Vera ecclesiae

Extract from Seán Manchester's autobiographical works:

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Having not been baptised as an infant ― my parents wanted to leave such an important decision entirely up to me ― I was “first baptised at the age of eleven in the Anglican Church and given conditional baptism in the Catholic Church at the age of twenty-two.” (The Grail Church, Holy Grail, 1995, page 56). When I joined St Luke’s Church as a choirboy, it came as something of a shock to the vicar when he made discovery of the fact that I had not been Christened.

The Reverend W A F Lee was a very large and somewhat humourless man who rode around on a twenty-eight inch wheel, outsize bicycle. He duly baptised me, appointing himself my godfather, as I continued in the choir and also in the Boy’s Church, which had special outings and field trips, sometimes in the company of the Boys Scouts, to the Hertfordshire countryside and, on one occasion, to Dover Castle.

Along with a school chum, I attended the regular functions and evening scripture lessons at the Boy’s Church, but, following the vicar’s invitation, joined the choir alone and under my own steam. This was a happy time for me; especially when I succeeded David Stump as head choirboy. Stump and I had a falling out about something unrelated to my promotion. It erupted in the vestry one Sunday evening before the service, and could have easily turned into a scrap. I have no recollection of what it was over, the incident itself was quickly forgotten, and life went on as before.

After a couple of years, Edward Keating succeeded me as head choirboy. This decision was hastened by two factors, neither of them to do with my prowess as a boy soprano. Keating had joined with his younger brother ― whose name escapes me ― and usurped me. This perturbed me slightly for, as I grew to know him better, Keating’s distinctly dark side revealed itself. He smoked, despite his young age, introduced cigarettes to the choir vestry, and proved himself to be manipulative on some occasions. I came to quite dislike him after a while. In the interim, I had found some new friends, who invited me to attend their church service ― a Mass.

The Rev'd William Alexander Frederick Lee

Peter and Pauline were twins who were about the same age as me. Aware of my passion for visiting churches when services were not in progress and, irrespective of the denomination, enjoying the atmosphere, sacred surroundings, architecture and music if the organist was practicing, the twins invited me to their church, where I experienced my first Roman Catholic Mass. It was still then the Old Rite, known as the Tridentine Mass.

Vicar Lee somehow learned of my clandestine attendance at a Roman Catholic Mass, and was less than pleased. The vicar and his no less gargantuan sister, who was installed in the vicarage as his housekeeper, had come over from Northern Ireland before the war. He did not approve of Roman Catholicism, and consequently the writing was on the wall as far as my future in St Luke’s choir was concerned. Coupled with the aforementioned factors were debates in the Boy’s Church every Tuesday evening at 6.00 pm, after hymns and study. One of my frequent debates was the just war theory. I found it incompatible with Christ’s teachings. It was only a decade after the war had ended, but I opined against Britain declaring war on Germany. This was a view I have held throughout my life. I have opposed all wars ― most vocally both Gulf Wars, actively campaigning and speaking against the actions of various UK governments have taken in this respect.

The vicar asked me where my ideas were coming from, and enquired whether my father was a Communist, which even now I find an extraordinary deduction to make. My ideas are found in the New Testament where it is explained that those chosen to follow Him “out of the world” are “not of the world” and will be hated; the commandment not to kill is upheld; moreover, expanded so that we are required to turn the other cheek. And, of course, in so far as we did it to the least among us, we did it to Christ.

On reflection, my replacement by Edward Keating, and subsequent expulsion from both the choir and Boy’s Church, was an important lesson. I learned how wrong it is to make favourites. Much later on, when someone I came to know socially joined the lifeguards, and failed miserably to carry his weight, expecting everyone else to absorb his duties, I sacked him. No favouritism would exist, or be seen to exist, whenever I was in charge. This person was astounded by my action, but, in the long term, it did not affect our friendship ― which remains to this day as strong as it did all those years ago. One or two of the lifeguards sometimes found me too disciplined, and told me so. They had received an easy time at other establishments. Now they were obliged to do their duty. Those who criticised me most were the very ones who years later made a point of telling me that I had been right. One in particular had learned a lot from my regimen, and went on to be in charge himself.

Eleven years after my baptism at St Luke’s, and much soul-searching, I was baptised again by Father Keane at the same Roman Catholic Church where I had experienced my first Tridentine Mass. He was often present at some of the dance hall venues where I was engaged to perform as a musician (tenor saxophone) for a showband called Amor Alcis. Showbands very often placed as much importance on performance as on the music itself. I would later be confirmed at London’s Westminster Cathedral.

Father Keane was not the obvious choice during my months of intensive study to become a Roman Catholic. His consumed copious amounts of alcohol, was sadly a Modernist, and had little time for what he described as “hearts and flowers” priests. He was also a prison chaplain, and no doubt did some very good work, but I sometimes wondered why he ever became a priest. He was not especially popular, despite his apparent holding of the record for celebrating Mass faster than any of the other priests at Our Lady of the Sacred Heart. Yet Modernists like Father Keane would multiply in the years ahead, as the older Traditionalist priests became an endangered species.

Father Keane

I found a sense of discipline and special devotion in the Roman Catholic Church at that time, which was not apparent in the Church of England. Yet, when finally received into the Church, the torrent of change ushered in by the Second Vatican Council had already begun. Father Keane welcomed “opening the shutters” to the outside world. I was less certain. Many of the landmarks were being swept away. The old ways were becoming obliterated for the sake of change ― the signposts blown down. The beautiful Old Mass was replaced with a liturgy, at best, uninspired and, at worst, banal. The New Mass left little time for meditation. It had transformed from a private devotion between the communicant and Christ into a communal service. I missed the atmosphere of solace for worldly pain so evident before. Disillusionment set in, as the Vatican appeared to throw the baby out with the bath water in its rush to catch up with the modern world. Its attraction for me had been the fact that when I first became acquainted with Catholicism it was to provide a much welcome escape from the corrosive effect of modernity in the latter half of the twentieth century.

My multifarious discussions with Father Keane over months of instruction for preparation to enter the Roman Catholic Church left entire areas unresolved. “Would God allow His Church to be misguided in this matter?” seemed to be the stock answer to virtually all my difficult, searching and challenging queries. The doctrine of papal infallibility was a hurdle I never surmounted. “Well it makes sense when you think about it,” is the response I was given. “If that’s all that you have a problem with, we’re not doing too badly, are we?” was another reaction from the priest. He asked for my trust. I gave it, and became a Catholic in the mid-1960s.

However, the Second Vatican Council reforms took away the discipline and devotion that distinguished Roman Catholicism from the Anglican Communion I had just quit, but, as I pursued my religious studies over the years, I became increasingly aware that the foundation of my new spiritual home was not so much Jesus Christ as Imperial Rome ― the very imperialism emulated by men who were very much "of the world." The Roman Catholic Church owed its existence to the Emperor Constantine in the fourth century who perverted Christianity when he included it in the empire’s extant pantheon of pagan cults. It was Constantine, not the Bishop of Rome, who ruled the “Christian” Roman Empire from the year 312. In the introduction to my published work on Christian history, I observe:

“When Constantine made Christianity a tolerated religion inside the barbaric Roman Empire, the Faith of the early Christians became seriously distorted. They ceased being pacifists and beat their ploughshares into swords. Previously Christians would neither be allowed, nor want to be, in the army. In 416, however, by an edict of Theodosius, only Christians were allowed to enlist. Tertullian had written two centuries earlier: ‘The world may need its Caesars, but the Emperor can never be a Christian, nor a Christian ever be Emperor.’ The emperor’s title, Pontifex Maximus, would later be assumed by every pope, but for now it was the emperor, not the pope, who was the head of the Church. The Bishop of Rome was obliged to prostrate himself and pledge his loyalty to Constantine who delayed his own baptism until he was on the point of death and, even then, was not baptised by a Catholic bishop or priest, but by the heretical Arian Bishop Eusebius of Nicomedia.” (The Grail Church, Holy Grail, 1995, pages 11-12).

I qualify my disenchantment on the same page by noting that the Roman Catholic Church has still produced the likes of St Francis of Assisi, and other mystics. However, St Francis “observed the incompatibility of the Church with the life of Christ and His apostles.” Furthermore, I remark: “No saint would provide greater inspiration for the work ahead. Like the Celtic Christians, St Francis appreciated the beauty and wonder of Creation and he was certainly no stranger to supernatural experience. It is therefore not too surprising to learn that in his youth St Francis sought the Grail itself.” (The Grail Church, Holy Grail, 1995, page 91).

It became clear, as I would publicly state in 1988: “Simply calling oneself ‘Christian’ and subscribing to what can only described as ‘Churchianity’ is to no avail. The Church in the past was far too eager to make ‘Christians’ of everyone and not followers of Christ as perhaps exemplified by Francis of Assisi who founded his Order outside of the Church.” I also observe in the same book: “The emergence of a satanic revival, stronger than anything seen since the Renaissance, is taking place worldwide.” (From Satan To Christ, Holy Grail, 1988, pages 5-6). Subsequent events have more than served to confirm what I wrote back in 1988.

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Though we should strive for perfection, I am well aware that we are all sinners and imperfect, aspiring to achieve something higher by facing the right direction in life. We tend to forget that St Francis was exquisitely dressed as a young man, spending such large sums on fashionable costume that his Perugian captors took him for the son of a gentleman rather than a merchant. He also had the ability to ignore unpleasantness. Physical ugliness repelled him to the degree that he really had to force himself to kiss a leper. The conflict with his father was never resolved, and he came to despise materialism so much that money made him feel sick. He acted with panache, even after conversion, and was never less than dramatic in all he did; being prepared to cast himself into a fire before the Sultan al-Kamil on one occasion. Visions and mystical experience were commonplace to him. It is not difficult to see how many in the 1960s, who felt themselves to be on a mystical path, could easily identify with this medieval aesthete who eschewed all the trappings of glamour and wealth for his Lord.

My own mystical experiences commenced when I came into contact with the Light. When barely five years old, my bedroom one night filled with a dazzling light. I lay very still, sensing all that was happening around me. Then I heard the name “Jesus” ― as if someone was whispering it directly in my ear ― but nobody was in the room apart from myself. I told my mother the next morning about the incident, and she just smiled. Years later she shared some of her own unexplained experiences. The most striking was her hearing shots and seeing flashes, like gunfire, on the night before the assassination of President John F Kennedy in Dallas, Texas, in November 1963, just before she fell asleep. She rarely talked about such experiences. In later life she never spoke about them.

I find that I am most sensitive where an affinity with a person or place becomes apparent. Then I pick up all sorts of intelligence whether I want to or not. This is not especially uncommon for people of the requisite sensitivity. It is nothing to do with the supernatural, and certainly nothing to do with being in touch with spirits etc. It is extra “sensitivity” ― not “power” of any sort — and many people harbour it wittingly and probably also unwittingly. It happens most when relaxed and in a spontaneous frame of mind. Such sensitivity belonged to St Francis of Assisi, plus the mystical experience of stigmata which, of course, is supernatural.

St Francis of Assisi in the grotto of our retreat.