Obscure traditions :)

Some wonderful humour from readers of The Shrine of the Holy Whapping:

"What obscure traditions can we resurrect to astonish the English tourists?"
--attributed to Pius IX (and too good to fact-check)

Also on that comments page (I can’t find the original posts these comments are related to…must be hilarious as well):

An obscure hymn, dug up from parish archives in recent years ...

For all Thy Saints forgotten,
For all Thy Saints suppressed,
Who not only existed,
But won eternal rest;
Who, honored through the ages
Like Chris and Valentine,
Went missing from the calendar
In 1969.

Confessors, Virgins, Martyrs
Whose names our parents took:
Those names and stories vetoed,
Erased now from the book,
But still renowned and glorious,
Surviving death anew,
Provided someone's offering
The Mass of '62.

For poor young Philomena,
For good Hermenegild;
For youthful brave Venantius,
Who for the Faith was killed;
Now being so exclusive,
Seems just a trifle mean;
Perhaps we'll be more tolerant
And go all Tridentine.

Does it fit the tune For All the Saints? I initially thought it did. :D

This is apt because at yesterday’s Mass, Fr Alex mentioned that St Christopher was a legend, he never existed. But that’s not entirely correct:

From the Catholic Encyclopaedia:

The existence of a martyr St. Christopher cannot be denied, as was sufficiently shown by the Jesuit Nicholas Serarius, in his treatise on litanies, "Litaneutici" (Cologne, 1609), and by Molanus in his history of sacred pictures, "De picturis et imaginibus sacris" (Louvain, 1570). In a small church dedicated to the martyr St. Christopher, the body of St. Remigius of Reims was buried, 532 (Acta SS., 1 Oct., 161). St. Gregory the Great (d. 604) speaks of a monastery of St. Christopher (Epp., x., 33). The Mozarabic Breviary and Missal, ascribed to St. Isidore of Seville (d. 636), contains a special office in his honour. In 1386 a brotherhood was founded under the patronage of St. Christopher in Tyrol and Vorarlberg, to guide travellers over the Arlberg. In 1517, a St. Christopher temperance society existed in Carinthia, Styria, in Saxony, and at Munich. Great veneration was shown to the saint in Venice, along the shores of the Danube, the Rhine, and other rivers where floods or ice-jams caused frequent damage. The oldest picture of the saint, in the monastery on the Mount Sinai dates from the time of Justinian (527-65). Coins with his image were cast at Würzburg, in Würtemberg, and in Bohemia.

He existed. It’s just that nothing is known of his life, and those stories attributed to him are probably legends.

From Catholic Answers:

The Church never issued any kind of decree saying that Christopher never existed. Furthermore, competent hagiographers, including Protestant ones, tell us that there was a Christopher, but we just don't know as much about him as some of the legends that grew up around him would suggest.

The confusion over Christopher's status comes from the 1969 reform of the Roman Calendar. This reform had been mandated by Vatican II in Sacrosanctum Concilium, its constitution on the liturgy. Because the Roman Calendar was getting crowded, especially with saints with local rather than universal followings, the Council declared: "Lest the feasts of the saints take precedence over the feasts commemorating the very mysteries of salvation, many of them should be left to be celebrated by a particular Church or nation or religious family; those only should be extended to the universal Church that commemorate saints of truly universal significance" (SC 111).

A revision of the Calendar was undertaken after the Council, and on February 14, 1969, Pope Paul VI issued a motu proprio with the unwieldy title "Approval of the Genera Norms for the Liturgical Year and the New General Roman Calendar" (AGN). In this document, which is found in standard sacramentaries, the Pope explained:

With the passage of centuries, it must be admitted, the faithful have become accustomed to so many special religious devotions that the principal mysteries of the redemption have lost their proper place. This was partly due to the increased number of vigils, holy days, and octaves, partly to the gradual overlapping of various seasons in the liturgical year.

The purpose of the reordering of the liturgical year and of the norms accomplishing its reform, therefore, is that through faith, hope, and love the faithful may share more deeply in the whole mystery of Christ as it unfolds throughout the year. (AGN 1)
To put [the] decrees of the Council into effect, the names of some saints have been deleted from the General Calendar, and permission was granted to restore the memorials and veneration of other saints in those areas with which they have been traditionally associated. The removal of certain lesser-known saints from the Roman Calendar has allowed the addition of the names of martyrs from regions where the Gospel spread later in history. (AGN 2)

In the Calendar that this document serves to implement, Christopher's name is omitted. One can question whether Christopher should have omitted. The devotions to him were broad-based enough that they would seem to make him a saint of "universal significance." Nevertheless, nowhere in this reform is it implied that he did not exist or that he was not a saint.