Defying the wishes of the archbishop, a shuttered Quincy church is holding a Catholic Easter Mass in a Protestant church and a married priest will preside.
The pain of a first Christmas without their neighborhood church was too much to bear for Star of the Sea parishioners in Quincy, said Sean Glennon, one of the leaders to reopen the church.
‘Too many of our parishioners expressed that they couldn’t go through that again, especially on Easter, which is the highest holy day of the year,’ Glennon said.
The Mass at the Protestant First Church of Squantum, which is on the same street as Star of the Sea, is the first Catholic Mass in the tight-knit section of Quincy since its closure in October.
Parishioners are holding the Mass against Archbishop Sean P. O’Malley’s wishes, and the Rev. Terry McDonough, a married priest not recognized by the church, will preside over an expected 500 people.
[Source]
Well you can’t get much more symbolic than that. To defy your Bishop and have an illicit Mass by a priest without faculties from the Bishop is to in effect become Protestant. If only people were as loyal to the universal Church as some of them are to their local church building.
5 comments
Yet so many of our pastors and bishops will deny that the Schism is here…and has been growing for four decades. They will denounce terms like conservative and progressive and screw their courage right onto the middle of the fence.
To paraphrase Our Lord, a house divided against itself cannot stand. A formal split is certain. The tragedy is the loss of these Catholics who will have sold out their birthright for a mess of moribund, decaying liberal religion. If they really want to see their future, they need look no further than the local Episcopalian parishes–emptying sepulchers.
Shamefully sad, but is it really any surprise that this is happening in Massachusetts? After all, this is the very land where it is impossible to discern the difference between a Catholic and a Unitarian. Just look at the �Catholics� they repeatedly choose to represent them. I apologize in advance to the two or three orthodox Catholics living in MA, we know you’re out there…somewhere.
Dear Curt Jester:
I am afraid that I am unfamiliar that I am unfamiliar with the antecedent circumstances as regards the parish of Mary Star of the Sea in Quincy. It is therefore possible that they deserved their eviction.
Nonetheless, I thought that the mandate from Jesus to Peter, and in turn, to all bishops, was that Peter, and they, feed their sheep, and not evict them.
Generally, though, I love reading your weblog, and look forward to more entries from your altar ego (spelling intended!), Moloch. You cute devil, you.
I go to school with a seminarian from Quincy, and believe me, it’s an embattled area for the faith. It’s tragic and shameful that people are reacting in this adverse way to such a good and holy shepherd as O’Malley. However, I would caution your second poster that there are VERY many good, orthodox Catholics buried amidst the rubble of a crumbling Archdiocese. They simply need our prayers and support to climb back to the top and begin rebuilding.
If they do this, they are effectively ex-communicating themselves. I am sure they are ignorant of what they are doing, and it is sad that they see this as a hope and a plan.