This is the Chapel of the International Seminary of St. Pius X in Écône, Switzerland. Please note how uncluttered the chapel is; how prominent and easy to see, the altar is and how beautiful the ambo/pulpit is. Please note, too, that the altar railing is on the first step up from the nave of the chapel making its use quite easy for young and old alike.
Most modern Mass sanctuaries are cluttered with plants, flowers, fabric and banners. The altar is too low and thus makes it seem as though it is absent in a full church. There is no spaciousness for other types of liturgies be they ordinations, nuptial liturgies or funeral liturgies.
Please note the reverence for the deceased body of a retired bishop of Chur who chose to join the SSPX and not to be buried in his former cathedral but next to Archbishop Lefebrve. You can read the Pillar story HERE.
3 comments:
It is quite a nice chapel.
I personally don't see the controversy here, but I understand why others would--the Pillar reporting may be read by some to say that Bishop Huonder made some sort of canonical move to rebel from the Church and join the SSPX, which as far as I know, isn't the case. Indeed, what is omitted or not made clear is that, before his retirement, he was charged with the mission of leading a personal and doctrinal dialogue with the SSPX and, after his retirement, he was given permission to reside with the SSPX to pray and celebrate the sacraments according to the traditional rites.
Nick
One can hope those "other liturgical functions" are not like in nice US churches where people wanting to pray there are often unable due to concerts, art and flower shows, and tour bus scheduling, with those wanting to worship in own church exiled to third rate "adoration chapels" with cast-off furnishings. Nothing says "house of prayer" like gobbling socialite flower shows.
As for the "controversy" of the late bishop, whom I was sad for our sake to hear had left us, he was sent to establish a communion of sorts, liked what he saw, and I cannot blame him for wanting to stay where he found due worship of God and proper teaching and a youthful future for his beloved Church.
Were a FSSP or SSPX church nearby, I'd be off like a rocket, joyful in finding sincere beautiful worship and a true house of prayer in which I could actually pray.
I do not care if SSPX is "irregular", so long as sacraments judged valid and them not judged schismatics or heretics, and I look at their intentions which were to preserve all which was being discarded that was true and good in the Roman Church. That they turned out to be right in their own prophecies in what the Church was headed towards only bolsters their position.
The schizoid papacy of today where it denies our own ancient rite while conferring officially the SSPX in some valid sacraments further bolsters their position.
And frankly, given the choice, receiving sacraments offered in good faith and ancient beauty is far more attractive than receiving them from/with bunch of superficial boobs worried as to an exercise in entertainment whose sole concerns are weekly commmunion and weekly donations as defining of what makes one Catholic. It seems a choice between genuine fraud Catholics, or fake genuine Catholics, where my sympathies lie much more with the sincere.
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