Friday 3 June 2022

Cardinal Collins waves forward the Sunday obligation - and Irenaeus writes a personal apology

I missed an important tidbit of information on Wednesday: Cardinal Collins has brought back the Sunday obligation.

The announcement is below.

It’s news to me. I was unaware the Sunday obligation had been suspended for almost 27 months. As far as I was aware, the obligation had been in force since July 2020.

Credit where credit is due, I suppose. Cardinal Collins has exercised his authoritative powers.

In full disclosure, since I was rather public about it, I never should have advocated for the shuttering of the churches as loudly as I did at the start of the pandemic. (See my posts in March 2020.) Authority is very important in the Church. There is no question of that for me. Just ask my parish priest. But I do wonder if my attitude – akin to so many of my contemporaries and elders – helped along His Eminence’s learned helplessness, as it were. Did my attitude strengthen His Eminence’s conviction that closing the churches was the right thing to do? Should I have taken a different stance? I suspect I know the answer. I am sorry, dear reader, for misleading you. It was not my intention. I know I cannot take back what I said and wrote. Please forgive me.

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Sunday Mass Obligation

Posted : Jun-01-2022


On March 13, 2020, Cardinal Collins issued a communication to the faithful of this archdiocese indicating that it was necessary to cancel public celebrations of the Eucharist on the coming Sunday, stating: “For this weekend and any other which may be required, I grant the faithful dispensation from their Sunday obligation.”

Given that most of the health and safety restrictions in our parishes are no longer in place and the faithful are able to attend the celebration of the Eucharist once again, the basis for the dispensation from the Sunday obligation has dissipated and is no longer in effect.

The Church does not obligate people to do the impossible. If individuals, based on their conscience, cannot attend Mass for a grave reason, including a great vulnerability to COVID-19 or because they are self-isolating to limit the spread of illness, then they are excused from their Sunday obligation, as the law of the Church allows.

After two years of COVID-19 restrictions, many have been deprived of the opportunity to attend Mass and to receive the most Holy Eucharist and all of us have missed the opportunity to experience community, including members of our parishes. As we come to the celebration of Pentecost this weekend, we invite and encourage the faithful to return to the practice of attending Mass in-person.

6 comments:

Everyday For Life Canada said...

If Costco and Walmart and Canadian Tire stayed opened during the “pandemic,” there was never a need to shut down parishes. The churches got their Covid relief money from Caesar, but they are suffering the spiritual consequences of saying nothing as religious freedom and civil liberties were violated across the country. Pastors were arrested, jailed and fined in Canada. The Church just followed government mandates and restrictions. Also, it’s not an act of charity to force the faithful to take an experimental injection. Even the Toronto Police has moved on by allowing the unvaccinated to get their jobs back. The Church chose to discriminate against some of the faithful without any moral or medical reason.

Irenaeus said...

Those were only some of the reasons I looked back on my postings with regret.

Thank you.

Anonymous said...

Excellent comment

Anonymous said...

The shut down of churches was the last straw for me. Honestly the push I needed: SSPX now and never looking back. Thanks Cardinal Collins

Barona said...


I understand that a new phenomena has emerged: a significant minority are not returning to Mass. They saw that Mass was not too important amongst the bishops who immediately boarded up their churches (nay, some - such as Cardinal Collins - even preempted Caesar without a whimper). They became accustomed to the reduction of Mass to a “show” which they could view dressed in pajamas, coffee in hand. More serious Catholics, who returned to Mass, were also seriously disturbed by not only the negation of public worship of God, but also the liturgy surrendered by the bishops to atheistic, pro-abortion (let us be blunt pre-natal infanticide), anti-family State officials. On top of all this the tragedy of mass death was not avoided amongst the vulnerable for whom all this was - so we were told - undertaken. Canada ended up with the highest death rate in long term “care”. Meanwhile, as our abused, abandoned elderly were dying by the thousands, our churches were boarded up, our bishops in hiding. But as our diabolical, vile politicians told us “we are all in this together”. Tell that to the elderly locked in their rooms for months on end, abused, malnourished, lying in urine and feces, dying of COVID - ALONE.

I wrote in 2020 that at least Cardinal Collins could have publicly blessed the city with the Blessed Sacrament. He could have taken the Blessed Sacrament throughout the City. But no, he fled, hid, and failed.

Vox Cantoris was correct about the Cardinal: the catastrophic failure of the Cardinal when leadership was called for has left a disastrous legacy that over the coming years will be played out. Look for close to a hundred churches closing in the Archdiocese over the next five years.

Irenaeus said...

Vox is correct about a lot of things.

So are you.

Thank you.