Dress doesn't make the man

TT was inevitable that the Church would fall some way into line with the grey age in which we live and reduce the external finery of dress in our bishops and cardinals. There may be good reasons for it all but I am willing to wager a golden cope to a brass thurible that it won't make a ha'worth of difference to the characters of our prelates.
All it will do is to rob the world and the Church of a little colour that we can ill afford to lose and no doubt hasten the day when we shall have a sports-jacketed clergy jovially joining in all our secular games. For those who see more glory in Dad's Army than in the Brigade of Guards the new Vatican decrees on dress will be an advance towards heaven on earth. But not for me.
Having sounded that triumphalist Last Post I can see the point in altering the form of address for Bishops. Most people can probably manage to mouth "Monsignor" without loss of face. whereas "My Lord" did set up all kinds of traumas (social and theological) for some. I fail, however. to appreciate much difference in addressing a cardinal as "Lord Cardinal" instead of "Your Eminence."
Man the ramparts
11 READ an interesting article in the Daily 2Telegraph colour magazine last week on N.A.T.O. and noticed that the author, Major Eugene Hinterhoff. was billed as Defence Correspondent of the Tablet. I felt rather odd; it was like having read a learned treatise on the European Economic Community and then being told that the writer was Diplomatic Correspondent of Playboy. For the life of me I could not understand why it should have struck me as bizarre that the Tablet should have a Defence Correspondent but it did. What, I kept asking myself, does a Defence Correspondent do on a religious periodical?
I worried about it all weekend until fantasy took complete control and I found myself on Easter Monday interviewing a colonel for the post of Defence Correspondent of the CATHOLIC HERALD. As the transcript shows it was not exactly a success: CATHOLIC HERALD editor: Good morning, colonel. Do stand at ease, please. You'll find us very informal at base H.Q. As I said in my letter I'm thinking of appointing a Defence Correspondent as all the best papers now have them. Does the idea appeal to you?
Colonel: Immensely.
Editor: Good. Now, tell me, how do you see your role?
Colonel: Exposing the lamentable state of the Church's infrastructure.
Editor: We call it the institutional Church. Colonel: Call it what you like, dammit. I call it Church infrastructure.
Editor: Quite. But I wasn't really concerned about the Church's defences. I was thinking more in terms of Western defence vis-a-vis Russia and China, with particular reference to . . .
Colonel: Then I think, Sir, it's time you did begin to think about the Church's defences. First things first is my motto and even Monty agreed with me on that one. I know for a fact that the Rome Supremo isn't too happy either about the defence position. Security in all things is my watchword. A secure soldier is a happy soldier. A secure church is a happy church. Be security conscious in everything— public and private.
Editor: But what exactly had you in mind?
C,olonel: What you should have in mind, Sir, church defence and church security. It won't be long before the dykes are breached. Just mark my words. There's far too much talking in the ranks. Far too many barrack room lawyers in clerical collars. Far too many debating squads. Orders should be orders. I have no taste, Sir, for rebellion.
Editor: We call it renewal.
Colonel: Do you, Sir. Well, I'm a simple soldier. I call a spade a spade, infrastructure infrastructure, and logistics logistics.
Editor: Quite. But how do we deal with the situation?
Colonel: Rally the troops. A bit of discipline here and a pat on the back there. Lectures on security. Make 'em all security conscious. I've just done a quick recce and I like the look of the Latin Mass brigade and Father Flanagan's Fusiliers. Good types.
Editor: We call them . . .
(The telephone rings. The editor answers it. He looks grave.)
Editor: I'm terribly sorry, Colonel, but that was the police. Your car has been stolen and they allege that it was unlocked.
Child cruelty
itALSO read another article in the Telegraph colour magazine which made me feel slightly sick. Written by Jill Tweedie, it was a shocking indictment of brutality masquerading under the name of discipline in some Irish church schools. I am only sorry that the article did not appear in the Telegraph proper, where it would have had greater impact. For sheer nastiness and cruelty to children I haven't read anything outside fiction for years to touch it. I hope the Irish reading it were as shocked as I was. Miss Tweedie deserves our thanks for exposing a deplorable and vicious state of affairs.
Heaven's below!
MGR. ALAN CLARK, bishop-elect of
Elmham, surprised an ecumenical congregation at Blackheath on Good Friday by absent-mindedly proclaiming: "He descended into heaven; the third day he rose from the dead, he ascended into hell, and sitteth on the right hand of God the Father Almighty."
Anglicans present found this distinctly more heretical than the not very original discovery of their own local bishop, Dr. John Robinson, that God is not literally "up there."