The Mass is celebrated in a baroque Divine Mercy Shrine just down the street from St. Peter’s. It is the parish church which has an English Mass each Sunday at 10:30 AM and which I attended somewhat regularly when I was in Rome.
The only problem with this splendid church is the silly plexiglass altar placed outside of the altar railing and the true sanctuary of this church, which has a splendid high altar. It makes you scratch your head and realize that this plexiglass altar is a caricature of the symbolism of what has happened to the Catholic Mass and its sanctuaries in the last 50 years.
I am not sure how you would categorize this Papal Mass in the Octave of Easter (Divine Mercy Sunday). Monsignor Marini did not accompany the pope down the road to this Mass. The MC is a priest of the shrine, I am sure, and is nervous beyond nervous, and very distracting and he flutters through the sanctuary in a chaotic way drawing attention to himself and away from the pope and the liturgy.
The pope chose not to use his miter for this Mass. So I presume it is a quasi-low pontifical Mass?
He also chooses to use the Second Eucharistic Prayer during the Octave of Easter. Did he want to get out of there as soon as possible?
And this will drive the Praytell clique crazy. It is a semi-private affair. There is the inept MC, and male Italian lector, who does justice to we Italian males, two concelebrating priests, one a bishop and the other the rector of the shrine and a few security people and a hidden schola.
But that plexiglass altar, o my! What are they thinking???? What were they thinking????
8 comments:
Based on the documentary about the original Divine Mercy painting shown on EWTN last night, there are "problems" with the paintings shown in your banner and in the Divine Mercy Shrine church. Jesus's gaze should be downward as if looking down from the cross, NOT looking forward at the observer. And, His right hand is raised too high above his shoulder. According to the documentary, when blessing, a priest should not raise his hand above the level of his shoulder. I noticed these errors in the image that they had at St. Joseph's in Macon too. The documentary stressed that although the graced received during the devotion did not depend on the image used, they preferred that the devotion be made using the original image of the Divine Mercy painting.
The framed image at St. Joseph is as you say. However the banner I use to hang from the choir loft for this feast is the original image you describe. The problem with that image, which is my perception and drove me to distraction, is the shading of Jesus’ hair which makes Him look like He has horns! That struck me as sacrilege sand blasphemous at least in my perception. Do you see it?
Yes, I can see it in the image in the article about the original image posted here:
https://www.catholicnewsagency.com/news/the-original-image-of-divine-mercy-its-not-where-you-might-think-70393
The "banner" image that I was talking about is not an actual banner, but the image at the top of your blog underneath the title "southern orders" on the framed picture on the tripod. It is the same image that I saw in Macon.
I understand that, but the banner in Macon is based on the original. The framed ones on my blog and at St. Joseph aren’t that image. The original image which the banner copies has the horns appearance which is caused by the shading of the hair.
The papal semi-Mass and church simply recognizes that the future is plastic, even as Dustin Hoffman learned in "The Graduate" and why nearly every inflexible dittyhymn of the rigid churches dates from that same time period, them refusing to bow to the future of plastic everything, plastic sex, plastic doctrine, plastic gender...their motto is "The People Of God, Where Tomorrow Is Yesterday, celebrating our 50th Year of hidebound"....too bad they did not install or use bottom lighting in the altar....purple would have been really cool.
The Master Of Ceremonies was simply trying to keep his distance from everybody, and in tizzies and fits of vapors only because he knew from all the pronouncements that celebrating a Mass was invariably fatal, and he was simply trying to stay closer to the well-looking people, but feeling, after looking at all the participants, that he was a goner, for sure.
There are two advantages in having a plexiglass altar and ambo.
1. When stripped, they leave a clear line of sight to the high altar.
2. The fact that they are cheap and nasty emphasizes their temporary nature. When the Church finally comes to its senses they can easily be done away with.
There is no point in having those stupid outdated and ridiculous high altars if we are not going to use them right????
Anonymous at 11:36,
Please don't give the philistines any ideas!
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