaidhlig I tried to learn on my own but gainful employment and bone laziness caught up with me.)

Health Care Crisis

“-- old Dr Blacklock. A real old pigheaded bully, absolutely set in his ways, and convinced that everything he thought and said was right. Probably killed thousands of patients through obstancy. He wouldn't stand for any new ideas or methods.

“I don't know that I blame him there,” said Miss Marple. “I always feel that the young doctors are only too anxious to experiment. After they've whipped out all our teeth, and administered quantities of very peculiar glands, and removed bits of our insides, they then confess that nothing can be done for us. I really prefer the old-fashioned remedy of big black bottles of medicine. After all, one can always pour those down the sink.”

A Murder is Announced - Agatha Christie

No, don't look for a deep meaning. I was just re-reading an old favourite and that made me laugh out loud.

Donors in Diapers

Powitics: I fwowed up.

Missa Antiqua -- another one in Rome

A new daily Mass in Rome celebrated in the ancient Roman Rite: this one at the basilica of St Mary Major.

Orbis Catholicus reports here.

This is an enormous step forward. As one of the commenters at the site points out "only a year ago, the traditional mass was treated an an exotic and forbidden museum piece". And now, daily and in a major basilica. Progress, indeed.

No Brimstone Yet

But plenty of smoke, ash, and fire.

The nearest fire, thank God, is a good 40 miles away. But we've got plenty of smoke and a constant light "snowfall" of ash. As this piece in the Times explains "Long Beach sits at the neck of a wind 'funnel' that, during strong Santa Ana conditions, carries smoke and ash to the coast from fires in distant mountain and desert areas. Since the wildfires ignited Sunday, the city has suffered some of the region's worst levels of airborne particulates."

You can get a look at our yellow atmosphere here or here.

This is decidedly unpleasant. But if you have time for a prayer, one for those who no longer have homes wouldn't go amiss. The networks seem to have focussed on the rich and the celebrities in Malibu. But there many more in any economic category you care to name.

Da nobis, quæsumus, Domine, pluviam salutarem. . . .

Oh, the Shame. . . .

The Jean Arthur TV Movie Alert Service, a wholly-owned subsidiary of The Inn at the End of the World, is mortified to realize that it forgot Jean Arthur's birthday.

Thanks to the Irish Elk it did not go unmemorialized on the web. You'll find his tribute here.

(Mark: Taking nothing at all away from Mr Smith Goes to Washington, but The More the Merrier needs to be on the must-see list.)

England 6 - South Africa 15

The southern hemisphere wraps it up this time. Could've been worse. Could've been 64 - 15 which is what South Africa did to the U.S.

The Northern Hemisphere Set To Redeem Itself

The U.S. got to go home early. Very early. Ireland collapsed; France likewise; Wales didn't make it either; and Scotland: oh, dear.

Now it's up to England to save the pride of the Northern Hemisphere.

Marty Haugen, Call Your Office

" A New Musical Season Opens at the Vatican" says Sandro Magister here. Highlights:

"The curia will have a new office with authority in the field of sacred music."

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"In effect, since just over a year ago, Gregorian chant has been restored as the primary form of singing for Mass and solemn Vespers in Saint Peter's basilica.

The rebirth of Gregorian chant at St. Peter's coincided with the appointment of a new choir director, who was chosen by the basilica chapter in February of 2006.

The new director, Pierre Paul, a Canadian and an Oblate of the Virgin Mary, has made a clean break with the practice established during the pontificate of John Paul II – and reaffirmed by the previous director, Pablo Colino – of bringing to sing at the Masses in St. Peter's the most disparate choirs, drawn from all over the world, very uneven in quality and often inadequate.

Fr. Paul put the gradual and the antiphonal back into the hands of his singers, and taught them to sing Mass and Vespers in pure Gregorian chant.

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[The Oblates of the Virgin Mary are not a well-known community in the United States, with only, perhaps, a half-dozen apostolates in this country. But they are in my local parish. And based on that sampling, without ever having seen Fr Paul, I am delighted.]

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"It is no mystery that the reciprocal enrichment between the Catholic liturgy and great sacred music is especially close to Benedict XVI's heart.

The pope made this clear with particular force during his recent trip to Austria, with the Mass he celebrated on Sunday, September 9, in the cathedral of Vienna, accompanied by the stupendous Mariazeller Messe by Franz Joseph Haydn, and by a communion antiphon and Psalm in pure Gregorian chant."

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In sum, a very optimistic report. We pray the optimism is justified.

Ut Unum Sint Department

"The College of Bishops of the Traditional Anglican Communion (TAC) met in Plenary Session in Portsmouth, England, in the first week of October 2007. The Bishops and Vicars-General unanimously agreed to the text of a letter to the See of Rome seeking full, corporate, sacramental union."

More here.

IS IT TRUE. . . .

. . .that the Democrats are boycotting the World Series because the Colorado Iraqis won the National League pennant?

Something Else To Get Depressed About

I was watching one of those wedding shows last night on the W/E channel. I actually do that every once in a while if they're going to have a piper at the ceremony. Sort of scouting the competition, as it were. This time I watched because they were featuring The Castaways, a restaurant/banquet hall/wedding site that I have played at a few times.

The show was, obviously, all about weddings.

It was sponsored by a contraceptive.

{{{Sigh}}}

Still No Irish Up the North

Don't expect to be getting your parking ticket as Gaelige in Belfast any time soon. The Northern Ireland Culture Minister has ruled out introducing an Irish Language Act that would "enshrine the rights of Irish speakers in the North."


And, I swear on a stack of bishops I am not making this up, the said minister's name is Poots. You could look it up.

Al Gets Another Oscar

The Times went all shoogly this morning: Al Gore got another prize. This one's the Nobel Peace Prize.

Jerry adds a little perspective: The peace prize isn't like the science prize. The Nobel prizes in the sciences are awarded by scientists, i.e., the Swedish Academy. The Nobel Peace Prize is awarded by Norwegian political appointees.

The hottest year in the last century was. . . .1934.

The hottest decade in the last century was. . . .the 1930's.

I'm just sayin'. . . .

Some Piping for Saturday

This is a delightful piece of border piping to brighten your Saturday. The piper is Jonathan Swayne playing his own border pipes in low G. If you were wondering, my old set of Naill border pipes don't sound anything like this. Jon built his to sound very much in the French style and low G is quite uncommon. But what a nice warm sound they give. Rather like uillean pipes, I think. (And isn't that Julian Goodacre, a very fine maker of English pipes, starting off the dancing?)

Bachelordom Again and The Project III

Mary is off again to visit her mother for a couple of weeks so I will be pottering around the estate by myself. It does have its advantages: I can practice my pipes whenever I like. On the other hand, I will have no excuse for not practicing my pipes.

And speaking of practice, I did a wedding yesterday in San Diego which involved something over four hours of driving. Not my favourite thing to do but what a beautiful event it turned out to be. It was a little church in a still sparsely populated part of California. The weather was cool and brisk with a threat of rain; magnificent weather for the pipes and they sang wonderfully. They can be so #$%^! tempermental; it's always a delight when they're in a good mood. Even the church's music master commented on the nice tone the pipes were giving.

The Project, as mentioned before, is at a standstill. There's a good deal of reed-tweaking that needs to be done but I can't do anything further until the new bellows arrive. The maker assures me this will occur this coming week. I do have some very good chanter reed prospects but the final decision awaits the new bellows.

I Readed This Just Today

Fire-breathing traditionalists are already aware that we are fast losing our past. Now it seems we are losing our past tense, too.

Tracing the evolution of English verbs over 1,200 years -- from the Old English of "Beowulf" to the modern English of "The Princess Diaries" -- researchers have found that the majority of irregular verbs are going the way of Grendel, falling to the linguistic equivalent of natural selection.

The irregular verbs, governed by confusing and antiquated rules, came under evolutionary pressure to obey the modern "-ed" rule of regular verb conjugation, according to a report today in the journal Nature.

This morning's Times explains it all here.

So that's why we don't say "He remembering His mercy hath holpen His servant Israel" any more.

Not in casual conversation, anyway.

Blogging via Verizon or AT&T?

The next time there's a service failure, make sure you don't say anything rude about either of those conscientious entities. Somewhere in that 14,000 word agreement (the one you agreed to when you checked the "I Agree" box) it says they can cut you off permanently if you hurt their feelings.

It says so here in this morning's Times.

More Traditional Masses in Los Angeles

Things have been looking up lately for the traditional Roman Rite in the Archdiocese of Los Angeles.

The southern half of the Archdiocese has been without a traditional Mass on the third Sunday of the month for several years now. Last month, the pastor of the Discalced Carmelite Church of St Theresa in Alhambra remedied that by sponsoring a third Sunday of the month Mass at 1:00 p.m. Then a couple of weeks ago this was expanded to include the fourth, and where necessary, the fifth Sundays of the month. These Masses are celebrated by Fr Robert Bishop, C.M.F. who also celebrates the indult Masses on the same days. The pastor is anxious to learn the old Mass so that he can take over from Fr Bishop on these days and institute additional Masses on the first and second Sundays of the month.

The Oblates of the Virgin Mary are beginning a 1:00 p.m. celebration of the traditional Mass this coming Sunday, 14 October at St Peter Chanel Church in the city of Hawaiian Gardens. It's hoped that this will be permanent, but it is dependent upon respectable attendance figures.

The Norbertines at Ss Peter and Paul Church in Wilmington will begin celebrating the traditional Mass at 6:30 a.m. on 2 December, the first Sunday of Advent. This, too, is announced as dependent upon attendance numbers. The latest bulletin says they need at least 100 people attending to make it viable.

As long as we're talking baseball. . . .

It was 50 years ago this month that the Dodgers made the big move from Brooklyn to Los Angeles. The Times has some great memorial articles.

Look here, here, and here.

Vin Scully, the best baseball announcer on the planet, wondered if he'd still have a job.

Danny McDevitt threw the last pitch in Ebbett's Field.

Wait 'til Next Year (if Arte will buy us a bat or two)

". . .if I predict doom for the Angels on this site, they tend to buck up and do much better. This post will determine if merely reporting doom - even if, so far, it is only a limited doom - will perform the same trick."

Apparently not.

Recriminations.

Future plans.

A bright spot.

The Perils of Fenway

All things being equal, Fenway Park is not where the Angels would prefer to be. At Fenway they tend to, not to put too fine a point upon it, not do as well as they might. But it's where they are at the moment. And at the moment Kelvim Escobar is busy collapsing in a heap in the first inning.

Interesting thing about this blogging wheeze: if I predict doom for the Angels on this site, they tend to buck up and do much better. This post will determine if merely reporting doom - even if, so far, it is only a limited doom - will perform the same trick.