In this season of ordinations, I’m sure some of you out there are searching for gifts for the ordinands in your lives. Rather than giving a brand-spanking-new chalice, crucifix, statue or vestment, why not rescue some church good which has lost its original home?
For example, save these beautiful Latin Mass cards from someone’s tastefully-ironic mantelpiece. Put them back in the hands of a priest.
I know at least one new-minted priest who would use something like this with joy. Later this morning, in fact, the children and I are driving into Charlotte for a Latin Mass which Fr. Michael is celebrating before returning to Toronto. It’s been a joy to us to re-meet Fr. Michael, whom we knew briefly in England when we were Anglicans, and he was a college student in the first stages of discerning his priestly vocation. My husband had met him at an ISI conference in Oxford; following the conference, he and some friends had spent a weekend with us in Cambridge; and then we heard no more of him until several weeks ago, when our own parish priest happened to mention that he was going to Toronto for the ordination of a seminary classmate. My husband, idly curious, did an internet search for “that Oratorian’s ordination,” and lo and behold.
We were blessed last Saturday to attend Fr. Michael’s Mass of Thanksgiving in his home parish in Charlotte. “Do you know these people?” said our own Father to Fr. Michael as he came upon us outside the church. There is no way for me to render accurately in written language the expressions which scrolled over Fr. Michael’s face in succession: Do I know these people? They look familiar. I know I don’t know them from here. I seem to remember fewer kids. I seem to remember not-Catholic. I seem to — Wait a minute — And then, miraculously, all the pieces came together without our prompting him, which seems a promising omen for his future as a good, able, and much-loved priest.
I wish I could give Fr. Michael, or my own priest, for that matter, these Latin Mass cards. Maybe you know someone who would give them a good home and a lifetime of regular use.
+Ornate Set of French Latin Mass Cards Plus Chalice+
(I forgot the set included a chalice!)[100/100]
Dear Reader,
Can I be direct with you?
War abroad. Socialists on the rise. AI upending human life. Endless uproar online. The modern attention economy doesn’t want readers — it wants users enslaved to the tyranny of the present.
First Things is the antidote: literary excellence, timeless truths, and a fixed point of reference in a culture that has lost its bearings.
But we can’t do it without readers like you.
Our goal: Raise $150,000 by November 1 to sustain First Things in the year ahead.
Your gift anchors readers in the permanent things.
Make your Fall Campaign gift now using the button below.
If you have any questions or would like more information, please contact Giovanni Del Piero, Director of the Editor’s Circle, at gdelpiero@firstthings.com or 212-627-1985.
YOU MIGHT ALSO LIKE
The Church in the Age of Therapy
In 1966, Philip Rieff wrote in The Triumph of the Therapeutic that “Religious man was born to…
Canada’s Deadliest Blind Spot
On September 20, the Daily Mail ran a story with the provocative headline, “Our 83-year-old Christian grandmother…
The Faithful Joy of Dolly Parton and Fulton Sheen
Dolly Parton and Fulton Sheen seem to have had little in common. She favored rhinestones; he wore…
