Informal exorcism at St. Paul Cathedral prompts investigation

This whole thing was pretty idiotic all around, and really anyone protesting the laxity of the clergy should know better. From the article, it sounds like this act may be the work of one overwrought guy.

This wasn't a serious 'exorcism' or act of prayer. Prayer requires reverence, and here's no reverence in slopping around a bunch of oil and salt. (Did the guy who did this think he was getting ready to make popcorn?) And of course there's no rationality in putting oil and salt into donation boxes, as if they'd been profaned.

If heretical lay people, lax clergy, or unworthy reception of Holy Communion were bad enough offenses to profane a church, we'd have to book a reconsecration as a weekly event in most parishes.

The clergy, on the other hand, are getting the results of their own laxity. When authorities let evils go unchallenged, some people are so shocked and outraged that they take matters into their own hands. The Church could use an Abp. Pell in St. Paul.

"slop"?

Sounds like they seined the doors and spread a sprinkle of salt, and that the priest at this desecrating congregation is exagerating beyond credibility.

Thousands of dollars to remove what the recent rains would have removed?

I bet the first snow we get, he'll authorize dumping 100x the salt involved on the parking lot.

Remember what "cast off all restraint" does to the credibility of a testimony.

To be fair, you're right: the priest's version isn't reliable.

+J.M.J+

Some quotes from another article about the incident:
(http://www.thecatholicspirit.com/archives.php?article=3070)

>>>The Rainbow Sash Movement and Catholics Against Sacrilege exchanged words before noon Mass at the Cathedral Nov. 7. And someone left an additional message of chrism oil and salt.

>>>Just after the Mass, Father Michael Skluzacek, Cathedral rector, was notified that oil was spilled on the stone all the way around the Cathedral and also smeared on some of the doors....

>>>"We had to call in professional cleaners, and they worked for three days to get it off. It’s a huge expense, and it’s destruction of property."

>>>"We’re not sure if there will be permanent damage," Father Skluzacek said. Although most of the oil was removed, some stains are still visible, he said.

>>>In addition to the oil, salt was spilled in all of the donation boxes around the Cathedral, so the parish maintenance crew had to take time from their other duties to clean that mess, he said.

Sounds like very extensive damage, not just a little sprinkling here and there. Oil can actually get stuck in porous stones like limestone, and is very costly to remove by steam pressure.

Salt in the poor boxes? This was obvoiusly not the work of a priest, but a lay person. Also, note that the oil spilled on the stones was chrism oil. Where did the person get chrism oil? That's not available to laity; he must have stolen it from a church!

So we have a lay person stealing holy chrism oil and attempting to "reconsecrate" a church though he has no such authority. He is also abusing sacramentals, which is sacreligious, and trying to perform an exorcism - which is forbidden for lay people to do, so add a sin of disobedience to Church discipline on top of sacrilege and theft!

Even the disobedient, sacreligious antics of dissident groups like "Rainbow Sash" cannot justify the abuse of something sacred.

In Jesu et Maria,