I post these pictures from an article in Praytell extolling this post-Vatican II renovation of the Jesuit Church in Rome, Jesu. To his credit, the author does point out the negatives but not in a consistent, logical way.

At the outset, I must say this isn’t a wreckovation as the church wasn’t gutted and the older sanctuary remains intact. All of this could easily be swept away and overnight, if sanity ever overtakes the insanity of the Jesuits.

The first thing I noticed which the author of the article neglects altogether is the new tabernacle placed directly in front of the old altar with its tabernacle already embedded in it. It’s not ugly, but why in the Name of God and all that is Holy do we need not only an altar in front of the existing altar and now a tabernacle in front of the existing tabernacle. What the h?????

In a modern church, the new altar, ambo and chair along with the risers would be fine in my book of eclectic tastes in liturgical architecture. But not in this Romanesque church. And even in a modern church, the cube altar is just silly looking and quite too small. Even if the same design is maintained, elongating it into a rectangle would solve the silliness of its current look.

And yes, the corona over the altar is very traditional, but not a new corona added to a new altar placed in front of an original altar with its spectacular painting above it and the new corona a modern version of it completely out of place in a Romanesque church. The new corona, as you will note below, blocks the view of the artwork above the old altar. It is quite stupid to place it over the cube to anger the eye that wants to see the art work above the altar.

Who, but silly liturgists, like this kind of dissonance in a traditional Romanesque church? What is wrong with the pre-Vatican II sanctuary arrangement for the modern missal? What is wrong with the Liturgy of the Eucharist ad orientem? There was no need to make clear the rupture of Vatican II with what preceded except to make that abundantly clear.

The author of the article, true to the recovery of the 1970’s in the Church of the Now, laments that more of a wreckovation did not take place, the type of wreckovations of the 1970’s and well into the 90’s.

If you want to make more young Catholics move to the older liturgy and seek FSSP and FSPX parishes, this is the way to do it!