A Liturgical Desert Island

I find myself in quite a peculiar situation. For seven days I'm doing some, shall we say, research work on an island where, liturgically at least, things seem pretty awkward. The stranger thing is the extraordinary feeling of being watched- watched for fear that I might do something as horrid as celebrate the form of the Holy Mass that I've been used to using since the day I was ordained. I admit there's a degree of personal paranoia here drummed up by the horror stories that you hear from time to time. I was advised before I came here to 'lay low' as any public manifestation might endanger the monthly celebration of the Usus Antiquior that the locals get. Now I realise that in the current atmosphere that care must be taken with exactly who celebrates what in public but to actually fear making an approach to say Mass privately in one of the churches of the diocese is a bit bizarre.

The subtle undermining of the provisions of Summorum Pontificum is not peculiar to this place however it seems that where the situation is the most barren, just as there are the dwindling forces of modernism, there is a faithful network of the traditional faithful just getting on with whatever that can manage to arrange. They deserve our daily prayers and our admiration.