PEOPLE IN SHORTS WERE STOPPED OUTSIDE ST.MARY MAJORS BASILICA TODAY WHILE OTHERS IN SHORTS WERE ALLOWED TO RECEIVE THE EUCHARIST AT THE 9 A.M MASS

Father Angelo M. Gaetta, F.I, the Rector of St. Mary Majors along with a Franciscan Friar of the Immaculate (F.I) was giving the Eucharist today to men and women with clothing above their knees. On this feast day of the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary, which is also the Ferragosto holiday, those who were dressed immodestly could have come to Mass before going to the beaches in Rome.

The Salus Populi Romani chapel of the Basilica was full of people. They included some women wearing a shawl covering the upper part of their body. They were also given the Eucharist. After the Mass they would discard the shawls as they did before entering the basilica and would expose themselves.

For Fr. Angelo Gaetta’s religious community immodesty is a mortal sin. Their founder Fr. Stefano Manelli F.I, who is still alive, has quite a few times written on the subject of immodesty in clothes. He considers it a mortal sin.

Fr. Massimilliano dei Gaspari F.I a Superior of their community in Rome once told me that he would not give the Eucharist to a woman with bare shoulders and a blouse with a deep V-cut in the front or back.

Immodesty is the cause of lust in the onlooker. Willful lust is a mortal sin according to the Catechism of the Catholic Church. Immodesty also causes scandal which is also a mortal sin.

As soon as the Mass ended a security guard entered the chapel and asked everyone to leave. There was no time to eve pray the Anima Christi.

I asked the guard whose name was Jano why at the gate they stop people wearing shorts from entering the basilica, and for which they are commended, but allow people in shorts to stand in the queue for the Eucharist?

“Non posso controllare” (We cannot check), he replied.

They are unable to check people dressed immodestly and stop them from receiving the Eucharist.

It was 9.50 am and in 10 minutes the solemn Latin Mass would begin at the main altar. The chief celebrant was the American Cardinal Bernal Francis Law. Also present at the Mass was the King of Spain and his wife.

The Mass would be in Latin with the celebrants facing the congregation and even the call for greeting each other with peace would be announced in Latin. This Mass was not the Tridentine Rite Mass but had elements of the Tridentine Rite Mass, the Italian Novus Ordo Mass and the Latin Novus Ordo Mass.

There were ushers directing a group of Chinese tourists away from the long line of people waiting to receive the Eucharist.None of them were wearing shorts as during the Italian Novus Ordos Mass offered by Fr. Angelo Gaetta.

The solemn feast day Mass with a wonderful choir singing in Latin, concluded with the final procession in which there was a bishop wearing blue vestments, from the Ukrainian Catholic Church. The King of Spain followed behind the cardinal and bishops.