Some things are WORTH the hours spent reading.
My unexpected hours of reading were assisted by a progression from coffee to fermented adult beverages.
As long as the long text in question is interesting, well-written, well thought out, not repetitious, etc.  This text passes all those tests.
Indeed it does. Were I to be demanded--yes, under duress and in haste--to devise a single phrase to describe the posted narrative, I'd describe it as "highly disturbing": What seems to be an overwhelming majority of traditional priestly vocations scuttled at certain traditional seminaries!? And the majority of those decisions without any reasons given? It's not as if there's a surplus of traditional priests nowadays.
The narrative made no mention of the Lavender Mafia, so all truly traditional Catholics must hope & trust that it was not merely an unmentioned issue, but one that was totally irrelevant to the seminaries in the narrative.
Some of the faculty making so many egregious--seemingly capricious--decisions denying vocations might find their skulls mingled with those of bad bishops whose skulls pave the floors of levels of H@||.
Indeed, I was there and I can attest that I never saw anything Lavender going on, or even any hints of the same.
I think it comes down to opportunity. The Trad world presents plenty of unique challenges to priests, some of which successfully passed (to their credit) and others are failed miserably (to their condemnation).
Specifically, I mean the temptation to power, bully, abuse, and start a cult. Look at how many groups in Traddieland have become de-facto cults. Bullying from influential parishioners, written abjurations, forbidding parishioners to attend the other Trad Mass in town, etc.
In normal times, most average priests would never have a chance to be thus tested. They would be much more supervision and a lot less isolation. They wouldn't be "the only game in town".
I was indirectly mentioned twice in the story, by the way.
In that year, only one seminarian left with ease, with true peace.
I knew before the seminarian knew. I would leave his room and I’d see that seminarian, laughing and talking and doing his duties. He didn’t know it was over. Once I was told 3 months in advance of the actual culling of someone. There was no reason why. That ex-seminarian, to this day, doesn’t even know why he was asked to leave. He was just “unsuitable”.
...
These were not humanities or first years he was name dropping, these were men who’d already put in 3 or 4 years, men who were committed. How can a vocation not be discerned after 2 years? That is a massive disservice. Sure, there might be exceptions, but this was becoming the norm. Their dreams were dead all over their face. Their efforts destroyed, reasons mysterious, and I felt party to it by my silence.
Topic: Life as a Seminarian was like movie Platoon (Read 49996 times)