It’s just so typical

So, we were at the Novus Ordo Latin Mass at St. Mark Monday night.  No great problems with the Mass, although I’d love to see a switch to the Roman Canon for the Consecration/Eucharist prayers. And Ad Orientem.  Those two changes would be immense in terms of really bringing the Novus Ordo Latin Mass to a much higher, much more sacrificial aspect.  But I digress. While there, one of my kids pulled out the “seasonal missalette” found in just about every Catholic parish.  They are from the ubiquitous Oregon Catholic Publishing (OCP), which has done yeoman’s work in continuing to afflict the laity with new age indifferentism and horrific folk hymns.  But even knowing what I know of OCP, I was still taken aback by the monstrosity they had on the cover of this missalette, which covers the time from Easter until Pentecost:

Good Lord!  Earth mother goddess’ hair is on fire!  Someone call 911!

OCP proudly announced on the inside cover that this work was the product of an Ansgar Holmberg. She’s a sister from a very liberated order called the Sisters of St. Joseph up in Minnesota. The work chosen from Sister Holmberg is very consistent with her overall style.  We are told she is a master.  Of what, I am quite uncertain.

My wife got a bit incensed at this extremely modern and, frankly, ugly art being on the cover of the missalette used by thousands of parishes around the country (which makes both OCP, and the USCCB (through copyright on the ICEL Mass translation) a very nice chunk

Holmber getting her zen on

of change), and proceeded to do some reasearch on Holmberg.  In addition to being a proudly displayed member of that religious order already mentioned, she also belongs to a buddhist community in St. Paul. In what capacity I am uncertain, but she is listed as being a member of the community and, as you can see at left, apparently takes part in Buddhist prayers.  There is a woman in the community who apparently goes by the name “one who sits nearby.”  Yeah, baby.  I have to wonder if Holmberg did not get exposed to Buddhism when another women’s religious group in the area, the Franciscan Poor Claires of Minneapolis, got engaged with some buddhist nuns there in 1999 and went on to develop quite the relationship with this buddhist group, which included a stay at their “monastery” in Taiwan in 2004. For the massive problems stemming from buddhism, especially in the men’s religious orders, read the life of St. Francis Xavier.  Buddhist religious organizations are rife with sexual immorality of the worst kind – not that Catholic ones have been much better, of late.  But all that, I suppose, is neither here from there.

What is of interest, however, is just why, out of all the glories of 2000 years of Catholic art, would OCP choose such a work as the one above for the cover of their Easter missalette.  Easter.  Is this work even good?  I know taste is an individual thing, but in terms of artistic quality, my 13 year old daughter can and has produced much more beautiful works, works that I would consider to be of a much higher quality, than the one above. Works that are obviously Catholic, not earth mother power goddess focus with a few Christian elements thrown in.  But OCP always uses such modern art!  Why?

I would argue that OCP would use a work like this because it suits their very modernist, indifferentist outlook. Many of the liturgists at OCP who write Mass settings and hymns are not even Catholic.  The above cover is hardly an exception – it is very representative of the exact type of artwork that one will find on the vast majority of OCP missals. While they do offer one semi-traditional missal (heavy on the semi), for the most part, this is what you get.  But, there is another reason for choosing exclusively modern art from living artists.  It keeps the entire gravy train of copyright, license fees, and other payments upon which the Novus Ordo liturgical establishment is built.  As I said, for every missal printed in the US, the USCCB gets a copyright fee.  When an artist gets their work on the cover of a missal, they get a fee.  When Marty Haugen gets one of his Mass settings or stuff-of-nightmares hymns published in a hymnal, he gets a fee.  Thus, hundreds or thousands of individuals now make their living off the Mass. It’s a crass commercialization that I think it really inappropriate.  One reason for hostility towards the TLM is that nothing is copyrighted, it’s too ancient.  No Marty Haugen or Own Alstott makes a living off of the works in the Liber Usualis.  And that just can’t be!

Ansgar Holmberg is just another modernist sister, whose allegiance to the Faith and state of soul are not for our knowing. But what we can know is that even the missal covers at the Novus Ordo are enough to give one pause, to ponder what they mean, and just what other influences one is being exposed to.  On its own, perhaps not very significant, but, taken in concert with so many other “little things” like this, perhaps indicative of the whole.