WORDS TO THE WHYS

Reality is not optional. Thomas Sowell

That's Odd

-

The image above is the pulpit (ca.1750) in a parish church in Dobroszów, Poland. How's that for an appropriate location from which to preach on Jonah 1:17 (see below) or perhaps Genesis 1:21? Tall priests need not apply.


Staying with an ocean theme, there's the following pulpit located in the Imperial Abbey of Irsee. A great place from which to invite people to get on board the Barque of Peter.



That is one serious pulpit! Most modern ambos are tame by comparison.

Turning from the unique and delightfully unusual to the highly unfortunate and disturbing, who can forget the following oddity (2020)?


In conclusion, the Left Coast favourite example of the painfully odd... not pulpits but puppets.


If you'll excuse me, I have to scratch out my eyes for looking at that scene from a "Catholic" liturgy led by a certain SJW RC Bishop-emeritus, a recipient of the Order of the (Anglican) Diocese of British Columbia for being, to their way of thinking, a successful SJW.

Comments

Post a Comment

Your comments will be appreciated and posted if 1) they are on topic and 2) preserve decorum.

Stand by your word.

Popular Posts

Through Thick and Thin: Surfing The Wake Of The Council

-
Image
Team Thick versus Team Thin On 4 December 1963, following the last vote at the Second Vatican Council, Paul VI promulgated the Apostolic Constitution Sacrosanctum Concilium on the Sacred Liturgy. Later, with the Apostolic Letter Motu proprio data Sacram Liturgiam dated 25 January 1964, Pope St. Paul VI established a Special Commission, called Consilium ad exsequendam Constitutionem de sacra Liturgia (Council for the Implementation of the Constitution on the Sacred Liturgy). https://www.cultodivino.va/en/chi-siamo/storia/il-consilium-ad-exsequendam-constitutionem-de-sacra-liturgia.html The Consilium consisted of 48 members (11 Cardinals, 36 Bishops and 1 Abbot) and more than 200 international consultors and advisors, spread across 40 study groups (coetus a studiis). The internal debates within the Consilium ad exsequendam Constitutionem de Sacra Liturgia were intense, often revealing two competing visions of liturgical reform. Primary Axes of Disagreement 1. Continuity vs. Reconstructi...
Read more

The Personal Ordinariates: Unity, Diversity, Harmony.

-
Image
St. John the Baptist Catholic Church, Bridgeport, PA In 2023, Monsignor Keith Newton, then head of the Personal Ordinariate of Our Lady of Walsingham, coined the term “realized ecumenism” to describe how the Ordinariates created by the Apostolic constitution Anglicanorum Coetibus offer a welcoming path for those seeking the fullness of the Faith. https://ewtn.co.uk/article-the-head-of-the-ordinariate-for-former-anglicans-in-england-and-wales-assesses-its-past-present-and-future/ The Personal Ordinariates represent one of the most quietly remarkable ecumenical achievements of the last century: a form of unity that does not require amnesia. They embody a model of reconciliation in which distinct traditions are not dissolved but transfigured — brought into full communion without losing the theological, liturgical, and pastoral instincts that shaped them. The Personal Ordinariates are a quiet work of the Holy Spirit, gathering what was once separated and transforming it into communion. Th...
Read more

The Lord in The Liturgy: The Formation Of Intentional And Resilient Christians

-
Image
The Ordinariate’s Liturgy Shapes the Soul Through Beauty, Order, and Sacramental Realism Divine Worship, the liturgical expression entrusted to the Ordinariates, is far more than a beautiful way of praying. It is a formative environment — a spiritual architecture that shapes the worshipper’s imagination, posture, and self‑understanding. In a culture marked by distraction, fragility, and self‑invention, Divine Worship quietly trains the believer to stand firm, to speak truthfully, and to live faithfully. Its beauty is not ornamental; its order is not rigid; its language is not nostalgic. All of it works together to cultivate resilience and responsibility as lived habits of Christian maturity. The Gravity That Strengthens the Soul One of the most striking features of Divine Worship is its gravity. The Liturgy carries a seriousness that is neither severe nor distant, but deeply dignified. The worshipper is confronted with the reality that he stands before the living God. The Collects, the...
Read more

Beauty Overcomes Envy: Politics And Liturgy

-
Image
Envy doesn’t just distort individual judgment — it reconfigures whole political parties and conversations by shifting motives from common good to status competition, from policy reasoning to resentment‑management, and from deliberation to punitive comparison. Political psychology treats envy as a relational toxin: it warps how groups see themselves, their rivals, and even their own members. Envy reshapes political parties. Envy in politics is seldom acknowledged directly, instead showing up through indirect behaviors like moralizing, scapegoating, enforcing purity tests, and fostering factionalism. Here’s a breakdown of how envy can mutate party dynamics. Status mimicry. Parties begin imitating the rhetorical style, emotional tone, or organizational tactics of rivals they resent. Envy drives copycat radicalization: “If they mobilize outrage, we must mobilize more.” Internal purging. Envy of rising figures inside the party produces loyalty tests, ideological policing, and factional pu...
Read more

The Language Of Sacrifice In The Offertory of Divine Worship

-
Image
Mass - Bloodless Synonym for Christ's Eternal Sacrifice for the Salvation of Souls The first offertory prayer of Divine Worship discloses the sacrifice of the Mass as an act in which Christ’s once‑for‑all oblation is made present and lovingly offered to the Father through the Church’s hands. Its language emphasizes that the gifts set upon the altar—“holy bread” and “chalice of salvation”—are not merely symbolic tokens but the very matter through which the faithful join themselves to Christ’s self‑giving. The prayer frames the offering as both propitiatory and participatory: propitiatory, because it looks to the Cross as the singular source of reconciliation; participatory, because the faithful unite their intentions, labours, and lives to Christ’s perfect sacrifice. This offertory thus reveals the Mass as a living movement of ascent, in which earthly gifts are taken up into the heavenly worship. It also underscores the priest’s mediating role, asking that the sacrifice be accepted ...
Read more

The Post‑Conciliar Era & The Promised Land

-
Image
Jacopo Tintoretto | The Jews in the Desert The wandering of Israel after the sin of the Golden Calf (Exodus 32) offers a striking biblical analogue to the post‑conciliar experience of the Catholic Church. In both cases, a people who had received extraordinary gifts from God found themselves disoriented, divided, and tempted by forms of worship and living that fell short of the covenantal ideal. Israel’s desert years reveal how God purifies His people after infidelity, and how He restores them to the holiness necessary to enter the Promised Land. Many Catholics today see a similar need for purification in the wake of liturgical disorder, moral laxity, and a widespread loss of faith that followed the decades after Vatican II. Humility - where wert thou? A quiet but consequential lack of humility marked many responses to the Second Vatican Council, as though renewal meant self‑authorization rather than deeper fidelity. In the rush to innovate, prudence was often set aside, opening the doo...
Read more

POPE LEO XIV Magnifica Humanitas

Even in the darkest nights, the Lord raises up men and women who refuse to give up, who persevere in doing good, who protect the vulnerable and open pathways to reconciliation. The memory of the saints, righteous people and the oft-forgotten peacemakers, show us that grace does not magically eliminate conflict, but instead it inspires active resistance to evil and an astonishing creativity in doing good” (paragraph 211).

LUCIUS ANNAEUS SENECA

One of the most beautiful qualities of true friendship is to understand and to be understood.

WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE

I doubt not then but innocence shall make false accusation blush, and tyranny tremble at patience.