I caught sight of last week's edition of the Anglican 'Church Times' today, It carried a front page picture of the new Catholic Church, followed by a centrefold spread extolling the virtues of this, the new S Bede’s Ecclesiastical Plant.
Read the full story here.
As you’ll see from the picture above, the church comes with its own Jacuzzi spa bath and is pyramidal in shape, to enhance the esoteric experience of the Protestant and pagan rites that may very well go on there in the name of ecumenism.
The last great wonder of the world... Why?
Mohammed would feel at home bathing here before worshipping the god of Islam
But this ugly new church is not just another example of lacklustre post-Conciliar architecture. The article in the Church Times reveals a new and subversive way of thinking about all things sacred within the English Catholic Church. I’ll leave you to read the full article, but the following stands out to me as something really sinister.
[The tabernacle] is perhaps the most radical change for some parishioners. Yet, like the baptismal pool, it also reverts to an older concept. The sacrament house has been renamed and re-sited: visible as you enter the church, it is placed within an apse, built into a modern sculpture depicting the Burning Bush, an elegant design of flamed stainless steel.
“The word ‘tabernacle’ basically denotes a safe,” says Fr Griffiths. “But ‘sacrament house’ suggests something creative, which makes a statement . . . you have put time into thinking about it. Current liturgical legislation says the Blessed Sacrament should not be reserved upon an altar, but set apart in a place for prayer, and also be prominent in the church interior. In medieval churches, it was often kept in a special shrine, unrelated to the altar.”
I’m a feeble linguist (as has been recently shown), but I it's my understanding that the Latin word for tabernacle means a tent and when used in a Judeo-Christian context, to mean the ‘Tent of Meeting’, the ‘Dwelling Place’, which for Catholics is most obviously the place of reservation of the Most Blessed Sacrament, the tabernacle. I’ve never heard it described as a safe before – an aumbry might be described as a safe, but not a tabernacle! It get’s worse inasmuch that the location of this particular ‘sacrament house’ appears to be outside of the sanctuary in an obscure little alcove; chairs are set up at right angles to it. How might one worship our Lord in the Sacrament of the Altar when he is stuck in a glorified broom cupboard? The driftwood Christus and cooling tower-esque altar, sorry table, received more reverence that the Blessed Sacrament.
For heaven's sake...S Bede's built in the shape of a pagan pyramid!! There is a ruddy-great fountain in it's courtyard that is more appropriate as an ablution pool outside a mosque.
S Bede’s is not just a new design, “…rooted in the Liturgical Movement of the 20th century, and its questioning of the physical separation of priest and people that characterised earlier periods…. [Where] the priest used to have his back to the people, and speak to the east window.” No, what S Bede’s Catholic Church in Basingstoke comes down to is an assault on the very sanctity of the Blessed Sacrament and an attack on the 2000 year-old orthodox belief of the Real Presence.
“Come friendly bombs and fall on ………….”
24 comments:
"…rooted in the Liturgical Movement of the 20th century,"
Barely rooted, even in the most confused period of the 20th century. Now we are in the 21st century, we have moved on.
Philip, it's as if they were trying for the "butt ugly" award of the year. I don't know which is worse...this .... "thing" or the "thing" masquerading as a cathedral in El-Lay.
It's like they were freebasing...
Karen H. -- San Diego, Ca.
[My sympathies to my brothers and sisters in Christ in BasingSTROKE.[
Is there a wetbar too? It desperately needs one. Can it be assumed that Christ is present under duress?
How sad!
It looks ugly and has little in common with a Christian church.
Oh, Lord have mercy on the misguided souls responsible for this one...
I'm with mac mclernon. We should pray that no other parishes adopt a, like, totally 1970s-California architecture for their parishes.
This is beyond sad. How could they?
And was that really a priest who did not know the meaning of a tabernacle?
Has he read Scripture?
Lord Have Mercy!!
It's all about change for change's sake. Out with the old, in with the banal.
I was feeling glum earlier and this has made it worse. Still, this stuff needs exposing. I have a suspicion that a lot of this guff is coming in on the back of the "fit for purpose", "disability access" agenda.
Also, I'm no expert historian but I do know that tabernacles for the Blessed Sacrament only became commonplace in the reign of Mary I, but prior to that a hanging pyx above the altar or a blessed sacrament "tower" were quite common, but these were always within the sanctuary. I have also known the word "tabernacle" used to describe an elaborate, covered niche in which a statue resided, but this was by Anglicans.
On "third thought" whatTheHell is that "pillar" thing near the so-called "ambo?"
Given building codes in Ca. I will sometimes give the outside architecture a "break" -- DEPENDING what they did with the inside. But I can't see ONE, not a sole, singular pleasing thing about this monstrosity. I suppose if they sell it to wiccans it will be easy enough after the wiccan's goat sacrifices to hose off the floor.
I wondered what that thing was. I thought it was rather phallic for the new feminist Church of Rome. A totel of represive, male, laissez-faire patriarchy, perhaps?
As for the animal sacrifices - nice try - but it looks like something cheap and nasty. I can see the good Mgr scrubbing the goo our of the grouting after the Week of Prayer for Interfaith Unity.
They are going to regret that pyramid; my 'church' has something similar. You can't clean the glass or repaint the ceiling (health and safety). It's a ventilation nightmare, and costs a fortune to heat. It's hugely hot and stuffy in summer and cold in winter.
This is quite apart from all the other horrors in this new 'church'. At least my church has a central tabernacle.
Truly truly ugly. Presumably, the priest sits where the tabernacle should be. Moving the tabernacle seems to be a logical development for some people. You know, create a people's altar, then note that the priest has his back to the tabernacle, then move the tabernacle.
Personally, I'm very happy for the priest to face the same way as me, but having his back to the Blessed Sacrament during Mass does seem less than ideal.
Also, in this new church, where do you kneel down? Poor parishoners.
utterly vile! Praise the Lord i'm about to attend Mass at the Birmingham Oratory...
Father, Thinking about modern churches that are either too hot in summer or too cold in winter reminds me Our Lady of Lourdes in Milton Keynes. Surrounded by large glass windows, it also has a glass roof. I haven't been there recently, but in the late eighties, it was heated by a gas contraption that was more akin to a jet on a 'plane's wing. Very reverent! But it does confirm waht bad designs are out there. If I'm to be cold, then I'd rather it was under a great gothic vault!
Leutgeb, Concerning the tabernacle - I'm not against Blessed Sacrament chapels that are separate to the main sanctuary, but they must be reverent and decent - arranged in a very obvious manner to convey the majesty of the Sacrament and provide a place for prayer. Quite often, the tabernacle seems to stuck anywhere, with very little thought.
Rita, I agree that the hanging pyx can be a very beautiful place of reservation. Quarr Abbey on the Isle of Wight has one over its high altar. Sir Ninian Comper favoured them too, considering them to be an authentic and historic English method of reservation.
The great Sacrament 'towers' that survive leave one in little doubt as to the importance of the contents. One of the finest medieval ones is in the abbey church at Milton Abbas in Dorest. Unfortunately, it is now the chapel of a somewhat evangelical girls' school and so not used.
Mrs Parkes - Me thinks you are just showing off! ;-)
I bet its won an award.
Yes, its in there with the gherkin and the wobbly bridge.
Ideal target for one of those 'bunker-busting' bombs, I'd say (after the Blessed Sacrament has been removed, of course)
Paulinus, Haha! Don't forget the congregation either!
I mean to remove them - not blow them up!
Don't forget the congregation either!
Depends.
What if there was a "Loud'n'clear" "sharing" day?
Or a Clown Mass?
Or an 'alternative' liturgy presided over by Joan Chittester?
As Vic Reeves used to say: "Only joking - or am I?"
Well, I suppose these trendies do like to think their worship goes with a bang!
I see the capstone has finally landed but where's the blinken eyepiece. That's the problem with all this novus ordo business. Everyone wants to do it their own way.
Now THIS is what the building is supposed to look like. You get the picture? good WELL THEN STICK TO THE RUBRIC AND GIMME AN EYE.
Darned masons they ain’t what they used to be, all this crazy modernism mumble mumble…..
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