Life at the Seminary

Coming Sunday is Advent. I really am looking forward to Advent. When you are in the seminary and praying the liturgical hours and celebrate Mass every day, it is amazing how well and wonderful you feel prepared when Christmas is finally there. Also, with this amazing long ‘ordinary time’, it’s a welcome change: the purple color of the chasubles, the ‘rorate caeli’ we sing, the antiphones with the Magnificat the week before Christmas, the beautiful Mass at Christmas Eve…

Well, this week has been busy enough, I must say, and this weekend will be fun (although I won’t get much homework done, I’m afraid). This first weekend of Advent we will be spending on Ameland, a small island north of the Netherlands (4 hours by car). The entire seminary will be there for a day in silence, after which we will celebrate the seminary’s anniversary. Granted, not the best reason to party, but we’re going to, anyway!

I hope you all have a good first Advent Sunday!

I would like to write something that perhaps not all of my readers could relate to… but if you are at all familiar with the situation of the Church in my country, I pray you understand the reason why I am writing this.

After the Second Vatican Council many liberal groups in the Netherlands sprouted. Growing up in the ’40s (most of them are in their 60s or older) they lived during a time that their parents rebuilt our country. And for the last decades they have tried to rebuild the Holy Church in their own image, instead of letting God form them into His. I am thinking of this whole group of elderly around Abbot Baeten and the Catholic Elderly Union (KBO), and dissident groups, like the one calling themselves ‘an inn’. Listening to an interview last week with Abbot Baeten (here available in Dutch) made all the hairs on my neck stand up with horror. He talks about himself and his clan as people who want a ‘Church of choice’, instead of realizing that it is God who chose his Church.

Now at the end of the 60s almost all seminaries in the Netherlands were closed because the influence that this ‘new’ train of thought had among many: not just the faithful, but seminarians, priests and bishops as well. Even before any permanent deacon, an office reinstated by Vatican II, was ordained, many so-called ‘pastoral workers’ had been given a mission. The thought was that these pastoral workers would be lay people who could assist priests in pastoral tasks. After all, Vatican II had emphasized the position of laymen and -women. The Church wasn’t just the priests, but everyone was part of the one priesthood.

While the idea of lay people actively engaging themselves for the Church could yield amazing results, in practise, the people of this generation I spoke of had only one goal, and still have so to this day: to annihilate the priesthood. Not by removing the priests, but by emphasizing that a celebration which they call ‘Word and Communion service’ is in no way different or less than Holy Mass. By emphasizing that women, married men, anyone that the community deems worthy to be a priest should be ordained by the bishop, and if the bishop doesn’t want to cooperate with them, that these ‘chosen’ laymen should celebrate ‘Mass’ anyway, and that this would in no way be different from a priest celebrating Mass.

Barring a few faithful individuals who truly live out their pastoral mission as a ’pastoral worker’ in the true spirit of the Church, many of these ‘pastoral workers’ allow themselves to be called pastor. Due to their explicit and implicit influence in many churches across the country, people do not pray for vocations anymore, or if they do, they pray for vocations for people to engage themselves for the Church (e.g. more pastoral workers). Unions of pastoral workers have sprouted, often openly resisting the bishops and celebrating these ‘Word and Communion services’ in hospitals, army barracks, prisons and in many parishes all over the Netherlands.

These self-proclaimed pastors deceive the faithful by giving ‘blessings to the dying’ somewhat resembling the Last Rites, in the same way they celebrate these services of them resembling Mass. I know cases in which they baptize, without permission from the bishop (and several have even been granted this permission by liberal bishops in the past). They preside in funerals. And sadly, there are few other ways to do things here! There are no priests to proclaim God’s word in the parishes. There are no priests for the army, for hospitals, for elderly homes, for prisons. This is hard to swallow, especially in an age where we send our soldiers to the ends of the earth to keep the peace, that these young men and women will never have their confession heard or receive Last Rites, because there are no priests! And why are there no more priests for them, or to baptize little babies in parishes, or preside over funerals, or be with the sick and dying in the hospitals?. Well, the last decades they have almost been exterminated, as well as any vocations for the priesthood. And as long as our seminaries remain empty, this will remain the case! If you are reading this, I am asking for your prayer for the Church in the Netherlands.

I realized this all the more yesterday, when my good friend and fellow brother in the seminary wrote me an e-mail about the funeral of his aunt. This 74-year old woman, God bless her soul, was a Franciscan nun. She had prayed for my friend all these years and supported his decision to go to seminary. All her life she worked, serving the sick in the hospital until she became 65 years of age. While a perfectly good, religious and devout Father is available to celebrate Holy Mass at her funeral, the monastary and the hospital institution have a perfectly capable ‘pastor’ who is their main man for all sorts of ‘pastoral cares’. Probably only due to my friend’s intervention, a real priest of Christ came to give his aunt Last Rites. But now that the funeral approaches and my friend wants to serve Mass and be a reader during the service (as is his obligation – the Bishop has appointed him for this task himself), this ‘pastor’ is protesting. In fact, our friend the ‘pastor’ isn’t only demanding he serve Mass and read the readings, but he is also delivering the sermon (!) – a task no lay person should take upon him, certainly not with an ordained priest present! There is little my friend can do. Nor the priest who is presiding over the funeral Mass – if they object, either this ‘pastor’ will do the funeral himself, or a liberal priest will be found who will say ‘Mass’ without a proper Eucharistic prayer.

Over the years, due to many things – the devaluation of the priesthood and hence the Eucharist – the liturgy here has been severely damaged. And when we start changing our words and actions, the meaning of the things themselves will shift. When we start calling the Altar a table, when we start calling the Eucharist the ‘Bread’, when we start calling laymen ‘pastor’, when we do not kneel anymore during the consecration, we will in fact alter what this Mystery means to us. What has happened to my friend (and his poor mother, who is crying because her sister cannot get a proper Mass for her funeral!) has once more awakened my realization of what has happened and is still happening in my country. Whether the bloodstains of Christ on the floors of many Dutch churches were not an alarm bell enough, where uncaring communicants were allowed to dip the Sacred Host into the chalice, spilling drops of Christ’s Blood on the floors! How often did I not have to embarrass myself in front of the uncaring congregation, by kneeling in front of the acolyte administering the Cup, to kiss Christ’s Blood off the floor where someone else had let it drip from his ‘dipped-in Host’, while not a thought would cross their mind that someone else might just walk through it!

Truly, this is what I call ‘the Scourge of Satan’! How long, o God, will you make your people suffer? How long will you keep your seminaries empty? How long will you punish your people for their faithlessness? How long must your Church, built on the faith of countless before us, crumble? Where decades ago we fought the devastating monster of Communism that tortured priests and faithful alike, we now face a malice in our own midst. Even if this older generation will one day die out, how long will we still suffer from people that are still God’s own people, but mutated by years of abuse and false doctrine?

Only when all the people in Nineveh cried out to God and made offerings and prayed, God was swayed to spare the city. How many more acts of desecration must happen? Does no one care? Is all that we can do: be politically correct? Not speak out against these crimes? Allow ‘pastors’ to do whatever they please, in name of the Church? What are we afraid of? That the decades-long misguided faithful will turn their backs onto the Church? I tell you, letting them live on in their malformed faith will not grant them salvation either! No, Abbot Baeten! The young people of the Church, THEY form the Church of Choice. Not by choosing what the Church should do for them, but by really choosing for God and asking Him what He chooses for them!

We are not fooled by these ‘pastors’ and their doctrines. God laughs at their pretense! God laughs at their fake-clerical attitude. God laughs at their clerical ‘attire’ during their celebrations. God will only use them a little while longer to chastise the ones He loves. It wasn’t until their Exile in Babylon, that the Israelites realized that they could only truly count on God. And, my fellow brothers and sisters-readers, pray with me that the hour draws near when the Church in Holland will realize that only God can truly save!

As for us, what stops us from surrounding these poor sinners, these ‘pastors’ at who God can only laugh, with our prayers? Let us pray with one voice to God -continuously- that they may repent, if only one, repent from their pride, their disillusion. My friend who lost his aunt, myself, and many young men in seminary today, will fight for a new ‘Church of Choice’, where we let God choose what He wants his poor servants to do! And then – when we truly count only on Him – I know for a certainty, He will save us!

I came across a pretty cool trailer online about three Irish priests recording a CD. It sounds pretty cool and it’s supposed to be released this week in Europe. Check out the trailer:

Seminary life is quite unique – a lot of things happen exactly the same way as they would for others, but sometimes it is a bit different. Maybe some of you have lived with someone for a while and that person moves out, or a long-time colleague and friend leaves the company. If you’ve been in situations like that, you may somewhat understand what it means when someone leaves the seminary.

One of my good friends did just that about a week ago. Since we share everything here in the seminary – the space, our meals, praying, studying, the yearly retreat, the many activities, a beer in the evenings and so on! – it has an impact in all our lives when one of the brothers leave.

Now don’t get me wrong: it is not a bad thing! We are all here because we earnestly believe that God is calling us to become priests, but since none of us will get a certificate from Heaven with the signatures of the twelve Apostles and Mother Mary on them… we are all here to find out whether we are right in our assumption.

Today I am seminarian Sebastiaan, and I wouldn’t be here still if I didn’t think that one day I would become Fr. Sebastiaan — but I always tell folk, ‘you never know… next time you meet me, I might just be Sebastiaan’. You never know. What I do know is that it took me years to get ‘into’ the seminary, that I won’t just leave all that soon

I don’t know what you’re like at weddings… I for one don’t always manage to come away without shedding a tear or two. I know, I know… but still: two people wanting to give themselves completely to one another really moves me. Especially when the wedding is between two people who really believe and who understand what a Catholic marriage really means – that’s incredible. There’s such a deep mystery at work there, that makes me so very grateful that God has given these two people to one another and to us, the community.

Well, if weddings are beautiful (and I know all of you can relate to that), then I hope you understand how beautiful ordinations are. An ordination is kind of like a marriage, and only in rare circumstances can one receive both the sacrament of marriage as well as ordination (it’s more common in the Eastern Churches). The candidate for priesthood will never marry a woman, but will marry, if you will, the Church itself. The Church (commonly referred to as a ’she’) is, in this view, the bride of the priest. Through their mutual love and with God’s grace, they also conceive children (this is H. Baptism) and they take care of their family together: they’re complementary. A Church without priests is non-existant, and priests without the Church are pointless!

Two weeks ago, my good friend Stefan received his first ordination. I say ‘first’, because there are three types of ordinations in the church: deacon, priest and bishop. Now before one can become a priest, one has to serve as deacon for at least (approximately) one year. Already in the Old Testament, God gave the sons of Levi to the priests as assistants, and when in the New Testament the Apostles became too occupied with their spiritual duties for the increasing number of Christians, they appointed deacons to assist them in taking care of the elderly, the widows and orphans. Being a deacon, therefore, means being a servant to God’s Church in a very real way, as well as an assistant to the bishop (and priests).

I’ve known Stefan for at least three years, if not more. We met at Fr. Ad’s vocation’s group. Fr. Ad is the priest that has helped me in discerning my vocation, he’s a truly remarkable priest with a lot of love for life and who seems to take a lot of pleasure in everything he does. In those days Stefan was also trying  to discern his vocation. He has studied Theology at a regular university, which is a rather different route than the one we are taking. Some seminaries are linked to universities, but ours is an episcopal seminary: it doesn’t give out degrees as such (although for promotion purposes, we are apparently able to receive some sort of degree through a Roman university… but anyway!) but trains young men for the priesthood here in the diocese all the same.

The disadvantage I think Stefan has had, is that he studied at a regular university without the aid of a community that prays the Breviary (the five prayer times) every day. I consider myself fortunate to be in a community where prayer is part of the rhythm of every day, as well as having six full years to really prepare yourself for the priesthood. Stefan only came to live with us last year, and -sadly- he’s already left us now to start his work in a parish.

Let me round off here, this post is getting way too long as it is (!) by saying that I couldn’t keep my eyes dry this time either! Seeing someone giving his life away in service to others is truly a beautiful thing. I cannot understand how he was able to say those vows: it takes a lot of humility – to take vows that no human being could fulfill on their own, but only with the grace of God. I cannot imagine ever managing to become so small that one day I might say the same vows. I am grateful a few years are still left to me to prepare, and I hope you will all pray for me that I, like Stefan, will be able to say “Here I am, Lord!”

As I’ve said in previous posts, it is sometimes difficult for a seminarian to be involved in all the things that you want to be involved in, or things that you think you should be involved in. That’s to say, there’s quite a lot of emphasize on study and prayer here, that we don’t get around to doing too many other things aside from some major hobbies (= the time you need to relax!)

Anyway, one of these things is really being with people – with the people you want to become a priest for. Two weeks ago I went to visit a family whom I’ve befriended last year. Mom, dad and three little rascals, the oldest being about 11, the youngest about 7 – all boys. It’s really a wonderful experience to be in their home and just share an afternoon and evening with them.

I don’t come from a Catholic family, so it’s taken a few visits to real Catholic families to kinda get an idea how they do things different than we used to do at home. Of course, every family is different, so there’s no one way of doing things, but one thing that sticks out is that in the families I’ve befriended, there is a completely different atmosphere in the house: the things they talk about, the time they spend together, the music that is played, etc. Then, what’s cooler than a dad picking up his guitar at the end of the evening and singing a few songs for Jesus along with the rest of the family?

Needless to say, I’ve had a great time: we played several board games and we had pancakes. After dinner, the kids performed a completely wacky (and utterly adorable) play for the grown-ups, we all prayed together and then they all tried to keep me there, by clinging to me and saying how I couldn’t leave. Well, I did leave (heh, they had to go to bed!), but it really made me happy to know that they had enjoyed themselves as well as I had. I know that if I continue down this road, I am not going to be a father, but it’s so cool to experience you can be a Father and that kids really take to you. Thank you, Lord, for this wonderful time

Hey everyone!

I don’t know if there’s anyone keeping up with my so called ‘blogroll’ in the sidebar, but just in case you aren’t (and indeed, why should you ) I thought I’d share that the Dutch website of the Brothers of St. John has been updated. It looks really spiffy – especially the banner at the top where the picture keeps changing.  Check it out, if you dare… :>

Do you remember when you were just a kid and you didn’t do your homework? Time doesn’t change that, even for seminarians! Since you’re not going to buy the ‘my dog ate my homework’ ruse anymore than my teacher did at the time, I am going to confess that I’ve just been too focused on other things to update this website. However, the last few weeks I received several comments of people that enjoyed reading stuff on here, which was a very pleasant surprise! Thanks to you all – I am going to continue posting on here more frequently, and to make up, I’ll be posting several tidbits of things that have kept me busy!