Monastery Ceremonies

Br Marcel-Marie, C.SS.R., has carved a relief of our Mother of Perpetual Succour which is now enthroned above the monastery gate. The image was blessed during the recitation of the Litany of Loreto by Fr. Michael Mary, C.SS.R.

February 2005

...If I were a wise man, I would do my part; Yet what can I give Him - Give my heart!
Once again this year the Christmas Masses were celebrated in the Stronsay Community Centre duly transformed for the occasion.

March 2005

Benedicat vos ...Bishop Fellay imparts his blessing after the Coronation and Mass of Our Lady of Fatima in the Monastery Church.

Consecration of the Papa Stronsay Cemetery

After the lapse of a number of centuries we once more have a consecrated cemetery on Papa Stronsay.

On 29 January this year His Lordship, Bishop Bernard Fellay consecrated the monastic cemetery on the peninsular of Papa Stronsay known as Corn Graand. From an early date every monastery possessed a cemetery of its own, and it became the ardent desire of many pious persons to be laid to rest among monks. Formal compacts dealing with this matter are to be met with among early charters, e.g. those of Anglo-Saxon England.

Br Wolf Maria, C.SS.R. making the cross which will stand in the centre of the cemetery for the ceremony.

Permission for the cemetery was very kindly given us by the Orkney Islands Council, and our monastery cemetery is at present the only private place of burial in the islands. All burials are registered in the Monastery archives and in those of the Islands Council.

Since 2002 four persons have been laid to rest in its precincts, beginning with the mortal remains of Brother Joseph Mary, C.SS.R., whose body was brought to Papa Stronsay from Joinville where he died in 1995.

It is necessary to have three interments in a graveyard before the ground can be consecrated, and so with the burial of Mrs Susan Andrews in January and the number reaching four we were able to ask His Lordship to perform the consecration.

Our temporary sacristy on wheels!

The practice of blessing the grave or the vault in which any Christian is laid to rest is extremely ancient. In many early pontificals, e.g. those of Egbert of York and Robert of Jumièges, a special service is provided with the title Consecratio Cymiterii, and this, with certain developments and additions, is still prescribed for the blessing of cemeteries at the present day.

According to the rite, a wooden cross is planted in the centre of the cemetery. The bishop makes the circuit of the enclosure sprinkling it everywhere with holy water.

Then he comes to the cross and recites before it a prayer of some length. Finally a consecratory preface is sung at the cross, after which the procession returns to the sacristy.

A cemetery which has thus been consecrated can be profaned, and it is regarded as losing its sacred character when any deed of blood or certain other outrages are committed within its enclosure.

For example, as the ground has been blessed for the burial of those who are in communion with the Church, the forcible intrusion of someone who had died under the Church’s ban is looked upon as a violation which unfits it for the purpose for which it was designed.

Pope Innocent III decided that in such a case, if for any reason it was impossible to exhume the remains and remove them from the enclosure, the cemetery must be reconciled by a form of service specially provided for the purpose. In a celebrated instance, known as the Guibord Case, which occurred in Montreal, Canada, in 1875, the bishop, seeing the civil law uphold the intrusion, laid the portion of the cemetery so profaned under an interdict.

Of special interest to us at Golgotha Monastery is the famous Campo Santo of Pisa, as well as one or two other Italian cemeteries, which were constructed by the transferring of soil from the Holy Mountain of Golgotha at Jerusalem, thus making it possible for the faithful to be buried in part of the Holy Land itself.

The consecration is begun by the bishop.		His Lordship blesses the cemetery with holy water in the form of a cross. From East to West...		...and from North to South.

That the early Christians from the beginning used only burial to dispose of the dead seems certain. This conclusion may be inferred not only from negative arguments but from the direct testimony of Tertullian, and from the stress laid upon the analogy between the resurrection of the body and the Resurrection of Christ. In the light of this same dogma of the resurrection of the body, it is easy to understand how the interment of the mortal remains of the Christian dead has always been regarded as an act of religious import and has been surrounded at all times with some measure of religious ceremonial.

In defence of the Church’s prohibitions, it may be urged that the revival of cremation in modern times has in practice been prompted less by considerations of improved hygiene or psychological sentiment than by avowed materialism and opposition to Catholic teaching.

According to canon law every man is free to choose for himself the burial ground in which he wishes to be interred. It is not necessary that this choice should be formally registered in his will. Any reasonable legal proof is sufficient as evidence of his wishes in the matter, and it has been decided that the testimony of one witness, for example his confessor, may be accepted, if there be no suspicion of interested motives. Where no wish has been expressed it will be assumed that the interment is to take place in any vault or burial place which may have belonged to the deceased or his family, and failing this the remains should be buried in the cemetery of the parish in which the deceased had his domicile.

Formerly monastic and other churches claimed and enjoyed under certain conditions the privilege of interring notable benefactors within their precincts.

Only baptised persons have a claim to Christian burial and the rites of the Church cannot lawfully be performed over those who are not baptised. Moreover no strict claim can be allowed in the case of those persons who have not lived in communion with the Church, according to the maxim which comes down from the time of Pope St Leo the Great (448): “we cannot hold communion in death with those who in life were not in communion with us”. It has further been recognised as a principle that the last rites of the Church constitute a mark of respect which is not to be shown to those who in their lives have proved themselves unworthy of it.

The consecratory preface is chanted.

Further, Christian burial is to be refused to suicides. This prohibition is as old as the fourth century; except in the case that the act was committed when they were of unsound mind or unless they showed signs of repentance before death occurred.

It is also withheld from those who have been killed in a duel, even though they should give signs of repentance before death.

Other persons similarly debarred are notorious sinners who die without repentance, those who have openly held the sacraments in contempt (for example by staying away from Communion at Easter time to the public scandal) and who showed no signs of sorrow, monks and nuns who are found to have died in the possession of money or valuables which they had kept for their own use, and finally those who have directed that their bodies should be cremated after death.

Many complications are caused in the administration of the canon law by the political conditions under which the Church exists in modern times in most countries of the world.

Thus we are very fortunate to be able to be buried in a Catholic Cemetery where we may safely hope to lie awaiting the Resurrection. We thank God, and the Islands Council, for this privilege which is not granted to all.

It seems to be possible that the remains of those originally interred in the Saint Nicholas Chapel which was excavated on Papa Stronsay from 1999 until 2001 will return to be buried in our cemetery. They number about 11 or 12 and seem with great likelihood to have been monks, given the site and manner of burial.

We await this day with expectation and extend our heartfelt thanks to His Lordship who granted all the indulgences possible to our new graveyard. †