Let our cry come before the LordStill on holiday, my wife and I visited the parish of St Thomas in Coeur d'Alene last weekend, her family's parish - which, sadly, none of them attend anymore. I think they're still recovering from the loss of the Redemptorists who handed it over to the secular diocesan priests in 2000, due to a lack of vocations. It's due to their influence and control of the parish that we see there today a beautifully appointed interior in spite of post-conciliar reordering some time ago. The sun was streaming through the large stained glass windows, not shown, in the square nave, filtering colored strands of light over the side altar of St Joseph and old high altar where the tabernacle still resides. The paint scheme is lovely, highlighting the architectural details to their best advantage. Many an Anglican church could learn how to paint their interiors from examples like this.
The only real complaint I had was that the priest's first utterance after the opening hymn and entrance was a joke about the weather in which I think only he found pleasure. Then it was 'in the name of the Father..." It's been that way on each of our visits. He must think mass can't begin or end without inserting something laughable - to him, at least.
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