Widdecombe defiant after telling Catholics off for ‘messy’ Mass
ANN WIDDECOMBE may be a late convert but she is without doubt one of the most out- spoken Roman Catholics in Britain.
True to form, the saintly Widders has issued a pamphlet which, to put it mildly, has ruffled a few feathers.
Take the title: The Mass is a Mess. In the 12-page booklet, issued in the name of the Guild, also known as “the Keys”, Widders and co-author Martin Kochanski describe the English Mass as a “dog’s breakfast” and accuse liberal liturgists of being “racists” and “misguided fools”.
Advertisement
The pamphlet carries a disclaimer making clear that it contains the personal views of the authors, rather than the Guild. But The Catholic Herald has accused her of triggering “uproar”. The paper says she is under pressure to resign and may be forced to issue an apology to Cormac Murphy- O’Connor, the leader of the Catholic Church in England and Wales and the president of the Guild. Piers Paul Read, former Master of the Guild and now a vice-president, said the language used by Widders was too strong. He told the Herald: “It should not have been published by anybody, let alone the Keys. It makes the organisation seem like a lot of extremists. which is an image we are trying to avoid.”
Widdecombe, who was objecting to the way the Mass was translated from Latin into English, is unrepentant.
“I am under no pressure. There is nothing happening of the sort described by the Herald,” she said.
And the racism charge? “We have changed Our Lord’s own words because we feel he must have got it wrong because he was only speaking in Hebrew or Aramaic. So racist.” Anyone going to argue with her?
Hell’s university
Advertisement
IT WILL be case of chaleur et Lumière at the University of Westminster when the grumpy old man of the BBC, John Humphrys, takes on all comers in the Media Society’s debate about “reality” TV. Humphrys upset the luvvies at the Edinburgh TV festival with his attack on Big Brother and other in-vogue reality programmes. The empire has its chance to strike back through Simon Shaps, whose company, Granada, makes I’m a Celebrity ... Get Me Out of Here! and Hell’s Kitchen. Audience votes will be vital in the showdown at the Lumière, which is reputed to be Britain’s first cinema and is on the university campus, on November 10.
Remember this
THERE is an important revelation in the surprisingly acerbic diaries of Lord Radice of Chester-le-Street, who quit as an MP in frustration at being denied a ministerial post by Tony Blair. Radice, who referred to the Queen as a “Hanoverian pudding face”, said that when he told Blair, the PM replied: “You have to be tough in this job. I hope I am still a human being. And I am not going to write my memoirs.” So will he break another promise?
Bidding on menu
LOYD GROSSMAN once remarked: “The history of food in Britain divides neatly into two periods — before Anton Mosimann and after Mosimann.”
Advertisement
Bonhams, the auction house, is holding a sale next month of items from the culinary collection amassed by Mosimann, left, including a 1908 menu from Windsor Castle and menus from the Coronation of King George V1 and the Royal Yacht, Britannia.
Smear campaign
EVEN while finger-painting with the offspring of his party’s delegates for a photo-op at the Liberal Democrats’ conference in Bournemouth yesterday, Charles Kennedy could not resist a sly swipe at the Labour Party. As he smeared paint on a small child’s hand, Kennedy declared: “If David Blunkett, the Home Secretary, was here this would be classed as an anti-social behaviour order piece, without a doubt.”