A Neglected Diocesan Patron?

The following study was an informal yet revealing one:

About 100 churches in the Diocese of San Diego, including single-church parishes and the member churches of merged parishes, had their bulletins, websites, Facebook pages, livestream feeds, and calendars examined to see whether they celebrated the Feast of St. Didacus, the Patron Saint of the Diocese. A look at the diocesan liturgical observances memo should put this celebration into context.

LINK: San Diego Diocese Liturgical Observations 2022

Matthew Plese T.O.S.D. mentions in his blog A Catholic Life that "the feastdays[sic] of these patrons should be kept as first-class feasts in each diocese... In fact, the primary patron saint for each diocese would have been a Holy Day of Obligation up until the time of St. Pius X's changes in 1911." Thus, the Diocesan calendar's labeling of St. Didacus' (San Diego's) feast as a "Feast" is a possible source of confusion, as in the Anglophone world, a "Feast" in the 1970 Calendar is equivalent to a 2nd Class Feast in the 1960 Calendar and before. Likewise, a "Solemnity" is the equivalent of a 1st Class Feast. The label of "Feast observed" is therefore ambiguous, and unless a diocesan priest shares emails, the existence of direct guidelines from the diocese for observing this feast (e.g., whether to say the Creed, what vestments to wear, etc.) remains unknown. The liturgical observance chart has a date signed at the bottom of "9/10/12," though this is likely a typo or some other oversight, with "12" likely being "21." Before proceeding to findings, it is necessary to explain why the Diocese of San Diego celebrates St. Didacus on November 7.

Example of a bulletin oversight

In the General Roman Calendar of 1960, St. Didacus was celebrated as a 3rd Class Feast (pre-1955, a Semidouble) on November 13, the date closest to his death, since November 12 was occupied by Pope St. Martin I (also a Semidouble). The Franciscans kept his Feast on November 12, however. When the calendar revisions of Vatican II were implemented, the American bishops and the Franciscans in America chose to relocate the Feast of St. Didacus from November 13 to November 7, a consequence of universal guidelines regarding the Greater Ferias of Advent (O Tide). To free the celebration of the week before Christmas from "interruptive" feast days, the makers of the 1970 Calendar chose to relocate the feast of St. Thomas the Apostle from his wintry Roman date of December 21 to the summer date of July 3. St. Frances Xavier Cabrini (who according to the 1956 and 1961 American editions of the Liber Usualis should be observed with a Feast of the 2nd Class within the United States) had her feast day assigned to December 22, the date of her death, placing her feast as an "obstruction" to the Greater Ferias of Advent. Thus, when the calendar change was implemented, her feast was moved to the date of her beatification, November 13, while St. Didacus was moved to November 7. Meanwhile, the rank of St. Didacus' feast day was dropped completely in the United States, meaning that bulletins from major bulletin publishers are unlikely to contain a single mention of him. Keep in mind that the complete dropping of St. Didacus' feast day means that he is even lower than an "Optional Memorial" (the approximate equivalent of a 4th Class Feast / Simple), and this can be attested to in this link from the USCCB for November 7, 2022. Contrast this with the USCCB providing two optional memorials for November 16, 2022. 

The 1961 Edition of the Liber Usualis

The findings were as follows:

Out of about 100 churches in the Diocese of San Diego (and ignoring the merging of numerous church communities under single parishes), 22 were found to have websites and online presences that were either insufficient or too out of date to determine whether the particular parish either acknowledged or celebrated the Feast of St. Didacus in the period between November 6 and November 13 inclusive. From the churches that could be analyzed, two were found to have acknowledged the Patronal Feast in the bulletin but were otherwise unable to celebrate the feast due to their statuses as rural communities with limited priest presence. Another nine were found to have celebrated the Feast Day, with the additional data on these nine being the following:

- One parish was the TLM parish, meaning the celebration was on November 13.

- Two parishes were already dedicated to St. Didacus, meaning whether he was the Diocesan Patron or not, they would already be obligated to keep his Feast.

- At least one parish other than the TLM parish celebrated the Feast using the Festal readings, rather than the daily readings (which are completely unrelated to the feast of St. Didacus). 

- At least two parishes other than the TLM parish celebrated the Feast using the unrelated daily readings and without the recitation of the Creed.

In total, this means 11 churches in total, out of the roughly 80 that could be checked, were confirmed to have at least acknowledged the Feast, and that as few as two celebrated the Feast with related readings.

The proper readings in the Ordinary Form, from another bulletin

Meanwhile, a discomforting discovery was the finding of TEN parishes that celebrated November 7, 2022 as a plain Monday in Ordinary Time, all confirmed via archived Mass livestreams. The esteem that a few of these parishes are held to by our Cardinal-Bishop should be a cause for concern among the diocesan faithful. The remaining parishes that could have their parish calendars, bulletins, and Facebook pages analyzed were generally labeled as having at least failed to promote the Feast of St. Didacus, especially when so many bulletins took more time to acknowledge Election Day than even make a single mention of our Diocesan Patron. Quite a few parishes simply labeled Monday, November 7 as "weekday" in the bulletin, often with the normal daily readings accompanying it, which is quite troubling.  With this in mind the percentage of churches that ignored the Feast of St. Didacus could be anywhere from 10% to nearly 90% (and 10% is still much too high, especially when the parishes in this percentage are those often visited and promoted by the diocese). We hope that in many of the cases that could not be confirmed, the Mass offered for that day was that of St. Didacus. Just as the true percentage of all churches in the diocese which celebrated the Feast Day cannot be ascertained, knowing whether this situation is the fault of the diocese, the parish priests, or parish liturgical directors cannot be concluded. I am assuming that the diocese distributed the liturgical observance chart at some point within the past year, though whether there were reminders distributed is unknown. Regardless, placing the blame on a single party fails to acknowledge the historical context for why such confusion is even possible in the first place.

Wait a second...

This is not to say, however, that the Diocese of San Diego hasn't cultivated an environment for ignorance. The diocesan newspaper, The Southern Cross, has made no mention of St. Didacus at all. Neither has the front page of the diocesan website for the past month. A great display of the diocese's own self-awareness about its Patron Saint is in the very section of the website dedicated to him, located at the bottom of the rightmost tab of the main page's tab bar. The author of this part of the diocesan website gives St. Didacus' feast day as November 13 (see the image above), the feast that the Saint is celebrated on in the Traditional Calendar. Whether the author or the diocese is aware of this mix-up is unknown. 

The Southern Cross as of November 15

I ought to clarify that these are not statements restricted to the Diocese of San Diego. The lack of liturgical formation across the United States could have a massive influence and the general lack of liturgical order across the world is a more rooted cause for such confusion. Even Matthew Plese T.O.S.D. acknowledges that many across the U.S.A. don't know their diocesan patron, hence the reason he created his chart. Even then, Mr. Plese's chart contains no mention of Our Lady of Refuge's patronage over the Diocese of San Diego, a fact that cannot be located easily outside the 2022 diocesan liturgical observance chart. One of the livestreams viewed during the study acknowledged her patronage in the sermon, fortunately showing that this title of Our Blessed Mother is not entirely forgotten.

Our Diocesan Patroness, Our Lady of Refuge

The Diocese of San Diego is very likely not unique in this mishap, and even the Priestly Fraternity of Saint Peter (FSSP) and Society of St. Pius X (SSPX) are not spared of the general confusion with where Saints fall on the liturgical calendar. Some FSSP and SSPX Calendars meant for the U.S.A. do not include St. Frances Xavier Cabrini at all on December 22 (perhaps in accordance with her "demotion"), and the FSSP and SSPX calendars label the Feast of the North American Martyrs as a 3rd Class Feast, when their feast was observed as one of the 2nd Class before the American liturgical calendar reform. Yet, we can acknowledge a difference between societies of apostolic life and pious unions determining their own liturgical observances and the fact that there are diocesan priests across the United States who have not been formed in observing the implied Solemnities of their local calendar. The situation in the Diocese of San Diego regarding St. Didacus' Day would be akin to a priest in the Archdiocese of New York ignoring St. Patrick's Day. 

Notice the options available for this day...

And the lack of options for this: Even trads have room for improvement!

Before concluding, consider how the Diocese of San Diego has promoted numerous events as "celebrations of the Feast of St. So-and-So" despite those days being detached from their true Feast days. Such "feast days" should be properly understood liturgically as Votive Masses, not true Feast Days, particularly because they occur on Saturdays that do not coincide with the feast day of the Saint. To name just a few examples, the "Feast of St. Lorenzo Ruiz" was actually a Votive Mass celebrated on September 10, over 2 weeks before his true feast day of September 28. The "Feast of St. Francis" was actually a Votive Mass celebrated on October 1, three days before his actual feast day of October 4. As far as the research is concerned, and giving a grace period of at least a month, St. Didacus was not given a public Votive celebration anywhere in the Diocese. Even a Facebook post acknowledging the day on the diocesan Facebook page could not be located. Votive Masses for particular communities are not inherently wrong by any measure, yet, if the Church must be "united," as many bishops say, can we not unite under our common patron, St. Didacus?

Our Patron

From the findings of this rough study, we can conclude that the Diocese of San Diego ought to try harder to inform its priests (and probably itself) of the existence of its Patronal Feast Day. Additionally, it is recommended that priests working within the diocese pay due attention to the Saint to whom they owe their patronage to and be vigilant of any differences between local calendars and the general American calendar. The diocese also ought to clarify whether the Feast of St. Didacus is a Solemnity of a Feast and offer some sort of direction on which Mass propers should be used. Solid liturgical formation is key to parishes not forgetting major feast days. While only tangentially related to the original purpose of this study, I would also recommend that parishes across the Diocese of San Diego regularly maintain their websites (if logistically possible) and sever themselves from company-made bulletins. So many bulletins looked at during the study shared the same three templates for multi-page bulletins that would ultimately end up in the garbage. Some parishes have very simple, straightforward bulletins without the advertisements, doodles, or decade-old stock (and often saccharine) scriptural reflections that inflate the size of contemporary parish bulletins. Avoiding the templates promoted by bulletin-formatting companies brings the necessary uniqueness and care that makes a parish bulletin much more relatable to the average parishioner and to the community that the bulletin informs. Simpler bulletins also create less waste by using less paper and ink.

A lesson on why we ought to remain steadfast in prayer

We may comfortably accept our diocese and its parishes repeatedly reminding us via Web and paper about Election Day, considering the demonic Proposition 1 that was on last week's ballot. We can definitely accept that spreading awareness that we can attend Mass in the morning before preparing Thanksgiving dinner causes no harm in itself. Yet are we too unaware to publicize the fact that we should pray to our Patron Saint for, if not victory in an earthly election, victory in our spiritual lives? Are we so unaware of our Patron that we can give thanks on an American federal holiday yet neglect giving thanks at Mass on our Patron's feast day? If parish bulletins can make room for Election Day, Thanksgiving stories, and opportunities to meet our Cardinal-Bishop, then we can certainly give at least a few square centimeters of room in the bulletin or newspaper to the great confessor whom this diocese is protected by. 

Sancte Didace, intercede pro nobis. 

Written by a resident of the Diocese of San Diego, for the glory of God and the exaltation of His holy confessor of, Diego.

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Note I: To those who may not be fully aware of the importance of the celebration of specific liturgies of the proper class on their particular feast days, I recommend reading these passages from Inter Oecumenici, the 1964 instruction from the Consilium that defined how the Constitution on the Sacred Liturgy (Sacrosanctum Concilium) of the Second Vatican Council was to be implemented: 

"The greatest care must be taken about rightly linking pastoral activity with the liturgy... Especially necessary is a close, living union between liturgy, catechesis, religious formation, and preaching" (I. Oe. 7).

"Liturgical celebrations shall be carried out as perfectly as possible. Therefore, rubrics shall be observed exactly and ceremonies carried out with dignity, under the careful supervision of superiors and with the required preparation beforehand" (I. Oe. 13).

"Bishops and their assistants in the priesthood should, therefore, attach ever greater importance to their whole pastoral ministry as it is focused toward the liturgy" (I. Oe. 14). 

This is the same instruction that recommends that the main altar of a church should be "freestanding... to permit walking around it and celebration facing the people" (I. Oe. 91) and that the presider's chair (a priest's sedilla) be visible to the faithful and may be permitted to be placed behind the main altar (I. Oe. 92). If these last two instructions could be embraced with fervor, perhaps we could see the first three embraced as well.

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Note II: This is not a thorough and formal study involving surveys or detailed comparisons. The ultimate goal of searching these bulletins, livestreams, websites, etc. was to find which parishes for sure did not celebrate the Feast of San Diego. The parishes which did and did not celebrate the Feast have been mostly censored, particularly out of charity towards the parish communities. The most certain part of the data to emphasize is that there were indeed 10 parishes that did not observe the Feast of St. Didacus based on archived livestreams, and that even 10 parishes forgetting the Feast out of nearly 100 in the diocese is still too many.